Rep. Kennedy's Democratic Response

Experienced Financial Analyst Warns of Huge Collapse

Well-known financial analyst Jim Rogers is expecting the biggest financial collapse of his life-time in the next few years according to the web site linked to below.  This startling prediction is contained in an interview he gave to Business Insider.

Other experts have been giving similar warnings over the last several years.  The main problem is the increasing appearance of economic "bubbles" which are cropping up again, according to Rogers.

His interview here is filled with historic facts providing context -- and a most urgent warning.  

Experienced Financial Analyst Warns of Impending Economic Collapse

A Useful Corporation Watchdog

The link below takes you to a web site which usefully monitors corporations and their misuse of power.  Though British-based, the web site has much useful information and many resources to help the citizen monitor global corporations.

We live in a time of unprecedented corporate power, with often dire consequences for the earth's people.  If information is power, this web site can help reverse the current flow of power.   

http://www.corporatewatch.org

Staying Abreast

Today I will be up-dating my knowledge of current events.  I will have more to say later.

In the meantime, I am almost finished with Move Fast and Break Things, a path-breaking work by Jonathan Taplin.  This is a book which is difficult to over-praise, what with its ample research and breadth of understanding regarding the underminers of democracy.  About this, too, I will have more to say soon.

Move fast and reconstruct things? 

Have Transgender Advocates Gone Too Far?

 This subject is not one I would have been likely to deal with in the past.  However, as transgender advocates have moved into the public schools to lecture to students reportedly as young as elementary age, it is appropriate to begin to examine this issue more closely.

Personally, I am for the maximum freedom for most people, excluding the harming of others or oneself.  In this particular rather narrow case it appears harm has been done.  You are invited to see for yourself in the following brief example.

Born a boy, Patrick Mitchell spent the past two years living as a girl after being diagnosed with gender dysphoria. Then six months ago, the unthinkable happened - 14-year-old Patrick changed his mind. Full story: https://t.co/8wZoArDsne #60Mins pic.twitter.com/yOV2lSJxRY

— 60 Minutes Australia (@60Mins) January 15, 2018

Greek Church Condemns Racism; Joins Conference

Photo of The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King at link below

The Greek Orthodox Church in America has joined with other Christians in condemning racism in America and around the world.  They have  joined with numerous other Christian churches in a new effort to oppose racism.   There is more information at the link below.

On this national holiday honoring Rev. King, his message is more pertinent -- and urgent --than ever.   


Greek Church Condemns Racism

Saturday Poetry

SONG OF MYSELF

by 

Walt Whitman

                    1

I celebrate myself, and sing myself,
And what I assume you shall assume,
For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you,
I loaf and invite my soul,
I lean and loaf at my ease observing a spear of summer grass.
My tongue, every atom of my blood, formed from this soil, this air,
Born here of parents born here from parents the same, and their parents the same,
I, now thirty-seven years old in perfect health begin,
Hoping to cease not till death.
Creeds and schools in abeyance,
Retiring back awhile sufficed at what they are, but never forgotten,
I harbor for good or bad, I permit to speak at every hazard,
Nature without check with original energy. 


excerpt from "Song of Myself" by Walt Whitman (1819-1892)

Progress for Workers

Quick Link --

New York City has come up with an innovative way to support workers' right to organize -- by making it easier to join non-union organizations which advocate for higher wages and benefits.  This appears to be a major advance for workers.   
 

The New York Times article:
Progress for Workers

Is There an Intelligent Choice on Marijuana Policy?

As the federal Department of Justice announces U. S. attorneys will no longer look the other way in states which have legalized recreational marijuana use, the rational individual looks for a smart alternative.  Is there an approach other than legalization on the one hand, and going after individual users on the other?

The people at an organization called Smart Approaches to Marijuana say yes.  You can read more about there mission at the link below.

Surely, we do not need another "Big Tobacco" in this country.  And recreational marijuana use does, afterall, involve smoking -- an activity which is not healthy no matter what you put in the pipe.  


A Smarter Choice on Marijuana?

The Importance of Study

 

As one might guess, study and scholarship were a strong suit of mine in school.  I actually enjoyed learning facts.   My favorite subjects other than music were English and History.  I also managed to get enjoyment out of chemistry and math. 

