Today is Thursday, February 3, 2022. If you read any articles about the outcome of our groundhog prognosticators, you might have learned that there was a split decision. The groundhog in Philadelphia, Punxsutawney Phil, did see his shadow when he came out of his den, but Staten Island Chuck, the furry animal right here in New York, did not see his shadow, thus foretelling an early spring. So it boils down to this: Whose prediction do you trust? In this case, the groundhog in Philadelphia is better known than our native Staten Islander. This year marks the 136th year that Phil has made his prediction, but according to an article in USA Today on my smartphone, the times that Phil has gotten it right is, on average, only 40% of the time over the past 10 years. The origins of Groundhog Day lie in an ancient European celebration of Candelmas, a point midway between the winter solstice and the spring equinox – the exact midpoint of astronomical winter. If you ask me, all signals point to six more weeks of winter anyway, Staten Island Chuck prediction or no. We’ll just have to hunker down and grin and bear it throughout the next several weeks, like we always do. Unless you can travel to a warmer climate before the arrival of spring. We had contemplated traveling down to Florida for a week or so in January, but that notion was scrapped because of Omicron’s presence.

Also in the news today was the visit to our fair city by the current president to discuss the spiraling uptick in gun violence in the region along with New York Mayor Eric Adams at New York Police Department (NYPD) headquarters. Could you ever imagine the Orange Menace doing the same? His visit would have been met with raucous demonstrations before he could be allowed to speak. He would have turned the solemn discussion on curbing the influx of guns into a discourse about himself, no doubt about it. But this would have been a nightmare if this were so, so we should just erase the ghastly image from our minds.

This situation was covered in an online CNN article by Maegan Vazquez, Peter Nickeas, Evan Perez, and Priya Krishnakumar in “Biden turns his focus to gun violence as Democrats try to shed ‘defund the police’ label.” Biden’s visit was meant to turn the issue of crime into a new focus on combating gun violence.

“This trip came amid a rash of high-profile shootings in major cities, including New York, and less than two weeks after two police officers were fatally shot on the job.”

Citing grim statistics concerning gun fatalities, Biden said, “Every day in this country, 316 people are shot, 106 are killed, and six NYPD officers have been victims of gun violence so far this year . . . 64 children injured by gun violence so far this year, 26 killed. So enough. Enough is enough because we know we can do better than this.” Biden issued these comments at NYPD headquarters for a Gun Violence Strategies Partnership meeting.

The President expressed admiration for those who serve, thanking them for putting “their lives on the line every single day to keep our community safe.” In addition, he called for enhanced tools, training, and funding for police nationwide, repeating his stance that “the answer is not to defund the police.” So take that, ugly repugnicans. These politicians have brushed Democrats with the wrong hue, accusing the whole party of wanting to defund the police, which is grossly not true. Biden talked about how repugnicans have seized on the “defund the police” movement which jelled after the murder of George Floyd in May 2020 to paint Democrats as radical and antipolice earlier at a 2020 meeting in Georgia before the state’s U.S. runoff elections in front of the leaders of seven civil rights organizations. Saying at the time, Biden asserted, “That’s how they beat the living hell out of us across the country, saying that we’re talking about defunding the police.”

What I enjoyed hearing is Biden’s reaffirming his call on Congress to pass gun laws, like universal background checks, and reach bipartisan agreement on the fiscal year 2022 appropriations bill – which includes significant funding for the strategies he’s proposing.

During the event, “Biden laid out how his administration will build on the comprehensive strategy to combat gun violence he unveiled last summer amid a surge in violent crimes, announcing new steps the Department of Justice is taking to build on his plan.” Some of these efforts include the launches of a national ghost gun enforcement initiative as well as a national drug-related violence reduction initiative. Even the attorney general has gotten into the action, as Biden said that Merrick Garland has “directed all US attorneys in the United States to prioritize combating gun trafficking across state lines and city boundaries.” The Justice Department will also be sending additional resources to help shut down weapon pipelines.

Along with his visit to NYPD headquarters and sharing the spotlight with Mayor Eric Adams, Biden also visited a New York public school to discuss community violence intervention programs with local leaders and met with officer Sumit Sulan, the rookie officer working with the two NYPD officers recently slain in the line of duty. Ahead of the trip, it was reported that Biden spoke with the families of the two fallen officers and NYPD Commissioner Keechant Sewell.

