The Misguided

So, what's been going on the last 21 days? A neanderthal has taken over the white house and impregnated  the country with a dizzying number of distractions, lies and illegalities half the citizens believe in and support. Planes are falling out of the sky, running into each other on Seattle tarmacs, and that moron is worrying about boycotting paper straws and has the NFL painting over "End Racism" signs in the end zones at the Super Bowl.* He's interested in de-funding the Department of Education he doesn't even know is already run by the states. This is one ignorant SOB who got elected. ONE. Listen to him speak. He maybe, maybe has the vocabulary of a fourth grader. What is wrong with you sheeple? And if any of that isn't true, well, right wing radical hypocrites, that's the cost of doing business in 2025. You want to control the pendulum of disinformation . . . some of us are still here to remind you, this is a free country?

I could use a pithy dog metaphor about the nature of American political activity these days . . . that, as an owner of two dogs, I am entertained by their dedication to urine-over their rival’s scent; dog one keeps whining about issues which challenge him, and sometimes dog #1 has cause because dog #2 nips at his legs while dog #1 is trying to get up the stairs. Each dog represents a major faction in the U.S. government. And I want to be clear here, I am definitely talking about dogs, but may also be referring to DOGE . . . is it too late to fund Springfield Ohio's Haitian immigrants, via redirected earmarks within USAID, to eat the DOGE?

 

We’re three weeks into round two of Trump. I feel like some of us should be considering our attics for potential livability, hollowing out bookshelves, and squirreling away canned food, hiding out until this  nightmare is over. How long did Anne Frank do it? Only two years. Huh.** But, seeing as some republican kiss-ass has already introduced a constitutional amendment which would allow Trump to run again, and since a vat filled with former, current, and future criminals, gutless cowards and acolytes has spilled all over Washington, we can’t be sure of when that will be. And who are we kidding, we’re on a trajectory which will see one of the Trumps, or one of the Musks,*** installed to continue the line of autocrat succession- because constitution be damned.

In the last week I wrote a letter to the editor about why our legislators should vote down the SAVE act (because it infringes people’s right to vote) and wrote to one of my state senators about- what the hell is going on out there? Next time they’re getting a call. I’ve signed a couple petitions through Common Cause, an unaffiliated to either party organization in favor of practicing democracy, and I've attended a few zoom calls about getting involved. I mentioned to Common Cause that petitions and filing lawsuits wasn't going to cut it. Apparently requesting that Musk be subpoenaed, which a set of gutless right wing house GOP cowards shot down, isn’t going to be enough either. What else you got people? What else is there? Take off of work and protest is probably one answer. I am not saying that list above is enough, or right, or even that anyone cares. But I'm not just howling in the wind.

Over the course of the last six+ months I’ve heard from a dozen people who have been friends or family for 20-30 years that the mainstream media should be ignored because of all the lies they pedal. Huh, ok. I’d make a comment about the pot and kettle, but we know that there will be an executive order, before you're done reading this sentence, which will strike the last word in that saying from all websites even before it is vanquished in the battle of AI v. DEI. I asked all of those people what passes for above reproach information in their world, in an effort to find common ground, and a shared reality. And people who support commander Trump, my use of the phrase, “shared reality” should not be construed as disqualifying because Charlie Kirk used it as a buzzword for right wing zombies to look out for as an indicator that some are relying too much on USA Today, MSNBC, CNN, and NPR. I maybe spend an hour a month on those news outlets. I also watch Fox News, listen to podcasts about history, too many TikTok videos to not be ashamed, and only recently left Twitter, so I’m pretty up on what is going on outside of the NBC nightly news. Oh, and books. I read books. A lot of books. I read books written by people I loathe and books sporting theses I know I’m going to disagree with. They may have a point here and there. So do I- trust me.

Case in point, I'm reading a book right now with the title- The Myth of American Inequality. I had to check it out. Challenge accepted. Anyone writing about how the haves of this country are not pulling one over, to the tune of trillions of dollars, and sacrificing generations-worth of opportunities, on the have nots, should be fired from humanity, like a responsible member of the FBI who was just doing his/her**** job and bringing something called evidence to bear on ruthless thugs who invaded the nation's capital on January 6th and who have been pardoned by the ultimate ruthless thug. For those already only skimming- that would be TRUMP.

