Catching Up - Briefly Touching on News Items That We Missed

Hey!  I know it's been a while since I've been on the this blog.  I'd been busy between the paying job and some family situations that had to be dealt with.  While I'll try to be on here more often I've learned that sometimes life gets in the way.

Those who read the last print issue may note that I referred to more up to date information on certain topics either at the time it hit the stands or shortly thereafter.  I had every intention of doing that but a combination of exhaustion from the job as well as several family emergencies happening at once made that somewhat impossible at the time.  Because of that and the passage of time things slipped through the cracks.  However, since I try to keep my word to the extent possible given a situation I've decided to give some brief summaries on the items I previously planned full posts on but now would be too late.  I apologize for the brevity of these but it should bring up somewhat up to date.

THE VIRGINIA DEMOCRATIC PARTY SCANDALS

Right around the time the last issue got published a combination of scandals rocking the Demcratic Party controlled governorship in Virginai.  Between revelations of Gov, Northam's blackface photos while in college, the sexual assault allegations towards Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax, and Secretary of State Mark Herring's claim that he may have taken a photo in blackface a strange door has opened that shows how entrenched racism may be even in the less conservative parts of the South ( in regards ot Northam and Herring) and how the second in line to rule if Northam resigned may be tarnished in teh era of Me Too.  Now, discussions over whether they should stay in office oir resign have come and gone tenfold since then and those in office are still there.  With that in mind I have decided to bring up what I originally wanted to bring up.

First, how the hell did this shit not come up when they were being vetted?  Political parties have been known, even on the state level, to do opposition research in prep for scandals like this - and somehow this slipped through the cracks.  Were these guys that entrenched in the VA state Democratic Party establishment?  Did anyone even bother to track these down as the 2018 election neared?  These questions somehow escaped the mainstream media but I think most people who have a passing knowledge of American politics have had these questions in their heads.  In Herring;'s case his revelation may have been trying to get in front of it as the shit went down but the Repubs will use this as ammunition.  And they'll definitely use the allegations against Fairfax as ammo being able to concern troll their racism and hide it in a way to mask the Demcrats as "anti woman" or some shit like that.

However, while many people have said the more ethical thing that Northam could've done was resign we must also point out that the website that leaked Northam's pics weren't doing it out of public outrage but out of cynical politicking.  It turned out to be released by a neo Confederate leaning website with ties to the man Northam beat in the Governor's race, Corey Stewart.  The common assumption was with Northam out, they could use the sexual assault allegations Fairfax faced to get him out and then possibly go after Herring if he made the confession he did, which would leave the 4th in charge, a Repub delegate  as the Governor.  They didn't count on Northam et al refusing to leave.  Which leads to the other factor - with the Democrats staying in this case the GOP can claim that the liberals only want to win and don't really care about racism or sexual assault as a cynical way to try and pick off votes, especially cynically trying to get the African American vote.

Ironically though polls taken after the scandal show that the majority of African Americans in Virginia want Northam to stay in office.  Some even suggest that the blockface scandal isn't that big of a deal.  That I personally tend to doubt.  However, I do think a lot of people may still want Northam in office there because the devil they know is still preferable to the devil they don't know, so to speak.

It's hard to say what lies ahead but as things slowly fade here this may either be a footnote to the weirdness of this year or it could be weaponized in Virginia for elections in 2020 and beyond.  I wish I knew what lies ahead but election years and the road leading to them are often confusing and unpredictable.

CPAC 2019

The Conservative Political Action Conference was held by the American Conservative Union at the very end of February and first couple days of March 2019.  The annual conference of the hard right base that the Repubs cater to every year had the usual weird mix of speakers, booths et al.  However, there were some distinctly disturbing things that went down.  While I"ll cover one of them in the upcoming issue, something else comes to mind as well that deserves mention in this blog.

The lockstep in rhetoric and attitudes at CPAC is getting scarier then usual.  Even when the Mad Fuhrer of Mar-A-Lago's weird over two hour speech is taken out of the equation,  the tendency for the base to embrace one point of view on an issue with next to no disagreement was ratcheted up more this time in prep for 2020.  Whether it's their pro forced childbirth stance using what should be a non issue of late term abortion (a procedure only performed when either the mother's life is in danger or when a medical issue with the fetus is so bad it either won't survive birth or will die very shortly thereafter) and ratchieting it into believing the other side supports infanticide or giving the illusion that socialism will ruin the US if the GOP doesn't win, what seems to be prominent in what little I was able to catch (again I was taking care of family issues) was more aimed at painting people on the left as not merely people they disagree with but creature who hate the country and want to persecute the right wing.  While some of this has always gone down at CPAC, their rallying aorund electoral vote winner Donny seems to give it a darker vibe this time around. 

While its good they reportedly banned white nationalists from appearing there a(t least on the booths to sell stuff side of things) it seems to contradict themselves when some of the speakers (especially Donny) seems to spout a variation of their same rhetoric.   Add that to the spin that those on the other side are evil and beyond reasoning with and there's  the potential of a small number of this lot that could be emboldened to head towards violent confrontation.  I really hope it doesn't happen but, until I see people on the right call in their own and consistently point out that the hateful rhetoric is counterproductive, I'm not holding my breath.

JUSSIE SMOLLETT 

I wasn't going to comment on this case at all given that it could be confusing whether of not the actor from the TV show Empire was attacked by two people late one night in Chicago or whether it was staged or not.  However, the recent dropping of all charges against Smollett means a lot of people are upset, climing that justice was not served.  The Mad Fuhrer of Mar-A-Lago even tweeted that he's having the FBI and DOJ lookk into the case (which, given it's a state case and not Federal would be difficult at best).

So where do I stand?  I have no idea.  I really don't/  At this point it's possible that Smollett was telling the truth. It was also possible that he might not have but that the prosecutions case was so weak (and 16 felony charges was a bit of overkill) that pursuing it further could've blown up in the Cook County prosecutors faces.  Nobody saw this coming so I have to say that I really don't know what to expect here - and you probably don't either. 


Granted this is merely the tip of the iceberg in terms of news issues that may fall through the cracks.  With the debate over the Green New Deal being of utmost importance, healthcare, women's reproductive rights being under attack now more than ever and various other things in the news it can be hard to get to the point.  We'll try to focus on these issues later when time permits.  Now it's time to step back and have some dinner. 

P.S.:  For the time being I am allowing comments.  However, if anyone decides to be a complete asshole or threatens myself or anyone else I have no problems with shutting that down.  Keep that in mind before you decide to comment.