Author: Mark Alexander

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David Mixner: None Dare To Call It Treason

“A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within. An enemy at the gates is less formidable, for he is known and carries his banner openly. But the traitor moves amongst those within the gate freely, his sly whispers rustling through all the alleys, heard in the very halls of government itself. For the traitor appears not a traitor; he speaks in accents familiar to his victims, and he wears their face and their arguments, he appeals to the baseness that lies deep in the hearts of all men. He rots the soul of a nation, he works secretly and unknown in the night to undermine the pillars of the city, he infects the body politic so that it can no longer resist. A murderer is less to fear. The traitor is the plague.”

– Marcus Tullius Cicero

Swirling like a tornado causing havoc and death, President Trump hopes to keep the American people off balance by committing one destructive act after another.  Our heads are spinning as we watch everything we care about in America be destroyed by this president who owes his election to a foreign power.

The strategy of the pathological lying is to create a smoke screen that makes it harder for our democracy to defend itself from the horror of these times.  There are so many issues we can fight back on including our environment, human rights, economic inequality, school lunches, healthcare, food for our seniors, climate change, etc.

All are important but we will lose all of these issues forever if we ignore the real threat which is to our democracy.

Let us not be distracted with noise, sideshows and attempts to divide.  At this stage, we must be citizens first who are willing to overlook our differences and control our self-righteousness to save America..

Oran’s Dictionary of the Law (1983) defines treason as a “citizen’s actions to help a foreign government overthrow, make war against, or seriously injure the [parent nation]. In many nations, it is also often considered treason to attempt or conspire to overthrow the government, even if no foreign country is aiding or involved by such an endeavor.”

President Donald Trump has committed treason.

Harsh? I don’t think so.

Early in this total nightmare, I was skeptical that the Trump people really coordinated with the Russians to win the election. Now I have not a doubt that Trump himself was aware of the Russians interfering in our democratic elections. Our sitting president coordinated with a foreign power to win in an election and in the process, has ‘seriously injured the nation.’

I supported Bernie Sanders in the primary but worked my ass off for Hillary in the general. There is no question (especially if you read ‘Shattered’) the Democratic campaign could have been more effective.

However, Hillary won the popular vote by three million votes and lost Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Michigan by a total just over 100,000 votes. Without a doubt, it is obvious that the Russian hacking of our election could have cost that many votes in those three states let alone the nation. As people are fearful of such harsh charges against a sitting President, it is important that the American people know his crimes against our nation.

  1. His campaign, and I am convinced with his knowledge, coordinated with a longtime hostile nation to undermine our democracy.
  2. He has used his presidential powers in a stunning attempt to cover up the treason.
  3. An America in chaos is a huge victory for the Russians.
  4. There is no question that entities involved with the entire Trump empire have benefited from the Russian connection including possibly laundering Russian funds in such places as banks in Cyprus.
  5. The president and his entire family are making tons of money from blatant conflict of interests and using foreign connections to create more wealth. The Oval Office has become one big garage sale.
  6. The president has attempted to undermine the Constitution with his bitter attacks on American institutions including a free press, separation of powers and transparency.
  7. His appointments to key positions in the administration are NOT people who attempt to provide a clear conservative alternative to critical issues facing America but are extremists to create chaos and destruction of our land, our values and our freedom.
  8. He is clearly breaking the laws of the land, violating the principles of the Constitution and committing obstruction of justice in order to cover-up his high crimes.
  9. President Trump is using the powers of his office to destroy American citizens personally and weaken our beloved American way so a select few can make huge profits.
  10. There is a real possibility that our president has serious mental disorders and if so, we can no longer pretend that the emperor has clothes.

This is not some cheap amateur burglary attempt at the Watergate and the attempted cover-up or a president lying about a sexual affair in the Oval Office.

Simply put, this is a coordinated effort with the Russians by our president to undermine our democracy and freedom. It is treason.

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Amazing

NASA’s JUNO probe is in orbit around Jupiter and is sending back some absolutely amazing views of the gas giant. We’re seeing the planet in ways we’ve never seen before and in unprecedented detail.

