After One Hundred Days
Happy
one hundred days folks! Somehow the unthinkable happened, somehow we’re still surviving
even as democracy as we know it is limping, somehow reality is still inverted,
somehow even with the lowest approval rating of any president after one hundred
days the motherfucker’s supporters still haven’t come down with a case of buyer’s
remorse, and somehow the motherfucker is still ballyhooing about an election we’d
all rather forget. Oh, the motherfucker is still tweeting away and now
commenting about how he never expected the goddamn job to be so hard.
After one hundred days it’s hard to measure a president
and that should be no surprise as the “democratic process” is slow to change.
The motherfucker came into office and immediately shut the door on half of the
country which makes that process even slower. He’s governed by executive order
mostly, twenty-nine so far, ten more than that villain obama, still less
than truman or even FDR who walloped out ninety nine during the worst of the
depression. Like FDR, who was branded a traitor to his class for his executive
orders, most of the motherfucker’s orders are being met with resistance, or are
already being subverted by a justice system that to some extent still believes
this is a democracy and that liberal forward thinking may not be the worst
thing.
After one hundred days we’ve seen three attempts at muslim
bans although none of the countries included in those bans has ever produced a
terrorist attack on american soil. All three muslim bans have been stuck down.
The aca has been attacked once and survived, the second attack is coming but
the government shutdown has waylaid that vote until after a budget has been
produced. The motherfucker has also tried to shout down sanctuary cities for
not working with/ sharing information with immigration officials. He’s
threatened to withhold federal funding for these cities but even in that threat
he has been shut down this week. If we could all stop at this moment and give
William Orrick a round of applause, I’d say he greatly deserves it.
After one hundred days were still talking about a wall
which will never be built. The wall was a big issue this week, considering it
was a campaign promise. That fucking wall that mexico won’t pay for, the wall the
democrats won’t support, the wall there is no reason to build, the wall that
would be an environmental disaster. There are currently about eleven million
illegals in this country, that’s the lowest in
almost fifteen years. The truth about it is there are only a small number of
illegals coming from mexico, most are coming from central and south america so ratcheting
up anti mexican rhetoric is absurd. Also take into account that the
crime rates among immigrant populations are around ten percent, and incarcerated
rates for immigrant populations come in at about half of what our “native”
population. Yes there is crime along the border, but the more I read the more I
find that crime, at least on the u.s side of the border, is down mostly because
of the police state that surrounds it.
After one hundred days the motherfucker considers
the news an inconvenient truth. To be straight folks, when you read news
think about what the organization passing that news has to gain by the story it’s
presenting. In this country the fifth estate was a noble place. We shan’t be so naïve to state that that
reporting didn’t at times play fast and loose with facts. Over the last twenty
years news has become
infotainment. The surge of reality tv has infused the news room and tightened
budgets have insured that real hard hitting investigative journalism is for the
most part a thing of the past. The
problem is is that we need good hard hitting investigative journalism.
Politics, race, economy, the environment, employment or unemployment, the war
on drugs, mass incarceration are all incredibly difficult, incredibly complex
issues. They don’t take to sound bites, they don’t even take to minute long
stories. If we really want to understand issues we need a fifth estate not
motivated by profit, we also need a working class with enough time and enough
at stake in a political system to want to be informed. Until that happens we
can only ask where have you gone Woodward and Bernstein? Until that happens I would
say the first question anyone should ask, especially when listening to
loudmouth pundits and conservative ball carriers is how much money do they make
to talk? After that answer has been established, then compare it to your own
income and wonder: do these asshats have your best interests in mind or are they
proverbial snake oil salesmen?
After one hundred days we still don’t know all there is
about russiagate. This week the shite house refused request for documents relating to
the disgraced michael flynn. As such flynn was warned about taking payments
back in 2014, and lied about payments from a russian television station. I do
love that spicer blamed obama for the clearances that his administration gave
to flynn. There’s so much more floating with this investigation, such as the
motherfucker refusing to release tax records because he took sizeable payments
from the russian mafia after his latest bankruptcy. It seems to me every time
this investigation gets a little too close to getting traction and more
complete coverage something else happens to distract us. That something
has been the muslim ban, the a bombing in syria, then afghanist and now much saber rattling in north
korea.
After one hundred days we are still at war. We are at war
in afghanistan and iraq. We continue military actions in syria and across the middle east.
The motherfucker hasn’t yet started a new war but things are heating up. We may
be at war in syria in no time although we have backed off after our most recent
(illegal) bombing raid last month. Then we dropped the “mother of all bombs” in
Afghanistan (how fucked up is it that this administration cuts women’s funding
but then names a killing device a mother? fucking priorities right?). Now we're threatening war with north korea. North korea has the bomb and they claim we are
being aggressive so they have the right to use it. We claim that north korea is
being aggressive and we have sent aircraft carriers as well as threatened to
use our own nuclear arsenal. Now let’s stop here for just a moment. The united
states has been involved in one war or another for over ninety percent of its
history. I was born in 1976, the year after vietnam ended, and since then, prior to the war on terror, we
have fought afghanistan, nicaragua, granada, the persian gulf, panama, the philippines,
iraq, haiti, bosnia, and somalia. While we were fighting
those wars there was a war on drugs, a cold war, and dozens of other
skirmishes, strikes etc all over the world. I’m gonna go out a limb here and
say that the u.s is the aggressor. We haven’t fought a world war in seventy years, yet omehow the u.s is
always fighting, always policing, always antagonizing. It’s always the
other nations fault, more than likely because
they are impeding united states business interests.
