Cars lost at sea creates mental health crisis

News with a Twist

Coping with the loss of a loved one – Porsche/Bentley edition

The big news in some parts of the country this week was not the impending confrontation between the United States and its NATO allies over the Russia’s potential invasion of Ukraine. Nor was it a judge’s ruling that Donald Trump and his two “children,” Lil’ Donny and “Ivankaranka,” will have to testify at depositions this week regarding financial improprieties at their eponymously named company. It wasn’t even Joe Manchin “just saying no” one more time.

No, the big news in Marin County California and Palm Beach County Florida, two places where I’ve lived and now live, was this:

Cargo ship carrying Porsches and Bentleys is burning and adrift at sea; tow boats on the way

The cargo ship, Felicity Ace, packed with Porches, Bentleys, Audis and Volkswagens — went up in flames while crossing the Atlantic Ocean on Wednesday.

According to the Portuguese navy, the 650-foot ship was afire and adrift near the Azores Islands. It was traveling from Emden, Germany, to Rhode Island. All 22 sailors aboard the ship were rescued.

While the cause of the fire has not been determined, it is possible that lithium-ion batteries in the electric cars on the Felicity Ace caught fire. Although no Tesla cars were reported to be on board, Elon Musk immediately issued a statement saying he bears no responsibility for the fire, blaming Mark Zuckerberg and FaceBook for once again spreading nasty rumors about him. However, the website “Find My Vessel” reported one crew member said that the ship was using Tesla’s self-driving, hands-free software to navigate and was miles off-course. Musk offered a “no comment” when asked about that allegation.

The good news is that the crew was rescued. That same could not be said about the Porsches and Bentleys. And that’s why this news was a page one, above the fold story in both the Marin Independent Journal and the Palm Beach Post.

Many buyers in both counties awaiting delivery of cars being transported on the ship were reported to be beside themselves and seeking psychological counsel. In Marin, where BMWs were once referred to as “BasicMarinWheels,” and where Porsche is now the sports car of choice, one man, Francis Drake VII who lives on the lagoon in the tony Marin enclave of Belvedere is in particular stress. Drake has been waiting for his Porsche since August and doesn’t know what he’ll do if the car he ordered burns and sinks.

2022 Boxster Deman Motorsport Spyder

“The Boxster Spyder with Deman 4.5 motor and shorty gears is the best sports car of all time, hands down,” Drake lamented. “I had it specced exactly as I wanted it. There is no moving on.”

The Marin IJ reported that the Belvedere Police Department has begun a suicide watch, placing one of their six officers outside Drake’s home on a 24/7 basis.

The situation in Palm Beach County, and particularly in Boca Raton, is even more critical, as many upscale gated communities in that city have a residential requirement that each household must have one registered Bentley convertible.

2022 Bentley Continental GT Speed Convertible

With that in mind, the Palm Beach Post is reporting that psychiatrists and psychologists in Boca are being overwhelmed with calls from patients seeking emergency counseling.

Curious about how my own “Boca shrink” is handling the emergency, I gave her a call. Here’s her current outgoing voice message:

“Hello, you’ve reached the office of Dr. Miriam Fitzgerald Schwartzkopf. Please listen carefully as this message has recently changed. If this is a medical emergency, please hang up and dial 911. If this is a Bentley emergency please press #. If this is about Porsches and Audis lost at sea, please leave a message with your name, phone number, car make and model and the car’s approximate MSRP. I’ll get back to you as soon as possible in descending order of your car’s value. If this is about VWs lost at sea, please press * and your call will be redirected to the next available psychologist in Boynton or Lake Worth.”

Here at Around the Block, we can only say to all our friends in both Marin and Boca, “our thoughts and prayers are with you in this time of need.”

From the ‘ridiculous’ to the ‘sublime’

Commentary

ridiculous [ ri-dik-yuh-luhs ]: stupid or unreasonable and deserving to be laughed at; Marjorie Taylor Greene.

sublime [sə-ˈblīm] extremely good; admirable; nine-year-old Khloe Joiner

By now, even if you didn’t read my last post, “You say “Gazpacho,” I say ‘Gestapo’…” (https://around-the-block.com/2022/02/10/you-say-gazpacho-i-say-gestapo/), I’m sure you’ve read about Marjorie Taylor Greene’s “Soup Nazi” moment. Calling her “ridiculous,” of course, is an affront to the word “ridiculous.”

