Walkabout Thoughts #74

Thoughts & Stream of Consciousness, rough and ready, from an award-winning filmmaker and author you’ve never heard of, while walking off long Covid, and listening to podcasts…walk day 5/12/2024 Mother's Day

Weather for the day… starting out, 59° nice sunny day starting out About 69° when I got home.

Podcast Prosecuting Donald Trump, ep. It's Not About Sex

I felt pretty horrible yesterday when I was walking. I went on the antivirals for long Covid for three days starting yesterday, a pill every 12 hours. I am already feeling better.

Quote for the day: "Any Great Stupid is still dangerous until it stops moving."

I have asked Copilot AI to summarize in a couple of paragraphs of what Al Capone would have been like as POTUS. Then compare and contrast that to the Donald Trump 45 administration. "POTUS" Al Capone vs FPOTUS Donald Trump

I’m so sick of hearing about Donald Trump. It makes me even more nauseous that we give so much attention to the narcissist (any narcissist) who so lives for the attention. For a grown man with his own version of Oppositional defiant disorder. For a national leader who claims victimhood as a form of being macho. Who lies constantly. And when he tells the truth, generally speaking, he’s just telling us what he’s going do or will make a joke of it once it's ralized what he's doing. And then? He does it anyway. He projects onto others his own crimes and current actions. I find this so vile. We see the GOP doing this of late, also. How can one not find this vile? And who would see such a person (or party) as having the material or character ever to be a national leader(s)?

The podcast now is talking about Stormy Daniels sometimes having to wanted to make money off of her story, sometimes not. And how that may appear to the jury as inconsistent or suspect. Maybe a jury of our peers should only be psychologists? I alwyas thought a "jury of your peers" was kind of nonsense anyway. What IF they did get that, peers of the defendent who really understand that person and their job and orientation? I wonder if there'd be more, or fewer guilty judgements?

We have in general very perverse belief about memory, recall, eyewitness accounts, etc. I’ve pushed forward on projects myself that I stopped and then went forward on after a while (referring to Stormy, wanting to sell her story, then not, etc.), all because of at one time, feeling strong enough to have the audacity to think it was a worthy project but at another time feeling weaker because of something that happened. I’ve been able to take a breath for a few days, collecting my wits and then moving forward again. So I don't see how that isn’t reasonable for what happened with Stormy Daniels. She's a person after all. Not to mention she had been threatened. Donald Trump is a scary little punk much fo the time with a bunch of money and more power than his money should portend. Then as POTUS we foolishly gave Donald Trump a shield against his criminal behaviors and one that is ongoing and ridiculous. I would argue anti-democratic, and has proven to be anti-American-citizen and anti-America.

Are “American citizens" actually American citizens if they are seditious and insurrectionist? Certainly treasonous would indicate no. So at what point are they not actual citizens? People are trying to claim that Palestinians are all Hamas and therefore the enemies of Israel. So are MAGA America’s enemies? Are they not?

It seems yet again binary thinking is the enemy of America. So, a porn star, now porn director cannot be surprised when that she walks out of a bathroom in a hotel room, after being invited to a dinner, that wasn’t gonna happen, and upon arriving meets Donald Trump in silk pajamas. Tells him to get dressed (because they were going to dinner, right?), certainly in her mind. He HAD said, or his Representative had told her that. So he gets dressed at her request, implying he’s playing along with the act that they’re going to have dinner. Then they never have dinner. Instead she gets cajolled into having sex.Thing is, had you asked her upon arrival, "want to have sex with Donald Trump, this old guy (remember at this time she's 27)?" I suspect she'd have said no. So how could she not have been fully cognizant and aware that what happened was going to happen? Please. Perhaps because she was a woman? Because you want to believe the best about others and for yourself? And to stereotypically presume otherwise, is just more toxic binary thinking in hindsight. About a stiuation we weren't ever in and Stormy was, and it’s just the worse form possible for us, for others? And why are we referring to her as Stormy Daniels, her stage name? She is Stephanie Gregory Clifford. As someone pointed out, Nikki Glaser maybe, we don't refer to an actor in court by his stage name in his latest film.

America’s problem, especially with Trump, seems to be a kind of flip-flopping in binary thinking in order to rationalize the best situation possible, in order to offer an ex-POTUS (and career criminal) so we can then be surprised in a kind of, “Casablanca style" retort as by Captain Renault, "I’m shocked to hear there’s gambling going on in this establishment.“ Please.

I decided to add into my previous Mother’s Day "walkabout thought" blog the Rosemary‘s baby meme, and the comments I posted elsewhere about my own oldest son. Maybe also the post I did today on Facebook about my and my siblings problematic relationship with our mother.

Did I add the Instagram post I made yesterday. No. But I just did.

I watched the entire first season of “Action “on Peacock streaming. I do hate the commercials every so often. But as I posted around social media the other day, if you’re regularly on a film set and there’s any action involved whatsoever, or you’re just a fan of action films, you really wanna watch this series. References go back to the first Matrix movie and the first "John Wick" and the guys who worked on those and then built their own company. Which where they’re now working on and they focus on in the series, like “Violent Night “and the one in theaters, “The Fall Guy“film, a version of the old 80s TV series with Lee Majors, the previous star of the $6 Million Man show, not to be confused with The Man Show.

End of mile one

Regarding long Covid lately, it’s been a rough 2024 so far. I’ll be 69 end of August and so far not enjoying the last few years at all. I expected old age to be much more entertaining and enjoyable. I’ve always had my health, so what the fuck happened? I blame Covid for this and my three infections from it. Even though I’ve gotten all the shots and boosters. Three weeks after I caught the last bout this year VA health came out and said "get your booster." Thanks guys. Great timing!

