Rand Paul giving himself too much credit if he thinks people have to be paid to dislike him

 

Now for a brief spasm of “comic” relief. This past Thursday night, Kentucky Republican Senator Rand Paul found himself surrounded by protesters as he was leaving the White House, after Donald Trump gave his nomination acceptance speech. Paul was apparently “shocked” that people actually knew who he was and might even dislike things he has said or done. On Friday he told Fox News that "I believe there are going to be people who were involved with the attack on us that actually were paid to come here and are not from Washington, D.C., and are sort of paid to be anarchists. The FBI needs to investigate but the only way you can do it is you have to arrest people."

It is rather ironic that Paul used the term “anarchist,” because that is what some on the right have accused him of being. Trump, of course, chimed-in about the protesters who were not “friendly,” but “a bunch of thugs.” Aside from the fact that protesters are not feeling “friendly” about Trump and his familiars these days, Trump as always went too far, claiming that Paul would have been in “very bad shape, or dead” if policeman “didn’t happen to be there.” Yet being typical Trump, he had to criticize even the police there, claiming that the Washington DC mayor had given them “bad instructions,” without explaining what he meant.

You know that someone of far-right ideology has a rather inflated opinion of himself when he thinks that people have to be paid to dislike him. The speech Paul had given in support of Trump was both bizarre and naïve. Three-quarters of it had to do with getting out of war zones; most people do not like war, but the majority who tend to be are on the right side of the political equation. But it is a vicious lie to claim that Trump’s “America First” foreign policy will make the U.S. “safer” from dangerous international entanglements—especially with someone the Washington Post is calling the “worst Secretary of State in our history,” Mike Pompeo.

Trump has abandoned our allies in their quest to create a unified front against rogue players—particularly Russia—and in doing so, vacating whatever say we have in world affairs. Who will listen to us? Even now, European leaders are being forced to work together to find ways to “contain” the damage being done by Trump’s either looking the other way, or worse, encouraging the activities of rogue dictators. Trump’s failure to show resolve in the face of anti-democratic threats has only made the world a more dangerous place—and has weakened the U.S.’ ability to keep potential threats from occurring. The Trump administration has not hyped its “peace deal” with the Taliban as “historic,” and why should it? The Taliban still refuses to renounce its support of Al-Qaeda. Didn’t this country go to war in Afghanistan to eliminate the Al-Qaeda threat in the first place?

In the other parts of his speech, Paul hyped enthusiastic about the 2017 tax cut for the rich, and was just as enthusiastic about his own health care “brainchild,” something he calls “association health plans.” These plans are hardly a “new” idea—in fact in the past they have been referred to as “mini-medical” plans, not real health insurance, but just providing “income replacement.” Yes they are “cheaper,” and as one might expect, you get what you pay for. Naturally there is no guarantee of coverage for pre-existing conditions, they are not “comprehensive,” they generally pay only small lump sums for benefits, forcing people to pay the “balance”—meaning most of the medical costs. These plans have no consumer protections, premiums rise considerably based on age, and “insurers” have been accused of fraudulent practices, such as refusing to pay for even “covered” procedures, to maintain profit margins. Paul’s “plans” are only for young people who think they will never get sick, fall off a ladder or get into a serious car accident. Or, for that matter, be infected by the COVID-19; Paul, by the way, was the first U.S. Senator to be infected by the virus, so he isn’t exactly the person we should be seeking medical advice from anyways.

Of course you know that someone whose “namesake” is Ayn Rand has serious flaws in his character. Rand was a Russian-Jewish immigrant whose “philosophy” has been accused by the right as espousing an extreme form of “libertarianism” that is little differentiated from “anarchy,’ and by the left for her enthusiasm for eugenics theories, caste systems and “supermen” who crush all before them underfoot; basically, Rand was an adherent of the “law of the jungle,” and her most ardent adherents seem not to realize that in her vision of the world, most of them would not be fit to live. Paul’s support for rescinding the 1994 crime bill, with its mandatory sentences that filled prisons with non-violent drug users who were mostly minorities, should be seen as part of his “libertarian” views on drug use, but some may note the incongruity of this with the “law and order” rhetoric we are hearing now, which suggests that we should “re-fill” the prisons with these “violent protesters.”

