Category: Uncategorized

July 14th is Bastille Day in France.  In Nice, on a main road edging the beach a man deliberately used his Lorrie to  run over as much of the crowd of people celebrating the holiday as he could.

The people of Nice are recoiling in shock
With eighty (last count) lying dead on the street
They died celebrating the Day of Bastille
Deliberately slaughtered by someone from Nice

Plus twenty-some critically injured as well
Their life-or-death outcome remains to be seen
It’s all we can do, now, is pray for their souls
And not allow terror to commandeer ours

How then, to eliminate terror attacks
By lone-wolf attackers, most often home grown
We must find the reason such terror attracts
What fosters fanatical mind-states to kill?

Is it environment; is it their genes?
Is it rejection way back in their teens?
Is second-class citizens how they perceive
Their place in society so it would seem?

I don’t have the answers, but this I observe:
Clinton’s suggestions are good of themselves
But they don’t address the home-grown loner threat
While, keeping out Muslims is Trumple’s approach

7/14/16

Ruth Bader Ginsberg, Supreme-Court justice, made critical remarks about Donald Trump during several interviews, for which she has since apologized.  Lawrence O’Donald, msnbc, pointed out that, contrary to popular opinion, SCOTUS justices historically have been involved in politics while on the bench.  John Jay, the first Chief Justice ran for governor of New York and resigned his appointment upon winning.  A second example: Oliver Elsworth, the third SCOTUS Chief Justice, ran for president during his first year as Chief Justice.  He lost and remained with the court.  Lawrence also pointed out that the only difference in presidential preferences between RBG’s public statements and justices privately voting is public vs private.  In both cases the justice is expressing preference for a nominee, which, one could argue, could bias later related judgments.

Oh dear, what can the matter be?
RBG has criticized Trumpledee
Violating SCOTUS propriety
Nobody’s done it before

There’s no way that unbiased she could be
Should she give a ruling on Trumpledee
Emphasizing that possibility
Herself she’d have to recuse

Commentators all tow this righteous line
Faulting her that on Trmp she would opine
Stating this was SCOTUS’s only time
Only, that just isn’t so

SCOTUS justices do vote for president
One, while justice, ran to be president
Does this sway their rulings on presidents?
Maybe, but we’ll never know

7/14/16

When my mother had to choose among objects of equal attraction she often would recite the jingle:
Eeny meeny tips-a-teeny / Apple John John Sweeny / My-mother-told-me-to-choose-the-very-best-one; sequentially pointing a finger at each object and repeating the sequence until she pointed to the final object, which she then selected.
Trump announced that he would reveal his VP selection in New York (Trump Towers) at 11 AM on Friday. Odds on, it will be Mike Pence, Gov. Indiana

Eeny meeny tips-a-teeny
Ginrich, Pence or maybe Christy
Don-Trmp-will-chose-his –vice-pres-i-dent

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Theresa May, formerly Home Secretary of Dave Cameron’s government was elected leader of the Conservative party yesterday after Cameron stepped down (due to Brexit). Today she was asked by the Queen to form a new government as Prime Minister. She is a “One-Nation” conservative, started in the late 1860’s by Benjamin Disraeli, where the wealthy are obliged to help support the poorer classes as patricians.

Theresa May
Was asked today
By the Queen, please to form a new government
Beyond today
She’ll have her way
As a One-Nation conservative PM

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High on Hillary’s list for vice president are: Senator Elizabeth Warren (Massachusetts), Senator Tim Kaine (Virginia) and Julian Castro (Secretary of Housing and Urban Development). Odds on, it will be Tim Kaine. Kaine was Governor of Virginia (2006-2010), Lt Governor prior to that, Chair of the DNC (2009-2011) plus other local elected positions. The main thing in my mind in addition to his executive and legislative experience that makes him the odds-on candidate is that he has raised a lot of money in the past for Clinton political campaigns and is close to Bill and Hillary.
No Poelitic.
******************************************

Two interviews we heard last night
Both telling, but in different ways
Jeb Bush bemoaning his poor plight
And Trmp ‘pon winning, might not stay

Jeb is convinced from deep within
He’s best of all the candidates
While Trumple only wants to win
Then hand it to his running mate

