So I said...

More random comments and thoughts posted elsewhere.

2026-01-03
[To members of Congress:]
The attack on Venezuela, combined with the White House declaration that the US will “run” the nation and “open” - better read “steal” - its oil reserves to the benefit of US oil corporations is open, blatant, and by definition a reversion to 18th and 19th century imperialism and colonialism: attack a nation, take over, and steal its resources.

If you do not condemn, loudly and insistently, this unlawful and un-Constitutional assault you will have abdicated all claim to any moral authority on any military or foreign policy issue.

Many have spoken in the past about “moral moments.” This is one. Don’t pass it by.

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2026-01-03
[Regarding the presser re Venezuela:]
Okay, first let’s not forget that the US has been trying to overthrow the government of Venezuela ever since the election of Hugo Chavez in 1999.

Second, we should recall that the lack of oil production cited by The Orange Overlord (hereafter TOO) can be traced to an increasingly harsh regimen of economic sanctions in place since 2017 and intended to force regime change by wrecking the economy.

Third, it’s clear but should be said directly: TOO and Rubio announced an intention to control and determine who becomes the government of Venezuela, as much as declaring it will be a puppet state.

Fourth, I thought “nation building” was supposed to be a bad idea.

And fifth, TOO’s answer to the question of what’s next for the Venezuelan people was “We’re making that decision now.” Am I the only one who remembers that a big complaint from the political establishment about the Iraq War was the lack of an “exit plan?”

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2026-01-04
[Tony Dokoupil’s smarmy video on becoming CBS news’ lead anchor had the line “we put too much weight in the analysis of academics or elites.”]
God forbid the media should report based on input from people who know what the hell they’re talking about.

“It is a newspaper’s duty to print the news and raise hell. - Wilbur F. Storey, editor, Chicago Times, 1861

“The job of a newspaper is to comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable.” - paraphrased from Mr. Dooley (humorist Finley Peter Dunne)

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2026-01-05
A nation-building timeline:

“If I become president, the era of nation-building will be brought to a very swift and decisive end.” - candidate Donald Trump, August 15, 2016

“We Are Not Nation-Building Again.” Trump re Afghanistan, August 21, 2017

“In the end, the so-called ‘nation-builders’ wrecked far more nations than they built - and the interventionists were intervening in complex societies that they did not even understand themselves.” - The Orange Overlord, May 13, 2025

“We’re in charge. ... We need total access…access to the oil and to other things in their country that allow us to rebuild their country.” - The Orange Overlord re Venezuela, January 4, 2026

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2026-01-05
[A group in Washington state has filed petitions for a ballot question that would require a genital exam to be eligible for school sports. The legislature could adopt it as written (making it a law), reject it (sending it to the ballot), or offer amended language.]
Tactically, I think the best course is for the legislature to reject it outright.

Passing it with the idea of amending it next year not only legitimizes the idea, it puts opponents in the position of trying to undo damage already done with a very high likelihood that any undoing will be partial at best.

Proposing revised text must by definition embrace some of the original petition, again legitimizing it, and more importantly (pardon the all caps but I don’t know how to emphasize it otherwise) IT WILL NOT SATISFY THE BIGOTS!

Rejecting it, OTOH, not only avoids legitimizing the idea, it can be employed as an argument to vote against this “already rejected” “extremist” ballot measure.

FWIW for context, 400,000 people [the number of signatures gathered on the petition] is about 7.8% of registered voters in Washington. It’s also likely safely above the required number, which is 308,911. I don’t know how picky the state is about signatures; a lot of campaigns aim for at least 50% above the minimum for safety, which in this case would be nearly 465,000. Here, they are about 29% above the minimum. Which again is probably enough but not a slam dunk.

I claim zero expertise on this, but based solely on the states where I have lived, WA seems to be a state where it is easier to get a public question on the ballot than in some others.

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2026-01-05
I still like my idea of how [transgender Rep. Sarah] McBride should have handled the whole bathroom business: cooperate very loudly.

Specifically, call a press conference outside a men’s room and get herself videoed going in after emphasizing “This is what they want. They WANT me in there - which also means that they WANT trans men to use the women’s room. They really didn’t think this through, did they?”

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2026-01-05
[A reply to the above: “ludicrous how little logic they seem capable of applying.”]
Bigotry does not require logic; indeed it hates the very concept.

