Ailantha - Blog

Flying To Chitown

11/14/2018

Last Thursday, November 8, I flew from Columbus to Chicago to visit Miguel and Claire.

This was my first time flying to Chicago.

In the past I'd always taken the wonderful Megabus,

...until, much to my dismay, Megabus dropped its Columbus-Chicago route.
On Tom's and my previous visit to Chicago last May we tried traveling via Greyhound Bus, which turned out to be a vile experience (See post from 5/13/2018, "Greyhounding It To Chicago").
As I hope to never again have to take a Greyhound bus, this now leaves us two options for traveling to Chicago: driving or flying. I once drove to Chicago by myself years ago and found driving in that city to be the first ring of Hades, the second ring being trying to find a parking spot anywhere on the streets of my daughter's urban neighborhood.

And so this time, as I was again traveling alone, I reluctantly opted for the pricier but oh-so-much quicker and more convenient flight option.
Thus I started out the morning in my favorite airport, Columbus John Glen International,

...where one is still reminded at every turn that here in Columbus we are all One Of Us (see posts from 4/29/2018, "What's So Funny At The Columbus Airport" and 4/30/2018, "One Of Us! One Of Us!").

As I had a little time to kill before my flight I had a breakfast of two bagels at the airport Bob Evans.

Though I expect one bagel would have been sufficient for me, I bought two because when I attempted to buy one the server, whom I would guess form his accent to be from an African country, warned me that the bagels there were very small and advised me that if I wanted a big bagel I should go across the way to Starbucks. When I hesitated in my decision he became quite insistent about the insufficiency of a single Bob Evans bagel and the superiority of the Starbucks bagels. So I asked if I could have two bagels, to which agreed, finally seeming satisfied that this customer wouldn't go hungry,

...which, in fact, I didn't.

Then, more than satiated after my two-bagel breakfast, I boarded my plane. 56 minutes after take-off I deplaned at Chicago O'Hare.

Having insisted that I did not wish to be picked up at the airport by my daughter or son-in-law, but preferred to find my way to their house via public transport, I followed the signs through the airport to the trains to downtown,

...then joined my fellow passengers,

...until I de-trained at the Western Avenue stop at Logan Square.

I then walked several blocks through the neighborhood,

...until I reached their house,

...where I was greeted by Miguel, who was quite relieved that his mother-in-law had found her way from O'Hare,

...and their three cats, Sassy, Siri,

...and Tinums, a little cat,

...who was hanging around the school auditorium in Texas where the disaster response team Claire was part of after Hurricane Harvey had set up an emergency medical center.

The members of Claire's medical team called the orphaned cat Rosie, but after Claire brought the cat home with her from Texas she and Miguel changed the kitty's name to Tinums because she was so tiny. (But isn't anymore).

After I settled into my cozy guest room,

...Miguel suggested that he and I - Claire was at work - drive over to an awesome little Italian Deli he knew of called Bari's to get a couple of their famous subs for lunch.

Bari's was in a cute, traditionally Italian neighborhood.

Inside there was a line of people with the same idea as us waiting at the deli counter.

After we procured our subs - I ordered a veggie sub with eggplant, which was quite delicioso - I suggested we pop into the bakery next door.

...where we found all kinds of yummy-looking things.

I snagged one of these vanilla-iced squares, which turned out to be a square - but none the less delicious - piece of cherry pie.

We also picked up a loaf of bread,

...then headed back home.

I love Chicago.

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On The Rainbow Wave And Staying Hungry

11/12/2018

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      If there's one thing the chain of events that's been unwinding since the midterm elections last Tuesday has shown people like myself - who had been hoping against probability and the polls that a blue wave might wash over both chambers of Congress - it's that now is no time for wallowing in visions of what might have been.
      What is yet to be is far, far more important.
     It was the day after the elections that I first heard the term Rainbow Wave. I heard it from my daughter Maria,

...who'd been a valiant campaigner during the midterms,

...and a phone bank captain,

...even my grand poochie Pinky Poo getting in on the action.

Maria's team worked for Harley Rouda, Democratic candidate for California's 48th Congressional district,

...who succeeded in defeating Republican 30-year incumbent Dana Rohrabacher.

