Robert, I thought President Biden gave an excellent, persuading speech. He was articulate and speaking straight from the heart. He was speaking to all Americans, not just Democrats. As Americans we have got to decide whether we want to continue without common sense gun laws and continue having multiple massacres every month. Or, do we want to join the civilized nations in the world who have common sense gun laws and fewer deaths by firearms. It is as simple as that.
Most people are parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles. America has always been known as a country that cares about the welfare of children. It is time for us to prove it.
Thank you for the clarification on what is allowable as an "executive order", so much gets blamed on Biden that is NOT his fault! I thought he gave a good speech and spoke of many things we have talked about at home...in the end it IS up to we the people, to VOTE!!
Boy, does that nail it. Thanks, Cathy. Reminds me that the survival of a democracy like ours is the participation of an INFORMED citizenry. On my bad days, I don't think American voters are stupid; I think we're lazy. Too many of us who are white, reasonably comfortable, and acceptably liberal, just don't seem to have the motivation to do what is required. With the economic disparity in this country and the amount and intensity of poverty both in our cities and in rural America, I am frankly puzzled that there hasn't been a revolution.
Income disparity is a key element in fixing the problems with our government. Yet, the Supreme Court is actually going the other direction and dismantling democracy. I don't think citizens are lazy, I think they don't think their vote makes any difference. And in some ways they are right with Citizens United authorizing legalized bribery, the gutting of the Voting Rights Act and now the taking away of rights like Roe. Our "representatives" vote with their donors 95% of the time and not with their constituents. If we all got out and voted we can change all this. I, quite frankly, ready to join a non-violent revolution. If the Supreme Court overturns Roe, I will! I have already vowed not to vote for any RPINO (Republican Party in Name Only) at any level in government, local, state or federal. Together we can make change. If we give up the result will be catastrophic. We, the People, all of us this time! Vote! It Matters!
Yes, Cathy, but I do think those of us who don't feel the immediate, sharp, daily impact of racism and poverty, have an outrage that is a step or two removed from the problem. I can read about the tenements in Manhattan where rats bite children while they sleep, and I can get indignant enough to chew nails, but honestly, I can neither manufacture nor even imagine that reality. No matter how sincere and intense my outrage, it fades and I can be distracted by other things.
I've been at this for a long time and I have never found a satisfactory explanation for why the McConnell's and his ilk manage to succeed with their consistently ugly message. We have a problem, for one thing, with the wretched American dream of the individual--free, unrestricted, self-made, independent, etc. It's always been the struggle of Western culture, this battle between the rights of the individual and the good of the community. We consistently come down on the side of the individual, and what we see in our world today is the fruits of that choice. Biden, at his best (and I think he has handled most things stunningly well), comes across as a kind man, sometimes roused to anger, but fundamentally powerless to turn either the kindness or the anger into concrete results. And the press is now 100% complicit in actually concealing from the public the list of his concrete results.
We have to do something and the only thing we have is the vote.
Dean, you are so correct in this. Why people are beating up on Biden rather than getting behind him is beyond me. Whenever I hear him talk I am reminded that there is a decent, intelligent leader in our country. But leaders can't lead without committed followers and we have to help him out. We have to "stand up and be counted", as my mother used to say. No leader can or should do this alone. McConnell wasted eight years of the intelligent leadership of Barack Obama and he's trying to do the same damn thing with Biden. He has to be stopped. We must change this--nonviolently. There's a book you might enjoy called, The Dandelion Insurrection, by Rivera Sun. It's a little different--a book of speculative fiction. But it did make me think in new ways.,
I spent my life teaching English--there is nothing that communicates truth and opens minds to new ways of thinking better than well-written fiction. For one thing, it provides insights into the complexities of human beings that no "study" can ever do. I think one of the big problems in our current situation is the black and white thinking of those who only see conflict between one absolute position and another. Immediately, I think about the almost pure praise of Obama and Biden on this forum. Granted, compared to the Republican alternatives, those two look like saints, but in reality they aren't. Joe Biden plagiarized work, led the charge against Anita Hill, and mocked the women who spoke against his too-familiar physical touch. Barack Obama wasn't touched with a single scandal, but was dead set against gay marriage and had to be pushed into supporting it by--guess who? Joe Biden.
Not one single fact of which calls into question my admiration for either of them. I've been aware of Biden's good work for decades and admired much of it, and I am an unapologetic Obama groupie!! I adored him right from the moment he appeared. Is he as clever a politician who's come along in a great while? You bet he is? Was he the naive idealist and reluctant candidate he appeared when he ran the first time? Not a bit of it.
If we could somehow stop seeing the world as either-or and open our eyes to the possibility of both-and, who knows what might be possible. That's one key to the Republicans' repeated success. They present one clear side and it's right and it's their side. And they repeat it like a refrain. And it works.
I think I'd better go read my voter's manual right now and get out there and vote. There is so much at stake, but taking the time to really be engaged citizens is perhaps the best place to start. Thanks for those words.
Please take someone with you who needs a ride to the polls. Also recommend going to VOTE411.org and get non-partisan Voters Guides published by the League of Women Voters. The candidates' answers to a few questions are printed verbatim! Thank you for voting!
