Is the Midwest Going Crazy?

Two events took place this past week that I'm sorely surprised and even disappointed in for all of us. It's bad enough things like these even happen, let alone in the US but what's made matters worst of all are that they also happened here in the Midwest, and extremely close to the Kansas City area. Here's the first:

Missouri man arrested after telling woman he wanted to show her where he hung her grandpa

This took place, horribly enough, up in Maryville, Missouri:

Nodaway County Prosecuting Attorney Robert Rice on Wednesday announced that he has filed a felony assault charge against Tommy Dean Gaa, 65, Maryville, in connection with an alleged hate crime.

According to a probable cause statement filed by Maryville Public Safety Officer Adam James, Gaa was taken into custody after ordering breakfast at a local business on Sunday, Jan. 25, where he was waited on by an African-American employee.

The employee, according to James’ statement, asked Gaa if he wanted white or wheat toast, and Gaa allegedly responded by saying, “I’m prejudiced. I’ll take white.”

Moments later, Gaa is said to have approached the employee, allegedly grabbing her arm in a manner that caused bruising and asking her if she “liked to party.”

According to the probable cause statement, Gaa then allegedly said, “I have a place I would like to take you where I hung your grandpa.”

Is that not incredible?

Then, there was this,  our of Topeka:

Kansas Girl Playing in Backyard When Passing Stranger Set Her on Fire

A brother and sister were simply playing in their backyard when, all of the sudden, the boy rushed inside, telling his uncle that his sister’s head was on fire.

The children’s uncle George said it was the worst thing he’s ever seen. He ran to the backyard and found his niece Jayden on fire.

The six-year-old’s hair was fully engulfed in flames and she was slapping her head trying to put them out, her uncle recounted. George used cold rags to treat the wounds and called 911.

Officers arrived less than a minute later and found Jayden had suffered non-life-threatening burns, according to the Topeka Police Dept. She was first taken to a nearby hospital for immediate treatment before going to a burn center in Kansas City.

George said she suffered third-degree burns to her head and first and second-degree burns to her hands.

“She was so terrified and scared about what had happened.”

The six-year-old’s hair was fully engulfed in flames and she was slapping her head trying to put them out, her uncle recounted. George used cold rags to treat the wounds and called 911.

Officers arrived less than a minute later and found Jayden had suffered non-life-threatening burns, according to the Topeka Police Dept. She was first taken to a nearby hospital for immediate treatment before going to a burn center in Kansas City.

George said she suffered third-degree burns to her head and first and second-degree burns to her hands.

“She was so terrified and scared about what had happened.”

Jayden’s brother, five-year-old Christopher, said a man they didn’t know came up to the fence and threatened to light his sister’s hair on fire.

“He scooted closer to us and he grabbed a cigarette out of his pocket and he lit it by my sister’s hair, and then her hair caught on fire,” Christopher said.

After that, Christopher said the man ran away.

What kind of sick person could or would do such a thing?

And what's going on? I mean, sure, there are plenty of ugly racist things that take place, say, in larger cities in the Midwest like Chicago and Kansas City and God knows, St. Louis but these are small towns and these heinous, ugly and very personal things are taking place with these people.

I thought we're better than this.

Is it a fluke of 2 ugly events or is this some sick trend of the future?

Here's hoping it's the former and not the latter.

A friend, local photographer Roy Inman, posited a few possible options:

"More population, hence more deviant behavior in total numbers; social media gets the word out faster and with greater coverage. And in a nod to the Malthusian Doctrine and studies on rats, several writers suggest that we are seeing the crowding factor at work. Studies done in bygone days showed that when rats were packed in tighter and tighter in a confined space, at some point some of the rats went berserk and started attacking other rats for no apparent reason and some even knawed off their legs out of frustration. One writer thought that technology was part to blame. It is becoming more and more difficult to keep up with changes and that religious fundamentalism, for example, is a backlash reaction."

I'm hoping for freak aberrations myself.

The Biggest--and Worst---Trade Deal Ever You Need to Know About

The biggest trade deal ever, in the history of the nation, is being considered right now and most people know very little or nothing at all of it.

It is the Trans-Pacific Partnership or the TPP and here, in only 2 minutes and 26 seconds, are some very important facts about it.



