Don’t get me wrong, Mr. President — we would love nothing more than to see the radical Iranian regime toppled. Ever since the 1979 revolution, that government has been a menace to global security. But recent events give many of us pause.

You have given us no reason to trust you on matters of truth or judgment. Throughout your career in business and politics, much of what you’ve said publicly — whether in speeches or on your phone — has been demonstrably false or misleading. That track record tempers any enthusiasm you might want us to feel now.

Beyond introducing the U.S. Olympic Men’s hockey team during your record-setting State of the Union, that speech was marked by distortions — claims of a post-Biden economic boom, misrepresentations of gasoline prices, broad assertions about undocumented immigrants as criminals, and the patently false idea that foreign countries are paying for tariffs.

So how can we trust your explanation for “why now” regarding this weekend’s military operations against Iran? You’ve given us every reason to suspect political motives — to divert attention from the ongoing fallout over the Epstein files, a sluggish economy, and sagging poll numbers. And now we have learned that on a betting platform, which involves Donald Trump Jr made a killing on the killing.

And let’s not forget: your earlier military action in Venezuela — an unprecedented strike that resulted in the capture and removal of President Nicolás Maduro — produced no meaningful bump in public approval. Early polling suggests Americans are not united behind what you call necessary force. 

If what you’re proposing has the promise of escalating into years of conflict, billions spent, lives lost, and chaos in Iran, what strategic clarity have you offered to assure the public that such sacrifice won’t be in vain?

Just saying the US has toppled the government and now it is up to the Iran people rings hollow when they have no way to organize when you have cut off the internet to that country and took down Voice of America in Iran. Any insurgency under these conditions against the couple of hundred of thousands heavily armed members of the Revolutionary Guard will be a sure death sentence for many.

We deserve better than rhetoric. We deserve clear criteria for victory, solid evidence of necessity, regime change (which has rarely worked for us) and honest answers from leadership we can trust.

Hear from the Democratic Candidates on May 17th

Our moderator will be Kathleen Dunn            

Our President chose to celebrate by sending in troops to snatch the president of Venezuela out of his sea-side compound for arraignment in New York City, basically predicated on charges that he is a narco-terrorist. 

Let’s talk about that. Over the past three months we have seen scenes of our military bombing, at $250 K a shot, outboard motorboats allegedly carrying drugs. Allegedly because these strikes were based on dodgy information put out by our very unreliable Secretary of Defense. 

We were never shown proof that these boats were in fact carrying drugs, let alone fentanyl like Trump keeps claiming. Even Senator Rand Paul questioned the notion these boats were carrying anything to this country given that to make it to Miami, these boats would have to refuel 20 times.

Of course, destroying these boats and killing all on board is a way too convenient cover up. The American people, the media and Congress should demand to know more. 

And finally, there is our thoroughly untrustworthy President that makes this all hard to swallow. Instead of our national interests, Donald Trump is clearly more driven by his self-interest.

Trump and MAGA are undisturbed about the hypocrisy of us snatching the head of a foreign country while pardoning Juan Hernandez who wanted to shove cocaine up all our noses (and had the quantity to do it). If Maduro was smart he would have given Trump’s campaign a million dollars like Hernandez did.

How is all of this going to lift our economy? Not hard to imagine that this Weekend at Maduro’s is going to cost us north of a billion for the raid and the carrier group that has been bobbing off shore, money that could have been better spent on the ACA subsidies.

If you have the time, write your member of Congress at www.house.gov or www. senate.gov. 

Many of these same people who bristle when greeted with “Happy Holidays” voted last week to end the Affordable Care Act’s subsidies, which made healthcare accessible to 24 million people. 

Now, rather than holiday cheer, parents across the country will be living in anxiety, fearful about their inability to provide healthcare security for their children. For many kids, losing access to healthcare will truly put them at mortal risk. 

As the Ghost of Christmas Present warned Ebenezer Scrooge, “If these shadows remain unaltered by the Future, the child will die.”

This year when enjoying a performance of “A Christmas Carol,” realize that this line will be more poignant than ever. 

Show if you want to express your feelings to Wisconsin’s Scrooge, write or call Ron Johnson by going to www.senate.gov. Wish him Happy Holidays.

Last weekend, a politically motivated gunman shot two Minnesota state representatives and their spouses at their doorsteps —killing two. This tragedy is just one example of how dangerously overheated our nation’s political climate has become.

