Around the Block

This was not a ‘typical Chicago’ shooting; this was a ‘typical American’ shooting.

Commentary

Another day; another shooting

July 4, 2022 will not be remembered as the 246th “birthday” of America. It will be remembered as the day of another mass shooting in America, this time in Highland Park, IL.

As of this writing, six people are dead, 24 more are in the hospital in serious to critical condition.

The shooter, still on the loose, took people out during a Fourth of July parade with a “high-powered” rifle from his perch on a rooftop.

There is more to come. The shooter will be somehow captured or killed. His motivation for the carnage will eventually be revealed.

But the trauma of the people attending the parade, people who came out on a beautiful summer morning to celebrate Independence Day, will not go away. Those people, children and adults both, will now forever associate July 4th not with the birth of the nation, but with the horror of Central Street in Highland Park.

In their cynical attempt to change the subject, to establish “false equivalencies,” it has become common for opponents of gun control to point to the “blue” city of Chicago as the epicenter of gun violence. “Why,” they maintain, “are you trying to take guns away from good, law-abiding gun owners, when you can’t control the gun violence perpetrated by the ‘hoodlums’ in your own ‘lefty’ city?”

A woman who attended the parade and who escaped with dozens of other potential victims by running away from the scene as fast as she could, was interviewed by one of the news organizations. Her name is Kristin Carlson and here’s what she said.

“This was not a typical Chicago shooting. This was a typical American shooting.”

Let that sink in on this July 4th.

The enigma of the American Democracy

Commentary

Enigma: (/əˈnɪɡ.mə/) A perplexing, baffling, or seemingly inexplicable matter.

Democracy: (/dɪˈmɑː.krə.si/) The belief in freedom and equality between people; a system of government based on this belief.

America: (/əˈmer.ɪ.kə/) A democratic republic in North America, more formerly known as the United States of America

Now that I’ve gotten those basic definitions out of the way, I guess I need to add one more:

A democratic republic is a form of government operating on principles adopted from a republic and a democracy. As a cross between two exceedingly similar systems, democratic republics may function on principles shared by both republics and democracies.

Get that? Pretty clear, huh?*

*(Just to muddy the waters a little more, there are many, particularly Republicans and other people on the right, who would rather refer to the United States as a “Constitutional Republic” rather than a “Democratic Republic.” This is semantics, a way to remove any derivative of the word “democrat” from the picture. In fact, there are even those who prefer to refer to our system of government as a “Constitutional Democratic Federal Republic.” But not only is that too long, it uses that nasty word, “Democratic!”)

Perhaps we should dig a little deeper.

According to the Oxford English Dictionary,

Republic: “A state in which supreme power is held by the people and their elected representatives…”^[
Democracy: “A system of government by the whole population or all the eligible members of a state, typically through elected representatives.”^[

Still confused? Let’s call in an expert. In this case, Eugene Volokh of the UCLA School of Law. Professor Volokh is a Ukrainian-American legal scholar known for his scholarship in American constitutional law, conservatism and libertarianism. He’s a former law clerk for Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Conner.

According to Volokh, “the United States exemplifies the varied nature of a constitutional republic—a country where some decisions (often local) are made by direct democratic processes, while others (often federal) are made by democratically elected representatives. As with many large systems, U.S. governance is incompletely described by any single term. It also employs the concept, for instance, of a constitutional democracy in which a court system is involved in matters of jurisprudence.”

There are some democratic republics in which not all persons are necessarily citizens, and not all citizens are necessarily entitled to vote. Suffrage is commonly restricted by criteria such as voting age, sometimes by felony or imprisonment status (as in the Florida “democratic republic,” despite a “democratic” vote by the people to allow it) or by skin-color (as in, well, we know where).

If this is still too confusing for most Americans, perhaps providing some examples of other self-identifying democratic republics could be insightful.

Here are some current Democratic Republics:

People’s Democratic Republic of Algeria
Democratic Republic of the Congo
Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia
Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea)
Lao People’s Democratic Republic (Laos)
Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal (Nepal)
Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste
Democratic Republic of São Tomé and Príncipe
Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka.

Add the United States of America to the list above and we can have another “G”- thing…the “G-10 of Democratic Republics! The only person I’m aware of who would be comfortable attending that meeting would be Donald Trump (as long as it wasn’t held in a “shit-hole” country. (I’m talking to you, Democratic Republic of the Congo.)

