Gaza War Continues, Blame Continues to be Missed

It's incredible. Six months and two weeks into Israel's war on Hamas, and nobody puts any blame for the atrocity on Egypt. Even Hamas seems to have been forgotten as a continued aggressor in the region, especially by my friends on the political Left.

Oh, don't get me wrong. What Israel is doing is nothing short of ethnic cleansing. They're very much hoping starvation will do most of the killing for them, and so far, the tactic is working. Israel's leaders need to be held accountable for this! But Israelis don't like Netenyahu so much anymore, in large part because of the way this war is degrading. They are increasingly recognizing that they have become the thing they most hated, and they don't like it. As of April 11, polls show Netenyahu having 40% unfavorable vs. an only 26% favorable rating, with 34% undecided. You can see the numbers here. Bibi is very likely on the way out.

But what's frustrating is how nobody in the news, nobody at all, places any blame upon Egypt for keeping the border closed! If they opened the border and allowed Gazans to flee the war zone, into a FUCKING DESERT which no one is using anyway, they would likely save over a million lives. All the aid which can't currently cross Israel's border would be able to reach the refugees. Food, fuel, shelter, and safety, all would be provided. But Egypt doesn't dare. Why? Because they're petrified that Israel will never allow those Palestinians back in. And while those fears are quite justified, they don't justify being complicit in the murder of their fellow Arabs!

Egypt might as well be lumped in entirely with the IDF for the wanton killing of civilians. They deserve this blame.

But in the media, on both sides of the political aisle, there is deafening silence regarding Egypt. For the life of me, I can't see why. One side of the border has badly needed aid. The other side has huge swaths of starving people. So if the aid can't get to the people, the only logical thing to do is allow the people to go to the aid! But nah, that would make too much sense!

Oh, I get it. Egypt thinks that such refugees would become a permanent settlement, and saddle them forever with a humanitarian crisis they would rather not spend money on. But this is the excuse they use while they casually look on, watching while women and children slowly starve to death. In light of this, such complaints seem trivial, because they are.

And Hamas? They apparently don't care about their own people, either. They could surrender, release their hostages, and end this entire thing. Today. But they would rather see all of themselves dead than give one inch. They would rather keep firing improvised rockets and other weapons, even now.

You need to have religion to be that stupid.

But why am I, with my little blog, the only one saying this? Why are my fellow liberals snarling traffic to O'Hare airport, as if that somehow won't simply make people ten times more pissed off? How obvious can it get?

Again, don't get me wrong. I've seen the news reports. I've seen how mass graves have been dug up, revealing how the IDF executed large swaths of civilians while their hands were zip-tied. Some Israeli officials, including Bibi Netenyahu, need to be put on trial for war crimes and executed.

But for fuck's sake, Egypt, open the goddamned border, already!

And SOMEBODY in the media better begin saying that!

Eric

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The Madness of Dan O'Donnell

Mark Belling is on his way out as far as WISN radio is concerned (good riddance!). His on-air time on the radio show that still ostensibly bears his name has been reduced to brief guest appearances every few days or so. One would hope he might go off the air sometime soon, and from there eventually join Rush Limbaugh in Hell. But for now, I want to focus on Belling's heir-apparent: the hyper-extremist Dan O'Donnell.

Charlie Sykes worked with Dan O'Donnell for years at WTMJ radio, and remarked way back in 2020 just how astonished he was at how Dan had gone completely overboard in recent years. In the years since, he seems to have gotten even worse. But O'Donnell's extremism doesn't seem to have given the executives in charge of WISN any problems. Far from it! In fact, O'Donnell gets three hours of airtime from 9:00 A.M. until noon on weekdays, and then gets yet another three hours filling in for the slowly fading-away Belling between 5:00 and 8:00 P.M. And what this person does with that additional airtime is breathtaking beyond belief.

There are some key differences between Belling and O'Donnell. For starters, Belling is at least leery of Trump and understands that he's a poor businessman. He still supports Trump, of course, but he's critical of him. O'Donnell gives reality no such latitude. In his book, it's all Trump or nothing. For another thing (and this plays to O'Donnell's favor), O'Donnell doesn't take the ridiculously long pauses between sentences that Belling takes. Belling wasted perhaps 40% of his airtime with not-so-pregnant pauses after forcing his listeners to endure 15 solid minutes of nothing but commercials leading up to, and sometimes during, his show. (I timed it!) O'Donnell at least keeps things moving along, and doesn't bother with dead-air time. Also, if he talks to someone off-microphone, he will allow that person to respond in the studio. Not so, Belling, who was constantly saying, "Paul says this," or "Paul says that." (Paul being his producer and call-screener.) Just give Paul the damned microphone already!