But how about “sublime”? And who is Khloe Joiner?

Khloe is a nine-year-old who loves to read. She was featured on Ali Velshi’s MSNBC show yesterday. From the show’s website:

“I like reading fiction, and I like reading educational books,” [Khloe] says. “Those are both my favorite.” She also loves uplifting her community and helping to improve police-community relations. “Sometimes when cops have to pull over kids’ parents, they might be a little bit afraid or scared that something bad will happen.” So she founded “A Book and A Smile,” an organization that collects and donates books for police and other officials to give to children during high-stress situations.

As I wrote yesterday, videos can be worth “millions of words.” So, with that in mind, here’s the segment with Khloe from Velshi’s show:

I hope you agree with me that the world needs less of the ridiculousness of the Marjorie Taylor Greene’s of the world and more of the sublimeness of Khloe Joiner.

And if you do, go to her website, A Book and a Smile, (https://abookandasmile.org). Read more about Chloe and her organization. And, while you’re there, particularly in this world of book banning and organized ignorance, consider donating to this wonderful young girl’s cause.

You say “Gazpacho,” I say “Gestapo”…

Commentary

“…Let’s call the whole thing off…at least the ‘Gestapo’ part.”

I’m not in the habit of posting more than one column a day; some people think it’s overkill, bordering on presumption. But, I am relenting just this once due to overwhelming reader demand, characterized by this comment from one of my most devoted readers after my SCOTUS post earlier today:

WHAT??? Nothing about Pelosi’s GAZPACHO Police??????????

If you haven’t heard by now, Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene ranted yesterday on the ultra-right wing cable network, OAN, about Nancy Pelosi and her “Gazpacho” Police.

Rather than go into a wordy treatise on Greene’s comments, I’m abiding by the old saw, “a picture is worth a thousand words.” And, if a picture is worth a thousand words, these two videos are worth a few million.

First, from MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnell. Please stick with O’Donnell to the end of the video for his take on yet another moronic GOP Congressman on a somewhat different subject.

Second, ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel.

Of course, what would an Around the Block post be without a few choice words from me, so let me close with this ATB exclusive comment from the Anti-Defamation League:

“After reviewing the Marjorie Taylor Greene video, the ADL has concluded, that gazpacho of any kind, including the delicious, but very weird, “Watermelon Gazpacho,” is a completely acceptable cold soup for Jewish people, of any persuasion, to eat. We do strongly recommend that not only Jewish people, but just about anyone except descendants of George Lincoln Rockwell not consume “Gestapo” soup of any variety.”

Supreme Court overrules lower court panel requiring Alabama to draw new voting map

Commentary

The stench of the Roberts Court gets “stinkier!”

The judicial militia of the Republican Party made the news the other day. The militia, otherwise known as the majority of the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS), reared its ugly, un-democratic head in a 5-4 decision stopping a lower court order requiring Alabama draw a new district voting map favorable to Black residents. The fourth dissenting vote was cast by conservative Chief Justice John Roberts, who joined the three Democratic-appointed justices in the minority. (If I was a betting man, I’d say that Roberts’ dissent had more to do with an attempt to preserve his legacy than what he really believes.)

At issue was a decision last month by a panel of three federal judges who threw out Alabama’s new congressional map, which included only one congressional district with a majority of Black voters even though Blacks make up more than a quarter of the state’s population.

The unanimous vote by the lower court panel ruled that a second district was necessary to comply with the Voting Rights Act.

You remember the Voting Rights Act (VRA). You know, the act passed in 1964, which Congress had extended for 25 years in 2006, but which in 2013, in Shelby County v. Holder, was decimated by the Roberts Court, which voted Section 5 unconstitutional.

A quick review. According to The Hill,

Section 5 required that nine, mostly Southern, states (including Alabama) and parts of seven other states in various sections of the country preclear with the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) any proposed change in voting requirements or practices. The preclearance requirement stemmed from those states’ and jurisdictions’ histories of voter discrimination, and it required them to demonstrate that their proposed changes did not have a racially discriminatory intent or effect.  From 1970 to 2000, the DOJ, under Section 5, objected to nearly 1,000 changes proposed by covered jurisdictions. The DOJ blocked 31 proposed changes in 2006, the year the VRA was extended.

