My first Post ! I am an elderly man, sort of. Some people say I’m senile and some say “I’m a crazy old man.”
So here we go, This morning I was watching the weather. Decided to go to YouTube. I spotted a channel which had the quotes of Galileo Galilei. If you’re not familiar he lived between 1564 thru 1642. My thought was in a time when life was so different what could he have said that would have relevance today. After reading a few of his quotes I landed on this one.
It is as follows “He who makes himself a sheep shall be eaten by the wolves”.
I was thinking about the present political situation in the USA today. Have we come to the point where the Democrats have intentionally made themselves the sheep and the Republicans have always been the wolf? The guess is that the Democrats played the sheep hoping to gain more votes in midterm elections. Now as the wolf bears his teeth they are about to be eaten. I believe the only way to beat a wolf is to fight like a wolf.
It is amazing that this scenario keeps repeating itself. Maybe because we don’t teach history or civics in school. We don’t promote programs like Boys and Girls State or Nation anymore. Our schools are focused more on power and money. This would mean the common citizen has no idea of parliamentary procedures. The electoral procedures or and responsibility of congress to its citizens.
This gives the great advantage to the wolves. They are easily able to prey upon the sheep.
If the leaders of the sheep promote sheep acting like sheep. Well, so goes the story ,the Wolf versus the sheep. We all know how it will end up. Just in case you don’t, the Wolves eat the sheep!
In case we’ve forgotten him, former OK Schools Supt. Ryan Walters did a lot of really expensive, very crazy stuff in the schools, later getting caught watching porn on school property; he was caught while chairing a meeting with Board members. I promised Scottie that I’d post whenever I found something about Ryan Walters. I read thishere, where there is plenty more news.
Alexia Aston, The Oklahoman Thu, October 2, 2025 at 9:17 AM CDT
Attorney General Gentner Drummond has called for an investigative audit into the Oklahoma State Department of Education following the resignation of Ryan Walters as the state’s top education official.
In a letter sent Wednesday, Oct. 1, to Oklahoma State Auditor and Inspector Cindy Byrd, Drummond ordered an audit covering Walters’ tenure from January 2023 to September 2025. The attorney general said several current and past state education employees had raised concerns about spending practices under Walters’ leadership, adding that the former superintendent has a “history of mishandling tax dollars.”
A spokesman for Byrd confirmed her office had received Drummond’s letter.
Walters, the controversial former state schools superintendent, resigned Tuesday to lead a new professional organization that touts itself as “an alternative to union membership” for teachers. The former education leader drew national attention Oklahoma through ultra-conservative, Christianity-focused initiatives. During his tenure, he ordered public schools to teach from the Bible, honor Kirk with a moment of silence and show students a video of him praying for President Donald Trump.
Madison Cercy, spokeswoman for the Department of Education, did not respond to a request for comment.
Grand jury findings blamed Ryan Walters for misspending COVID funds
Drummond, a Republican who’s running for governor, cited the state’s multicounty grand jury findings in 2024, which blamed Walters for misspending pandemic relief funds.
“You are well aware that the former superintendent has a documented history of mismanaging tax dollars, as it was your office that exposed Mr. Walters for granting ‘blanket approval’ for families to purchase non-educational items like Xboxes and refrigerators,” Drummond wrote in the letter to Byrd.
At the time, grand jurors did not issue any indictments, saying they found insufficient evidence to establish, beyond a reasonable doubt, that a crime was committed.
The grand jury specifically blamed Walters for the misspending of federal funds in a program called Bridge the Gap. The program fell underneath the Governor’s Emergency Education Relief Fund. Bridge the Gap’s purpose was to help children get supplies to learn at home during the pandemic. Some parents used funds from the program to buy things for themselves.
Walters has faulted ClassWallet, the out-of-state company hired to help disburse the federal funds.
Democratic lawmaker files ethics complaint against Walters
Drummond isn’t the only elected official requesting a state agency to investigate Walters’ oversight.
State Rep. Ellen Pogemiller, D-Oklahoma City, filed a formal complaint with the Oklahoma Ethics Commission on Sept. 29, saying Walters’ hiring as chief executive officer of the Teacher Freedom Alliance – which he announced during an appearance on Fox News Sept. 24 – raises ethics concerns. Walters repeatedly touted the organization in the months leading up to his hiring.
“This development strongly suggests that his prior actions were motivated by personal financial or professional gain, further underscoring the need for investigation,” Pogemiller wrote in her complaint, which was addressed to Lee Anne Bruce Boone, the Ethics Commission’s executive director.
More than half a million people flooded Washington, D.C., demanding civil rights for gay and lesbian Americans, now celebrated each year as National Coming Out Day. Many of the marchers objected to the government’s response to the AIDS crisis, as well as the Supreme Court’s 1986 decision to uphold sodomy laws in Bowers v. Hardwick.
