Loving A Dying Tree

 THE LITTLE TREE,  like all too many human beings, born too briefly into this world of cruel indifference, never really had a chance. It sprouted as a volunteer, , like so many people, unplanned and unwanted. The winds of  fate blew the spring maple seed in the wrong direction landing it in the wrong place, as they do for so many people, people born in the wrong place and time, and the little maple sprouted two feet from my house. It might have survived there, and it might have grown big and healthy, without doing damage to either itself or my slab concrete foundation, but I will never know. During the rainy spring of 2021 it grew quickly to six feet, beautifully, perfectly proportioned. I knew it would grow fast, grow big, and run out of room, and that its teeming, throbbing, searching roots would become ever larger, large enough to crack concrete. Maybe it never would have cracked my foundation, and maybe it would have thrived for decades snuggling against the house, content. but I doubted it, and I couldn't take the chance, not while I still had the chance to do something, I had to try, for my house, for my tree, and , least importantly, for me. My neighbor, a tree trimmer by trade, urged me to transplant it and to not wait long. Bless his heart, he offered to help, and he did most of the work. He dug u p the tree while I dug its new home farther from the house. Beside it he drove a hollow pipe into the ground, for feeding, and I began to feed it daily. Within a day the leaves, one at a time, began to wilt, to be expected from the shock of being moved. As the days went by, the wilting and dying leaves continued, and my neighbor told me not to give up, that it might well live. After a month of the sort of desperate hope we reserve for the dying, I gave up, and cut it down. It had been dead awhile. My theory is that when it was dug up for transplanting, too many roots were left behind, too many roots were cut off too short, and that it entered its new home with too few roots. I will grieve for it forever, like we always do, like I still do for my long dead parents, my long dead friends, my long dead beloved pets. And, like always, the grieving will become less painful every day, until the pain is but a faintly pulsing memory of loss. A tree is a living being, and it feels. I love trees, I loved this little tree, and I always will love its memory, and hope to see it in a happy forest in heaven.

Believing Absurdities, Committing Atrocities, Living In Infamy

 "WHOEVER CAN MAKE YOU believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities", observed the always outspoken Francois Marie Arouet, who pen named himself "Voltaire", and himself refused to believe absurdities or commit atrocities, such as religious dogma, though he himself was immersed in both, being surrounded by both in eighteenth century Catholic France. Voltaire resisted both, and spoke out against both religious absurdities and religious atrocities in his famous admonition regarding the Catholic church: "Crush the infamous thing!" Risky business, philosophizing. His salvation, so to speak, was that people in high paces knew perfectly well that although he was outspoken, he told he damned truth, and secretly agreed with him. There aren't many people sufficiently charismatic or persuasive to make you people believe absurdities with sufficient conviction to inspire them to commit atrocities, but, when one comes along, all  hell usually breaks loose. There aren't even many people who can run for high political office, slick tongued though politicians often are, lose badly and obviously, claim to actually have won the election and that the election was stolen from him, make this absurd claim before the votes have even been counted, make it without any supporting evidence, and be instantly and forever believed by seventy five  million presumably reasonably intelligent albeit sycophantic followers, notwithstanding his notorious well deserved reputation as a chronic, pathological prevaricator, and to have many of those same followers proceed to attempt to overthrow the government and the allegedly stolen election results with a violent, atrocious insurrection,  but Donald Trump can, and did. For that, Donald Trump deserves credit, though of a dubious sort. The big lie, often repeated, becomes believed, as Joseph Goebbels knew well. The atrocities then follow. For people like Hitler and Trump to accomplish their nefarious goals, or to attempt to,  by telling big lies might be expected, but is not nearly as shocking nor surprising as millions of people believing them and acting as accomplices. "We are never deceived", sagely stated Goethe; "we only deceive ourselves". Goethe, like Voltaire a sage student of human nature, understood that under all circumstances, we are all responsible for what we believe, no matter who or by what methods somebody tries to influence our beliefs, for the simple reason that under all circumstances, al beliefs are ultimately, a matter of personal choice. there always exists the option of deciding, a priori, that everything anybody ever tells you is a lie, an option which came to my friend one night while he strutted around my town laughing hysterically under the influence of LSD, and which to this day I consider worthy of consideration. Seventy five million American chose and continue to choose to believe the biggest lie of all by a demonstrable, pathological serial liar.  They believe it only because it provides them a convenient vehicle to their desired  state of victimhood, and way to escape accepting the crushing reality of a humiliating, unthinkable electoral defeat, and to turn it into a pseudo crusade for pseudo justice. That they are turning themselves into traitors and criminals by undermining the democratic system of government upon which their country functions predicated is to them. apparently, unimportant. They are mentally ill by choice, traitorous, treasonous, and worthy only of condemnation. Trump and his followers, like Hitler and his, will, as another sage leader once said, forever live in infamy.