I’ve also had this weird thing going on for a couple of months on my right hand, ring finger, largest knuckle. Actually it's the proximal phalege. I don’t know, second phalange first phalange, I can never figure it out. But I woke up one morning to close my hand and that finger locked at that knuckle as I closed my hand. And it’s been catching like that. I figured it has to do with a lack of exercise. So I bought a gel exercise ball to fit my hand. Couple inches in diameter. Every day I’ve tried to do 10 squeezes with each hand and then nine, down to one. Tried to do that a few times a day. I don’t know, seems to be helping? I’ve got arthritis so it may have something to do with that. I’ve been eating 9 gin raisins every morning for a few years now. When I stop eating those, I feel the arthritis pain in my body, worse. I’ve seen some really old women in the news piecers replying to the question of "what do you credit your longevity to" and they said "Gin raisins". I don’t know, but can’t hurt.

Why does Stormy Daniel say that she’s not a "me too!" victim with Donald Trump? Because she’s a strong, intelligent woman. And yes, even those are susceptible to a guy conning them into a bad situation, or even sex. This has inevitably happened to millions of women throughout the history of humanity. Let’s turn this around. If this was Donald Trump rather than Stormy he would be screaming. "I’m a victim. I’m a victim. Me too! Me too!", to the high heaven. Don’t think that’s not true. 100%! And he would especially be claiming that if it was a lie because he’d be getting some kind of salacious deliciousness out of his fetish of lying to the public or anyone. Damn, this guy...

In Trump’s criminal court trial his defense attorney a shameless woman who said to Stormy in the witness box that she’s a strong woman when at 27 years old when all this happened and she should’ve been able to deal with it appropriately. Stormy‘s reply? “I’m a stronger woman now." Why? Because our worst experiences should inform our future selves.

I don’t usually eat sugar. Stopped that years ago, decades ago? I use agave. I’ll eat a little sugar as a treat once in a while. But I read in a study last year that it's a long Covid symptom, or certain aspects of it, that evokes a craving for sweets. I have to admit this past month or two, way too many sweets. No need to be putting on weight, even a few pounds. Dinner has been a cup of yogurt, lately, so I’ve been maintaining. But I seem to feel better and finally getting more exercise, so this feeling is diminishing. I’m really pushing myself to get in more exercise now that I’m feeling better and the weather is better. My lungs are still not fully healed from the last Covid infection though. Getting there, I suppose but it takes forever. I thought they would be better healed by now.

I know the court has to run how it runs, but claiming anything is abusive toward Trump in his court trial, this side of jumping over the witness stand and blowing his brains out, I would argue at this piont might be considered fair game. Now that’s not the case legally. Just morally and ethically, considering his utter disrespect he gave to our office of the president, to American citizens, to our US Constitution and our liberal democratic republic, so Trump pretty much deserves anything that happens to him in negative repurcussions he's earned. I do prefer to do this through the courts, but we're suffering fools here. I suspect we need some new laws for the next more enhanced version of a Donald Trump, career criminals made POTUS. Or we're fucked.

Little nugget of information… "Wicked Pictures" is one of the only adult film companies that require use of a condom onset. We know this because a FPOTUS is on criminal trial for election fraud and that's Stormy Daniel's company she has worked for. Why do you need to know anything more than that? 

Trump in his own words said a candidate in this situation shouldn’t be allowed to run. He said that in 2016.

End of mile two.

Damn. I just realized. My last podcast was on comedy and social issues and this one is on politics again. Sigh…

Here’s a thing about this Trump criminal trial. Had he not broken the law that requires this trial and information about Stormy Daniels, after the Access Hollywood recording came out, he would not have ended becoming POTUS. Director of the FBI Comey, pulling his bullshit about protecting the FBI over, protecting a national candidate in Hillary Clinton for POTUS, is another matter. I suspect we’re seeing that kind of crap with AG Garland. These people need to stop protecting their institutions and start protecting the US Constitution and the American citizen. YES, protect the FBI and the DOJ but when it's between them and citizens...CITIZENS! Between America and MAGA? Fucking AMERICA!

If God really existed, his (best) fake (worst) acolyte Donald Trump would immediately have a really bad stroke. So there that is I guess...

Donald Trump always negotiates his bills. Regardless that he OWES that money, he often gets reductions. Or he doesn’t even pay! I was once ONE week late, owed $7 on my home electric bill and the local small electric company put a lien against our house! The day I found out I paid it off. HAD they just called me I would’ve driven in and paid it off. It took some effort to get the lien off the house after that. So stop treating Donald Trump like a fragile glass object. He’s a career criminal. He ONCE was POTUS, AND? Deal with it!

Trump‘s accountant Allen Weisselberg prefers to sit in jail than testify against his former and current boss. As with Trump, who has plenty of money to pay penalties, you need to hit these people at a level they understand to feel the pain. While we would feel the pain as normal citizens, they won’t. Try giving Weisselberg 20 years in prison and see if he talks. Or  confiscate everything he owns and make it so that he can receive no further funds from Trump or anyone associated with him. Perhaps do what Trump does, and go after his family.

Yes, we don’t do that kind of thing because were the US government and we have a Constitution, and protections for our citizens (not that Trump cares if he can abuse us for his own good) and democracy, which Trump is trying to kill and that MAGA wants to kill and that the GOP is working to kill. But there has to be work arounds and we have to learn ASAP how this shit needs to be done... yesterday, not a year or 10 from now, as our jurisprudence tends to go sometimes.

Must be feeling better I’m getting rather long-winded and these blogs are getting longer. That’s a good sign. For me anyway.

Here’s an idea about Judge Cannon with the Mar y Lago documents trial for Donald Trump… Request of whomever you would request this of, that she not be replaced, so much as another judge is put into place for this, one who has a docket better capable of handling this, who is willing ready and able to act, before the election... because the American people have a right to due process and a speedy trial. Donald Trump and Judge Cannon do not have a right to delay tactics to avoid that situation. Or maybe they do.

