Voting Rights

Democrats Call Postmaster General to Urgent Hearing on Trump’s USPS Sabotage

Posted by on August 16, 2020 at 10:50 am. 4 Comments :

Among the most blatant signs of Donald Trump’s aspirations to tyranny is his deliberate assault on the United States Postal Service. It’s an obvious attempt to make it harder for Americans to cast their votes this coming November. And in pursuit of that goal, Trump installed Louis DeJoy, a wealthy campaign donor with no relevant experience, as the executioner of his grossly anti-democratic agenda.

Donald Trump, Nancy Pelosi

Trump himself admitted his intentions to purposefully dismantle postal operations in order to disrupt the delivery of ballots to and from state election offices. He recently told Fox News that Democrats are requesting funding because they “need that money in order to have the post office work so it can take all of these millions and millions of ballots.” And if they don’t get it “that means you can’t have universal mail-in voting because they’re not equipped to have it.” This perverse strategy is driven by Trump’s inability to deal with the fact that he’s losing bigly to Joe Biden, someone he regards as a mentally deficient socialist.

https://twitter.com/therecount/status/1293896544668782592

As it turns out, sabotaging the Postal Service isn’t particularly popular with the American people. A whopping “70 percent of voters support a mail-in option, including 88 percent of Democrats, 71 percent of independents and 50 percent of Republicans.” And they have risen up to demand that Trump’s destructive policies be rescinded.

Now the House of Representatives is answering the call. The chair of the House Oversight Committee, Carolyn Maloney just announced that she is scheduling an “urgent hearing” on the matter and has requested DeJoy’s appearance to testify. Her letter to DeJoy charges that…

“Over the past several weeks, there have been startling new revelations about the scope and gravity of operational changes you are implementing at hundreds of postal facilities without consulting adequately with Congress, the Postal Regulatory Commission, or the Board of Governors. Your testimony is particularly urgent given the troubling influx of reports of widespread delays at postal facilities across the country—as well as President Trump’s explicit admission last week that he has been blocking critical coronavirus funding for the Postal Service in order to impair mail-in voting efforts for the upcoming elections in November.”

This is positive development that, at the very least, will keep the issue at the forefront of the media’s attention. It will force the Postmaster General to justify his actions. That is, if he doesn’t chicken out and refuse to show. And it will make clear the connections to White House pressure tactics and the potential illegal interference by the Trump campaign.

As a side benefit, the hearing is scheduled for August 24, which is, coincidentally, the first day of the Republican convention. It was previously reported that Trump is plotting to upstage the Democratic convention by hopping around the country for political appearances on each day of the Democrats’ event. His travel plans culminate in Biden’s home town of Scranton, Pennsylvania, on the same say that Biden is delivering his acceptance speech.

So, under the circumstances, the Trump schemers can hardly complain about the scheduling of the Oversight Committee hearing. In fact, Democrats should continue to host events throughout the GOP convention and consider having Barack Obama give an national address in support of Biden on the the final day when Trump bellows out his latest “American Carnage” horror story as he accepts the nomination of his Republican confederates. Give the GOP a dose of their own medicine. This may be one of those rare circumstances where turnabout really is fair play.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

Trump Reveals New Campaign Slogan: The Greatest Election Disaster in History

Posted by on July 31, 2020 at 1:25 pm. 1 Comments :

When someone is suffering from severe mental infirmities, they are prone to making remarks that inadvertently expose the depths of their derangement. Donald Trump is a prime example of this. And he just provided another instance to add to the cornucopia of commentaries that serve to prove how socially distant he is from reality.

Donald Trump Rally Trash

On Friday morning Trump addressed a gaggle of reporters in his ongoing effort to claw his way out of the political abyss he has dug for himself. Among the questions he replied to was one about mail-in voting. He began by falsely asserting that “mail-in ballots are a disaster,” and that the upcoming election will be “rigged.” He then went off on an extended tirade that was chock full of baseless allegations drawn mostly from his asinine imagination. The rant (video below) concluded with Trump claiming that…

“This is going to be the greatest election disaster in history.”

Don’t be confused. That is not a warning. It’s a promise. It’s what Trump and his Republican confederates intend to insure happens by whatever means necessary. He’s not issuing an alarm. He’s proclaiming with pride the core strategy of his 2020 reelection campaign. He should print it on his hats.

