A Certain Point of View: Writing, Film and Stuff

On Quora, an anonymous Trump supporter asks: Will you secretly vote for Trump even though you are a life-long liberal/centrist? My reply: No. Why should I? First of all, Donald J. Trump is perhaps the worst person elected to the Presidency in my lifetime; his personal behavior (both public and private), his actions as Chief Executive, his Administration’s policies, and his Cabinet picks have lowered the standing of the United States in the eyes of the world. I do not like the man  or  what he stands for, so why should I vote for him and betray my core values as an American citizen? Second, there’s no way on Earth that I will vote for  any  Republican candidate at the national level, considering how low the Republican Party has sunk in its bid to win a “permanent majority” in Congress and win control of the Supreme Court for the so-called “conservative movement.” When the Legislative Branch of Congress’ upper house is led by a man who is publicly unwilli...

On Quora, member Lynn Boca asks: Why does the US government feel video games are to blame for the rash of mass shootings when other countries without the shootings also have video games? My reply First of all, it’s not the entire United States government that is making the false connection between video games and mass shootings. It’s just one of the two major political parties that govern the country - and it’s the one which is closely allied with the National Rifle Association and gun manufacturers. Second, I doubt that any of the Republican Party politicians who blame video game use for the shootings in El Paso and Dayton truly believe this false narrative. The pols and spokespersons who say “Video games are to blame for mass shootings” are directing their comments at their base, not at more worldly individuals who know that Japan and other countries (such as the United Kingdom, Sweden, and Germany) where video games are not only widely played but  created and publis...

Above: A typical rant from Laura Ingraham. Should Fox News suspend Laura Ingraham for her constant false, petty, partisan attacks on Democratic candidates who criticize Trump's racial rhetoric? No. First of all, Fox News Channel is not a true newsgathering organization free from bias. On the contrary; with the exception of some news breaks and coverage of “breaking news,” Fox News devotes much of its prime time programming to opinions-based content. (So do CNN and MSNBC, because opinionated presenters generate higher ratings than traditional news reports. This has been true since the early 2000s, and since ad revenue is the driving force of every free-to-air or cable/satellite channel, as long as Rachel Maddow, Sean Hannity, and Anderson Cooper get eyeballs and $$$ on their 8–11 PM programming, it’s not going to change any time soon.) In the case of Fox, which is Rupert Murdoch’s version of a propaganda network for the post-1994 Republican Party, Laura Ingraham is do...

On Quora, Trump supporter Dan Lauffer asks: Why does the Left hate Trump and Christians love him? I hate insincere, loaded questions, especially those written by Trump-supporting individuals who are also self-described Christians, but I’ll try to explain this anyway. First of all, it’s not just “the left” that dislikes Donald John Trump. There are many millions of people - not just in the United States, but also around the world - who find Trump distasteful in every way possible. And it's not just liberals that don't like Trump; quite a few conservatives, among them columnist George F. Will, have left the Republican Party due to its embrace of "Don the Con."  From his aggressive “I’m from Queens, New York” mien, his constant bragging, his dishonesty, his pandering to his “base,” his total disregard for diplomacy, his hateful attitudes toward minorities, and his admiration for authoritarian leaders such as Vladimir Putin, Kim Jung Un, Jair Bolsonaro, and Rodri...

Image Credit:Wikipedia Recently, the right-wing leaning Epoch Times ran an open letter criticizing NBC News for daring to ask its staff questions about the newspaper's guiding principles (staunch anti-Communism, especially when it comes to the People's Republic of China, strong support for Donald Trump, and its connections with the banned-in-China Falun Gong movement). In it, publisher Stephen Gregory figuratively wrings his hands when an established media outlet dares to suggest it is biased in favor of Trump and other conservatives because Epoch Times founder John Tang and his partners hate China and its current government and are consistent supporters of right-wing movements throughout the world. Here are some of Gregory's "woe-is-us, we are an honest newspaper" comments: Last week, we were contacted by two NBC reporters who posed a series of highly inappropriate questions. The NBC reporters questioned the religious beliefs of some of our staff mem...

Photo Credit: Michael Stewart/Getty Pictures On Quora, Trump supporter extraordinaire Paulie Duguay asks: Why can't people support President Trump the way U.S. Presidents in the 1940's, 50's, and 60's were supported? My reply: I wasn’t going to answer this; I have a comedy screenplay to finish and turn in, but since right now I’m stuck trying to add an extra scene the director/producer wants me to add for “dramatic tension,” I will use this rather bizarre and patently insincere question to loosen up my writing muscles and do some mental gymnastics. I’m sorry to tell you this, dear staunch Trump supporter, but this question is based on a flawed premise: that before the Sixties, Americans of all social strata and political stances supported American Presidents almost universally. This, my sweet summer child, has never been true in any era of American history. Since 1789, perhaps the only U.S. Chief Executive who enjoyed this kind of support  may have been ...

In the 1950s, the fearmongering was about "miscegenation" or "race mixing." Today it's about LGBTQ bathroom rights.  Should the Democrats stop making an issue out of LGBTQ bathroom rights because it simply inflames the right? That’s an odd question, considering that it wasn’t the Democrats who made a huge “oh-the-world-is-ending” issue when transgendered people decided on using the gender-appropriate bathrooms they needed to use. It was a very loud, very vocal  conservative  bunch who used vitriol, fear-mongering, and old-fashioned bigotry to cause a controversy where there should have been none. It seems to me that when self-described Christian conservatives want to stir up a hate campaign, be it against politicians they oppose, races they want to be suppressed, or minorities they would rather not care about, they always turn around and choose someone else to blame when they cause controversy. In this instance - the LGBTQ/bathroom issue - the bigo...

