Lots Of B*llshit For 2028

The DNC has decided where the first in the nation vote will be and their decision was South Carolina.

Progressives are not thrilled with this choice….

Democrats just set the opening scene for 2028—and the party’s left flank is not applauding. A key Democratic National Committee rules panel voted Friday to make South Carolina the first presidential primary state, sidelining Nevada and igniting fears among progressives that the move is designed to blunt another Bernie Sanders–style bid. South Carolina is where Sanders was trounced in both 2016 and 2020, and one panel member told Axios the choice risks “shutting down” a progressive contender rather than reflecting “the winds of change” while “the public is swinging left.”

The fight is layered with questions of ideology and race. Critics on the left, including Jacobin writer Branko Marcetic and streamer Hasan Piker, see the decision as an establishment play to block a “left-wing insurgent,” while some DNC members reportedly worried Nevada’s first-in-the-nation status could turbocharge a socialist candidate. Sanders easily won the Nevada caucuses in 2020 with help from organized labor allies, Puck notes. Earlier that month, Sanders won the New Hampshire primaries, with Joe Biden finishing fifth. But Biden went on to score a resounding victory in South Carolina, finishing ahead of Sanders in every county.

South Carolina Democratic Party chair Christale Spain, a former Sanders staffer, argues that a progressive such as Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez could “absolutely” win there—if they master retail politics in the South. The full DNC still has to ratify the calendar, but the deeper test for progressives remains whether they can finally break through with the older Black voters who dominate Southern primaries.

Will this make a difference?

The DNC is a dysfunctional mess and hoping blacks show up to vote will somehow save them.

Even that fossil James Carville sees how screwed up the DNC has become….he has even suggested the Hogg take over the leadership of the DNC.

Hogg was run out of the DNC earlier this year for his extreme views and yet a centrist slug like Carville says he would be a good choice for leader.

I do not necessarily disagree but beyond that I want to know what Carville’s game is….it is not at all like him to side with the more progressive Dems.

He is up to something….or he is got some sort of mental issue that comes with extreme age.

Educate, Agitate

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

“Everyone Is A Bit Marxist…”

The title is a quote from Italian Antonio Gramsci, the Marxist theorist, ideologue, philosopher and journalist, has long been associated exclusively with communism and socialism. And yet his thoughts are showing up in the strange places….the far Right talking points…


The entire quote is….”Everyone is a bit of a Marxist….without being aware of it”

We see this in the presence of Gramsci’s theories and his phrases in speeches and publications.


Viktor Orban, Hungary’s authoritarian prime minister who studied Gramsci in the 1980s, rarely misses an opportunity to speak of the need to fight liberal-left ideas, parties and movements.


Elsewhere, Gramsci’s presence is more implicit. In the 900-page Mandate for Leadership, a document published by Project 2025 — the staffing and policy planning organization aimed at institutionalizing “Trumpism” — there’s no shortage of Gramsci talking points expressed in the inimitable style of the New Right in the United States.


Right-wing Gramsci adherents simplify and vulgarize Gramsci’s thought, reducing it to slogans and simple formulas. In doing so, they are doing what Gramsci expected right-wingers to do under democratic conditions — protect the capitalist status quo while framing “the left” as the cause of all manner of social, economic and geopolitical ills.


This should be another reason to read Gramsci.


The existential climate crisis aside, many of the problems that concerned Gramsci then are eerily similar to the problems that concern us today — a failing global economic system, multiplying military conflict, massive geopolitical shifts and the hollowing of representative political institutions.


https://theconversation.com/why-the-radical-right-has-turned-to-the-teachings-of-an-italian-marxist-thinker-237531


A little more background may be helpful….

Gramsci undertook a series of historical and theoretical reflections on the conditions for revolution in modern states—such as Italy’s—where degrees of popular consent had been achieved. He employed the concept “hegemony” to describe a process of “intellectual and moral leadership” that embedded a ruling class across society. He rejected the economic determinism of classical Marxism in favor of a nuanced political analysis attuned to contingent variation in historical circumstance. Gramsci brought Marxism into dialogue with neo-idealist insights into practical subjectivity and he sketched a revolutionary strategy aimed at preparing a new collective identity.


