Waiting for Brunhilde

 

The opera has grown increasingly Wagnerian, and I never had much tolerance for Wagner — too long and just too noisy to sleep through.  Although all the major news outlets have accepted the idea that Biden won the election, a distressingly large number of Americans still firmly believe that Tr*mp was “robbed” of  victory.  The cognitive dissonance suffered by Our President is shared by his loyal base; and their news sources are working hard to preserve their illusions.

Trump still seems to be counting on “his” Supreme Court to back up his play to remain in power, and the first test of loyalty will be his attempt to discount illegal immigrants when allocating representation in the House.  Frankly, I can’t see how self-proclaimed “Originalists” and “Literalists” can twist the plain language of the Constitution to exclude them, but logical consistency, of late, hasn’t been held in especially high regard.

For all the optimism around the Pfizer, Moderna, and AstraZeneca vaccines, it’s hard to imagine a two-dose protocol having enough impact to make much of a difference. It’s hard enough to get people inoculated even once, much less have them return for a second dose a month later.  In the Third World especially, dispensing on-time second doses will be next to impossible.

Wagner’s painfully long Ring Cycle “ain’t over ’til the fat lady sings” — and it looks like the fat lady, this time around, isn’t even waiting in the wings.

Let the Fireworks Begin

On this date in 1776, an assembly of wealthy planters and merchants signed a document asserting it was "self-evident, that all men are created equal."  It was America's founding hypocrisy.

What actually is self-evident to anybody over the age of 12 is that wealth creates power, and that power creates wealth.  With only minimal interruptions, that has been the story of America — and the story of the world.  Once in a while, economic disaster combines with an especially incompetent plutocracy, resulting in a need to make enough concessions to placate an angry mob.  If things are especially bad, a new gang of plutocrats will push the old gang aside.

Whoever replaces Anthony Kennedy, rest assured she or he will be a committed corporatist, just as Kennedy has been.  Kennedy joined in the Epic Systems v. Lewis decision, which places crippling limitations on class-action lawsuits, making most legal actions against corporate abuse exercises in futility, for both consumers and labor organizations.  Janus was just the icing on the cake.

Since corporate America really couldn't care less about abortion rights, the fate of Roe v. Wade will be purely a political decision; but the Supreme Court already has allowed reproductive choice to be nickel-and-dimed away over much of the country, so there may be little practical change no matter how Susan Collins chooses to vote.  (Corporations do care about trade policy, though — so Tr*mp's hold over corporatist Republicans may be less secure than he believes.)

So, what's a frustrated leftist – or even a small-d democrat – to do?  Historical approaches include mass civil disobedience, boycotts, and strikes, preferably cloaked in populist patriotism.  Sharpen your pitchforks, peasants — but always remember to point them where the money is.

As the year ends...

Pundits traditionally dedicate year-end musings to making excuses for the things they got wrong.  Not me!  Here's what I wrote on January 2:

We can expect revisions to the tax code to make the party's benevolent billionaires even richer, at the expense of the rest of us.  We can expect windfalls for military contractors, the banking industry, any company that takes advantage of "public-private partnership" opportunities and, of course, property developers. Deficit hawks will insist such expenditures be "paid for" with spending cuts in other areas.  The most "obvious" places for cuts already are being eyed hungrily by GOP ideologues: environmental protection, health care (including Medicare and Medicaid), Social Security, the tattered remains of the rest of the social safety net, and regulatory enforcement. 

Many hope for a Democratic "sweep" in the midterm elections,  but those elections still are a year away.  In the meanwhile, the religious right is aggressively advancing its agenda in increasingly accomodative courts.  In Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, the Supreme Court will decide if bigots may cite "religious conviction" to justify discrimination against a minority group.  Although portrayed in the media as a gay rights case, the Court's opinion could establish a principle in law applicable to any category of persons.  Religious belief was offered as justification for racial discrimination in the 1982 case of Bob Jones University v. United States.  The Burger Court rejected that argument eight to one, but that was 1982.