Past Democratic Republics before coups, wars/revolutions and wall “take-downs” included:

Somali Democratic Republic (Somalia)
Democratic Republic of Vietnam (North Vietnam)
People’s Democratic Republic of Yemen (South Yemen)
Democratic Republic of Afghanistan (Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan)
German Democratic Republic (East Germany)

But I digress. So let’s go back to Professor Volokh to understand the enigma I alluded to earlier.

To refresh your memory, an enigma is a perplexing, baffling, or seemingly inexplicable matter. Given that, what could be more enigmatic than the American system in which “some decisions (often local) are made by direct democratic processes, while others (often federal) are made by democratically elected representatives?” And the determination of who will be making those decisions is predicated on who is in power at the time of the decision. Which leads to, as we’ve seen in the last week or so of Supreme Court decisions, a veritable “follow the bouncing ball” of decisions and laws. Those local decisions, for example, sometimes short-handed into a concept called “states’ rights” are only states’ rights when the “right” is favorable to certain groups. When it’s not, federal rights are invoked.

The most obvious examples of this dichotomy is the conservative support of states’ rights when it came to slavery and Jim Crow, as well as more recently with regard to issues such as gay marriage, abortion, and separation of church and state. But when more liberal states passed, for example, laws restricting certain gun rights, the conservative right yelled foul and used the court system, up to and including most recently and tragically, the Supreme Court, to strike those state laws down.

If that’s not an enigma, I don’t know what is.

So, America is a “republic” only if it suits one’s specific interest? But how about a democracy? Is America a democracy? Not even close.

Remember, the founders established our current system of government to put some brakes on the majority. As George Thomas recently wrote the The Atlantic:

“When founding thinkers such as James Madison spoke of democracy, they were usually referring to direct democracy, what Madison frequently labeled ‘pure’ democracy.“

In essence, Madison argued against a pure democracy, which had a checkered history in the late 18th century, and was sometimes referred to as the “tyranny of the majority.”

So how has that worked out 200+years later?

Not that well, unless you think the “tyranny of the the minority” is a good idea.

To wit:

A voter in Montana gets 31 times the electoral bang for their presidential vote than a voter in New York;
A voter in Wyoming has 70 times the representation in the Senate as a voter in California;
The Republican Senate majority that recently confirmed Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court, was elected by 14 million fewer votes than the 47 senators who voted against her confirmation;
In the 2020 presidential election, Al Gore garnered 543,895 more votes than George Bush, but Bush became president
In the 2016 presidential election, Hillary Clinton received 2,868,686 more votes than Donald Trump and…well, you know what happened
In 2020, Donald Trump lost the popular vote to Joe Biden by more than 7 million votes, but because of his (undoubtably) illegal attempt to manipulate Electoral College votes in a number of key states, he claimed that he “won in a landslide” and the “election was stolen” from him. And, MORE THAN 70% OF REPUBLICAN VOTERS BELIEVE HIM!

Sorry to be such a downer. But what better day to publish a story like this on Independence Day? The day that these words were codified:

The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States.

Kingly tyranny then, minority tyranny now. Not much progress

Let me close with this. In the U.S. we celebrate Independence Day every July 4th. Interestingly, while we do have a “Constitution Day” federal holiday in the United States, it was only established in 2004 as an amendment(!) to an Omnibus spending bill. And I’d bet before reading this, most people didn’t know of the existence of this “Constitution Day,” nor when it falls (September 17). Now that you know, will you walk around next September 17 wishing friends and neighbors a “Happy Constitution Day?” You won’t…unless you like people muttering under their breath, “Who’s the nutcase?”

But when many of us were in grammar school, there was one thing, besides the “Pledge of Allegiance” we were required to memorize; the “Preamble to the Constitution of the United States.” In case you forgot, it goes like this:

We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

Did we actually think about those memorized words back then. If you were like me, you didn’t. But should we be thinking about them now? Thinking about how some of those words have played out in the past 200+ years?

…form a more perfect union;
…establish justice;
…insure domestic Tranquility;
…promote the general Welfare;
…secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity.

You be the judge. Are we a “perfect union?” Is there “justice” for all? Does “domestic Tranquility” co-exist with January 6? Are we really willing to promote the “general (i.e., everyone’s ) Welfare?” We’re the “Posterity;” have we really been “blessed” by Liberty?

Happy July 4th to one and to all!

Does ‘Around the Block’ make a difference?

Commentary

One reader thinks so!