At the time, in a 5-4 ruling, Roberts writing for the majority in one of the more disingenuous recent SCOTUS arguments opined, “things have changed dramatically” since the VRA was first enacted. Roberts went on to argue that the changed circumstances meant that the time had come to end a remedy that strained the normal constitutional order.

In her dissent, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg characterized the majority’s opinion ending pre-clearance as being like “throwing away an umbrella in the middle of a rainstorm because you are not getting wet.”

RBG was right. Roberts was wrong.

Recently, Justice Sonia Sotomayor, in oral arguments regarding Mississippi’s anti-abortion legislation, wondered whether the Supreme Court as an institution could survive the “stench” from overturning 50 years of precedent of its Roe v. Wade decision. Many would argue that the “stench” began with the Roberts argument in the 2013 VRA decision.

By the way, that three-judge panel whose order was halted was composed of Judge Stanley Marcus from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit, nominated by President Bill Clinton, and District Court Judges Anna M. Manasco and Terry F. Moorer, both chosen by President Donald Trump.

Oops!

Conservative justices like to talk about Constitutional “originalism.” I’ve never understood that fascination. I mean it’s not like a few things haven’t changed since 1789.

It wasn’t until over 80 years later, in 1870, that the 15th Amendment, which stated that voting rights could not be “denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude,” was passed. 

Unfortunately, it was left to states to determine the specific qualifications for suffrage. Southern state legislatures used such qualifications—including literacy tests, poll taxes and other discriminatory practices—to disenfranchise a majority of Black voters in the decades following Reconstruction.

WHICH IS WHY THE VOTING RIGHTS ACT WAS PASSED! 

In systematically overturning voting rights that disproportionally disenfranchise minority voters, the Republican judicial militia seems to be doing whatever it can to go back, not to 1870, but to 1789.

So, what’s next to make things right? Passing the For the People Act or the John Lewis Voting Rights Act?

Don’t count on it.

Macron and Putin meet in Moscow

Cartoon News with a Twist

Social Distancing – Moscow Style

The post-meeting read-out said that although the two leaders started the meeting far apart…literally at opposite ends of a (very big) table, no matter how hard their aides tried, they couldn’t make the table smaller…or get them closer together!

Macron: “Can’t someone remove some of the leaves? Mon dieu! This ‘image ridicule‘ is going out all over the world.” Putin: “And I look like a ‘pin-head.’” Macron: “And I look like I have a swelled head!” Putin: “Well, you are French.”

When it comes to book banning, the beat goes on

Commentary

Palm Beach Post columnist Frank Cerabino wonders, if they’re going to ban books with “explicit and detailed verbal descriptions or narrative accounts of sexual excitement, or sexual conduct, that is harmful to minors,” shouldn’t the Bible be on the list?

A few days after I posted an Around the Block entitled, “Book banning and the American Way of education” (https://around-the-block.com/2022/01/29/book-banning-and-the-american-way-of-education/) the Palm Beach Post published a column by Frank Cerabino, a 30-plus year news columnist for the Post. As someone who spent many years reading the legendary San Francisco Chronicle “news columnist” Herb Caen, I kind of look at Cerabino as Caen with less tittle-tattle and a bit more substance. A liberal voice in the community, Cerabino was recently chastised by one conservative Post Op-ed contributor this way, “I don’t buy Cerabino’s hooey.” Oh, if only my column could become so popular that I could be chastised that way.

But I digress.

Cerabino’s column today, “Book banners might want to put Bible at top of list,” was so in-synch with my recent post that I was moved to write a letter to the editor of the Post.

But first, some excerpts from Frank’s column. First, his setup,

We may have to ban the Bible from Florida’s public schools.

Book banning is starting to take off in Florida, and as long as it is, we shouldn’t leave the Bible out of the discussion.

A national group called The County Citizens Defending Freedom has formed in Polk County to remove books from public school libraries that are deemed harmful to children under the age of 18. [Among the “deemed harmful,” includes,] “narrative accounts of sexual excitement or sexual conduct,

And then the closer:

I’ll let Genesis 19:30 pick up the action from here. “One day [Lot’s] older daughter said to the younger, ‘Our father is old, and there is no man around here to give us children – as is the custom all over the Earth.