While Judge Cannon's scheduling order is on her purview and requirements, I would say there’s an overarching requirement of the American people, who own the courts who are responsible to US, to get this trial done before further damages are done to the Constitution and the country.

I know the standards are high for replacing a judge on a trial, but we’re in new territory and the government has got to get its shit together and they've got to do it ASAP, or this country is going down. I don’t see things like MAGA who thinks they have to take guns to take over the government. It’s not how America is. That's how criminals work. And you may have noticed that MAGA are the ones who attacked Congress...

And so I’ll leave you with wishing you all the greatest success and health! 

Until next time! Sigh...

Cheers! Sláinte!

Allow The God Fearing to Rule the Day?

First off, Happy Labor Day! For more on that, see the link from my 2014 blog article on Labor Day.

Now, let's get to it!


Through the course of human endeavors,
before there was God there were Gods.
Before there were Gods there was Heaven.
Before there was Heaven there was the Sun.
Before there was the Sun there was darkness.
In that darkness there was no language.
There was no way to store and convey information
to any, to all.
But then there was language, then there was writing,
then there was, reading. But only to the few.
The few who had seen a book, who had a book, who learned to read.
This was magical. Words were magical.
It was unbelievable. It was powerful. It was Holy.
It was sacred. it was God like.
The Word became God.
Those who held the Word, became God like.
God has power. God IS power.
Those who serve God, have power.
To protect themselves from those they read to, the had to say they served.
Those who the servers served, they ruled over.
The servers became the served.
Their word becomes the Word.
Those who now serve Them, find themselves believing things.
Things not originally intended.
Things not currently intended.
Things that were never intended.
Those who believed, altered the Word of those who once served
and are now being served.
Then the nothing became the something.
And so the word was broken.

This is the problem in treating the modern day extremist God Fearing respectfully. Just as it is with the other extremists (and some even not so extreme) of the right wing politically conservative and Republican crowd. We should treat people respectfully to be sure, though not so much their beliefs, if respect for those beliefs are reasonably undeserved.

The trouble is in showing them respect, and therefore their beliefs, respect in discourse and debate tends also to lend a respectability overall. One they simply do not deserve. Religion has a lot of pretty (and not so pretty) words.

The trouble is, every religion breaks down because no philosophy answers all questions in every instance. A closed system such as any religion is, cannot answer all things in an ever changing universe. Which gives us a clue. ANY religion that seems to have ALL the answers, is a broken religion, a defective form of deity worship with a set of rules designed to subvert reality. Because there is no such thing as a philosophy that can answer all questions all the time.

It's like any form of government, not pure form is fully functional, only hybrids. It's why in part, Churchill said: "Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time."

It's an uneven playing field right from the start. Which explains so much of the current situation in our dealing with true God Fearers. Both those politically in general as well as in Congress. If one treats them as derisively as they may well deserve, then it becomes the rational people who are seen as rude and illegitimate. Rather than simply taking an appropriate stand against utter silliness. Dangerous, silliness.

If on the other hand they are treated with respect, they receive a perceived legitimacy they have failed to prove deserving of. Other than a general respectful right to believe in any delusion they choose to come up with. Delusions that are typically supported by some ancient book of "wisdom" recorded over time, founded in antiquity and conjecture, based on imperfect observations, conflated histories and your basic magical thinking.

Such is our world today. It will change though. It has to.

Not because it's wanted, rather because in the end the Truth typically wins out. It is nature's course. It's the balance in history that sooner or later incorrect but accepted beliefs will be superseded from improperly recorded histories. Reality tends to win out in the end. Something that is becoming more and more prevalent as technology allows us anymore to record nearly everything, nearly anywhere.

The question as usual is, will these more accurate public appraisals of history happen within our lifetime?

As a friend once said to me in reply to this question:

"But who is the arbiter of silliness? To a devout evangelical, my atheism is just as silly."

I guess what I'm saying is that it's not so much what is on their side of the equation that is at issue. Some might even say that is a lost cause anyway. It is on our side, the side of those of us who might put up with it all, to ignore, to allow delusions to continue unabated. Out of good manners, ill conceived political correctness.

As a general rule we must all agree upon at very least a general baseline of belief. And in America it is and always has been through a government without religion. While now that seems to many load voices to be the outlier position. Something that grew out of fear that back in the origins of the post WWII cold war. A belief we allowed insidiously to creep into our national mindset, even into our pledge of allegiance, and onto our money.

It is not "In God We Trust" that we need to proclaim on a national basis, but "In Ourselves". To do what is right regardless of God, or whoever's God, or whatever religion, or even...no religion at all.

Our option needs to be government devoid of deity, and a government's belief based in Science. Reality as best our minds can fathom to use in our decision making. Since we cannot choose one religion over all others in a country where all religions are welcome (anyway those who don't go out and kill people over religion or some antiquated medieval view of God), then we simply have to choose... no religion.

To find order in no religion requires science. It's not a big leap in logic. Science that we need to be protected from through our government and if you will, moderated by our mindsets of Liberté, égalité, fraternité ("liberty, equality, fraternity"). Moderated by an individual's own beliefs even in religion and through ethics and morals.

The Grammarist defines Morals as the principles on which one’s judgments of right and wrong are based. Ethics are principles of right conduct. So the two nouns are closely related and are often interchangeable.

The main difference is that morals are more abstract, subjective, and often personal or religion-based, while ethics are more practical, conceived as shared principles promoting fairness in social and business interactions.

We need more of the practical and less of the ethereal.

