Friday, February 7, 2025
D+92
1857 Gustave Flaubert was acquitted of obscenity for "Madame Bovary"
1950 Senator Joe McCarthy found "communists" in US Department of State
1950 United States formally recognized the State of Vietnam as the legitimate government of Vietnam, with Bảo Đại as leader
1962 JFK began the blockade of Cuba by banning all Cuban imports and exports.
In bed by 10:45 and up at 6:15. 13° outside, wind chill of 2°,
Prednisone, day 294,\ 5 mg. day 3, Kevzara, day 3/14. 2.5 mg. prednisone at 6:20 a.m. Other meds around 9:30. 2/5 mg. [redmospmeat5 p.m. Trulicity injection around 6 p.m
Beautiful dreamer, wake unto me / Starlight and dewdrops are waiting for thee; Stephen Foster wrote his song in 1862 but one might think he had in mind Donald Trump and his plan to "tale over" and "own" the Gaza Strip. Even after worldwide rejection and denunciation of his plan, he wrote on his Truth Social site that the United States and its partners were prepared to build “one of the greatest and most spectacular developments” on the planet in Gaza once Israel ceded control there. “The Gaza Strip would be turned over to the United States by Israel at the conclusion of the fighting,” adding that Palestinians “would have already been resettled in far safer and more beautiful communities, with new and modern homes, in the region. . . No soldiers by the U.S. would be needed! Stability for the region would reign!!!” We worried about Joe Biden's mental acuity at age 81, how about Trump's mental condition at age 78? Delusional?
No state wants the Palestinians, certainly not Jordan and certainly not Egypt. Presumably, Trump plans on offering any state that agrees to accept Palestinians displaced by the U.S. and Israel many billions of dollars of American foreign aid as an inducement, much like the foreign aid already provided to dictator-led Egypt as the bribe/reward for its peace treaty with Israel back in 1979 (which led to Anwar Sadat's assassination in 1981.) From the Camp David peace accords in 1978 until 2000, the United States has subsidized Egypt's armed forces with over $38 billion worth of aid. Egypt receives about $1.3 billion annually.
"Since 1946, the United States has provided an estimated total of $372.6 billion (obligations in current dollars) in foreign assistance to the MENA )Middle East/North Africa) region. For FY2024, overall aid requested forthe MENA region amounts to $7.57 billion, or about 11% of the State Department’s InternationaAffairs budget request. Compared with FY2022 actuals (not including emergency supplemental funding), for FY2024, the Administration proposed to reduce MENA funding by 3.5%. As inprevious years, assistance for Israel, Egypt, and Jordan constitutes the majority of the Middle East funding request. The region also receives a sizable portion of annual humanitarian assistance appropriations, which are not included in the region-specific aid figures" Congressional Reseach Service, "U.S. Foreign Assistance to the Middle East: Historical, Recent Trends, and the FY2024 Background Request"
Even since the surpluses generated by the Clinton Administration in the 1990s, the U.S. has operated on deficit spending, borrowing money, largely from China, to run its many programs, including foreign aid, mostly to Israel, Egypt, and Jordan (discounting the emergency aid to Ukraine since the Russian invasion in 2022.) This year's budget deficit is projected to be $1.6 trillion! What would it cost the U.S. to get MENA countries to accept almost 2 million war-ravaged Palestinian Gazans and how would we pay for it? More borrowing from China? More taxing the middle class while protecting the very wealthy under the Trump/Republican tax plan? Or will Elon Musk pick up the tab? The U.S. has been picking up much of the tab for the Zionist Project for 75 years, especially since the 1967 war resulted in the occupation of Gaza, the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and the Golan Heights. Now Trump wants to increase the burdens by joining Israel as an occupier of Palestinian lands. Look how well that has worked out for Israel and for the Palestinians. What madness.
Living among the swells. The house next door to us was bought a couple years ago for $1,085,000. It has just been sold ("contract pending, accepted offer") for $1,4000,000, or at least that was the asking price. Egad! How far I've dome from the roach-infested 1 bedroom basement flat at 7303 S. Emerald Ave.
Random observation at Walgreens today: Marlboro cigarettes, $10.81 per pack which comes out to 54.05 cents per butt. Wow.
The South Dakota Snow(job) Queen is in Guantanamo today, America's dumping ground or garbage pit. Lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch' intrate. She will show as much compassion for the deported immigrants she sends there as she showed her puppy 'Cricket' that she bragged in her autobiography about shooting in her gravel pit. Guantanamo will be her gravel pit for about 30,000 human Crickets.
Trump 'presser' with Japanese prime minister today. I show my age by being put off a bit by seeing Japanese flags side-by-side with Old Glory behind the two men. The 'rising sun' flag still reminds me of Japanese aggression and homicidal cruelty in the 1930s and 1940s. First question from Peter Doucy (what a surprise!) Trump almost accuses the entire US government of being a criminal enterprise, on the take.
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