Tuesday, June 9, 2020

Which Side Are You On?


PROTEST HAS COME TO NOE VALLEY!
I certainly would have gone to this 
if I hadn't been on my silent retreat.

1.  ABOUT MOVING BAUMBLOG FROM GMAIL TO BLOGGER
2.  GOOD NEWS ABOUT RACIAL ISSUES
3.  GOOD NEWS ABOUT TRUMP'S FUTURE AS OUR DICTATOR
4.  EXCELLENT LINKS


1.  MOVING BAUMBLOG FROM GMAIL TO BLOGGER

Dear Bloggelinis:  Welcome to my official blog.  I've been writing here since 2013. If you have any complaints about this change, please tell me.    I moved my current blog from my gmail account for two reasons:

1.  I'm hoping to get new subscribers by being out in the blog world.  In fact, even with very few actual subscribers on this site, I'm listed 75th in the top 100 LGBT blogs in the universe!!  Lesley, my wonderful business manager made that happen.  She doesn't know what she did to accomplish this amazing feat, but she did a lot of things and one of them put BaumBlog on a list that we never knew existed.

2.  I think visually it will be much more pleasing, because the format of emails takes up a lot of everyone's computer screen, and that makes the size of the photos limited. Since photos are a very important part of what I'm doing, that's frustrating.  

You can make a comment on this blog at the bottom of the blog, and all who read the blog will see it and can respond.  Or if you want to reply to me personally, which I have greatly enjoyed, you can email me.



2.  GOOD NEWS ABOUT RACIAL ISSUES

I went away from the world for three of the most tumultuous days we've ever experienced.   Of course, there's a lot of bad news, like the fact that the U.S. is totally fucked and has been since we enshrined slavery in the Constitution.

But the GOOD NEWS is that some people who I never thought would get it ARE GETTING IT:

Robert E. Lee Statue in Richmond, VA

  • All  over the South, mayors and governors are ringing the death knell for statues honoring Confederate "heroes" who defended that "peculiar institution," as it was so quaintly known -- human slavery.  Of course the White Supremacists are fighting back to preserve "history," otherwise known as the good old days when whites never ever ever worried about killing black people.  A judge, whose great-grandfather erected the Richmond equestrian statue of Lee, has delayed the removal on a technicality.  Actually, the horse, the renowned Traveller, never did anything wrong.  How about sawing off Lee and leaving Traveller there?  Now THAT would be an excellent historical reminder!

  • The NFL  -- that's right the National FOOTBALL League -- has come around!  Commissioner Roger Goodell has "admitted we were wrong for not listening to NFL players earlier and encourage all to speak out and peacefully protest.  We, the National Football League believe black lives matter."  Who knew?  And it only took George Floyd's murder and over a week of protests and police rioting throughout the entire nation for Goodell to figure this out.  That's what I call a fast learner.  I'd love to see him take a knee with Kaepernick.
  •  
  • Most important, the protests continue and growOne protester was quoted as saying, "This feels different.  This feels like... like HOME."  I only wish I could join them, but I'm afraid of catching the virus, and I'm very worried about THEM getting sick.  But the truth is THESE YOUNG PEOPLE HAVE NOTHING TO LOSE -- ALL OF THEM, OF EVERY RACE.  It's parallel to the position of young people in Hong Kong.  They KNOW they're risking their lives.  They've chosen to keep on keeping on.
At this point, I must suggest this MSNBC interview with Cornel West.  I don't agree with West on all issues, but here he is channeling the spirit of Martin Luther King Jr.  It's a sermon rather than a talk.    West moved me in his description of the fork in the road that we are facing.



3.  GOOD NEWS ABOUT TRUMP'S FUTURE AS A DICTATOR

Quite frankly, from the time he became a candidate, I never thought that Trump would willingly leave the White House.  After all, what future would he face?  He'd be charged up and down the wazoo with crimes.  He might never go to prison, but he'd never get out of court.  That is, unless he escaped to find sanctuary in some congenial full-blown dictatorship -- say... oh... Russia for instance.  I was wondering when would be the appropriate time to acknowledge my fears to my Bloggelinis.  

My greatest concern was where the military would land if Trump attempted a coup.  Because if they backed him, we would be well and truly screwed.  We would face two choices:

1.  Living in a dictatorship 
or 
2.  All-out civil war, with the government having both the army and the great majority of armed civilians on its side. 

Definitely not what I'm wishing for my old age and retirement, should either of those ever arrive.  

 Upper Headline:  Mattis Delivers Blistering Criticism of Trump as a Divider
Lower Headline:  In Break With President, Esper Calls Use of Military "A Matter of Last Resort"


And now  Jim Mattis, Trump's former Secretary of Defense, is speaking out against using the army against civilian protesters!  It turns out that former Marine (!) General Mattis is the most respected military man alive -- worshiped by the Marines and deeply honored by everyone else in the Army!  And he believes in the right of citizens to protest, even if the fringe contains some anarchists and looters!  I tell ya, you can't make this stuff up.

Could it be that there is enough goodness in the souls of enough individual Americans that, when it's all combined, it will be enough save this nation?  

And then there's current Secretary of Defense Mark Esper, who accompanied Trump on his ill-fated and idiotic Bible-flaunting photo-op.  Esper is now walking himself back from his own disastrous handling of the D.C. protesters and calling the use of the military "a matter of last resort."  

So maybe we won't have civil war after all.  Maybe the push is finally coming to shove and the American people are saying 

NO to Trump and 
YES to looking racism and injustice in the face.


4.  EXCELLENT LINKS

I have found that the late-night comics/commentators are quite visionary and instructive.  Each person says at least one thing that helps me understand the situation more deeply.  Their talks empower me.  And of course, they're entertaining.



Now, John Oliver is a bit of a mixed bag.  But he's absolutely brilliant and a deep, radical thinker.  His show is only once a week.  That gives him time to create a brief documentary on that week's subject. He does sometimes have a very juvenile sense of humor, which I CAN'T STAND.  But he's also hilarious and very serious.  This week's subject is, very simply:  POLICE.

WELL, BLOGGELINIS, I THINK THIS NEW FORMAT WILL EVENTUALLY WORK OUT.  IT'S BEEN A BIT ROUGH THIS FIRST TIME.  BUT I'VE FIGURED OUT HOW I CAN RETURN TO THE BEAUTIFUL AQUA PAPYRUS FONT NEXT TIME, WHICH I FIND SO PLEASING AND I KNOW YOU ENJOY TOO.

STRENGTH & KINDNESS TO YOU ALL.         Terry

Thanks to Rosalia Stamatakos for the links.

3 comments:

  1. I love you, Terry! Cecelia. PS. My email is ccwamba@yahoo.com, not the one you have down there!!!

    ReplyDelete
  2. The format looks great from this end. The DIY nature of removing Lee from horse is perfect - it’s so basic and shows response in your part.
    As a bloggelini - why do you say the youth activists “have nothing to lose.” It seems just the opposite to me - I think they are bravely designing new prioritues —

    ReplyDelete
  3. What about Jimmy Fallon? I think he’s funny and has great politics. I don’t like Oliver or Colbert because they are not very funny and Every joke is about trump when I am trying to forget him. Like the new blog congratulations

    ReplyDelete