As ever, please take a moment to write your Congressional representatives in the House of Representatives and the Senate and heck, for the matter, the President himself and tell him your thoughts on this:

Contact the U.S. Congress and the White House

Thank you, in advance.

And enjoy your Sunday and keep safe and warm out there, if you got snow and GO PATRIOTS!

Born this day

For Langston Hughes, born this day, 1902 in, of all places, Southwest Missouri. Joplin, to be specific, which is now so Right Wing and Republican:

Let America Be America Again

Langston Hughes, 1902 - 1967

Let America be America again.
Let it be the dream it used to be.
Let it be the pioneer on the plain
Seeking a home where he himself is free.

(America never was America to me.)

Let America be the dream the dreamers dreamed—
Let it be that great strong land of love
Where never kings connive nor tyrants scheme
That any man be crushed by one above.

(It never was America to me.)

O, let my land be a land where Liberty
Is crowned with no false patriotic wreath,
But opportunity is real, and life is free,
Equality is in the air we breathe.

(There’s never been equality for me,
Nor freedom in this “homeland of the free.”)

Say, who are you that mumbles in the dark? 
And who are you that draws your veil across the stars?

I am the poor white, fooled and pushed apart,
I am the Negro bearing slavery’s scars.
I am the red man driven from the land,
I am the immigrant clutching the hope I seek—
And finding only the same old stupid plan
Of dog eat dog, of mighty crush the weak.

I am the young man, full of strength and hope,
Tangled in that ancient endless chain
Of profit, power, gain, of grab the land!
Of grab the gold! Of grab the ways of satisfying need!
Of work the men! Of take the pay!
Of owning everything for one’s own greed!

I am the farmer, bondsman to the soil.
I am the worker sold to the machine.
I am the Negro, servant to you all.
I am the people, humble, hungry, mean—
Hungry yet today despite the dream.
Beaten yet today—O, Pioneers!
I am the man who never got ahead,
The poorest worker bartered through the years.

Yet I’m the one who dreamt our basic dream
In the Old World while still a serf of kings,
Who dreamt a dream so strong, so brave, so true,
That even yet its mighty daring sings
In every brick and stone, in every furrow turned
That’s made America the land it has become.
O, I’m the man who sailed those early seas
In search of what I meant to be my home—
For I’m the one who left dark Ireland’s shore,
And Poland’s plain, and England’s grassy lea,
And torn from Black Africa’s strand I came
To build a “homeland of the free.”

The free?

Who said the free?  Not me?
Surely not me?  The millions on relief today?
The millions shot down when we strike?
The millions who have nothing for our pay?
For all the dreams we’ve dreamed
And all the songs we’ve sung
And all the hopes we’ve held
And all the flags we’ve hung,
The millions who have nothing for our pay—
Except the dream that’s almost dead today.

O, let America be America again—
The land that never has been yet—
And yet must be—the land where every man is free.
The land that’s mine—the poor man’s, Indian’s, Negro’s, ME—
Who made America,
Whose sweat and blood, whose faith and pain,
Whose hand at the foundry, whose plow in the rain,
Must bring back our mighty dream again.

Sure, call me any ugly name you choose—
The steel of freedom does not stain.
From those who live like leeches on the people’s lives,
We must take back our land again,
America!

O, yes,
I say it plain,
America never was America to me,
And yet I swear this oath—
America will be!

Out of the rack and ruin of our gangster death,
The rape and rot of graft, and stealth, and lies,
We, the people, must redeem
The land, the mines, the plants, the rivers.
The mountains and the endless plain—
All, all the stretch of these great green states—
And make America again!

Kicking Off Black History Month

Mississippi God damn...

Missouri now?

Two of the Most Important Quotes for America Today

Two of the most prophetic and important quotes of the last 60 years are President Dwight David Eisenhower's at the end of his Presdiency for the first:

In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist."

And this, the second:

Entertainment Overnight -- Flashback

Lyin' in my bed I hear the clock tick
And think of you
Caught up in circles confusion
Is nothing new
Flashback warm nights
Almost left behind
Suitcase of memories
Time after

Quote of the Day -- Lessons We Used to Know

Lessons we need to relearn.

