Indians Die

 

In the year 1500 as many as 7 million American Indians lived in what is now the United States. By 1700 the population had dropped to less than 1 million. (These are uncertain estimates.)

The loss was caused by diseases like measles, new to the area, introduced by Spanish, British and French conquerors. 

American health care today is led by a flea-munching crackpot who kind of likes measles. In the eyes of MAGA, children who can't shrug off measles don't have the manly European genes needed to make America great again. 

Estimating the Native American population in 1500, 1600, and 1700 is challenging due to limited records and significant disruption from European colonization, disease, and conflict. However, historians and anthropologists have provided widely accepted estimates:

🌎 Entire Americas (North, Central, and South America):

• 1500: 50–60 million

• 1600: ~10–20 million

• 1700: ~8–10 million

🇺🇸 Present-day United States:

• 1500: 3.8 to 7 million (some estimates go as high as 10 million)

• 1600: ~1.5 to 2 million

• 1700: ~600,000 to 1 million

These numbers reflect the devastating impact of diseases like smallpox, measles, and influenza introduced by Europeans, as well as displacement and warfare.

Key Notes:

• Most of the population decline happened before sustained European settlement in many areas, due to disease spreading ahead of contact.

• Estimates vary widely depending on the methodology used (e.g., archaeological evidence, early European records, oral histories).

Mamdani

I'm going to assume, for sake of argument, that the next election will be mostly honest and honored. Not a fake.

In the 31 American states keeping track of newly registered voters, Republicans are out-registering Democrats in 31 states out of 31. 

Polls show that Trump is unpopular, the Republican party is unpopular and the Democratic party is the most unpopular. 

Why are the Democrats failing? And why don't they care more? 

The party leaders, centrists from the last century, focus on keeping control of the Democratic Party, a cash cow.  To do that leaders believe they have to squelch AOC  and other young representatives of the center-left. 

As things stand the Democratic Leaders offer thin oatmeal. They promise to fight climate change but not enough to matter. They sent just enough arms to Ukraine to keep Ukraine slowly retreating. Democrats let Israel starve Palestinians. They saw to it some but not all Americans have health care. 

In the NYC race for mayor, Zohran Mamdani argues for free bus rides and so on, and he's now the leading candidate. He plans to give ordinary people help. It's certain that some of his ideas won't work (see FDR). But some will. 

The limping Democratic leaders are throwing a fit, calling Mamdani a pinko. Maybe he can show Democrats how to win. 

 

  

w

Fort Bliss]

 

Our nation once used Fort Bliss, aka Camp East Montana, in WW II to incarcerate Japanese-American citizens. Today it is back in use to hold brown-skinned people snatched off sidewalks by ICE. 

Apparently we will need this giant massing of summer tents from time to time, during our Fascist periods.

Today our elected leaders hold around a thousand brown men at Fort Bliss. A deranged spokeswoman for ICE claims the internees are murderers, gang members, pedophiles and rapists. In fact about 80% are farm workers, carpenters and day laborers. 

If ICE is running short of rapists and pedophiles to arrest, why not clean out the White House?

 

Gerrymander

The 2026 election is shaping up as a contest between the Gerrymander Party and the Other Gerrymander Party. 

I am not suggesting the two parties are equal, except when it comes to gerrymanders.  

Let's be clear. Politicians adore safe seats. Once you get elected in a gerrymandered congressional district, you have a job for ten years. You can smile, age and sleep until noon.

One side wants to suppress liberal voters of color. The other hopes to suppress conservative white voters. Both sides will pretend that the only choice is between gerrymandering or losing. They see no third, fourth or fifth election strategy. 

California voters, in polls, support suppressing conservative white people. 

Californians, including me, will vote on the issue.

 Spinoza (and Spike Lee) argue that doing the right thing is what makes people happy.

q

Trump Ascends to Heaven

Putin just played Trump like a kazoo. 

Trump hopes to find a road to peace in Ukraine. At the moment, the only possible road is for Ukraine to surrender, which is awkward. But Trump apparently believes that a peace treaty will help his own case with the Christian God.

According to the New York Times, the doddering lecher is talking about how he can save his soul. That may be his major source of motivation.  

So he's out in public with swollen ankles, sagging jowls and brainless blabber. He's beginning to see time is limited. And so far he's lived like an alligator. 

"I want to try to get to heaven if possible," the President said on Fox and Friends on Tuesday. 

s

Fascism Arrives

Governor Newsom has said that we must "meet fire with fire." He's talking about fascism, not fires. 

We must meet fascism with fascism?   

The gov, a strongman, intends to call a statewide vote on whether to discard (for a while) our nonpartisan congressional districts and replace them with carefully gerrymandered districts. 

The Namby Pamby party became committed to gerrymandering last week; suddenly anyone who disagrees is a weakling.

Who wants to be weak? I expect voters to go along. Going along is how Mussolini, Hitler, Putin and Trump were first elected. 

I'm not a contrarian. I vote Namby Pamby, not for Raving Loonies.  But gerrymandering is wrong, isn't it.  

