If We Were Honest With Ourselves, We’d Admit That Alcohol And Pandemics Simply Do Not Mix

~ A L Katz ~ Leave a comment

Pandemics don’t sit well with social creatures. Covid19 would be a lot easier to beat if humans were more like snow leopards — exceptional at self-isolating from other snow leopards. But, humans mostly crave each others’ company. We like socializing. We especially like drinking while socializing. Sometimes, in fact, we like the drinking more than we even like the socializing. If we socialized without drinking, we’d feel like we didn’t really quite “socialize” properly. Don’t get me wrong — there’s nothing wrong with either self-medicating or self-medicating together. But the last thing we need is a “medicine” (alcohol) that makes us more susceptible to a pathogen by encouraging stupid behavior.

I stopped drinking alcohol four years ago. I didn’t mean to. The mood stabilizer I started taking to treat a suicidal depression gives all alcohol a terrible, grapefruit skin-like aftertaste. Even a big, inky red loaded with fruit and depth suddenly became grapefruit skin on the finish. Given the choice between not being suicidally depressed and not drinking alcohol because of the aftertaste, I turned my back on a collection of lovely reds, single malt scotches and all sorts of interesting alcohols. I walked away from bracing, ice cold gin martinis and sumptuously malty IPAs. I didn’t just drink alcohol, I savored it. I collected it. I celebrated it.

These days, I self medicate almost exclusively with cannabis. I could not be happier. Literally.

Being a non-drinker opened my eyes to both my own excessive drinking and — sorry, guys — everyone else’s too. Don’t take this personally. It’s just a stone cold fact: you all drink too much. You think about alcohol too much. You don’t appreciate how much it impacts you because you haven’t the (non-drinker’s) perspective. It’s fascinating to go to a bar or party (back when we used to do things like that) and, over the course of a few hours, watch everyone you’re with become less coherent. Or worse. I can’t tell you how many times, over the last four years, I’ve watched friends and loved ones become painfully silly the more they drank and thought “There but for the grace of alcohol go I”.

We know this to be true: the more alcohol you drink, the more your motor skills diminish. The more your thoughts blur together. The more your emotions — anger especially — spark to life. Alcohol obliterates our capacity to edit ourselves. In vinas veritas? Bullshit. In vinas stuff you shouldn’t say. Not because it’s “true” but because however you’re going to say it, you’re going to say it inelegantly. You’re not going to articulate the nuances of your feelings, you’re going to take a huge emotional dump all over the person you’re focused on.

How much trouble has alcohol caused at sporting events around the world? How much rioting? How many championship celebrations have morphed into street violence? Take alcohol out of those equations and — I betcha — those equations all end differently.

Imagine for a second that instead of serving alcohol at sporting events they served cannabis. Think there’d be any violence at the end of a soccer match? Hell, no! Cannabis doesn’t work in our brains the same way alcohol does. Not even remotely. Ever see gangs of people hopped up on cannabis rioting? No? There’s a reason for that. Cannabis does not compel you to do anything like that.

Cannabis (especially sativas) focus the mind while drenching you in feelings of mild euphoria. One can appreciate nuances of the game one would miss on alcohol. And there’s no anger. Oh, yeah, sure — if your team’s playing badly, it’s not nearly as much fun as when your team’s winning. But a stadium filled with fans high on pot would never turn violent. They might hug each other a little too tightly. They might praise each other a little too effusively. They might be asleep.

I had the pleasure of going (only once unfortunately) to LA’s first cannabis cafe. It was awesome. At the time I went they didn’t serve alcohol; I’m not sure if that ever changed; I hope it didn’t. A couple of quick takeaways: the most striking thing to me was how the place sounded. For starters, the profit-driving product for sale wasn’t alcohol — served in glasses — it was cannabis — served in joints or as ground flower or concentrate. One heard lighters flicking a lot. But very little clinking of glass. Cocktails weren’t be mixed. Beer bottles weren’t being opened. Toasts weren’t being made.

And what happens after the drinking begins — that wasn’t happening either as my friend Johnny and I sat there, enjoying first the giant sativa joint we bought to share and then a very good lunch: people getting louder. People getting high on cannabis may laugh a lot more — and there was abundant laughter in the room (joyful, delighted, high-as-a-kite laughter), but no one got boisterous the way alcohol makes people boisterous. Cannabis, by contrast, draws people inward.

They get a little quieter actually, more thoughtful. Johnny and I — the THC from the sativa (I don’t recall what strains were blended into it) drenching our brains — had a very good, very intense conversation about what we were experiencing. We couldn’t help noticing how many of the tables around us were doing the same thing — in the same normal tone of voice. That’s the thing, ya see: unless you’re (deliberately) wasted? Most people on cannabis don’t change much from when they’re NOT on cannabis.

So — the Cannabis Cafe was quieter because less glass clinking, more conversation using indoor voices exclusively, more focus and euphoria. Cannabis, by the way, makes food taste awesome. And the menu was created with a clear understanding of the ways pot makes you hungry and what it makes you hungry for. The Korean tacos would have been good anyway. On pot, they were transcendently good.

One other relevant observation. The cafe has a parking lot right next to it — with valet service. Johnny and I both parked on the street and walked a half block or so to the cafe. When our ninety minutes were done (that’s all the time you get — there’s a line of people waiting for your table after all), Johnny and I paid our bill and headed for the door. Like everyone else, we’d just spent 90 minutes eating and getting high.

Just outside the cafe’s front door, Johnny and I watched the other diners get their keys from the valet, climb into their cars and drive off. Johnny and I then said our good-byes (and how much we enjoyed ourselves) and headed off to our cars — which we both got into and drove off. Having — all of us — just smoked dope. Know how many traffic accidents happened just outside the cafe (as “high” drivers, oblivious because they’d smoked weed turned into oncoming traffic)? Zero.

There’s a reason. Alcohol and THC do not act on our brains the same way. Though we treat them like they do, they simply do not. While alcohol impairs your motor skills almost from the get-go, THC doesn’t. There’s data from the National Highway Transportation that makes the point. It states in fact:

“…Most marijuana-intoxicated drivers show only modest impairments on actual road tests.37, 38 Experienced smokers who drive on a set course show almost no functional impairment under the influence of marijuana, except when it is combined with alcohol.”

It does not matter how experienced a drinker you are. You will always be impaired by a certain amount of alcohol. It’s just math — and blood-alcohol chemistry. The same simply is not true of marijuana.

Hell, I take a hit or two of Durban Poison (a wonderful classic sativa) before playing tennis because it improves my timing. The THC slows my thought process down (I’m hypomanic) just enough so I can focus on the ball. I see it far better WITH the THC in me than without. I know where I have to be to put the ball where I want it to go. Another benefit I’ve noticed? My timing is better because I become more “coachable”.

I listen to myself. I make the necessary adjustments in order to play better. And then I do.

