BartBlog

Books bring such pleasure into my life. While reading, I get to spend major time with some of the greatest human beings who ever lived — hours and hours with them. I love books!

But sometimes what these great authors have to say isn’t always so pleasant.

Currently I’m reading a book written back in 2005 — but it could easily have been written today. What’s the Matter with Kansas, by Thomas Frank. Absolutely nothing has changed in America since 2005. The average American is still trying to do the moral thing — and Wall Street and War Street have still managed to convince him or her that the truly moral thing to do is to hand over all our power and all our money to the global super-elites. That’s just weird. Are Americans still that gullible and masochistic? Apparently so.

The author says that the average voter in America in 2005 cared more about eliminating women’s reproductive choices than about healthcare, jobs, education or even life itself — just as long as there are no more safe abortions. And Americans still think that way. Would I myself vote for some guy who only promises to halt legal abortions — even if it means that I would die tomorrow of starvation, homelessness or lack of healthcare? Hmmm. No-brainer! I love food and a comfortable bed far too much!

But what happens to a fetus after it’s born? “Hey, that’s someone else’s problem.”

I’m also reading another book that was just recently published. America is better than this: Trump’s War Against Immigrant Families. Its author, U.S. Senator Jeff Merkley, painstakingly details many of the horrors inflicted on kids kept in freezing-cold cages at our southern border. “Inflicting trauma on children has become a political strategy.” https://www.twelvebooks.com/titles/jeff-merkley/america-is-better-than-this/9781538734186/

Americans are saving fetuses? And then imprisoning, raping, endangering, traumatizing and torturing children? Seriously? Where’s the disconnect here, America? What is missing in America’s morality?

It’s like going to church twice a week but ignoring everything that Jesus teaches us.

It’s like protecting embryos in their mothers’ wombs but setting the Devil loose on them after they are born.

It’s like turning morality on its head.

PS: I just heard Senator Merkley give a talk about his new book — and he also signed my copy personally! Now here is a man who has his moral priorities straight. I highly recommend his book. And reading it is probably the only way that I’m going to be able to spend several hours with a U.S. Senator too.

I don’t think I’ll be reading Mitch McConnell’s book any time soon, however. I can already imagine what it would be about. “I screwed the Senate. I screwed the American people. And I made a whole pile of money doing it too! God bless Jesus and amen.”

At his book-signing event, Senator Merkley wrote in my copy, “Let’s re-light Lady Liberty’s torch!” Yeah, duh. And let’s also re-light America’s soul-crushing need for genuine morality. Let’s stop buying the snake oil. Let’s do whatever we can to stop America from kidnapping, imprisoning, torturing, raping and traumatizing little kids.

While commuting back and forth to the recent American Bar Association convention in San Francisco, I dragged along Seth Rosenfeld’s 600-page tome, Subversives, so that I would have something to read on BART during the commute.

Rosenfeld spent years and years in court trying to force the FBI to surrender more than 250,000 pages of documents chronicling J. Edgar Hoover’s personal and highly illegal war on everyone in America who dared to think differently than him. What Hoover did back then was totally un-American and disgusting. And yet even today most of us are still brainwashed enough to allow the FBI building in Washington DC to continue to be named after this abdominal man.

Sidebar: Please sign my petition to rename the FBI building. Rename it for who? I don’t care. Just pick a name. Any honest and moral person in Washington will do — if you can find one! Here’s the link to my petition: http://chng.it/hQNbKVg8

America continues to honor that crook J. Edgar Hoover — yet no one will give a job to Colin Kaepernick? That’s just fracked up!

So when an honor guard presented the colors at the ABA’s final assembly of delegates and Robert Simms sang the national anthem, I too took a knee. Hey, you should try it sometime. Nothing I have done in this world makes me feel more patriotic — than when I am humbly down on one knee expressing my god-given right to dissent.

J. Edgar Hoover would have hated me.

ABA members, however, seemed to think I was doing the right thing — even if no one else joined me. It was that kind of convention. Lots of diversity.

More highlights from the convention: Did you know that cannabinoids are being legalized federally through a farm bill? Seems that farmers all want to grow hemp now that soy products can no longer be profitably sold to China. Even though Trump is eliminating tariffs on Apple products made in China, he’s still willing to screw both America’s farmers and the fan club who voted for him. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6zhUJE7heU8&feature=youtu.be

I also learned that the concept of judicial review is not written into the Constitution. And also that “If we want true justice, we need to make sure that everyone receives equal justice.” So true. And we were also reminded of what Justice Sotomayor said about being diplomatic. At the end of the day, she still has to work with the other eight justices at least 40 hours a week — so they all do need to be polite to each other. Americans also need to learn not to [poop] in their own nests as well. And, like it or not, in these intense times of horrific war-mongering and terrifying climate-change escalation, the entire world is now our nest.

The Chief Justice for our heroic Ninth Circuit federal court also spoke. The Ninth Circuit is famous for holding out in favor of justice over politics. No judge on the court dares to retire for fear that he or she will be replaced by one of the Koch brothers’ flying monkeys. “Justice is not a spectator sport.”

