Month: August 2019

Trumpism Is Unsustainable

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Calamity face

I am on a mission to make sure that Donald Trump is a one term president. Voter Blue.

Trumpism Is Unsustainable

By D. S. Mitchell

My Personal Mission

Trumpism is unsustainable. Donald Trump has been in office for two and a half years. Since November 9th, 2016 I have made it my personal mission to call out our faux president every chance I get for his scandalous and corrupt behavior. I challenge anyone, Republican or Democrat to name any president in our 200 year plus history that was worse than this guy. Trump is in fact a risk to the country, in every way imaginable.  He is a reckless and hate filled demagogue.

Temperamentally Unfit

Trump’s chaotic thinking and his emotional volatility are, in fact, a danger to the country he administers. In my most wild nightmares, I never imagined the potential of such a soulless narcissist ever being elected to any office in the country, much less the presidency. His behavior over the last week has raised both tempers and eyebrows. The local volunteer Fire Department has had to stop by my house several times to put my ‘hair fire’ out.

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Great Blue Heron

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A Great Blue Heron just hanging out.

I have a friend who lives in a houseboat moored at Sauvie’s Island. Fortunate one. Sauvie’s Island is a beautiful rural island in a channel of the Columbia River.  The rapidly gentrifying little farming enclave is just a few miles outside of Portland, Oregon. Blue Heron’s and other waterfowl can be seen just hanging out enjoying the day.

Editorial: “A Matter Of Time”

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A Look At Gun Control and 2nd Amendment Reform           

By Trevor K. McNeil

Still Echoing

The cycle has come back around again, and gun-control has returned to the sociopolitical forefront. Something that has occurred with increasing regularity since the beginning of the 21st century, starting with the Columbine shooting in 1999. A twenty year old tragedy that still has echos today.

Posting Memes

Both Sandy Hook shooter Adam Lanza and Parkland shooter Nikolas Cruz posted memes related to Columbine massacre, before committing their own atrocities. The down time between mass shootings has been reduced from months, to weeks, to hours.  The two most recent shootings in Ohio and Texas occurring on the same day. Something that has never happened before on American soil. It has gotten to the point that in the United States no one is safe anywhere. Not in church, not in school, not at the mall, not at a concert, not at a restaurant.

Efficient Means Of Killing

The main reason this is happening, and will continue to happen, is a lack of political will by law makers to devise meaningful reforms. Finding that ‘will’ seems is apparently hard.  But we must find the will. We must make it more difficult for such crimes to occur by limiting access to guns. Death by gun is one of the most modern and efficient means of killing, on an personal level, ever devised. One such reform would be an extreme overhaul of unlicensed gun shows. Such unregulated gun shows are exactly how the Columbine shooters got the guns they used that fateful day, in April 1999.

Under Age

Despite that both shooters were too young to buy, or own a gun in Colorado, they were able to use a ‘straw buyer’ to get the guns at an unlicensed gun show. In December, 1998 several guns were purchased at an unlicensed gun show by the straw buyer. The buyer later sold the weapons to Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, in spite of the seller knowing the boys were under the legal age. It is clear that if they had tried to buy such weapons in a licensed gun store they would have been turned away.  If they hadn’t gotten the guns a lot of people would be alive today, including the shooters.

Gun Love

The gun love is so strong in some quarters, not even Democrats dare stand against them, even in terms of reasonable measures. Conor Lamb, as such, is a self-described “Pro-Gun Democrat.” It was that distinction that was key in his victory over his Republican opponent in 2018. It is a fact that gun law reform will be necessary if America is to slow the number of gun related deaths. Currently, the United States loses 40,000 people annually to gun violence.  Many of these deaths are not mass shooting events, but rather domestic violence or suicidal actions.

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News That Bites: Try A Little Kindness

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Try A Little Kindness

By David L. Shadrick

Hello and welcome to Calamity Politics and “News That Bites” with David Shadrick and Calamity Clown.  Calamity has stood us up. She sent me a note scribbled on the back of a Nancy Pelosi fund raising letter telling me she intended to spend the afternoon curled up in Bernie Sanders’ lap, while he reads his “Medicare4All” plan aloud. 

It Ain’t Easy

This is probably the hardest article I have ever tried to write.  It shouldn’t be that hard to simply remind everyone that we all need to be a little bit nicer to each other.  As the world around us experiences the chaos that is existence, we need to remember to take a few extra minutes to embrace kindness, as a life choice.

