The White House Needs To Shut Up About Election Recount

Depiction of Obama from 2011 when he was ready to cave on Social Security (COLA) cuts, like he wants to cave on recounts now. But we need leaders with balls, not appeasing wimps.

It is incredible that now,  with Hillary Clinton backing the election recounts in three states (Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania),  the White House wants to interject its two cents that "the American people have spoken" and Hillary and Jill Stein need to put a halt to it. (This according to the UK Guardian yesterday). No fucking way, not with what's on the line. It is especially incredible to many that Obama - clearly the source of these statements - given he hates conflict,  could so easily be ready to see his legacy ripped apart step by step. Hell, Obama's White House ought to be the first on board to support these recounts given all the irregularities reported, including provisional ballots not being counted.

It isn't just a matter of the pitiful political IQ Trump brings to the table, accentuated yesterday with a series of petulant tweets at the level of a dyspeptic 3-year old: "Very unfair! No Way! This is a Green Party scam to fill up their coffers!!"    It's particularly choice Trump is squealing like a stuck pig given he'd be the first in line to do recounts- and in all the states he lost - if the situation was reversed. Oh, and here's the kicker showing this splenetic blowhard pretender fails the reality test for President:

"I won the popular vote if you deduct the millions of people who voted illegally!"

Seriously,  Sherlock? In fact, as numerous credible sources including Politifact have shown,  there isn't a scintilla of evidence for this off the wall claim. A claim which merely shows Trump  - now nicknamed 'Donald Dump'  by the Left - belongs more in a rubber room at Bellevue than the Oval Office.

By now, everyone not living under a rock is aware of the  outbreaks of bigotry and racist violence perpetrated on innocents in the wake of Trump's aberrational  electoral vote "victory". Many of us worried, and it's now been vindicated with over 1,000 reports to the Southern Poverty Law Center, that the troglodytes and knuckle draggers would interpret the Trump electoral college win (he didn't win the popular vote) as license to commit all manner of hate crimes and  domestic terrorism. We have now seen this reprehensible behavior in spades.

Now include on top of that the "abominables row" of cabinet and other agency picks (which David Axelrod has called the "Monster's Ball") and you can understand why millions of sane citizens are terrified. Ryan Holmes of Chicago, quoted in yesterday's Denver Post (p. 4B) said:

"I am frightened of what's to come. Sad and less hopeful of the future."

That sentiment is shared by nearly 53 percent of the populace who saw their votes flushed down the toilet because GOP gubernators had been gaming their electronic voting systems since at least April,, as originally reported by Bob Fritakis and Harvey Wasserman ('The Fix May Already Be In For GOP To Steal The 2016 Election') As they noted in part:

There is no way to verify the official tally on the electronic machines on which the majority of Americans will vote this fall. Nearly all the machines are a decade old, most are controlled by a single company (ES&S, owned by Warren Buffett) and the courts have ruled that the software is proprietary, making the vote counts beyond public scrutiny. In fact, they are beyond all independent monitoring altogether. In many key swing states (including Ohio, Michigan, Iowa and Arizona) GOP governors and secretaries of state will have a free hand to flip the vote count to whatever they want it to be without detection or accountability. This could turn control of our government over to the GOP come November, as it did in 2000 and 2004.

Obama and his White House, meanwhile, appear to be oblivious - given their response to the recounts - that the nation's voting majority are aghast as Trump has made appalling decisions in staffing his administration.  This includes appointing racist bomb thrower Steven Bannon to be a "strategist" and appointing  pro-Confederate Jeff Sessions as Attorney General.  The cast of "abominables" changes almost hour to hour but one thing has been established, these inveterate assholes will hurl this country back at least 50 years, demolishing most advances made with tears, sweat, toil and grit. The "Dump" menagerie includes the likes of climate denier Myron Ebell, e.g.

http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2016/11/trump-appoints-denier-loser-looneytune.html

Whose staffing of the EPA and other agencies will burn up all our climate change regs in a monster coal pit fire.

Then there is the screwball Betsy DeVos that has been appointed to Education Secretary who is dedicated to converting U.S. public schools into vast educational ghettoes- where resources amount to string and cellotape and only poor kids are found.

As Matthew Rosza of salon.com has written:

"DeVos, is a woman who never went to public school, nor sent her children to public school, nor worked for public schools. She does, however, come from a wealthy family that has donated millions to the Republican Party. And she would be terrible for public education in this country"

Adding:

"DeVos also serves on the board of the Acton Institute, which merges corporate interests with dominion theology, or the belief that Christians should take control of political and social institutions. Earlier this month, the Acton Institute published a blog post titled, “Bring back child labor: Work is a gift our kids can handle.”.


Bring back child labor?  This derelict nut case is to be in charge of public education and one can imagine her replacing education with child labor for  6 hours a day at all public schools under the rubric "they will learn by doing".  No wonder so many are appalled, including that the hijacking of the Supreme Court could easily bring back back room abortions ....or coat hangars.

Trump, by his very picks,  is not about unifying this nation but rending it asunder with his reckless decision making and arrogance. The fool needs to be stopped, and short of the state electors coming to their senses on December 19th to cast the electoral ballots, we need this recount to do the job.

This despite the media - including the so-called liberal- already mounting a campaign to normalize Trump and his fascist pool of anti-government degenerates.. 

The last thing needed in this mix is the White House adding its two cents to try to make this election appear normal and Trump being the "choice of most Americans". (See link at bottom which skewers this nonsense.)  No, a majority of us didn't make that choice at all, so don't perturb the results with verbal effluent and snide PR. In a genuine democracy - which doesn't depend on an artificial anachronism - Hillary Clinton would now be President Elect by virtue of a 2.4 million popular vote win.  That outcome is still possible, no matter what Donald Dump barks on his Twitter, if these recounts are done faithfully, including all the provisional ballots.

Let Trump tweet until he's hysterical with rage, he merely proves each day how unfit he is for the job.. Since he wants so desperately to keep his fingers in the 73 odd outposts of the Trump empire maybe it's best he do that, since he clearly doesn't wish to devote 100 percent of time and energy to being a President. Especially for ALL the people!

As for the White House, it ought to be cheering Jill Stein's efforts, given that her success - especially in overturning the electoral vote totals- will ensure Obama of retaining his legacy, policies - including Obamacare.   If those policies and legacy mean anything to him he will now put a sock in it, as they say, regarding Stein's (and now Clinton's) recount efforts.

See also:  "The Voters Rejected Trump":

http://smirkingchimp.com/thread/jack-lessenberry/70081/the-voters-rejected-trump

And:

http://smirkingchimp.com/thread/steven-rosenfeld/70121/trump-campaign-and-gop-allies-in-full-legal-panic-as-recounts-could-create-electoral-college-crisi

As They Celebrate Castro's Death, Miami's Cubans Would Do Well To Remember...

