Tag: democrats

On Medicine Today

by jcafesin, posted in civil rights, politics

Got Covid again last month. Second time, close to a year after my first go-round with it. I’m fully vaxed. Workout 5 miles a day, 5 days a week. No underlying medical conditions. Low-risk age group.

I got Covid the first time at a karaoke bar when the person sitting next to me literally spit in my mouth. Not purposefully. She was singing with the tone deaf performer, along with most of the bar. It lasted 5 days. I had the typical symptoms and I thought it was done, but 4 weeks after I tested negative, I ended up with a vitreous detachment in my right eye. Two weeks after that, I was in the hospital with vertigo.

My husband took me to Emergency, and after throwing up in the empty waiting room for 20 minutes we followed a nurse into a small glass enclosure. She instructed me to get into the bed while she asked me questions I could barely answer, entered my information into her iPad, and left. The doctor came in 30 minutes later and asked the exact same questions as the nurse. The doctor instructed the nurse what medication to give me intravenously, and what prescriptions I should pick up on my way home, then left. I did not see him again, and was released from the hospital half-hour later.

I was at the hospital for about two and a half hrs, 20 minutes of which I spent in the waiting room, and another 30 waiting for the doctor. Besides the nurse, the only other person who came into the enclosure was a woman collecting $350, credit cards accepted into her handheld payment device. I received a saline solution for hydration, and Metoclopramide to curb the nausea, (though by the time it was administered, my nausea had passed). Oh, and I saw the doctor for less than 5 minutes.

The hospital bill for my Emergency visit was over $3,500. I personally paid out-of-pocket close to $1,200, though I am fully insured and pay $700+ monthly for Blue Shield medical insurance.

Getting the picture why I was scared out of my mind of having Covid again?

Beyond the damage to my health the virus was undoubtedly doing, how much was this second round of Covid going to cost me in downtime and money?

I’d heard of Paxlovid from their constant TV commercials. Pfizer, and their like seem to sponsor most network news these days. “If taken within 5 days of symptoms, Paxlovid reduces severe Covid symptoms in high-risk patients by 86%,” the authoritative male voice-over proclaimed. The ad closed with a quick list of all the reported side effects, including, but not limited to death.

The commercial ran through my head as I lay awake with body aches and sweats. Four days into suffering from this new round of Covid, I asked my husband to call the doctor I’d seen only once, the previous year, for my Long Covid symptoms, and get a prescription for Paxlovid. A part of me didn’t think the doctor could legally prescribe the drug since I don’t exactly fit the ‘high-risk’ profile. The on-call doctor who I’ve never met prescribed me Paxlovid, assuring my husband it was the best course of action to shut down the virus and minimize the risk of another round with Long Covid.

Promises. Promises.

During the time DH was procuring the Paxlovid from our local pharmacy, I searched the internet for data from studies on the drug. The first 5 pages of Google returns were from Pfizer and other Big Pharma corps. Big Pharma pays Google billions annually to advertise their offerings, so of course, Google’s top search results are from their highest paying clients. Google’s returns also included a range of ‘medical’ websites, like WebMD, CVS.com, and Medical News Today, supported by pharmaceutical giants through affiliate marketing. Nine out of ten medical sites pulled their content from Pfizer’s website, all proclaiming the wonders of Paxlovid.

Feverish and exhausted, I searched for FACTS. I started crying reading all the lies from Pfizer, and every other site Google returned, all of them dismissing the complaints from people on Reddit or other discussion forums about their horrible reactions to Paxlovid. Pfizer, and therefore every site that got their content from Pfizer, were all spreading PR lies claiming there was no proof the ill effects reported from taking Paxlovid were related to their drug.

Frustrated and desperate to get the TRUTH, I called the doctor who’d given me the prescription. Talking to him was on par with reading Pfizer’s website — he literally quoted their PR, told me everything I’d read already. When I questioned him about, well, anything negative I’d read in my research, he told me, “Don’t get on the internet and look this stuff up. All it’ll do is scare you.” He went on to instruct me to take the Paxlovid for the next 5 days as prescribed, and I’d be fine. “You may get a slight metallic taste in your mouth, but that’s about it, and that hardly happens to anyone, like 3%.” This was a direct quote from Pfizer I’d read many times in my research. My doctor was repeating to me the same bullshit that the sexy, busty, bubble-headed female Pfizer rep sold to him about Paxlovid.