Paul rode to election to the U.S. Senate on the “Tea Party” wave, despite the fact he had many bizarre beliefs he inherited from his father, Ron Paul—or maybe because of them. For one thing, he was an opponent of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, and he believed that employers had a “right” to discriminate against anyone they wanted for any reason. Paul opposed the Fair Housing Act, telling the Bowling Green Daily News that a “free society” should allow even “hate-filled groups to exclude people based on skin color.” You know, the media should be revealing more of these kind of “anecdotes” about Paul so that people actually know that there are very good reasons to dislike him. Although he eventually claimed he wouldn’t support rescinding the 1964 Act, that doesn’t mean he still doesn’t dislike it. Paul infamously single-handedly put a hold on the passage of the recent anti-lynching law, making bizarre claims about it punishing “cuts” and “bruises,” ignoring the law’s explicit reference to the hate crimes statute in the 1968 Civil Rights Act.

Paul has also espoused eye-popping views on border security and gun rights, and his “anti-war” posturing seems to run counter to his view that the United Nations is some sort of rogue outfit whose principle purpose to emasculate this country, which it has somehow failed to do in its 75 years of existence. In fact the UN has been used in the past by the U.S. to assist it in “punishing” other countries with sanctions, like North Korea, Iran and Iraq. Paul’s claim that the UN—in seeking to end the proliferation of arms to international hotspots—was actually seeking to “disarm” the U.S., which of course was typical Second Amendment  paranoia, and was typical of Paul exposing himself as having an almost juvenile grasp of the world. He is like a child who wants to play with no rules—except, of course, when he needs “rules” to protect himself from those protesters.

Does Trump really "love" this country?

 

Documentary filmmaker Michael Moore has come out and said what needs to be said: That Trump voters seem to be more “energized” to get out and vote for their candidate, while voters leaning toward Joe Biden seem less enthusiastic. While Biden may be ahead in the polls at the moment, a majority of voters still think that Trump will win reelection. How can this be, unless, there is a clear “enthusiasm” gap with their candidate? The problem with Biden, I think, is that he just isn’t angry enough  about what Trump is doing to this country like, say, Bernie Sanders. People who are angry have that adrenaline rush that focuses the mind, and I just don’t see that coming from Biden. Perhaps it will come when or if he debates Trump and is confronted with Trump’s outrageous lies and misrepresentations; we can only hope.

For the diehard anti-Trump voter, it is simply incomprehensible that having survived four years of Trump, why anyone could think the country could survive another four years of him. Yet the problem seems to be that for many white voters, even if they dislike Trump personally, they don’t really see him as a “threat” to their own lives, but only for the “others”—i.e., minorities, and especially immigrants. They may not want him to win in November, but if he does, it is no skin off their backs; others will suffer, not themselves.

There is one question voters must ask themselves when they vote in this election: Does Trump actually “love” this country, or does he only “love” what this country has done for him, which among many other things is to look the other way when he has defrauded partners in his numerous failed business dealings and bankruptcies, or to look the other way when he has committed financial crimes, such as falsifying financial statements to either get billions in loans, or to avoid paying his fair share of taxes?

The questions voters need ask themselves about Trump should include the following:

If Trump “loves” this country, then why has he continuously downplayed the COVID-19 threat, allowing it to spread across the entire country and kill close to 200,000 people (“officially”) and force agencies like the CDC and the Department of Health and Human Services—which are supposed to be protecting the people from the danger—to dilute the threat and deliberately seek to alter the numbers for the political benefit of Trump?

If Trump “loves” this country, then why did he allow, because of his failure to act promptly and decisively on the COVID-19, tens of millions of people to lose their jobs—many of them permanently because of 100,000 small businesses permanently closed and larger ones going into bankruptcy? Forbes is claiming that 42 percent of jobs lost because of the pandemic are lost “forever.”

If Trump “loves” this country, then why has he deliberately pitted American against American, destroying any recognition of shared goals or a common vision? Why is it that for Republicans it is always “us” against “them,” while Democrats are decried for having the gall to include “them” into the fabric of American existence?

If Trump “loves” this country, then why is he (and Tucker Carlson) inciting and/or justifying violence by “avid” supporters like Kyle Rittenhouse and Patrick Crusius? Crusius has the gall to plead “not guilty” for the El Paso massacre, claiming he was in a “psychotic” state; the question is, whose constant racist rhetoric against Hispanics brought on this “psychotic episode”?

