Donald Trump and hypocrites in White House violate God's first Commandment: "No Strange Gods Before Me"

Opinion letter published in the Chattenooga Times Free Pess

I am shaking my head in disbelief.

"I am the Lord Thy God"

Exodus 20:2 is the opening statement of the Ten Commandments, establishing a covenant relationship between God and His people.

"There shall be no strange God's before me"....
🙄 In the last couple of weeks I have seen an ugly Donald Trump post depicting himself as Jesus Christ. JD Vance, who has been a Catholic for about 10 minutes, arrogantly insulted Pope Leo XIV by telling him to be "careful" talking about theology. Pete Hegseth, apparently thinking he was correctly quoting Ezekiel 25:17 in a Pentagon service prayer, instead quoted "Pulp Fiction." ❗

White House (fake female bogus shaman) spiritual advisor Paula White compared Trump to Jesus (OMG "no strange God's before me"💢). 

Now Trump is picking a fight with the Pope Leo, admonishing him to "get his act together." 

I was raised as a mainstream Protestant but now rarely attend church, so I am the last one to claim any level of Biblical literacy. But, I am appalled and offended.  They are hypocrites❗

From Nancy Bishop in Ooltewah, Tennessee

Donald Trump and maga Republicans are wrong to confuse Trump's evil Iran war with Christianity

Donald Trump's incoherent actions, attitude concern readers for the nation’s future: Opinion published in the Chattanooga Times Free Press: Apostle Matthew 5-9: "Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God"  

War is not Christian and not in any way evidence of Patriotism❗

Not Christian nor American:  I find this version of "Christianity" that insists God is blessing Donald Trump's illegal Iran war, that prays for "bullets to find their target," that promotes bombs as God's instruments, to be repulsive, reckless and irresponsible. 

Those evil descriptors don't begin to address the issue that this is neither the values representing Christianity nor the values we have traditionally held dear as Americans.

And did I mention, this has bypassed Congress, has ignored our very Constitution and has come in direct conflict with international law❓ Who have we become that we are not hearing more dissent? Why are we not absolutely resolute in insisting our lawmakers in Congress take back their rightful role in the co-equal branches of government❓

Tragically, so much is at stake. Truly, this is much more than one's political affiliation. This is an issue that should matter to every single American. This is about our values and morality and our willingness to hold those who are conducting this current war to a standard that reflects our values and morality. 

Handwringing doesn't cut it. Insistence and persistence are our friends in making our voices heard and our expectations clear to our lawmakers and to those who are tasked with leadership.

From: Rev. Kate Stulce in Harrison, Tennessee

Donald Trump and maga Republicans must protect America's foriegn alliances: claims to take over Greenland are stupid

“Trump Mocks Leaders Who Seek to Curb His Greenland Ambitions as Weak” (news article, January 21):

Echo opinion letters published in The New York Times:

As tensions rise between the United States and Europe, Donald Trump has not done anything to cool things down but instead derided Europe as weak ahead of his meeting with European leaders in Davos, Switzerland. Donald Trump has gone too far.

For years the U.S. has been able to build strength through its alliances, but Donald Trump has turned this idea on its head. 

Obviously and unbelievably, it has come to a point where Donald Trump is willing to bully allies and make threats in order to obtain Greenland, an island that few Americans care about and that would not improve the security of the country, whatsoever. (IOW "stupid")

Donald Trump has made a dangerous assumption that the U.S. on its own would be able to stand strong on the global stage, particularly against two superpowers: Russia and China. If the Donald Trump really wants to pay off the national debt (a financial impossibility) and improve the economy, losing allies is not the way to go about it ❗ Perhaps it is time for Trump to learn the meaning of the word “cooperation.”  From Maxwell Mercado in  Collegedale, Tennessee

To the Editor:  This is not a test. Donald Trump’s increasingly flagrant and bellicose threats to violate Greenland’s sovereignty represent an existential threat. There is no telling what will befall us if the United States shatters the NATO alliance and cements its abrupt shift from leader of the free world to global pariah.

Congress and all Americans: If you oppose this perilous path, now is the time to speak. 

 (Maine Writer post script:  #WhereIsSenatorSusanCollins ❓)

From Emily L. Cooke in Cape Elizabeth, Maine

Marorie Taylor Greene cannot handle the truth: She is a leader in the Flat Earthers society

A Few Good Men:  Lieutenant Kaffee: I want the truth❗

Colonel Jessup: You can’t handle the truth❗

Echo essay by Ramon Presson published in the Williamson Herald, a Tennessee newspaper"

t’s one of the most iconic punch/counter punch moments in film history. Three decades now since its release, this courtroom exchange between Cruise and Nicholson’s characters seems to have prophesied and describe our present strained relationship (or perhaps divorce) with truth and facts.