In order to govern people, we need beliefs founded in what is real and functional. If prayer worked every time, I'd say fine, we can use that. But it is not fine, it does not work every time, if it even works at all, ever. And I'd argue that it never works. It merely buffers our reality. It is simply coincidental on any real results from its use and is pretty dysfunctional in any kind of way in governing people.

Here's the really important thing... to all theists, all believers, all religious types. In order to have all religions for all people, none must govern.

It is on us all to stop this madness. To allow those who wish to continue to believe in the ethereal as real, is fine in their personal lives, just not in their public lives. Especially if it affects others. including those of the rest of us who use the rational and real in our own daily lives.

Allowing the God Fearing to Rule the day couldn't be a bigger mistake. Shying away form this fact is only going to make everything worse. We need to speak up, speak out, stand our ground, Politely but firmly state our case and if necessary, bulldoze our public ways right over top of them if not straight through them if need be.

For our protection. For their own protection. For all of our protection. 

3+ Points Against the Anti-Gun Control Argument

Stupid.

That's what all this discussion, arguing, disagreement, lies, twisted logic and outright logical fallacies are about gun control. Stupid.

Speaking of Stupid with a capital "S", we have to mention the NRA and either their tactics (brilliant as they work, or stupid as they are in the worst interests of the citizenry). Here's an interesting article on how blatant they are about their tactics.

Just circle back around later and check these links out; I've supplied you with a few to gather further info from. Just be sure to also read this, FROM a self-professed "gun nut":
Why Gun Nuts Lie – I Know From Experience.

Let's set the tone with this:

Now real quick on the NRA being stupid...regarding their comment that, "the only way to stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy"...there's so many ways that concept immediately goes wrong:

First sign you have a problem? For most people? If you're always carrying a gun.

Not to mention firing into usually the dark in a theater or a club missing and hitting an innocent, or hitting the bad guy even killing him and your bullet goes on to kill an innocent, or ricochet and wounding someone. Shooting another "good" guy with a gun who was trying to stop the bad guy with gun. The list goes on.

The honest truth about guns in this country is that this need just doesn't happen often enough for the mentality of all people claiming to need guns for protection. Besides, it abdicates the responsibility from law makers, police and gun manufacturers for them to do something more useful and widespread. It's a child's solution to a problem, really.

The problem as I see it is that we think that a right abdicates control. In having the right to guns, even if that were true from what the 2nd Amendment indicates, we have abdicated the culture and then we just throw people into ownership. These people have not grown up with guns as those did in the past, where a gun was life. It's not LIFE now.

We have supermarkets for food, we have police and fire departments for life saving. And yet we pretend life is still like it is back in the 1700s. It's not. Yes it takes time for police to arrive and they are frequently only good for clean up and reporting. But this is nothing like the 1700s with no phones, no established governmental protections in police, medical and military if and when needed. The mere existence of those things changes the situation greatly.

You have to be raised into a gun culture to have one. Not suddenly join it as an adult and expect things will be just fine overall. For the most part things are going well, but they certainly are not perfect by any means or we wouldn't be seeing mass shootings using weapons designed to kill masses of people.

So if you suddenly want to bring a gun into your life, you need proper indoctrination first!
There's a lot to get through here so I'll go through my three points, to give you an idea of what I'm talking about, and then skip through some things and offer other places you can get more and even better information about this sad topic that mostly faux conservatives and the NRA have abused America over.

Even Pres. Reagan, Pres. Bush Sr. and many others going back into the 80s thought what the NRA started to do and has done, were disgusting abuses of rational arguments about guns. We have a police and military now unlike at the founding of this country and what this nonsense does is disrespect all of them in their efforts.

First of all we're ALL into gun control. Or at least studying it for some answers. As the AMA has just pointed out, it's time to lift the ridiculous ban on the CDC studying gun violence..

To say otherwise is, well...stupid. No one wants (some do) excessive gun control. It's still America (mostly and at least until the next election in November). I just don't think we need too loose of gun control. People are dying, something needs to be done, pretty much, end of story. Only a really truly foolish individual would say we should do anything at all in any way possible about the current rash of mass shootings these past years.

People who correlate "Freedom" and guns. Stupid. I'm sick of Constitutional originalists. The Constitution is a "living document". How do you prove that? Easy. If it wasn't it would never have been amended, ever. We have the Supreme Court whose job it is to interpret the meaning of the Constitution in the climate of the times so that it IS the functional document that it has been.

Besides, freedom actually has nothing whatsoever to do with guns or gun control.

It's just that they've been linked together for so long, only the uneducated, the alleged "conservative", the faux "patriot", the greedy and the simply firearms addicted think that it does. They think it has everything to do with it in fact. The times and climate on this topic is finally changing as the Supreme Court rules states have the right to ban assault weapons.

About the 2nd Amendment:

"A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed."

Nothing whatsoever is stated about purchasing arms in that. Or what type of. People focus too much on the wrong elements, giving emphasis to the wrong things in that Amendment.

There's three points in that statement that we need to pay particular attention to, and which get very little understanding and correct attention to. 

1. A "well regulated" militia (or I'd allow, citizenry) is important. 

2. And so, a "Militia" is important. 

3. Finally to "keep and bear arms" is important. 

But not in the ways you might think. 

To understand the problems we face with this issue one has to examine what the Founding Fathers thought and said back then, and then consider the evolution of society at large, of this nation, of technology and of the world in general.

Take some of the Founding Fathers' comments. 

"A free people ought not only to be armed, but disciplined..."

- George Washington, First Annual Address, to both House of Congress, January 8, 1790

"Disciplined". That's important. It eliminates issues like what we're seeing today. A well disciplined soldier, or people for that matter, do not perform mass shootings such as we see today. Nor do they kill innocents. 

"No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms."

