This nation NEEDS a full, fair, and no-stone-left-unturned investigation of the "event" on

January 6, 2021. It has become a festering gangrenous wound on the body politic that will be painful to treat and will require the amputation of some of those who participated in it, planned it or now condone it. Most of all, those who DENY that it was an insurrection---an attempted coup---must be banished from further participation in our government.

When the stench of a rotten gangrenous toe is ignored---it claims and destroys the foot---then the leg---and, then, the life of the fool who couldn't---or wouldn't---deal with it.

If the Republicans refuse to participate in such an investigation, we should brand them as complicit and go over, around or through them in order to proceed.

Again, "whatever it takes".

A note from Tom Paine:

"If there must be trouble, let it be in my day, that my child may have peace; and this single reflection, well applied, is sufficient to awaken every man to duty.”

A note from John Lewis: "Never, ever be afraid to make some noise and get in good trouble, necessary trouble."

Let's get to it.

The conviction of Derek Chauvin today is an exhilarating, wonderful, thrilling event---but it

shouldn't be. In a just system, this conviction would not be a "pleasant surprise" or a "relief"; it would be EXPECTED.

Was this a "clear-cut" case? A "no-brainer"? Of course it was!

But, there have been countless prior cases that were just as clear cut that resulted in infuriating and transparently unjust acquittals. In this instance, there were videos and witnesses because people were willing to step up and get involved.

We ARE called upon to be "keepers" of ALL our brothers and sisters. That sometimes requires us to anger the powers that be and it sometimes requires us to give voice to our righteous indignation.

Whenever we are witnesses to injustice and stand silent, we PARTICIPATE in that injustice.

Whenever we allow racists to spew their vile ignorance without calling them out for it, we CONDONE their hateful words.

We must be better than what we have been.

I sent the Florida Chamber of Congress an email last evening explaining that as long as

DeSantis was their governor, we would not be spending any of our time or money in their state. I told them I could not justify taking any of my family to a state where there were people who claimed the legal right to gun them down if they scared someone or run them down in the street if they were thought to be protesters.

I closed by telling them that California and Hawaii also have beaches and they are still civil democracies, not third-world autocracies.

Bil Keane, the cartoonist who made us smile for years with "The Family Circus", would have

clearly understood why today's Republicans blame black Americans for racial conflicts.

In one of his classics, he drew a tearful Dolly pointing at Billy while telling her parents "He started it when he hit me back!"

Brianna has Eric Cantor on. I had forgotten what a smarmy smirking prick that guy is. nt

Trump, McConnell, Barr, Nunes, McCarthy, Cruz, Hawley, Cotton, Scalise, Gohmert, Jordan,

Miller, Pompeo, Flynn, Manafort, Stone, DeSantis, Kemp, Blackwell, Huckabee-Sanders, Greene, Boebert,----------

There are many more we could list, but could someone please just pull the handle down and flush these away now. The political commode is about to overflow.

Besides being Republicans, what do Ronald Reagan, John McCain, George Bush, Gerald

Ford, Ev Dirksen, Chuck Percy and Dwight Eisenhower have in common?





Every last one of them would be booed out of a "Republican" event today and would be lucky to get out without being assaulted.

Could they win a primary? Fuhgeddaboudit!

I fully understand that this post is likely to draw very intense personal criticism but, at my age,

I speak my mind without any concern about what others may say.

I do not know what was in the mind of the Chicago police officer who shot and killed 13 year old Adam Toledo in an alley at 2:37 a.m. on a school night. From the several videos taken from different angles and the FACTS, I believe those who insist that the tragic shooting was "murder" or an "execution" are spouting totally unsupported conclusions, possibly to prop up the silly agenda which says "All cops are bad and are always wrong."

To cut through the name calling and jumps to conclusions, let's consider what the videos show. After answering a "shots fired" call and encountering two males on a street corner where the shots were heard, the cop chases one of the males down an alley after he takes off. After shouting "Stop!" four times as they run along a board fence on their right, the pair comes to a gap in the fence. Here, as the cop shouts "Show me your hands!" and "Drop it!" and the video shows a pistol in the boys right hand, the boy leans into the gap far enough to conceal his right arm from view. He then VERY quickly turns to his left, toward the cop and raises both hands. Almost instantly, he is shot once in the chest and is soon dead.

The video indicates that the time passing between the gun being visible in the boy's right hand and that hand reappearing---empty---from behind the fence was DIGHT TENTHS OF ONE SECOND. THE cop literally had a "split second" to make the decision to either shoot the guy he saw with a pistol or risk being shot himself.

The shooting death of any person is a tragedy and this is especially so when the victim is a child. But, not every tragic death is a cold-blooded murder or an execution.

I have heard a female attorney say repeatedly on TV that the boy "dropped the gun as ordered". No he didn't. He THREW the gun behind the fence where it was concealed. The same woman said that the boy was "unarmed at the MOMENT he was shot". Technically, that is apparently true, but she conveniently fails to mention that he WAS armed EIGHT TENTHS OF A SECOND BEFORE he was shot.

Heartbreaking tragedy? To be sure.

Murder? Execution? No evidence of that.

"Quaking News!" Marjie Greene's new America First caucus, which Representatives Gosar and Gaetz

quickly joined, has already been renamed to more accurately reflect it's TRUE nature.

Henceforth, the Greene, Gosar and Gaetz group ( Don't all those "g"s make you wanna g-g-gag? )will be referred to---at least by me---as the "Sedition Caucus". According to a rumor,---which I am starting right know---their motto is "Let whitey be mighty!".