Sexist Commercials, Mobile Phones, What "They" Don't Read, Security Clearances, a Letter and Some Disagreement

Sexist Advertisments?

There’s a TV commercial for Toyota automobiles which shows a couple unloading a very large number of bags filled with groceries from the back of their SUV.  The husband insists on carrying what looks like about fifty bags all at one time, despite his wise-looking wife’s admonition not to do so.  “Gotta do it, that’s who I am,” he mumbles as she smiles and lets him do it.  You know darn well that he’s going to drop half of them by the time he reaches the kitchen.

A similar commercial shows an unkempt husband scratching his head, bemoaning his unsuccessful efforts to find the kind of used car the couple has been looking for.  But his sharp wife finds exactly what they are seeking in about five seconds on a popular website used to locate used cars.  The grateful husband smiles. Gee, why didn’t I think of that.

One more TV commercial:  There’s the husband who is absolutely elated to find from the mobile phone in his hand that “Wayfair ships for free.”  

He acts as if he has discovered the Holy Grail and that the couple must immediately start taking advantage of this wonderful benefit and buy a lot of stuff from Wayfair!  Here’s some news, sir. Nothing in this world is free, and that the cost of shipping items shipped “for free” is always somewhere built into their price. That's how the shippers get paid; they don't work for free! 

I cite these three commercials because of an increasing trend I see on TV of portraying men as dumber than women.  It started years ago with sitcoms such as “All in the Family” and “The Jeffersons” featuring male buffoons with smarter wives and continues today in many current sitcoms. Even the Progressive Insurance commercials give “Flo” a good measure of intelligence whereas her assistant, Jamie, is portrayed as not very bright.  I wonder why she doesn’t fire him.

I am waiting to see a TV commercial portraying a woman as being stupid or would that be considered “sexist”?  Hmm.  I think the media industry is avoiding doing that and is satisfied to make fun of men many of whom are too busy drinking beer and watching pro football to notice how badly their sex is being demeaned.

For those of you who still read the comics, more an adult pastime than a childhood activity these days, try to envision female counterparts to such boobs as Dagwood Bumstead, the Born Loser or Hagar the Horrible.  There aren’t any.  And of course, their spouses are painted as considerably brighter than they are.

As a sidebar to this story, note the number of female candidates for both Houses of Congress and the governorships.  After all, most of them have raised children, managed a household, often while holding down a job, and succeeded in doing all of this while still looking trim, whereas all their husbands can seem to do is attempt to carry in 56 bags of groceries in one trip.  There’s a message there somewhere. 
Jack Lippman

Will Rides Again and Beyond

Last week's posting included a column by George Will, dean of conservative Republican columnists  (though I doubt that he continues to vote Republican any longer.)

This past Tuesday evening he was on Larry O'Donnell's "Last Word" program on MSNBC where he specifically referred to the President as a "low life from Queens." (Having lived there for a few years, I don't think that NYC borough should be taking the rap for the President.)  Commenting on the tape released by Trump's former lawyer, Michael Cohen, dealing with Trump's attempt to pay off a model with whom he might have had an affair, Will said that he was hearing redundant evidence that 

Will

"Mr. Trump is a seedy man whose incontinent sexual appetite gets him into seedy women.”   I wonder how long the Evangelical Christian voters will continue to support the immoral, adulterous President whom they supported in 2016 for all of the wrong reasons.  They should start listening to and reading real Republicans like Will, Michael Gerson, Ross Doutout, Mona Charon and Kathleen Parker.  

Which raises some interesting questions:  Do Republican voters read newspapers?  Do they ever look at cable news channels, other than Fox News?   

Do they automatically give credibility to material they find on the internet (particularly if it is bordered in red, white and blue)?  Are they really aware of Trump's sexual pecadillos, his blunders in the area of tariffs, his cow-towing to Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong Un and the revelations being made by his former lawyer/fixer Michael Cohen? And of course, the indictments the Mueller investigation has produced?  Or is this the stuff to which only Democrats, academics and elitists pay any attention?  Do they simply accept it as "fake news" as the faker in the White House claims it is?  
JL

The Fourth Amendment and Your Mobile Phone

If you carry your mobile phone with you, regardless of whether or not you are using it, those ubiquitous cell phone towers, some masquerading as flagpoles, bell towers

or even tall trees, know where you are and where you have been.  

Did you know that until June, law enforcement agencies had easy access to this information, without a court issuing a search warrant!  No longer, however!  It’s a violation of the Fourth Amendment’s right to privacy and the Supreme Court said so in June, voting five to four that law enforcement agencies could not access such information without first getting a search warrant.