Alcohol, by contrast, causes terrible decision-making. People say things they shouldn’t. They have sex they shouldn’t have with people they shouldn’t have sex with. They get into their cars and turn on the ignition.

Or they go out drinking with friends during a pandemic.

If there was more of me and less of you, I’d try to stage an intervention on your behalf. Alas, there’s not so I can’t. I totally get our obsession with drinking. It used to be my obsession. But, these days, if I get hurt or die in a drunk driving accident, I know going in I won’t be the cause. Neither will my medication. I can’t control drunk drivers.

Neither can I control assholes who won’t wear a mask. I wouldn’t even try.

They’re probably drunk.

Please Pity The Conservative Male — If He Had Confidence In Himself, He Wouldn’t Be So Conservative — Or Gullible

~ A L Katz ~ Leave a comment

Ignore whatever political party a Donald Trump “belongs to”. He was a Democrat when he did business in Manhattan because that was more useful than being a Republican. Pure cynicism. The same goes for Trump running as a Republican. But then, it was completely cynical of the Republican Party to hitch THEIR wagon and their future to someone they KNEW going in was corrupt and a traitor. Donald Trump epitomizes Republicanism in all its cynical glory. But “Republican” is just a label. Under that icing, they’re all conservatives — and their flaws are conservative flaws.

Bullies like Donald Trump, Mitch McConnell, Stephen Miller, Lindsey Graham and pretty much anyone who sticks that “R” next to their names are, above all, weak-assed MEN (or women who love them or who aspire to be like them). Something in their Y chromosome has irreparably weakened their manhood and personhood. They really do think they alone can “fix it”. That’s delusion. The only thing they can fix is an election. We have receipts to prove it.

A person — male or female — who has faith in themselves and their ideas doesn’t need to shove them down other peoples’ throats against their will. Good ideas persevere over time. A leader who has faith in himself has faith not only in himself but in the nation he’s leading. He sees himself as the epitome of its values. Of all its potential. He’s not essential to our success but he sure could help us get there a whole lot quicker. And that’s when he becomes “essential”. But to become “essential”, first, he’d have to have the confidence and the patience that confidence allows.

Ask any conservative this simple question: “What do you want to conserve?” As a proud Progressive, I can tell you quite specifically what I want for us as a nation — what I want us to progress toward. Conservatives are just as name-specific in their mission. Conservatives want to conserve. Fair enough.

We’re entitled to know WHAT they want to conserve. It can’t be the future. It can only be the present — and therefore however much of the past remains conserved in the present. Conservatism — by its nature and by its name — aspires to keep us where we are culturally and politically. To most conservatives, where we are is already a thousand miles beyond where they want us to be. Defenses have been breached, walls toppled, sacred cows chopped to bits. That’s made most conservatives desperate.

Donald Trump’s refusal to accept defeat is a criminal trying to keep out of prison. As for the rest of the Republicans? Why are THEY going along with it? Part of it is that same need to not die in federal prison. But part of it is the Grand Plan Mitch McConnell and the rest of the Republican muckety-mucks bought into — a state of permanent minority rule shoved down the majority’s throat via a hijacked judiciary, a permanently crippled Senate and an executive branch Republicans can always game out of a Democrat’s hands.

Think of all the Republican males who honestly believe Donald Trump is a patriot. Who honestly believe the majority of Americans must have voted for him (and any other result is fraudulent). Who refuse to do the job they took an oath to do — because of their allegiance to the only POTUS ever to run for re-election in the very election he was IMPEACHED for cheating in.

There are plenty of moderate voices out there — socially progressive but fiscally conservative. They, too, want the best for America and every American. They worry — legitimately — about how we pay for it. That’s a fair argument that we will need to have going forward. At least we’re all pulling toward the same goal if only via different paths through the maze. These former Republicans aren’t trying to drag America back to those “glorious 50’s” — the 1850’s. They want us to move forwards responsibly and with more deliberation. That’s where the dynamic tension between us will come from.

Again — that’s a reasonable argument that reasonable people can have.

The strange thing about men who lack confidence in themselves? They can’t be reasonable. They’re in crisis mode 24/7 because they can’t trust what they think. They need constant verification — from their children, from their wives and lovers, from their bosses — from the men who seem to possess the very confidence they lack.

But, remember — a man lacking confidence is a poor judge of everything — including other men (especially other men he thinks are confident). Odds are those other men also are struggling with confidence issues. A confident man doesn’t peacock about on his horse — doing it purely for show. Like a peacock.

And confident men don’t look like THIS either.

Imagine a man who puts his confidence in another man who looks like Donald Trump does. Who speaks like Trump and thinks like Trump and acts like Trump. Imagine the lack of perspective it takes to equate anything Trump says or does with “manliness”.

Barack Obama is more manly when just standing around, waiting than Donald Trump is doing literally ANYTHING. That’s because being “manly” means being “human” first.

If you have confidence in your humanity, that becomes the foundation on which you build not only your values but your day-to-day life. You don’t need your voice to dominate the mix but you have faith that your voice will, in time, be heard — especially after you do the hard work of using your voice. To get trust, you have to give trust. And then you have to demonstrate your worthiness to maintain that trust.

That can be hard for men with secrets. Those secrets (all betrayals of one kind or another — THAT’S WHY THEY’RE SECRETS!) sap a man’s confidence. The secret and its destructiveness are bigger than they are. It gets harder still for the conservative male because his biggest secret of all is that he only gets his way politically via bamboozlement.

Again — pity the poor conservative man who has to sell people ideas they don’t want and so has resorted to lying to them about his ideas or, worse, has resorted to lying about everything in a desperate attempt to get what he wants. Pity him for what’s coming. It’s going to make a mess of what was left of his confidence.

A Presidency Is Like A Four-Year Story Cycle — And America Is Done, Done, DONE With The Donald Trump Story

~ A L Katz ~ Leave a comment

We didn’t need to preview “The Donald Trump Presidency” to know it was going to be a double-barreled dumpster fire that could only end horribly. Everything about the prequel to Trump’s presidency — his life — suggested he was a terrible businessman, a terrible husband, a terrible father, a terrible American and an even worse human being. His candidacy did not change one iota of our assessment. If anything, Trump’s presidency has proven that we underestimated his awfulness. By a factor of a million.

The Donald Trump story is about greed and malfeasance and corruption and treason. It’s about piggery and power lust. It’s about bullying and bullshit replacing common decency and stone cold truth. It’s about one of our two political parties finding enough common ground with a man they KNEW was treasonous to make him their presidential nominee anyway. It’s about bad guys running amok because the good guys let them for so long. Or, maybe that’s because the news media equated bad guys with good guys since “both sides do it”.

Nothing about it makes sense. It’s like a rabbit hole designed by a dunderhead. It was never going to make sense anyway but now, it’s completely incomprehensible.

What the hell is THIS?

