Hallway to Nowhere

Category: poems

  • WTF: Trump’s Iowa Rally And The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test

    WTF: Trump’s Iowa Rally And The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test

    I’ve come to the conclusion that there are Republicans and then are Trump supporters. His Iowa rally proved that for me beyond any shadow of a doubt. After that campaign rally-and that’s what it was, call it what you will-I now think that WHAT Trump says matters not one bit to his base. What matters is his PRESENCE, and I keep getting unnerving flashes of Hitler at HIS rallies, when I see Trump among his followers.

    Why do I say this? Let’s look at one of the things they were cheering: A solar-panelled wall that would save money for Mexico. SERIOUSLY??? Trump has consistently spoken out AGAINST clean energy. He disparaged wind turbines, a notable source of energy for many Iowans. He took the U.S. out of the Paris agreement, causing us to rebuked by NORTH KOREA. Trump claimed this was HIS idea, btw. Ahem, not true.  This idea was explored in a WSJ Op-ED piece AND by one of the companies that  submitted a design to the government. But, despite this, the crowd cheered on. Why let some glaring inconsistencies and downright lies spoil the fun. Let’s not go into the whys and wherefores of why this wouldn’t work and would be a waste of money, even should it be proven possible.

    Then there’s the whole “save money for Mexico” bit. People thought THIS was great, too. After all, we want to do as much to help our neighbor to the south as possible, right? Trump and his supporters have ALWAYS been strongly in favor of aiding Mexico….ABSOFUCKINGLUTELY NOT! Trump has done more to anger and disempower Mexico than any president in my lifetime. I won’t say ever b/c I haven’t done enough research. But he talks about NAFTA, factories moving to Mexico, and we won’t even go into what he says about actual Mexicans.  (I know I get keep saying “Let’s not go into….” . Sorry. So much Trump, so little time.)

    That was just a dissection of one of the things he said. I’ve said this before but am more convinced of it than ever: Trump supporters do NOT care about Trump’s words, tweets, ideas, or positions, content-wise. I truly believe he could announce that he would be personally sacrificing a kitten to Satan (in whom I don’t believe FYI) on the White House lawn EVERY morning, surrounded by 3 Goldman-Sachs execs, sorry, cabinet members and people would be convinced that this was FINE. Fox and Friends would provide commentary on how kitten sacrifices were an American tradition dating back to the Revolutionary times…and did you know that Abraham Lincoln himself sacrificed a BLACK kitten in the Oval Office? SMH in disgust……

     

  • WTF: Trump’s Iowa Rally And The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test

    WTF: Trump’s Iowa Rally And The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test

    I’ve come to the conclusion that there are Republicans and then are Trump supporters. His Iowa rally proved that for me beyond any shadow of a doubt. After that campaign rally-and that’s what it was, call it what you will-I now think that WHAT Trump says matters not one bit to his base. What matters is his PRESENCE, and I keep getting unnerving flashes of Hitler at HIS rallies, when I see Trump among his followers.

    Why do I say this? Let’s look at one of the things they were cheering: A solar-panelled wall that would save money for Mexico. SERIOUSLY??? Trump has consistently spoken out AGAINST clean energy. He disparaged wind turbines, a notable source of energy for many Iowans. He took the U.S. out of the Paris agreement, causing us to rebuked by NORTH KOREA. Trump claimed this was HIS idea, btw. Ahem, not true.  This idea was explored in a WSJ Op-ED piece AND by one of the companies that  submitted a design to the government. But, despite this, the crowd cheered on. Why let some glaring inconsistencies and downright lies spoil the fun. Let’s not go into the whys and wherefores of why this wouldn’t work and would be a waste of money, even should it be proven possible.

    Then there’s the whole “save money for Mexico” bit. People thought THIS was great, too. After all, we want to do as much to help our neighbor to the south as possible, right? Trump and his supporters have ALWAYS been strongly in favor of aiding Mexico….ABSOFUCKINGLUTELY NOT! Trump has done more to anger and disempower Mexico than any president in my lifetime. I won’t say ever b/c I haven’t done enough research. But he talks about NAFTA, factories moving to Mexico, and we won’t even go into what he says about actual Mexicans.  (I know I get keep saying “Let’s not go into….” . Sorry. So much Trump, so little time.)