But I got a real taste of the kind of unbelievable bullshit when I listened to his podcast episode from March 20th. He kicked it off by (interestingly) campaigning strongly for early voting. This is a sea change for right-wingers in Wisconsin, who had previously decried mail-in and early voting ballots as skewing strongly toward Democrats. But now, it seems, O'Donnell is convinced that early voting plays to the conservatives' advantage, and so he strongly advocates for it. I look forward to seeing him proven wrong.

But that was just the beginning. He goes on from there to draw parallels from today to when the very first Republican was elected (Abraham Lincoln), and Southern Democrats threw a fit about it, preferring secession to advocating. The result was, of course, the Civil War.

"Man! Those Democrats just refused to give up their slaves!" he says. "What a racist party!"

Well, no. The crucial part that O'Donnell leaves out is that these Southern Democrats were ALL Christian conservatives! Yes! Don't believe me? Recall William Jennings Bryan, three time DEMOCRATIC candidate for president, and the prosecuting attorney in the John Scopes Monkey Trial in Tennessee. You don't get much more Christian conservative than that! This sad state of affairs stayed that way all the way through the 1970's, after which Reagan convinced most Southern Democrats to slowly switch sides. Southern Christian conservatism became exclusively owned by the Republicans by the time the 1992 mid-term elections ousted Democrats from their Congressional majority for the first time since Roosevelt.

And all the moderates either resigned or declared they would not seek re-election.

"It is just weird," he goes on, "that it's not taught anymore. That every single secessionist, was a Democrat." And later adds, "They launched a violent revolution against the Uni... some might call it an insurrection! against the government of the United States.  Who would have guessed that 170 years ago all of that would have been started by a group of abolitionists who were tired of Democrats treating people like their own personal property."

Apparently, somebody in the newsroom studio took exception to this bullshit and tried flagging O'Donnell for attention. Perhaps they were saying, "Dude, what the fuck?!"

"What?" O'Donnell Protested on the air. "What? It's history."

No, Dan, it's not. Because history is telling the whole story, not leaving out the most crucial part of it in order to transform it into political spin. These were CONSERVATIVES in the Confederate South. And they revolted, just like their ideological descendants did on January 6th, 2021.

"Democrat" is nothing more than a team name. The real enemy is conservatism. And more specifically, that brand of Christian conservatism which has no problem with telling bald-faced lies on the air, designed to make their own people revolt yet again.

Later that same broadcast, he cites Tony Bobulinski, a former business associate of Hunter Biden's, and plays some key parts of his testimony in congress during the Joe Biden impeachment attempt. He claims that this testimony shows that Hunter Biden took payments from China in exchange for leverage against Joe Biden. As additional evidence, he cites the fact that Joe Biden bowed out of the 2016 election back in 2015. He (Bobulinski) says he believes that China's money bought influence regarding that decision, even though that's pure speculation. He says it's clear to him that Joe Biden was the brand being sold in the Biden family, which is more speculation. He asks, if Joe Biden were so innocent, why is his family being so dishonest about it?

"That's a great question," O'Donnell says. He then claims that 10% of the payments from China were being "held by H. for the Big Guy." Where H. is presumably Hunter Biden, and the "Big Guy," is his dad. He then highlights a $40,000 payment to Joe Biden. "Remember that amount," he says. "$40,000."

He cites Byron Donaldson's testimony, and plays a clip, in which he details various payments made from the CCP to CEFC, a company associated with the Bidens, and various smaller dollar payments that went from that fund to various members of the Biden family, including Joe. 

O'Donnell then plays a clip of a heated exchange between Alexandria Ocasio Cortez and Tony Bobulinski, a former associate of Hunter Biden's who was testifying. O'Donnell plays that clip. For clarification, here's a brief transcript:

AOC: Did you witness the President commit a crime?

Bobulinski: Yes.

AOC: And what crime have you witnessed?

Bobulinski: How much time do I have to go through it?

