It’s more newsworthy when America doesn’t have a mass shooting

in

Half Moon Bay. Monterey Park. Chicago. Robinsonville. Baton Rouge. Shreveport. Houston. Fort Pierce. Goshen. Rockford. That’s not even all of them in the past week.

It’s so frequent we are numb to it. Maybe that’s why most of America continues to do nothing?

Lizzo the Pied Piper

in

Popular musician Lizzo - a classically trained flautist and Black woman - was allowed by the Library of Congress to play a 200+ year old crystal flute once owned by former President James Madison.

In one of the stupider controversies lately, many conservative pundits lost their minds. They seemed to think this somehow desecrates American history.

Just like the Pied Piper, Lizzo’s flute playing drew out the awful people like rats.

Likely many of the same people who were upset at Disney casting a Black woman as Ariel in their live action Little Mermaid film.

There’s probably even a common thread between the two… sigh. 🙄

Dumb

in

Today is Constitution Day, commemorating the day our US Constitution was signed in 1787.

But many won’t know that. Because US knowledge is sorely lacking.

The Annenberg Public Policy Center’s annual, nationally representative survey showed that less than half of US adults could name all three branches of the US government.

Less than 1/4 of people could cite Freedom of Religion as one of the five freedoms protected by the First Amendment. While over half incorrectly believed that the First Amendment requires Facebook to allow them to express themselves freely on its platform.

https://www.annenbergpublicpolicycenter.org/americans-civics-knowledge-drops-on-first-amendment-and-branches-of-government/

Education, knowledge, and expertise are under attack in our country. Whether it’s untrained parents who feel they should decide school curriculum over trained educators. Or the Michigan town threatening to defund the library because they don’t like certain books there. Don’t even start on the pushes to ban books across several states and towns.

Many people have long said that America would not be defeated by outside enemies, but rather threatened from internal strife and divisions.

Unfortunately, I fear America is just going to dumb itself to death.

Student Loan Debt

in

President Biden announced his plan for student debt relief, canceling up to $10,000 in government backed student debt per individual (or up to $20k for Pell grant recipients).

While I don’t think this is any long term answer to our student debt problems, it’s going to help millions of people. Estimated to help up to 43 million borrowers, with 90% of the debt relief dollars going to people earning under $75k.

At the same time, Biden put a definitive end to the freeze on student debt payments.

Moody’s Analytics estimates the combined effects will largely be a wash on GDP growth, unemployment, and inflation.

I don’t think it’s the real solution we need to the soaring costs of higher education. We should address the underlying issues of the cost and not just one time fixes for some. It’s not like we should expect to do this every ten years or so. I understand people feeling it sets a bad precedent for others, so let’s address the bigger issue. But it’s hard to ignore the huge number of people who will have immediate, real, life altering benefits from this.

For those not getting debt canceled, it will likely result in no noticeable change. And projected to have no large negative effect on the macro economy.

Hard to argue against a move that won’t affect most people in any real material way, but will improve the lives of up to 43 million people.

I don’t think we feel secure

in

Debates over the 2nd Amendment often hinge on phrases from the text, “shall not be infringed,” or “a well regulated militia.”

Maybe there’s something we’re missing in the part between those phrases? If this is about security and freedom, do we feel more secure and free today with the proliferation of guns? It seems the list of places we don’t feel secure just keeps growing with each mass shooting.

Yes, this is mostly a semantics point and has no real legal basis. But, perhaps to feel more secure we need to stop this idolatry of guns as the key to freedom. Because it doesn’t seem to be working.

Freedom and Rights, but for Whom?

in

As we start the Fourth of July weekend, I reflect on the promise of America and what we see happening today.

“All men are created equal.” That’s the promise. And we still struggle to live up to that, with more restrictions being pushed on LGBTQ people, promotion of Christian theocratic norms, women’s body autonomy vanishing overnight in many places, voting laws that discriminate based on systemic racial issues, immigrants made to feel like they’re not wanted, and more.

As a financially secure, straight, cisgender, white male, it’s not me that these discriminatory laws and practices and hatred are after- but lots of people I love.

“Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.” America is set up to be majority role with rights of the minorities protected. But we’re losing both of those. The majority of Americans disagree with many recent rulings and laws. Yet the system has been rigged to ram through minority opinions. And the minority rights that are supposed to be protected are being eroded.

Minority rule without protecting rights- that’s fascism. A word thrown about so much lately that’s it’s lost its impact.

I truly love America. I love the promise of what it should be. That’s why we keep pushing to make it better.

