states rights

50 Years Since Lyndon B. Johnson’s Passing: His Heritage Is Immense!

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It has been a half century since the passing of President Lyndon B. Johnson on January 22, 1973.

This giant of a man and a President had massive impact on the American people and their history.

LBJ brought about the greatest social and economic reform of any President except Franklin D. Roosevelt, and many might say that his impact in some ways was greater than that of FDR.

When one considers his impact on civil rights, education, health care, and the issue of urban and rural poverty, it is clear that LBJ transformed the American psyche on these matters.

The battles he fought and overcame against Southern Democrats have now, sadly, been transformed into struggles against most Republicans, who have become the new white supremacists and are out to promote the same narrow minded “states rights” arguments to erase advancements on race, women’s rights, and gay rights, in an attempt to bring America back to the mentality of the 19th century.

Had LBJ only had to deal with domestic issues, he would be ranked in the top five of all Presidents, but sadly, his insistence on continuing and expanding the war in Vietnam caused a massive split that started the attack against American liberalism and progressivism, which he and FDR had so championed from the 1930s through the 1960s.

So his ranking is lower, although with time, it has recovered so that he is considered in the top quarter of Presidents, generally ranking as about number 10 or 11 of all the 45 Presidents we have had.

Historic Moment For Vice President To Turn Against President: Extremely Rare!

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Former Vice President Mike Pence has FINALLY stopped being a sycophant to Donald Trump, after being obsequious to the former President since his selection to be Vice President in the Summer of 2016.

Pence has been weak all along, but finally said he did his constitutional duty by counting the Electoral College votes in the Presidential Election of 2020, a ceremonial duty, with no power to challenge the official vote count.

This IS an historic moment, for a Vice President to turn against the President, extremely rare!

The only public times were Aaron Burr against Thomas Jefferson in 1801, after Burr created a constitutional crisis over whether he or Jefferson was to be President, due to a so called “tie’ in electoral votes; and John C. Calhoun against both John Quincy Adams and Andrew Jackson, the two Presidents he served as Vice President, over the issue of the protective tariff and states rights, secession, and nullification.

Also, but more veiled, not obvious publicly, Charles G. Dawes had disagreements with Calvin Coolidge: John Nance Garner broke with Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1940 as he sought to succeed him; Al Gore separated himself from Bill Clinton over the Monica Lewinsky Scandal as Gore ran for President in 2000; and Dick Cheney had growing disagreements and a growing breach with George W. Bush in Bush’s second term after 2005.

Also, more veiled was Thomas Marshall not being informed about Woodrow Wilson’s health after his stroke; Lyndon B. Johnson being mistreated by Robert F. Kennedy under John F. Kennedy’s Presidency; and Hubert Humphrey forced to support the Vietnam War under Johnson after 1965, later stated as a very difficult time for Humphrey.

Texas Is Crazy To Drop COVID 19 Restrictions: Will Likely Lead To New Surge Of Cases And Deaths!

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Texas is the second largest state in population and in land area, but Texas government under Republican dominance in the past four decades has been a total disaster!

It continues to discriminate against its African American and Latino population, making it more difficult for them to vote!

Its electric grid system led to disaster and loss of property and life last week, and no apologies from Texas Republicans!

And now, Texas Governor Greg Abbott has announced that COVID 10 Pandemic restrictions are ending in the next week!

This is a total disgrace, and undermines the fight against the pandemic, as Texas with more than 30 million people, and with so much commerce and travel in a state as large as Texas, is a prime area of the infection, and undermines what President Joe Biden, scientists, and medical personnel say needs to be done to overcome the pandemic, which has cost more than half a million lives in one year!

This is states rights gone mad, and already, Mississippi, the poorest state in America, is also abandoning the restrictions on the pandemic, and do not be surprised that Florida, with its moronic governor Ron DeSantis, will be next!

So the battle to overcome COVID 19 is being sabotaged, and will make the recovery be more extended, at much greater loss of life!

Donald Trump, The Fascist Wannabe: Attacking Conservative Support Of States Rights, And First Amendment Right To Freedom Of Speech And Assembly

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Donald Trump is demonstrating how he is a Fascist Wannabe, and in so doing, he is attacking conservatives who support states rights, and attacking all decent people who uphold the First Amendment right to freedom of speech and freedom of assembly.

Trump’s sending of military forces incognito to Portland, Oregon to use tear gas and rubber bullets against mostly peaceful demonstrators calling for change in race relations and for accountability of police, has not been called for by the Oregon state government or the Portland city government, but two night ago, even the Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler was personally tear gassed by these unaccountable forces unleashed by Trump! And Trump ridiculed Wheeler on Twitter, making fun of him, after he was assaulted with tear gas!