Before today’s conspiracy theories enjoyed the fuel and fertilizer of the internet and social media, the positively absurd was once largely limited to cover stories in the National Enquirer. I remember waiting in grocery store checkout lines and seeing actual Enquirer headlines such as “Redneck Aliens Take Over Trailer Park” 👿👺and “Half Man, Half Dog Baffles Doctors.”  MTG (Marjorie Taylor Greene😕) and OMG❗

Instead of “truth is stranger than fiction” we’ve arrived at “fiction is my truth.” And there is no better fiction writer at the keyboard today than Georgia congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Green (MTG) who recently doubled down on her post-Helene & Milton claims that “they” are controlling the weather. On Oct 3 she tweeted, “Yes, they can control the weather. It’s ridiculous for anyone to lie and say it can’t be done.” On October 7, Green tweeted “Climate change is the new COVID. Ask your government if the weather is manipulated or controlled. Did you ever give permission to them to do it❓Are you paying for it? Of course you are.” 

Green is implying that “they” are somewhere, somehow manufacturing deadly Category 4 and 5 hurricanes to prove a point and advance an agenda, and you’re naïve if you don’t believe that.

This is from the woman who claims that 9/11 was an inside job and that there is no evidence that a plane actually hit the Pentagon. She maintained that the horrific shootings at Sandy Hook, Parkland and Las Vegas were staged. In 2018 MTG made headlines for claiming Jewish space lasers were operating for leftist agendas, specifically insisting that wildfires in California had been started by PG&E, in conjunction with the Rothschilds, using a space laser, in order to clear room for a high-speed rail project.

Conspiracy of the Month Club:  MTG serves up platters of extreme examples, but what’s frightening is that thousands of people believe her. Conspiracy theories certainly got a boost during Covid regarding the virus, vaccines, masks, social distancing, etc. That anyone could say with a straight face that a virus that has killed 7 million people worldwide, 1.1 million in the United States alone, was a “hoax” is beyond my comprehension.

But there are large numbers of Flat Earthers and Holocaust deniers, so I don’t know why other crazy claims surprise me. And that doesn’t even begin to scratch the surface of the tip of the bizarre and outrageous QAnon iceberg that rose up in 2017 from a large ocean of shared misinformation. The wife of one of my patients believed that lizard people were running the government and that the only people who could recognize them were other lizard people.

Why are we susceptible to falling for conspiracy theories?Our brains have trouble managing ambiguity and uncertainty. We say we love mysteries, but what we really love are solved mysteries. We are wired to try and connect the dots and discern cause and effect.
In the absence of clear information, truth and facts, our imaginations will fill in the gaps to come up with explanations.

When we don’t understand, agree with, or like the explanation for an incident or for someone’s actions, we’ll even make something up.
Sometimes the actual facts and truth are not very interesting, opening the door for a strange alternative explanation to be more engaging and entertaining. It’s true of social media and all marketing: uninteresting things don’t go viral.

Sometimes the actual facts and truth are disturbing and can leave us feeling partly responsible for the damage and/or necessary change. Denial, minimizing, and blame shifting are always easier than accepting even partial responsibility for the problem and thus a role in the improvement. As a couples therapist, I’ve seen this play out right in front of me for 30-plus years.

What we make up (or believe from elsewhere) will fit our personal ideology, politics and/or theology. We are very seldom willing at any given moment to challenge our biases and cherished beliefs.
We like to believe we have insider information, exclusive and valuable intel that most others don’t have but that everybody needs. Said the aforementioned wife to her family, “Can you see I’m trying to help you?”

There are Gaslighters among us who would have us doubt what we’ve witnessed. They are like Chico Marx who said, “Well, who you gonna believe —me or your own eyes?” When challenged, they will not only repeat the falsehood, but double down on it. It’s good to remember what Abraham Lincoln famously said, “Don’t believe everything you read on the internet.”😁

I see something in the public forum that I see in too many marriages—the inability, or at least the unwillingness, to say either of these two things: "I don’t know - or/ But, I was wrong."

Marjorie Taylor Greene (MTG) and the Flat Earth Society

How refreshing it would be if politicians, business leaders and spouses could bring themselves to say those two things. Yea, I know; that’s crazy talk right there.

Ramon Presson, PhD, is a licensed marriage & family therapist in Franklin, (www.ramonpressontherapy.com) the author of multiple books, and a member of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists. He can be reached at ramonpresson@gmail.com

Youth voters must unite to protect future generations from gun violence

An important echo opinion written by Jennifer Rubin published in The Washington Post: 

Youth driven anti-gun violence protests against school shootings will energize young voters!

Tennessee Republican state representatives’ outlandish recent expulsion of two Black Democratic lawmakers brought shame on the GOP and on a state with a dismal history of voter repression. 

But the attempt to silence the lawmakers, for leading a youth-driven gun protest at the Capitol following the March 27 Nashville school slaughter, might also have accelerated two key developments: (1) awareness that social change is inextricably linked to democracy’s defense, and (2) engagement of young voters, who have lately been showing their muscle.

