Here It Is, 2016

Well here it is 2016 already. 

Seems like only yesterday it was 1967.  

Not much has changed. 

America was involved in its longest war at that time

and today America is now in another longer and apparently endless war.

Not much has changed,

just the names and places.

The years of the Obama Administration have been an endless oscillation of the Administration trying to accomplish some decent domestic policy and having to fight an irrational mob of mindless Republican and Tea Party robots whose pockets are filled with dark money which spreads into a 24 / 7 miasma of political propaganda.  I more or less watched the struggle with bafflement which in time turned to amusement as people as poor as myself and with more need than me agreed to vote against government sponsored Obamacare.  What madness can make people choose the option which makes it harder on themselves?  It seems that the answer in this instance is political ideology.  What is so unusual about this phenomenon is that while people may approve legislation that harms others, they rarely put their political energies into harming themselves and their families. But on the issue of healthcare they did. Crazy isn’t it?

And then we are forced to elect another President and I have a few words short and to the point.

As far as Republicans and Democrats go the only one I would feel comfortable with is Bernie Sanders.  His campaign is being sandbagged by lack of cooperation by the frigging Democrats themselves and the media.  Elections have become a farce.  The process of electing a major world leader in the U.S. is more like a traveling minstrel show designed to amuse children.  In the end what the dark money says is what happens

I’d like to digress some and give my impression of a few candidates.

1.  Trump. He reminds me of Benito Mussolini and his followers remind me of Mussolini’s followers.  I view this as a negative feature of the Trump campaign; his followers view it as positive.
2. Carson.  Not suited for the job.  He reminds me of Buckwheat of the Little Rascals movie series.
3. Clinton.  Not to be trusted under any circumstances. That’s it, that’s how I feel about a Clinton candidacy and Presidency.
4. Sanders is the only one among the major candidates who knows what the problem is and is prepared to do what is necessary to solve it. So he is not given appropriate media coverage.

Today, as I write the President has spoken out one more time about how violent a place American society has become and focusing on the use of guns in producing the violence.  The meme of the day is background checks at all points of the sale of firearms.  I’m okay with that as far as a commercial enterprise goes or sales to strangers on the internet. A buddy should be able to sell a gun to a buddy. It is in the interest of society to keep guns out of the hands of criminals and people who are certifiably mentally unfit to have a weapon.  Much caution should be used when implementing the last caveat.

There was one aspect of violence in need of abatement which the President did not mention.  That is police violence.  He made no mention of disarming the police or curtailing police violence.  If those who are employed to supervise our activities are allowed to have firearms I suggest they must undergo intense psychological profiling to see if they can be trusted. 

This may raise the hackles of some but the statistics indicate that the families in which a police officer lives are significantly more likely to be the object of domestic abuse.  If this is indeed the case then a thorough psychological profiling of someone who is entrusted with authority is certainly appropriate. Allowing persons who are abusive to their family to carry guns and meet the public on the basis of an ‘authority’ granted by the government is a dangerous mix.  So what I’m saying is that if mentally unfit persons can be barred from possessing firearms that must also apply to the police.  And because they are entrusted with ‘authority’ and a weapon they should logically be examined with greater scrutiny to see if they are fit to wield authority in a society like ours which values liberty and life.  For an overview of the problem of domestic violence in the families of police officer The National Center For Women & Policing has provided statistics which support my previous statements.

So we enter the first week of the year 2016 with the 21^st century version of a range war and an embattled group of patriots suffering through their personal Valley Forge of the long Oregon winter.  The Feds turned off the power LOL.  This is turning into a good old fashioned siege.  Get some popcorn, maybe start a pool on how this turns out and when or if the 'Frigid Few' surrender.

Sit back and enjoy the new year all you experience is brought to you in full cooperation with the Republican and Democratic committee to control the conversation and make the rules and generally pull the wool over everyone's eyes.