HalWrightNewtown.Info
In support of rational and compassionate public policy at all levels of government which affect the residents of Newtown Township and Bucks County
“Facts are stubborn things; and whatever may be our wishes, our inclinations, or the dictates of our passion, they cannot alter the state of facts and evidence.”
~ John Adams
~ John Adams
What the FAR LEFT has to say about me and my writing
"You are anti-semitic!"
"You are a Zionist!"
"We don't give single fuck what your privileged ignorant ass has to say."
"Think, you pudding headed fuck."
What the FAR RIGHT has to say about me and my writing
"What an arrogant fool you are."
"YOU are pushing that racist bullshit."
"Dmb fk."
"You're a groomer, and are a danger to society."
I encourage you to explore this site and see what the fuss is about. Apologies in advance if you aren't as excited by measured, evidence-based reasoning as my "fans" in social media.
Of Interest in Newtown
Views from the Commons
More Republicans Find their Voice
When Karl Rove and I stand on common ground, the ground under all of our feet may have shifted.
Rove was the key strategist in George W. Bush's presidential campaigns, and his advisor while in office. Those on the left criticized Rove for his divisive use of wedge issues, such as same-sex marriage, to drive conservative voter turnout. Rove claimed executive privilege in an attempt to avoid testifying before Congress. He outed Valerie Plame as a CIA operative during a feud with her husband, ambassador Joseph Wilson, after Wilson challenged the Bush administration's claims around Iraqi attempts to purchase uranium from Niger—an example of Rove's willingness to engage in brazen and potentially deadly political retribution.
Rove set the precedent for behaviors Donald Trump would amp up to eleven. And yet here was Rove, in the Wall Street Journal, announcing support for the Democratic opponent in Republican Bo French's bid for statewide office. Rove devoted most of his opinion piece excoriating French as a bigot and a misogynist. For me though, the most interesting paragraph is when Rove dials the lens back to wide view, and comments on the current state of the Republican party:
Conservatism and the party it dominates have an increasing number of bigoted advocates of a “heritage America” composed of white descendants of the original European settlers. There are “just asking questions” Jew-haters, misogynists who worship hypermasculinity, conspiracy nuts seeking clicks for profit, and religious bigots who won’t differentiate between Muslim terrorists and Muslim American patriots. These people are diminishing the Republican Party, not building it. I’ll have no part of it.
We are reminded that, for all its dissembling and corruption, the Bush administration signaled its support for Muslim Americans in the aftermath of 9/11. Bush even spoke at a mosque a few days later, characterizing Islam as a religion of peace and quoting the Quran. Donald Trump has distilled every bad impulse present in the Republican party of 25 years ago and injected that venom into our politics, doing lasting and possibly irreparable harm.
Rove has joined a growing group of Republicans distancing themselves from MAGA intolerance, incompetence, and corruption. Congresswoman María Elvira Salazar (R-FL), the daughter of Cuban immigrants and a crusader for immigration reform, issued a pointed video statement, in which she spoke directly to President Trump to denounce ICE policies and actions:
Mr. President, some of your immigration enforcement efforts have gone too far. In July, 50% of the 50,000 people who were detained had no criminal record. Be careful what your advisers are telling you about immigration policy. The same Hispanics who helped you get to the White House in 2024 feel betrayed today. You can be for immigration what Lincoln was for slavery, and Reagan was for communism. I'm not talking about giving them amnesty, I'm talking about giving them a dignified life in this promised land. Only you can do that.
Congressional incumbents like Carlos de la Cruz (R-TX), James Gallagher (R-CA), Ralph Alvarado (R-KY), and Ryan Mackenzie (R-PA) have removed Trump and MAGA references from their literature or otherwise distanced themselves from the current administration. Iowa Senate candidate and congresswoman Ashley Hinson didn't appear with JD Vance today and now opposes Trump's tariffs and beef imports. All of these individuals are running for reelection, unlike Thomas Massie, whose anti-Trump activism peaked only after he had lost his primary.
Many high-profile Republicans skipped the farcical midterm Republican convention dubbed "Trumpapalooza," one saying he had promised to watch his son play football.
It could be just the economy, stupid. Nonetheless, a couple of optimistic takes:
(a) the roster of Americans vilified as radical, extreme, criminal, communist, and/or perverse by Trump has grown to where it's impossible for most politicians to win an election without them, and
(b) Americans in the mainstream are not as alarmed by peaceful, law-abiding non-citizen neighbors, and by those defying gender norms, as they are by MAGA extremism and cruelty.
The November elections and what happens after them will determine if such optimism is warranted.
More views
An Infant Dies in Lancaster County
The controversy over the death of a newborn in Lancaster County has revealed the extent to which our politics and our public health are broken.
Fact: Climate change is real. Promoting clean energy is an urgent matter of national security.
Fact: Transgender persons exist, and cannot be legislated out of existence.
Fact: Students need a factual account of our history, including slavery and its residual effects on the rights and freedoms of all Americans.
Me Imperturbe
Me imperturbe, standing at ease in Nature,
Master of all, or mistress of all—aplomb in the midst of irrational things,
Imbued as they—passive, receptive, silent as they,
Finding my occupation, poverty, notoriety, foibles, crimes, less important than I thought;
Master of all, or mistress of all—aplomb in the midst of irrational things,
Imbued as they—passive, receptive, silent as they,
Finding my occupation, poverty, notoriety, foibles, crimes, less important than I thought;
Me private, or public, or menial, or solitary—all these subordinate, (I am eternally equal with the best—I am not subordinate;)
Me toward the Mexican Sea, or in the Mannahatta, or the Tennessee, or far north, or inland,
A river-man, or a man of the woods, or of any farm-life of These States, or of the coast, or the lakes, or Kanada,
Me toward the Mexican Sea, or in the Mannahatta, or the Tennessee, or far north, or inland,
A river-man, or a man of the woods, or of any farm-life of These States, or of the coast, or the lakes, or Kanada,
Me, wherever my life is lived, O to be self-balanced for contingencies!
O to confront night, storms, hunger, ridicule, accidents, rebuffs, as the trees and animals do.
~ Walt Whitman
Tired
I am so tired of waiting,
Aren’t you,
For the world to become good
And beautiful and kind?
Let us take a knife
And cut the world in two –
And see what worms are eating
At the rind.
Aren’t you,
For the world to become good
And beautiful and kind?
Let us take a knife
And cut the world in two –
And see what worms are eating
At the rind.
~ Langston Hughes