‘Let’s get our father to drink wine and then sleep with him and preserve our family line through our father.’ “That night they got their father to drink wine, and the older daughter went in and slept with him. He was not aware of it when she lay down or when she got up.

“The next day the older daughter said to the younger, ‘Last night I slept with my father. Let’s get him to drink wine again tonight, and you go in and sleep with him so we can preserve our family line through our father.’ “So they got their father to drink wine that night also, and the younger daughter went in and slept with him. Again he was not aware of it when she lay down or when she got up.

“So both of Lot’s daughters became pregnant by their father.”

As Cerabino opined, If you’re into more graphic sexual passages, the Old Testament has a lot to offer.

And my comment in a letter to the Post’s editor?

Hear, hear to Frank Cerabino on his column, “Book banners might want to put Bible at top of list.” The column was particularly timely, coming so soon after the news of the banning of the Pulitzer Prize winning graphic Holocaust novel, “Maus,” in Athens, Tennessee, where one member of the school board intoned, “Our children need to know about the Holocaust, they need to understand that there are several pieces of history … that show(s) depression or suppression of certain ethnicities (emphasis mine). Is it just me, but does anyone else see the irony in the “Maus” banning occurring in a place called, “Athens?” We’ll never learn, will we? Remember, Tennessee was the site of another bit of educational, Bible-thumping, lack of enlightenment, the 1925, “Scopes Monkey Trial” in which high school teacher, John Scopes, was accused of violating an act which had made it unlawful to teach human evolution in any state-funded school. Is Florida now not only making Texas, but Tennessee as well, our models for ignorance? I’d say, “heaven help us” but I guess that would be a little disingenuous. 

Here’s a PDF to Cerabino’s full column:

florida-school-library-book-banners-need-to-take-hard-look-at-bibleDownload

The irony* of two January 6th related headlines today

Commentary

*For GOP readers:

i·ro·ny, a state of affairs or an event that seems deliberately contrary to what one expects and is often amusing as a result.

I couldn’t help but notice the ironic juxtaposition of the two Associated Press headlines on Page A3 of today’s Palm Beach Post.

GOP censures Reps. Cheney, Kinzinger on the left; Pence says Trump was ‘wrong’ to claim election could be overturned on the right.

Let’s talk about the Cheney/Kinzinger situation first as it’s the more important of the two; after all, does what Pence says, more than a year after the January 6 insurrection, carry much weight? Certainly not among the RNC committee members who voted to censure the two truth-speaking members of their party.

Here’s AP reporter Sam Metz’s lede about the censure:

“The Republican National Committee censured two GOP lawmakers on Friday for participating on the committee investigating the violent Jan.6 insurrection and assailed the panel for leading a ‘persecution of ordinary citizens engaged in legitimate political discourse.'”

Let me unpack this. The RNC, headed by Ronna McDaniel, a niece of former presidential candidate, Mitt Romney, the man considered to be a “voice of reason” in the GOP, assailed the Congressional January 6 Select Committee for persecuting “ordinary citizens engaged in legitimate political discourse.”

Of course, in an act of passionate leniency, only a censure of Cheney and Kinzinger was approved, not an expulsion from the Party, as originally recommended.

McDaniel denied that the ‘legitimate political discourse’ wording in the censure was referring to the violent attack on the Capitol by supporters of former President Donald Trump and said it had to do with other actions taken by the House committee investigating the Jan.6, 2021, insurrection.

And if you believe that, I have a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you.

While the censure was the big news, some smaller, but important decisions came out of the RNC meeting.

As Metz reported, “RNC members also voted in favor of a rule change that would prohibit their candidates from participating in debates organized by the Commission on Presidential Debates. Republicans object to past moderators they perceive as left-leaning and remarks about Trump made by commission co-chair Mike McCurry.”

“Restoring faith in our elections means making sure our candidate can compete on a level playing field,” McDaniel was quoted as saying.

Ah yes, the famous, gerrymandered, voter suppressed, vote-counting “shenniganed” free and fair elections.

And Pence?

The AP’s Jill Colvin reported that Pence, in a speech on Friday called, Jan. 6 a “dark day” in history of the Capitol, going on to say, “Frankly there is no idea more un-American than the notion that any one person could choose the American president.”

