Okay, at this point in the political game, it is fair to assume if you’re still a Trump supporter, you are antithetical to the notion of democracy. Let me tell you why I say that. I don’t say that lightly. There was a time in my political analysis, when I would say those who support Trump are a mixed bag, you have individuals that are adversarial to certain powers that be they are tired of the gridlock in DC, they wanted something new, they wanted something to be a game changer. And so they experimented with Trump. I don’t say that anymore. At this point, at this stage of the political career of Donald Trump, you have to conclude the man is adverse to democracy, his team, the people who will implement his policies, if you give him power, again, they are openly saying that they are trying to get rid of democracy. They’re at major convention saying that they are adverse to democracy. They don’t care about policies. They’re not concerned about rule of law due process. Remember, January 6, was about overthrowing not simply the government, not simply the capital, but the Constitution. They were there to stop a constitutionally mandated process. Here’s the point. I don’t believe you have different factions who are trying to get to the same goal. I believe you have very different factions, trying to get to very different goals. There was a time in this nation where good faith disagreement was okay. Because ultimately, we desired the same outcome. We prefer people to have access to high quality education. We prefer children to not be concluded, summarize, based on their zip code. Opportunities are good, anti racism, good. These are things we typically would agree with. Now, there’s debate. You see Donald Trump, he’s not trying to make America great again. He’s trying to make America Well, what it was founded upon the principle, not a freedom, but the principle that you can own another human being the principle that women had restricted rights and or no rights at all. You see, the nation was founded on principles that are not aligned to what we understand as an enlightened culture. However, those who support Trump support some of those principles, they say it out loud, their elected officials who have literally set on record from the Republican Party, they no longer want everyone to participate in democracy. Some candidates for higher office have said that women should not be allowed to vote, that individuals who aren’t smart should not be allowed to vote. And then the agenda, the actual agenda of Donald Trump to up end policies that have protected disenfranchised citizens all across this nation. You see, this is part of their strategy. This is part of their plan. And once again, I submit to you if you support Trump at this stage of the game, I must conclude that you are okay with the dissolving of our current democracy.

We are on the cusp of the commencement of the first of former president Donald Trump’s four trials. As someone who would like nothing more than for this horrible man – this criminal, who has caused so much pain to so many – to be locked away for the remainder of his life, I should be…if not “eagerly anticipating” the trial, certainly looking forward to the opportunity to have Trump pay for his actions. 

But I do not feel very optimistic about the outcome here. Because here’s the thing: This first trial, the so-called “hush money” trial – it actually doesn’t seem to offer an especially strong case against Trump. 

Trump paid off adult film star Stormy Daniels to keep her from talking about their affair in the leadup to the 2016 election – I don’t think anyone doubts that. Trump knew about the payment; of course he did. But there are several worrying factors that I fear will lead to either an acquittal, a mistrial, or – at the worst – some fines and a slap on the wrist. 

First, hush money payments aren’t actually illegal; they’re just gross. What would be illegal would be the fact that the payments were marked as “legal expenses” on Trump’s records. Trump’s attorneys will almost certainly argue that the former president had no knowledge or understanding of the bookkeeping process or how these payments were recorded. 

And even if the prosecution can prove that he did…falsification of business records is a misdemeanor, not a felony. It’s not the kind of thing that results in jail time. It’s not the kind of thing that I can imagine his rabid supporters abandoning him because of. If the prosecution can prove that these hush money payments amounted to campaign finance violations, the charges could rise to the level of a felony…but a conviction is still very unlikely to result in anything more than a fine, or probation. 

Another problem is the credibility of the man who appears likely to be the primary witness in this case, Trump’s former attorney and friend Michael Cohen. Michael Cohen has lied in court. A lot. By his own admission. He also hates Donald Trump. A lot. By his own admission. And these factors combined may make the jury view him as an unreliable witness. 

This case was never going to be the strongest one against Trump – the classified-documents case, the January 6 case and the Fulton County, Georgia case all allege more serious crimes, with vaster consequences should he be convicted. But those cases, more than ever, are looking unlikely to see verdicts before the presidential election. Which, of course, is what Trump is hoping for. 

So I suppose we’ll just have to wait and see. I just wonder whether this case will have much of an impact on…well…anything at all. 

