Sunday Morning Reflections - and Sadness for America

A group of us went to see the movie "Jackie" last evening.  The movie was very well done and I can now understand the talk about Natalie Portman perhaps receiving an Academy Award nomination.  Being of an age where I remember first hand watching the news and TV coverage after the fateful day in Dallas in 1963, the movie brought back some of the emotions from that time.  But it also had me constantly thinking "what the Hell has happened to America"  that a crude, narcissistic bully and demagogue like Donald Trump will soon be the resident at the White House.   John F. Kennedy certainly had his faults, but he challenge America to be its best and seemingly cared about making things better for all Americans.  In contrast, with Trump we have a would be authoritarian leader who won office by appealing to hatred and bigotry and who through his cabinet nominees seems poised to erase the progress in equality that has occurred over the years since 1963. 

The reality this morning is that racist, homophobes and those who would destroy public education and the social safety net are ascendant.  This Friday, a would be fascist who cares nothing about upholding and protecting the U.S. Constitution will be sworn into the presidency.  Worse yet, there are serious reasons to believe that Trump is either subject to Russian blackmail or colluded with a hostile foreign power to win the 2016 presidential election. Compounding the nightmare, Congressional Republicans for the most part are seeking to turn a blind eye to possible treason and seek to wage war on average Americans, literally pursuing policies that will lead to premature deaths of many, many Americans. 

The movie "Jackie" ends with the vision of the Kennedy White House as "Camelot" - an image Jackie Kennedy sought to plant and maintain.  Now, with Donald J. Trump soon to be the titular president - I will NEVER recognize or respect him as such - it feels as King Arthur has been slain by Mordred or akin to Rome being sacked by the Visigoths.  I have little faith in American intelligence services to take down Trump  - and hopefully Pence too if he was complicit in Trump's dealing with Putin - as needs to be done.  It seems that our only hope may be that Britain's MI-6 or other allied intelligence services get the goods on Trump and release the information to the foreign media.  My faith in the American media that gives false equivalence to the reprehensible and untruths to do the job that the Founding Fathers envisioned.

Darkness is descending on America and it must be resisted.   

Trump South Carolina Rally Has Shades of Nazi Behavior

I and others have accused Donald Trump of fascist behavior and policies.  Now, at a rally in North Augusta, South Carolina yesterday, Trump brought on stage thugs in attendance at the rally who engaged in behavior reminiscent of what Nazi goons did to opponents at rallies early in the rise of the Nazi Party.  What happened?  Attendees at the Trump rally roughed up a young protester who had a handmade sign denouncing Trump’s stance on immigration.   Like Hitler and his brown shirts, Trump and his followers deal with critics by engaging in physical and verbal violence.  Don't like people and/or what they have to say, the solution is to beat them up physically.  I would remind readers that a third of Trump supporters would ban gays from entering America.  Are American gays a future target of Trumps goons?  Think Progress looks at this frightening behavior.  Here are highlights:

It’s become a familiar pattern at Donald Trump rallies: a protester or several interrupt the Republican front runner, angry Trump supporters physically and verbally attack, and the offenders are escorted out by security officers. 

Tuesday’s rowdy rally in North Augusta, South Carolina brought a twist to the formula. After Trump supporters ripped away a handmade sign denouncing Trump’s stance on immigration from young protester Thomas Hill, Trump honored the men by inviting them on stage.

“I saw fists start to fly,” Trump said, referring to the protester as a “rough cookie.”  He then praised the supporters who physically confronted him, saying, “I love people with courage.”

After the protester was escorted out by security, flipping his middle fingers to the crowd as he left, Trump asked those who “took action” against him to join him on stage. After hugging the men and praising them, Trump gave them the microphone. 

“Do not let them intimidate you,” the first supporter told the roaring crowd, referring to the lone protester. “They will say anything, they will do anything to keep in power. We don’t need who is in there now. We need to get some fresh bunch up there, some fresh blood.”

The second, an Richmond County police officer and Iraq War veteran, added: “If it wasn’t for Mr. Trump right here, I don’t think any of us would have the voice that we have. This is the only man who is really going to bring America back.”

