Nicaragua

Growing Migrant Crisis In America And Worldwide

With the growing climate change crisis worldwide, and the mistreatment of migrants, based on religion, race, and ethnicity, the world faces a massive crisis.

Not only in America with the Republican party do we have nativism rearing its ugly head, but also all over the globe, as migrants wish to escape horrendous economic and climate conditions and persecution in their homelands.

Men, women, and children are being rejected at borders after dangerous migrations, and also at sea, and the crisis will only grow in future years.

The idea that Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and Texas Governor Greg Abbott are showing disrespect toward migrants from left wing dictatorships, including Cuba, Nicaragua, and Venezuela, and using them as political props is shocking and reprehensible!

This is a spiritual and moral crisis of massive proportions in Europe and worldwide, and reminds us of the crisis of Jews in Europe and antisemitism in World War II. The conflicts going on today in many nations, with politicians exploiting hatred and division, is very disturbing!

And now, the rise of Giorgia Meloni as the first woman Prime Minister in Italy, promoting the Fascism of former dictator Benito Mussolini, is yet another sign of the dangers facing migrants. The idea that exactly a hundred years after the rise of Mussolini and the Fascist Movement, we are seeing Fascism come to power again, is shocking.

And the fact that the Republican Party and Donald Trump are clearly Fascist oriented, and wish to promote authoritarian government, is a sign that much of the history of the first half of the 20th century may be repeating itself.

American democracy and worldwide democracy is in crisis, and basic decency and humanity is under attack!

US Joins 4 Recent Nations Banning Abortion, While 59 Nations Have Expanded Abortion Rights!

The United States, supposedly the leader of the “free world”, has now joined four other nations recently banning abortion, including Poland, Nicaragua, El Salvador, and Honduras!

Meanwhile, at least 59 other nations, which put America to shame, have expanded abortion rights, including all other democracies in Western Europe, some areas of South America and some nations in Asia, as well as Australia and New Zealand.

Most of the Middle East and Africa restrict or ban abortion, as well as areas of Latin America and Asia.

“Socialism” And “Defund The Police” Killed Democratic House Numbers, Endangering Majority In 2022

The Democratic Party needs to realize that if it goes too far to the Left, it will doom President Joe Biden’s efforts for success!

Unfortunately, the Congressional Elections of 2020 demonstrated that the nation is still very split on what is desirable to accomplish, as the Republican opposition and Donald Trump utilized fear of the word “Socialism”, as if Joe Biden and the Democrats are equivalent of Communist leaders in Cuba, China, the Russian Federation, and other left wing regimes, such as Venezuela and Nicaragua!

This shows total ignorance of the term “Socialism”, and the reality that America is a mixed Capitalist-Socialist nation, with the Socialist party of Eugene Debs and Norman Thomas in the first half of the 20th century contributing many ideas, which over time, were part of the New Deal of Franklin D. Roosevelt, the Great Society of Lyndon B. Johnson, and many other progressive reform since then.

But it is clear that had Bernie Sanders somehow been the Democratic nominee for President, he would NOT have been able to win, as only a moderate centrist with a tip to the Left, as Joe Biden has been his whole life, could possibly have won back the Midwest states of Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania, along with the Sun Belt states of Georgia and Arizona, and not lose any of the 20 states that Hillary Clinton won in 2016.

Also, while there have been too many outrageous examples of police abuse and brutality, and particularly against African American males and Latino males, and really even females, the answer is police reform and accountability, not “Defund the Police”, as they are still essential.

Sadly, the Senate only saw two Democrats elected (Mark Kelly, John Hickenlooper), while one (Doug Jones) was defeated, gaining only one seat, to 48, although Georgia creates an opportunity in its runoff election for the chance to have a 50-50 Senate, that Vice President Kamala Harris could organize as a Democratic Senate, with Chuck Schumer as Senate Majority Leader, instead of the horrible Mitch McConnell.

But there is danger of the House of Representatives, in a midterm election, going back to the Republicans, since they have gained at least 5-7 seats in the 117th Congress, and with the reality, that the party in the White House usually loses seats in the following midterm election.

The Senate will have, again, twice as many Republican seats up for election in 2022, but this scenario did not work out in 2020, so no assurance there either of retaining or gaining a Democratic Senate majority, which is so urgent to make Joe Biden a successful President!