At another panel, attorneys talked bout Trump v. Hawaii. “The courts must hold the government’s feet to the fire — even with regard to national security.” The Nazis were held accountable at Nuremberg. Americans should be held accountable too. “In times of crisis people may say, ‘Oh this is different’ — but it is not.”

Tell that to J. Edgar Hoover’s evil ghost! And take his damn name off the FBI building in DC while you’re at it too.

PS: The ABA President’s Reception was held at the Contemporary Jewish Museum — which had an exhibit called “Dark Matter,” extolling the virtues of Black America’s street culture. Ha! Tell that to the Palestinians whose “Street Culture” is being systematically murdered back in ZionistLand.

But the rest of the museum was nice. And it would be unjust of me to equate Jews with Zionists. Jews honor justice. Zionists honor…not sure if they honor anything at all. No wonder Trump and Netanyahu get along so well. They both take a knee to self-aggrandizement.

PPS: Many people compare Donald Trump to Adolph Hitler. Same rhetorical style, same appeal to his minions’ base immorality. But I myself compare Trump to Herbert Hoover (as well as J. Edgar) because of Trump’s arse-kissing attitude toward the rapacious global elite and also because of his “Let them eat cake” attitude toward America’s salt of the earth in the face of our upcoming Great Depression II. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6zhUJE7heU8&feature=youtu.be

“So what can we do to prevent this oncoming juggernaut of war, famine, death and pestilence?” you might ask. Our small, individual acts of defiance against injustice really do matter. Whenever you see injustice, for Christ’s sake take a knee. Be patriotic!
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Stop Wall Street and War Street from destroying our world. And while you’re at it, please buy my books. https://www.amazon.com/Jane-Stillwater/e/B00IW6O1RM

At the recent American Bar Association annual convention in San Francisco, I managed to come up with several burning questions. For instance, why are they serving us giant pretzels? It’s San Francisco, for crying out loud. Shouldn’t we be getting crab salad and sourdough instead?

And here’s another burning question. “When the ABA showed us the film And Then They Came for Us regarding the 1940s illegal concentration camps for Japanese-American citizens, why did the rows and rows of barracks in the movie remind me so much of the rows and rows of barracks in the current concentration camps at our southern border?”
https://www.thentheycamedoc.com/

And my next burning question? “If Japanese-Americans were incarcerated illegally because they were accused of being a threat to national security, then how come that threat was never proven?”

According to an ABA panel that spoke on this subject the other day, the answer is, “Hell, no!” A threat was never proven and, in fact, what was proven later was that our government had actually even doctored the evidence. Even that freak J. Edgar Hoover said that Japanese-Americans never posed a threat to America.

So. Next burning question. “Do the Honduran refugees who are legally seeking asylum at our southern borders actually pose a threat to America’s national security — or is this just another trumped-up charge?” I think that asylum seekers are getting a bum rap. And apparently the ABA thinks so too.

Who in their right mind can possibly prove that two-month-old babies are a clear-and-present danger to America’s national security? Nobody can.

But if two-month-old babies actually do pose such a huge threat to America’s national security, then why the freak is our government spending 800 billion dollars a year on nuclear weapons, tanks and killer drones to defend us against babies? Get real. Shouldn’t they be spending all that money on diapers and cradles instead?

Another interesting thing that I learned from this ABA panel was with regard to the Rule of Law. “The Rule of Law isn’t as important than the content of that Rule.” Nazi Germany was famous for its extensive Rule of Law. GWB followed his own Rule of Law. Obama and Clinton instigated NATO’s phony “humanitarian” Rule of Law in their illegal invasions of Syria and Libya and just look where that got us. And Donald Trump’s so-called Rule of Law? Yeah, right. I rest my case! https://unac.notowar.net/2019/08/09/another-perspective-on-middle-east-peace/

PS: The Themis Bar Review gave out some really awesome free ballpoint, pens, the bar association’s Criminal Justice Section hosted an excellent buffet and the ABA itself scored us tickets to a Giants vs. Phillies game!

“Eat your vegetables,” our mothers used to tell us when we were kids — but all we really wanted to eat was birthday cake! And mostly just the frosting. “That’s no way to be healthy,” said Mom.

Unfortunately it seems like the handful of wealthy movers and shakers who run our world also think like these little kids as well. “All we want is something that will produce high interest rates,” they cry — and then bang their spoons on their high chairs too.

But these wealthy .001% elite people have been clearly blindsided by greed. “Let them eat cake” is all they can think. https://www.sevenstories.com/books/4097-giants

And to their narrow vision, the only things that produce high enough interest rates are only Wars and Walls. No one can live for long on that kind of a diet. Not the CitiBank-Chase-Wells-Fargo types. Not the military-industrial complex. Not even Wall Street. And certainly not Marie Antoinette. Eat your veggies, guys!

You can still get good interest rates by investing in solar power, infrastructure, a Green New Deal — even in higher education and MediCare for all. It would be a win-win situation. “Where’s the fun in that?” Just ask Marie Antoinette.

