Mr. Toy's Mental Notes

I saw this in an Associated Press article in the June 3 Monterey Herald.  “The high court in 2022 handed down a ruling that expanded gun rights and told lower-court judges they should no longer consider factors such as public safety in deciding whether firearm laws are constitutional. Instead, they should focus on whether a law fits into the nation’s historic tradition of gun ownership, the court said.” I checked it out, and it is true. The Supreme Court of the United States of America, in what is known as the Bruen decision, stated that tradition is more important than the written law. This comes from a court whose conservative members have often declared that the letter of the law is not open to interpretation. It should be taken literally, as the founding fathers intended. This is ironic, no it’s completely nuts, because the stated objective of the Second Amendment to the US Constitution is “the security of a free state,” in other words, public safety. On a few occasions I h...

My message to Congressman Jimmy Panetta After reading your May 4th newsletter on the chaotic first 100 days of Trump 2.0, I'm more convinced than ever that Congressional Democrats are taking boxing gloves to a gun fight. You write about legislation to curb Trump's abuse of power. But this legislation will require some Republican cooperation to pass, and most importantly, would need Trump's signature to go into effect unless you miraculously get a veto-proof majority in both the House and Senate.  Considering how unlikely it is that any of this legislation could ever become law it looks like you're just engaging in busywork so it looks like you're doing something, but which is clearly a waste of time. I understand you wanting to play by the rules, and certainly you shouldn't break any laws fighting Trump, But the Trumpers have thrown out the rule book, so you need to be more aggressive and visible than you would be under ordinary circumstances. Maybe I missed ...

CBS News posted this brief news item on Facebook: "World War II codebreaker Julia Parsons died last month at 104 years old. She was part of an all-woman team unscrambling messages to and from German submarines." When I was a kid, a common topic of adult conversation involved things that happened "during the war." Mostly they talked about everyday things that happened on the home front, like where they lived, who they knew, how they used gas ration cards, that sort of thing, as if it happened yesterday. I was fascinated by those stories, and it prompted me to learn everything could about WWII. Today there's almost nobody left to tell those tales.  The last civil war soldier died in 1956, at age 106, just three years before I was born. We think about the civil war as ancient 19th century history, but many people who were there lived through the first half of the 20th century.  Lately I've encountered several young people who are very interested in 1960s cu...

During the past week I've read several posts and comments on Facebook praising Elon Musk for uncovering and eliminating waste and fraud in the federal government. They range from simple expressions of gratitude to positively giddy but unsubstantiated pronouncements that Elon has found huge savings, or exposed massive fraud. Slow down. Musk's so-called "Department Of Government Efficiency" has only been operating for a few weeks. Its staff of around 100 people with little or no government experience hasn't had time to really get to know their way around the massive federal bureaucracy and learn what these agencies actually do, much less determine what is meat and what is fat. Yet from day 1, they've been firing government employees right and left and proudly telling everyone they've already saved us billions of dollars. I see no evidence that DOGE has uncovered any waste or fraud as they claim, though it is possible they may have stumbled on some by acci...

  I'm starting to see a common thread among Trump/Musk ("Trusk") supporters who are letting an unelected billionaire from South Africa dismantle government agencies without going through Congress. They justify this because they are all convinced that Congress has been so thoroughly corrupted that it can't do anything in the public interest anymore. There is a nugget of truth at the core of that perception. Congresscritters, particularly the Republican variety, have for the most part become so dependent on campaign donations from giant corporations and billionaires that they are indebted to them for winning their seat and keeping it. Bernie Sanders built a substantial following by pointing this out and he attempted to correct it. Bernie was somewhat successful.  Democrats are now less dependent on big money donations thanks to the grassroots organization Act Blue which makes it easy for Democrats to receive large numbers of small donations from individual citizens. ...

Sing to the tune of My Boyfriend's Back . It might help if you have a backup singer, even if she's only in your head. If you don't know the tune click here . ___________________________ He went away yet he hung around And he lied to us every day Insisting he had really won And did things that weren’t very nice The Donald’s back and he’s out for retribution He lied, they lied, the Donald’s back He’s so pissed off he’s gonna change the constitution He lied, they lied, the Donald’s back He’s been spouting words that were not true He lied, they lied, the Donald’s back His minions now are comin’ after you He lied, they lied, the Donald’s back Hey, he thinks the deep state’s real And that Putin’s the real deal He was out for four short years He lied, they lied, the Donald’s back Now he’s back and stoking people’s fears He lied, they lied, the Donald’s back You’re gonna be sorry that you gave him your vote He lied, they lied, the Donald’s back ...