Yes! I was surprised and deeply moved by Biden's decent, thorough and total demolition of the naysaying, defeatist chatter that has blanketed the airwaves as we struggle to address the current wave of domestic terrorism: angry men armed with weapons of war invading churches, hospitals and schools. Insanity. We can, we must, do what we know we need to do: wrest control of our country from a hideous culture that celebrates guns, machismo and death. Enough. Save the children, save the teachers and doctors -- save ourselves.
"[Biden] is attempting to wrest control of the terms of the debate from temporizing Republicans and give it back to the American people—so that they can vote on the issue of gun control in 2022 and 2024." Exactly right, in a nutshell. The whole purpose of a democracy is to respond to the popular will. Joe Biden, in this speech, is harassing the existing views of Americans to their capacity to vote for candidates who support their views. I appreciate Biden's effort and your commentary.
I agree with you that President Biden's speech was powerful and powerfully delivered. It should be played again and again until We the People demand and get action on gun legislation.
I asked a member of a memoir group I lead if I could pass on a piece she wrote, which I think is a fitting companion to Biden's speech:
A Moment of Noise
“Dear friends,
Do not lose heart. . .
I, too, am stumbling
under the burden of my not-enoughness.”*
I am all out of words. I have used up, run out of outrage. I am shattered by what has happened in a little town in Texas. I should never have heard of this town and I weep for its fame. I grieve for the survivors as much as I grieve for the dead. How does the teacher who propped open the door of the school go back to her classroom — to any classroom? How do the local police continue to enforce the law when they appeared at best inept and at worst cowards? How does anyone understand why he or she survived and how do they go on with their lives?
I am trying to understand a world in which it is normal for a parent to give a fourth grader a cell phone and instructions on how and why to call 911. I am trying to understand a world in which a fourth grader knows that she may survive being murdered by smearing herself with a classmate’s blood. I am trying, once more, to make sense of a country that allows citizens to own weapons meant for the battlefield. And I am trying to control my anger, my contempt, my despair for the country I still love, where mass murder is so common in our schools that there is a federal grant available so that the blood and chaos can be tidied up by simply razing the offending school building.
I don’t want to stand for a moment of silence called for by a clergyman who will preach against abortion but not against gun-violence. I don’t want to listen to anyone who clothes himself in false righteousness, but does nothing to protect the innocent. And I certainly don’t want to listen to a storm of rhetoric by self-serving politicians who are funded by the NRA. I wait, I listen for those same voices to speak out against the gun lobby. I wait for these people who love life so much to take a public stand and do something to save the children dying in their classrooms and on our streets.
I sit in the darkness, trying not to lose hope. I hold on to my faith and a belief in the possibility of change; I repeat the familiar prayer, “I believe, help my unbelief.” And I remind myself, do not lose heart. Do not lose heart.
Marie-Therese Marzullo
*Quotation from Seasons of the Heart by Macrina Wiedozkehr
Eric Swalwell just said that a mother told him her 6-year-old daughter saw the pictures of the Uvalde victims on the news and asked her mom, “What picture are you going to use for me?”
What has to happen to so many politicians hearts not to be moved by this and other stories of our children's losing their childhoods if not their lives? Apparently it doesn't matter because they will not change....so we need to do whatever we can to vote them out of office and power.
Help me not to despair. We have had so many chances to "vote them out of office and power." There seems to be a complete disconnect between words like Biden's and any kind of substantial action. When the spokesmen for the alt-right speak, the connection is immediate and effective. I wish I understood it as something less disturbing than a prevalence of hate over love in the human heart.
That is beautiful. I'm going to fill out my ballot now and next Saturday, June 11, I'm going with my daughter, her friends, and mine to march in San Francisco. Enough.,
One thing that has been missing in both gun laws and anti-abortion laws and the Supreme Court's rulings on them is what I call the "Principle of Responsibility" in a democratic republic. In a democratic republic where government is supposed to be "By and For the People" laws which give one right a priority of one group of people over the rights of another group people is anarchy not democracy. The right to own any gun needs to be tempered with the use of guns to take away the right to life of other citizens. The absolute right of a fetus to life over the right to life and privacy of the woman carrying the fetus is also wrong. The Principle of Responsibility in a democratic republic is that with any individual right there comes the responsibility to protect the rights of others. Without that responsibility an absolute right given one individual becomes anarchy if it takes away especially the right to life for others. There must be a balance reached like Roe v Wade has done now for almost fifty years. Justice Alito's draft position denies a woman her right to determine the risk to her own life by making forced pregnancy law based on one group's religious tenets. The same now needs to be done with gun rights providing some level of protection of the right to life of others. No individual or group of individuals should have more rights than the whole. We, the people, all of us this time.
I remember well this being told to me many times to me by my Dad when I was young when he explained his own involvement in various challenges and stances he took on issues while encouraging me to do likewise. I have provided this advice to my own children and many others as well. “Just because something is not your fault, does not mean it's not still your responsibility.“
Thank you for this Robert, and especialy for this:
"Those commentators miss the point of Biden’s speech. He is attempting to wrest control of the terms of the debate from temporizing Republicans and give it back to the American people—so that they can vote on the issue of gun control in 2022 and 2024. America must ban assault weapons and will never succeed unless we declare our resolve to achieve a ban. In that regard, Biden’s speech was a welcome change of tactics that succeeded in its purpose."