Miami's Cubans whoop it up last night on Calle Ocho, downtown.




















The 73 innocent souls blown out of the sky off Barbados' southwest coast on October 6, 1976. Blown to smithereens by a cabal of anti-Castro extremists - fighting for "freedom" - but taking their wrath out on the Cuban fencing team and family. All regarded as "targets of opportunity" by Orlando Bosch, one of the masterminds, and Luis Posada Carrilles.

The true fact here? Cuba was the victim of the worst state-terror attack in the western hemisphere before 9/11 and it came from the U.S. This was instigated by the CIA on Oct. 6, 1976 using a Venezuelan- based former CIA asset (Luis Posada)  to blow up Cubana Airlines Flight 455 killing all 73 on board.

Certainly the event is just as emblazoned in Barbadian neurons as the 9-11 attack for those in New York. Maybe worse,  since the scale of Barbados is radically smaller than New York, or the U.S. On a national scale of devastation, that Cubana Airline bombing took out a percentage of people equal to 0.03% of the total populace, while numerically as a %, 9-11 took out roughly 0.0001%. Thus, in purely proportionate numerical terms, Cubana 455 was much deadlier. But sadly, it's not on most citizens' radar - certainly not in the US Of A.

I was at the Paradise Beach on the southwest coast of the island with my five nieces when it occurred. We witnessed the plane come down, and wondered what the hell had happened – then watched in horror barely an hour and a half later as bloody body parts began to wash ashore. Even now, as adult women, they're unable to venture anywhere near that particular beach.

The prevailing thought at the time was some malfunction occurred and the plane just blew up more or less by accident. It was only years later that it was ascertained that the two questioned in Barbados were hired thugs commissioned by anti-Castro extremist Cubans and the CIA . As former federal agents Warren Hinckle and William Turner noted in their excellent book, ‘Deadly Secrets: The CIA-Mafia War Against Castro and the Assassination of JFK’ (p. 384, Thunders Mouth Press, 1992):

“Two men who had deplaned in Barbados, Freddy Lugo and Hernan Ricardo Lusano, were interrogated after joking about the bombing in a Barbados taxicab. The two were employed by Luis Posada…and confessed that Posada and (Orlando) Bosch had supplied them with two bombs, which they planted on the Cubana aircraft.”

Luis Posada  Carriles - state-sponsored  (by the U.S.) Venezuealan terrorist, who was allowed U.S. sanctuary by George Bush Jr. and never extradited for trial in Venezuela.


According to a secret CIA cable dated Oct. 14, 1976, intelligence sources in Venezuela relayed information about the Cubana Airlines Flt. 455 bombing that tied in  Alpha 66 terrorist Orlando Bosch, who had been visiting Venezuela, and Posada, who then served as a senior officer in Venezuela’s intelligence agency, DISIP. On his arrival, Bosch was met by a CIA operative and Posada, according to the report. Later, a fundraising dinner was held in Bosch’s honor. “A few
days following the fund-raising dinner, Posada was overheard to say that, ‘we are going to hit a Cuban airplane,’ and that ‘Orlando has the details,’” the CIA report said.

Meanwhile, those of us living in Barbados at the time had no remote notion of the bloody act to come, nor of the U.S. complicity in it, or that the same right wing Cuban renegades - whose associates conspired in the JFK assassination -  were part of it. The CIA Report went on to read:

“Following the 6 October [1976] Cubana Airline crash off the coast of Barbados, Bosch, Garcia and Posada agreed that it would be best for Bosch to leave Venezuela. Therefore, on 9 October, Posada and Garcia escorted Bosch to the Colombian border, where he crossed into Colombian territory.”

(Note the CIA's  sanitizing of language, the use of "crash" instead of bombing, or what we call "collateral language.)

Meanwhile, Venezuelan police began rounding up suspects. Two right wing Cuban exiles, Hernan Ricardo Lusano and Freddy Lugo, who got off the Cubana plane (Flight 455) in Barbados, confessed that they had planted the bomb and they named Bosch and Posada as the architects of the attack. A search of Posada’s apartment in Venezuela turned up bomb-making instructions, some materials as well as Cubana Airlines timetables and other incriminating documents.

Posada and Bosch were charged in Venezuela for the Cubana Airlines bombing, but the case soon became a political tug-of-war, since the suspects were in possession of sensitive Venezuelan government secrets that could embarrass President Andres Perez. Posada escaped from a Venezuelan prison where he was awaiting trial in 1985. In his autobiography, Posada thanked Miami-based Cuban activist Jorge Mas Canosa for the $25,000 that was used to bribe guards who allowed Posada to walk out of prison. Another Cuban exile who aided Posada was former CIA officer Felix Rodriguez, who was close to then-Vice President Bush.

To make a long story short, Posada became the beneficiary of assistance of not only a somnolent, uninterested media (which expressed more outrage at the Pan Am 103 downing in 1988) and a friendly Bush Junior Administration - but also Miami's Cuban community which provided safe harbor for a number of years while investigations were ongoing.

Years earlier, the U.S. had planned massive terror attacks not only on Cuban soil but in the U.S.  - to blame on Fidel Castro, in order to foment a full scale war and invasion of the island. We have the records that document  the extent of it, e.g.                                                          









































This was none other than Operation Northwoods.  In Operation Northwoods the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the U.S. military planned a campaign of terror, to include the sinking of refugee boats (carrying Cuban refugees) on the high seas, as well as the killing of innocent citizens on American cities’ streets, plus random bombings carried out in Washington, DC, Miami and other places. What was the  motivation? Author James Bamford shows (Body Of Secrets, pp. 82-83) it was to incite an invasion and war against Cuba and enable the U.S. to invade and overthrow Fidel Castro.

But the documents to support suspicions of this (failed) conspiracy were only released years later – though many smelled a ‘rat’. When I first heard of Northwoods, I had trouble processing how any U.S. government agency or entity could remotely conceive of such foul deeds, far less carry them out. Then I quickly recalled the blowing up of Cubana Airlines Flight 455 over Barbados, on October 6. 1976 by Luis Posada, Freddie Lugo and other renegades sponsored in the extremist Alpha 66 enclave by the CIA.

It is interesting, historically, to note that the bulk of Cubans who fled as refugees  after Fidel Castro overthrew the jackboots of Dictator Fulgencio Batista, were of the middle class. They fled because they were no longer able to get the easy perks they could under Batista, given Castro wanted to redistribute the island's scarce resources. And since Cuban intelligence learned of plans to try to topple Castro long before he turned to the Soviet Union, his decision was made much easier regarding which nation had his best interests at heart. Most of Miami's entitled Cubans celebrating on Calle Ocho forget that.