(Now, it probably didn't help Dana Rohrabacher that he was enticed by Sasha Baron Cohen, playing the role of an Israeli Mossad agent,

...into making a video promoting arming toddlers).

Anyway, the day after the elections, when I was feeling a weence funky, taking more of a "half-empty" view of the Democratic Congressional victory, I talked to my daughter, who was feeling considerably more upbeat.
She explained to me that even though the Blue Wave hadn't been as sweeping as we'd hoped, more important was the rising up in this country of an electoral Rainbow Wave: Over 150 - a record number - candidates of color, LGBTQ candidates, Muslim, Native American and minority candidates won their midterm elections.

And this, said my daughter, was in the big picture an even greater cause for celebration than a total Blue Wave would have been.
    In fact, said my daughter, it was maybe better for the Democrats that they didn’t achieve a complete Congressional sweep because, as she put it, “This way we’ll stay hungry.”
      I believe that what my daughter said is true.
      Many of us are still still hungry. But these days it's doubtless better that way.

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Nancy Pelosi, Viper Hunter

11/11/2018

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I've never been able to figure out why everybody hates Nancy Pelosi so much.

      Among conservatives her name is thrown around as synonymous with evil, and even quite a few Democrats hiss at the sound of her name. But it's never been clear to me specifically why.
      Last August NBC News posted a list of 35 Democratic House candidates and incumbents who publicly stated that if the Democrats took back the House they wouldn't vote for Nancy Pelosi for Speaker of the House even though she's been the leader of the House Democrats for most of this century. None of the Democratic candidates opposing Pelosi gave any particular reason for their opposition other than a vague pseudo-quotable - apparently agreed upon by the lot of them - about it being time for a chance in leadership.
        Never mind that Nancy Pelosi is the highest-ranking female law-maker in the history of the United States government and that Barack Obama has called her the best Speaker the House of Representatives has ever had.
      In fact Nancy Pelosi is a strong Progressive who has championed health care, civil liberties, LGBTQ and women's rights, education, and the environment,

...just like Bernie Sanders. Who, of course, nobody hates. Everybody loves, or at least respects, Bernie Sanders.

      In fact, politically speaking, I see only two main differences between Bernie Sanders and Nancy Pelosi: (1) Pelosi is a woman, and (2) she gets things done, and it's these two differences that make her the target of the right, whose members have done such a good and thorough job of generating free-floating generic hatred against Nancy Pelosi that the hate has bled across the aisle and villainizing her has become the norm among much of the American populace. Which is the real reason why jelly-spined Democratic candidates have been slinking away from her. They've been afraid that the toxicity that the right strives to paint her with will rub off on them.
       But that was before.
     The chain of events that has been unwinding since the midterm elections last Tuesday has changed everything.
         Or at least I hope it has.
     Because it's become clear that last week's midterm Democratic victory in the House of Representatives,

...not to mention the "Rainbow Wave" of candidates of color, LGBTQ candidates, Muslim, Native American and minority candidates and women who won their midterm elections,

...has so greatly riled Donald Trump that he has since been behaving like a viper provoked in its nest, rearing up, baring its fangs, and striking.

There was Donald Trump the day after midterms at his press conference, agitated, bellicose, snapping and snarling at journalists, insulting them, shouting them down, calling them enemies of the people.

There was Trump revoking the press pass of reporter Jim Acosta for daring to press him for answers to hard questions.

There was his press secretary Sarah Sanders spreading a lie that Jim Acosta had assaulted a female White House aide, a lie she attempted to substantiate with a doctored video.

There was Donald Trump firing his own Attorney General,

...and replacing him with a personal sycophant with a history of bigotry and a fraud accusation hanging over his head,

...upon whom Trump is counting to block Special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation into Russia's meddling - and possibly Donald Trump's collusion in that meddling - in our 2016 Presidential election.

And there was Donald Trump declaring war on House Democrats via tweet, threatening retaliation if they ever dared to launch an investigation involving himself or his administration:

...as if the Presidency of the United States were nothing more than a glorified game of one-upmanship.