Though in recent weeks the Trump has played a recorded warning at his rallies telling supporters not to “touch or harm” protesters, the candidate has previously praised those who have acted violently.
In August, after two men inspired by Trump’s rhetoric beat and urinated on a homeless Latino man, Trump told reporters that his supporters tend to be “passionate” and said, “They love this country and they want this country to be great again.” 

The RNC Sells its Soul to Trump

The moral corruption and retreat from sanity and decency of the Republican Party began years ago and ironically traces, in my view, to the rise of the "godly folks" in the party base.  The Christofascists, as I call them, who are neither sane nor decent people.  Hate, bigotry and a world view based on myths and - as one blogger friend puts it - belief in an imaginary invisible friend are now what drives the GOP and demagogues like Donald Trump and Ted Cruz are the natural result of the party's throwing aside of logic, reason, and belief in science in favor of racism and superstition.  Now, even the RNC seems ready to put the final nails in the coffin of the party by signalling that it will sell itself to Trump and Trumpism.   A column in the Washington Post looks at this final surrender.  Here are excerpts:

Late Thursday night, National Review, the storied conservative magazine founded by William F. Buckley, published an issue denouncing Donald Trump. . . . The Republican National Committee reacted swiftly — immediately revoking the permission it had given National Review to host a Republican presidential debate next month. 

That soft flapping sound you hear is the Grand Old Party waving the flag of surrender to Trump. Party elites — what’s left of the now-derided “establishment” — are acquiescing to the once inconceivable: that a xenophobic and bigoted showman is now the face of the Republican Party and of American conservatism. 

In recent days, influential Republicans including Bob Dole, Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad, RNC Chairman Reince Priebus, Rupert Murdoch and, as my Post colleagues reported, Rudy Giuliani and Rep. Peter King (N.Y.) have made noises about being able to stomach Trump. Republican donors are trying to insinuate themselves in the billionaire’s orbit. 

The Wall Street Journal editorial page had long criticized Trump’s candidacy, publishing an editorial in July arguing that the conservative media who applaud Trump “are hurting the cause.” The editors opined: “If Donald Trump becomes the voice of conservatives, conservatism will implode along with him.”

A week ago, the Journal reversed course. “Mr. Trump is a better politician than we ever imagined, and he is becoming a better candidate,” the editorialists wrote, speculating that “he might possibly be able to appeal to a larger set of voters than he has so far.”

[H]ow do you un-ring all these bells? Trump has in word and deed built his candidacy by antagonizing Latinos and Muslims, immigrants and women, Jews and African Americans, Asian Americans and the disabled. And if he walked away from his vows to deport 11 million illegal immigrants and to block Muslims from coming into the United States, he’d abandon the source of his power: the rage of angry, less-educated white men.

[T]he only thing more likely to devastate the Republican Party and the conservative movement than a Trump wipeout in November would be a Trump victory. Either way, he’d cement the Republican Party’s long-term demographic problems and bind conservatism to bigotry and nativism.

 

This is why I wonder about the self-deception of those GOP elites now cozying up to Trump. . . . . If, in future years, Republicans and conservatives are called to explain how Trump happened, they might recall this: Good people could have stopped him, but they didn’t.

Once again we see the RNC looking for a current election cycle  victory with no thought to the long terms consequences.  This is how those who once would have been shunned and looked at as a form of contagion were welcomed into the GOP only to ultimately hijack the party. This is precisely how the GOP has come to be the party of insanity and hate.  The RNC and the so-called establishment have seemingly learned nothing.

Donald Trump and the Cult of White America

Even in today's Republican Party it is still unacceptable to openly support the Klu Klux Klan and overt white supremacy groups, but Donald Trump has seemingly formulate a campaign pitch that otherwise plays to the prejudices of such groups and white Americans terrified at losing their white privilege and/or ability to force their religious beliefs on all of society.  As a piece in Salon argues, Trump has become a cult leader for these objective-reality adverse people and plays upon their fears by blaming their misfortunes on those deemed as "other."  Trump also promises a return to "greatness" as the prize that he will deliver if elected.  It is very much the model used by Hitler and Mussolini to come to power in 1930's Germany and Italy.  It is very frightening to watch and the mindset of his followers borders on psychotic.  Here are column highlights:

Donald Trump is the front-runner in the 2016 Republican presidential primary race. He leads his closest rival, Ted Cruz, by a substantial margin. Trump’s proto-fascism, xenophobia and bigotry are not anomalies or outliers. These values are held by a large percentage of Republicans.