Trapping Deadly Gases

 THERE ARE APPROXIMATELY one billion head of cattle in the world, ninety five million in the United States. Each cow burps out about two hundred and forty pounds of methane gas every year, which they must do, or bloat and die. Methane is ninety time more harmful to the environment than carbon dioxide, ninety time the heat absorption. for every one foot of heat absorption accomplished by carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, methane absorbs seven and a half feet, metaphorically and actually. methane causes climate change seven and a half times more severely than CO2. Raising cattle requires enormous amounts of grain and water, grain and water we could eat and drink ourselves. Six hundred gallons of water are used in producing a single hamburger. Fuel companies drill thousands of oil wells eacy year, and since the natural gas and methane which are mixed in with the oil are insufficiently profitable, the two gases are simply released into the earth's atmosphere, to contribute to global warming, which is now beginning to reach alarming levels. Obama tried to stop this practice, Trump allowed it to continue, and now Biden is trying to stop it, although he has made it clear that he has no intention of banning oil fracking. Plainly, eliminating atmospheric methane pollution is crucial in stopping and reversing climate change and saving Earth's ecosystem, and humanity. Clearly, the cattle industry must be phases out, fast. for confirmation of this inconvenient but indisputable reality, consult and  professor of agriculture, any biologist, chemist, physicist, or climate scientist. the problem does not end there. The most prolific source of uncontrolled methane emissions is from the rapidly melting tundra beneath the rapidly melting polar ice caps, beneath which lies billions of tones of frozen organic matter the legacy of billions of year of the life and death cycle on Earth. with polar temperatures rising much more rapidly than the other continents, the decaying decomposing organic matter is releasing more methane into the atmosphere only human activities which must be curtailed. The next obvious necessary change is well publicized: the elimination of transportation systems and energy sources based on fossil fuels, oil, coal, and natural gas. encouragingly, that transformation is well under way, although well behind a desirable schedule and far enough advanced to inspire realistic hope. Planting trees worldwide is also being undertaken. At the beginning of neolithic civilization were was an estimated seven trillion trees in the world. that number has been cut in half, and until quite recently the decrease was about ten billion a year. But even if all the available land on Earth were covered with new forests, it would not be enough to remove the billions of tons of carbon from the air needed to stop climate change. That can only be accomplished by employing all possible technologies and strategies. Truly, its all hands on deck.

Quietly Counting the Dead

 QUIETLY, imperceptibly, nearly unnoticed, the six hundred thousandth American to die of covid 19 became a tragic footnote in a tragic, uniquely America saga, in a country whose hidden history is littered with footnotes of forgotten tragic sagas. In america, we like to sweep our infamy under the rug, out of sight. Meanwhile, we go merrily back about our business of self absorbed self gratification; the bars are reopening. To be a member of a family or circle of friends which has experienced the loss of Covid 19 victim five hundred fifty thousand to six hundred thousand bears an added burden of despair, best swept away and hidden. It is the knowledge, unavoidable though unspoken, that the most recent fifty thousand deaths were even more unnecessary than the first half million, because they occurred after the vaccines became widely available to anyone who chose to take it. You can scarcely conceive of the hidden agony of losing a beloved friend or family member in the summer of 2021, six months after the prevention was available and offered to nearly all adults. In reality, nearly all the six hundred thousand deaths were unnecessary. There are countries more densely populated than the United States where the death toll has  been minimal. In the United states, we were simply unable to muster the will power and discipline to do what was necessary to save ourselves from the catastrophe from which we are only now beginning to emerge. Barely half the population has been fully vaccinated, and we are behaving as if the nightmare is over, when in fact it continues, but at a somewhat less nightmarish pace. On every holiday in 2020, we gathered together arrogantly, dismissive of expert advice to the contrary. We crowded the beaches on memorial Day, and on the Fourth of July. At Christmas and Thanksgiving, we traveled. We argued about whether wearing face masks and staying away from each other even mattered, when every scientific expert assured that it did matter. We listened to a vain, deranged leader tell us that there was nothing to worry about, that we should reopen our economy by Easter, 2020, at which point the pandemic had but barely begun. Out idiot president told us to ingest bleach or other disinfectants to clean out the inside of our bodies. NO, not all of us succumbed to the insanity, but enough of us did to turn a bad situation into one of the most complete nightmares we have ever, or will ever endure again, if we are lucky.