Given the ongoing attacks on abortion care, I’m glad to see that the Biden administration is not only stepping up, but they’re speaking out about the need to preserve the bodily autonomy of women. From the VP visiting an abortion clinic to Biden centering this human rights issue in his campaign, these visible displays of support, they’re significant. That’s why I was a bit taken aback with the Biden administration when they had a delayed and weak approach to what we know is a pervasive practice that violates the bodily autonomy of women.

This month, the Department of Health and Human Services announced that hospitals must obtain a written informed consent from patients before performing pelvic exams, especially while the patients are under anesthesia. Apparently conducting non-consensual pelvic exams on unconscious women has been a long-standing practice at teaching hospitals and medical schools across the country. The HHS said institutions that don’t comply could lose Medicare funding.

Try again, federal government. This practice of copping a feel on women in the supposed name of science is criminal. Hospitals and medical schools that violate patient bodily autonomy by conducting pelvic exams without patient consent should not just possibly lose Medicare funding, they should lose their medical licensure and their freedom.

Let’s get this straight: In the Year of Our Lord 2024, medical professionals and professionals in training are examining the private parts of unconscious women without their consent. How are people okay with poking around others under carriages when they’re out cold? How did this disgusting practice survive? Me too? I have so many questions, including Why did it take the federal government so long to say anything about it? The Department of Health and Human Services only push back at the practice of nonconsensual pelvic exams this month. In the announcement, the HHS Secretary said the department is aware of media reports as well as medical and scientific literature highlighting instances where as part of medical students courses of study and training patients have been subjected to sensitive and intimate examinations. When were these media reports publicized mind you in 2020, so it took the HHS to what come forward four years later with their condemnation after a New York Times investigation. And to make matters worse, this investigation found that hospitals and doctors were performing pelvic exams on women who were under anesthesia even when those exams were not medically necessary. Said another way the medical community has been using vulnerable patients as guinea pigs accessing their private parts without their permission. For instance, a 33 year old Arizona nurse named Janine expressly told her physician that she did not want medical students involved in her stomach surgery in 2017. But after the Anastasia warmth wore off, well, a doctor told Janine in passing that she had gotten her period, which they noticed while conducting a pelvic exam on her. The doctor said the operating team saw she was due for a pap smear and they stepped up and figured that they would take care of it. Yeah, really. I am speechless. The doctor’s audacity has gall. Of course when they were questioned while the hospital declined to comment to the to the New York Times on its policy on informed consent for pelvic exams. They also face no legal liability it appears in many US states and medical institutions. Physicians are not required to get expressed consent for pelvic exams while women are under anesthesia. Make that makes sense. Just because you put me under doesn’t mean you get to indulge your curiosities. Yet this happens all the time. And there’s no record of who is being subjected to these unnecessary and a highly offensive physical violations. But if history has any indication, I would say it’s generally society’s most marginalized, who are systematically being victimized by the medical profession. The father of modern gynecology, well, he comes to mind as he happily performed barbaric pelvic experimentations on enslaved women, black women back in the 1800s without anesthesia or a second thought, and today, the only thing we should not be giving a second thought to is criminalizing this behavior. It should not matter whether you have an MD behind your name or not. Accessing someone’s private parts without permission should be a sex offense. Possibly pulling Medicare funding will not cut it. If this administered Rachel is serious about protecting the bodily autonomy of women it should ensure the consequences of violating that autonomy are grave.

Demographics are destiny, they say, but apparently destiny can sometimes be derailed or distorted—that is, if Texas has anything to say about it, the Lone Star State is currently 40% Latino demographic projections say that by 2040, that figure could grow to 50%. Now, this shouldn’t be so surprising to people, and especially to people who live in Texas, not for nothing. But we’re talking about a big chunk of land that used to belong to Mexico, before the mid 1800s, when a bunch of white people from states like Missouri and Tennessee, invaded the territory and tried to bring their black slaves with them, even though the Mexican said, No, you can’t do that. Of course, the state of Texas or test, if you prefer, was always going to be heavily Latino, and becoming more so all the time, due in large part to immigration and higher birth rates among immigrants.