Interesting how a group that hates ‘Marxists’ turns to them for their inspiration.

Really should not be a surprise since the Trumpites have been doing a Stalin-esque style of political purges to get the ‘proper’ people in places they need.

You should read Gramsci maybe you will learn something.Or not…you see one needs to be able to think to see the conflict and most of those supporters gave up thinking and let the ‘rulers’ do it for them.


Be Smart!


Learn Stuff!

Educate, Agitate

I Read, I Write, You Know


“cognito ergo agito”

Hamilton May Have Been On To Something

****Please keep any abortion comments to yourself this post is about our loss of freedoms….if you comment stick to the post….we already have enough manure being spread****


Year after year we have watched the states go about taking rights away from their residents and few have anything to say about it other than the old ‘state’s rights’ dodge.


One state has stated that the people do not have a fundamental right to vote….while others are taking the freedom of choice away from the voters….etc etc  I am sure that you have some sort of horror story along these lines coming from your state legislature.


That intro leads me to the point of this post….


Hamilton believed that the US should be one strong unit as opposed to smaller units….



Alexander Hamilton believed that America need- ed a strong central government. Instead of let- ting the states mostly govern themselves, he wanted the federal government to hold more power. This led him to support the approval of the Constitution and affected what he did as the country’s first Treasury secretary.


Hamilton believed that a strong Government is necessary to protect and preserve liberty. He regarded anarchy—exemplified in the French Revolution—as freedom’s worst enemy. He feared that the American people, if allowed to freely express an exaggerated concept of liberty, could destroy the benefits of our Revolution.


Hamilton wanted a new national government that had complete political authority. He disliked state governments and believed that they should be eliminated entirely. In fact, Hamilton believed that the perfect union would be one in which there were no states at all.


A government that gives too much power to the common people cannot be trusted. Wealthy, educated, public-spirited men should lead the country. Alexander Hamilton: How strong should our national government be? We should have a strong national government that unties the states and keeps order among the people.



To keep it simple….Hamilton thought the US should be one country under uniform law not individual states with their own constitution and laws.


The American people basically have two sets of laws they must conform to on any given day.


Got it now?


As the title infers I believe that Hamilton was on to something….one country divided into districts with representatives in the capitol to deliver the wants of those districts.


The whole state’s rights thing is just a powder keg waiting to ignite….and it is a smoldering mess now.


Problems that state’s rights promotes…..


Conflict of Authority – The biggest problem that arises when you have two bodies of
government in power is the power struggle. Both central and state government intend to
assert their power over the other which at time causes conflict between them. Even the long-
term conflict between the central and state government can create hurdles in way of national
development and prosperity.


(We see this today with states usurping federal law)


Regionalism Over Patriotism – The mark of a great country is just how patriotic and
prideful the citizens is to be a part of it. Federalism, since it promotes smaller level of
government, it also promotes smaller levels of pride. It can begin to pit one region against
another and take away from the feeling of patriotism that should be present all over the entire
country.


(Red State vs Blue State is making regionalism the priority among certain states….patriotism is gone)


Inequalities Between States – The federal form of government allows for regional
inequalities between different states. For example, instead of education funding throughout
the country being the same, since it is a state issue, some states will spend more, per capita,
on education than other states, causing what could be considered a disparity. The same goes
for other things, as well, such as taxes, health care programs, and welfare programs which
increases regional inequality amongst the different states.


(We see this in most Southern states that are lagging behind most of the wider nation)


The Blockage of Nationalist Policies by States – States can fight against the existence of
certain national laws by challenging them in court, or going out of their way to not enforce
those national laws, or even deliberately obstructing enforcement of national laws


(Again the states are changing voting laws, freedom of choice, and condemning the population into poverty and hunger)


SO I say once again…I believe Hamilton was on to something.

