Arguably the greatest-ever movie on politics, “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington,” still amazingly on-point and apropos some 80-years on, featured a statewide political machine embargoing via intimidation and muscle the dissemination of information regarding Sen. Smith’s intrepid filibustering over the misdeeds of that same Machiavellian machine.
In the election rightly deemed the most important of modern times, the machine that is Washington D.C.-proper is pretty clearly engendering it’s own embargo surrounding critical Senate proceedings, albeit a much more passive version of “Mr. Smith,” a yawning at and minimizing of the import of the radical high court sea change being unceremoniously jammed down the throat of this, that most critical of all elections.
By the Sunday a.m. punditry programs just four days removed from Sen. Richard Blumenthal & Co.’s remarkable final hearing day’s anti-Barrett uprising (itself utterly ignored by network news, called a mere “discussion” by PBS’s Judy Woodruff) the media has shrugged and moved on amidst the flurry of polls and pandemic-infused election politics, with GOP senators in tight re-elections very much allowed to coast. Hearings? What hearings?
This press misfeasance is remarkable in its breadth; Judge Barrett is the hard-nosed prospect vetted and groomed by the judicially extreme and deep-pocketed Federalist Society (dark money chicanery ever more present in the federal judiciary, as Sen. Whitehouse declaimed), her nomination brought forward by the D.C.-resented president as hand-picked successor to the sainted RBG, Barrett a most-festering of cynical branches off the tainted Trump tree presently capsizing of it’s own inimitable rot.
Nonetheless, Barrett has that very Establishment’s blessing (if couched in the metrics of inevitability), and after witnessing Kamala Harris’ spirited grilling of Barrett last week, it may be Harris’ proximity to the top and not exclusively the ACA that the power elite wants to thwart the most.
In the court of the despised president, how very jarring to see Judge Barrett granted this media exception, and just minutes to the 2020 Election zero hour (that unprecedented fact in no way a disqualifier, not even mentioning the extraordinary McConnell SCOTUS-appointment hypocrisy; they aren’t).
The vertically-integrated watchdog press having taken a powder on Barrett, it looks like it’s up to grassroots pressure to stop the SCOTUS travesty from proceeding to fruition. I hope the GOP is sweating bullets, because behind the ‘mission-accomplished’ facade, some stepped-up citizen action heat is certainly being brought to bear. God willing, it suffices. Thanks.
MIKE WETTSTEIN Jr., Appleton, Wis.
One of the greatest political cons and shams every perpetrated on the American Public is that Donald Trump supports working people and is “Pro Life.” Trumps tragic and unspeakable approach to the COVID-19 epidemic pandemic has awarded him a special and infamous place in history that will endure through the ages. However one must openly confront and challenge the toxic if not unspeakable sentiment or belief that Donald Trump is somehow “pro life.” Quite the contrary-the reality suggests and confirms that the mantle awarded Trump here is that he is the “pro death” candidate.
His staggering incompetence regarding COVID-19 is bad enough. However the greater horror is Trump’s total hatred for science and the growing realities of catastrophic climate change. Trump is racing humanity to the precipice of environmental collapse while allowing a select corporate few the opportunity to maximize short term profit while the planet enters a terminal life threatening period.
Currently, we are in the midst of the sixth great extinction while over 80 animal species enter extinction every day. And these damning and tragic realities have no impact on a dangerously mentally ill man who will do anything to obtain a second term. Saying Donald Trump is “pro-life” is akin to saying that David Duke is a champion of diversity and human rights. Mother Earth is in her death throes. We as a species owe it to our precious planet and to each other to do everything in our power to remove from office perhaps the most dangerous man in human history. This statement is not hyperbole or exaggeration — it is a pragmatic and reasoned assessment of where we are at as a nation and a species.
JIM SAWYER, Edmonds, Wash.
Former friends voted for Jill Stein in the 2016 presidential race in Michigan because, they said, they just didn’t feel it for Hillary Clinton. Now they get upset when I expect them to take responsibility for the two right-wing justices they helped Donald Trump put on the Supreme Court, out of more than 200 federal judges who have gotten lifetime appointments from Trump with minimal qualifications other than the endorsement of the right-wing Federalist Society. Now Senate Republicans are setting up to confirm right-winger Amy Coney Barrett to take the place of Ruth Bader Ginsburg on the Supreme Court, to give the right wingers a 6-3 majority.
