Opuscula Democrat Beggars: Dumb and dumber

TODAY I RECEIVED A NICE EMAIL with Reaching out to you personally, John... as the Subject line.

I do not recall giving license to address me so informally, but

The email was from marketeers for Florida U.S. Senate candidate Val Demings (info@electdemocraticwomen.org) who is running (assuming she survives the primaries) against incumbent Republican Sen. Marco Rubio (assuming he survives the primaries).

Ms. Demings is not the first dumocrat to seek my vote.Previously, candidates in Ohio and Michigan ask for my vote and begged for my money.

I am a registered Republican in Florida.

At least Ms. Demings is running in Florida.

 

I’LL GIVE Ms. Demings marketeers credit (no cash): they get right to the point, i.e., my wallet.

Screen capture from dumocrat candidate’s begging email

Because I am a nice guy, I wrote Ms. Deming a nice letter explaining that I never support leftists/socialists in the mode of (Hillary) Clinton/Obama/Harris-Emhoff.

I suggested that the people of her party (it was her marketeers, but as the last decent Democrat said¹, “The Buck Stops Here” so it is her responsibility to monitor the marketeer’s actions)

Were they “(a) too lazy to check voter registration lists? I am a registered Republican.

Or (b) to ignorant to READ the registration lists?

Or (c) just too stupid to know asking for donations from a long-time Republican is a waste of bits and bytes.

Or (d) -- as I suspect. -- ALL OF THE ABOVE.”

I wonder if the dumocrats would beg for my dollars if they had to waste postage. (Ms. Demings, who currently represents Florida’s 10th Congressional District has franking — free postage — privileges.)

The Response

In response to my email (in response to the begging letter), I received in short order the following auto-response (right).

My comments should be obvious.

On 8/6/2021 7:29 AM, Info Elect Democratic Woemn

– This is an automated response -

Thanks for reaching out!

Elect Democratic Women is a grassroots organization committed to taking back Congress for Democrats by electing more pro-choice women. Elect Democratic Women was formed by Democratic Congresswomen who understand that Congress cannot and will not address the urgent needs facing women and their families by a Congress where less than one in five representatives are women. 

If you’d like to support our movement, please consider making a contribution. Just $1 goes a long way:
https://secure.actblue.com/donate/ms_edw_fr_2018_homepage  WORKS OK

If you'd like to receive less emails and only our most important emails, please use this form
https://go.electdemocraticwomen.org/page/s/less-emails   DOES NOT WORK

If you’d no longer like to receive emails about our mission, you can unsubscribe from our list here:
https://go.electdemocraticwomen.org/page/unsubscribe  DOES NOT WORK

If you're having an issue with an online donation you've made or are trying to make, please contact ActBlue immediately:
info@actblue.com  DOES NOT WORK

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I tried each of the links.

The only link that worked was the one to make a donation.

Being a nice guy, I returned the email with the boldface comments shown above.

If anyone cares to try, cut-n-paste the links in your favorite browser and see if anyone
Read my response (probably not)
Acted on the response (fixed the links) — again, probably not.

What is “ActBlue”?

Just for “kicks” I did a web search for “actblue.”

According to its self-identification on Twitter (which, unlike former President Trump is not banned), We're a nonprofit fundraising platform for campaigns and organizations and the small-dollar donors who support them! #IamASmallDollarDonor (https://twitter.com/actblue)

There is a caveat for actblue that Contributions or gifts to ActBlue are not deductible as charitable contributions for federal income tax purposes. (https://secure.actblue.com/signin)

I did not see this disclaimer on Ms. Demings’ beg missive; perhaps it does not apply to political contributions.

It is, for me, a non-issue.

Actblue advertises itself (ibid.) As a nonprofit, we’re driven by the belief that our democracy works better when more people participate in civic life and when our campaigns and nonprofits are powered by the people they serve. That’s why we’ve built a powerful online fundraising platform for Democratic candidates up and down the ballot, progressive organizations, and nonprofits. Our tools make it possible for anyone to build a grassroots campaign or movement and give donors an easy and secure way to support their favorite candidates and causes

On the other hand . . .

Axios Media (https://www.axios.com/) reports Dem fundraising platform ActBlue boots Cuomo (https://tinyurl.com/wypjszk)

The Democratic fundraising platform ActBlue has removed a donation page that New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo's campaign committee used to solicit contributions, the company confirmed to Axios.