Donald Trump validates these feelings. As such, it is now fundamentally clear that Donald Trump is a hero and leader for many conservatives in the Age of Obama. 

Most members of the pundit class have been befuddled by the ascendance of Donald Trump. But, there is one person who has solved this riddle.

In a little-discussed editorial written several weeks ago, Pat Buchanan offered the following analysis:

Enter The Donald:

His popularity is traceable to the fact that he rejects the moral authority of the media, breaks their commandments, and mocks their condemnations. His contempt for the norms of Political Correctness is daily on display.

And that large slice of America that detests a media whose public approval now rivals that of Congress, relishes this defiance. The last thing these folks want Trump to do is to apologize to the press.

And the media have played right into Trump’s hand. They constantly denounce him as grossly insensitive for what he has said about women, Mexicans, Muslims, McCain and a reporter with a disability. Such crimes against decency, says the press, disqualify Trump as a candidate for president.

And when they demand that Republicans repudiate him, the GOP base replies:  “Who are you to tell us whom we may nominate? You are not friends. You are not going to vote for us. And the names you call Trump — bigot, racist, xenophobe, sexist — are the names you call us, nothing but cuss words that a corrupt establishment uses on those it most detests.”

Pat Buchanan possesses gifted insight into powerful appeal of Donald Trump for the Republican base. Both men are nativist, xenophobic, right-wing populists who understand the allure of white alienation and racial resentment in the post civil rights era. Pat Buchanan is more of a “culture warrior” than Donald Trump. But like George Wallace in the 1960s, the Know-Nothings in the 19th century and the Black Legion in the 1930s, Buchanan and Trump are recent iterations in a long history of right-wing demagoguery and false populism in American politics.

All one has to do is listen to Donald Trump’s supporters (who are really none too different from the Republican base writ large) and how they make sense of the political and social world.

These people are divorced from reality. To listen to Donald Trump’s supporters is to peek into the mouth of political madness.

One of the main challenges that responsible members of the pundit classes are having in making sense of the Republican Party in the Age of Obama—and movement conservatism in the post civil rights era, more generally—is that they still possess some faith in the merits of political discourse as based on mutually agreed upon facts, proceeding in good faith, the Common Good, and a belief in some version of normal politics in the service of responsible governance.

Moreover, the commentariat has still not effectively grappled with how today’s brand of conservatism exhibits pre-Enlightenment era thinking, and uses what I (and others) have described as “the politics of disorientation” to confuse the American people through a coordinated campaign of outright lying and seductive disinformation.

Donald Trump is a proto-fascist. He buddies up with Russian President Vladimir Putin for credibility in his role as a new il-Duce, a petit Mussolini for 21st century American politics. Donald Trump is a classic “strong man” political figure. To that end, he encourages violence by his followers against political opponents and those identified as the Other or somehow weak. Nor does Donald Trump deny that he is a “racist” or “neo-fascist.”

Trump also brags about his “perfect health,” “high energy” and vitality. Here, the fit body and Trump’s egomaniacal narcissism are essential for his crafting the charismatic leader persona.

To understand Donald Trump’s appeal, one must seriously consider the possibility that his followers specifically, and movement conservatives and the Republican Party more generally, are exhibiting signs of political psychopathology.

Donald Trump’s — and the Republican Party’s — base of low information voters are not being grabbed off of the street by his agents. Trump is providing a safe space and outlet for conservatives to validate their preexisting racist, xenophobic and bigoted attitudes. Their true selves are being actualized and “liberated.”

The Republican 2016 presidential primary candidates are using a campaign of fear and anxiety about terrorism, “illegal immigrants,” changing racial demographics, “black crime” and “Islam” to gin up support among a frightened public. This is the Southern Strategy mixed with old-fashioned fear-mongering to win over the votes of scared, mostly older, white voters in a moment when a black man happens to be president of the United States. This tactic also leverages how the brain structures and political personal types of conservatives/authoritarians are much more responsive to anxiety, fear and feelings of disgust than those of liberals and progressives.