In yesterday’s Around the Block, I posted an open letter to my Congresswoman, Lois Frankel. The subject was “The tyranny of the Supreme Court.” I told Congresswoman Frankel that I have, in my posts, “advocated for Congress to take action regarding Court reform.” I lamented the fact that “I am but one citizen opining on the issue; an opinionated citizen reaching a very small audience. Beyond my opinions, I am powerless. But you and your colleagues are not.” I asked Ms. Frankel how she and her colleagues, “…representatives of the people, [can] sit back and do nothing.” I questioned, why she wasn’t “…like me and many other citizens…your constituents, mad as hell and not going to take it anymore!” I suggested that while writing opinion pieces on the critical issues may “provide me some solace,” those pieces will “not change a thing.”

Finally, in what will most likely be a futile attempt to reach a bigger audience, I submitted my open letter to the South Florida Sun-Sentinel (circ. 163,728 daily, 228,906 Sunday) for consideration as an Op-ed column.

Not long after I posted my open letter, I received a comment from a man who has proven to be my most frequent, and often, my most discerning correspondent. He’s a blogger from Canada who publishes, among other blogs, one called, Ideas From Outside the Boxes, under the nom de plume, “rawgod.” His comment back to me, and his actions, gave me a least a little hope that my efforts might be accomplishing something.

Here is rawgod’s comment:

Hey, Ted. I have very few readers, but that did not stop me from asking them to visit your site, and asking them to re-blog the post, and for Americans to send adjusted letters to their elected Representatives. I hope I can accomplish some little thing towards creating change in the present political situation in the USA. Good luck and keep on working hard to create change. You are being heard. Now we just need to make you heard in the right places by the right people. Thank you.

Here is his re-blog:

THE U.S. SUPREME COURT CAN BE STOPPED, LEGALLY

PLEASE RE-BLOG, AND FORWARD THIS LETTER TO YOUR CONGRESSPERSON, AND ENCOURAGE EVERYONE YOU KNOW TO DO THE SAME!

This post is mainly for Americans, but every concerned blogger with American readers can help by re-blogging this.

Ted Block is a political commentator who has worked in government off and on for many decades. He knows things the average person might not know.*

(*Full disclosure: While I was in the U.S. Navy for several years, unless my 40+ years in advertising was a front for my real job in the CIA, I’m not sure where that comes from. But it sounds good.)

In this letter to his Congressperson he beseeches Ms. Frankel to help stop the runaway train that is the US Supreme Court. Apparently, the tools to do so are contained right in the US Constitution. His question, and mine, is why are these tools not being used?

So, now, I beseech you, my dear friends and readers, to ask the same question. But please do not just ask it, please do something about it. Please use this letter as it is intended. Get all your American readers to re-address the letter with appropriate changes and forward it on to their elected Representatives. The whole world will thank you if you can make change happen.

Thank you, rawgod, for reading, supporting and acting!

One last comment. I mentioned that rawgod has been, recently at least, “my most frequent, and often, my most discerning correspondent.” That statement was not meant to be critical of, or to demean, my other readers and correspondents. But, after doing a little analysis of both my readership and the volume of comments I receive, I noticed a discouraging trend. Both are down. That leads me to two possible reasons why:

My posts are becoming less compelling;
Readers who had once “subscribed” to Around the Block and are supposed to receive an email alert every time I post a new story, have mysteriously been deleted from my followers list.

If the reason is the former, I’ll work harder to gain back your readership. If it’s the latter, here’s the fix:

Navigate to https://around-the-block.com

Scroll down to Follow Around the Block and do this:

But wait, there’s more: for a limited time…actually for an UNLIMITED TIME, new, old, in fact, ALL subscriptions to Around the Block are being offered for FREE! Don’t let this one-time, unlimited offer get away. And for you Chicago readers, Subscribe now. Subscribe often.

The tyranny of the Supreme Court

Commentary

An open letter to Congresswoman Lois Frankel

Dear Congresswoman Frankel,

I have written to you many times. Perhaps I’m naïve, but for the most part my messages have only engendered canned replies from your office. I would hope this message will prompt a more thoughtful response and, more importantly, some action on your part and on the part of your colleagues in the Democratic caucus.

The tyranny of the Supreme Court has never been more apparent than in the rulings of the last few weeks. As Hayes Brown of MSNBC writes in his newsletter today (https://www.msnbc.com/opinion/msnbc-opinion/supreme-court-congress-are-out-balance-n1296709?cid=eml_mda_20220701&user_email=b40d3f282e3bae220979b29f1ed5ea0ea0bbd7772d3905fde93ef87519951d4b):

“The framers intended Congress to be the most powerful of the three branches of government, consisting of representatives of the people and the states. The executive was to be feared and constrained; the judiciary was, in comparison, an afterthought mostly left to future Congresses to craft. In drafting the Federalist Papers, Alexander Hamilton considered the courts the ‘least dangerous to the political rights of the Constitution.’

