The Lottery Losers

The back of the “1,000 Frenzy” lottery ticket noted that your odds of winning $20 are one in 7.5. But the ticket costs $20, so by spending a mere $160, you may well win 20 bucks.

However, the seven two-digit numbers on this particular “Frenzy” matched none of the 25 two-digit “winning” numbers. So the disgusted buyer tossed it down on the road in the park, where the dog and I found it today.

Odd how quickly, in America, things “Stuffed With $1,000 Prizes” become litter.

All of which suggests a new advertising slogan for the Illinois Lottery. Something along the lines of “You Hope and Pray; We Prey on Hope.”

Trump Empowered American Nazis

Gee, you'd think picking a serially bankrupt con artist and lying "reality show" goon to run the country would turn out better, wouldn't you?

Trump: 'Some Very Fine People on Both Sides'

This is a scene from a film. But of course it also happened in reality.

Another Attack by the Antifascists

For almost 20 years now, I have identified my politics as “antifascist.” Given the enormity of historic evil that has resulted from fascism, that ought to be a noncontroversial position. Any sane, decent human being should be antifascist.

But the Republicans have decided to do to the term “antifascist” what they previously did to the terms “liberal,” “entitlement,” “social justice warrior” and “politically correct.” Republican propagandists like Frank Luntz and Karl Rove successfully demonized those terms through their minions at Fox News and elsewhere. Their intent was to discredit the very concepts of compassionate politics, earned government benefits, people who fight for the rights of others and politeness.

The GOP is on a constant propaganda mission to redefine language and make the better appear the worse. As Jeffrey Martini observed, science and education are now described as “liberal scams.”

The Republican Party has decided to demonize the term “antifascist” for the obvious reason. The GOP is the American fascist party, thriving in a dung heap of its own propaganda, screaming in fury whenever it’s scalded by the cleansing touch of factual truth.

Better Check Your Own Balance

I just can’t swallow any more of this hogwash about American “checks and balances.” The checks have all bounced, and the United States is unbalanced — journalistically, politically and mentally.

No, Trump Cannot Be Ignored

Enough with this “the news media should just ignore Trump” crap. These kinds of statements are silly and pointless. The news media is obviously going to cover the president of the United States.

So you’re saying the honest news media should simply refuse to cover Trump's Nazi rallies and fascist tweets, leaving them to Fox News to report? And then Fox will carefully edit out his most damning statements and lies and avoid any coverage of his rabid crowds, making Trump into a glorious leader — just the way Leni Riefenstahl did it.

The people who are saying the news media shouldn’t cover Trump’s rallies are dead wrong. We need to see the face of naked, screaming, racist evil up close and personal, just as the world needed to see it in Hitler’s rallies.

I know Trump’s corporate allies and Republican fluffers would love to hide what he really is and who his supporters really are. Reporters shouldn’t help them do it.

Donald Trump is no longer some mere con artist celebrity. He's a would-be fascist dictator who controls a massive nuclear arsenal. He cannot and should not be ignored, and the news media is not going to ignore him.

I understand how much people want Trump to just go away, but ignoring him won’t make that happen. Quite the reverse.

The Face of Republican America