Contemporary conservatives exist within an echo chamber that has been created by Republican elites, Fox News, right-wing talk radio and other media. It has expanded to include online spaces. The worldview that is created there is one where basic facts about empirical reality are rejected, and the right-wing paranoid style of conspiracy theories and unfounded rumors have replaced substantive political discourse. 

Bursting the information cocoon of those people in a traditional religious cult or who are immersed in the right-wing media echo chamber is not an easy task. They will resist. In political psychology, this phenomenon is called the “backfire effect.” It offers a chilling insight into the impact of extreme political ideology, polarization and the right-wing media on its followers.

If Trump’s supporters—and movement conservatives en masse—are in fact exhibiting signs of political psychopathology, then the backfire effect is a powerful lens for understanding their behavior.

Donald Trump is a hero for the angry and resentful white “silent majority” and “Everyman” who feel that they are somehow marginalized in “their” country and that “the blacks,” immigrants, Muslims and terrorists are out to get them. Cults provide easy answers, direction and a feeling of belonging for their members. The cult leader offers a way for his or her devotees to feel better about themselves than they did before joining the community. This is not a form of healthy personal growth or behavior. In most cases, it is deleterious to the self. When such techniques are used in politics, on many millions of people, it is a form of mass psychosis.

Donald Trump is a carnival barker, proto-fascist reality TV show host turned Republican 2016 presidential primary leader. And he may also be a Svengali or Rasputin-like figure for the low information Republican base.

What Donald Trump's Surge Says About the GOP

As a one time GOP activist more than two decades ago, I am continually appalled by what the Republican Party has become.  It's not only ugly, but dangerous and the driving forces behind the GOP today are greed - individual and corporate - and hatred of others, with the list of those deemed "other" being extensive and encompassing pretty much everyone other than white far right Christians.  A piece in Salon looks at the phenomenon and looks at why Donald Trump is surging in the GOP polls.  The piece also draws apt parallels between today's GOP and fascism of the 1930's .  Here are highlights:

In the political discussion of today, there always comes a risk of being discounted as a crackpot when using a word like “fascist” to describe a political opponent. The word, much like “socialist,” has been so abused since the fall of fascism that it lost its meaning quite some time ago.

In a recent article by Jeffrey Tucker, however, it is argued, quite justly in my opinion, that Donald Trump, whether he knows it or not, is a fascist (or is at least acting like one). Much like Mussolini and Hitler, Trump is a demagogue dedicated to riling up the people (particularly conservatives) with race baiting, traditionalism and strongman tough talk — and, according to polls, it’s working — for now. Tucker writes:

“Trump has tapped into it, absorbing unto his own political ambitions every conceivable resentment (race, class, sex, religion, economic) and promising a new order of things under his mighty hand.”

The thing is, his style — full of race baiting, xenophobia and belligerent nationalism — is not unique to Trump; he is simply the most blatant and vocal about it. There’s a reason he’s leading in the GOP polls: the party’s base likes what he’s saying. The people are angry about illegal immigrants murdering white women (anyone who has followed Bill O’Reilly over the past week knows what I’m talking about), homosexuals destroying the tradition of marriage, and so on. Much like fascism reacted to modernity and social progress in the early 20th century, right-wingers are reacting angrily to social progress of the new century.

So is the GOP becoming the new fascist party? That might be an exaggeration, but it does share many similar features, and Trump, with his demagogic style, is simply exposing how very similar the passions of the GOP base are to the passions of fascism of the early 20th century.

The modern GOP is a party of unwavering and dogmatic patriotism mixed with traditionalism and intolerance. The social progression we have been witnessing over the past decade in America, most clearly with the acceptance of the LGBT community, seems to be triggering a reactionary movement on the right. We see this most recently with the religious freedom controversies and the angry protests of the Supreme Court’s gay marriage ruling. Fascism of the early 20th century was also largely a negative reaction to modernity . . .

The modern GOP is also somewhat contradictory. Its followers, for example, promote free market ideals and despise welfare for the poor, while exclaiming the worship of Jesus Christ, whose teachings are almost socialistic.

Overall, however, the GOP has a pretty straightforward idea of its platform. Like fascism, tradition is holy — the tradition of marriage, family values, Christian ideals. . . . Another similarity is its belligerence.