I  beheld these entitled Cubans when they first arrived in Miami in 1962 via "Operation Pedro Pan" - given most had been in elite Catholic schools and their parents were horrified at the prospect of a "communist education".  They arrived at my high school, Mgsr. Edward Pace, and were given free textbooks, clothing,  housing, as well as paid tuition compliments of the Miami Archdiocese. Meanwhile, I had to work after classes to pay my own tuition. Do I necessarily begrudge them? No, but I want them to stop their whining now, and disgusting celebrations on the death of a ninety year old man who - let's face it - had been literally on his death bed the past ten years. As Janice opined this morning: "Maybe if they get it all out of their system they'll behave from now on." Miami's Right Wing Cubans? No way.  They'll find some other grievance to chew on with Raul Castro, just stay tuned.

Much of the travail and Castro reprisals were due to the U.S. own attempted interventions and mischief. In each case it forced Castro to tighten the screws of security further including scoping out domestic enemies - like Orlando Bosch and cohort.  Thankfully, after the October, 1962 missile crisis, John F. Kennedy attempted to end the awful relations via rapprochement with Castro through his aide de camp Renee Vallejo and JFK's go between, William Attwood.

Attwood, a Washington lawyer, who had earlier negotiated the release of the Bay of Pigs prisoners who was to be instrumental. He was charged by JFK with becoming the first American emissary to secure Castro’s ear and trust. In particular, to show good will and good faith, Attwood arranged for $62 million in medicines and food aid as part of the prisoner deal.

 Attwood was also continually active in the spring of 1963, securing the release of other prisoners, including three CIA operatives held in Cuban jails. What derailed the effort, ending it violently with the Kennedy asssassination? Likely the CIA getting wind of the plan, especially given they were still enraged by Kennedy's reaction after the Bay of Pigs.

Probability of cross-Agency leakage would’ve occurred when ABC News reporter Lisa Howard offered herself as an intermediary, and her apartment in New York as the venue, for the first bilateral talks between U.S. and Cuban officials.   Certainly, the Agency’s eyes and ears would’ve been turned (tuned?) toward Howard after she did a fairly sympathetic TV special on Castro in April, 1963.   Might they have bugged her apartment and listened in? Possible, but they may not have had to – since a “high society” crowd attended and these may well have provided all the extra source leaks the Agency needed to plan ahead for what it wanted to do.

By September 24, 1963, Robert Kennedy had informed Deputy U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. William Atwood, that Jack might be able to meet Castro, but not in Cuba. Mexico may have been suggested as an alternative. By then many of us suspected that the conspirators had a plan afoot to possibly take out Kennedy in September. We didn't realize it already had been planned for Dallas in November, using at least one team composed of Cuban exiles from the Bay of Pigs with  vengeance on their minds.

With Trump now likely to assume office in two months,  all the progress toward Cuban relations launched recently by Obama will be upended and we 'll return to the same Cold War mentality as before. That is something, along with the memory of  their 73 countrymen blown out of the sky 40 years ago,  Miami's Cubans ought to weep over -   rather than celebrate.

See also:

https://nsarchive.gwu.edu/briefing-book/cuba/2016-10-06/bombing-cuban-jetliner-40-years-later

http://www.loopnewsbarbados.com/content/watch-cubana-air-bombing-remembered

And:

http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2016/03/what-maddow-left-out-in-her-segment-on.html

A Welcome Addition To Basic Astrophysical Literature: "Welcome To The Universe"

As Black Friday dawned yesterday it was almost a certainty that 99 percent of people would be flooding big box stores to snatch up the latest electronic wonders including the new 55"  "Ultra HD" TV sets to make their debuts as Walmart and Best Buy. But a much more sensible option,  as opposed to more electronic titillation,  would have been to invest in Neil De Grasse Tyson's new book, Welcome to the Universe: An Astrophysical Tour.'

The book, a breathtaking overview of astrophysics and especially how we obtain the knowledge we do, is indispensable to getting to know the universe as science knows it   It is distinct from most other basic texts because most of those - as De Grasse Tyson noted on a recent CBS Early Show appearance -  are "a mile wide and an inch deep".  By contrast, this 472 -page book is a "mile wide and a mile deep."  Well, not quite but pretty close and hey, it even includes algebraic equations where necessary - so ignores the old rule that each equation given "decreases sales by one percent" - or some such jabberwocky.

Some of the topics covered include: stellar evolution (the lives and deaths of stars), the search for life in the galaxy, the interstellar medium, the Milky Way, the expansion of the universe, the early universe, quasars and Einstein's special and general theories of relativity. Also: black holes, cosmic strings, inflation and the shape of the universe.

The content actually represents a division of labor between Neil De Grasse Tyson, Michael A. Strauss and J. Richard Gott. For example, the three chapters on special and general relativity were very ably done by Gott.  If you truly wish to get a handle on these abstruse theories there is perhaps no place better then Gott's trio of chapters, so long as you're ok with some intermediate algebra to assist in the task.

Tyson himself is responsible for chapters:  1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9 and 10. The only one I really had issues with was Chapter 9, 'Why Pluto Is Not A Planet'.   For one thing, Pluto is not specifically an object for astrophysical inquiry but rather planetary astronomy. Hence, the chapter's inclusion can only be attributed to Tyson having already spent a lot of ink on the subject, so why not include it (since it's firmly in his academic 'wheelhouse') in a new book?

But as I noted in previous posts the arguments given don't make any physical sense. For example, Alan Stern, executive director of the Space Science & Engineering Division of the Southwest Research Institute – and Principal Investigator for NASA’s New Horizons mission to Pluto- observed that the new planet definition was “sadly flawed, particularly due to the vagueness of the third condition- clearing the neighborhood around its orbit - which might also disqualify Earth”.

He added: “A lot of people are going to ignore the (new) definition because it doesn’t make sense.” (Source: Eos Transactions of the American Geophysical Union, Vol. 87, 29 August, p. 350). The other aspect is that Pluto’s dethroning was done by a subjective vote at an IAU meeting, not by any objective measures or consistency. The problem is the IAU definition overlooks the neighborhood of the object.  Pluto just happens to be in the Edgeworth –Kuiper belt with thousands of other objects. This is a condition of happenstance, not of actual intrinsic property.

If Earth were to interchange its position with Pluto it would also be in the same belt, and because other substantial objects (e.g. Neptune) crossed its path, it would have to be demoted – by De Grasse Tyson and the IAU's definition. So what to call it, a “demi-Earth”? A jumbo dwarf planet or jumbo shrimp planet? Give me a break!

Tyson is on much firmer ground - as well within the proper astrophysical sphere -  when he explores the lives and deaths of stars, as well as the scale of the cosmos, how stars radiate energy and stellar spectra. The last two are especially important cornerstones of astrophysics, and Tyson does a stand up job. One also hopes that when curious readers finish his chapters they will move on to Lawrence Aller's  (and now also Leo Goldberg's) 'Atoms, Stars and Nebulae' - which remains the standard for elementary astrophysics in terms of deciphering the nature of stars.

