Author: Mark Alexander

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Pride Was Always a Protest

Here is a list of Black-led LGBTQ community organizations you can donate to, compiled by pfpicardi and RaquelWillis_:

Snapco – Builds power of Black trans and queer people to force systemic divestment from the prison industrial complex and invest in community support.

Black AIDS Institute – Working to end the Black HIV epidemic through policy, advocacy, and high-quality direct HIV services.

Trans Cultural District – The world’s first-ever legally recognized trans district, which aims to stabilize and economically empower the trans community.

LGBTQ+ Freedom Fund – Posts bail for LGBTQ+ people held in jail or immigrant detention and raises awareness of the epidemic of LGBTQ overincarceration.

House of GG – Creating safe and transformative spaces for community to heal, and nurturing them into tomorrow’s leaders, focusing on trans women of color in the South.

Trans Justice Funding Project – Community-led funding initiative to support grassroots trans justice groups run by and for trans people.

The Okra Project – Collective that seeks to address the global crisis faced by Black trans people by bringing home-cooked meals and resources to the community.

Youth Breakout – Works to end the criminalization of LGBTQ youth in New Orleans to build a safer and more just community.

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Trump’s Presidency is Over

From Robert Reich:

You’d be forgiven if you hadn’t noticed. His verbal bombshells are louder than ever, but Donald J. Trump is no longer president of the United States.

By having no constructive response to any of the monumental crises now convulsing America, Trump has abdicated his office.

He is not governing. He’s golfing, watching cable TV, and tweeting.

How has Trump responded to the widespread unrest following the murder in Minneapolis of George Floyd, a black man who died after a white police officer knelt on his neck for nine minutes as he was handcuffed on the ground?

He has incited more police violence. Trump called the protesters “thugs” and threatened to have them shot. “When the looting starts, the shooting starts,” he tweeted, parroting a former Miami police chief whose words spurred race riots in the late 1960s.

The following day he encouraged more police violence, gloating about “the most vicious dogs, and most ominous weapons” awaiting protesters outside the White House, should they ever break through Secret Service lines. On Sunday he again resorted to incendiary tweets, instructing “Democrat Mayors and Governors” to “get tough” on the “ANARCHISTS.”

Trump’s response to George Floyd’s murder has debased the presidency and squandered whatever moral authority remained. 

Trump’s response to the last three ghastly months of mounting disease and death has been just as heedless. Since claiming Covid-19 was a “Democratic hoax” and muzzling public health officials, he has punted management of the coronavirus to the states.

Governors have had to find ventilators to keep patients alive and protective equipment for hospital and other essential workers who lack it, often bidding against each other. They have had to decide how, when, and where to reopen their economies.

Trump has claimed “no responsibility at all” for testing and contact-tracing – the keys to containing the virus. His new “plan” places responsibility on states to do their own testing and contact-tracing.

Trump is also AWOL in the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.

More than 41 million Americans are jobless. In the coming weeks temporary eviction moratoriums are set to end in half of the states. One-fifth of Americans missed rent payments this month. Extra unemployment benefits are set to expire at the end of July.

What is Trump’s response? Like Herbert Hoover, who in 1930 said “the worst is behind us” as thousands starved, Trump says the economy will improve and does nothing about the growing hardship. The Democratic-led House passed a $3 trillion relief package on May 15. Mitch McConnell has recessed the Senate without taking action and Trump calls the bill dead on arrival.

What about other pressing issues a real president would be addressing? The House has passed nearly 400 bills this term, including measures to reduce climate change, enhance election security, require background checks on gun sales, reauthorize the Violence Against Women Act and reform campaign finance. All are languishing in McConnell’s inbox. Trump doesn’t seem to be aware of any of them.

There is nothing inherently wrong with golfing, watching television and tweeting. But if that’s pretty much all that a president does when the nation is engulfed in crises, he is not a president.

Trump’s tweets are no substitute for governing. They are mostly about getting even.