Driving the news: ActBlue is the lifeblood of grassroots Democratic fundraising. Its decision to cut off Cuomo following damning allegations of sexual harassment and assault deals a body blow to what's left of his political future.

ActBlue donation pages for Cuomo's campaign and PAC were no longer active on Thursday afternoon.

Apparently, if the beggar falls out of grace with the company’s philosophy, ActBlue, drops the client like the proverbial hot potato.

Granted Cuomo fils has been facing complaints of indiscriminate behavior toward women for several years. Cuomo called for the investigation leading to the cited report.²

The Cuomo flap suggests — at last to this scrivener — that Ms. Demings probably is the mold of Clinton/Obama/Harris-Emhoff, a mold that won’t work for me.

I just wish the dumocrats would remove my email from their beggars’ lists.

I complain, but apparently ignoring people of a different point of view is a growing dumocrat trait.

That bodes ill for America.

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Sources

1. Harry S Truman (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_S._Truman)

Harry S Truman and “The Buck Stops Here” desk plaque.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_S._Truman)

2. NPR: Sexual Harassment Charges Against Gov. Cuomo Are Detailed In Scathing 165-Page Report (https://tinyurl.com/dpurzeyf)

 

 

 

PLAGIARISM is the act of appropriating the literary composition of another, or parts or passages of his writings, or the ideas or language of the same, and passing them off as the product of one’s own mind.

Truth is an absolute defense to defamation. Defamation is a false statement of fact. If the statement was accurate, then by definition it wasn’t defamatory.

Web sites (URLs) beginning https://tinyurl.com/ are generated by the free Tiny URL utility and reduce lengthy URLs to manageable size.

 

 

 

 

Comment on Democrat Beggars

Opuscula Sheriff fired But problem Not eliminated

NEW FLORIDA GOV. RON DESANTIS fired Broward County Sheriff Scott Israel for his personnel’s inaction at the Marjory Stoneman Douglas school shooting.

Israel can fight the removal by taking his case to Florida’s legislature, but speculation is that this won’t happen.

I THINK THE SHERIFF may have gotten a bum deal.

The Sheriff’s Office (BSO) does have some deputies that need to be replaced. All departments have people who need to be replaced.

But the BSO is not alone in allowing the murder of 14 students and three faculty at the high school.

 

Communications

 

The multiple police agencies must share part of the blame, along with the county commissioners.

Why?

At the time of the shooting — and still today — law enforcement operates on multiple radio frequencies; frequencies that are not shared with all departments. Communication is fragmented which means that one department cannot call for assistance from other departments without going through intermediate dispatchers.

The county commissioners need to use their influence — that’s spelled with $$ signs — to get the local governments to cooperate.

If the commissioners cannot do that, perhaps the new governor should expend his removal efforts — at both the county and municipal levels.

 

School failure

 

The Broward School Superintendent and the entire school board must share a great deal of the blame for failing to have enforced policies and procedures to keep unauthorized personnel out of the facilities and to sound a campus-wide alert if an intruder is detected.

I believe the governor should remove both the school superintendent and the members of the school board who were sitting at the time.(There has since been an election and the board has several new members.)

It seems to me that the superintendent and the board should have seen — and acted upon — the lack of security at all the county's public schools.

How does a person enter a facility with a RIFLE? A pocket gun I can understand, but a rifle?

Doors were not secured or even monitored.

The disaster might have been avoided it

a. All visitors had to enter through a single door
b. Visitors with a valid reason to go beyond a reception (screening) area had to be “buzzed” in.

Since all schools have a “Resource Officer,” that officer’s primary location would be in the reception area. In the case of multiple buildings, as is the case for Marjory Stoneman Douglas, each building would have a reception area and resource officer AND INTER-BUILDING COMMUNICATIONS.

Cameras in hallways — if the ACLU doesn’t object — would not STOP a shooter, but they could track a shooter and make locating and eliminating the threat faster (read “with less loss of life”).

Moreover, this school shooter — sorry, “alleged” shooter — had a history with the school system and had been removed from at least one school as a threat.

Was this communicated to law enforcement? If it was, was it shared among the different agencies?

 

FBI bears some blame

 

The FBI must assume a good part of the blame for the massacre. It had evidence that the alleged shooter was a threat to the school. But, as with 9-11-2001, it kept the information to itself. (In 2001, the FBI’s Chicago field office had information about the terrorists well before 9-11. Chicago refused, for whatever reason, to share that information with FBI HQ. We saw the result.)