White House press secretary Jen Psaki underscored this week that “addressing crime is something that is a root of the President’s agenda.”

A positive trend has been witnessed in gun safety groups, according to Shannon Watts, the founder of Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, in which their outlays have exceeded money spent by the horrible National Rifle Association (NRA) during the 2018 midterm election cycle. “It’s a winning issue [gun safety] because the vast majority of Americans support commonsense gun safety measures,” Watts said.

Mayor Adams has said, “We have to stop the flow of guns.” He continued, “We are removing thousands of guns off our streets, and it appears as though for every gun we remove from the street, five are coming in. That is unacceptable.”

Let’s hope that this visit by the President is the first step in reducing the sickly upsurge in violent crime on our city streets, not just in New York but in other major cities as well. So far, at least 10 large American cities saw a record number of homicides last year. “Two-thirds of the 40 most populous cities surpassed their 2020 homicide totals.”

The depths of repugnican perfidy achieved new lows as I just heard that the members of the Republican National Committee (RNC) resolutions committee just passed a resolution today to censure Reps. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) and Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.) for their truth-telling role on the House Select Committee investigating the insurrection of January 6. This sad story appeared in my online edition of The Hill by Olafimihan Oshin in “RNC committee advances resolution to censure Cheney, Kinzinger.” What a despicable act! This action just goes to the depths of insanity that the repugnican party has descended to since it embraced the anti-Christ, Donald Dumpf. One thing we should be grateful for is that this rebuke is weaker than what was originally proposed, which was removing them both from the House conference. We should praise God for their lack of extremism in this one regard, but it still shows how irretrievably connected they really are to a modern-day Benedict Arnold.

Dismissing the rebuke from his own party, Kinzinger defended his role in uncovering the treachery of the last president, saying, “I’ve been a member of the Republican Party before Donald Trump entered the field. My values and core beliefs remain the same and have not wavered. I’m a conservative who believes in truth, freedom, and upholding the Constitution of the United States.” His colleagues obviously do not! Kinzinger then slammed the committee for choosing to censure “two lifelong Members of their party for simply upholding their oaths of office.” The duty-bound representative continued to double down on his obligation to serve, saying this about members of that disgusting committee, “They’ve allowed conspiracies and toxic tribalism to hinder their ability to see clear-eyed.” He added, “My efforts will continue to be focused on standing up for the truth and working to fight the political matrix that’s led us to this point.”

Cheney was more critical of her party and its embrace of a loathsome figure in modern history, saying repugnicans had “made themselves willing hostages to a man who admits he tried to overturn a presidential election and suggests he would pardon Jan. 6 defendants, some of whom have been charged with seditious conspiracy.”

She also upheld her conservative foundation, saying, “I’m a constitutional conservative and I do not recognize those in my party who have abandoned the Constitution to embrace Donald Trump.” She had these ominous words for her misguided colleagues: “History will be their judge. I will never stop fighting for our constitutional republic. No matter what.”

Why didn’t this despicable committee composed of anesthetized Trump-heads not censure others like the abominable Marjorie Taylor Greene or Lauren Boebert or a slew of others for their awfulness as congresspeople? These people should have been censured by their colleagues a long time ago.

This situation with the party of Lincoln is just so dispiriting. When will this obsession with such a subhuman fade in this country? Don’t you agree? It should have been over by November 7, but we all know what sadly developed since then.

It’s getting late here. Enough of my ranting here.

All I know is that by watching a lost episode of The Honeymooners these past few weeks has calmed me considerably after writing my blog. I accidentally discovered several weeks ago that a station by the name of Decades began featuring these lost episodes, so I began taping them. They don’t come on every night, but they do regularly appear in my queue. These episodes seem more ambitious than the original episodes in some ways; they also introduce characters that might have not appeared in the original half-hours, people like Alice’s brother, aunt, or other family members. Some of these episodes also run for a two-episode arc, which I don’t recall the original series having. So if you have that station, by all means record this show if you want to laugh uproariously.

Stay safe and be well.