Educate, Agitate

I Read, I Write, You Know


“cognito ergo me agitare”

Open Letter To Biden

He will not be president but there is still room to grade his performance as president.

This is an open letter to President Biden….this is a focus on international situations and what he/she can do is answer questions.

Mr. President,

The ongoing wars in Gaza, the West Bank and Ukraine raise serious questions about American foreign policy, questions that call for honest answers.

1. Gaza

Why do you continue to enable Israel’s genocide against Palestinian civilians in Gaza? The death toll from IDF bombs and missiles has reached more than 40,000 (not counting untold numbers buried in the rubble). Following the declaration of siege by extremist members of the Israeli war cabinet last October, Israel has deployed starvation as a war tactic.  It has drastically reduced humanitarian  deliveries of food and medicine; and it has destroyed both clean water sources and sewage disposal facilities. As a result, Gazans (especially children) are dying of malnutrition and disease– this on top of the enormous stress of repeated evacuations under fire.

Your oft-repeated calls for a ceasefire and a two-state solution have fallen on deaf ears. Prime Minister Netanyahu has firmly refused to change course. For both political and personal motives, he clearly wants to prolong the war. Yet you continue to supply him with a wide assortment of lethal weapons that fuel Israel’s genocide  How do you reconcile your professed desire for a ceasefire and the return of hostages with your continuing and unconditional deliveries of arms that kill and maim Gazans?

read on…..

https://www.counterpunch.org/2024/09/18/some-whys-an-open-letter-to-president-biden/

Time for the Democrats to take up a cause other than lining their pockets by special interests….the world is on the brink and Biden and probably his VP Harris can still do much to make this a more peaceful world.

But will they?

My thought is NO they will not….their hands are dirty with all the conflicts and deaths associated with them and they are in too deep top change the course or for that matter change anything.

I have a problem voting for these criminals…..but what is a person of principle to do?

I Read, I Write, You Know

“cognito ergo me agitare”

School Shootings: A Retrospective

Another mass shooting but not at a school (for a change)….this time in Birmingham, Alabama…..

A mass shooting killed four people and wounded 18 others in a popular nightlife area in Birmingham, Alabama, with many of the victims caught in the crossfire, police said. No one was immediately arrested, and police asked the public for information. The shooting happened shortly after 11pm Saturday in the city’s Five Points South entertainment district, said Officer Truman Fitzgerald in an email to the AP. Officers arriving at the scene found two men and a woman on a sidewalk with gunshot wounds, and they were pronounced dead there. An additional male gunshot victim was pronounced dead at a hospital.

A preliminary investigation showed that “multiple suspects fired upon a large group of people who were outside in a public area,” Fitzgerald said. “Detectives believe the shooting was not random and stemmed from an isolated incident where multiple victims were caught in the crossfire,” Fitzgerald said. Injured people began showing up at hospitals, Fitzgerald said. By early Sunday, police had identified 18 other victims with injuries, some of them life-threatening.

That attack lead me to look at the school shootings that are all too common.

Almost daily there is a school shooting or a bomb threat or other assorted attacks on the schools of our great nation….it has become commonplace and gets nothing more than a shrug from the people that we depend on to make our schools safe…..why is that?

School shootings are American Exceptionalism in action. No other country does them like we do. None even come close. USA! NRA! USA! NRA! USA! NRA!

 A country that tolerates the routine shootings of its own school children as the cost of doing business in our weird notion of a “free society” is unlikely to feel any empathy for Palestinian children killed by the weapons we sell Israel. Violence is our chief export; indifference to the bloodshed is our national characteristic.

This is just a retrospective of these incidents and how some politicians handle them.

JD Vance, who now speaks at outdoor rallies inside a box of bulletproof glass, said that school shootings are now “a fact of life” in America.