This isn’t a new tactic by the GOP. They have made the failure of government the primary theme of their party philosophy for decades. They fear monger about how terrible government is, and then, when they gain power, they set about to prove it by purposefully orchestrating the failure they predicted. Then they ask you to vote for them again.

Trump’s persistent condemnation of mail-in voting will continue to be a key component of his reelection effort. He knows that his prospects for victory are dismal, so he’s focusing on delegitimizing the election. He even went so far as to propose to delay the election, which he has no legal authority to do. Although, if the the election date were to change, most Americans would probably prefer to make it sooner, along with Inauguration Day.

In a bizarre twist of political theater, Trump’s press secretary, Kayleigh McEnany, was asked about the news that Hong Kong would be delaying their elections. She responded without a hint of irony that…

“We condemn the Hong Kong government’s decision to postpone for one year its legislative counsel elections and to disqualify opposition candidates. This action undermines the democratic processes and freedoms that have underpinned Hong Kong’s prosperity.”

Exactly! So McEnany is affirming that Trump’s intentions are to “undermine the democratic processes and freedoms” of the United States. Not that any further affirmation was needed. It was apparent in Trump’s deployment of federal storm troopers to assault and suppress citizens exercising their constitutional rights to demonstrate. It’s apparent in his toleration of Russia placing bounties on American soldiers. It’s apparent in his favoritism of corporations and the wealthy in his economic and taxation agenda. And it’s tragically apparent in his fatally negligent mishandling of the coronavirus pandemic.

Remember that when you hear Trump say that “This is going to be the greatest election disaster in history.” He’s right, but not for the reason he thinks. Like everything else that Trump brags about, this will be “the greatest…in history.” That’s how you know that it’s something he’s taking pride in. And It’s why the American people cannot afford to be complacent about it. It will take the determined vigilance of every patriotic citizen to prevent Trump from achieving the disaster he intends to provoke.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

Trump Admits to Presiding Over ‘The Most RIGGED Election In Our Nation’s History’

Posted by on June 22, 2020 at 2:43 pm. 7 Comments :

Like a wounded grizzly bear, Donald Trump is exhibiting the sort of ultra-aggressive behavior of an animal that is desperate and mortally fearful. He knows that the American people are overwhelming repulsed by his noxious antics and totalitarian aspirations. He knows that every poll shows him trailing Joe Biden nationally, as well as in the crucial swing states. He knows that his political demise is imminent.

Donald Trump, Vote By Mail

In response to these facts, Trump has initiated a frantic and dangerous campaign to undermine America’s democracy. At a time when voters are understandably concerned about the deadly COVID-19 coronavirus, Trump and his Republican confederates are plotting to suppress votes in the upcoming presidential election. They are on a crusade to deny voters the right to cast their ballots by mail.

Even worse, Trump is attempting to delegitimize the election if mail-in voting is permitted. His intent is to lay the groundwork to challenge the results when he loses in November. Never mind that every study (including one by a Trump White House commission) found no evidence of fraud or any other problem. On Monday morning Trump pounded out four tweets condemning mail-in voting as rife with fraud. For instance…

Trump’s all-caps tirade sounds eerily like a threat. Is he soliciting foreign countries to print ballots? Is he proposing it as a tactic for his campaign or its devotees? It’s reminiscent of when he asked Russia to hack Hillary Clinton’s email. Not that any of that would work. The security features of vote-by-mail systems would catch those fakes easily. But Trump would claim that just the fact that they existed was proof that cheating occurred. Even though their existence would most likely be due to his involvement. The “scandal of our times” indeed.

Trump’s assertion that “MAIL-IN BALLOTS, 2020 will be the most RIGGED Election in our nations history” is supported by nothing but the hot air steaming from his lying lips. And his attempt to compare it to voting during previous world wars is simply asinine. Besides being a call to revert to voting systems that are as much as 100 years old, it ignores the fact that there were no impediments to voting because of the wars. There were no German soldiers lurking around polling places in Kansas. However, our soldiers, and their families stationed abroad, did vote by mail. That’s hardly analogous to the current situation with the presence of a highly contagious virus spreading throughout the country.

Trump also tweeted an article from the rabidly right-wing Breitbart News that quoted the Attorney General, Bill Barr, agreeing with Trump that mail-in voting would lead to a “rigged election” and would “absolutely open the floodgates to fraud.” Once again, there was no effort made to back up that claim with any proof. Very much like another of Trump’s morning tweets that was just another crackpot outburst about alleged “millions of mail-in ballots being sent out,” that no one “knows where they are going, and to whom.”