A lot of white people are panicking about all this. And they would love to reverse those demographic changes, or at least stop them in their tracks. So much so that when you break down the anxiety that Americans feel about the issue of immigration, which pollsters say is now the number one concern in this election, I would say that at least half of the worry has to do with something that people never talk about out loud: demographics.

You’ve probably heard about the great replacement theory, a right-wing conspiracy popular with white supremacists that suggests white people are being pushed around and pushed out by massive waves of immigrants. The fear is that they’re going to be replaced or at least displaced. Well, they say somebody has to do something to stop this. So here comes Texas, where Republican Governor Greg Abbott is drawing the line with an immigration law that he says will scare off as many undocumented immigrants as possible, maybe even some legal immigrants who are afraid that they might be mistaken for undocumented.

To turn back the clock, Abbott will need a magic wand. Or maybe just a state immigration law that allows local and state cops to enforce federal immigration statutes by arresting people who they suspect are in the country illegally—read Latinos. Even though Abbott is a former Texas Attorney General, his grasp on basic legal concepts like the federal Supremacy Clause of the Constitution and the fact that only the federal government can make immigration policy is so weak that it makes me wonder if whatever law school he attended also doubles as the rodeo clown college.

It’s no wonder that the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals recently blocked the law from being enforced. Because it’s not clear that’s constitutional. The smart money bet is that’s not not that avid cares much one way or another what the courts say. He’s not in this for the law. He only cares about the politics. Supporting this divisive and unlawful piece of legislation is how Abbott shows Republican voters in Texas and around the country, that he’s a tough guy who will keep Texas and the whole country safe from what Republicans describe as an invasion along the US Mexico border. Best of all, Abbott doesn’t have to do the really hard thing. You know, the thing that would really take courage, and that’s going after all those Texans who hire the undocumented, to do their chores, to carry out every job imaginable because a lot of Americans don’t want to work anymore. See, taking on employers is scary employers fight back. So Abbott would rather just go after the poor and the weak, a bunch of desperate, largely uneducated non citizens who can’t vote through what they say everything is bigger in Texas, even the cowards.

Then, aside from the politics, there’s the demographics. Texas Republicans don’t have a prayer of winning elections over the next 20 years in the state. If Texas continues to go down the road that’s on now and becomes more and more Latino. See, the Texas immigration law is the last gasp of those who want to change that reality. Silly Texas Republicans don’t you understand? You don’t spit in the wind. And you don’t make enemies out of those who will soon make up the majority.