I wonder if keeping Hungary and Turkey as members of NATO is good for NATO. They both appear to be staunchly supportive of Putin. Hungary scuttled the sanctioning of the head of the Russian Orthodox Church who has been cheering Putin on with his war against Ukraine. Are those two countries really friends of the Western Alliance?
Better, at least right now, to have them in where there are political and financial pressures that can be brought to bear on them than out where they are less susceptible.
A simple truth understood by anyone who has even a passing knowledge of economics supplied by introductory university courses in the subject is that the President can have little impact on the rate of inflation. Congress with it's budgetary powers can have a far more significant though lagging impact. In the short term the Federal Reserve Board can have a moderating or accelerating impact through it's control of the monetary supply and interest rates.
However, Congress through it's legislative and budgetary powers has primary control over policies related to healthcare including reproductive healthcare, gun violence reduction efforts or none, police reforms or none, and taxation fairness and equity.
So when I speak to voters about thinking carefully on their choices, I urge them to focus their attention and their votes on where they can actually have an impact, areas where those they are choosing amongst can actually make their lives better, healthier, and safer or can make their lives of themselves and their families worse, less healthy, diminished, and poorer. Choose wisely. It will make a difference.
I am embarrassed to say I never took an economic course, but I have a rough understanding that federal spending has little to no impact on inflation. And as to the old shibboleth that deficit spending causes inflation, please explain the 1% inflation rate over the last decade of huge deficits. Instead, it is monetary policy that affects inflation, which is largely under the control of the independent Federal Reserve. See, e.g., the near zero inflation rate over the last decade with 1% interest rates. I know it is not that simple, but there are many more obvious answers to the current bout of inflation that don't get talked about: pent up savings rate during the pandemic, labor shortages, supply chain disruption and price gouging by businesses that have decided to use inflation as an excuse to raise prices far beyond their increased costs due to inflation. (sorry to go on at length from a guy with no economics background; forgive me if I am 100% wrong.)
Spot on with your observations. There are some ways in which the budgetary powers of Congress and spending can have an impact on spending but it is not actually directly through fiscal policy (spending and taxing) rather it is through their influence on the money supply and interest rates. While the Fed has direct control of the money supply and interest rates, Congress can definitely have an impact, although as I said it is more a lagging impact and therefore not a very effective control. Excessive spending and reduced taxation (without trying to define or quantify excessive) puts more money into the economy and therefore the supply of money and capital, spurring demand for goods and services and sometimes can compete with private demand for goods also heating up and raising prices. Likewise excess deficit spending causing the Treasury to issue more debt (borrowing money) can influence interest rates by competing for available investment dollars and thereby driving up interest rates. These are pretty ineffective monetary controls but Congress has never been particularly good at anything else so we should not be surprised they are not adept at using these tools. A challenge repeatedly for the Fed has been the tendency of Congress to exactly the wrong thing at the wrong time while the Fed is doing its best to muddle through.
The clip I saw of Swalwell's remarks was powerful. I also saw him make a comment that his 5 yr old asked him which photo Swalwell would use for him/her , when looking at the photos representing the children of Uvalde. Heartbreaking.
As far as the Russian Orthodox church supporting Putin: no surprise. They supported Pogroms against Jews. Just to bring some folks up to speed...a Pogrom were rape, pillage, and plunder missions. These could last for days. These were sanctioned by the Czar and by the Church. Many occurred right around Easter. Nice tradition, huh!
I can't tell you how disgusted and disappointed I am by the ROC actions. Dostoevsky wrote a short story about Christ returning during the time of the Inquisition. (The Grand Inquisitor). He is arrested by church leaders and they sentence him to be burned. The Grand Inquisitor says to Christ, "We are not with Thee, but with him, and that is our secret! For centuries have we abandoned Thee to follow him." Substitute "Satan" or "Putin" for "him" and the passage works equally well. Patriarch Kirill should reflect on that passage every day.
Robert, I think you know how much I appreciate your newsletters and the unflagging optimism and encouragement they give us every day. So this is absolutely not a criticism. I feel this morning I’d like to give words to some of the frustration that we/I am feeling. Republicans are spreading lies and disinformation which continues to permeate our discourse and people are still buying it. The answer? Vote them out. They are putting elaborate schemes in place to take over elections. The answer? Vote them out….in large numbers. They are killing our children and grandparents with their gun nonsense. The answer? Vote them out. They have gerrymandered districts and in many cases (Florida) courts have refused to do anything. The answer? Vote them out, and wait another 10 years for another census. We seem to be the only ones trying to do something. Where is the Justice Department, and the AG? Where are the judges who should not be afraid to make a sane ruling? Where are the leaders of the Democratic Party…you know, the ones who should be pulling the fire alarm loudly? Where are the people with a real platform? I fully understand the “power of the people”, but dear God we need reinforcements.