Finally, our Fourth Amendment right to privacy is specifically extended to these mobile phone records.   The Court split along its liberal-conservative division, with Chief Justice Roberts siding with Justices Ginsberg, Breyer, Sotomayor and Kagan.  Of course, the other justices, led by Clarence Thomas, unsuccessfully voted to allow this encroachment onto Fourth Amendment rights to continue.  This is why it is so very important for Democrats to vote in November and hopefully, gain control of the Senate, the approval of which is necessary for future appointments to the Supreme Court. 

JL 

Security Clearance Removal a Phony Issue

No matter how high a security clearance a government employee or civilian may have, their access to classified information is still predicated on their having “a need to know.”   High officials might retain security clearances given to them after they are no longer performing the work that required them to have such clearances, but they cannot exercise them because they no longer have any “need to know” anything about an area in which they are no longer involved.  It is convenient, however, for such security clearances be maintained in the event the clearance’s holder is asked at some time in the future to reassume duties requiring such clearances.

When I was in the Army in the 1950’s, my duties in communications intelligence required me to have a security clearance.  It did not give me access, however, to any classified information other than that involved in my specific duties.  I didn’t have the slightest idea, for example, of what was going on in the building next door to the one where I worked.  I had “no need to know” that.

When our vindictive and spiteful President threatens to revoke the security clearances of former government employees who disagree with him, he is revoking “nothing,” because these individuals are no longer actively working in positions requiring security clearances.  Of course, Federal law requires them to permanently remain silent about classified matters to which they were privy in their former positions.  This they scrupulously do, but that does not take away their First Amendment rights to say whatever they want about what is going on today!  The President, who probably would not qualify for a security clearance were he not the President, seemed to have no qualms about releasing classified information to those with no “need to know” such as the Russian diplomats to whom he talked about some of our sources of intelligence information.  This may charitably be attributed to the man’s profound ignorance.

His claims that those with security clearances subsequently “monetize” them are ludicrous. Thousands of books and articles have been written by former high government officials after their service who of course, because of the positions they held, had high security clearances.  The President, whose family fortune is based on his “monetizing” his family surname, even while he is in office, should be the last person to make such accusations.

The bottom line for this is that it is just another of the President’s efforts to draw attention away from the inexorable process which is slowly closing in on him and will ultimately lead to his impeachment, conviction and exile.  The greatest danger to the nation is that he will lead it into an unnecessary war to further delay his ultimate fate.

JL 

 

Words from Someone Who Disagrees 

An occasional follower of the blog, whose views are diametrically opposed to mine, recently sent me the following email:

“Not bad eh?   Illegals are being given the vote for the school board elections.  Whom do you think they will vote for?   Why don’t we give away the entire country?   We are being overcome by Hispanics and especially illegals, who work for cash, receive all the benefit that were for working Americans, and send their money back to their country of origin.  The poor Americans do not have the rights these illegals have.  Go ahead liberals.   You want to dissolve a free nation to get a communist or socialist system.   When you do, you will be screaming from the rafters and you will not like what you made of this great country.   Blame Trump all you want, he is trying to make America great like before.   The me generation has not lived under a socialist/communist country.   They think the government will take care of them.  What a mistake.  Ask anyone who lived under it, being Italians, Germans, Japanese, Chinese, Vietnamese, and from Muslim countries who are living in this country today.  Wake up Americans.   You want to help, yes.  But be careful what you wish for.”

Attached to it was a posting from www.RestoreAmericanGlory.com, a right-wing website, which pointed out that San Francisco was giving the right to non-citizens who had children in their public schools to vote in school board elections.  This is the type of website from which many of the President’s supporters get their information and which their personal prejudices expand into the kind of email reproduced above. (See last week’s posting in which Trump’s support base was dissected, and  above article about the columnists they don't read.)   

Just as I urge followers of this blog to watch Fox News, I recommend an occasional visit to sites like the one mentioned above.  To emerge victorious, one must understand the opposition.    

JL

A Letter Gets Published

For those of you who missed it (and out-of-towners), here is the text of a letter from me published last week in the Palm Beach Post.

"A letter in Saturday’s Post advocated the popular election of Presidents instead of it being done indirectly through the Electoral College.  The writers of our Constitution established the Electoral College because they did not trust “ordinary people” to make such decisions.  In fact, the Founding Fathers didn’t even trust people to elect their Senators, leaving their election to state legislatures which was the case until the 17^th Amendment changed that in 1913.  The popular election of Presidents would open the way for the presidency going to the candidate with the most appealing sales pitch who just might not be the one most qualified for the job.  The presence of the Electoral College somewhat reduces that possibility.  Even though the popular election of the President would be the most democratic method, in view of our lax campaign financing laws and the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision, it might not be best for democracy in the long run.  The caution of the Founding Fathers was a wise thing."

JL

One does not have to be an ostrich to bury their head in the sand.

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Jack Lippman