Although Democrats quickly reappointed the ousted lawmakers, the Tennessee travesty is a reminder that a largely White Republican Party increasingly resorts to antidemocratic means to squelch Black voting power and maintain policies (on guns, abortion, LGBTQ rights) that most voters reject. As Democracy Docket’s Caroline Sullivan and Madeleine Greenberg point out, the expulsion was not an isolated event in Tennessee, but rather part of a widespread attack on democracy that includes 470,000 people affected by felony disenfranchisement, egregious gerrymandering and barriers to mail-in voting.

If their representatives cannot be heard, voters will find that their interests — on matters such as gun safety, education and health care — can be quashed. The effort to muzzle the majority reflects the MAGA movement’s heightened panic.

“Tired from choosing to defend the indefensible, enraged at being called out, Trump’s supporters lash out,” evangelical Christian and conservative writer Peter Wehner wrote in an Atlantic article headlined “An Acute Attack of Trumpism in Tennessee.”  (IMO Maine Writer says this "acute attack" should become a chronic condition! Trumpziism = Fascism.)

In this case, the entire country witnessed a temper tantrum that tried to block progress on guns by quashing free speech and representative democracy.

This is a party frantic to hold back the tide of social change. As long as a narrow subsection of mostly White officials can gerrymander districts, erect obstacles to voting and appoint partisan ideologues to the bench (as well as maintain antidemocratic mechanisms such as the Senate filibuster), social change might be impossible. Voters and their representatives cannot address gun safety (favored by an overwhelming majority of Americans) or preserve abortion rights (favored by a 2-1 majority) unless democratic values are secured and fortified.

While Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) and four other Senate Democrats, alarmed by the Tennessee Republicans’ punitive move, plead with Attorney General Merrick Garland to use “all available legal authorities to investigate the expulsions,” activists for issues such as gun safety, abortion rights and LGBTQ rights must connect the dots: (Trumpziism!) MAGA forces’ attack on democracy poses the greatest barrier to obtaining progressive policy goals. The public is with them on guns, abortion rights and LGBTQ rights; but proponents might never achieve their aims so long as reactionary Republicans block the will of the people. The return to office by the expelled Democrats known as the Tennessee Two might help Americans appreciate that racial and social change depend on a strengthened democracy.

Lighting a fire under young voters

The temporarily ousted Tennessee state representatives, Justin Pearson and Justin Jones, both under 30, had stood shoulder to shoulder with students who poured out of Nashville schools protesting inaction on gun safety. They garnered national attention at a time younger voters are drawing attention as a decisive voting bloc. Republicans are noticing.

In Wisconsin, a Republican former governor, Scott Walker, viewing the results of Democrats’ recent win in the state Supreme Court election, declared on Twitter, “Younger voters are the issue.” Although he bizarrely blamed “radical indoctrination,” Walker’s conclusion was sound: “We have to counter it or conservatives will never win battleground states again.”

In a similar vein, GOP pollster and strategist Kellyanne Conway said on Fox News that Republicans have “got work to do on the young people who think differently on abortion, perhaps, or guns or climate change.” She’s worried that Democrats can create a “turnout machine with young people.”

These Republicans understand that young voters, as in the 1960s, and 1970s, can play a critical role in igniting social change and dislodging right-wing powerholders.

Youth voters united!  VOTE for change!

Current data debunks the conventional wisdom that younger Americans don’t vote (and therefore can be ignored). Young voters turned out where it mattered most in 2022, namely in swing states with competitive races. The Center for Information & Research on Civic Learning and Engagement at Tuft University’s post-2022, election study found that youth turnout in Colorado, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, Oregon and Pennsylvania exceeded 32 percent. Atrocious turnout rates below 20 percent in states such as Alabama, Indiana, Louisiana, Oklahoma, Tennessee and West Virginia dragged down the national youth turnout rate.

The significance of the youth vote shouldn’t be underestimated. “If the elections had been decided by voters 45 and older, Republicans would have won the House by an even greater margin and likely taken the Senate,” polling analyst John Della Volpe wrote in the New York Times after the election.

The implications for 2024 are eye-opening, according to Simon Rosenberg, a Democratic pollster who pre-bunked the 2022 red wave. “Projecting forward,” he writes on Substack, “keeping the 2020, vote constant, but now [adjusting] upward for the growth of [Gen Z and Millennial] generations into the electorate,” he found, these two segments could rise to 37 percent of all voters. 😃😃

Therefore, the result would be a national margin for Democrats of 6 percent.

If youth activism and Democratic Party outreach to younger voters increase in the run-up to 2024, the two young Tennessee lawmakers will deserve plenty of credit. Indeed, that pair and the students they championed might one day be regarded in a light similar to that of the 1963 Children’s Crusade, when hundreds of young people — braving attack dogs and fire hoses turned on them by racist official Bull Connor in Birmingham, Ala. — alerted the nation that democracy needs foot soldiers.