Even the news media — incapable of judging Trump despite the wall of immorality he presented every day of his presidency — has given up on any pretense that this isn’t “bonkers” — a word CNN used to describe Trump. America — by a margin of SIX MILLION VOTES & COUNTING — voted to go another way (the way we actually voted to go four years ago!) We all agreed: it’s time to turn the channel on this show because it sucks.

Most Americans enjoyed the Barack Obama story. We survived the George W. Bush story but only just. The Donald Trump story started off bonkers and then got steadily crazier.

It’s taken “bonkers” to places even “bonkers” had never been to.

That’s one more feature the Republican Party to add to its “brand” (in addition to “CORRUPT”, “RACIST”, “MISOGYNIST”, “BIGOTED” and “TREASONOUS”) — “BONKERS”. Thanks anyway, GOP — We The People have had our fill of bonkers. We’re moving onto healthier fare.

The Republican Playbook Is Now The Trump Playbook: That’s Why They’re Accusing Democrats Of The Very Crime THEY Are Guilty Of…

~ A L Katz ~ Leave a comment

Want to know the stone cold proof that Republicans are using (and probably have been using) voting machines to steal elections? They’re now accusing Democrats of doing it — without a lick of proof. Because there isn’t any. But — here’s the point — when the Democrats (a functional Department of Justice functioning again) begin to investigate what exactly happened in 2016 and in this election and they focus their attention on Republican voting machine fraud? The Republicans will claim it’s pure retaliation.

See how that will work? When the criminals finally get accused of their crime? They’ll claim the accusation is entirely political when, in fact, it’s not political at all.

If our news media hadn’t instilled the bullshit idea that “both sides do it” (they absolutely do not), such a hacky move would fail right off the bat. But, that’s the “genius” of the Trump playbook. It relies on the news media’s inability to focus, their love of jingly-jangly keys and squirrels, their refusal to approach the subject with an ounce of perspective. Remember in 2016, during one of the debates when — after Hillary Clinton accused Trump of being a “Russian puppet”? Remember how Trump responded?

“YOU’RE the puppet”. Uh huh. Who looks like a “puppet” in THIS now infamous photo?

Ya think we’ll ever see the “notes” from the FIVE SECRETIVE MEETINGS Trump had with Vladimir Putin? Maybe we will on the day Putin decides to burn Trump — and dumps EVERYTHING onto our heads — every bit of Republican collusion with Russia’s cyber war on us. Imagine the chaos THAT would cause internally.

Remember the last time a transition played like this one’s playing? Of course not. It’s never happened before. Hell, Barack Obama KNEW he was turning the government over to a criminal (and a traitor) but the transfer of power was bigger than him. See, both sides DON’T think like Republicans think. Only Republicans think like Republicans. They aren’t playing a game, interfering with the transfer of power, they’re playing FOR KEEPS. Because they have no choice.

Trump’s playbook is a criminal’s playbook. All its plays are meant to circumvent the law (or break it entirely) so as to get richer, richer and richer. The Republicans had no objection to that playbook — so long as they got their cut and Power went to them. The point of the exercise for them is permanent minority rule. If the majority of Americans get to have a say? It’s just like Trump said — Republicans won’t win another election.

As I wrote here, it wouldn’t take a grand conspiracy of Republicans to use voting machines to literally steal elections. While the Republicans are accusing Democrats of FLIPPING votes, that’s not the smart way to win via internet-connected voting machine. The Republicans’ problem is they have zero receipts. There would be receipts if votes had flipped. Well — correction — if those machines spit out paper receipts that a voter could check — the voter could catch the mistake. As happened in Mississippi.

If machines beyond that one polling place started acting the same way — flipping votes from Republican to Democrat or Democrat to Republican — red flags would have gone up. They didn’t. That’s not how the Republicans cheated.

Now, remember: the companies that make most of our voting machines — Diebold, ESS, Dominion — they’re all owned by Republicans. Proud Republicans who donate to political campaigns (a clear conflict of interest). But it gets “conflictier”. There are Republican politicians ADVISING these companies and even sitting on their boards of directors. Sorry, but assurances from people that conflicted — with a history of ignoring conflicts of interests — do not get a pass.

Instead of flipping votes, the Republican play has been to pad their numbers. We don’t know how long Republicans have been doing this but even a cursory glance at, say, Mitch McConnell’s county-to-county vote totals makes you think something is beyond rotten in the State Of Kentucky. Though there are more registered Democrats than Republicans in Kentucky, though county-after-county has Moscow Mitch winning not only all the Republican votes but big chunks of the Independent and Democratic votes too. Mitch’s approval rating in KY is around 18%. That does not fit with Independents and especially Democrats crossing over in huge numbers to vote for Mitch. And yet…

Mitch won 15% of Black voters, far higher than your typical Republican. He won people who make more than $100,000, and people who make less than that. He won 56% of men and 59% of women.

Racist, old misogynist Mitch McConnell got nearly 60% of Kentucky’s women? Bullshit. Stick a microphone in the face of a few and maybe we’ll begin to believe it. Those women don’t exist in reality though. They were created inside a voting machine.

Here’s now it works: the code says something like “for every tenth Republican vote, add one”. So, ten votes becomes eleven, twenty becomes twenty-two, thirty becomes thirty-three et cetera. The machine is adding TEN PERCENT to the Republican’s vote total with almost NO WAY TO VERIFY whether or not actual voters made all those votes.

Their historical and relentless lack of transparency is troubling. Their need to win elections at all costs is even more troubling. Their current behavior — trying openly to toss the will of the people aside in favor of their blatant theft — cements the certainty that this is exactly what the Republican Party is doing.

In the Donald Trump cheating playbook, one never brings receipts. Why would one? Any receipts (if they’re legit) can only screw you. That’s probably why Republicans NEVER bring receipts. It’d be like negotiating against yourself. And losing badly.

The Republican Party has now set itself squarely in opposition to democracy and especially OUR democracy. Can we please, please, please accept what they’re telling us? Their playbook doesn’t include allowing Democrats political power ever again. It’s understandable. The moment the Democrats are back in power (as we’re about to be), the Republican Party is going to have endless legal problems.

Good. It couldn’t happen to a “nicer” bunch of raping & pillaging pirates. Republic

Dear Republicans: We The People Are Angrier At You Than You Realize

~ A L Katz ~ Leave a comment

The Republicans are now all-in on their power grab. The soft coup d’etat they started in 2016 has reached it’s moment of truth. There’s no going back anymore. Either the Republican Party will finish what they started — and bust a cap in American democracy’s noggin — or they’ll balk. Because, really, creating a state of permanent minority rule and then RUNNING IT SUCCESSFULLY requires more governing skill than any Republican is capable of. Republicans hate government because the suck at governing.

What scares the Trumpanistas more than almost anything is what will happen when Team Biden restores a functioning Department of Justice whose mission is actually justice (and not being the corrupt president’s consigliere). Think of all the oversight that never got done because of corruption. Think of all the investigations into Trump and all his cronies that AG Bill Barr either derailed or killed. Think of the counter intelligence investigation into Trump and his relationship with Russia that neither Team Mueller nor the FBI ever began because Rod Rosenstein — a real snake in the grass — made go away.

