Tag Archives: Bill Maher

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The End Is Near?

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Anybody else watch Bill Maher last night? He left me with the feeling that we are on death watch, waiting to usher in the the death of American Democracy. First, he urged everyone to vote, and then proceeded to explain why it won’t matter all that much because the Republican machine has the election all tied up in their favor, going right up to 2024, when, Maher thinks, Donald Trump and his goon squad will be waiting at the door, regardless of the outcome at the polls.

On the flip side, Michael Moore, more often than not a purveyor of doom, is apparently of the opinion that we are about to see a Democratic victory, with women coast to coast refusing the support the party that killed Roe. If that’s the case, then the polls will have been off, not by a little, but by a lot. It shocked me how abruptly they switched from favoring the Dems to favoring Republicans. Can’t recall polling numbers being upended that abruptly before. I do think Oprah, may have just tilted the race for the Senate in PA in Fetterman’s favor.

Blog, Politics

The Dems Need To Dial It Down

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Last night’s ” Bill Maher show was well worth watching, particularly the last ten minutes with his analysis of how badly the Democratic Party stands to get stomped in 22 and 24 if they don’t reign in their special interest purity test promoting extremists. In short, their wild-eyed push for “inclusion” stands to blow them right out of the electoral water. How many people even know what the hell that actually means, as though it has any standard meaning at all? People fear what they cannot understand.

I’m progressive. I’ve been in a”woke” mode since the 60’s. I was actually there, unlike so many younger people who now want to preach to me and others of my generation regarding what they think we should believe based upon what they naively think we do not know.

The 60’s were a bitch. Only those who were there can fully understand the scope of what went down . The threat to the Republic is now even greater. Somehow the Democratic leadership has got to get AOC and a few others to stand down and chill out, turning off their PC “purity test” meters to a degree that the party becomes more attractive to a broader base by appealing to, as Bill Maher put it, “common sense.” The alternative is to continue the infighting over PC/special interest issues and risk losing the country to Fascism.

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“Throwdown” In The Middle East

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On his show Friday night, Bill Maher, called it “the Shia-Sunni Throwdown.”  That’s pretty much what it is.   Two major Muslim factions that hate one another are at war.    It’s been going on for centuries.  The Bush/Cheney Administration’s decision to invade Iraq put us smack in the middle of it and left us there.  And it’s only getting worse.

The United States is now allied with Iran (Shia) in the fight against ISIS (Sunni), with some air support coming from Saudi Arabia which is Sunni, but heavily allied with the U.S.   The Sunni Saudis hate the Shia Irainians,  but they are allied against ISIS, which threatens all of Iraq, which is also mostly Shia.    Got that?   Iraq and Iran, are Shia.   The Saudis, are Sunni, but they are allies in trying to put down the ISIS revolt, which got started because the United States invaded Iraq and overthrew Saddam Hussein, who was the lynchpin which kept the region from flying apart into factions and devolving into widespread warfare.

Skip over to Yemen, where Shia Iran is in support of Shia Houthi fighters, who have overthrown the government of Saudi (Sunni) supported President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi.

So the Saudis (Sunni) and Iran (Shia) are  allies in fighting ISIS, but they oppose one another in Yemen.    They are fighting on the same side against ISIS, but they are on opposing sides in Yemen.   That’s complex in and of itself.   It becomes even more tangled when Israel enters the picture.

Six nations are attempting to cut a nuclear power control deal with Iran.   Israeli President Benjamin Netanyahu, opposes the pact, even before knowing what the final agreement will say.   He does not want it and appears eager to spread conflict in the Middle East and North Africa by getting the United States involved, either directly or in support of some kind of military action against Iran – which is what the United States hopes to avoid with the deal they and five other nations are trying to reach with the Iranians.

It’s difficult to determine precisely what Netanyahu wants.  Apparently his plan is to eliminate the Palestinians by driving them into the sea and over the border into Jordan, along with the military annihilation of Iran, ISIS, Syria,  portions of Iraq and anybody else he and his supporters on the Israeli right find disagreeable.   In other words, widespread ongoing slaughter as opposed to ongoing negotiations for peace.   It’s important to remember that not all Israelis agree with Netanyahu’s position which is doing serious damage to Israel’s image in Europe and the United States.

And now comes the Arab League, agreeing in principle to form a joint military force to fight Jihadis, like ISIS and the uprising in Yemen.  However, there is no certainty as to how many members of the Arab League will commit resources to the effort, which already had numerous countries including the U.S., Iraq, Iran, Syria, the Kurds and the Saudis involved in the fight against ISIS.

It’s the mother of all holy wars, an unholy mess, and that’s precisely the reason Baby Bush’s daddy,  George H.W. Bush, withdrew American troops after pushing Saddam Hussein back into Iraq, following the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in 1991.   A very smart move by  Bush I.    If only junior had inherited some of those smarts.

Yes, our troops have been in the region since 1991.   That’s 24 years, not counting incursions during the two world wars or the European crusades, which may have greater meaning for Middle Easterners who sometimes tend to take a longer view of things.

As his nation’s “strong man,” Saddam, held the Iranians in check.    In addition, because his regime was secular, he was able to maintain a balance between the Shia and the Sunnis,  something the United States destroyed when the administration of Bush II and Dick Cheney, decided to invade with the goal of overthrowing Saddam and “democtratizing” the Middle East, leaving the United States stuck there ever since.

Perhaps this new military alliance coming out of the Arab League will open the door for the U.S.  to finally withdraw from the region, ending a futile effort of more than a dozen years to impose a military solution on a problem that’s both religious and political – which increasingly appears to be one and the same – both in the Middle East and in other parts of the world as well.

The American military solution has not worked.   There is no good reason to believe that it will work.   It is time to leave.  It is time to let the Shia and the Sunni solve their own problems.   U.S. planning has been idiotic with regard to culture and history in the Middle East,  just as it was in Vietnam.

Perhaps we should ask ourselves why we keep doing this?   For profit?  Bravado?  Some combination of the two?   Are we really so arrogant as to believe that we can solve anything, simply through the application of military power?