    That was just a dissection of one of the things he said. I’ve said this before but am more convinced of it than ever: Trump supporters do NOT care about Trump’s words, tweets, ideas, or positions, content-wise. I truly believe he could announce that he would be personally sacrificing a kitten to Satan (in whom I don’t believe FYI) on the White House lawn EVERY morning, surrounded by 3 Goldman-Sachs execs, sorry, cabinet members and people would be convinced that this was FINE. Fox and Friends would provide commentary on how kitten sacrifices were an American tradition dating back to the Revolutionary times…and did you know that Abraham Lincoln himself sacrificed a BLACK kitten in the Oval Office? SMH in disgust……

     

  • Gay?Not Okay! Anti-LGBTQ Legislation Continues To Be Passed

    Gay?Not Okay! Anti-LGBTQ Legislation Continues To Be Passed

    Remember DJT promising to be a great friend to “the gays” and brandishing a rainbow flag at his rallies (well, at at least one rally that was photoghaphed)? So much for that! The rollback of protection for LGBTQ indviduals and couples coninues apace, as states pass laws that place “religious liberty” above the rights of LGBTQ citizens and deny  the protection of law from those who are most often targeted.  The courts in one state, Mississippi, even went so far as to pass an entirely redundant law to PROTECT those engaged in anti-LGBTQ discrimination.

    And lest you think this is purely a Southern state phenomenon, the courts of South Dakota, North Dakota, AND Michigan joined Virginia, Alabama, Texas, West Virginia, and as mentioned, Mississippi, to pass laws that either allow institutions to discriminate against LGBTQ persons in the name of religion or deny LGBTQ persons protect from hate-crimes.  Apparently, along with no longer being counted in the Census, we can no longer do things like adopt children, GET BURIED (Mississippi-why am I not surprised?), or oh, I don’t know….JUST EXIST without being an affront to right-thinking people everywhere.

    This is not to be taken lightly. We need to treat this seriously. Just because OBergefell became law doesn’t mean a f…. thing anymore. We need to get out and put people into office who will stand up for HUMAN RIGHTS. Not tomorrow. Not next week. NOW. Stand up; speak out; RESIST and VOTE!

  • Statues, Memory, And Soil

    Statues, Memory, And Soil

    I’ve been reading lately about the heated atmosphere surrounding the removal of statues of Confederate figures in New Orleans. I know those statues and have often used them to give directions to people attempting to get to various places in the French Quarter.  I’ve followed the story of their plight with some interest, as I am from the South and this IS a particularly and peculiarly Southern problem.  The South is dotted with statues, obelisks, plaques, and other monuments to the glorious heroes and fighters of the Lost Cause. Now, mind you, when you grow up in the South, as a young child it can be a LONG TIME before anyone ever tells you THAT THESE ARE PEOPLE WHO LOST THE WAR! I had extraordinary parents who did do and at an early age. I reasonably asked,”Then why are there statues of them everywhere?” My father sighed and replied, “This is the South; that is a difficult question; you’re much too young for hard liquor.”

    Personal history aside, I’ve heard the arguments that we should leave these things up for the sake of history and as some sort of teaching instuments. I find those argument totally and completely spurious. For the sake of history? Like the entire South is going to have a complete bout of amnesia, should the monuments get taken down? The battles of the Civil War and the struggles upon which it was based-that of slavery and man’s oh-so-human urge to trample wholesale on the rights of others based on skincolor-are soaked into the very soil of the Southern states. Southerners, whether there by birth or geographical accident and whatever their race-are confronted with the legacy of the slavery every day, like it or not. I hardly think that the absence of some statues will make us forget. Not when we’ve got neighbors who persist in flying the Confederate flag from their pick-up truck or porch. Not when we’ve got the legacy of Jim Crow lingering in our voting districts, our laws and our attitudes. Not when when we’ve got a resurgence of white supremacists looking back fondly to a society that exists only in fiction and calling it the South. I’m not sorry to see the statues et al. coming down.  As for the “Never forget!” contingent, some of us are busy trying to build a new society, not hark back to the Old Dixie that lives mainly in your beer cans and fevered imagination.