Take Russia out of the 2016 equation and Trump never gets past the primaries (never mind “winning” the presidency). Without Russia, Trump does not win. What more does one need to know? Russia won the 2016 election. And that cannot stand. Neither can the political party that aligned themselves with a hostile foreign power carrying out an open act of cyber war.

That’s something else the Republicans don’t realize they’ve done. The anger at them isn’t simple. It isn’t about one thing. It’s about a whole bunch of things — that ultimately come down to one thing (greed). But, as we stand here in the midst of the most important election this country will ever have, what will strike us is how many terrible, criminal, corrupt things the Republicans have done — and how much they deserve to be punished for every last bit of it.

Were it just the treason alone, of course, that would be bad enough. Perversely, the catalogue of Trumpian criminality is so vast that we’ve already forgotten that Donald Trump is the first president EVER to run for re-election having been IMPEACHED for cheating in the very election he’s now running in. We ain’t in Kansas here, Toto. Even Kansas isn’t in Kansas anymore.

Republican greed and selfishness have now resulted in actual American death. Their response to the pandemic can never be forgiven. They’ve effectively gutted the rule of law. That can’t be forgiven either. We will get it back in working order though — and when we do, Republicans will be shocked by how many of them suddenly have giant legal problems. Pretty much all of them will actually. See something, say something. See something, say nothing? We have to ask “Why?”

Why did so many Republican say nothing when they KNEW it was morally, ethically and legally wrong?

We’re angry now because we see the Republican Party and Donald Trump cheating out in the open. We see how we outnumber them. We see how we are the majority and they are not. That they are still trying to impose their will over us — well, frankly, that’s really pissing us off. Having been on the receiving end of sexual assault when I was 14, I know what this feeling on the back of my neck is. Donald Trump and the Republicans may not be physically assaulting us but the impact on our minds is no different.

We feel under assault because we are under assault. And, having told you to stop repeatedly, Republican Party, now that we’ve gotten to our feet, we intend to make you stop. You will not like how this ends.

I’m not saying the feeding frenzy around the Republicans as the accusations start to land won’t be fun to watch. It absolutely will be. The catharsis will be exquisite. That’s what will drive us, drive our fury: our need to catharsis our way past this moment of epic awfulness.

There’s an “uh oh” moment coming to the GOP as more and more Republicans realize that not only are they losing the election, but also they’re entering a winter wilderness of shame, investigation, indictment and financial hardship. You can already hear them begging for a deal if only to lighten their brutal sentencing.

And the sentencing for what the Republicans have done will be brutal — at least it will seem that way to them. As we all know, most Republicans are nothing but soft, white underbelly. They’re bullies at heart, good at kicking their victims when they’re down — but only if someone is holding them down. They’re charmless sociopaths out on a joyride.

In their calculus, the Republicans must think we’ll feel obligated to keep what they did because… that’s how criminals think. They don’t want to give back what they stole but then — IT’S NOT UP TO THEM. We The People are the victims of a crime perpetrated upon us by the Republican Party. In 2016, We The People voted one way — for Hillary Clinton and whatever she wanted to make of her presidency — but, instead, were given Donald Trump because the Republican Party had conspired with Russia to alter the results in three key states: Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Michigan.

We will arrive here: Donald Trump is not now nor has he ever been the legitimate president. He had no right or business taking any oath of office (that he would break even as he spoke it). He’s the only fake in our fake news cavalcade. Having never been the legitimate potus with the legitimate authority vested in him, at no point did he ever have the authority to sign legislation into law, make presidential pronouncements, put together a cabinet or even nominate judges. IOW Donald Trump never had the authority to nominate a single one of the unqualified hacks he nominated up to and including Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barnett.

There really are a thousand very good reasons for Americans to be angry at Donald Trump. What he’s done to this country is, well, criminal.

An Ode To Waking And Baking

~ A L Katz ~ Leave a comment

Two facts: I have never been busier in my entire life AND I have never been more “stoned” in my entire life. Those facts don’t contradict each other. Actually, they complement each other. Pot and productivity go hand in hand. It’s hard to describe to people who are fearful of pot that it’s not just one thing — a get you impossibly high product. It’s a variety of things. Because it does a variety of things to your brain chemistry. Most cannabis strains have been hybridized one way or another; sativas are more focus forward (like a red wine can be fruit forward) while indicas are more euphoria forward. I wouldn’t use a sativa at bedtime just like I wouldn’t smoke an indica and expect to get any work done.

That I’m busier is pure luck. Some to do with me, some not. Being busier, time management becomes essential. The last thing I need is to feel lethargic, unmotivated or “stoned”. That’s why, even before I’ve had my first sip of coffee, I’m tapping some Willy Wonka into my favorite glass piece (that looks like a banana slug). Sometimes, I’ll wake and bake with GMO or Alaskan Thunderf*ck. I’m also a fan of Canndescent’s “Charge”. In the wine world, they’d call “Charge” a “meritage” — a proprietary blend (of grapes). That’s Canndescent’s approach. They’ve created a series of proprietary strains, each approaching cannabis from an effects point of view: what do you want the cannabis to do for you? If you want it to get your mind percolating, choose “Charge”. Indeed — a couple of good hits of “Charge” and my mind’s percolating.

The cannabis users understand what I’m talking about. That’s one of the challenges of talking about and writing about cannabis. It’s effects are principally cerebral. You may feel like your limbs suddenly weigh a ton as the couch lock sets in, but every bit of that is emanating from your head. A drunk person literally loses their motor skills. A person high on cannabis does not.

As I’ve written here, I “came to cannabis” late in life. It didn’t do much for me when I was a kid except put me to sleep which held zero attraction. Much later in life, when sleep was an issue and over-the-counter sleep meds were doing more harm than good, the idea of pot putting me to sleep suddenly became appealing. Good thing I live in California. From that first night when Skywalker eased me into the most restful sleep I’d had in a decade, sleep has not been an issue. I had no idea that cannabis could do just as much for my waking hours.

We live in the shadow of the mythology invented by Harry Anslinger, America’s first Commissioner of The Federal Bureau of Narcotics (1930) in order to satisfy his racism. As I wrote about in my series “Blunt Truths” (written for now defunct Weedmaps News), every single bit of marijuana prohibition was racist, based on racism and bent on punishing people because of racism. At no point in the “illegalizing” process did anyone doing the illegalizing EVER ask “But, is it bad for people?” Any possible health risks were not the problem (the people in the hearings were all smoking tobacco — during the hearings!) The people using marijuana were “the problem”.

As cannabis legalization spreads across the nation, more and more people are using cannabis and incorporating it into their day without civilization coming to an end. Cannabis doesn’t make people violent the way alcohol can. Imagine if they stopped selling beer at sporting events and started selling reefer instead. There’d never be another fight at the end of a soccer match as the two opposing fan bases — liquored to the gills — pour into the streets together, still feeling the game. If all those sports fans had been using cannabis instead of alcohol, it would never occur to the to fight.