But Tyson and company excel in their own approach presenting the (usual) less advanced reader with numerous examples borne out by superb diagrams such as Fig. 2.4 showing Kepler's laws, and Fig. 6.2 showing the energy levels and associated spectral line series for hydrogen. I also liked how Tyson delved into the historical background, e.g. for the Balmer series, discovered in 1885.

The H-R diagram (Fig. 7.1) is also one of the best, most beautiful I've seen in any astrophysics text, with the relative sizes of specific stars - like Betelgeuse and Aldebaran - in color and projected against their evolutionary tracks. It's also interesting just how the famous diagram was composed: "From a catalog of stellar luminosities and temperatures Hertzsprung and Russell started filling in the diagram and discovered stars did not occupy just any place". Well, no, because it plots the stellar spectra (or surface temperature) vs luminosity so because each stars has distinct pairs of these, it will have differing positions on the H-R grid.

One warning here: Tyson uses an unorthodox form for describing nuclear fusion reactions in stars. For example (p. 101):

ppn + ppn  =  ppnn + p + p

As opposed to say,

³ He + ³ He ®  ⁴ He + ¹H + ¹H  + 12.85 MeV

with the energy given off.    But truth be told, this notation of his would probably only irritate purists or pedants

What really sets the text apart is all the calculations shown, all very basic, such as the total energy a star will generate over its lifetime by multiplying the star's luminosity L by the lifetime. T. In fact, all the math used which leads to so many fascinating insights, is fairly basic. None of it ought to be beyond a person who has taken at least first year algebra though the derivation of  E = m c²       in Appendix I will likely require at least an intermediate algebra background to follow. .

What makes this book so special is that it offers the reader so many more useful insights and "tidbits" - for lack of a better word- than most astrophysics texts would at this level. One learns, for example (p. 51) "Superman can indeed throw an object 5 miles per second . The object will also fall under the influence of gravity but its curved trajectory now matches the curvature of the Earth such that it never hits the surface and ends up in a circular orbit."

De Grasse Tyson's conversational style, which served him so well in his  2014 reprise of 'COSMOS'  e.g.

http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2014/03/new-cosmos-series-is-well-worth-look.html


is apparent throughout his chapters in the current work. For example, on p. 88, we read:

"You can think of the outermost layer of a star as a tree. Do you know what is coming toward the tree (from inside the star)?  Mixed nuts. We have a mixed nut cannon (the interior of the star) firing mixed nuts (photons at different frequencies) into the tree, and in the tree we have squirrels. My squirrels like acorns (the photons) - these are acorn squirrels. They see all these mixed nuts coming through but they are grabbing only the nuts they like, the acorns, on the other side. (outside the star) come mixed nuts minus the acorns (the thermal radiation minus the H-alpha  photons)"

The reader has to understand that this sort of description is uniquely Tyson's, You won't find it in the chapters by Gott or Strauss, though theirs do remain in a colloquial mode.

The takeaway here is that if you enjoyed the COSMOS series you should find a lot  to enhance your reading in this book. There is all one could ask for to gain a foothold in grasping the basic principles of astrophysics - as well as other topics not specifically related to it, such as how the zodiacal constellations came to be (including why astrology is off) and, of course, why Tyson doesn't regard Pluto as a planet.

YES! Let The Election Recounts Begin In Three States!

Former Green candidate Jill Stein, has raised more than $4 million to do election recounts in Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania.

Americans, by and large, are too gullible and accepting of democratic process - and despite painting themselves as fierce "patriots" - they often fall short where the rubber meets the road. I am talking here about the basic processes for electing our highest officials including for President - an office that arguably is the most powerful on Earth.  Such an election is particularly critical if the capture of the Presidency, for example, represents the final linchpin in one party having total control of government. Hence, by its appointments  (including Supreme Court) and agendas it can then literally affect the lives of tens of millions for good or ill. If the wrong person gets in, sneaks in, really by failure of election processes, it can mean upending the lives of a majority of citizens.

Author Greg Palast, who investigated the 2000 fake Florida (Choicepoint) voter felon rolls, has noted the stark consequences:

"No way around it, this is one frightening moment.  Decades of progress created with sweat and determination face destruction.  Within the next six months, we may see the Voting Rights Act repealed—and civil rights set back 50 years; the entirety of our environmental protection laws burnt in a coal pit; police cruelty made our urban policy; the Education Department closed to give billionaires a tax holiday; and a howling anti-Semite as White House Senior Counselor.."

In respect of this 2016 Presidential election, many critical eyes - not just on the left - have looked askance at what has transpired, especially in view of the Supreme Court's torpedoing of voter protections hitherto assured under the 1965 Voting Rights Act.  But beyond those issues, there is the one that overshadows the use of electronic voting machines and whether, indeed, they can be trusted in giving reliable results.

For any who gullibly believe Diebold machines - for example- are as good as paper ballots, I invite you to take a gander at the machine below showing vote switching (from 2012) in action, e.g. at: http://wonkette.com/488754/watch-this-pennsylvania-voting-machine-hilariously-refuse-to-accept-a-vote-for-barack-obama

Arguably, if the total election results had been much closer, a much narrower margin for Obama, it is quite conceivable the 2012 election could have been stolen. The narrower margins would have made election theft more successful, effective.

The incident shown in the link was not unusual, or exceptional. On Nov. 6, 2012, at  precisely 8.30 a.m. Mountain time, wifey and I stared spellbound while watching KOAA-TV, as the newscaster noted two electronic machines in Adams County had 'switched' voters' choices for President - from Barack Obama to Mitt Romney! Like smart citizens who check their grocery receipts for errors after each purchase, the voters checked their paper printouts and sure enough.....there on the paper was 'Mitt Romney (R)- Paul Ryan(VP)' instead of 'Barack Obama(D)- Joe Biden (VP)'. The voters complained and precinct specialists attempted to replicate the errors, but to no avail.  However, they then performed the legit fail -safe action (demanded) of taking the machines out of commission.

Had the Colorado electoral vote total been determined by those voting machine differences, Colorado would have gone for Romney instead of Obama. THAT is why electoral processes need to be examined especially in close, nail biter elections. It is stupid to just say "Well, the election is over, deal with it!". No, uh uh, not when so many millions of lives are at stake in terms of their life quality.
This is why I am vexed and impatient by people why assert we need to "move on" or those like Kellyanne Conway saying HRC voters "can't accept the results of this election". Yes, they can- IF it is fair.