“What we’ve seen this term is a court determined to prove Hamilton wrong. While Congress has the ability to curtail the authority that the unbalanced, undemocratic courts have accumulated, there seems to be almost no drive among Democrats to even challenge the third branch.”

I publish a blog. In that blog, I have advocated for Congress to take action regarding Court reform. But nothing has been done. I am but one citizen opining on the issue; an opinionated citizen reaching a very small audience. Beyond my opinions, I am powerless. But you and your colleagues are not.

Democracy in America is on the precipice. Without any action by Congress, the “powers” that be, it is questionable whether that democracy can be sustained in my lifetime…and I’m 75 years old! On this Independence Day weekend, I will be publishing an essay to be entitled “The Enigma of American Democracy.” Writing that post will provide me some solace; but it will not change a thing.

As Brown writes:

“It is not an exaggeration to say that Congress’ neglect has left the Supreme Court unaccountable. Instead of Hamilton, we must look to Brutus’ warning in the Anti-Federalist Papers [1788] for an accurate prediction of what has come to pass: ‘In short, they are independent of the people, of the legislature, and of every power under heaven. Men placed in this situation will generally soon feel themselves independent of heaven itself.’

“Years of inaction stripped the power from the people and left it in the hands of a concentrated few who would rather watch the world burn than willingly yield to change. The assumption among liberals that America’s institutions are immutable and beyond changing, even in times of crisis, has left the country at a tipping point. It’s not too late for Democrats to snap out of it and restore Congress to its position of primacy. It will involve hard choices and hard votes that will fundamentally alter the country. But the current imbalance of power is not sustainable, in any sense of the word.”

I guess my question to you, Congresswoman Frankel, is this: What are you doing? What is the Democratic caucus doing? How can you and your colleagues, representatives of the people, sit back and do nothing? Why aren’t you, like me and many other citizens…your constituents…” mad as hell and not going to take it anymore!”

I’m sure you’re aware of the following, but it bears repeating:

In one term, the Supreme Court has eroded: the right of women to control their own bodies; the right to seek redress for civil rights violations by police; the separation of church and state; the ability of states to determine their own gun control policies; and the ability of the EPA to regulate greenhouse gases.

And next year this same Court will probably completely disrupt our system of federal elections, further eroding an already broken democracy beyond any hope of repair.

I implore you and your colleagues, Congresswoman Frankel, to take a little break from fund raising (and yes, I’m aware that because of the Court’s ruling that “corporations are people too,” fund raising is critical) and address the existential issue facing this country, the tyranny of the Supreme Court.

Sincerely,

Ted Block

Gun Control Legislation: I guess ‘baby steps’ are better than no steps at all. But is this the best we can do?

Commentary

Not even ‘baby steps’ for 34 GOP Senators, they voted for no steps!

The New York Times reported today that “…the Senate on Tuesday cleared the first hurdle to passing a bipartisan measure aimed at keeping firearms out of the hands of dangerous people, agreeing to take up a compromise bill whose enactment would break a years-long stalemate over federal legislation to address gun violence.

“While the bill falls short of the sweeping gun control measures Democrats have long demanded, its approval would amount to the most significant action in decades to overhaul the nation’s gun laws. The 64-to-34 vote came just hours after Republicans and Democrats released the text of the legislation, and after days of feverish negotiations to hammer out its details.

“The 80-page bill, called the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act, would enhance background checks, giving authorities up to 10 business days to review the juvenile and mental health records of gun purchasers younger than 21, and direct millions toward helping states implement so-called red-flag laws, which allow authorities to temporarily confiscate guns from people deemed dangerous, as well as other intervention programs.

“The measure would also, for the first time, ensure that serious dating partners are included in a federal law that bars domestic abusers from purchasing firearms, a longtime priority that has eluded gun safety advocates for years.”

Talk about baby steps. But will it protect our babies? Or anyone else?

I know, I should react like Senator Chris Murphy (D-CT), the most vocal gun-control advocate in the Senate, who said, “This is a breakthrough, and more importantly, this is a bipartisan breakthrough.”

