Civil Discourse Now

Where the far left and far right overlap for fun and enlightenment

Mark Small's Blog – February 2022 Archive (32)

ABC/PAC: anti-union construction group & I am pro-union

Political Action Committees (PACs) send mail to candidates for public office. ABC/PAC (its logo in red, white & blue), made of “400 businesses in the construction industry across Indiana” sent a questionnaire of five (5) compound questions that could be a bit confusing. 1/5

ABC/PAC opposes labor unions and calls non-union contractors “merit construction companies.” Labor unions is subject to the same imperfections as any human endeavor, but without unions we would not have…

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Added by Mark Small on February 28, 2022 at 9:00pm — 1 Comment

Hogs are polite to those who feed them slop

On a different note: gov’t should not subsidize pro sports. Billionaires don’t need $. Our public school teachers, bridges & highways are better places to spend tax $. However, local gov’t has already thrown $ in and there is little we can do to stop the deluge. However... 1/3

If I am elected State Rep from Indiana’s 86th legisl district, I shall offer a bill to ban professional sports franchises from offering, and elected officials from accepting, free tickets, passes to suites,…

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Added by Mark Small on February 28, 2022 at 10:13am — No Comments

Nervous that Rick Santorums of the World might have nuke launch codes?

For the first time since the Cuban Missile Crisis, when I was in 2nd grade, there is very real talk of nuclear war. Evangelicals w/whom I’ve disagreed on issues maintain people who do not believe in their specific supreme deity cannot be “moral.” An insane Russian 1/6



named Putin, at any minute, could give a launch order and, as a result, cause most of the Earth to be incinerated. The next “act,” according to “Revelation,” is the 2nd coming. People who believe such a nuclear is good… Continue

Added by Mark Small on February 27, 2022 at 6:38pm — 1 Comment

MAGA fans of Putin & 1930s "America First" fans

trump calls Putin invading Ukraine brilliant/something we should do to Mexico. So trump is callous to mass death, wants conquest for its own sake, ignores how Russia’s economy will be crippled & would have us reviled by rest of the World. 1/

Groups of Americans cheered 4 dictators B4. Example: 2/20/39 the German-American Bund (“GAB”) held rally in Madison Square Garden w/ > 20K present. Few months later Germany invaded Poland & WWII started. Support for GAB collapsed.…

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Added by Mark Small on February 27, 2022 at 7:29am — No Comments

GOP corporate entity needs to be changed to be accountable to voters

Not long ago, each of the two major political parties (“Big 2") had liberal & conservative wings. The GOP in 1964 began to shed its liberals so it could grab the Dems’ “solid South”: States that went “D” since the Civil War because Dems had opposed the GOP’s Reconstruction. 1/6



Racism isn’t ancient, but contemporary, history. And the GOP has structured itself as a corporate entity under control of right wing elements that must be dislodged. This is important in States like… Continue

Added by Mark Small on February 26, 2022 at 9:08am — No Comments

MAGA ppl: want a "strong man" leader? Look at Putin

Vladimir Putin came up through the KGB back in the U.S.S.R. After Boris Yeltsin gave Putin the keys & staggered off the stage, Putin cemented his hold on power by blaming apt bldg bombings on Chechens. Over 300 ppl were killed. This from the Heritage Foundation: 1/5

“Putin is a killer” because his rise to pwr was based on the siege of Grozny, the Chechen capital, where “between 50,000 and 80,000, most civilians, were killed. Russian tanks flattened the city.” Add to that:…

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Added by Mark Small on February 24, 2022 at 4:14pm — No Comments

Sen Rick Scott's GOP, nationalist & socialist, manifesto

Sen Rick Scott built his career on defrauding Medicare, Medicaid & other Federal programs. He has issued an 11-point GOP manifesto (of sorts) with several policy suggestions to follow. The first point focuses on kids. They’ll say the pledge of allegiance & salute the Flag. 1/6

They’ll learn America’s gr8, choose a school that will inspire patriotism & stop teaching radical left’s revisionist history. Kids’ll learn re: wisdom of Constitution, Bill of Rights & founding…

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Added by Mark Small on February 23, 2022 at 10:31pm — No Comments

Putin loves & wants to emulate Stalin. That's NOT good

Putin’s speech was startling & scary. Parts seem to have passed w/little notice, but that is to be understood in such a long speech. Rare is the speech of a U.S. President that cites specific events in distant history to justify current policy. Putin traced Russian/Soviet history. 1/6

An Austrian, who later led Germany, dictated an exhaustive, fictional history of der Fatherland to justify twisted plans. Skirmishes expanded his Reich & led up 2 false claims of Polish…

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Added by Mark Small on February 22, 2022 at 10:10pm — No Comments

GOP candidates can't say what case is Griswold is, then want to toss it

All 3 GOP candidates for Michigan Att’y Gen’l last evening chimed in on SCOTUS’s decision in Griswold v Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479 (1965). Good news? None recognized the case by name & 1 had to look it up on his phone. Bad news? All 3 want Griswold scrapped. 1/7

In Griswold, the Court held there is a right to privacy. If you say, “There’s no ‘right of privacy’ in The Constitution,” you do not understand The Constitution. This sentiment is why Alexander Hamilton, one of The Framers,…

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Added by Mark Small on February 22, 2022 at 7:58am — No Comments

Why I'm running as a Republican

People close to me, whom I respect, don’t understand why I am a Republican after a life spent as a person not GOP. Others, who cling to a GOP as bastion of conservativism, say I am not a “true Republican”, but the GOP’s articles of incorporation contain no ideology. 1/8

Lee Atwater set the groundwork for double-think. In the early ‘80s he said the GOP should swap out divisive terms (like racial expletives) with race-neutral terms like “busing,” i.e. the GOP should dissemble & deny…

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Added by Mark Small on February 21, 2022 at 9:32pm — No Comments

Crime downtown & construction w/o urban planning

“If you build it, he will come,” a voice told Kevin Costner’s character, Ray Kinsella, in “Field of Dreams.” Kinsella nearly goes bankrupt as he mows down corn to build a baseball field. We see a similar phenomenon here in Indianapolis. A lot of buildings are going up. 1/7

If someone has $, contractors will build. In Indy the $ is from Tax Increment Financing Districts or “TIFs.” TIFs were a funding mechanism created in California in the 1950s to build things in urban wastelands where…

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Added by Mark Small on February 21, 2022 at 7:18am — No Comments

Let's sit outside gun stores/shooting ranges & photograph those who enter!

