To Texas

If I may quote U.S. Representative Brian Sims who said this about publicly sworn officials: 

"Each of us put our hand on the Bible and swore to uphold the Constitution., We did not place our hands on the Constitution and swear to uphold the Bible."

Stop playing hypocritical games with the people of Texas, all of whom have the same rights under the Contitution that you allegedly swore to uphold.


And quit wasting their tax money with what are bound to be ridiculous, frivolous and doomed lawsuits. For which they will wind up having to pay not only state costs, but the costs of those forced to bring the suit.

Oh, and that Bible: You might want to read what it says sometime. I suggest something from your Christian New Testament, King James Version:

There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus.

Paul's Letter to the Galatians 3:28

Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes!

The Supreme Court has upheld the Obamacare subsidies for more than 6 million Americans with a 6-3 vote in the King v. Burwell decision, handed down moments ago.

This means that individuals who get their health insurance through an exchange established by the federal government will be eligible for tax subsidies.

Six voting for the Affordable Care Act are Chief Roberts, Kennedy, Ginsburg, Breyer, Sotomayor, and Kagan.

This is, of course, great news for those people who can now feel secure about Affordable Health Care and their own health needs. It is great news for the Obama administration and oddly enough, for Republicans, who can continue to moan and groan about it to their radical base without having to watch millions of people suddenly lose health care while the Grand Old Party stands by cheering without having any plan to put in its place.

Realty reality

 

Click on the image above to enlarge image

The National Low Income Housing Coalition has calculated the hourly wage a resident would need to earn to afford a moderate, two-bedroom apartment in each state. They found that the average hourly wage needed to rent a $1,006 two-bedroom unit in the United States is $19.35  -- $40,240 per year.

And yet there are those among us who believe that a single mother with two children should be happy to get by with the minimum wage of  $7.25. Even someone earning $19.35 a hour would have to work forty hours a week, fifty-two weeks of the year to earn the $40,240 needed. And people working for minimum wage are usually not working full-time all year long.

Labor

No small part of this situation is the deliberate destruction of labor unions and other efforts to organize workers. That the so-called religious leaders of this country have not only stood by but actively colluded in this process is one of the scandals of our times.

Sinister

Sinister: adjective

1. threatening or portending evil, harm, or trouble; ominous:

a sinister remark.

2. bad, evil, base, or wicked; fell:

his sinister purposes.

3. unfortunate; disastrous; unfavorable:

a sinister accident.

4. of or on the left side; left.

From the Latin sinistra: on the left hand or side, hence unfavorable, injurious   

Hence? 

Home again, home again, jiggety-jig

Well, I made it home Sunday night after a dreadful flight and all sorts of hassles at customs and missing my connecting flight to O'Hare and ... well, I made it home exhausted.  I am getting too old for this. There was a time when ... Never mind.

I took a limo from O'Hare down to Barona. Damien welcomed me with open arms and heart, but immediately shushed me because we had a house guest. The plaguey Hank Pharr was still here. Fortunately I was too wiped out to care about anything but taking some aspirin and going to bed. Damien assured me that the Pharr thing would be gone by the time I awoke.

Which, I am happy to say, was true. I slept until nearly noon and woke to the nuzzle of two cats and the sound of Damien moving about in the kitchen.

It is good to be home.