America, The Greatest Show on Earth

 

P.T. Barnum and James A. Bailey coined the term, The Greatest Show on Earth to describe their American circus extravaganza.  They have traveled throughout America since 1871.  By the 1920s the circus had been bought out by the Ringling brothers who continued and expanded the show to include over 1,000 people with 16 camels, 26 elephants, and 335 horses.

Circus Clowns 1906

I vaguely remember going to the circus when I was probably eight.  This guess is from research that indicates that the Ringling Circus made a tour that ended in Miami on November 22, 1953.  1957 was the final time they used tents before switching to arena venues.  Future shows were at the Miami Beach Convention Center in the 60s, and the Miami Arena in the late 80s.  I remember working across from the Orange Bowl in a nearby office complex when a circus elephant walked by my second-floor window having broken loose from a parade on the street.  My only other circus references are from the many movies like The Greatest Show on Earth and Trapeze.

Having just witnessed the RNC and DNC conventions with their choreographed shows, the circus analogy came to mind.  Every four years the presidential political circus comes to town.  After the conventions, they take the show on the road for the final push before the big election.  Like the circus performances of old, the modern political circus has its high-wire acts, clowns, hucksters, and a freak show that is not to be missed.  The only thing missing is the animal acts unless you count the childless cat ladies.

Both sides feature inane rhetoric and to quote Jimmy Durante, “Everybody wants to get into the act.”  At the RNC Convention gathering, Arizona Republican Kari Lake’s speech ran over, and she was twice warned to “get off the stage.”  The second warning added the additional line, “Trump waiting.”   A short time later, Teamster president, Sean O’Brian was seen supporting Trump before he was nudged aside by an impatient Trump. 

That part of the clown show was disconcerting if one only considers the fact that it was Joe Biden in 2022 who provided the Teamster’s pension fund a one-time $36 billion bailout to halt the threat of pension cuts for 350,000 workers and retirees.  Those workers are generally in trucking, warehousing, and food processing industries.  While it was certainly a questionable use of tax dollars to support and keep solvent a private pension fund, one economist pointed out that annual tax benefits to higher-income taxpayers through 401k plans is much higher than the Teamster bailout.

The political circus too is expensive.  The cost of the 2020 presidential election was pegged at $6.5B.  The whole dog and pony show is a phenomenal waste of time and money.  We have political “entertainers” who are anything but entertaining and whose only talent is making promises for which no one holds them accountable.  It is like watching a high wire act where the cable is on the ground and nobody cares if they fall.  Telling listeners that they will do something that is beyond their control is the height of comic theatre.  When the circus leaves town and the elections are behind us the only thing that remains is the elephant dung and deflated balloons.

You would think that America, The Greatest Show on Earth, could come up with a better system for filling the most important job in the world.  So, we will continue to spend billions of dollars, listen to empty nonsense, and cast our vote for whoever pisses us off the least.  For now, the clown car is still circling the ring and the only mystery that remains is how many clowns are inside.  

It can be noted that the original PT Barnum circus toured in 1871 on two different trains, a Red Tour and a Blue Tour with each featuring different full three-ring productions.  Each train traveled on a two-year tour taking December off.  Sounds like a political campaign, just on a tighter schedule.

The Giant of Cardiff

“There’s a sucker born every minute.”  Ask most people who said that and PT Barnum’s name will be a common answer.  Like much of history and politics, this is probably BS.  Closer to the truth is that it was said OF PT Barnum and not by him.  You see, there was a famous hoax called the Cardiff Giant.  The “giant” was actually a ten-foot-long block of gypsum that had been sculpted to resemble a petrified American goliath.  It was buried and then “discovered” by “accident” and then promoted as the Giant of Cardiff.  When PT Barnum tried unsuccessfully to buy the hoax for his sideshow he then created his own fake of the fake giant.  The owner of the “real” giant when told that Barnum was showcasing his own giant he proclaimed, “There’s a sucker born every minute.”

Politics and the circus, the parallels are endless.  Perhaps the politicians of today would be wise to heed the advice of PT Barnum who really said, 

"It is of no advantage to advertise unless you intend to honestly fulfill the promises made in this manner."

