3/23/2025

 Sunday, March 23, 2025

D+136/63

1933 German Reichstag hastily passed the Enabling Act and President Paul von Hindenburg signed it the same day, granting Adolf Hitler dictatorial powers

2003 In Nasiriyah, Iraq, 11 soldiers and 18 U.S. Marines were killed during the first major conflict of Operation Iraqi Freedom

2010  President Barack Obama signed the Affordable Care Act (ACA), nicknamed 'Obamacare', expanding the availability and affordability of health care insurance

In bed at 9:05, awake and up at 3:15 to fill the humidifier, light a Kitty candle and a log in the fireplace, and enjoy a cup of lavender chamomile tea.  

Prednisone, day 336; 4 mg., day 18/21; Kevzara, day5.14; GCM, day 5/15; Trulicity,  day 3/7.  2 mg. of prednisone at 5 a.m. and  5 p.m.  Other meds at 2:30 p.m.   

À la recherche du temps perdu.   At the conclusion of Bill Maher's Real Time program this week he concluded his "New Rules" segment ranting about America's military, i.e., war budget.  The 2024 U. S. federal budget was $6.8 trillion. Discretionary spending is only $1.8 trillion, of which 47% was devoted to military spending.  Another 8% went for VA benefits, 7% to Health and Human Services, and 6% to Homeland Security.  We should probably add that 8% allocated to veterans benefits to DOD's 47% since providing promised health and other benefits to military veterans is merely another cost of our gigantic war machine costs.  Our defense budget is higher than that of the next 9 countries combined.  It is greater than the combined defense budgets of China, Russia, India, Saudi Arabia, the U.K., Germany, Ukraine, France, and Japan.  It is more than triple that of our biggest adversary, China, and 8 and ½ times that of Russia.  The Pentagon itself, in a 2017 self-assessment, says it has 19% more bases than it needs.  According to a Cato Institute analysis, there are 750 American military facilities in 80 nations and territories all around the world.       

Maher's righteous and right-on rant reminded me of a brief lunchtime conversation decades ago in our law firm's lunchroom.  We were discussing world affairs or national security or somesuch and I offered that the greatest threat to world peace is us, the U.S.  I believed then, as I believe now, the the rest of the world realizes this and the only people who don't are us/US.  I argued that the reason was our voracious for raw materials, goods, and markets.  I guess I had said the wrong thing; you would have thought I had challenged the virtue of all my colleagues' mothers.  But how else does one explain the size of our war machine budget?  How else does one explain the 750 military facilities in 80 nations?  How else does one explain the subordination of universal health care, child care, ample and affordable housing, excellent public education, and so on to the financing of our war machine?  How else to explain our misadventures in Vietnam, Afghanistan, and Iraq?  Of course, there are lots of reasons for each individual facility-siting and staffing and for each war we get ourselves into, or support, or threaten, just as there are a lot of reason for each social welfare program we underfund, e.g., health care, education, housing, etc.  But the old truism remains true: our budgets reflect our priorities and our values.  Our defense budgets, ever since the end of World War II, reflect both our desire to dominate the world, to be the hegemon, and our willingness to use military force, i.e., to wage war, in order to maintain our dominance.

Trump's War on Law, Lawyers, and Judges.  There have been three Executive Orders against prominent law firms that have represented persons and interests against the federal government: Covington and Berling, Perkins Coie, and Paul, Weiss.  Covington was targeted because it represented Special Counsel Jack Smith in his proceedings involving Donald J. Trump.  Perkins Coie represented Hilary Clinton.  Paul Weiss has long represented Democratic parties and interests.  Paul Weiss, unlike the other two firms, caved into Trump, settling with him (1) by agreeing to donate $40 million worth of work on pro bono work favored by the Trump administration, and (2) by agreeing to engge an audit firm to audit its hiring and promotion practices, especially its so-called DEI practices.  There is another Executive Order saying that the  White House is tasking all federal agencies with bringing sanctions motion against lawyers and law firms that may have violated Rule 11 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure and Rule 3 of the Model Rules of Professional Conduct.  Lastly, there are the disparagement, vilification, and villainization of judges who rule against the government in litigation, the encouragement to impeach them, and seeking to have them removed from cases, and worst of all, the incitement of the MAGA crackpot crowd to threaten and perhaps do violence against them.  One can argue about whether the Trumpkins are 'merely' authoritarian or fascistic, but it seems to me to be beyond cavil that the incitement to violence of lone wolf crackpots and of mobs comes right from 1930s fascists using their Black Shirt and Brown Shirts to cow their opponents.  Seig heil!