The Bob Jones decision inspired Christian conservatives to seek political power, and now they have it.  This time the Court's decision will be much closer than eight to one, and may effectively overturn the earlier decision.  With unabashed hypocrisy, the plaintiffs seek to sway Anthony Kennedy's vote with claims that baker Jack Phillips is a "cake artist," and that  bigotry is "free speech."

Everybody knows how Tr*mp appointee Neil Gorsuch will vote.  My New Year's wish is that his egoistic grandstanding so alienates his conservative colleagues that they join with the liberals, just to put him in his place.  (It's New Year's, and I'm allowed to dream.)

 

Sociologic Outlook

Stephen K. Bannon.  Need I say more?  Probably not.  Nevertheless, I shall.  I doubt that any of us seriously considered the possibility of a crypto-fascist dictating social policy in the USofA, but now it's time to get serious.  I know I swore off making predictions, but some things are pretty obvious:

WOMEN
It's unlikely that Bannon himself could care less about the right of women to have control over their own bodies, but it's important to a major segment of the Tr*mp coalition: Evangelicals.  Women's reproductive rights will be in serious trouble with any Tr*mp appointment to the Supreme Court, unless one of the sitting conservative Justices is too conservative to approve overturning a decision that's been in place since 1973.  As for birth control, protection from sexual assault, equal pay for equal work, etc., the Magic 8-Ball says, "Uh-oh!"  Opposition is mounting, but will it be enough?

BLACKS & LATINOS
Clearly, disenfranchisement of black and Latino voters through voter suppression will continue, especially since it worked so well in the recent election.  "Law & Order" policies in Republican dominated states and localities will breathe new life, and the prosecution of killer cops will continue to be distressingly rare.  The only bright spot may be some degree of criminal justice reform, since prisons are just too expensive for the tax-cut zealots.  Lobbyists for private prisons, though, continue to spend freely, claiming "cost savings" that don't exist.

IMMIGRANTS
The "huddled masses" will keep right on "yearning to breathe free."  While the "wall" will remain a figment of xenophobic imagination, Bannon's Breitbart followers and the National Border Control Council (the pro-Tr*mp union that represents border control agents) will keep up the pressure to expand Obama's already onerous deportation policy.  The budget deficits this will entail will be significant, leading to devastating cuts in funding to more productive areas of government.

LGBT
The various permutations of gay and trans Americans can expect their rapid gains in civil rights to come to a screeching halt.  Although Tr*mp says that marriage equality is "a settled issue," presidential opinions don't count for much when a conservative Supreme Court issues its rulings.  Hopefully eighty-year-old Anthony Kennedy is in good health.  Meanwhile, the green light is lit and burning brightly as far as gay-bashings and attacks on the transgendered are concerned.

EDUCATION
Look for state funding of private and religious schools, defunding of public education at both the K-12 and university levels, new lawsuits challenging affirmative action in admissions, and all federal aid to education provided in the form of block grants with no strings attached.  States will accelerate takeovers of "failing" schools, ensuring that they continue to fail.

HEALTH
Tr*mp's ideas for maintaining the popular parts of Obamacare while eliminating the rest is obviously untenable.  Forget about reining in Big Pharma.  Drug rehabilitation programs will succumb to Evangelical moralism, despite the enormous impact of the heroin epidemic on rural America.  Bannon probably would like to end CHIP, since that would lead to more deaths among the "mud people," but it's probably safe because Tr*mp is too much of an approval whore to countenance killing children.  Congress will delight in defunding the NIH and the NIMH.  Don't get sick!

WELFARE
Did I hear somebody say "block grants?"  The Earned Income Tax Credit is safe, but no longer likely to be expanded to childless families.

CULTURE
Season one of "Political Apprentice" will continue to earn high ratings on cable news.  Intellectuals and artists, both left and right, will be on their own.

NATIONAL UNITY
What?  Are you kidding?

Briefly...

Merrick Garland
From what I've been able to learn, Garland is not one to blaze new frontiers, closely basing his decisions on precedent.  Many would call that "conservative."  Would he be different if advanced to the Supremes?  Beats me.