So as you think about or celebrate America’s birthday this year, ponder: is America what it should be? If not, what am I going to do about it?

Empathy

in

America is severely lacking in empathy. The ability to feel a situation from another’s viewpoint. The ability to care about the impact on others.

A pandemic that killed over a million Americans (and counting), exacerbated by people who won’t take simple steps to slow the spread.

Legislators who are so fearful of whom others love that they push to remove LGBTQ representation from available books and punish families who live that way.

People who want to control a woman’s right to choose.

Voters clinging so tightly to their dollars they can’t see that the crumbling infrastructure around them needs more funding.

People who accept the level of gun violence far out of line with any other rich, developed nation in the world because they can’t imagine any limitations on their toys designed only for killing people quickly.

People who demonize immigrants trying to find a better life, and cast them as hordes coming to replace white people.

Those who want to be “tough on criminals” and increase policies that don’t seem to be working and have led to America having 5% of the global population yet 20% of the globally incarcerated people.

People dismissing the effects of the climate catastrophe on communities all around us, trying to defend a status quo.

America needs a shot of empathy. To think beyond only ourselves. Remember, we’re in this together.

It’s an addiction

in

Since Uvalde, there have been 33 mass shootings in the US, with a mass shooting defined as 4 or more shooting victims.

157 days into 2022, the US has seen 246 mass shootings; more than one per day.

There were almost 20 million guns sold legally in America in 2021.

America clearly has a problem, and this addiction to guns and violence is not going away any time soon.

Leaked Republican memos tell the GOP party members and pundits to, “ignore guns, talk inflation.” They offer no solutions. Just telling people to buy more guns and more hardened doors. Apparently that’s their only answer to protect schools, churches, grocery stores, hospitals, medical clinics, parties, private homes, etc., where these mass shootings keep happening and happening. They expect the furor to die down and people to move on.

Let’s not let them ignore the problem.

Sane Gun Laws or Guns Everywhere?

in

With each mass shooting there’s an outcry for more gun control. And an inevitable backlash from those who stubbornly oppose any actions. Instead, many say we need MORE guns.

Ted Cruz called for more armed guards in schools. More “hardened targets.”

Of course they won’t research the effects that might have. In fact, some research shows, “armed guards were not associated with significant reduction in rates of injuries; in fact, controlling for the aforementioned factors of location and school characteristics, the rate of deaths was 2.83 times greater in schools with an armed guard present.”

https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/2776515

Some politicians think it will hit a point there are so many shootings the people will rise up and demand gun control. But instead we get more stalling for any research or changes, and more guns in more places. Which only benefits the gun makers. And paints an awful picture of the future.

Want to do something? Contact your Senators and tell them to pass H.R. 8- Bipartisan Background Checks Act of 2021 and H.R. 1446 - Enhanced Background Checks Act of 2021.

Follow for more cartoons.

Replacement

in

The Buffalo shooter left a “manifesto” claiming hoods actions were motivated by The Great Replacement, a racist conspiracy theory that claims whites in America are being deliberately replaced by people of color.

Great Replacement messaging is prominent on Tucker Carlson and other Fox News shows, and repeated by several high profile Republicans congress people.

And now it’s leasing directly to the death of innocent Americans.

We must push back against this racist rhetoric.

Doesn’t the state holiday prove its systemic?

in

Yep, today in Alabama is Confederate Memorial Day. It’s recognized tomorrow in Florida. Mississippi and South Carolina also have official state holidays for it (maybe on different days), while it’s commemorated in Kentucky, Texas, North Carolina, and Tennessee.

In Alabama, several state agencies will be closed today for the holiday. Schools will be open, though, so they could still teach why it’s celebrated and address why that might affect Black people living in the state. Except Alabama has just signed a bill against teaching any “divisive topics” in K-12 schools, yet another vaguely defined bill that will punish teachers found in violation of loose and subjective legal language. So, unlikely most teachers would try to address it.

Maybe it’s just me, but a holiday celebrating a failed, armed rebellion driven largely by the desire to keep people enslaved seems pretty divisive.

Everybody Hates Ted

in

Whether it’s inane questioning at a confirmation hearing, checking his Twitter feed while someone responds to his question, jetting off to Cancun to escape a winter storm, or just his general levels of being a jerk, does anyone actually like Ted Cruz?

This week he implied that someone who chooses to be a public defender must like criminals, ignoring that the US has a Constitutional right to a defense attorney.

I have to imagine, after kowtowing to Trump even after Trump insulted his wife and father, that everyone sees through him.

Everybody must hate Ted.