In recent years, interest in facts has not been particularly popular in many circles.  This is changing.  We are finding out that a disdain for facts can lead to trouble, no matter how much bravado one enters into the habit of truth-denying.  It is, after all, easier to deny truth than to have to think about the facts.  And especially if the facts are inconvenient, it is ever so easy to simply change them in one's mind.

But Truth or whatever we might call it, does object.  And inasmuch as truth is an inherent part of the world, people of the world will notice, later if not sooner. 

The difficulties of the current Administration in Washington points this up.  So it can be predicted credibly that Truth will once again come to be valued.  We can only hope this change will come about with as little pain as possible.  


-- TMP  


Photo: Public Domain Pictures

Saturday Inspiration

In the Bleak Midwinter

by

Christina Rosetti

In the bleak midwinter, frosty wind made moan,

   earth stood hard as iron, water like a stone;

   snow had fallen, snow on snow, snow on snow,

   in the bleak midwinter, long ago.

Our God, heaven cannot hold him, nor earth sustain;

   heaven and earth shall flee away when he comes to reign:

   in the bleak midwinter a stable-place sufficed

   the Lord God incarnate, Jesus Christ.

Angels and archangels may have gathered there,

   cherubim and seraphim thronged the air;

   but his mother only, in her maiden bliss,

   worshiped the beloved with a kiss. 

What can I give him, poor as I am?

If I were a shepherd, I would bring a lamb;

   if I were a wise man, I would do my part;

   yet what I can I give him, give my heart.

 

  

 

How Internet Companies are Ruining Our Democracy

I think people should carefully re-read the first part of the Declaration of Independence.  Because I think sometimes we as a society start to get confused and think that we have a right to happiness.  But if you read the Declaration of Independence, it talks about "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness."   Nobody has a right to happiness.   You should have a right to pursue it, and I think the core of that is liberty.   

                  
                                                     -- Jeff Bezos


 This is, in a word, ignorant.   A more complete excerpt, including the complete sentence which contains the phrase quoted above is the following:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. 

It is clear from this fuller excerpt that the Declaration of Indepence does assert through implication that citizens have a right to happiness.   If there is no such thing as happiness, why guarantee a right to pursue it?  Thus Bezos' claim is illogical, a non sequitur.  This is easy to see from a careful reading.  More important, can anyone claim that people are happy with the system they now have?   

Jonathan Taplin's 2017 book Move Fast and Break Things. How Facebook, Google, and Amazon Cornered Culture and Undermined Democracy, gives a certain history which I have read nowhere else.  It is an important history, a history which is critical to the understanding of why we are where we are now.  

Although clearly there are antecedents to the ascendant dominance of the Internet over culture and its concomittant victory over democracy, Taplin's book usefully describes how the way the Internet has developed has indeed helped to undermine our democracy.   The book is highly recommended for its readability and credibility.

 

How to Thwart Authoritarianism

At this time of electoral victories for Democrats it is wise to remember who  -- and what kind of President -- sits in the Oval Office.  The article shown below was written by a Pole who has faced an increasingly authoritarian regime in his country.  His warnings are most apropos.

Another writer has said it is shocking that only six Democrats have called for the resignation of Trump.  Who knows?  -- perhaps they are thinking of the theocrat Pence ascending to the Presidency and want to prevent that.

But while OML is still in the White House, the American democracy remains under duress.  While I believe the democracy is going to survive, it is going to take work to bring down the plutocrats.   A good question to ask is:  How did such a sycophantic neophyte ever get himself declared "President" in the first place? 


Guide to Thwarting an Authoritarian Regime


N.B.   "OML" stands for Our Military Leader.  This reminds us that a dangerous incompetent still has putative authority over the USA's massively powerful war-making machinery.  

American Pai?

What should we expect from the illicit current administration but a stealth job from its FCC chairman against net neutrality?  The article referenced below helps show why the illegitimate FCC is poised to destroy net neutrality. 

This is un-American.  This is ugly.  This is -- as I say -- illegitimate. 



Far From Humble Pai

Election Hijinx A-Brewin' in Alabama

This is not just conjectural.  Following the link below will take you to a Greg Palast investigative report on nine methods of vote suppression being used by Republicans in Alabama.  And, yes, this the new Republican party of accused -- well -- you know what.  


Is the Fix In -- In Alabama?