Recall that back on April 19, I warned of a possible heist using electronic voting machines in Repub states, i.e. states in which Republican governors had control of the voting stations, regulations, accessibility etc. The header of my post was 'The Fix May Already Be In For Gooprs to Steal the 2016 Election'. Therein I cited a blog post by Bob Fitrakis and Harvey Wasserman  on smirkingchimp.com:

There are two things we all need to know about the upcoming 2016 election:

1. Millions of likely Democratic voters have already been stripped from the voter rolls in critical states like Ohio. The key reporting on this has been done by the great Greg Palast, who has shown that a computer program coordinated by the Republican secretary of state of Kansas is being used in some two dozen states to steal from a substantial percentage of the citizenry their right to vote. The raw numbers are high enough that they could have a significant impact on the presidential, US Senate, House and many other elections this fall. The ACLU has now sued Jon Husted, Ohio’s secretary of state, over the stripping of two million citizens from Ohio's voter rolls.

2. There is no way to verify the official tally on the electronic machines on which the majority of Americans will vote this fall. Nearly all the machines are a decade old, most are controlled by a single company (ES&S, owned by Warren Buffett) and the courts have ruled that the software is proprietary, making the vote counts beyond public scrutiny. In fact, they are beyond all independent monitoring altogether. In many key swing states (including Ohio, Michigan, Iowa and Arizona) GOP governors and secretaries of state will have a free hand to flip the vote count to whatever they want it to be without detection or accountability. This could turn control of our government over to the GOP come November, as it did in 2000 and 2004.

These two critical markers of the upcoming national election were at center stage in their upcoming report :  The Flip & Strip Selection of 2016: Five Jim Crows and Electronic Election Theft (www.freepress.org / www.solartopia.org),

In the wake of the historical findings and proof that electronic voting machines CAN switch votes and given the close (as well as suspicious)  results in three industrial states - two of which flipped, and one still close to call - it boggles the mind the media is in such a rush to foreclose the election. This is why Jill Stein merits kudos for undertaking a task that Hillary wouldn't. This despite Hillary getting hundreds of millions of bucks in campaign donations more than Stein.  But obviously, the Clinton campaign is more invested in the "optics" of looking graceful in defeat and honorable - despite the fact many more (2.2. million at last count) voted for her and therefore over 62.5 million stand to have their votes trashed in the dumpster of history. (Even as our nation risks having its reputation and integrity trashed by a Trump administration.)

I applaud Stein's efforts, as everyone should,  and that basically means doing a very simple thing in the three states noted: comparing the electronic vote results with the paper ballot records.  If the totals square off with each other and whatever differential doesn't lead to a reversal in the state's electoral votes, then fine and dandy. award that state's electoral votes to Trump. If not, then no, you can't do that.

As for Hillary, she's being urged by many to officially request a recount in those states. But don't hold your breath, it was far easier for her campaign to grab donated money for the initial run than to protect the integrity of the results after the fact. Also, according to a UK Guardian report "several senior Democrats are said to be intensely reluctant to suggest there were irregularities in the result because Clinton and her team criticized Trump so sharply during the campaign for claiming that the election would be “rigged” against him."

Yes, and well, don't you think if the situation was reversed Trump would be calling for recounts now, and in more than 3 states? Again, it doesn't pay to be faux honorable or gracious when so much is on the line. Hillary needs to drop the pretense of just silently accepting the loss and come out fighting like she besieged her voters to do for her in her 'Stronger Together' campaign.

At the same time, according to the same report, others have spoken publicly, including the sister of Huma Abedin, Clinton’s closest aide who pointed out. “A shift of just 55,000 Trump votes to Hillary in PA, MI & WI is all that is needed to win,” Heba Abedin said on Facebook, urging people to call the justice department to request an audit.

Again, this issue goes beyond the claims of "Russian hacking" which I doubt was responsible. It is more a matter of investigating whether the electronic votes cast via Diebold, ES & S voting machines were "true" and not switched. Also, that all the voters (especially African Americans) in key states who tried to vote - including using provisional ballots - were allowed to do so.

Update:  Ted Olson Pitches Hissy Fit Over Recount:

Yep, the same dolt and hired hack who represented Bush Jr, in Bush v. Gore, now claims (TIME. Dec. 12, p. 18) "Jill Stein's recounts are destructive to democracy".. But how can a process that validates democratic choice be destructive to it? This is total nonsense but we shouldn't be surprised by such loopy logic from a guy who insisted the FLA recounts in 2000, were against "equal treatment" for his client.  He also bitched and moaned about Stein being a "bit player" and yet demanding recounts. Sorry, Roscoe, that is what the STATE laws allow- for any candidate no matter what the % of votes! Seems like this punk just can't handle true democracy.

What I'd like to see instead is an uproar over the refusal of official to do recounts of African -American votes in Michigan, see e.g

http://smirkingchimp.com/thread/steven-rosenfeld/70158/michigan-election-officials-refuse-to-recount-thousands-of-ballots-in-states-communities-of-color

See also:

http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/steven-rosenfeld/70016/recount-or-bust-its-the-only-way-to-verify-who-won-the-2016-election


Excerpt:

Any functioning democracy should involve the verification of the vote. That, in this case, involves a recount process. The candidates who are on the ballot in Michigan and Wisconsin can call for the recount. In Pennsylvania, it’s voters who can. It doesn’t have to be the runner-up candidate. Third-party candidates can call for the recounts in Michigan and Wisconsin. And three voters per county in Pennsylvania can call for them. There were serious concerns leading up to the election about the vulnerability of our voting systems. There were anomalies that occurred on Election Day and all those give rise to the basis of why we make sure we verify the vote.

And:

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/nov/23/jill-stein-election-recount-fund-michigan-wisconsin-pennsylvania

Trumpies Beset By Rage After Campaign Promises Broken

BWAAAAHAHA! You pwomised you'd lock her up,  Mistuh Twump!

Will wonders never cease?  Seems now the Trumpies who literally believed the Donald's fulsome promises during his bombastic campaign are now beside themselves with lots of buyer's remorse and rage. "He promised he'd investigate Crooked Hillary!" burped one gullible fool on the FT website in response to a lead article on 'Trump Reverses Course on Core Campaign Pledges'.  Another doofus barked "He cheated us and he knows it!"  Followed by a whiner who spat: "Another fucking liar in the WH!" Yet another twit bellyached: "I knew he'd backtrack. What a dishonest way to secure the presidency".  In regard to the last, sure - if you enabled him because you're a fucking moron!

The goofy nabobs at Judicial Watch, meanwhile, "warned Trump against his promise to the American people to drain the swamp", according to the same Financial Times piece.

Well, who'da thought! Eh? A guy who everyone with a grain of sense already knew was full of hot air, backtracks on a Clinton investigation.

During a live  meeting with the NY Times, Trump tweeted to reporter Maggie Haberman:

"I don't want to hurt the Clintons. I really don't. She went through a lot and suffered greatly in many different ways.....I think it would be very, very divisive for the country."