There was Donald Trump and his nest of vipers condemning the counting of absentee and mail-in midterm ballots Arizona and Florida, crying that counting these ballots was "stealing" the election from his party.
But then there was Nancy Pelosi, the day after the midterm elections, calmly but in no uncertain terms assuring the country that the House of Representatives would uphold its responsibility of oversight of the Executive branch, and that when it came to conducting investigations,

"We'll know what we're doing, and we'll do it right,"

The prediction is that those Democrats who before the midterms vowed to oppose Nancy Pelosi as Speaker of the House will rally around her now.
We can only hope. Because, hate Nancy Pelosi if you must, if there was ever a moment that our country needed a Congressional leader unafraid to go after and de-fang the vipers' nest that the White House has become, that moment is now,

References:
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/elections/democrats-opposing-pelosi-n899536

http://www.latimes.com/politics/la-na-pol-congress-pelosi-speaker-20181107-story.html

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2018/10/18/one-third-non-incumbent-house-democratic-candidates-dont-support-nancy-pelosi/?utm_term=.2b24f7334d65

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/04/us/politics/nancy-pelosi-house-leader-women.html

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/nancy-pelosi-house-minority-leader-news-conference-democrats-win-house-of-representatives-today-2018-11-07/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nancy_Pelosi

https://www.aol.com/article/news/2018/11/07/white-house-revokes-cnn-reporter-jim-acostas-credentials-after-argument-with-trump/23583181/

https://www.newsweek.com/matthew-whitaker-jews-muslim-judges-attorney-general-1210003

https://www.yahoo.com/news/apos-two-play-game-apos-135405788.html

https://www.abc15.com/news/state/president-trump-weighs-in-on-kyrsten-sinema-taking-lead-over-martha-mcsally

https://beta.nbcnews.com/politics/white-house/trump-calls-florida-ballot-count-disgrace-nelson-scott-file-lawsuits-n934451

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Randy Rainbow On Voting

11/6/2018

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If there ever was a moment in history when our nation was in sore need of an All-American prophet, that moment is upon us.
Thank goodness we've been sent such a prophet,

...in satirist Randy Rainbow,

...who cries out from the wilderness of his small recording studio/apartment in Queens, New York, calling down shame in catchy musical parody on those who merit it,

...and providing the rest of us with some solace in the midst of woe.
Today is midterm election day in the United States, the outcome of which, according to political analysts,

...will determine whether Donald Trump will subsequently be reined in or enabled to drive on with his agenda.

By the end of the day there may be millions among us in need of solace in the midst of woe.
But in the meantime, on this day when so many of us may be in a state of anxiety,

...I suggest watching Randy Rainbow's current video - "Voting!" -

...which you can find on Youtube:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-jDGQHaWiNQ&feature=youtu.be&t=17

...that he released as a reminder of why it's so important for Americans to vote:

Because we can.

So, whatever the result of today's elections, we'd all do well to heed these words of wisdom:

Listen to Randy Rainbow. And vote.

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A Memorable Century

11/4/2018

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EQUAL AND OPPOSITE REACTIONS
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A Memorable Century

On November 8, 2018, Tom’s father, Charlie Liszkay, will be 100 years old.

To celebrate the occasion Tom’s sister Mary Jane,

...planned a surprise birthday party for her father at his assisted living facility in Lorain, Ohio. A surprise it had to be because we all knew that Charlie Liszkay's response to the idea of a party for himself - even to mark such an epochal milestone as a century on the planet - would be “Like fun!”
However, as the rest of us did happen to want to mark the event, the surprise party took place yesterday, Saturday November 3 and did, in fact, turn out to be quite a fun event, even for the soon-to-be centenarian.
Those who could come came, including Charlie's four children,

All grown up now.

Our branch of the family was represented by Tom, myself, Tommy and Emily,

...here at a brunch stop along the 3-hour trip from Columbus to Lorain,

...at an awesome little restaurant called Dmitri's,

...in the cute little town of Wellington, Ohio.

Dmitri's

The food was really good.

Tom gave a special shout-out to his extra-fluffy pancakes,

...Tommy to his potato pancakes, (with a side of also yummy broccoli cheddar)

...Emily to the enormous pile of hot, crispy fries served with her grilled cheese,

...and me to my just-perfect hash browns.

