Meeting Israeli Michelle

I MET HER online, in the year two thousand, when America Online (AOL) was king of the internet, and folks did their chatting in chatrooms (remember those? Maybe not...), and in private messaging, which AOL called "instant messages". (AOL was forced by the courts to surrender their monopoly on messaging, which, coupled with their disastrous merger with Time Warner, contributed to the company's demise.) Her name was Michelle, she had been born in the nation of Israel in 1972, and had spent the first eight years of her life there, before moving with her family to New Jersey, America. In Joisey, things hadn't gone entirely her way. She had a good job, but had somehow gotten mixed up with the Russian mafia, which had insinuated itself into the American criminal economy following the fall of the Soviet Union. The mob turned her into a prostitute. She had three children by one of them, who beat her often, children who would by now be adults in early middle age. I hope the entire family is still alive. She said she wanted to escape, to get away to some remote place. She mentioned Australia. I suggested Arkansas, where I live. What could possibly be more remote than that? We made plans. She would ge here on the last day of 2000, and I would help her get set up, just as the new century (2001) was beginning. That, of course, never happened. Instead, at the last moment, one of her good friends proposed to her, and she accepted. I hope Michelle Barkman is alive, and doing well. By this time long distance telephone had already become cheap, and we talked for hours, which was and still is to my thinking much preferrable to text messsaging on internet messenger. Some way or another the subject of Israel-Palestine was broached, perhaps inevitably. My view was, and remains, that the establashment of Israel as a nation rather than merely a religion or ethnic entity was ill conceived in violence and poorly executed; a bad idea in general, replacing a perfectly acceptable situation in the middle east with chaos and perpetual war. She begged to differ, and went on to express much more. What become clear is that she hated Palestinians with every fiber of her Jewish being. Yes, she called them "animals", the usual epithet. There are no Palestinian civilians. They are all terrorists, etc.. I countered with my usual parry to this tired argument. If they are animals,what,then,are we? I quoted Bertolt Brecht, which I like to do. "I make friends with people. And I wear a derby on my head, as others do. I say, "They are strangely stinking animals". And I say: "No matter, I am too"". That didn't work. It seldom does, although it should. She was relentless. Palestininas are animals. The rest of us are something entirely different. Angels, perhaps? Nowadays when I think of Michelle, which is not often, I not only wonder how she is doing, and whether she is a grandmother by now, but also, I remember her passionate hatred of Palestinians in context with the world of twenty twenty five. Israel is such a tiny little country, she opined, Why can't they just let us exist? She never mentioned the nuclear bombs or militaristic Israeli national military might, or the fact that Israel, since 1948, has been and remains an aggressive expanionist nation state. I have little doubt that she wholeheartedly supports the current genocide in Gaza, or that she refuses to see it as genocide, incorrectly. Bertolt Brecht wrote: "In the earthquakes to come it is to be hoped I shan't allow bitterness to quench my cigar's glow". And: "There shall remain of our cities but the wind that blew through them." I hope MIchelle is alive and well, and has mellowed, at least somewhat, the way my parents finally, late in their lives, began to see Japanese and Germans as human beings. Today I still despise the aggressive expanionist Israeli nation state more than ever, which is a burden I choose to bear. As for Michelle, assuming she still regards the Palestinains as animals, I hope that she at least has begun to understand that, as Bertolt Brecht reminded us, so are the rest of us.

Doubling Down On Church

I SET A PERSONAL RECORD, and perhaps at least tied a world record by attending church twice on a single Sunday, at two different churches, which is what matters. Certainly many millions of congregants have congregated at the same church multiple times in a single day. Fundamentalist Christians come to mind. They are likely as not to go back and forth several times in a twenty four hour period, on any given day, Sunday, Wednesday, you name it. In my one year plus of sampling, I have attended three churches I like, two of which made the cut as being places I might like to attend weekly. The service at the tiny Presbyterian church starts at nine thirty, and the one at the Unitarian church begins at eleven. The two buildings are about twenty miles apart, in different towns, so, if I walk out of the chapel of the first, without atending the after service social, skipping donuts and more coffee, I can make it, just in the nick of time. The Presbyterian church needs me, but I'm not sure whether its minister wants me there, even though he definitely needs me there to reach double digits, and the latter, whatever they might think of me, seems open to my coming. By driving about five to ten miles per hour over the speed limit and rolling through stop signs, I made it happen. The cops'll give you five; they won't give you ten. As to whether I actually attend both in the same day, on a regular basis,that, as we say,remains to be seen. Maybe I'll do it differently each and every Sunday. Since most folks belong to one church but not to more than one, I claim to have tied or maybe established a new world record for..diversity? Religious freedom and the free exercise thereof? Utter Confusion? I'm no more a Christian now than I ever was. The whole thing still seems primitive, barbaric, and factually baseless to me, as it did to Thomas Jefferson, who said so, and who called himself a "primitive Christian". By that I think he meant that he embraced the essential message of Christ, but rejected all claims to the supernatural, including walking on water, parting seas, and any tangible connections to Christ through the ritual of communion. Case Closed. I am a primitive Christian, while remaining, as I have been for more than four decades, a "pantheist", follower of Spinoza and Einstein. The Unitarians, who accept all comers, atheists and pantheists alike, talked about parenting skills this Sunday, and since I have no children, I alternated between nearly falling asleep in one of the big cushy chairs provided for all, and applying the sermon to my cats. This was yesterday, my first time in Unitarian attendance. They seem to like me, despite this. The Presbyterians had a substitute minister, whose sermon concerned the proper way to pray and the implications and complexities associated with it, and for that he referred to Luke, Chapter eleven. That's the part where Jesus teaches people how to pray, because somebody asked him to, and ever since we have had the surpassingly beautiful Lord's prayer. Isn't that sufficient unto the day? Apparently not, because the fill in minister went on to tell us how challenging and complicated the process of praying can be and often is. I didn't get that at all, and, a day later, still don't. When I pray, which is often, I do one thing: I give thanks, for everything, and leave it at that. For me, that's plenty simple, straight forward, easy to accomplish. But, church here or church there, as long as I know that the "Sermon On the Mount" aint goin' nowhere, I'm good to go, as we like to say. Besides, as a good friend of mine and excellent lyricist wrote in a song: "You can keep the cross, just give me Jesus".