Of course, merely because Trump has adopted a semblance of decency, grace and humanity doesn't mean his deplorables will fall in line.  They will believe as fiercely as ever she deserves punishment, and now their standard bearer has punked out.

Who can forget al the idiotic chants  "Lock her up!", "Lock her up!" at Trump rallies during the long and histrionic campaign. Some knuckledraggers were so taken in by Trump's swag talk, e.g. "I'm gonna appoint a special prosecutor!",  they actually wasted hard -earned money on T-shirts with the same 'Lock her up!' and showing "Killary" behind bars. Sheesh, how dumb can you get?  (Let's further note Trump's minions ought to have known better anyway given a President cannot prosecute or lock people up on his own, that is left to the DOJ, other law enforcement.)

Obviously and clearly, Trump didn't expect to really win as most of his honest strategists will admit. That is why he went overboard repeating the message the election was "rigged" by huge unseen "interests". When he did win, you could see the astonishment on his face and then reflected in his - now humble- victory speech. In that speech he spoke relatively sincere words on Hillary's effort and one could see a change in tone coming especially after he said he wanted "to bring the country together". Not that he will have an easy time doing this, but the wrong way was definitely to go after her with more than half of voters (she's now leading the popular vote by  over 2 million) ready to be pissed off if he did. Indeed, in real terms Trump is the "minority President- Elect" if, in fact, genuine democracy is assessed using actual votes of citizens as opposed to artificially contrived "electoral votes".

But it was only a matter of time, following his civil victory speech,  before he'd break the news to his followers that there's be no investigation of "Killary" as they disrespectfully called her. And let's get another thing straight here: Just because Trump won the electoral vote majority doesn't mean our side plans to shut up about him or his administration to come, or his deluded followers. Sorry, but accepting his minority 'W' doesn't mean we also forfeit out first amendment rights. Deal with it!

But obviously from reading the FT reactions, most didn't see it coming. ("How could he DO this!?", I feel BETRAYED!") They are now even reconsidering Trump for a 2nd term. Even Breitbart. com posted "A broken Promise!"  Aw, tough shit! Deal with it, assholes!   Let the alt Right also suck on Trump's other words yesterday that he "disavows and condemns" those extremists. (Maybe he actually read my post on how the alt Right are Nazis, giving Nazi salutes.) 

It didn't stop there and as reported on CBS News last night, Trump has reversed himself on two other issues as well, in which he appeared to put his foot down during his odious campaign.  Those were to do with climate change and torture. In respect of the last, despite all his howling about bringing back water boarding and asserting "I will bring back a lot worse than water boarding!", Sen. John McCain (himself tortured during the Vietnam War) let it be known that no such BS would be tolerated. That meant McCain and possibly others could stand with the Dems and use a filibuster to block any such nonsense.

Further, Trump told the Times that he "changed his mind" after talking with Gen. James "Mad Dog"  Mattis, a Marine, no less. Mattis told Trump "Give me a pack of cigarettes and a couple of beers and I'll do better.".

Will Trump's diehard followers, who want all the tortures of the Inquisition brought back for "radical Islamicists" accept this? Doubtful, but I guarantee they will spill a lot of vitriol in the coming months.

In respect of climate change, Trump repeatedly blurted that it "was a hoax" and "started by the Chinese". Never mind the concept was actually proposed more than a century ago by Svante Arrhenius, see e.g.

http://warming.sdsu.edu/

Now, Trump has evidently changed his tune, at least to some degree.  He told Maggie Haberman, reporter for the NY Times:

"I think there is some connectivity between humans and climate change."

When asked by Tom Friedman if he'd withdraw from existing climate change accords, Trump responded: "I'm looking at it very closely. I have an open mind to it."

This is at least a first step, and might disclose Trump actually possesses a few real neurons and isn't a total buffoon. But this is also contingent on assuming he won't now change his mind with the next breath and say something 180 degrees different.

All in all, what was most appealing was seeing so many of Trump's supporters losing their minds over his broken promises. I warrant many more of their heads will be at risk of exploding in the months and years ahead as they learn that the blurtations recklessly uttered in campaign mode don't easily translate into post-election reality.

See also:

http://www.salon.com/2016/11/23/republicans-did-everything-to-stop-president-obama-but-now-want-to-america-to-back-a-president-who-lost-the-popular-vote_partner/

Excerpt:

"the very same Republican Party that spent eight solid years making President Obama’s life a living hell, obstructing and blocking everything he proposed under the sun all while hurling vile and racist attacks on the man, well, suddenly wants the country to come together and sing kumbaya and accept the electoral outcome. To that end, Republicans have done everything to delegitimize the outbreak of passionate protests taking place across the country in the wake of Trump’s unexpected victory "

Let's Admit It: If You Succumb To "Fake News" You're A Dummy

We are, to put it bluntly, immersed in an information cornucopia. There is simply no excuse for anyone of normal intelligence to get things wrong or be misled. Hence, the reports of "fake news" posted at Facebook taking gullible people in is beyond belief.  Anyone with a grain of sense knows that news outside authorized sources, like Facebook posts, has to be cross-checked. If a person then is still taken in, as in one FB post during the election campaign that "Pope Francis endorsed Donald Trump" then that person must be a dummy.

Reinforcing this was Froma Harrop's recent astounding findings - appearing in her Nov. 20 Denver Post column('I'm Leaving Facebook, Won't You Follow Me?'), that nearly all the Facebook fake news items were generated outside the U.S. and often by kids - playing the American public. She wrote:

"Kids in a town in Macedonia (that’s near Greece) created over 100 pro-Trump websites, spreading phony reports such as FBI plans to indict Hillary Clinton. The Make America Great page outsources the writing of fraudulent news to a couple in the Philippines."


Did they know something most pollsters don't? Yeppers, that too many Americans are dumb as rocks and don't check their facts, or dismiss them as incredible.

Harrop adds:

"Compounding the evil, Facebook’s design makes fake stories from fake sites such as the nonexistent Denver Guardian look like stories from the very real Denver Post. And no, blocking fake news sites from ad revenues is not going to stop politically motivated lying.Facebook further degrades the national conversation by creating echo chambers. Its algorithm directs the “news” people like to their like-minded friends."

With travesties like this no surprise the Oxford Dictionary's choice of post- truth as 2016's "word of the year". It defines post -truth as "relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping pubic opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief"


 Stanford's  Robert N.  Proctor recently asked (NY Times, 'Climate Change In Trump's Age Of Ignorance'):

"People like to think of us as living in an age of information, but a better descriptor might be “the age of ignorance.”

How did we get into this predicament? Why are we about to inaugurate the most anti-science administration in American history?"