When he’s not fomenting violence against black protesters, he’s accusing a media personality of committing murder, retweeting slurs about a black female politician’s weight and the House speaker’s looks, conjuring up conspiracies against himself supposedly organized by Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, and encouraging his followers to “liberate” their states from lockdown restrictions.

He tweets bogus threats that he has no power to carry out – withholding funds from states that expand absentee voting, “overruling” governors who don’t allow places of worship to reopen “right away,” designating anti-fascism activists as terrorists, and punishing Twitter for fact-checking him.

And he lies incessantly.

In reality, Donald Trump does not run the government of the United States. He doesn’t manage anything. He doesn’t organize anyone. He doesn’t administer or oversee or supervise. He doesn’t read memos. He hates meetings. He has no patience for briefings. His White House is in perpetual chaos.

His advisors aren’t truth-tellers. They’re toadies, lackeys, sycophants and relatives.

Since moving into the Oval Office in January 2017, Trump hasn’t shown an ounce of interest in governing. He obsesses only about himself.

But it has taken the present set of crises to reveal the depths of his self-absorbed abdication – his utter contempt for his job, his total repudiation of his office.

Trump’s nonfeasance goes far beyond an absence of leadership or inattention to traditional norms and roles. In a time of national trauma, he has relinquished the core duties and responsibilities of the presidency.

He is no longer president. The sooner we stop treating him as if he were, the better.

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I Hate to Say, “I Told You So, But…”

Arizona Reports Highest Single-Day Rise in Coronavirus Cases – State Experts Blame Ending Lockdown

Arizona reported its highest single-day rise in new confirmed cases of the novel coronavirus as hospitalizations have also risen, with health experts suggesting the end of lockdown measures has likely led to the increase.

“What we see in the data is pretty predictable,” Will Humble, who served as the director of Arizona’s Department of Health Services from 2009 to 2015, told KSAZ-TV Fox 10 Phoenix. Humble pointed out that the southwestern state’s stay-at-home order ended just over two weeks ago.

“I’d expect to continue to see an increase in cases compared to where we were in the middle of May, because we are not using the same intervention, the-stay-at-home order, the distancing, and people are getting back to work,” he said.

On Tuesday, the state reported 1,127 new infections of the novel virus, the highest number reported in a single day since the outbreak began, according to the dashboard updated by the Arizona Department of Health Services. The state also reached a new record of more than 1,000 hospitalizations due to COVID-19 on Monday, suggesting the state is seeing an increase in more serious infections.

Newsweek reached out to the office of Arizona Governor Doug Ducey, a Republican, and the Arizona Department of Health Services for comment, but they had not responded by the time of publication.

Local officials in Arizona’s Maricopa County, which has been the hardest hit by the pandemic, suggested in a Tuesday statement that the increase in cases was beyond what would be expected due to an increase in testing, which also would detect asymptomatic and mild cases of the novel coronavirus.

“The total number of positive COVID-19 cases in Maricopa County grew by 615 from yesterday’s report. This refers to how many were reported to Public Health yesterday, not how many cases there were in the last 24 hours. We are seeing some indicators that cases in Maricopa County are starting to rise beyond the increase from additional testing,” the statement explained.

Overall, Arizona has reported 21,250 infections. The state has conducted more than 330,000 tests for the novel virus and 941 people have died. On Tuesday, the state reported 24 new deaths.

While all 50 states have eased lockdown measures significantly over the past couple weeks, health experts have urged the public to continue following social distancing guidelines and wear masks in public. They have warned that a second wave, or spike, in new infections could take place if Americans do not take adequate precautions.

“We’ve learned a lot about this virus, but we now need to translate that learning into real change behavior that stays with us so we can continue to drive down the number of cases,” Dr. Deborah Birx, the coordinator of the White House coronavirus task force, said in a May 24 interview with ABC’s This Week. “This only works if we all follow the guidelines and protect one another,” she cautioned.

