"Alt-Right"

Recently I listened to a course from the Teaching Company on the subject of English in America.  The professor emphasized that new words enter the language constantly.  Every year a group of linguists votes on a “word of the year.”  It would not surprise me if the word of the year for 2016 was “alt-right.”

Fortunately, some new words don’t last.  “Alt-right” is short for “alternative right,” and it is used to describe people like Trump’s White House strategist Stephen K. Bannon.  

Here’s is what Rich Lowry, editor of the National Review, a conservative magazine, said about the term.  He explained he was not opposed to using it as long as it was applied to a specific group.  In Lowry’s words, quoted in the New York Times, the term should be reserved for “people who are obsessed with race and, in one form or another, are white supremacists.”

In this blog I will not use the term “alt-right.”  I will use terms like “white supremacist” or “racist” or “neo-Nazi.”  Let’s call them what they are.

A right to be scared

Last night at a meeting of the Executive Board of the Palmerton Area Historical Society, I was handed a picture of the White House with a big Trump sign on top in shiny gold letters.  I think everyone on the board knows my politics, and they assured me it was all in good fun.

I said I was sure it was, but nonetheless I was very frightened.  I said some of my former students and my friends could be deported, and many of the remarks Trump made during the campaign scared me.  A couple of the members scoffed.  “It was just campaign rhetoric,” and “It won’t be that bad.”

Let me quote three front page headlines in the Times today.

“Trump’s Threat to Close Door Reopens Old Wounds in Cuba”

“Fierce Crtitic of Health Care Law Said to Be Pick for Health Dept.”

“Plan to Revive Waterboarding Faces Obstacles:  A Trump Campaign Vow”

Yeah, I’m scared.  I have a right to be scared, as any reasonable person should be.

Hunting with semi-automatics

Gov. Wolf signed HB 263, a new law to allow the use of semi-automatic rifles for hunting.  The law gives the Game Commission the power to regulate “sporting rifles” for various game species.

Some hunters say this will allow them to take a quick follow-up shot to finish off a wounded animal.

Wouldn’t it make even more sense to use fully automatics?  You just hold down the trigger and the weapon keeps firing.  Wouldn’t hunters be much more effective?  Why isn’t the NRA pushing for this?  

RPGs would be even more effective.  You could really blast a deer with a rocket-propelled grenade.  The Second Amendment says you have the right to bear arms.  It doesn’t forbid RPGs, does it?  

Go Back To Your Own Country

On Friday evening my neighbors and their two girls went to see “Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them” at the Mahoning Valley Cinema.  The kids in the row behind them kept crinkling their candy wrappers, and my neighbors asked them politely to stop doing that.  

They did, but after the movie the mother of the kids confronted my neighbors and said, “That was very rude of you.  My kids eat candy at the movies, and they can make noise if they want to.”

My neighbor, an immigrant from India, said, “No, that’s why there is an announcement to turn off your cell phones before the movie starts.”

At this the woman said in a very loud voice, “Why don’t you go back to your own country.”  I think she was expecting support from the people around her.

Now, here is the good part.  A woman behind her said, “That is unacceptable.  We are a small community here, and that is not the way to behave.”  Other people stated agreement and apologized to my neighbors for the woman’s behavior.  She left the theater in a hurry.  The manager heard about the incident and offered my neighbor free tickets to another movie.  A local clergyman added his apology.  

All right, Lehighton.  My neighbor said he was quite surprised by the support, and quite touched.  So am I.

Schadenfreude

According to the Times today, quite a few Trump supporters are now worried that they will lose their medical insurance.

If you don’t know what “schadenfreude” means, look it up.  I’m feeling it.

A grant for Weatherly from Heffley and Yudichak

According to today’s Times News, “State Sen. John Yudichak, D-Luzerne/Carbon, and State Rep. Doyle Heffley, R-Carbon, announced today that the borough of Weatherly will receive $1 million in state grant funding.”

Did they get that money personally?  Does that state grant funding come out of their own pockets?  That’s the impression I get.  

Why Weatherly?  Why would some Carbon County boroughs deserve a grant more than others?  The whole grant process is shot through with arbitrary favoritism and incumbency protection.  Does Pennsylvania have that much money that it can dole out a million bucks to Weatherly?

I personally think Weatherly is an interesting town, but so is Summit Hill, or Lansford, or Nesquehoning, all towns in Carbon County that could use a boost. 

