Update from the
Heartland
No.796
13.3.17 – 19.3.17
Blog version: http://heartlandupdate.blogspot.com/
To all,
I note with sadness the passing of Charles Edward Anderson ‘Chuck’
Berry. I had the honor of seeing
him perform live at the Fillmore Auditorium in the Haight- Ashbury District of
San Francisco, California. It was
an incredible performance. He went
on stage at 22:00 for what was advertised as a two-hour program. He left the stage once for what was
presumably a potty break, but did not complete his performance until 06:00 the
next morning. He never played the
same song twice. Awesome is a
grossly inadequate word for what he did that night. A little side note, the opening band for Berry that night
was a little known local band called Big Brother and the Holding Company, with
a young female lead singer by the name of Janis Joplin. May God rest his immortal soul; his
music will last for eternity. What
an entertainer!
Wow! This was a big week for follow-up news
items, so here we go.
The follow-up news items:
-- Scotland First Minister Nicola Ferguson Sturgeon
indicated she intends to seek the approval of Parliament for a second
referendum on Scottish independence before the U.K. exits the European Union,
expected in early 2019. The first
attempt failed 45-55 [666,
18.September.2014]. I suppose
Sturgeon’s intention is understandable given the outcome of the Brexit EU vote
[758, 23.June.2016]. As reported, Sturgeon’s will add a
further option beyond independence or remaining with the UK – whether to join
the EU as a separate state.
-- According to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office,
the Congressional Republican plan to replace the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act
(PPACA) [432, 512, 553] would leave 14
million more people without insurance in 2018 compared with the current law, and
that number would climb to 24 million by 2026. The legislation would reduce the federal deficit by US$337B
through 2026, in large part because it would lower federal spending for
Medicaid and end tax credits now provided to people under the current law.
-- Prime Minister Theresa May gained the authorization by
the House of Commons, required by the Court in R v.
Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union {[2017] UKSC 5 on
appeals from: [2016] EWHC 2768 (Admin) and [2016] NIQB 85}[789], to begin Brexit negotiations with the European Union [758, 777]. The House of
Lords dropped its objections late Monday, after having sought a guarantee of
more in the eventual shape of the deal.
Mrs. May is expected to move this month to formally trigger what are
expected to be two years of negotiations. The two sides publicly remain far
apart on central issues, raising the risk of a messy separation, detrimental to
both sides. Add to this, the call
by Scotland First Minister Sturgeon (above) for a second separation referendum,
the full scope of Brexit could be very messy indeed.
-- Federal judges in Hawaii and Maryland added to President
Trump’s woes regarding his attempts to imposed travel and immigration
restrictions [789, 790] on now six, predominately Muslim
countries. Both judges issued
Temporary Restraining Orders (TRO) against the President second “watered down”
attempt to issue an executive order restricting travel. Iraq was removed from the list in the
version 2.0. The President has
been his own worst enemy with his careless word choice and linkages, and poor
staffing of these executive orders.
The President clearly has the constitutional authority to regulate
immigration and entry into the United States. What he does not have the authority to do is apply a
religious test for his actions.
-- Regarding President Trump’s wild accusations of wiretapping
[794], Senate Intelligence Committee
Chairman Richard Burr of North Carolina (Republican) and Vice Chairman Mark
Warner of Virginia (Democrat) issued a joint statement, “Based on the
information available to us, we see no indications that Trump Tower was the
subject of surveillance by any element of the United States government either
before or after Election Day 2016.”
The Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is scheduled
to testify before Congress tomorrow, and based on public statements to date, he
is likely to clearly affirm the paucity of ANY evidence to support the
President’s statement. In
addition, all of the President’s excuse-makers are trying to explain away the
President’s associated Tweets as “air quotes” or generalizations. According to the decoder ring possessed
by the anointed few among us, the term “wiretap” in the President’s unknown
language actually means some far broader term of surveillance. I really wish I could find one of those
magical decoder rings. Nonetheless,
Trump is apparently prepared to sacrifice all credibility of the office he
holds to feed his ego; this is what rampant narcissism does to a man’s conduct.
