And Now, A Few Words About William Barr

William Barr was, is, and always will be a Republican hack.

I refer you all to Iran-Contra, Iraqgate, and the pardons George H. W. Bush issued to everyone who ignored the Constitution to do whatever they wanted in the Middle East and Latin America--including shipping drugs into the U.S.--just as an earlier Special Counsel, Lawrence Walsh, was closing in.

Guess who urged Bush the Elder to issue the pardons?

His Attorney General, William Barr.

The preservation of the cesspool that is the GOP is the prime directive of Republican hacks everywhere.

So, of course, Barr says there was no collusion by Trump. Nothing to see here, move along.

The Party must be preserved, even if the President is a traitor, even if countless Republican Senators and Representatives have been bought by the Russians, too.

The Party must be preserved at all costs.

Not the country. Not the Constitution. The Party.

Guns Don't Kill People. Ritalin Kills People.

In a just world, Ollie North would be in prison. Or, perhaps, out on parole.

But this is not a just world...

So Oliver North, who was a TRAITOR, and probably still is, if the price is right, has a new gig!

Ollie is the newest mouthpiece of the NRA.

And Ollie's bit of wisdom about our latest (as of the instant I type this) school shooting, is that it happened because kids are on ritalin.

Not because of the ease at which anyone, even the craziest among us, can get access to all kinds of weaponry. Including some rifles that should only be found on a battlefield.

Not because the NRA, which is essentially the lobbyist for gun manufacturers, has had the Congress in its pocket for 30 years.

Not because the Second Amendment fetishists get all wound up by spurious claims that "the gubmint is coming for our guns!"

Not because this loud, vocal, minority cares more about their guns than they do about anything else. Anything.

No. None of those.

It's the ritalin that's to blame. That makes perfect sense, don't it?

Goddamn, this is a stupid country, chock full of very stupid people.

"Just Say No"

Nancy Reagan will be remembered for three things: her glassy-eyed adoration of her husband, that little red dress, and "just say no", her contribution to the war on drugs.

"Just say no."

As a simple, easy to remember catch phrase, sure.

As a drug policy, not so much.

But it was all we got from the Gipper and Mrs. Gipper.

And that was the 80's in nutshell:

Rich, comfortable, smugly clueless people telling the rest of us to "just say no."

As the CIA helped flood black neighborhoods with crack cocaine to fund Ronnie's illegal war against the Contras.

As thousands of people died from AIDS, a disease that neither of them acknowledged until one of their own, Rock Hudson, contracted it.

As American trained death squads wandered around Central America, killing any leftists they could find.

As the Republican Party began its systematic dismantling of the American Middle Class.

And all the while trillions of dollars disappeared into the waiting maws of defense contractors.

It was Nancy's reactionary father who turned dear, simple Ronnie from an FDR Democrat to a fire breathing, red baiting, FBI informant Republican.

Weep for Nancy Reagan's passing? Let her family do that.

The rest of us should...

"Just say no."