Prickly City by Scott Stantis for April 28, 2018

I get the impression Stantis is struggling to find a new, Bash Trump theme!

Regrettably, Mr. Stantis has quite accurately portrayed our current national dilemma. “Compromise” has become anathema. “Common ground” has to be avoided at all costs, lest “they” receive something more than “us.” There can be no dialogue when no speaker will listen to any other. Our diverse opinions once allowed us to arrive at a middle ground that was workable even if not completely satisfactory to either side. We could respect differing opinions, since we all believed that all were working for the common good of the whole. Civil discourse has become just another oxymoron. Well done, Mr. Stantis, for pointing out that the fault does not lie in our stars but in ourselves.

Cute cat videos! The urge to run away when someone says “Hold my beer and watch this!”

Compromise isn’t possible anymore with a GOP that won’t act in good faith.

A GOP that has admitted (several times) on tape that the reason for Voter ID is to suppress the vote of Dems.

A GOP that won’t attempt to secure voting machines from hacking.

A GOP that gerrymanders States to disenfranchise Dems.

A GOP that complains and lies about the Health Care plan being rammed through: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/07/10/us/republican-health-care-process.html

Then writes a Tax Scam bill in 18 hours… https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/12/1/16726234/handwritten-republican-tax-bill

Pretends to be Fiscally Conservative… https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-fiscal-deficit/republican-tax-cuts-to-fuel-historic-u-s-deficits-cbo-idUSKBN1HG2RW

Stole a Supreme Court Justice after talking about what a good pick he would be.

A GOP that supports Nazis, traitors, gun nuts, climate-deniers, nationalists, oligarchs, and religious zealots.

But ignores the obvious GOP abuses of emoluments and power.

SILLY SEASON: You are indeed well named.

Wagnertinatlanta: Yes. It is indeed silly of me to expect GOP’ers to work in good faith.

Try attacking my arguments instead of my handle.

All it takes to believe that this is a time of unique dissension is a bad memory. Eras of Good Feeling are few and far between in a democracy. The first and namesake period was just after the War of 1812. This was probably a good thing, because a young and unstable country hadn’t been able to agree on much up to that point. Dissent peaked with the Civil War, again with labor strife in the 1880s and 90s, with the Depression, the Civil Rights/Vietnam era and Nixon. Only those whose political memory goes back no farther than Reagan think that we’re going to fly apart soon.

Well, the GOP presidents have been a little vague in their loyalties since 1968.

Richard Nixon colluded with the N. Vietnamese to delay peace talks. LBJ knew about it and felt that confidence of the USA was more important (How many Americans did Nixon add to the death toll do you think?);

Of course, we will never know if Ford’s pardon of Nixon was Quid pro quo for the VP job.

Ronald Reagan presided over the Iran / Contra affair. Col. North got immunity and then took 100% the blame, even though a mere Marine Lieutenant Colonel could not have done it all on his own.

Bush the Elder correctly called Reagan’s’ ‘Supply Side Economics as ’Voodoo Economics’. Then he joined the team as VP.

Bush the Lesser is an unindicted war criminal for his war of choice against Iraq. And his admin outed CIA agent Valerie Plame over something her husband wrote.

Bush the Lesser ignored the warnings of Osama Bin Laden about to attack the US. Put $2 Trillion of the two wars off the books, and presided over the military’s loss of Billions in cash in Iraq.

Now with Trump, Don Jr. volunteered the email and the statement that he intended to collude with the “Russian Gov lawyer” to dig up dirt on Clinton. Which falls under the crimes of espionage, various computer crimes, and receiving stolen property. You don’t need to have receive any actual info of value to be convicted.

Funny thing about some crimes… Sex with an underage boy / girl, terrorist bomb making, espionage, and treason only require the intent and related action(s) to commit the crime. Don Jr provided the email evidence. (And it doesn’t matter in the least if he didn’t know it was a crime.)

So while not paragons of virtue themselves, the Dems don’t seem to have been actual traitors over the past 45 – 50 years….