Question for the voters: What’s more important, your wallet or your life and the lives of your loved ones? Will you vote on inflation or on the denial of personal liberty to most Americans, and threats to the lives of all? That’s the question Democrats need to be asking, loudly, every hour between now and Election Day. Maybe there really are scores of millions of voters who love the unregulated right to possess weapons that enable mass killing, or maybe the people who feel that way just make the most noise. Maybe the polls are wrong and 2/3 of Americans don’t want Roe v. Wade upheld. Let’s find out.
First, I'm really glad to see that President Biden reads the Comments section of your newsletter, Robert, and took my advice by giving a prime time speech. The moment called out for it.
Biden finally used the "bully pulpit" to call for legislative action while simultaneously undercutting Republican arguments opposing legislation. Quoting from Scalia's opinion in Heller was brilliant. (For more on that, see link below to today's "A Note to Readers" by Ellie Honig.)
My only criticisms of his speech were, first, he should have announced an assault weapon buy-back program (something I'm guessing he can instruct the Treasury Dept to do via executive order) and, second, asked Americans to take action NOW by calling their elected Senator and *demand* they take action to stop this bloodshed.
With reference to "Holding Trump Accountable," how's the saying go? What goes around comes around? It will be ignominable payback when "The Worst Attorney General in American History—Bill Barr—" is subpoenaed to testify before the Federal Grand Jury. I'm guessing they will have some interesting questions for Mr. Barr (who's father was the headmaster at my school - a tight-arsed SOB) about his story published in the WSJ (see link below). As a refresher:
"When I [Bill Barr] left that afternoon for my previously scheduled meeting in the West Wing with the president’s chief of staff, Mark Meadows, and Pat Cipollone, the White House counsel, I knew what to expect. President Trump hailed me down to meet with him. I knew it would be an unpleasant meeting. . . .
I looked at POTUS and greeted him. “Hello, Mr. President.”
There was an awkward silence. He put down the remote control, at first not looking at me. I could tell he was enraged, struggling to keep his temper under control. He shuffled through some papers on the table, looking for something, his breathing a little heavier than usual, his nostrils flaring slightly. Finding what he wanted, he thrust a news clipping at me. “Did you say this?” he snapped.
It was the Balsamo article. “Yes, I did, Mr. President,” I responded. “Why would you say that?” he demanded, his voice rising. “Because it is true, Mr. President,” I replied. “The reporter asked me what the department had found to date, and I told him.”
‘He stopped for a moment and then said, ‘You must hate Trump. You would only do this if you hate Trump.
“But you did not have to say that!” he barked. “You could have just said, ‘No comment.’ This is killing me—killing me. This is pulling the rug out from under me.” He stopped for a moment and then said, “You must hate Trump. You would only do this if you hate Trump.”
“No, Mr. President, I don’t hate you,” I said. “You know I sacrificed a lot personally to come in to help you when I thought you were being wronged.” The president nodded, almost involuntarily conceding the point. “But over the weekend, you started blaming the department for the inability of your legal team to come up with evidence of fraud. The department is not an extension of your legal team. Our mission is to investigate and prosecute actual fraud. The fact is, we have looked at the major claims your people are making, and they are bullshit.”
Hopefully, Trumps' train is finally leaving the station headed toward **USP ADX Florence.** (From Wikipedia: USP ADX Florence houses male inmates in the federal prison system deemed the most dangerous and in need of the tightest control, including prisoners whose escape would pose a serious threat to national security.)
Thanks for the link to Elie Honig's Cafe article. I have been looking for the opportunity to respond to John Bash's NYTimes op-ed in which he attempts to wash the blood off his hands for helping Scalia draft the Heller opinion. In his op ed, Bash cites to the opening paragraph that Ellie quotes in her article--i.e., that America can still regulate guns. But what Bash and Scalia did after that was to do violence to the words of the Constitution--a fact nowhere mentioned in Bash's apologist op-ed.
I think Bash now regrets his role in helping Scalia and Trump. (At least, I hope he does.) If you check out his bio on his law firm website, his "prior experience" description highlighted on the website does not mention clerking for Scalia. (That info can be found by digging through a tab entitled, "Prior Associations.) Hmm . . . How many Supreme Court clerks make you dig for that information in their professional biographies? And, oh by the way, Bash highlights his work as "Special Assistant to the President and Associate Counsel to the President." Hmm. . . Which "President" did Bash work for? He's not saying, but you can figure that out with one guess.
Robert, I thought President Biden gave an excellent, persuading speech. He was articulate and speaking straight from the heart. He was speaking to all Americans, not just Democrats. As Americans we have got to decide whether we want to continue without common sense gun laws and continue having multiple massacres every month. Or, do we want to join the civilized nations in the world who have common sense gun laws and fewer deaths by firearms. It is as simple as that.
Most people are parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles. America has always been known as a country that cares about the welfare of children. It is time for us to prove it.
Well said.
Thank you.
Thank you for the clarification on what is allowable as an "executive order", so much gets blamed on Biden that is NOT his fault! I thought he gave a good speech and spoke of many things we have talked about at home...in the end it IS up to we the people, to VOTE!!