Beyond these values, the GOP tends to preach and practice intolerance, xenophobia, nationalism and anti-democratic values (i.e., voter suppression). In many ways, the GOP is anti-enlightenment, and embraces passion over reason. The dangerous denial of climate change and other scientific facts seems to come out of the corrupt alliance of anti-intellectual traditionalism and corporate influence (i.e., oil and gas).

The GOP are obviously not fascists, but they share a family resemblance. As stated above, the base have many similar passions — traditionalism, nationalism, intolerance towards immigrants or minorities. They react with hostility towards the social progress of others and largely believe in a ‘survival of the fittest’ ideology.

Donald Trump is no doubt a wealthy buffoon — but he is a buffoon who understands the underlying passions of the GOP base. Fascist leaders also understood these passions, and knew how to exploit them for political gain. These passions may seem irrational, but they should not be underestimated. 

Putin Increase His War on Gay Russians

A new article at The Daily Beast looks at the worsening conditions for gays in Russia as Vladimir Putin continues to use methods from Adolph Hitler's playbook for marginalizing Jews and making their lives a living Hell in general.  Under Putin's regime, gays are being fired from their jobs, landlords are being pressured to break leases and force gays from their homes, and banks are closing accounts of gay customers.  Some have said Putin's anti-gay policies underscore that he is a fascist at heart.  I'd say Putin's a piece of foul smelling excrement. Here are some article excerpts:

LGBT organizations declared foreign agents in one fell swoop, gays being blacklisted by banks, employers, and landlords—welcome to the new reality of being LGBT under Putin.

In an exclusive interview with The Daily Beast, Tatiana Vinnichenko, director of the Russian LGBT organization Rakurs, revealed how much most of us in the West don’t know about Russia’s anti-gay crackdown. And all of it is bad news.

First, official state prosecutions and persecution of LGBT organizations has morphed and intensified. Previously, LGBT organizations were pressured to register as “foreign agents”—spies, basically—but those registrations were subject to judicial review. The results were uneven: Some courts rubber-stamped the government’s positions, but others found a lack of evidence and ruled for the LGBT organizations.

Earlier this year, says Vinnichenko, the law was quietly changed. Now the government has the power to declare an organization a foreign agent as an administrative matter. In other words, what was once a matter of law, however imperfect, is now a matter of bureaucracy. With one fell swoop—and one that can come at any moment, without warning—a gay community center, or film festival, or support group can be branded a spy.

According to Vinnichenko, Russian authorities are putting pressure on all kinds of institutions—banks, landlords, employers—not to do business with LGBT people and LGBT organizations. Because licenses are required for just about everything in Russia, this “pressure” is existential. Banks are being told, “Dump your LGBT customers, or we’ll shut you down,” she said.

Vinnichenko says all banks have been told that if they have any LGBT organizations as clients, they will lose their licenses; it’s just a matter of time until all of the organizations’ accounts are closed. And the local LGBT community center she runs, she says, is in danger of losing its lease and will have nowhere else to go. No one will rent to her.

This subcontracted homophobia has largely escaped the notice of the Western media so far. It is off the books, so to speak, propelled by threats and extortion rather than overt acts like legislation or prosecution. And it has plausible deniability. “Putin is asked about LGBT people whenever he goes abroad, and he just lies or says he doesn’t know,” said Vinnichenko. “But he knows the situation—he’s the homophobe in chief.”

What she has in mind is for the Russian businesses participating in the privatization of homophobia to be confronted overseas. She points to her own university, which frequently partners with other European and American universities. “The president should be picketed everywhere she goes,” Vinnichenko said. So, too, should the leaders of banks and other businesses.

And Vinnichenko is calling for the United States to follow Canada in providing expedited and “favored” review to LGBT applicants for asylum.

There is more to the sad piece that you should read.  I find myself thinking that it's not a good thing to wish that someone would die, but like Hitler, I think the world would be a better place without Putin in it.  Ditto for the leadership of the Russian Orthodox Church.  Fascism and religion are a truly foul combination.