I had almost every side effect, other than dying, (though some moments I wished I would) from taking Paxlovid. The metallic taste in my mouth was so severe it made me sicker than Covid. I could barely eat. It made me dizzy, and nauseous. I had trouble sleeping while on it. But worse, I got Covid again, a third time, 2 weeks after I had a negative test. And Pfizer KNEW I WOULD. They call it “Rebound” cases, and if you look on Reddit, you’ll find MOST WHO TOOK PAXLOVID GOT A REBOUND CASE — meaning they tested positive for Covid again, weeks after they thought it was over. Without Paxlovid, I got over my first round of Covid in 5 days. It took me almost a month to clear my system of the virus on Paxlovid.

Until Covid, I’d been in the hospital 3 times in my life. I wiped out on my bike and screwed up my knee at 23. I ended up at a Public hospital without insurance at the time (staffed by young intern doctors and training nurses relatively clueless about medicine beyond gunshot wounds and ODs). The other two were to birth my kids.

What these recent experiences have taught me:

  • Google returns and promotes LIES. Google is the ONE (and only) SOURCE MOST USED to get their information.
  • Doctors LIE. They are clueless about most new pharms they prescribe. They simply repeat what these pretty young women are selling them, accepting ‘gifts’ of cash and vacation perks; or maybe they’ll check out the link Pfizer sent them about their new ‘targeted’ cure for Covid.
  • Big Pharma LIES. They consistently over-promise and under deliver. They steal from consumers because our govt lets them. Hundreds of billions of our tax dollars go to fund Pfizer and their like. They should be GIVING AWAY THESE DRUGS because U.S. citizens have PAID FOR THEM WITH OUR TAXES. Yet, they charge us fortunes while making themselves billions annually.
  • Our medical system is BROKEN. Medical debt is the #1 reason for bankruptcy in this country. Money for medicine DOES NOT WORK for anyone other than the wealthy, and the U.S. congress, and our elected officials.

What to do with these FACTS?

  1. Get your information from MANY SOURCES, not just Google!
  2. Don’t blindly believe your doctors, as they choose to remain ignorant to the fact that 74% of the 50 new drugs approved by the FDA in 2022 had little proof they actually worked. Research! Reddit. Discord. DuckDuckGo. Bing. White papers, valid medical studies (called Abstracts)…etc.
  3. VOTE BLUE, as Republicans want to take away Medicare, Medicaid, and most social services. They believe in “Trickle Down Economics” which has created more oligarchs than any other socioeconomic practice — loosening regulations and providing tax ‘incentives’ for corporations and individuals with high incomes. Democrats, though not much better as they are still slaves to Corporate America’s lobbyists, at least have an eye out for the middle class in this country. They support more social services, like the Affordable Care Act (‘Obamacare’), mental and reproductive healthcare, Medicaid and Medicare, and lower prescription drug costs. In 2024, close to 69% of the world’s population has some form of Universal Healthcare, while the U.S. still does not. UHC is not socialism. Access to quality medical care regardless of income should be a Civil Right. Let’s do better — serve the many, not just the few! VOTE BLUE.

    Is WOKE Brain-Dead

    by jcafesin, posted in Uncategorized

    Got feedback for my novella, A Marriage Fable, from a reader.

    Pam L (She/Her) 3:55 PM

    Thanks Jeri! I actually read it and enjoyed it. I just hesitate to review because the husband calls the therapist a muslim I think it was, in a nonflattering way, and never takes it back later in the book. It just didn’t sit right with me.

    A Marriage Fable is a fantasy romance of a typical husband nearing his 20th anniversary, and the powerful genie that inspires him to be a better man. The “muslim” Pam is referring to is the genie. The husband is a sexist, narcissistic asshole in the beginning of this fable, and does indeed refer to the genie, who he thinks is a therapist, as a Muslim because he’s mad with his wife for asking him to participate in her session with Dr. Boggs.