Fox News seems not to dissect and interpret current developments in the Russia Probe like other channels do. Why? Are they intentionally limiting the information that their viewers receive? As I’ve said in my previous answers to questions about Fox “News” Channel, the reason for this is simple: Fox News Channel is  not  a dedicated newsgathering organization. It might have a news division with real journalists for “breaking news” or their off-peak hour news programming, but in reality, Fox News is a propaganda outlet for the post-Reagan Republican Party. For this reason, thoughtful, dispassionate, and honest dissection of such news stories as the Trump Organization’s connections to Russia and the conspiracy to basically use the Internet as a Psychological Operations (PsyOps) weapon to give Donald Trump an edge during the Presidential election in 2016 goes against Fox News Channel’s ethos. I mean, think about it. Fox News is a  propaganda  machine that would...

The question, as originally posted, is:  Do you feel as if the NFL’s updated national anthem policy is unfair? Several months ago,  when I answered a question on Quora regarding this topic, I erroneously said that forcing NFL players - who are all adults and have certain inalienable rights as citizens of this country - to stand during the playing of the National Anthem if  they choose to be on the field  at such time during a pro football game is unconstitutional. I was disabused of this belief by Quorans who pointed out that such a policy is only  unconstitutional  if it is foisted on the players by any government official at any level, be it local, state, or federal. It’s  not  unconstitutional, apparently, if a business owner (in this case, the National Football League’s owners) tells employees (aka the pro football players) that they can either stay in the locker room while  The Star Spangled Banner  plays or stand with the te...

Fox News logo. © 2019 FNC and New Fox Why does Fox News constantly lie or state false information? Founded in 1996 by Australian media mogul Rupert Murdoch and led for much of its existence by the late Roger Ailes, Fox News Channel is  not  primarily a genuine journalistic organization. It has the name “Fox News Channel,” yes, but that’s partly to differentiate itself from its elder sibling, the Fox broadcast television network, which was also a brainchild of Mr. Murdoch and became America’s Fourth Network (after ABC, CBS, and NBC) in 1987. Mostly, though, “Fox News Channel” is essentially a propaganda outlet for the post-Reagan/Goldwater Republican Party. Its mission, per the concepts laid down by Messrs. Ailes and Murdoch, is to provide viewers with conservative opinion and some news content with a conservative slant (or, if you will, a bias). That’s why much of the cable channel’s programming in prime time (8–11 PM) features Sean Hannity, Laur...

Dear Anonymous, Originally, I wasn’t going to answer this question. I find it insulting, based on partisan hate, and full of ignorance. And, of course, chances are that the original creator of this “query” is a paid troll working for Russia’s destabilizing efforts. But, hey, it’s rather early on a Sunday morning, and since I have nothing better to do, I’ll try to enlighten you. Not that I’ll succeed, especially if you are one of those Trump supporters who believe that “liberalism is a mental disorder.” First of all, let’s look at a map of the world. Let’s, for a few minutes, take  seriously  the “modest proposal” that is the basis for this, ahem, question. Examine closely, my conservative friend, the map above. You no doubt recall from your high school science class that three-quarters of the Earth’s surface is covered by water, most of it  salty  ocean water that humans can’t consume without desalination and purification. The other quarter of the Ea...

This is what happens when conservatives in Miami see a Cuban flag patch on Emma Gonzalez's olive-drab jacket during her speech about the need for common-sense gun control laws: This is communistic as well. Her choice of attire, green army jacket and Cuban flag on one shoulder. Offensive to me! She looks like a young communist sympathizer. Logic exercise...Miami Politics 101 . Emma Gonzalez wore a jacket with a Cuban shoulder patch at the recent gun control (NOT ban all guns) protest. Cuba currently is misgoverned by a Communist dictatorship. That dictatorship appropriated, as it did everything else in Cuba, the flag that has flown over the island since 1902. Emma Gonzalez had the audacity to wear a patch bearing the image of that flag to celebrate her heritage. Enter "conservative logic." Emma Gonzalez is at a protest march related to a controversial topic. (Check.) Emma Gonzalez is wearing an army jacket with all kinds of patches....

Fighting soldiers from the sky. Fearless men who jump and die. Men who mean just what they say. The brave men of the Green Beret. -- Staff Sergeant Barry Sadler, "The Ballad of the Green Beret." Since the mid-1950s, a time when the Cold War between the United States and the former Soviet Union was at its coldest and the threat of a third world war seemed to loom behind every crisis, the United States Army has deployed very highly trained commando/special warfare teams to Europe, the Middle East, Latin America, and other regions to assist and train local military forces and to fight against conventional and irregular forces (such as communist guerrillas in Southeast Asia and Al Qaeda terrorists in Afghanistan and elsewhere). And ever since President John F. Kennedy authorized the various Special Forces Groups to adopt a previously frowned-upon bit of headgear, the Army's SF troops have been popularly known by the nickname "Green Berets," ...