The NAMES Project AIDS Memorial Quilt was first displayed there, bringing national attention to the impact of AIDS on gay communities, a tapestry of nearly two thousand fabric panels each a tribute to the life of one who had been lost in the pandemic.
<–The AIDS quilt, first displayed in 1987 in Washington, DC
October 8, 1945 President Harry S. Truman announced that the secret of the atomic bomb would be shared only with Great Britain and Canada.
October 8, 1982 The Polish Parliament overwhelmingly approved a law banning Solidarnos´c´ (Solidarity), the independent trade union that had captured the imagination and allegiance of nearly 10 million Poles. Solidarnosc leader Lech Walesa, 1982 The law abolished all existing labor organizations, including Solidarity, whose 15 months of existence brought hope to people in Poland and around the world but drew the anger of the Soviet and other Eastern-bloc (Warsaw Pact) governments. The parliament created a new set of unions with severely restricted rights.
October 7, 1989 Tens of thousands (estimates ranged from 40,000 to 150,000) from all over the country marched on Washington, lobbied Congress and Housing Secretary Jack Kemp to provide affordable housing for the homeless. Some of the signs read, “Build Houses, Not Bombs.” Kemp signed a letter committing the George H.W. Bush administration to several steps to help the homeless, including setting aside about 5000 government-owned single-family houses for them.
October 7, 1998 Matthew Shepard Matthew Shepard, a gay student at the University of Wyoming, was beaten, robbed and left tied to a wooden fence post outside Laramie, Wyoming; he died five days later. His death helped awaken the nation to the persecution of homosexuals and their victimization as objects of hate crimes. A play about the incident, and later an HBO movie, “The Laramie Project,” has been performed all over the country. Watch a preview MatthewShepard.org Matthew’s Place
This is bad news, probably very bad news. SPLC and ADL do so much work against anti-semitism, and SPLC lobbies against and informs of hate of all people. I do lobbying work with SPLC. Maybe the Quakers are more gentle than SPLC, but only by a hair! So this is bad news for many reasons now.
WASHINGTON (AP) — FBI Director Kash Patel says the bureau is cutting ties with two organizations that for decades have tracked domestic extremism and racial and religious bias, a move that follows complaints about the groups from some conservatives and prominent allies of President Donald Trump.
Patel said Friday that the FBI would sever its relationship with the Southern Poverty Law Center, asserting that the organization had been turned into a “partisan smear machine” and criticizing it for its use of a “hate map” that documents alleged anti-government and hate groups inside the United States. A statement earlier in the week from Patel said the FBI would end ties with the Anti-Defamation League, a prominent Jewish advocacy organization that fights antisemitism.
The announcements amount to a dramatic rethinking of longstanding FBI partnerships with prominent civil rights groups at a time when Patel is moving rapidly to reshape the nation’s premier federal law enforcement agency. The organizations over the years have provided research on hate crime and domestic extremism, law enforcement training and other services but have also been criticized by some conservatives for what they say is an unfair maligning of their viewpoints. snip-MORE on the page)
October 4, 1976 Earl Butz resigned as President Gerald Ford’s agriculture secretary with an apology for what he called the “gross indiscretion” of uttering a racist remark.
October 4, 1997 Demonstrations across the country occurred protesting the scheduled launch of the space probe Cassini because its power source was three plutonium-fueled Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generators.The probe carried 72.3 pounds of plutonium, the most ever put on a device to be launched into space. The concern was for an accidental release in the event of a launch mishap. Plutonium is the most toxic substance known. “It is so toxic,” says Helen Caldicott, president emeritus of Physicians for Social Responsibility, “that less than one-millionth of a gram is a carcinogenic dose. One pound, if uniformly distributed, could hypothetically induce lung cancer in every person on Earth.” The Risk of Cassini Probe Plutonium An interview with Dr. Caldicott
Maybe we all live in red states, and this won’t be a thing with which we deal (just maybe.) But, just in case, here is a pointer for coping. Pass it along!
An anti-Vietnam demonstration. Arlington, Virginia, USA. By S.Sgt. Albert R. Simpson. Department of Defense. Department of the Army. Office of the Deputy Chief of Staff for Operations. U.S. Army Audiovisual Center. – This media is available in the holdings of the National Archives and Records Administration, cataloged under the National Archives Identifier (NAID) 594360. Public Domain. Via Picryl.
