This summer at their respective conventions, Donald Trump and Joe Biden will officially become their party’s nominees, Trump, the Republican nominee, Joe Biden, the Democratic nominee. And the question now is increasingly turning to will they or won’t they debate, presidential debates go back a long time. This is part of the norms and traditions, the Republican and Democratic candidates debate each other, usually three, sometimes four times, maybe only two in certain cases. And it’s an opportunity to see them on the same stage, in different formats, some more conducive and some less conducive to real conversation. It’s not clear that there are going to be debates this time around. And what’s particularly interesting is that it seems as though not everybody agrees why there wouldn’t be debates. On the one hand, you have some Trump supporters saying, Biden’s definitely not going to debate. Why? Because he can’t handle it. He’s demented. He doesn’t know what day it is. He doesn’t know what time it is. He doesn’t know that he’s running for president. He doesn’t know anything. He’s essentially an empty body unable of any thought. This was what they said, By the way, in 2020. And then Biden showed up and debated Trump and did completely fine. It wasn’t spectacularly explosive, but it was fine. And they’ve said this many other times, including before the recent State of the Union address, there’s no way Biden can get through even a 30 minute speech and the speech was like an hour and a half. And Biden was fine. And then they said, Well, he was on some kind of drug. Even though medical experts have said there’s not really a drug that would just like hide dementia in the way that these Republicans are saying so a lot of Magga people saying Biden’s the one incentivized not to do it. On the other hand, there’s the question as to whether Trump actually wants to debate because Trump, embroiled in multiple criminal trials with mostly humiliations over the last several years to speak of and no accomplishments and no interesting policy proposals that would materially improve circumstances for people living in the United States with really nothing to show for himself. Other than now 88 criminal counts against him and felony trials and being found civilly liable for sexual assault with a judge said qualified for the definition of rape. He doesn’t have a lot to show for himself. So there are also those who say it’s Trump that actually won’t debate. Now, both have recently said, Sure, I’ll debate. Let me know when I look forward to it. I don’t know that Trump is going to accept the Commission on Presidential Debates as the arbiter. Now I want to remind everybody in general with how the debates work, the primary debates are organized by the parties, along with whatever media outlet they want to work with. So for example, the DNC and NBC News will partner on a debate. Those debates are not open source or for public domain. Copyright is held by NBC. And it’s organized by the party and by the network. Similarly, the RNC would organize one with Fox News or whatever the case may be, historically, the way it works for the general election when it’s the nominees debating each other. The presidential, the Commission on Presidential Debates, organizes them working with both candidates. They are open source public domain. And that’s why when you turn on the TV during these debates, it’s on C span. It’s on PBS, it’s on Fox News, CNN, MSNBC, it’s everywhere with the same pool feed, because they are public domain debates of public interest. Trump has already started over the last several years to say this Commission on Presidential Debates is biased. It’s unfair, no, no, no. And that seems to be the latest attempt at getting out of doing it, because he doesn’t like who is organizing it. It is true that one of the things that the Commission on Presidential Debates requires or at least they did previously, and they probably would again, that if you are going to work with them on debates, you don’t do any unsanctioned debates. Trump, I think once unsanctioned debates, I don’t know what the terms would be the location, the host, the duration, the format, big picture, I always want to see debates, even though they are always underwhelming. And what I mean by that is the following. What I want to see our long form back and forth discussions, not where they scream over each other. So you can’t hear anybody, but where there is a real back and forth in terms of the ideas that are being presented. The format will often be like, Okay, you get 90 seconds, and then you get a 32nd rebuttal. And you get a 15 second rebuttal to that. We’re moving on. This is not a format that is conducive to any kind of real long form conversation. Now, by the way, if you are Trump and you think that Biden’s demented, and can’t string together more than just a simple talking point. You would want the longest possible amounts of time since it would expose Biden if you believe that he is unable to speak. Once again, if you watch the recent Howard Stern interview with Joe Biden 75 minute interview, open format where they talk about so many different things. My instinct is Biden will do that the expectations have been set so low, that Biden will probably do fine. So I want there to be debates. I question whether there will be debates. Let me know what you think.