Friedrichs
What's left of organized labor in the USofA dodged the bullet when a divided Supreme Court let stand a lower court ruling affirming agency fee — the principle that non-members can be charged for services provided by a union, including collective bargaining, contract enforcement, and grievance.  Dead Tony would have rewarded the wannabe free riders with —what else?— free rides.

That iPhone again
It's been "leaked" that an Israeli security firm cracked Farook's iPhone.  I suppose people will feel better about that than if they heard the encryption had been cracked by the Russian based Kaspersky Labs.  Mostly, though, it sounds like the administration didn't want to risk losing to Apple in court.  It's also possible that the encryption wasn't penetrated, but the Obamites thought they'd punish Apple by saying it was.

"Allies"
The USofA should be embarrassed to have Turkey and Saudi Arabia as allies, and Likudniks have steadily been pushing Israel into that category as well.  While there never was a time when the USofA acted on its stated ideals rather than its immediate interests, it would be nice if Kissenger, Cheney, and realpolitik all dropped dead tomorrow.

Short takes

State of the Union
I had hoped for a little less subtlety in the president's critique of Republicans, given the density of many of those critiqued, but at least he's finally figured out that seven years of calling for bipartisan cooperation was a waste of time.

"Navigational Error"
Of course those naval patrol boats detained by the Iranians inside their territorial waters were "snooping."  Everybody "snoops" on everybody.  You could tell the Iranians were not especially surprised nor upset because they called it "snooping" rather than "spying," and their prompt release of the ten sailors demonstrates that the nuclear agreement is having a positive impact on relations.

Latest Republican Debate
I didn't watch, but I gather from the coverage that Cruz is trying to contrast himself with Tr*mp in an effort to gain "establishment" support.  I hope he succeeds, because that would be likely to hasten the demise of the Republican party.

Attacks in Cologne
Apparently sharia law has no great hold over young Muslim men in Germany, since the lads out groping German lasses were dead drunk.  Yes, they're pigs.  No, they're not terrorists.

Friedrichs v. California Teachers Association
If the Court overturns its 1977 decision which allowed public sector unions to collect agency fees for legally required representation of non-members, it will be an entirely political decision by the conservative majority.  As far as activism goes, the Roberts court makes the Warren court look feeble by comparison.

Personhood

Read this!  Really!  YOU MUST read this!

The Supremes

Abortion protest

In unanimously striking down the Massachusetts 35 foot protest barrier around the entrances to its abortion providers, the Court defended the free speech of protestors — and free speech should be defended.  The Court also suggested that harassment and physical abuse continue to be against Massachusetts law, and that those laws should continue to be enforced.

It may be wise for the Massachusetts legislature to have a fresh look at its laws defining the nature of harassment, and making certain that it's police forces (especially in Boston, where the worst of the crazies congregate) are trained and willing to hook up verbal abusers of vulnerable women.

Agency Fee

The Court carved out a "narrow" exception allowing certain employees represented by labor unions to stop paying for services provided to them by unions — essentially allowing them to become "free riders."

One obvious solution is to deny the deadbeats the benefits of the union contract, and force them to negotiate and fight employer abuses on their own.  How would the conservative Justices vote on that one?

Hobby Lobby

Corporations no longer are just "persons" who may enter into contracts while protecting shareholders with limited liability.  Since the Citizens United decision, they are "persons" who may dump unlimited funds into election campaigns.  Now a corporation can be a "person" who has a "religious belief."  Gag me with a spoon!

If one of the right-wing Justices were suddenly to drop dead while Obama still is President, I would not be among the mourners.  (NOTE:  This is not a suggestion that somebody assassinate one of those assholes, so please don't blame me if it happens.  If anybody reads this blog, it's unlikely that she or he owns a gun, or knows how to construct a bomb, or grow anthrax or whatever.  I certainly don't.)

The Supremes on public prayer

By the usual vote of 5 to 4, the Supremes affirmed that the town of Greece, New York, can continue to intone Christian prayers as a prelude to town meetings.  Me, I couldn't care less.