Tiffin, Ohio (Special to Informed Comment; Feature) – During some of the large anti-war demonstrations during the 1960’s some of the protesters gave flowers to the troops faced off against them. In the 1967 March on the Pentagon it was the 503rd Military Police Battalion, and elsewhere the National Guard was deployed. An iconic photo from 1967 shows a young man placing a flower into a soldier’s gun barrel during the protest. Let’s bring that custom back when the US military occupies your town in 2025, but this time let’s include a note along with the flower.
Allow me to explain.
The demonstrators of the 1960’s understood that the soldiers faced off against him were not the enemy. Nearly all of the soldiers were young and patriotic and trying to do the right thing. Many of them were under economic hardship and wanted help paying for their education. The flower symbolized the protesters’ belief that the soldiers were not their enemies, and they did not wish to be theirs. And in fact, as the almost entirely peaceful protests grew, many soldiers came to sympathize and began to actively oppose the war as well.
Now we have federalized Guard troops being called out by President Trump in Washington, DC, Los Angeles, Portland with other cities soon to follow. Chicago is likely next. The authority for this is said to be Title Ten of the US Code which says that the president may federalize the National Guard if the US “is invaded or is in danger of invasion by a foreign nation; there is a rebellion or danger of a rebellion . . or the president is unable with the regular forces to execute the laws of the United States.”
Legitimate grounds for a US military or National Guard deployment do not exist. The claim that crime is spiraling out of control is false, and those pushing for the deployments know it. There is zero credible proof that crime is increasing. According to a recent FBI report (August, 2025) robbery, assault, rape and murder all continued a decline that began post-covid. We are not being invaded, there is no rebellion, and the laws are being enforced about as well as ever.
A second reason against deploying the military on our streets is that the Posse Comitatus act of 1878 forbids the use of US military forces within the country for active law enforcement except in exceptional circumstances such as insurrection, and explicitly approved by Congress. The military is forbidden from making arrests, conducting searches, issuing warrants, or interfering with local law enforcement. The law also applies to National Guard forces unless approved by state governors. No governors this year have made any requests for federalized National Guard troops.
And it is worth noting that Trump’s military forays into cities are only being used in areas run by Democratic officials. High crime in red state cities is ignored. And the Trump administration refuses to realize the obvious danger of political violence and threats from MAGA and the American right which are much higher than those from the left, according to the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) and others. Antifa is officially (and improperly) designated as domestic terrorists while violent right wing groups get a pass from the administration.
The President’s rhetoric seems aimed at inflaming and dividing. The “enemy from within”, “full force”, “thugs”, “vermin”, and much more. And there is hardly a peep of protest from the Republican party.
So this time around, how about if we give the troops a note along with the flower? You could use wording such as this:
Dear US soldier –
Your service oath included a pledge to uphold the US constitution, and your training taught you to disobey illegal orders.The orders sending you here (insert name of your city or town) are unlawful and unjust. You have a legal obligation to disobey.
We encourage you to go home, and we will support you in that decision.
About the Author
Arnold Oliver is an emeritus professor of political science at Heidelberg University in Tiffin, Ohio. A Vietnam veteran, he belongs to Veterans For Peace, and can be reached at soliver@heidelberg.edu.
(Needless to say, state Republican legislators, with their supermajority here, are working to gerrymander her district to oblivion before the midterm filing deadline.)
The letter includes links for answers and help regarding the shutdown, seen below. If you click, those links will help all; Rep. Davids is a U.S. Rep and these are U.S. resources.
My actual rep did not send anything today. Over the weekend he referred to the “Schumer Shutdown” as if it was an inevitability; I’m sure he saw it that way as he’s all in on this administration’s actions (yep, Republican.) Anyway, here is this:
I know many people are worried and upset about this government shutdown. I am doing everything I can to push for a bipartisan solution to end this crisis as quickly as possible. I understand Kansans are frustrated with Washington and are demanding solutions instead of more partisanship.
Right now, many government agencies unfortunately may be operating with limited staff. This will impact a variety of crucial services people depend on. My team created this web page to help answer questions, connect people with assistance, and to ask for your thoughts.
This is an evolving situation, so my team will continue to update this page as events warrant. Please know that we’re here to help however we possibly can. You can find the below menu to get answers to your questions. Please also feel free to call my office at (913) 621-0832.
“I think there’s two things that are happening at once: one, there absolutely is an unprecedented abuse of power, destruction of norms, erosion of our government and our democracy in order to prop up an authoritarian style of governance however, they are weaker than they look, and it is important that we remember that because what they rely on is the impression of power, the perception of inevitability in us giving up in advance. Donald Trump is at record levels of unpopularity in his tenure. the Republican house is at record levels of unpopularity. they are underwater across the board and they know it. and that is causing them to double down in public. but it is backfiring. that is why whether it’s a shutdown, whether it’s all of this, they want us to blink first and we have too much to save.”
Scottie's Playtime 