A Poem: From an Iraq War Veteran

Maybe a poem for the American people:

I Hate: A Poem

I hate being a veteran of war

I hate the constant triggers

I hate the never ending avoidance of emotions

I hate the constant reminders of what I’ve lost

I hate that I’m not alone in my pain

I hate that people say “Thank you for your service”

I hate that the VA does little to help the people they serve

I hate that Americans still crave war

I hate that our children play war video games

I hate that every day is a day of pain and anger

I hate that so many of us take our own lives because the pain is too much

I hate that there are no reparations I can make to fix my faults

I hate that I cry whenever I think about Iraq

I hate that I can’t fully express the anguish and resentment I feel

I hate that this poem may only get read once before you close your laptop and move on to something less painful

--published by Jennifer Cole on 01/23/15 10:31am

posted to: 

New York City

. I wrote this poem this morning after trying to fill out even more VA compensation paperwork and seeing one too many commercials for preventing veteran suicide and for the new film "American Sniper". Life just becomes so overwhelming at times, and poetry is one of the few ways I can express my feelings in a way that is safe for me. 

We must never forget.

Link:  Iraq Veterans Against the War

An Open Letter from Republicans to the American Voter

From Facebook, yesterday:

Mindy Fischer, Writer

Dear Americans....

We would like to ask you to please consider voting for the GOP in 2016. 

We very seriously believe that our party is best suited for helping all Americans because we are all about honesty, sincerity, and intelligence. And to prove it, we'd like you to meet some of our top leaders....

Donald Trump, Sarah Palin, Ben Carson, and the dude from Duck Dynasty.

Respectfully, 

The Republicans

On this day...

The UN designated January 27—the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau—as an annual day of Holocaust remembrance. Never forget this tragedy in history so we never repeat it.

Entertainment Overnight

Young talent, from the heart, it seems

A Great, Fair Even Important Question

So let's ask if of our members of Congress---in both houses.

Entertainment Overnight -- Flashback

A wonderful flashback

Entertainment Ovenight -- Walk Off the Earth

And have a great weekend, y'all.

That Republican Keystone XL "Jobs Bill"?

Check out what the Republican Keystone XL "jobs bill" won't have in it (from The Daily Kos and Bloomberg News):.

Senate Republicans Block Keystone Export and Steel Amendments

Republicans like to point to Keystone XL as one of their signature jobs bills and, when oil prices are high, like to imply that it would mean cheap oil flowing free in America. But Tuesday afternoon they voted down two Democratic amendments aimed at just those issues.

Massachusetts Sen. Ed Markey's amendment to the Keystone bill would have prohibited oil shipped through the pipeline from being exported. It was killed by a 57 to 42 vote. Minnesota Sen. Al Franken's amendment would have required that the pipeline be built with American steel. It was killed by a 53 to 46 vote.

Nice, huh?

First they won't promise the oil will stay in the US---because, of course, they're "Big Oil" overlords that own them don't want that. They want this stuff going out to the world oil markets where they can make more money than if they sell it to us Americans.

And then make it out of US steel?

FUGGEDABOUDIT!

Really could they be more shallow or transparent? It is precisely what it's been described all along. That is, it is foreign, Canadian oil, crossing the US and our pastures and fields and rivers and streams and creeks---and the huge, very important Ogallala aquifer--and then going out to world oil markets. And sure, for a short while we'll have some construction jobs but then it will create between 35 to 50 permanent jobs, tops. The CEO of the oil company, Transcanada, said as much, very publicly. 

This is not for you, America.

Let's not kid ourselves.

America: We're Number One!

Entertainment Overnight -- I love a breathy singer

President Obama, Kansas and the Likely Brilliant Move

By now, most who follow politics and/or President Obama know he's taking his State of the Union messages on the road. He was in Idaho today and will be in Kansas tomorrow, two very "red", Republican states.

And if you think about it, his going to Kansas is likely pretty brilliant.

Kansas' Republican Governor Sam Brownback and all the Republicans in the statehouse all slashed taxes for the wealthy and corporations a few years ago, claiming money and people would come flooding in.

Yeah, I know, right? Flooding in to Kansas?

For what, the beaches or the mountains?