Bipartisan? Let’s unpack that statement. While all 50 Democratic senators voted to pass the measure, only 14 Republican senators voted for it with the majority of Republicans opposing the measure, arguing that it infringed on the rights of gun owners. In fact, over the weekend, one GOP senator who helped negotiate the measure, John Cornyn of Texas, was booed at a rally by Texas Republicans who also moved to formally “rebuke” him and eight other Republican senators for their role in the negotiations.

But enough about Texas; I wrote about that secession-crazy state yesterday. If we’re talking about gun control no, ground zero right now is Missouri and their potential Republican Senate candidate, Eric Greitens.

Greitens is running for Senate after serving as the “Show Me” state’s governor from January 2017 until his resignation in June 2018 amid allegations of sexual assault and campaign finance impropriety. Allow me to let that sink in: Although Greitens served as governor for only 18 months before leaving office due to allegations of sexual assault and campaign finance impropriety, he is running again in the Republican primary for U.S. Senate. And he’s ahead!!

But my story about Greitens is not about his past indiscretions, it’s about the most recent Greitens outrage and, more specifically, the campaign ad he’s running.

This ad has been taken down by Facebook but is still running on Twitter which only “flagged” the video.

Words cannot express how outrageous this is. The disgraced former governor of Missouri is now running for Senate by “RINO* hunting” with his SEAL tactical team while filling up his campaign coffers by selling “RINO Hunting Permits” to his legion of MAGA friends and supporters.

(*RINO – Republican In Name Only)

Outrageous? Tasteless? Incitement? But while much more graphic, not original for a Republican candidate. Remember this ad from Sarah Palin?

If Greitens wins the GOP primary and subsequently beats his Democratic opponent in November I have one piece of advice for you Missourians: Join Texas and secede from the Union. No “compromise” this time, Missouri. Just leave. And don’t even think about coming back!

Texas GOP pushing to secede from the Union

Commentary

Bye, bye Texas – sorry, but we won’t miss you.

I haven’t written in a while. Although I’ve been pondering a story that sums up all the outrages we’re facing in America and in the world…some travel, some other writing projects and a lot of ennui, have kept me far from my keyboard.

And then this morning I received an email that snapped me out of my lethargy.

The email was from Reddit. Now, full disclosure, I have no idea what Reddit is. And while I’m sure I’ve received emails from Reddit before, I’ve never opened one. Until now. Why? After reading the subject line, “Texas Could Vote to Secede From U.S. in 2023 as GOP…,” I had to read more.

Reddit, I learned, is a social news aggregation, content rating, and discussion website. This particular Reddit post was submitted by a user forwarding an article from Newsweek. The Newsweek story began,

(All bold emphases mine)

“Texas Republicans are pushing for a referendum to decide whether the state should secede from the U.S. The demand for Texans to be allowed to vote on the issue in 2023 was one of many measures adopted in the Texas GOP’s party platform following last week’s state convention in Houston.“

Among the other “many measures” adopted at the convention:

A resolution declaring that President Joe Biden was “not legitimately elected;”
A call for full repeal of the Voting Rights Act of 1965:
A plank describing homosexuality as “an abnormal lifestyle choice,” also declaring that the party opposes “all efforts to validate transgender identity;”
A call for a total ban on abortion and “equal protection for the Pre-born;“
Planks on education that include:
- The education system should focus on “imparting essential academic knowledge, understanding why Texas and America are exceptional and have positively contributed to our world, and while doing so, also offer enrichment subjects that bless students’ lives;”
- Calling for students to learn about the “Humanity of the Pre-born Child,” including teaching that life begins at fertilization.
- Demanding that the state legislature pass a law prohibiting the teaching of “sex education, sexual health, or sexual choice or identity in any public school in any grade whatsoever.”

Maybe it’s time to re-think applying to the University of Texas, boys and girls.

But back to the main subject of this essay – Texas’ threat to secede from the Union.

According to Newsweek, “The U.S. Constitution makes no provision for states to secede and in 1869, the Supreme Court ruled in Texas v. White that states cannot unilaterally secede from the Union.

Even the hero of the SCOTUS right, the late Justice Antonin Scalia once wrote, “If there was any constitutional issue resolved by the Civil War, it is that there is no right to secede.”

Not surprisingly, I find myself once again disagreeing with Justice Scalia.

I say, if Texas wants to secede, let them. The values espoused in the Texas GOP’s platform do not reflect my values. And, they don’t reflect the values of the majority of Americans. So go, Texas, leave. And don’t worry about closing the door on your way out. We’ll close the door…and double lock it so you can’t get back in!

By the way, if double locking doesn’t work, anyone want to help “build that wall?” I guarantee that we’ll get Texas to pay for it.