They might hug. They might tell each other how well they played. They might even have a vicious case of the munchies. But they won’t have it in them to get violent with each other. It’s just now how cannabis works inside our brains. The fact is, our brains like cannabis. We have receptors that, it turns out, are tailor-made to bind themselves to THC.

As my day goes on, I like to layer one sativa atop another. Each sativa strain — between the THC in it and its terpene structure — presents a little differently. There are nuances. Willy Wonka produces a clean focus with good mental energy. Add twenty percent to that focus and you have Strawberry Diesel. One can really bore in on an idea. There’s a little “edge” to it. Hints of more free-associative thinking.

Same goes for Ghost Train Haze and White Buffalo. Green Crack, too. They present evenly.

Then there’s a strain like The Fork. Whoa! The hybrid Trainwreck can create a feeling of hyper focus in your head. Even cleaning the house becomes a satisfying experience you’re so intensely focused on it. The Fork unleashes waves of free associative thinking. And yet, one doesn’t find oneself “all over the place”. The free associations all seem to be circling the thing you’re really thinking about. From the point of view of “thinking”? It’s extraordinary.

The all-time go-to workday strain is Durban Poison.

Durban Poison has virtually no edge. Its “high” is pure, even focus. That’s why I like it for working AND playing tennis. With a hit of DP in me, the ball slows down (everything slows down — but only in the sense that my mind isn’t racing to keep up with all the information coming at it; I feel like I’m seeing, hearing, processing it all just fine and in real time). So — when the ball comes off my opponent’s racket, I’m better able to focus on the ball and track it all the way to where I want it to be when I attack it. I’ll put it this way: I coach myself better and am coached better when the coaching is coated in Durban Poison.

In a later post, I’ll talk about straight hybrids — afternoon and early evening strains. Finding a good hybrid that chills without sedating — that’s a whole other journey.

Since “Republican” Now Equals “Trump”, Non-Trumpist Republicans Need To Re-Brand; I’m Here To Help

~ A L Katz ~ Leave a comment

As much as they suck at governing, Republicans excel at marketing. Remember “Mission Accomplished”? The only thing “accomplished” was hanging that banner. While Americans vote with their hopes and dreams, Republicans only ever deliver smoke and mirrors. Missions UNaccomplished. Skies NOT blue. Plenty of children left behind. The words promise plenty. Too bad they’re all as hollow as Donald Trump’s heart. Hollow because corrupt — and corruption is what binds Trump to each and every Republican.

The fact is, Trump epitomizes Republicanism, its every cynical, greedy, power-mad excess cranked up to eleven. That’s why Republicans — and the republic — are now hurtling toward the mission Republicans have ALWAYS wanted to accomplish: a state of permanent minority rule. Republicans are about to learn a harsh, harsh lesson. The criminal mojo that worked for Trump his whole life is about to stop working.

For four years, every Republican benefited from the fact that Trump gets away with everything by themselves getting away with almost everything. The thing is, those around Trump did NOT get away with everything like Trump does because they’re NOT Trump. Republicans have forgotten: what worked for him would never work for anyone else. Without Trump — and his corrupt, befuddling sorcery — the backstop Republicans have grown accustomed to is gone. They just don’t realize it yet.

But Trump does. He’s even said it in private, back stage. He’s worried about going to jail and he bloody well should be. Because he IS going to jail. One way or another. And the process that puts him in jail will be as highly entertaining as it is revelatory.

We’ve forgotten ourselves how the world works when we have even a semi-functional Department of Justice — that’s how perverted our view of justice has become with Bill Barr at the DoJ’s helm. In addition to attacking the pandemic head on as they hit the ground, Team Biden also must attack corruption head on because corruption threatens the effort to attack the pandemic.

Even with some in the American news media still determined that “both sides do it”, most Americans — the majority of us — see clearly that, really, only ONE SIDE “does it”. Only one side made Donald Trump their candidate and thus their standard-bearer. Only one side made a Devil’s bargain with Russia — and Russian money — in order to win the 2016 election. Only one side has resisted oversight with religious zeal — as if they had something to hide. Only one side refuses still to acknowledge the decision We The People just made about our future leadership.

To call oneself a “Republican” now is to call oneself a “Trumpist”. That won’t change tomorrow. In fact, the fact that Republicans made themselves the Party Of Trump is going to be the brush all future political campaigns paint all future Republicans with. If they WANT to be “The Party Of Trump”, they’re good to go! Voters will understand their choice. But if a Republican wants voters to see them as something other than a Trumpist?

You can’t “call yourself” a Trumpist and not expect people to think you’re a Trumpist. Regardless of whatever nuances YOU apply to the word, the rest of us see zero nuance. We only see Trump. Ask the Coca Cola company what happens when you try to nuance “Coke” with “New”. However the Coca Cola company perceived themselves or wanted their customers to perceive them — they got the opposite. They got confusion — and then anger, resentment and customers turning to Pepsi or RC.

The “Republican” brand is about to be as dead as the “Whig” brand. The problem: we still need those people we used to call “Republicans”. Not the Trumpists, of course, the normal people. We still need their voices of moderation to counter balance ours — which are about to send the country heading hard to the left. Rest assured, whatever resistance Mitch McConnell thinks he’s going to present will be undermined by Mitch’s legal problems. He’s not going to be worried about blocking anything Joe Biden’s doing; he is going to be worried about saving his own bony, white, Treason Turtle ass.

Also — I believe we’re going to learn that all the Republican-manufactured voting machines (the voting machine manufacturers are all Republicans, Republican donors and their boards are all loaded with Republican politicians) have been padding Republican vote totals for YEARS. When a fully functioning Department of Justice begins pulling the thread of Republican Corruption, that garment will unravel faster than a Trumpian lie. We will see Trump, the Republican Party, the Republican leadership and Republicanism bare-assed naked.

Every revelation about greed, corruption, cynicism — and especially treason — will sledgehammer the Republican Brand further. By the time we get to the 2022 mid-terms, Team Biden will have 1) mitigated the worst of the pandemic, 2) eased the economic hurt most Americans are now feeling, 3) restored order and rational thinking to our political process and 4) begun to uncover whole mountains of criminal behavior. To call oneself a “Republican” while running for office would be like saying “Hey, never mind that I may be a criminal myself — since I run with criminals — vote for ME!”

In an environment where integrity and caring about the Commonweal are the norm, good people will want to be perceived as having integrity and caring.

All those good, former-Republicans are going to need a new brand to describe themselves to the American voter. I have a helpful suggestion. A real one.

The problem with calling yourselves “conservative” is that the word gives away too much. As a Progressive, my politics are all geared toward progress — toward meeting the future’s challenges head on with new, outside-the-box solutions. Conservatives are no different. Their politics are all geared toward “conserving” — just like their name says.