Tennessean anger about how the state legislature responded to free speech Tennessee Three

'Ashamed to be a Tennessean': Nashville area readers against 'Tennessee Three' expulsion | Letters to the editor published in The Tennessean newspaper:

After the March 2023, mass shooting at The Covenant School in Nashville, Representatives Justin Jones, Gloria Johnson and Justin J. Pearson called for gun control reforms in a way that briefly disrupted the House proceedings at the state capitol. Jones, Johnson and Pearson became known as "The Tennessee Three".

Editor’s note: Hundreds of readers weighed in on the expulsion hearings of the “Tennessee Three” – the state House lawmakers who were accused of “disorderly behavior” for encouraging gun law reform protesters from the chamber’s floor. The vast majority of letter writers have condemned the Tennessee General Assembly’s action, including readers from throughout the world and across the United States. 

Absolute power corrupts absolutely

More than 135 years ago, the British politician and writer Lord Acton famously wrote that “Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” The truth of that maxim was on vivid display last Friday in the Tennessee House of Representatives in a shameful display of political cruelty and cowardice, which is to say political bullying. The State of Tennessee and that state of democracy across our great country deserve better.

Matthew Kenney, Clarksville (zip code 37040)

Ashamed to be a Tennessean

After 25 days of being away from Nashville, and catching up with the news of Tennessee, I am ashamed to live here. We have legislators that kick out elected legislators, take over an elected Metro council, legally carry guns to their offices, flip collective fingers to creed, gender, and persuasion. This isn’t America, this is what Tennessee has become right now.

Bill Tyler, Nashville (zip code 37221)

Sinking to a new moral low- Tennessee's Republican legislature blocked free speech for three elected legislators.

The Tennessee legislature has sunk to a new moral low. Following a deadly elementary school shooting, they offer up cheap and easy "thoughts and prayers" as opposed to real concrete solutions to keeping guns away from the mentally ill. Most egregiously, when three members stood with citizens to demand action, they elected to expel the two Black men involved. Their actions seriously call into question their fitness to hold office.

Michael Hinson, Antioch (zip code 37013)

Expulsion was over the top

The punishment is not proportional. Some of the Tennessee lawmakers are out of touch with what the people want. When Gloria runs again I will donate the maximum amount allowed to her campaign.

Chip Rayman, Knoxville TN

Result will be revival for state’s Democrats

Those two young men were voted out of the legislative body at the intersection of Hubris and Ignorance Avenues yesterday. I believe that this moronic act will very much help to revive a moribund TN Democratic party that has suffered from ineffective and uninspiring leadership for far too long. This may not create a tidal wave of resistance, but it will absolutely help the Democrats turn a corner and finally gain momentum and head in the right direction.

Tracy Edwards, Nashville (zip code 37146)

Disagree with the Speaker and you will be punished

I’m appalled at the conduct of the Tennessee House Speaker and his band of ultra-conservative followers. Are they just trying to make themselves look more ridiculous and authoritarian than usual?Cameron Sexton had a temper tantrum because someone wasn’t agreeing with him. We, who don’t agree with him on important issues (gun regulation, the right to make decisions about your own body, and free and fair elections for example) are tired of being silenced and left out of the conversation. The supermajority, who hold the views of a minority of Tennesseans on these issues, have been doing that for too long. They have bent the rules and the law to serve their own purposes, and those have little to do with protecting the people of Tennessee.

Ann White, Franklin Tennessee

Republicans worship guns over the lives of innocents including children and Christians

Vote all Republican gun idolatry worshippers out of Congress!

"Senator John Cornyn, Republican of Texas, dismissed President Biden’s calls for an assault weapons ban as 'tired talking points'.”

Nashville citizens shrine mourns the massacre of three innocent children and three adults in the Covenant Christian School mass shooting.  But Senator Cornyn says nothing can be done? #IDTS

.

Shooting Prompts a Shrug in Washington, as G.O.P. rejects pleas to act.  President Biden said he had reached the limit of his powers to act alone on gun violence, and needed Congress to respond. Republicans said they had already done all they were willing to do.

Reported in The New York Times another massacre where children were slaughtered in their Nashville classrooms by Anni Karni.  

WASHINGTON, DC — The mass shooting at a Christian Covenant elementary school in Nashville this week generated a broad shrugging of the shoulders in Washington, from President Biden to Republicans in Congress, who seemed to agree on little other than that there was nothing left for them to do to counter the continuing death toll of gun violence across the country.

But while President Biden’s stark admission on Tuesday that he could do no more on his own to tackle the issue was a statement of fact that aimed to put the burden on Congress to send him legislation, like the ban on assault weapons he has repeatedly championed, Republicans’ expressions of helplessness reflected an unwillingness, rather than an inability, to act.

Their answer to Mr. Biden’s plea was as blunt as it was swift, as lawmaker after Republican lawmaker made it clear that they had no intention of considering any additional gun safety measures.

“We’re not going to fix it,” Representative Tim Burchett, Republican of Tennessee, told reporters on the steps of the Capitol just hours after the shooting that massacred three children and three adults in his home state. “Criminals are going to be criminals.”

