Facts from the Front – December 2015
by Moe White –
The Donald began December by inadvertently insulting the Republican Jewish Coalition in New York. Speaking before the group of conservative Jews – doctors, lawyers, other professionals, and business owners – Trump said, “I’m a negotiator, like you folks.” Later he asked, “Is there anyone in this room who doesn’t negotiate deals? Probably more than any room I’ve ever spoken.” Trump’s ignorant stereotyping of Jews as “negotiators” was reminiscent of Ross Perot’s comments to “you people” at a 1992 NAACP convention.
The rabble-rousing billionaire has previously confused Kurds – an ethnic group that has lived for millennia at the intersection of Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Turkey – and Quds, an Iranian paramilitary force established about 35 years ago; and dismissed the difference between the leaders of Hezbollah and Hamas, because “by the time we get to office, they’ll all be changed.” Hezbollah has had the same leader, Hassan Nasrallah, for 23 years.
A few days later, Trump demanded the U.S. not allow anyone across its borders who’s a Muslim “until we get this thing figured out.”
It’s happened before. “Chinese and dogs prohibited.” “No Irish need apply.” “All Negroes must depart before nightfall.” “Ship carrying Jewish refugees turned back to Germany.”
At least we now know how the Donald plans to “make America great again.”
Closer to home
Retiring state Senator Tom Apodaca reflected on the GOP’s four-year record since he helped lead the Republican takeover of the NC legislature for the first time in 140 years.
Since 2011 his party has erected massive obstacles to minority voting rights; ensured that half a million NC citizens can’t get Medicare coverage; cut unemployment compensation by 80%; slashed education funding from kindergarten through college; decreased taxes for the rich while increasing them on everyone else; and stolen Asheville’s airport and water system from the taxpayers who built them. In an interview with a Charlotte newspaper Apodaca boasted that he had “accomplished almost everything we set out to.”
With no more public fields to slash, burn, and salt, Apodaca apparently will focus again on his bail bond business, making a fortune off the misfortunes of others. We bid a fond farewell – emphasis on “farewell” – to the little man on the wedding cake.
Down in Alabama
The chairman of the state’s House of Representatives Economic Development and Tourism Committee demanded people not support economic development in his state … if it involved shopping at some local convenience stores he doesn’t like.
State Representative Alan Harper (R-Loopyland) wants people to buy only from stores owned by “God fearing Christians,” lest their money somehow wind up in the hands of terrorists. On his Facebook page (the posting has since been deleted), he wrote, “As you travel during the holidays or any other time, please try to shop and purchase gas and other items at American owned stores.”
He specifically urged people to boycott “the C stores/tobacco outlets… In large part, these stores are owned by folk that send their profits back to their homeland and then in turn use these funds against our country to create turmoil, fear and in some cases death and destruction… Please join me in making the extra effort to never support these stores/shops!”
Harper’s evidence that the chain’s owners support terrorism? “Look behind the cash register,” he wrote. Those brown-skinned owner-operators are wearing turbans, so “real Americans” can tell at a glance that the owner is neither a citizen nor a Christian. Of course, those turbans are worn by Sikhs, not Muslims, but, what the heck! The look almost as anti-American as that Sikh-born Nikki Randhawa Haley and Hindu anchor baby Piyush “Bobby” Jindal. And I don’t trust either of them, do you?
Maybe Rep. Harper can have all those dark-skinned Alabama cashiers arrested for “business-owning while black.” And then the owners of the C stores can sue Mr. Harper for libel and slander: that’s as American as apple pie.
The Lone-Star State
Three years ago the Republican Party of Texas (where else?) included this statement in its official party platform: “We oppose the teaching of Higher Order Thinking Skills, critical thinking skills and similar programs that … have the purpose of challenging the student’s fixed beliefs and undermining parental authority.”
Facts be damned, knowledge disdained, only lower-order thinking skills allowed. This crowd’s fixed belief seems to be that “critical thinking” means being critical – of them.
This year, on December 4, the very same Texas Republican Executive Committee voted on whether to put a non-binding measure on the March primary ballot that would ask Texas voters whether they would like the state to secede from the Union. The proposed language read, “If the Federal Government continues to disregard the Constitution and the sovereignty of the State of Texas, the State of Texas should reassert its prior status as an independent nation.”
Executive Committee member Tanya Robertson, who introduced the proposal, insisted the measure would have been “harmless,” as voters would be registering an “opinion only.” She also hoped the measure would “get out the vote” by energizing Texas Republicans.
To the surprise of critical thinkers everywhere, the committee rejected the proposal. Only 150 years after the Civil War ended the legal option of states to secede, maybe Texas Republicans will soon be ready to learn about Higher Order Thinking Skills.
Of course, if they did secede, Cuban-Canadian Ted Cruz would have to drop out – he’d be a foreigner!
Ideas from the Midwest
On the bright side, Missouri State Rep. Stacey Newman has drafted a bill that would require anyone buying a gun to observe the same restrictions imposed on women seeking abortions.
House Bill 1397 states that before Missourians can buy a gun, they will have to: meet with a licensed physician to discuss the risks of gun ownership; get the physician’s written approval; wait 72 hours; make their purchase from a licensed gun dealer at least 120 miles from the purchaser’s legal residence; learn about medical risks of guns; learn about “peaceful and nonviolent conflict resolution” and other alternatives to firearm use; and tour an emergency trauma center during the hours when most gun violence victims are present.
Sounds like Newman has learned something from Rep. Nina Turner of Ohio (in October we reported on her bill to force men to undergo therapy and counseling before buying drugs for erectile dysfunction). Sadly, the overwhelmingly Republican Missouri House opposed Newman’s bill.
Facts From The Front is a monthly column by copy editor Moe White in which America’s Constitutional democracy is defended against ongoing assaults by those who prefer less palatable alternatives: oligarchy, autocracy, theocracy, feudalism, fascism, and other nondemocratic methods of government. Among the qualifications for White’s commentary and ridicule are hypocrisy, dishonesty, corruption, unbridled greed, flat-out lies, and sheer idiocy on the part of public figures.