During a recent meeting with supporters of Robert F. Kennedy Jr, his New York State Director, Rita Palmer, made some stunning comments in which she said, Hey, if you want to support Trump, you should go and door knock in Pennsylvania, like she did in previous elections, where she says the goal here is to work together with Trump supporters to deny Joe Biden the presidency and 270 electoral votes. This is so remarkable for a number of different ways that are worthy of discussion. And I believe, and I believe we’re already seeing it that that as this information gets out, fewer and fewer Democrats are going to be considering Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as a real alternative to Joe Biden. From the beginning. We went back and forth. Does Robert F. Kennedy Jr’s candidacy help Joe Biden or help Donald Trump on the one hand RFK Junior’s candidacy started as a democratic challenge to Joe Biden within the Democratic primary. And of course, the Kennedy is a longtime democratic family. At that point, the assumption and the belief was, oh, this is definitely better for Trump, because Democrat Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. is going to take voters from Joe Biden more than he will from Donald Trump. However, then, the focus of the campaign became foreign policy comments, including about Russia and Ukraine, that we’re certainly more sympathetic to Russia than to Ukraine and aligned much more with the sort of stuff you hear going around in Trump’s circles. The anti Vax stuff, which Kennedy denies is anti Vax, but upon close examination, it is effectively anti Vax, anti Vax, appealing much more to Trump support supporters than the Biden supporters. And then Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said, hey, you know what, I’m actually going to run as an independent rather than as a Democrat. When that’ll happen, there was the idea. Maybe this is actually good for Biden and bad for Trump, Fox News, seemingly realizing that slowing down and almost completely halting the interviews of RFK Jr. But at the end of the day, as of about six to eight weeks ago, when you looked at polling had to had Trump versus Biden as compared to three way polling. When you added Robert F. Kennedy Jr. It worsened the situation for Joe Biden, and seem to help Donald Trump. We now have this video that was released, and it appears as though the Robert F. Kennedy Jr. campaign has been working to get the video off of YouTube, even though it’s been reproduced so many times that you can certainly find it, in which Rita Palmer says our mutual enemy is Biden. What we can look at doing is denying Biden the 270 electoral votes. If Republicans take the house in November, then the denial of 270 electoral votes to Biden would throw the election to the House of Representatives, which would then make trump the President of the United States. This is not what you normally hear from third party candidates. This is not about here is how Robert F. Kennedy Jr. can become president. This is how we can work together with Trump supporters to make sure Biden is not the president and Trump is and then I don’t know what I don’t know what Trump offers RFK Jr. So here’s my hope. My hope is that as more voters who are sort of toying with the idea, maybe I’ll stay home, maybe I’ll vote third party, RFK Jr, Cornel West, Jill Stein, whatever. I hope that the brazen and cynical nature of this becomes clear to them. And they will say, hey, you know what? Any action other than voting Biden helps Trump because Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has no path to the presidency. Cornel West has no path. Jill Stein has no path. I don’t even think any of them have enough ballot access to get 270 electoral votes, and people will hopefully realize, if I vote for RFK, or if I stay home, I make a Trump presidency more likely. This is the reality. It’s not about shaming people. It’s not about calling people stupid. It’s only about the only thing it’s about is saying my moral and ethical framework does not allow me to make an action or to take a step that is going to make it more likely that Trump is president. I think we’re starting to see that in the polls, because there are some recent polls in which the numbers are almost identical. When you add Robert F. Kennedy in there’s polling, for example, where in a head to head matchup, it’s Biden plus three, and in a three way matchup, it’s tied. That’s still a three point shift, but it’s not as dramatic as it once was. There’s polling where in a head to head matchup, it’s Biden plus one and in a three way matchup, it’s Trump plus one that’s only a two point swing. It’s still not good, but it’s better than it was the other sign that I am caught cautiously optimistic about is that while several months ago, you could regularly find polling in which Kennedy was polling 14 1618. He is much more frequently polling six, eight and nine. So my hope is that no matter what his intentions are, no matter what the intentions are of his voters, my hope is that he will not succeed at flipping this election to Donald Trump.

I mean, the irony is unreal. I’ve never known people to care so much about a billionaire and a politician. I mean, the level of compassion people are having for Donald Trump, and all of his self-inflicted political, criminal and civil woes, self-inflicted, is astounding. Where was this compassion, where was the nuanced conversation, where was the “That’s not fair, that’s too much, that’s too heavy handed!” Where was that when there was a 17-year-old child who made a dumb mistake and got a life sentence or damn near. And then a DA comes out, a chief of police comes out, they say something like, “We’re going to make an example out of these thugs!” intentionally making sure that the punishment is not only exacting, but it is, let’s just say, extreme. Nobody blinked.

Nobody had compassion. But because of the self inflicted wounds of an adult, of a person who is allegedly learned, a great businessman, a great negotiator.

All of a sudden, that individual can do no wrong and when they do wrong, you just make excuses as to why it seems they did wrong. But really everybody else is doing wrong to them.

What happened to pull yourself up by your bootstraps? What happened to taking responsibility for your actions? What happened to the conservative agenda, to conservative ideology? I’m no conservative. But there are some things that I used to respect about you guys. I’m no conservative, but there are some things that I could understand. No more. No more.

I think Don Jr. said it best when he said there is no Republican Party, it’s only MAGA now. Well, what the hell is MAGA? What are we talking about? What policy does MAGA support other than just rhetoric and fear-mongering and trying to make people think the world is going to end if a person of color or a woman or God forbid member of the LGBTQ community has a position of leadership?

The reality is this. They have no answers. And to the conservatives who keep saying, well, we’re not Trump, Republicans or Trump conservatives, we’re real conservatives. The hell you say, if you’re a real conservative, you would not have allowed them to hijack your party, hijack your platform, hijack everything you said you believed in.

