Public Comment

SMITHEREENS: Reflections on Bits & Pieces: Bombs,Bums&Biden

Gar Smith

Monday April 01, 2024 - 09:21:00 PM

A Congresswoman Pleads for Humanity:
A Congressman Calls for Nuclear Attack
Last week, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez stood before a microphone in the House Chamber and gave an impassioned presentation that has been called "one of the greatest speeches of her career." Here's a link to the video:

https://www.youtube.com/embed/vXRRwFNYgSQ

Meanwhile, another video has been going viral. The video captured US Rep. (and Christian pastor) Tim Walberg (R-Michigan), proposing that the US drop nuclear bombs on Gaza to, in Walberg's words: "Get it over quick." Listen in at this link: https://www.youtube.com/embed/RX8SfNYOeE8

Power of Israeli Bombings on Gaza Has Already Surpassed Hiroshima

https://www.youtube.com/embed/QOAjbkrcxSE

Mind-numbing Memes
Two news items I can't get out of my head:
"Israel has killed more than 13,000 children."
"A starving child doesn't have the strength to cry."

BDS the US: Disarm the US War Machine
The Boycott-Divest-Sanctions 9BDS) movement was effective in moving South Africa from a brutal apartheid state to an inclusive and functioning democracy. The global BDS strategy has more recently been applied against the political leaders of Israel. And now there's a new cry: "BDS the US."

World BEYOND War has posted an online education-and-action campaign to hold Washington accountable for its long history of foreign invasions, hegemonic militarism, and war profiteering.

The full presentation, which is available online, offers an extensive list of Washington's long-but-little-known rap-sheet of global thuggery. Here is a single sentence that you won't find in any of the history books in US schoolrooms:

"Since 1945, the US military has fought in 74 other nations, while the US government has overthrown at least 36 governments, interfered in at least 85 foreign elections, attempted to assassinate over 50 foreign leaders, dropped bombs on people in over 30 countries, and killed or helped kill some 20 million people."

You can read the entire document (and sign on as an endorser if you wish) by clicking on this link.

Eclipse Eclipsed? Not for the Blind!
The monumental tourist rush to reach the North American states in the path of the April 8 solar eclipse is expected to bring millions to gaze skyward (through protective eye-wear) and marvel as the sun grows dim and covers the ground in shadows. This, of course, all depends on the weather, which has been a bit on the stormy side.

There is one segment of the population that doesn't need to worry about a rain cloud blotting out the eclipse: blind eclipse fans.

The AP reports that new "sound and touch devises" will make it possible "to hear and feel the celestial event."

Typically during a total eclipse, sunlight dims, temperatures drop, and the world grows quiet as songbirds cease their chirping. But no longer! Thanks to an invention called the LightSound box, the blind and visually impaired can "hear' an event they cannot see. According to the AP report: "When the sun is bright, there will be high, delicate flute notes. As the moon begins to cover the sun, the mid-range notes are those of a clarinet. Darkness is rendered by a low, clicking sound."

The AP quoted a blind high-school student from Austin, Texas who is eagerly waiting to turn on a LightSound box as the eclipse begins. He told the AP: "I'm looking forward to [it]."

Fashion Plates
Peronalized license plates spotted about town.
V552GO (V55 To Go?)
GRNBEAM (Green Beam)
PEARWGN (Pear Wagon)
WHO GAS (Pronounced: "Whoa Gas"?)
CKJLNHK (Chuck Jellenik? Check Jail in Hong Kong?)

Bumper Snickers
End Militarism Now
Stop the Oiligarcy: Oil Sucks

Back Off Bumper Humper!"
I Hope Something Good Happens to You Today
Voting Is Like Driving:

To Go Forward Choose 'D' To Go Backward Choose 'R'

Charging Ahead in Sun-powered Cars

A friend just sent a photo showing one of TESLA's road-emergency trucks hooked up to a hose at a local filling station. Apparently Tesla's service trucks are gas-dependent hybrids.

The age of Solar Sedans has not yet arrived and, if Big Carbon has its way, auto-owners on this heating globe we call home will remain chained to corporate-owned "charging stations" that sell electricity produced by oil- and carbon-fueled electricity plants.

But there's a better, cleaner, cheaper alternative. How about tank-less, sun-powered vehicles with there own built-in photoelectric panels. No need to search for a charging station. Just wait for the sun to rise in the morning.

Germany's Sono Motors already offers a Solar Bus Kit—as seen here:
https://www.youtube.com/embed/R9WWkc4Ol3A?si=FV4aC_FjGI0sAKcc

Sono Motors has also started work on mass-production of the Sion, a solar powerplant on wheels. Parked in your driveway, it can even serve as a stand-alone power plant that can provide electricity for your entire home!