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8 Things Only Teacher Spouses Will Understand

6, 7, and especially 8!

What It’s Like Being Married to a Professional Educator

Being married to a teacher is great. Nobody works harder. Nobody is more motivated. Nobody is more ready and willing to correct your poor grammar. Nevertheless, there are a few things you should know about being married to a professional educator.

1. Your dinner dates will constantly be interrupted.

Think Friday night means it’s time to kick back, relax, and enjoy the company of your significant other at that new restaurant that just opened up? Maybe. Chances are you’ll make it to dinner. But chances are higher that, just as the waiter is bringing your herb-crusted, non-GMO, something-or-other to the table, your beloved will get a call from her principal outlining the new school strategy for standardized testing. Or she’ll see an email from little Johnny’s father lambasting the fact that he only got a 98 on the last pop-quiz. And you’ll sip your wine in solitude and check your Twitter feed while your wife performs educational triage in the parking lot.

2. It’s easy to take conversations with adults for granted.

I go to the office every morning. And talk to adults. And work with adults. But my wife doesn’t. She goes for hours at a time every day without conversing with anyone over the age of 13. When we’re both home, sometimes I catch her staring at me with an odd look, hanging on my every word while I talk about some mundane conversation I had at the office. She’ll interrupt me: “You mean NOBODY in your office had horrible BO? Or cried because their girlfriend broke up with them? Or inexplicably fell out of their chair while you were talking to them?  You’re so lucky!”  Lucky indeed.

3. Your spouse will always be a better parent than you.

I’ve been a dad for almost six years and I like to think that I have this parenthood thing down pat. But I have nothing on my wife. Her daily focus is getting the best out of dozens of kids. Making them do things they don’t want to do and providing a hundred types of support in a thousand different ways. Every time I think I’ve had some type of amazing breakthrough with my kids (got all of our kindergarten sight words on the first try!) I quickly realize it’s because she’s already laid the groundwork (reading with them since they were 6 weeks old!). Sometimes it’s easy to forget how great a teacher she is. But then I look at what she’s done with our children and I remember.

4. Halloween demands constant vigilance.

We live very close to my wife’s school. All her students know where we live. I see how low the egg inventory gets at the grocery store the last week of October. You better believe I spend Halloween on my front porch with a raised eyebrow, a flashlight, and a grimace.

5. Nobody multitasks like a teacher.

Until I married my wife, I had never seen someone who could simultaneously cook, soothe a crying baby, talk on the phone, and make lesson plans. But then I realized her day is full of doing a thousand things at the same time. She reads, teaches, conducts parent conferences, referees, participates in faculty meetings, plans summer school, coaches the flag football team, and finds some way to squeeze in bathroom breaks, all while managing a hoard of hormonal preteens. And I thought mowing the lawn while holding a beer was a big deal.

6. You will never EVER win an argument about work.

Me: “Man, I had a rough day at work. My morning meeting didn’t go well, I have a big project due tomorrow, and our yearly reviews are coming up.”

Her: “A kid in my first period class farted so much I had to teach in the gym for the rest of the day.”

7. Your spouse will never be the only teacher in your life.

Teachers flock to other teachers. It’s a scientific fact. Any party we go to, my wife unconsciously seeks the other teachers there. It’s like her ears are tuned to the word “pre-planning.”  And then she spends the evening in deep conversation with someone she’s never met while I hover by the punch bowl and blink at the wall. The number of adults in my life who are educators is obscene. On the bright side, I appreciate a fully-functioning photocopier more than I ever thought possible.

8. Your spouse is a hero who saves the world every single day.

I could never be a teacher. And I know I’m not in the minority. Many people don’t realize it, but being a teacher is challenging, and tedious and about as unglamorous as a profession can be. But my wife doesn’t care. She does it in spite of little recognition, low pay, and long hours. (Three months off in the summer isn’t a thing, ok? My wife has maybe three weeks completely disconnected from school in July and she spends those planning for the coming year.) She knows it’s more than a job. It’s a calling. A way to make the word a better place at a fundamental, actionable level. And I feel lucky to see it happen on a daily basis.

