Rita's Spur to Action

The four years of the Trump Administration has accelerated the diminution of America. It has been supported by Mitch McConnell and his followers in the republican party.

Their only interest is in self preservation and in retaining their seats in the house and in the senate.

Their lifetime salaries are paid by the American taxpayers, the citizens of the United States.

Under one administration after another, they have held power over the congress and over the senate with no regard for the benefit of the country, nor for the people who inhabit it.

They seek to repress the vote of the citizens of the United Sates in order to maintain power in their States, and in the congress.

America is on the brink. We no longer have time to waste on racism, antisemitism or whether the virus originated in China.

The only thing that matters at this time is whether America can regain the respect of the world and can we again redevelop American exceptionalism.

Exceptionalism is not defined by race, creed, religion, or gender.

Finally at least some true Republicans, regardless of political party, have joined together in support of Biden’s effort toward the reconstruction of the United States.

 We must build back the roads, the tunnels, the bridges, and the highways. The railroads must be updated or replaced if necessary. Japan’s railways are eons ahead of our antiquated systems.

Yes we will have to pay higher taxes to rebuild America!

It is important to note that under President Dwight D. Eisenhower, the super rich paid 90% in taxes and the rest of the population paid 70% tax.

With those additional funds, we rebuilt America after World War II, and with the Marshall Plan (the European Recovery Program), the U.S. provided aid to the recovery of Western Europe following the devastation of the second world war.

America generated enough money in taxes to launch and complete the labyrinth of interstate highways, roads and bridges across the U.S. , the largest projects that America had ever seen.

It is now once again needed.

Compare Biden’s proposed tax plan to Dwight D. Eisenhower’s. Biden’s proposed tax plan is to increase the corporate tax rate from 21% to 28% and the top individual income tax rate from 37% to 39.6%. Far less than Eisenhower’s.

We must look to the future. American exceptionalism means investing in people, in the best possible education for everyone, in new ideas and new technologies.

It means investing in schools, better training of teachers and according them the salaries and the respect that they deserve. It means providing the best possible education for everybody in America.

We need to invest in our future to maintain our prominence in the fields of technology and science, and we need to continue to support of our universities to be the best in the world. Instead we are falling way behind.
We also need to invest in our communities, providing new schools and affordable housing.

People need to have a roof over their heads, and they need to have jobs and decent remuneration.

This is neither Socialism, nor Communism. It is clearly the way back to American exceptionalism.

People who have made vast fortunes in coal and oil, in fracking and mining, now should invest in future fortunes to be made from new forms of energy and in the technology of the future.

The energy sources of the future should prove to be less destructive and more protective of our planet.

As America has become more isolationist and more bigoted, we have fallen behind China, Japan, and Germany, they have developed more advanced systems than we have.

We have been diminished, and influenced by the abusive power of money in our politics, in our government, in our social system, and in our democracy.

America has been diminished by a political system that has allowed the former President of the U.S. to be a cheat, a liar, a crook, a woman abuser and possibly a traitor.

The Republicans are sitting on their brains, refusing even to discuss these issues so relevant for the survival and the future of our democracy and our nation.

Remember, once again, for this they are being paid for the rest of their lives by the American tax payer.

We are losing influence all over the world.China has been building the railroad system in Africa since the 1960’s.The same system that will allow African countries ultimately to send their wealth to China.Chinese state-owned enterprises are still the largest investors in Africa.

Meanwhile America is worrying about the color of skin, creed, religion, and gender, and failing to support exceptionalism.

Wake up America! Forget petty party politics.

Imagine a revival of the American Spirit. Where exceptionalism knows no limits and no boundaries.

We the people of the USA have abrogated our rights. We can be Democrats or we can be Republicans. 

We do not have to be black, white, Asian or any other racial religious or ethnic group. 

All we need to be is “We the people” of the United States of America standing together to take military weapons off the streets of our nation. 

This does not mean depriving people of the right to own a legally registered gun, a sporting rifle or whatever anyone legally wants to have. 

It simply means that military weapons, repetitive rifles and glock pistols would simply not be so easily available to demented or angry people. 

It would mean that you and I, whoever we are, wherever we live, no matter rich or poor, no matter what race or religion, we could feel safer on our own streets. We the people can live safely together.