In reality, it is well known and documented where all vote-by-mail ballots are going, and who is receiving them. It is a tested and secure method of voting that is currently used by the military, most (but not all) states, and even Trump and his family.

That hasn’t stopped Trump from illegally threatening governors (ala Ukraine-style quid pro quo) with the withholding of federal funds if they disobey him and implement mail-in voting. He has explicitly admitted that his reasoning for opposing the practice is purely political due to his baseless belief that it benefits Democrats. And he has embarked on a campaign to destroy the Postal Service in order to achieve his goal of vote-by-mail prohibition.

Trump’s un-American determination to deny citizens their right to vote needs to be resisted in the strongest possible terms. Democrats in Congress are trying to pass legislation securing these rights, but they are being obstructed by anti-democratic Republicans. Organizations like the ACLU are working hard to make sure that mail-in voting is available to all Americans. They need our support now.

However, there are some idiotic Trump disciples who actually have a plan that we can all happily get behind. They are burning the applications they receive for vote-by-mail ballots. In their diseased minds they think that they are getting the better of Democrats who support mail-in voting. Okay, fine. That’s the sort of deranged behavior that we should all encourage. If they are so convinced that voting by mail will result in fraud, then they are free to opt out. And if Trump thinks that 2020 will have historic levels of election fraud, it’s only because he knows exactly what he is capable of. It isn’t a warning. It’s a threat.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

Trump Supporters are Burning Their Own Vote-By-Mail Applications to Own the Libs

Posted by on June 14, 2020 at 1:18 pm. 4 Comments :

There seems to be no outer limit to the magnitude of idiocy achievable by Donald Trump and his legions of glassy-eyed disciples. They have built up an impressive tolerance for humiliation, which serves them well considering how often they subject themselves to it. Just continuing to support Trump amid his endless string of failures and his noxious persona is a feat of Olympic-grade stamina and tunnel-blindness.

Flaming Trump

However, a group of Trump cultists in Michigan are pulling out all the stops in the competition for the gold medal in Trumpian crackpottery. They have embarked on a campaign to eliminate the scourge of election fraud by constraining their own options for voting. As reported by the Detroit News…

“People burned letters informing them that they can vote by absentee ballot in future elections during a protest near Grand Rapids.

“The applications were burned Friday during an event called Operation Incinerator outside the DeltaPlex Arena in Walker. Many people had flags, shirts and signs showing support for President Donald Trump and Republicans.”

That’s right! They received forms permitting them to apply for mail-in voting ballots and gathered to hold a public bonfire into which they cast the offending applications. No one was requiring them to fill out the applications or return them. No one was hindering their freedom to show up at a polling place on election day to cast their vote. But their repulsion of having been given the choice to vote by mail was too much for them to endure.

The organizers of this pyro-protest called themselves “Operation Incinerator,” and they posted the announcement of their crusade on Facebook saying “Together we will gather and burn all of the taxpayer funded applications, illegally sent to us from [Secretary of State] Benson. When you receive your unsolicited application, ‘harvest it’ and bring it with you.” This demonstration – attended by nearly half a dozen devotees – was inspired by Trump’s repeated and baseless attacks on mail-in voting as being rife with fraud. He specifically singled out Michigan and issued a tweet threatening the state:

As with almost everything Trump says, these assertions are utterly false. [Note: Trump first tweeted this saying falsely that actual ballots were mailed out. He deleted that tweet and re-posted the one above specifying that it’s only applications] It is certainly not illegal for the Secretary of State to send out these applications. However, it would be illegal for Trump to withhold federal funds in retaliation. Not that he cares about that. It’s reminiscent of his threat to withhold funds from Ukraine unless they helped with his reelection campaign. In fact, he was impeached for it.

Trump’s campaign against mail-in voting has been in progress for some time. He has ranted without a sliver of evidence that mail-in voting will produce “the greatest Rigged Election in history,” with “thousands of forgeries.” He has also posted hypocritical remarks that approve of mail-in voting for seniors, the military, and himself, but not for any other citizen. And as part of this voter suppression effort, Trump has been attacking the United States Postal Service and advocating for its demise. His bizarre and fabricated arguments stretch into his personal contempt for Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, who also owns the Washington Post.