 

Historical Footnote: When California voters created non-partisan districts, it was over the dead bodies of the Namby Pamby and Raving Loony leaders (except for the Terminator). Politicians enjoy the security of gerrymandered districts as much as Trump enjoys the company of fourteen-year-old girls. 

  

Planes, Trains and Automobiles

Last week I visited friends on Orcas Island (near Seattle). I'm too old to drive 900 miles, so I came home on other forms of transportation.

I left Orcas Island on a ferry, then walked to a bus, then later transferred to a second bus, which took me to Sea-Tac, a gigantic, terrifying airport. Once inside Sea-Tac I walked around through crowds for an hour, unable to find my airline's desks. 

Once I found my airline, I realized that I did not know where to ask for a boarding pass. The area had thousands of people standing in 30 different lines. I wandered until I came upon a lone white woman manning an empty desk--she took  care of people with special needs. 

I told this white woman my special need was that I was 90 years old and no longer knew how to approach an airplane. She led me to a nook, where a stern black woman, an immigrant, handed me a boarding pass and ordered me to take a seat and wait quietly for a wheelchair. 

It looked like the port had maybe three wheelchairs and around 150 people waiting for a ride.

Eventually a small black woman, an immigrant, pushed a chair over to my area and offered to take one of us on a ride, me or a young blind guy. He and I conferred. My plane departed first, so he let me have the chair.

We headed for the departure gate. The woman pushed and pushed fast, beeping milling crowds away. These were voice beeps. 

We passed many stores, neon signs, gates, more of this and that and more. Then my pusher told me about six times (I could not understand her)  that there had been an announcement. My departure gate had been changed.

I had no idea what floor we were on or where we were. I had not heard the announcement. 

My pusher next shoved us onto a train.  I do not know why there was a train inside an airport. We rumbled along for a while, then got off and made it to my new gate. I gave the pusher all my paper money. 

I cursed Donald Trump and MAGA to Hell. 

Once on the plane I could not find my tray. A young woman next to me explained three times how the tray had been hidden in the armrest! Jesus Christ!  

And then I could not get my seatbelt hooked up. The young woman explained three times, and I got it so it looked like the others. But it never clamped. 

My wife met me at our local port, and we ate dinner at Mary's Pizza.

Car, ferry, two buses, wheelchair, train, airplane, car.  

MAGA

MAGA

The first question--what is going on? Then, what can we do about it?

One of the several belief systems that drive MAGA (and its equivalent in other nations) is white nationalism.  

The tea party and then MAGA erupted from a class of white men. often working men, who  weren't getting anywhere, and no one was listening.

These voters believed that they meant little to the Clintons' Democratic Party or the plutocratic Republican party.

They had a point. 

Money flowed from far-right billionaires to expand the unrest. 

Some MAGA leaders turned against democracy, which they believe allows a manipulative elite to screw them. They were encouraged in this belief by a manipulative elite.

In Donald Trump voters found  a candidate with the right personality disorders to represent their cognitive weaknesses. 

The Democrats reacted by moving their party to the center-right, when MAGA was looking for revolutionary change.  The Democrats failed and continue to fail today.

MAGA took over the Republican Party.

The strongest MAGA supporters today are those afraid of diversity. City MAGAs fear being replaced by the masses of people they see around them: Latinos, Jews, black people and (worst of all) women. 

MAGA's goal (for some) is to destroy the old system and create a new system. To do that they must tear down the old institutions, including norms and traditions,  the public schools, Harvard,  UCLA, NBC, scientific health care, the CIA, the courts, the Constitution, the military leadership, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, the FBI,  libraries, PBS, whatever. 

The new system (some say) should adopt a corporate format. The nation should be run like a corporation with a CEO in charge. He will act as a dictator, answerable only to super-rich sponsors on a board of directors. The purpose of this set-up will be to speed up the transfer of money from the poor to the super-rich.  

Meanwhile, MAGA voters enjoy something powerful, a warm sense of community with one another as they rip apart the evils of pedophilia,  education, Hollywood, math, science and so on.  

Voters are choosing chaos and catastrophe.  

This has happened before. The western system, fell apart twice in the past, during the Bronze Age collapse and during the collapse of the top-heavy Roman Empire.  

If we want to keep our system , we'd better start working things out.  It's a choice. 

What Would Aristotle Think?

What would Aristotle think of Donald Trump? (From comments by someone on MSNBC)

Don acts only in his own self-interest. 

Don has denied access to the Epstein files.

Therefore, denying access to the Epstein files is in Don's self-interest. 

--------------------------------------

Denying access to the Epstein files has been harmful to Don.

Don acts only in his own self-interest.

Therefore, granting access must be even more harmful. 

Happy MAGA

Most have seen MAGA events on TV. The people attending seem colorful, happy, excited and friendly. Also ignorant and cognitively undeveloped. 

The rewards for joining MAGA include the joy of membership in a strong community and the pleasure that comes from the denunciation of pedophiles, scientists, creative types and anti-racists.