Unfortunately, the governor can do nothing about Federal incompetence and the arrogance of secrecy that seems to permeate the Bureau at all levels. Perhaps former governor and now U.S. Sen. Rick Scott can pressure Congress to force the FBI to get its act together. It’s performance in this century has been pathetic at best. Florida’s other senator, Marco Rubio who probably still has visions of moving to 1600 Pennsylvania Ave., can join Scott.

It would be nice — and, frankly I don’t expect it — if Democrat leaders would join with Scott and Rubio and demand improvements in the FBI. Broward is heavily Democrat.

 

Not the first time

 

This is not the first time the Broward Sheriff’s Office (BSO) has had an active shooter disaster. On January 6, 2017, a man murdered five people and injured six others at the local airport, an airport “protected” by BSO officers.

According to an article in Airport Improvement (https://tinyurl.com/y84oq2mb), Deputies stationed at the airport raced toward the shooter as he fired 14 rounds. Within 85 seconds, law enforcement had him in custody. But he had already done his damage, and people lay dead and wounded. To be fair, the shooter was in an open area and, unlike at the school, not going from enclosed space to enclosed space. Also, the airport has numerous deputies inside and outside each terminal building, most doing traffic control, but on site none-the-less.

Most police and sheriffs’ offices practice “active shooter” drills with schools, at least on an annual basis.

 

From a cop’s point of view

 

My son is a cop. Has been for more than a decade.

His initial reaction on hearing that a deputy failed to rush into a building where shots were heard was: So he rushes in and the shooter shoots the deputy. How does a dead cop help anyone?

The sheriff’s guidelines at the time of the shooting stated that a deputy may enter an active-shooter environment before backup arrives.

Since the disaster at the high school, the policy now states a deputy shall enter the active shooter environment even without waiting for backup.

Again, getting immediate backup under the current hodge-podge of cop shop radio frequencies may not be possible.

My son’s department insists that its officers wear — not just have at hand — a “bullet proof” vest. The vest may suffice against a hand gun, but it is no match for a rifle’s high velocity. To the best of my knowledge, BSO deputies don’t wear vests.

 

The sheriff is the scapegoat for everyone

 

If the governor stops with the removal of the sheriff, I think the Florida’s legislature should consider impeachment proceedings.

Meanwhile, the governor-appointed sheriff comes to the job from a local police force where he was a sergeant. Desantis claims his appointee has command experience and expects him to shape up the Sheriffs Office. I question the new sheriff’s command ability; if he is such a good commander, why was he “just” a sergeant with the local department. Suddenly he heads up a very large, county-wide organization, a far cry from the small community police department from which the new governor plucked him.

I wish the new sheriff well, but I keep seeing images of the late Clevon Little as the sheriff in Blazing Saddles.

 

My own 2¢

 

I spent a number of years as an enterprise risk management practitioner.

My job was to look at organizations of all types; to work with management and line personnel, to identify risks to “business as usual” from any source.

In a school, that means keeping everyone safe and learning.

I’m reasonably sure that had the school board insisted that it’s superintendent ask local law enforcement to survey the school’s the cops and deputies would have recommended policies and procedures that, if implemented, might have prevented the massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas.

The operative word above is “if.”

As a risk management practitioner, I know you can “lead a horse to water but you can’t make it drink.”

Actually, anyone with an ability to “think outside the box” could have told the school board and superintendent — assuming they would listen — where there were security problems — and, for the same price, might have been able to tell the board how to save some money in school operations.

Perhaps the governor ought to hire some enterprise risk management people to go around the state — and to each state department ‐ to look for things that could interfere with “business as usual.” (Many years ago I was part of a team that did just that for the state’s Department of Management Services. I never found out if our recommendations were implemented. Horses and water.)

 

Bottom line

 

It may be that taking away Scott Israel’s badge is warranted, but in my opinion, if the governor stops now, he is derelict in HIS duties. There is no doubt the sheriff could have been a better leader, that he should have had his officers (better) trained for active shooter situations in schools and other multi-room buildings (e.g., hospitals, government buildings and other offices). The sheriff should have worked closely — more closely — together his constituents to identify risks and ways to avoid or mitigate them, and he should have “gone public” after the school shooting, telling everyone what the BSO was doing to prevent a similar situation in the future.

BUT Scott Israel is not alone; the blame must be shared with the school board and its superintendent, with the county commissioners and local governments, and — without any doubt — the FBI.

In the Bible, the scapegoat was one of two animals. In Broward County we have a flock of goats to send to their (political) ends. Making Scott Israel the sole scapegoat for the Marjory Stoneman Douglas school disaster does the students and faculty who died a disservice and does nothing to prevent a recurrence.