Now that Trump supporters have taken it upon themselves to join his anti-voting campaign, perhaps Democrats should give them some encouragement. These cretinous losers should be applauded for their determination to limit their own voting options. They are actually helping to raise the collective IQ of the electorate by not participating. So News Corpse has created an advertisement to spread this message to Trump supporters around the country. Feel free to retweet it, post it on Facebook, and otherwise cause it to be disseminated everywhere. If this is how they want to march toward November’s election, we should respect their wishes and lend them a helping hand.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

PROOF: Trump is Lying About Vote-By-Mail Fraud to Suppress Turnout

Posted by on June 1, 2020 at 12:26 pm. 2 Comments :

For several weeks Donald Trump has been accelerating his disinformation campaign to delegitimize mail-in voting. Never mind that it has been in practice since the Civil War, is used extensively by members of the military, and millions of people have voted safely for decades with only extremely rare incidents of misuse.

Donald Trump, Vote By Mail

Nevertheless, Trump is obsessed with what he is falsely maligning as a process rife with fraud. He has zero evidence to support that claim, but facts were never very high among his priorities. Instead, he simply tweets his flagrant lies hoping that repetition (such as this and this and this and this and this) will persuade the dimmest of his cult followers to buy into his fictional narrative. Take this one tweet for example:

Notice that Trump is focused solely on the partisan argument that Republicans need to oppose mail-in voting. Ironically, he’s admitting that greater access to the ballot box is detrimental to the GOP, which is actually true. That’s the real reason that Trump and his confederates are so worried about it. They know that they must suppress the vote in order to win.

However, that doesn’t stop Trump from taking advantage of mail-in voting when he determines that it’s in his interest to do so. Recent fundraising letters sent out by his campaign explicitly encouraged his supporters to request mail-in ballots and use them. “For the FIRST TIME EVER,” it reads, “every single eligible voter can now request a primary ballot and safely vote for President Trump from the comfort of their own home.” Well, is that special? It’s safe and so convenient and free of any potential for fraud. What’s more, Trump himself appealed to his glassy-eyed disciples to “Make sure you mail in those ballots before election day..”

So it’s clear that Trump is a flaming hypocrite on this issue. He wants his Klan to vote by mail, but is working furiously to prohibit it for everyone else. His ludicrous claims that Democrats favor it because they intend to cheat fall apart in light of these remarks.

Equally ludicrous are his shills on Fox News who back his lies. On Monday morning Brian Kilmeade of Fox and Friends suggested that Trump add the words “in my opinion” to avoid making his lies about election fraud controversial. Huh? How does that in any way change the fact that he’s fear mongering about election fraud with allegations he’s made up from thin air?

This is typical of the right-wing effort to suppress the vote and prevent Americans from exercising their most precious right as citizens. It’s what Republicans have been trying to do for decades. They know that the majority of the American people support progressive principles, and if they vote the GOP (Greedy One Percent) will suffer the consequences of their unpopular, self-serving, elitist agenda. But Trump cannot pretend that he’s ideologically opposed to voting by mail after having been caught promoting it. And we the people cannot let him forget that.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

BLACKMAIL: Trump Threatens American Voters in Scheme to Suppress Voting

Posted by on May 20, 2020 at 1:20 pm. 5 Comments :

Every recent national poll is showing Joe Biden with a significant lead over Donald Trump (for instance). Biden is even leading in most of the crucial swing states (Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Minnesota, Arizona, and Florida). That’s obviously bad news for Trump. However, the best indication that Trump is scared witless of losing the upcoming election is his frenzied and feeble attempts to prevent the American people from exercising their right to vote.

Donald Trump

Trump knows that the more people who vote, the less likely it is that he – or his Republican confederates – will prevail in November. So his only option is to try to prevent voters from casting ballots. That’s a particularly complicated endeavor this year with the coronavirus making many people nervous about exposing themselves to infection at in-person polling sites. The obvious solution to that problem is to expand mail-in voting across the country.

Consequently, Trump and the GOP (Greed and Oppression Party) are committed to prohibiting this safe and secure method of voting. They are bellowing about imaginary election fraud as the reason for their obstructionism. But, try as they may, they’ve been pitifully unable to make that case with any factual evidence to back up their wild claims. And in the absence of proof, Trump is now posting Twitter rants that are flagrantly untrue. Trump tweeted…

Breaking: Michigan sends absentee ballots to 7.7 million people ahead of Primaries and the General Election. This was done illegally and without authorization by a rogue Secretary of State. I will ask to hold up funding to Michigan if they want to go down this Voter Fraud path! [NOTE: Trump deleted this tweet and reposted adding the word “applications” after “absentee ballot.”]

