Author: Michael A. Ventrella

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The conservative threat in 2022

What exactly do conservatives want to conserve? Clearly, they want to conserve what they consider to be the “good old days” where straight white rich men controlled everything and the rest of us were basically pawns for them to use in their goal to get richer and more powerful.

Let’s look at what they seriously are proposing this election season:

I mean, come on, they’re still supporting this asshole
  • Make abortion illegal everywhere and curtail women’s rights;
  • Make gay marriage illegal again;
  • Restrict access to contraception;
  • Shut down medicare and medicaid;
  • Repeal the recently passed law that limits what Big Pharma can charge for medicine;
  • Repeal Obamacare;
  • Force Christian religious training in schools while banning books they find dangerous;
  • Reduce taxes on the very wealthy;
  • Prevent higher education from being free or cheaper;
  • Fight against raising the minimum wage;
  • Refuse refugees begging for help at our border;
  • Allow governors to throw out election results they don’t like…

I could go on, but you know the pattern. Every one of these things is opposed by a majority of Americans, but they don’t care. They’re used to the minority of rich, white men running everything, and they see nothing wrong with it.

It is predicted that the GOP will win the House in November, which means you can expect that we’ll never see anything of value accomplished. Instead, there will be investigation after investigation of made-up conspiracy theories, along with numerous attempts to impeach Biden for stupid reasons.

Our only hope is that people (and especially women people) are mad enough to vote in numbers never seen before for a mid-term election. The signs are encouraging so far, but the other side knows it, too, and you can expect them to turn out in big numbers. Remember that Trump cultists are often underrepresented in public opinion polls, because they don’t want to come out and admit that they support treason and racism.

 

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The power of thought

Pat Byrnes
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The illegal transport of legal immigrants

Imagine you approached a bunch of American citizens down on their luck and promised them that if they came with you, you’d take them somewhere they could get jobs and assistance. You then shove them on a plane and send them off without making any plans whatsoever as to what happens to them when they get there. Oh, and you also lie to them about where they are going.

cartoon by Steve Breen

To reiterate: You committed a fraud by lying to these people, and you committed the crime of “unlawful restraint” by transporting people against their will (since they only agreed based on your lies).

Now if you say, “that’s different, these people that DeSantis sent to Martha’s Vineyard were immigrants,” then you clearly don’t know your Constitution. (I mean, no one has ever accused DeSantis of having the slightest bit of knowledge of the Constitution, of course.)

If you’re in America, you have rights. The 14th Amendment guarantees these rights to “people,” not just citizens. Even tourists get these rights. Hell, even illegal immigrants get these rights.

And these people were here legally. They are refugees, most of whom are escaping from a terrible regime in Venezuela. You know — Venezuela. That place Republicans incorrectly use as an example of socialism gone mad (when it’s really because of a dictator gone mad). You’d think conservatives would at least be consistent in that regard, and welcome them.

Refugees are allowed to come here, and once here, they have certain rights. Among those rights are not to be lied to and treated like cattle, and then shipped hundreds of miles away from the place where technically they are supposed to report to in order to take care of all their paperwork for entry.

The evil conservatives who cite the Bible while ignoring 90% of what it preaches just assumed Massachusetts residents would treat these refugees as terrible as they had, but of course, the exact opposite happened. The locals embraced the refugees, fed them, found shelter for them, and are working to help them get the assistance they need. You know, all the things Jesus said to do with immigrants.

You’ll never hear about that on right-wing talk shows, however. After all, if there is one thing modern conservatives are known for, it’s simply ignoring facts when they contradict their already-held viewpoint.

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Spy Stories for Dummies

Ruben Bolling

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Trump’s Crimes vs. Hillary’s Emails

“But her emails!”

Some Trump supporters are seriously arguing that Hillary’s emails were worse than Trump’s literal stealing of classified documents.

Can you believe it? They’re still obsessed with their fantasy.

The GOP spent millions of dollars and countless hours in hearings trying to find anything they could pin on the Clintons — over and over again. Whitewater, Vincent Foster, emails, whatever. The Trump administration continued to investigate, frantically searching for anything they could use.

But nothing. There’s nothing there.

Obviously, if there was anything there, one of the Republican prosecutors would have been more than happy to bring charges.

Then again, this is from the party that believes what they want, evidence be damned. Climate change is a hoax, trickle-down economics works, they’re teaching Critical Race Theory in elementary schools, Trump won the election — when facts contradict their world view, they just pretend the facts don’t exist.

It’s delusional. Seriously. These people need help.

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The real reason

Nick Anderson
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This post is about billionaires

Let’s say you were drowning, and I could help. I could easily help. I could throw you a life preserver, I could swim in, I could do a LOT. But instead I just stand there. And then, when you drown, I say it was your fault for not learning how to swim, since this is America, and anyone can learn how to swim.

This post is about billionaires.

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A real choice

Rick McKee

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At my age, I’m still paying my student loans

College wasn’t that big of a deal. I went to a state college where the tuition was around $750 a semester (that’s about $3000 today). I was able to work part-time and pay it back.

Law school, however, was quite expensive. I needed loans for that.

After law school, I worked as a public defender in Boston for a while and then my wife and I moved to NYC to start a business running a LARP game, but while we were able to pay our bills, we were living in poverty. I got deferments during those years, where the loan was on hold but the interest grew.

Once I moved to Pennsylvania and started practicing law again, I returned to paying my loans.

I paid back what I borrowed years ago. I’m now only paying interest, and the interest I have paid is much more than the original loan. And I’m 64 years old, for chrissake. Soon I can use my social security income to pay back the loans.

And it’s not like this money is going to the government so they can have more money to loan other students. Nope, it’s going to banks that already recouped their investment.

The vast majority of people who will benefit from Biden’s plan are like me — the loan has already been paid. Now it’s just banks earning profit.

Trump can go bankrupt seven times and get out of paying his bills but students are stuck, because the banks were able to bribe Congress (which ironically included this Senator named Joe Biden) to exempt students from bankruptcy on their loans.

We should be investing in education because that leads to higher incomes and that improves the economy. Pay your loans back, yes. But these loans should be interest-free.

I also can’t help but notice all the people complaining about this were silent when the PPP loans being forgiven for huge businesses and corporations. Apparently they only complain when the government helps poor people.

cartoon by Clay Jones
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Banana Republicans

Nick Anderson