Tonight’s South Carolina Democratic Presidential Debate A Turning Point

It is clear that Tuesday night’s CBS South Carolina Democratic Presidential debate is a turning point, as Senator Bernie Sanders will have the tremendous advantage if he wins the South Carolina Primary this Saturday.

Sanders is self destructing, however, with his inability to stop praising Cuba under Fidel Castro, and the Chinese government of President Xi Jinping, ignoring their violations of human rights, while improving education and health care.

Sanders seems totally deaf to warnings that he must repudiate his past extreme leftist views on Nicaragua and the Soviet Union in the 1980s, as that is a guarantee to cause the loss of Florida at the least, and likely cause the industrial Midwest and the Southwest to run away from his candidacy, if he is the Democratic nominee for President.

How Sanders could win states that Hillary Clinton lost by small margins, such as Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin, is impossible to conceive.

Also, any hope of winning Arizona, Georgia and North Carolina, and come within striking distance of Texas, would be totally gone with a Sanders Presidential candidacy.

And Colorado, New Mexico, and Nevada could be in danger, as well as New Hampshire and Virginia, all won by Hillary Clinton in 2016.

And this is without addressing the “democratic Socialism” label that Sanders embraces, and his unwillingness to fully explain how all of his ambitious programs, which sound great on paper, could possibly be achieved through Congressional action.

The importance of the federal judiciary and the Supreme Court is at stake, and the nation cannot afford more right wing judges and Justices if Donald Trump is reelected.

Hopefully, we will see moderates unite around one candidate to oppose Sanders after Super Tuesday next week, with the best bet now seeming to be Pete Buttigieg, unless Joe Biden has a major rehabilitation by voters in South Carolina and the 14 states of Super Tuesday.

US, Due To Ignorance And Stupidity Of Donald Trump, Only Nation Against Paris Climate Agreement, As Nicaragua And Syria Sign Agreement

The United States, under President Donald Trump, is the laughing stock of the world, as our country is now the only one that has broken with the Paris Climate Agreement, negotiated in 2016. and agreed to by President Barack Obama.

As part of his war on anything connected with Barack Obama, and accepting the corruption and ignorance of Environmental Protection Agency head Scott Pruitt and Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke, Donald Trump has decided that there is no global warming or climate change crisis even though 97 percent of all scientists see the crisis, and we are seeing the results of global warming and climate change in our country, as well as worldwide.

Rather than plan for the future, Trump is embracing the coal and oil industry and the long term damage they are perpetrating, and insuring massive long range problems for America internally and on the world scene, with our nation’s head in the sand, repudiating scientific fact. and believing only in prayer as the solution.

When Nicaragua and Syria embrace such an agreement, particularly Syria in the midst of a seven year civil war, it just shows how low our prestige and standing as a nation, and supposedly the leader of the world, has fallen.

The long term damage that can be expected, is alarming, and it will help to condemn Donald Trump in history, but somehow, one gets the feeling that Trump is not concerned about that, but rather, simply, total destruction of all of good work of the federal government and Republican and Democratic Presidents for the past century from Theodore Roosevelt onward.

Donald Trump Rejects The Paris Climate Deal, A Tragedy Long Term For America And The World!

Donald Trump has just done the most disastrous long term action so far in his Presidency. by rejecting the Paris Climate Deal!

His own daughter, Ivanka, could not get through to him, and neither could Secretary of State Rex Tillerson; thousands of climate scientists; and hundreds of corporations, including Shell Oil and Exxon Oil, where Tillerson was once its leader.

It is a smack in the face to the entire world, with 195 countries having agreed to it, and only Syria and Nicaragua not taking part, and in the case of Nicaragua, they rejected the deal as too weak and wanted a stronger deal. So only a nation in the midst of a long civil war has refused to cooperate, as millions are dying, being wounded, or fleeing for their lives in that tragic war in Syria.

Trump is rejecting science, and allowing Scott Pruitt, his despicable head of the Environmental Protection Agency, and White House Advisor Stephen Bannon, to control his decision.

Trump will be condemned in history for this dastardly act, and his super nationalistic view reeks of Fascism, and it must be bitterly opposed by marches and demonstrations, and the push to defeat every Republican in Congress who supports what Trump has done.

Trump is showing no concern for future generations, and we will see over this century the eventual flooding of such cities as New York City, Boston, Miami, and New Orleans, and his legacy will be that he helped to cause this to occur.