State of Nevada “thinks” that they can send out illegal vote by mail ballots, creating a great Voter Fraud scenario for the State and the U.S. They can’t! If they do, “I think” I can hold up funds to the State. Sorry, but you must not cheat in elections. @RussVought45 @USTreasury

First of all, Trump is lying about absentee ballots being sent out. What has been sent is only applications for absentee ballots that voters can fill out and return. Trump is also lying about this being illegal. The states have every right to do this and to conduct their elections as they see fit. The federal government has no jurisdiction over this whatsoever.

Worst of all is Trump’s brazen threat to withhold federal funds from states that choose to permit mail-in voting. That’s the same sort of blackmail that Trump tried to impose on Ukraine in order to get them to dig up dirt on Joe Biden. That’s what got him impeached. What’s more, Trump doesn’t even have any legal authority to withhold such funding. Congress would have to do it, and it’s a pretty safe bet that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi wouldn’t cooperate with Trump’s extortion plot. Also it is distinctly repulsive that Trump would even consider denying critical funds during a raging pandemic. That would only increase the suffering and the death toll.

It’s notable that Trump’s threat was narrowly cast only at states with Democratic governors. That’s an observation that was made by the woman who Trump snidely referred to as Michigan’s “rogue Secretary of State.” In response to his blatantly partisan tantrum, she tweeted…

Not only have those Republican-led states approved mail-in voting, the American people are overwhelmingly in favor of it. A recent poll showed that “72% of all U.S. adults, including 79% of Democrats and 65% of Republicans, supported a requirement for mail-in ballots.” And members of the military have been doing it for decades. And guess who else is in favor of it? Donald Trump, who actually votes by mail himself.

So is Trump confessing to committing election fraud? Or he is just saying that it’s okay for him, but not for any other American citizens? Trump’s relentless assertions that mail-in voting is rife with fraud has never been supported by facts. He even formed a White House committee to certify his charges, but it was later disbanded having found nothing untoward. Yet he continues to make the same charges.

Trump, however, recently gave away his deceitful game by admitting that Democrats participating in mail-in voting “had levels of voting, that if you ever agreed to it you’d never have a Republican elected in this country again.” He is so determined to clamp down on voter’s rights that he embarked on a campaign to do away with the Postal Service in order to make mail-in voting impossible.

And there you have it. Trump is openly confessing that the real intent of opposing mail-in voting is to suppress voter turnout. This is something that Republicans have been trying to do for decades. They likewise have sought to prohibit early voting, weekend voting, and any other method of making it easier for citizens to cast ballots. And they engage in extreme gerrymandering in order to disenfranchise voters they disapprove of.

This is more proof that Trump and the Republican Party are actually scared of voters being able to express themselves. They are, in fact, scared of democracy. They know that the only way they can win is to shut down access to the ballot. That’s particularly true for low income people, working people, and people of color. And now it’s also true for people who have concerns about exposure to a deadly virus that has already taken the lives of more than 92,000 Americans due to Trump’s negligence and incompetence.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

In Deranged Tweets Trump Says that All California Votes ‘Must Not Count’

Posted by on May 9, 2020 at 11:17 am. 11 Comments :

The evidence of Donald Trump’s mental infirmity continues to pile up. On a daily basis he openly exhibits an unbridled rage at those he fears. He proclaims that he has the “total authority” of the tyrants he admires. With paranoid fervor he regards every critic as a “hater” who is out to get him. He ignores the suffering and death caused by COVID-19 (coronavirus) while focusing furiously on his abysmal polling. And he refuses to accept responsibility for any of his actions, while vainly shifting blame to others.

Donald Trump, Constitution

The psychoses of Trump could fill a textbook on sociopaths and narcissists. The latest example of the severity of his psychological degradation was displayed in another Twitter outburst on Saturday morning. This one was boiling over with fear and desperation as he lashed out incoherently at Americans who happen to live in California.

Seriously, what on Earth is he ranting about? Californians have had access to mail-in voting for years. The only new twist is that Gov. Gavin Newsom just signed an executive order sending ballots to all registered voters in the state. They are not obligated to use them, but they have the choice. And that freedom, that makes voting easier for everyone, is what Trump believes is a “SCAM!” Consequently, in his diseased mind, all the votes of American citizens in California “must not count.” What sort of madness produces this disgustingly undemocratic – and un-American – idiocy?