 

 

 

 

RFK JR's. Support Brings More to the Table for Trump

 RFK Jr's. Support Brings More to the Table for Trump

The RFK Jr endorsement of Donald J Trump provides some mental stability to a campaign beleaguered with the stigma of crazy, bizarre, and the forever-accurate moniker, weird. With Trump regularly worrying about electric boats sinking in shark-infested waters, windmills killing whales by driving them insane, and the late great Hannibal Lecter who would love to have him for dinner, RKF Jr. can spread the crazy to include brain parasites, cocaine, dead bears riding bicycles through Central Park, sexual assault, and philandering on a par with the Trump's high standards.

Rumors that RFK Jr’s brainworm left an unflattering review of the cuisine on Yelp are totally suspicious and should be considered without merit. In keeping with RFK Jr’s other work, such a statement cannot be evaluated without additional review data. In the worm’s defense and by RFK Jr’s. own admission, it was a tragic story. RFK JR. said, "A worm that got into my brain and ate a portion of it and then died." Depending upon the timing of the worm's demise, he might not have had time to even write a Yelp review. However, Mr. Worm’s death would substantiate that the cuisine would be suspect and not up to even Hannibal Lecter’s standards.

Yes, the misbehaving, under-achieving playboy with generational wealth, who regularly champions his anti-vax cause, can bring a proper level of science to a possible cabinet post of Health Secretary in the Trump administration. Perhaps he can get to the bottom of the previously untested bleach injections and bright light inside the human body treatments as a welcome alternative to those crazy injections that he fears.

The other thing RFK Jr brings to the Trump campaign is a measure of balance. You see, he, like Trump, has felony convictions. In 2001 a Virginia jury convicted Kennedy of two counts of distributing cocaine base, and one count of conspiring to distribute five kilograms or more of cocaine and fifty grams or more of cocaine base. Like Trump, he is working on his third wife. RFK Jr’s second wife hanged herself after reading Kennedy’s personal journal where he recorded his sexual encounters with 37 different women. He also has a sexual assault allegation with the part-time babysitter of his children. When asked about the allegation he responded, "I am not a church boy. I had a very, very rambunctious youth. I said in my announcement speech that I have so many skeletons in my closet that if they could all vote, I could run for king of the world."

With all the Bizarro World that RFK Jr. brings to the table, Donald J. Trump almost looks normal. The emphasis here is on the word, “almost.”

FOR IT IS WRITTEN...

 

Those four words are generally a preamble to a statement claiming moral superiority based on some religious scripture.  It would be the speaker's claim that all arguments to the contrary are moot because their interpretation of some religious text makes their point for them.  Logic has no place in the discussion if it contradicts whatever they claim, “is written.”

One reference, Wikipedia, estimates that there are currently 4,200 religions, churches, denominations, faith groups, etc., in existence.  There have been thousands of religious variations over the course of humankind.  These religions govern ethics, morality, and lifestyle based on ideas about the cosmos and human nature.  Humans are drawn to religion to provide structure in their lives and to perhaps explain those things about their own existence they don’t understand.

On the current world stage, we have an ongoing war between at least two religious ideologies in Gaza and its surrounds.  We have an American political candidate with questionable moral standards selling Bibles and promoting a religious theory that the government should control the human reproductive process.

Many of these established religions have a formalized written rulebook.  Christians have their Bible, Islam has the Quran and Hadith, and Jews have the Talmud and Torah.  The origins of these religions go back thousands of years.  Judaism is over 3,500 years old, Christianity is over 2,000 years old, and Islam for Muslims goes back over 1,400 years.

I only mention these three religions now as they are part of the current strife in the news.  As has been the case for millennia, battles are being fought using the written word of their religious beliefs as justification.  I will ignore the underlying causality that is the real motivation in much of this chaos, the human lust for power, money, and control of others.

If we look back historically at the text that is the foundation of these religions, we find common themes.  While most claim some divine inspiration as the source for the material in their respective texts, all were written by men.  Many of these texts describe events and provide explanations.  They provide mandates and structure for “keeping the faith,” laws if you will.