Anyway, as predicted and even warned, not only did people and companies and jobs and money not flow in to the state, the only thing that did happen is that Kansas coffers are now not only pretty empty but Kansas needs to come up with hundreds of millions of dollars, due to all the slashing. This is where they were last August:

Adjusted Kansas numbers show $238 million budget shortfall

In this article, The New York Times points out Kansas' tax cuts could cost them as much as 9 billion dollars through 2019:

Brownback's Tax Cuts Not Set in Stone

So what's all this got to do with President Obama and his trip now?

What could be great is if he rubs the Republicans' "trickle down" economic theories not only don't work but they put public budgets in debt---possibly deep debt---while rewarding the already-wealthy and corporations.

Now, clearly he can't get too obvious and punishing with this message---however fun that would be---but still, I expect it will be at least easy to rather gently but obviously point out that tax cuts only for corporations and the wealthy, again, that "trickly down" nonsense, only makes corporations have bigger profits and send yet more money to the already wealthy. None of this helps the middle class, the lower classes or working class. It not only doesn't help the broadest swaths of America, much of the nation, it actually hurts them because it puts the burdens of tax payments on, again, the working-, middle- and lower classes.

So let's hope for some fun barbs tomorrow from the President, directly into the faces of all the Republicans who supported and maybe still support the voodoo economics nonsense of "trickle down" economic theory.

It doesn't work, Kansas and our nation proves it doesn't work and we need to get beyond it.

The Things from the State of the Union Address I Think We Can All Support

Of all the things said last night in President Obama's annual State of the Union address, it seems these, at least, are things you'd think everyone and anyone, from any political affiliation, would surely support. Everyone, anyway, but the people who simply hate Barack Obama for being Barack Obama, anyway, and it certainly seems they're out there. (No worries, too. It's a short list. I don't think we Americans agree on much). 

No. 1--

"...nothing helps families make ends meet like higher wages. That’s why this Congress still needs to pass a law that makes sure a woman is paid the same as a man for doing the same work. Really. It’s 2015. It’s time. We still need to make sure employees get the overtime they’ve earned. And to everyone in this Congress who still refuses to raise the minimum wage, I say this: If you truly believe you could work full-time and support a family on less than $15,000 a year, go try it. If not, vote to give millions of the hardest-working people in America a raise."

No. 2--

"...as a new generation of veterans comes home, we owe them every opportunity to live the American Dream they helped defend. Already, we’ve made strides towards ensuring that every veteran has access to the highest quality care. We’re slashing the backlog that had too many veterans waiting years to get the benefits they need, and we’re making it easier for vets to translate their training and experience into civilian jobs. Joining Forces, the national campaign launched by Michelle and Jill Biden, has helped nearly 700,000 veterans and military spouses get new jobs. So to every CEO in America, let me repeat: If you want somebody who’s going to get the job done, hire a veteran."

No. 3--

"21st century businesses need 21st century infrastructure – modern ports, stronger bridges, faster trains and the fastest internet. Democrats and Republicans used to agree on this. So let’s set our sights higher than a single oil pipeline. Let’s pass a bipartisan infrastructure plan that could create more than thirty times as many jobs per year, and make this country stronger for decades to come."

No. 4--

"I want Americans to win the race for the kinds of discoveries that unleash new jobs – converting sunlight into liquid fuel; creating revolutionary prosthetics, so that a veteran who gave his arms for his country can play catch with his kid; pushing out into the Solar System not just to visit, but to stay. "

No. 5--

""Let’s close loopholes so we stop rewarding companies that keep profits abroad, and reward those that invest in America. Let’s use those savings to rebuild our infrastructure and make it more attractive for companies to bring jobs home. Let’s simplify the system and let a small business owner file based on her actual bank statement, instead of the number of accountants she can afford. And let’s close the loopholes that lead to inequality by allowing the top one percent to avoid paying taxes on their accumulated wealth. We can use that money to help more families pay for childcare and send their kids to college. We need a tax code that truly helps working Americans trying to get a leg up in the new economy, and we can achieve that together."

No. 6--

"No foreign nation, no hacker, should be able to shut down our networks, steal our trade secrets, or invade the privacy of American families, especially our kids. We are making sure our government integrates intelligence to combat cyber threats, just as we have done to combat terrorism."

No. 7--

"A better politics is one where we appeal to each other’s basic decency instead of our basest fears.

A better politics is one where we debate without demonizing each other; where we talk issues, and values, and principles, and facts, rather than “gotcha” moments, or trivial gaffes, or fake controversies that have nothing to do with people’s daily lives...