Nearly half of Republican voters choose gun rights over protecting gun violence victims

Commentary

Surprised? I’m not, given the NRA, big donors and inaction and lies from GOP politicians.

I’m overwhelmed with writing projects. I vowed to spend the day “Spring cleaning” my disastrously messy office (it’s still Spring, right). I told myself to take a day or two off from opining. After all, what good am I doing?

And then I saw this from Charlie Sykes, an editor-at-large at the Bulwark and an MSNBC opinion columnist:

GOP’s mass shooting response is a bizarre twist for the so-called ‘pro-life’ party

Just days after a teenage gunman murdered 19 children and two teachers in Uvalde, Texas, nearly half of Republican voters told pollsters that mass murders were “unfortunately, something we have to accept as part of a free society.”

(Just to head off all the “there he goes again, quoting radical left MSNBC pundits” comments, Sykes is a former conservative radio talk show host and the Bulwark is a right-of-center news and opinion website. He quit his radio show because he felt that the conservative movement had lost its way during the 2016 campaign, saying “…as we learned this year, we had succeeded in persuading our audiences to ignore and discount any information from the mainstream media. Over time, we’d succeeded in delegitimizing the media altogether — all the normal guideposts were down, the referees discredited.” In his column today, Sykes is simply reporting the facts.)

The poll Sykes refers to is a YouGov/CBS News Poll conducted between June 1 -3. Here’s the question that engendered Sykes’ (and my) ire.

He continues,

“Forty-four percent of GOP voters say that “we have to accept” the slaughter of children on a more or less regular basis, because they are the collateral damage of living in a free society.

“Don’t slide past that poll number, because it gives us a glimpse of how broken our discourse has become, when weapons become fetishes of manhood and guns designed to blow human beings are embraced as symbols of “freedom.”

“There is no confusion or misunderstanding here, because the wording of the question was clear and blunt (“Do you feel that mass shootings are___”), and the memories of the murders in Uvalde, Texas and Buffalo, New York, were still fresh. Media reports were still showing images of the victims and scenes of mourning.

“The result is shocking, but it shouldn’t be surprising. For years, despite the rising death toll, the gun lobby has continued to insist that guns were the foundation of the nation’s liberty — and none more than the deadliest of semi-automatic weapons.“

Shocking, but not surprising; Republican voters have been fed this rubbish for years.

Sykes:

“This is not a new position for talking heads on the right.

“In 2017, after a gunman murdered more than that 50 people in Las Vegas, former Fox News anchor Bill O’Reilly declared that the carnage was ‘the price of freedom.‘

“’Violent nuts are allowed to roam free until they do damage, no matter how threatening they are,’ O’Reilly wrote on his blog. ‘The Second Amendment is clear that Americans have a right to arm themselves for protection. Even the loons.'”

Of course, O’Reilly is as wrong on the clarity of the Second Amendment as he is on just about everything else. But, apparently, when he, and others of his ilk, speak, Republican voters listen:

The AR-15 has become the nation’s most popular rifle. As the New York Times noted, “for those who love the rifle, it is seen as a testament to freedom — a rite of passage shared between parents and children, a token to welcome soldiers home, a tradition shared with friends at the range.”

But this “testament to freedom” has been used in one mass murder after another. Here’s a partial list:

May 24, 2022: Shooting at Robb Elementary School in Ulvade, Texas, 19 children and two teachers dead.
May 14, 2022: Shooting at Tops Friendly Market in Buffalo, New York, 10 people murdered.
Feb. 14, 2018: Shooting at Stoneman Douglas High School shooting in Florida leaves 17 people dead.
Oct. 1, 2017: The Las Vegas slaughter of 58 people.
Nov. 5, 2017: The Sutherland Springs, Texas, church shooting that claimed 26 lives.
June 12, 2016: The Pulse nightclub shooting in Orlando, Fla., that left 49 dead.
Dec. 2, 2015: The San Bernardino, Calif., shooting that killed 14 people.
Dec. 14, 2012: The shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut that took 27 lives.

In 1775, Patrick Henry uttered these words, “Give me liberty, or give me death!”

I would submit that in 2022, those words, at least from today’s GOP politicians and right-wing talking heads, would be better expressed this way, “Give me liberty, and give others death!”

As mass shootings become a daily event, GOP theories as to their cause become ever more outrageous

Commentary

Yesterday it was “out of wedlock child birth, divorce, single parent homes and abortion;” today it’s “Black people, frankly.”