Shrine for Nashville Tennessee victims of a mass shooting massacre at the Covenant Christian School.

(In other words- "evil is as evil does". I don't think Scripture has  supported such apologist and enabling nonaction!)

The right wing extremist Burchett said he saw no “real role” for Congress to play in reducing gun violence, and volunteered that his solution to the issue of protecting his family was to home-school his children.

Likewise, Senator Mike Rounds, Republican of South Dakota, said Congress had done enough.

“When we start talking about bans or challenging the Second Amendment, the things that have already been done have gone about as far as we’re going with gun control,” Mr. Rounds told CNN.

Last year, Congress passed a narrow, bipartisan compromise that enhanced background checks to give authorities time to examine the juvenile and mental health records of any prospective gun buyer under the age of 21, and a provision that for the first time extended a prohibition on domestic abusers having guns to dating partners.

The bill was the first major gun control legislation that Congress had passed in decades, but it addressed only a small set of issues designed to keep guns out of the hands of dangerous people.

At the time, Republicans like Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the minority leader, noted that supporting the measure was necessary to win back suburban voters, who broadly support some changes to the nation’s gun laws. But even then, proponents conceded that the bill did not signify a political shift on gun restrictions; rather, it was a measure that went precisely as far as Republicans were willing to go in strengthening gun laws, and one pushed through only by a fleeting political coalition that would soon dissipate.

Several of those Republican supporters have since retired, and the House is now in the hands of G.O.P. leaders who have no intention of allowing gun safety legislation to reach the floor.

“Gun violence is uniquely an American problem because of lawmakers who refuse to act proactively to prevent it,” said Christian Heyne, the vice president for policy at the Brady: United Against Gun Violence organization, who noted that House Republicans this week had originally scheduled a committee vote to weaken the government’s authority to keep short-barreled rifles off the streets. “Our lawmakers should be working to strengthen our gun laws, not weaken them,” he said.

But even the Republicans who championed the law enacted last summer showed no desire to take any further action.
Senator John Cornyn, Republican of Texas, who served as the lead Republican negotiator on that bill, dismissed Mr. Biden’s calls for banning assault weapons as a set of “tired talking points.”

What common sense gun reform looks like.

“I want to see the bill we just passed get implemented,” he said. One of the provisions of that bill provided funding for states to enact so-called red-flag laws that allow authorities to temporarily confiscate guns from people deemed to be dangerous. But Tennessee does not have a red flag law, and would not benefit from federal funds to implement a law that Republican state lawmakers are not willing to consider.

Senator Marsha Blackburn alert: Assuming she knows how to read!

Question: Let's clear up the right wing hypocrisy:

If you protect lives (aka "pro-life"), then why do you not protect children from gun massacres and automatic weapons? Opinion echo letter published in the Chattanooga Times Free Press newspaper, in Tennessee.  

Pro-Life hypocrisy!

Tennessee's right wing Senator Marsha Blackburn should find some literate person to read for her the message in this constituent's letter to the editor:

Behold! It's the Greek icon "Medusa" doing a Senator Marsha Blackburn impersonation!

Dear Editor: I find myself puzzled by recent events and right wing "labels".

Why do Republicans call themselves "pro-life", falsely claiming they are committed to protecting the lives of unborn fetuses. Yet, those same people don't care enough about protecting children in schools from being massacred by demanding for changes to laws about how killers access automatic weapons. These crazy right wing extremists protest abortions, sometimes to the point of violence at clinics, yet will not  ban assault rifles or make it harder to obtain a gun. Oh yeah. I know — it's all about the Second Amendment.

But does anyone really believe that those 18th century authors, who wrote that amendment, had in mind what we live with now, because of the proliferation of guns? Guns kill innocent people. If it's important to you right wing extremists to protect unborn lives, then start agitating to protect children who are already here.  

Letter from Cathy Dreger in Chattanooga, TN 

Tennessee Congressional delegation alert! Look at the January 6 evidence!

https://www.oakridger.com/story/opinion/2022/01/05/those-behind-jan-6-riot-need-suffer-consequences/9078410002/
Those behind Jan. 6 riot need to suffer consequences
Echo opinion letter published in the Oakridger newspaper in Oak Ridge Tennessee.

"If our Tennessee Congressional contingent tries to turn a blind eye to the heinousness of this organized attack on democracy as well as the Congress itself, then they are not fit to be in Congress", Virginia M. Jones.

“The 1/6 MAGA* attack on the Capitol was the biggest terrorist attack in America since 9/11.” ― Oliver Markus Malloy, American Fascism: A German Writer's Urgent Warning To America

To the Editor: For many Christians, January 6 is a day of joy and celebration. It is the last of the 12 days of Christmas which begins on December 25, and ends on Epiphany, the day the Wise Men arrived at the manger, bearing gifts for the newborn baby, who will bring hope and love to the world.