So what do you do now? It’s too late. Trump has taken over your party. Trump has taken over the hearts and minds of many of the voters inside of your party. The man did not have to debate anyone in the Republican primary. He’s a landslide victory guy heir apparent to the throne again. The voters

were primed for this. You can blame Trump Trump definitely is part to blame here. But remember, Trump is a Johnny come lately to the political scene.

The politicians who decided to gaslight who decided to manipulate who decided to indoctrinate voters. We know them allies.

And we started to expect every politician to lie to us. And when you get the chief liar, what happens? He becomes number one in the Republican primary. You trained your conservatives quite well.

There is nothing funny about the situation in Gaza – where, in addition to the tens of thousands of lives lost, the citizens are currently facing a famine of proportions that may contribute to a ruling of genocide against Israel in the international court system. The images of starving children are haunting, unforgettable. There is also nothing funny about the 134 Israeli hostages remaining in Gaza under the control of Hamas, which presents a conundrum for comedians, especially those who tackle the political spectrum.

So, take recent SNL host Ramy Youssef, whose opening monologue directly addressed the conflict. The thing is, I loved the monologue. I did. It’s worth a watch if you haven’t seen the whole thing. I thought he was sincere and brave, and willing to speak on behalf of humanity rather than one “side” or the other. And somehow, while doing this, he also made me laugh, which is no easy feat.

The thing is, the news cycle is so unrelentingly negative, that…look, as human beings, at a certain point, you stop being able to absorb the information. It’s just too much, especially when the events taking place feel wholly out of your hands to do anything about.

(Sidenote: remember to vote for Biden, please. Even if you’re not a superfan, get yourself to the polls and participate in saving democracy. That you can do.)

Comedians on variously-sized stages around the country are, in increasing numbers, taking on the conflict. Some of the jokes elicit deserved groans from the audience. Others are more nuanced, managing to draw attention to the realities of life as a Jew or a Palestinian in a less-expected way…a way that may bring a different kind of awareness, may reach people who might not otherwise be reached.

There is a saying that goes something like “tragedy plus time equals comedy.” That’s not always so; not in cases of tremendous human suffering. You can also certainly argue that there is no right way to joke about tragedy, that’s an acceptable perspective, although not necessarily my own.

But when done right – and, like I said, it is no easy feat to get these kinds of jokes “right” – comedy has a way of reinvigorating a discussion, making things hurt a little less, just for a moment, and giving us the emotional and mental space to perhaps find a more common ground.

The collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge shocked us all. Who expected a cargo vessel the length of the Eiffel Tower to slam into a major Baltimore bridge and block one of the U.S.’s most significant trade waterways? Now, fortunately, the Biden administration was quick to act. They pledged to rebuild the bridge, moving heaven and earth to do so as quickly as possible. President Biden wants to avoid any kind of rippling impact on our economy, keeping those access to goods and trade, cars, everything, open. That’s a great idea. But if Biden is really serious about rebuilding the Key Bridge quickly, he won’t just throw federal funds at reopening access to the Port of Baltimore. Rather, he’ll push Congress to repeal the antiquated protectionist law that is the Foreign Dredge Act of 1906. This act slows the recovery of the Port of Baltimore, compromising the employment of at least 15,000 blue-collar workers.

The Foreign Dredge Act, which was passed, mind you, more than a century ago, forbids dredges built in foreign countries from operating in the U.S. Dredges are those huge vessels that remove debris from waterways [and] dredges also help build the waterways. So basically, a dredge is what is needed right now to remove the Key Bridge and that huge cargo vessel from the Baltimore river. But under the act, a foreign-built dredge is subject to immediate forfeiture, which means we are left with only American-built dredges. Now, why is that a problem, you may ask? Well, as you may imagine, because the Foreign Dredge Act shields American companies from international competition when it comes to dredges, the U.S. fleet of dredges are substandard, and that’s putting it nicely.

The U.S. has 16 vessels, compared to 87 in Europe. A recent study from Tulane University found that the combined capacity of the U.S. fleet is less than a single EU dredging vessel. Translation: All the dredges in the United States put together couldn’t do what just one dredge in Europe could do. In fact, the largest U.S. dredge has a capacity that would rank only 31st in Europe. Our dredges aren’t only small, with little capacity, and they are few, mind you, but they’re also old. The Army Corps of Engineers still uses dredges built during World War Two. That means U.S. dredges are fewer, smaller, slower, and less efficient than their foreign counterparts.