Sore winners

My friend Rene coined a new term.  He called this evening and noted that Trump supporters are still angry.  They are angry that Clinton supporters aren’t happy.  They are angry that everyone isn’t praising Donald Trump.  They are angry that Clinton won a plurality of the vote, approximately 2 million more American voters than Trump.  They are angry that Trump is being questioned about his taxes, or his businesses, or his so-called university, or his connections to neo-Nazis.

Rene’s new term is “sore winner.”  We’ve all heard about sore losers, but this election has brought us sore winners.  Sad.

Note:  I won’t post tomorrow night.  It’s a holiday.  I need a break.

Water cannons in winter weather

What kind of people would soak demonstrators with water cannons in freezing weather?  

I understand that Amnesty International has sent observers to North Dakota to monitor the treatment of Indians, over a hundred of whom have required medical treatment in the last few days.  

Tonight we met Gene Stilp, an attorney from Dauphin County, who is leaving for North Dakota on Thursday along with other lawyers to offer legal services to the Indians.  Tonight the Carbon County Democrats for Progress collected winter coats for the demonstrators.  

These are small gestures in the face of multibillion dollar oil companies, banks, and a new administration that approves of pipeline construction.  We keep on fighting.

Give the guy a chance

I’ve noticed a spate of articles and op-ed essays urging Clinton supporters to give Trump a chance.  They criticize Clinton voters for being poor sports.  They give us lectures on democracy and how it works.

OK, point taken.  I will give Trump the same treatment that the Republicans gave to President Obama when he was elected.  Surely you can remember that.  It was only eight years ago.

Old age

I turned 74 on Nov. 18.  Do not send presents.  

Here’s what Leon Trotsky said:  “Old age is the most unexpected of all the things that happen to a man.”  

It’s true.  One minute you are 17, mooning over the girl in the next row in typing class, and the next minute you need a few steps for your joints to move when you get out of the car.  How did that happen so fast?

Impeach Trump

That’s a bumper sticker I put on the tailgate of my truck yesterday.  I’m hoping some Trump supporters tell me that I should give him a chance.  That will give me the opportunity to explain that Mitch McConnell and other members of Congress met the night Obama won in 2008 and plotted how they could derail his proposals.

I thought I was ahead of the curve, but I just checked, and similar bumper stickers are already available on the internet.

Order yours today!

Becoming a Muslim

Christian X, King of Denmark during World War II, noted the inhumane treatment of Jews in German-occupied countries.  He wrote in his personal diary that Danish Jews would need to be protected, and if they were singled out, “...we would best meet it by all wearing the Star of David.”

On Wednesday evening Trump surrogate Carl Higbie told Fox reporter Megyn Kelly that the U.S. might need a national registry of all Muslims.  He said there was precedent for such a list in the World War II Japanese internment, which the Supreme Court has never declared unconstitutional.  

When Kelly questioned this, Higbie said, “I’m just saying there’s a precedent for it.”  

If the Trump administration does compile a national registry of Muslims, I will become a Muslim.  I won’t go through the whole conversion process, but I once attended a service in a mosque in Allentown.  I think that is enough to put my name on the registry.

I’m hoping millions of Americans would do the same.

Good Neighbors?

Good Neighbors:  The Democracy of Everyday Life in America was published earlier this year.  Written by Harvard Political Science professor Nancy Rosenblum, the book discusses two types of democracy.  There is the political one, where we function as citizens, and a “democracy of everyday life,” in which we operate as neighbors.

Rosenblum believes the political democracy functions in the abstract, with words like conservative or progressive or libertarian.  Our day-to-day interactions with neighbors, however, hinge on concrete acts.  Will they collect our mail when we aren’t home?  Does our barking dog disturb the people upstairs?

In the day-to-day world we ignore much that we might not ordinarily like in the political world.  Thus, when I was working the polls at the Palmerton Rod and Gun Club, I got on quite well with my Republican counterparts Roger, Kenny, and Robert.  We were civil to each other and found we had quite a bit in common.

Given that, why do I feel such hostility to my neighbors who had Trump signs in their lawns?  Why can’t we all get along?

It is because this election was different.  When I saw thousands of people at rallies chanting “Lock her up,” that was my candidate they were chanting about.  When I saw Trump calling for mass deportations, some of my former students who have lived in the U.S. since childhood will be rounded up and sent to a country they can’t remember.  When I saw Trump call for punishing women who get abortions, that affects my friends.  When I saw Trump proudly accepting support from racists, I can’t forgive that.