AOC: It is simple, you name the crime. Did you watch him steal something?

Bobulinski: Corruption statutes, RICO and conspiracy, FARA...

AOC: What is the crime? Specifically. I asked you to answer the question.

Bobulinski: You asked, I answered the question - RICO. You're obviously not familiar, corruption statutes...

AOC: Excuse me sir, excuse me sir, excuse me sir-- RICO is not a crime. It is a category.

[At this, some audible gasps are heard from the floor.]

Bobulinski: It's a category of crimes that you're then charged under, a long hundred list of statutes...

AOC: (Speaking over Bobulinski) you have charges -- you have charges -- sir, please name...

Bobulinski: You want me to name the exact statute under RICO?

AOC: Yes.

Bobulinski: Well, it's funny, in this committee room, everyone who's not here, there's like eighteen lawyers who went to law school. I'll leave it up to you guys to find the statute.

AOC: I reclaim my time.

[Note: RICO is the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act.]

After playing the audio clip, O'Donnell actually laughs, going on to describe how he thinks corruption payments flowed over to Joe Biden and his family. But wait, there's another interpretation, here. That the Bidens had perfectly legitimate business interests which received money from the CCP just like every other corporation that does business in China.

AOC's question is perfectly valid. What IS the actual crime, here? Bobulinski couldn't name one and was forced to appeal to the authority of the lawyers in the room. That's a pretty good job by AOC in getting to the point of the matter!

In fact, on Keith Olbermann's podcast, Countdown, he played exactly this same clip as proof that the investigation into Hunter Biden is baseless. Now why is one ultra-left podcast getting pretty much the exact opposite interpretation from a right-wing A.M. radio program?

The answer is obvious: spin. The truth is somewhere between the extremes. Hunter Biden was into some shady shit, but we already knew about that. Does any of it lead to Joe? Not decisively. So then AOC's point is perfectly valid. There is no actual, identifiable crime here. And if there's no crime, then there's no impeachment.

And just how utterly ridiculous is it to conclude that a mere $40,000 can convince a Vice President to not run for office? $40 million, now we're talking. But $40 thousand? Come on! That's a drop in the bucket for any vice president. This paltry sum couldn't have bought anything. And, bear in mind, that Biden was only VICE president at the time. Just what kind of influence do these idiots think a VP could even peddle?

This is what we're fighting. There are thousands upon thousands of O'Donnells out there, each one spewing this same sort of spin-doctored crap, some of which they may actually believe themselves, driving their listenership insane for the sake of a few more ratings points. People are glued to this stuff, sometimes 18 hours per day, being lied to and lied to and lied to until they're so pissed off that an insurrection on the capital seems like the only thing to do!

It's all threatening to happen again.

And we're doing exactly NOTHING to stop it.

Eric

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At Long Last, What Will It Take?

Adam Keiper is quoted recently in the Bulwark, saying, “Between the immigration bill being DOA, the D.C. Circuit ruling on Trump's immunity, Tucker Carlson hanging out with Putin, the failed Mayorkas impeachment followed immediately by the failed Israel funding bill, and now Ronna stepping down, today feels like a perfect storm of GOP insanity.”

Except it doesn't feel like a perfect storm. It IS a perfect storm.

What I have to express this time around is how obvious all this bullshit is. Yes, people live in their insulated bubbles of misinformation, and it's impossible to penetrate those bubbles without encountering insanity on the level so intense that we all quickly unfriend and block it before it drives us insane as well.

But seriously, come on!

The Republicans had a good deal. A damned good deal! Perfect? No. But damned good. In exchange for all the border policing Republicans want, Democrats (and indeed, ALL of us) would get more aid to Ukraine, which we all desperately need. Also Israel, though less so.

And the Republicans scuttled it. Not because they objected to anything in the bill specifically, but because they wanted to deny Biden the win. They wanted to keep immigration reform as a key issue in the upcoming election.

One has to be a Trump follower in order to be that stupid.

They threw us all under the bus, just to make Biden a (very!) little bit more beatable.

What disgusts me the most is that Republicans will get away with it! The blood is SO on their hands for killing this bill. Yet they will point those bloody fingers at the Democrats and say, "They failed on immigration!"

And nobody, not one, among the right-wing masses will ever notice how red those pointing fingers are.

