AN OPEN LETTER TO MAGA MARCHERS

When Donald Trump incited you to assault the Capitol, he said he would be with you.

He wasn’t.

Four of you are dead and you’ve killed a policeman. More of you will suffer and die from the COVID that spread through your maskless march. Many of you now face prison terms and ruined lives.

Had you been black, you’d’ve been gunned down before you got anywhere near the Capitol building.

Some of you in Los Angeles compensated by assaulting a black woman who accidentally walked into one of your rallies. Others expressed your opinions about Jews by wearing hats saying 6MWE (Six Million Wasn’t Enough).

Maybe Trump’s bone spurs kept him from marching with you.

When Alice Paul and Martin Luther King and Dorothy Day and Cesar Chavez and so many other great American leaders have organized marches for social change, they personally endured gassings, beatings, imprisonment. They never hesitated to risk their own bodies for a higher cause.

Should you be worried about the new COVID strains originating in the UK, South Africa, and elsewhere, and recently identified in the US, as well as newly identified strains that originated in the US and quickly became predominant in Central Ohio?

As the US ruling elites have fully succumbed to Israel’s political discourse on Palestine, the Israeli government of right-wing Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, may feel that it, alone, is capable of determining the future of the Palestinian people. 

This conclusion is, perhaps, gleaned from Israel’s behavior in recent years and months. The expansion of illegal Jewish settlements, the plan to annex large swathes of the Occupied Palestinian Territories and the entrenching of the existing system of apartheid and perpetual colonialism are all evidence that demonstrates Israel’s renewed sense of empowerment. 

Israel is further emboldened by the fact that the so-called ‘international community’ has, thus far, failed to challenge American and Israeli intransigency. The European Union, which is fighting for its own identity, let alone survival, is proving to be a marginal force in Israel and Palestine. Without American guidance, the EU seems incapable of leading its own independent initiatives. 

Not unsurprisingly, the so-called Trumpster “patriots” plan armed demonstrations in Washington D.C. and at all state capitol buildings this week, according to reports.

This is a good time to review Ohio’s updated “stand your ground” law, which the Republican-besieged Statehouse pushed to get passed during the summer of social justice.

Remember, “stand your ground” is how George Zimmerman, when he was playing his favorite make-believe game “biased cop,” got away with murdering Trayvon Martin.

When Gov. DeWine recently signed Senate Bill 175, he made it legal for Ohioans, if they feel threatened, to shoot and kill in nearly all places, not just their residence or vehicle.

The law also abolishes the “duty to retreat” or try to get away first, meaning “a person has no duty to retreat before using force in self-defense,” as stated in the law.

Stand your ground is what justified gun-fighting in the Old West.

BANGKOK, Thailand -- Thailand's 68-year-old king and his loyal, testy
prime minister suffered a dangerous 2020, relentlessly exposed to
loud, satirical, young revolutionaries in the streets demanding
democracy and limits to the monarch's wealth and security forces.

"Maha" or "Great" King Vajiralongkorn and Prime Minister Prayuth
Chan-ocha now face a harsh January but are expected to emerge secure.

"Prayuth does not seem to be in danger. The royal-military alliance
seems to be unassailable," said Michael Nelson of the Asian Governance
Foundation.

The foundation focuses on law, academia and other sectors in Asia. Its
advisors include former commanding general of the U.S. Marine Corps in
the Pacific, Lt. Gen. Wallace C. Gregson.

"The protesters, though big on Facebook, also have little backing in
the population. And now, the government is getting tough with them,"
Mr. Nelson said in an interview.

Prime Minister Prayuth seized power in a bloodless 2014 coup when he
was a general and army commander-in-chief.