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The
Floridian Tragedy – Where Freedom Goes to Die
Voter apathy in Florida has enabled fascist-leaning foes of democracy to maintain control of its governorship and its State legislature. As do all autocratic governments, they have passed laws criminalizing efforts to increase voter participation. Organized voter registration drives are now risky, potentially illegal, endeavors and are disappearing in the Sunslime (not a typo) State. What can you do about it in the face of these anti-voter actions? It’s simple.
(1)
Register to vote if you’ve not already done so. In Palm Beach County, the
Supervisor of Elections can be reached at (561)
656-6200 or online at VotePalmBeach.gov.
(2)
Sign up to have a vote-by-mail ballot sent to your home for the 2024 election,
and
(3)
urge your friends, relatives, and neighbors to do the same.
It doesn’t matter if you
do not fully agree with the candidates or parties opposing the fascist-leaning
foes of democracy running the State from Tallahassee. Bite the
bullet and support them, anyway.
Skipping voting is not an alternative! Doing so makes you an ally
of the foes of democracy.
Start doing the job that
groups dedicated to voters’ rights have been prevented from continuing to do by
the foes of democracy entrenched in Florida’s State government. In situations where voters encounter
difficulty, they can contact ‘Common Cause Florida’s Election Protection
Hotline’ at 866-OUR-VOTE.
This is the way to dig our
way out of the mess into which voter apathy has mired us. It is up to
you. Remember that if you are not part of the solution, you are
part of the problem.
JL
* * *
Why Not Treat a Witch
Hunt like a Witch Hunt?
For those of you who,
along with the defeated former president, feel that the ongoing criminal
investigations (attempting to get votes changed in
Georgia, unlawful handling of government documents after leaving office,
inspiring the Capitol attack to delay the counting of electoral votes, paying
‘hush money’ in New York to silence someone during an election campaign) are
merely thinly veiled ‘witch hunts’ designed to discredit both his reputation
and possible future campaigns to regain the presidency, I have a
solution!
Anyone who believes in
that ‘witch hunt’ theory, including the defeated former president, should
insist on his being tested the way suspected witches were tested in the Middle
Ages and in the early days of the American colonies. That way could
quickly prove his innocence.
The
defeated former president should be seated in a chair and dunked into a deep
body of water. If he
sinks to the bottom, that is historically taken as
proof of innocence, the theory being that someone already possessing the virtue
of having already been dunked during their baptism, or having gone through a
similar redeeming experience, need not be dunked a second time, he
should be adjudged not to be a witch, assuming he would be lifted out of the
water before drowning.
If the
chair's occupant floats, however, an indication that he
was not ever properly baptized, or not having gone through a similar redeeming
experience, that should confirm that he is indeed a witch, and
appropriate punishment should be meted out. If this was good enough for
seventeenth century settlers in the Massachusetts Bay colony, it ought to
suffice for the defeated former president and his adherents.
Of course, this being the
twenty-first century, EMT personnel should be available to fish him out of the
water if necessary, as well as a judge to confirm or deny that the ‘witch hunt’
had indeed located, or failed to locate, a witch. In olden times, those
who sunk to the bottom were released if rescued before drowning, as not being
witches. Those who floated on top, however, were executed as witches after
being dried off with towels.
Or should the defeated
former president, if indicted in any of the cases mentioned above, forget about
the ‘witch hunt’ defense and just count on a jury reaching a just verdict.
We are a nation based on laws, not on ‘witch hunts.’
JL
* * *
Journalism and
History
The other evening on MSNBC’s ‘Beat’ program at 6:00 p.m., host Ari Melber was interviewing New Yorker magazine editor David Remnick (who just wrote a book that was being plugged), and it was mentioned in passing that ‘Journalism is the rough draft of history.’
I had never heard that expression before and in checking it
out, found that it originated with former Washington Post editor, Philip Graham
in 2010. When you stop and think about it, you will note how much of our
history is developed from journalism. Going back to the nation’s founding, both
the writings of Thomas Paine and the Federalist Papers might have started as
journalism once, but now they are part of American History. Without them,
history might have been different.
That is why the demise of so many American newspapers, and the mergers of many that manage to survive, is so tragic. Without their reporting, history can stand still, and that is often the intention of those who have a dim view of making certain the people are kept informed about what is, and what is not, in their interest. If you believe in history, cherish journalism. Subscribe to a newspaper today!
JL
*
* *
Dangers of Artificial
Intelligence
News media has been filled lately with articles warning us
of the threat posed by the growth of Artificial Intelligence. Some
experts in the field fear it can even lead to the extinction of the human race,
at least as we know it. All of the data out there in cyberspace is
available to be accessed and harvested by Artificial Intelligence. All of
it.
To get a feel for the infinite extent of this data, use a
search engine like Google to check on anything you choose. Anything!
Scientific, Literary, Political, Whatever! You can spend days if not a
lifetime checking out the results of just one search. And Artificial
Intelligence accomplishes that in an instant.
Concern of those who know it best, its developers, that
such activity might occur without human initiation, human interference, or
human participation is frightening. And you or I, or whoever originally
input the data ‘A.I.’ captures, would never know what Artificial Intelligence
is doing with it.
Think for a moment. Did I really make this comment that you
are presently reading? Or post this blog? Or is it the product of
what we call ‘A.I.’? How do you know? Are you sure? Can you
take my word for it?
Let’s not get too receptive to using Artificial
Intelligence until human intelligence has a strong leash on it, strong enough
to prevent it striking off on its own for unknown purposes.
JL
* * * *
Housekeeping
on the Blog
Email
Alerts: If you
are NOT receiving emails from me alerting you each time there is a new posting
on Jackspotpourri, just send me your email address and we’ll see that you do. And if
you are forwarding a posting to someone, you might suggest that they do the
same, so they will be similarly alerted. (You
can pass those email addresses to me by email at jacklippman18@gmail.com .
)
Forwarding
Postings: Please
forward this posting to anyone you think might benefit from reading it.
If you want to send someone the blog, exactly as you are now seeing it, with all of its bells and whistles, you can just tell folks to check it out by visiting https://jackspotpourri.blogspot.com, or by providing a link to that address in your email to them. I think this is the best method of forwarding Jackspotpourri.
There’s
another, perhaps easier, method of forwarding it though! Google
Blogspot, the platform on which Jackspotpourri is prepared, makes that
possible. If you click on the tiny envelope with the arrow at the bottom
of every posting, you will have the opportunity to list up to ten email
addresses to which the blog will be forwarded, along with a comment from you.
Each will receive a link to the textual
portion only of the blog that you now are reading, but without the
illustrations, colors, variations in typography, or the ‘sidebar’ features such
as access to the blog’s archives.
Either way will work, sending them the link to https://jackspotpourri.blogspot.com, or clicking on the envelope at the bottom of this posting, but I recommend sending them the link.
Again,
I urge you to forward this posting to anyone you think might benefit from
reading it.
Have a
nice day!
* * *
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