Trump’s tweet also makes the bizarre assertion that a voting booth was just opened “in the most Democrat area in the State.” Does anyone know what he’s even talking about anymore? There are voting booths in every district. Does he think that predominantly Democratic districts shouldn’t have them? Is the prospect of Democrats voting the basis for his complaint that “It’s all rigged out there”?

UPDATE: In another tweet, Trump elaborated on his curious remarks about new voting booths. Apparently he thinks that voting in California is “supposed to be mail in ballots only.” He is wrong, of course. And he’s demonstrating how pitiful he is at comprehending what’s going on around him.

Trump continued to address the matter of mail-in voting in his very next tweet, which promoted a Republican candidate. Except in that tweet Trump completely reversed himself himself noting that in this special election there is mail-in voting and offering this reminder to his cult followers: “Mail in ballots, & check that they are counted!” Really? So for Republicans mail-in voting isn’t a scam and those votes should be counted? And a couple of tweets later Trump declares that the whole “CA25 is a Rigged Election.”

The question of mail-in voting is a touchy subject for Trump and all Republicans. They have always had a mortal fear of expanding the electorate. Trump recently said the quiet part out loud with a rant about mail-in voting wherein he whined that “They had levels of voting, that if you ever agreed to it you’d never have a Republican elected in this country again.” Trump is afraid because he knows that the more people who vote, the less likely it is that he will be reelected. Republicans at large have the same fear.

This fear is what is driving Trump’s assault on the U.S. Postal Service. His hostility to this agency, that is explicitly authorized by the Constitution, is rooted in his jealousy of and contempt for Jeff Bezos, a real billionaire and the owner of Amazon and the Washington Post. In a rancid screed last month Trump called the Postal Service “a joke,” and threatened to withhold funding if they didn’t quadruple their rates. That, of course, would put an enormous burden on every business, as well as every American wanting to wish their grandmas a happy birthday.

Trump’s nauseating attack on democracy must not be ignored or normalized. He needs to be called out for this obvious grasping of totalitarian rule. This week Trump appointed a new postmaster general who just happens to be a major Trump ally and donor. That confirms that he is serious about sabotaging the Post Office for his own nefarious political advantage. And we, the people, must not allow him to get away with it.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

GOING POSTAL: Trump’s USPS Envy Reveals His Egomaniacal Intentions

Posted by on April 27, 2020 at 1:32 pm. 10 Comments :

Never forget that there is always an ulterior motive behind everything Donald Trump does. If there isn’t a tangible personal benefit for Trump he wouldn’t be doing it. That benefit could be political, financial, or just a shot in the arm to his voracious ego. But it’s there, and you don’t usually have to dig too deep to find it.

Donald Trump, Stock Market Crash

Last week Trump reprised his long-running vilification of the U.S. Postal Service. His hostility to this agency, that is explicitly authorized by the Constitution, is rooted in his jealousy of and contempt for Jeff Bezos, a real billionaire and the owner of Amazon and the Washington Post. In a rancid screed on Friday Trump called the Postal Service “a joke” and complained about their management and deficits, saying that…

“The post office, if they raised the price of a package by approximately four times, it would be a whole new ballgame. But they don’t want to raise it because they don’t want to insult Amazon, and they don’t want to insult other companies, perhaps, that they like. The post office should raise the price of the packages to the companies. Not to the people, to the companies. If they did that, it would be a whole different story.”

First of all, if the Post Office raised their prices four times, those costs would be passed on to their customers. So Trump’s ignorant and disingenuous promise not to burden “the people” with the increases is a purposeful lie. This is similar to his ludicrous claim that tariffs imposed on China are paid by the Chinese government directly to the U.S. treasury. In fact, they are paid by American companies who either absorb the decline in their profit margin, or tack the increase on to their products, amounting to a de facto tax on all American consumers. As a failed businessman Trump can’t be expected to understand how these things work.

What’s more, Trump’s assertion that Amazon is getting some kind of a sweetheart deal is false. They are paying bulk rates similar to all other shippers of mass quantities of packages. It’s also false that the Post Office is losing money as result of their relationship with Amazon. Actually, it is Amazon and other large retailers who are the bright spots in the USPS business. Without them the Postal Service would be even further in debt. And Trump’s idiotic proposal to raise rates would likely cause Amazon and others to develop their own delivery operations (which Amazon has already started), resulting in still deeper debt for the USPS.