I don't see why some sucker, babbling to his imaginary master, does me or any other atheist any damage.  Let them babble on.  Town meetings tend to be morons babbling to morons — and since morons are a large part of the population, and no supernatural father figure is listening, much less striking the rest of us down, why stop them?

Let them babble on.  The court seemed to infer that secularists could apply to do the invocations. blah blah blah, but what in hell would they say?  Me, I have nothing.  Well, maybe this:

"Dear Nothing:  While I sincerely believe that nothing will result from this invocation, I will do it just for the sake of being a pain in the ass to the many Christians and the rare Jew who usually invoke here.  Uh...  well...  I guess that's good enough.  Bye."

Short Subjects

The Ryan Budget

Evil.  What else is there to say?

Okay, there's a little more to say.  Ryan claims that eviscerating SNAP and turning Medicare and Medicaid into block grants to the states will generate enormous economic growth.  Needless to say, even he knows he's wrong.  He's not stupid.  He's just evil.

The Supremes

The most recent decision in favor of plutocracy (McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission) really does not do too much more to empower the oligarchs, because they already had all the power.  On the other hand, it makes the very richest of our plutocrats a bit more powerful than the others — and to that I say, "So what?"

If Clarence Thomas (like so many black men of his age) dropped dead tomorrow, it probably wouldn't matter.  Obama would feel obliged to nominate a "moderate," and what the hell good is that?  (Even the ACLU seems to believe that money equals speech.)

Andrew Cuomo

If I had Mario Cuomo's personal email address, I would advise him to slap his boy around a bit.  Here in New York, it's pretty obvious that Andrew is pursuing the Clinton (Bill, mostly) route to the White House (which mostly involves right turns.)

Andy-Boy has been fucking over Bill DeBlasio (that shameless liberal) while sucking up to Wall Street and the hedge fund managers who no longer have any real limits on how much they can funnel to his eventual campaign.  I wouldn't vote for him if he were running against Rush Limbaugh.  (No, I wouldn't vote for Rush.  I guess I'd go Green again, for all the good that does.)

The Supremes

When you stop to think about it, John Roberts was right, in a way.  Times have changed.  Back in the 1960s, southerners wanted to keep blacks from voting because they were black.  Now, they want to keep blacks (and Latinos) from voting because they vote for Democrats.

Given the dismal state of Congress, the chance of it "fixing" Section 4 of the Voting Rights Act anytime soon is very unlikely.  Personally, I think Section 5 should apply to all states and counties, because you don't have to be a racist to take an interest in voter suppression.  Also, considering how clever our programmers are, wouldn't it be possible to develop computer algorithms to create rational (rather than politicized) voting districts in every state?  (Perhaps the criteria could be crowd-sourced.)

As for the Defense of Marriage Act, I was hoping for something better than the usual five-four split, but you take what you can get.  The California marriage case, which turned on the litigant's standing to sue, was more a matter of ducking the issue than a statement about marital rights.  I wonder if the nine of them got together and negotiated which of them would vote on one side or the other?

Affirmative Action

Maybe I'm not so old after all, because they've been rehashing this shit nearly all my life — and here we go again.

So now the Supremes get to listen to the whining of young Abagail Fisher, who claims that some darkie got "her" place at UT Austin.  UT Austin says they wouldn't have let her in whatever her race.  Maybe that's true.  Who knows?

Anyway, here's the scoop: it doesn't make a damned bit of difference what kinds of "advantages" people of color have at the college level.  College is just too goddamned late.  We need affirmative action in preschool, pre-preschool, and throughout the rest of the "grades" between birth and college.  By the time a kid is considered for college, it's too late.

We need affirmative action for infants, toddlers, children and adolescents, both of color and also others of lesser socioeconomic advantage.  We need to level the playing field a hell of a lot earlier.

Of course, it's not happening.  Level playing fields are not "the American way."

Whatever the Supremes decides this time around, it doesn't really matter.

Montana v. the Supremes

The big Supreme Court decision today, from a news media perspective, was the decision on Arizona's immigration law.  I have no comment on that, since I expect it will be back before the court not all that long after Arizona actually starts enforcing the provision the Supremes upheld today.