Russian Government Intimidating Journalists And Activists Before The Olympics

The parallels between the 1936 Summer Olympic Games and the 2014 Sochi Winter Games continue to grow.  One of the measures employed by Hitler and the Nazis was to shut down domestic media outlets that criticize the brutal Nazi policies and to intimidate foreign press officials into silence or  into publishing puff pieces that ignored the growing list of Nazi horrors.  Now, as Towleroad reports, evidence of similar efforts by Vladimir Putin's dictatorial regime are increasing.  Here are some excerpts:

News sites everywhere have been documenting the issues in Russia surrounding the 2014 Olympics in Sochi, including abuse of migrant workers, the health and environmental impacts of construction, and the rather severe problem Russia has with homosexuality. Russia's response to this dissent has been to try to intimidate and abuse journalists and activists, particularly in the lead up to the Olympic Games.

Human Rights Watch has extensive coverage of these abuses and includes accounts of the Sochi Branch of the Russian Geographic Society having its funding threatened, rejection of the Sochi Pride House, distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks on websites critical of the government and the Olympics, and several individual journalists and activists being threatened by government officials.
Rule 48 of the IOC bye-laws explicitly states: 

The IOC takes all necessary steps in order to ensure the fullest coverage by the different media and the widest possible audience in the world for the Olympic Games.

Russia's treatment of journalists may wind up causing even more complications for the IOC as these abuses run directly counter to the bye-laws the IOC are obligated to uphold.

Here's more highlights from Human Rights Watch:

“Trying to bully activists and journalists into silence is wrong and only further tarnishes the image of the Olympics,” said Jane Buchanan, associate Europe and Central Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “One of the non-negotiable requirements of hosting the Olympics is to allow press freedom, and the authorities’ attempts to silence critics are in clear violation of that principle.”

Press freedom is guaranteed under the Olympic Charter, which has an entire section on “Media Coverage of the Olympic Games.” The IOC is obligated to take “all necessary steps in order to ensure the fullest coverage by the different media.” Other by-laws require that “media coverage of the Olympic Games shall not be impaired in any way….”

Starting in 2008, Human Rights Watch has documented the harassment and intimidation of activists, journalists, and others, regarding their actions and comments related to the Sochi Games.

“Preparations for the Sochi Games have been plagued with serious human rights abuses and other problems, many of which have only been brought to light through the efforts of activists and journalists,” Buchanan said. “If the IOC is committed to these issues, it should ask the Russian authorities to immediately stop harassing activists, organizations, and journalists, and investigate allegations of abuse.”

Some journalists told Human Rights Watch that local authorities sought to control negative or critical information about Sochi by pressuring editors to present Olympic preparations exclusively in a “positive” light. In addition, several independent online news sources and blogs that post critical materials about Olympics preparations faced highly coordinated, disabling denial of service attacks, where hackers rendered the sites inaccessible.

“Press freedom is a central tenet of the Olympic Charter and no successful Games can take place in an atmosphere in which journalists are afraid to report on stories of legitimate public interest,” Buchanan said. “The IOC should insist that the Russian authorities guarantee full media freedom for each and every journalist reporting in or traveling to Sochi.”

Harassment and intimidation of civil society in Sochi should be seen against the backdrop of the crackdown on human rights in Russia that has been underway for 15 months since the May 2012 inauguration of President Vladimir Putin.

During that time new laws were adopted restricting public assemblies, re-criminalizing libel, criminalizing religious insult, introducing additional restrictions on internet content, expanding the definition of treason, and banning “propaganda” for “nontraditional sexual relations.” A nationwide, government campaign to force nongovernment groups that accept foreign funding and engage in vaguely-defined “political activity” to register as foreign agents aims to curtail a broad range of work by independent organizations.

 All of these actions are reprehensible.  But they should not be a surprise.  After all, Putin is a former KGB thug.  Now we are seeing that he's changed very little from his KGB days.

Is Cuccinelli's Campaign Seeking to Intimidate and Have Police Watch Bloggers?