“We do not have government by the majority. We have government by the majority who participate.” – Thomas Jefferson
Boy, does that nail it. Thanks, Cathy. Reminds me that the survival of a democracy like ours is the participation of an INFORMED citizenry. On my bad days, I don't think American voters are stupid; I think we're lazy. Too many of us who are white, reasonably comfortable, and acceptably liberal, just don't seem to have the motivation to do what is required. With the economic disparity in this country and the amount and intensity of poverty both in our cities and in rural America, I am frankly puzzled that there hasn't been a revolution.
Income disparity is a key element in fixing the problems with our government. Yet, the Supreme Court is actually going the other direction and dismantling democracy. I don't think citizens are lazy, I think they don't think their vote makes any difference. And in some ways they are right with Citizens United authorizing legalized bribery, the gutting of the Voting Rights Act and now the taking away of rights like Roe. Our "representatives" vote with their donors 95% of the time and not with their constituents. If we all got out and voted we can change all this. I, quite frankly, ready to join a non-violent revolution. If the Supreme Court overturns Roe, I will! I have already vowed not to vote for any RPINO (Republican Party in Name Only) at any level in government, local, state or federal. Together we can make change. If we give up the result will be catastrophic. We, the People, all of us this time! Vote! It Matters!
Yes, Cathy, but I do think those of us who don't feel the immediate, sharp, daily impact of racism and poverty, have an outrage that is a step or two removed from the problem. I can read about the tenements in Manhattan where rats bite children while they sleep, and I can get indignant enough to chew nails, but honestly, I can neither manufacture nor even imagine that reality. No matter how sincere and intense my outrage, it fades and I can be distracted by other things.
I've been at this for a long time and I have never found a satisfactory explanation for why the McConnell's and his ilk manage to succeed with their consistently ugly message. We have a problem, for one thing, with the wretched American dream of the individual--free, unrestricted, self-made, independent, etc. It's always been the struggle of Western culture, this battle between the rights of the individual and the good of the community. We consistently come down on the side of the individual, and what we see in our world today is the fruits of that choice. Biden, at his best (and I think he has handled most things stunningly well), comes across as a kind man, sometimes roused to anger, but fundamentally powerless to turn either the kindness or the anger into concrete results. And the press is now 100% complicit in actually concealing from the public the list of his concrete results.
We have to do something and the only thing we have is the vote.
Dean, you are so correct in this. Why people are beating up on Biden rather than getting behind him is beyond me. Whenever I hear him talk I am reminded that there is a decent, intelligent leader in our country. But leaders can't lead without committed followers and we have to help him out. We have to "stand up and be counted", as my mother used to say. No leader can or should do this alone. McConnell wasted eight years of the intelligent leadership of Barack Obama and he's trying to do the same damn thing with Biden. He has to be stopped. We must change this--nonviolently. There's a book you might enjoy called, The Dandelion Insurrection, by Rivera Sun. It's a little different--a book of speculative fiction. But it did make me think in new ways.,
Happy Friday to you all.
I spent my life teaching English--there is nothing that communicates truth and opens minds to new ways of thinking better than well-written fiction. For one thing, it provides insights into the complexities of human beings that no "study" can ever do. I think one of the big problems in our current situation is the black and white thinking of those who only see conflict between one absolute position and another. Immediately, I think about the almost pure praise of Obama and Biden on this forum. Granted, compared to the Republican alternatives, those two look like saints, but in reality they aren't. Joe Biden plagiarized work, led the charge against Anita Hill, and mocked the women who spoke against his too-familiar physical touch. Barack Obama wasn't touched with a single scandal, but was dead set against gay marriage and had to be pushed into supporting it by--guess who? Joe Biden.
Not one single fact of which calls into question my admiration for either of them. I've been aware of Biden's good work for decades and admired much of it, and I am an unapologetic Obama groupie!! I adored him right from the moment he appeared. Is he as clever a politician who's come along in a great while? You bet he is? Was he the naive idealist and reluctant candidate he appeared when he ran the first time? Not a bit of it.
If we could somehow stop seeing the world as either-or and open our eyes to the possibility of both-and, who knows what might be possible. That's one key to the Republicans' repeated success. They present one clear side and it's right and it's their side. And they repeat it like a refrain. And it works.
I think I'd better go read my voter's manual right now and get out there and vote. There is so much at stake, but taking the time to really be engaged citizens is perhaps the best place to start. Thanks for those words.
Please take someone with you who needs a ride to the polls. Also recommend going to VOTE411.org and get non-partisan Voters Guides published by the League of Women Voters. The candidates' answers to a few questions are printed verbatim! Thank you for voting!
We all need to stand up and stand together now.
Yes, Susan, we absolutely do.
Yes! I was surprised and deeply moved by Biden's decent, thorough and total demolition of the naysaying, defeatist chatter that has blanketed the airwaves as we struggle to address the current wave of domestic terrorism: angry men armed with weapons of war invading churches, hospitals and schools. Insanity. We can, we must, do what we know we need to do: wrest control of our country from a hideous culture that celebrates guns, machismo and death. Enough. Save the children, save the teachers and doctors -- save ourselves.
"[Biden] is attempting to wrest control of the terms of the debate from temporizing Republicans and give it back to the American people—so that they can vote on the issue of gun control in 2022 and 2024." Exactly right, in a nutshell. The whole purpose of a democracy is to respond to the popular will. Joe Biden, in this speech, is harassing the existing views of Americans to their capacity to vote for candidates who support their views. I appreciate Biden's effort and your commentary.