While I won’t get into burning bushes, talking clouds, dream visions, visiting spirits, etc., that many of the writers of scripture claim as inspiration, I just know that many of these religious stories and themes are older than the existing “written word.”  Long before much of this was written down for inclusion in these religious guidebooks, the same or similar stories were being told.

Many of us know the first five books of the Hebrew Bible are the Old Testament of the Judeo-Christian tradition.  This original text was the legal code of the time and was used as the mediator of law.  Central authorship is rather vague but is largely attributed to Moses.  It was written down in something called the Babylonian Talmud around 200-500 CE (Christian Era aka AD).  The origins are even older and date to around 600 BCE from a variety of unconnected materials.  I don’t mention this as a lesson in religious doctrine but only to point out the length of time (800 years ??) of its development and the opportunity for change and varied interpretations of events.

This brings me to the Epic of Gilgamesh.  If you know of this collection of Sumerian poems from ancient Mesopotamia (modern-day Iraq), you are certainly better read than am I.  I came across this reference while researching the previous paragraph.  My religious education amounts to but five years of Catholic school and memorizing Latin I didn’t understand.

It seems that this Epic of Gilgamesh was unknown in modern times until its discovery in the 1850s when 15,000 fragments of Assyrian cuneiform tables were found in an ancient library.  These “texts” date to 700 BCE and mention legends associated with an extended period around 2600 BCE.

Now that we have some context of time for this Gilgamesh legend, I will mention just one of the stories to see if it sounds familiar.  It is of the Great Flood sent by the deities to destroy civilization in a cleansing of humanity for a “rebirth.”  This same myth occurs in many cultures including Hinduism, Greek mythology, the Genesis flood narrative with Noah, Mesopotamian flood stories, and the Cheyenne flood story.  It seems that everyone enjoys a good flood yarn.

In the Gilgamesh version of the flood, the highest god Enlil, decides to destroy the world because humans have become too noisy.  The god Ea, who created humans out of clay and divine blood, secretly warns the hero Utnapishtim of the impending flood and gives him detailed instructions for building a boat so that life may survive. 

In Hindu mythology, the great flood also involves a hero, Manu, who is told to build a giant boat.  In an Iranian religion, the same story is told when the god Ahriman tries to destroy the world with a drought which is ended when another god, Mithra, shoots an arrow into a rock causing a flood and only one man survives in an ark with his cattle.  The North American Cheyenne also has a flood myth involving the Missouri River Valley.

It seems that, while there are variations in the details of the characters, these flood myths were stories told and retold by a variety of cultures over thousands of years.  The fact that it is also in the sacred scriptures of modern religions provides some foundation for skepticism for the literal interpretations of these “good books.”

None of this is to say that religions are based wholly on “fake news” and don’t provide some structure for good, but to use the written words found in a sacred text as the end-all for further deliberation or discussion is wholly without merit.  Religions may be the foundation for moral guidance but should never be used to dictate our actions when they countermand common sense.  Remember this when anyone again uses, “It is written…” as some preemptive argument.  Religion has its place in society but one person’s religion and their interpretation of its doctrine should never be used as a mandate for governance.

The Modern Stepford America

 The Modern Stepford America

In an excellent article from The Hartman Report, shared by my friend Henry Popkin, “The Dark Side of the Tradwife Movement,” I found that while I knew something of the information covered, I was unfamiliar with the term, “tradwife.” Further reading and research found that it refers to the “TRADitional” role of the female in marriage as one of homemaking and child-rearing. Having been raised in an “Ozzie and Harriet” household (my brother was even named Ricky) I understand the concept and appreciate some of the benefits of such an environment. It worked for us in the 1950s and 60s before I went away to college. At some point, however, my parents both were wage earners with my mother joining my father in the real estate business.

