Americans are under attack from enemies within. Much of the President's time recently has been spent insisting WE THE PEOPLE do not know how to hold an election anymore. Link to NY Times commentary. The Republican Party supports him all the way. This is an unhealthy development for democracy lovers in America and around the world. Noam Chomsky gives his opinion on the COVID-19 epidemic and the response of the American political class to the threat to the nation at the link from The Real News Network.
In the 21 century no word of apology from Donald Trump as he works hand in hand with the "opinion and duress of a small group of dominant men."
A raccoon destroyed the future held in the duck egg in the picture below. The Ring Of Fire report at the link reveals the Trump Administration's ongoing attempts to deprive the nation's voting class from voting. Like what happened to the raccoon eaten egg below Trump and the Republican Party are eating the heart out of our democracy.
Donald Trump and the Republican Party are attempting to do something similar to the idea of Self Determination. Have a nice day.
Anyone who has had but a smidgen of interest in daily events in the U.S. recently is aware that Donald Trump, the President of the United States, has gone all out to convince Americans they cannot trust their own ability to hold a fair election. The Damage Report is confronting the issue head onwith its reporting. The Ring of Fire also adds some needed information.
To top it off he, Trump, is actively making plans to make of no effect the People's right to vote by sabotaging the ability of the USPS to deliver the mail used for voting during the COVID-19 pandemic. The President is behaving in a way intelligence analysts recognize as the way dictators go about setting up shop. Link to MSNBC report on the danger of the Trump Administration's dictatorial tendencies. To get right to the point. The People can employ measures to counteract the intention of the President to deny them their march toward self-determination. Something simple can be done like not using the mail for anything not essential for as long as necessary leading up to and during the election period. Don't expect the government to orchestrate this. You'll be old and a veteran laborer in the salt mines if you wait for the government to see to it the election is on the up and up. So I got to thinking we might save ourselves if we can convince THE PEOPLE, the same people whose future depends on being free in a just society, to make the effort to see to it that the work load of post offices will be reduced to a bare minimum. If that were done it would be difficult or impossible for Trump to make excuses for non-delivery of ballots without raising a lot of suspicion. Here's where the corporations that use the mail can be of a great help. They can switch to another carrier until the votes have been all delivered and counted. It would be like was done during the previous world wars where the corporations were put to work for the public good. Remember, the situation is dire, the last un-elected President, G.W. Bush, in 2000 started a war that is still going on in one way or another and is not expected to end until world domination is complete. I found an article on how corporations use the USPS. The article can be read here. The article is obviously written from a pro corporate perspective. The point I wish to make is that the corporations who use this service now could and should find another way to deliver their packages during the election period. Another thing consumers can do is reduce all kinds of purchases that involve the USPS until the ballots have been delivered and counted. Do you really need that trinket as much as you think you do? Given the animosity of the Trump Administration directed toward the voting class the corporations could play a big part in defending democracy. (CNN report.) If they were to bite the bullet a little and cease to use the USPS during the critical election period for American voters it would relieve the system and remove the ability of the Trump Administration to argue effectively that the post office had failed to deliver the ballots.
The Trump Administration is arguing that since 2016 Americans have become unable to hold elections. The President is arguing that letting people vote off the digital grid on paper mail in ballots will harm America and it's future. The President just might be lying again like he was lying about kids getting sick. (CNN report at link) Only this time he's lying about our democratic republic. Lies, by the way, which if acted on will destroy the democratic processes that insure liberty and justice for all. That's how serious the situation is folks! Mr. President, kids can get sick and die and we THE PEOPLE do know how to hold an election. It is you are the problem, not WE THE PEOPLE. Now it is time for WE THE REAL PEOPLE to join with or coerce with boycotts the Corporate People to find a way not to use the Post Office until the votes are cast and counted. Our democratic republic should be worth more than express overnight delivery. Obviously the President doesn't think it is and that is the evidence why this is the most serious time in the history of our nation. Let it sink in. We have a President so dead set against the People voting that he is willing to sabotage the means of THE PEOPLE to choose their own leaders. When that is accomplished what are you left with? The President and the Republican Party have given the signals that their special interests trump the right of the people to direct their own fate. This is what we are witnessing now and if WE THE PEOPLE sit idly by watching the sideshow, laughing at the absurdity, instead of taking this seriously we will lose every right implied by the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. Now is the time to convince everyone, yes you corporate People too, to stop using the mail during this most important period. By reducing the work load we can give the Postal Employees every opportunity to deliver our ballots and defend the democratic process. Trump and the Republicans most likely will still attempt to defraud THE PEOPLE of their right to self determination. THE PEOPLE can counteract his attempts by drastically reducing the use of the mail during the critical time of the voting process. If we do that we might be able to demonstrate that the President is wrong about Americans not being smart enough to hold an election anymore. That's all Folks! Have a nice day!