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PLAGIARISM is the act of appropriating the literary composition of another, or parts or passages of his writings, or the ideas or language of the same, and passing them off as the product of one’s own mind.

Truth is an absolute defense to defamation. Defamation is a false statement of fact. If the statement was accurate, then by definition it wasn’t defamatory.

Comments on Scapegoat Sheriff

Opuscula Where oh where Is Medicare hiding?

TODAY’S MAIL BROUGHT my quarterly statement from AvMed, a Medicare Advantage insurer.

According to AvMed, it paid out $221.20 for provider services.

My share was $0.

So why am I complaining?

I’M UPSET BECAUSE someone is scamming Medicare.

I’m also complaining because the only ways I can get Medicare’s attention to alert it to the scam is to telephone, fax, or use its web mail.

• I loathe the telephone and being on hold for “forever”
• My excellent phone service lacks fax support
• The web mail insisted I keyed an unacceptable character; it didn’t let me know WHAT that character might be, but simply refused to forward my message.

Medicare raised the basic rate from $104/month to $134/month and, I’m given to understand, it will go up again next year to $154/month.

Imagine a person trying to survive on minimal Social Security now having to pay an onerous portion to Medicare. This increase was in the works before Trump took office, so don’t blame him.

We – Medicare recipients – are frequently encouraged to report what we perceive to be scams taking advantage of Medicare’s “largess.”

Apparently AvMed doesn’t care that someone is billing it for services never rendered to a former subscriber.

I have not been an AvMed subscriber since 12/31/2016.

The more an insurance company pays out, the more Medicare pays the company. There is no impetuous for an insurer to report what, to this scrivener at least, is a blatant attempt to scam Medicare.

AvMed is a pretty good company. Because it has providers I want, I’ll go back to it in October, even though there are other companies with better benefits. It’s a balancing act.

I don’t want to think that AvMed is a willing partner in the scam, but since it’s been two years since I was with AvMed and it still claims to be paying providers for services not rendered . . .

I sent a snail mail letter to AvMed Member Services in Miami detailing my complaint.

I was going to send a copy to CMS (Medicare), but CMS lacks a mailing address. Seems impossible, but such is life with government agencies. It’s easy to contact the IRS, why not CMS?

I did manage to send a web mail note to CMS telling it someone is scamming it and asking for someone to call me for details. It is NOT likely a Medicare rep will call and even if I am called, what are the odds (slim to none) that anything will be done?

I could write to my congresswoman, but she is less than useless. (When she was asked for help in the past, she simply ignored the request.) Maybe I should contact presidential want-to-be Marco Rubio.

I don’t have the resources (read “connections”) to investigate why AvMed claims it paid some provider for some services never rendered and I am beginning to suspect that, despite encouraging reporting of Medicare abuse, no one really cares. After all, it’s easy to increase the monthly rates.

I am a little “upset” since I paid into Medicare since its inception and now I’m having to pay again.

Our government at work. (Maybe we’re better off when it goes on strike.)

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PLAGIARISM is the act of appropriating the literary composition of another, or parts or passages of his writings, or the ideas or language of the same, and passing them off as the product of one’s own mind.

Comments on Medicare scam

Opuscula Common sense, Thing of the past?

THE FATALITIES FROM BRIDGE COLLAPSE In Miami could have been avoided if someone – anyone – had used a little common sense.

I know “Monday morning quarterbacking” often is not welcomed, but now that is all anyone can do. The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) are representing the Federal government. Florida’s Sen. Marco Rubio already claimed on Facebook that ¹ cables that suspend the bridge had loosened and the engineering firm ordered that they be tightened. " They were being tightened when it collapsed today." Rubio’s Facebook announcement failed to provide any attribution

Later, speaking at an all-network news conference², Rubio said “We deserve to know and the public deserves to know and the families of those who have been hurt and who lost their lives deserve to know what went wrong,”

The newspaper USA Today parrots Rubio’s Facebook claim³ while the Miami Herald headlines Stress test may have contributed to collapse of FIU pedestrian bridge⁴

In addition to the NTSB, OSHA, state and local agencies’ spokespeople claim their agencies will be investigating.

Miami tv channel NBC6⁵ reports that FDOT says the two companies (bridge designer Tallahassee's Figg Engineering and contractor, Miami’s Munilla Construction Management) were under contract with FIU and it was that team's responsibility to hire a firm to conduct an independent, secondary review. 

