October-December


















October-December
July-September
I am a dog person.
I grew up with a dog as a pet, and as an adult had two of my own. I spoiled my two dogs, especially Oscar, the second one, who would travel with me on long car rides and when I drove from Oklahoma City to Boston at Christmas. After he died at 15, some of his ashes were spread in the park in my OKC neighborhood, Mesta Park, where we walked daily, some remained in the wooden box they came in from the vet’s that sits on a curio shelf in my apartment, and the remainder are in a small urn on my car’s dashboard so Oscar can continue to go for rides in the car.
I usually greet a dog before I do the person walking it, and I sympathize with those poor dogs forced into embarrassing Halloween costumes against their will for the amusement of their owners.
I cringe and become angry with those who treat their dogs as things with a cruelty no dog deserves.
I was happy when President Trump recently signed the bipartisan bill, Preventing Animal Cruelty and Torture Act, or the PACT Act, that makes animal cruelty a federal crime, and which bans abusive behavior including crushing, burning, drowning, suffocating, impaling and other bodily injury toward any non-human mammals, birds, reptiles or amphibians.
Violators of the Act face criminal penalties of a fine, a prison term of up to seven years, or both.
There are two types of animal cruelty which can be categorized as active, animals are intentionally tortured, and passive, unintentional cruelty resulting from neglect. Examples would include the failure to provide an animal with the most basic of requirements of food, water, shelter and medical care, and inflicting physical harm or injury.
Someone who is violent towards animals may also be violent towards family members or others, and cruelty can escalate into violence beyond animals. Because of this, many states require perpetrators to undergo psychological evaluation and counseling.
Although the exact laws on animal cruelty have varied from state to state, PACT brings them under one umbrella.
Interestingly, the first anti-cruelty laws were enacted on behalf of animals, not children, and the existence of those laws was used as justification for enacting laws to protect children.
Henry Burgh, who had established the first animal abuse association in the United States, the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, was approached by Etta Angell Wheeler, a Methodist, missionary, about a child who was daily beaten by her step-mother and locked in a closet in a tenement house in the Hell’s Kitchen area of New York City.
Burgh’s response was,
“The child is an animal, if there is no justice for it as a human being, it shall at least have the rights of the stray cur in the street. It shall not be abused.”
The courts removed the child from the home, the step-mother received a year in jail, And in 1874 the New York Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, the first such child abuse prevention society in the world, was formed.
Perhaps history will repeat itself, and, now that animal cruelty is a felony under federal law, recognizing that a child arriving at the border “is an animal, if there is no justice for it as a human being, it shall at least have the rights of the stray cur in the street. It shall not be abused”, those that are there will be treated humanely, receiving the most basic requirements of food, water, shelter and medical care in livable conditions with parental contract, and actions taken that intentionally mistreat or unintentionally result from neglect will be properly reviewed and addressed.
Trump once, when speaking of those arriving at the border, declared,
“These aren’t people. These are animals.”
So now with the PACT Act and history, the conditions at the border, when it comes to children, will be improved.
APRIL-JUNE
As with his idol, Donald Trump, as more documents are handed over because of ACLU Freedom of Information requests, it is becoming more obvious that the sheriff of Bristol County Massachusetts, Thomas Hodgson, has been quietly breaking the law in his effort to support the white supremacist organizations with which he is connected and curry favor with the White House.
Initially it was discovered that two years ago he reported the church he attends on Sundays to Stephen Miller, Trump’s anti-immigrant and white supremacist architect of his immigration policies, without anyone’s knowledge, because the church had made pamphlets available in various languages informing all immigrants, documented or otherwise, of their legal rights if confronted by ICE.
Beyond the actual reporting, what was more frightening was that sheriff included in that email that he intended to investigate if this was a single incident, or if it was something being done in any number of churches in the county that employs him, and that he would also report any other places, community centers, immigration support organizations, and places of business that might have such information available.
The dates on this email would lead any thinking person to believe that he most likely has secretly been doing this for at least the two years from his promise to do so to the time the email was revealed.
Unlike in many states west of the Mississippi where there are large swaths of unincorporated land patrolled by county sheriff departments, in Massachusetts, where all the land, with the exception of state and federal parks, belong to cities, towns, and villages, with no unincorporated lands, the job of the county sheriffs and their departments is to run the county jails.