So I, as one cursed to see things as they actually are, have to resort to venting on this blog with a burning question: What will it take? At long last, what can finally shake Americans out of the goddamned tree of stupidity?!

Because it must happen. Yesterday. Or we're all doomed.

These past three years under Biden have been good, with one grave exception: There has been no urgency, zero, to counter the Right Wing Media Cult. None. Democrats have not only not countered it, they have yet to even try! By leaving conservatives in charge of the FCC, they are even actively encouraging it! They have allowed its expansion into Spanish-speaking talk radio unchecked. They felt the terror brought upon themselves through their own inaction on January 6th, 2021. And STILL they do nothing!

It's maddening. You want to scream, "For fuck's sake, DO something! ANYTHING!"

This is not a case where we all have to shrug our shoulders and say, "Well, that's just freedom of speech for you." No! This is a case where laws MUST be enacted forcing for-profit, ad-driven news sources to adhere to a minimum standard of truth-telling. In other words, right wing media can go on lying to people, exercising their freedom of speech to its fullest, but they cannot retain the label of "news" if they do so.

Yes, that will make the news less profitable, but GOOD! The news isn't meant to be profitable! Profitability is for the entertainment industry. And if news becomes entertainment, then it will only tell people what they want to hear instead of what they need to hear.

They need to hear that Republicans are now the most anti-immigration reform party ever!

They need to hear that Trump is the antichrist! (I'm an atheist and I find that argument compelling!)

We need the Fairness Doctrine brought back.

I don't think there's ever been a moment in history where so many people have so fully committed to something so stupid. With the possible exception of Nazi Germany, and yes, the comparison is apt.

It could happen here. It mustn't happen here.

In the name of God, American Christians are in league with Trump/Satan. And no, that's not hyperbole. That's observation.

There's an old prayer apt to this situation: "Oh, Lord, deliver us from your followers!"

At long last, what will it take?!

Eric

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Give Palestinians A Way Out!

Well, I've finally decided to weigh in on the thorny perpetual conflict between Israel and Palestine. While I have historically sided more with Israel, I have to agree with many of my fellow Leftists that Israel has really gone too far this time. But, as is frequently the case when I feel the need to blog about something, everybody, and I mean EVERYBODY is missing the main contributing factor in the conflict. There are no clean hands on either side, but there is an overriding, overlooked cause.

Religion? Yes, that's a big one, but it's not being overlooked.

Historical claim to the land? Yes, but again, that one is also frequently cited.

The primary cause being overlooked is - CLOSED BORDERS.

Yes. Closed borders. It's not sexy or obvious, but it's true. Because when people are not allowed to leave somewhere, their economic prospects are limited, and everyone in that area suffers as a result.

Say you're a young Palestinian man living in Gaza. You want a good job? Good luck. There aren't any good jobs available. You might find good paying work if you went to a different Arab country. But will any Arab countries let you in? No! Because that would make too much sense, of course. How dare people leave Palestine to get a good job with better pay which they can then wire home to help support extended family and improve the lives of everyone in the region. How dare they want to work in a country where the language is similar and their job prospects are therefore better!

Why bar the Palestinians from leaving? Primarily it's because the rest of the Arab world is scared shitless that those Palestinians will refuse to come back. They'll have built better lives for themselves, and won't want to return to the ghettos they escaped. And, most importantly, every Palestinian that leaves is considered a winning vote for Israel, and a step closer to Israel's domination of the entire region.

No, the Arab world refuses to consider any solution to the Palestinian crisis except one: Trap the Palestinians in the region and force them into having no other choice but to invade Israel.

Of course, one might as well wish for the moon. Short of nuking the entire region, Israel isn't going anywhere. But that doesn't prevent the closed door policy of the Arab world from being just as immovable.

And all Palestinians pay the price for this stupidity.

So what is a Palestinian person to do if he wants a better life? Well, according to the propaganda the Arab nations constantly pipe in, he must arm himself and attack Israel. It's the only way.

Now, as impossibly stupid as that faith-based bullshit is, it overlooks the fact that one nation that was wise enough to open its borders to give Palestinians better pay and good, permanent employment. That nation, in fact, has had a running policy of employing Palestinians to better their lives.

Yes! That nation is Israel! The ONE nation that has given Palestinians a better shot at life is the one nation the extremists keep firing make-shift missiles into!

Again, you have to have religion to be that stupid.