Check out the video at this link:
https://www.youtube.com/embed/4aM37qO2Nwc?si=JbVUlizrwWR-FCbi

A company in The Netherlands is also selling self-powered solar cars while Aptera, a US company in Carlsbad, California, has begun building a futuristic vehicle powered by "the wireless nuclear-generator in the sky.":
https://www.youtube.com/embed/IzG-x3-_4sk

Trump's Impressive List of Non-endorsers

Some political wonk has posted a Facebook page with a poster listing the members of Donald Trump's White House staff and cabinet who now want nothing to do with the Ocher Ogre. The ranks of rankled former Trump-nics includes:

VP Mike Pence; Attorney General Bill Barr; Nat. Security Advisor John Bolton; Defense Sec. Mark Esper; Defense Sec. James Mattis; Aide Cassidy Hutchinson; Chief of Staff John Kelly; Press Sec. Stephanie Grisham; Deputy Press Sec, Sarah Matthews; Joint Chiefs' Chair Mark Milley; Communications Director Anthony Scaramucci; and Director of Strategic Communications, Alyssa Farah Griffin.

That list of Trump cabinet/staff non-endorsers is impressive but it could be longer if it included folks outside Trump's inner-circle of Oval Office appointees.How about starting with Trump lawyer and hush-money fixer Michael Cohen?

Dread Kennedy

According to More Perfect Union (MPU), "Some of the wealthiest people in America have spent millions of dollars to get Robert Kennedy Jr. on the ballot." No, this big bucks lobbying org isn't interested in getting a vax-whacking radical elected president. In fact, RKJ has denounced the pro-Trumpers behind the MPU ad-romp and disavowed any connection with their promotion of his campaign. Their intentions are clear. They just hope that promoting a radical Democrat like RKJ will drain Joe Biden's pool of supporters so he runs short of a majority of state electors. In short, they just want to see the Democrats trumped.

When MPU sussed out RKJ.’s top donors, they uncovered "connections to Donald Trump’s campaign over and over again. They want [RKJ] to be the key to Trump’s margin of victory." The sordid details are laid on the table in this video with Byron Tylor Cohen. https://www.youtube.com/embed/qLtL6afShA0

The Ultra-Millionaires' Tax

Public CItizen raises a familiar complaint — and offers a solution.

The wealthiest Americans (the top 0.1% — or the richest 1 out of every 1,000) end up owing barely more than 3% of their fortunes in federal, state, and local taxes.

Meanwhile, families in the bottom 99% end up with tax bills exceeding 7% of our total wealth (which of course may not be much to begin with).

That means the vast majority of us are paying taxes at a rate that is more than double what the richest of the rich get away with. Like the CEO of a multinational corporation who pays a lower tax rate than the janitor who cleans his office night after night

A bill in Congress — the Ultra Millionaire Tax Act of 2024 — would start to bring some sanity to our nation’s disgraceful and unequal tax regime.
Sponsors of this critical new legislation include Representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Jamaal Bowman and Senators Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren.Click to add your name.

Russia Considers a "Nuclear Reminder"
In the aftermath of the deadly attack targeting thousands assembled for a concert at Russia's Crocus City Hall, Vladimir Putin went on TV to address the nation and vowed: “All perpetrators, organizers and masterminds behind this crime will get just and inevitable punishment. Whoever they are, whoever guides them.

It troubles me that Joe Biden failed to offer his heartfelt condolences to the Russian people or issue a stern condemnation of the horrific "terrorist attack"

ISIS was reported to have been involved in the attack. Troubling news, given the response by former British Ambassador Craig Murray who posted a message reading: "I have been explaining for years that the US and Israel are behind ISIS....

Let's hope the US/CIA wasn't involved. (Are we still in the dark as to who bombed the Nord Stream pipeline?) As Russian war advisor Dmitry Trenin told the Kremlin: “The adversary should not remain in a state of comfort, believing that the war he is waging with the help of another country will not affect him in any way...In other words, it is necessary to put fear back into the minds and hearts of the enemy’s leaders... It’s time for Russia to give the West a nuclear reminder.”

Picture Otters Holding Hands
I don't know if otters really hold hands but Kate Foster's Facebook musing is so comforting, I don't feel the need to submit it to fact-checking. Let's just go with it:
'It's a deep consolation to know that spiders dream, that monkeys tease predators, that dolphins have accents, that lions can be scared silly by a lone mongoose, that otters hold hands, and ants bury their dead. That there isn't their life and our life. That it's just one teetering and endless thread and all of us, all of us, are entangled with it as deep as entanglement goes."

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