After one hundred days I have never heard a president
invoke the nuclear option as if it was going for a sunday drive. The last
time the united states was on the brink of a full scale nuclear war was the cuban
missile crisis. I know that over the course of the cold war things ratcheted
and vacillated and there were a number of near misses. I know that the only
time the united states, or any country, has used nuclear weapons in an assault
were the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Those bombs were
dropped after japan had sued for peace. Those bombs were a message from truman to
stalin. Those bombs showed u.s military might and started the cold war. Those
bombs killed, on a conservative estimate, two-hundred and fifty thousand
people. Those bombs killed, on a conservative estimate, two-hundred and fifty
thousand people. I said that twice for a reason. Think for just one second. What
would happen if two-hundred and fifty thousand people were there and then they
weren’t? This is not a fucking video game. This is real fucking life. The real
fucking lives of humans, and I don’t give a flying fuck what color those human
are. Is there a good, unassailable reason why we should drop a bomb
that could conservatively kill two-hundred and fifty thousand people? Can you
think of a good, unassailable reason to kill two-hundred and fifty
thousand people?
After one hundred days the motherfucker is still at war
with the environment. We are reaching a tipping point for humanity yet
capitalism seems to believe we can play chicken with the earth and not expect disastrous
results. Throughout the course of this administration we have seen the relaxing
of epa standards. This week the motherfucker signed yet another executive order
that will review the latest twenty one national monuments. Most of these
national monuments are in places that are difficult for humans to visit, yet the motherfucker claims that these are a criminal
federal land grab. The most recent national monument is Bears Ears in Utah, which was controversial when obama signed for its protection. The reason why it
was controversial is because the site contains oil and is of interest for other
mining as well. It is also a treasure trove for geologist, dinosaur hunters as
well as containing a number of american indian tribal artifacts. On friday the
motherfucker also relaxed off shore drilling and I’m sure some of those national monuments may be sitting on land ripe for fossil fuel extraction. The problem here is
that the age of oil is over, or ending quickly. The need for renewable energy
is obvious. Solar is growing in leaps and bounds and other forms of efficient energy
are being explored mostly in other countries but to some extent here. Why is it
that we are denying the reality and not progressing into fuel alternatives?
The answer once again is money, but there is no fixing a place
once it’s destroyed. There is no bringing back species after extinction. We are
headed to a mass extinction and that mass extinction will include our own
species if we do not stand up and protect it.
After one hundred days the republicants are still unable
to govern. The motherfucker rules by executive order and even with majority, legislation
is stalling and dying in committee. This week the government was ready to shut
down without a budget, which was finally averted Friday when a one week funding
compromise was reached. I’ll leave this topic here since I’ll be writing next
week’s recap and I’m sure more shenanigans are coming soon.
After one hundred days the rich are still getting richer.
The motherfucker finally trotted out his tax plan this week which, as promised,
would give the largest tax cut since the reagan era. The motherfuckers tax plan
would reduce the corporate tax rate to fifteen percent, it would eliminate and
inheritance tax, it would cut the tax tiers from seven to three and would allow
companies to report their taxes as
people so as to qualify for the fifteen percent tax rate. Of course, most of
the tax cuts go to the wealthy which includes the motherfucker. He claims this
tax cut will promote investment which is another version of trickle-down
economics and if you remember the eighties you know how that went. Eliminating
the inheritance tax is flat out ridiculous. Most of the people affected by the inheritance
tax are the rich, and when you do away with that tax that means money stays at
the top. When reagan reduced that tax in the eighties that when this era, this
new gilded age started. The fabulously wealthy got to horde more money and the gap
between rich and poor widened to the chasm it is now. One more problem: our
corporate tax rate is high in comparison with first world countries (we could
argue we are a third world country with a first world military which is what
keeps American influence relevant but that’s another essay) but there are huge
tax loops for corporations right now. We could also argue for government
largesse is part of the reason that those tax rates are too high. The problem
is is that largesse isn’t because of social programs which really amount to a
drop in the federal bucket, the largesse isn’t because of infrastructure, the
largesse isn’t because of government spending on healthcare, the largesse is
because of what this country spends of defense and the military.
After one hundred days the scandals are endless. The motherfucker is a fake fucking
populist, he is huey long, and his people are eating up the drain the swamp
bullshit. Maybe they shouldn’t care that the koch brothers used money to aid in
the confirmation of scott pruitt, or that American apparel seeded the
confirmation of pudzer. Maybe none of us should care that the government is for
sale. Or maybe it’s time for that to change.
After one hundred days it really is one big ridiculous
farcical reality show. Over the course of this week, the daughter motherfucker
was booed in Germany for claiming her father cared about women’s
issues. Meanwhile arkansas keeps enforcing the death penalty with aplomb.
Meanwhile, le pen is one step closer to the French presidency and she’s
wants to outlaw jews. Meanwhile, in a fit of sanity new orleans takes down
confederate monuments and because an opposite reaction is necessary, white supremacist
shouted from the rooftops. Meanwhile, something similar is brewing is south carolina.
Meanwhile, were only a hundred days into
this administration and for all of us life gets harder, makes less sense. Meanwhile, we hope for an actual populist and any bit of sanity in a
world that maybe would be better off without humanity.
Happy Birthday Ally!
Jason Baldinger
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