There is no breakdown of law and order, and there is no right of the President to send in what is best described as storm troopers, without name plates or identifying, to detain people and kidnap them from the scene. The local police are in charge of anything that has to be dealt with, not a secret, unaccountable force authorized by Attorney General William Barr, who is the most abusive and corrupt leader of the Justice Department in its history!

Conservatives with principles are up in arms about the violation of states rights on this matter, and it reminds many of the Nazi storm troopers who abused people and brought about Nazi absolutism under Adolf Hitler. Conservatives, but also anyone interested in promoting freedom, are alarmed by this going on in not just Portland, but now the threat of it also showing up in Albuquerque, New Mexico; Seattle; Chicago; Detroit; Philadelphia; New York and other cities.

Republican groups, such as the Lincoln Project, are condemning what Trump is authorizing, as unlawful!

The job of keeping order is up to local and state authorities, and only when they call for federal intervention, does the US government have authority to intervene.

And the right of freedom of speech and assembly, and ability to call for redress of grievances in a peaceful manner, is inscribed in the First Amendment of the Bill of Rights.

This alone, forgetting for the moment all of the other multitude of violations of law, would be enough to impeach and remove both Donald Trump and William Barr, for corruption and abuse of power in office!

The Department of Homeland Security and its subsidiary, Customs and Border Patrol, is breaking the Constitution, with the approval of Trump and Barr.

If this is not a move toward Fascism, then nothing is so!

Donald Trump A Combination Of George Wallace, Joseph McCarthy, John C. Calhoun: The Most Demagogic Figures In American Political History!

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Donald Trump can be seen as a combination of three demagogues we have witnessed in American history.

He is George Wallace (1919-1998), the Alabama Governor, who ran for President in 1968, and gained five states and 46 electoral votes, preaching racism and white supremacy. Fortunately, he was a third party candidate, and not a serious possibility to win the White House.

He is Joseph McCarthy (1908-1957), the Wisconsin Republican Senator, who promoted the Red Scare in the early 1950s, and had Roy Cohn as his chief aide. In later years, Roy Cohn was a friend and had an impact on young Donald Trump, and Trump now has a young aide, Stephen Miller, who is as nasty and mean spirited as Cohn was. Until McCarthy destroyed himself at the Army-McCarthy hearings in 1954, many saw him as a potential threat for the future, possibly even running for President.

He is also John C. Calhoun (1782-1850), the South Carolina Senator in the 19th century, who promoted secession, states rights, slavery, and white supremacy. As Vice President for nearly eight years under John Quincy Adams and Andrew Jackson, he was a heartbeat away from the Presidency. Although Calhoun died in 1850, many would later say that he helped to bring on the Civil War that began a decade after his death.

Republicans, Normally States Rights Advocates, Now Trying To Limit States Rights On Sanctuary Cities, Marijuana Laws, And Oil And Gas Drilling!

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The Republican Party is long famous for promotion of states rights, and their strong stand against national government authority over the states.

Oh, until now, when they are doing their best to LIMIT states rights.

The Trump Administration and the Republicans in Congress are working to undermine “sanctuary cities”, major cities around the nation which are working to protect and support undocumented immigrants from arrest and deportation, as long as they have no criminal record.

Also, with eight states allowing marijuana use, and medical marijuana permitted in many other states, we have Attorney General Jeff Sessions and the Trump Administration trying to promote enforcement of penalties, that has led to tens of thousands of people in prisons, for possession and or sale of the drug, when there is no connection between marijuana and crime, or auto accidents, or deaths.

Also, oil and gas drilling off the coasts of the United States, is an attempt to take away environmental rights of mostly “blue” states, but with Florida, under Republican Governor Rick Scott getting special dispensation on the matter, and former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie working with Democrats to prevent such drilling off of New Jersey shores. But all the other states, along the Atlantic Coast, from New England to Georgia; the Pacific Coast; and Alaska should also have the freedom and authority to ban such energy exploration as detrimental to the environment.

When one compares the “Red” States and how they are governed, to the “Blue” states and their greater progress and open mindedness, it is as if we have two nations, and the Republicans are becoming so extreme that a chasm has developed between them and the Democrats.

Trump Voter Fraud Commission An Attack On Voting Rights, Clear And Simple!

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The Trump Voter Fraud Commission, set up and headed by Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach, who is infamous for promoting voter suppression tactics, has become a total failure, as 44 states refuse to comply with all of the information that the commission is asking the states to provide.

Trump wants this commission, because he cannot accept that he lost the popular vote by 2.85 million to Hillary Clinton, and claims that millions of illegal immigrants voted, with absolutely no such evidence of this crazy theory.

What Trump is trying to do is a clear attack on voting rights, and an attempt to cut millions off the voter rolls, so that Trump can have less opposition for a reelection campaign in 2020.

