The "Idle Janie" Journal - Days 66 through 70
The “Idle Janie” Journal - Day 66
“It’s Just Ideological Differences!”
We all just have different opinions, that’s all. Right? And both sides make compelling, substantive arguments, right? That’s how politics has always worked. RIGHT??
WRONG.
For four years now, it doesn’t matter what the issue is, there is ALWAYS something to fire back with. Some kind of knee-jerk scream in your face reaction — and it’s getting worse by the day. It’s starting to get a little weak on one side, though, if you ask me. Smoke and mirrors. Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain. Just enjoy a little friendly conversation between those dumb old demonrats and those ridiculous repugnicants.
Demonrat: Trump said that Americans who died in war are losers and suckers!
Repugnicant: Nancy Pelosi got a haircut!
Demonrat: Over 190,000 Americans have died of the coronavirus, which Trump initially called a hoax for 2 months! We are still losing 1000 people per day, and his administration is saying it’s under control??
Repugnicant: 4 people died in Benghazi! And her emails!!!
Demonrat: Wow. Okay. That kid drove across state lines with an illegal weapon and murdered two people and injured another!
Repugnicant: Jacob Blake is a pedophile! The 3 people who that nice patriot shot are all pedophiles! You’re a pedophile! Deep state pizza!
Demonrat: Trump hasn’t once commented publicly about the fact that Russia is supposedly paying the Taliban to kill American soldiers. What do you . . .
Repugnicant: The New York times made that story up! ALL news if fake news!
Demonrat: Trump just committed yet another felony, imploring voters in North Carolina to vote twice!
Repugnicant: This election is rigged!
Demonrat: Can you at least please just try to understand why we say “Black Lives Matter”?
Repugnicant: All lives matter!
Demonrat: Well, can police officers please then at least stop killing defenseless unarmed black men on a WEEKLY basis?
Repugnicant: Blue lives matter!
Demonrat: But wait, you just said that all lives matter??
Repugnicant:
Demonrat: How about this. Can you guys at least stop sending death threats to Fauci’s daughters, for Christ’s sake??? What the hell did THEY do to deserve that??
Repugnicant: Bill Gates 5G alien demon sperm maskholes!
Demonrat: Look, we know you guys think the media is biased towards the left, but some of these news outlets have been around for literally a century!
Repugnicant: Q is the only reputable source for news!
Demonrat: But I thought you said all news was fake news?
Repugnicant:
Demonrat: Okay, what about the almost TWENTY folks tied to Trump HIMSELF, who have all pleaded guilty to, or been convicted of, various crimes?
Repugnicant: They were all planted by the left! Biden is a pervert!
Demonrat: Okay, how about this? Even if you distrust the latest news about Trump calling our fallen heroes losers and suckers, why not take it in context about what he PUBLICLY said about John McCain, that he was a loser for getting caught? Don’t you think someone who has used such language before might at least *possibly* be capable of saying something similar on other occasions?
Repugnicant: “John McCain was a bitter swamp creature while he served in the senate. He may have served our country and would be considered a hero but that was erased when he became a traitor to our country!” (note: actual quote)
Demonrat: Ummm… you guys chose him as your presidential candidate just 3 election cycles ago. So now you don’t even . . .
Repugnicant: Obama was black!
Demonrat: Wow you all are now actively turning on your own. As soon as ANYONE is critical of Trump, they are immediately demonized, dismissed and discredited.
Repugnicant: Hail to the Chief!
Demonrat: I guess we just can’t have a civil conversation about anything. You’re an embarrassment to your supposed party, and to America.
Repugnicant: YOU GOT GUNS AS BIG AS MINE, BRO????
Folks, these aren’t ideological differences. This is no longer an issue of conservative versus liberal thinking. I definitely lean left, but I am flummoxed at the threads I read on all of these issues. From my perspective, there is one side of folks using critical thinking, asking hard questions, and looking for verifiable evidence. Then there is the other side, which seems to be just a cacophonous echo chamber, regurgitating the same old tired phrases, arguments, and justifications in order to defend a man — AT ANY AND ALL COSTS — who has uttered literally 20 THOUSAND DOCUMENTED lies, mistruths, or misleading claims since taking office.
This is “bury your head in the sand” and ignore reality regardless of the issue.
It’s not possible to even have a conversation anymore.
Get the kitchen sink ready.
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“Universal Basic Income”
A friend posted a twitter thread on facebook this morning, and I think it deserves attention and consideration. In these journal postings, I RARELY quote large amounts of material that someone else has written — because then it’s not really MY post. But I think THIS one needs to be heard, dissected, and digested.