Calling Spades Spades, Duly

TRUMP IS A PEDOPHILE, is a refrain oft repeated among his enemies, of whom I am one. I seek the destruction of Trump. It aint the latest thang, as Mick Jagger once said, referring to looking at women. And it may be that the best way to faciliate Trump's destruction is to merely let Trump be Trump, as we like to say. Hating on folks and calling them names is richly fulfilling, but, alas, is worth only what it brings: emotional expression and momentary fulfillment.. But, I digress. Fact: whether Trump is a pedophile remains to be seen, as we say when uncertain. The fly in the ointment is this: It remains to be seen whether Trump is a pedophile for the simple but obvious and compellingly just reason that he has not yet been convicted of pedophilia by due procees in a court of law. And yes, its that simple. I for one have no doubts that he is indeed what millions say he is. But that, as we say, don't feed the bulldog. Due process, equal justice under law still matters, despite recent Supreme Court rulings to the evident contrary. Donald Trump was convicted last year, by due process in a duly authorized court of law, of rape. Remember E. Jean Carrol? Therefore, he is a rapist, tried and convicted, completely fairly. Now, in all factual fairness, years ago Trump paid a total of eighteen million dollars to the families of five very young children, for improper sexual contact. Trump, cornered, plea bargained. That, seemingly, is proof of pedaphilia. But wait. No, it is not. It is strong evidence, but not proof. There was no conviction. There was a plea bargain. In that agreement, Trump admitted no wrongdoing, nor was he duly convicted of any. One can call and accurately identify Trump as a rapist, but not a pedophile, at least not yet. That, as we say, is for another day. Is that not sufficient unto itself? If not, it should be. Pedophilia is scientifically medically defined as an ongoing sexual attraction to childern who have not yet reached puberty, generally kids thirteen years old or younger. Either or both sexes can be the object of sexual fantasies. You need to be a pedo for at least six months to be formally diagonsed as having this, what is described as a mental illness, a psychiactric disorder. Who knew? I always thought pedophilia was attraction to anyone under the age of eighteen by anyone over the age of eighteen. Attraction by an adult to any underage person. Alas, not so. Also, one needn't actually act on the urge to be so defined and diagnosed. The mere urge is sufficient. If you teach high schol, for instance, and you are sixty five years old, and you think one of your seventeen year old students is attractive, you are not a pedophile. It is probably not even fair to call you a pervert, or anything like that. What you are in that case is a perfectly normal human being, attracted to somebody much younger than you. Most if not all of us are probably "guilty" of that, of being attracted to people younger than we. When I taught high school, female students often walked up to me in the hall way between classes, and began converstaions with their noses about two inches from mine. I kept backing up, into the lockers, to keep my job. It cuts both ways. I can recall being attracted to a couple of female teachers when I was in hgih school. Hell, I was attracted to my lady music teacher when I was in sixth grade. As they say, no harm, no foul, "Pedophilia" is a term used far too often nowadays. it is too widely, indiscriminantly applied, especially now. Trump indeed may be a pedophile. But let's wait a bit. His underage victims probably had reached puberty. Like he himself said, he likes to grab pussy, and can (so he bragged) do it at will, because he is rich and famous. That is brazen, weird, perverted and criminal, but not pedophilic. Give credit where due. At least he, occasonally, is honest. Whether he is a pedophile remains to be seen, whether we like it or not. A we say, the proof is in the pudding.

Empathizing, Somewhat, Introspectively

I WAS A SENIOR IN HIGH SCHOOL in 1972, and supported Nixon. Big mistake, in retrospect. As Goethe said: "Only by errors which really irk us do we advance." By the mid seventies, post Watergate, I had evolved into a progressive, who in those days were still called "liberals". I moved to Arkansas at about the time Bill clinton entered politics, and I supported his candidacy for president and him during his presidency, despite his relatively moderate and sometimes conservative policies. Despite the fact that Bill Clinton was, evidently, for most of his adult life a sexual predator, and, yes, a pedophile, with an "impressive resume'" of consistency; persistant sexual misbehavior. In all fairness and in my defense, I remained wholly unaware of all this until well until his time in office. the Monkia Lewinsky affair brought it to my attention. People I knew in Arkansas confirmed it. The Republicans, expediently, were all over it, much as they should now be in the case of Trump, but are not. A friend of mine, a rousing good fun loving fellow and fellow Clinton supporter, well into his cups, proclaimed his actual admiration of such behavior, I did not. But I didn't spend a whole lotta time and effort comdemning it either. I just sort of let it slide, as a peripheral issue, something which had little or nothing to do with Clinton's actual performance in office. The point here is that my behavior, it has now come to my attention, was very similar to that of today's Trump supporters. Maybe different, in degree and scope, but still, as Davy Crockett might say, "a mite too close for comfort." It seems that I am, somewhat belatedly, taking a look in the mirror. Oral sex in the Oval office holds no candle to Trump at his worst, but Clinton also seems to have done worse, much worse, including sex of the non consensual kind. So here I am, stuck in the middle with you, as the old rock song goes. I still tend to justify my support of Clinton, based on public policy, but I never defend him, or Hillary either for that matter. Her only apparent sins seem to be an unbridled lust for personal wealth and power. Fame for its own sake does not seem to be her game. Then too, Donald Trump's entire life, his every word and deed, are now fully revealed to have been and to still be so blatantly,reprehensibly vicious, cruel, and egregious, to name but a few of the relevant adjectives, that even as we speak I regard him as the most vile human being I have ever beheld, either in person or in history books. He possesses not a single redeeming quality. Clinton did, and still does. As he himselfsaid: "The Republicans spent seventy million dollars proving that I'm a sinner. The folks back in Arkansas could've told 'em that for free". I tell Trump supporters that their support of Trump is appropriate, for they remind me of Trump, and I mean it. They never seem to be flattered. I forgive my own relatively brand of hypocrisy in this matter like I forgive, say, Thomas Jefferson's, who was yet another complicated, contradictory human being. Trump is none of these things. He is an irredemable, blathering mentally ill reprobate with medicoare intelligence at best, who demostrates this to a "candid world", as Jefferson might say, daily... I'm still looking in the mirror, to the extent that I can stomach what I see, and I can see far beyond but not through or around my hypocrasy. In the end, I see a well intentiond if flawed human being. I highly recommend it, with a couple of cautionary caveats. To quote Goethe: "Know thyself? If I knew myself, I would probably run away." As Nietzsche warned: "If thou gaze long into the abyss, the abyss will gaze into thee". And finally, perhaps in all our defense, again Goethe: "He loves not who does not regard the faults of the beloved as virtues." If nothing else, we can take solace in and celebrate our capacity to love anything at all, however undeserving of our love it, he, or she may be.

Running Trump's Extortion Racket

FINALLY, WE KNOW. We know the going rate major American universities must pay to free themselves from the onerous burden of being blackmailed by the Trump administration. We know because Columbia University, among the crown jewels of Ivy League academia, has agreed to pay Trump and his gangster associates, who protect themslves from legal exposure by pretending to be the United States government, the grand total of two hundred million dollars. Trump's extortion scheme, which can properly be described as a sort of street style protection racket, has thereby undergone a succcessful trial run, and its instigators are doubtless now infused with confidence that it will work as neatly at every turn in the future, near and far. There are, after all, more than three thousand colleges and universities in the United States of Avarice; seemingly easy marks, ripe for the taking. All this, merely by taking full advantage of current events. The ongoing genocide in Palestinian GAZA, cleverly renamed and marketed as a "war" against the terrorist organization Hamas, turns out to be a veritable gold mine of investment opportunities. We might next expect Trump & Sons to incorporate, go public, sell shares, and proceed to launch similar legal attacks agaisnt any and all other institutions of higher learning and beehives of social protest, from Division I on down. The only remaining question to be answered will be the share value of the IPO. The narrative is this. College students, who are amost always more aware of social injusice and willing to do something about it than your average less educated American, have perceptively noticed that what has often been called a "war" is actually nothing other than a genocide. And all across America's fruited plain in the land of liberty they have been and are still taking to the campus commons, holding signs, shouting protest chants, calling attention to the almost unprecedented brutality of the nation of Israel in its obvious design to eliminate from the heavily blemished face of the Earth the Palestinian people, fellow Semites. The usual protest scenario. ("Semites" are not necessarily Jews. They are defined as people whose ancestors originated in the Arabian peninsula. This includes Arabs, in Palestine and elsewhere.) At dear old Columbia, they went a bit far. Students entered the library, not to study, but to stage a "sit in", after the fashion of their anti-Viet Nam War protestor grand paresnt, who, one might conjecture, are even now grinning through the haze of marijuana smoke. Either that, or resting comfortably in their graves, without turning over even once within their permanent digs. The police were called, altercations ensued, suspensions and expulsions meted out, and all the rest. History, paradigmatically if not in fact, repeating itself. Into the fray injects itself the Trump adminstration, seizing the day, leveling charges of institutional "anti-Semitism", the usual tired, well worn rot. Pay now or pay later. Of note here is the simple fact that opposition to a nation state, a military power armed with nuclear weapons, pursiung a policy of genocidal ethnic cleansing, does not, repeat, does not, constitute "anti-Semitism. But so what? For Trump & Associates, Ltd, the Columbia U. on campus dissent is nothing less than a "target of opportunity". What it is is blatant blackmail, outright extortion. And as of now, the going rate is a cool two hundred mil. Look for the price to go up. Hallowed Harvard is under Trump's gun, locked and loaded. Others will soon follow. When the fleecing of the Ivy League is complete, look for the ice cold gangsters to move on to the Big Ten, or perhaps the Southeastern conference. Every univesrity within earshot which dares question the moral implications of genocide is, as we say, good for the taking.