- Thomas Jefferson, Virginia Constitution, Draft 1, 1776

That is to say like, what? That we shall not be kept from any form of weapon whatsoever? Or that we shall not be kept entirely from any weapon to wit, in that we are not allowed to have any kind of arm at all? That is a big disparity. 

"I prefer dangerous freedom over peaceful slavery."

- Thomas Jefferson, letter to James Madison, January 30, 1787

First consider he is thinking not necessarily as being indentured by the state, but in relation to outright slavery as he was after all, a slave owner, as were many who were considered "normal" and "decent" people back then. 

"What country can preserve its liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance. Let them take arms."

- Thomas Jefferson, letter to James Madison, December 20, 1787

This is a good one. Back then taking arms to resist was not just to battle another force, but to show up in force, armed, to make a point, to be taken seriously. And also if necessary, in the consideration not of our own government being the enemy, but of the British empire.

Our government was set up as the "Great Experiment" so that we would not have to live that way, fearful of our own government since it would be and is a government of the people, for the people and by the people. 

The Founding Fathers would be horrified to hear conservatives now a days talking about needing to be armed to protect themselves from their own government. From This Government. 

Back in those days, armed resistance was not an unnatural thing. Today things have changed dramatically. WE do not need to show up armed to make a point because we have our government. We also have a standing army, in multiple branches, which is the most powerful in the world, as well as a well regulated National Guard and police force of various levels (local, state and national). 

What is so sad about conservatives who believe we need to remained armed is that they obviously do not respect our government, themselves or other Americans as they should. With all its warts and embellishments, difficulties, dissatisfactions and difficulties, this is still our, OUR... government. 

So what about those words, those phrases then?

"Well regulated" is important. "Militia" is important. "Keep and bear arms" is important. 

Well regulated does not mean we should be allowed as citizens to walk into any gun store and buy any weapon. It doesn't mean any citizen either, UNLESS they are "well regulated". Many take that to mean a militia, or an army.

Our Founding Fathers were leary of a standing national army. Because of Britain. However as we grew up as a nation we grew to need and understand the importance of having a standing army and thus the United States Military came into being. 

From Wikipedia:

"After the war, though, the Continental Army was quickly given land certificates and disbanded in a reflection of the republican distrust of standing armies. State militias became the new nation's sole ground army, with the exception of a regiment to guard the Western Frontier and one battery of artillery guarding West Point's arsenal. However, because of continuing conflict with Native Americans, it was soon realized that it was necessary to field a trained standing army. The Regular Army was at first very small, and after General St. Clair's defeat at the Battle of the Wabash, the Regular Army was reorganized as the Legion of the United States, which was established in 1791 and renamed the "United States Army" in 1796."

Well regulated also means that if you want a gun, you have to be, well, regulated. That means laws and certifications. Training. It also means responsibility for you bearing, storing, maintaining your arms. But in today's conservatively nauseating climate, people wish to believe it means we are all granted a right to have any mechanized weaponry. Nonsense.

We could point out here that when some today say to bear arms includes assault weapons, or if you prefer rapid fire, high capacity mechanized firearms, it can also simply mean, swords and knives, clubs and well who knows what medieval weaponry besides modern firearms. 

I would argue what it should mean is if you want a revolver or bolt action hunting rifle, you need to be trained, learn respect of a killing machine that you will have and store in your home correctly and no you do NOT get carte blanche, a blanket bill to just have a gun with no training, no reasonable storage considerations and so on. Much as it is now.

If you wish to have a semi automatic handgun or rifle, then you need more formal training and you need to own appropriate storage for those weapons and protection of those weapons when you are using them OR storing them.

NO one should ever be able to take your weapon, whether you are carrying it loaded, unloaded, or in storing it when you are either at home or away. 

A well regulated citizenry bearing arms would be a safe and sane citizenry. 

Which brings up the next term, Militia. 

What is a militia and what did the Founding Fathers intend by that term? I'm really not going to get into that morass of nonsense as it's bandied about and argued over today. Just let it be said that they were referring to the citizenry back then who were the army, who were not a standing army, but who could be called upon at a moment's notice to serve the country.

Who nowadays is ready to drop their lives and go into the Army if need be? We're not talking eighteen year olds either. Anyone of any age, granted focused more so on the young and strong enough to fight and die for their country. And sometimes foolish enough to follow orders. Which is why they don't seen old men into harm's way when they can avoid it, aside from the obvious physical issues age brings along with it.

The point there is since we've already given up on that concept as dysfunctional and problematic, raising an army from the citizenry only when needed, something we did at the birth of our nation out of necessity, then we need to understand the term militia for today to mean something entirely different, and if not unnecessary.

It doesn't mean the same anymore, we don't have the same anymore, and frankly, it points out this part of the 2nd Amendment needs to be rewritten to fit the new situation. For one thing the professionalism and complexity of militaries have gotten to a point that far outpaces that of an instant citizen army. Possibly you could do what Israel does and yet, we do not. Nor do we have an enemy on our borders such as they do. And no, we do not. We have oceans, Mexico and Canada. 

Finally the third point, to "keep and bear arms". 

Nowhere in this does it say people can buy guns. Or what type of guns. It cannot mean assault rifles because they simply didn't exist in 1791. I think the Founding Fathers would be stunned and horrified to learn of the compact and massive firepower we have today and that we allow citizens to own military grade weaponry. Certainly military grade by 1791 standards.

Consider this article on the phrase:

"Among the numerous amicus briefs submitted is the so-called "Linguists' Brief", written by Dennis E. Baron, Richard W. Bailey, and Jeffrey P. Kaplan. This brief argues that the Second Amendment protects only a public right on two grounds: the afore-mentioned interpretation of the leading clause, and the argument that the expression "bear arms" refers only to the organized military use of arms, not to individual use. They claim that the term "bear arms" is "an idiomatic expression that means 'to serve as a soldier, do military service'".

