After reading about, then hearing, finally watching Trump’s “why would they” and accompanying remarks from the post-coital 7/16/18 Helsinki news conference, H.L. experienced a series of reactions that corresponded to 80% of the Kübler-Ross stages of grief. Acceptance being the one missing. […]
As H.L. Post 55 made clear, this hopeless liberal bids good riddance to Justice Anthony Kennedy. Among liberals that point of view is not widely shared and the laments keep coming, stoked by press on the left. Among the foremost and most knowledgeable in that camp is NPR’s Nina Totenberg, who upon Kennedy’s announcement commented “it’s the end of the world as we know it.” Immediately and repeatedly followed by her false history of the context of Kennedy’s nomination, the falsity of which is known better by Totenberg than anyone. She recites that in 1987 Kennedy was nominated by President Reagan, in the wake of the Senate’s rejection of Reagan’s nomination of Judge Robert Bork. Half true enough. Reagan in fact nominated Kennedy in the wake of another intervening nomination, of D.C. Circuit Judge Douglas Ginsburg. A nomination that Totenberg single handedly torpedoed. […]
In the two weeks before Justice Anthony Kennedy announced that he would retire, the high court issued five very bad decisions that will grievously harm many Americans and America for decades, at the very least. They are, one, National Institute of Family and Life Advocates v. Becerra, Attorney General of California involving “pro-life” unlicensed crisis pregnancy centers; two, Janus v. American Federation of State County and Municipal Employees, involving agency fees paid by non-union members to unions for negotiating better compensation and benefits for them; three, Ohio v. American Express, involving an antitrust challenge to a credit card practice that raises merchant and consumer prices by $ billions annually; four, Trump v. Hawaii, involving our openly bigoted President’s third attempt to ban most Muslim aliens from entering the United States; and five, Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, involving a bakers refusal, on religious grounds, to bake a wedding cake for a same sex couple. […]
Though America’s white population must continually be reminded that racism – overt, covert and systemic, still pervade American life, Jews need little reminder of pervasive anti-Semitism, mostly below the surface in America but openly expressed virtually everywhere else. H.L. encounters it as he travels and often because his funny Welsh/Greek-Russian Romanian name allows him to “pass for white” (as Jews used to say) and initially cloaks his ethnicity and religion. […]
Monday, June 4, H.L. went to Roland Garros anxious to watch the Rafael Nadal/Maximillian Marterer match – though not much in doubt – and very much excited at the prospect of seeing the 22nd match between Serena Williams and Maria Sharapova. It was to be played on Court Philippe Chatrier- center court – but of course. Though the match would have occurred in only the fourth round, with the quarters, semis and final still to be contested, this match was one likely to make those succeeding it seem anticlimactic. […]
By this 52nd post, readers know that Hopelessly Liberal is a chronicle of and guide to survival until the Trump presidency ends. Perhaps, like Nightline, it will continue after the hostages are released. H.L. bears witness to the daily assaults on our decency and Constitution and calls for resistance and preservation of the best in America during this dark age. But each of us needs occasional respite and escape from this war, as we did after 9/11. H.L.’s is tennis. Playing it, watching it played beautifully and debating it with others similarly obsessed. Last week H.L. traveled to Paris and the French Open, contested at Roland Garros next to the Bois de Boulogne. […]
Naked and Afraid H.L. spent Memorial Day weekend with living family and long deceased parents. Dad a waist gunner and bombardier in two of Rosie the Riveter’s B-24 Liberator Bombers. Mom a canteen girl who helped establish a USO in Clovis, New Mexico but met Dad on West 44th Street in ’44 at the Stage Door Canteen, while he furloughed to say goodbye to his mother. Rosie the Riveter One weekend activity was a group viewing and discussion of the reality/survivalist TV show Naked and Afraid. My kids gave the show a “C” for the genre but I experienced it as a good 2018 version of Father Knows Best and Amos and Andy. Those 1950s TV shows, while presenting stereotyped versions of [...]
After Parkland, in stand your ground Florida and the Santa Fe Massacre in the have it your way (open and/or concealed carry) Lone Star state, the gun cult doubled and redoubled down. Armed guards at both schools weren’t enough. More guns packed by more teachers were needed and might have reduced the number of casualties – they chanted. And one might predict that it is just a matter of time until the cult calls for armed high school students. Except a cult lawmaker already proposed that. He be Ohio Republican Representative Niraj Antani. […]
“Say Anything” was a great John Cusack flick. Among many reasons was the line that billed it as a “Lloyd Meets Girl Movie.” Lloyd Dobler said any and everything and won the love of the objectively unreachable and out of his class, Diane Court played by Ione Skye. […]
The stakes in the 2018 congressional elections are greatest of any in midterm memory. If Democrats can thread the needle and regain control of the Senate, the next Gorsuch-like abomination can be prevented. The multi-faceted damage his votes and opinions will inflict has been hinted at but will become increasingly clear in the spring and crescendo this June. […]