Here is the series of tweets in their entirety:
“When discussing Universal Basic Income, inevitably the retort comes: ‘So you just want people to not have to work, is that it?’ Accompanied by a smug smirk, expecting me to backpedal and hem and haw, say ‘Of course not, that’s silly.’ Except… yes. Yes, I do.
People shouldn’t HAVE to work. People should WANT to work. Sharing in the labor of building and maintaining a society because it benefits everyone should be desirable, not forced. It shouldn’t be something we do because we’ll die otherwise.
Imagine a society where survival didn’t depend on a job. Imagine how that would alter the fabric of . . . everything. Imagine if you could leave a job without fearing the loss of income or health care. Imagine the power of the worker in that society.
If a person could survive without a job, imagine what employers would be like. They’d have to treat their workers fairly, and make themselves attractive to entice workers. They’d have to offer a better option than other employers, and make people want to participate.
Places that have offered UBI have seen the results: most people do want to work. The people who choose not to are generally young parents, students, people with disabilities and the elderly. People have a desire to contribute, for our lives to have purpose and to be useful.
And before you say it, yes, some people will take advantage. That is true for absolutely everything ever. You think people don’t take advantage of the economy we have? Like, say, the 1% who grow wealthier while their employees have to work three jobs and use food stamps?
They can only do that, by the way, because people are so terrified of losing a job and the destruction that would follow that they tolerate mistreatment, disempowerment, the destruction of their unions, healthcare, retirements and even their bodies to avoid it.
That would not be the case if everyone were guaranteed a baseline survival income. Your boss couldn’t treat you like shit because he knows you can’t leave. You CAN leave, and you will.
What if desperation didn’t motivate everything? Imagine the impact on health, relationships, parenting, well-being, crime, violence, progress. When you aren’t desperately scrabbling for the rent, you can spare a neuron to contemplate long-term problems.
Imagine a society where terror of destitution wasn’t a constant thrum underneath everyone’s existence. Imagine the creative works that society could produce. Imagine the children it could raise, the elderly it could care for. Imagine the inventions it could produce.
Now, imagine knowing all this and thinking ‘NOPE. We can’t have all that because someone I don’t like might benefit from it. So to avoid that, the rest of you can all hang.’ And there you have modern conservative thinking”
[BACK TO ME]: I am obviously living in the midst of this discussion right now. I lost my job, and I am getting unemployment insurance. Yes, I’m actively looking for another job because (a) I’m required to in order to collect benefits, and (b) I am used to a certain standard of living and health care, all of which has diminished as a result of losing my job.
But… BUT - in the meantime, I am finding that I am living the BEST LIFE I HAVE EVER KNOWN. No, I’m not sitting around binge watching Netflix 12 hours a day while sucking down 40s of malt liquor and ordering expensive takeout when I get hungry. As you can see from the title of this post, I HAVE BEEN WRITING FOR 67 DAYS STRAIGHT. Since Day 1 of being “unemployed,” I have produced something. Minus probably 5 days when I wanted or needed to take a day off, to be sure. But you get the point. I AM CREATING. I am using my brain in the healthiest, funnest, and most useful ways that far surpass how I used my brain in the job that I lost — where I simply felt like a cog in a machine. I have also been doing weekly virtual concerts of Grateful Dead songs, and seem to have built up a small audience who apparently get some satisfaction from tuning in and hearing me hone my craft. I just did the second installment of a monthly all-originals stream, where I got to share MY music with my online friends. I am eyeing another once-a-month series, where I will cover other people’s music, choosing a different artist for each month. (Any requests? 😉 ) I’m probably going to start a weekly Tai Chi Zoom Class pretty soon, as I picked up a short “tai chi form” a few years ago that I would feel comfortable teaching to others. I am reading almost every day, and also trying to find time to do simple healthy things like stretch every morning, meditate, go for a walk, floss once a day, etc. I’d like to pick up yoga as well. I’m generally eating better than I ever did while working for someone else. I just wrote my first original song in literally YEARS.
FOR THE FIRST TIME IN A LONG TIME, I LOVE MY LIFE.
It’s not a GIVEN that most or all of these things would immediately grind to a halt if I had to start a new full time job. But I know me, and I know my tendencies. And I know how depressing it is to have to unnaturally jolt yourself out of bed and rush to go and answer to and prostrate yourself before someone else, just to be able to eke out a living and be able to go see the doctor when something hurts.