Taking the phrase as it was in general use back then, it means something different than we understand it to mean today.

And this is a final nail in the coffin on conservatives arguing for guns for all as a right:

"To oblige the great body of the yeomanry, and of the other classes of the citizens, to be under arms for the purpose of going through military exercises and evolutions, as often as might be necessary to acquire the degree of perfection which would entitle them to the character of a well-regulated militia, would be a real grievance to the people, and a serious public inconvenience and loss. It would form an annual deduction from the productive labor of the country, to an amount which, calculating upon the present numbers of the people, would not fall far short of the whole expense of the civil establishments of all the States. To attempt a thing which would abridge the mass of labor and industry to so considerable an extent, would be unwise: and the experiment, if made, could not succeed, because it would not long be endured. Little more can reasonably be aimed at, with respect to the people at large, than to have them properly armed and equipped; and in order to see that this be not neglected, it will be necessary to assemble them once or twice in the course of a year."

It goes on further to state that contrary to what some ignorant conservatives think today, they were not fearful of our government against the people but of a militia against the government as well as the people. Which I would argue almost (but not quite) indicates for the nation today to disarm people out of protection rather than have them fully armed.

"This appears to me the only substitute that can be devised for a standing army, and the best possible security against it, if it should exist."

"Thus differently from the adversaries of the proposed Constitution should I reason on the same subject, deducing arguments of safety from the very sources which they represent as fraught with danger and perdition."

See?

And finally this passage as if they were viewing conservatives today in their admonitions of ridiculous contentions over and over again against our nation:

"Are suppositions of this sort the sober admonitions of discerning patriots to a discerning people? Or are they the inflammatory ravings of incendiaries or distempered enthusiasts? If we were even to suppose the national rulers actuated by the most ungovernable ambition, it is impossible to believe that they would employ such preposterous means to accomplish their designs."

You could also argue that the way the phrase was written refers to the government giving us weapons that we could keep and carry. Then that gets into when we would be given them, and when we could be carrying them. Considering back then many had their own guns they used in battle under the banner of the US flag and constitution, we can't expect the government to give us arms to keep and carry and if they did, as they do when you are in a real army, you actually need to use them to go to war. 

When you are off duty in the military you give up your arms, which are then stored in an armory, guarded by armed guards. So then you can't go get drunk and kill your sergeant or friends if you get mad at them during your off periods where you're not just killing the enemy. 

It begs the question, if they refer to citizens keeping and bearing arms at home whenever they like or, only during war, but in that our own government could remove all arms from citizens. And yet this says nothing about which arms are being referred to or how many per person.

Technically the 2nd Amendment could just be saying everyone can have a .22 long rifle or a shotgun to kill rabbits with for food and to use for protection against property or home invaders. Which is to say, burglars and criminals. But that doesn't mean using an assault rifle for home protection which any professional would point out is ludicrous. 

The degree to which people today have abused the meaning of the 2nd Amendment is pathetic. When we have a climate as we do today that includes mass shooters, snipers of public citizens, political assassinations, and terrorist attacks by foreign as well as nationalists, the 2nd Amendment needs again to be reconsidered and handled in such a way appropriate so as to fit our needs today, our current technologies and situations. 

We have to consider not only what the 2nd Amendment means, what it's original intent was, but also what we need it to mean today, how we consider what we have already agreed to do in many ways over many years and, how we have accepted the current meaning of the Constitution and its Amendments.

These are just three of the points we need to clearly understand while not allowing some group like the NRA to subvert and abuse us as a nation for their own slighted agenda and for greed and for power. In light of the disgusting travesties like the Orlando Pulse massacre we can not sit idly by doing nothing, yet again. But we need to stand up to the bullies like the NRA and actually do something useful.

Background checks are the least we can do, as is disallowing those on a Terrorist (TSA) No Fly List from buying guns. Which is not the much larger Terrorist Watch List which people keep confusing with the No Fly List.

What to do if you find you're on a No Fly List.

There is also no reason we need to access a firearm on the same day of purchase and it is wise for there to be a waiting period. I would argue a much longer one than what has been typical in being only three days. We want a gun today when we finally get the money for one. But we don't have to have it, the nation doesn't need to have us need to have it the same day.

In waiting to receive a weapon, it gives us a chance to run a proper background check, to give hot headed potential murderers a chance to calm down, those few who would benefit by a cooling off period, and it exemplifies to us all the import and respect of receiving, owning, and having the right to own, a firearm. 

Firearms purchases should force us to require much planning and thought and most of all respect for their purpose and reason for existing, attaining and retaining. For their purpose is, to kill. Even if you only ever use one for target practice. If you buy cars with the intent purposes of driving them off cliffs so they fly for a moment or two, they were still constructed to be driven.

NOTE on the term "assault rifle":

Don't call them assault rifles! Conservatives don't respond properly to that just as with much of reality and rationality. I'm so sick of their twisting everything just to get their own way.

Many of them believe assault rifles were named as such by the left wing media in the 90s for the assault weapons ban. When really it came about by weapons manufacturer Brunswick Corporation (yes the bowling ball people, among their many other products) way back in 1977 for their RAW (Rifleman's Assault Weapon) rifle, later used by the US Marines in the 1990s.

One could even argue that Hitler's storm rifle translates as the 1943 "assault rifle". From German Sturmgewehr ("assault rifle", literally "storm rifle"). The Maschinenpistole 44 was called the Sturmgewehr by Adolf Hitler, whence it was renamed to represent the separate class of firearm it represented. From assault + rifle.

