ICYMI - Outrages of the past couple of weeks

Texas officials used roughly $1 billion in coronavirus funding intended to pay front-line workers and purchase protective equipment to finance a campaign to arrest migrants at the U.S.-Mexico border.

“We’re not just at war to support the Ukrainians; we’re fundamentally at war, although somewhat through a proxy, with Russia, and it’s important that we win,” commented US Rep. Seth Moulton, Democrat from Massachusetts.

Three asset management firms, BlackRock, Vanguard and State Street have a combined $22 trillion in managed assets, which is the equivalent of more than half of the value of all shares for companies in the S&P 500, which is about $38 trillion. This makes the economic power of these 3 greater than all the Robber Barons on the 1890s combined. Can a political democracy endure, when so much economic power is in the hand of a very, very tiny minority?

Amazon founder Jeff Bezos called on Twitter to investigate a message by Joe Biden after the president tweeted wealthier corporations should “pay their fair share” of taxes. Bezos wants Twitter’s “Disinformation Board” to probe Biden’s message because he claimed the president inaccurately linked higher corporate taxes to lowering inflation. It appears that Bezos believes any attempt to get the he and his friends to pay up for having looted the treasury under Trump is “disinformation”. I wonder if Elon Musk agrees???

In the category of “it takes one to know one”, once more the US wins hands down: The United States said Thursday it had no immediate plans to share vaccines with North Korea, with White House press secretary Jen Psaki accusing the Kim regime of focusing more on military power than on medical supplies. 

Israeli soldiers assaulted civilians during a funeral procession for the slain Palestinian-American journalist, Shireen Abu Akleh, on Friday, 5/13, "using stun grenades and tear gas and charging at them with horses and batons." Abu Akleh, 51, was fatally shot in the face on Wednesday while reporting on the Israeli Defense Force’s ransacking of the Jenin refugee camp. Will the US government send military aid to the Palestinians, so they can defend themselves from the aggressors?

Republican Texas Gov. Greg Abbott was widely condemned Thursday for his joint statement with the National Border Patrol Council complaining about the Biden administration feeding migrant children in U.S. custody amid a national shortage of infant formula. "Gov. Abbott and NBPC are literally demanding that the government lock babies in cages and then starve them, said Carl Takei, a senior staff attorney at the ACLU. One has to ask how Abbott’s “right to life” supporters feel about his position.  

Evelyn Tamez from Laredo, Texas: If the Supreme Court overturns Roe v. Wade, “it’s not going to stop abortions. It’s just going to stop safe abortions.” Her one sentence demolishes all the arguments of the so-called “right to lifers”.

“In the richest country in the history of the world, it is absurd, to say the least, that we have sentenced an entire generation to a lifetime of debt simply for doing what was expected of them — getting a college education.” Bernie Sanders

Worried about the skyrocketing increase in crime during the pandemic. You should be. No, I’m not talking about drugs and gangs, it’s white-collar crime that leading the way. Recent polls suggest that 60 million Americans lost money to phone scams in the last couple of years. Little old ladies (and the rest of us) are about 1,800 times more likely to be robbed with a phone than with a gun.