Number of school shootings in the US by year…

2024: 45
2023: 82
2022: 79
2021: 73
2020: 22 (Pandemic school closures)
2019: 52
2018: 44
2017: 42
2016: 51
2015: 37
2014: 36
2013: 26
2012: 13
2011: 15
2010: 13
2009: 22
2008: 18

States with the highest per capita school shootings since 2008

Louisiana: 32 shootings; 0.69 shootings per 100,000 people
Maryland: 32 shootings; 0.52 shootings per 100,000 people13 s
Alabama: 25 shootings; 0.50 shootings per 100,000 people
Tennessee: 33 shootings; 0.48 shootings per 100,000 people
Mississippi: 13 shootings; 0.44 shootings per 100,000 people
Arkansas: 13 shootings; 0.43 shootings per 100,000 people
North Carolina: 41 shootings; 0.41 shootings per 100,000 people
Georgia: 41 shootings; 0.38 shootings per 100,000 people

How long will we tolerate this kind of crap?

Instead of action against this obscenity we get such platitudes as “thoughts and prayer’ or the ever politician BS…’there is no place for violence in America’….have these idiots ever watched a news story?

Violence does have a place in America unless you are too blind to see it…..and will continue as long as some garden slugs believe there is a Constitutional right to kill children.

Thanx to my friend at beetleypete.com for bringing this quote from Tom Waits to my attention.

“We are moneys with money and guns”

I Read, I Write, You Know

“cognito ergo me agitare”

“Banality Of Evil”

That is a term that was first used by Arendt back in the early 60s at the trial of Eichmann…..

The term “banality of evil” was coined by intellectual Hannah Arendt after she observed the 1961 trial of Adolf Eichmann, the Nazi official who, from his post atop the inscrutably-named Office IV B 4, oversaw the grim logistics of funneling Jews into German concentration camps.

Arendt said she was struck to find Eichmann “neither perverted nor sadistic,” but “terrifyingly normal.” Rather than a rabid ideologue or psychopathic antisemite, Arendt found herself observing a boring bureaucrat whose diligent performance of his assigned duties was largely motivated by a mere desire for career advancement. “The deeds were monstrous, but the doer – at least the very effective one now on trial – was quite ordinary, commonplace, and neither demonic nor monstrous,” Arendt later wrote.

The term “banality of evil” was coined by intellectual Hannah Arendt after she observed the 1961 trial of Adolf Eichmann, the Nazi official who, from his post atop the inscrutably-named Office IV B 4, oversaw the grim logistics of funneling Jews into German concentration camps.

Arendt said she was struck to find Eichmann “neither perverted nor sadistic,” but “terrifyingly normal.” Rather than a rabid ideologue or psychopathic antisemite, Arendt found herself observing a boring bureaucrat whose diligent performance of his assigned duties was largely motivated by a mere desire for career advancement. “The deeds were monstrous, but the doer – at least the very effective one now on trial – was quite ordinary, commonplace, and neither demonic nor monstrous,” Arendt later wrote.

That typed….ever heard of the Office of Foreign Asset Control (OFAC)?

No?

As tourists complete their strolls to the White House from the east along Pennsylvania Avenue, they pass a relatively unremarkable, columned office building that overlooks Lafayette Square — oblivious that, behind its walls, bureaucrats are quietly inflicting poverty, illness and death on innumerable innocents around the world.

The Freedman’s Bank Building doesn’t house CIA or Department of Defense officials, but rather the US Treasury’s little-known Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC). Instead of orchestrating airstrikes or insurgencies, these bureaucrats impose mass suffering via economic warfare, collectively serving as the tip of the spear that is America’s ever-expanding economic sanctions regime.

https://starkrealities.substack.com/p/ofacs-banality-of-evil-small-us-agency

This group can be as lethal to innocent civilians as an airstrike….

Just thought you might like to know.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“cognito ergo  me agitare”

Is It An Illusion Of Liberty?

I have been thinking about some people that cherish our liberties but in the past few years those so-called liberties have been eroding away and a special thanks to the Supreme Court for helping the demise.

Below are some thoughts from an author, Stuart Delony, on what we are losing, piece by piece….