 

I am hardly the only Virginia blogger who is seeking to educate readers and others as to the severe danger Ken "Kookinelli" Cuccinelli poses to the Commonwealth of Virginia and the rights and liberties of its citizens, especially those Kookinelli despises: gays, blacks, women and non-Christians for starters.   One such blog is called Cooch Watch 2013 which is reporting on (i) the growing Star Scientific scandal, (ii) Kookinelli's anti-women agenda, and (iii) and all of the other regressive and Christofascist agenda items so loved by Kookinelli.  A post in Blue Virginia suggests that Cuccinelli may not be too happy with such scrutiny and raises the question of whether or not Cuccinelli may be preparing to use the police to harass those who want the public to know all they need to know about Cuccinelli.  Here are excerpts:

Wow, this does not look good at all [see image above]:

An anonymous Cooch Watch supporter got into Ken Cuccinelli's Henrico Field Office and sent us this picture. We did our own research and this is real, folks. Cooch's minions have "Cooch Watch Watch" up and running in cooperation with the police.

In sum, according to the "Cooch Watch" folks, Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli is alleged to be coordinating with local police in Henrico County to keep an eye on a bunch of bloggers who pose absolutely no threat to anyone. If this is really what's going on here: wow. 

So, let's summarize Cuccinelli's unethical behavior over the past couple years: 

*"U.S. Navy Veterans Association" scam/Bobby Thompson scandal? Check.
*Using the powers of the AG's office to persecute a scientist he didn't agree with (Democratic AG candidate Mark Herring has called that behavior by Cuccinelli "UnAmerican," and he's right!)? Check.
*Using Virginia taxpayers' money to have a state employee ghost write his book? Check.
*Crony investing with a slimeball company that pushes "tobacco candy" to kids? Check.
*According to CoochWatch, having the police keep an eye on a bunch of bloggers who don't want him elected? Check. 

P.S. One person on the "Cooch Watch" Facebook page wrote, "[I] just called the 501-5000 number. [T]he lady who answered the phone professed ignorance about the possibility that a sitting politician is abusing state power by asking one of the coercive agencies of the state (the PD) to spy or harass a women's health advocacy group. She also verified the 328-2570 number as an east end PD office number."

I will let readers draw their own conclusions.  Personally, in my opinion, such conduct would be very much in keeping with Cuccinelli's fascist inclinations.  His definition of "freedom" and "liberty" translates to extremists and Christofascist like himself imposing their beliefs on all citizens.  The man is in my opinion mentally ill and is a would be Hitler at the state level - although his ambitions extend far beyond Virginia.  He needs to be roundly defeated in November.  

How the Vatican Built a Secret Real Estate Empire With Mussolini's Millions

Personally, I view the Roman Catholic Church hierarchy as among the most corrupt and morally bankrupt institutions in the world.  But, as a story in The Guardian reveals, a world wide conspiracy to protect and cover up for sexual predators who molested thousands and thousands of children and minors and past charges of money laundering aren't the Church's only dirty laundry.  Now, we find out that the Vatican has used millions in Fascist money to build a secret real estate empire.  As I have frequently maintained, tawdry whore are more virtuous that the leadership of the Catholic Church.  Here are story highlights:

Few passing London tourists would ever guess that the premises of Bulgari, the upmarket jewellers in New Bond Street, had anything to do with the pope. Nor indeed the nearby headquarters of the wealthy investment bank Altium Capital, on the corner of St James's Square and Pall Mall.

But these office blocks in one of London's most expensive districts are part of a surprising secret commercial property empire owned by the Vatican.

Behind a disguised offshore company structure, the church's international portfolio has been built up over the years, using cash originally handed over by Mussolini in return for papal recognition of the Italian fascist regime in 1929.

Since then the international value of Mussolini's nest-egg has mounted until it now exceeds £500m. In 2006, at the height of the recent property bubble, the Vatican spent £15m of those funds to buy 30 St James's Square. Other UK properties are at 168 New Bond Street and in the city of Coventry. It also owns blocks of flats in Paris and Switzerland.

The surprising aspect for some will be the lengths to which the Vatican has gone to preserve secrecy about the Mussolini millions. The St James's Square office block was bought by a company called British Grolux Investments Ltd, which also holds the other UK properties. Published registers at Companies House do not disclose the company's true ownership, nor make any mention of the Vatican.  Instead, they list two nominee shareholders, both prominent Catholic bankers.

Ultimate control is recorded as being exercised by a Swiss company, Profima SA.  British wartime records from the National Archives in Kew complete the picture. They confirm Profima SA as the Vatican's own holding company, accused at the time of "engaging in activities contrary to Allied interests". Files from officials at Britain's Ministry of Economic Warfare at the end of the war criticised the pope's financier, Bernardino Nogara, who controlled the investment of more than £50m cash from the Mussolini windfall.