Atomizing Religiosity

 THE SOUTHERN BAPTIST LEADERSHIP CONFERENCE, white people's division, currently conventioning, is experiencing dissension, par for the human race/course. What group isn't? As is often the case, the lines are drawn between hard line conservative versus somewhat less conservative divisions, the division having to do with doctrinal matters, the role of women within the church, among many other more minor matters. Maybe they'll split into separate churches. American Baptism was born to be divided, as were all human associations of more than one person. In the eighteen forties Baptism north and south divided over the issue of slavery. The southern congregants favored the peculiar institution, the northerners did not, and the twain tore asunder,  for ever more. The slave themselves, involuntarily imported Africans, were not consulted, and eventually founded their own branch, the first Baptist Church of the Reverend Jesse Jackson. Matters Everyone invents his own religion". This, of course, assuming  that Christ did not and does not intend for his followers to segregate themselves into Catholic, Protestant, and then further, into Methodist, Christian Scientist, southern Baptist, conservative southern Baptist, less conservative southern Baptist and a multiplicity more, unto the ultimate conclusion: a fully atomized, fragmented kingdom of Christ, each unto his or her own, one person per church.  People do the fragmenting, Christ does not. The complete Goethe quote is: "When I realized that everyone invents his own religion, I decided to invent my own". And so we do, like it or not, deny it or not. In the United States today, there are about fifteen hundred organized religions, many of them some denomination of Christianity, all making the same claim: the unique, exclusive possession of the truth. If only Jesus, in his apparent haste to get on about the business of being tortured to temporary death, had not ignored Pilate's crucial question. Perhaps the doomed rabbi thought the answer too obvious to dignify with a response. Suppose he had simply said: "Truth is God and God is truth." This would have solved nothing, nor changed Christian history of division and violent internecine conflict, ameliorating not at all future fragmentation. The universe is layered in its meaning; Pilate probably would have have pressed on with: "What is God?", and, as we like to say, here we go again.

Reinventing Reality

 JARED KUSHNER, throughout his tenure as Trump's chief Asst. Sec. of State for Israeli subjugation of Palestine, or Trump youth minister, or whatever, struck me as something of a foppish dandy, born to be arrogant, but reasonably intelligent and reasonably well educated, despite his immersion in the Trump clan and his own father's, as well as his father in law's criminality. In other words,  a perfect fit within the prevaricating land of Trump, Ivanka sector. But most certainly, indisputably, not the "Anti-Christ", whatever that is. The former friend of mine who made this assertion about him, and probably still does, also claimed that Michelle Obama is a man, and Barack Obama was born not in Honolulu, but in Kenya, and is thus an apparent equal opportunity fantasy basher, delusional on both ends of the political spectrum. That in itself merits credit/ She, the fantasy accuser, is my former friend because  although I do not end friendships over small matters like lack of sanity, I do call crazy crazy to the crazy, and racist racist, and purveyors of lunacy invariably do not brook being identified as lunatics. I'm willing to tolerate it, but not to ignore or overlook it. I respond accordingly, and I always offer to find help. For her that was, evidently, insufficiently passive on my part. At my age, it is nigh time to shed lunatic friends, the conspiracy mongers, the extraterrestrial contactees,  the alternative cosmic paradigm multi dimensional weirdos, and the Lord is returning tomorrow crowd. Problem is, if you add all of them up, it comes to about half the population, or more, not much more that the stolen election crowd. Crazy, in a nutshell, is back in style in the United States of Anesthesia, not that it ever truly departed. The U.S. of A was founded under false pretenses, and continues to operate under them, and must, otherwise it would be necessary to laud itself as the land of  exploitation, violent conquest, and flim flam. (see Gore Vidal). In the alterative reality community the self styled gurus have the answers to everything, the answers are always fantastic, and its possessors are always willing to share and to convert the uninitiated, but can never explain exactly where they came from. Any attempt by an acolyte to contribute knowledge is summarily, nonchalantly dismissed as irrelevant, or unnecessary. Facts? We no need no stinking facts! They have their own, and they come from "within". Facts, reality, and science are the first casualties of the alternative reality community, which in recent years has multiplied, proliferated, and spread like  a contagious virus without a vaccine, and is firmly ensconced within the Trump is the true president community, fighting against the dark forces of pedophilic Democrats, federal reserve extraterrestrials, and mainstream media, with the weapons at hand, the most potent of which is the unbridled human imagination, run amok.