...If we’re going to have arguments, let’s have arguments – but let’s make them debates worthy of this body and worthy of this country. "

No. 8--

"I want this chamber, this city, to reflect the truth – that for all our blind spots and shortcomings, we are a people with the strength and generosity of spirit to bridge divides, to unite in common effort, and help our neighbors, whether down the street or on the other side of the world.

I want our actions to tell every child, in every neighborhood: your life matters, and we are as committed to improving your life chances as we are for our own kids."

And that's it. Eight fairly brief things out of an entire hour of speech I think we can all agree on, as a nation. There are a few spots where I think we might have come a bit closer to agreeing on a few things but not very much. When I thought there was any chance of a person or group disagreeing or having reservations, I left it out.

Here's hoping we can come back together as a nation, as a people and that we address our questions and issues and problems of the country and go forward as one.

Hey, we can hope, can't we?

Republicans' hypocrisy "honoring Dr. King"

I was just out on Facebook and saw how Missouri's Senator Roy Blunt said he was to "honor the life and legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr." By comparison, Congressional Representative Billy Long had no tribute of any kind and Rep. Vicky Hartzler honored her mother's death, a week ago, instead.

In the bigger picture, their Republican party's true actions show what they're really made of and what they're about and it's important to keep it in mind and perspective:

The GOP’s state-by-state crusade to disenfranchise voters

You can't get too much more un-American than taking away the votes of fellow Americans.

North Carolina Voter ID Law Targets Students

Their official policies take voting away from students, the elderly, the physically-challenged, blacks, Hispanics, the poor, virtually anyone and everyone they even think might vote for any political party but their own.

Three ways the GOP’s disenfranchised voters

More Republican Voter Disenfranchisement

The GOP And Voter Disenfranchisement

The Republican Disenfranchisement Project

They sometimes use the excuses of protecting the voting process but it's known, statistically, that people don't try to cheat on voting in anything like significant numbers, either state by state or nationally:

The Big Lie Behind Voter ID Laws

UFO Sightings Are More Common Than Voter Fraud

So happy Martin Luther King Day, Republicans. You, with your Jim Crow tactics in 2015 America.

You shameless, lying, un-American hypocrites.

Martin Luther King Day

"...we must find an alternative to war and bloodshed."

"It is no longer a choice, my friends, between violence and nonviolence. It is either nonviolence or nonexistence."

"A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual doom."

Entertainment Overnight -- Flashback

Play loud



And have a great weekend, y'all.

America----Where is your memory?

Am I the only one in this nation that knows or remembers that the George W Bush administration flew billions of dollars into Iraq, around the time of the "mission accomplished"?

How the US sent $12bn in cash to Iraq. And watched it vanish

Special flights brought in tonnes of banknotes which disappeared into the war zone

The US flew nearly $12bn in shrink-wrapped $100 bills into Iraq, then distributed the cash with no proper control over who was receiving it and how it was being spent.

The staggering scale of the biggest transfer of cash in the history of the Federal Reserve has been graphically laid bare by a US congressional committee.

In the year after the invasion of Iraq in 2003 nearly 281 million notes, weighing 363 tonnes, were sent from New York to Baghdad for disbursement to Iraqi ministries and US contractors. Using C-130 planes, the deliveries took place once or twice a month with the biggest of $2,401,600,000 on June 22 2004, six days before the handover.

Details of the shipments have emerged in a memorandum prepared for the meeting of the House committee on oversight and government reform which is examining Iraqi reconstruction. Its chairman, Henry Waxman, a fierce critic of the war, said the way the cash had been handled was mind-boggling. "The numbers are so large that it doesn't seem possible that they're true. Who in their right mind would send 363 tonnes of cash into a war zone?"

The memorandum details the casual manner in which the US-led Coalition Provisional Authority disbursed the money, which came from Iraqi oil sales, surplus funds from the UN oil-for-food programme and seized Iraqi assets.

"One CPA official described an environment awash in $100 bills," the memorandum says. "One contractor received a $2m payment in a duffel bag stuffed with shrink-wrapped bundles of currency. Auditors discovered that the key to a vault was kept in an unsecured backpack.