So, my point is, YES. We NEED Universal Basic Income. Yes, some folks WILL take advantage of it. But you know what? It’s not going to provide them with enough money that they will ever be able to join your ridiculous rich people’s club. Y’all can have your stupid money. I just need a miniscule enough slice of that, so that I can keep CREATING. The hard evidence is there. I’m not wasting my time or the government’s money. It’s true that — at least as of now — I have only a small readership for these posts, or a small audience for my online concerts.
But you know what? OTHERS ARE BENEFITTING FROM MY LABOR. There are probably innumerable others who would likewise take such an opportunity and turn it into art and writing and music and poetry and photography and meditation and dance and beauty and peace and love. All those hippie things that the Reaganites and the Gradgrinds want to stamp out. But all those things that society NEEDS in order to keep some semblance of sanity.
And for those who will insist that nobody will want to stock the grocery shelves or pick up the trash or make the food deliveries: why not say, if you get this UBI, then you commit to ONE DAY a week of doing one of these jobs? If enough people are contributing one day of their labor to the overall force, then things will get done. And you know what? I always thought that I would have NO problem whatsoever doing any of these jobs - as long as I'm not having to do it for 8 hours a day 5 days a week. All I ever craved as a full-time employee was DIVERSITY. It's just the doing of the same thing every day for, really, the rest of your life, that is so daunting and boring and soul sucking. I'd love to be a trash collector once a month! Or stock the shelves at the local grocery or book store. Bring it on! As long as it's something DIFFERENT!
So, I vote yes. Let’s make this a thing. Some of us don’t need 4 houses, 6 cars, 12 vacations a year, and a big pile of cash in the bank. Some of us just want to survive, but be able to do what makes us most happy in the process. Let’s do this.
Happy LABOR DAY to all of you.
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Thanks for reading. If you like what you read, and want to support my fledgeling career as a writer and musician, you can drop a few bucks in the virtual tip jar. It all adds up!
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"Don't Trust The Military!"
This is probably what we're soon going to start hearing. Everyone and everything is slowly becoming anathema to the far right. It won't surprise me if our service men and women are next to be hung out to dry.
Short commentary today, again using a longer post by someone else. There is increasingly more and more to write about and analyze, it's hard to keep up!
ORIGINAL POST:
Someone (Jason Moon) wrote a nice list to file under "Here's your list, now shut up."
A short, incomplete list of why are troops turning away from Trump?
Maybe because...
• In May 2020, the White House ended National Guard deployments one day before they could claim benefits
• The Trump admin seized 5 million masks intended for VA hospitals. Kushner distributes these masks to private entities for a fee, who then sells the masks to the government
• Trump fired the captain of the USS Theodore Roosevelt after he warned superiors that COVID19 was spreading among his crew. The virus subsequently spread amongst the crew.
• After Iran's retaliatory strike, 109 US troops suffered brain injuries. Trump dismissed these as "headaches"
• On July 20, 2017, in room 2E924 of the Pentagon, Trump told a room full of Generals, "You’re a bunch of dopes and babies"
• Pardoned multiple war criminals, which stomped on long standing military values, discipline, and command. Trump has no military experience (May&Nov, 2019)
• Trump mocked Lt. Col. Vindman for his rank and uniform. He threatened said purple heart officer, resulting in the Army providing him protection
• Trump’s Chief of Staff worked—in secret—to deny comprehensive health coverage to Vietnam Vets who suffered from Agent Orange.
• There is a facility in Tijuana for US veterans that Trump deported. Wounded war vet, Sen Duckworth (D) marked Veterans Day 2019 by visiting this facility
• Russia took control of the main U.S. military facility in Syria abandoned on Trump’s orders. Russia now owns the airstrip we built
• On Oct 7, 2019, Trump abruptly withdrew support from America's allies in Syria after a phone call with Turkey's president (Erdogan). Turkey subsequently bombed US Special Forces.
• Trump sent thousands of American troops to defend the oil assets of the country that perpetrated 9/11
• In Sept 2019, he made an Air Force cargo crew, flying from the U.S. to Kuwait stop in Scotland (where there's no U.S. base) to refuel at a commercial airport (where it costs more), so they could stay overnight at a Trump property (which isn't close to the airport). Trump’s golf courses are losing money, so he's forcing the military to pay for 5-star nights there.
• In Sept, 2019, Pentagon pulled funds for military schools, military housing funds, and daycare to pay for Trump's border wall.