But don’t let these infirmities lead you to believe that US dredges are cheap, no. With the limited competition out there in the U.S., not only are dredge makers disincentivized from making a better product, but they’re also incentivized to jack up the prices. The foreign dredge act is hurting the United States. It was passed forever ago to protect and foster Americans shipbuilding industry without foreign competition. But that was also back before the Titanic was built. The act is unnecessary now, all it does is keep the United States inferior while funneling more of our tax dollars to substandard dredge construction companies here in the States. We the People deserve our ports and waterways to function as efficiently as possible, as this is critical for distributing goods and enabling trade throughout the US economy. Instead, we have a draconian act that operates to the detriment of taxpayers, consumers the environment, and it’s currently holding Baltimore back. The problematic nature of the foreign dredge act is also something that’s well known in Congress bills to reform or eliminate us dredging protectionism were introduced in late 2021 2022 and also 2023. Yet those bills did not receive much support at all. But what about now, now that the nation needs dredges that do the job and do so quickly? If Biden truly wants to build back Baltimore better, then he’ll push Congress to repeal the foreign dredge act, and to put us ports and waterways into the 21st century.

Sometimes, liberal Democrats really get on my last nerve. And I know why, too. It’s because of how dishonest and cynical many of those on the Left tend to be when dealing with race, ethnicity and people of color. That’s weird, because those issues are supposed to be the home turf of the Democratic Party. Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, DEI, is supposed to be the native language on the Left. At least that’s how liberals intended for the story to be written. They have a lot of time, energy and rhetoric invested over the years in a prolonged campaign of trying to convince Latinos and African Americans that Republicans are racist and out to get them, dating back to the 1960s, and specifically to the 1964 presidential election and the candidacy of Republican nominee Barry Goldwater.

Democrats have sought to scare up votes by portraying conservatives as being opposed to people of color progressing, achieving and advancing. Lately, I’ve wondered if that’s all wrong. What if Democrats are, when push comes to shove, just as disinterested as Republicans in seeing Latinos and African Americans get ahead and stay ahead?

That’s what I glean from two stories currently in the mix. Both had to do with attempts by liberal Democrats to force out and essentially put out to pasture a pair of history-making women of color in prominent positions whose ascension to those positions liberals were only too happy to brag about and celebrate when doing so served their interests. Now, those same liberal Democrats have decided that their interests have changed. They say the Democratic Party would be better served by ousting these trailblazers and perhaps replacing them with younger and whiter alternatives. The trailblazers are Kamala Harris, the first Black and Asian and female vice president, and Sonia Sotomayor, the first non-white woman and Latina to sit on the Supreme Court.

There are those in the Democratic Party who want to give them both a bus ticket out of town. I’ll be it for different reasons, with Harris, who has a lower approval rating than President Biden. And that’s saying something. Many Democrats would like to see her dumb from the ticket because they think she’s a liability, especially since Biden is 82 years old, and questions remain about who would ascend to the White House if he couldn’t complete a second term. Many Democrats are convinced that Harris is not up to the job of being President. They think she wouldn’t win an election with her name at the top of the ticket. As for Sotomayor, some Democrats are worried about the possibility that the 69 year old justice might not live long enough to outlast a second term for Donald Trump, if he were to win in November. They also worry that Republicans could retake the Senate, the body that confirms Supreme Court nominees. They’re thinking about the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who died of cancer and left an opening on the bench that was filled by Trump. They don’t want that to happen again.

Note that in both of these cases, the doomsday scenarios that are keeping Democrats up at night are hinged on the idea of white men failing. Harris’s electoral viability is only an issue because Biden is doing such a bad job of keeping Democrats in the fall to the point where he now trails Trump in most polls. And so so my your seat on the High Court is only in danger of falling into the hands of Republicans, if Biden loses in November, and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer can hold on to the Democratic majority. So why is it the responsibility of Harris and Sotomayor to solve these problems for Democrats? And why are liberals so eager to make waste of those who make history?

Gee, Democrats, Thanks for nothing. This one way relationship hasn’t been very satisfying for people of color. But hey, we’re happy that it still seems to be working out for you.