We the people are the only ones , only we together can end the proliferation of guns on the streets of the United States.

In one week in the month of April, in just that week there were 40 shootings on the streets of New York city, 8 of them were fatal.

This represented a 30 percent of a surge over shootings in 2020.

This is the only country in the world that i know of where anyone who wants a gun can go to a Walmart and buy themselves a gun. 

Apparently anyone who wants one can buy a glock  pistol  which is a repetitive pistol, or a repetitive rifle. These are a military type of weapon. There is absolutely no reason for any private citizen to own one.

It is easier to buy a gun in this country than to buy a car or get a driver’s license or even to get a bus or a subway pass. 

At times it is easier to buy a gun than it is get a doctor’s appointment.

Last week tourist were shot and killed on 42nd street in the middle of the day. 

It is an outrage. 

The NRA has basically been protected by the government, Wall Street, investors, civilians and a gun toting public. 

This must stop now. 

50 people who were shot in 46 incidents over a 7 day period. 8 of them were fatal. 

That is a more than 300 % surge in gun related incidence of the same week in 2020. 

It is easy to blame the covid. It is easy to say that people feel cooped up and angry and possibly demented due to the demands of the covid and the effort to curtail the pandemic. 

The facts do not support this theory.

The NRA has been largely responsible for fostering the use of guns and making rifles accessible to the general public. The NRA should simply be shut down.

There is no earthly reason for anyone to own a repetitive rifle.

It is a military weapon and it should be clearly and absolutely illegal to own one. There is no earthly reason for it to be in anyone’s private home.

The same thing is true of the glock pistol , also a military weapon. It should not be available to any member of the general public.

If somebody want to have a gun with which to go hunting there is no reason on earth that they can not have that gun as long as it is legally registered. 

That seems altogether normal and necessary. That alone would probably go a long way towards reducing gun crime on the streets and in the homes. 

America wake up.

People wake up! It is up to us to “We the people” to pressure our congressmen and our senators to put through gun control legislation. Once again it is up to our senators to get on their stick and act on behalf of their constituents. 

It is up to “We the people” to pressure to unseat any member of the congress who does not support gun registration and who does not support the abolition of military weapons being sold into the hand of the general public.

Wake up America, it is your lives that are at stake. Act now!

The constitution of the USA clearly provides for the removal from office of a President who is deemed no longer fit to serve in the office as President of the USA. 

This President has already done irreparable damage to the US. Who would come to support ourforeign-policy. He affect the politic system, to the justice department, to the supreme court , and to the moral fiber of the nation, by exasperating inherent problems.
 His withdraw from all the traditional world organizations puts us at risk. It will take years and years before our former friends and allies will ever trust us again.

He has succeeded with the support of a corrupt Republican Party made up of senators who are embracing Trump, so that they can remain in his club.
This is not a matter of Republican or Democratic preference. This is a question of who, we the people of this Nation are, and what our values are, at home, and how we want to present ourselves to the world.

Who we are at home, is how the world sees us abroad. We have lost our world leadership position over the past four years.

Donald Trump is only dedicated to himself and his own personal and family fortune. He measures the financial success of the country by his own personal success in the stock market .     

The people and organizations invested in the stock market have done well, they’ve made money. 

However, this money that has a crude to the wealthiest people in the country whose taxes simultaneously, have been reduced, are of course satisfied with Trump’s regime. 

This wealth however has not reflect itself throughout the society. A very large portion of the nation population is worth off than they have been since the depression of 1933. 

This is not due just to the layoffs caused by covid-19. It was caused by the total lack of attention or investment  or attention to the suffering and needs of the middle and lower class population. 
No investment has been made in health, education, welfare or affordable housing under Trump.

It is not socialism for a wealthy nation to take care of its poorest members. 
No matter how loudly he trumpets his successes, Trump has done nothing but to double the national debt, spend tax money to benefit himself, he has divide the country by exacerbating the anger and divisiveness that already existed in the country. 

This is the portrait of America today under Trump. Who would want to claim us as an ally? A nation divided and in a state of chaos, with disease, poverty, and crime on the rise. 

He has succeeded in destroying every agreement that has been made whether with Iran, Mexico, Canada, or China. 