Bashing Conservatives, With Facts

 FOR MORE THAN TWENTY YEARS, the U.S. Department of Defense has identified man made climate change as the greatest single threat to American national security, with good reason. Climate change, if not addressed, will disrupt the American economy  severely by making much of the U.S. barely habitable. Climate change deniers are welcome to argue with the Pentagon, and the scientists upon whom its leaders rely. Good luck trying to do that. For expertise, one could do worse, much worse. than the D.O.D.. The vast majority of conservatives are climate change deniers, though the number is slowly decreasing, due to the annoying persistence of reality. A liberal conspiracy to advance socialism, they often call it. Self deluded conspiracy theorists are conservatives, all. It seems reasonable to assert that when a large group of people (conservatives) refuse to acknowledge the existence of the greatest threat to their nation's future security, thereby refusing to contribute to the fight against the threat, they are, in effect and in fact, traitors. Speaking of traitors,  about seventy percent of American conservatives indicate that they still consider the Capitol insurrection of January sixth to have been well intentioned, a good idea. That speaks volumes, about  conservative's true lack of devotion to law and order, and  to their country, and their true love of their criminal, traitorous cult leader. Also, their lack of concern about  national security. It speaks volumes about conservatism's utter lack of concern for the devastation to democracy caused by an attempt to overthrow their own government. Six months after the election, roughly seventy five million conservatives still insist that the election of 2020 was stolen from Trump, despite the lack of even a shred of supporting evidence for their false, irresponsible claim. That has to do with integrity, honor, and belief in American democracy, and their tragic lack thereof.  Every person who worked every precinct in America testifies that the election went smoothly and properly, as do the FBI and every law enforcement agency  in the country. Conservatives choose to ignore this inconvenient reality. Speaking of reality, the entire human genome, which includes every gene in every human being, and every gene's precise function, has been identified. It includes a gene for homosexuality, a genetic trait, like skin color. Gay people are gay because they are mandated by their genetic make up to be gay. And yet, a vast majority of conservatives insist, ignoring scientific reality, that being gay is a  "choice", a sickness, a sin, and are eager to torture people by brainwashing them, using "conversion therapy" to force them into heterosexuality. Obviously, conversion therapy never works, and leaves people seriously emotionally and psychologically injured. That concerns conservatives not. Conservatism in action. Science and reality denial know no limits among conservatives, most of whom refuse to accept the long confirmed fact that humans emerged on Earth through the process of evolution by natural and sexual selection. Most conservatives prefer an ancient, primitive, charming creation myth, according to which a sky god fashioned people out of mud. They read it in a book, a very primitive book, after all. Speaking of denial, most conservatives, including social security (a highly successful form of socialism) recipients, either deny the reality that the United States is very much a socialist country, or claim that socialism destroys freedom and has never worked anywhere, and never will, even as it works in their own country, in their own lives, even as they cash their social security checks, send their children to public, socialized schools, rely on public, socialized fire and police protection, and drive on public, socialized streets and highways, all examples of American socialism, working well. For the sake of preserving their false narrative, conservatives always omit mention of the successful and prosperous democratic socialist countries of Scandinavia and most of Europe, all more prosperous than the United States, all with thriving  business economies working together with socialism.  Their denial continues,, with regard to racism. Nonexistent, claim most conservatives. It ended when slavery ended, or maybe when MLK was killed,  whenever, whatever. Racism only exists when liberals talk about it, their delusional lie line goes, even as systemic racism permeates every institution in America, a proved fact. Racism is a forest, easily concealed by trees. I am surrounded by conservatives, nationally, locally. Its like living in a an intellectual and moral wasteland, or a landfill, the stench of deception always rising, always renewing itself, never abating. I consider it useless, based on long experience, to discuss anything substantive with them, with people who believe that climate change is a liberal conspiratorial hoax, and that Donald Trump is  a hero, a decent person, is anything other than a pathological liar, a criminal, and a traitor. Anyone who paid attention to the Trump administration, to its lies and hatred and ineptitude, and still supports Trump  post insurrection is beyond intellectual and moral redemption. It has been suggested that I publish essays only because I lack the courage to confront conservatives and address these issues directly, face to face. Anyone harboring this misconception I invite to approach me, face to face, with facts, or with whatever passes for facts in  the delusional land of Limbaugh, (may he rest in peace, and in silence.) Publishing essays provides people the choice of ignoring me,  which many conservatives simply cannot seem to do. By avoiding direct discussions with conservatives, I avoid conflict, and I avoid conservative blather. If they approach me, I respond to them., with facts, with facts they refuse to acknowledge. I much prefer, however, to waste no time talking to people who still support Donald Trump, post insurrection, for I consider them traitors, and forever will.