But, those who hurled themselves up the steps of the Capitol of the United States to try to prevent the certification of the votes in the Presidential election on Jan. 6, 2020, were not bearing gifts or bringing joy. They had violence, disruption and even, in some cases, murder, in their hearts, and people died and were seriously injured from their vicious attack.

Who planned this insurrection and called for its being carried out? 

Who ran screaming up the steps and defecated in the halls of the Capitol? This information needs to be known. The authors of this horrific attempt at a coup need to suffer the consequences of their crime as much as any pickpocket, or anyone guilty of assault and battery, or sedition against the government.

If our Tennessee Congressional contingent tries to turn a blind eye to the heinousness of this organized attack on democracy as well as the Congress itself, then they are not fit to be in Congress.

Virginia M. Jones, Oak Ridge Tennessee

*#TFG's fake logo (The Former Guy lost!)

Hello? Senator Marsha Blackburn alert!

A Tennessee echo opinion might make covfefe sense- Donald Trump babble

When outright lying isn't effective - Gish Gallop: A technique used during debating that focuses on overwhelming an opponent with as many arguments as possible.  (Soooo...maybe this topic is the real meaning behind "covfefe", the Trumpziim neologism?)

Tennessee Chattanooga Times Free Press

Outright lying is not the only way to deceive in public discourse. For more than 2,000 years, those who care about getting the truth have universally agreed on a number of fallacies that have nothing to do with an issue being discussed. 

In such cases, the purpose is to win the argument, not to get at the truth.

Examples of this were on full display by the Republican minority in the House Judiciary Committee's first impeachment session. Here are a few of their misleading tactics:

They used arguments against the persons testifying rather than against what they were saying. Whatever might be said about those testifying (good or bad) has nothing to do with the validity of their testimony.

Several threw out the red herring of investigating Hunter Biden. Whatever could be discovered about Biden's activity (good or bad) has nothing to do with what Donald Trump did or did not do.

Others used what is known as the Gish gallop. The tactic is to talk nonstop in the effort to overwhelm without regard to accuracy.

Some appealed to pity ("look how badly we're being treated").

Those who used these tactics were not discussing in good faith.

Boyce Brawley

Donald Trump is defined by his afinity for despots - echo letter

Trump has co-opted the GOP completely- echo opinion published in the Chattanooga Times Free Press.  

#IMpotus45

Maine Writer- Actually, I would subtitle this opinion letter instead as, "the Growing Old Party" is now co-opted by the 73, year old (b. 1946)  #IMpotus45.

It has never been a matter of if, but when, President Trump would be impeached. He cheated and lied in his business and personal life. He was a corrupt businessman, and he is a corrupt president. He has tried to play the victim during this process when he has no one to blame but himself.

What he has played is the American people, especially his base, and the Republican Party has let him get away with it. Meanwhile, Trump is being played by every despot and autocrat in the world, and he is too narcissistic and naïve to see through it, even while they are laughing at him. His handshake and photo op diplomacy has been a "disaster," to use one of his favorite words in his limited vocabulary.

I watched both the Nixon and Clinton impeachment hearings, and I have watched almost all of Trump's hearings. Congress could distinguish fact from fiction during the Nixon and Clinton hearings and were able to vote with country and the Constitution as its lodestar, not the next election.

By Rebecca Rochat

More guns make people less safe: A Florida echo opinion

No, sorry, more guns won't make us safer | Opinion published in the Florida Sun Sentinel newspaper, by Alan Grayson.

Former Congressman Alan Grayson ~ opinion

On the day of the tragic shooting at Terminal 2 at the Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood airport, I had the misfortune of listening to right-wing talk radio during a long drive. 

Discussion turned to what could have been done to prevent the attack, and I heard that sad but persistent fallacy: "If only the other passengers had been armed . ..."

And when Nikolas Cruz killed 17 students and staffers at Parkland’s Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, President Truhttps://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/02/17/us/politics/live-congress-votes-scott-pruitt-epa.htmlmp advocated arming teachers.

No, sorry. It doesn't work that way. 

Subjecting the victims to crossfire does not make them safer.

When the Second Amendment was ratified, it took two minutes to load a musket. Esteban Santiago, the accused Fort Lauderdale shooter, fired 10-15 rounds in just over one minute. At Parkland, Cruz fired around 150 rounds in three or four minutes. Does anyone seriously believe that a bystander with a gun, possibly under attack himself, could have disabled the killer that quickly?

If "more guns" meant "more safe," we'd be the safest place on Earth. America is the only country with more guns than people. We also have the 11th highest "firearm-related death rate," more than one death each year for every 10,000 people.

Here is a list of annual gun homicides, as reported by the Washington Post:

Japan: 11

S. Korea: 14

France: 35

England: 41

Spain: 90

Germany: 158

Canada 173

Italy: 417

U.S.: 9,960

Inside the United States, Alaska has the highest rate of gun ownership, twice the national average. And the highest rate of gun deaths, twice the national average.