I will, of course, continue to talk to my relatives and neighbors who supported Trump.  What I cannot do is look upon them in the same way.  To me politics is not something I do on election day.  I try to live my politics, and I assume that Trump supporters do as well.  I can’t get past that.

Rising above principle

Bernie Hennessy, a professor of Political Science when I was in grad school and later a good friend, said a good citizen occasionally had to “rise above principle.”  It took me a while to understand what he meant, but I will give you an example.  

Let’s say you are committed environmentalist.  You understand that global warming is an existential threat to the planet, you are fully cognizant that we are in the middle of a human-caused Sixth Extinction, and you realize that unless we turn this around fast, we will live in an overcrowded polluted planet, if we live at all.

You are a member of the Green Party.  You know that the Democratic Party is full of people like Sen. Yudichak, who favors the PennEast/UGI pipeline, and Hillary Clinton, who is unwilling to call for a total ban on fracking.  

That offends your principles.  You can’t compromise with that, so you go into the voting booth and vote for Jill Stein, the Green Party candidate for president.  You have remained true to your personal principles.  You have also helped to elect a man who will abrogate climate treaties, who favors the Keystone XL pipeline, who is said to be considering Sarah Palin as Secretary of the Interior, and who will undo much of the work of the E.P.A.

That’s what Bernie Hennessy meant.  There are times you need to rise above principle.

Vigil in Jim Thorpe

Approximately 25 people participated in a silent vigil in support of the Standing Rock Sioux this morning at the Carbon County Court House.  The tribe is trying to stop the North Dakota Access Pipeline, which carries oil from the fracking fields, from crossing their Reservation land polluting their water supply.

The Army Corps of Engineers has the power to stop the pipeline, but so far the request of the Indians to either stop or move the pipeline has been unsuccessful.  Other demonstrations and vigils were held around the country today.  I’m hoping that enough public pressure will have an effect.  

Irony abounds

First example:  I’m picking up political signs from the election.  I came across one in the Lehigh Gap, commercially printed, that said “We are lead by fools.”  We are also at the mercy of sign writers who don’t know the difference between led and lead.

Second example:  Sen. Lisa Baker (R, Wayne County) has filed a motion to overturn a moratorium on fracking by the Delaware River Basin Commission.  She said,”This is a property rights issue.”  She said nothing about the property rights of farmers subject to eminent domain when fracking gas pipelines cross their land, nor is she evidently concerned about the property rights of residents who live next to the noise, water and air pollution, and disruptions caused by the fracking process.

Third example:  After months of saying that they might not accept the results if Trump lost, Trump supporters are now giving lectures on democracy to Clinton supporters demonstrating against the election results.  Perhaps the Clinton supporters, who supported a candidate who received two million more popular votes than Trump, think the election was rigged.

Greg Abbott and Pam Bondi

Before his election as of Texas, Greg Abbott had been the state’s Attorney General; Pam Bondi is the current AG for Florida.  Each of them cancelled fraud investigations of Trump University.  Shortly afterward, their campaign accounts received five-figure checks from Donald Trump or his foundation.  

Abbott and Bondi say the checks had nothing to do with canceling their investigations.

Meanwhile, Kathleen Kane goes to jail. 

In case you are suspicious at a time of fake news, this info came from the Sept. 2016 issue of Governing Magazine, a very reputable publication.

Standing with Standing Rock

A national day of protest against the Dakota Access Pipeline is scheduled for Tuesday, November 15.  This is the pipeline that was moved from a location near Bismarck, North Dakota, because of concerns over the water supply, to a location across American Indian ancestral and treaty lands.  You probably have read or seen the demonstrations at the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation in North Dakota.  

In Carbon County our demonstration in solidarity with the Indians will be held at the Courthouse in Jim Thorpe on Nov. 15 at 10:00 a.m.  This will be a silent vigil lasting approximately one hour.  It is fitting to hold this protest in a town named after one of America’s Indian heroes.  It is also fitting because once again the American government is failing to honor its treaty obligations with an Indian tribe.  

The Safety Pin Project

After the Brexit vote in June, hate crimes and anti-immigrant violence rose in Britain.  To counteract the idea that all Brits were anti-immigrant, people began wearing safety pins on their clothing.  The safety pins sent a signal that immigrants and other minorities were safe with them.

I am now wearing my safety pin.  It is a quiet way to let minority groups, LGBT people, legal and undocumented immigrants, yes, in Trump’s America, women, know that they are safe with me.  I don’t know how long I will wear the pin, but I assume at least for the next four years.