    This fable is a modern twist on the classic Dicken’s novella, A Christmas Carol. I used Arabic words for the opening of each stave, and honored the legends of Marid Djinns throughout the writing. I, Jeri Cafesin, did not slam Muslims. Andrew Wyman did, the MC in A Marriage Fable. To show, (not tell in exposition) that Andrew was a self-absorbed dick, he indeed used ugly language, as he, like most men these days, was not violent. Words were his weapon, and his complete lack of interest in anything but his career.

    Pam deciding not to leave my novella a review is beyond WOKE, it’s brain-dead. She’s so into being politically correct, following the masses, a ‘believer’ she’s being ‘good, respectful, polite,’ she’s stopped actually thinking for herself. She enjoyed my novella, but can’t leave a review because the Woke community, to which she is a card-carrying member, says using the word Muslim derogatorily in all cases is wrong. And she’s bought that crap. She’s so unsure of her own mind, so afraid of her own racism that she has to call out a fable showing an arc of a character to protect her self-image. She must follow the crowd she’s picked — falling off the boat left-wing. Her behavior is equal only to the far right of the Trump coalition, which she likely despises.

    I used to be a Democrat. I am not anymore because of people like Pam who can’t think beyond their rabbis, priests, and the will of the crowd they’ve picked so they can look in the mirror and feel good about themselves. Fuck that. TRUTH changes things, not all this PC bullshit.

    So, let’s get down to some TRUTH, and face some facts about humanity. WE ARE ALL RACISTS. We are all BORN RACISTS! And until we all wrap our heads around that FACT, we are doomed to stay racists!

    At my writing group the other night a guy read 1500 words out of his historical novel about WW2. In his book, he quoted Hitler, and other Nazis using racial slurs. Several group members had “a problem” with this. They found the language offensive and suggested he take out the terms. Instead, he was advised to use the PC version of describing the terms without using the actual slurs. Again, brain dead! Are these people so scared of the TRUTH that they cannot face the FACTS of what the Nazis did/do. Wokes must sugar-coat it to swallow it down? There is nothing sweet about Nazism! It was/is ugly in the extreme, and this writer in my group was showing this. It wasn’t his job to be politically correct as to offend NO ONE EVER. It was meant to offend! Ignoring history, we are doomed to repeat it, and we ARE with Trump and the current Republican party, and the other side, the Woke party.

    Fiction writing is a fine art. Should someone have told Edvard Munch he shouldn’t paint The SCREAM because it may give some kids nightmares? It did me! Should books like Ulysses, To Kill a Mockingbird, The Color Purple not have been written because they may offend? Of course not. Art is supposed to be controversial, get people feeling first, then thinking about what they feel and why.

    My father used to call me Marco after the MC in And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street because I’ve been a storyteller since I was a little kid. I’ve read it to my kids to spark their imagination because that is what the story is about, not a ‘Chinaman (original wording) who walks with sticks’ (and by the way, the TRUTH is, Chinese in China still use chopsticks), or a ‘Rajah with Rubies.’ The Woke community has robbed children forward of a method to reach and spark their own imaginations.

    New York Times had an article about transgender conversion a couple weeks ago. For once, the left-wing rag, wasn’t. They actually had the balls, in our politically correct version of the world now, to call out therapists who are pushing children, as young as 10 years old, to change their sex. In their extensive research, the article points out that the Woke community is selling kids on medically ‘reconfiguring’ (the PC term) their bodies, a decision that will affect the rest of their lives, and in many cases negatively. Personally, I don’t care if an adult decides to become the opposite sex. It is an adult decision. Blind support of a child wanting to change their sex after seeing some YouTuber trans who is saying how great their life is now, is ugly in the extreme. It doesn’t make you a good therapist to always be ‘supportive.’ It makes you a bad one.

    Oddly, well, maybe not, the same Woke crowd is calling out Trader Joe’s for using Trader José on their Mexican label beer as racial appropriation. I don’t understand why changing sex later in life isn’t sexual appropriation. A man changed to a woman at 18 or later didn’t have to grow up with the slings and arrows I faced as a girl or a woman in the workforce. They have no idea what it means to be constantly hit on from the moment you get tits, groped, assaulted, get pregnant, paid less, and a girl better be pretty, and thin, or she’s lonely. And I was. The damage sexism did to me will be with me for the rest of my life, regardless of the sex I later become.