The question is “WHAT do conservatives want to conserve?” Obviously it can’t be the future. You can’t conserve what isn’t. Conservatives want to conserve what IS. How we are now — because it still holds on to the bits of how we WERE that conservatives REALLY want to conserve. Ask any conservative what they want to conserve and, ultimately, they’ll reveal that the thing they want to keep alive is the past.

Tradition’s important and all but — in a rapidly changing world, tradition can be dangerous because it’s based on old knowledge that new knowledge might contradict. If they try to bleed you in a hospital emergency room? Say no! Their medical text books are out of date.

And, really, these moderate Republicans aren’t conservatives anyway. Most of them are social Progressives with a Methodist’s view of money. Circumstances — a dissolving economy — are going to force Progressive solutions on us. The cash Team Biden will use to flood the economy is very much a form of Universal Basic Income. We’ll witness ourselves how cash flowing America from the bottom up works far, FAR better than trickling money down from the top ever could work. Even after we’ve wrestled the pandemic to the ground, more pandemics are coming; we have no idea what pathogens a thawing permafrost will release. In a world where we’re as healthy as the least healthy among us — it only takes one person to start a pandemic raging (hello, COVID19!), socialized medicine can’t be a pipe dream. It needs to be a fact of life.

Yes, yes, yes — what Progressives like me want to do will be expensive. Americans will pay more in taxes at the end of the day. But they’ll get something valuable for the money. And the wealthy will pay far more than they do now because they can afford to but — more importantly — because it is their obligation as citizens of this country. Don’t like the responsibility? You don’t have to be a citizen. You can take your chances with your money elsewhere.

Hey, though Trump paid virtually no taxes to America, he obligingly paid hefty taxes to China — because he feared what would happen if he DIDN’T pay his taxes to China.

See? How does the other side counter “corruption” arguments? “Be more conservative” won’t sell. How about “Let’s be more moderate”?

Moderation may not be progress’s diametric opposite (regress), but it is the perfect alternative to “Let’s Do This Now!” Moderation says “Let’s take a deep breath and make sure we’re making the right decision for the most people”. There’s nothing wrong with making Progressives bring their receipts with them. By all means — please check our work. Hell, I bet that while checking our work, these new “moderate former-Republicans” will innovate solutions that Progressives didn’t think of. Those solutions may not get Progressives everything they want but then welcome to democracy.

America is best when it’s moderates are most dynamic — when they’re taking the best ideas and knitting them together into workable solutions. And think how sensible “moderation” will sound going forward. Calling oneself “Moderate” — or “The Moderation Party” would be a bold, direct announcement of who these former Republicans are. With its mission statement baked into its name, a “Moderation Party” would be incredibly attractive to a lot of Americans.

Maybe there’s a better, sexier word than “moderate”. It won’t cut to the end of the chase like “moderate” does. Conservatives won’t go away any time soon though their numbers will dwindle as conservatism takes residual damage from Republicanism’s fall. Ironically, their voice will sound increasingly extreme, making moderation — or a “Moderation Party” that much more sane-sounding.

Please, at least take my suggestion under consideration, moderates. Call yourselves something other than “Republican”. Most of you already do call yourselves something different — “Former Republican”. Let’s find you something you can be proud to call yourselves not as a reaction but as a statement of faith and purpose.

This Progressive is happy to say out loud: We need YOU.

How To Level An American Playing Field That’s NEVER Been Level

~ A L Katz ~ Leave a comment

The playing field in America has never truly been level because the “men” in “All men are created equal” never included all “men” and definitely never included women. It’s hard to even field a team to put on the pitch when the majority of the players have been banned from the stadium to begin with. America’s fatal flaw wasn’t the idea of a grand experiment in self-government, it was who we excluded from the experiment when we started it. If you really want to get depressed, think of amazing women, skilled, smart like Stacey Abrams, AOC and Susan Rice — then think of all the Stacey’s, AOC’s and Susan’s whose skill sets we left on the table, never bothering to educate them, nurture them or encourage them. Think of all the great ideas America never bothered to develop simply because of racism, bigotry and misogyny.

Leveling the playing field is, ultimately, good for everyone playing on it. Want to see just how exceptional America really is? Let’s put everyone onto the same field of dreams.

Those who really can’t compete — white guys apparently — might lose more often but, if they’d just give innovating and thinking outside the box a try, they might find themselves — because they’re being forced to compete — competing better and winning again. This Progressive won’t mind so much losing an argument to a moderate (conservatives can’t compromise) whose ideas, having been forced to compete with everyone’s, simply are better than mine.

That’s the whole mentality behind a completely level playing field. It really does put us all into the same game with the same rules.

Imagine a “game” where some turtle-faced nitwit insists the rules work one way for him and his rich friends but completely different for everyone else.

Imagine a game where we measure the field and all its features the exact same way — where both sides have to run ten yards to score a first down rather than one side having to make ten while the other gets first downs just for showing up. Imagine a game where no one gets born on third base and thinks they hit a triple.

Gerrymandering prevents the field from being level by breaking up potentially dominant Democratic voting districts into far less threatening districts dominated by some distant, rural Republican enclave that outnumbers the segmented Democratic area by just enough to be forever insurmountable. Gerrymandering is permanent minority rule’s whip. And, boy do they love cracking it over our heads every election.

And then there’s electronic voting machine fraud — the ultimate, silent, un-leveler of any playing field anywhere. As I wrote about here, it would take no more than three people to pull off a successful conspiracy to use voting machines to pad Republican vote totals — to perpetually make it appear as if there were more Republicans than there, in fact, are. Padding totals consistently would create a false narrative that those mean Progressives better be checked because of all the worried, socialism-fearing Republicans. Except, of course, a lot of those worried Republicans don’t exist and never have.

Republican-manufactured, internet-accessible, corruption-vulnerable, virtually unregulated electronic voting machines don’t fill one with confidence when contemplating their integrity. That’s because the manufacturers have none theselves (between donating to Trump and Republicans and having those same Republicans sit on their board). Neither do the Republican-run states who’ve bought the damned things and insist on using them instead of far safer, far more reliable hand-marked paper ballots. It’s also because Trump INSISTED that HIS VOTERS forgo voting by mail and USE THE VOTING MACHINES INSTEAD.

Talk about thinks that make ya go “Hmmmmmmm…”.

Sorry, but a man who lies every time he opens his mouth, projects massive criminality twenty-four-seven and who was IMPEACHED for cheating in the very election he just ran in cannot be trusted. If you’re ears didn’t prick up the instant Trump insisted HIS voters vote via machine then you haven’t been paying attention. You need to sit down till the rest of us fix this; you’ll only ever get in everyone else’s way.

The solution to our problem is this: in order, fix 1) Equality, 2) Justice and 3) Hope. You can’t have justice without equality. Fix equality first, you can have justice. If everyone believes justice is fair, they’ll have hope. Hope will create purpose and the will to realize all those Big Plans we’ll need to realize if we’re ever to regain our place in the world.