More important, from my perspective, was the Supremes' refusal to uphold Montana's ban on corporate contributions to political campaigns.  Citizens United was upheld, presumably by the same five to four majority that made the original ruling.  If I recall correctly, I have not had much to say about Citizens United in earlier posts — actually, I don't think I weighed in on it at all.  Well, here I go: Constitutionally speaking, I think the decision was correct.

Corporations are not persons, however the law is interpreted.  Not being a person, however, should not deprive an institution of First Amendment rights — at least not until the First Amendment is rewritten to apply only to individuals.  Anyway, it wouldn't make a difference so long as there are individual persons like, say, Sheldon Adelson, whose fortunes rival those of some pretty big corporations.

The real problem is that some people are just too goddamned rich, given that money is power.  I've said it before, and I'll say it again: the class war is over, and we lost it.  The plutocracy reigns.

Montana (where Frank Zappa hoped to raise a crop of dental floss) had a history of plutocrats (most notably, copper barons) buying its political leaders.  Its century-old legislation that sought to combat that problem, sadly, turned out to be unconstitutional.  Well, what can I say?  That's the Constitution for you.

On the other hand, I have no idea why 501(c)(3) organizations should not be required to disclose who the hell their donors are.  Donors to truly "charitable" groups — no matter whether they're rescuing puppies, fighting rare diseases, or even providing rehabilitation to persons previously kidnapped by aliens — should not object to having their names disclosed.  Hell, they're doing good, right?

Going one step further, 501(c)(3) organizations whose objectives are entirely political — like Crossroads GPS — not only should have to disclose their donors, but should lose their non-profit status.  They're not promoting any sort of public good.  They're just promoting plutocracy.

***

Here's another thought: Mitt Romney tithes to the LDS Church.  I'm not sure how much of that money is devoted to genuine good works.  Personally, I don't see any public good at all in converting Samoans, Nicaraguans, and (in Mitt's case) the French to Mormonism.  Just because it's "good" for the Mormons (or the Catholics or the Seventh Day Adventists or the Sunni Muslims) doesn't mean it's good for the public at large.  A lot of Mormon money went to fighting same sex marriage in California.  Is that a public good, or just more politics?

Moreover, who cares if the Pentecostals are saving "souls" in Kenya if they are not simultaneously saving Kenyan children from malnutrition or river blindness or being forced to become child soldiers?  Wouldn't it make sense to separate out ideology from action?  Public good should be observable and measurable in terms of life expectancy, reduction of suffering, and the general well-being of real people.  Changing someone's belief about what you have to do to get the gods to like you should not count.

To your health...

The weather's been especially windy this month, and so have I. What the hell — here comes post #11 for March.

As we have seen in the past week (if we hadn't noticed it earlier), the Supreme Court is thoroughly politicized. Now there is no branch of government in which the American people can place its faith.

The first mistake of the Obama administration was deciding to go with a health care plan designed by the Heritage Foundation. Did Our President think a plan designed by a right wing think tank would lead to bipartisan support for universal coverage? Probably not. For a smart man, he's more than a little naive, but he couldn't have been that innocent. Even though he never actually joined the DLC, he's been a fellow traveler — and he certainly didn't want to offend the deep-pocketed insurance industry.

I don't know whether the individual mandate is or isn't constitutional, and I don't suppose it especially matters — unless Chief Justice Roberts, perhaps, figures out he no longer is beholden to the plutocrats, or Kennedy hits the Jameson's a little harder than usual. (Our affirmative action Justice, as usual, said nothing — but we all know how he'll vote.)

What I do know is that if the Democrats had some organization, some discipline, and some guts, we might even have single payer on the horizon instead of a jumbled mishmash of questionable legislation which will do nothing to lower health care costs. (Okay, that was just wishful thinking — too many goddamned DINOs were standing in the way. There may have been sixty Democrats in the Senate, but there were a hell of a lot fewer liberals.)