In an Around the Block post last week, America may be broken beyond repair, the featured photo I chose was a screen shot from a campaign ad from Blake Masters, a man running for the Republican nomination for Senate from Arizona. If Masters becomes the GOP candidate, he will challenge the incumbent Democrat, Mark Kelly.

Here’s what I wrote, courtesy of the New York Times Michelle Goldberg.

In an ad released last year, Blake Masters, a leading candidate in Arizona’s Republican Senate primary, cradles a semiautomatic weapon. “This is a short-barreled rifle,” he said, ominous music playing in the background. “It wasn’t designed for hunting. This is designed to kill people.”

If you actually clicked on the link to the ad, you’d see that Masters went on to say, “…but if you’re not a bad guy, I support your right to own one.”

Chilling.

Particularly after the events of the last several weeks.

As I write this on a Monday, a headline today read:

At least 12 dead in another weekend of mass shootings across America

The article went on to detail attacks in Philadelphia and Chattanooga, Tennessee.

But despite the carnage caused by the inability of this country to control guns, Blake Masters won’t shut-up! Here’s his latest outrage:

“Tech investor and Arizona Republican Senate hopeful Blake Masters acknowledges that the United States has a gun violence problem. But he also has a theory about why there’s a problem—it’s “Black people, frankly.”

Yes, you read that correctly. A Republican candidate for the United States Senate is blaming the unrelenting gun violence at schools, at supermarkets, at houses of worship and on the streets of America…on “Black people, frankly.”

Now just to be clear, all the facts are not in, but based on preliminary information, in the majority of the recent mass shootings the perpetrator was not Black.

In fact, according to Statista, between 1982 and June 2022 there were 129 documented mass shootings in the United States. Of those, 68 (53%) were done by White shooters; 21 (16%) by Blacks.

Number of mass shootings in the United States between 1982 and June 2022, by shooter’s race or ethnicity

Not suprisingly, facts doesn’t seem to bother people like Masters.

According to Yahoo News, “it was unclear why Masters—who has pushed the baseless ‘great replacement’ conspiracy theory narrative—felt compelled to single out Black people.” And frankly, I don’t have the time or stomach to list all Masters other outrageous statements, theories and lies. Suffice it to say, at least for some of us, candidates like the Stanford-educated Masters, who was recently endorsed by the ever reliable Donald Trump, are scary beyond comprehension.

The only good news is that in a field of five GOP candidates, Masters is running third, 5-6 points below the leaders. And in current head-to-head polling, incumbent Democratic Senator Mark Kelly is running 4-10 points ahead of any of the Republicans.

Having said that, Masters is still garnering 20% of the Republican vote in this primary. Based on what you now know about this man, I ask you, “How do you feel about our great country when your fellow citizens continue to vote for people like Blake Masters?

I live in Florida. Ron DeSantis is my governor. Woe is me!

Commentary

His latest demonstration of authoritarianism: blackmailing the Special Olympics.

In closing my story yesterday, Just when you think the GOP can’t any get worse, it gets worse, I posed several questions. One of those questions was this:

“How do you feel about our great country when your fellow citizens continue to elect people like Steube, Brooks and Long, not to mention Marjorie Taylor Greene, Lauren Boebert, Greg Abbot and Ted Cruz, among many, many others?“

One of the “many, many others” I omitted was the governor of my own state, Florida’s Ron DeSantis. My omission wasn’t an oversight; I simply felt that because I write about DeSantis so often, the takeaway might be a shrug and something like, “Block complaining about DeSantis? There he goes again?

Then this morning I read the daily email I receive from Ruth Ben-Giat, Dr. Ben-Giat is a scholar on fascism and authoritarian leaders and a professor of history and Italian studies at New York University. Her piece today was entitled, Ron DeSantis Sends an Authoritarian Message: Submit To Me Or Else

Dr. Ben-Giat’s piece focuses on DeSantis’ latest authoritarian overreach, threatening the Special Olympics, which is holding its 2022 USA competition in Orlando, with a $27.5 million fine if it didn’t rescind its vaccine mandate, which the organization “considers necessary for its vulnerable populations.”

As Dr. Ben-Giat writes,

“DeSantis, a scientific savant, claimed that the vaccine mandates were unnecessary because ‘a lot of these special Olympians have also had Covid by now. Most people have had it by now.’ Perhaps the governor doesn’t know that people can become reinfected with coronavirus. In any event, this was always about politics, not public welfare. ‘We’ve never seen something wielded like this vaccine to try to marginalize disfavored people,’ DeSantis said, returning to his favorite theme of the federal government’s dictatorial ways.“

Needless to say, with their backs against the wall, the Special Olympics had to comply.