The fact that all but a few states refuse to cooperate is a good sign, as we now have a situation in which the stares are the progressive forces, against a right wing reactionary federal government headed by Trump cronies.

This is the precise opposite of the 1960s, when we had southern states, including Mississippi and Alabama most notably, but others as well, that worked to undermine civil and voting rights, and were forced into compliance by the federal government.

There are those conservatives who believe in states rights when it is convenient, but now want that to be ignored when it comes to states and cities protecting the environment; and also law abiding immigrants, even if they may have overstayed their time as a visitor, or entered illegally, but have led law abiding lives for decades in this nation, and should not face deportation, as the Trump Administration is pursuing, to the outrage of millions of Americans!

History Tells Us Many States Are Not Protective Of Their Population: Reason Why We Need Federal Government!

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Conservatives and libertarians love to promote the propaganda that “states rights” are the best government, and that state governments are there for their population’s needs.

History tells us otherwise, clear and simple.

“States rights” promoted 76 years of slavery under the Constitution, until it was ended by the Union winning the Civil War over the Confederacy.

“States rights” promoted segregation of the races for nearly a century after the Civil War until the 1960s.

“States rights” promoted laws against marriage, including blacks and whites, and gays and lesbians.

“States rights” promoted vigilante justice, including lynchings, chain gangs, and overly harsh criminal justice laws.

“States rights” promoted men having dominance over their wives in marriages, and resulting abuses toward women.

“States rights” promoted inferior education, including denial of historical facts, and of science, favoring religious ideas over facts.

“States rights” promoted violations of voting rights, with the intent of ruling white upper classes controlling who could vote.

“States rights” promoted denial of health care to people, while insisting on all fetuses being taken to birth against a woman’s wishes.

“States rights” promoted resistance to the Bill of Rights, and to federal government political, social, and economic reforms that made America pursue the goals of democracy, equality, and justice.

Those states that have regularly promoted “states rights” have been the most backward, the most discriminatory, the most regressive. the poorest, and have depended on the more advanced and open minded states for their economic existence.

It is the “Red” states, those in the old Confederate South, and in the Great Plains and Rocky Mountain West, where we see the worship of “states rights”, as long as the elite political and religious hierarchy keep control over their populations, and keep them ignorant and under mind control.

History tells us that these states are not protective of the needs of their population, the reason we need a strong, assertive federal government, ready to step in, and having bettered life for people who are seemingly unaware how they have been manipulated by corrupt state governments.

The Threat Of The Alt-Right Made Clear By Hillary Clinton In Nevada Speech: White Nationalists And Anti Semite Hate Groups And The Radical Fringe

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The Alt-Right is the new extremist Right Wing, which makes Fox News Channel, the right wing radio talk show hosts, and the conservative think tanks seem moderate.

These are groups and individuals, including Stephen Bannon of Breitbart News, now working with Donald Trump, who are white nationalists, mixed with anti Semites, nativists, misogynists, xenophobes, homophobes, and Islamophobes.

They include Confederate sympathizers, who hate the federal government, and want the end of all government regulation on any area of the economy, and would love to get rid of civil rights laws and civil liberties protections.

If they could gain power, they would love to wipe out the New Deal and Great Society reforms, that have made America the nation it is today.

They want the return of the “good old days” of states rights, racial discrimination, and women being “put in their place” in the bedroom and the kitchen, and not being out in the work force and promoting feminist causes.

And they believe in a “great Jewish conspiracy”, which connects them to Nazi mentality.

These are the groups that Hillary called a “Basket of Deplorables” yesterday, a perfectly appropriate term.

The Death Of Phyllis Schlafly: The War On Women And Social Change By A Divisive Woman Of The Right Wing

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The death of Phyllis Schlafly yesterday marked the end of the life of a hateful woman who opposed feminism and gay rights, and promoted the rise of Republican conservatism in a masterly, if overwhelmingly nasty, manner.

Schlafly became first noticed when she vigorously backed Republican Senator Barry Goldwater in 1964, when the Establishment Republicans repudiated him and led to his massive defeat.

She ended her life with an endorsement of Donald Trump a few weeks ago, again a candidate repudiated by much of the Establishment Republicans.

In between, she bitterly fought the Equal Rights Amendment and Gay Rights, and headed the Eagle Forum, an extreme right wing organization, which became engaged in promotion of right wing attitudes on all subjects, including immigration and attacks on the federal government in favor of states rights.

The woman was very intelligent and effective in promoting her beliefs, and became noticed when she debated the role of women in public life on numerous television programs back in the 1970s, infuriating those who could not stomach her extremist views.

Somehow, it seemed as if Phyllis Schlafly would never leave us, but now, finally, at age 92, she has, and her impact, as negative as it is, will still be felt for a long time.