Possibly those commitments were not totally advantageous to America, but now they have been annihilated .They were better than nothing. At least they provided the grounds for further discussion, and at the same time a certain amount of protection,whether from exploding nuclear bombs or developing nuclear power. If they weren’t perfect there surely was room for further negotiation. 

None of these treaties have been renegotiated and the cost has been born by the American people ,by agriculturalists, by farmers and by general population. 

There has been a substantial rise of the cost of living in America as a consequence. 

If isolation, alienation, divisiveness, anger and violence is what this country wants to be today, then this President has succeeded. 
America under Trump is becoming a Banana Republic.

Vote! Hit the Streets , Vote! This is your last chance to save this nation.PS : If you agree with this blog, please send on to your contact list.

America has never had a proper comprehensive immigration policy. America has become a hostile and dangerous country to refugees who seek asylum. 

Nonetheless, people will try to enter whether legally or illegally but these people still need to be treated as human beings and not brutalized and tortured. 

This is no longer a matter of republican vs democrat. This is a clarion call to all decent people of all parties: Republican, Democrat, liberal, conservative, moderate or any other.

Women are now arriving at our border only to be imprisoned, abused and forced to undergo unnecessary hysterectomies. That is sterilization. This is torture by any other name.

Mr Trump and the so called  “Republican Party” that he has constructed with his acolyte Mitch McConnell, and the lemmings who cow tow to them both, have totally lost credibility for the right to govern. 

These people no longer represent the majority of the people of the United States and should not be allowed to participate in overseeing the check and balance system of the US government in which they are suppose to serve. 

If we ever get rid of these criminals, this country must demand some constitutional amendments. 

The first would be to get the money out of politics. 

The second is to limit the term that any elected official can serve, making it less likely for anyone of these criminals to care more about their lifetime job in a governing position than what is right and good for the country. 

The third would be surely to make it impossible to bring their fake religious fanaticism into governing as they are now doing even though it is in opposition to the US Constitution under which they serve which clearly separates church and state.

What in their Bible, or in the Bible that Trump so virtuously held up in front of St John’s Church in Washington DC, gives them the right to think that they can make judgements over the bodies of women in America?

”Republicans”  will rush to confirm a new Justice of the Supreme Court so they can totally reverse the prior Supreme Court ruling of Roe v. Wade, which entitles women to the legal right to choose what is best for their lives and for their bodies. This will reverse the progress that it has taken women over 100 years to gain in the United States of America. 

Before Roe v. Wade, women used wire hangers to abort unwanted pregnancy. Legal abortion enables women to have safe and medically sound care. Women generally do not choose abortion lightly or easily.

This senate, these Anti- Christs, have set themselves up as judge and jury over the lives of women. These senators who have sold their souls to their Devil, Trump, should be swept out of the Senate, out of the government and even out of the country. 

If women are not to be permitted to have control over their own bodies then all men should not have control either. They should all be rounded up and forced to have vasectomies- that would solve the problem for everyone of all persuasions. 

Trump and his sycophants are afraid of losing their lifetime jobs. They only worry about keeping their seat in the Senate. They do not have any regard for the people of this nation for whom they have been elected to serve. 

Women of America (and all of those who care about them), hit the streets and go to the polls. Vote for your right to choose what is best for you.

My friend Sally Timpson forwarded me this letter and I thought I would pass it along to all of you for your pleasure and enjoyment.

DEAR RED STATES; WE’RE LEAVING.

 We’ve decided we’re leaving. We intend to form our own country, and we’re taking the other Blue States with us. 

In case you aren’t aware, that includes Hawaii, Oregon, California, New Mexico, Washington, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Illinois and all the Northeast. 

We believe this split will be beneficial to the nation, and especially to the people of the new country that includes Puerto Rico, U.S. Virgin Islands, Guam and Washington D.C. 

We also get the vast majority of the major shipping ports. So good luck with getting goods in or out of the country affordably. 

We also get Costco, Starbucks and Boeing. You get Texas, Oklahoma and all the slave states. 

We get stem cell research and the best beaches. 

We get the Statue of Liberty. You get Branson, Missouri. 

We get Intel, Apple and Microsoft. You get WorldCom. 

We get 85 percent of America’s venture capital and entrepreneurs. You get Mississippi. 