Reserve Your Condemnation

When I do fundraising I often times have to remind volunteers not to become agitated or angry when someone doesn’t make a donation, or worse, is disrespectful.  I remind them that there are so many charities begging for money; and people have limited resources. I know what it’s like to be on a fund raisers platinum mailing list.

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“Killers, Victims or Bystanders”

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Killers, Victims, or Bystanders

By D. S. Mitchell

Indifference Is Seductive

Elie Wiesel, teacher, writer, philosopher and Auschwitz death camp survivor, said in a speech before the US Congress in 1999, “indifference can be tempting-more than that, seductive.  It is much easier to look away from victims.  It is after all, awkward and troublesome to be involved in another person’s pain and despair.”

Three Categories

Furthermore, “to be indifferent to that suffering makes the human being, inhuman.  Indifference is always the friend of the enemy, for it benefits the aggressor-never the victim, whose pain is magnified when he or she feels forgotten.  The political prisoner, the starving children, the homeless refugees-not to respond to their plight, not to relieve their solitude by offering them a spark of hope is to exile them from human memory.  And in denying their humanity, we betray our own.  Indifference, then, is not only a sin, it is a punishment.  Where I came from, society was composed of three simple categories: the killers, the victims, and the bystanders.”

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Conspiracy Theories Fly With Epstein’s Death

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By D. S. Mitchell

Twitter On Fire

There is a great deal of discussion about whether sex trafficker and pedophile, Jeffrey Epstein committed suicide, or was murdered. OMG, if you have been on Twitter; or watching the 24/7 cable news, over the last week, the hue and cry has been thundering.  The conspiracy theories are flying, and they aren’t flattering to many high profile men, such as Prince Andrew, Alan Dershowitiz, Bill Clinton, Donald Trump and strangely, AG William Barr’s father, Donald Barr.

Failure Of Explanations

I have a few times in my life knowingly and eagerly embraced a “conspiracy theory.” The reason of course, was because I could not accept the unbelievable government “explanations.”  The first and second were the murders of JFK and RFK. I just have felt that the Kennedy brothers made some very powerful enemies. Their enemies believed the Kennedy’s were dangerous to the country.

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Household Helps: Cleaning Schedule

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Cleaning Schedule

By D. S. Mitchell

Helpful Hints

I love saving helpful hints. You know the stuff you see on the side bars of Good Housekeeping. I’ve had some things saved so long they may have been written in cuneiform. These little hints and helps are often preserved written on the back of an envelope, or a crumpled magazine page I snatched from a magazine at my doctor’s office. I have an entire filing cabinet drawer memorializing “helpful hints”.

Rolodex Mind

John S., my second husband was a very organized fellow. He had a schedule for nearly everything. You know, those things a conscientious hubby tends to do around the house. He kept track of oil changes for the cars, Spring window washing, furnace filter changes, gutter cleaning. You get the idea. Anyway, I often miss his “already done” attitude toward household tasks. When I saw this household cleaning schedule I just knew I had to have it….and pass it on, of course.

When Lights Come On

Seriously, without this list how would you know that the coffee maker that I haven’t cleaned since I took it out of the box should have been cleaned every day.  That I should be cleaning the mirrors weekly but instead I clear them after they steam up from the shower with my bath towel.  Monthly cleaning includes maintenance on the vacuum cleaner instead of changing the bag when the light comes on.  Ovens aren’t cleaned when you want your deposit back, you’re supposed to do it every 3 to 6 months.  And finally, I’m pretty sure that none of my homes have ever been pressure washed, let alone annually.

Now you can refer to this list in order to better ignore important tasks around your home too!

Enjoy your weekend checking off chores on your cleaning schedule.

 

6 Lies About Single-Payer Health Care

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SINGLE-PAYER HEALTH CARE LIES

By D. S. Mitchell

Drop The Labels

Honest health care policy experts know that the solution to fix the American health care system is staring us in the face, and it is single-payer. Whether dubbed “Medicare-for-All” or an “expansion of Medicaid” through ObamaCare. The solution is easy when labels like “socialism” “liberalism” “progressivism” are ignored. Trump and his DOJ is in court at this very moment trying to invalidate the ACA (ObamaCare). It seems that the more resistance Republicans arouse over destroying ObamaCare the voices for Medicare-for-All grows louder.

Health Care As A Right

The evidence is clear, Americans believe that every person has a right to health care, irrespective of their ability to pay. We as a people, believe that we have an obligation to take care of each other. In fact, there is more momentum for the adoption of a single-payer health care system than at any time in our history.

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