Pence also intoned, “The truth is, there’s more at stake than our party or political fortunes…if we lose faith in the Constitution, we won’t just lose elections – we’ll lose our country.”

That final statement, juxtaposed with the RNC’s recent pronouncements, confirmed Pence’s irrelevance in the Republican Party

Neo-Nazis demonstrate in Orlando; Ron DeSantis: Investigate “highway protest violations!”

Commentary

Say hello, America, to your next potential President

Thursday, January 27, was International Holocaust Remembrance Day.

On Saturday, January 29 and Sunday, January 30, in Orlando Florida, Neo-Nazis demonstrated. 

Now we all know that there are “good people on both sides.” In the spirit of that statement by our ex-President, allow me to detail some of the things these “good people” in Orlando did:

  • Hung a banner from a highway overpass that said, “Vax the Jews” 
  • Hung another with swastikas and the right-wing slogan “Let’s Go Branon[sic]” 
  • Hung a third banner that featured GoyimTV, the video platform for the Goyim Defense League
  • Held flags with swastikas chanting “White Power” and “Heil Hitler” while yelling obscene antisemitic insults at people driving by, and mockingly urging them to call police.

As if these hateful, disgusting anti-Semitic representations of free speech rights weren’t enough, it occurred in Florida with, predictable results; Governor Ron DeSantis couldn’t get up the courage to condemn the demonstrators. 

But wait, doesn’t Florida have one of the biggest Jewish populations in the country? And isn’t it political suicide for DeSantis to not speak out against Neo-Nazis and anti-Semitism?

Yes, Florida, with over 650,000 Jews is only surpassed by New York and California. But those 650,000 represent only 3% of Florida’s population, just slightly more than the national average of 2.4%. And most of those Jews don’t vote for DeSantis anyway.

So, what was his response. 

  • DeSantis press secretary, Christina Pushaw, tweeted, “Do we even know they’re Nazis?”, while suggesting the highway rally was a Democratic stunt.
  • She accused Democratic politicians of linking DeSantis to hate groups writing, “DeSantis has ALWAYS condemned antisemitic attacks & hatred,” and calling attempts to tie the neo-Nazi demonstrations to DeSantis’ policies, “disgusting political smears.”
  • Pushaw attacked activists and Democratic politicians for asking why DeSantis hadn’t condemned the rallies.

Finally at a press event in Palm Beach (Jews represent 15.8% of the Palm Beach County population), DeSantis’s only comment on the Neo-Nazis was to say they should be investigated for protesting on the highway.

Wait, what? His only comment was that there should be an investigation into highway protests?

No, actually, there’s more. DeSantis went on to accuse Democrats of smearing him by using, “a half-dozen malcontents” for “political gain.” Then concluded his remarks by touting his administration’s relationship to Israel.

Wouldn’t you know it? When all else fails for a Republican politician facing a “Jewish issue”, pull out the “Israel card!”

DeSantis is running for reelection in 2022. He’s up by +5 points and +10 points on the two most likely Democratic opponents, former Republican Governor, now Democratic Congressman Charlie Crist and Agricultural Secretary, Nikki Fried, respectively. 

Reports indicate DeSantis’ has $62.6 million cash on hand. Crist has $3.18 million while Fried has $2.51 million. Since elections are all about money (and voter suppression and partisan vote counting), this does not bode well for Democrats. If DeSantis wins, he’ll challenge an increasingly erratic Donald Trump for the GOP 2024 presidential nomination. 

So, get ready America – you’re next!

Mirror, mirror on the wall, who’s the most offensive of them all?

News with a Twist

Hint: His name rhymes with Red Ooze

Did you ever think to yourself, after hearing or reading about some outrageous comment or deed from a Republican politician, how they get up in the morning and look themselves in the mirror?

Like last week, when former Speaker of the House and current “Most Ludicrous Man in America,” Newt Gingrich, said in an interview on Fox News (where else?), alluding to members of the Congressional January 6 Select Committee, “I think when you have a Republican Congress, this is all going to come crashing down. And the wolves are going to find out that they’re now sheep and they’re the ones who are in fact, I think, face a real risk of jail for the kinds of laws they’re breaking.”