In the meantime, Congressmember Tony Wied (R–WI-8) has introduced a bill that would halt federal funding to cities and states with high crime rates. No doubt the intent of his bill is to punish “Democrat” jurisdictions, it’s actually red states that lead the nation in violent crime. But cutting off funding to any jurisdiction makes his proposal counterintuitive at best.

The name of the bill—Stop Anarchists from Endangering Cities Act—is equally troubling. It implies that entire local governments promote anarchy, stoking fear, propping up ignorance, further inflaming political rhetoric rather than encouraging reasoned debate.

Even more concerning is that the bill sidesteps root causes of crime, many of which have been exacerbated by policies championed by Wied’s own party. If the draconian cuts outlined in the so-called “Big, Beautiful Bill” pass, these problems only intensify.

Sociologists tell us that intensifying the products of poverty leads to jacking up crime.

It’s way past time for our leaders to call a rhetorical ceasefire and genuinely engage with solutions that serve the public good. 

You know. Making things work better in this country. Not grandstanding and raising the national temper.

Keith Schmitz GRNS Steering Committee

A suggestion to you all.

What has the GOP done for this country? You'd have to go all the way back to, believe it or not, RICHARD NIXON!

Be totally honest with yourself.

Can you name any achievement that this party has pushed or enacted? And no, fat-cat tax cuts, stuffing the courts with unqualified corporatist judges, or a brutal border policy that ignores the suffering these people are fleeing do not count as anything that benefits us.

It's time we start calling the GOP the Party of Mediocrity to help wake up voters to what this tribe is doing to our country and this state.

Back in Wisconsin, the Party of Mediocrity failed to do anything to address the COVID crisis. And don't count on them passing anything beneficial -- including funding the police -- because, god forbid, that would mean taxing their wealthy donors.

The Judge Brown-Jackson hearings when it came to the GOP members of the judiciary committee was a Mediocrity Circus. It had everything from Lindsay Graham asking what the Judge's religion is from to Dixie Disaster Marsha Blackburn asking Brown-Jackson asking her to define what a woman was to the GOP's OANN obsession over seven cases around the sentencing of child pornographers.

And don't forget. The Party of Mediocrity got us into this recession and let the pandemic rage, which Joe Biden is struggling against the Party of Mediocracy's obstruction. Yet, yesterday's unemployment numbers show this to be the lowest since Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid was on the screen.

We have to ask voters: Do you want this country to not only be what it can be but put into power a party so mediocre that they have to engineer their one-party rule to stay in control?

In advance of the September 19th Zoom Townhall on Gun Violence, an article by David Kyle Johnson bats back the myths cherished by the pro-gun side. Johnson ran this around the time of the Parkland shootings, but because this issue hasn’t gone away, his points still have relevance.

As with so many issues in this country, what the majority wants doesn’t seem to count. The people for whom guns seem to validate their lives prevail too often with a whole bucket of misconceptions. These myths glue together their forces and usually have some appeal to those on the fence.

But essentially, all of the arguments for gun violence in America don’t hold up when you get out of America.

Atheism? The US has one of the most churched populations in the western world, yet the highest rate of gun violence.

Violent Video Games? Ever see what Japanese kids play on their screens? Yet, Japan had 17 deaths from gun violence in 2020.

Immorality? Try measuring what exactly that is.

There’s more in Johnson’s piece on pro-gun arguments that are like balloons – all shape but only air inside.

So, of course, for the gun fetish crowd, the causes of gun violence are everything except the always available gun in American society.

At the time Johnson wrote this article in 2018, violent gun deaths were going down, and as we all know, gun crimes (but not a lot of other crimes) have been rising in this country.

So what has led to the increase? Try the instability from the pandemic in 2020 and stress from a collapsing economy, for starters. And who was president in 2020? A man who is the very model of impulsive behavior.

The loosened gun laws passed over the last few years – including in Wisconsin – haven’t helped. It’s no accident that our freeways in Metro Milwaukee have been closed down because of road rage shoot-outs.

Thanks to our conceal and carry law, many people have their weapon right at hand in the glove compartment, available when the impulse strikes. Because the guns are now being carried around in cars, they are targets for break-ins, with the stolen guns going right out into criminal world.

But Johnson does not, as Wolf Blitzer would say, leave it there. Check out the list of common-sense gun measures that even members of the NRA can get behind.

The solution is to be as willing to push back as the weapon worships are to flood our neighborhoods with guns. The first step starts with attending our Zoom meeting on gun violence on September 19th.