The aim by many on the right is to fully privatize the USPS and run it like FedEx. That’s preposterous. FedEx and other third-party shippers are profitable because they took only the most profitable type of business from the Postal Service. They do not, and cannot, deliver ordinary first class mail. Nor do they service many rural areas. So unless you want to pay $14.00 to send a letter to grandma, or a birthday card to your sister, you better start supporting the Post Office.

The real problem facing the USPS is not package delivery, but a bizarre requirement that they must pre-fund 75 years’ worth of retiree health benefits. Neither the government nor private companies are required to do that. And the prices for their services are in line with their costs. That is actually required by a 2006 law mandating that “each line of business within the postal service set its prices at least high enough to break even.” It is, therefore, literally against the law for the postal service to lose money on package delivery. Again, business moron Trump wouldn’t know this.

So why is Trump fixated on this issue when there are so many other matters (such as a deadly global pandemic) that require the nation’s attention? For two reasons. First, he is bursting with envy of Jeff Bezos. He knows that he will never achieve the sort of success or respect that Bezos has. Consequently, he seeks to illegally abuse the power of the presidency to inflict pain on his nemesis. In addition, Bezos is also the owner of the Washington Post that Trump despises because they aren’t afraid to publish the truth about him. That assault on journalism is another unlawful action on Trump’s part intended to intimidate the free press.

The second motivation behind Trump’s attack on the Postal Service is his fear of the prospect of all Americans having access to their right to vote. Mail-in ballots are permitted in many states and also by the Pentagon for our citizens in the military. And it is especially necessary at this moment in time to protect people from exposure to the coronavirus.

However, Trump has claimed that mail-in voting is only used by cheaters (including himself) and that it is rife with fraud, although there has never been any evidence of that. However, Trump himself revealed the real reason he’s opposed to it when he told Fox News that it “doesn’t work out well for Republicans.” He went on to complain that Democrats were “crazy” for supporting vote-by-mail, saying that “They had levels of voting, that if you ever agreed to it you’d never have a Republican elected in this country again.”

So there you have it. Trump is afraid because he knows that the more people who vote, the less likely it is that Republicans will be elected. And his confederates in the Republican Party agree with him. They are probably right. Consequently, killing initiatives like vote-by-mail that make it easier to vote is part of the GOP platform, along with other assorted means of suppressing votes.

What true patriots should be doing now is contacting their representatives in Congress and demanding that they support the Postal Service by fully funding it and providing emergency funds to help it get through the pandemic. Remember, they are a major American employer, including tens of thousands of veterans. In addition, you can help by buying a sheet of commemorative stamps. I would suggest the Trump tribute stamp that is labeled as “Year of the Rat.”

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

Watch Seth Meyers Hilariously Skewer The GOP’s Voter Suppression Campaign

Posted by on March 18, 2016 at 2:01 pm. NO Comments :

Seth Meyers is proving to be one of the smartest and funniest of the late-night, political comedians. He has taken his mock-news anchor persona from Saturday Night Live and made it a central feature of his NBC Late, Late Show. And last night’s outing is one of the best examples of why it’s working so well.

Seth Meyers

Meyers “A Closer Look” segment took on the subject of voter ID (video below) with the opening premise that “Voting levels in the U.S. are already among the lowest in the industrialized world,” with slightly more than half of eligible Americans participating in the democratic process. That compares to some other democracies like Sweden where the participation rate is over eighty percent.

The problem, as Meyers sees it, is that rather than trying to improve things many states are passing laws that make it “harder, not easier” to vote. It is not coincidental that those states are run by Republican governors and/or legislatures that have clear partisan agendas. And the impact of these laws can result in the difference “between President Hillary Clinton and glorious beloved leader, Donald Trump, all praise to him and his magnificent hands.”

The segment spelled out how these laws specifically make it harder for low-income residents and people of color to obtain the newly required photo IDs. He cited as an example a 94 year old North Carolina woman who was put through an absurd obstacle course that included ten trips to the DMV and over 200 miles of commuting. All of this to allegedly prevent a suspicious nonagenarian from scamming a North Carolinian whistle-stop out of a single vote.