Okay, college protests happening all over the United States of America, college students are standing up for what? They’re standing up to protect human beings. They’re anti war. Yes, they are anti war. They’re anti genocide. You got to look at the details. Look at the facts. Palestinians are not at war with the Government of Israel, the government of Israel says they are not at war with Palestinians. Well, you could have fooled me, because the people who were being killed a Palestinian 70% of Palestinians who were killed in Gaza, are women and children, they have no weapons, they have no combat training, they are simply trying to survive trying to wake up every day and figure out how to work and how to put bread on the table. That’s what they’re doing. But instead, you have a policy that’s antithetical to common sense coming out of the United States of America. That’s why American college students are standing up. These student groups are both pro Israel student groups and pro Palestinian student groups that gets lost in the narrative. They are showing us a better way, a new approach. You see, they give me hope, because they don’t think like the old guard, they’re not resolving conflict, by way of this war. They believe in a better path forward, and see one day they will not be denied. Even if you shut down their encampment, one day, they will not be denied. Even if you suspend them from school one day, they will not be denied. You know why? Because those same students that you’re shutting down, those same students that are protesting in unison, saying stop the war, those like it or not, are the future leaders of this nation. They will not be denied. Now, there are some colleges who are already learning from the mistakes of others, for example, Northwestern University, also Brown University, they have negotiated deals with their student advocacy groups on campus. These deals are mutually respected, and mutually benefit the interest not only of the institution, but of those who attend. At the end of the day, who makes a college a college, not the professors, not the faculty, no, not the president, the students, they are the ones who make it what it is. Now, full disclosure, I’m a college professor, myself, and one of the campuses that I work at, well, there’s conflict now, that conflict has not risen to the level of there being an encampment or a student, active student protests, but it could. And I hope that the leaders that govern that board of trustees and that institution are willing to listen to what the students are saying. This is how we move forward. This is how we progress. Anything less than that will be met with defiance, obviously. And this is the reality of America, we push and pull. We try to stand up and sacrifice to make sure we have a better nation. I believe it is the right way forward, to look at the details to pay attention to the nuance, and not just accept a narrative that has been handed to us from others.

The atmosphere on many of our nation’s college campuses is…tense, to say the least. Across the country, students at numerous major universities – including Columbia, Cornell, and Yale – are holding massive pro-Palestinian protests.

These demonstrations have resulted in student suspensions, campus closures, and the cancellation of commencement ceremonies for students who may very well have missed their high school commencements as well, thanks to our little visitor from four years ago.

At UCLA, simultaneous protests held by opposing groups ended with physical violence, as demonstrators breached security barriers intended to keep them separated.  Hundreds of students have been arrested at Columbia, Emerson University, Emory university, and USC, among other schools. 

The overarching aim of these protests is to encourage the universities to divest themselves of any institutional investments with companies that aid Israel’s war effort, whether directly or indirectly, as well as those that profit in any way from the conflict in the MidEast. And people have a lot of feelings about these protests. 

Supporters of the pro-Palestine efforts say that the crackdown among student protestors at universities speaks to just how out of touch these elite institutions are with their charges. They hold that civil disobedience is a crucial element of collegiate-aged growth, and that, frankly, there is nothing more worthy of protest than the deaths of tens of thousands of innocent civilians. 

Detractors – and there are many – say that the students are elevating an incomplete image of the situation. And…yes, probably. We’re talking about three thousand years of intensely complex conflict. And the increasing anti-Zionism that’s coloring these protests is deeply concerning. It’s not as simple as “from the river to the sea,” when what you’re talking about is the virtual eradication of Israel – a place that, yes, has a deeply complicated history, but is also the refuge for a people who have been persecuted virtually throughout recorded history. 

There’s also the issue of just how much these protests will end up benefiting Donald Trump, because they will. The right is definitely going to lean into the “Biden can’t control the country, there’s chaos everywhere, THE ELITES ARE RIOTING” narrative. And when potential candidates like Jill Stein show up to secure that progressive young vote…who do you think that vote’s getting taken away from? 

It’s so important to fight for change, and yes, to take advantage of your right to protest, but also…being 100% “pro” or “anti” either side in a situation that feels so impossibly tragic for virtually all involved seems…reductive at best. I understand the impulse to put your voice and body on the line in the service of your very deeply-held beliefs. I just wish these beliefs weren’t being presented as such a binary.