We get two-thirds of the tax revenue; you get to make the red states pay their fair share. 

Since our aggregate divorce rate is 22 percent lower than the Christian Coalition’s, we get a bunch of happier, intact families. 

Please be aware that we will be pro-choice and anti-war, and we’re going to want all our citizens back from Iraq at once. If you need people to fight, ask your evangelicals. They have kids they’re apparently willing to send to their deaths for no purpose, and they don’t care if you don’t show pictures of their children’s caskets coming home. 

With the Blue States unified, we will have firm control of 80 percent of the country’s fresh water, more than 90 percent of the pineapple and lettuce, 92 percent of the nation’s fresh fruit, 95 percent of America’s quality wines (you can serve French wines at your state dinners) 90 percent of all cheese, 90 percent of the high tech industry, most of the U.S. low-sulfur coal, all living redwoods, sequoias and condors, all the Ivy and Seven Sister schools — Brown, Columbia, Cornell, Dartmouth, Harvard, the Penn, Princeton, and Yale; and Mount Holyoke, Vassar, Smith, Wellesley, Bryn Mawr, Barnard, and Radcliffe colleges; plus UCLA, UCB, Stanford, Cal Tech and MIT. 

With the Red States, on the other hand, you will have to cope with 88 percent of all obese Americans (and their projected health care costs), 92 percent of all U.S. mosquitoes, nearly 100 percent of the tornadoes, 90 percent of the hurricanes, 99 percent of all Southern Baptists, virtually 100 percent of all televangelists, Rush Limbaugh, Alex Jones and Rand Paul. 

We get Hollywood and Yosemite, thank you. 

Additionally, 62 percent of you believe life is sacred unless we’re discussing the death penalty or gun laws, 44 percent say that evolution is only a theory, 53 percent that Saddam was involved in 9/11 and 61 percent of you crazy bastards believe you are people with higher morals then we lefties. (See that part about divorces. …) 

Oh, and you can have all the new COVID-19 cases since you’re too dumb and self-centered to wear masks. 

Peace out. 

We are the people of the Blue States

The Black Lives Matter Movement is doomed to failure unless it remains a totally peaceful movement. All movements have followers who feel that it is their right to use violent means to express their personal feelings. It takes a great deal of discipline to keep a large group of people from becoming a mob no matter how just the cause may be. It only takes one or two people to cause chaos. 

Martin Luther King Jr, John Lewis, and Ghandi understood that no matter what the temptation, the only way to win was to refuse to respond with hostility. Throwing bottles, bricks, and bats at the police is by any standard or definition an expression of hostility and therefore a threat to a peaceful movement. The probability is that in order to have a peaceful movement or maintain it over time, the protesters need to have their own guards to protect themselves from within and also from outside perpetrators of violence. 

The younger generations today are not necessarily a disciplined group of people. Few of them have served the country in any capacity. Ever since the Vietnam War there has been no draft and no public service requirement of any kind. The Gen X, Millennial and Gen Z Generations are the first generations who have not  benefitted from military training. 

To be successful, Black Lives Matter must organize and protect themselves from dissidents within their own ranks, otherwise they will destroy the movement. If the movement is peaceful it is less likely that the police will use rubber bullets, tear gas, and tasers to stop a peaceful gathering of people. With a normal Democratic government, the police are not ordered or allowed to forcibly break up peaceful protests. This is why it is so important for the survival of any peaceful movement to protect its members from such as the 17 year old boy who picked up a gun from God knows where and went out to shoot peaceful protestors. This is exactly why it is imperative for any peaceful movement to protect themselves. 

The Black Lives Matter Movement is a very important protest against brutality on the part of the police forces of this nation but it is also an important movement to help this country to rise up against discrimination within our society. This is not just racial discrimination, this is the failure of our society to provide a proper education for every member of the society. Education provides people with the means and the tools to rise economically and integrate into the job market. In this, America has failed abysmally. Since the 1930s, at least one third of this country has suffered from all of the following and more- poor education, poor job opportunity, poor housing, poor health care. The value of a democratic society is that it is supposed to offer these basics to all of its citizens. 

Over the nearly 350 years of existence, America has made an attempt at these but has never succeeded at an overall fulfillment of the society’s needs. Our public school system manages to graduate people who can barely read or write. We have a poor trade school system. We underpay our teachers. Classrooms are overcrowded. Little attention is paid to mental health in early childhood development. These are some of the obligations of a democracy.

