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A Caution! - (Repeated from earlier Jackspotpourri postings) … but with a very significant revision today!
Make of this what you wish: In today's political climate, it might be personally dangerous to write specifically about certain topics, and all members of the staff (at present, just me) at Jackspotpourri are aware of that. No one wants the DOJ chasing after them, and lawyers are expensive. Sometimes leaving certain things 'unsaid' can be more effective than saying them. We must learn to 'read between the lines.'
JL
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| Where the Department of Defense lives |
A Big Change
In most of the recent Jackspotpourri postings, I have suggested that we ‘abide,’ meaning to ‘endure adversity, but not yield to it.’ Well, the time for that message has passed!
You might recall my specifically not including a posting by Michael Moore because I then felt it approached the kind of thinking better left ‘unsaid.’ Well, I am changing my mind.
Here is the pertinent portion of Moore’s February 14 posting concerning President Trump that I thought was better left ‘unsaid’ a week ago:
‘A big clue to his (Trump’s) awakening might be when he sees the Joint Chiefs of Staff entering the White House with armed MPs and officers of the court. “Oops,” his miniaturized brain will say to itself. “Uhh, these guys look like they mean business. Somebody call Roy Cohn!’ (You can read the entire posting by copying and pasting https://www.michaelmoore.com/p/overwhelm-overreach-overthrown on your browser line or by CLICKING HERE.)
It is almost as if the president had read Moore’s posting and decided he better take care of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and quickly! So he fired their head and ‘retired’ some of its members, and got rid of some of the military’s legal officers at the same time. That crossed the Red Line that I described in the last posting of Jackspotpourri.
Adding the military to his existing control of the Department of Justice, the FBI, and our intelligence services, gives Trump’s Executive branch unlimited police power it should not have. It destroys the checks and balances built into our Constitution. Neutralizing the military is a routine tactic of dictators when they attempt to seize full power. Seig Heil, they saluted in Germany … or else.
(That act is far more significant than the Supreme Court’s anticipated February 26 action on the firing of the head of the Office of Legal Counsel, an agency that regulates ‘whistleblowers,’ whose dismissal is being held up by a lower court. I had indicated that situation to be a potentially uncrossable Red Line but Trump’s intrusion into the military is far more serious.)
And that will result in a major change in focus here on Jackspotpourri from here on in. The days of ‘enduring adversity, but not yielding to it, ‘Abiding,’ have passed.
IT'S TIME TO STAND UP PROUDLY FOR AMERICA, TO SPEAK OUT LOUDLY FOR DEMOCRACY, AND TO JOIN THE CHORUS OF PROTEST THAT IS SPREADING THROUGHOUT THE LAND!
JL
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Heather is On Target
In her posting dated February 20, Professor Heather Cox Richardson included a column from the Times (the one published in London, not the New York Times) that more or less described what I have repeatedly called ‘Democracy’s Achilles Heel.’ It is worth checking out because the problem persists today among American voters who are misinformed or misled. No one wants to take away their right to vote, but it is important to rid the media of the gross misinformation that has seduced them.
A good sampling of such misinformation is the ‘alternate reality’ believed in by many Trump supporters and is explained in an article by the New York Times’ Peter Baker. CLICK HERE or copy and paste com/2025/02/23/us/politics/trump-alternative-reality.html on your browser line to access it. … and now back to Heather.
Even more alarming is her posting of February 22 that included the following: “Now that Trump has captured the intelligence services, the Justice Department, and the FBI,” military specialist Tom Nichols wrote in The Atlantic, “the military is the last piece he needs to establish the foundations for authoritarian control of the U.S. government.” Well, he has grabbed it !
Richardson included this comment based on Trump having selected a new head for the Joint Chiefs and having ‘retired’ several existing members,’ again prioritizing loyalty to him over competence and experience. It also pushed Jackspotpourri over that Red Line.
Goodbye to ‘Abiding.’ As pointed out above, IT'S TIME TO STAND UP PROUDLY FOR AMERICA, TO SPEAK OUT LOUDLY FOR DEMOCRACY, AND TO JOIN THE CHORUS OF PROTEST THAT IS SPREADING THROUGHOUT THE LAND!
Despite the ringing of these two ‘alarm bells,’ Professor Richardson also documents the clear beginnings of that ‘chorus of protest’ against the President. In her postings dated February 21 and 23, HCR points out that many Americans, including some Democratic governors, and government employees, are now speaking out. With each day, those ‘beginnings’ grow.
If you are not getting Professor Richardson's free daily postings on ‘Letters from an American,’ CLICK HERE or copy and paste https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/ on your browser line. PLEASE READ THEM EVERY DAY!
JL
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Learning From the Past
Those of us living in the United States of America in 2025 have a chance, at least in our minds, to relive history and perhaps learn from it.
If you pay attention to newspapers, magazines, television, and I hope an occasional book, you should know what was happening in Europe, particularly in Germany, during the 1930s. We have the luxury of knowing where the tragic excesses of that period led. Those who were there at the time did not. It was beyond the imagination of most of them.
If you were able to step back in history to that period, knowing what you now know about the freedoms that were lost, about World War Two, about the Holocaust, and about the deaths of millions of innocent people, what steps would you have taken to prevent those things from happening? Would you have had the courage to do the things you saw as necessary?
And if you have answers to these two questions, are you now able to share them with others?
JL
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Separation of Powers in a Democracy
The Declaration of Independence clearly states that all men are created equal, but that doesn’t mean that society recognizes that to be the case. If that ‘equality’ is to be meaningful, and democracy is to exist, there must be a ‘separation of powers’ in government to account for the differing opinions of what government’s role should be.
Ideally, these powers should serve as independent checks and balances on one another, necessary to bring about that ‘equality.’
That’s the way the Constitution of the United States of America is structured with its triad of Legislative, Executive, and Judicial branches.
But when there is an imbalance between these ‘powers,’ and one becomes the servant of another, eventually a ‘readjustment’ is needed, desirably accomplished without violence. (In 1861, violence resulted.)
For example, when an Executive branch dominates the other two branches, as with dictators like Julius Caesar or Caligua in ancient Rome, and many since then, their days are numbered. Few survive permanently.
The English king was once such a ruler, supposedly deriving his powers from God, until they were limited by the Magna Carta in 1215, forced upon him, at least temporarily, by English noblemen. The path from there on through political philosopher John Locke to our Founding Fathers and our Constitution is clear with the ‘rule of law’ emerging triumphant.
Our government’s structure is a good one, but when any part of it threatens its pattern of checks and balances, as is the case in the United States right now with a strong Executive and a subservient Congress …
IT'S TIME TO STAND UP PROUDLY FOR AMERICA, TO SPEAK OUT LOUDLY FOR DEMOCRACY, AND TO JOIN THE CHORUS OF PROTEST THAT IS SPREADING THROUGHOUT THE LAND!
How to accomplish that will be addressed in future postings on Jackspotpourri.
JL
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Housekeeping on Jackspotpourri
Forwarding Postings: Please forward this posting to anyone you think might benefit from reading it (Friends, relatives, enemies, etc.) If you want to send someone the blog, you can just tell them to check it out by visiting https://jackspotpourri.blogspot.com or you can provide a link to that address in your email to them.
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 that blog posting will be forwarded, along with a brief comment from you. Each will receive a link to click on that will directly connect them to the blog. Either way will work, sending them the link to https://jackspotpourri.blogspot.com, or clicking on the envelope at the bottom of this posting.
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.
Again, I urge you to forward this posting to anyone you think might benefit from reading it. Bear in mind that the population of Florida is constantly changing and many newcomers are not familiar with Jackspotpourri.
JL
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