May is finally here and so as graduation season, across the country, many college students have earned their degrees and they’re going to be welcoming in the next chapter of their lives, whether it’s furthering their education or finally entering the workforce. While this moment should be a joyous one all around. For many young people out there, this moment is marked by lasting disappointment and either, as Pro Palestine protests sweep college campuses across the nation, and jarring arrests, attempt to silence peaceful voices. These students are getting a first rate education on the complicity and depravity of their institutions of higher education. And this disturbing awakening will have a lasting effect as to how these young people engage with their educational institutions in the future. In addition to following media coverage of the student protests, as an adjunct faculty member teaching Media Law at the University of Southern California, I have had an up close and personal look at at least one of these institutions, and they have failed to properly respond to student protests of Israel’s attack on Gaza. at USC, we watched the university select an accomplished Muslim student who minored in genocide studies to be valedictorian, only to cancel her graduation commencement speech, citing safety concerns, then cancel all the speakers likely upon realizing that canceling the speech of asna Tabasum alone wasn’t a good look, whether it was in the court of public opinion, or the court of law. The students my students saw this, no matter where they stood in terms of Israel or Palestine. They were angry, and rightly so. Did the school consider how its decision to silence Tabasum would impact Jewish students that these students would be perceived as threatening or violent? That USCIS decision would fuel further anti semitism playing into tropes about Jews controlling the world and silencing voices and so on? Tabassum on her spot as valedictorian why give her the honor event silence her. USC has no idea what she had planned to say, to spend four years educating this young woman on genocide, recognize her for her knowledge, and then preemptively silence her over fear that she may actually share. That knowledge that you taught her is a hell of a thing. It also appears pretextual to cancel to awesome speech for purported safety reasons, especially without providing any evidence of actual or legitimate threats. As my students observed the school has safely hosted President Barack Obama and a litany of controversial speakers without safety issue. So how is it that a young Muslim woman who isn’t a public figure presents such a safety threat? Even giving USC leadership the benefit of the doubt here by assuming that these safety concerns are indeed legit? I can’t give them much for Mr. Mobility. What if it was Adrian Lawrence, who had worked hard and been designated valedictorian? And the Klan called saying that they were going to disrupt the graduation if I was allowed to speak with USC cancel my speech out of fear? What does it say of an elite institution that would quickly capitulate in the face of suppose it intimidation to me, it says that that institution does not stand for what it purports to stand for. And I may be fired for saying this, but may be acts of cowardice are what are showing here and USC, his legacy will be harmed, just like the harm that was brought by calling in the LAPD in their riot gear to arrest some 93 peaceful protesters last week. As many of my students have relayed to me USC has lost their respect. And I’m sure that many faculty, staff, alumni and prospective students feel the same way. I imagine that this disappointment will manifest for the school in the form of decreased gifts and donations, reduced Human Capital and Talent, and fewer intangible yet valuable resources for the school, particularly now that it has canceled its main graduation ceremony. In the wake of all the turmoil. Four years ago, a global pandemic robbed many high school students have a memorable graduation ceremony, something that marked their transition into higher education. Next week, many of those same students who are set to graduate at least at USC that is, will be robbed of such a memorable moment once again. But this time, it’ll be because those students or their peers are taking a stand against those who are enabling genocide in Palestine. While these students have the courage and conviction to stand up for what they believe in and what’s right, there, institutions of higher education seem to be clinging to nothing more than Craven power. The deafening dis enchantment of this moment is an education that these students didn’t expect but that they will remember for the rest of their lives.