PS: If interest rates based on Walls and Wars are as unhealthy as cake, then perhaps the wealthy .001% should pursue happiness instead — like the Declaration of Independence tells us. High interest rates will never make the elite happy — and never build strong muscles, teeth and bones either.

PPS: Have you guessed by now that the main purpose of Trump’s fake Wall isn’t to keep asylum-seekers out? And that his cruel prison camps for babies aren’t to keep America safe either? The .001% elite could care less about any of that. The main purpose of the Wall and the concentration camps are to make money — but not money for people like us.

PPPS: To quote RuPaul, “Some people are so poor, all they have is money.” No conscience, no humanity, no soul. Even young Honduran mothers trapped in cages at our southern border have more abundance than the elite .001%.

And here’s what journalist Steve Fournier has to say about the recent NRA-sanctioned murders in Gilroy, Dayton and El Paso:

“It’s not what we’re about,” said the mayor of El Paso, Texas, after a young white guy shot down a crowd of dark-skinned shoppers with a military-style rifle. Actually, this is what we’re about.

Shooting, bombing, and otherwise terrorizing dark-skinned people is our stock in trade. We kill them in Iraq. We kill them in Libya. We kill them in Yemen. We’re OK with that. Ask any newsman. Ask your candidates for office. Anybody out there want to end the killing? One presidential candidate had the gall to suggest that the USA might be blameworthy in some way for the wars it wages — this was before the latest shootings — and the newsmen came down on her like a ton of [poop]. https://www.tulsi2020.com/

You can comb published reports of the latest massacres, and you’ll find no mention of the wars we’ve been waging without pause for the last 20 years. The latest two mass murderers never knew a time when their nation was not dropping bombs on people in faraway lands. Does the question not occur to the media: if it’s OK that we, as a nation, employ soldiers to kill black and brown people as a matter of policy in distant countries, isn’t it also OK for individuals to take up arms, on our behalf, and do the same here? ”

“Gun control” won’t help us with this problem, and neither will improved mental hygiene. You want to prevent mass murder, quit killing people. www.currentinvective.com

There was so much to see and do in Philadelphia. Who knew? I stayed in a fourth-floor walk-up in Chinatown and ate beef chow fun at M-Kee, an old-school hole-in-the-wall straight outta Shanghai. Then there was Mueller’s Amish bakery for dessert (no, not that Mueller) at the Reading Market. They surely don’t skimp on the sugar. https://www.yelp.com/biz/m-kee-philadelphia

There is a science museum in Philadelphia with a planetarium and an old locomotive train as big as a house — or even bigger. 350 tons of cast iron, looking pretty much like Darth Vader. I took a whole bunch of photos of it because I couldn’t even believe it was real! After avoiding a whole bunch of food trucks selling cheese steaks, I visited Philly’s fancy wedding-cake and rococo City Hall next. You gotta see it to believe it. https://www.fi.edu/exhibit/train-factory

What should I do next? WWBFD? What would Benjamin Franklin do? Wander over to the Historic District, of course. I even splurged and bought a T-shirt at the Independence Hall gift shop that had a picture of Washington, Jefferson, Franklin and Hamilton crossing Abby Road and singing, “We all want a Revolution….” So appropriate for today — although I would be willing to settle for just a Green New Deal. And perhaps an impeachment or two. Oh, and fair elections that haven’t been gerrymandered and tampered with by the Repubs, Google, FaceBook, the DNC, the Saudis and AIPAC. https://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2019/08/02/empire-coming-for-tulsi-gabbard/

But the jewel in the crown of downtown Philly was definitely the Barnes Foundation — where they are sitting on at least a billion dollars worth of French Impressionist paintings. My jaw just dropped. Dropped! One gallery alone contained a Picasso, several Monets, a few Cezannes, several Van Goghs, a Modigliani and two or three Degas. And that was just one gallery out of twenty. Apparently this Barnes guy got on the band-wagon early and was able to buy up all these paintings for cheap. Wish that had been me. https://www.barnesfoundation.org/whats-on/collection

And then things got real. I took the #23 bus out to North Philly and then transferred to the #60 bus for another two miles. Why? Because I had just finished reading Elizabeth Acevedo’s latest novel and she had mentioned at Puerto Rican restaurant named “Freddie and Tony”. Solidarity with Puerto Rico! At least they have the cajones down there to actually stage a revolution when things get too corrupt. http://www.acevedowrites.com/about

The bus ride was worth it. While the pork chops were a bit over-cooked, the homemade flan was dreamy. And I also got to take a look at the Other Philly — home of closed schools, used-tire lots, food stamps, dollar stores, high unemployment, homelessness and broken-down cars. Not exactly the type of place you would go in the “Pursuit of Happiness” but folks in North Philly made do. Good for them.

Downtown Philadelphia was beautiful, wonderful and historic as hell. North Philly just looked like the rest of America — just trying to get by.

It’s time for us all to follow the example of Jefferson, Franklin, Hamilton, Washington — and Puerto Rico — and also demand an end to corruption in our current federal government as well.
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Stop Wall Street and War Street from destroying our world. And while you’re at it, please buy my books. https://www.amazon.com/Jane-Stillwater/e/B00IW6O1RM