Failing Education

THE LIST was rather lengthy, impressive in a tragic sort of way, humorous at best, extremely alarming at worst. Listed were basic facts, facts which one would think would be known by any and all grade schoolers, but aren't. One fact given is that slightly less than fifty percent of the American people can read on a sixth grade level. that alarmed me, because when I was in grade school, we were told that newspapers are written on an eigth grade level, because at that time, in the nineteen sixties, most Americans were considered to be possessed of a middle school or junior high level vocabulary. I don't know whether or when the printed press has made the dumbed down adjustment; one is almost afraid to find out. I remember my third grade teacher, in 1963, teaching the class the difference between the three verions of to, too, and two. My classmates and I found this hard to believe...(it was true then, and its true now. (Another example of vocabulary confusion is "there, their, and they're.")... Then came more facts on the list of intellectual ignominy: Frty six percent of the American people cannot locate the Pacific Ocean on a map. (This is especially hard to believe, considering the sheer size of it). Only about twenty five percent of American people are aware that the United States fought a war with Mexico, won it, and thereby greatly expanded the U.S. by "acquiring" (stealing) the northern half of Mexico. This might have the unintended advantage that, if more Americans were aware of this, a clamor to rename the Gulf of Mexico the "Gulf of America" would have predated Trump. A signifcant number of Americans believe that the sun orbits the Earth. It is true that technically Earth and sun orbit each other, but that's not to excuse ignorance of basic astronomical science. We are left to hope and pray that today's Bible readers, unlike its writers, are aware that stars and planets are something more than glass trinkets dangling from the dome of heaven, or pin prick holes in it, through which the light of heaven comes streaming through. Both explanations are given in the Word of God. A majority of us are not aware that Samual Clemmons and Mark Twain were, and still are, the same person. Most do not know the difference between Theodore Roosevelt and Franklin Delano Roosevelt. The list goes on. Both Paul Bunyon and Davy Crockett are ficticious characters, or, maybe its the other way around. Maybe they both existed. A similar confusion exists concerning Herbert and J. Edgar Hoover, both of whom, at least as of now, nearly half of all Americans suspect of actually having existed. This is, if nothing else, somewhat comforting. I recall my sixth grade teacher jokingly asking: "Who's buried in Grant's tomb? And, what color was Napoleon's white horse? As far as I know, everyone in the class knew the answer, had the joke figured out. Are today's sixth graders able to answer? I know exactly how I could find out, but, I must admit, am afraid to try. Aside from any attempt to denigrate the intelligence of the American people, we can agree that democracy, which demands citizen governance, cannot, as Madison and Jefferson knew well, function efectively with an ignorant population, but that authoritarian fascism can and does. I can remember a time when I firmly believed that when it rains, concrete melts. My excuse is that I was five years old, and I did not attend kindergarten. The best excuse available now might be that we are living in the era of Trump, when windmills cause cancer and the Department of Education is being systematically dismantled.

Name Dropping

WHEN DONALD TRUMP recently bragged about having received phone calls from "hundreds" of governors, up went the red flags among Trump supporters, Trump detractors, and mathematicians alike. Not so much Trump supporters, for whom math classes are no more relevant than chemistry or ethics. Hundreds of governors. Was the Wharton grad referring to some other country, or does he harbor the mistaken notion that some or all of the fifty nifty are governed by executive committee? We can derive comfort from reflecting that this latter day faux pas ranks, on balance, among Teflon Don's least flagrantly amusing mental verbal blunders. But give credit. It ranks right up there with Geroge Washington "taking over" airports and windmills possibly causing cancer. Then too, words may mean things, as Rush Limbaugh, if you happen to remember him, told us from behind his golden EIB microphone. Whatever Trump says, however banal, must be true, because, after all, it was he who said it. One might recall the days when you could buy one of those day to day tear off calendars, with an idiotic insipid quote of the day froom George Bush the first, and then another for George Bush the second. We were never disappointed. Every dqy was a new laffer. My favorite might have been from George H.W.: "The United States is the greatest nation in the country." Wasn't there also a Ronald Wilson Reagan tear off verbal inanity calendar? If not, there certainly should have been. Give credit where credit is due; Republicans do not have a penchant for electing intelligent articulate national leaders, but they sure know how to keep the electorate entertained. What they lack in intelligence and moral integrity they more than make up for in material for late night television. Richard M. Nixon now looks more like a genius among Republicans than ever before, and that's goin' some. All word salads aside, while we patiently await the publication of the 2026 Donald J. Trump inane quote of the day tear off calendar, musing that Trump's declining mental state promises to offer more of the same in increasing quantity and quality, we note with anticipation that he seeems to be gaining momentum, not losing it. Now he wants professional sports teams to retrogressively rename themsselves, to return to old familiar monikers. His delusion is that native Americans are honored by becoming mascots. Maybe some of them are. Can you imagine the reaction among western European-Americans in the unlikely event that the North Carolina Crackers or the Honolulu Honkies take to field? The San Antonio Spics. The Wllmington Wetbacks. The Nebraska Negroes. By now you get the point. It may well be that indigenous American prefer being called "Redskins". Maybe not. Personally, I would rather be called a "native American" or "an indigenous person" than an "Indian". No disrespect intended to the very confused Christopher Columbus, but I sure as heel wouldn't want to be even remotely confused with people who live in India. I am assured by traditionalists that the terms "Indians" and "redskins" are widely considered a great honor among those so dsignated. As Festus Haggen sometimes said: "I have my doubtfuls." But Festus never learned how to read, despite receiving offers of help. You sometimes suspect that neither did those among us - and we know exactly who they are, and their political affiliation - who insist on abandoning politically correct renaming in favor of the presumed comfort of insulting tags. Festus once hung a "Barn Dance" sign upside down and didn't even know it. And my beloved New York Yankees were once upon a time called the "Hilltoppers". So much for tradition. Thank the dear lord for name droppers.