Not Egypt. Not Jordan. Not Lebanon, Iraq or Syria. Israel.

Now, Israel has been brutally attacked by a hopelessly impossible assault yet again. Only this time, the assault was bigger and better planned than ever before. And the retaliation to that attack has predictably been just as ruthless. In fact, it's as ruthless Israel's currently extremist government will allow. It has made the conscious decision that if Hamas militants are hiding behind innocent civilians, those civilians are forfeit. It's harsh, it's brutal, it's ethically dicey at best, and it needs to stop. Many of my friends on the Left are screaming that this amounts to ethnic cleansing, and they're not wrong.

But here's the thing: Egypt could save millions of their fellow Arabs if they just open up the damned border and allow them to park their keesters in a HUGE FUCKING UNUSED DESERT so that they won't get killed!

And will they? Even now? NO! Because they are still too irrationally terrified that any Palestinians who leave will stay gone!

In my book, watching your own people get run over by tanks, and doing nothing when you had the opportunity to help them flee, is just as bad as running them over with tanks yourselves.

Fuck! Egypt!

The borders must open! Palestinians must be allowed to flee the BOMBS, for fuck's sake! And they need to make encampments where food, water, and medicine can flow in freely. Egypt is simply, plainly, not helping by keeping the borders closed! Neither is Jordan, for that matter.

They are every bit as complicit in this admittedly horrible genocide.

Also, I must point out that Hamas is, even now, STILL firing make-shift missiles into Israel. And once again, you need religion in order to be that goddamned stupid.

That's me laying the blame. NOW hear me lay out a solution. And it's so crazy it just might work. So hear me out.

First, everyone calls for a two-state solution. And that sounds great, but it's simply unrealistic. Ask a Palestinian child where they're from, and they'll likely name a town or village way on the other side of the border, deep inside Israel. Why insist on such a foolish narrative? Because that's their faith-based bullshit, that's why! And so long as that situation remains (which is forever, by the way), Palestine can never be an independent state. No matter what non-militarization treaties are in place, a free Palestinian state today will militarize tomorrow and be invading Israel by June.

If a two-state solution were even remotely possible, it would have been done by now. But it isn't. So it hasn't.

So what do we do? Let Israel continue to occupy the territories? That hasn't worked out so well, either. Because Israel isn't really "occupying" Gaza. Oh, it's been encroaching into the West Bank for years, but Gaza, not so much. And the Palestinians living in those areas have been allowed to go pretty much unfettered, which is why the networks of tunnels and systems of smuggling in weapons have gotten so sophisticated over the years. "Occupying" a territory takes a lot of police presence, risk, and money. And Israel has limited supplies of all these.

So here's my suggestion:

Make Gaza and Palestine permanent protectorates of the United Nations. The U.N. can rule Gaza and the West Bank, administer passports, build airports, roads, infrastructure as possible and/or needed, and help distribute foreign aid. And best of all, it will help guarantee that weapons are not smuggled in. Or, if they are, that they are found and neutralized before use.

And Israel's extremist factions won't be able to use Hamas as an excuse to slaughter civilians anymore. Because they won't be the ones calling the shots.

I mean, what do we even have a United Nations for, otherwise?

It will be painful at first. Many nations will call it a boondoggle. But as Palestine prospers under this forced peace, people's lives will eventually improve. And as they do, the peace will gradually become more and more permanent.

The best way to avoid militant extremism is make sure the potential militants have full bellies and ample bank accounts.

It's the only thing that ever works.

Oh, and a note to my fellow Leftists who are being all pro-Palestinian right now: I guarantee you that you are simply planting the seeds of more future war. I simply know too much about Islam to say otherwise. If you succeed in building a Palestinian state, you will get wars, wars, and even more wars, and it will be your own, dumbass, damned, naive fault. I'm not saying that you shouldn't oppose genocide. But don't buy the narrative that the Palestinian cause is so holy and just. And don't lay all the blame on Israel, either. There's a reason Israel has been attacked, and attacked, and attacked. And it's not because Palestinians simply want to live in peace.

So knock it the fuck off with your naive bullshit.

So that's my two-pronged solution. 1) Fuck Egypt, force them to open their borders and give Palestinians a way out, then 2) give Gaza and the West Bank over to U.N. rule.

A perfect solution? Hell, no. But I dare you to come up with a better one.

Eric

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