Forgive me but did you mean "harnessing the existing views of Americans to their capacity to vote..." If so I agree!!!
I agree with you that President Biden's speech was powerful and powerfully delivered. It should be played again and again until We the People demand and get action on gun legislation.
I asked a member of a memoir group I lead if I could pass on a piece she wrote, which I think is a fitting companion to Biden's speech:
A Moment of Noise
“Dear friends,
Do not lose heart. . .
I, too, am stumbling
under the burden of my not-enoughness.”*
I am all out of words. I have used up, run out of outrage. I am shattered by what has happened in a little town in Texas. I should never have heard of this town and I weep for its fame. I grieve for the survivors as much as I grieve for the dead. How does the teacher who propped open the door of the school go back to her classroom — to any classroom? How do the local police continue to enforce the law when they appeared at best inept and at worst cowards? How does anyone understand why he or she survived and how do they go on with their lives?
I am trying to understand a world in which it is normal for a parent to give a fourth grader a cell phone and instructions on how and why to call 911. I am trying to understand a world in which a fourth grader knows that she may survive being murdered by smearing herself with a classmate’s blood. I am trying, once more, to make sense of a country that allows citizens to own weapons meant for the battlefield. And I am trying to control my anger, my contempt, my despair for the country I still love, where mass murder is so common in our schools that there is a federal grant available so that the blood and chaos can be tidied up by simply razing the offending school building.
I don’t want to stand for a moment of silence called for by a clergyman who will preach against abortion but not against gun-violence. I don’t want to listen to anyone who clothes himself in false righteousness, but does nothing to protect the innocent. And I certainly don’t want to listen to a storm of rhetoric by self-serving politicians who are funded by the NRA. I wait, I listen for those same voices to speak out against the gun lobby. I wait for these people who love life so much to take a public stand and do something to save the children dying in their classrooms and on our streets.
I sit in the darkness, trying not to lose hope. I hold on to my faith and a belief in the possibility of change; I repeat the familiar prayer, “I believe, help my unbelief.” And I remind myself, do not lose heart. Do not lose heart.
Marie-Therese Marzullo
*Quotation from Seasons of the Heart by Macrina Wiedozkehr
Eric Swalwell just said that a mother told him her 6-year-old daughter saw the pictures of the Uvalde victims on the news and asked her mom, “What picture are you going to use for me?”
That is heartbreaking to hear.
What has to happen to so many politicians hearts not to be moved by this and other stories of our children's losing their childhoods if not their lives? Apparently it doesn't matter because they will not change....so we need to do whatever we can to vote them out of office and power.
Help me not to despair. We have had so many chances to "vote them out of office and power." There seems to be a complete disconnect between words like Biden's and any kind of substantial action. When the spokesmen for the alt-right speak, the connection is immediate and effective. I wish I understood it as something less disturbing than a prevalence of hate over love in the human heart.
Dear God . . what have we become?
So unbelievably sad,
That is beautiful. I'm going to fill out my ballot now and next Saturday, June 11, I'm going with my daughter, her friends, and mine to march in San Francisco. Enough.,
Shockingly sad!!
One thing that has been missing in both gun laws and anti-abortion laws and the Supreme Court's rulings on them is what I call the "Principle of Responsibility" in a democratic republic. In a democratic republic where government is supposed to be "By and For the People" laws which give one right a priority of one group of people over the rights of another group people is anarchy not democracy. The right to own any gun needs to be tempered with the use of guns to take away the right to life of other citizens. The absolute right of a fetus to life over the right to life and privacy of the woman carrying the fetus is also wrong. The Principle of Responsibility in a democratic republic is that with any individual right there comes the responsibility to protect the rights of others. Without that responsibility an absolute right given one individual becomes anarchy if it takes away especially the right to life for others. There must be a balance reached like Roe v Wade has done now for almost fifty years. Justice Alito's draft position denies a woman her right to determine the risk to her own life by making forced pregnancy law based on one group's religious tenets. The same now needs to be done with gun rights providing some level of protection of the right to life of others. No individual or group of individuals should have more rights than the whole. We, the people, all of us this time.
"No individual or group of individuals should have more rights than the whole."
I remember well this being told to me many times to me by my Dad when I was young when he explained his own involvement in various challenges and stances he took on issues while encouraging me to do likewise. I have provided this advice to my own children and many others as well. “Just because something is not your fault, does not mean it's not still your responsibility.“
Well said, Cathy. Thank you.
Once again you hit it out of the ballpark Cathy.
Thank you for this Robert, and especialy for this:
"Those commentators miss the point of Biden’s speech. He is attempting to wrest control of the terms of the debate from temporizing Republicans and give it back to the American people—so that they can vote on the issue of gun control in 2022 and 2024. America must ban assault weapons and will never succeed unless we declare our resolve to achieve a ban. In that regard, Biden’s speech was a welcome change of tactics that succeeded in its purpose."
I wonder if keeping Hungary and Turkey as members of NATO is good for NATO. They both appear to be staunchly supportive of Putin. Hungary scuttled the sanctioning of the head of the Russian Orthodox Church who has been cheering Putin on with his war against Ukraine. Are those two countries really friends of the Western Alliance?