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2026-01-06
[A Hilton Hotel in Minneapolis canceled a DHS reservation; DHS said the hotel was “siding with murderers and rapists.” The corporation folded immediately.]
To paraphrase the DHS post, this is UNACCEPTABLE. Why is Hilton Hotels siding with the brutalizing armed thugs of a masked secret police to deliberately endorse and back repeated violations of the Constitutional guarantee of due process and basic human rights?

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2026-01-06
[A thought prompted by Delcy Rodríguez becoming interim president.]
With Venezuela, I’m having flashbacks of the “Saddam’s regime without Saddam” notions from the Shrub cabal - and recalling how well that worked out.

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2026-01-06
[Hegseth praised the “men and women” involved in the Venezuela attack.]
Wait - “Men and women dedicating their lives...” I thought women weren’t supposed to be part of “Peter Principle” Hegseth’s military operations.

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2026-01-07
[The attacks on trans rights increasingly include adults.]
We knew this was coming, we had to. Several years ago various restrictions and bans on GAC for “youth” extended the definition of the term to 26. Others arose to block insurance coverage for anyone at any age. The focus on “youth,” on “OMG! The children! SAVE THE CHILDREN!” was never the goal, it was the starting point, the wedge issue, the camel’s nose under the tent.

It’s the same reason for making bathroom and sports bans points of attack; they were deliberately chosen as ways to get people used to the idea of “othering” trans folks, of seeing them as “not us” and so less deserving of concern and then respect and then even acknowledgment.

It has nothing to do with protecting children, nothing to do with religious belief except to the extent it provides convenient excuses. It’s about bigotry and shrunken souls and the drive for political power to enforce the one and normalize the other.

Which means nothing is to be gained by being nice or accommodating to the bigots; although some individuals have changed (for example, George Wallace’s late-in-life regret for his earlier racism seemed genuine) it is rare enough to be on a “you’ll have to prove it to me” basis.

The hard reality is that the enemy - bigotry - is rarely overcome, it always exists even when it is driven to the shadows by being made socially unacceptable.

What it can be, however, and what has been and can continue to be our basis for a more humane, a more just, future, is outlasted. Because in a dark time, survival is resistance. Sooner or later, sooner or later, enough people will get angry enough, enough people will see clearly enough, enough people will have hope enough, to take back their futures - if only we can survive this dark time. Which I fully and perhaps foolishly believe we will.

And if I can end with two more cliche-ish quotes:

“Nothing we do is for nothing.” - I first heard that from Daniel Ellsberg but I don’t know if he was quoting someone else.

“What is once well done is done forever.” - Henry David Thoreau, “On the Duty of Civil Disobedience”

Oh wait, one more: Carry it on. And never forget no one of us is actually alone.

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2026-01-07
I add this comment by way of a footnote.

Re-reading that, I realize that it sounds as if I am saying I am trans. I am not.

I do think of myself as a staunch ally, and in my last couple of paragraphs I was thinking of a community of transgender folks and allies alike, of that whole, while intending to remind and reassure trans folks that you are not alone, you have friends you can count on for support.

I apologize if anyone was misled by my perhaps overly-broad language.

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2026-01-07
[A post argued that the invasion of Venezuela “had nothing to do with oil.”]
I have to push back on the claim that this has nothing to do with the oil. You framed the argument in terms of what the oil industry wants; it should be framed in terms of what the administration of the Orange Overlord wants.

First, while the heavy crude found in Venezuela is indeed harder to extract and refine, it has been and is being both. It upheld the economy of Venezuela until US sanctions significantly damaged the industry and is useful for applications ranging from roofing and asphalt through heavy machine lubricants to even some types of fuel.

Which means, second, that there is an on-going market for it. The oil giants may not be interested in expanding production, but don’t doubt for a second that the agents and acolytes of the Trump crime family couldn’t/wouldn’t put together a partnership to run Venezuela’s existing domestic oil industry.

Third, this is an administration that rejects climate change. It has pulled out of the Paris Climate Accords, slashed NOAA, removed climate information from public websites and replaced it with climate denial propaganda, continuously pushed for more fossil fuel production (including blocking state laws that would limit it) while canceling projects for renewable energy, and a good deal more such that this list barely merits the adjective “partial.”

Bottom line is that oil still means profit and power and these people are convinced that will continue for quite some time.

So while it many not be “all” abut the oil, and as you note hemispheric hegemony and dominance are surely a good part of it, it still is about oil.