Or, also last week, when GOP Representative Lauren Boebert (whose only virtue is that she’s not quite as vile as Marjorie Taylor Greene) asked a group of orthodox Jewish visitors to Capitol Hill if they were there to conduct a “reconnaissance” mission.

And then there’s Mitch McConnell, the Republican leader who engineered a blockade of the last Supreme Court nominee from a Democratic president, Merrick B. Garland, warning, with a straight face (actually, his only face), President Biden against making an overly ideological SCOTUS choice and not to outsource this important decision to the radical left (whatever that means).

As I thought about this “mirror thing” I wondered if there might be one mirror, to be used by one specific person, that could answer my question.

And then, my extensive knowledge of motion picture history kicked in; there is one.

That mirror is very special, very magical, one originally destined to be used in the sequel to Disney’s “Snow White,” in a film to be called, “Nasty Red.” The film depicts Nasty Red, who’s not interested in “who’s the fairest of them all,” but “who’s the most offensive of them all.”

Alas, Disney could never make the story work and dropped the project.

But then, a miracle happened. An Hispanic-named, Canadian-born, junior Senator from Texas, Ted Cruz, decided he needed to look into a mirror to determine if his quest to be the most offensive man in America was on track. Cruz, whose wife, a former Goldman Sachs executive excoriated by Donald Trump, is very rich, bought the mirror for several million dollars. Cruz, whose real name is Rafael Edward Cruz, began using it every day.

And guess what? According to news reports today, the mirror, after a number of offensive, but perhaps not the MOST offensive Cruz pronouncements, finally worked. When, Cruz, the most hated man in Washington DC intoned, “President Biden’s vow to nominate and confirm the first Black woman to the U.S. Supreme Court is “offensive,” checked in with the mirror, the mirror’s reply, for the first time was, “You, my hirsute junior senator, are the most offensive of them all.”

To put all this into perspective, and as a public service to the millions of Around the Block readers, here are Ted Cruz’s ten previous most offensive comments or actions, as compiled by the Dallas Observer.*

  • Ted Cruz Blocks a Senate Resolution Honoring Ruth Bader Ginsburg
  • Ted Cruz Gets Caught By a Dog Puppet Repeating the Same BS Speech to Primary Voters
  • Ted Cruz Brags About a Painting of Himself While Arguing Before the Supreme Court.
  • Ted Cruz Reads Green Eggs and Ham to Filibuster the Affordable Care Act
  • Ted Cruz Says He “Consistently Opposed Shutdowns”
  • Ted Cruz Tries to Legally Defend a 16-Year Sentence for Someone Who Stole a Calculator
  • Ted Cruz Tries to Make Beto O’Rourke Look Bad Because He Was in a Punk Rock Band
  • Ted Cruz Makes Fun of Joe Biden the Night Before Biden’s Son’s Funeral
  • Ted Cruz Pisses Off Everyone on George W. Bush’s 2000 Presidential Campaign
  • Ted Cruz Elbows His Wife in the Face While Hugging His Dad Three Times
Sorry, this one was so precious, I couldn’t help myself

* For more on the article, here’s the link: https://www.dallasobserver.com/arts/the-worst-ted-cruz-moments-in-history-11990723

Now that Cruz’s mirror has confirmed that he’s the “most offensive of them all,” the Texas junior senator has sworn off mirrors. Why? Because, as Around the Block has learned exclusively, a Cruz aide vetting other magic mirrors, discovered there is a special mirror only to be used by elite Ivy League graduates, which Cruz is (Princeton/Harvard). This new mirror answers the question, “Mirror, mirror on the wall, who’s the most contemptuous of them all.” The Cruz aide told Around the Block, on the condition of anonymity because he wasn’t authorized to discuss the matter, that Cruz, fearing he might lose, didn’t want to get into a competition with fellow Ivy Leaguers, Missouri Senator Josh Hawley (Stanford, the “Harvard of the West”/Yale) and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis (Yale/Harvard).

“Senator Cruz is completely satisfied with being the most offensive of them all,” said the aide.

Trumpsters, when is enough, enough?

Commentary

Aren’t we better than this?

Donald Trump appeared at a rally in Conroe, Texas on Saturday. Conroe is the county seat of Montgomery County about 40 miles north of Houston. It is described by Rolling Stone reporter, Steven Monacelli, who attended the rally, as “…one of the reddest counties in one of the reddest states… and it showed.”