  • Trump’s Religious Liberty Executive Order-A Call To Arms

    Trump’s Religious Liberty Executive Order-A Call To Arms

    If this was an actual repeal of the Johnson Amendment, I would be greatly alarmed. BUT, like many of Trump’s orders, this is sturm und drang aimed at mollifying  his more conservative Evangelical Christian followers and as usual it failed to do even the job for which it was designed. I’ve read the order and some some excellent analyses of it. In the end, it boils down to little more than Trump instructing to tell the IRS to do something it does anyway.  No religious leaders or organizations have actually been persecuted under the Johnson Amendment. It is more of a cautionary “Smokey Bear” threat looming in the horizon- and often ignored in the breech. During the recent election, especially, pastors took to the pulpits to give their opinions on both candidates and give moral guidance on politcal issues. And no IRS agents appeared at their doors.

    The order also contains some language designed to give companies that are religiously owned and operated more leeway in terms of granting their employees birth control. WHY is this  still an issue? There a work-around built into the ACA that allow the insurance company to do so, thus freeing the company itself doing so. (Don’t even get me started on Trumpcare.) But apparently this does not go far enough. I suppose religious organzations like Hobby Lobby (snort) and Little Sisters of the Poor want it taken totally off the table. I disagree that they should be allowed to do this. They are NOT in the business of healthcare and should not be allowed to dictate what healthcare their employees receive. But I digress. The language of Trump’s order about this is incredibly vague and doesn’t really say anything beyond a call to draft new rules letting businesses draft rules that would allow them to avoid giving employees contraception and that ALREADY is in place.

    So. Trump by himself cannot repeal the Johnson Amendment. THAT takes an act of Congress. He is being sued by the Freedom from Religion Foundation (GO ATHEISTS!) on behalf of secularists everywhere, since the ACLU declined to bring suit. I would like to see what would happen if more pastors, priests, preachers, imams, rabbis, Pagans of all stripes, Hindus, Sikhs, Pastafarians, Satanists, etc started taking advantage of this “religious liberty” order! Let’s hear from ALL of you, not just Trump’s far-right anti-LGBTQ xenophobic  Neo-Con Fundies! Let’s get political, people! Let’s PARTY…and I’m speaking DEMOCRAT SOCIALIST!

  • Alabama Church May Get Own Police Force

    Alabama Church May Get Own Police Force

    The Alabama senate passed a bill on Tuesday that will allow Briarwood Presbyterian Church in Birmingham, Alabama the right to create its own police force to patrol its grounds and schools.  These officers have to remain on the church property but will be “invested with all the power of law enforcement officers” in Alabama, according to the bill that won by a 24-4 vote in the state Senate. A version of the bill failed last year, after passing both houses but the governor at the time, Gov. Robert Bentley, refused to sign it into law. Concerns over the creation of private security forces were cited by the administration. But apparently that concern has been muted for the new governor, and so the bill might actually get signed into law.

    The orignators of this bill cite the fact that religious educational institutions of higher learning, such as BYU and other universities, have their own police forces. They claim to want to “mirror” a code of Alabama law that allows for the employment of one or more law enforcement officers at a college or private educational institution. They cite practical reasons, reaching back to the tragedy at Sandy Hook for their justification as a need to have first responders on hand for their members and to coordinate with the local community.

    Let’s look at this. First of all, I want to ask, WHY does a church, specifically a predominantly WHITE mainstream-denomination church need a police force of its very own? Historically, the churches that have been the scenes of violence have been the BLACK churches, particularly in the South. Just ask any member of the Emanuel African Episcopal Church in Charleston, SC. This sounds suspiciously like a case of Christian paranoia running rampant.

    Secondly, I want to know what oversight there will be for this police force? Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? Will there be transparency, or will there be the usual religious exemption from scutiny? Alabama has already encountered a problem here, with its religious day schools. They have been the subject of a number of articles detailing abuse and neglect. But, due to the fact that they are run by RELIGIOUS organizations, and that means CHRISTIAN, in case you were wondering, the State Department of Human Resouces has no way to even investigate these stories. I imagine that, should Briarwood be allowed to establish its police force, a similar religious exemption from accountability will most likely be part of the bargain. Just one of those little believer’s perks….

    Third, I’m wondering if Alabama (and other states to follow) will grant similar privileges to NON-CHRISTIAN places that might want their own police force? I’m willing to bet that mosques and synagogues need police officers (for the congregants’ protection) WAY more than churches do! (Unless you are an African American Christian. Then you DO need your own police force. Plus, a police force to protect you FROM the first police force.) And Hindu temples need them, too. Ignorant people now think Indians are Muslim terrorists and want to kill them. And let’s not forget the Pastafarians! The Church of The Flying Spaghetti Monster deserves a police force! Seriously, can you imagine Trump’s America giving a MOSQUE, even one with a madrassa, permission to have its own police force? Or even a synagogue? Snort! I don’t see it happening. (Though let me just say, that as a Jew, the idea of a bunch of goyishe policemen surrounding me at shul would NOT make me feel safer….my bubbe would be whispering from her grave, “Run, kindele, run!”)