I noted in an earlier post that deniers and believers in codswallop merit no tolerance, because in this age of Google and abundant knowledge it's inexcusable not to have the right material at your hands, if you make even a modest effort. But denialists especially aren't so invested, as Proctor pinpoints the key issue:

"We now live in a world where ignorance of a very dangerous sort is being deliberately manufactured, to protect certain kinds of unfettered corporate enterprise. The global climate catastrophe gets short shrift, largely because powerful fossil fuel producers still have enormous political clout, following decades-long campaigns to sow doubt about whether anthropogenic emissions are really causing planetary warming. Trust in science suffers, but also trust in government. And that is not an accident. Climate deniers are not so much anti-science as anti-regulation and anti-government."

Auden Schendler writing in the Sunday Denver Post exposes one major consequence of Trump's minority election:

"Trump’s election almost certainly dooms us to warming beyond the 2 degrees Celsius threshold identified by scientists, because many of the rules put into place by President Barack Obama — the Clean Power Plan, the Paris treaty, even mileage standards on cars — can be undermined by a new president. Beyond two degrees, feedback loops like forest die-off, ice-melt and methane-release take us to an ever warmer world"

This is something I've complained about before in terms of the pernicious mind virus inherent in agnotology, the deliberate cultivation of skepticism for economic, political ends.. But it goes beyond that in the willingness of too many of our fellow citizens to treat information and actual, verifiable knowledge like food choices in a cafeteria - where you just pick what you want and it's all relative to one's preferences.. No it is not.

The libertarian climate denier who disavows the data from ice core analysis and satellite sea ice mappings does himself no favors. Worse, if he invests his gray matter into beliefs that there is a "global warming alarmist conspiracy" and controversial scientific papers are deliberately excluded from publication..

As I noted before, most of these "skeptics" are really pseudo-skeptics: they adopt the venerable verbal mantle of skeptic but in fact do so in an unfounded, unaccountable way. They actually possess the necessary intellect to ferret out the truth and DO the research but are too damned lazy to do it. They don't want to read 15 or 20 papers that thoroughly debunk their idiotic beliefs, they'd rather just go to climate denier websites, imbibe the misinformation and repeat it. Especially with the conspiracy aspect.

One of the best exposes of their methods and dynamics has come from Yale Law school prof and science communication researcher Dan Kahan.  He has concluded that their information processing is almost entirely determined by their deep-seated political values and cultural identities. Thus, a white libertarian member of  Intertel, for example, will see global warming science as just one more vehicle of  subversive force backed  by the "untermenschen"  to be used against his precious economic values and Eurocentric ideals. All of this is then attributed to "global warming alarmism", as an expeditious cover for his own abysmal laziness, ignorance and cynicism. At this point, his thinking is already so corrupted and contaminated it's almost impossible to break through on any rational or critical thinking level.

At the other end of the post-truth spectrum are those who can't even be bothered to invoke rationalizations, they simply believe whatever nonsense is expelled from a moron's mouth. Especially a moron full of himself with pretensions to national leadership like Donald Trump. Hence, Atlantic columnist David Frum's reference to Trump's dishonesty as "qualitatively different than anything before seen in a major party nominee".

Such as saying Mexicans coming to the States were "rapists", Ted Cruz' dad was involved in the Kennedy assassination and climate change was a "hoax invented by the Chinese."  (See my next post, however, as Trump appears to have changed his position on this).

But what has gotten the attention of those like Frum, David Brooks, and others is that none of his idiotic spoutings mattered to those who supported him. It was as if truth was dead, all facts passe. If the Trumpster said it, especially with gusto, it has to be true. As my German sister-in-law put it, the only example she ever recalled that came close was Adolf Hitler.. He could repeat a lie often and via about ten different versions, getting the masses to believe each merely by the passion injected.

But it goes beyond passion, also involving the medium used, and in Trump's case, Twitter. Or what I refer to as a "mini medium" allowing for only 140 characters and hence an absolute minimum of complex thought. One is basically reduced to the equivalent of a series of language cartoons.  This also harkens back to the medium used  constituting the basis of the message, as Marshall McLuhan first pointed out in Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man. 

If then Twitter is essentially a cartoon language medium it will be most deftly exploited by a cartoon persona, which is precisely what Trump is when you dissect him: Bigger than life, believes he can actually be a President and billionaire businessman simultaneously (he can't) and capable of spouting any nonsense that erupts within his synapses realizing a lot of receptive brains will simply imbibe it in unthinking fashion. Those brains themselves the equivalent of cartoons if they receive his tweeting expulsions  and absorb them uncritically. So, little wonder there is no parsing of the messages or analytical processing. Tweets do not lend themselves to any critical processing.  Hence, there is much greater probability of taking them literally.

A big question that arises now is whether Trump will continue his tweeting as President. There is a good case to be made that this would be akin to hiring a 12 year old as his speech writer. Bottom line is we expect more gravitas in our Presidents and the office itself - if one is going to insist on ""respect" - demands a certain level of decorum. This simply can't be achieved by tweets, unless one is willing to be viewed as an unreconstructed adolescent. So, like it or not, Trump- if he wishes to be taken seriously by those beyond his cartoon tweet and re-tweet community - will have to put on his big boy pants and put the Twitter away. Better yet, give his phone to Melania for safe keeping.

That will be a good thing because it will open him up to the potential for really, finally addressing his millions of daffy supporters in a serious way. Also, using media less likely to be hijacked by 14 year olds in Macedonia to create fake news posts on Facebook.

At least one can hope!

See also:

http://smirkingchimp.com/thread/neal-gabler/70096/who-s-really-to-blame-for-fake-news-look-in-the-mirror-america

Excerpt:

"Fake news thrives because there is a lazy, incurious, self-satisfied public that wants it to thrive; because large swaths of that public don’t want news in any traditional sense,. So much as they want vindication of their preconceptions and prejudices; because in this post-modernist age, every alleged fact is supposed to be a politico-economic construct, and nothing can possibly be true; and because even rationality now is passé. Above all else, fake news is a lazy person’s news. It provides passive entertainment, demanding nothing of us. And that is a major reason we now have a fake news president."

If The "Alt Right" Aren't Nazis Why Are They Giving the Nazi Salute?