Converting

AS I SIPPED my Synday morning coffee, a bit before dawn, it dwned onme that if I failed to attend church this day, it would be the thrid consecutive Sunday of my absence. I failed. The tiny Presbyterian church in the holler would have to get along without me. I was informed that the previous week there had been seven people in the building,three of whom were there in an official capacity. As it has before, it occured to me that this parish is not lognfor this world,that the church would not live to see its two hundreth annniversary. The main reason I quit going is that the minister, a friend of mine, suggested that I should. "You should probably settle in permanently at the Methodist church in the next town", he told me, paraphrased. Exactly why he wante me out, amid his dearth of congragants, I might never know. Maybe he tired of watching me from the pulpit, twiddling my thumbs and nodding off. (I had assumed he hadn't noticed. Maybe its easier to keep track of five people from an elevated vantage point than I had imagined.))I can take a hint. And, of course, he was right; to a degree. In point of fact I probably shouldn't, andprobably won't settle in anywhere at all regarding religious affiliation. Certainly, I am not a Presbyterian or Methodist, nor, for that matter, any kind of Christian at all. My mind and soul are blank slates, religiously, and, lord willing, shall forever so remain. I cherish open mindedness, and rigorously guard and flaunt mine. I lean strongly towards pantheism, the "religiosity" of Spinoza and Einstein. Humble admiration of the infinitely superier spirit which reveals itself throughout nature, to paraphrase Einstein. What I need is a church even more openminded andliberal than the two previously mentioned. Either that, or I need to sleep in late on Sunday mornings, and upon wakening,drink coffee before going running, biking, or treaemilling. On that schedule, I would awaken early only to feed the cats and use the restroom, in no particular order. A notion struck me awhile back, that I would like to research, explore, and attend, on a trial basis,the Unitarian church a bit further down the road, twenty mmiles to the college town near where I live and let live. problem is,I hate driving, hate it so much that I never tired it until I turned eighteen, and needed a way to get to college. But I've still a hankering to participate in some worthwhile community activity, attend to matters of ths spirit, enjoy the fellowship, and call it a day. Besides, one can only get so much exercise on a sunday morning, and, well, right after the cats have their early breakfast, they settle down and go right back to sleep, and that's no fun. I did my assiduous reaseatch, since the folks I had asked had provided only a rudimentary, cursory description of the precise nature of "Unitarianism", and I needed more. Almost immediately I liked whatI found. for one thing, the Unitarian folks seem to meet in a very nice bilding, relatively conveniently located,and, from what I could tellfrom the pictures, they sit in very comfortable chairs,eawh with his or her very own well cushioned resting place. The minister is a lady, and I like that. Above all, hey accept eveyrbody, which most denominations claim to do but don't. Come as you are, whatever your faith. I would (will?) be sitting among Muslims,Jew, agnostice,atheits, come one, come all. That in itself amazes, motivates, and inspires me. So, I plan to give it a try, gas prices and all. The worst thing can hppen to me, other than mechanical failure, is that I will emerge from some service some day utterly confused as to my precise religion, without giving a damn.

Trending

"THERE ARE THREE THINGS THAT ARE REAL", said John F. Kennedy. "God, human folly, and laughter. The first two are beyond our comprehension, we must do what we can with the third." Much the same might be said of the three main pillars of modern American culture; social status, celebrity, and the possession and consumption of material wealth. These have always been part of the American experience, but have been magnified in importance in the twentieth and twenty first centuries. The process by which this has occurred is cogently explained in a delightfully dishy new book by New York Times writer Michael M. Grynbaum: "Empire of the Elite: "Inside Conde' Nast,the Media Dynasty That Reshaped America". Vogue, Vanity Fair, the New Yorker, and Gentleman's Quarterly, among other widely distributed magazines in this publishing empire are largely responsible for the precipitous rise in the importance of these three commodities in modern Americana. America's founders sought and possessed material wealth and social status. The first true celebrity, the first person who became famous for being famous was, arguably Davy Crockett, not Paris Hilton. His admirerers went so far as to change his name to a more endearing "Davy". (He preferred "David".) These popular magazines represented a veritable culture factory, instilling within the general population ideals about how to dress, how to speak, how to think about such pertinent topics as intellectual preferences, political ffiliation. Everything one needed to know and do to be chic in the land of first impressions could be found in print,in the glossy pages of influential magazines which have long since lost much of their influence and popularity in our age of internet influencers. The Si Newhouse media empire crowned newly minted celebrities much like the Medici family subsidised artists in Renaissance Italy, and brought them together in gala social events much like King Louis XVI hosted fabulously opulant parties in eigtheenth century Versaille France. Americans were trained to embrace the dubious belief that you too can become rich and famous, as if the two necessarily had anything to do with each other. Social status became equivelant to fame. Our present day consumer society, in which we buy whatever we can and want, and are willing to go deeply into debt to do it, regardless of how wasteful our throw away society increasingly becomes, can be directly traced to the hedonistic spirit evinced within the pages of publcations designed precisely for that purpose. A great philosopher once said that fame is worth exactly what it brings: recognition from a lot of strangers, Much the same may be said of social status, which,in the shallowness of mmodern American culture, usually translates as celebrity. Precisely what makes a celebrity a celebrity is up for grabs. People who do a good job of keeping us entertained make the list. In our crass culture, we build statues and monuments to those we elevate to celebrity status, almost as if they were Gods, which, in a sense, they are. Upon entering Graceland, people often fall reverantly silent, whispering, almost as of standing at the foot of the Lincoln Memorial or attending church. Our current obsession with Taylor Swift can be directly linked to this phenomenon. Surely someday she shall be chiseled in granite. All this, becasue of a handful of slick magazines with nothing better to do. Our blessing is that a cultural historian took the time and effort to tell us all about our nonsensical, incomprehensible love affair with human folly.

Sharing the Wealth

IT AINT NO FUN BEING POOR, as most graduate students can attest. Those Spam sandwiches and water in double occupancy dorm rooms only go so far. And what's even worse, according to a well known college basketball coach, is when you are born poor, grow up poor, suddenly get rich by playing college sports at a high level, then, too infused with a desire to show off one's welath, end up poor again, through mismanagement and overspending. But the rich don't always win. When I moved to Aspen, Colorado and joined an exclusive tennis slub, it being the only game in town, I brought a mean game of tennis, honed on public courts among salty players, and fit in quite well. It turned out I was the only member who was not a millionaire. Hell, I was barely a hundredaire, trying to hold down three jobs while playing good tennis after work. I recall the day when my doubles partner informed me that our opponents were worth a combined thrity million dollars. or something north of that. I didn't give a damn. "Then let's go beat the rich guys", I said, and we did. I even turned pro for a day. My partner and I lost a mixed doubles final, but got thirty dollar second place gift certificates for our trouble...My education, intelligence, and high level of tennis ensured my popularity, even though I could barely rub two dimes together. The rich don't always win..."The Rich Don't Always Win: The Forgotten Triumph Ovr Plutocracy That Created the American Middle Class, 1900-1970", by Sam Pizzigati, published in 2012, explains how and why, and it has nothing to do with tennis. Anyone familiar with basic American history is familiar with the "robber baron" era of the late nineteeth and early twentieth centuries, when the Rockefellers, Carnegie, and the Vanderbilts used their accumulated wealth to forge corporate industrial monopolies, hoarding most of the wealth of America. Aware of the growing disparity between rich and poor, and the resulting shrinking consumer base, anti-Trust Acts, the Sherman in 1890 and the Clayton in 1914, were implemented to remedy the situation, which, to a certain extent, they did. "Combinations in restraint of trade are illegal"... Labor Unions fought tooth and nail against corporate goons and thugs to come into existence. Wages were raised barely enough to give hourly workers something better than the slave labor label that had been affixed to them. The creation of the income tax in 1913, and the restructuring of the tax code associated with World War Two which placed a far greater burden on the nation's wealthy, succeeeded in ameliorating the situation somewhat, and by the end of the war the playing field had levelled...somewhat. The period between 1945 and 1975 is now considered the most prosperous in American history. The United States had become a middle class country, the most shining example in world histry, in which a working man could feed a family of four. Now, we are back where we were a hundred years ago. Beginning with Kennedy, and continuing with Reagan, reductions in taxes on the wealthy, the decline of labor unions, and unbridled spending on military procurement have combined to replace the former "robber barons" with our "one percent". It is not enough to recall that once we the people enjoyed a halcyon era of reasonably distributed wealth. Concentrated wealth destroys the middle class, drives down demand, and suppresses production. Demand, and supply. It is time to bring about another golden era of shared prosperity, and Sam Pizzigati, in his seminal monograph, offers an interesting prescription for doing precisely that.