One of my favorite things to do is to read the Tao Te Ching. I've been pleasantly surprised to see how compatible the notion of the Eternal Tao and the notion of Logos used in the New Testament are with each other. Translators, some of them anyhow, agree that the meaning of the 'Way' in the Tao has the same meaning of the 'Way' as used to apply to Christ by the writers of the New Testament. I was asked once why the Tao Te Ching which provides instructions for those who govern would be considered a 'Spiritual' text. I didn't have an answer then. I had not made the connection that erased the divide between 'Spirituality' and 'Humanity' making the two inseparable. I returned, after years, to read the New Testament with fresh eyes. This time with 'eyes' washed clean of the traditional explanations given by the traditional Christian institutions. I simply began reading and thinking about the concepts in the Parables of Jesus of Nazareth as well as his teaching. I made note of the way it is told that he related to all he met and how a picture began to come to view of Jesus being like one of the Wise Masters referred to by Lao Tzu. Verse 15 in the link provided below will give an idea. Jesus surely met those standards. What I understood linked the Mighty Tao, referred to by Lao Tzu and the directions derived from it, with the same purposes of the Christian Kingdom of Heaven (or God) which the parables, deportment and teaching of Jesus reveal. Jesus who came some 500 years after both Lao Tzu and Buddha was applying, whether he knew it or not, the fundamental spiritual lessons of both previous traditions with regard to the concept of the Kingdom of Heaven he was promoting in the first century. By his application of the ultimate 'Truth' to the temporal existential circumstances of human society Jesus, The Son of Man', melded 'Humanity' with 'Spirituality'. His plain everyday examples and maxims in the Sermon On The Mount radically reinforce the demands and legitimacy of the voices of the people. His response comes in the form of a prescription for governing that will bring an end to social injustices within society. The Kingdom of Heaven Jesus envisioned would be revealed by a society that responded to and provided what those in that society needed. Jesus lays it out right here in the Parable of the Good Samaritan. Lao Tzu is the bearer of ancient Chinese Wisdom to Americans today.
The other morning as I sat in the yard reading the Tao and listening to the chatter of a variety of birds at the feeders I read the passage above, 24, from the Tao Te Ching and was inspired by events in the U.S. today to make the poster about those governing society and thought how nice it would be if governments operated the way Jesus, Buddha and Lao Tzu all said they could and should be. What a revolutionary thought! Read the Tao Te Ching and think about the 'Spiritual' principles of governing that come to mind when the benefit of 'Humanity' is placed as the first in the order of societies priorities. Each of the three 'Spiritual' traditions when practiced will produce the benefit society needs. Societies that do not measure up to these standards will, by virtue of the human spirit, eventually cease to exist. The churches have taught the people to refer to Jesus as the Son of God and treat him as if he were other worldly. Jesus however spent his life living with 'Humanity' with the intention to serve the needs of the outcasts of society and put on notice those in authority. There is a lot to say on this topic that cannot be said today. But I suggest stopping and taking another look at Jesus before we do it. I encountered the essay "The Scandal Of Joshua Ben Adam" by Robert Brinsmeadin 2004 and was stunned by it. I don't agree with all of it but it opened the door to a larger understanding of the Christ Event and the positive impact the principles of the teaching of Jesus would have in rectifying the results and conditions of the current social paradigm. Have a nice day.
The Presidency of Donald Trump is following the plan revealed by Woodrow Wilson when he made the above confession. Trump has escalated the animosity of the State by attacking the right of THE PEOPLE to vote. We, as a nation, have known how to hold elections all the way up until the Trump Administration. Now according to Trump and the Republicans we don't know how to do it anymore. When it is in the interest of the State to keep voters from voting the social situation is not serious, it is critical approaching dire. Stop for a moment and think what it means for the State to make voting difficult for those eligible to vote.
What would be the right thing for Americans to do when confronted with information to that effect? How about, since we are hosting an ever growing deadly PANDEMIC we have a nationwide teachers strike out of an abundance of caution? Such an act would lessen the probability of a nationwide outbreak just before the election which could be used to halt the election Trump and the Republicans are already attempting to interfere with. It is hard to imagine either Trump or the Republicans care whether we live or die. If it looks like they don't care, it is incumbent on ourselves to care. How many teachers is Trump willing to have get sick while at work and possibly die in order to save the economy? Maybe a better question to ask is how many teachers are there who are willing to get sick and die for the benefit of the economy and Donald Trump, his Republican enablers and corporate donors? It seems like the teachers should be the ones making decisions like that, doesn't it?
Something amounting to a terrible wrong has been apparent in the U.S. since Trump took center stage. It's like an aneurysm at the heart of our nation. It remains to be seen if the condition is treatable or if it has progressed too far. The special interests Woodrow Wilson spoke of are still present in the mind of the resident of the Oval Office and the offices of Wall Street today. The people in those offices are demanding, from their gilded chambers, that the workplaces down at street level be staffed no matter what the cost to human life.
So what should Americans do? How about a nationwide teachers strike to kick things off and reset the mood of the people? Truly this is a do or die moment and such a justified rebellion will wake up the populace to the danger society is in. It is time to encourage and support the teachers in a nationwide strike if they choose to do so. I for one hope the teachers walk out on strike, masks on and determined. So we started with "Pepper". For inspiration I'll leave you with "Banks Of Marble".