First order of business though — let’s remove the bully not just from the playing field we’re on but from the zip code we’re in entirely. Hell, let’s kick him off the planet if we can. No one will miss him.

Consider that a slam dunk.

America Is Divided But The MAJORITY Of Americans Were Not Divided About Donald Trump

~ A L Katz ~ 2 Comments

Chicken Little — journalism degree in hand — dashes hither and thither squawking “the sky is falling!” or, as he now puts it, “America is hopelessly divided! What are we all to do?” Shhhh, calm down, Chicken Little. Stop believing your own hype. Stop believing that “both sides do it”. They don’t. That brand of “journalism” has destroyed your sense of perspective; it’s convinced you that you can’t possibly arbitrate between bullshit and truth for your audience; THEY’LL have to decide for themselves if bullshit can be truth and truth can be bullshit. Just for the record, no, it can’t and no, it can’t.

“Both sides to it” is bullshit. And bullshit can never be true. Cos it’s bullshit.

The gun-toting, Christo-fascist, liquored-to-their-bloodshot-eyeballs Trumpanistas do not care about representative democracy and never have. Let’s be generous and call them 30% of America. That’s the slice of America that still approved of Richard Nixon on the day he quit because of Watergate (actually it was 29% — I’m being even more generous!) The truth is, the hardcore-iest of the hardcore Trumpanistas are a thin slice of the larger half-baked tranche. When you stop and do the math — who they are vs who we are? It’s batshit crazy insane that “these people” hold the sway that they do.

I wonder if it’s because they’re all white (or white aspirational)?

The slow but steady attrition of gerrymandering, minority rule and elections stolen from the majority brought us to a place where that disempowered majority finally had enough. Donald Trump himself said the unspoken but true part out loud: when more Americans vote, they vote for Democrats. If too many Americans vote, Republicans would never win again.

Wow. Donald Trump got one right. He spoke a truth.

Why do you suppose Trump thinks that? If more Americans took part in the decision-making process, they would NOT struggle with their choice. They would choose a Democratic, PROGRESSIVE way forward over a Republican, REGRESSIVE way back to what we were: a country that compromised with SLAVERY. Seen as a trend line, a diversifying America is NOT divided on that subject and hasn’t been for a long, long time. That’s the MAJORITY I’m speaking of.

“Both sides do it” insists on giving equal weight to both sides of an argument regardless of any argument’s actual heft. That’s why climate science and climate denial got to share 50-50 screens on every single news network. Quick note to the news networks who apparently don’t understand how the visual medium works. Anything presented in a 50-50 screen is saying (even if unintentionally) “these two things are equal”. If it’s two people making diametrically opposite arguments? Those two arguments (climate science and climate denial) could BOTH be equally valid.

Just like that, NEWS NETWORKS gave credence to rubbish. They said, in the visual language, “this argument could be true”. Bullshit could be true.

Oy.

Once you’ve gone there, there’s not bottom. Mexicans “could be” rapists. Women might “like” being grabbed by their pussies. Children might prefer to grow up in cages, separated from their parents. Voters might not care if their president shoots them on Fifth Avenue — as a bizarre way to keep their vote. Once you chase a rabbit like this down its festering hole, you’re lost. That’s why our news media could never tell the Donald Trump story. It’s why they can’t today.

This story will happen IN SPITE OF our news media mostly and NOT because of it. The majority of heroic reporting on Trump has come from WITHOUT mainstream American journalism and not from within as it should have.

I watched MSNBC’s Stephanie Ruhl report the other day how the spontaneous celebrations that broke out across America once Joe and Kamala’s election was a fully established fact that those celebrations weren’t about Donald Trump, they were about a hopeful return to normalcy. My response to Stephanie (through my TV — I don’t think she heard) was “What the HELL are you talking about? I was IN one of those spontaneous celebrations (masked and distanced — but needed see and feel the vibe). I know for a fact what and how WE were celebrating. I wasn’t an observer, ya see, I WAS A PARTICIPANT.

But Stephanie — an observer apparently who didn’t speak to ANY participants — adjudged our motives for us. We weren’t doing it for OUR reason, we were doing it for HERS.

She was “both sides doing it” it to us. The one time we WERE reacting politically, Stephanie (to whom the left is ALWAYS being political rather than reactive) had us being purely reactive.

Um, no, Ms. Ruhl. Everyone as far as I could see and hear at the street celebration I attended was there because of the relief we felt at RIDDING OURSELVES of Donald J. Trump. Please get that distinction. We had to do this OURSELVES because our news media couldn’t. Wouldn’t.

We have to look into this. We will. As badly as the news media has reported on Trump, they are reporting on us. They’re gravitating toward the most visible — the loudest, gun-totingest, bleary-eyed Trumpanistas — the ones with the most white, Christian male grievances to grieve over. Stories of angry white people are easier to tell than stories of everyone else — struggling to get into or stay in a game that remains entirely stacked against them and for the RICH, white, Christian men who are actually oppressing everyone.

Even Charles Koch now realizes how deeply he stepped in it. Charles isn’t being contrite as much as he’s being strategic. He’s seen the same handwriting on the wall that the 21st Century Fox Board of Directors did when they fired Bill O’Reilly on April 19, 2017. The handwriting was female. It belonged to America’s women. They make up most of the buying decisions in American households. If you lose them, you lose. And Bill O’Reilly — a sexual predator — had lost America’s women.

More precisely, Bill O’Reilly lost his advertisers. His show lost its advertisers because all of them saw they’d lose their clients — the companies that made the products being advertised. And those companies didn’t want to lose their customers — all those women making all those buying decisions. It was between Bill O’Reilly and staying in business. We all know who won. That victory should be shouting at us. It is — if only we’d listen to it.

I’ve written here about how I believe our view of the American electorate walks in the door skewed because of who owns most of the voting machine-making companies (and who’s on their boards and to whom they make healthy political campaign donations). Please don’t ask me or anyone to trust people with an aversion to transparency, a cash-paying love for an authoritarian fraud and vehement resistance to Americans using much more secure hand-marked paper ballots to vote. Something about them smells.

If I’m even half-right about Republicans padding their numbers, our perception of who we are and how we vote has been significantly perverted. They’re still as crazy as we think they are, but there are a lot fewer of them than we’ve been told.

That, ya see, is the point of the exercise. Republicans now are like an animal whose sole defense is to puff up its feathers. That “defense” is still just feathers. Republicans aren’t who they present themselves to be. They’re neither growers not show-ers.

We, on the other hand, are both growers AND show-ers. Our numbers grew (significantly) and we showed up — both on election day and after to celebrate.

Hey, Stephanie Ruhl — you’re a good reporter when you stick to matters financial. The moment you wander away from that beat, you lose your super powers. Completely. We’re in a forgiving mood though (with some people). We’ll blame your j-school education instead of you. We’ll assume you were sharp as a tack before “both sides do it” blunted your analytical skills. If you HAD wandered into one of those spontaneous celebrations BEFORE reporting on it and characterizing it, I feel certain your eyes and ears would not have betrayed you.