State police patrol, pursue, and apprehend suspects state-wide, with most people only dealing with them if pulled over on a state highway for a traffic violation. Local law enforcement does the same within the borders of their municipalities, their legal jurisdictions that ends at the town line. If during a pursuit the suspect heads to a town line, those in pursuit must either call ahead to the next town to take over the pursuit, something that could create a less than effective chain of such requests, or simply call for the state police who can cross town lines automatically.
County sheriff departments neither patrol, pursue, nor apprehend.
Local and state law enforcement are active participants in law enforcement because they pursue and apprehend, while county sheriff department are passive as they receive those pursued and apprehended by them.
The county sheriff’s job is to run the county jails and get inmates to and from the jails to the courts, and to house and care for inmates, the majority of whom may have been arrested, but have yet to have their day court.
While state prisons house convicted criminals, more than 50% of those in county jails are innocent until proven guilty, their arrest not being a conviction.
Rather than the stereotype of sheriffs of the wild west who are a macho presence, in Massachusetts, the position of the county sheriff is an administrative one lacking the glamour of cowboy hats and John Wayne machismo.
There is no need for a county sheriff to have law enforcement experience because of this, and the major requirements for being a sheriff is to be a resident of the state, over 21, with at least a high school diploma.
Considering that more and more people being incarcerated struggle with drug addiction and mental illness, the best sheriff would be someone with expertise in those areas.
What should alarm residents of the county is another email sent to Stephen Miller prior to the one about the church was the one in which he complained about local law enforcement not being required to perform the work of the federal ICE agency in which he revealed,
“My undercover units are poised and ready for whatever we can do to identify and expedite the arrest and removal of criminal illegal alien. Our discussion regarding a hotline is clearly relevant.”
Not only does he reveal a unit that no one knew about and which is not part of his job, but also that he wants a direct line to Stephen Miller to report residents of the county who not only do not know there is a secret county surveillance unit, but that they might be a target of it without their knowledge while they are being reported.
Until this email was discovered, his original two year old promise to investigate, seemed to just be a bit of puffery, but now that we know there has been a secret surveillance unit, things have taken on a darker and more serious tone.
We have seen this sort of thing in fascist countries, and we have seen where it ends up.
Is Bristol County alone in this, or is this happening in the shadows all over the country?
I have been watching the debates and reading the political coverage of the Democratic candidates. While I understand the need to snipe at each other, in the process some of the “clever” comments and attacks reveal, in a very clichéd manner, more about the person making the comments and attacks rather than their target.
Mayor Pete was prepared for the recent attacks.
Of course he was.
As a Gay man, in the closet or out, he has had to be prepared for what is thrown at him. Out of the closet, the attacks are directed at him. In the closet, he saw the attacks on others, and needed to prepare for the time they would be directed at him.
He is reduced to a white man, and so the white people on the campaign trail claim to fully know his life experience, while those of color see him through the lens of their own experiences with the white majority.
He is condemned for having had fundraisers with no press presence, and assigned some nefarious motive for this. As a Gay man who has lived in various places in the country, I am well aware of the uneven attitudes toward Gay people. People , whether Straight or Gay, who live comfortably in more progressive locations might not be aware that there are still places where being Gay is a career and social standing killer. There is the possibility that without press, people who would compromise their careers and social standing if they were “outed” by others, in this case with their names and, perhaps, pictures in the media, can attend these fundraisers without that fear.
There are many Gay supporters who could lose much if their employers, co-workers, family, friends, landlords, or social circle find out they’re Gay.
If you are Gay, you get that.
If you are not Gay, you might not see that as the big deal it actually is.
And if you don’t, then you are not as well informed about the Gay experience as you may assume you are.
I am out, and proudly and unapologetically so. I have had my share of the negative treatment Gay people have to deal with. I am long past the fear of people’s reaction if I mention I am Gay if it comes up in conversations about relationships, politics, bars I frequent, and life experiences, and if the person with whom I am speaking makes that “ewwww” face. I just let it pass. I have had the worst slurs thrown at me and the most absurd claims made about me in the past by those who do not know me.
I am at that place now where the worst has already been said, and where all that is left is being maimed or killed for being Gay. It was not easy to get to that point.
Those who attack Mayor Pete alternate between his not being “Gay enough”, mainly because he came out “late” so he avoided the negatives Gay people have to live with in their youth, as if the closet is a pleasant place, and he doesn’t mince and swish, and his being White means he has lived a life of privilege.