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The “I’m Getting Old” Starter Pack

  • “This is way too sweet.”
  • “They’re remaking that movie already?”
  • “My back/knee hurts.”
  • “Wait, people get mad about that now?”
  • “I can’t eat that, it’s gonna fuck my stomach up.”
  • “Hold on let me check my calendar first”
  • **turns on the radio** [groans]

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Quote of the Day

A man is a success if he gets up in the morning and gets to bed at night, and in between he does what he wants to do.” ~ Bob Dylan

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I Don’t Feel Any Older…

…than I did yesterday, or the day before, or even last month—but the calendar tells me that I’ve somehow managed to survive one more trip around the sun.

When I was in my 20s, my 50s seemed impossibly far away. Now looking back it feels like the years have passed in the blink of an eye. Hell, I realized that next year Ben and I will be celebrating ten years together!

 

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Oh, That’s Just Silly

We saw Alien Covenent tonight.

It wasn’t a bad movie, but it wasn’t a good one, either.

I had hoped for so much more.

My initial thought as the credits were rolling was that this franchise has become the M. Night Shamalan of the genre; something that started out great and rapidly deteriorated to predictable, meaningless, crap.

Predictable is the key word here. There is nothing left to shock or surprise any more. You already know that by the end of the film everyone except one or two humans and the Synthetic will have been dispatched in the most gruesome ways possible.

The monster alien drips acid. The alien has a double steel jaw and likes to tunnel through your skull with it. The alien will burst out of your body somewhere. And most importantly, if you’re separated from your comrades and your attention is focused somewhere else, you will die.

Viewed strictly as horror cinema (which is what the Alien franchise is), it was much more effective when you didn’t know every anatomical detail of what was lurking in the shadows. What we don’t know is far scarier than what we do.

I remember how I felt after leaving the theater back in 1979 at the original Alien premiere. It scared the bejeebus out of me. I kept looking over my shoulder as I walked back to my car, and then kept one eye on my rearview mirror all the way home.

In 1986, after screening Aliens (IMHO probably the best film of the series), I came home and promptly turned on every light in the apartment.

But no more. Now the whole thing now just strikes me as silly.

To its credit, Covenant isn’t chock full of stupid scientists the way  Prometheus was. It also answers most—if not all—of the outstanding questions posed by its predecessor. But it was so damned predictable. Ben whispered the final “gotcha” moment to me a good fifteen minutes before the end of the film; something I’d also already figured out on my own.

And Ridley Scott says he wants to do five more? Please, for the love of the gods, NO. Let it DIE.

 

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Back to “Normal”

They weren’t the circumstances under which I wanted this to happen, but since it did, I’m going to make the best of it—even if it means #backindebt again.

Say hello to my new Mac.

I’ve had it less than 24 hours, but I have to say that everything I’ve read online about this machine is true. It’s beautiful. It’s responsive. The display is awesome. But what do I like the most?

The keyboard.

I’d been a little worried about how it would “feel” in relation to all previous iterations of the Apple keyboard because of all the negative press the redesign initially received, but at least for me, it’s an absolute joy to use. The keyboard illumination is uniform and has no light leak at all.

You know what I like second most? The fact that encountering a page full of animated gifs online or using Adobe Bridge no longer sends the fans into overdrive. That is wonderful!

Yeah, I kind of miss the glowing Apple logo on the case, and I still think the Touch Bar is more gimmick than anything else, but there’s no denying it’s a cool gimmick, and maybe some day I’ll actually use it for more than just changing screen brightness or playback volume…

Since this time I was able to restore from my last Time Machine backup in full—in comparison to having to pick and choose what to leave out because Ben’s old MacBook couldn’t hold it all—bringing this machine online and have everything work from the get go was a breeze.

And now there’s a new rule in this house: NO LIQUIDS ANYWHERE NEAR OUR TECH!

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