An interesting question.
Better, at least right now, to have them in where there are political and financial pressures that can be brought to bear on them than out where they are less susceptible.
I agree Dave. One old saying comes to mind - keep your friends close, and your enemies closer.
A simple truth understood by anyone who has even a passing knowledge of economics supplied by introductory university courses in the subject is that the President can have little impact on the rate of inflation. Congress with it's budgetary powers can have a far more significant though lagging impact. In the short term the Federal Reserve Board can have a moderating or accelerating impact through it's control of the monetary supply and interest rates.
However, Congress through it's legislative and budgetary powers has primary control over policies related to healthcare including reproductive healthcare, gun violence reduction efforts or none, police reforms or none, and taxation fairness and equity.
So when I speak to voters about thinking carefully on their choices, I urge them to focus their attention and their votes on where they can actually have an impact, areas where those they are choosing amongst can actually make their lives better, healthier, and safer or can make their lives of themselves and their families worse, less healthy, diminished, and poorer. Choose wisely. It will make a difference.
Exactly!
I am embarrassed to say I never took an economic course, but I have a rough understanding that federal spending has little to no impact on inflation. And as to the old shibboleth that deficit spending causes inflation, please explain the 1% inflation rate over the last decade of huge deficits. Instead, it is monetary policy that affects inflation, which is largely under the control of the independent Federal Reserve. See, e.g., the near zero inflation rate over the last decade with 1% interest rates. I know it is not that simple, but there are many more obvious answers to the current bout of inflation that don't get talked about: pent up savings rate during the pandemic, labor shortages, supply chain disruption and price gouging by businesses that have decided to use inflation as an excuse to raise prices far beyond their increased costs due to inflation. (sorry to go on at length from a guy with no economics background; forgive me if I am 100% wrong.)
Robert,
Spot on with your observations. There are some ways in which the budgetary powers of Congress and spending can have an impact on spending but it is not actually directly through fiscal policy (spending and taxing) rather it is through their influence on the money supply and interest rates. While the Fed has direct control of the money supply and interest rates, Congress can definitely have an impact, although as I said it is more a lagging impact and therefore not a very effective control. Excessive spending and reduced taxation (without trying to define or quantify excessive) puts more money into the economy and therefore the supply of money and capital, spurring demand for goods and services and sometimes can compete with private demand for goods also heating up and raising prices. Likewise excess deficit spending causing the Treasury to issue more debt (borrowing money) can influence interest rates by competing for available investment dollars and thereby driving up interest rates. These are pretty ineffective monetary controls but Congress has never been particularly good at anything else so we should not be surprised they are not adept at using these tools. A challenge repeatedly for the Fed has been the tendency of Congress to exactly the wrong thing at the wrong time while the Fed is doing its best to muddle through.
I agree that Biden's speech was excellent. I would also highly recommend watching Rep. Swalwell during the Judiciary Comm. meeting: https://twitter.com/RepSwalwell/status/1532414741309792259?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Etweet
I am so glad that dems are calling out the GOP BS: "Are you for the kids or the killers?"
The clip I saw of Swalwell's remarks was powerful. I also saw him make a comment that his 5 yr old asked him which photo Swalwell would use for him/her , when looking at the photos representing the children of Uvalde. Heartbreaking.
Thanks. Don't let us lose track of the $2 billion "bonus" Jared Kushner got from Saudi Arabia.
It may be the biggest financial scandal in US politics, ever. A $2 billion payoff.
(Of course accompanied by the @1 Billion that Mnuchin made...)
Thank you, Robert. Voting is the answer!
As far as the Russian Orthodox church supporting Putin: no surprise. They supported Pogroms against Jews. Just to bring some folks up to speed...a Pogrom were rape, pillage, and plunder missions. These could last for days. These were sanctioned by the Czar and by the Church. Many occurred right around Easter. Nice tradition, huh!
I can't tell you how disgusted and disappointed I am by the ROC actions. Dostoevsky wrote a short story about Christ returning during the time of the Inquisition. (The Grand Inquisitor). He is arrested by church leaders and they sentence him to be burned. The Grand Inquisitor says to Christ, "We are not with Thee, but with him, and that is our secret! For centuries have we abandoned Thee to follow him." Substitute "Satan" or "Putin" for "him" and the passage works equally well. Patriarch Kirill should reflect on that passage every day.
Thanks, Robert. I will have to look up that work by Dostoevsky. In my younger years use to read Chekov and other Russian authors. Missed that one.
Robert, I think you know how much I appreciate your newsletters and the unflagging optimism and encouragement they give us every day. So this is absolutely not a criticism. I feel this morning I’d like to give words to some of the frustration that we/I am feeling. Republicans are spreading lies and disinformation which continues to permeate our discourse and people are still buying it. The answer? Vote them out. They are putting elaborate schemes in place to take over elections. The answer? Vote them out….in large numbers. They are killing our children and grandparents with their gun nonsense. The answer? Vote them out. They have gerrymandered districts and in many cases (Florida) courts have refused to do anything. The answer? Vote them out, and wait another 10 years for another census. We seem to be the only ones trying to do something. Where is the Justice Department, and the AG? Where are the judges who should not be afraid to make a sane ruling? Where are the leaders of the Democratic Party…you know, the ones who should be pulling the fire alarm loudly? Where are the people with a real platform? I fully understand the “power of the people”, but dear God we need reinforcements.
