Four Election Shorties, My Letter to the Sun-Sentinel, Ocular "Innuendo" and Communication Changes

                           

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Four Election Tidbits You Should Know About

Gutless Wonders:  The height of hypocrisy is being illustrated daily by Republicans who refuse to support or endorse their party’s Presidential candidate, but still will vote for him, rather than for the Democratic nominee.  If these hypocrites had any spine, they would abstain from voting.  But they are gutless wimps who are willing to sacrifice their personal honor in order to prevent the Democratic nominee from winning the election and appointing Supreme Court justices during her term in office.  This is because the Court’s future decisions may involve the Second Amendment, a woman’s right to abortion or birth control and government involvement in health care.  In all of these areas, the votes of those heavily committed to the conservative side of these issues are more important than risking the future of our nation by putting a totally unqualified and vulgar individual into the Presidency.  The most heinous of these hypocrites is House Speaker Paul Ryan, who should be ashamed of himself.  But he will learn his lesson when the Republican Party, destined to be ruled by the “alt-rightists,” scripted by Steve Bannon whom Donald Trump brought into the campaign, ultimately dump him from the Speaker’s role.

 Birds of a feather

Also in this category is “Little Marco” Rubio (so named by Trump) who is willing to vote for the man who repeatedly insulted him during the primary campaign.  Another gutless wonder. 

G.O.P. Strategy Revealed: The Republican Party’s strategy at this stage of the election campaign is to reduce the turnout of Democrats and Independents who plan on voting for Hillary Clinton.  This requires a good measure of lying and exaggeration.

  

They know that Donald Trump’s voting base cannot be further expanded.  But if they can convince Clinton voters to stay away from the polls, that base might be enough to win some “battleground” states for the G.O.P.  To do this, the Republicans are emphasizing Hillary Clinton’s handling of emails, her reaction to the Benghazi tragedy, her husband’s marital infidelities two decades ago and her relationship to the Clinton Foundation.   Anyone who has been active in politics for as long as Hillary Clinton has been has done things and made comments which may be open to criticism.  The Republicans have chosen to magnify these incidents a thousand fold, to an extent intended to keep Hillary Clinton’s supporters away from the polls. That is their plan. 

But the things they are bringing up are infinitesimal compared to the total lack of qualifications of their candidate whose experience in the business world involved stretching his activities to the limits of the law, allowing him to get away with far more unscrupulous things than the Republican Party is trying to pin on Hillary Clinton.

Russian Involvement:  Most of the negative information about Hillary Clinton which has been taken from “hacked” emails involving the Democratic Party and the Clinton Foundation, is made possible by technology far beyond that possessed by Julian Assange’s “Wikileaks” operation.  American counter-intelligence experts, with good reason, credit these “hacks” to technology originating in Russia.  In that country, individuals do not do these kind of things without government approval.  It is clear that Russia is doing this because they would much rather have an unqualified and unprepared occupant in the White House than one with years of government experience, particularly in the area of foreign affairs. It appears that the United States will eventually answer this Russian interference in our election process with a proportionate response.

  Certainly it does not warrant risking a war, but keep your eyes and ears open in regard to how we get even with them.  Vladimir Putin has some dirty laundry of his own which sooner or later may be exposed to his disadvantage in the unending struggle for supremacy which goes on in Russia.

State Legislatures are Where It’s At:  It’s odd that when all of the numbers are in, far more votes nationwide will have been cast for Democratic Congressional candidates than for Republican Congressional candidates.  Yet it is highly likely that the G.O.P. will still have a majority in the House of Representatives.  That is because of way Congressional Districts are “gerrymandered” by State Legislatures every ten years.  Republicans, wiser to this than Democrats, have poured tremendous resources in to maintaining control of State Legislatures, which determine the Districts’ borders.  The idea is to pack Democratic voters together into districts, usually in urban areas, so that the remaining districts have Republican majorities, resulting in a State with a Democratic majority having mostly Republican Representatives in Congress. 

  This could be remedied by a Constitutional Amendment requiring that Congressional representation be determined proportionately.  To illustrate this, and this is an over-simplification, if a State had 2,000,000 Republican Congressional voters, and 1,600,000 Democratic Congressional voters, that State would get five Republican Representatives and four Democratic Representatives.  The way “gerrymandering” works, however, results in such a State having perhaps six Republican and only three Democrats in Congress.  I don’t expect this to happen in the foreseeable future.  

JL

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I Wrote a Letter

Here’s the text of a letter from me published 10-26-2016 in the South Florida Sun-Sentinal.

I’m not worried about Donald Trump becoming president; he is going to lose. What I am worried about are the millions of Americans who have been gullible enough to believe in his simplistic and emotionally based solutions. If not Trump, to whom will they turn?