Criticizing Critical Thinking

 CRITICAL RACE THEORY, which isn't "theory", but historical fact, or the search for it, has been with us for more than four decades, but has never taken hold in American public education, largely due to strenuous objections to it by, as you might have guessed, conservatives. Critical race studies are nothing other than an attempt to describe and understand the history of racism, and the nature of current racism in America, factually, without "white washing" of the sort ideology or patriotism can bring to any area of study. conservatives, known for their ostentatious patriotism, prefer hagiography, which is the presentation of one's nation's history from a patriotic, dishonestly favorable point of view. As Goethe said: "patriotism corrupts history". Several states, governed as you might have guessed governed by republican legislatures, have already banned critical, honesty based education about american racism in their public schools, preferring the whitewashing of hagiography. Other states may be expected to follow, the ones which are doing similarly harmful things like limiting the rights of transgenders, limiting opportunities to vote, gerrymandering congressional districts to favor republican candidates, and so forth. The simple, undeniable truth is that the United States of America was founded on racism, as well as genocide, and that racism remains very much with us today, not only as the attitude of choice among many on the far right (racism is a traditional, conservative phenomenon, not a progressive one), but also deeply embedded within American institutions such as law enforcement, criminal justice, housing, access to voting, and education. Proving this is easy; one need only consult the arrest and criminal and sentencing records of thousands of American citizens, and  correlate these results with the race of the criminals. Another way is to check the history of government "red lining", and to compare property values of properties owned by European-Americans to those owned by African-Americans. The facts are irrefutable. Being African American, native-american,  Asian-American, or a minority of any sort, especially gay and transgender, is, in the United States, a distinct disadvantage in terms of income, wealth, social status, and chances of advancement in any of these area. this, despite attempts to band aid the phenomenon, bands aids such as affirmative action, color blindness, among others. Critical race theory is the process by which american racism, past and present, is understood critically, historically, scientifically, and factually, rather than ideologically. Predictably, studying the phenomenon of racism with intellectual integrity yields the same result as studying the Christian religion with objective, historical, factual analysis; the wrath and opposition of America's conservative community.

Working Hard, Anyway

HARD WORK leads to success, we like to say. In fact, hard work leads to many different things, depending on circumstances, including failure, fatigue, frustration, resentment, physical and mental illness, pride, satisfaction, good health, among much else. It depends on what the hard work entails, and how other people respond to it. Exhaustive, verified research has in fact identified with great accuracy what factors predict and determine a person's success, success defined as personal wealth and social status. The factors include hard work, luck, age, gender, intelligence, education, race, among others. Research has shown the proportions in which the various factors contribute to success in the United States. The future success of anyone can be predicted, within a surprising small range of error, by isolating which factors are most and least influential. This is done by examining the precise circumstances of tens of thousands of people in a meaningful population sample, rather like asking survey question to several hundred or thousand people and from their answers extrapolating for the entire population. Poll taking and surveys yield remarkably accurate results; so does research concerning predicting the future success to any particular person by including all contributing factors. And now for the answer to the question: what single factor most determines a person's, any person's future success? (drum roll) The single most influential factors determining a person's future financial success and social status is the wealth of the person's parents. Not hard work, not luck, neither smarts nor education, but rather, parental wealth. And before you vehemently deny this, please bear in mind, you are not arguing with the author of this essay, you are arguing with sociologists and computes at places like, you guessed it, Harvard, M.I.T, among many others. Go argue with them. They will strike down your arguments like summer flies and present facts to you which will leave you in the dust, unable to other than nod in agreement and intellectual defeat. Harvard and M.I.T. people have a way of doing that, because they never shoot off their mouths unless they know exactly what they're talking about, guaranteed. One's lot in life is determined, more than anything else, by how much money one's parents have. Of course nobody like to believe that, and Americans in particular like to deny any reality which conflicts with their emotional well being. Reality, however, has the annoying habit of being irrefutable.

