Establishmentarians 0
Alabama recently passed a law requiring the display of (one particular version of) the Ten Commandments in public schools.
At AL.com, PJ Schwartz, Rabbi of the century and a half old Temple B’nai Sholom in Huntsville, Alabama, cuts through the plethora of prevarications propagated to promote this practice. Here’s a tiny bit from his article (emphasis added):
Calling this law “historical” is not just inaccurate. It is a strategy—a way to give legal and cultural cover to something that would be far more obvious if it were named honestly: privilege of one particular Christian worldview in a public institution meant to serve everyone.
“An Armed Society Is a Polite Society” 0
He had a pocket full of politeness.
Guns and stupid, guns and stupid.
They go together like love and Cupid.
Let me tell you brother,
You can’t have one without the other.
Dis Coarse Discourse 0
Via The Charlotte Observer, Lorraine Ali tries to make sense of Donald Trump’s “social” media posts the senseless. A snippet:
Unlike the fictional Kurtz or the real Churchill, Trump has no military experience. He avoided the Vietnam War draft with four student deferments and one medical deferment for bone spurs. An area where he is experienced? Baiting foes. Antagonizing enemies, genuine or imagined, is a Trump specialty, be it from the Oval Office, on the campaign trail, or in the before times, as a reality TV personality.
Clouds of Witless 0
Mary Trump marvels at the stupid.
Twits on Twitter X Offenders,
Republican Thought Police Dept.
0
If the truth hurts, why, just make it go away.
Artificial? Yes. Intelligent? Not So Much. 0
Competent counsel? At Above the Law, Joe Patrice notes that
Follow the link for details.
You’ll Win that Bet . . . 0
. . . if you bet the explosion of legal gambling and, especially, gambling apps and websites* is not going to work out well.
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*No doubt aided by algorithms designed to suck the marks dry attract and keep eyeballs.
“An Armed Society Is Polite Society” 0
Yet another oxymoronic “responsible gun owner” feels called upon to discharge his portable phallus at a fellow driver.
We are a broken society.
“History Does Not Repeat Itself, but It Often Rhymes”* 0
Joe Conason looks at the defeat of Viktor Orban in the recent election in Hungary and hears a rhyme:
Follow the link for context.
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*Mark Twain.
All the News that Fits 0
Ring of Fire’s Josh G. explains how, in this New Gilded Age, right-wing monopolists are taking over and manipulating local broadcast news so as to advance their own political ends.
Me, I gave up on broadcast news years ago, when I realized I can read more in ten minutes that a news broadcast can tell me in 30.
Recommended Listening 0
Kimberley A. Johnson’s interview with the Knitting Cult Lady. From the description:
Born into the Children of God cult and trafficked as a child, Daniela escaped to the U.S. at 15, put herself through school to become a U.S. Army intelligence officer who deployed twice to Afghanistan with the 101st Airborne Division, and now studies Organizational Psychology at Harvard Extension School, researching group behavior, extremism, leadership demagoguery, and cults.
Methinks it sheds some light on dis coarse discourse, as one our two major political parties seems to have turned into a cult of poisonality.
(Yeah, I know the release date was a month ago. I’m behind on my podcasts.)