The very legitimate grievances created by missing jobs that will never return, by spiraling health care costs and by more and more people — including immigrants — grasping at the bottom rungs of the ladder of American opportunity must be addressed by the new president. If Hillary Clinton does not successfully do so, the frustrated and gullible will continue to reach for anyone offering solutions, and what they might be buying might make Donald Trump's solutions look like a family of cuddly teddy bears.

Jacob Lippman　

Communications ... They are a-Changing

  Ninety percent of the stuff the Postal Service leaves in my mailbox gets thrown into the “paper trash” bin before I get back in my house.  Whatever is important, sooner or later, I will transfer over entirely to my computer as banks and others with whom I have a business relationship are constantly urging me to do.  Certainly when they start charging me to send stuff to that mailbox in front of my house, that I will finally make that change.  At that point, my relationship with the USPS will shrink to practically nothing. Packages and things which must, for some reason or other, be delivered quickly will entirely become the province of Fedex or UPS.  The Postal Service will continue functioning as the prime distriibutor of unwanted advertisements and solicitations at dirt cheap rates, subsidized by you and me.  (Fedex and UPS won't be subsidized in that manner.)

Next on the list of things which will have to go is my "landline" traditional telephone.  Again, the vast majority of the calls which come in, especially during an election year, are totally unwanted and unwelcome.  Sadly, my telephones have the capacity to block only twenty callers’ numbers.  I wish that number were expanded five-fold!   (When I  stop to think about it, the only reason I have that phone anyway is because it is a necessary adjunct  to my burglar alarm system, but advances in  technology may soon change that.)

But if I dump my telephone into the same garbage bin into which I actually eventually may be be dumping my outdoor mailbox, how will I communicate by talking with those I actually want to talk to?  The answer is the texting function on one’s smart phone.  (Everyone will eventually be required to have a smart phone.  There might even be an IRS penalty for those who do not, encouraging everyone to have one, and lowering their cost for all purchasers.  Sound familiar?)

If I actually want to speak to someone, or someone wants to speak to me by exercising our vocal cords and ears, a text message announcing that should suffice. “Please call me back.” Then, one can choose to call back on one’s smart phone, reply by texting or simply ignore the request to talk.  That seems to be the way recent generations are operating already.  The key to success in this area is to keep advertisers away from texting, a task becoming more and more difficult because smart phones also are useful as devices with which to access the internet which is already contaminated by advertising.  Regulations of some sort will be necessary to keep texting a viable garbage-free option.

JL                                      

I Can Play the "Innuendo" Game Too

In an earlier blog posting, I discussed the use of “innuendo” by Donald Trump in attacking Hillary Clinton by implying things which probably have no basis in fact.  He often prefaces such "innuendo" with disclaimers such as "people are telling me" removing him from responsibility for what he is saying, but then goes on to exploit the undocumented information anyway.  At this time, I am going to engage in some “innuendo” of my own directed at Donald Trump by asking the question of whether he might have an eye problem?  Does he? You decide!

Every time Dangerous Donald Trump appears at an outdoor daytime rally, he wears one of those “Make America Great” baseball caps which shade his eyes from the bright sunlight.  But at his indoor events, where his campaign has control of the lighting, he does not wear one.  At those indoor events, however, where he cannot control the lighting as was the case with the three debates where he couldn’t wear his cap, he noticeably squints.  There even are things on the internet about this!   Go check them out!  Sometimes the cap looks very much out of place with his business suit , but could his wearing it be a medical necessity? 

        

Sensitivity to light, which can cause squinting, is known as photophobia.  The web site of the American Academy of Opthalomology lists the following disorders which might be associated with light sensitivity.  

I am not implying that Donald Trump suffers from any of these impairments, but squinting as he was doing during the debates can be a symptom of all of them.

Ocular

• Dry eye
• Corneal diseases
• Uveitis
• Blepharitis
• Conjunctivitis
• Iritis
• Asthenopia
• Keratoconjunctivitis
• Retinal disease (e.g., cone dystrophy, retinitis pigmentosa)
• Vitreous disease
• Optic neuritis
• Papilledema

Non-ocular

• Migraine
• Blepharospasm
• Depression
• Head injury
• Meningitis
• Pituitary tumors
• Subarachnoid hemorrhage

See, by the use of "innuendo" I have perhaps put some ideas into your head which may or may not have any basis in fact.  If Dangerous Donald Trump can do this, so can I.  And that is why much of what the Republicans are saying about Hillary Clinton is not worth the paper it is written on nor the TV time bought to disseminate it, anymore than my baseless suggestion that Donald Trump has an eye disorder! 

In electing our President, decisions should be based on issues and how well the candidates are prepared and qualified to deal with them!  That's what it's all about.  All else is hogwash.   (Next time I see a farmer, I am going to ask him if anyone ever washes hogs   ...   but it does sound kind of filthy!)
  JL                                  

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