Question for the voters: What’s more important, your wallet or your life and the lives of your loved ones? Will you vote on inflation or on the denial of personal liberty to most Americans, and threats to the lives of all? That’s the question Democrats need to be asking, loudly, every hour between now and Election Day. Maybe there really are scores of millions of voters who love the unregulated right to possess weapons that enable mass killing, or maybe the people who feel that way just make the most noise. Maybe the polls are wrong and 2/3 of Americans don’t want Roe v. Wade upheld. Let’s find out.
First, I'm really glad to see that President Biden reads the Comments section of your newsletter, Robert, and took my advice by giving a prime time speech. The moment called out for it.
Biden finally used the "bully pulpit" to call for legislative action while simultaneously undercutting Republican arguments opposing legislation. Quoting from Scalia's opinion in Heller was brilliant. (For more on that, see link below to today's "A Note to Readers" by Ellie Honig.)
My only criticisms of his speech were, first, he should have announced an assault weapon buy-back program (something I'm guessing he can instruct the Treasury Dept to do via executive order) and, second, asked Americans to take action NOW by calling their elected Senator and *demand* they take action to stop this bloodshed.
https://cafe.com/elies-note/note-from-elie-the-2nd-amendment-justice-scalia-and-selective-textualism/?utm_source=CAFE&utm_campaign=414fa0d6ec-20220603_CAFEBrief_Insiders&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_575ee841eb-414fa0d6ec-165423610
With reference to "Holding Trump Accountable," how's the saying go? What goes around comes around? It will be ignominable payback when "The Worst Attorney General in American History—Bill Barr—" is subpoenaed to testify before the Federal Grand Jury. I'm guessing they will have some interesting questions for Mr. Barr (who's father was the headmaster at my school - a tight-arsed SOB) about his story published in the WSJ (see link below). As a refresher:
"When I [Bill Barr] left that afternoon for my previously scheduled meeting in the West Wing with the president’s chief of staff, Mark Meadows, and Pat Cipollone, the White House counsel, I knew what to expect. President Trump hailed me down to meet with him. I knew it would be an unpleasant meeting. . . .
I looked at POTUS and greeted him. “Hello, Mr. President.”
There was an awkward silence. He put down the remote control, at first not looking at me. I could tell he was enraged, struggling to keep his temper under control. He shuffled through some papers on the table, looking for something, his breathing a little heavier than usual, his nostrils flaring slightly. Finding what he wanted, he thrust a news clipping at me. “Did you say this?” he snapped.
It was the Balsamo article. “Yes, I did, Mr. President,” I responded. “Why would you say that?” he demanded, his voice rising. “Because it is true, Mr. President,” I replied. “The reporter asked me what the department had found to date, and I told him.”
‘He stopped for a moment and then said, ‘You must hate Trump. You would only do this if you hate Trump.
“But you did not have to say that!” he barked. “You could have just said, ‘No comment.’ This is killing me—killing me. This is pulling the rug out from under me.” He stopped for a moment and then said, “You must hate Trump. You would only do this if you hate Trump.”
“No, Mr. President, I don’t hate you,” I said. “You know I sacrificed a lot personally to come in to help you when I thought you were being wronged.” The president nodded, almost involuntarily conceding the point. “But over the weekend, you started blaming the department for the inability of your legal team to come up with evidence of fraud. The department is not an extension of your legal team. Our mission is to investigate and prosecute actual fraud. The fact is, we have looked at the major claims your people are making, and they are bullshit.”
Hopefully, Trumps' train is finally leaving the station headed toward **USP ADX Florence.** (From Wikipedia: USP ADX Florence houses male inmates in the federal prison system deemed the most dangerous and in need of the tightest control, including prisoners whose escape would pose a serious threat to national security.)
;-))
https://www.wsj.com/articles/william-barr-when-i-confronted-trump-about-election-fraud-11646323237
Thanks for the link to Elie Honig's Cafe article. I have been looking for the opportunity to respond to John Bash's NYTimes op-ed in which he attempts to wash the blood off his hands for helping Scalia draft the Heller opinion. In his op ed, Bash cites to the opening paragraph that Ellie quotes in her article--i.e., that America can still regulate guns. But what Bash and Scalia did after that was to do violence to the words of the Constitution--a fact nowhere mentioned in Bash's apologist op-ed.
I think Bash now regrets his role in helping Scalia and Trump. (At least, I hope he does.) If you check out his bio on his law firm website, his "prior experience" description highlighted on the website does not mention clerking for Scalia. (That info can be found by digging through a tab entitled, "Prior Associations.) Hmm . . . How many Supreme Court clerks make you dig for that information in their professional biographies? And, oh by the way, Bash highlights his work as "Special Assistant to the President and Associate Counsel to the President." Hmm. . . Which "President" did Bash work for? He's not saying, but you can figure that out with one guess.