Ozzie, Harriet, David, and Ricky
The Nelsons

While times may have changed, the mindsets of a few remain mired in the past. In the Hartman Report article, the plight of many women in this draconian post-Roe world sponsored by Donald J. Trump and his fellow “Stepford Men” on the Supreme Court and in Congress, was brought to light. The harsh reality of what they had “accomplished” was related to one tale where a woman (Amanda) who suffered a life-threatening ectopic pregnancy was denied proper medical care. She was denied treatment because, even though ectopic pregnancies left to their own fate result in near-certain death of both the woman and the fetus they are carrying, the doctors are threatened with 91 years in prison if they treat a woman after a bundle of cells in the microscopic zygote begin to twitch. This twitching of cells in the zygote is defined in law as a “fetal heartbeat” even though there is no fully formed fetus or discernable heart.

The end result of these new “freedoms” mandated by the Supreme Court is that the states now have the right to impose their own laws guided by whatever religious morality happens to dominate their individual state legislatures. In Texas, Amanda went into sepsis, nearly died, and lost a fallopian tube in the process. Any future attempts to have children would require an expensive and painful IVF procedure. But if she wants to follow that route, she had better hurry because Republican-led legislatures want to outlaw IVF. From their lofty moral ground, legislatures want to dictate how, when, and why a person should get pregnant, what their doctors are allowed to do to protect her life, and even mandate that she should die so that they might sleep in self-righteous peace.

Tradwife

In true Stepford Wives fashion, the robot-like females of this new Republican utopia will feel like they have just stepped out of a time-traveling DeLorean and awakened in a 1950s sitcom, albeit one without humor or laugh track. While the choice to be a homemaker is laudable, it can only be so if it is still a choice made of free will and not the result of some legal mandate. If we ever return to a world in which a family can have the replacement level fertility rate of 2.1 kids and live a full happy existence on a single salary, perhaps more people would elect to have one parent stay home. Or not. It should be their choice.

The Hartman article went on to remind us of what that past meant for half of our population. Since women might get pregnant, employers before 1964 could deny a woman employment. Until 1974 home sellers and real estate agents could refuse to sell a home to a woman. Before 1988, landlords could refuse to rent to women. Husbands could legally rape their wives before 1993. It was the Equal Credit Opportunity Act of 1974 that finally allowed women to get a credit card in their name without a male co-signer.

The Cleavers, Leave it to Beaver

Harriet Nelson, June Cleaver, Lucy Ricardo, and Donna Stone all wore high heels and dresses, cooked dinner for the family, and raised the kids. It all looked idyllic on a 21-inch black and white television screen. As Joanna Eberhart eventually realized in the quaint little town of Stepford, Connecticut, appearances can be deceiving. In twenty states, Republicans have taken the right to terminate an unwanted pregnancy away from women. They also want to take away the right to contraception so many more women would be forced to leave their jobs or be faced with the difficulties of holding down a job (or two) while trying to raise children. In the words of JD Vance, women should stay home and serve their husbands. His implication is that women in the workplace drive down wages by competing with men for jobs.

If you think we should, as voiced at the beginning of each Lone Ranger television episode of the 50s, “Return with us now to those thrilling days of yesteryear,” and force women to become the new June Cleavers of the future, my guess is that you and your “tradwife” will be voting for Donald Trump and his sidekick, JD Vance. If, however, you think women are fully capable of being more like Daenerys Targaryen in Game of Thrones and can be strong, confident, and courageous, you would be voting for Kamala Harris and Tim Walz.

“I am Daenerys Stormborn of House Targaryen, the Unburnt, Mother of Dragons, Khaleesi to Drogo's riders, and queen of the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros.” “I am the blood of the dragon. I must be strong. I must have fire in my eyes when I face them, not tears.”

Stop Your Bitchin'

Like three hundred million cats in a darkened room chasing the bright red dots from a thousand laser pointers, Americans are easily distracted from reality. Perhaps it is time to stop pursuing the shiny illusions racing around that hypothetical room and turn our attention to the people holding the light source.

I am talking about the wealthy doomsayers proclaiming that your situation is dire and only they can make things better. You would think that the average American was living a miserable existence without hope. If this is true, why is it that we have to take such extreme measures to stem the tide of people willing to risk death to come here? Maybe it is time to STFU and look around and appreciate what we have.