Stealing and Discarding Lives

IT HAPPENED in the wee hours, as usual, when nobody was watching. As if the public wouldn't find out later, by watching the morning news. The Vice President of Perfidy, J.D. Vance, cast the deciding vote in the Senate, a vote to reneg on commitments to fund the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and food assistance to starving people in impoverished countries. (Previously, the fuhrer and his lackeys in Congress had cut S.N.A.P.benefits for hungry people in the U.S.) Almost amazingly, three Republicns joined all forty seven Senate Democrats in attempting to keep the promise. Unsurprisingly, the fifty miscreants who voted to withdraw the funding were, as ou might have guessed, Republicans. Never let it be said that a modern day Republican ever did anything for the purpose of helping people. By a vote of fifty one to fifty, the U.S. Senate voted to defund the parent company of National public Radio and the Public Broadcast system of approximately one billion dollars for the next decade. NPR is among the few worthwhile radio broadcasters; PBS is quite epossible the only truly valuable programming available among the thousands of television channels now available. (Upon further reflection, there are others, mostly having to do with nature and history.) Hundreds of thousands of pounds of food, something exceeding five hundred metric tons, has been wasted by a Trump administration and Republican perfidy, by preventing it from being delivered to its intended and desperatly needy locales, places like GAZA and Sudan. The food lay rotting and spoiling in storage. It cost the American taxpayers about eight hundred thousand dollars, and will soon be incinerated at a cost of approximately one hundred and thirty thousand dollars. More than a million dollars of wasted food and effort, all because the Trump administration prefers to avoid helping people. The food would have fed hundreds of thousands of people for at least one week. The radio and television broadcasting entities would have provided, (and still might provide, if alternative philanthropic funding can be found) people in rural areas one of their only sources of information. Noam Chomsky once said that he can think of no word sufficiently strong to describe the behavior of people and corporations which place the future of organized civiliztion in jeopardy, seeking to further line already overstuffed pockets, by sidesteping safe clean energy sources in favor of the continued exploitation of fossil fuels. The word "evil" is utterly, tragically inadequate. No decent, educated person could disagree. And, as a matter of fact, government subsidies for wind, solar, and geothermal energy have alredy been removed by the reprobates who currently govern America. Indeed, Mmorons Are Governing America. As an astute historian and student of current events remarked, it is almost as if a foreign country had attacked and invaded the United States, assumed control, and set out on a deliberate plan to destroy the United States by reducing it to a moral and cultural wasteland of greed, deprivation, impoverishment, and iniquity. Much the same can be said of current Americna policy towards the world. How many millions of people could have been kept alive long enough by merely sending help where help is desperately needed to give these countries a greater opportunity to develop their own efficient systems of production and distribution? Many. I have heard people express amazement at the abject cruelty of the current administration. And I have heard others express heartbreak and amazement at what the United Stats seems to have become. I could not agree more.

Drenching and Drying

I'M STARTING TO TALK ABOUT it a lot more, because to me it is an increasingly prevalent phenomenon. And it seems to be intensifying during all four seasons; the tendency for the weather to produce prolonged periods of drought, punctuated by periods of nonstop torrential downpours. I never imagined that in the area in which I live there would be a month long drought in February. I was wrong. It happened a couple of years of go. This is entirely aside from the noticeable trend in the American mid south and indeed all across the country, that of much less snowfall. I can recall when we would have several three or four inch snowfalls every winter, spread out over the three winter mnoths, and the snow would stay on the ground only a couple of days, and would quickly melt. As we move deeper into the twenty firt century, we have years without any snow at all, then, once in a blue moon, so to speak, two feet of it falls at once, or if not snow, a severe ice storm takes down power lines and trees. Its all about extremes. Extreme wet, extreme dry. I am fortunate, rainfall-wise, to live atop a plateau, with a slight but steady downhill slope, my house located on the gentle slope. The rain runs into my yard, then the waters divide and flow around my house, and on downhill to the rivers, lakes, and streams. Lareg lake-like puddle ominously form in my front yard, and I worry about the water entering the house, but it never does, and after living here for twenty years, I tend to believe that it never will, lord unwilling. But it still alarms me. Several inches of rain n a mattter of mere hours, many inches over a period of several days, relentlessly drenching our town. Since I live in an area which is naturally deciduous forest, the rain gladdens me. I don't want our lovely Ozark mountains to eutrophy into a grassy prairie or desert. Then come the droughts, especiall in the spring and summer, and as the treeswilt and sag, I once again start to wonder if, over the next few decades, teh tress will indeed vanish, replace by the sort of ten foot tall grass through whcih teh Americanpioners in their covered wagons had to strive on their way through Kansas going west. On either two or three occasions - I can't recall which - I have witnessed trees turning brown in August, most alarming of all. And, as has benn pointed out to us too many times to coutn, we know exaclty the cause of all this, for it is a phenomenon, this extreme wether pattern of alternating wet and dry, is manifesting all over the world. The recent events in Texas, the flooding which is tragicially repeating itself and threatening to take even more lives, bear stark witness to the over the top wet cycle. Only this spring did I see on the news that New York City is getting drenched. The subways are flooded, many of them temproarily out of service. We knwothat we are inthe midst of climate change, which was once relegated to the future,but has now arrived. It arrived long ago, as early as the nineteenth century. In 1852 London was blackas night for four consecutive days, inudated in coal smoke,and tousands of people dropped dead in teh streets. The indications and warnings have been with us a very long time, and for a very long time we the people have ingored them. The weather patterns we have experienced so farin 2025 are the fairest weather we will ever again experience. From now on,the climate only changes more,and keeps changing,and becomes more volatile and deadly. The heavily carbonated atmosphere absorbs more heat from the sun, which increases evaporation world wide,and the atmosphere soaks up more and more rain, until it can hold no more. I can remember the almost daily pop up showers which briefly interrupted our whiffle ball games in the nineteen sixties. Now, the overheaed atmosphere an hold much more moisture, so it does. Our ball games were interrupted for mere minutes, and were often followed by a rainbow. Now the ball gamse are washed out for days and long forgotten, and even the rainbows seem to have gone somewhere else.