It’s that time when we celebrate our freedoms while cooking meat, blowing things up, and conveniently ignoring the erosion of the very liberties we’re celebrating. So between the hotdogs and fireworks, let’s explore if we’re as free as our forefathers intended… or living in blissful ignorance.

Remember back in history class? When we all learned that the founding fathers risked everything to declare independence from British tyranny? They gave us the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and seemingly endless bumper sticker quotes. 

Fast forward to now, and I’m left wondering if those sacrifices were in vain and freedom a relic of the past. Think I’m wrong? Let’s look down a list for fun:

A Surveillance Nation

Our civil liberties are on life support. Mass surveillance has become the norm. Big Brother watches our every move. Sure, we’ve still got the right to protest, but only if you’re okay with being pepper-sprayed, tasered, and/or hauled off to jail. It really doesn’t seem much of an upgrade to tar and feathering.

The Voting Games

Voting is supposed to be the cornerstone of democracy, right? Except it’s not as simple as showing up and casting a ballot. Gerrymandering ensures that politicians pick their voters and not the other way around. Then we’ve got voter ID laws, polling place closures, and purges of voter rolls. Those are just a few of the tricks used to suppress the vote. And don’t even get me started on the Electoral College.

The Rich Get Richer

You’re free to pursue the American Dream – if you can afford it. The top 1% hoard their wealth while the rest of us are stuck in a cycle of debt, stagnating wages, and skyrocketing living costs. The richest 1% of Americans own more than 40% of the country’s wealth. Meanwhile, the bottom 50% collectively own just 1%. A level playing field is never an option when corporate greed reigns supreme. The system is rigged whether we want to acknowledge it or not.

A Selective Kind of Liberty

Personal freedom used to mean being able to make choices about your own body and life. Today, reproductive rights are under constant assault, with politicians horny to control what women’s bodies. Doesn’t sound creepy at all. Then there’s LGBTQ+ rights. While progress has been made, there’s always a new push to strip away the hard-won gains.

The Changing Narrative

Is truth truth anymore? Media companies now control what we see, hear, and read, shaping public opinion to suit their agendas and profits. The problem is that independent journalism is on the decline and dissenting voices are drowned out by the din of manufactured consent.

Our liberties are being strip away slowly but slowly and we the people spend our time worrying about bathrooms while you focus on silliness you are losing your rights and liberties.

Don’t blame Trump completely for the Dems have done little to change the direction of this downward spiral…..they promise but their actions are far from proof.

This vote will be a joke told by our great-grand kids and you spend your time worrying about bathrooms.

I hope you get what is coming to you for cultivating ignorance.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“cognito ergo me agitare”

Assault On Free Speech

We hear a lot of this stuff these days….it seems that everyone is ranting about the loss of of our right to freely speak our minds.

The TikTok thing is said to be a loss of free speech and so……

Take for instance this AntiSemitism Awareness Act that will come up for a vote soon.

Totalitarianism rarely shows its true face when it arises. Instead, it often pretends to stand for good and decent values. A new bill claims to fight anti-Semitism, something all decent people oppose. 

But anti-Semitism — that is, bias and discrimination against Jews because of their religion or ethnic identity — is already barred under civil rights law. The real goal of the so-called “Antisemitism Awareness Act” is to suppress free speech.

This dangerous bill was passed by the House of Representatives and now awaits a Senate vote. It outsources some of our constitutional rights to an outside organization, the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance, whose arbitrary definition of anti-Semitism poses a threat to civil liberties.

It could be used to crush legitimate debate about Israel, its policies and American policies toward it — policies that have given rise to one of the greatest acts of genocide since the Holocaust.

This bill could suppress historical research and ban the mention of facts that have been verified by international organizations. It could initiate lawsuits, funding cuts and disciplinary action across all American “education programs or activities, and for other purposes.” (Those “other purposes” are not defined.)

Student protesters, professors, writers and even elected officials could face political repression and become legal targets.

The Dangerous ‘Anti-Semitism Awareness’ Act

I bring this up because according to this pack of manure flies I am an anti-Semite….which is total bullshit.

