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JOE BIDEN HAS GIVEN DEMOCRACY A FIGHTING CHANCE AND KAMALA HARRIS IS READY TO WIN THE FIGHT AGAINST DONALD TRUMP, MAGA, FASCISM, AND TYRANNY

  ©Wendell Griffen, 2024 Little Rock, Arkansas U.S. President Joe Biden made history and fired a shot that may change the world when he decided to end his re-election effort and pledged his support for Vice President Kamala Harris to become the Democratic nominee for President during the 2024 election season. Biden’s decision to end his re-election effort was difficult and heroic. He has worked since 1987 to be elected President. His 2020 presidential campaign succeeded despite the difficulties caused by the Covid pandemic, the forced seclusion Biden and his supporters had to endure, and despite the many lies told by then President/now former President Donald Trump about everything ranging from the Covid 19 pandemic to civil rights for women, people of color, people living with disabling conditions, workers, immigrants, seniors, and anyone else. Whatever flaws Biden may have, his decision to end his re-election campaign and minutes later pledge his wholehearted support for Ha
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MESSAGE TO U.S. VOTERS - BIDEN AND TRUMP ARE POOR CHOICES, BUT THERE IS A BETTER ONE

  ©Wendell Griffen, 2024 Little Rock, Arkansas   The Democratic and Republican parties have served up two poor choices to American voters as the 2024 presidential election approaches. They are not similarly poor. They are not equally poor. But they are, unmistakably, poor choices. President Joe Biden wants to serve another term. His tenure in office has produced some positive results, without question. But even his staunch supporters recognize that Biden’s memory issues are not to be sneezed at. Despite his reluctance to admit it, Biden is impaired by declining health. Biden’s June 27 debate performance on CNN against former President Donald Trump was abysmal. Try as he might (and does), Biden cannot “un-ring” the bell that his poor debate performance sounded. Calling Vice President Kamala Harris “Vice President Trump” and calling Ukrainian President Zelensky “Putin” during a recent NATO summit certainly didn’t help his image, at home or globally. Donald Trump’s issue is ch
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STAGGERING TOWARD FASCISM

  ©Wendell Griffen 2024 Little Rock, Arkansas     The United States appears to be staggering towards fascism. The Supreme Court of the United States marked the beginning of the month and pushed the nation closer to fascist rule by its July 1 decision in Donald Trump v. United States . By a 6-3 margin, SCOTUS declared that the President of the United States is absolutely immune from criminal prosecution for unlawful conduct whenever he or she engages in “core constitutional duties” and is presumably immune from criminal prosecution for unlawful conduct while engaging in other “official duties.” Less than two weeks later, on July 13, a gunman fired several rounds from an AR-15 assault rifle during a Donald Trump campaign rally in Pennsylvania. Trump was slightly wounded. Another person was struck and killed by one of the bullets. A third person was injured. Many others were frightened. The alleged gunman was eventually killed. Perhaps it is coincidence that the Trump-loaded S
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The Debate Was About Theatrics, Not Public Policies

Good morning from Chicago, where I am attending a family reunion. My family arrived yesterday evening and enjoyed greeting other relatives, so I did not view last night's televised "debate" between Joe Biden and Donald Trump as it happened. Based on all media analysts and political pundits I have considered since then, Biden and Trump performed as I expected. Biden was hoarse and halting. Trump was rambling and untruthful. Both candidates performed miserably. If the future of the nation and world is to be decided by a debate performance, reasonable political observers should be concerned. Media and political pundits will point to the debate and use it as the lens through which Biden and Trump should be compared. That's what they are paid to do. But that is always the wrong standard for judging public policy.  The true, correct, and proper question is whether the U.S. will be more just, stable, and functional nation if led by Biden or Trump, not how either candidate &q
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SENTENCING DONALD TRUMP

  © Wendell Griffen, 2024 June 21, 2024 Little Rock, Arkansas     A New York state court jury found Donald Trump guilty of committing 34 felony counts of falsifying business records to conceal check’s signed by Trump to repay his former attorney (Michael Cohen) in 2017 for suppressing unfavorable information about Trump’s alleged sexual encounter years earlier before the November 2016 presidential election. Trump could be sentenced by Judge Juan Merchan by fine, up to four years imprisonment, or probation on each of the 34 counts. Because I had the same sentencing responsibilities for the last 12 of my 25-year tenure as state court judge in Arkansas (I retired at the end of 2022), I am familiar with the issues Judge Merchan faces as he contemplates sentencing Donald Trump on July 11, 2024. There are four theories of punishment judges weigh once persons have been convicted of crimes. They are retribution, deterrence, prevention, and rehabilitation. Each theory has its benefits
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A LETTER TO DONALD TRUMP’S SUPPORTERS

  ©Wendell Griffen, 2024 June 7, 2024 Little Rock, Arkansas   Dear Neighbors, I write you in the aftermath of the May 30 New York state court jury verdict that found Donald Trump guilty of committing 34 felony offenses of falsifying business records in order to conceal a conspiracy to interfere with the 2020 U.S. presidential election. I write as a fellow citizen of the United States, native of the American South, African American pastor in the religion of Jesus, honorably discharged former U.S. Army officer, retired state court trial and appellate judge, husband, father, and grandfather. Above all, I am your neighbor. We hold differing views about the role of government. However, I hope we agree that falsifying business records is wrong. I hope we agree that people should not lie, cheat, or entice others to do so. I doubt that you routinely entrust your personal affairs to people who lie, cheat, and steal. I doubt that you encourage your children to cheat in spor
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A TRAGIC DEATH WISH GRANTED

  ©Wendell Griffen 2024 Little Rock, Arkansas   On April 4, 1967, Martin Luther King Jr. called on the United States to lead the world in what he termed “a radical revolution of values” during a speech at Riverside Church in New York City when he urged the United States to end its war in Vietnam. A true revolution of values will lay hands on the world order and say of war: “This way of settling differences is not just.” This business of burning human beings with napalm, of filling…homes with orphans and widows, of injecting poisonous drugs of hate into veins of peoples normally humane, of sending [people] home from dark and bloody battlefields physically handicapped and psychologically deranged, cannot be reconciled with wisdom, justice, and love. A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death. America, the richest and most powerful nation in the world, can well lead the way in t
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