Lunching, and Hating, At the Senior Center

IT WAS A NORMAL DAY at the local senior center, to the extent that any day is normal anywhere. A rather small crowd, even for a Friday, especially since catfish was being served, and folks could ask for seconds, like I successfully did. I was seated at my usual place at the head of the table, flanked by three eighty year olds, friends of mine all of whom, despite having little formal education, are mighty street smart and savvy. Age seems to do that to folks. A hard right conservtive, a moderate conservative, and an unidentifiable man, probably a moderate, who calls himself "Thunder Wagon", perhaps aspiring to a Cherokee heritage. The topc of verbal disagreements and conflict came up, and we agreedthat there is only a thing line between agreeing to disagree, disagreeing in anger, and outright conflict. My har right Trumper friends mentioned that when he has a difference of opinion with someone, anyone, of the more serious sort, he merely writes the person with whom hs seriously disagree off his list, ignore them, make them dead to him, pretend they aren't in the room when they in fact are. The old invisibility treatment, if you will. I told him that I am well familiar with this strategy,for it has been levied against me more often than I care to think, and was in fact being levied against me by two of my former friends, in this room now, having lunch. Oh, dear me... I further acknowledged that this sort of strategy had occurred to me overthe years, but that I had rarely if ever employed it, it being unnecessary most of the time. I keep my "enemies" closer, if you will. My friend said that he, in effect holds grudges,and does not seek reconciliation, that being his peronal method of dealing with dissention. I don't like that very much,a dn never have. It occurred to me, and I told my friend this, that isnearly every situation in my life, past and present, involving people being aliented towards me, the alienation had been precipitated not by me, by then the other person. That is to say, in nearly every instance, it was the other person who felt as if I had committed an offense of some sort, and had seeminly decided to respond by chosing not to interact or associate with me further, or, in essence, nto to like me anymore. I simply don't do this to other people/ I may stay away from someone or other, but usually it has to do with my perception that the other perosn has no interst in being approached by me, andnothing more. OH, I get annoyed, even angry, but as I age, I notice that whatever grudge I hole tensto last for less than ten minutes, if that. There are exceptions, of course. And that's true. Even now, after all thes years offriendship formation and dissolution and interaction with thousands of homo sapien sapiens, I just don't feel any special animosity towards any particular primate. Now, in all honesty, it must be admitted that I do have a certain misanthropy towards my entire species,though even that is tempered by what seems to be an equal or greater amount of "lovingkindness" for lack of a better word.. I guess I just kind of lump everbody together in one "baske of deplorables" asHillary Clinton put, leave it at that, and move on. Depsite its severslimitations in desirability and efficacy,this approach does at least have the benefit of alleviating a great deal of the lingering, personal burdensome baggage of emotional trial and turmoil,teh burden of hatred. "Dross", as it is called in the hymn "Are You Leaning on the Cross"? (I for one am not). The gang of eighty year olds fell silent, perhaps in sadness, when I related that depsite my generally magnanimous approach to people, I have, rather recently,nonetheless developed one particular hatred, a hatred so intense that it burns and rages within me, teaching me more than I ever wanted to know about my own capacity for abject hatred. I could sens by their silence that they all know exactly who I was talking about. A Louis Armstrong said about understanding jazz; "If they don't by now, they never wiil". I can only hope that they do, and that they fully agree.

Censuring Dissent, Facebook Style

ITS OFFICIAL, having been repeatedly confirmed. I am being censured by Facebook. I am no longer being allowed to share posts having anything to do with politics. This obviously applies to posts haateful towards the current American president and/or his MAGA mob movement. Facebook, in my universe, has gone full pro-Trump. Trump and Zuck. Corporate birds flocking together. I have no idea whether I would be allowed to post hateful anti-Trump material, would allow me to post pro-Trump material, or to share pro-Trump material. To prevent nausea, I will never find out. At first, I was being prevented from sharing posts having nothing to do with politics, but then, that stopped, and all my non political post sharing was allowed to proceed without further interruption. I can share lions, tigers, house cats and birds, but not anything Trump. The orange blob, as they call him, has scurried out of my reach. I assume that I can still post ads for this website, and use phrases like "The Truthless Reconciler website effing hates Trump" (I'll soon find out)...but, I'm not sure. For several weeks now I have been unable to share my own advertising posts. I recall the old days when Facebook would limit the amount of sharing one could do. They seem to have quit that. Then, of course, there's Facebook Jail, in which I have spent one day, long ago, for posting below a picture of a dead elephant with a smug hunter standing in front of him that I wish the elephant had killed the human instead. I'm still proud of that one. A badge of honor, that sort of thing. That must be how folks taking selfies next to "Alligator Alcatraz" road signs - they hurlig into Ukraine.must feel honored when hoardes of libs start dogging them online with "alligator Auschwitz" knock offs. Hell, I haven't spent a day in Facebook jail since..heaven knows when. Matt Dillon must be very proud of me. Also, no more one hour suspensions from Facebook messenger, evidently. So, it may be that we are finally gaining our freedom from social media tyranny. So I don't know. I suspet that I might get back the "prvilege" of sharing posts posted by my fellow Facebook progressives antithetical to Trump, as Facebook turns its ugly head, falls back asleep, while I sneak out of jail, and get lost in the crowd. Meanwhile, I'll have plenty of targets of opportunity to attack. I can add comments to if not share posts, and I can urge others to click on "share" an extra time for me. There are, as they say, any number of "work arounds". As Davy Crockett might have said: "I reckon the government's a mite prickly, but I'm wrathy as a screamin' painter, and I'll stand up to my rack, all holler, fodder, or no fodder, and may the devil take the hindmost." So, I'll go right on attacking and berating Trump, all holler, and I'll do the same to his MAGA mob of immoral maggots. Its that important. It is to be hoped that this nightmarish swampy Trump era will pass away, and that decency and at least some semblance of democracy shall return to our beloved America. WE further hope that it happens far less forcefully than it did in post Hitlerian Germany. To that end, any attack I levy against Trump, whether instantly effective or not, is worth the price I pay to make it. IN any event, I see my verbal attacks as being like the drones Russia keeps hurling at Ukraine, like little chimpanzees throwing their own dung haphazardly at humans on the outside their cage. Sometimes it hits, sometimes it misses. Others will always carry the torch. The lights will come back on. And if I end up right back in Facebook jail for mercilessly slandering the forty seventh president, it was worth every moment, as long as they don't send me to "Alligator Alcatraz", and feed me only Twinkies and water.

Forgiving, and Supporting Trump

THE SOCIAL MEDIA post left no room for doubt. It brought to mind a quote from H.L Mencken: "The idiots would be humorous, were they not in such deadly earnest". Like the fixed fortifications in real space and time derided by General George Patton, it stands, and shall forever remain in the digital universe as a monument to the stupidity of humankind. A politically far right wing evangelical Christian and avid Trump supporter was asked, in the event that Donald Trump had raped his daughter, whether he would remain a Trump supporter. This, bearing in mind that the families of no fewer than five children actually did, in years past, file civil lawsuits against the Republican representation of Christ on Earth for allegedly raping and sexually abusing their children. In every case, Trump chose to settle out of court, and paid an estimated eighteen million dollars to the plaintiffs. Need one wonder whether Trump would have so settled had he in fact been guiltless, spotless in his white robe, as the gospel hymns like to say? Then too, there is the actual conviction for rape for which Trump was court ordered to pay millions. Well, responded the respondent, "if that happened to my daughter, if Mr. Trump raped her, I would be devastated and angry beyond anything I have ever imagined. But my religious faith and Christian values would kick in, and I would be fully aware of the admonition of Christ to forgive all sinners, just as HE has forgiven mine. Forgiving such a heinous act would take every ounce of my faith and moral strength, and it would be a burden I would carry with me the rest of my life. But yes, politically, I would still support him". Need he have said more? Amid indications that this sentiment prevails among the eighty two percent of white evangelical Christians who fill the pews of the first church of MAGA mania, we are left to ask: exactly what would it take, what horrible act of depravity, what unspeakable behavior could Don the Con engage in that could or would possibly dislodge Trump cultists from their hypnotic, zombie blind allegiance to the great prevaricator? Forgivenees, according to doctrine, comes after confession and atonement by the sinner, but from this Trump gets an exemption. The white Christian Trump cult remains intact, oblivious to outside influences. It is an unshakable bond, rooted in political and religious fanaticism, exuding raw perfidy and naked infamy. The "forgiveness" would of course be a sham, a facade to conceal the true wellspring of Trumpism: abject hatred. Hatred of an American culture which is fundamentally inimical to but tolerant of all things Trump represents; racism, misogyny, contempt for all minorities, the concentration of power in the hand of an authoritarian fascist, a never ending litany of imaginary enemmies - the whole ball of wax of the full to overflowing swamp of Trump and his sycophantic, blindly obedient MAGA minions. As akways, it is the tens of millions of cult of Trump members who evoke the most unmitigated amazement, amazement at their moral and intellectual bankruptcy, their willingness to figuratively sell their souls to the devil in a twisted Faustian bargain, all in the name of their Hitlerian fuhrer, their representative of Christ on earth. The Christian faith is a harsh, unrelenting dictatorship, so perhaps it is in keeping with their political proclivities. Those who still support Trump remind me of Trump. When I tell them this, they don't seem to feel flattered. They shouldn't. But they are much too deeply embedded within their fascist fantasy to give a tinker's damn.