Well, the time has come for the Republican Party to change its callsign. From GOP to SOS, the party of Lincoln is engaged in its own civil war. In fact, the Republicans are unraveling right before our very eyes right there in Congress. This is not to say that the Democrats are just fine, united and worry free. That’s hardly ever the case. As American humorist Will Rogers used to say, quote, I’m not a member of any organized political party. I’m a Democrat. The Democratic Party has chaos and nasty infighting baked right into its brand. On the left, they’re always throwing punches inside the tent. Recently, Israel’s military operation in Gaza, which intends to do the world of favor by eliminating Hamas has split Democratic lawmakers based on whether they are more sympathetic to Israelis or Palestinians. But when chaos and infighting begins to afflict the Republican Party, well, it’s big news. It’s supposed to be that Republicans fall in line while Democrats fall apart. You see, the GOP is supposed to be an orderly and discreet bunch that doesn’t go around airing its dirty laundry in public. Well, that’s over with much of the blame goes to surprise Donald Trump. And you thought the troubling destroyed the media, civility and race relations? No, the first thing he tore apart was a Republican Party. Trump has loyalists in the House of Representatives that take their orders from him. Though it’s not clear at this point that even Trump can control these renegades. They seem to be running wild at times. One of the leaders of this wild bunch is representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, the Republican congresswoman from Georgia. At the moment she is furious at House Speaker Mike Johnson, because he displayed something that she finds totally offensive. It’s called Leadership for more than six months. While the world was on fire, the House of Representatives, which approves foreign aid was held hostage by this legislative terrorist, MTG and a small band of fellow Trump pieces. The decision was made by Johnson and agreed to by Democrats to lump together all the foreign aid requests for Israel, Taiwan and Ukraine in one big bundle with a sky high price tag $95 billion for all three countries in all three conflicts. Well, MTG and company were okay with sending money to Israel to help our ally defend itself against Hamas, Hezbollah, Iran, you name it. They were fine with sending money to Taiwan to help fortify that ally now that China may be looking at it with conquest in mind. But for whatever reason, the Trump terrorists felt differently about Ukraine. They are vehemently opposed to sending even a nickel to our ally to help fend off the invasion by Russia. Maybe the holdup was on Trump’s orders. Or maybe the lawmakers just have a soft spot in their tiny cold hearts for Russian President Vladimir Putin. Either way, Mt. G and her fellow insurgents were dead set against getting Ukraine billions of dollars to buy bread and bullets. And they threatened Johnson telling him that he would lose the speaker’s gavel if he dared dare to put a Ukraine a bill on the House floor for a vote. For months. No Bill made it to the floor. Then on April 20, Johnson put a massive funding bill on the floor where it was voted on and approved. Folks, this is what real leadership looks like I don’t blame you for not be able to recognize the MC much of it lately. Green is naturally furious at the speaker declaring, quote, Mike Johnson’s leadership is over you now? I don’t think so. I’d say Johnson’s political career looks just fine. While greens protection racket is now running on fumes. You see, that’s how politics works. It’s how life works. When you stand up to a bully you take away her power. Johnson will be just fine. Alas, the Republican Party is another story. Once the debris is cleared, we’ll know more. But for now, the party that’s populated by the red states has little orange cones all around it

Will they or won’t they? What is going on with some Republicans already wanting to get rid of their second speaker of the house? magam Mike Johnson? Well, let’s discuss it. Donald Trump recently weighed in on it. And there are many considerations. So some of you may or may not remember that Kevin McCarthy was the Republican Speaker of the House, and he was ousted by a combination of Democrats, alongside some Magga. Republicans. They didn’t like Kevin McCarthy, and they successfully got rid of him, and they replaced him with Maga, Mike Johnson, who is nicknamed Maga, Mike, because of his predilection and preference for all things. Magga. But all of a sudden, a few Republicans, including radical and repugnant, Republican congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, aren’t particularly happy with maghemite Johnson, it relates to Ukraine funding and some other bones to pick that they have with him. Of course, it is very risky for Republicans to again, remove a speaker of the house, disunity could cause all sorts of chaos, their margin in the house is down to the slimmest it can possibly be. And they risk if they alienate a few Republicans, even though they might maintain in a literal sense, a majority, if just a few Republicans become so what would you call it? Resentful of what these Maga Republicans have done if just a few Republicans decide I’m going to abstain from any more votes, or maybe I’ll even join Democrats. You effectively make Democratic Congressman Hakeem Jeffries, the Speaker of the House, and you turn over effective control to Democrats. So there is real risk here to Republicans ousting Maga Mike Johnson, then the question is, Who do you go with? Is there anyone that would satisfy these Magga Republicans at this point in time, so as a show of solidarity, I guess you would say, and to try to stem the chaos. Recently, maghemite Johnson flew down to mar a Lago net with Donald Trump, they held a joint press conference during which they were all buddy, buddy, and everything was great, and everything was lovely. But did it really convince anybody that there is unity here, more recently, Donald Trump was asked on a real America’s voice program about his view on the entire Mac of Mike Johnson and the fact that some Republicans want to get rid of the guy. And Trump took essentially the same approach that he took on the Arizona law, which is I kind of don’t care as long as it’s good for me and vote for me and we need Republicans to maintain control. The impression I got from what Trump said, was that Trump if it weren’t for the slimmest of slim margins in the house, and the possibility that Trump may need the house to make him president depending on what goes on. If it weren’t for Trump’s personal stake, and whatever’s good for me is all I care about. Trump would be more open to getting rid of Maga Mike Johnson, but Trump recognizes that that is not the situation. It is potentially a complex situation, he may need Maga, Mike, he may need Republicans in the House, depending on what happens in November, he may need the next Congress to make him president in one of these send it back to the States scenarios. So Trump is keeping his mouth shut, and sort of taking it on the on the one hand, on the other hand approach with Trump, it’s always what’s good for me, and what can I justify? So where do I think this is going to go? My prediction is that Republicans do not get rid of maghemite Johnson, I believe that they are going to ultimately realize that it is at their own potential peril, they potentially destroy themselves if they get rid of him. And I don’t think that they are going to do it. I’m curious to hear from you. And then more importantly, or maybe as importantly, we still have the open question. If the convictions of Trump start to drop in criminal trials, will we hear more elected Republicans say this is now too much? We really should not have a convicted felon as President of the United States. And will this influence Republican voters as well, I genuinely do not know the answer. There are two views on this. One view is all of the disastrous effect of these trials is baked in already. It’s possible. The counterpoint, and it’s one you can see reflected in some polling is that if you ask people, do you plan to vote for Trump, you get one number. If you ask people, would you still vote for Trump? If you were convicted, you get a way lower number. And what that suggests is that there is a significant portion of this electorate that If Trump were to be indicted would change from saying I will vote Trump to I won’t vote Trump in an election that almost certainly we’ll come down to somewhere under half a million votes across five or fewer states. At the end of the day, small shifts in the electorate like that could make all the difference so let me know what you expect in terms of maghemite Johnson let me know what you expect If Trump were to be convicted of a topic and a story that I’ll keep talking about.