The answer I get after my request for the misguided to pass me information is . . . nothing. They evade the question, pretend it wasn’t asked, double down on their distrust of ABC, CBS or Politico, or send me a podcast link to Joe Rogan, drop Ben Shapiro’s name, or regurgitate information they heard second or third hand, I suspect, during one of their zombie shut in meetings or brainwashing sessions? The misguided don’t give me information about their sources because they know I will rip them to shreds. Apparently, that is the only shame of which they are capable.

So, I told them to stop. Stop countering everything I bring up with the tired line about how misguided the mainstream media is, as if the radical right have the moral high ground. I know the mainstream media is liberal. In some cases, it is also shamelessly so. I can admit it, because liberals are also capable of duplicity, evading direct questioning and overreach. There are too many democratic bleeding hearts for me to defend. I can definitely see what troubles the anti-woke mob. However, you can’t refute facts and journalism, proven science and legitimate sources with nonsense right wing propaganda and hero-worship of a giant child; it is unbecoming. Please, brainwashed followers of Trump and Musk, etc., stop contending that the more enlightened people in this war over who is the bigger government scourge, need any help coming up with our own ideas about the problems enlightened people anywhere, and at any time, are incapable of ignoring. I won’t shut my eyes to it, and I won’t shut my ears. And when I am fairly convinced that my objectivity TRUMPS, (ha) your lunacy, I’m going to call you on it, repeatedly- as I am doing now, where maybe ten people will find it. Silence just isn't in my DNA even if no ears are tuned to my frequency.

It is tiresome for people like me, to be thought gullible, as if we (true Independents) are being misled by the mainstream media. Our collective incredulity, at the fact that this nation’s traitors continue to be cast as patriots by half of the country could fuel the top ten departments in terms of total outlays (Social Security, Health, Medicare, Defense, Net Interest on the National debt, etc.) forever. Even I am shocked that we are shocked by the stunts, illegality and extra-constitutional ways and means of the right. Elected officials were denied admission to the Department of Education on February 7th by a guy wearing a wind-breaker. That's more pathetic than a Pomeranian prevented from getting up on the couch by the cushions. I would ask my friends and family and 77+ million people who might buy that the fault lies with the mainstream media- (about the wind-breaker guard) am I allowed to believe that? Or will you alter an old Jack Buck line when he was left incredulous by the 1988 Kirk Gibson World Series homer- "[you] can't believe what [you] just saw."

Short interlude- you know this is what the economic elite want though right? They want the lower classes to argue among themselves over social and political issues so that we all don't realize that 80% of the people should be infuriated about economic issues. Only reason I'm doing it here is because this offering is akin to the letter you write to a friend, and don't send because it will ruin the friendship, or type up on your computer and don't email because it will get you sent to El Salvador.

. . . And, we're back. That's my attempt to make this feel more like a podcast, or a string of TikTok videos the algorithm allows, which is all anyone pays attention to anymore. No one wants to read for twenty minutes. Why would we read the idiot musings of a lunatic when we can doom scroll twenty minutes of videos instead.

If anyone is sitting there thinking, "damn this guy is long-winded," imagine this entire space taken over by a listing of illegal, immoral and nonsensical, but actual Trump missteps, which, according to him, in no way rival the ones he imagines his enemies have made. He wants CBS-Paramount to give him $10 billion dollars for a slight misrepresentation during an interview with Harris. I can admit CBS made a mistake because I acknowledge reality. But how about as recompense, we subtract the $10 billion that loser thinks he’s owed in that instance to all he owes countless victims of his strategies, schemes, layoffs and harassment, let alone from the outcomes of criminal trials he avoided because he fooled 2.3 million more people into voting for him than his opponent. 2.3 million. A random misguided guy on Facebook, yet another media conglomerate that caved to one guy’s tantrums because he didn’t get his way, posted that his apparent victory was a "landslide". I dismissed that dufus a few days ago, then unfriended the guy I knew 35 years ago who led me to him. I fired that guy like Trump took away Biden's security clearance. The current presidential criminal won by 1.5%; that is only a landslide according to the extremists on the right. Those numbers, by the way, are courtesy of The Cook Political Report; however, according to Don’tLookBehindtheCurtain.com, the product of the radical right think tank, no one voted for Harris, and you better believe it, else you will be socially, politically and economically outcast. People, it’s one friggin' guy that got elected; he isn’t god, but he could have god killed . . . apparently. Would it really be that much of a stretch to believe that at this point? Our next secretary of defense the republican senate will confirm, after the current unqualified poser is replaced, is slated to be- the actual devil.