Nationwide, the U.S. has seen more than 1.8 million infections and more than 106,000 deaths due to the novel virus, according to a tracker maintained by The New York Times. The number of new daily cases reported has dropped from the peak of more than 36,000 reported on April 24, to 20,74 new cases reported on Tuesday. The number of new daily deaths has also declined, with just over 1,000 reported on Tuesday, a significant decrease from a peak of 2,752 reported on April 15.

Source.

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It Would Be a Shame…


It would also be really annoying if they wore heat resistant gloves to throw back the hot tear gas canisters and if this got shared to all those protesting…

It would be a further shame if people started covering cameras (as seen in Hong Kong, with protestors using poles and rakes to lift cardboard boxes over security cameras), blinding drone optics with laser pointers, and flooding police-run reporting apps with junk data.

It would also be a shame if the protesters noted that plainclothes cops can be identified a number of ways, such as wearing steel-toed boots; an armband or wristband of a particular color; driving white, black, or dark blue cars with concealed lights; or having the outline of cuffs visible in the back pocket or the bumps of an armor vest’s shoulder straps under their shirt.

It would be a shame if the protesters began making their signs out of inch-thick plywood to stop rubber bullets,* forming a tight shield wall to prevent police from singling out and mobbing individual protesters. It would be a shame if the people behind the shield wall held up umbrellas so that tear gas canisters fired over the heads of the front line will be bounced away. It would be a shame if protesters began constructing improvised armor vests out of duct tape, hardback books, and ceramic tiles.

It would be a shame if protesters started wearing safety glasses, hard hats, respirators, and gardening gloves, all of which can be found at the same hardware stores as the plywood. It would be a shame if they started using traffic cones (the kind without the hole in the top) upside-down buckets, or other improvised lids to contain tear gas by placing them over the canisters.

It would be a shame if protesters learned that police scanners are legal to own in the US, allowing them to learn where police are moving and what routes they intend to take. It would be a shame if they discovered that these scanners can be used to send as well as receive, allowing them to flood the scanner frequencies with noise.

All this would be a terrible, terrible shame.

 

*I can’t speak for the other things on this list but do not use plywood as a shield! It will not defend against rubber bullets and will splinter if hit.

Source.

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Finally Some Good News

Steve King, one of Congress’s biggest pieces of human excrement and openly and proudly racist members, gets beaten by Randy Feenstra in the GOP Iowa primary.

With that being said, this is a deeply-red district (4th District of Iowa) and it’s a longshot that Democrat J.D. Scholten will win in November. Still, it will be refreshing not to hear remarks like, “Where did any other subgroup of people contribute more to civilization [than whites].” ~Steve King, July 2016

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Burning Down the House

From Blobby, because he quite eloquently verbalized my own feelings far better than I could:

I’ve been trying to avoid this post.

I have too many words—and on the other hand, I have none.

I am not sure I can coherently put into words how and what I feel. Sure, there is anger, shock, sadness, disbelief, but it usually comes right back to anger.

We had debated going to the Cleveland rally on Saturday. In the first paragraph, it was billed as a peaceful one. In the second, it mentioned writing an emergency contact on your arm; making provisions for work, family, pets, should you be in jail for 2-3 days. At that point, we opted out.

Part of that decision was the volume of folks and the closeness of several thousand people and the potential for covid spread. That said, while looking at the videos of our protests, the majority of folks had on masks—be it to conceal their identify or for infection control.

But like other cities, ours went violent.

And I totally get it.

How else does one get the attention of the white establishment? Break their shit.

Voting hasn’t worked. Mediation hasn’t worked. Peaceful protests weren’t even allowed—not really.

Let’s not even talk about justice. Has any white cop actually been convicted of any killing of a black man? Not in Ohio they haven’t. How could any specific community continue to take this lying down?