If Trump “loves” this country, then how can he claim the “higher” moral ground after pardoning Dwight and Steven Hammond, accused of starting illegal fires on a federal wildlife refuge to cover-up their illegal deer poaching, which subsequently “inspired” Ammon Bundy to expose himself to be the radical anti-government militia gangster he was when he and an armed group commandeered the refuge, claiming that the U.S. government had no “right” to the land, and at the same time insisting that thugs like themselves could deny the people of this country the right to enjoy nature as it was meant to be. As the BBC reported at the time of the pardons, “The president stands with right-wing militias in their disputes with the government.”

If Trump “loves” this country, then why is he selling this country out to Russian interests everywhere in the world? The recent incident in Syria where U.S. troops were injured when a Russian military vehicle deliberately rammed into an American military vehicle shows that Vladimir Putin believes he can push Trump around—which is why Russia continues its election interference in support of Trump. In fact, Trump seems bound and determined to surrender the U.S.’ leadership role as a bastion of democracy by cozying up to dictators and abandoning our allies, camouflaged as a foolhardy “America First” policy.

If Trump “loves” this country, then why is he denying its creed as a refuge for asylum seekers wishing to escape violence and poverty—much of it caused by the insatiable American greed for illegal drugs? Since when is being a “white nationalist” something to be “proud” of, instead of being shunned as a radical fringe of the racist right? Since when is demonizing and dehumanizing whole groups of people a "Christian" trait?

If Trump “loves” this country, then why did he void the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal, which would have reduced the signatories’ dependence on Chinese goods? Instead, Trump’s tariffs and so-called “phase one” trade “deal” have done nothing to reduce U.S. dependence on Chinese goods or induce domestic manufacturing or increase exports of agricultural products; in fact, the U.S. trade deficit with China has only returned to previous high levels.

If Trump “loves” this country, then why was his promise of massive infrastructure investment such a massive fraud? Following his massive tax giveaway to the rich in 2017, his 2018 “plan” called for 80 percent funding by the private sector, to be paid for by cash-strapped state and local governments. His 2019 “plan” was contingent on the House stop investigating his crimes and ending the impeachment inquiry.

If Trump “loves” this country, then why has he rolled back nearly 100 environmental rules and regulations, completely mindless of the fact that this country’s heritage is not just about the people in it, but “for spacious skies, for amber waves of grain, for purple mountain majesties, above the fruited plain.”

And if Trump “loves” this country, then why has he made a mockery of the words “America! America! God shed his grace on thee. And crown thy good with brotherhood from sea to shining sea!” Why would any “god” shed “grace” on a country that allows a “Fuhrer” wannabe to work out his fascist tendencies?  Peace will only return to this country on the day the Trump Era is defeated and remanded to its dark place in this nation’s history—and we can only pray that this happens this November.

Fox News' false "narrative" of vigilante killer is the kind of fascist propaganda we can only hope sinks with Trump in November

 

It has been noted that viewership of the Democratic National Convention through the first three days surpassed that of its Republican counterpart by a substantial number, and is unlikely to be overcome much after Donald Trump’s long, boring reading from his teleprompter on Thursday, as usually happens when he struggles to read and get all the words pronounced correctly. Trump recited his “accomplishments,” which were only “considerable” if you think that the words “subtraction” and “substantial” actually mean the same thing, and not just the kind of misspelling or mispronunciation that Trump is prone to do. Does Trump really take the majority of voters to be that stupid? One million new unemployed, 27 million still filing for some form of jobless assistance. COVID-19 numbers might have slowed down, but they also did so in May before the summer explosion. What will happen this fall? Trump can’t keep blaming Joe Biden for everything when he isn’t even president yet, and Trump still is.

While Fox News’ coverage of the Republican Convention is still well above its usual average, but almost half of the convention’s total viewership—meaning that most of the rest of America have essentially tuned out. And why should most Americans bother with the lies and deliberate misinformation and total absence of empathy for or even recognition of people who are suffering under the Trump regime?

Thus it doesn’t seem particularly “odd” that there would be a roundtable “news” program that calls itself “Outnumbered” on the cable news station which has the highest viewership, and where rational opinion and fact-based journalism is at a premium. I’m sure that Chris Wallace takes some pride in being the “outnumbered” person in the room at Fox News, but it must also be frustrating dealing with colleagues who say mindless things, and then deny they even said them, or insist that their words were “misunderstood.”