In response to my request for sites detailing important factual information be provided, I was told no more novels (um, like this). That person didn’t want his hearsay to tangle with objective truth. My counter-offer was- no! When prompted, I will not stop quoting from the constitution, the still relevant Hobbes, Locke and Rousseau (about the state of nature, sovereignty and inequality); I won't stop referencing what happened to the Romans given a set of historical facts we should currently be paying attention to about chronic overreach, nor can I stop providing the particulars from Associated Press articles which offer irrefutable proof about pieces of information that can't be disputed- like which political party the first Trump shooter was a registered voter for (hint- it starts with an 'r').

There are relatively unimportant declarations Trump and Musk have made in the first three weeks, we'll see if these two will be challenged by judges with the cajones to stand up to those nimrods, which strike me as appropriate (like banning the penny), but any laurels I would offer have been wilted by the new zeitgeist created by the dual buffoons, constantly named here, and by their fellow traitors. 

To concede a point, lest anyone refer to me as a liberal, do we need to have an audit of the government programs which are fraught with redundancy, abuse, waste and fraud? Absolutely! I’m tired of not knowing where my tax money is going, or of highly suspecting where it is going and of disapproving resoundingly. I do not want to fund all kinds of other country’s welfare systems; we have enough problems with our own. But this batch of “republicans” are clearly not the ones to perform an audit, primarily because they won’t know where to stop, which is evident because they didn’t know how to start. And here’s the other kicker, if people think the fraud, waste and redundancy are all on one side, I would say that they should be admitted, excepting they won’t consent to admit to anything- all they can do is deny. Are there articles, columns, books and podcasts on the right which are telling the truth? Yes, but the misguided don't seem to send them my way.

The actual vice-president, and the VP by proxy, (Musk) both had the nerve to question judges blocking the constitutional overreach of the Trump administration. Trump said he's disappointed in the judges. Gee, that's too bad, we're all real thrilled with you pal. "No judge should be allowed to make that decision" . . . "else we don't have a country" to block the search for waste, fraud and abuse is what fascist Trump said. I did one search "Vance disappointed with judges" and got results from PBS, BBC, ABC News, The Guardian, The Washington Post which all stated that Vance said judges "aren't allowed" to control the president's "legitimate power". To be fair, all of those would be classified as liberal entities. We're at the point though that if the Heritage Foundation told republicans that eating shell casings, which were moving down the barrel of an AR-15 was good for their mental health, they'd believe it. 

Also, republicans, please tell me Vance didn't say that. Please show me where in the constitution it states the executive branch has the right to initiate policies the congress didn't vote for and act in ways that judges can't check and courts can't rightly decide. I don't need a law degree to contend that. I've can read.  All I need is common sense. Thomas Paine would be proud to have his most famous work "Common Sense" invoked, but would be repulsed by Trump's claim he has anything akin to it. When president #47 used the line- "I have common sense" to identify who was responsible for the plane v helicopter collision over the Potomac. The response has to be- "buddy, you're at the bottom of that list." If Peter Alexander, a member of the mainstream media, responded with that, I wonder if the misguided would believe it.

So, when a representative, elected by his or her constituents, within the rules, requests that a billionaire (who live tweets his antics from the confines of the U.S. Treasury) be subpoenaed to appear before elected officials, to answer for his missteps, in attempting to gut programs falling under an umbrella of an agency (USAID), 80% of the people didn't even know existed two weeks ago, that request damn well better be granted. Else, it is time to step beyond the podium which appears before the doors of a federal institution and hold open the doors so ALL of the secrets can be revealed. What is holding those doors closed? The perpetrators should be dragged out so actual partnership can begin, and so this continuing nightmare can come to an end. Democrats/dog #1, it is well past time to either use the hands evolution has granted, or at least start pissing all over dog #2 and DOGE #1 for that matter, because that is what they're doing to everyone who is not them.

*I'd rather they painted over Kendrick Lamar's mouth/performance at halftime of "the Big Game"- with liquid nails.

**Not actually comparing myself to Anne Frank in any way; it was a joke? Only time will tell.

***Musk probably had at least one of his twelve kids ooze out onto American soil. Of course, the Presidential Inheritance Commission, an organization which will exist once the filibuster is eliminated, would ignore the new desired precedent of circumventing birthright citizenship, but only in such cases as excused by Commander Trump.

****That is not an instance of me trying to use the right pronouns, for which I will soon be imprisoned, but an attempt to acknowledge that FBI agents may be male or female, or another gender- not anymore of course, but in the olden times before 1/20/25. So sensitive.