That Minneapolis cop is kind of fucked either way—not that I care. So many of these violations are not caught clearly on camera, if at all. We’ve all seen what he did. His side will claim he cannot get a fair trial, which may or may not be true. No matter the outcome, there will be protests. Should he be found guilty, the most he can get is 12 years—no one is going to see that as justice. Should he get acquitted, what we saw this last weekend will be a day at the park in comparison.

That said, this week felt like something is about to break. Big time.

Before there have been some upheavals, riots and protests. This feels different. It should. I hope it is.

I do worry. BLOTUS is all but egging on the violence. He needs this discourse to re-re-re-re solidify his base. He needs the country to be in turmoil. Normally, you’d think that would get him voted out, but I don’t believe that to be the case. We’re already (ALREADY!) getting his 2020 ads playing every single night and multiple times. They are vile—and lies. Total lies.

I don’t know what these next few days or weeks will feel like. The riots have taken away from the video being played. That can’t happen.

As horrible as that video is, it needs to keep being shown. A distraction of violence will lessen the heinousness of the actual crime.

Odd as it sounds, while my stomach has been in knots for the last week, I am not sure I want that uneasiness to go away. I think it’s the hate fire that has to remain to keep change moving forward. It’s going to be difficult on every level.

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Something Light and Fun, Yet Topical…

Because god knows we need it.

“Be aware to trim your nose hairs, cause they could put up a fight!” Japan’s state of emergency has been lifted after their initial bout with COVID-19. To both cautiously celebrate, and to remind people to be diligent, disinfectant company SMV Japan released this silly animated music video.

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Asked and Answered

Via I Should Be Laughing:

AN ANGUISHED QUESTION FROM A Trump SUPPORTER: ‘Why do liberals think Trump supporters are stupid?’

THE SERIOUS ANSWER: Here’s what the majority of anti-Trump voters honestly feel about Trump supporters en masse:

That when you saw a man who had owned a fraudulent University, intent on scamming poor people, you thought “Fine.” USA Today

That when you saw a man who had made it his business practice to stiff his creditors, you said, “Okay.” The Daily Beast

That when you heard him proudly brag about his own history of sexual abuse, you said, “No problem.” ABC News

That when he made up stories about seeing Muslim-Americans in the thousands cheering the destruction of the World Trade Center, you said, “Not an issue.” Washington Post

That when you saw him brag that he could shoot a man on Fifth Avenue and you wouldn’t care, you exclaimed, “He sure knows me.” USA Today

That when you heard him relating a story of an elderly guest of his country club, an 80-year old man, who fell off a stage and hit his head, to Trump replied: “‘Oh my God, that’s disgusting,’ and I turned away. I couldn’t—you know, he was right in front of me, and I turned away. I didn’t want to touch him. He was bleeding all over the place. And I felt terrible, because it was a beautiful white marble floor, and now it had changed color. Became very red.” You said, “That’s cool!” GQ

That when you saw him mock the disabled, you thought it was the funniest thing you ever saw. NBC News

That when you heard him brag that he doesn’t read books, you said, “Well, who has time?” The Atlantic

That when the Central Park Five were compensated as innocent men convicted of a crime they didn’t commit, and he angrily said that they should still be in prison, you said, “That makes sense.” USA Today

That when you heard him tell his supporters to beat up protesters and that he would hire attorneys, you thought, “Yes!” LA Times

That when you heard him tell one rally to confiscate a man’s coat before throwing him out into the freezing cold, you said, “What a great guy!” The Independent

That you have watched the parade of neo-Nazis and white supremacists with whom he curries favor, while refusing to condemn outright Nazis, and you have said, “Thumbs up!” The Atlantic

That you hear him unable to talk to foreign dignitaries without insulting their countries and demanding that they praise his electoral win, you said, “That’s the way I want my President to be.” Huffington Post

That you have watched him remove expertise from all layers of government in favor of people who make money off of eliminating protections in the industries they’re supposed to be regulating and you have said, “What a genius!” Politico