• In Aug, 2019, emails revealed that three of Trump's Mar-a-Lago pals, who are now running Veterans Affairs, are rampant with meddling. "They had no experience in veterans affairs (none of them even served in the military) nor underwent any kind of approval process to serve as de facto managers. Yet, with Trump’s approval, they directed actions and criticized operations without any oversight. They wasted valuable staff time in hundreds of pages of communications and meetings, emails show. Emails reveal disdainful attitudes within the department to the trio’s meddling."
• Veterans graves will be "dug up" for the border wall, after Trump instructed aides to seize private property. Trump told officials he would pardon them if they break the law by illegally seizing property
• Children of deployed US troops are no longer guaranteed citizenship. This includes US troops posted abroad for years at a time (August 28, 2019)
• On Aug 2, 2019, Trump requisitioned military retirement funds towards border wall
• On July 31, 2019, Trump ordered the Navy rescind medals to prosecutors who were prosecuted war criminals
• Trump denied a U.S. Marine of 6 years entry into the United States for his citizenship interview (Reported July 17, 2019)
• Trump made the U.S. Navy Blue Angels violate ethics rules by having them fly at his July 4th political campaign event (July 4, 2019)
• Trump demanded US military chiefs stand next to him at 4th of July parade (reported July 2, 2019)
• In June, 2019, Trump sent troops to the border to paint the fence for a better "aesthetic appearance"
• Trump used his D-Day interview at a cemetery commemorating fallen US soldiers to attack a Vietnam veteran (June 6, 2019)
• Trump started his D-Day commemoration speech by attacking a private citizen (Bette Midler, of all people) (reported on June 4th, 2019)
• Trump made his 2nd wife, Marla Maples, sign a prenup that would have cut off all child support if Tiffany joined the military (reported June 4th, 2019)
• On May 27, 2019, Trump turned away US military from his Memorial Day speech because they were from the destroyer USS John S. McCain
• Trump ordered the USS John McCain out of sight during his visit to Japan (May 15, 2019). The ship's name was subsequently covered. (May 27, 2019)
• Trump purged 200,000 vets' healthcare applications (due to known administrative errors within VA’s enrollment system) (reported on May 13, 2019)
• Trump deported a spouse of fallen Army soldier killed in Afghanistan, leaving their daughter parentless (April 16, 2019)
• On March 20, 2019, Trump complained that a deceased war hero didn't thank him for his funeral
• Between 12/22/2018, and 1/25/2019, Trump refused to sign his party's funding bill, which shut down the government, forcing the Coast Guard to go without pay, which made service members rely on food pantries. However, his appointees got a $10,000 pay raise
• He banned service members from serving based on gender identity (1/22/2019)
• He denied female troops access to birth control to limit sexual activity (on-going. Published Jan 18, 2019)
• He tried to deport a marine vet who is a U.S.-born citizen (Jan 16, 2019)
• When a man was caught swindling veterans pensions for high-interest “cash advances," Trump's Consumer Financial Protection Bureau fined him $1 (Jan 26, 2019)
• He called a retired general a 'dog' with a 'big, dumb mouth' (Jan 1, 2019)
• He increased privatization of the VA, leading to longer waits and higher taxpayer cost (2018)
• He finally visited troops 2 years after taking office, but only after 154 vacation days at his properties (Dec 26, 2018)
• He revealed a covert Seal Team 5 deployment, including names and faces, on Twitter during his visit to Iraq (Dec 26, 2018)
• Trump lied to deployed troops that he gave them a 10% raise (12/26/2018). He tried giving the military a raise that was lower than the standard living adjustment. Congress told him that idea wasn't going to work. Then after giving them the raise that Congress made him, he lied about it pretending that it was larger than Obama's. It wasn't.