We are awash in guns, and — no coincidence — we're awash in mass murder. 

How could we possibly make it easier to buy a gun? In Florida, if you're 18 years old, you're not a convicted felon, and you don't have an adjudication of mental illness or drug abuse, you can buy a rifle, and as much ammo as you can carry. One-third of us already own guns. What are we supposed to do? Make it mandatory?

There certainly are lessons to be learned from these attacks. Santiago, the airport shooting, suspect suffered a mental breakdown serving in Iraq, when he saw two friends blown up. He was under psychiatric care. He tried to strangle his girlfriend. He told the FBI that the CIA was forcing him to join ISIS, and that he heard voices in his head urging violent acts. 

The police took away guns away from him, twice!

And gave the guns back, twice.

Lesson One: Don't give the guns back!!

(MaineWriter note ~ the heinous murder at the Tennessee waffle house on Sunday April 22, 2018, was carried out by a mentally ill man whose father returned his guns to him, after the Secret Service and police had revoked them!)
Santiago used a semi-automatic weapon. Any semi-automatic weapon makes it all-too-easy to kill too many people, very quickly. So why did he stop? He ran out of bullets.

But in Parkland, Nikolas Cruz not only fired around 150 shots, but he also had more than 180 rounds left over, in six 30-round magazines.

Lesson Two: A ban on high-capacity magazines (which eight states now have) can save lives.
When tragedies like these occur, just ask a simple question: "What could have prevented it?" The answers are there.

Former Rep. Alan Grayson represented Florida's 9th District in Orlando where many of the Pulse nightclub shooting victims lived. In the wake of that massacre, he introduced a permanent assault weapons ban bill, called the "Freedom from Fear Act."

Las Vegas victims- registered nurse saved his wife

Sonny Melton RN and his wife Heather Melton*, an orthopedic physician- Mr. Melton lived in Big Sandy, Tenn., and was a registered nurse at Henry County Medical Center in Paris, Tenn. Heather Melton, his wife, is an orthopedic surgeon there, and officials from the center will provide counselors to staff who are struggling to deal with the mass gun violence murders.

JACKSON, Tennessee - Less than 24 hours after learning of his son’s death, James Melton memorialized his son, Sonny, and his surviving wife, Heather, as heroes in a post on his Facebook page.

Sonny was one of the more than 50 killed in the shooting in Las Vegas late Sunday night during a country music festival that was wrapping up with a Jason Aldean concert.

Sonny Melton, a 29-year-old nurse, was among the 22,000-strong crowd at the Route 91 Harvest festival with his wife, Heather Melton.  His grieving widow has described how she would have died were it not for his quick actions when bullets started flying through the air.

“He saved my life. He grabbed me and started running when I felt him get shot in the back," she told a radio station in Tennessee. "I want everyone to know what a kind-hearted, loving man he was, but at this point, I can barely breathe."

In a Facebook post she said she had lost her “true love and knight in shining armour”.

"At this point, I'm in complete disbelief and despair,” she wrote. “I don't know what to say. Sonny was the most kind-hearted, loving man I have ever met. He saved my life and lost his.”

*Dr. Heather Melton is an orthopedic surgeon in Paris, Tennessee and is affiliated with Henry County Medical Center.

MaineWriter: All gun violence is preventable.  My sincere condolences to all victims of gun violence.  As a registered nurse, I extend our professional condolences to the family and loved ones who knew and will miss Sonny Melton, R.N.

Biography of Andrew Jackson for dummies

President Donald Trump told an interviewer how he admired Andrew Jackson, because the 7th President who served from 1829-1837, was somehow a man who could've avoided the American Civil War?  

Almost immediately, critics took issue with Trump’s historical accuracy. The Washington Post’s Aaron Blake called Trump’s grasp of history "totally bizarre," noting, among other things, that Jackson died a decade and a half before the Civil War (1861-65).

What planet is Donald Trump living on?

Here's Andrew Jackson 101 (for dummies!)

Andrew Jackson was an American soldier and statesman who served as the seventh President of the United States from 1829 to 1837 and was the founder of the Democratic Party. Wikipedia

Born: March 15, 1767, Waxhaws
Died: June 8, 1845, The Hermitage, his home Nashville, TN, where he and his wife Rachel are buried

Presidential term: March 4, 1829 – March 4, 1837
Political parties: Democratic Party (1828–), Democratic-Republican Party (?–1828)

Nicknames: King Mob, The Hero of New Orleans, Old Hickory

In no way did Andrew Jackson consider trying to avoid the American Civil War because he lived in Tennessee on a plantation where he owned plenty of slaves.  

America's Civil War began with The Battle of Fort Sumter. from April 12-14th, 1861. In fact, bombardment of Fort Sumter near Charleston, South Carolina by the Confederate States Army, and the return gunfire and subsequent surrender by the United States Army that started the American Civil War. 