After brunch we headed back out on the road, passing on this lovely fall day through the small northern Ohio towns,

...and farmland,

...on the way to Lorain.
Tom noticed that he had a voicemail message that had apparently arrived while we were in the restaurant. It was his father. "They sent around invitations to a surprise party for me today at one o'clock," went his father's phone message, "I'm quite surprised."
Still, his father didn't sound unhappy about the party or that all the residents in his assisted living facility had been invited. In fact, when we arrived,

...with 25 filled helium birthday balloons, which we'd carted in contractor bags from Columbus,

...we learned that after learning about the party he had been saying to the staff and his fellow residents, with tongue-in-cheek indignation,

..."How do you like that? My own party and I'm the only one who didn't get an invitation!"

As it was 12:30 pm when we arrived we got straight to work setting up the balloons,

...while the other relatives set out the place-settings and favors made by Mary Jane,

...the cake,

...and a beautiful poster,

...made by two of the grand children, Mary Jane's children Stacy and Jason.

At one o'clock all the guests arrived,

...and the celebration began with a tribute by Tom to his father..

Then we lit a cupcake, and after Charlie blew out the candles,

...the cake and ice cream was passed around.

Jason also made a card,

....which we passed around for the residents to sign.

After I snapped this picture with Carmen, one of the super facility aids, Charlie thanked her and asked her to thank everyone else in the facility for him.

To me he said, "It's so wonderful that all my friends and family came to celebrate my birthday." He added that he planned to have ten more birthdays.

Charlie with his children and their spouses,

...and some of his 13 grandchildren.

After the party we moved to the dining room/common area,

...which offers a lovely view of Lake Erie,

...to give Charlie his birthday gifts,

...mostly Browns and Indians items,

...Charlie being dyed-in-the-wool Cleveland rooter,

...as is evidenced by the stats chart on his wall upon which he keeps track of the team scores during their respective seasons.

Then, after walking Charlie back to his room,

...we said our good-byes.
Wonderful it was.

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Ora Pro Nobis

11/1/2018

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Ora Pro Nobis

A week and a half ago U.S. postal workers discovered the first of a dozen pipe bombs sent to prominent Democrats by Cesar Seyoc, a man who derived his source of inspiration from Donald Trump, whose hallmark is condoning violence among his supporters against his critics:

"Trump praises GOP congressman who assaulted reporter: 'Any guy that can do a body slam — he's my guy.'"

"Trump tells police officers they should rough people up more during arrests. 'Please don't be too nice,' he said, to laughter from the crowd."

"At a Las Vegas rally he said security guards were too gentle with a protester. 'He's walking out with big high-fives, smiling, laughing,' Trump said. 'I'd like to punch him in the face, I'll tell you.'"

"Trump supporters chant 'Lock Her Up' the same day Hillary Clinton was sent a pipe bomb."

In Louisville Kentucky, two days after the news of the pipe bombs, one Gregory A Bush, whose face evokes a cyborg with a circuit-board run haywire behind its glass eyes, went on a mission to gun down African Americans and killed two people who were shopping at a Kroger's.

And three days after the Kroger's shooting eleven people in a synagogue were shot to death with an assault rifle wielded by Robert Bowers, a twisted, hate-filled social media fiend who may be the avatar for the all the twisted, hate-filled minds spreading the plague of antisemitism in this country that has intensified in the two years since Donald Trump has been in office.

For Americans it's been a week of horror, and we are all still gripped by shock, grief, fear, barely able to find the words to help us come to terms with the terrible things going on around us.

Some families have just finished burying their dead;

Maurice E. Stallard Vicki Lee Jones

...others have just started.

But Donald Trump has, of course, already moved on, barely pausing along the way to read or tweet a few lifeless words about unity and coming together before getting back to his main job as President of the United States:

...whipping up his base into a frenzy against his critics.