The state identified the firm that's not FDOT pre-qualified as Louis Berger. Because the design of this bridge was unique, that's the reason the state said a secondary review was required. No reason was given why Louis Berger wasn't pre-qualified for this work. The firm does do other business with FDOT.

The primary inspection was being done by Bolton Perez and Associates of Miami. FDOT says they are what's called the CEI or Construction Engineering & Inspection team. 

Hindsight won’t bring back the dead

No matter what caused the collapse, the deaths could easily have been avoided HAD A LITTLE COMMON SENSE BEEN APPLIED.

Tamiami Trail, a/k/a 8th Street, Calle Ocho, and U.S. 41, is a heavily-traveled road, both by locals and people living on Florida’s lower west coast. The bridge was built to prevent injuries or death to people going to and from Florida International University (FIU). Most of FIU’s students are commuters; apparently many lived on the south side of the bridge in the Miami suburb of Sweetwater.

No matter what was being done on or to the bridge, the Trail should have been closed until the work was completed.

But that interferes with traffic flow I can imagine government and contractors responding.

Now traffic will be disrupted for days.

Everyone connected to the bridge will have to spend more than a few days in court – and countless thousands for defense attorneys – as the victims or their survivors demand some type restitution.

The Miami New Times, an alternative paper in Miami, noted that Construction Firms Behind Collapsed FIU Bridge Faced Accusations of Unsafe Practices.⁶

Common sense: Close the road while a test or adjustments are made. Whenever possible, do the test or adjustments during low traffic periods, much as many highway projects are done.

There are ways to bypass the bridge site, albeit not necessarily convenient, but available.

Now those “bypass” options will be in effect for days rather than hours.

Simply because no one applied a little common sense.

Six people are dead and more bodies remain to be recovered as this is posted.

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Sources

1. http://tinyurl.com/y7aqxu4a

2. http://tinyurl.com/y8o8wd2x

3. http://tinyurl.com/ycj3gzsn

4. http://tinyurl.com/yco8j83d

5. http://tinyurl.com/ya53qyjn

6. http://tinyurl.com/y9awrpxg

PLAGIARISM is the act of appropriating the literary composition of another, or parts or passages of his writings, or the ideas or language of the same, and passing them off as the product of one’s own mind.

BCPLANNER: Comments on Common sense

Opuscula Media endorsements: Current or outdated?

I NEVER GAVE IT MUCH THOUGHT until this political season, but media endorsements sometimes outlive their time.

We have a tightening race to determine what Democrat will stand against a Republican for a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives.

Since the race is in my congressional district, I find myself watching the candidates’ advertisements.

The incumbent, who has been in office so long she no longer is responsive to her constituents, is running advertisements that claim the local newspaper – we still have a very active press in my area – endorsed her; praised her good works.

Her opponent also includes endorsements from the same newspaper – and others. The difference is, and this is what prompts this effort, the challenger includes the date of the endorsement and all dates are current. The incumbent somehow fails to include the dates the endorsements (allegedly) were made.

Interestingly, the incumbent grudgingly debated the challenger one time, and her ads fail to tell the voters what she will do on their behalf. (Making roll call votes in the House would be an improvement over her last term.) She whines about Republicans and Democrats, some “from out of state,” funneling funds to her opponent and she stands firmly behind her president.

Her raison d’être, she tells all who will listen, is to defeat the GOP presidential candidate. Not exactly a reason to vote for her in the Democrat primary.

The challenger naturally chastises the incumbent for her voting record and claims both the president and vp endorse him. Unless you support Washington’s current policies, that endorsement is enough to make you vote for whomever the GOP will field in November.

Given that the incumbent recently was pushed out of her job as DNC chair due to an email scandal– and quickly found a job with the Clinton campaign with its own email scandal – Democrat voters should seriously consider both candidates’ qualifications for the House seat. Honesty and truthfulness being two criteria

My district will not lose any political clout if the challenger or the GOP candidate is elected to replace the incumbent. She gave up any prestige when she took on the role as DNC chair – and abandoned her responsibilities as our (unresponsive) representative to congress. (To be fair, Florida’s junior senator also has a disgraceful voting record; worse, he denigrated the U.S. Senate and now decries that he was misunderstood; he really likes his job as a senator.)

Opuscula Politicians' And Opinions

 

EVERYONE - EVEN POLITICIANS - ARE ENTITLED to their opinions. Voters may not LIKE a politician's opinions, but until they express themselves, how are we to judge them?

