Two men sitting next to each other on a plane start to talk. First guy asks “where you from?” “Cleveland; and where are you from?” “Miami” says the second guy.
“Isn’t there a lot of violence and crime in Miami?” “Oh no, Miami is a really safe and tranquil place”.
“By the way, mind telling me what you do for a living in Miami?”. Not at all, I am a rear gunner on a bakery truck”.
—————————
That story used to be a joke. Times change. I have never owned a gun. Never thought about buying a gun. I do think I could learn how to maintain a gun and use it. One never knows until the time comes if one can actually use it. On that score, I would bet a lot that if Barbara’s life or my life were threatened, yes I could pull the trigger in a heartbeat .
My best sense is that I have lived this long without a gun and, that, on balance, the status quo should remain. On the other hand, if, and I think this is a shot, Barbara said she thought we should each own a gun and learn how to use it, I would agree.
The idea that I am even thinking about this kind of thing is really shocking.
———————————
We could never get the 2nd Amendment abolished but how about amending it to limit each person to one musket?
——————————
The 4th Circuit reversed the lower court and said Cawthorn could be barred from public office. Query: could that help remove others? This could be a big deal.
———————-
l believe that about 3 a.m. Florence time I had some kind of epiphany. I was wide awake concerned about our country being torn apart. We are now the Disunited States of America. We are about to become like Hungary.
Our freedoms will quickly disappear. We will be a White Christian Country, an autocracy run by a few for a few.
Yesterday I said I thought our Country was broken. and many others agree.
My new thought was how do we mend the break. We have a President who campaigned on unifying our Nation. Biden was the perfect choice. He had the experience, the desire, the respect of the world and the ability to unify. Hell, he unified NATO. He has done all kinds of great things and tried to do many more. He failed because his own Party failed him and because the a Republican Party disintegrated into a bunch of lying cheating hoodlums. Not only would no one help Biden, many took affirmative steps to hinder him. For months, Biden could not even get his Ambassadorial choices confirmed.
So it just dawned on me, and you are the first to know my conclusions, I confirm we are broken. I now conclude the break cannot be repaired by Biden, who is the right person for the job, nor by anyone else.
Why cannot the problem be fixed? Why cannot we unify? The answer is so simple. It is right before our eyes staring is in the face and we missed it.
WE DO NOT WANT TO BE UNIFIED !!!!!!
Greed has won over humanity. Power and money are our new Gods and nothing else matters. Our children are like props. We take them out to parade them around, but fail every time to step up to the plate when it is time to really get things done.
We can, if not stop, at least greatly reduce mass gun massacres, but the money made by not doing so will be reduced.
We can have fair elections but then the autocrats lose.
Think about this really simply. Two sides disagree. They cannot make a deal. What happens? They sit down at a table and don’t get up until a deal is made. There may be many meetings and it may be hard. The only requirement is that both sides want a deal. We do not want a deal in our country.
There was no reason in the world to tinker with Roe v Wade. Don”t like abortion don’t have one.
If everyone just went about minding their own damn business, everyone would be happier. Why should anyone else care, why is it their business who I want to marry, or my religion or my skin color. Live and let live and we will all be happier but we will not all be richer or more powerful and therein lies the run.
Simple but it will not happen because the conservative Christian Right does not want it to happen and the Democrats can't get their collective heads out of their asses to unify even when they could fix things. The filibuster just cannot be more important than our freedoms.
———————————