From Pine View Farm

“That Conversation about Race” category archive

Voting Is Not a Right. It Is a Duty. 0

I learned that from my Daddy by example.

He never missed an election, nor have I.

Indeed, I have memories of his making sure his poll tax was paid, back when I was a young ‘un growing up under Jim Crow, when segregation was de jure, and not, as it is today, primarily de facto. (No, it hasn’t gone away. If you think it has, you are kidding yourself. It may not be as obvious, but it still is. Just ask Florida Man.)

We voted Monday at a local early voting site. It was a swift and painless process which took less then 10 minutes from parking the car to pulling out of the parking lot.

And I urge you vote too, if not early, certainly on election day.

Taking a few minutes–or even a few hours–to vote is a small price to pay for preserving democracy.

Don’t exercise your right. Do your duty.

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Cujo Goes to Congress 0

Television shows Mike Johnson wearing

Via Job’s Anger.

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Easy Marks 0

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Establishmentarians 0

Michael in Norfolk is less than sanguine about the new Speaker of the House. A snippet:

Mike Johnson would erase the separation of church and state and make his dangerous and bigoted form of Christianity the de facto established religion in America,

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The Spirit of the Secesh Haunts the House 0

Frame One, title:  Night of the Living Republicans.  Frame Two, captioned

Click for the original image.

Afterthought:

I do find it puzzling why so many they-call-themselves pundits want to hold Democrats to account for Republicans’ actions.

Could be that on some level they realize that Republicans are no account?

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Tricky Treating, Republican Thought Police Dept. 0

At the Tampa Bay Times, Stephanie Hayes has some ideas as to what Halloween costumes will be acceptable to Floria Man’s Republican Thought Police.

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The Coronation 0

House GOP crowning the new Speaker of the House with the hat of the QAnon Shaman.

Click to view the original image.

Dick Polman is less that taken with the Republicans’ choice for Speaker of the House. Here’s a bit of what he has to say:

Just what we need running the House: A evangelical fanatic who touts the blessing of a felonious criminal defendant who yesterday was fined 10 grand for contempt of court. A guy who formerly ranked 213th in House seniority is now second in line to the presidency. Every time we think we’ve hit bottom in this benighted nation, another cellar trap door creaks open.

Follow the link to find out what he really thinks.

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Dis Coarse Discourse 0

Title:  Intimi-Nation.  Frame One:  Party leaders and followers show how it's done!  Forst. try to overturn election results through violent intimidatioon (Image of January 6 insurrecction).  Frame Two:  After that, bully state officials into not certifying that vote (Image of state legislator pressing

Click to view the original image.

Aside:

You can listen to the threatening phone call for the Congressman’s wife.

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Republican Thought Police 0

Michael in Norfolk decodes de code:

If one listens to Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin and other disingenuous liars on the political right, they claim to be advocates for “parents’ Rights.” Yet when one takes a look at what their agenda really entails, it is really all about suppressing parents rights save for the minority of Christofascists and white supremacist in the GOP base. These people find any book acknowledging the lives and loves of any one non-white or non-heterosexual to be abhorrent.

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Karen Karen-Like, Reprise 0

Phoning it in.

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Karen Karen-Like 0

What’s the proper term for a cosplaying male Karen?

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Republican Thought Police 0

Florida Man plans to enforce Newspeak, Florida style.

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Still Rising Again after All These Years 0

Thom shares the backstory of why the United States is the only major industrialized country that does offer universal health care.

America’s original sin of chattel slavery continues to exact its toll.

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The Seeds of Dysfunction 0

Michael in Norfolk considers the state of today’s Republican Party and considers how it became what it is today. Here’s a bit of his article:

Instead (of the Republican Party of his youth–ed.) we have a sectarian party dominated by evangelicals, white supremacists and the obscenely wealthy who manipulate the former two to act against their own best financial interests. Increasingly, “family values,” racial division, homophobia and wild conspiracy theories are used to dupe the gullible and ignorant. How did this all happen? Personally, I think there were two causations that stand out – although they were not the sole factors – the first being Richard Nixon’s “Southern Strategy” to court racist southern whites and the second was Ronald Reagan’s embrace of evangelicals and the falsely named “Moral Majority.”

My two or three regular readers know that I agree completely with him about Nixon’s Southern Strategy.

I’m not so sure that the Moral Majority and its ilk deserve to be considered a separate cause. White Southern Protestant fundamentalism and racism have always been intertwined. Just to pick one example, the Southern Baptist Convention seceded (you will pardon the expression) from the national group in 1845 in support of slavery.

If the two causes Michael identifies are not bother and sister, they are at least first cousins–and incestuous ones at that.

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The Crypto Con 0

The Southern Poverty Law Center follows the funny money.

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Republican Thought Police 0

At the Tampa Bay Times, seven former presidents of Florida universities unite to speak out against efforts in Florida (and other states) to pretend that history isn’t and certain persons aren’t. A snippet (emphasis added):

Two likely unintended consequences we can reasonably predict. First, the ability to participate in debate and discussion in a future Florida Legislature or in the public arena cannot happen if people never learn about their history, their fellow citizens, and the world they live in. Second, prohibition of certain content could well place graduates from Florida’s educational systems at a competitive disadvantage in the global talent hiring pool. Most global corporations value experience in understanding and navigating diversity across all dimensions.

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Still Rising Again after All These Years 0

There are none so blind as those who will not look.

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Still Rising Again after All These Years 0

Emma talks with Professor John S. Huntington about the deep racist and anti-worker roots of today’s it calls itself “conservative” movement. Those roots go deeper than you might think.

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Indoctrination Nation, the Saga Continues 0

Bus Stop Guy is talking to Lemont:  I got them to fire a subersive

Click for the original, larger image.

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Indoctrination Nation 0

Peter Smagorinsky, emeritus professor at the University of Georgia, points out that not only can it happen here, it is happening here. Here’s just one of the examples he cites:

Florida is perhaps the nexus of selective, distorted history. The state is using materials provided by PragerU, which is not a university. It is headed by radio personality Dennis Prager, who says, “We are in the mind-changing business. …

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