    And THEY is more than ONE. Unless a human is two people in one, like Siamese twins, what does someone calling themselves THEY even mean? Using ‘THEY’ as your ‘personal pronoun’ WON’T STOP SEXISM! This will — the TRUTH is a good place to start.

    Politically correct doesn’t help humanity become kinder or more equitable. Activist groups like LGBTQ have powerful lobbyists who help change discriminatory laws. The Gay Liberation Movement (GLM) in the 1980s got Congress to invest in AIDS research. Black Lives Matter (BLM) forces us to investigate systemic racism in our police forces across the US. These organized groups send representatives to DC who actually fight for legal change. If you really want to be politically correct, actually do something to help make us a more just society, join one of these organizations, and help end discrimination.

    It’s hip, slick, and trending Woke these days to say “I’m Pro-Palestine.” In fact, my own daughter said this to me the other day.

    Hmm, I thought I taught you better than jumping on the Woke train, I told her. Do you even know what it means to be pro-Palestine? All her friends are. All her friends are Chinese and Indian students at UCSD. Literally. She is White and has no White friends. Many of these friends are on visas and have no voting rights in this country. And they too have no clue what they are talking about when they claim to be pro-Palestine. My daughter’s friends are feeling disenfranchised. They’ve been the target of racism here and are justifiably angry. But instead of dealing with that TRUTH, they’ve lobbed onto a crowd — the PC community — that lets them express their internalized anger by getting behind causes they have no clue about.

    Do you know that Hamas, the government of Gaza, launched an unprovoked attack on Israel from Gaza, killed over 1,200 people, and kidnapped 253 in October of last year?

    No.

    And did you know Hamas was raping 12–48 yr old girls and women they kidnapped, then posting it online to terrorize victim’s loved ones?

    I haven’t heard that. All I heard was Israel was bombing civilians in Palestine and killing mostly women and children.

    Do you know that the government the Palestinians voted in are using their women and children as cover for their terrorist shit, and that is why they were getting killed in Israeli bombings?

    No. But it doesn’t make it right that Israel is killing kids.

    No. It doesn’t. I didn’t say Israel is right. There is no right here, baby. Both sides are wrong. I’m not pro-Israel. They know that Hamas is sacrificing their own children, yet instead of targeted strikes against Hamas, they are wielding an iron fist. Badly. Ugly. For sure. 100%. My beautiful daughter, I told her, siding with one side or the other is divisive in the extreme. It perpetuates the problems there, and creates more here, between us. Call out bad behavior, like Israel knowingly killing civilians regardless of their reasons. Or Palestine voting in a fanatical religious government with an agenda to kill all Israelis. Neither is right. Call out bad behavior. Do not get on the PC train because your friends are and you wanta fit in. Do the research before taking a stand. Blind faith means turning off your brain. And that is never OK.

    I get writing this essay is going to piss off a lot of people. While I understand and support the underlying tenor of being PC is to stop discrimination in all forms, the Woke community has no clue how divisive and ugly they are when they call out everyone who isn’t on their train. They perpetuate racism, sexism, and flat-out stupidity so they can look in the mirror and lie to themselves they are righteous people.

    Let’s all get off the PC train and focus on how to tackle our differences by getting honest with our own feelings — our fears of THE OTHER, of looking stupid, of not fitting in, of being alone and lonely. Let’s start sharing how often we fail, in our careers and our relationships, instead of perpetuating the happy-ending lie. I’m so sick of almost every businessperson I talk to saying they’re doing “just great!” and then their biz failing the next year.

    Want to end discrimination? Then let’s start sharing how it feels to BE HUMAN since we all FEEL THE SAME THINGS.

    An Atheist on Morality

    by jcafesin, posted in atheism, atheists, christianity, christians, conservatives, far-right, jewish, muslim, Uncategorized

    Einstein did not believe in God, as many [mistakenly] claim.