Wikipedia:
"Others say the firearms industry itself introduced the term "assault weapon" to build interest in new product lines.[8] Phillip Peterson, the author of Gun Digest Buyer’s Guide to Assault Weapons (2008) wrote:

"The popularly held idea that the term 'assault weapon' originated with anti-gun activists is wrong. The term was first adopted by manufacturers, wholesalers, importers and dealers in the American firearms industry to stimulate sales of certain firearms that did not have an appearance that was familiar to many firearms owners. The manufacturers and gun writers of the day needed a catchy name to identify this new type of gun.[24]"

So for all our sake and that of conservatives so they stop looking even dumber than normal, consider possibly calling them:

FBBGs (for Fast Bang Bang Guns).

Not enough? Want more? The tide may be changing.

SCOTUS on domestic violence.

How about this:

Family of AR-15 Inventor Eugene Stoner: He Didn't Intend It for Civilians

Let's face it, civilians do not need military style weapons. Join the military if you want to play soldier and guess what? If you do you don't get to keep your automatic or semi auto weapon in your barracks room while off duty. Unless perhaps if you're actually soldiering, in a war environment. Then it's only reasonable. Because your soldiering, in a war theatre.

Here's a good one....

Breaking Down Gun Nuts: 10 Ways to Determine if Someone is Too Mentally Ill to Own Guns

And now this....

The 2nd Amendment Wasn’t Written To Mean ‘Let Any Damn Idiot Have A Gun’

And if that wasn't the nail in the coffin, this surely is....

From MarketWatch:
"Opinion: What America’s gun fanatics won’t tell you" by Brett Arends

Just a touch from that article....

"The Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution doesn’t just say Congress shall not infringe the right to “keep and bear arms.” It specifically says that right exists in order to maintain “a well-regulated militia.” Even the late conservative Supreme Court Associate Justice Antonin Scalia admitted those words weren’t in there by accident. Oh, and the Constitution doesn’t just say a “militia.” It says a “well-regulated” militia.

"What did the Founding Fathers mean by that? We don’t have to guess because they told us. In Federalist No. 29 of the Federalist Papers, Alexander Hamilton explained at great length precisely what a “well-regulated militia” was, why the Founding Fathers thought we needed one, and why they wanted to protect it from being disarmed by the federal government."

I wish you all the best. I wish us all the best....

And now, from Amy Schumer, this.

Why America is confused over Donald Trump

There is some interesting research about authoritarianism.

Matthew MacWilliams, a doctoral candidate at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, conducted a poll in which Republicans were asked four questions about child-rearing. With each question, respondents were asked which of two traits were more important in children:

• independence or respect for their elders;
• curiosity or good manners;
• self-reliance or obedience;
• being considerate or being well-behaved.

Psychologists use these questions to identify people who are disposed to favor hierarchy, loyalty and strong leadership — those who picked the second trait in each set — what experts call "authoritarianism." That many of Trump's supporters share this trait helps explain the success of his unconventional candidacy and suggests that his rivals will have a hard time winning over his adherents.

Thus the confusion. We all want our children to have the latter traits but we also want them or we should want them, to also be of the former. The difficulty is in having the intellect to judge when to be which. An issue conservatives in general have missing. 

We need to compartmentalize, to have an overarching mentality allowing us to shift appropriately at the right times. Lacking that you find yourself embedded in less sophisticated pursuits like authoritarianism, conservatism, racism, a seeking for the pure and simple, the righteous, the saving grace of one far above us to "guide" us as in a political leader or a deity.

"For authoritarians, things are black and white," MacWilliams said. "Authoritarians obey."

Authoritarians prefer purity and simplicity in thought and thus the eventual rise and misconstrued application of simplicity and purity that rears its ugly head as bigotry and racism among their rank ranks.

Life is not black and white and some cannot handle that because it requires thought and an acceptance that life is generally messy and we have to deal with that on a constant and ongoing basis. 

There are no easy and simple answers.

Which means that neither Donald Trump, conservative politics, or the Republican party are the answer.

This is clearly where I seem to break with so many people now a days and I wonder why and where their humanity and American spirit went? 

When we are our most as people is when we are at our most dire, fearful, distressed, or unhappy. 
Many people especially Trump followers and many on the right are showing their colors, an ugly blending for many of them of mere whiteness, with no room for color at all. Purity is a child's view of life. 

Real life is messy, not binary, not black and white, but a morass of grey, or varied and many colors, of complexity that is far more sophisticated than soundbites like, "We'll bomb them real good!"

Or,
"They're different than us, not as privileged, not as great not as us not as pure not as perfect because we think we are GODS!"

Which only makes you an asshole and a half and then some and you have no place in America. Less of a place is here for you in fact than there is and always has been for immigrants. Especially those in dire need.

We are a country of the many and not the few.

Now we just have to realize that and return not to the greatness we can be but the oneness we should be.

#DonaldTrump #Democrats @GOP

The New American Imperial President Model

This is long, but it is enlightening. I've been pro Obama since the beginning and anti Bush since his beginning. But if you are pro Obama, you really need to read this. We have some very questionable (bad) things going on now. I still like Obama. But we have some directions in this country that have got to be changed back. ASAP. Sooner. Before it's too late, if it's not already.

John Cusack Interviews Law Professor Jonathan Turley About Obama Administration’s War On the Constitution

I've always liked John Cusak going back to his first films back in the 1980s. I like his choices in films, I like his acting. I think he's talented and intelligent. His sister on Showtime's "Shameless" is as funny as she has always been. So obviously it runs in the family. "Gross Pointe Blank" is one of my all time favorite films on several levels and I as well liked his latest film, "The Numbers Station".

The American Administrations these past ten years have been doing what many of us have been doing, what I've been doing in my own mind. Thinking that the end of our efforts in using the Constitution is what is important. Where in reality it is the end in the meaning of the Constitution that is most important.