In “justifying” Kyle Rittenhouse’s one-man vigilante spree in Kenosha, Katie Pavlich asserted that "When it comes to how do you stop this and why people are doing what they're doing, you're making a choice as a leader not to stop riots at the beginning, This is the choice leaders are making not to stop the violence initially…on the argument of vigilante justice, when you have no police around to defend businesses and people who are being attacked and their livelihoods burned to the ground, then there is a void that is filled."

Actually, there were police around; they just weren’t doing much except telling people to disperse. Breaking  down Pavlich’s statement, she is clearly saying that in the alleged absence of “leadership” and policing “initially,” then there is “a void that is filled” by vigilantes like Rittenhouse. Co-host Melissa Francis responded "That's a great point. The vigilantes are just as much the fault of those local leaders who have failed so miserably." What is being said here? That there wouldn’t be any vigilantes going around shooting random people if “leaders” acted just as irrationally?

Wallace, who had decried violent protest, was nonetheless shocked by the “implication " that somehow vigilante “justice” was “understandable” and even “justified” by an absence of heavy-handed police action. Both Francis and Pavlich played dumb, insisting that they didn’t say what they had just said on live television.  Wallace, amazed at the “disconnect” between what was said and what was “meant,” insisted that what he and everyone else heard was that “vigilantes were filling the void from police." When Francis and Pavlich again scolded him for “misunderstanding” what they had said, Wallace just had to throw up his hands and remind them that they said what they said, and it wasn’t “right.”

Of course, Tucker Carlson wasn’t just doubling-down on his defense of Rittenhouse’s actions, by squirming like a pig in slop to find new justifications for it. Over a graphic stating “Two People Killed in Deadly Wisconsin Riots,” Carlson failed to make plain that the only reason why street protests (“riots”) in Kenosha became “deadly” was because the actions of one person who apparently wanted to join the police in shooting unarmed people, although he managed to surpass them in raw numbers, shooting three unarmed white men. After Rittenhouse shot and killed Joseph Rosenbaum, who had first confronted Rittenhouse carrying his rifle, Anthony Huber and Gaige Grosskreutz apparently tried to disarm Rittenhouse, who then shot and killed Huber and wounded Grosskreutz at close range.

Naturally, Carlson gave his viewers a false picture of what had transpired. “The 17-year-old who has been charged (with murder) tried to run from the mob, tripped and fell in the middle of the street. A man ran up and smashed him in the head with a skateboard. The 17-year-old fired his gun.” Rittenhouse in “fact” acted in “self-defense.”

That is not, of course, what actually transpired. Carlson completely ignored that fact that Rittenhouse had been seen shooting his first victim, and the audio clearly indicates that he “feared” he had killed someone. He wasn’t trying to “run from the mob,” he was trying run from the crime he had just committed—which is why later in the video he is seen with his hands-up when approaching police, who despite being told he had just shot some people, they simply let him go; that is police not showing “leadership” and “doing their job.”

Carlson implied that Rittenhouse was “attacked” by the “mob” for no reason. Any reasonable person when given all the facts knows this is not the truth. Rittenhouse had been seen shooting another man dead. Two men chased him down; he was armed with a rifle that he already used against another person. The two men were unarmed against this armed man, and one of them used his skateboard to try to incapacitate him from shooting other people, and in failing to do so, they were both shot, one fatally.

Those are the facts. Rittenhouse is nothing more or less than a man who was looking for an excuse to shed blood, and that is what he did. Only commentators at Fox News and other far-right “news” outlets saw something different. If Biden wins in November, it will not only be a statement that voters have had enough of the Trump “experiment,” but a rejection of the false view of the world being sold by Fox News.

It isn't a question of which candidate is promoting racial disharmony or the one showing more empathy for those threatened by white nationalism, because whatever it is that Trump is doing, it isn't working

 

The shooting of a black man named Jacob Blake by a white police officer in Kenosha, Wisconsin sounds like the kind of story we’ve heard so many times before: woman calls police concerning a “domestic” incident—this time her “boyfriend” is on the property when he is not supposed to be. Multiple police show-up. The woman, though apparently not touched, is assumed to be the “victim.” Though the suspect is unarmed, an officer pulls out his gun to be more “persuasive.” Suspect does not feel he has done anything wrong, and does not respond to commands. He offers that there is a knife in his car; not very smart.  Disobeying commands to stop, he heads to the driver’s side door, opens it as the officer with gun drawn follows close behind. Suspect leans forward as if he is looking for something on the floor. Officer shoots him the back at point blank range multiple times. Knife found in driver’s side floorboard. Not known if he was intending to grab for it, but not a very smart idea to even appear that he was.

