General Discussion

People think their vote will support their interests. For the GOP, it's less taxes and small gubmint. They have no clue that both -- taxes and government services -- work in their best interests -- short term and long term. Seeing the oligarchs who own and operate the nation's news media makes clear why it's up to us to tell them.

Regarding my MAGA fam: They threw a cocktail party for us. One of the older cousins became sore mad at me for criticizing Trump (I had a drink or two and forgot not to talk politics). I brought up the NAZI influence on the GOP and detailed how. And he got angrier and angrier. I then brought up how his late father -- my wife's uncle -- had fought the bastards in World War II. I recounted the time his father had told me about how he had trained pilots to fly the twin-engine B-25 bombers in Texas. Meanwhile his brother -- my wife's dad -- was flying as a navigator aboard B-17Gs out of England.

The fact I remembered the role our cousin's dad served dring WW2 calmed him down enough long enough to really listen to what I had to say. I wasn't criticizing him or his beliefs: I was criticizing the lies a number of politicians had led him to believe. By the time we were done, we were back to the jug, hugs and back-slapping.

That direct connection between GOP policies and NAZI/KKK/Dixie ideology was not being expressed by the nation's mass media, nor is it much taught in schools any more. Heck, the family is descended from Germans who emigrated when the Kaiser wanted to draft them for cannon-fodder in one of the wars against France after Napoleon. During the Civil War in America, several of their new countrymen in the great state of Texas volunteered to fight to preserve the Union and were murdered by their fellow Texans who supported the Confederacy.

These are misled, misguided and misinformed people of good character. If they knew what we do, they'd vote straight Democratic ticket. I'm working on that.

Regarding the flooding: One cousin opened up the family ranch for use by the emergency responders. They did so without compensation nor publicity.