Demagogue-ing Right Along

 FORMER VICE DEMAGOGUE Mike Pence, new pace maker pounding away, says he'll b e darned if he'll allow Democrats to distract from the allegedly enormous accomplishments of the Trump administration and allow them to be forgotten or covered over by over emphasizing that itsy bisty little annoying event, the insurrection at the Capitol on January sixth. As if the sanctimonious little sycophant has any choice in the matter, or control over what Democrats, the justice system, and the American people do regarding the Trump administration and its attempt to overthrow the government. To refresh, the 'accomplishments" of the Trump administration include killing six hundred thousand Americans by aiding and abetting the pandemic, fostering climate change, turning Trump into the puppet of the North Korean dictator and the Russian dictator, and averaging better than twenty two point five outrageous lies a day, for starters. Then too, lest we forget, not one impeachment, but for good measure, two, both more than justified. Pence says that he does not see eye to eye with Trump about te insurrection, and may never, understandably so, since the violent mob came after him, as well as others, chanting "kill Pence". Pence ought properly to despise Trump, and may well, but chooses not to say so in public, for fear of MAGA mob retribution, including death. And now, like a snake in spring, trump begins to emerge from his pouty Mara Lago hibernation, hissing the usual venomous lies and slanders.He is of course utterly unconcerned about his potential to tear the Republican party in twain; as 2024 approaches, there will be a bevy of attractive right wind presidential candidates, and how will they treat Trump, other than like a liberal on steroids? Well, Mr. Prevarication, Mr. Insurrection, bring it. Bring back your poisonous, hateful vitriolic lies and slanders, and hurl it all against your fellow Republican presidential candidates in the 2024 primaries, and see how far you get, and what you do to your political party.You will attack them all, and all of them will respond in kind, like Democrats on steroids, determined to secure the republican nomination if only so that you don't get it again, and further ruin the party of Lincoln by making it the party of Trump, the low life criminal. Popular candidates like tom cotton and Ted Cruz will have their say, and you will once again call Senator Cruz "lyin' Ted", and will sunder the party with your vile bile....Donald Trump is an albatross hanging around the neck of the conservative community, and teh Republican party, and the evangelical christian community. If they do not want to rid themselves of him now, they will, soon enough.And the Democrats will sit back and watch the spectacle, popcorn popper going full blast.

The Changing Climate, Sans Conservative Acceptance

 IN THE AMERICAN WEST,  it refuses to rain. the drought intensifies, and the "great American desert" as nineteenth century pioneers termed it, live sup to its nick name. Back east, it won't stop raining. Extreme weather at both ends, the "new normal" as we like to say. The frequency and intensity of tornadoes and hurricanes is increasing, spring starts in February, October is now a summer month, record hot temperatures; the facts are well documented, if not well known. Excess heat, trapped in Earth's atmosphere, strengthening the winds, evaporating more water vapor, causing more violent weather.All this is simple. anyone can understand human made climate change, even those who pretend not to, the deniers. Simple, straight forward, the essentials, requiring only a high school understanding of basic science. Otherwise intelligent people refuse to acknowledge it only when they subconsciously perceive that doing so would cause irreparable harm to their ideology, create too much cognitive conflict, challenge the validity of their conservative thinking. suddenly the eastern United States is sundered by extreme heat in the northeast and extreme rain in the southeast. Extreme weather, side by side. Climate change creates complex weather patterns, varied by region. Prolonged drought in the American west, a looming new ice age across Europe, as melting polar ice  floods the Atlantic, cooling the gulf stream and the air above the colder water, the air flowing across England and then the continent, making it cold amidst global warming. climate change deniers, ostrich heads buried, bleat that climate change theory is "full of holes", and that in fact many many natural causes contribute to it, with or without humanity. what they fail to realize is that the experts at Harvard, M.I.T. and many other places around the world already know all about that, have already long since factored natural forces, all of them, into their research, and that the research, and the world around us, still proves that natural events do not prevent humans from having the impact we are having. Nature cause climate change, so can mankind. so does mankind. It is not a zero sum game, one excluding the other.  The climate change deniers, with their high school diplomas hanging proudly beneath their portraits of Donald Trump, simply know more than the people who spend years with their doctorates in physics and chemistry studying the climate daily, for decades. The right wing high school graduates simply cannot be wrong, because if they are wrong, so is their entire political and economic ideology of greed and individual freedom, society be damned. They will deny climate change even as climate change consumes their petty little bubble, and themselves along with it.