Is there overlap of gun nuts & ppl harass women who enter women’s health centers? A peer reviewed study might establish a link. Also: do guns deter crimes & prevent more injuries & death than they cause? That question can’t be effectively answered. 1/6



The CDC have been barred, since the mid-1990s, by Federal law from sanctioning such research. The work can be significant. For example, 1964 Surgeon General’s report on mainstream cigarette smoke relied on peer review… Continue

Added by Mark Small on February 19, 2022 at 8:41am — No Comments

Opposites of meaning on a cold evening of rain

The Land of the Free has the largest # of inmates, total & as % of population of any country. The Home of the Brave uses drones operated like blips in video games, by kids in air-conditioned, reinforced concrete bunkers, here in the USA. The drones kill people. 1/3



One hopes they kill intended targets & usually on the other side of the World w/o a war declared. People used to say, “Love it or leave it.” I preferred, “Change it or lose it” Now anything might be too late. I’ll… Continue

Added by Mark Small on February 18, 2022 at 9:37pm — No Comments

"Liberty Institute" in Texas was created to stifle academic freedom

Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines “liberty” as “the ability to do as one pleases, or a right or immunity enjoyed by prescription or by grant.” Academic freedom in college means professors “should be free from institutional censorship or discipline.” AAUP, 1940. 1/5

Texas Lt Gov Dan Patrick tweeted about Critical Race Theory (CRT) “we will ban it in publicly funded higher ed. That’s why we created the Liberty Institute at UT [Univ Texas].” To “ban” is “to legally or officially…

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Added by Mark Small on February 17, 2022 at 9:00am — No Comments

Gun survey this left-wing GOP candidate has received! Yee-haw!

1 benefit of candidacy 4 Indiana State Rep is organizations want to know where I stand on their pet issues. “Hoosier Gun Rights” & “National Association for Gun Rights” sent me a “candidate Survey” to be completed & signed by 3/4/22. Two items are @ the end. 1/8

“Please Note: Failure to answer a question will be graded as an anti-gun answer.”& “My signature affirms that the answers given above accurately represent my beliefs as a candidate for State Representative in the…

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Added by Mark Small on February 16, 2022 at 6:02pm — No Comments

Tonight on CDN: SEL and CRT w/Kim Livorno of Purple for Parents and Ronald Cunningham K-12 educator

There are people who say slavery, as an issue, is in this country’s distant past. As such kids in public schools should not be made to feel “uncomfortable” by study of slavery. We should put slavery in the context of a tumor holding that which should be released. 1/8

U.S. average adult weights today. Adult male: near 200 lbs, female 170. At the start of the Civil War, slaves were 17% of the total population and 32% population of the States that seceded. The tumor would be 34/28.9 lbs…

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Added by Mark Small on February 15, 2022 at 9:54am — No Comments

Free speech protects those who say trump stole 2016 election; his acts of treason are not protected

Prof Laurence Tribe noted trump “now suggests that in a country as ‘strong’ as he’d make ours, those linking his 2016 campaign to Russia would be put to death. That’s Donald Trump’s America. Not kidding.” I would have to be included on the list of the condemned. 1/5

I’ve written how trump obtained office w/Russian help. The Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act, passed by veto-proof majorities in House & Senate in 2017, noted Putin, in 2012, aimed to influence our…

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Added by Mark Small on February 14, 2022 at 8:18am — No Comments

I do not want racists' votes & I'm GOP candidate in IN86

If you are a voter in Indiana’s House of Representatives District 86 (IN86), please consider why you should request a Republican ballot for the primary election on May 3, especially if “GOP” or “Republican,” in these times, makes you angry or has an emetic effect. 1/9

1) Not long ago both major parties had progressive wings. Clean Air & Clean Water Acts were enacted & EPA created during a GOP administration. Roe v Wade: written by GOP-nominated Justice. @ 1 time Nixon & Dr…

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Added by Mark Small on February 13, 2022 at 7:46am — No Comments

Also from my platform: protect voting rights & eliminate "winner-take-all" method of selecting electors

More random points from my platform. 10) Voting rights. We should make it easier for people to register to vote & then to vote. Early voting, voting by mail and multiple polling sites facilitate voting. We need to pursue all three. Gerrymandering is a horrible practice. 1/6

Both major parties gerrymander to marginalize opponents. Redrawing district lines inherently is political, but should be insulated from partisans for any party. Non-partisan commissions are a step in the right…

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Added by Mark Small on February 12, 2022 at 8:33am — No Comments

Evangelical control of public schools = no choice

It is not easy to refuse to go along. Evangelicals, a minority among Hoosier Christians, might say a child may choose not to go along w/classroom-led prayer, ignore the difficulty of going against the “tide.” (NOTE: prayer in school never has been illegal.) 1/8

Each generation starts out as kids who face crap, some of which is different from what earlier generations faced & some crap is the same, e.g., puberty. In the 1960s I was lucky, as were a lot of the kids in our…

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Added by Mark Small on February 11, 2022 at 9:25pm — 1 Comment

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