-- The supposition surrounding the fate of Malaysia Airlines
Flight MH370 (8.March.2014) [638, 691, 711, 716] continues to bubble
up, especially with the suspension of undersea search operations in the Indian
Ocean [788]. The latest bubble:
“Air Safety: The Fate of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370—Revisited”
Published: March 15, 2017
I agree with Blackwell. My opinion remains unchanged to this date. The physical evidence is hard to see as
anything other than an intentional act.
Who or why this event occurred remains unknown and illusive. With the wreckage and the “black boxes”
unrecovered, we are not likely to learn more than we know today. This event may well go into history as
an unresolved incident.
No comments
or contributions from Update no.795 . . . quite understandable, since I
did not have much to say last week.
Thank you all for your interest in my Blog.
My
very best wishes to all. Take care
of yourselves and each other.
Cheers,
Cap :-)
2 comments:
Scotland illustrates one problem of “successful” conquest. People don’t stay conquered. In anything from a few weeks to several generations, they rise up all over again. Also, if Scotland achieves independence, it may give us a case study of EU membership versus England’s stand-alone approach.
In the meantime, Theresa May and the UK (or English) government will surely discover the differences between campaigning and actually achieving significant changes.
President Chump has surrounded himself with yes-men (and women), as his style of executive typically does. One hazard of that approach is that the puppets may say ridiculous things to the outside world in their efforts to support the boss’s equally irrational statements. Thus, Kellyanne Conway spouts nonsense about spying via microwave. (She probably meant to refer to hacking via the “Internet of things,” but didn’t know enough about it to make sense.) Sean Spicer, if anything, says irrational things even more often.
That’s not even the most serious part. The term for people who should know better going along with a consensus even when they know they ought to speak up is “groupthink.” That is the only explanation I can find for the health care fiasco and the budget proposal, among other things. Trump knows very little actual fact, policy, or history. He makes up an idea to deal with some issue, and the idea reflects his aggressive ignorance. Rather than stand up to “the big guy,” people with better minds but no character keep their jobs by playing along and trying to make Trump sound not-crazy. This has somehow spread to the Republican Party, who have ceased to consider their own re-election prospects. Some of the Democrats lost their backbones long ago, and when push comes to shove they vote against their own interests yet again. So here we are. The investigations and what not were bound to happen sooner or later unless Trump had been able to immediately seize all power. He’s not there.
Calvin,
The Scotland case is indeed an interesting study, as is Ireland, Ukraine (Crimea), Taiwan, et al. Independence is not always the answer. Taken to the end point, each individual person cannot be a state. Scotland independence (or affiliation with the EU) is a substantial complication to the whole Brexit affair.
Theresa May appears to be a far more serious and capable politician than our president, but hey, that is just me.
Generals Mattis and Kelly are not “yes-men” in any form. It will be interesting to see how their integrity plays in the rampant narcissistic Trump-sphere. Far too many of those he has put in the White House use the decoder ring they were issued and taught to use properly when they entered the sphere; you mentioned two of those in that category.
I have friends and contributors to this humble forum who are staunch supporters of the Donald – before & after his election. I have tried to understand the basis of their support. I have tried to coax them into explaining why they voted for and support him. So much seems to be tied up in anger at, frustration with and rejection of the political establishment of both parties in federal Washington, and those negative emotions are so great that a form of desperation compels them to overlook the character flaws of their champion. And now, we have Republican establishment politicians who know better and are driven by party loyalty more than reason and logic. To me, Trump is the ultimate symbol of resentment toward establishment Washington. Frankly, I share their frustration and anger. I have voiced my anger as long as I have had an audience of one or more to listen. My inability to get beyond the Trump-ster’s character flaws is a direct product of my life experience with men like him. I shall continue to search mightily for the positive in all this.
“That’s just my opinion, but I could be wrong,” and I am humble enough to admit that reality, which is validation that I could never be president.
Cheers,
Cap
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