Secularizing

 FINALLY, INEVITABLY, the scales have tilted. For the first time in American history, survey says, people who are not religious, are not formally associated with any established religion, outnumber those who are.  The inexorable advance of science and secularism proceeds apace. Its been a long time coming. We've known for awhile that the world isn't flat, that humans were not fashioned in less than a day from mud, that the stars are much more than mere pin pricks in the dome of heaven through which radiant brilliance pours, and our progress has been so great that we have even begun to suspect that a wafer and a bit of wine is not only an inadequate snack, but, at best, symbolic cannibalism, as George Washington believed. (An Episcopalian on paper, he refused communion).  The latest "Word of God" seems not to be the Christian bible, not if we think about it, thinking about it, or the lack thereof, being the Achilles heel of all religious dogma, which thrives best in a thoughtless environment.  Speaking of thoughtless, once upon a time Ronald Reagan said he was afraid to pray in public, but even more afraid not to. Scary guy, that Reagan. Thus began a questionable marriage, in terms of coherence and consistency, of the far right followers of the great communicator and redeemed New Deal Democrat and a hundred million redeemed sinners. Political and economic conservatism and the message of Christ don't mix, only they either don't know it or don't care. But now, as a percentage of the population, the evangelical Christian politically conservative demographic, having become the Trump base, is shrinking, post insurrection, post Trump presidency. One can, after all, tolerate only so much cognitive conflict. The white Christian Republican party is firmly ensconced in a demographic cul de sac, badly in need of an infusion of youth, color, and ideals. But how much effective expansionist outreach into young and minority communities can a political party achieve which identifies transgender gender according to birth certificates and espouses neo-liberal capitalism to people who are going nowhere fast financially, fully aware that most of the money is in the hands of an elite oligarchy reluctant to share? Americans currently under the age of forty, in large numbers, eschew traditional religious dogma and an ethic predicated on a never ending pursuit of personal profit. John Maynard Keynes seventy years ago sensibly asked: how much longer can capitalism, which relies on economic and hence population growth, continue on a planet with finite resources? The political future clearly belongs to those who can provide answers to this and other questions, and the conservative Christian community in 2021 isn't even asking them.

Finding First Causes of the Second

 CAROL ANDERSON, of Emory University, recently published "The Second: Guns and Race in a Fatally Unequal America", a seminal monograph which provides the most compellingly illuminating description to date of the origins of the second amendment. The second amendment, like the rest of the American constitution, was carefully crafted so as to lure members into the club, and to keep them therein, members as diverse as Massachusetts and Virginia, as Georgia, as night and day. If the slave owning south would sign up, their slaves, for purposes of adding up people to determine representation in the House of representatives,  would be generously considered three fifths of a human being, each and every one. Generous indeed, considering the alternative, which was nonexistence. But, it must be constitutional for gangs of plantation police, armed to the hilt, to go forth into the countryside hunting down AWOL slaves, or the deal is off. Thus, white gangsters become a militia, para military law enforcers, albeit well regulated, to assuage the civilized sort. Bad laws require enhanced enforcement, bad institutions even more. In 2021 the sacred, inviolable right of every American citizen to go out and about bearing arms has been chiseled into supreme court stone, some might be surprised to learn, only as recently as 2008. Before then, it was inexplicably assumed that to exercise the right to bear arms, a well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, one ought to actually belong, as least nominally, to such a questionably contrived creature.  For the elucidation of our constitutional "originalists", whose originality does not encompass using muzzle loading muskets in our modern world, the framers intended that arms should be borne almost exclusively by militiamen, under strict supervision, to hunt down freedom seekers and to return them to the alleged benefits of christian bondage. Nobody back then wanted the streets clogged with gun toting private citizens. the arms should be left at home, under lock and key, just in case.Self styled tough guys and gals could parade around proudly, with arms, at home. Professor Carol Anderson is an African-American woman who probably therefore has reservations about the second amendment, but does not say so in her book, whose purpose is history, not opinion. We do know, however, that James Madison was not enthusiastic about the Bill of Rights, which he thought would be widely ignored. On a recent NPR interview, she intimated that she is not a strong supporter of the second. Why would she be? It was intended only as a carrot extended to the enslavers, permitting them to reacquire their properly, convincingly. And then, when you reflect on the fact that American gun culture has never been particularly African-american friendly, what could possible motivate her to , say, join the NRA?  Governor Ronald Reagan was all in on gun rights, until the very moment when the Black Panthers started strolling the streets of Oakland, carrying assault rifles.