For slow learners like Donald Trump- Andrew Jackson died in 1845.  He was long dead by the time the Civil War started.  

There was no way for Andrew Jackson to be connected with the American Civil War. Rather, he was the Hero of New Orleans where his victory statue is quite visible in the City's Jackson Square (check it out!).

The Battle of New Orleans was an engagement fought between January 8 and January 18, 1815, constituting the final major battle of the War of 1812, and the most one-sided battle of that war.

Obviously, Donald Trump confused the American Civil War with the end of War of 1812 against the British.

Final battle of the War of 1812- Battle of New Orleans

Maybe White House advisers can find an elementary school teacher  to work in the office. It has to be a qualified educator, somebody who can educate Donald Trump, before he speaks to the world, giving fake American history lessons.

Gun violence continues to consume American news

Oh my God! 

Every week, there's horrible news about another gun violence incident, with deaths, someplace in the United States. 

Today August 5th, was the occasion of yet another theater shooting. This time, the shooting was in Memphis Tennessee, an obvious copy cat incident, following a chain of other murder rampages.

Although right wing extremists point fingers about the conspiratorial causes of these deadly incidents, the fact is, easy access to weapons are like germs in a nurturing host environment.

We know this: Guns cause deaths. There are no other causes of deaths when guns are the sources of the moralities. Murderers intent on causing rampages can easily obtain a gun with ammunition to inflict carnage, wherever they want to create lethal pandemonium.  

Now, Americans are exposed to guns in the hands of terrorists and the mentally  ill. In fact, if terrorists and the mentally ill did not have access to guns, the number of deaths caused by these delusional criminals would obviously be far fewer than an unbelievable deadly rampage per week. 

A Nashville, TN incident comes a day after Al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula released an online video calling for "lone wolf" attacks and praising Mohammad Youssef Abdulazeez, a 24-year-old gunman who killed four Marines at a pair of military facilities in Chattanooga, Tenn

Here's the latest: a murderer who was killed by police, in Nashville, Tennessee:

Memphis Tennessee shooter killed

The suspect behind yet another movie theater shooting was declared dead after opening fire on a police officer early Wednesday afternoon in a Nashville, Tennessee, suburb.

Officers from the Metropolitan Nashville Police Department responded to reports of a man with a gun and a hatchet inside a showing of "Mad Max: Fury Road" at the Carmike 8 Cinemas on Bell Road at 1:15 p.m. in Antioch, authorities said.

Don Aaron, a public information officer, said the gunman shot at a police office, prompting him to return fire. A SWAT team moved in and exchanged fire. Ultimately, he said, the suspect exited out the back door of the theater where he was confronted by more police officers who shot and killed him.

"The actions of that first officer who went in the theater to engage this individual may well have saved multiple individuals inside that theater," Aaron said during a presser on site.

The suspect, a 51-year-old local man, was wearing a surgical mask and doused two women's faces with pepper spray, authorities said.

“The gunman apparently unleashed this pepper spray throughout the theater,” Aaron said. 

“As the SWAT team entered that theater, it was very thick with chemical spray, with irritant. 

Gas masks were brought in to those officers as they attempted to get this person into custody.”

Brian Hass, a Nashville Fire Department spokesman, confirmed that two people were injured with pepper spray and one person was injured by the hatchet. The injuries were minor and no one was hospitalized.

"This could have been a lot worse" Hass said.

Aaron explained that the first two officers were able to respond quickly because they were working a crash on Bell Road just beyond the cinema's property. Moviegoers ran to the cops and alerted them of the armed man's presence.

Two backpacks were left inside the theater and bomb squad were called to the scene to clear the bags, Aaron said. The suspect was wearing one of the bags when he opened fire on the officer.

"We want to make sure that there is no danger with those backbacks," Aaron added.

Jeremy Cardoza, who works at the nearby Ford Ice Center, told The Tennessean that the business was placed on lockdown with roughly 25 people, mostly children, inside.

"We're waiting on instructions from police, we have not been contacted yet," he said to the local paper. "We had a parent come in and they kind of just told us that there were a bunch of cops posted outside."

The incident comes less than two weeks after a gunman opened fire inside a movie theater in Lafayette, La., killing two people and injuring nine others before committing suicide.

It also comes a day after Al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula released an online video calling for "lone wolf" attacks and praising Mohammad Youssef Abdulazeez, a 24-year-old gunman who killed four Marines at a pair of military facilities in Chattanooga, Tenn., and injured two others before he was killed by police. A Naval officer who was injured in the attack died two days later.

The FBI said it is investigating that attack as an instance of "homegrown violent extremism," but would not officially label it an act of domestic terrorism.

It's impossible to understand how right wing gun advocates can justify the proliferation of gun violence, by denial and projection. These zealots claim murders aren't caused by guns, but by criminals, as though there's no cause and effect.

Meanwhile, gun violence continues to consume American news media, like a rampant cancer, attacking a growing number of innocent people. America is now a nation in perpetual mourning, with no end in sight.