Politicians go to doctors for medical treatment, for their expertise, so why not have politicians leave it to scientists to warn us what we must do to prevent climate change and global warming from destroying the nation and the world?

Imagine if Franklin D. Roosevelt had rejected the advice of Albert Einstein about nuclear weapons in 1939, because after all, one cannot see the atom visually!

America has given up world leadership, and will pay long term for our isolationism, and whatever can be done to reverse this crazy decision legally and politically over the next few years must be done!

How selfish and self serving can a President be? And Trump says the world will laugh at us if we do not rescind the Paris agreement, as the world is taking advantage of us, when in fact, the world is laughing at his stupidity and ignorance precisely because he has made this despicable decision!

Ronald Reagan: The Unvarnished Truth! Myth Versus Reality!

Ronald Reagan is treated as a saint by the conservative movement and the Republican Party, as a man and a President who could do no wrong, but the truth is otherwise.

Of course, no President and no human being is perfect, and all commit mistakes or show lack of sensitivity, but the point is that the 40th President’s image and historical record needs to come down to earth, on this, the 104th anniversary of his birth, and a quarter century after his leaving office.

So what should Americans and others know about Ronald Reagan, that is not general knowledge?

As California Governor and as President, the issue of mental illness was dealt with by cutting spending, and throwing mental patients onto the streets of America, creating a great increase in homeless population.

As head of the Screen Actors Guild in the late 1940s and early 1950s, Reagan cooperated with the House Unamerican Activities Committee investigation of Communists; worked with Senator Joseph McCarthy during the Red Scare; and was an FBI informant for J. Edgar Hoover, all to protect his own image and security as he had been a strong liberal Democrat, and supporter of the New Deal.

Reagan sold illegal arms to Iran, what became known as the Iran-Contra Scandal, as he worked to overthrow the government of Nicaragua, despite Congressional admonitions banning such activities.

Reagan backed the apartheid government of South Africa, despite its horrific violation of human rights, and vetoed a sanctions law, which was passed over his veto in 1986.

Reagan’s Presidency saw the greatest amount of scandals of all sizes, only surpassed by the administrations of Richard Nixon, Ulysses S. Grant, and Warren G. Harding in overall malfeasance.

Reagan’s record on the environment is regarded by scholars as the absolute worst of all Presidents since 1900, and a big letdown after Jimmy Carter, who had one of the top three performances on that issue in American history.

Reagan ignored the AIDS crisis until 1987, and ridiculed the “gay plague”, only taking any interest when young hemophiliac Ryan White, and actor Rock Hudson, were revealed to have the disease in 1985.

Reagan supported backing the groups which fought Soviet occupation of Afghanistan in the 1980s, including such future terrorists as Osama Bin Laden; and also gave support to Saddam Hussein of Iraq in war with Iran, while still supplying arms to Iran.

The high ethical and moral standard said to be part of Reagan’s persona has now been revealed to be inappropriate, as he has been shown to have cheated on his first wife, Jane Wyman, and to have had affairs with dozens of actresses, including Marilyn Monroe, Elizabeth Taylor, and Doris Day, among many others.

For a man who professed “family values”, Reagan and his wife Nancy ignored their children, Patti and Ron, Jr; and hardly saw their grandchild from Reagan stepson Michael; and hardly ever attended church services, although flirting with the Christian Coalition and Moral Majority of the Reverend Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson.

So the truth about Ronald Reagan is far from the myth that has been promoted!

Presidents And Dictatorships: Double Standard Of Critics Of Obama Change Of Cuban Policy

Presidents of the United States deal with reality, not what they might wish was so.

America has had diplomatic relations with all sorts of terrible people who govern the world’s nations over time.

Latin American dictatorships, including those of Fulgencio Batista in Cuba; Rafael Trujillo in the Dominican Republic; the Duvalier dynasty, father and son, in Haiti; Anastasio Somoza in Nicaragua; and military dictatorships in all of the South American nations at different times, have been accepted by American Presidents.

Our Presidents have dealt with Asian dictatorships, including China beginning with Richard Nixon; and with Taiwan, the Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, Pakistan, Vietnam, South Korea for decades, Laos, Cambodia, Afghanistan and the former Soviet Republics, now independent, but almost all of them dictatorships.

We have dealt with the Arab nations of the Middle East and with Iran under the Shah, despite their harsh dictatorships.

