Late June 2023 News.

 

Some breaking news is that Hunter Biden has been recently indicted. Hunter Biden is President Biden's son. Hunter Biden has plead guilty to two tax misdemeanors after years of willful failure to pay federal income taxes. He is working with prosecutors to avoid trial for violation of the federal law after his purchase of a handgun at a time when he was addicted to drugs. The firearm was later thrown into the dumpster by his then-girlfriend, who is also his brother's widow. The attorney who led the Hunter Biden probe is a Republican. The Republicans are angry that Hunter Biden wasn't thrown the book act or charged with massive felonies. The reality is that Trump's actions are much worse than Hunter Biden. Hunter Biden never conspired to steal the 2020 election, Hunter Biden never stole classified documents and originally refused to send them back to the government, and Hunter Biden never faced 37 felony counts. Hunter has agreed to have a deal where he can't own a gun for life, he is required to not use drugs, and other actions. Therefore, Hunter's errors don't have any justification, but Trump is among the top 3 worst Presidents in American history. Trump actually wanted to abolish the Constitution in trying to steal the 2020 election. 

The racism in the GOP is overt. While we are celebrating Juneteenth, Ron DeSantis and Mike Pence want to honor a Confederate general. DeSantis and Pence want a military base in North Carolina to be named after Braxton Bragg. Bragg was a slave owning former Confederate general. The fort is now called Fort Liberty. Right now, a Florida school banned the inaugural poem made by Amanda Gorman. We must fight to make sure that history is shown in America. We have GOP attacks on the teaching on slavery, civil rights, and voting rights. Recently, black people legitimately refuted Nikki Haley's like that Barack Obama personally set minorities back by singling them out as victims instead of empowering them. The rest of Haley's nonsense is GOP racist nonsense, because she believes in the racist myth that any black person who is not a Republican extremist has a victim mentality of constantly lacking responsible for actions. The truth is that Barack Obama is quite conservative on the issue of responsibility. Also, people from across the political spectrum support personal responsibility, but we believe that systematic racism still exists in the world (that has harmed the lives of black people back then and now). Two things can be true. It is true that we have the responsibility to do right, but it is also true that we don't live in a complete meritocracy in society. The vast majority of poor people work very hard and have great integrity, but they lack economic justice because of the system of oppression. There are victims of racism and economic oppression in the world today, but we don't embrace a victim mentality. The racists embrace a whitewashing of history and reality mentality. Downplaying American racism is racism plain and simple. Ironically, a progressive immigration policy caused Nikki Haley's father to come to America to teach at an HBCU. Without that progressive law, Nikki would not be here in America. Haley never wanted to remove the Confederate flag in South Carolina until the Emmanuel AME church mass murder of innocent black people. Haley's lie that America is not a racist country is a slap in the face to the victims of racism then and now. 

I agree with former President Barack Obama that Nikki Haley and Tim Scott (both GOP Presidential candidates) are wrong to diminish racial inequalities and deny systematic racism. The fact is that we have sociological studies galore proving the systematic racism exists. Examples include how black mothers have higher percentage of maternal deaths than their white counterparts, how black people serve longer prison sentences than white people (even if they are convicted of the same crime), how economic oppression disproportionately harm the black community, and racial discrimination being a reality in many spheres of the world. The cruel irony is that many MAGA extremists are trying to ban books by black people describing real black history and other policies that violate voting rights. These actions not only are offensive but harm the lives of Americans (who need the truth about America to be shown in public). Tim Scott lied and said that people who disagree with him want to invalidate his experience. No, we just believe that your experience is not representative of every black person's in America, and America still is a racist country (filled with righteous and evil people).

Voting is important. Today, a local primary existed in Virginia. Voting just doesn't deal with federal elections. Voting does also deal with state elections, local elections, and other procedures that deal with electing judges, school officials, state legislators, and other important positions that has influence in the daily lives of the people. We are called to enrich the general welfare of the people. The general welfare of humanity deals with the environment, health, economic vitality, and other facets of community. In the final analysis, we want our civil liberties protected, we desire our voting rights to be strengthened, and we want people to achieve their own destinies as human beings without injustice. To grow a society, you have to invest in the community, develop families, help the poor, defend the lives of the people, and make sure that justice for all is an active saying (beyond just glowing rhetoric). That is why we believe in altruism as there are causes bigger than self-interest. The federal government has a duty to provide for the general welfare of the people. So, when people say that voting doesn't matter, they are lying. Voting did matter to cause the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act to exist. Voting caused a liar to not be President in 2021, and voting caused many changes in our world. On a higher level, when you learn this, you always are opposed to colonialism, racism, imperialism, xenophobia, and other evils plaguing the world.

Days ago was the heroic Sister Ernestine Shepherd, and she is 86 years old. For years, she is known as a fitness expert, spiritual woman (who loves God as there is nothing wrong with that), and an inspirational human being. At one point, she was the oldest competitive woman bodybuilder in the world, as declared by the Guiness Book of World Records in 2010 and in 2011. She is active in fitness culture to this day. She was a model in Baltimore for years. At the age of 56 years old, she and her sister Mildred Blackwell started to take aerobics classes. Her sister competed in bodybuilding in the name of Velvet, and Ernestine followed under the name of Ernie. His sister passed away in the early 1990s following a brain aneurysm. Ernestine Shepherd has dedicated her fitness career to her sister. Her published book is entitled, "Determined, Dedicated, and Disciplined to be Fit" in 2016. She appeared in the Black is King video movie by Beyonce. At her local church in Baltimore (named Union Memorial United Methodist Church), she helps many people to do exercises and inspire positive change. She has run 80 miles a week. She eats boiled eggs, chicken, vegetables, and a liquid eggs drink. Her life has been filled with resilience and miracles as she loves being a grandmother too. She loves her husband and her family. Ernestine Shepherd's lesson is that it is never too late to achieve monumental greatness in your life. She started exercising a lot at age 56, and the point of life is to not only bless ourselves but other people too. Never giving up on your dreams and aspirations is an accurate precept to adhere to as well. I wish Sister Ernestine Shepherd more Blessings.

By Timothy