"They also found that $774,300 in cash had been stolen from one division's vault. Cash payments were made from the back of a pickup truck, and cash was stored in unguarded sacks in Iraqi ministry offices. One official was given $6.75m in cash, and was ordered to spend it in one week before the interim Iraqi government took control of Iraqi funds."

Can you even begin to imagine the uproar if current President Obama even thought of such a thing, let lone did it?

Then, not to be done there, that previous Republican, supposed Capitalist-loving president also made competition illegal?  Oh, yes he did.

Administration Opposes Democrats’ Plan for Negotiating Medicare Drug Prices

WASHINGTON, Nov. 12 — The Bush administration said on Sunday that it would strenuously oppose one of the Democrats’ top priorities for the new Congress: legislation authorizing the government to negotiate with drug companies to secure lower drug prices for Medicare beneficiaries....

“The government negotiates big discounts for the prices of drugs for our veterans,” said Senator-elect Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota. “But the drug companies got Congress to make it illegal to negotiate for lower prices under Medicare.”

So I ask you----am I the only one that remembers these things? These outrageious things? If a Democrat did either of these, he'd be figuratively crucified upon an alter of wrongness and unfairness and--in the case of flying planeloads of American cash from our own Federal Reserve into a war zone, only to be handed out--and then promptly impeached.

You have to hand it to Dubya'.  All this and torture and war crimes, too. 

And he got away with it all.

Missourians, you and your government are being bought---and sold

Ladies and gentlemen, voters of Missouri, it's important you know the name Rex Sinquefield and that you know what he's done, what he's doing and what, it seems clearly, he's attempting to do with, about and to your government.

Check out just these 2 headlines. First this one:

Sinquefield gifts to Hanaway governor bid at $900K 

It seems Mr Sinquefield has already decided who he wants--and who we should have--for Missouri's next governor so he's ponying up nearly 1 million dollars for her.

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) – Wealthy political activist Rex Sinquefield’s donations to Republican Catherine Hanaway’s campaign for governor have reached $900,000.

Campaign finance records show Sinquefield this week gave Hanaway another $10,000, the 10th straight week he’s given her that amount.

The recent donation comes after an October contribution from Sinquefield for $750,000 and another for $50,000 in March.

Most of the more than $1.1 million she’s raised so far this year has come from Sinquefield.

Sinquefield is a retired investment firm founder who has been one of Missouri’s most active political donors in recent years. He has backed efforts to cut income taxes and revamp public school teacher evaluation methods.

Hanaway is a former U.S. attorney and Missouri House speaker who is the only declared GOP gubernatorial candidate for 2016.

Then, next up, this little beauty int this second headline:

Missouri's big money man gives $1 million to 2016 Potential 2016 Candidate

Another day, yet another 1 million dollars from this man, to the candidate of his choice for Missouri.

Wealthy financier Rex Sinquefield appears to have made his choice for Missouri’s next lieutenant governor:  Bev Randles, chairman of the Missouri Club for Growth.

Sinquefield is backing up his support with a $1 million check into Randles’ newly created exploratory committee, set up Monday. Randles says she will spend months talking to fellow Republicans to decide whether she has adequate support for a 2016 campaign.

Sinquefield’s check appears to be the largest single donation to a candidate in Missouri history.  The check was taken to the Missouri Ethics Commission when Randles' paperwork was filed, and should be on its web site within 48 hours, her spokesman said.

Randles, a Kansas City lawyer, said in an interview, “Rex is one donor. He represents one vote. He is not going to be the only person who contributes during this exploratory phase.”

But Sinquefield's huge check could discourage other candidates in either major party from running for the post. His support for Randles may send a message to incumbent Lt. Gov. Peter Kinder, a Republican serving a third term.

"...Sinquefield's huge check could discourage other candidates..."?  Could? Seriously?

What else is it going to do but discourage other candidates? 

Can you imagine if you're current Lt. Governor Peter Kindle, considering a run for your fourth term? On the one hand, sure, you should have name recognition but if your opponent already has a million dollars in their campaign war chest, with more, surely, possibly available both from Mr. Sinquefield's rather deep pockets, along with anyone and everyone else who might contribute to your opponent's campaign. that's formidable. You have to at least think twice, if not give up entirely. That is already a daunting candidate, even before the campaign has begun. You'd have to overcome not just getting your name and message out but also all the time it would take, raising money, in an attempt to keep up.