    I’m going to keep an eye on this story. Alabama…sigh. Doing its best to make Mississippi look “not so bad”. But, hey, at least no-one from the state made any Hitler references yet (publicly, that is).

  • Hitler Comes To North Carolina

    Hitler Comes To North Carolina

    First the state has the notorious HB2 bill that causes it to lose business and engenders bad press, rightly so. It then elects a new Democratic governor but he has almost no power to do anything. Then the HB2 bill is rescinded, sorta, kinda, in a compromise that is designed to bring business back but not to REALLY give legal protection to NC’c LGBTQ population. And now there is a bill being proposed again to ban gay marriage, something that has been settled as the law of the land by the Obergefell decision in the U. S. Supreme Court. Just to add insult to injury, the representative who is sponsoring it, compares Lincoln to HITLER. He is Representative Larry Pittman, and he did this publically on Facebook.

    I want to discuss this. The Hitler reference, coming as it did after Sean Spicer’s egregious Hitler reference, shows boneheaded stupidity. Spicer had ALREADY made an ass of himself by an inaccurate statement about Hitler DURING PESACH and his clumsy apology compounded it. For another lawmaker to go and then use Hitler as a referent still during Pesach is astoundingly idiodic. Had he not read the national news? There are many many reasons that Hitler and Lincoln are not equivalent, such that I believe them self-evident if you are a rational human being and not a Southern Republican North Carolinian. I won’t enumerate them here. But just for reasons of common sense,  THINK! It’s PASSOVER!!! You don’t go making HITLER references during a MAJOR JEWISH HOLIDAY!!! Get a clue!!! This is offensive!!! And I know that you have Jewish consituents! We do live in NC, too! And WE VOTE!  (For all you reading out, I’m Jewish, btw. Atheist, yes. But Jewish, nonetheless. Just not observant.) So for all the Sean Spicers and the Larry Pittmans out there, stop with the Hitler stuff! Oy gevalt iz mir!

  • “Not MY Problem!”-Saith The Right

    “Not MY Problem!”-Saith The Right

    I’m thinking I should start a new blog entitled “Bus Stories”. That seems to be where some of my best material comes from these days. So, I was on transit last week and listening to three men converse. They were all older white men and were discussing the Rockville incident. The topic turned to immigration and DACHA, though they did not use those terms. They were uniformly against giving Dreamers ANY sort of help, be it schooling, healthcare, or housing. They agreed that anyone here who is an “illegal” should be sent back to where they came from, period. When I spoke up in defense of DACHA, they turned to me and said, “I don’t care how they got here, they’re illegal. What part of “illegal” don’t you understand? So they were brought here as children? NOT MY PROBLEM!”

    Several things stuck me about this exchange. The first was the the absolute lack of any glimmer of compassion in their voices. And these men all would probaby describe themselves as good Christians. I knew one of them outside of the conversation and had always found him to be very friendly towards every rider of the bus. That was before this election legitimized showing bigotry, though, and I’ve noticed an increase in racist remarks from people I’ve never heard make them before Trump got elected. The second thing I noticed was their uniformity of tone. There was no real back and forth in this conversation. Even the phrases they used were identical. It sounded more like they were trading slogans than really talking. I felt odd, like I was eavesdropping on a secret club-house meeting. Maybe a steady diet of Fox news does that to you….Even when my progressive friends and I get together, we do argue.

    I want to say to these men that YES, IT IS YOUR PROBLEM! And it is my problem, too. And it is is OUR problem because we live here and immigrants live here and how we deal with them says volumes about who we are and what our actual values are. Are you going to live according to those “good Christian values” you presume to uphold, or do they only apply to your white neighbors? This country was founded BY IMMIGRANTS. WE ARE ALL IMMIGRANTS! Just because YOUR ancestors got here a little earlier than some of the others and had whiter skin does NOT make you better! And YOUR brand of religion is not any better than that of the “illegals” you purport to despise or of the Muslims you want to ban or even any better than the unbelief of the atheists like myself. We are all in this together. You can say it is “not my problem” and try to stick your head in the sand but you live here. The draconian laws over immigration will ultimately trickle down to affect someone you know. The taxes that get imposed to build more private prisons to hold those that Trump (#notmypresident) and Co. want rounded up will affect YOU. We’d better start thinking about this.

