Ready for both election outcomes

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60 Percent Of Americans will have an Election Denier on the ballot next week. In races for Governor, Senator, House of Representatives, Secretary of State, and Attorney General. Elections that could very well determine the certification of the 2024 electoral outcomes.

Our democracy relies on peaceful transition of power, with the participants in elections accepting the outcomes.

Out of 552 Republicans running for office, 199 fully denied the legitimacy of the 2020 election. That’s more than 1/3.

Still clinging to false lies that have been debunked in the courts, by investigative journalists, even by former Trump administration officials in testimony to the January 6th committee.

That’s scary.

So when you’re casting your ballots, consider which candidates will accept the results rather than lies that the election was rigged.

Because democracy is truly at stake.

Free speech, but who’s watching?

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Elon Musk often says how much he  supports free speech on Twitter. But it’s going to be tough to keep allowing that with some of the folks looking over his shoulder - including the Saudis who are the second largest investor in Twitter, and the Chinese who control access to China as a major financial market for Tesla.

Both countries have proven rather oppressive to free speech, with the Saudis recently sentencing an American citizen to 16 years in prison for tweets critical of the Saudi regime.

Musk might soon have to choose between his grand standing and his wallet.

Ideas and Debate, Not Violence

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On Friday, a man broke into the home of Nancy Pelosi and assaulted her 82 year old husband with a hammer. The assailant has been posting Conspiracy theories about the Big Lie, COVID vaccines, and much more. During the attack, he repeatedly yelled, “Where’s Nancy.” It’s easy to infer he planned to assault the Speaker of the House, second in line to the Presidency of the United States.

While few will say the assault is a good thing, there are several politicians who immediately jumped to blaming Nancy Pelosi. Some gleefully conflating the crime to her politics.

We’ve seen the insurrection and assault on the Capitol. We’ve heard the Q Anon crap about hanging politicians. We’ve had a Congressional softball game shot up. We’ve had a plot to kidnap a Governor.

When is the violence enough? Politics is a debate of ideas, thoughts, and policies. At least it should be. But violence seems somehow imbued in the American DNA.

Mark my words: someone will soon be selling t-shirts reading, “Where’s Nancy?”

If you gleefully celebrate any aspect of this assault, look deep in the mirror, my friends, because something inside you is broken.

Enough with the hate. We can disagree on politics without allowing or encouraging the violence.

After all, in the end we’re supposed to be on the same team, right?

Zombie Prime Minister

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With the resignation of Liz Truss as UK Prime Minister, the political jockeying begins to select the new PM.

And Boris Johnson - Truss’s predecessor as PM who left amidst a series of scandals and disgraces - sees this as his opportunity to bring his political career back from the dead.

It’s hopefully a long shot. But politics is pretty crazy these days. So who knows. We might have an undead PM just in time for Halloween.

Bye, Liz Truss

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So Liz Truss resigns as UK Conservative party leader (and as Prime Minister once a new one is selected) after her party pushes for her to leave. Her policies were deemed a failure and lacked planning to help the UK avoid recession. She’s the shortest serving PM in UK history (I’ve heard), but also the first PM to serve two monarchs since Winston Churchill. In the end, though, she was deemed an incompetent disaster.

Sounds awful, right?

Or does it show that the UK government is more resilient and can quickly remove a regrettable leader? Something many Americans wish we could have done more easily here.

Thanks, Biden.

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Yesterday, the Biden administration launched the application process for their student loan forgiveness program.

This cartoon is based on a billboard seen on the streets of Las Vegas. If women want to strip, more power to them. But if, as this billboards implies, they’re only doing it to pay off student loans and would decide to not do it if they don’t have the loans, then maybe the forgiveness is a good thing.

Propositions

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It’s election season and in California, as usual, we have several propositions on the ballot for direct decisions by the general voting population.

Among several other propositions, this time we’re asked to decide on multiple competing initiatives for online gambling and regulation for the dialysis industry.

I’m not a fan of the ballot propositions. I’ll be honest, I have zero expertise in gambling or dialysis regulations. Nor do I really want to put in the time to figure it out.

And that’s the problem. I’m a pretty engaged and informed voter. I don’t think most of the population has much more insight to the long term ramifications of the propositions, which can often back us into budgetary and legislative corners that limit the ability of our elected officials to manage the state.

But that’s kind of the goal with some of these. Play to the emotions and tie the hands of legislators.

So I’ll do the best I can to figure it out. We’ll spin the election wheel and see where the ball lands.

Social Media Myths

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Perhaps you’ve heard the story going around social media. Perhaps you’re lucky and haven’t. But the story goes that schools are installing cat litter boxes in some bathrooms to accommodate kids who identify as cats.

Sounds ridiculous, right? Because it is. Yet it’s been shared widely across social media. Worse, several political candidates (almost entirely Republican) have repeated it in the press, on social media, at rallies and meetings. Joe Rogan - essentially an Internet troll with a big platform - repeated it on his show.

And it’s not true. A team of investigative journalists looked into each named accounting of the story. No truth to it.

How an urban myth about litter boxes in schools became a GOP talking point

Instead it spreads as part of the fear mongering over the gender identity debates and LGBTQ+ issues. It’s a way to ridicule and stoke fears of “the others” and legitimize laws to restrict rights of minority groups.

The saddest part is that the only kernel of truth in the cat litter story is some schools (from the same district as Columbine) that stock cat litter do it for “go buckets;” buckets of materials for kids locked in a classroom by an active shooter.

Way to go, America: do nothing about the real, horrible thing that happens repeatedly in our country and instead focus on some fake, imagined fear.

Please don’t spread this stupid cat litter nonsense. People who do should take a break from social media.

Trump and His Documents

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The Congressional Committee on January 6th voted unanimously to subpoena former President Trump to seek his testimony about the day of the Capitol Insurrection.

I’m sure Trump will fight the subpoena. The only sensible legal strategy is for Trump to exercise his rights under the 5th Amendment for every question. But sensible legal strategies are not a strong point for Trump.

On the plus side, he likes collecting government documents, so this gives him one more to take home with him.

That guy is Awful

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Yeah, I REALLY don’t like Tucker Carlson.

Now there’s a video going around yesterday off the pieces he edited it off his recent interview with Ye (aka Kanye West) that just reinforces how he manipulates things to make awful points.

Watch the Disturbing Kanye Interview Clips That Tucker Carlson Didn’t Put on Air

Marijuana

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President Biden has announced that he will pardon all people convicted of federal offenses for simple marijuana possession. This isn’t drug dealers and traffickers, but people who simply had small amounts or used marijuana on federal lands.

He also will try to influence governors to do the same at the state level, and work to reclassify marijuana so it’s not considered the same as heroin and other hard drugs.

It’s a good step that is bound to help millions who can’t get a job or housing due to simple marijuana violations.

It’s time for our country to recognize that the War on Drugs has done more harm than good and move ahead with decriminalization of marijuana.