I'm not aware of any other state where just one person, one very wealthy person, is trying so thoroughly to buy the government representatives and so, the government he wants. 

Lucky you, Missouri.

But then, it was "lucky Missouri" that got its campaign contribution limits taken down a few years ago, by the Republicans.

Indeed, lucky us.

Here's this rich guy, this Rex Sinquefield, trying to buy not one, not just the highest office in the state, but two---the highest and second highest offices in Missouri.

How's that for chutzpah?

The thing is, now this lack of limits is even hurting Republicans and high profile ones, at that, since Lt. Governor Kinder is, of course, a Republican.

How's that for Karma coming back and biting you?

The fact is, the time has long since come for Missouri to put back up campaign contribution limits. 

Secretary of State Jason Kander has campaigned for bringing back campaign contributions limits---and he's correct---but it's tilting at a bit of a rather Don Quixote like windmill because he's a Democrat and there are all those Republicans in the Statehouse in Jefferson City. It's important we Missourians need to stand up, stand with Mr. Kander and say "Enough!" 

We can't continue to let the wealthy and corporations buy our legislators and government.

We just can't.

Our Obscene Defense Spending, America

Famous and very talented, accomplished author James Fallows writes, this week, in The Atlantic Monthly on the obscene, wasteful Defense budget and our military and it's anything but flattering:

The Tragedy of the American Military

The American public and its political leadership will do anything for the military except take it seriously. The result is a chickenhawk nation in which careless spending and strategic folly combine to lure America into endless wars it can’t win.

Fortunately for us, he didn't stop with just the one article, either:

The Chickenhawk Chronicles, No. 11: A Failure of Grand Strategy

What Alfred Lord Tennyson could teach us about civil-military relations. Plus, the simple lessons of Iraq and Afghanistan, from a naval veteran's point of view.

It's fantastic reading and research, as ever, from Mr. Fallows and it's downright important material many more Americans need to read, be aware of and hopefully, hopefully act on----maybe by contacting our governmental representatives and telling them it must stop.

Here's hoping.

The Nightmare That Is US Military Spening

Americans, you think you're a "peace-loving country", don't you?




Contact your Congressional Representatives and the President. Tell them to get the Defense budget cut. It's bloated, it's wasteful, it's unaccounted for, it's immoral, it's downright obscene.

Contact the U.S. Congress and the White House 

Tell them, not in our name. Not any longer.

Who and What's Bankrupting America?

The corporations and wealthy are bankrupting America, for one, what with all the tax deductions they buy themselves from their---our----legislators, with campaign contributions. They get to write off untold "expenses." Even "Big Oil", one of the most profitable industries in the nation and world, and then they offshore profits, on top of it.

The other culprit bankrupting America?

Look no further than the obscene, bloated, wasteful, nearly completely unaccounted for, utterly immoral defense budget:

Kansas City Gets Some Mention from the Oval Office

Kansas City, as I said above, gets some mention this week from the Oval Office and President Obama, largely due to Google's internet speeds:


Because here's what the big internet providers and free market Capitalism are doing to us in America. They're doing the same thing to us on internet speeds and costs as the health care companies have done and are doing to us for our health care:

Americans are paying more for slower Internet

We're just not that bright.

The More Common but Tragic Racism

"The vast majority of poor people and people of color whose lives have been lost to this inhumane system are never shot or beaten by police. They are not victims of unlawful abuse that can be caught on camera or ferreted out through federal investigation. They are victims of a lawful system of mass incarceration. . . . For every police shooting, tens of thousands of lives will be destroyed by a legal process that wreaks far more havoc on our most vulnerable communities than the illegal use of excessive force by police. . . .The battle for equal justice will only be won when we demand equal treatment in every aspect of our justice system. We must muster outrage over the routine dehumanization that happens in our criminal-justice system, rather than reserve it for the most extraordinary instances of injustice, if we are to maintain a movement for change."

--Jonathan Rapping, lawer and legal defense advocate, author

Links:  Jonathan Rapping — MacArthur Foundation

Jonathan A. Rapping | Harvard Law School

The Republican Part vs. Pope Francis

More particularly, the Republican Party and their economics models vs. Christianity

Awkward...