  • Guns For The Mentally Ill-AWESOME IDEA!

    Guns For The Mentally Ill-AWESOME IDEA!

    Among the many regulations that the Trump (#notmypresident) administration is busy rolling back is one that effectively banned persons with MAJOR MENTAL ILLNESSES from BUYING GUNS. Apparently this is thought to be a good idea by the NRA (no surprise there), the ACLU (and I am a card-carrying member), NAMI, and, of course, Republicans everywhere. I respectfully and wholeheartedly disagree. First of all let me reiterate my position that I do not think that ANYONE outside of the military or perhaps some few members of the police force should have access to guns, period. But even should you disagree with with that, and most do, what reason would you give for making weapons available to people suffering from mental illnesses that make them irrational, delusional, enraged, depressed, and/or suicidal? We’re not talking about people who need a few bouts of counseling because of a bad break-up or who have a bit of grief after their favorite cat died. No, this are people who have mental illnesses that are debilitating and severe: schizophenia; bi-polar disorder; severe depression; post-traumatic stress disorder; multiple personality disorder, among others. These types of illness can cause changes in mood and can cause the sufferer to completely lose touch with the objective world. With proper medication, therapy, and support, however, they can be managed…as long as the person STAYS WITH THE PROGRAM (takes the meds, sees the therapist, does whatever he/she/whatever needs to do to maintain). That “staying with the program” is key. I’ve known some wonderful people who had major mental illnesses. A few are still my friends and doing well….because they stay with their respective programs. A few aren’t my friends anymore, either because they are dead, or because they have trashed their lives so thoroughly I wouldn’t remain in the hit-zone. Would I give these people guns? Either group? HELL NO!!! I’ve seen the demons with which they struggle, heard them talk to the voices, seen the pictures they’ve painted of the world they see. I do not want to give any of them a weapon to use. I know how hard they struggle daily just to survive. Life is dangerous enough without handing them a loaded gun.

  • Trump’s Continuing Attack On The Free Press

    Trump’s Continuing Attack On The Free Press

    Friday Trump (#notmypresident) escalated his attack on the free press to new levels. After first excoriating what he called “fake news” at CPAC and then later on Twitter, the White House then barred reporters from certain news organizations (The NYT, BuzzFeed News, CNN, The Los Angeles Times, Politico, BBC, and HuffPost) from a press briefing. Conservative-leaning organizations such as  Fox News, The Washington Times, The One America News and the mainstream outlets ABC, NBC, CBS were allowed, as was that purveyor of racism, homophobia, and general bigotry, Breitbart News. The Washington Post chose not to send a reporter. I’m sure their reporter, too, would have been barred. This action contradicts what Trump’s press secretary claimed in December. Trump has said that he doesn’t mind criticism, yet this shows with glaring clarity that he cannot stand to told again and again that he and his administration are having problems. He is attempting to use the power of of the White House and the Presidency to stifle dissent: directly by shutting the press out and indirectly by making people distrust the press. He asks that we trust HIM, the prince of lies! If you’ve been fact-checking, you know that Trump cannot make a speech or indeed have a simple conversation without uttering lies. (I’m not going to make nice and use pretty language. He flat-out lies.) He makes claims such as “The administration is running like a fine-tuned machine” and “We’ve spent 6 trillion dollars in the Middle East.” Does he not know or care that not just reporters but ordinary citizens (like me) are, one, watching the chaotic mess that is his administration and, two, fact-checking what he says? Oh, wait, I forgot…this is the administration that deals in “alternative facts” with an “alt-right” chief strategist at the White House and a favored “alt-right” news outlet. This is NOT normal behavior, even for a paranoid president! Nixon didn’t do this, and he had his truly bizarre moments. Clinton didn’t do this, even during the whole Monica Lewinsky thing. But Trump is barely into his Presidency and already he has designated the press “an enemy of the people”. Not of HIM, mind you. We, the citizens of the the United States, are now supposed to be on our guard against not ISIS but the NYT, the Washington Post, Politico, and other liberal media. I don’t know about you, but my fears are directed towards the White House and its current occupants, as well as his Republican minions. To use that famous quote from The Fly, “Be afraid. Be very, very afraid.”