However, both on this agree
Of all the would be presidents
The very worst is Hillary
To take up White House residence

She wouldn’t start a wasting war
Nor wreck the world’s economies
Nor favor wealth, ignoring poor
So terrible, her policies

She’s such a liar and a crook
No question that she is unfit
But never fact-check, never look
The stringent truth hurts quite a bit

So Jeb’s decided not to vote
As has his father’s dynasty
And Trumple on his self still dotes
While perpetrating travesty

7/12/16

Last Tuesday Alton Sterling (father of 5) was killed, selling CDs.  On Wednesday Philandro Castile was stopped for a broken tail light and was killed.   Both of these killings by policemen.  Then on Friday police officers: Brent Thompson, Patrick Zamarripa, Michael Krol, Michael Smith and Lorne Ahrens were gunned down by a sniper in Dallas (others were wounded).

These killings have got to stop!
……..But they won’t

We cultivate violence
……..As entertainment

These killings have got to stop!
……..But they won’t

Always, good guys kill bad guys
……..From the killer’s view

Some police hate/fear blacks
……..And kill them

Some blacks hate/fear police
……..And kill them

These killings have got to stop!
……..But they won’t

We are all aware and we respond
……..With apathy

……..No lives matter!

Yes, stock markets can be vexing
Market mavens oft are wrong
But this market’s most perplexing
Brexit’s impact waxing strong

Stocks were slaughtered then recovered
Nearly back where they’d begun
Bonds, however offered cover
Dropping yields on buyer’s runs

Now the yields are lowest ever
On the T-bill, ten-year life
And in Europe sense has severed
Less than zero rates are rife

Stocks, when high, imply good feelings
Yields at lows show lots of fear
Gross confusion reigns in dealings
Markets have gone virtual here

7/7/16

Trumple’s recent advertising
Seemed a gross attempted smear
Featured there the Star of David
(Not a sheriff’s badge, it’s clear)
Clinton’s portrait and corruption
Lots of dollars raining down
Anti-Jewish implications
For his neo-Nazi clowns

Something strange is happening
Something’s an anomaly
Trumple’s not an anti-Semite
He has Hebrew family
So, here’s Trumple candidate
Foul mouthed bigot for his base
Then there’s Trumple family man
Big, bad Trumple, not a trace

7/7/16

I’m fascinated by the lack
Of knowledge oft attending acts
Especially in politics
Where charlatans and lunatics
Prevail, resulting at the polls
In Congress fraught with sorry souls

This ignorant complacency
Can doom our great democracy
Electing to its leadership
A president who’s quite unfit,
A Congress that gets nothing done
And wars on end that can’t be won

I do lose patience when I hear:
“On politics, I don’t go near.”
This attitude, this stupid stance
Just means you’ll vote in ignorance
That in this information age
Gross ignorance is center stage

7/4/16

Based on my own experience of 40 years working in the Defense industry, I would say that Secretary Clinton was caught up in the relatively lax security environment of the State Department.  This in not to excuse her “recklessness” in handling the 55, or so, Emails out of approximately 30,000; it is to put it in context.  A relevant article, written by Bill McLeod (A Better World Is Possible) is at the following link:

If You Believed the Lies

Let’s hope a lesson, tough, was learned today
The FBI gave Clinton a reprieve
She neither lied nor acted to deceive
But negligent she was, it’s fair to say

Some several dozen Emails this comprised
Among the thirty thousand that transpired
She didn’t follow protocols required
To keep her mail from being compromised

It’s time to learn and then release the past
It’s time to gird ourselves to win this race
It’s time for legislation that can pass
It’s time to weld the Democratic base

This doesn’t change the contest Clinton’s in
A contest Clinton handily must win

7/5/16

Trumple met his Uncle Sammy on July the fourth
Trumple asked his unc about gov benefits put forth
Asked his Uncle Sam of Trumple: “Where is my tax money?”
Answered Trumple to his unc: “Indeed I haven’t any.”
Uncle Sam then questioned Trumple: “Where are all your billions?”
Answered Trumple to his uncle: “In the Cayman Islands.”

7/4/16