Repeat Tweets: Scales Falling From Eyes

Repeat tweets from July, 2016:

• Jul 3 2016: "scales-falling-from-eyes kind of book". How you describe a book that confirms your preconceived notions. @roddreher
• Jul 4 2016: American Sphinx: Complex, conflicted, contradictory. Not the Thomas Jefferson in schoolbooks. No longer count me on Team Jefferson. B+
• Jul 4 2016: My Twitter feed is hard to follow this morning. Near as I can tell, Donald Trump is considering Kevin Durant for VP. Or vice versa.
• Jul 4 2016: So, Kevin Durant is taking his talents to the West Coast. Does that about sum it up?

After the jump, more repeat tweets.

Natural Allies

It occurs to me that the Black Lives Matter movement and the tea party movement ought to be natural allies. Wait, hear me out. The movements share some of the same policy goals.

BLM has as one of its 10 categories of policy solutions: ending the "over-policing of communities." The tea party has as one of its 15 non-negotiable core beliefs: "Intrusive government must be stopped."

BLM focuses on things like the criminalization of issues that should be handled by social workers or mental health professionals instead of police. The tea party focuses on things like red light cameras and the militarization of police. The root cause underlying many of the complaints, "intrusive government" and "over-policing," is the same.

If the tea party and BLM sought common ground and allied themselves, they would make a powerful political movement. Why don't they? I have a theory about that, too. ;-)

Whiskey Tango Foxtrot (2016)

IMDB

Whiskey Tango Foxtrot (2016): Female reporter goes to Afghanistan. Based on a real story. Watchable but satire doesn't have enough bite. B-

POTD: Do Feed the Animals

From 2016 02 11 Jodhpur

Today's photo-of-the-day is from rural Rajasthan, India.

Go ahead and feed the cows. The customary explanation given is that "feeding cows, or any other animal for that matter, according to the Hindu religion, is believed to be an act of goodness and humanity." An economic benefit is that "the milkmen in India let their cows roam free as they know they will get free food...It's like a double jackpot for them, because the cows return to their owner's place to give milk after eating [free] food."

Poor People, Go Home

Donald Trump and the Republicans have a plan to counter immigration. Namely, ban Muslims and Hispanics from entering the country, deport the ones here, and then quit trading with them. Or something like that. It keeps changing.

It reminds me of the 12th century story of King Canute commanding the incoming tide to stop. Contrary to popular belief (i.e., what I believed until I looked it up), Canute in fact understood the futility of this. (I recommend more people try fact-checking before posting on social media.) I imagine Trump understands the futility of trying to stop the tide, too, but is cynically trying to get elected by appealing to voters who don't.

A news story today suggests why Trump's followers are bound to be disappointed even if they succeed in electing Trump in November.