Fixing a rigged system

My friend Tom sent me five suggestions for fixing our system of electing presidents.  Here are what he wrote, with a few small changes to fit the format of the blog:

This presidential election result is more strong evidence that we need to

1.  amend the Constitution to replace the state-based electoral college system with a nationwide direct popular-majority-vote method; and 

2.  guarantee access to ballots and public debates for all political parties having several thousand active registered members (such as the Green Party); and 

3.  mandate purple thumb inking for all voters; and 

4.  provide paper ballots instead of electronic machines that leave no paper trail; and 

5.  insure full transparency, free and easy public access to all rules and records, of

all aspects of the election process.  

Of course in the primary election process parties would still continue to act, as parties do, according to their own rules, to select their nominees for the general election.  

Had the first suggestion been adopted, of course, Clinton would be our president-elect.  I would amend the second one to suggest that a party recognized in at least ten states would be included in the debates.  As for the third suggestion, to ink thumbs for voters to prevent fraud, I was ridiculed at a California legislative hearing when I suggested this, but I still like the idea.

The fourth suggestion is also important, especially if we go to a direct popular vote system.  Incidentally, the Carbon County Commissioners have publicly agreed to this in principle when they purchase new voting machines.  The fifth suggestions of full transparency, is a no-brainer.

Two years

In 2008 President Obama was elected by a healthy majority of votes.  Democrats were a majority in the U.S. Senate and the U.S. House of Representatives.  

Two years later the “Tea Party” movement erupted, and the Republicans won a majority in the House.  

We have two years in which the Republicans will be in control of all three branches of government, and not just any Republicans, but Republicans of the far right.  It will be difficult for Democrats to win the House in 2018, since Republican state legislatures have gerrymandered congressional districts and over thirty states have made it more difficult for citizens to vote.

On the other hand, the Republicans now own this government.  They will be in charge when the economy goes sour, when the wall is not built, when coal remains too expensive, when trade wars erupt, when the Middle East remains a war zone.  

So buckle up.  We have two years to turn this thing around.

What has happened to America?

Even if Hillary Clinton wins, and right now, at 10 p.m., it looks doubtful, Trump will still have received approximately half the votes of my fellow Americans.

This means that half of my fellow Americans voted for a man who stiffs creditors, mistreats women, thinks global warming is a Chinese hoax, would put doctors who perform abortions in jail, and ran a phony university that cheated thousands.  This is a guy who never reads, does not know history, and has encouraged white supremacists and racists.  Any reader of this blog can add much more.

ONE HALF OF AMERICAN VOTERS VOTED FOR THIS CLOWN.  Trump once said he loved the uneducated, and they obviously love him back.

Here is my prediction.  If he wins, this country will suffer in all kinds of ways.  Unfortunately, the voters who brought this on will not take responsibility.  It will be the fault of blacks, or Jews, or Latinos, or feminists, or environmentalists.

Finally, here is my advice to liberals, socialists, Marxists, and left-wingers in general.  Buy a gun.  Take a firearms course.  Get ready for the apocalypse.  It will be upon us before you know it.

A sad thing about this election

My friend Rene noted that come Wednesday, half of America will be very disappointed.  I’m hoping it is the Trump half, but I think it is important to note that this election has scarred America like no other in my life time.

I have lost friends over this election.  I will not patronize businesses that supported Trump.  I have lost respect for approximately half of my fellow Americans.  In the past, I didn’t like certain Republican candidates, but I certainly didn’t think that Romney or McCain or Bush would ruin our country.  This election is different.  

This is an election in which the other side has systematically removed our yard signs.  They put up signs that call for the imprisonment of my candidate.  Many of the people I talked to were afraid to put out Clinton signs because they thought the other side might retaliate.  Here, in America, they were afraid to put out political signs.

Both sides think the election is rigged. Over thirty states have increased restrictions on voting to reduce minority voting, the campaign finance system aids people like the Koch Brothers, and gerrymandering helps to ensure Republican dominance of the House.  I think it’s rigged.

The other side thinks the rigging takes place in the voting, although they can never seem to find actual examples.

In this election season, hate crimes against Muslims have increased.  High school kids shout insults at fellow students.  Women who were abused in the past are experiencing stress.  A former Latina student sent me an email telling me how worried she was.  

Do you think Trump will accept the results if he loses?  Of course not.  If Trump wins, do you think I will shrug and say, “Oh well, the people have spoken.”  Of course not.  I will be calling for his impeachment before he is even inaugurated.  