    Albert Einstein said, “My position concerning God is that of an agnostic.” He clarified with, “The word God is, for me, nothing more than the expression and product of human weaknesses, the Bible a collection of honorable, but still primitive legends. No interpretation no matter how subtle can (for me) change this.”

    Atheist don’t believe in God either. Not any god/s. Ever. Unlike Agnostics, open to the possibility of a ‘higher power,’ or ‘collective, sentient being,’ Einstein believed in neither. Agnostic is politically correct, less threatening, especially during his time, born a Jew, and existing on federal and university funding.

    I am an Atheist. I do not recognize the Old/New Testament, and related works illuminating the adventures of a divine being as anything more than fiction—parables by some wise, some ignorant, but guaranteed partisan male scribes with an agenda to dominate and control human behavior. (The defense that organized religion was necessary to reign us in when we were small warring tribes has been [and still is] proselytized by every power-hungry, self-proclaimed ‘person-of-god’ out there.)

    So when I need money, [as an Atheist] why don’t I go rob someone. Or shoplift?

    When I’m attracted to my neighbor’s husband, why don’t I hit on him, get intimate if he’s into it?

    When I get pissed off at the driver on their cellphone that just cut me off, why don’t I just shoot her?

    Snatch & Run, even drive-by’s these days, and the odds of getting caught for these crimes is somewhat nominal if I’m discreet. Fear of being busted is not the main motivation that prevents me from committing these, and ‘lesser’ crimes like lying, cheating and behaviors that most others would agree, religious or not, are moral infractions.

    If I believe I answer to no higher power, where do I get my morality?

    Einstein said, “We have to content ourselves with our imperfect knowledge and understanding and treat values and moral obligations as a purely human problem—the most important of all human problems.”

    Believer or not, what are your ‘Moral Obligations?’

    Mine, as an Atheist and a Human being, is to support our continued evolution. Part of my Moral Obligation is to reproduce, and extend the magnificent, wondrous, glorious feelings of being alive to someone else, as it has been gifted to me. In keeping with this particular Moral Obligation, bringing kids into the world comes with more Moral Obligations. Reproducing requires me to care for my progeny above myself, especially through childhood, teach them things I’ve learned so far, and to lay a foundation of trust, respect and love that my parents neglected to give to me. But my moral obligations extend far beyond having kids.

    I am born owing Humanity that came before me, and everything on this planet that supports us.

    We all are. Global warming, climate change, believe in them or not, what is your Moral Obligation to creating a more sustainable future for everything here? It may seem we have little control over our environment, but we have more than we think, or at least are practicing. My M.O. is to do better at preserving life, and the earth itself from our crap—our toxic emissions, our trash, our fecal waste, killing forests for toilet paper, over-farming, over-fishing, fracking, and the list goes on and on.

    Another M.O. I follow is to THINK, a lot, about most anything and everything. Research, question, and learn are all important M.O.s. So, I research how I, as just one person, can fulfill my Moral Obligation to care for our planet better and came up with a lot of ways:

    • Use LED or CFL lightbulbs
    • Stop eating beef
    • Stop eating fish unless it is sustainably caught
    • Drive a fuel-efficient vehicle
    • Recycle
    • Use recycled products

    Sure, I can use the excuse that as only one person doing any of these things won’t matter to the big picture. But I’d be denying one of my Moral Obligations to do better at preserving life here. Praying for better weather won’t change anything. I must actualize the action items in the list above to do my minuscule part in insuring life here continues long after my time, and that my children’s children’s children evolve to more fully embrace our spectacular creativity, our ingenuity, our capacity for kindness and our amazing ability to share love.

    “…treat values and moral obligations as a purely human problem,” Einstein said. In other words, morality is determined by human beings, not handed down from on-high by some obscure being requiring blind obedience invented by men looking to control the ignorant masses.

    Religious or Atheist, we all must recognize and actualize our Moral Obligations to each other and this planet for humanity to survive, and thrive.