Okay, you know, Trump lies all the time. You have to know. He’s an egotistical maniac if Trump wasn’t Trump, but I don’t know, maybe your husband, or brother or dad, you would clearly see, this is a narcissist. Let me correct myself, clinical narcissist, you will not like him. You don’t want your children to be like him. Hell, you don’t want to be like him. But for some reason, this egotistical maniac who had an experience as being President of the United States for four years, and did not deliver what he told you, he would deliver. He gets every break in the world. He gets every excuse imaginable. It’s amazing to me how a billionaire well connected, politically savvy, white male, simply cannot get a break in America. You know, racism did not exist when black people said racism existed, according to many Republicans. But racism does exist. As it relates to fight racism. Literally, this is coming out of the Trump camp. That’s simply one of the nuances he’s proposing. So let’s consider what’s happening now. The court system, you know, co equal branches of government. He’s a private citizen. He’s in court because he committed crimes. A grand jury indicted him not not a man, not a DA but a grand jury. Did they looked at evidence, and they said under the normative rules and the statutory language, Trump violated the law, and it is worthy of indictment. Okay. Trump has actively called for his supporters to disrupt court proceedings. Why? If you’re innocent, you want the opportunity to show how flimsy the prosecution’s case is. If you did nothing wrong, you want the opportunity to expose those who are on fairly targeting you. But if you’re guilty, you don’t want the proceeding to continue. Now Trump is getting a break again, I guarantee you if Trump was a gangster, okay, dang leader saying these things on social media and in the public, he would have been held in contempt. He would have been arrested, and likely not able to qualify for bond. But he’s trumped. All right. He brought all these things on himself. You got to think about this. Everything he’s experiencing, he brought it on himself. What happened to taking responsibility, being accountable, pulling yourself up by your bootstraps. Now keep in mind, all of these individuals who are willing to hold him accountable, because he broke the law, at least based on the standards of a grand jury, when they looked at the evidence per state. What do you think will happen to the prosecutors who dare to step out and say we’re going to treat him like a man and not like a deity? He is no God. He is simply a human being. What do you think will happen to them when he or if he gets power again? Okay. Talk about weaponizing the government. Trump during his four years of being President, he attempted to weaponize the government against Joe Biden, Joe Biden’s son, Hillary Clinton, and many others. What are we going to wake up? Ask that question. But I no longer believe that people who are operating on the other side of this care much about democracy. You see, I think they actually want anarchy so that they can present Trump as order. I think they’re looking for chaos, to somehow uphold Trump as the ideal choice. Even Trump himself. When Democrats or Republicans agreed on the immigration policy or the border policy, Trump himself till Republicans don’t sign. There’s already an agreement. He has this kind of authority over individuals without even having political power. He is not elected to anything. Imagine what happens if you give him power again, if you’re willing to allow what you understand as democracy to leave, vote for Trump. But at least in an imperfect democracy, the people are Always have another opportunity to get it right.