Uh, There Goes the Robert E. Lee

 ROBERT E. LEE high school in Jacksonville, FLA, might, in the fairly near future, become "Riverside" high school, in a move designed to replace controversy with calm. At least African-american student has complained that each day as she walks down the halls, she must endure the portrait of a man who contributed to the enslavement of her ancestors, a seemingly valid point of view. she is not alone in her discomfort. the comlalint is the usual one, oft heard nowadays; political correctness, which is not always a bad thing, is a gathering storm the intent of which is to bring to a full stop the tradition of much of America to honor the leaders of the former Confederate States of America. The veneration of confederate leaders as worthy of memorializing is often, defensively and dishonestly, portrayed as a mere process of historical preservation. More accurately and honestly, it is a process of immortalization of heroes, heroes whose immoritalization serves the hidden but obvious purpose of expressing modern racism. We do not build statues of, hang portraits of, name streets and towns after people, and the values of people, we do not greatly admire. The veneration of confederate leaders derives from a long perpetuated historical misconception. In deference to the former confederate states which before the Civil War enjoyed a disproportionate share of power in the U.S. government, and whose eventual cooperation was necessary to reconstruct the union after their military defeat, the historical misconception has been allowed to endure and flourish. The historical misconception is that the civil war was an internal struggle between equals, which unfortunately necessitated a violent resolution. More accurately, nearly half the country abandoned its country over the irreconcilable issue of slavery,  formed its own country, then proceeded to attack  and made war, as a foreign adversary, against its former country. Thsi is not a struggle of equals; but rather, traitorous treason and foreign aggression. The false narrative has served to simultaneously assuage the sensitivities of northern reconstructionists, and stubborn southern stalwarts. revisionist history accomplishes such things. In order to preserve historical heritage and to remember history, books are necessary,, but not monuments or statues. It may well be that confederates leaders should be memorialized in statues and monuments, but not in the United States of America.

Conspiring, Fantastically

 THE EXPRESSION "conspiracy theory entrepreneur", gifted to me by a communications professor, explains much. The massive disinformation culture and industry, consisting in conspiracy theories,alternative global and cosmic paradigms, general denial of verifiable reality in preference for fantasy, is driven, like the world's two oldest profession, by the profit motive, aka capitalism. And, of course, by the millions of soul seekers who purchase the rubbish they sell.  People who possess knowledge unavailable to others save through the possessor are emotionally empowered, and eager to share their esoterica. Anybody who is absolutely sure that a "Galactic Federation" is monitoring us will gladly explain the methods of monitoring. You need only ask. The culture of disinformation/conspiracy theory gives society a nearly unlimited supply of self made gurus with superior wisdom, eager to illuminate the rest of us. the best of the bunch make good money. The very best, Alex Jones, with his extensive radio network and listenership, was at one point compelled to testify, unfortunately for him, under oath. something to do with child paternity. What he said was: "Hey look! I'm just an entertainer. of course I don't believe a word of what i say, Nobody is required to." True enough. The desire to substitute subjective reality for objective reality is humanly inherent, evidently.  We find it irresistible to pretend to understand whatever we are still incapable of understanding. We lack patience. Hence, religion. Hence,conspiracy culture. The entrepreneur sells it, the unwitting sycophantic  victim buys it. As far as we're concerned, Aristotle invented science, simply by noticing that the world has patterns, patterns which can be labeled and categorized. There are those who resent him for this. Damnable science, with its verified, boring look at reality. Where's the fun in that? Aristotle's dimly lit candle began to burn a bit brighter when, in 1543, Copernicus  wrote that the Earth orbits the sun. Wisely he waited until his own death before telling the world this, thus escaping the inevitable wrath of the Catholic church, which Galileo fell prey to seventy five years later merely by confirming Copernicus. You talk you walk. Galileo had a nice house, good, because he spent the rest of his life arrested within it. One must not question religious dogma; sciences thrives on questioning, and improving itself. The superstitious-religious establishment, the church, "pushed back", as we like to say, against Galileo for merely telling the truth. he is not alone, not even today. Thomas Jefferson referred to the christian religion as "our modern superstition". Well, we have even more modern versions, and its all over the internet. Fact check: the U.S. of A. is not governed by a secret cabal of Satan worshiping pedophiles, but, you already knew that, correct? And we're still digging, deep, for those missing votes for you know who. Keep looking.  Science, in short, is the answer, the solution, the antidote to the superstition, religion, misinformation culture, into which so many of which gleefully escape reality. Our current strain of science and reality denial will, at some idyllic future time, vanish, but only if we fight it hard, and hope for the best.