This is a question that bears repeating and emphasis, especially - remember - it is the deluded members of the Right who've tried to pin the "National Socialist" - Nazi tail on the left. See e.g.

http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2010/07/getting-socialist-thingie-straight-once.html

But this emerges as codswallop rife with cow manure now that The Atlantic has captured the denizens of one Alt Right group - the National Policy Institute- in full throated homage to Nazi ideals and agendas with their 'Hail Trump!" (Ger. "Heil Trump!") salutes and "Sieg Heils"  See e.g. this bunch at their recent gathering in D.C. after Trump's rise to power:

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/11/richard-spencer-speech-npi/508379/

Are there parallels with more distant history, especially in Germany after Hitler rose to the Chancellory? Yes, and much of this background has been provided by German author Konrad Heiden in his mesmerizing book, The Fuehrer.   Heiden, unlike most who write about the Third Reich and Hitler today, actually lived at the time.  He was one of the first to hear the young Hitler's rousing, anti-Semitic orations even as he recognized the perverse self-serving ideology and narcissism at work. (One now ascendant again after Trump has been voted in and appointed Stephen Bannon to his inner circle. ) This as Heiden worked as a staff reporter for The Frankfurter Zeitung.   Heiden was also one of the few writers at the time, despite the Reich laws, to stand against Nazism.

This elicits the question of what Hitler's N.S.D.A.P. or Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei  has in common with the National Policy Institute apart from shouting "Heil Hitler/Hail Trump". In fact, as Heiden points out (p. 468, 'Heil Hitler' was the greeting of the  N.S.D.A.P.  while "Front Heil!" was the greeting of the Stahlhelm (Steel Helmet) itself derived from the Vaterländische Front, VF   or Fatherland Front  - which is the closest analog to the National Policy Institute today. This is given both are devoted to pure Nationalism and the removal of "untermenschen". (More below).

Heiden in his earlier German version 'Hitler- Das Leben Eines Diktators' (1936), of his remarkable book, traces extreme German Nationalism as embodied in  the Volkisch movement extant in Germany since the Middle Ages. It extolled a eugenic Aryanism and invested much of it in myths traced back to ancient Nordic origins. It also incorporated Christian rituals, such as the Passion Play at Oberammagau, in which the Jews were featured as "Christ killers". In other words, it was the Volkisch movement  - embodied in a cultural anti-Semitism  that had gone on for centuries, which Hitler then applied as justification for the Final Solution. (And which he crudely described in Mein Kampf). 

And just as the Jews were deemed untermenschen in the Reich, and hence listed in a National Registry for identification purposes, so also are Muslims earmarked for a similar fate under Trump's appointed White Aryan Nationalists, as exemplified by the National Policy Institute and the alt Right movement in general.

While it is true that Hitler had a rabid hatred of Bolshevism, which he tied to Jews (Karl Marx in particular) this in itself would not have made Jews a "threat" to his expansion demands for Lebensraum. Indeed, he saw the Jews as no "threats" at all but as inconvenient impediments or better, vermin, to be exterminated in line with the Volkisch mindset. 

But let us bear in mind the Jews weren't the only "undesirables" to Hitler and the Nazis. In fact, he wanted the elimination of all those deemed to be members of inferior races or nationalities, including: Slavs, Gypsies, the disabled or mentally enfeebled, and  homosexuals as well. (Blacks would also have been included but essentially numbered zero in German population statistics at the time of Hitler's final power grab on March 23, 1933.)  Heiden described Hitler's thinking in his own words, in The Fuehrer, p. 257:

"If Germany should get a million children each year and eliminate seven to eight hundred thousand  of the weakest, in the end the result would be an increase in power."


Heiden's point is that Hitler believed he could attain the "American" eugenic ideal by brutally murdering those he regarded as the weakest, including those seen as a human sub-species: the Jews.

Now, to more firmly establish parallels: It is actually the Stahlhelm to which the National Policy Institute is most closely compared from a historical perspective. This is because - as Heiden notes (p. 239) it was in this group that the leading and more educated classes placed their trust for advancement of nationalist imperatives. This as opposed to the more working class -composed Sturm Abteilung. In like manner, to advance its own agenda, the  National Policy Institute depends on more college educated white men as opposed to working class men.

Another prime parallel is that both have evidently gorged on Josef Goebbels' propaganda with the National Policy Institute actually translating some of his tracts from the original German. It is most plausible that they included this segment of one Goebbel's tract (The Nazi -Sozi, 1932) cited by Heiden:

"Certainly the Jew is also a man, but the flea is also an animal. And the other animals do not harbor and cultivate the flea but exterminate it"

Which was directly incorporated by Reinhardt Heydrich and others in implementing the Final Solution. DO the tracts being translated by the  National Policy Institute reflect the same disgusting notions and vile language? We can only surmise they do, which is why so many neo-Nazis, White Aryans and others hail the election of Trump because it's set their vicious memes free. Indeed, Richard Spencer in his screed shown in the link above actually refers to the U.S. media in the original Nazi parlance "Judenpresse" used by the Nazis. (Jewish press.)

All of which settles once and for all which side of the ideological spectrum the alt Right is on: the side of fascism and Nazism.  Again, Ian Kershaw in his magnificent account of Hitler’s rise to power (‘Hitler Nemesis’) describes in detail how the NSDAP party members would regularly beat Marxists, socialists, and any leftists on the streets while holding up signs that read: “Tot dem Marxem!” (Death to Marxists!)  Since Marxists are, in fact, Socialists first and foremost, it would make no sense for a true Socialist party to encourage anyone to do that.

If these geniuses who insist Hitler "wasn't of the Right" were correct, then WHY did they beat up on Marxists, Socialists and Commies of the LEFT?  But this shows how even these whackos abhor comparisons with Hitler and the Nazis, even when they encourage Nazi salutes! (As shown in the youtube link above). This fact is unassailable: with the spectacle of alt Right loonies giving Nazi salutes they are clearly pro-Nazi and if they subscribe to Nazism's agendas they are full Nazis. As my sister-in-law Krimhilde put it: "Being a Nazi isn't simply being a formal party member.  It is embracing Nazi ideals and agendas."

The saddest chapter in Heiden's lengthy book has to be XXIII ('Coup D 'Etat by Instalments') where we learn how fast the German electorate regretted its ill-advised choice to help Hitler attain power. When the overt persecution of the Jews and others did finally begin, we are informed (p. 456):

"Up until this time, foreign countries, as well as the German public, had been lulled by the National Socialists in the comfortable faith that 'things would not be so bad', that the anti-Jewish agitation was not meant so seriously ...Now it turned out this was a lie. The anti-Semitic agitation was meant seriously. The persecution of political enemies, bestial as it was, was part of the political struggle but the attack on Jews was an attack on a peaceful group".

Will Americans come to rue their decision to unleash Trump and his minions, as the Germans did with Hitler - and when it was too late? We can only guess. But a first important marker and indicator will be the Senate hearings for racist hate monger Jeff  Sessions as Attorney General. If the Dems roll over on this, it will be almost as bad as the Reichstag voting for the Enabling Act.. Bottom line: at the risk of our nation's own integrity we cannot allow an alt Right segregationist and white nationalist to occupy the top seat of law enforcement - come Hell or high water.

As for "fake news"  anyone reading this blog can be assured that is a non-starter. That's because I rely on multiple independent (including historical) sources which can all be cross-checked. More on this in a future post.