For something a little different today, let’s do a Movie Preview. So I finally saw the massive box office hit Civil War, a film that I had been anticipating with mixed dread and curiosity.

So the movie was very good. I think from a critical perspective, it was phenomenal acting, obviously compelling subject matter and so forth. But for me, the most interesting thing about Civil War was what it didn’t say, it didn’t say the specific motivations behind the war, or give any real background information at all. And throughout the film, I found myself trying to figure out which side each new character we met was on, until I finally realized that’s the whole point. That’s what director Alex Garland was trying to achieve. Garland is by his own description, a left centrist and interviews, he tends to emphasize the centrist element because to him, apparently, the point of both the film and the locus of his anxiety is not as much about politics as much as it is about extremism on both sides. And an interview with PBS garland said, quote, for me, it categorically is a political film. It’s just not choosing a politics of left and right.
I think that if I sat down and asked somebody, why might your country or my country disintegrate into a state of civil war, they would know the answers. I don’t need to spell them out. Those answers surround us. So I felt it would be not just patronizing, but redundant to spell it out.
Look, I am of the opinion that you don’t change anyone’s mind in either direction by yelling at them telling them they’re crazy fascists, what have you. The way you change minds is by finding points of commonality, communicating, above all, listening. And I definitely understand that the extremism of the very far left can be damaging to the goal of unity, perhaps, perhaps even to the goal of progress. But there is a danger to this film again. It’s one I thought was very good and very thought provoking, and I do recommend it. But the thing is,
I can have my disagreements with certain elements of the far left and certain elements of the far right but the danger presented by the two. It’s not an equivalency. A simple peek at gun death statistics in our country shows that the vast majority of mass shooting events have been at the hands of white men, often white nationalists. Only one side of our sadly binary political system is calling for a bloodbath if Trump doesn’t win the next election. So while I do believe, like Alex Garland does, it seems that centrism isn’t just an ideal but probably an imperative. I take issue with the concept that the far left is just as dangerous to our democracy and very selves as the far right. It’s just not a competition.

When people think about the Eighth Amendment, that is if they ever think about the Eighth Amendment at all, will they generally think of that cruel and unusual punishment clause. Now, that is the provision that bans the government from punishing people in a way that could be deemed to be cruel and unusual. What punishment actually meets that measure is something for the courts to decide. After all, they’re the ones that interpret the law. And this week, our highest court heard oral arguments on deciding whether it’s cruel and unusual to enforce laws punishing unhoused people for camping on public property when there are no shelters that are available, even though the right has a stronghold on the majority of our supreme court right now, the left may indeed take a win on this one. Because if people experiencing homelessness have no constitutional right to housing in this country, they should have a constitutional right to camp on public property when they’re given no other option. Let me be clear, homelessness is a choice, not a choice of the individual on housed person that is but a choice of us policymakers. The United States is among the richest nations in the world. Particularly it’s number three in terms of wealthiest country on a per capita basis. It also boasts more than 15 million vacant homes. That means approximately 10% of the homes in our nation are totally empty inventory. People aren’t living there, all the while 600,000 People live without permanent shelter. Some 30% of those people are unhoused families with children. 6% are veterans. 5% are unaccompanied youth. That’s children alone, and the number of individuals experiencing homelessness is steadily on the rise, and it has been increasing since 2017. People simply cannot afford housing. In California, for example, over the past 20 years, the average rent has increased 35% How much has the average renters income gone up? 6% all said right has increased more than 116% in US dollars for the average renter. We need not even talk about homeownership for that matter. It’s not even an option as a largest demographic in the workplace, that is Millennials like me, are priced out of the real estate market entirely. How are Americans to keep a roof over their heads when their wages remain stagnant? Yet housing prices go up? Where will the people go when they can’t make rent, we’re being forced onto the streets to punish us for that is cruel and unusual. And that’s what the Supreme Court will likely decide in the face of several states effectively criminalizing homelessness without providing adequate housing alternatives. And the cruelty it abounds. Just last month, Ron DeSantis signed a bill banning homelessness in terms of camping and public spaces. The Florida Governor believes somehow that this anti camping penalty will help ensure that individuals have the resources they need to get back on their feet. Come on make it make sense here. If lawmakers and leaders want to keep people from living on the streets, they must step up provide adequate housing ensure opportunities are available to thrive. Guaranteeing basic fundamental rights that include housing isn’t far fetched. France, Scotland, South Africa and many other nations have adopted a right to housing in their constitutions or their law books, improving the housing conditions of their people. There’s no reason the same approach cannot be taken right here in the United States. If our lawmakers and leaders won’t do it for us, I think the Supreme Court may find a way. Until then, it is so incredibly cruel. And disgustingly unusual to punish people who are forced to live on the streets because our lawmakers and leaders aren’t providing alternative housing options.