There are multiple poor moves made by those involved here, first by the woman who called the police, then police responding as if this was a “domestic violence” incident, the suspect not “cooperating” with police commands, and then a police officer overreacting before an actual threat was identified. While Blake did not die, it is believed that his injuries will leave him paralyzed from the waist down. Once more, a police officer failed to learn the lesson of previous shooting incidents: you never use lethal force against a black person unless there is clear evidence that your own life is in danger. Pick your targets carefully; Hispanics and whites don’t make as much “noise” when members of their own group are shot by police, even under clearly questionable circumstances.

I am not trying to be cynical about this, but there are multiple levels of “truth” to be gleaned here. Mixed signals are everywhere; the Republican Barnum & Bailey Circus and Freak Show going on right now has swung from cringe-inducing claims of promoting “racial healing” and being seemingly clueless about how this administration’s actions—and inactions—have created an atmosphere of racial animus and animosity that can only get worse the longer Trump remains in office. Trump keeps telling police that he has their back no matter what they do, and continuously calls protestors “terrorists” and little more than violent criminals, showing no understanding whatever for how he himself is to a great extent responsible for the upsurge of unrest.

Yet on the other hand, there is the danger that what whites sitting on the fence see on their television screens causes them to muse to themselves, “if this man had done this” or “had this man not done that” when confronted by police who in the first place did have justification for detaining the suspect-turned-victim. There is the danger that some white voters will wonder to what point must the enforcement of the law become subservient to a suspect’s “right” to refuse to “cooperate” in order to avoid the potential of lethal action. We don’t want police running amok and behaving like this is the Wild, Wild West—but we also do not want a country where some people think they have a “right” to disregard laws, because those laws were created merely to “oppress” them.   

In the end, it will all come down to the question of who is more responsible for the lack of “racial harmony” in this country.  If black people do not trust the white community—and let’s be frank about this, it is just a game for white protesters who can always go back to their comfortable lives, leaving behind carnage for minorities to take sole blame for—there is a reason for this. Thomas Edsall in his recent op-ed in the New York Times writes that “The most important issue driving Trump’s ascendancy, however, has not been the economy, but race. Republican political strategy is to cloak or veil frank racism.” He quotes Robert P. Jones of Public Religion Research Institute, who states that whites are insulated from the problems of minority communities, most do not have a close relationship with a minority person, and “there are virtually no American institutions positioned to resolve these problems”—doubly true for the Trump administration.

While Trump is trying to scare white “suburban housewives” with Joe Biden’s plan for affordable housing, Rep. Matt Gaetz, who endorsed the QAnon-crazed Laura Loomer, claims that “It’s a horror film, really. They’ll disarm you, empty the prisons, lock you in your home and MS-13 to live next door” (yeah, they were telling us that all through the Obama administration; remember any of that happening?). Harvard’s Joshua Greene likened Trump to a gang member himself; His incendiary commentary is “like gang tattoos. And in Trump’s case, it’s tattoos all over his neck and face.” 

Trump’s “gang” apparently includes 17-year-old Kyle Rittenhouse, who Kenosha police literally allowed to walk the streets carrying around an assault rifle shooting people (killing two) without once stopping him, and he literally returned to Illinois unmolested before news of his activities led to his arrest on murder charges. Fox News' Tucker Carlson defended his killing spree: "How shocked are we that 17-year-olds with rifles decided they had to maintain order when no one else would?” Well maybe his viewers who are fed a daily dose of his incendiary fabrications are not "surprised," but Rittenhouse doesn't live in Kenosha, but the next state over; it was probably a safer place for him to work out his violent fantasies than, say, Chicago.

The choices we have to make are not easy, but ultimately it is a question of what constitutes the greater danger: Trump’s “gang” actively promoting racial disharmony, or Biden’s promise to show more empathy for those who feel threatened by the turn toward white nationalism. One thing is for certain: whatever it is that Trump is doing, it certainly isn’t “working” to make this a better place for all of us to live in peace.