Monacelli wrote, “When I arrived at the press check-in station, the first thing I saw was a merchandise vendor with a Confederate flag — the banner of a nation that lasted only 4 years before being routed out of existence…set up directly across from a wooden cross.”

The rally, part of Trump’s “Save America” tour, not only drew the usual adoring crowd, but also the entire panoply of Texas GOP elite, including Governor Greg Abbott, Lt. Governor Dan Patrick, Attorney General Ken Paxton, and State Senator Dawn Buckingham who, according to Monacelli, “all spoke glowingly of Trump [touting] their endorsements from the former president.”

According to Monacelli, Trump claimed in his opening “remarks” that the the Conroe rally was the biggest rally ever, that the fake media won’t turn their cameras around to show the crowd size and, repeated a false claim he made at a recent “Save America” rally in Arizona about a 29 mile long line of cars coming to the rally. Only this time it was 30 miles long! As the the crowd began to jeer at the press. Monacelli turned around to take a photo of the overflow crowd and “someone flipped me off.”

So, I guess in places like Conroe, enough is not enough.

With Monacelli’s reporting serving as background, the real horror show came during Trump’s “prepared” remarks.

As reported by The Washington Post’s, Aaron Blake, Trump “encouraged people to engage in massive demonstrations in jurisdictions pursuing criminal investigations against him over Jan. 6 and tax-related issues. Then, minutes later, he said that if he’s reinstalled as president, he would consider pardoning some of the Jan. 6 Capitol rioters.”

You’ve got to be making this up, you’re asking yourselves.

Get real, dear readers. We’re talking about Donald Trump here, America’s tin-hat, wannabe dictator/president for life.

Trump’s actual words regarding the January 6 insurrectionists:

“If I run and I win, we will treat those people from January 6 fairly — we will treat them fairly. And if it requires pardons, then we will give them pardons because they are being treated so unfairly.

And Trump called out the prosecutors from Georgia, New York and Washington, D.C., who are independently investigating him, saying, “These prosecutors are vicious, horrible people. They’re racists and they’re very sick—they’re mentally sick. They’re going after me without any protection of my rights from the Supreme Court or most other courts. In reality, they’re not after me, they’re after you.”

Those prosecutors are Fulton County (Ga.) District Attorney Fani Willis, New York Attorney General Letitia James and Washington, D.C., Attorney General Karl Racine, are all African American women.

Trump told his cheering mob, if any of them “do anything wrong or illegal,” he hopes to see “the biggest protests we have ever had in Washington, D.C., in New York, in Atlanta and elsewhere.”

In other words, opined the Post’s Blake, “I might use my extraordinary potential power to free those who broke the law to support me, and I would like you to consider assembling en masse to again rise up against another injustice that has befallen me.”

As if one Trump-induced riot wasn’t enough.

While some wavering GOP stalwarts called out Trump’s treachery, including (shockingly) Lindsey “How the Winds Blow” Graham, Susan Collins and New Hampshire Governor, Chris Sununu, they were quickly and strongly beaten down by the Trumpster blonde heartthrob, Marjorie Taylor Greene (I thought only good witches were blond.), accusing Graham in particular, of “pretending to be a friend” of Trump while slamming the South Carolina senator for condemning rioters involved in the deadly insurrection.

Unlike the “not-so-good” folks in Conroe, along with Trump’s politician toadies like Greg Abbot, I don’t just think, I know, “enough is enough.” And, like the immortal, fictional news anchor in the 1975 film classic “Network,” Howard Beale who implored his viewers to shout from their windows, “I’m as mad as hell, and I’m not going to take this anymore!”

Beale actually prefaced one of the most famous lines in movie history with this: “I don’t have to tell you things are bad. Everybody knows things are bad,” going on to say, “So, I want you to get up now. I want all of you to get up out of your chairs. I want you to get up right now and go to the window, open it, and stick your head out, and yell, ‘I’m as mad as hell, and I’m not going to take this anymore!’”

Beale acted on the bad things he saw around him. And his listeners joined him. To you like-minded readers out there, this could be our Howard Beale moment. I know you’re as mad as hell as I am. The question is what do we do about it?

Enough is enough!