Some Year-End Opinions

 

• Without BBB, the infrastructure bill is just another (lobbyist-written) highway bill.

• There were no better "team players" in 2021 than the progressives in Congress.

• I am tired of hearing the Dem narrative about "winning elections" instead of talking about doing shit.

• It is good that we are technically not "at war" anywhere in the world right now. It's not so good that we are still supporting war and warlike activity all over the world.

• I have said this on this blog before: If you go out of your way to give people a reason to not vote for you, some of those people are going to take you up on it.

• The defense budget exists more to enrich the defense industry that it does to defend the country.

• The US should hold the behavior of its "friends" (Israel, Saudi Arabia, India, the Gulf States, etc.)  to a higher standard than our ''nonfriends". Somehow it doesn't seem that way.

• Increasing the defense budget beyond what even Biden asked for is a bad signal, especially with the withdrawal from Afghanistan. How is this any different from a Republican President and Congress? Is business as usual what we should expect? Very milquetoast on lowering prescription costs but no problem showering money on Lockheed-Martin and Raytheon. Very bad.

• There's lots of deserved disdain poured on Manchin and Sinema, but my gut tells me that if they weren't there we'd still have a lot of Dems in line that would do exactly what they are doing. There were five corporate Dems who thwarted the nomination of highly qualified Saule Omarova for Comptroller of the Currency. She actually wants to regulate the banks (you know, like, do her job) but these Senators are in bed with the banks. Might as well be Republicans. In fact, they joined hands with the red-baiting Repubs. Disgusting.

• There are quite a few words and phrases that I would be fine with never seeing or hearing again in a news story. The one that's gotten to me lately is: "experts say...".

• It's worth remembering that the Tea Party originating in the late aughts claimed to be all about small government and lower national debt. They claimed the movement wasn't about any of those traditional conservative social issues. Of course, everyone but the corporate media knew this was baloney. Since the people in the Tea Party movement are pretty much now the staunchest supporters of Trump (who increased the debt to record levels with their support) and the January 6th seditionists, it's clear that it was about race and hate all along. The size of government and spending was always a smokescreen for the real agenda.

Biden's First Year

 

With the Biden Administration approaching its first anniversary, I would characterize his foreign policy as awful. The only positive is the withdrawal from Afghanistan, but the sanctions he left behind are going to kill many people. Policies towards Saudi Arabia, Israel, Cuba, the war in Yemen, and the Iran Nuclear Deal are unchanged from the Trump Administration, and in many cases worse.

The rhetoric has become almost warlike concerning China. While China's human rights abuses should be on the table, so should those of our "friends" like Saudi Arabia, India, Israel, and the Gulf States. Otherwise our credibility is zero.

Biden's domestic policy initiatives are better than a lefty like myself could have expected, especially given the crappy Senate he's been stuck with. But on balance, if a pollster asked about my approval of Biden, I'm not sure that I wouldn't say "disapprove."

Whitewashed History

 When I was in school in the 1950s and 1960s we pretty much learned white history. And the whites in America were always good guys, both at home and abroad. And I grew up in the north. Looks like Lynne Cheney is finally getting her way because we are heading back there. We'll see how that works out. I think part of what contributed to the counterculture and other movements in the '60s was that people my age were pretty pissed when they found out how they were lied to in school.

"Manifest Destiny" was presented--at least implicitly--in a positive light. The idea that it was our own unique form of imperialism was never even hinted at.

The fact that many founders and subsequent presidents were slaveowners was pretty much glossed over.

Reconstruction was presented as kinda not working out, and that was largely because those northern carpetbaggers forced the white southerners to retake control. There was no mention of the fact that many places in the south had fully functioning black majority governments that were violently overthrown.

Robert E. Lee was characterized as a pretty good guy who reluctantly decided to remain loyal to his state of Virginia (i.e., betray his country). And he didn't care much for slavery, even though he was a pretty big slaveowner.

These things and many others will now be taught again. Welcome to whitelashed and whitewashed America.

QAnon Insurrection Stories

I know someone who was at the January 6th insurrection. It's been fun to watch the narrative metamorphose as the facts have emerged over time.

• It was entirely peaceful except that Black Lives Matter kept us from getting out of town.

• It was all antifa.

• Typical tourist activity except for a few rowdies who got a little out of hand.

• False flag.

• The texts read by Liz Cheney prove that everyone in the White House was very concerned and on top of things, and did everything they could to stop it. And besides, it was mostly peaceful anyway.

Rest assured that the story will continue to metamorphose as needed.

[Incidentally, this is eerily similar to how the Covid story evolved over a couple years in these circles. Just change the narrative as needed in order prove that either (1) it's very serious and Donald Trump saved us all or (2) just a flu and the vaxxes just made everything worse]

It's Monday

 

• On the Cuomos: Good riddance to both of them. It's fun to watch Conservatives play the gotcha card. They are clueless to the fact that Andrew Cuomo was pretty universally hated (in a political sense) by the left since forever, if not earlier.

• In my lifetime, it's been common to hear folks in the center and on the right preaching about competition in the "marketplace of ideas". But then when they lose that competition all we get is whining and grievance about how they've been "canceled" or that the left somehow rigged the competition. So they sign Forbes letters or start up faux universities to assuage their hurt feelings and their loss of the entitlements that they think belong to them.

• Dr. Oz has done a complete 180 on Roe v. Wade, now that he is a Republican candidate for Senator. (He was a quite adamant believer in abortion rights just a couple years ago.) He'll fit right in with a party that believes in nothing but obtaining and keeping power