I think we've had the right intentions, but have become deluded through fear and intimidation, and that has got to stop. Not the fear and intimidation so much as our reaction to it. At some point you simply have to stand your ground and face the bad guys down and just say, No. If you get killed doing it, well that is Courage and if enough of us say No, it will change things. But if we are all afraid to stand and live (or die) for our belief in our country's foundations, in our Constitution, then how we will win out in the end?

We are too into never making a mistake, never losing ground, never having to wait or sacrifice for our ethics; and so in some ways we are losing. Losing our identity as a nation and as perceived by the world, and losing our credibility. We are losing our freedoms and our protections by and from, our own government. If, you really look around, there are some very scary things happening to our nation. But it's easier and less scary, to simply ignore... all of it. Just wonder for a moment, in twenty years time what will this country look like if we stay on this track?

Here is something to consider along this track, on what is or is not, torture:

Watch Christopher Hitchens Get Waterboarded (VANITY FAIR)

For anyone who thinks that "enhanced interrogation", that "waterboarding" is not torture, please drop by and I'll change your mind.

I'm going to post an interview shortly (below) that was put our by John Cusak that he posted back in September 2012. But first I want to set the tone for what the Bush and Obama Administrations have done to remove our criminality in changing the topic from "torture" to pretty much anything else, like "waterboarding", like "enhanced interrogation".

We have gone from "gutting" Nuremburg now ("you can't charge them as war criminals, they were just following orders"), to actually killing American citizens. It's mission creep and as the butler at Highclaire Castle said in a recent documentary on that famous house used in Downton Abbey, "Once standards go away, they don't come back."

This is rather ironic:

"If people let the government decide what foods they eat and what medicines they take, their bodies will soon be in as sorry a state as are the souls of those who live under tyranny." - Thomas Jefferson.

We seem to agree with just about anything lately.

Yes these "enhanced interrogations" work to break down resistance, but at some point we have to ask ourselves, who are we? Cowards afraid of anything? Or people of principle who the world looks up to, even when it hurts?

What is water boarding like? See this 3 minute and twenty-second video with a volunteer.

Getting Waterboarded: Vanguard

From now on whenever you hear "enhanced interrogation" or "waterboarding", think in your mind, "Torture" with a capital "T". Because those are keywords hiding reality. The users of these words are doing the same thing people have done in saying they haven't had sex with someone because it wasn't intercourse, or they didn't love the person. So why should their spouse be upset? Or someone who says calories don't count because they ate some off of someone else's plate. It's simply ludicrous, it's twisting reality and that is something we cannot have in our leaders when it comes to abusing and killing people, especially American citizens; but that cannot be the only gauge of who we kill. In killing foreign enemies, terrorists, in killing them using indirect means such as drones, we are creating "collateral damage" in neutral foreign citizens, in innocents, even in children. We are also fostering new angers, new enemies.

Yes, I think drones are a useful tool, but perhaps we use them too much. And what will be the new awareness in this technology with other nations who are starting to use them? There are currently fifty other nations getting into the drone technology for Reconnaissance (defense) and attack (offense). In our abuses, others will us us as their model to get away with the same, or worse. Or use them against us. We need to sponsor new international laws on these devices, just like we did with other easily abused actions and technologies since the First Geneva Convention governing sick and wounded members of armed forces, signed in 1864.

Here are a few snippets from this rather long but fascinating interview. These are several pieces put together from different sections of the interview:

CUSACK: I hate to speak too much to motivation, but why do you think MSNBC and other so-called centrist or left outlets won't bring up any of these things? These issues were broadcast and reported on nightly when John Ashcroft and Alberto Gonzalez and Bush were in office.

TURLEY: Well, there is no question that some at MSNBC have backed away from these issues, although occasionally you'll see people talk about –

CUSACK: I think that's being kind, don't you? More like "abandoned."

TURLEY: Yeah. The civil liberties perspective is rarely given more than a passing reference while national security concerns are explored in depth. Fox is viewed as protective of Bush while MSNBC is viewed as protective of Obama. But both presidents are guilty of the same violations. There are relatively few journalists willing to pursue these questions aggressively and objectively, particularly on television. And so the result is that the public is hearing a script written by the government that downplays these principles. They don't hear the word "torture."

They hear "enhanced interrogation." They don't hear much about the treaties. They don't hear about the international condemnation of the United States. Most Americans are unaware of how far we have moved away from Nuremberg and core principles of international law.

TURLEY: We appear to be in a sort of a free-fall. We have what used to be called an "imperial presidency."

CUSACK: Obama is far more of an imperial president than Bush in many ways, wouldn't you say?

TURLEY: Oh, President Obama has created an imperial presidency that would have made Richard Nixon blush. It is unbelievable.
---
CUSACK: And to say these things, most of the liberal community or the progressive community would say, "Turley and Cusack have lost their minds. What do they want? They want Mitt Romney to come in?"

TURLEY: The question is, "What has all of your relativistic voting and support done for you?"
---
CUSACK: But, see, that's a very tough principle to take, because everybody feels so rightfully loathsome about Bin Laden, right? But principles are not meant to be convenient, right? The Constitution is not meant to be convenient. If they can catch Adolf Eichmann and put him on trial, why not bin Laden? The principles are what separate us from the beasts.

I think the best answer I ever heard about this, besides sitting around a kitchen table with you and your father and my father, was I heard somebody, they asked Mario Cuomo, "You don't support the death penalty...? Would you for someone who raped your wife?" And Cuomo blinked, and he looked at him, and he said, "What would I do? Well, I'd take a baseball bat and I'd bash his skull in... But I don't matter. The law is better than me. The law is supposed to be better than me. That's the whole point."

---

Again, you can read the entire interview and I suggest you do, because I only scratche the surface here of the what all they address: John Cusack Interviews Law Professor Jonathan Turley About Obama Administration’s War On the Constitution