If you asked me to rank an order the top 100 problems facing America, your crime, your homelessness, drugs division, climate change, xenophobia, etc. Nowhere on that list, would you find the phrase anti white racism. Whoever heard of such a thing? That must be when the folks who devoured 99% of the pie fight you for the extra 1% And then cry foul. Crybaby in chief Donald Trump. If the skies turned Red Seas, boiled frogs fall from heaven and he is reelected President plans to use a second term to settle scores and get even with those who wronged him and his supporters. According to news reports, given what his close aides including the nativist know nothing Stephen Miller, have planned if they returned to power, one group that this bunch thinks has been wronged or white people. They intend to use the Justice Department and a perversion of more than a half century of civil rights laws to avenge the victims of what they claim is an epidemic of anti white racism.

This is nothing new. In the 1980s white people attacked affirmative action, insisting that it amounted to quote reverse discrimination. In the 1990s, they thought multiculturalism was a plot to make them feel guilty for the racial and justices of the past. Today, there are those who think to push for dei diversity, equity inclusion is all about taking things away from white people and giving it to people of color. Still, this whole concept of anti white racism is weird for me. I spent most of the first half of my life about 28 years growing up in the conservative farm country of Central California, where white people own the farms and brown people work the farms and no one lets you forget the color scheme.

Another thing that was always stressed to me and other Mexican Americans, strivers and achievers who didn’t know our place, or who maybe felt less well suited to the great fields than the Ivy League was that we should stop acting like victims. Boyd I hear that phrase about 1000 times before my 30th birthday. And the more I achieved, and the higher I rose, the more I heard it.

The sermon was always the same. Don’t be a victim. They said, Let bygones be bygones. They said, If one day the Mexicans run things, they said, Well, you shouldn’t do to white people, white people did to you just move on. And I bought it to I bought the whole thing. I don’t know Donald Trump. I wasn’t looking to settle scores. I’m not that small and petty, even though the injustice is of my parents and my people had to endure in the 1800s and 1900s. Were real. Little did I realize, though, that the reason that white folks wanted me to toss off the victim quote, was that they could put it on.

That’s the whole idea. They wanted me to not be a victim, so they could have the title alter themselves. In 2024. There is no group in America. Let me say again, there is no group in America that complains more or whines louder than white men. In Michigan, or Ohio or Pennsylvania or Nebraska, you will hear white men make the case that their lives have been ruined by everything from affirmative action to globalization, to immigration, to unfair trade deals, you name it, and white men think they’ve been screwed over by it. And even though it’s Donald Trump, who has been picking up on this thread, and has now decided to be the superhero that no one needs or wants, ie the white Avenger, make no mistake, Democrats played this game to this whole thing is a bipartisan deal. Heck, in the Rust Belt states, the white guy in the union is both a Trump voter and a Biden voter, depending whose name is on the ballot, he’ll go back and forth, as long as the candidate keeps playing up the narrative that the poor guy has been victimized by take your pick immigrants who invade the country or rich fat cats who don’t pay their quote, fair share of taxes. You see the victim him you hear it from both parties? Well, we’ve had enough of that. If Trump makes it back into power he should. What’s that thing that used to tell me years ago? Yes, let bygones be bygones and just move on.