Democracy is always under attack.  You can never take it as a given.  I don’t know how resilient this country is, but it will take years, perhaps decades, for us to return to the kind of civil society I once took for granted.

Veterans' Day parade

The Carbon County Democrats entered the Veterans’ Day parade, held this year in Palmerton.  The Republicans also entered, with campaign signs and a paper mache elephant.

We thought the parade was about veterans, so we had a banner that read “Be An American Voter” and a second banner telling who we were.  We also had a pickup truck with posters thanking American veterans and detailing some of the landmark expansions of the suffrage, such as absentee ballots for Union soldiers (1864) and women’s right to vote, the 19th Amendment, passed in 1920.

As we went by, a bunch of Trump supporters shouted out that Clinton should be in jail.  Rene, who was holding the banner with me, shouted back, “Today is about honoring veterans.”  Their response was somewhat incoherent.  

Indian wars

The American Civil Liberties Union sent its members a message about the Standing Rock protest.  Here is what ACLU said:

On a North Dakota prairie, nonviolent protesters are being confronted by police in riot gear with armored military vehicles, automatic rifles, sonic weapons, concussion grenades, attack dogs, pepper spray, and beanbag bullets.

The NoDAPL water protectors at Standing Rock are being treated like prisoners of war simply for protesting the Dakota Access Pipeline.  Some are being strip-searched and detained in structures resembling dog kennels.  Police are even hooding detainees and forcing them to remain in jail cells.

I’ve read that the reason the pipeline was routed through Sioux land in the first place was to protect the water supply of Bismarck.

Will this country will ever stop mistreating its indigenous people?

11 Million Refugees

What I can’t get past in this election is that almost half of my fellow Americans are voting for a man who will create more refugees than the entire war in Syria.  Many of the 11 million undocumented Mexican and Central American residents in this country have no homes to go when they are deported.  Many don’t even speak Spanish.

The effort will require a national identification cards, roundups, people herded into relocation centers, perhaps convoys of buses, or railroad cars, thousands of agents to enforce the policy.

I have heard Trump supporters tell me, when I bring up this issue, he won’t really do that.  He’s just saying that.  Really?  We have historical examples of candidates promising to “deal with” minority groups.  They were not taken seriously until it was too late. 

I take Trump seriously.  

Nice Trump supporter

In a canvass of Lehighton today, we met the mother of the person on our list.  The daughter had moved out, and the mother told us she was a Republican.  I mentioned that she could vote for Clinton anyway, and she said she wouldn’t do that.  

She wished me “good luck” and I stopped in my tracks.  I told her how pleasant it was to meet a Trump supporter who was not mean, did not tell me Hillary belonged in jail, or insulted me.  She said, “What would be the point of that?”

Exactly.  Trump supporters:  pay attention.

Ellis Island, really?

A letter from a Lehighton resident named Ruthann Schlecht in support of Donald Trump in today’s Times News illustrates why Trump may win this election.  

Ms. Schlecht wants the “immigration rules back.”  Which ones?  The ones that said no Chinese?  The ones in effect when the Irish arrived?  How about the ones in effect when West African slaves were imported?

She notes that her heritage was Pennsylvania Dutch, and then she mentions Ellis Island.  When the Pennsylvania Dutch arrived in America (before there was a U.S.), there were no limits, no requirement to learn English, and no Ellis Island procedure.  When immigrants did come through Ellis Island, there was no requirement to learn English as Ms. Schlecht seems to think.

Ms. Schlecht also says “...let’s build that wall!”  Yeah, like that’s gonna happen.

The sad thing is that people like Ms. Schlecht may elect Donald Trump as our next president.  And when things go downhill, as they will, Trump won’t be blamed.  You can probably name who will be blamed, but in case you can’t I’ll give you a hint:  blacks, Latinos, Democrats, liberals, Muslims, immigrants, environmentalists, intellectuals, and perhaps even rogue bloggers who actually know some U.S. history.

Lansford canvass

This afternoon my friend Pat and I canvassed a portion of Patterson Street in Lansford for Hillary Clinton.  The response was amazingly positive.  We had Clinton signs with us, and we placed about ten along Patterson, which is also Route 209.  

Pat pointed out that Hillary supporters feel somewhat isolated in this area, and are so delighted when a supporter shows up at the door.  We also encountered two supporters who were reluctant to put signs out because they were fearful.  This is what America has come to in 2016. 

Incidentally, when we left Lansford, we noticed that one of our signs had already been stolen.  This seems to be a campaign tactic among the Trump supporters.  What a bunch of losers.