Meyers correctly observes that the only fraud associated with the anti-voting laws is the purported reason for their existence. The law’s defenders say they are trying to stop voter impersonation – a crime that nobody is committing. Enacting laws to prohibit crimes that aren’t occurring is, as Meyers said, like saying “We’re not sure you’re gonna be on The Batchelor, but you should start taking Valtrex anyway.” Had the law been in effect since 2000 it would have prevented thirty-one possibly improper voters out of more than two billion cast. However, at the same time, it would have kept hundreds of thousands of legitimate voters from casting ballots.

In one particularly egregious example of voter disenfranchisement, Meyers cited an Alabama law that resulted in the closure of DMV offices in mostly rural counties. The secretary of state promised that he would offset that loss of access by dispatching a mobile unit to provide IDs and register the estimated 250,000 voters that didn’t have the IDs made necessary by the new law. He said that the mobile unit would be sent to festivals, schools, churches, and even Walmarts. But when asked how many IDs the unit issued last year he answered, “only twenty-nine.” Out of 250,000. To which Meyers quipped that the unit must actually have been sent to empty lots, swamps, abandoned mineshafts, and Radio Shacks.

The issue of voter suppression is one that is too often ignored by the so-called liberal media. But it is one of the most harmful initiatives being carried out by conservative politicians with the support of right-wing media. Fox News, of course, is leading the way in promoting the false narrative of imaginary voter fraud. For instance, Bill O’Reilly has been fear mongering for years that lax rules for registration are threatening to let “illegal aliens” take over the country. It’s a lie that he and others at Fox are continuing to push on their dimwitted cult of viewers.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

Fear Mongering Racists At Fox News Promote Voter Fraud Lies – Again

Posted by on February 23, 2016 at 1:43 pm. 2 Comments :

The American media obsession with hair-raising tabloid journalism is responsible for lowering the political IQ of the nation. As an example, the wholly manufactured debate over voter fraud keeps popping up whenever there is a lull in stories about Hillary Clinton murdering U.S. ambassadors or if Donald Trump goes a couple of hours without saying something pitifully stupid.

Yesterday at the Fox News community website, Fox Nation, they linked to a story from the National Review that once again raised allegations of non-existent illegal voters invading polling places across the nation. This zombie myth has been debunked repeatedly but continues to surface in the conservative press that doesn’t have anything better to do than lie about fearsome minorities plotting to steal America away from its rightful, white Christianist owners. The headline blared that “The Obama Administration Wants To Make Sure Non-Citizens Vote In The Upcoming Election.”

Fox Nation

This goes somewhat beyond the run of the mill dishonesty where they merely complain that President Obama opposes unnecessary voter ID laws. In this article, by long-time voting fraud alarmist Hans von Spakovsky, the President is accused of wanting to “make sure” that illegal votes are cast by nefarious foreigners. This would make him an accomplice to the crime. Spakovsky wades into the weeds of arcane legalistic rhetoric containing baseless allegations of conflict of interest from unnamed sources. The crux of his argument centers around a wingnut lawsuit…

“…seeking to reverse a recent decision by the U.S. Election Assistance Commission (EAC). The Commission’s decision allows Kansas and other states, including Arizona and Georgia, to enforce state laws ensuring that only citizens register to vote when they use a federally designed registration form.”

Spakovsky characterizes the dispute as an effort to prevent non-citizens from voting illegally (something that virtually never happens) by imposing identification requirements for prospective registrants. In fact, what the lawsuit aims to achieve is to prevent Democrats from voting. What the article leaves out entirely are the specific requirements proposed in Kansas by their ultra-rightist Secretary of State Kris Kobach and other GOP-led states. The consequences of the policies advocated by Spakovsky and his ilk resulted in some 40,000 voters being removed from the voting rolls in Kansas. They justified this on the basis of having found seven names of undocumented residents on those rolls, none of whom ever cast a vote. And guess who most of those 40,000 disenfranchised voters were: minorities, students, low-income workers, and other Democratic leaning constituents.

How Fox News Deceives and Controls Their Flock:
Fox Nation vs. Reality: The Fox News Cult of Ignorance.
Available now at Amazon.

In addition to having no documented evidence of voter registration fraud or illegal voting, even after pouring through hundreds of thousands of votes, the voter suppressors themselves were found to be fraudulent. Both Spakovsky and Kobach were called out in a PolitiFact analysis as falsely representing data on illegal voting. This is the sort hypocrisy we are dealing with. And this is something they have been doing for years in an attempt to put up roadblocks for voters they don’t happen to like. Be watchful as November approaches because they aren’t through with this yet.