Writing About Trump

OF THE NEARLY SIX THOUSAND essays published on this website over the past fourteen years, no topic has been addressed nearly as much as Donald Trump, and it isn't even close. The first essay was published here on September 17, 2011, on the same day that the "Occupy Wall Street" protests took place, appropriately. All the Trump stuff started here, as best as I can recall, in the summer of twenty fifteen, not long after Trump descended his golden elevator, informing us that rapists and murderers are being "sent" to freedom's land from what he later termed "shithole countries", and that, if elected, he would damned well do something about it. By now there must be at least a thousand Trump oriented essays buried here, all of them negative towards their subject, and may they R.I.P.. "Shithole countries", a term which seems aimed at countries in which the population is predominaantly non white, the standard of living somewhat low, Trump "invented" to describe African countries primarily. Trump wanted, and still wants, immigrants to come to the U.S. from places like,say, Norway, and he said so. Oh, for an America populated with fair skinned, blue eyed Scandanavians! You have to write about Trump. You have to think about Trump. He has us exactly where he wants us, at the forefront of our hearts and minds. This so called "big beautiful bill", recently signed into law, perfectly exemplifies Trump's personality. It and he are utterly contemptuous of the poor, solicitous of towards the wealthy, and effectlvely declares war on immigrants. Ironic, for a nation of immigrants. Some years more people cross the Rio Grande heading north, some years more people cross it heading south. We tend to overlook the fact that many desperate immigrants,documented or not, become disillusioned with the land of plenty, and give up on America, finally realizing that they have done nothing but trade one third world country for another. The formation of the "I.C.E." agency, our very own gestapo, is proof of Trump's attitude towards immigrants and people "of color". Historians will come to view the Trump administration as the most corrupt and inept in American history, far outpacing Grant, Harding, and Nixon. We know this because they already do, and have said so.The early histories of the Trump presidency, focusing on his first term, already reflect this,andany future "revisionist" history seem unlikely to change this fundamental, nearly universal assessment. As for me, my hatred of Trump grows and swells daily, having by now reached proportions I previously would have considered impossible. Trump, if nothing else, has made me fully aware of my own capacity for hatred in a way I never could have predicted. Trump is already the second most hated president in American history, trailing only, but rapidly gaining ground on, the notorious Abraham Lincoln. I keep reminding myself that there is much more to write about, many more important topics than Donald Trump. But I, like many others, keep writing about Trump. After all, like it or not, he really IS that important, the most important person in the world, arguably. I seem to recall beinginformed that Napoleon Bonaparte is the most written aobut human in human history, with good reason. As many as a quarter million books about the immigrant emporer of France, Trump'll probably never catch up, but he'll never stop trying. Of his "big three' addictions, to fame, wealth, and power, the former, fame, might well well be the most addictive of all. Fine. Let him have his moment in the sun. Fame, unto itself, is harmless. As a wise man once said, fame is worth only what it brings; recognition fromalot of strangers. Personal wealth has power, but is limited. But something, anything, must be done about his power, and sooner rather than later.

Air Conditioning

THE FOURTH OF JULY came and went, and here in the hot humid southern part of the United States I still have not used my air conditioner this summer. Or, more accurately, I have used it in the car, but not in the house. I'm trying to see how long I can hold out without it, sort of a game, and also a money saver. I really didn't think I would last this long, and now, fortified and encouraged, I am setting my sights on Bastille Day (July 14) as my goal for AC abstinence. Maybe even beyond. Maybe, just maybe, I can make it all sumemr without ever once turning on the central air, although at some point I probably need to turn it on, if only briefly, just to make sure it still works and to give it some exercise. Cool as my shaded house stays, its hard to imagine enduring the entire upcoming months of July and August entirely without AC. At least, I never have yet. July and August in my neck of the woods are both brutal, just as they arein almost the entire northern hemisphere. My house was deliberately built twenty years ago firht smack dab between two large trees on both the east end and the west end of the house, both trees loom shadily over the house all summer long, and my house spends almost the entire day immersed in shade, and the sun is blocked for all but about two or three hours every day throught June, July, and August. At night, the internal temp gets down to about sventy degrees,and seldom rises above seventy five or six, ever, during the day. That's comfortable for me. When its ninety five outdoors, seventy five indoors will do just fine. Its a nice arrangement, and my heating and cooling bills are low. In the winter, the sun is low in the southern sky, and shine right through my leafless barren trees into my living rooom, which faces the south and has large picture windows. Thus have I managed to greatly reduce my "carbon footprint", which pleases me, and yes, it is important. Air condtioning spews...what....chloroflourocarbons, or some such, into the atmosphere? So it goes with freon gas circulation. Powerful greenhouse gases come from air conditioning, which ranks right up there with cattle raising and car driving as global warming sources. Twenty years ago,when I had my house built,I planted dozens of saplings on m property,and they have now all gorwn big, and supplant my neighbor's treesin keepingmy pro[erty cool in teh summer,but inundated in fallen leaves in the autumen and winter. Future, natural fertilizer, as I see it. I rakeup only the excess. I have a feeling that whoever owns this house and land after I die might not want to have as many trees as there are, and might cut some of them down. That, in my opinion, would be a mistake. When I reflect on how much I have decreased my driving over the past few years, I can take pride on my toned down contributions to climate change. At my age, seventy, you either givea damn about what happens on planet Earth after you die, or you don't. I do. I wnat to finish my life knowing,or at least believing that the difference I made, however small, contributed to something much, much greater than I; a long productive future of humanity, ever growing in knowledge, awareness, and progress. Therefore I fervantly hope that our descendants save themselves from the mess we are bestowing upon them. It would be far more comforting to believe that we, ourselves, and us, will have left this world after having at least begun the planetary healing process.