BEN CARSON & MUSLIMS Dr. Ben raised the liberals' ire and raised conservative eyebrows when he allegedly declared that no Muslim should be president.

Republican presidential candidate Dr. Ben Carson “absolutely would not” support a Muslim president, as he told NBC host Chuck Todd in a “Meet the Press” interview airing this Sunday, according to the The Christian Science Monitor

The entire Carson Meet the Press interview is online, but be prepared to suffer a long commercial before the interview starts. The "No Muslim president" remark comes near the end of the interview.

If Muslims are precluded from the Oval Office, then why not Catholics (John Kennedy) who opponents said he would be a tool of Rome. Likewise those of other beliefs. What about Mormons? They are Christians, but not "main stream." Could a Buddhist be president; the candidate cannot claim a Judeo-Christian religious background?

MARCO RUBIO & CUBA Florida's junior senator is incensed that the incumbent has opened diplomatic relations with Cuba. Rubio is the son of Cuban immigrant parents who arrived in the U.S. in 1956. Neither of his parents was a citizen at the time of Rubio’s birth in 1971 in Miami. They did not become naturalized until 1975; however, Rubio, as a natural born citizen, IS eligible to run for U.S. president under the Constitution.

Rubio is against lifting the embargo - or having any contact at all with Cuba - because of the Castro regime's human rights policies. The question must be asked: What about China, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Vietnam, and a host of other nations with human rights records as bad as, or worse than, Cuba yet the U.S. has embargo-less diplomatic relations with those countries. Somehow Sen. Rubio's position re Cuba "does not compute."

Trump on the president's credentials While "The Donald" (Trump) didn't actually SAY it, when asked if the incumbent's was (a) eligible to run for office and (b) was a Muslim, he is said (by the media) to have answered "Yes."

Trump is known for candid speech, and he also is known for saying what a lot of people believe. The incumbent is the son of a Muslim father and, under Islamic law, that makes him a Muslim. Although he claims to be a Christian, his choice of churches - with the anti-American preacher, The Rev. Jeremiah Wright - makes one wonder what "type" Christian. As for the incumbent's claim to have been born in the U.S., it took two years into his first term for a birth certificate to be provided, and according to some document experts, the provided document is "suspect."

Carly Fiorina, who often disagrees with "The Donald's" candid comments, is a candidate with whom I have personal, albeit second hand, experience. She was head of Hewlett-Packard (HP) when my Compaq computer failed. Under her tenure, customer service was more than "just talk." On the other hand, like President Nixon, I think she allowed some of her "trusted few" to do her in and that, as it did with Nixon, cost her her job. That was then; this is now, and I suspect she learned the lesson: "watch your back."

Congressional speeches and presidential welcomes The pope, the Vatican's Chief Executive Officer - as the president is to the U.S. - is to visit the U.S. He is to be welcomed by the president and he is to give a speech before the a joint session of Congress, with the president slated to be in attendance.

How different from how hot under the collar the president got when Israel's prime minister - as the pope, his country's CEO - spoke to a joint session at Congress' invitation. The Israeli was snubbed; no invitation to visit with the incumbent at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue; but this was hardly the first time the president has snubbed the Israeli. (On the other hand, the president traveled to Saudi Arabia where he bowed to that oppressive state's king.)

U.S. response to UN condemnation: silence For the first time, the United States may be willing to accept a United Nations condemnation of the U.S. trade embargo against Cuba without a fight, The Associated Press has learned. " Merely considering an abstention is unprecedented" the article continues.

On the other hand, the U.S. has laws against Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) actions against other nations and it has full diplomatic relations with most of the nations on the lists of human rights violators.

According to the 2014 Human Rights Risk Atlas the following at the "Top 10" of nations that are guilty of human rights violations:

1. Syria
2. Sudan
3. Democratic Republic of Congo
4. Pakistan
5. Somalia
6. Afghanistan
7. Iraq
8. Yemen
9. Myanmar
10. Nigeria

Where is Cuba? It failed to make the cut for the "Top 10." There are only three (3) countries with which the U.S. lacks diplomatic relations; two are Iran and North Korea (and relations with Iran probably will be restored in the near future, despite its leaders' rhetoric). The third country is tiny Bhutan; the only embassies in Bhutan's capital are Bangladesh and India.

The Human Rights Watch report covering Afghanistan to Zimbabwe is available as a PDF document at https://www.hrw.org/sites/default/files/wr2015_web.pdf