My dislike of the state of Israel has not a damn thing to do with religion….I personally could care less where or what they choose to worship that is their problem not mine.  I dislike Israel goes way back to 1967 and the murderous attack on the US naval vessel, the USS Liberty, where they, Israel, was allowed to attack an unarmed ship killing and injuring American sailors without any retaliation.

My nation may have forget this dastardly deed but I have not.

If I criticize the bastards I will be labelled an anti-Semite….I say so be it I refuse to give up my right to free speech and criticism.

First I was banned from a boycott of Israel and now I cannot criticize the state of Israel and their barbaric ways….this from a government that is in the deep pockets of AIPAC.

Apparently with enough ‘grease’ you can get anything you want from our corrupt officials…..like Congress and the White house.

You may be silent but I shall not and will never until I am dead.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Is US Devoted To The Constitution?

The recent rulings by the corrupt Supreme Court got me to thinking about the Constitution…..is the US truly devoted to the document?

Let me tackle the question….I think the people of this nation is all caring about the Constitution and the people we elect could care less about the document.

The people warp themselves in the Constitution as some sort of misguided patriotism but once you get pass amendment 1 and 2 they know nothing.

In reality….it shows up often in political discourse as some sort of symbol of freedom and then quickly disappears until it is needed in some sort of explanation for a particular political action.

In a new book it is surmised that the worship of the Constitution has warped our politics……

Which version of the Constitution will shape America’s future? Emboldened coalitions on the right purport to tether the country’s tomorrows to the original meanings of an eighteenth-century Constitution—or to so-called natural law principles that are even older. Anxious liberals, by contrast, hold out frayed hopes that a living Constitution will be able to translate the nation’s constitutional history into a new century. An increasingly vocal cadre on the left proposes something altogether different—to scrap the whole arrangement, to make a clean break from a tarnished constitutional tradition by marginalizing the Supreme Court and doing away with the project of the Constitution entirely

In his new book, The Constitutional Bind, lawyer and political theorist Aziz Rana adds his voice to this swelling chorus, urging that a truly emancipatory politics requires breaking free from the U.S. constitutional project. Rana takes aim at what he calls the worship of the Constitution. U.S. politics today, he contends, idealizes the Constitution to its own detriment. Our political formations—especially those on the left—trim their sails in advance of doing battle by accepting the charter’s historical compromises. But such compromises, Rana says, come at a galling democratic cost. They grant unelected justices on the Supreme Court unwarranted authority over the basic terms of our social life. And they sustain voting inequities in the Electoral College and the Senate, which confer unwarranted representation on rural states with disproportionately white and conservative populations.

As late as the first decades of the twentieth century, Rana proposes, Americans took part in a more robust debate over the Constitution, one that nurtured a wild profusion of alternative political visions. The most promising of those visions, in Rana’s eyes, chafed at and often even rejected the Constitution as a parochial and limiting framework. In the middle third of the twentieth century, however, U.S. politics marginalized the political formations that were most critical of the Constitution’s basic terms. And since the middle of the twentieth century, Rana argues, constitutional politics has shape-shifted into a kind of idolatry. Constitutional devotion has sustained American global empire, supported white ethno-nationalism, justified security panics, and cabined real democracy. Constitutional fetishism, according to Rana, sustains “a fundamentally undemocratic order” by granting the Constitution undue “immunity from challenge”; it produces an anti-democratic “cultural genuflection” before a Supreme Court that supports the interests of elites over the liberation of the masses. We are, Rana tells us, bound “by a narrow constitutional narrative” that constrains our collective life and imposes severe limits on our aspirations for true freedom and equality.

https://newrepublic.com/article/182334/united-states-devoted-constitution

My question now is….given all the stuff happening is this the society that the Founders envisioned with the Constitution?

Now what do you think about the question?

I know there are some great thoughts out there….voice them here and now.

I Reads, I Write, You Know

“cognito ergo me agitare”