• He fired service members living with HIV just before the 2018 holidays
• He tried to slash disability and unemployment benefits for Veterans to $0, and eliminate the unemployability extrascheduler rating (Dec 17, 2018)
• He called troops on Thanksgiving and told them he's most thankful for himself (Thanksgiving, 2018)
• He urged Florida to not count deployed military votes (Nov 12, 2018)
• He canceled an Arlington Cemetery visit on Veterans Day due to light rain (Nov 12, 2018)
• While in Europe commemorating the end of WWI, he didn't attend the ceremony at a US cemetery due to the rain -- other world leaders went anyway (Nov 10, 2018)
• He used troops as a political prop by sending them on a phantom mission to the border and made them miss Thanksgiving with their families (Oct-Dec, 2018)
• He stopped using troops as a political prop immediately after the election. However, the troops remained in muddy camps on the border (Nov 7, 2018)
• Trump changed the GI Bill through his Forever GI Act, causing the VA to miss veteran benefits, including housing allowances. This caused many vets to run out of food and rent. (reported October 7, 2018)
• Trump doubled the rejection rate for veterans requesting family deportation protections (July 5, 2018)
• Trump deported active-duty spouses (11,800 military families face this problem as of April 2018)
• He forgot a fallen soldier's name (below) during a call to his pregnant widow, then attacked her the next day (Oct 23-24, 2017)
• He sent commandos into an ambush due to a lack of intel, and sends contractors to pick them up, resulting in a commando being left behind, tortured, and executed. (Trump approved the mission because Bannon told him Obama didn't have the guts to do it) (Oct 4, 2017)
• He blocked a veteran group on Twitter (June 2017)
• He ordered the discharge of active-duty immigrant troops with good records (2017-present)
• He deported veterans (2017-present)
• He said he knows more about ISIS than American generals (Oct 2016)
• On Oct 3, 2016, Trump said vets get PTSD because they aren't strong (note: yes, he said it's 'because they aren't strong.' He didn't say it's 'because they're weak.' This distinction is important because of Snopes)
• Trump accepted a Purple Heart from a fan at one of his rallies and said: “I always wanted to get the Purple Heart. This was much easier.” (Aug 2, 2016)
• Trump attacks Gold Star families: Myeshia Johnson (gold star widow), Khan family (gold star parents) etc. (2016-present)
• Trump sent funds raised from a Jan 2016 veterans benefit to the Donald J Trump Foundation instead of veterans charities (the foundation has since been ordered shut because of fraud) (Jan, 2016)
• Trump said he has "more training militarily than a lot of the guys that go into the military" because he went to a military-style academy (2015 biography)
• Trump said he doesn't consider POWs heroes because they were caught. He said he prefers people who were not caught (July 18, 2015)
• Trump said having unprotected sex was his own personal Vietnam (1998)
• For a decade, Trump sought to kick veterans off of Fifth Avenue because he found them unsightly nuisances outside of Trump Tower. 1991
• Trump dodged the draft 5 times by having a doctor diagnose him with bone spurs.
• No Trump in America has ever served in the military; this spans 5 generations, and every branch of the family tree. In fact, the reason his grandfather immigrated to America was to avoid military service.
AND there you have it. Many of these “headlines” sound familiar to me. But when you space it out over 4 years, it's not all on the airwaves at the same time, so you don't realize until it really piles up, and then boils over. I guess it’s hard to “validate” or “substantiate” whether or not Trump’s supposed claims about the military that just came to light are true. But this original poster has supposedly created a compendium of his utterances about and actions toward the military — for which he claims to be the biggest advocate ever. This coming from a man who basically says he knows more about anything than anybody. Come on, you’ve heard the ridiculous things he’s said. NOT things that have been attributed to him second hand — things CAUGHT ON TAPE. In broad daylight in front of microphones and cameras.
His supporters, as to be expected, are having nothing to do with it. They latch on to the fact that the so-called “sources” are confidential. But this is the way journalism has always worked. Just because the informant is anonymous doesn’t mean the media haven’t done their due diligence. Even their beloved Fox News has substantiated these claims. And then, of course, Trump disparages that Fox News reporter, demanding she be fired.
The need of Trump supporters for EVERYTHING to be a rosy picture is frightening. ANYTHING uttered that goes against their belief in his integrity is deemed FAKE. Yet, we have literally 5 years worth of sound bytes — of Trump HIMSELF — making disparaging comments towards anyone and everyone who gets in his way or criticizes him.
I do wish the original author had linked all of these, for ease of objectively confirming the supposed claims. Although I imagine if one enters ANY of these headlines into a google search, it will yield some pretty damning evidence. Not that it would make any difference to those who cry "fake news" at anything unflattering to Trump. I guess if the military starts to distance from him as a result of all this, his supporters will eventually turn on them too?? If so-called conservatives don’t have our fallen heroes to hold up in the light anymore, then what the hell else is left for them??? Will they simply be left standing alone with only their guns and their unbridled white rage??
That, and maybe an upside down bible?
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Thanks for reading. If you like what you read, and want to support my fledgeling career as a writer and musician, you can drop a few bucks in the virtual tip jar. It all adds up!
Venmo: @David-Bryan10026
Paypal: paypal.me/davidbryanandfriends
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