This is not socialism or communism as it is being touted by today’s Republicans who are stealing our democracy and fast turning it into a fascist dictatorship. Capitalism and democracy can and have gone hand in hand in America. That has been what made America exceptional. However, increasingly over the years and most recently, the wealthiest people in the nation have been relieved of their social and financial obligations. The measure of economic viability has come to only represent people who invest in the stock market, while most people do not have the means to invest. 

These are some of the issues that have divided this country. It is this division that has created the conditions under which a police officer can act as judge, jury and executioner in the life of a citizen. 

Crime exists in our society, even amongst the peaceful and civil. Violent crime exists more in poorer communities than wealthier communities. Once again, peaceful movements will be overtaken if they do not take steps to protect their own communities, their own movements, their own peaceful protests. This does not mean that communities take the law into their own hands. It means that the communities and the law enforcement have to work together more closely than ever before. 

The Black Lives Matter statement as opposed to All Lives Matter statement innately separates people from one another. The point is that everyone should be treated fairly under the law. If you commit a crime, you should be treated the same no matter the color of your skin and, likewise, if you are the victim of a crime you should be given the same treatment and opportunity for justice against your assailant just the same as anyone else. All lives matter. All lives should be equally treated under the law.

Here dead lie we because we did not choose
     To live and shame the land from which we sprung. – -A.E. Housman

It is the obligation of Americans today to finally, once and for all do away with Apartheid. Black lives really matter. But so do white lives. In order for this country to end apartheid it really doesn’t help to have black people attacking white people on the streets or having white people attack black people under any circumstances. This must not become a war between blacks and whites- we need unity, not disparity.

Right from the beginning I thought that the BLM leaders should have hired their own guards to make sure that neither from either inside or outside there are people who are looters and destroyers that will fall exactly into the plot of Trump’s agenda. People who want to agitate and cause upheaval, they are costly and will ultimately destroy the cause of BLM.

People protesting peacefully on the streets of the United States does make a difference. When white people and black people join forces peacefully they are winning the war against prejudice and hatred.

The fires that Mr Trump stokes are then exact opposite of the peaceful movement. He wants looting. He wants conflict. He wants war. Anyone who saw his RNC Convention and his 3 blond haired, blue eyed, white skinned barbie dolls has to have gotten the message that he wants an America that is all blond haired, blue eyed and white skinned. He will do in the next 90 days whatever he needs to do to cause chaos and to destroy the BLM movement. The leaders of the movement must take command of the protests and protect themselves from the people, both inside and outside the peaceful movement, who will otherwise ultimately overwhelm the cause and derail it.

Hit the streets but keep the peace.

Of course “Black lives matter”. The peaceful demonstrations matter. they speak out to all of us.

Alas, however, the movement took a side turn when demonstrators started defacing buildings and tearing down statues all across the country. 

Some of the great generals represented by the statues were indeed slave owners. In those days anyone who could own slaves, did own slaves. 

The black lives matter movement can get side tracked by allowing members to destroy the very history that we must preserve in order to learn from the past and to move on.

The history of slavery in America goes back 400 years. The slave trade was a huge business in those days. The slaves came from Africa. Parts of Africa continue to this very day to own and to sell slaves. They still buy and sell human beings. 

Owning slaves, is surely not something to be proud of. It is, however, a part of our history. It is part of world history.

Whether people were slaves in Egypt in 1550 BC, whether they were white serfs in the middle ages in Europe or black slaves in America, for centuries, historically and shamefully, people have been bought and sold into slavery.

Although this is nothing to be proud of, it was and it remains a part of our history.

These statues also represent our history. It would be far better to leave them standing so that we can learn about each of these generals. There should be large plaques on each statue informing us of the wars in which the generals fought, the battles they won and unfortunately that they also were slave traders and owners.

The civil war was fought partially to free the slaves but the civil war did little or nothing to help support these former slaves, these people of color.

This is perhaps one of the most important and most critical moments in the history of this nation. 

If we do not recognize our  past failures, nothing will ever change in the present and we will never be able to move on to a different and better future.