You see, White Gay men know only privilege.
White Gay men do not necessarily benefit from white privilege.
To not know that, or not accept that, is to reveal the shallowness of what could be, perhaps, a useful and convenient acceptance of Gay people.
The women on stage and the people of color who stand with them decry “Identity Politics”, as they speak of their own attributes that display diversity, while condemning references to Mayor Pete’s orientation for being “identity politics”, a bad thing. He is to accept only that he is a White male and, so, privileged, rather than a Gay man who does not have it.
They can proclaim their identity and claim it as a strength, while he is supposed to ignore a part of his identity and meekly accept, as Gay men have been expected to do for far too long, what identity they assign him.
I can accept that Trump has some familiarity with toilets and the flushing thereof, after all, he does have a thing for fancy restrooms.
In 1989 when he began what would become another failed business, Trump Shuttle, he had all the aircraft exteriors of the planes of the company he had bought, Northeastern Shuttle, repainted and the interiors redecorated with maple wood veneer, chrome seat belt latches, and gold colored lavatory fixtures which were only gold in color.
His private jet has gold-plated sink fixtures in one bathroom, but, again, not solid gold.
His Fifth Avenue Trump Tower penthouse includes nicely gilded furnishings and a five star bathroom with solid gold sinks, million dollar walls, and, although it is not gold, an “intuitive” toilet that senses which way you are approaching it and will lift the cover and seat most appropriate to you intended usage.
When they entered the White House, Trump and Melania, as previous first couples had done, requested museums to loan them some masterpieces to adorn the walls.
The Guggenheim was asked to loan a Vincent Van Gogh painting, “Landscape with Snow” from 1888, for the private residence, but, as that work was not available, the museum offered the fully functional toilet made out of solid 18-karat gold entitled “America”, estimated to have cost $1 million to construct, and designed by Italian-born artist Maurizio Cattelan.
Cattelan’s toilet was available after concluding its year-long exhibit in a public bathroom on the museum’s fifth floor where it had been used by visitors.
The artist offered it to the White House for a long-term loan with the explanation,
“Everything seems absurd until we die and then it makes sense.”
But, not actually owning a golden toilet aside, Trump does have to use toilets, so his concern about the number of times it takes to flush one effectively is understandable enough to give some glimpse into his desire to have the EPA look into the country’s toilet flushing crisis.
There is, however, no evidence to even assume Trump has ever loaded and run a dishwasher.
But he is aware of the related crisis.
On the day he was impeached, Trump
was telling a rally of this crisis which weighed far heavier than his own plight, dishwashers don’t work as well as they once did.Along with all those “friends”, “many people”, and the associates who take turns Round Robin style in the stories where someone encouraged him, he learned of this latest crisis because “women tell me” they have to repeatedly run their dishwashers.
I find it astounding that when women get to speak with a president, regardless who it is, they bring up the dishwashing problems.
“Remember the dishwasher? You’d press it, boom! There’d be like an explosion. Five minutes later you open it up, the steam pours out. Now you press it 12 times. Women tell me …You know, they give you four drops of water.”
Now his Department of Energy has said that it will move forward with rule-making changes that would exempt new dishwashers from existing energy-efficiency standards, asserting,
“People’s time is a nonrenewable resource.”
And the time it takes to load the dishwasher and then watch television or get involved in any activity while the machine does its work in another room without you having to be there, is such an inconvenience.
But as one beleaguered dishwasher user informed the Department of Energy,
“Please mother of God, allow someone to make a dishwasher that will get my dishes for a family of 5 clean enough, fast enough to empty the dishwasher by bedtime!”
The move to deregulate efficiency requirements for this and other appliances is being led by the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a group known for its activism refuting climate-change statistics.
FreedomWorks is pushing a petition “Make Dishwashers Great Again”.
The new standards would waive the water-efficiency requirements that have limited dishwashers to use half the water and energy of those from 20 years ago.
As far as the alleged tortoise speed of the appliance, the lower wash cycles was created to meet market demand for quieter dishwashers and a gentler cycle that boosts the longevity of what is being washed.
According to a study at Germany’s University of Bonn, dishwashers use half the energy, one-sixth of the water, and less soap than hand washing.
That addresses the DOE concern about People’s time being a nonrenewable resource.
And instead of waiting around idly while the dishwasher chugs along, go watch a movie, get involved in community work, play with the kids or you spouse, or just get a life.