A couple of days ago one of my Facebook friends posted this:

...to which I commented:

I think my Facebook friend and I got to the double-branched root of the problem:

(1) A President whose embrace of the principles of White Nationalism has emboldened a legion of nematodes to slither out from under their rocks while giving society's most severely deranged,

...a big, visible blaring, direction towards which to warp,

...and (2) the easy availability of guns and assault rifles to even those most severely deranged.
      But Donald Trump will not say that Nazis are bad because neo-Nazis make up a significant chunk of his base and the issue of banning assault rifles has barely surfaced this mass-murder around.
      Instead Donald Trump has chosen to quickly change the subject of those who died last week and further rattle the nerves of our already too-rattled nation by springing on us that he plans to abolish the 14th amendment - which grants citizenship to all those born on our soil - because he can.
       His anti-immigrant supporters are now hopped up on the idea while far-right conservative pundits on Fox News gleefully pick apart our Constitution to argue that the 14th Amendment in truth never meant that just anybody born here was entitled to American citizenship.
        The rest of us nervously wonder if Donald Trump can, in fact, erase whichever of our Constitutional rights it pleases him to erase,

...even if he can't grieve with us.

References:
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/29/us/anti-semitism-attacks.html?rref=collection%2Ftimestopic%2FAnti-Semitism&action=click&contentCollection=timestopics&region=stream&module=stream_unit&version=latest&contentPlacement=2&pgtype=collection

https://www.cnn.com/2018/10/26/us/kentucky-kroger-shooting/index.html

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/back-trump-comments-perceived-encouraging-violence/story?id=48415766

https://progressive.org/magazine/trump-s-army-how-the-president-and-neo-nazis-work-hand-in-ha/

https://www.cnn.com/2018/10/30/politics/donald-trump-ending-birthright-citizenship/index.html

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/fourteenth-amendment-citizenship-clause-president-trump-today-2018-10-30/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jus_soli

https://video.foxnews.com/v/5855306758001/?#sp=show-clips

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Ghosts Of Halloweens Past

10/31/2018

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Ghosts Of Halloweens Past

   I know Halloween has its lovers and its haters, though probably more lovers than haters.
    I happen to be among the Halloween lovers.
I've always loved Halloween, even past the time when I was still considered young enough to put on a costume and go house-to-house collecting candy bars, full-sized candy bars being the Halloween treat de rigueur back in my day.
    I remember even being excited on the first Halloween that I stayed home to give out candy to trick-or-treaters instead being among them. It was 1964. I was in eighth grade. I felt very grown-up,

...even though I still played with Barbies. (See post from 3/6/2014, https://www.ailantha.com/blog/our-barbies-ourselves).

I remember that night hearing on the radio the song "She's Not There" by the British rock group The Zombies,

...and thinking that was a cool song for Halloween because it sounded kind of spooky and The Zombies was kind of a spooky name. I think it's because of that song that this particular Halloween stands out so saliently in my memory.

Maybe it's because of the memories of Halloweens past,

...that those of us who love Halloween continue to look forward to it,

...even after our own little ghosts,

...and clowns,

...and dancers,

...and knights,

...have long grown.

Maybe we love Halloween because we see in the faces of the little
tricker- or -treaters,

...the faces of our own children, once upon a time,

...and remember ourselves being young.
Happy Halloween.

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Megyn Kelly, The Thing Personified, And My Unfortunate Evolution

10/26/2018

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Today I thought I'd rerun a post I wrote on 10/26/2016, two years ago to the day.

In view of all the commentary - both on the media and among the citizenry - swirling around the firing of Megyn Kelly from NBC,

...I thought this post might be appropriate and educational and perhaps a clue for anyone who doesn't get what was offensive and wrong with Megyn Kelly's breezy defense of white people wearing blackface on Halloween; for anyone who doesn't understand that Megyn Kelly, for all her success, fame and $17million-a-year salary, is not only dense and tone deaf, but has shown herself to be just another variation - though in her case a public and blaring one - of The Thing. In fact, one could say that Megyn Kelly is The Thing personified.
Read on, and, if need be, may you experience an unfortunate evolution of your own.