Declaring Independence, With God's Help

THIS INDEPENDENCE DAY is the two hundred and forty ninth anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, and the sixth anniversary of the U.S. president, in a speech delivered in front of the Lincoln Memorial, praising George Washington for "taking over airports" in the Revolutonary War. One can easily deduce the identity of said American president who, believe it or not, actually said that. He blamed it on the teleprompter, as anyone would have. As a typically hot and steamy June lazily flowed along in a nearly empty Philadelphia in 1776,(each summer most residents left the city to avoid mosquitos and malaria), Continental Congress member John Adams wrote to his wife Abagail that the letter to the king would most likely be formally adopted and signed on the first of July, a date which, he predicted, would live forever in the proud and famous anals of American history. He wasn't far off. Adams, a member of the five man committee delegated to draw up the audacious document, nominated young Thomas Jefferson to write it; Benjamin Franklin seconded the motion. Franlikn was seventy years old, Adams and the other two committee members, Morris and Livingston, were also much older than the thirty three year old Jefferson. Stunned by the nomination, Jefferson asked Adams why he, Adams, shouldn't write it. "Because you, young man, are ten times smarter than I, ten times the better writer, and whereas I am surly and unpopular, you are warm and friendly, and much liked by everyone." How could he say no? Just to make sure, Franklin, who had nearly lost patience and stood six foot four and weighed more than two hundred and fifty pounds, leaned into Dreamy Tom and, as usuall looking down his nose, muttered, "Tis time to do your duty for your country, sir". An offer Tom couldn't refuse. Jefferson's draft was heavily edited by Franklin, which improved it. Nonetheless, Jefferson, reportedly, wasn't happy about all the red ink.Jefferson had written: "We hold these truths to be sacred and undeniable". Franklin,like everybody else wanting a document based on science and reason rather than religion, thought the phrase "sacred and undeniable" too religious in tone. He replaced it with "self enident", a scientific term. The term "nature,and nature's God", instead of simply saying "God", is a clear indication of Jefferon's pantheism, his scientific world view, his scientific secularism. Jefferson called himself a "primitiveChristian", by which he meant that he,like everyone else, embraced the essential teachings of Jesus, but rejected all claims of the supernatural and the miraculous; all claims fo fact which violated the known laws of science were unacceptable to Jefferson, and to most of the other signers of the Declaration of Independence. But at theend of it, Jeffeson cannot resist; he tells the King and the "candid world" that God (the Christian God?) is without question on the side of the American revolutionaries. It is difficult to imagine a more frightening situation to be in than to be closely associated with the issuance of the American Declaration of Independence. They would all be hunted down and hanged. The colonies would be severely punished. On July 4,1776, and for a long time thereafter,there was absolutely no reason to think that the revolution had a snowball's chance in hell, so to speak. It was like committing political and personal suicide. So, even the atheistic Thomas Jefferson turned to God, in writing. As they say, there are no atheists in foxholes.

The Speaker, Speaking Spew

THE SPEAKER of the HOUSE spoke, in front of many smart phone cameras, on the morning of July 3, 2025, after a night spent on the House floor and on his smart phone, coercing his fellow Reupblicans to vote in favor of Trump's big bad bill. As he spoke, the lower legislative assembly was poised to vote, and to pass a trillion dollar reduction in spending to feed the hungry and health care for the poor, and a historically large tax cut for the nation's ruling wealthy corporate plutocracy. The seemingly inevitable passage of this legislative monstrosity well before Trump's decreed deadline of July 4 promised to provide all the campaign fodder necessary for any reasonably legitimate political party to soundly defeat the G.O.P.in '26. If only the Democrats filled the bill. Thus spake Speaker Mike Johnson: "This is how the legislative process is supposed to work. This is how the nation's founders, its constitutional framers, intended it to work"...Um...excuse me, Mr. Speaker? Say what? The way it works is; that nation's billionaires, multi millionaires and corporations spend billions to purchase the politicians, hence the government, which then proceeds to legislate and govern by the wealthy elite,of the wealthy elite, and for the wealthy elite. To facilitate this, two political parties exist, one progressive,one conservative, giving the appearance of real choice, but both utterly beholden to and owned and controlled by, you guessed it, the nation's wealthy corporate elite. Thus are we the people effectively excluded from meaningful participation in the governance of our country, and reduced to submission under the tyranny of "our corporate masters", as Gore Vidal put it. Any question? None? Good. Thus proceeds our plutocratic oligarchy, the U.S.of A. What the founders actually wanted, and created, and got, was a plutocratic republic, government in whichthe "better sort" as Madison put it, wealthy men, governed on behalf and in the best interests of - the rest of us, Madison's "lesser sort". Flattering, isn't it? Bottom line is; the last, the very last thing the framers wanted waswhat we have today. For nething, they hated political parties, dreaded even the remote possibility that political parties would emerge in American politics, and lamented the system they had created when they saw it happen Within five years after Madison, et al, wrote the constitution and it was formally adopted he regretted what he and the other founders had done. He noticed, basically, that the better sort were governing not in the best interests of the lesser sort, but isntead, surprise surprise, in their own selfish best interests. And so it goes today. Five'll get you ten that back when Biden was pushing his two huge pieces of legislation successfully through Congressand into law, that Tim Johnson wasn't so all fired fired up about "the legislative preocess". The Speaker insists that his only source of wisdom, inspiration, guidance, and knowledge is the Holy Christian Bible. He thus eschews almost the entire sum total of all accumulated human knowledge. A twenty first century man, choosing to embrace a violent, barbaric, primitve stone age mentality of the bible. The most extrme closed minded abrogation of intellect imaginable. And it shows. The Speaker needs to learn much about the framers, and their attitudes towards political parties. He also needs read the part of the Bible he seems to ingore, the part where his savior admonishes him to render unto Caesar and to give unto the poor.

Me, Merging with Marjorie, Momentarily

MARJORIE TAYLOR GREENE is not my favorite person. Quite the contrary, actually. She is in fact among my least favorite, not all that far behind you know who. Ever since she entered Congress (and it seems as if she's been in Congress forever) in 2021, her every word and deed has disgusted and angered me. She's a screeching lunatic Christian conservative, that deadly, traitorous, heretical combination of religious fanaticism and far right political extremism which so poisons us all. MTG, emblem of the cancer of MAGA Trumpism. When she said, sometime ago, that she would favor a "divorce" between the American religious right and the secular left, she seemed perfectly serious, and I must admit was, and still am, onboard. But that's where empathy between Margie and me ended...until just the other day. Madam Congressperson said three things of which I so enthusiastically approve and with which I so completely agree that I amtempted to take her right off my most hated list, and to leave her in limbo for the time being, neither hated nor liked by me, but rather, floating harmlessly in the "indifferent zone". First, she stated her opposition to Trump's attack on Iran. She pointed out that both she and Trump, and MAGA Republicans in general, ran for office on a platform of opposition to American involvement in foreign wars, and this includes starting them. We simply don't have any business bombing foreign countries right now, she opined. I couldn't possibly agree more. Not only that, Marjorie made it clear that she has no idea precisely why the United States has its military anywhere in the Middle East at all, much less everywhere there, and she implied that in her opinion, it shouldn't. Again, I couldn't agree more. Why the maintanance of an immensely expensive global military and economic American empire, and why worry about foreign sources of oil, since we have now fracked our way out of dependence on middle eastern oil. Her third eternal verity concerns American relations with Israel. Taylor-Greene mentioned that during her time in the House of Reps, Congress has passed no fewer than twenty two proclamations, declarations, and other pieces of legislation affirming and reaffirming the undying love and loyalty of these United States for the nation of Israel, God's chosen country, populated by God's chosen peeps. How many times do we need to do this? That's a fair question by the nemesis of liberals, whom they often describe, perhaps unfairly, as a "dumb blonde". It seems that Marjorie Taylor Greene, of all people, of all conservative Christian evangelical Republican lunatics - has noticed the white elephant in the room, the utter and complete control of United States foreign policy towards Israel...by Israel. Again, she is merely asking why. Again, I think her observation is surpassingly wise and courageous. Courageous, because she surely is aware that she,by her mere implication that the chosen country of Israel might be a bit less than perfect is likely to attract the verbal wrath of her fellow conservatives. You can almsot hear them screaming the epithet of the day, "anti-Semite" at MTG, and her screaming something right back. Could there possibly be trouble in MAGA paradise? AS Trump says: wait and see. As for me, I remain confident that soon enough, I can and will go right back to despising Marjorie Taylor Greene. But for just one,brief, strangely shining moment, I, of all people, am in her corner. Surely I can't and shan't stay there long. It just doesn't seem right. I may stray, but I always come home.