Americans live in arguably the greatest country on this planet. We are a land of plenty. We have an abundance of resources. We have the world’s third-largest population behind India and China. Annually we produce over 600 million metric tons of agricultural products, second only to China. We are the largest oil producer in the world, ahead of Saudi Arabia, Russia, and China. We have the world's strongest (and most expensive) military force. We have the strongest economy in the world, far exceeding China, Germany, and Japan who hold positions two, three, and four in terms of GDP.

None of this is to say we don’t have room for improvement, but you would think after listening to people running for office that we are living through the Great Depression of 1929 or facing fuel shortages like the 1973 oil crisis. Make America Great Again? One of the funniest sights in recent memory was that of a billionaire standing in front of his multi-million-dollar mansion complaining about the price of Cheerios. Yes, Cheerios, an item he has never placed in a grocery cart. I would even venture a guess that he hasn’t seen the inside of a grocery store in well over fifty years, if ever.

Yes, we have problems in this country but most of them are caused by those holding our metaphorical laser pointers. It is the uber-wealthy who want to further exacerbate the income disparity that exists here so that their relative positions over the working class are strengthened. Like any good magician, it is the distraction that allows them to deceive the audience. Look at the brown and black people coming across our borders but don’t watch as I give myself a huge tax break. Look at the high price of gasoline but don’t look to see that I have raked in a record-breaking $250 billion profit selling oil during the last two years.

It is time that we start looking out for the middle and lower classes and stop listening to those who tell us that allowing them to control everything will eventually improve our lives. Only they know what is in our best interests. It is time to stop waiting for trickle-down economics to work to our benefit. This is not a time to allow a billionaire authoritarian to take over our democracy so that he can control everything. This is a man who has never done a charitable thing in his life without having an agenda where he could benefit.

The billionaires look out for each other. It is a mutual admiration society. Just recently our most famous blonde billionaire proclaimed that the Medal of Freedom he awarded in 2018 to fellow billionaire Miriam Adelson, widow of Sheldon Adelson, was “much better” than the Congressional Medal of Honor. After all, “everyone gets the Congressional Medal of Honor” because they are “either in very bad shape because they have been hit so many times with bullets or because they are dead.” So said the man who would be our Commander in Chief, again.

Medal of Freedom he awarded in 2018 to fellow billionaire Miriam Adelson, widow of Sheldon Adelson

Trump went on to proclaim that the Medal of Freedom is better than the Medal of Honor because, “she’s a healthy, beautiful woman.” The fact that the Adelsons donated 20 million dollars to Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign couldn’t have had anything to do with the award. Nor did the 5 million dollar donation for his inauguration or the half-million-dollar donation to his legal fund. After Miriam Adelson got the Medal of Freedom, she donated another $75 million to a pro-Trump super PAC. It’s too bad the less fortunate have to get killed or severely injured to get one of those less important Medals of Honor. According to Trump, our war dead are the “losers” and “suckers” of history. Just the sort of person you want in charge of our military because he wouldn’t hesitate to send more losers and suckers to their deaths.

Trump’s plan for our future has been outed and published. It has a name, Project 2025. In this Stephen King-worthy horror tome, we find the plan for setting aside our democracy for a pseudo-democracy where the chief executive has total control and voting is a mere formality that proclaims our undying love for whatever “they” decide. Their religion is our religion. Their decisions will be good for us if only we have faith.

So, darken the room. If you are good, they might even break out the green lasers to give you something new to chase. The billionaire class knows what’s best for you. Put on your little red MAGA hat to let them know you hear and obey.

Rap Music and Politics

I’ve never understood rap music, certainly not the lyrics. The street-slang rapid-fire staccato presentation of rap meant that I heard perhaps one word in six. I now know I didn’t miss much, or maybe I did. I recently began a cable television series that features lots of rap music in the soundtrack. Since I regularly leave the subtitles on for even English features, I can now read what they say (sing?). I will have to assume the person doing the subtitles is getting the rap lyrics right.

I did a quick Google search with the question, what is rap music. The first response was a Wikipedia explanation that it was originally called hip hop and was based on a rhythmic beat with an anti-drug and anti-violence message. After reading the words about contemporary rap music, I’m guessing Wikipedia doesn’t understand it either. Anti-drug? Anti-violence? Not when toughness and street cred are all important themes.