We have had dealings with African dictatorships of all stripes, including South Africa under Apartheid; and the brutal governments of much of the continent.

Somehow, Cuba has been seen differently, when the governments of many of the world’s nations has been far worse in their oppression than Fidel and Raul Castro.

This is not saying that Fidel and Raul Castro cannot, rightfully, be condemned for their human rights violations, but if human rights was the guide, we would not have any diplomatic relations or trade with 80 percent of the world!

When Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan, and the two Presidents Bush have embraced, and even endorsed, dictators, it was always seen as no big deal, but when Barack Obama opens up to Cuba after 54 years, it is perceived as a crime of massive proportions, while we willingly accepted the previous harsh dictatorship in Cuba of Batista and his henchmen!

Hypocrisy anyone?

Shame And Embarrassment Over Hatred And Prejudice Displayed Against Central American Children And Women Refugees In Murietta, California!

This entire nation should hold its head in shame and embarrassment over the outrageous, ugly, prejudicial display of behavior by so called “good Americans”, many of them probably quite devout Christians, who blocked buses in Murietta, California, which were carrying Central American children and women refugees to a Border Patrol facility to deal with the growing migration crisis into America’s borders.

These women and children, some as young as infants, are escaping bloodshed and violence in Honduras, El Salvador, Guatemala, and Nicaragua, not trying to undermine US security, but seeing America as their last hope for survival!

We have an ugly history of nativism, of anti immigrant bigotry, throughout our history, but that does not excuse this kind of behavior in a humanitarian crisis as this one is! Carrying the American flag and shouting “USA, USA” is something that makes one want to vomit, as this is not patriotism, but rather pure hate and poison by people who seem unwilling to recognize that this experience will scar the lives of those children, something these bigots would not wish to be visited upon their own children!

America has become a nation with a hardhearted manner, due to the viciousness of the right wing talk show hosts, and the Tea Party Movement in Congress and the states, and nothing is beyond the pale to these hateful, sick elements in our society!

We must not allow such hate to consume us any further, and this is not freedom of speech or assembly, and future such demonstrations must be cracked down upon by police and the Border Patrol.

It is most ironic that these despicable people are sure to be ignorant of the fact that their town is named after an Hispanic land owner, and that the land they call “their own”, was stolen from Native Americans, and then controlled by Mexico, until the US went to war in an aggressive manner in the Mexican War of 1846-1848, and took the land away from our southern neighbor. If anything, we, as a nation, are the true “intruders”, not people from Central America trying to save their lives and those of their children!

Comparing Apples With Oranges: Obama Versus Republican Abuses Of Power Under Nixon, Reagan, Bush II

The Republican Party and conservatives are having a field day on the supposed Obama scandals over the Benghazi, Libya terror attack that killed the ambassador and three others; over the improper investigation of right wing groups by the Internal Revenue Service; and the investigation of Associated Press journalists on the basis of a national security investigation.

We are being told that Barack Obama is another Richard Nixon, when it is more appropriate to say that Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush are examples of another Richard Nixon, to a much greater level!

Nixon was involved in the promotion of break ins; internal revenue service investigations of political opponents, including Ted Kennedy; had an “enemies list”; had his aides do “dirty tricks”; blocked investigations by the Congress and the FBI. He undermined the Presidency in massive ways, and abused power in ways that have harmed the image of the Presidency ever since.

Ronald Reagan may have had a more pleasant persona, but he authorized illegal activities against Nicaragua, backed arms sales to Iran, feigned ignorance of Iran Contra, and promoted secrecy and suspicion of his opponents.

George W. Bush promoted deception and lies to get American into Iraq; engaged in the exposure of a CIA agent who opposed what he was doing; gave his Vice President Dick Cheney unprecedented power to abuse his position; had the IRS investigate liberal groups; engaged in lies and deception not seen seen Richard Nixon.

Barack Obama is NOT engaged in corruption of any kind, but his enemies are pursuing him as if he was the abuser that Nixon, Reagan and Bush II were, but it is all theater, and just like the pursuit of Bill Clinton for his personal behavior, it will fail, and the GOP will suffer as a result!

The sad part of this hot pursuit of Obama is that even liberal media are jumping on the bandwagon of attack, and they should be ashamed of themselves, as they demonstrate no knowledge of history, and are just pursuing a story to build up circulation and readership and make money, a sad moment for the media, when they allow the right wing propaganda to control them!