    —

    Cited Notable Facts:

    Murder rates are lower in more secular nations and higher in more religious countries where belief in God is deep and widespread. (Jensen 2006; Paul 2005; Fajnzylber et al. 2002; Fox and Levin 2000)

    Within U.S., the states with the highest murder rates tend to be highly religious, such as Louisiana and Alabama, but the states with the lowest murder rates tend to be among the least religious in the country, such as Vermont and Oregon. (Ellison et al. 2003; Death Penalty Information Center, 2008)

    Rates of most violent crimes tend to be lower in the less religious states and higher in the most religious states. (United States Census Bureau, 2006)

    The top 50 safest cities in the world, nearly all are in relatively non-religious countries, and of the eight cities within the United States that make the safest-city list, nearly all are located in the least religious regions of the country. (Mercer Survey, 2008)

    Domestic terrorists of the American far right are driven by zeal for heretical distortions of Christian theology. (Paul de Armond, DOJ, 1999) Christian nationalism [is] a serious and growing threat to our democracy. (Robert P. Jones, TIME Magazine, 2022)

    Reverse Racism IS Racism

    by jcafesin, posted in Uncategorized

    My daughter came home crying from her job as a barista for a local Boba Tea cafe.

    “They don’t like me mom! I’m doing the exact same level of work that all the new kids are, and they keep calling ME out cuz I’m not Asian.”

    Several other barista type jobs at various local businesses to which she applied told her flat out they only hire Asians (which, at least in my neighborhood, includes Indians, from India). Since most of the fast food and convenience stores here are owned by Asians, this has severely limited her choices for simple, flexible, part-time work.

    A month ago, on the first day of this first job my daughter’s ever had, she came home and said, “My manager called me their ‘diversity hire,’ since I’m the only White person who works there. It hurt my feelings. He made me feel like I didn’t get the job cuz I deserved it.” Every day since, she’s come home with other racist comments most of her managers continue to make.

    Our daughter has a 4.3 gpa, is a hard worker academically, and socially. She is the only White person in her small group of all Asian friends. She’s worked very hard, and continues to do so, to be a part of this bunch of kids, to fit into the Asian culture that is now well over 75% of her high school in our East Bay suburb of the San Francisco Bay area.

    My son wasn’t so lucky. Boys going through puberty are all about bravado, one-upping each other. Girls are about connecting, communicating, building their community. Our son was excluded and bullied for not being “A”sian, throughout middle and high school. He had no friends at all, though he tried again and again to ‘fit in’ with them, from Karate to Robotics to Chess club and more. It broke his heart daily, and mine as well, watching my beautiful, open, kind kid ostracized for being White. He will likely struggle with a damaged self-image the rest of his life because of those formative experiences.

    Yet, neither of my children are racists, like so many of their Asian friends and associates. My daughter gets bullied often, even from her ‘friends’ with thoughtless comments: “I only date Asians. I don’t find White girls attractive,” from the 4 out of 5 boys in her group. My daughter would love to get asked to proms, on dates. She watches her Asian girlfriends get asked out. She does not.*

    These are REALITIES for all of us, Asians and Whites, here in the global melting pot of the San Francisco Bay Area, and yet my children are still not racists. Why, when so many are?

    My daughter’s half White, half Chinese best friend had a sleepover the weekend before Thanksgiving. Her BF told me their family didn’t celebrate the holiday. Her mother was a tech-visa transplant from China in her early 20s, and had no association with U.S. traditions. She did not adopt them for her kids, regardless that they are native born here. My daughter’s BF confessed she’d always dreamed of celebrating Thanksgiving. Well, of course I invited her, and her mom and brother, right then. She was so excited she texted her mom the invite, and the girls were jumping up and down, cheering, moments later with her mother’s response.

    The seven of us ate turkey, and stuffing, and shared stories of thanks around the table that night. We played Pictionary after dinner, and laughed and laughed. When the kids exited the scene to play video games, Yi, my husband and I spoke of relationships, politics, religion, ignoring social lines of polite conversation. And though we have radically different perspectives, and I felt no personal connection with few common interests, a profound one existed between us. She was raising two kids, a boy my son’s age, and a girl, my daughter’s best friend, Yi loves her children the exact same way, with the same intensity as I do mine.