The rap music of today, if this cable series is not an anomaly in its selections, is a boastful, male-centric dialogue where money and power are one and the same. They are the main objectives in life. Your acquisition of money through any means possible, both legal and illegal, is a priority. Once acquired, you must flaunt your wealth for all to see. Drink whatever is most expensive, “Pop your confetti, pop your Pérignon,” and wear the flashiest clothes and jewelry you can find. Women are sex objects whose only purpose is to make men look good. Men own their “bitches” and keep them in line with gifts, drugs, clothes, jewelry, and entertainment. Life is cheap and violence is power.

While I don’t want to seem like a grumpy old man and dinosaur from a bygone era, rap music may have entertainment value for some, but not for me. I’m not a prude but I find its message to be patently offensive. I will grant that I am only basing my opinion on the music that was featured in a cable series (Power, btw) that is about a drug dealer and that there may be some other rap music with a different message, but I feel this (gangster??) rap has had its influence on a large section of our younger-than-me generation.

I used the word “Politics” in the title, and this is where I feel there is a certain parallel between our rap music topic and the morality of today's politics. The term “political morality” is an oxymoron with an emphasis on the morons. Morals be damned, power at all cost. Social issues are but a cover, noise if you will, that hides the lust for power. When people enter the voting booth, emotions win the day, not any specific issue.

Like the not-so-subtle messages in rap music, power is a means to an end which happens to be more power. It is the ouroboros metaphor, the self-eating snake, wherein the cycle is self-destructive. We are willing to set aside our instinctive morality for elusive self-gratification. In the political arena, the promise of a better life is dangled like the carrot in front of the cart mule, it will always be out of reach. The one with all the carrots is the guy driving the cart, not the mule doing all the work.

We see America following leaders bellowing their promises and relying on the frailties of the human condition, lust, greed, prejudice, and religious fervor, to obscure their intent. We ignore what we see and hear with our own eyes and ears and believe the contradictory messages of these purveyors of confidence schemes. Their lust for power is motivation enough and justifies the lies and deceit.

The “lies” are not just the spoken promises of campaigns that we all take with a pinch of salt, they are also the contradictions of their actions that would require more of the sodium chloride condiment than could be produced at the Bonneville Salt Flats of Utah. There is the feigned abhorrence of illegal immigration countered with killing the legislation written by their own party that would have gone a long way to correct the problem. There is the blocking of a SCOTUS appointment with the claim that we were too close to electing another president and then the complete about-face when the situation is reversed.

Rap music presents a fantasy world of excitement sometimes experienced by the entertainers but not part of the IRL of the fans. The “bitches and bling” world of the rappers is but a dream or nightmare depending on your perspective. Likewise, politicians paint a picture of a fantasy world of splendor they would have for themselves but don’t really work for or want for their constituents.

Without mentioning any specific politician lacking a moral compass, I’m sure many of you have an image in mind. His moral compass is more like a fidget spinner than an ethics guide. He has dangled the carrot of a total abortion ban to blind and motivate those Christians willing to ignore his total aversion to morality to achieve their self-identified pious objective. For the racists, white supremacists, neo-Nazis, and other societal flotsam, he uses immigration as a rallying cry to keep out the “others” not like them. Lying becomes like breathing. When caught in a blatant lie, he doubles down, triples down, and never admits he is wrong. You must not believe your lying eyes. His followers respond in a zombie-like fashion, “Yes master.”

These purveyors of false messages have terms for their lies. They are the “new truth” or alternate facts, all else is “fake news.” Their mantra, “truth is not the truth,” is like something that should have been in 1984 or Catch-22 and not part of the current political landscape. Distract the peons with bling and flash and you can get them to believe whatever you tell them. Many of today’s politicians are the troubadours of falsity, the rappers of image over substance. Grab that snake by the tail because it is you.

