The time just after midnight friday. The place Love Park in Philadelphia. A two year old boy was found wandering alone. No shoes, no socks.
The two year old one of the homeless. His parents, 4 year old sister and he were sleeping behind cardboard walls under the city’s Welcome Center. The youngster found his way out.
Pictures of the two year old with his head resting on a police officer’s shoulder are all over the internet and in the newspapers this morning. Pathetic best describes the photo.
We are told the economy is in great shape. I say not for all. The two year old’s story evidence of the 1 percent/99 percent thing.
Our country is failing its youngest.
The weather. A day for weather comment. There is a strong wind from the north. Very strong. Palm trees bent as much as possible. Other trees bent about 35 degrees. White caps.
The House of Representatives returns this week. The Republican majority screwed up big time. Need a Speaker. Need a budget. Neither going to be easy.
Mike Lofgren is a 28 year respected Republican Congressional servant. He retired in 2011. Following retirement, he wrote an essay. Then in 2012, a book.
The essay is titled Goodbye To All That: Reflections of a GOP Operative Who Left The Cult. He wrote both major parties are “rotten captives to corporate loot.” As to the far right, he wrote the Tea Party is “filled with lunatics.”
With regard to grid lock, he wrote “legislating has become war minus the shooting, something one could have observed 80 years ago in the Reichstag of the Weimar Republic.”
The book is The Party Is Over: How Republicans Went Crazy, Democrats Became Useless and the Middle Class Got Shafted.
Some days I cannot win. I mentioned yesterday that I was in the process of writing this week’s KONK Life column. About Lincoln. Eventually titled Lincoln The Man.
I mentioned that Lincoln may have been our greatest President. The first comment I read this morning disagrees with me…..Lincoln the WORST! Emphasis his, not mine.
I have respect and admiration for the writer. He has been reading the blog for years and commenting the same amount of time. We rarely agree. That is ok. I write, he disagrees. That is what it is all about. For some reason however, Lincoln the WORST hits me hard.
Watch. Tomorrow I shall receive a slew of comments in support of his position. So it goes.
I spent yesterday afternoon writing Lincoln The Man. A story of some of the personal aspects of Lincoln’s life. Things most do not know.
Late in the afternoon, I headed up to Boondocks. A party scheduled for Howard Livingston to introduce his new CD. Sell Your Stuff Keep The Dog Live On An Island.
Not many cars in the parking lot when I arrived. Strange, I thought. Then I found out why. The event was saturday, not yesterday.
Oh, well. I stayed. Sat at the bar and enjoyed a fish sandwich. Watched Boondock locals. Good people, fun. A different breed from Key West.
Enjoy your day!
“We are told the economy is in great shape. I say not for all. The two year old’s story evidence of the 1 percent/99 percent thing.”
It was straight out of Les Miserables. Of course, wandering little shoe less children are all over the third world dally. The global 1% have indeed cornered the greed of the world, capture dour politics with stupidity and graft and slowly made almost everyone’s lives worse, some even to the point of death. Maybe one day the mass of people will have enough of the charade and deal with this inequity, knowing humans, probably very violently. However, system so out of tune and whack will ultimately correct itself.
Oh, and as to Lincoln, this article from last President’s Day notes that Lincoln was rated #1 ahead of even Washington by a prominent group of political scientists. You can read who did the ranking and their rankings here:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/monkey-cage/wp/2015/02/16/new-ranking-of-u-s-presidents-puts-lincoln-1-obama-18-kennedy-judged-most-over-rated/
Laugh! (that we seldom agree.)
Lincoln turned the Northern War machine on the civilians in the South. That’s what “elevates” him to the ranking of “worst”. Prior to that, women and children were “off limits”.
I can forgive him his Crony Capitalism with the railroads, his racism (send all the blacks back to Africa), his income tax, his anti-press sedition persecutions, his saying one thing / doing another, and even — if he was — a closet homosexual.
It’s the was on civilians, that then became acceptable, which was inexcusable.
“Honest Abe”, and the caricature of what he was, has been “airbrushed” to lead us to worship the all-powerful State.
Argh!
Respectfully submitted for your consideration.
fjohn68