I can't fault Sandra Day O'Conner for leaving the court — I am not one to begrudge anybody's retirement — but I still wish she had stayed. I don't know how she would have voted, but I'm sure her vote would have been based on her understanding of the law rather than on ideology.

Okay. That should do it for March.

Elizabeth Warren???!!! :-)

About a minute ago, NPR mentioned Elizabeth Warren as a possible nominee for the Supreme Court. I jumped up and down, yelled "Whoopie," and came directly here to post.

Elizabeth Warren actually cares about the poor. Elizabeth Warren has offered more valuable insights into the disintegration of the American middle class than almost anybody. Elizabeth Warren is brilliant, articulate, and (from my perspective) hot. (Okay, I've had a big crush on her since I read The Two-Income Trap six years ago, and then saw her on the Daily Show.)

Needless to say, she won't get the nomination. The GOP would never let her be confirmed — and the Obama administration would never stop sucking up to Wall Street long enough to give her a chance. Personally, I think that's dreadful — but dreadful is par for the course these days.

Sigh. (I do a lot of sighing these days.)

That tired old race card

The more I read about Sonia Sotomayor, the more I like her. I don't really care why the President chose her -- she's a good choice and, for me, at least, she was a pleasant surprise. I was expecting someone a lot more, ahem, shall we say moderate?

Nobody expected the Republicans to embrace any candidate put forward by Obama, given their current propensity to apply the Nancy Reagan approach ("Just say NO") to anything Democrats propose. On the other hand, I suppose I'm a little surprised that even the few brighter bulbs on the GOP Christmas tree are falling back on that tired old Republican standby, playing the race card. You would think that somebody smart -- Orrin Hatch, for example -- might have figured out that the party will be permanently moribund unless it can peel off some segment of the Latino vote.

But no -- they are out there accusing Sotomayor of "reverse discrimination," many even going so far as to call her a "racist." Sigh.

Their evidence seems to be one line from a 2001 speech and a history of support for affirmative action. Personally, I've always thought affirmative action should be class based rather than race based -- I don't suppose Stanley O'Neal's granddaughter will have any problem getting into a top college -- but calling affirmative action "racist" is the worst kind of backwards reasoning, no matter what John Roberts may have to say on the matter.

The real racist on the court, of course, is Clarence Thomas. He is so insistent on denying the fact that affirmative action might have advanced his own career that he votes against the interests of minorities every chance he gets.

Change? Yeah, right!

You know, I think people would think better of politicians if they actually tried running their own campaigns, instead of hiring consultants to do their thinking for them. (At this point, I suspect Hillary Clinton wishes she'd run her own campaign -- she was very poorly served.)

Yes, I know the strategists advise presidential hopefuls to run to their bases -- liberals for Democrats, conservatives for Republicans -- during the primaries, and then move to the center for the general election. It's a sensible strategy except for one thing: it leaves the candidate sounding just like a, well... like a politician -- a self-serving, pandering hypocrite.

Barack Obama had me gagging recently when he commented on a couple of Supreme Court decisions. Yes, Barack, nobody likes child rapists -- but when you suggested that the Court was wrong to deny states the right to execute them, you were criticizing exactly the sort of Justices you've pledged to appoint. Oh, right, your consultants were afraid the Republican attack machine would portray you as in favor of raping children! Or perhaps you genuinely believe states should have the right to execute people who haven't taken a life, but whose behavior the public finds especially distasteful. Well, just how distasteful does an act have to be? If we give up the "life for a life" standard, a very wide range of behaviors could put a person on death row. Is that what you want?

Then, after you pandered to the "kill anyone I don't like" crowd, you pandered to the "pry my gun from my cold dead fingers" crowd when you appeared to support the Court's rejection of Washington's hand gun ban. Come to think of it, they're really pretty much the same crowd -- and I don't see too many of them voting for you anyway. Hell, their alternative is a macho white war hero!

Face it -- you're not going to convince anybody you're a secret conservative. You're just starting to look less and less like an "agent of change," and more and more like the same old empty suit.

Re: Lethal Injection

(A bit of a digression, but what the hell...)