POSTSCRIPT: Further research into the origins of rap/hip hop, found that I had listened to and enjoyed some of the earlier roots of the genre. Claimed as one of the first hip hop songs was Pigmeat Markham’s 1968 single, “Here Comes the Judge.” It was later picked up by Flip Wilson as a routine on his show. I knew someone who worked at a Black radio station in Orlando and the station’s storeroom was filled with music and comedy albums I wouldn’t have normally heard. Pigmeat Markham and Mom’s Mabley were two of my comedy favorites. While Pigmeat and Mom’s were the king and queen of the double entendre, they were a far cry from the lyrics of today. I’ll leave you with the last four verses of, Here Comes the Judge:

Let them know I'm comin' back

Sit right down with Rock and Nick

Teach them boys some of Pigmeat's tricks

Oh, oh judge, your Honor, Pigmeat said

"Don't you remember me??"

No, who are you, boy

Well, I'm the feller that introduced you

To your wife... to my wife?

Yeah, life! You son-of-a-gun you

Come November, election time

You vote your way, I'll vote mine

'Cause there's a tie, and the money gets spent

Vote for Pigmeat Markham, President

I am the judge, vote for Pigmeat

I am the judge, vote for Pigmeat

Now, everybody knows I am the judge

Let's Get Ready to Rumble

Is America ready for its first female president? We have been governed by male presidents for 235 years, why change now? In a contest dominated by rhetoric on both sides that points out how poorly we have been doing as a nation and our need to work hard to be “great again,” it would seem there is room for improvement.

Donald Trump and the Republicans came out with an extra-large dose of testosterone at their convention. The former president was introduced by Dana White. He is the CEO of the UFC Ultimate Fighting Championship franchise (not to be confused with KFC, a Trump favorite), who spoke to Trump’s virility when he claimed that he was the, “toughest, most resilient human being" he had ever met. Later in the program, Hulk Hogan (aka Terry Bollea), a former World Wrestling Entertainment star, came out wearing a red bandana topped with sunglasses, chanting "USA."

Trump is at home in the UFC-WWE-KFC arenas. Both the UFC and WWE are known for scripted matches and ringside drama that pumps up the crowds who half-believe what they see and hear is real. I included the KFC reference as it too pumps up the crowds, but not necessarily in a good way. Trump has a long association with the WWE and one of its early owners, Vince McMahon. Trump hired McMahon’s wife Linda as his small business administrator from 2017-2019 before she left to work at a pro-Trump super PAC. The WWE and UFC are now merged.

Donald Trump and Hulk Hogan have a few things in common. While Trump had sex with a porn star, Hulk Hogan was a porn star. [Just to be clear, Trump’s porn star was a female] Yes, the Hulk made a sex tape that was released by Gawker Media. Unlike Trump who paid Stormy Daniels $130,000 in hush money and was ordered by a judge to pay E. Jean Carroll over $80M in connection with a sexual assault, Hulk/Bollea won a $140M award against Gawker for their release of his sex tape.

Both Donald Trump and Hulk Hogan should be considered racists. Trump’s racist actions and comments go back decades. Housing discrimination, comments on his Apprentice show, Trump Castle forcing Black personnel to the back room when Trump and Ivana came, racist comments about Central Park Five, and the list goes on. Hogan made his racist remarks on his sex tape. The other racist on the RNC stage was JD Vance whose public racist/sexist comments are just now coming to light.

The presidency has been a “boys' club” since its inception and Congress too has been wholly dominated by male representation. So, should a woman be president? To that I say, it’s about damn time. With women representing half of our population my only question would be, why hasn’t it happened sooner? Gender shouldn’t even be a part of the presidential equation any more than it should be a consideration for any position, political or otherwise.

As you read this, you may be receiving it through a Wi-Fi connection. That technology was founded upon the work of Hedwig Eva Kiesler who was awarded US Patent No. 2,292,387 for a system using frequency hopping in 1942. You know her as Hedy Lamarr, the Austrian-American actress. Howard Hughes called her a genius. This was after he told her he wanted to create faster planes and she went out and bought books on fish and birds. She used those books to find the fastest designs from nature and then provided Hughes with sketches for a new wing design.

Yes, women have contributed greatly to all areas for the betterment of mankind. All, so far, except the presidency of the United States. I say it is past time for us to take advantage of the other half of the human equation. I believe that Kamala Harris can and will do a great job leading our country.