Going on, she opines,

“DeSantis displays many traits of authoritarian-minded leaders, and one of the most disastrous is their insatiable appetite for power. This means that they persecute and harass increasing numbers of people as they strive to satisfy their desire to control everyone and everything.

“This is why, along with the usual GOP targets (the LBGTQ community, Blacks, and immigrants) we find DeSantis going after the Special Olympics. That’s not the move you make if you care about being seen as decent, but it’s the move you make if you want to be feared.”

Some other recent DeSantis targets, Dr. Ben-Giat points out, have been Disney, for speaking out against his “Don’t Say Gay” Bill, and the Tampa Bay Rays baseball team for “having the temerity to express sadness about the recent mass shooting of children in Texas–and for making a $50,000 donation to Everytown for Gun Safety’s Support fund. Opposing GOP gun rights policies earned the team a veto of their planned $35 million baseball complex.”

Dr. Ben-Giat concludes:

“And here we arrive at the common denominator of the governor’s positions and the most telling measure of his authoritarian ways: his cruelty to vulnerable groups in our society, who already face discrimination and worse without DeSantis punishing anyone who shows solidarity with them. Thus does a humane comment after a mass shooting of children become dangerous ‘activism.’”

Ron DeSantis is running for reelection in November. He has a much better than even shot to win. A win in Florida in 2022 will put him in a very favorable position to challenge Trump for the Republican nomination for president in 2024 or, if Trump won’t or can’t run (one can only hope that he can’t because he will be by then, finally, a convicted felon), the favorite to take the nomination.

So, I conclude with an restatement of my question, amended.

How do you feel about our great country when your fellow citizens continue to elect people like Ron DeSantis?

Just when you think the GOP can’t any get worse, it gets worse

Commentary

The inane comments by three GOP Congressmen this week don’t bode well for progress on gun control, or anything else for that matter

Just when I thought the GOP solutions to gun violence in schools including, arming teachers (because armed trained police professionals at schools has worked out so well), limiting access doors and locking them (of course, that’s if you can find the key in an emergency) and surrounding school campuses with stronger, taller fences, perhaps with razor wire on the top (I guess these GOP lawmakers aren’t as concerned about solutions for gun violence at supermarkets), were incomprehensible and insulting, it’s gotten worse.

First, a Republican congressman used a House hearing on gun control in the aftermath of multiple mass shootings in the U.S. to show off his own collection of guns and brandish them via remote video link. Greg Steube, a representative from Florida, displayed a succession of firearms he says would be banned under a bill being debated in response to the shootings. ‘Here’s a gun I carry every single day to protect myself, my family, my wife, my home,’ he said while holding a firearm. When Sheila Jackson Lee, a Democrat from Texas, interjected and said she hoped the gun was not loaded, Steube replied: ‘I’m in my house, I can do whatever I want with my guns’.

Florida Rep. Greg Steube with some of his favorite things.

Then two Republican congressmen went on record saying that it wasn’t guns that caused these massacres but liberal policies.

First, Rep. Mo Brooks, Republican from Alabama who, by the way, was at the January 6 rally in DC prior to the assault on the Capitol whipping up the crowd.

Then, Rep. Billy Long, Republican from Missouri squarely put the blame on abortion!

You might have noticed that Congressman Long began his indictment of abortion as the root cause of gun violence with this. “To my knowledge, none of those shootings were done with any kind of a ArmaLite rifle or an AK or anything like that…” For clarification this is an ArmaLite rifle:

In both the Buffalo and Uvalde mass shootings, the gunmen used similar assault-style rifles. Clearly, Congressman Long’s “knowledge” has some gaps in it.

So let’s sum up. The Republican solution to end the epidemic of gun violence in America, violence that is happening almost nowhere else in the world, is to arm more people while turning our schools into fortresses. The root cause of the epidemic is “immoral” liberal values. And the Second Amendment means “you can’t take my gun away…any kind of gun.”

Based on all this, how do you feel about the prospects of any progress on gun control?

How do you feel about our great country when your fellow citizens continue to elect people like Steube, Brooks and Long, not to mention Marjorie Taylor Greene, Lauren Boebert, Greg Abbot and Ted Cruz, among many, many others?

And how do you feel about that wonderful, patriotic song, “This is My Country,” the lyrics of which rang true when it was written in 1940. Do those lyrics ring true in 2022?