    Globalization is a REALITY. It’s happening, right now. Most first world nations are being inundated with immigrants looking for that illusive ‘better life.’ Like it, or not, global integration is here, and, as my husband, and our kids know, it is mandatory, simply must happen, for humanity, and our very small planet to survive.

    My husband is a software architect. He’s been creating and deploying SaaS offerings for over 25 years here in Silicon Valley. Every job he’s ever had in the software industry, and trust me, he’s had a lot of jobs, he’s worked almost exclusively with Asians. While offshore H1B labor has been brought here by the tech industry since 1990, this massive Asian influx into the U.S. was not anticipated. In the last five yrs, the companies he’s worked for in software development, or any other department now, whether the staff is 30 or 3000—60% or more are of Asian descent. And yet, my husband is not racist, though he’s been passed up for many positions by Asians on work visas and H1Bs.**

    “One wish,” my mom asked my sister and me on our drive home from elementary school back in the old days. “Anything you want, what would it be.”

    “World peace,” I’d said. It was the mid-1970s, and a common catch phrase, but I meant it. Without war, or economic disparity, I believed in our creative potential to problem solve, and our unique ability to work together to realize our fantastical visions. I didn’t know about the hunger of greed then, insatiable, and colorblind.

    It has been particularly hard on my kids, this globalization process. It deeply saddens me that they must suffer the slights of blind prejudice, just as the Asians in past generations had to suffer the racism of the ignorant Whites here. It terrifies me—the global competition for fewer jobs my kids will be competing for after college. Yet, I still advocate for globalization. This very small planet must integrate, or we will perish, and likely take much of the life here with us.

    My daughter worries she’ll never meet anyone to date, yet alone marry, but I assure her she likely will. And it’s even likely that man will be Asian, since 60% of the global population are Asian*** and more than half of them are men. “It doesn’t matter where someone came from, what their heritage, or place of origin on the planet,” I’ve preached to my kids. “Choose to be with someone kind.”

    A border wall surrounding the U.S. entirely will not stop Asians from flying in from China and India, Korea, Viet Nam, Indonesia and other emerging Asian nations. Nor will it stop the Middle East, South Americans, Cubans from coming here. Seeking to keep us separate is a fool’s play. Communication is key to build bridges over our differences, allowing us to meet in the middle and mutually benefit from our strengths. Ignorance and mistrust breed with distance. Nationalism is just thinly disguised racism.

    Asians, Latinos, Syrian’s, and Palestinians, are all different cultures, not separate races from Caucasian. We are one race, the human race. Globalization—the blending of cultures—is hard for everyone, scary, new, threatening to our social structure, but a must if humanity is to survive, even thrive. The beauty of interracial marriage is the same thing that bonds Yi and I, as parents. We both passionately love our kids. She can’t possibly hate Whites, since her children are Asian/White. Combine two cultures, at least on a localize level, defeats racism, as most every parent loves their kids with the intensity Yi and I do. It’s one of our best bits about being human—the magnificent, spectacular, all-encompassing love we get to feel, and share as parents.

    —

    *Dating app data (in the U.S. and abroad) shows White men prefer Asian women, though it is unusual to see an Asian man partner with a White woman.

    **Hiring offshore workers for less money, now being exploited by every social network from Facebook to Instagram to YouTube, to Mr. Trump’s summer staff at his Mar-a-Lago estate, lowers the pay rate for all of us. It’s no wonder U.S. income levels have been stagnant for years. There has been 308,613 H1B registrations for 2022, a 12.5% rise over 2021.

    ***Asia Population 2022 (Demographics, Maps, Graphs) (worldpopulationreview.com)

    Republicans, Religion and What’s Right

    by jcafesin, posted in Healthcare, holocaust, Trump

    The Tea Party rally was just breaking up when I picked up my daughter from her day camp at Central Park. A woman standing at the fringe of the crowd held a big poster that read: “Gay Marriage is a SIN! God said NO on Prop. 8! God says preserve DOMA!” On the poster was a huge cross. My nine year old daughter asked me what her sign meant. I told her it was against human rights and the woman was a nutcase.