My Unfortunate Evolution

Yesterday occurred the regular Wednesday morning meeting of the Panera Posse - my group of gal pals, there are eight of us altogether, though it's a rare week that we can all make it - who get together once a week to have our coffee or tea while we talk about all sorts of things, what we've been up to,

...our families, our grandkids, our pets, our life events,

...the books we've read, the movies we've seen, a great new recipe or restaurant we've found, our happy news, our sad news, the local news, the national news, politics, basically whatever's on any of our minds.
       So yesterday one of the Posse members told us about a day trip she and her husband had taken with a retired colleagues' group to which they belong to Granville, a scenic little Ohio college town about 30 miles outside Columbus.
       After lunch in a nice restaurant my friend wanted to visit some of the cute little shops in the town.   But when my friend and her husband entered the first store The Thing happened. The Thing that that still happens once in a while when my friend, who is white, and her husband, who is African American, enter a public place together. The sudden silence. The feel of eyes on them. My friend's desire to leave, just leave.
       It didn't happen in every store in the town, of course, and it doesn't happen all the time. But it did happen again that day.
       "Oh, I know what you mean," sympathized one of our other friends who just turned 70 and who spent most of her career working in Washington D.C. in the Office of Human Resources Management.

"I still get followed around by the sales ladies in Macy's, right up behind me" she said. "I swear, one of these days I'm going to turn around quick and end up kissing one of them!"

"Oh, that happens to my daughter, too, when she goes shopping," said my first friend, whose daughter is biracial. Then she went on to tell us of a variation on the theme that happened a few days ago.
     He daughter, an attorney in her early thirties, was shopping with a white friend at a local White House Black Market store.   As they roamed the upscale boutique, each picking out clothes to try on, a white saleswoman approached the white woman and asked if she could open a dressing room for her. The salesperson did not return to my friend's daughter, who also had some items draped over her arm, to ask if she could open a dressing room for her, but stayed attentive to the white woman, returning and retrieving items to and from the racks for her while ignoring my friend's daughter.
     "At least it's not as bad as it used to be," sighed the friend who threatened to end up kissing a too-closely-following salesperson.
     "No, it is bad!" I jumped in, "When it happens to you, even if it only happens once in a while, or once a year, or once every few years, even if it only happens once, it's bad! It's wrong!" I ranted on, telling my friends that I was so sorry, that I felt so badly that they still had to put up with that kind of thing.
       My first friend smiled at me. "You've evolved", she said.
      When I asked her what she meant she reminded that when she first met me years ago and talked about the kind of treatment she and her husband sometimes received in public places I'd been incredulous. I just couldn't believe that that sort of subtle racism was still alive and well and thriving in and around Columbus, Ohio.
      "But now you believe it," my friend said.
       Yes, now, sadly, I believe it.

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Everything You Never Wondered About The Mega Millions Lottery And So Never Thought To Ask

10/25/2018

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Don't stress the holidays, give the gift of a good book.

"Equal And Opposite Reactions"
by Patti Liszkay
Buy it at
amazon.com, http://amzn.to/2xvcgRa
Barnes & Noble,
The Book Loft
of German Village,
Columbus, Ohio

Everything You Never Wondered About The Mega Millions Lottery And So Never Thought To Ask

A couple of days ago, after the Mega Millions jackpot had crept upwards of one-and-a-half billion dollars, I posted this on my Facebook page:

...which generated a few shares and a subsequent flurry of comments over where the money is really going and how come the schools aren't flush with money.
At one point I added this comment:

...to which another reader replied that I might want to research that myself, to which I replied:

     And so I did. I had to search and search the internet to find some answers - most sites had to do with how to play the lottery or how the jackpot money would be paid out or how to collect the jackpot money if one won - but I did find some answers, more or less, though what I found turned out to be a weence more complicated and involved than I'd anticipated.
     Therefore, if anyone else besides me is interested in the simple-version answers to the above questions, read on.
       So, then, the Mega Millions lottery - and the Powerball lottery, too - is jointly run by a coalition of the 44 states which sell the lottery tickets. According to a report by cnbcnews.com the money taken in from the sale of Mega Millions tickets is divided thus:
60% is given out in prize money.
          15% goes to retailers, marketing and operations.
           25% goes back to the states to spend as they wish.
        Therefore the most recent $1.6 billion prize, most of which was won the other night by somebody in South Carolina, was only 60% of all the ticket revenue taken in. Which, according to my calculations, means that people in this country spent over $2.6 billion since July 24 when the last Mega Millions lottery prize was paid out.
          So:
           In the past 3 months a little over $2.6 billion was collected in Mega Millions money.
          $1.6 billion (60%) was (or soon will be) paid out (minus the taxes) in prize money.
            A little over $400 million will be paid to retailers, marketing and operations.
            And $600 million will be paid to the states.
         But that $600 million has to be divided among 44 states, so that means that each state will get a little over $13.6 million.