Four years ago, the MAJORITY of us (and had this many Americans voted, the disappointed majority would have been significantly larger) were shocked when the minority got to rule. We protested. We tore at our hair and ripped at our clothing. But we allowed Trump to take his place in the White House. We now know we were bamboozled. The whole country was — by a man who always favors”me” over “we”.

This past election day, We The People spoke clearly in the loudest, clearest, most steady voice a shitload of voter suppression allowed: “Ding dong, the witch is dead”.

Hear, bloody HEAR!

When Team Biden Hits The Ground, They’ll Have TWO Viruses To Contend With — COVID19 And Republican Corruption

~ A L Katz ~ Leave a comment

Team Biden-Harris choosing Ron Klain as Chief of Staff signals clearly that the Democratic response to the greatest threat to Americans’ health in a century will be multi-faceted, dynamic and hell-bent on getting results. I hope a good chunk of the remaining brain trust gets tasked with confronting America’s OTHER raging virus: Republican corruption. That one’s just as dangerous — more probably. And a hell of a lot more insidious. Think of how much Republican corruption we as a nation of laws had to normalize just to have a “President Trump”. Yeah — that’s a disease and we have it.

Republican corruption is now so widespread and uniform that we marvel each time another GOP-er peels off and says out loud that the election is over. The boys in the bund took one on the chin. They’ll tell themselves that Democrats never demand Republicans EVER pay for their bad behavior; in the name of “getting back to normal”, the Democrats (the Republicans think) will, as usual, live and let live. That would like cutting a deal with cancer.

Not doing it. Here — I’ll link to a song that says it clearly: We Won’t Get Fooled Again.

Now that we’ll begin to apply science to our pandemic response, we’ll actually HAVE a pandemic response. Thank you, Team Trump, for setting the bar so low we have to be careful not to trip over it while surpassing it. Even if Team Biden-Harris failed spectacularly, that failure would still be miles better than whatever herd immunity type non-response Trump was going to call “a plan”. Already — because Team Biden-Harris will be there and Team Trump won’t — our fortunes will be measurably better.

Team Biden-Harris needs to apply the same aggressive, science-based, whole world, deal-with-it-on-every-level attack plan they apply to the coronavirus to the even more pervasive virus of Trumpism. This is a cancer we ignore at our peril.

On the one hand, a winter of sickness will both cull the Trumpian herd and rob it of righteous indignation. Most people (Trump not included) emerge quite humbled by their experience with COVID19. Plenty will survive it but feel its hold on them for the rest of their lives. As Trump followers die, having caught the virus at a Trump event, while Trump comes unglued in full public view, the Cult of Trump will be harder to justify except to the most hardcore of the hardcore. The Lifers. The 29% who still loved Richard Nixon on the day he resigned because of Watergate.

On the other hand, a political environment free from Trump’s voice — private citizen Trump won’t get the pass President Trump does from Twitter or any other social media platform who now have to live in a world where Joe Biden is President and the rules are beginning to be rewritten. Enter into this environment a functioning Department of Justice, dedicated anew to Justice instead of behaving like some crime boss’s consigliere.

It’s that reinvigorated DoJ where the fight against Virus #2 — Trumpism — will begin in earnest. An equally reinvigorated FBI will finally get down to the counter intelligence investigation into Trump’s relationship with Russia that Rod Rosenstein knee capped. Those threads, once pulled, will obliterate the bad Christmas sweater of corruption that has been the Republican Party for a generation. Well, it will REVEAL all the corruption in revolting waves of puke-inducing awfulness. One of the more puke-inducing will be the revelation that we’ve been living inside a giant False Narrative for that very same time frame.

How long, I wonder, have the Republican-owned voting machine companies been padding Republican vote results? As I wrote here, it wouldn’t take more than three people — and no one meticulously checking the math — to add, say, ten percent to one party’s vote total. Point of reference. Kentucky, this cycle.

Let’s start by hauling out the voter rolls — they’re public record: https://elect.ky.gov/SiteCollectionDocuments/Election%20Results/2010-2019/2014/statcnty.txt

Here’s the final page — with the state totals.

Here — the next part of the data — the actual results from the election —

Here’s the statewide result. Mitch really whupped Amy McGrath’s butt, didn’t he?

If we compare totals, Mitch got 1,233,135 votes out of a possible 3,105,349 registered voters in Kentucky. How many of Kentucky’s voters are registered as Republicans? 1,196.183. How many as Democrats? 1672,664…

Wait, what? Yeah. Kentucky has more registered Democrats than it does Republicans. Who knew? There are a half million or so “other” voters in the mix — independents, Libertarians, Greens, Who-Know-What-Else — but, still, DEMOCRATS OUTNUMBER REPUBLICANS in Kentucky.

Yet Mitch — in a tribe election — in a state with more registered Democrats than Republicans — blows out the Democrat. Did I mention that Mitch’s approval number sits at 18% in one poll! Either Mitch is simply the greatest politician of all time — turning groups of voters who should despise the air he breathes into people happy to pull the lever for him. Excuse me if I’m dubious.

Take Pike County. Here’s how Mitch performed there —

Mitch beat McGrath 18,362 to 6,013. That’s in a county where there are 34,464 registered Democrats vs 11,178 registered Republicans. That means at least 7,000 other voters plus Democrats had to vote for Mitch — at a far greater clip than an 18% approval rating would suggest possible.

See how the math doesn’t “add up”? We need to be skeptical about this. We need to be suspicious at the very least.

Make that Team Biden-Harris needs to be suspicious — and they need to act swiftly. For starters, we need to ascertain whether Republicans have been padding their vote totals for years or not (take it to the bank and make plans with the proceeds — it’s that dead certain). We need to have this piece of the puzzle in hand as we look at election 2016 and the question of “Did Trump Really Win Pennsylvania, Wisconsin & Michigan?” Because, if he didn’t (he didn’t) then Trump never did win the Electoral College. That means he never did legitimately win the presidency — just like he’s been telling us in his strangely projective way. That means that everything Donald Trump did should be voided since he never had the legal authority to do it.

Something was stolen from We The People — the result of our vote. The outcome, with all its legislative and judicial manifestations — that was what we voted for. That is what was literally stolen from us and taken by the Republicans. They replaced our judges with theirs. Our president with theirs. Our future with… whatever the hell this monstrosity is.

Just like Covid19 can fog your brain, Trumpism fogs reason. It’s got some of us thinking that cheating to win is just “another way to win” and that if a cheater wins, they still get to keep what they stole from us.

No, they don’t. Turns out the cure for Trumpism is the same as for a pandemic: diligence and a lockdown. Let’s start by locking down every single Republican. Then let’s diligently ask them all the questions we have for them — under oath.

Let’s cure ourselves of this sickness once and for all.