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Here they come again! Another far-right-wing mob, spurred on by President Donald Trump, is storming our U.S. Capitol!

Only, these are not uncouth MAGA marauders wearing buffalo horns, breaking in, and attacking Capitol police. No, this is a very couth, richly attired, well-mannered political mob laying siege on Congress. And look: Instead of fighting or fleeing, Republican lawmakers are holding the Capitol's doors wide open for this incursion! That's because this is a swarm of always-welcome corporate lobbyists and campaign funders. In particular, they're an army of global pesticide giants.

Led by Bayer, the multibillion-dollar German biochemical conglomerate, they're demanding that Congress keep us commoners from interfering with their poisonous profiteering. Bayer reaps billions of dollars selling a killer pesticide named Roundup, which scientists increasingly consider a cause of cancer, especially in children. Thousands of afflicted families have filed major lawsuits holding Bayer responsible.

Of course, Bayer honchos did the honorable thing. Ha! Just kidding. Instead, its lobbyists rushed to Trump and GOP congressional leaders, who -- shhhh -- quietly tucked a corporate "gotcha" into this month's must-pass budget bill. It would effectively hand retroactive immunity to chemical manufacturers, quashing all those lawsuits filed by families of Roundup victims. Sneaky, huh? Infuriated, grassroots leaders of MAHA (The "Make America Healthy Again" movement) say the Republican Party is being corrupted by false information from the pesticide companies.

This is Jim Hightower saying... What's corrupting the Party's lawmakers is the gusher of campaign money they take from the poison pushers. For information and action on stopping this capitulation to what Bayer, go to FoodAndWaterWatch.org.

THE SECRET HISTORY OF 'WOKENESS'

In "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland," Humpty Dumpty scornfully declares that "When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean."

So, what does "woke" mean? It's become the pet political aspersion that today's kooky right-wing hucksters hurl at liberals, but the hurlers would be whopper-jawed to learn that it was actually coined by and for progressives! Indeed, it admonishes people to be awake to the dangers posed by hate-filled bigots and reactionaries like ... well, like today's right-wing extremists.

Among his many classic songs was "Scottsboro Boys," about nine Black teenagers falsely accused in 1931 of raping two Alabama white women. As a Black musician who traveled the backroads of the Jim Crow South, Lead Belly warned others to pay attention when in a viciously racist state: "Best stay woke," he cautioned.

But -- out of blind ignorance, blind arrogance, or both -- today's adaptors of the Jim Crow mentality have perverted common-sense wokeness into a verbal whip to lash African Americans, immigrants, Democrats, women, LGBTQ+ people and all others they don't like (pretty much everyone who looks, thinks, prays and acts differently from them). How kooky? They've declared librarians, science, Mickey Mouse and Bud Light to be their evil enemies. "Don't be woke," they bark, demanding autocratic, plutocratic, and theocratic laws to coerce compliance with their own retrogressive bigotries.

This is Jim Hightower saying ... Bear in mind that this is no longer a fringe cult, but the mainstream of the Republican Party, including its top congressional leaders, presidential wannabes, and state officials. You can easily comprehend what these Humpty-Dumpties really mean by their "Don't Be Woke" war cry. Just substitute the word "sane" for "woke."

To find out more about Jim Hightower and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators webpage at www.creators.com.

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