    So that answers the questions of how much lottery money is collected, how much is paid out, and how much the states get. Which begs the next question of what the states do with their share of the Mega Millions money, which, as far as I could find out, nobody seems to know for sure.
      Most of the states purportedly earmark lottery income for education, though the money tends to be tossed into the general state fund, and how much of it is actually spent on education is a question of faith. In any case, it's obvious that lottery money has not, as initially promised, bailed out education in this country.
        In Ohio, for example, an investigation by the Columbus Dispatch found that, while state officials did use lottery money for education, they then cut the amount of the lottery money out of state funding for education.
        So for Ohio, the lottery is a zero net profit for education, but more money for the general state fund to spend on whatever state legislators want to spend it on, which is, well, who knows what?
         Come think of it I guess the Mega Millions, Powerball, and all the other state lotteries are, in effect, a sneaky way to collect more taxes.
         In fact, with the U.S. national debt up over $21 trillion maybe the U.S. Treasury should start running a Mega Trillions lottery to raise more revenue. But it would probably be smarter hold off doing it until the next president. By then our country will be mega-broke.

References:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multi-State_Lottery_Association

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/where-does-mega-millions-money-go-after-the-jackpot/

https://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/local/2014/03/16/fund-shifts-siphon-aid-to-schools.html

https://abcnews.go.com/US/story?id=92598&page=1

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_debt_of_the_United_States

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Then They Came For The LGBTQ Community, All Of Whom Were Someone's Children.

10/22/2018

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This morning when I looked at the front page of the New York Times and saw this:

...I felt as if I'd had the wind momentarily knocked out of me.
I felt worse after reading the article under the headline.
According to the article the Trump administration, which has already tried to bar transgenders from the military and take away their rights to health care under the Affordable Care Act, is considering "a government-wide effort to roll back recognition and protections of transgender people under civil rights law."

This effort is being led by the Department of Health and Human Services and overseen by Roger Severino, the Department's director of - ironically - the Office of Civil Rights, who, before he was appointed by Trump, was a zealous anti-LGBTQ activist and head of the DeVos Center for Religion and Civil Society at the right-wing Heritage Foundation.

The Health and Human Services department contends that government agencies need to adopt a uniform definition of gender and must "define sex as either male or female, unchangeable, and determined by the genitals that a person is born with."
       This definition would initially be applied to Title IX, the civil rights law that bans gender discrimination in federally-funded education programs, but Health and Human Services is calling on The Departments of Education, Justice, and Labor to likewise adopt its definition in order to establish uniformity in government regulations.
           And if the Justice Department rules that everyone must be defined as either male or female based strictly to the genitals they were born with, then this rule can be enforced across all government agencies.
         According to the Times, this new ruling would "eradicate federal recognition of the estimated 1.4 million Americans who have opted to recognize themselves — surgically or otherwise — as a gender other than the one they were born into."
          In other words, when it to came to protected civil rights and human rights, transgenders would cease to exist and so would their rights. They'd have no laws on their side protecting them from discrimination, sexual harassment or sexual assault. How could they have any laws on their side when legally they don't exist?
   It's likely that I'm more outraged than most Americans with a shred of decency are outraged by this latest act of inhumanity by the Trump Administration; and in truth I'm more frightened than outraged.
   Because for me this is not just a matter of conscience, of justice, of doing unto others as I would have them do unto me, of being my brothers' and sisters' keepers;

For me this is about the ones I love.

I can't protect or save them alone; please, every American who reads this, please don't let this happen to our country.
Please don't let this happen to my child.

References:
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/21/us/politics/transgender-trump-administration-sex-definition.html

https://www.advocate.com/politics/2018/10/22/meet-roger-severino-trump-bigot-working-erase-trans-people

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Then They Came For The LGBTQ Community, All Of Whom Were Someone's Children.

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