Clinton lost Michigan by 10,904 votes in 2016. Stein drew 51,463 votes. “Don’t vote shame me,” I’ve been told by people who won’t admit they cast a pointless vote that will hurt progressives for at least a generation. Many of them undoubtedly will vote Green again this year, rationalizing that Joe Biden is not progressive enough for them. That just shows that there are morons on the left, as well as the right.
ALICIA MOORE, Detroit, Mich.
Ted Rall recently (11/1/20 TPP) explained why he’ll vote for a third party candidate for president in November. Let’s assume he’s serious. Both Dems and the GOP are unworthy of his vote, he says — the Dems for reasons of omission, the GOP for reasons of commission. So, if both are evil, the Dems are at least the lesser of the two evils, while the third party vote is totally worthless. Ergo, I say vote for the Dems!
ROLLAND AMOS, Severn, Md.
Is Ted Rall Fifth Column? Only two people have a shot at taking the oath of office for the President of the United States on Jan. 20, 2021. We know who they are. So what do we really get out of voting for Howie Hawkins for president and other Green Party candidates for Senate and Congress but to help Donald Trump and other Republicans get elected?
Ted Rall writes, “After you accept the reality that a Biden administration would probably be even worse than keeping Trump ...” What reality? Biden even worse than Trump? Whom does this guy think he’s kidding?
As for the Green Party of the United States, do a search for Republican funding of Green Party Candidates. Howie Hawkins is getting a lot of money from Republicans, according to the New York Times. Ask yourself why? In fact, this Green Party even lies about having started in 1984. It started in 1996 and was called “Association of State Green Parties.” In 2001, it changed its name to the Green Party of the United States but it did not even exit in 1984. Our first Green Party did start in 1984 and that was the Green Committees of Correspondence. As for Ted Rall, I think he is Fifth Column all the way and really wants Trump and the Republicans to win.
DAVID RAISMAN, Brooklyn, N.Y.
As a Unitarian, an ex-Catholic, and a citizen of this world, I was very interested in James A. Haught’s article on “Watching Religion Die.”
Mr. Haught, I wondered if you’d consider the role of feminism on the large picture. Our main religions, and I include Mormonism, were all started by men and taken over by other men. I think men’s sexual drive, of which I suspect some men are ashamed, and women’s drive which they, again I suspect, fear, has had them impose all kinds of restrictions on women for over countless centuries.
St. Paul says, “Women, cover your heads.” Some Muslims say, “Cover your whole body.” The orthodox Jews say, “Shave your hair off. Wear a wig.” And that’s just a few examples.
Give us women economic freedom and we gain social freedom. Give us an education and we join men in ruling and decision making. And — let’s get real — give us contraceptives and we control family planning.
The major religions had better adapt or they’ll lose even more members and rightfully so.
GRACE GAMBINO, Monroe Twp., N.J.
Here are some selected quotes from American Presidents who have delivered them in times of national danger or emergency:
“The occasion is piled high with difficulty, and we must rise to the occasion.” — Abraham LIncoln, 1862.
“I pledge you, I pledge myself, to a New Deal for the American people.” — Franklin D. Roosevelt, 1932.
“For those to whom much is given, much is required.” — John F. Kennedy, 1962.
“No, I don’t take responsibility at all.” — Donald J. Trump, 2020.
GEORGE MANCUSO Jr., Rochester, N.Y.
Editor's Note: These quotes also appeared in "Absentee President" by Wayne O'Leary, 5/1/20 TPP.
According to an antique anecdote, a monk expressed sympathy for Pope Julius III about the tremendous responsibilities the papacy entailed. The Pope’s response to the monkish concern was a gem of lighthearted bemusement and candor.
“Learn, my son,” replied the titular head of European Christendom,” with how little wisdom the world is governed.”
It has taken centuries, but maybe we are at least beginning to learn that trenchant lesson.
WILLIAM DAUENHAUER, Willowick, Ohio
From The Progressive Populist, November 15, 2020
Blog | Current Issue | Back Issues | Essays | Links
About the Progressive Populist | How to Subscribe | How to Contact Us
PO Box 819, Manchaca TX 78652
Trump’s Socialism
Look, Trump claims that Regeneron cured him of COVID-19 and that he is going to give it away to all of America for free. Isn’t that called socialized medicine?
MIKE EKLUND, Mercer, Wis.