That you have heard him continue to profit from his businesses, in part by leveraging his position as President, to the point of overcharging the Secret Service for space in the properties he owns, and you have said, “That’s smart!” US News

That you have heard him say that it was difficult to help Puerto Rico because it was in the middle of water and you have said, “That makes sense.” Washington Post

That you have seen him start fights with every country from Canada to New Zealand while praising Russia and quote, “falling in love” with the dictator of North Korea, and you have said, “That’s statesmanship!” CNN

That Trump separated children from their families and put them in cages, managed to lose track of 1500 kids, has opened a tent city incarceration camp in the desert in Texas – he explains that they’re just “animals” – and you say, “Well, OK then.” NBC news

That you have witnessed all the thousand and one other manifestations of corruption and low moral character and outright animalistic rudeness and contempt for you, the working American voter, and you still show up grinning and wearing your MAGA hats and threatening to beat up anybody who says otherwise. American Progress

What you don’t get, Trump supporters, is that our succumbing to frustration and shaking our heads, thinking of you as stupid, may very well be wrong and unhelpful, but it’s also…hear me…charitable.

Because if you’re NOT stupid, we must turn to other explanations, and most of them are less flattering.

(To all who agree with its content, I ask that you PLEASE SHARE IT on your own post, and ENCOURAGE OTHERS to do the same.)

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I Just Can’t Right Now

With the country shattering in front of my eyes, I think it’s time to step back for a while from this here blog thing. Right now I feel that anything I post will never adequately describe the sense of despair I—and people of conscience—are feeling right now, and posting anything silly, salacious, or light-hearted just seems out of place.

I have two more months of Days of UNF auto-posting, but except for those already in the pipeline I’m reasonably certain I’m going to suspend operations until all this madness plays itself out or withdrawal from blogging proves to be an insurmountable task. Whether that’s 24 hours, a few days, a few weeks, is anyone’s guess at this point.

I feel the same way about Instagram, my last remaining link to social media. That may also go silent for a while, because as I was scrolling through the images today I found myself asking more and more, “How can these idiots post photos of themselves at the beach or shoving their stuffed speedos in my face when the country is fucking burning around them?”

Peace.

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Ugly Houses

My dad worked as principal designer for Hallcraft (later NuWest) Homes from around 1972 to 1980. During that time, some of the company’s most iconic developments were built in the valley.

Unfortunately, in the decade before he took over, Hallcraft had another designer who—IMHO and I’m admittedly biased—came up with some of the ugliest designs the company ever built.

These were generally homes that fell in the upper price range, which might explain their rarity In the various subdivisions. Of course, the other reason might be because they’re butt-fugly.

One of the worst offenders. The rusted out car seems a perfect companion to this POS.
Same floor plan as the one above. Just as ugly. (Which is too bad, because the plan itself was interesting.)
Another ugly Mansard Roof atrocity. The French doors are not original to the house. At one time it had a proper front door.
Another interesting plan with a dreadful facade. This one had an inner courtyard that in the Phoenix climate was designed to be a cool respite from the heat.
Another interesting plan (this time a tri-level) with a horrible “Spanish” facade.
Same great plan as I spent my high school and college years in (but not with this “Spanish” abomination out front.
This was actually a really nice design when first built. It was a very unique floor plan (another tri-level; it was the 60s/70s after all), but the exterior has been destroyed by subsequent alterations.
I wish I still had the brochure for this house. I was probably 5 or 6 years old when we toured this development, so my memories are cloudy, but I do remember it was a wild tri-level design with a 2-story living room (hence those windows).
And lastly, I think this was some sort of bastard variation of the house above built on two lots, allowing for the once-upon-a-time garage to be moved off to the side and later converted to more living space. But goddamn…BUTT FUGLY.

If you’re in Phoenix and would like to see these for yourself (why?!) they’re in neighborhoods on the southeast and northwest corners of West Bethany Home Road and 43rd Avenue. The area, like most, has gone through ups and downs, and I think it’s all in a very depressed mode at the moment.