Sleeping With Dogs, A George Will Column, Fox News' Bias, Immigrants and Epstein's Suicide

Don’t Sleep with Dogs

Charlottesville, Two Years Ago

A frequent accusation made in political campaigns is that "if you sleep with dogs, you get fleas.”  President Trump’s dalliance with white nationalist racism, which has led to bloodshed because of our *preposterous gun laws, falls into this category.  Even if one accepts his claim that he is not a racist, his support by them, whereby they use his rhetoric to justify their violence, contaminates him.  He sleeps with dogs.  He has fleas.

"AOC"

On the other side of the coin, right wingers (just watch Fox News) think the Democratic Party, which includes some far-left progressives, has been similarly contaminated.  Not so!  For example, Alexandria Octavia-Lopez hasn’t shot anyone, and the ‘socialist’ leanings attributed to her are in the American tradition of Social Security, Medicare, and other government programs for the benefit of the people.  Many of the folks in Appalachia get their electricity from the TVA, a ‘socialist’ power program dating from Franklin Roosevelt’s ‘New Deal’ (yet they always vote Republican).  No, there is no valid Democratic comparison to be made to the bedmates found in the Trumpublican doghouse, a few of whom are pictured top left. 

* and as I said a few postings back, we ought to get it over with and repeal the Second Amendment and replace it with something more in line with today's challenges.  Remember that violent video games, mental disorders, illegal access to weapons for ‘bad guys’ and ‘loose’ security at schools and public places are all present in many countries in the world, just like in the United States.  But the level of gun violence in almost all such countries is far, far below that in the United States.  That is because they recognize the one key factor which must be regulated to reduce gun violence.  Guns!  We fail to do that.  That is why I am for repeal of the Second Amendment.  It is that simple.

Jack Lippman

A George Will Column Worth Treasuring

This might be a good moment to check out a column written by the Washington Post’s George Will on April 5.  CLICK HERE TO READ IT.  Hopefully a few Trumpublicans, remembering who Will is, will also manage to do so (although not from this blog which they don’t read). 

JL

Fox News – Unfair and Biased

Biden in Iowa

And speaking of Fox News, their reporting on Joe Biden in Iowa is particularly biased, stressing every pause, hesitation and grammatical flaw he might make, rather than what he is saying.  We all cannot be snake oil salesmen like the unethical real estate peddler and pompous TV reality show host who is all showmanship and no substance whom Fox News hustles for 24/7!  

After ‘covering’ Biden in Iowa, Fox included a clip of Trump indicating that Biden, like Robert Mueller, was “losing it.”  Donald J. Trump never had “it” to start with and probably doesn’t even know what “it” is.  I urge you all to watch Fox News for at least an hour a day.  Know the opposition!  I must caution those with elevated blood pressure not to watch Sean Hannity, Tucker Carlson nor Laura Ingraham.  It might prove damaging to your health.

JL

Jeffrey Epstein’s Suicide

Site of  Epstein Suicide

And now getting to the late Jeffrey Epstein who committed suicide in his cell the other morning.  If this happened in Russia or North Korea, would you believe it?  I would have my doubts.  But it happened in a Federal detention facility in New York City in the United States of America, so I believe it. 

In any suicide, investigators also try to rule out homicide.  This should be easy to do in Epstein’s case since it appears he was found hanging, despite the fact that there were many individuals, some now breathing sighs of relief, who feared that in Epstein’s court proceedings he would willingly or otherwise expose their participation in his sordid activities. I am sure that right now, investigators and reporters are busily compiling lists of such individuals.  They would be negligent if they did not.

But clearly, from all that I’ve read in the media, it was an act of suicide.  Indeed, Epstein had been on a ‘suicide watch’ in the facility for a while because of a possible earlier abortive attempt, which would seem to indicate that quite likely, suicide was on his mind.  Authorities were certainly aware of this and watching him to some extent, but just as his 2008 incarceration in Palm Beach County was made comfortably easy for him, his suicide might have been made easier and facilitated by eyes that were looking in another direction at the wrong, or was it at the right, time.  Accidently?  Intentionally?  There are going to be investigations, ultimately a few books written and of course a film directed by Quentin Tarantino.  (And the victims' lawsuits will go on for years ... which they must.)

JL

And on the Immigration Frontline

Here's the text of a letter I’ve sent off to the Palm Beach Post:

”In response to the letter (Sunday, 8/11) disputing a comparison to 1930’s Germany, there is a frightening similarity between how Germany’s Jews reacted to an unexpected knock at their doors in those sad days and how some Mexican-Americans react today to a similar knock at their doors." 

And in related events, the raiding of meat packing plants in Mississippi resulting in the arrest of 680 undocumented (or illegally documented) workers should have been accompanied by the arrest of the plants’ local and corporate management as well. 

The site of one of the raids

Having a few such illegal workers is understandable, but employing hundreds is not.  These workers would not have been working there if their employers hadn’t broken the law by hiring them, and the feeble excuse that the workers presented forged documents is only an acceptable one to those who wanted to hire them in the first place.  They had to have known.
JL

Online Voter Registration

Know any Floridians one who are NOT registered voters?   Refer them to a web site where they can complete the registration process online!    Every vote counts.  https://registertovoteflorida.gov/en/Registration/Index   

ALSO, YOU CAN CLICK HERE TO GET THERE.

And if you are not in Florida, do the same thing wherever you live.  It’s all on the Internet somewhere!

JL