    DOMA, the Defense of Marriage Act, was signed into federal law by Pres. Bill Clinton in 1997. It basically said that legally valid marriage is limited to opposite sex couples, absolving individual states from extending the financial benefits and tax credits to which only heterosexual couples are now privy. And who supported this unconstitutional Act denying civil rights?

    –Republicans for Family Values
    –The Tea Party (Republicans)
    –Focus on Family  (Republicans)
    –Proposition 8 [banning gay marriage] supporters (And who were they? Proposition 8 got on the ballot backed by millions from the Roman Catholic Church, and the Mormon Church, and the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations, and, well, you get the picture.)

    The foundation of this nation is based on a separation between church and state. The Establishment Clause of the First Amendment of our Bill of Rights prohibits the establishment of a national religion by the Congress or the preference of one religion over another, non-religion over religion, or religion over non-religion.

    Our civil rights should not, MUST NOT be a determined by the church, or be beholden to any religious sect or organization/s. I am an atheist. I don’t recognize the Bible, Old or New Testament as truth, and as an American citizen it is my federal civil right NOT to believe according to our constitution. Christian morality doesn’t apply to me, or the many gay people who wish to marry. It should be in their civil right to do so. Yet senators, congressmen, presidents still choose religious ideology over constitutional laws that guarantees every U.S. citizen equal rights and protections.

    Regardless of their religious persuasion, our elected officials have sworn to uphold our constitution, including The Establishment Clause of the First Amendment, and have no right to push their religion’s morality onto every American. Millions of our tax dollars have gone and will go to lawyers and court time over DOMA, absurdly prejudicial and preferential legislation originally meant to limit states financial liability, without understanding, maybe even acknowledging the cost to civil rights. Right-wing extremists like the Tea Party and Focus on Family have adopted DOMA as a monicker, preaching biblical text that says homosexuality is a sin and it should never be recognized as legitimate. But I don’t believe in the bible. And I don’t think being gay is a sin. Sin is a religious construct meant to control followers. I believe indifference to suffering and willful ignorance are the greatest evils.

    DOMA was repealed, as unconstitutional, in 2013 under President Obama and a Democratic congress. The Republican Reich fought it out in court after court, appeal after appeal, blowing many more billions in tax dollars over a law that should never have been written, yet alone endorsed and enacted. If the right-wing had its way, DOMA would have stayed the law, limiting marriage and the benefits that come with the union to only heterosexual couples.

    Who cares? You’re not gay. Doesn’t really effect you? Not your fight? There are bigger issues out there of import…

    Watch out! Yesterday, it was denying gay rights, and today, it’s banning transgender from military service. Tomorrow our Republican government may outlaw a woman’s right to choose what to do with her body, or interracial marriage, or maybe Jews again, or Muslims this time, or… You and your ideology may be next on the chopping block of the religious Republican Reich.

    A POLITICAL JOKE

    by jcafesin, posted in Uncategorized

    A woman in a hot air balloon realizes she is lost. She
    lowers her altitude and spots a man fishing from a
    boat below.

    She shouts to him, ‘Excuse me, can you help me? I
    promised a friend I would meet him an hour ago, but I
    don’t know where I am.’

    The man consults his portable GPS and replies, ‘You’re
    in a hot air balloon, approximately 30 feet above a
    ground elevation of 2346 feet above sea level. You are
    at 31 degrees, 14.97 minutes north latitude and 100
    degrees, 49.09 minutes west longitude.

    She rolls her eyes and says, ‘You must be a
    Democrat!’

    ‘I am,’ replies the man. ‘How did you know?’

    ‘Well,’ answers the balloonist, ‘everything you tell
    me is technically correct, but I have no idea what to
    do with your information, and I’m still lost. Frankly,
    you’re not much help to me.’

    The man smiles and responds, ‘You must be a Republican.’

    ‘I am,’ replies the balloonist. ‘How did you know?’

    ‘Well,’ says the man, ‘You don’t know where you are or
    where you’re going. You’ve risen to where you are, due
    to a large quantity of hot air. You made a promise
    that you have no idea how to keep, and now you expect
    me to solve your problem. You’re in exactly the same
    position you were in before we met, but, somehow,
    now it’s my fault.