For the first time in the 400 years of American history it is possible for all of us, we the people of this nation, to finally give recognition and pay more than just lip service to the protection of the right of all citizens of the United States of America to vote and to be treated equally under the law regardless of race, creed or religion.

There has always been a percentage of the population of this nation who were poor and left behind. Afro Americans have historically always been left further behind.

Ever since the 1930’s there were and are still citizens of our nation who even though employed, simply do not earn enough to put bread on the table. These people have never been able to built a reserve to carry them through any emergency that might arise.

These people are not only Afro-Americans.

This pandemic has forced and focused the attention of every American on the people who are suffering the most from the COVID19. 

We live in a capitalistic society. Capitalism allows some people to amass large fortunes however it requires periodic rethinking and readjustment in order to serve all of the people.

It is not communism nor it is socialism to believe that some part of the corporate profits should go to the people who actually do the work that makes the profit possible. This is fairness.

Most presidents of the United States since Roosevelt have tried to create programs that would be helpful to the general population. However, some communities, largely Afro American, have always fallen behind, whether in healthcare, education or housing. 

This is the time. This is the moment to end apartheid in the United States. This is also the time to end the extreme poverty in any community in which extreme poverty exists.

This is the time to address these problems by making our past history known and relevant so that we can look at the changes that we must make in the present in order to move our nation into a future in which all citizens have access to equal medical care, good education, affordable housing and equal protection under the law regardless of race, creed or religion.

A friend of mine send this letter to me and I think it says everything that needs to be said and that can be said about William Barr and the destruction that he has wrought upon the department of justice and the social contract under which all of us live in this country. Please read it and weep and take action.

https://www.openlettertoagbarr.com/

It is a dangerous road to travel for this country to suddenly turn against the police forces nationwide.

Starting just in New York city alone, the crime rate is far lower than it was in 1990. At least it was lower before this antagonism and threats of defunding towards the police. 

There is  no question that there is racial antipathy amongst the police as there is in the American population in general.

The black lives matter campaign is certainly a worthy cause. It is time for this country to deal with its prejudice and start by changing its attitude towards people of color. But that does not mean that our society, our nation or our people of color, or that any of us are pure as the driven snow.
There are crimes committed and there are people killed. There are shootings and useless deaths and murders caused by some amongst all of us. We cannot blame the police for all.

The police in this country do need to be trained quite differently from the way they have been until now. 

In France, Belgium, England, New Zealand, Ireland, Iceland and Norway the police do not carry guns nor do the citizens of these countries. America has more gun owners than the entire rest of the world. Anybody in America can own a gun and as a consequence almost everybody who wants a gun has one.

It is true and obvious that some members of the police forces around the country are prejudiced in some way or other so it is with a large portion of the population of the United States of America.
As cops often are faced by a person carrying a gun or having a gun pointed at them, the cops in this country are usually trained to kill, if necessary in order to defend themselves.

It is hard to believe that there are many circumstances in which a well trained police officer, who should be wearing the proper protective gear, from head to toe, should ever find himself in a position where he has to kill a suspect.
It may be that people of color are more often suspected than white people but even, that does not give the police the right to be judge, jury and executioner. They do have the right and they should have the training to be able to disarm, disable and arrest a suspect.

The extent to which racial prejudice enters into a police officer’s decision makingis a reflexion of America’s racial attitudes and prejudice.

This is the time for this country, this nation to finally address this issue. Yes, it is true that black lives matter. However, it is equally true that all lives matter. 

It is also true that in America for 150 years or more there has been a prejudicial attitude towards people of color and this attitude has denied entire segments of our society from having a proper education, proper and affordable housing, medical assistance and job opportunities. This prejudice behavior cannot be blamed on the police force alone. 

This is a societal problem and perhaps this is the moment at last when we as Americans can change these attitudes. The police will change as the society demands.

The corona virus should have opened the eyes of America to the heroism of so many Afro-Americans as well as others who put their lives on the line to save our lives.

It is time for America to embrace all Americans and to realize that all lives are meaningful and matter.

We must recognize that there are those in our society who do commit crimes. We do need the protection of a properly trained police force. We should support them as they put their lives in jeopardy for us. Nonetheless, this does not exonerate them from their obligation to treat all Americans alike. 

All of our lives matter.