Nogara's "shady activities" were detailed in intercepted 1945 cable traffic from the Vatican to a contact in Geneva, according to the British, who discussed whether to blacklist Profima as a result.

The Mussolini money was dramatically important to the Vatican's finances. John Pollard, a Cambridge historian, says in Money and the Rise of the Modern Papacy: "The papacy was now financially secure. It would never be poor again."

The Mussolini investments in Britain are currently controlled, along with its other European holdings and a currency trading arm, by a papal official in Rome, Paolo Mennini, who is in effect the pope's merchant banker. Mennini heads a special unit inside the Vatican called the extraordinary division of APSA – Amministrazione del Patrimonio della Sede Apostolica – which handles the so-called "patrimony of the Holy See".

While secrecy about the Fascist origins of the papacy's wealth might have been understandable in wartime, what is less clear is why the Vatican subsequently continued to maintain secrecy about its holdings in Britain  .  .  .  .  True to its tradition of silence on the subject, the Roman Catholic church's spokesman said that the nuncio had no comment.

For those unfamiliar with Mussolini, here are some highlights from Wikipedia:

Following the March on Rome in October 1922 he became the 27th Prime Minister of Italy and began using the title Il Duce by 1925, within five years he had established dictatorial authority by both legal and extraordinary means, aspiring to create a totalitarian state. After 1936, his official title was Sua Eccellenza Benito Mussolini, Capo del Governo, Duce del Fascismo e Fondatore dell'Impero ("His Excellency Benito Mussolini, Head of Government, Duce of Fascism, and Founder of the Empire").

^{Mussolini argued that Italy was right to follow an imperalist policy in Africa because all black people were "inferior" to whites.  Mussolini claimed that the world was divided into a hierarchy of races (stirpe), though this was justified more on cultural than on biological grounds, and that history was nothing more than a Darwinian struggle for power and territory between various "racial masses"}

after 1922, Mussolini personally took over the ministries of the interior, foreign affairs, colonies, corporations, defense, and public works. Sometimes he held as many as seven departments simultaneously, as well as the premiership. He was also head of the all-powerful Fascist Party and the armed local fascist militia, the MVSN or "Blackshirts", who terrorised incipient resistances in the cities and provinces. He would later form the OVRA, an institutionalised secret police that carried official state support. In this way he succeeded in keeping power in his own hands and preventing the emergence of any rival.

Between 1925 and 1927, Mussolini progressively dismantled virtually all constitutional and conventional restraints on his power,

He did not hesitate laying siege to towns, using torture, and holding women and children as hostages to oblige suspects to give themselves up.

Mussolini pushed for government control of business: by 1935, Mussolini claimed that three-quarters of Italian businesses were under state control. That same year, he issued several edicts to further control the economy, including forcing all banks, businesses, and private citizens to give up all their foreign-issued stocks and bonds to the Bank of Italy.

All teachers in schools and universities had to swear an oath to defend the fascist regime. Newspaper editors were all personally chosen by Mussolini and no one who did not possess a certificate of approval from the fascist party could practice journalism.

By 1938, the enormous influence Hitler now had over Mussolini became clear with the introduction of the Manifesto of Race. The Manifesto, which was closely modeled on the Nazi Nuremberg laws, stripped Jews of their Italian citizenship and with it any position in the government or professions.

On 11 February 1929, he signed a concordat and treaty with the Roman Catholic Church Under the Lateran Pact, Vatican City was granted independent statehood and placed under Church law—rather than Italian law—and the Catholic religion was recognized as Italy's state religion. The Church also regained authority over marriage, Catholicism could be taught in all secondary schools, birth control and freemasonry were banned, and the clergy received subsidies from the state, and was exempted from taxation. Pope Pius XI praised Mussolini, and the official Catholic newspaper pronounced "Italy has been given back to God and God to Italy."

And there you have it - a little bit of background on the man who was the source of the Vatican's new found wealth following the Lateran Pact.  Wealth that allowed the Vatican to build its secret real estate empire.   Ill gotten money financing an ill gotten institution.  ^{How appropriate that the current Pope is literally a former Nazi - or at minimum, a Hitler Youth.}