https://mypoliticalselfblog.com/ Political Blog https://mypoliticalselfblog.com/articles/the-declaration-of-independence/ https://mypoliticalselfblog.com/articles/the-declaration-of-independence/ Mon, 01 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT WHEN in the Course of human Events, it becomes necessary for one People to dissolve the Political Bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the Powers of the Earth, the separate and equal Station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent Respect to the Opinions of Mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the Separation. https://mypoliticalselfblog.com/articles/the-heritage-foundation-a-contradiction-in-terms/ https://mypoliticalselfblog.com/articles/the-heritage-foundation-a-contradiction-in-terms/ Tue, 24 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT For those of you who remain blissfully ignorant, The Heritage Foundation is a group of ne’er-do-wells who believe that they know better and more than all the historians and Constitutional scholars in the US about what the American government was, is, and should be. https://mypoliticalselfblog.com/articles/on-maga/ https://mypoliticalselfblog.com/articles/on-maga/ Tue, 17 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT Well, Guys and Dolls, I apologize for the lapse in content. There’s been a lot going on here, and until we get those 48-hour days I requisitioned, there’s not always time during the 24-hour ones to get everything done. https://mypoliticalselfblog.com/articles/peace-in-israel/ https://mypoliticalselfblog.com/articles/peace-in-israel/ Thu, 23 Oct 2025 00:00:00 GMT It should be well known by now that on Tuesday, 7 October 2025, the still living hostages were returned to Israel just two years from the day they were taken. https://mypoliticalselfblog.com/articles/dump-2-0-a-monumental-disimprovement/ https://mypoliticalselfblog.com/articles/dump-2-0-a-monumental-disimprovement/ Tue, 01 Apr 2025 00:00:00 GMT For anyone who’s been living in a cave since November 4, 2024, Dump* won the election and has become “president” for a second term. I put the word president in quotes because not only is he NOT presidential, but he actually took the oath of office without having had his hand on either of the two Bibles Melania was holding (we know because one or both might have burst into flames), which is basically the official equivalent of making a promise to a peer on the playground while having one hand behind one’s back negating that very promise. https://mypoliticalselfblog.com/articles/as-the-world-turns/ https://mypoliticalselfblog.com/articles/as-the-world-turns/ Tue, 18 Mar 2025 00:00:00 GMT I had always, until 2015, been under the impression that the longer we live, the smarter we get. By “we,” I mean the human race, as a whole. Over the millennia, there have been individuals whose curiosity led them to make various discoveries in science and philosophy and mathematics and law and psychology and physics and engineering, and every bit of knowledge that we gained meant that we took a step forward. Because of a lack of good communication in the past, say prior to the 19th century, many discoveries were made contemporaneously in various parts of the planet, but eventually the communities of like-minded individuals were able to get together and hypothesize and test and work out the results of their various theories, so that they could finally put some facts on the table: the Earth rotates around the sun; food that we consume by mouth is digested in the mouth, stomach, small intestines and large intestines, in that order; the diameter of a circle can go around it π times; growing roses and tomatoes is best done with manure, etc. https://mypoliticalselfblog.com/articles/the-honor-system/ https://mypoliticalselfblog.com/articles/the-honor-system/ Thu, 04 Apr 2024 00:00:00 GMT The honor system is something many of us have heard about all our lives. It's a system by which we survive by following unspoken but well-known rules, like not cheating on tests, not pilfering from the cash drawer at work, not stepping out on our significant other while we are on business trips. These are things that we've heard about, but that, at a certain point in our lives, no one should have to tell us directly. They are - at least in certain societies - rules that we've grown up with and grown into and pretty much abide by automatically. https://mypoliticalselfblog.com/articles/enigma/ https://mypoliticalselfblog.com/articles/enigma/ Sun, 11 Feb 2024 00:00:00 GMT The Dump* Enigma https://mypoliticalselfblog.com/articles/truth-or-consequences/ https://mypoliticalselfblog.com/articles/truth-or-consequences/ Tue, 20 Dec 2022 00:00:00 GMT For those of you who don't remember, there was a game show that ran in the US from 1940-1988, first on radio and then on television, in which contestants who failed to answer certain questions truthfully were forced to face the consequences of their wrong answers. Back in the day, people took this seriously as an object lesson in truth versus lies and fact versus fiction. https://mypoliticalselfblog.com/articles/the-wild-wild-west/ https://mypoliticalselfblog.com/articles/the-wild-wild-west/ Mon, 31 Oct 2022 00:00:00 GMT Fans of Seinfeld will remember one of the earlier episodes in which George decides to "slip [his boss] a mickey." On the show, George is frustrated by the way his entitled boss acts, and thinks it would be amusing to do this as it sounds like "something people do in the movies," and he even manages to enlist Elaine in the project. Fortunately, even though he makes the attempt, it does not work as intended, and all is forgotten. In real life, this is conspiracy and attempted murder, both of which are felonies, and he and Elaine would have spent time in jail. https://mypoliticalselfblog.com/articles/insurrection/ https://mypoliticalselfblog.com/articles/insurrection/ Sun, 25 Apr 2021 00:00:00 GMT As I write this the morning after the first insurrection in my recorded history, I think back to the July, 2016 afternoon when D(onald J. Tr)ump (hereinafter "Dump") spoke from a Florida golf course on live television and invited Russia, in so many words, to hack into US e-mail servers to look for Hillary Clinton's "missing e-mails." That was the day that I actively started keeping track of his activities and telling people that he should be arrested and charged with treason, and should by no means be permitted to run for office. I was also - and still am - of the opinion that the media should watch him from afar, but not report on him. A man (I use the term generically, not intending to imply in any way that he is a man or a mensch of any sort) of that mentality needs constant publicity to flourish, and denial of same would pretty much make him crawl back under the rock - or, more accurately, into the hellmouth - from whence he emerged. https://mypoliticalselfblog.com/articles/why-dont-americans-want-national-health-care/ https://mypoliticalselfblog.com/articles/why-dont-americans-want-national-health-care/ Sun, 22 Nov 2020 00:00:00 GMT As you might have noticed from my previous posts, I tend toward the logical and pragmatic, and I will use that approach here, as well. https://mypoliticalselfblog.com/articles/death-by-tweet/ https://mypoliticalselfblog.com/articles/death-by-tweet/ Sat, 08 Jun 2019 00:00:00 GMT A few years back, when social media was taking its first tentative steps into the digital world, I asked around about it. Naturally, no one is born into this world automatically knowing about social media. What I got as an explanation – basically, that it duplicated everything I was getting via e-mail, only this would open up my life to the scrutiny of the whole world rather than my intended victims – put me off. I send essays, comments, personal letters, photographs, to a limited number of people who may be interested. The rest of the world has their own social circles. So I opted out. And when I say “opted out,” I mean that I never joined anything, not Facebook, not Twitter, not LinkedIn, nothing. I’ve been invited several times by colleagues to join LinkedIn – after all, it is supposed to be for professionals in various fields and I am a paraprofessional in several fields – but I’ve always sent them polite e-mails declining their invitations, citing the fact that they could reach me by phone, e-mail, snail mail and text, and that if none of those works, I’m either in the shower or deceased. https://mypoliticalselfblog.com/articles/where-o-where-has-democracy-gone/ https://mypoliticalselfblog.com/articles/where-o-where-has-democracy-gone/ Sat, 25 May 2019 00:00:00 GMT Before we begin, I want to make it clear that I am the product of a fairly comprehensive education at the hands of the New York State public schools, and despite the fact that Latin was removed from our high school curriculum the year before I entered, and, incredibly, despite the fact that I am guilty of never having done a day’s worth of homework in my entire pre-college career, I am an educated person and I remember things that I learned sitting in the classroom. I even remember getting a 95% on an English exam about The Old Man and the Sea despite my never having read the book. I tried, but by the end of page one I determined that I wasn’t a huge Hemingway fan, and so I just paid attention in class and got my 95% on the test and that was the end of it. https://mypoliticalselfblog.com/articles/fentanyl/ https://mypoliticalselfblog.com/articles/fentanyl/ Fri, 10 May 2019 00:00:00 GMT As I'm sure you have all heard, Fentanyl is a growing problem in this country. Many of the recent opioid deaths are a direct result of Fentanyl - either from its direct use, or from other drugs being cut with it. https://mypoliticalselfblog.com/articles/we-the-people/ https://mypoliticalselfblog.com/articles/we-the-people/ Sun, 28 Apr 2019 00:00:00 GMT We, The People is the opening line of the Constitution of the United States, drafted in 1787, and still holding us together 232 years later. Pretty amazing for an upstart country to form itself into a union under the circumstances that we did – fighting off the British and the French and oppressing the natives – and that we have managed to keep it alive so long without descending into anarchy or dictatorship is equally amazing.