Tuesday, February 11, 2025

Tuesday, February 11, 2025

February 11, 2025

Save The Date

We may finally have a start date for Armageddon: Saturday, February 15, 12:00 PM EST. What that means is that if you love someone, even if you just like them a lot, you might as well go ahead and tell them on Friday. Buy the chocolate. Eat the fancy dinner. Go to that concert you can’t afford. Indulge. This could be your last chance.

Am I fear-mongering a bit? Yes, intentionally to make a point. In the past three and a half weeks, we’ve already become so accustomed to one alarming headline after another that we’re starting to ignore the ones that don’t appear to directly affect us. As a result, developments that could genuinely bring about the beginning of the end go ignored because they’re not sitting in your back door, don’t have an immediate effect on your pocketbook, and may not disturb your spring break plans. As stressful as it is, though, we need to pay more attention.

Here’s what’s happened in the past twenty-four hours:

Hamas says it’s putting additional hostage releases ‘on pause.’ This immediately puts the entire ceasefire truce in danger.
Israel fatally shot a pregnant Palestinian woman in the West Bank. Tensions were already high in the region and this incident, accident or not, put residents more on edge.
Felonious Punk warns ‘all hell is going to break out’ if Gaza hostages are not returned by Hamas. He arbitrarily set a deadline for noon on Saturday, about the time the Punk finishes his first Big Mac.
Hamas brushes off Punk and insists all parties must be committed to a ceasefire. Someone is playing into the other’s hand, but I’m not sure which side is likely to win. I do know that both are equally heartless and stupid.
Punk Says He May Cut Aid if Jordan and Egypt Don’t Take Displaced Gazans. The danger here isn’t necessarily a lack of aid to the two countries, but with whom they will ally in its absence. Don’t expect it to be anyone who likes us.

King Abdullah II of Jordan is scheduled to meet with Punk in Washington later this morning. Expect the toughest possible diplomatic language to be thrown about. Jordan’s laws prohibit taking refugees. Since Punk has no respect for anyone’s laws, including our own, he’s taking a ‘don’t give a fuck’ attitude. Plans for an upcoming visit by President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi of Egypt appear to have been scrapped, according to Arab media. El-Sisi isn’t inclined to play games with the US presidork and will turn to Iran and Russia in a heartbeat.

Are you beginning to see how this all could blow up in our faces? The more Punk pushes, the more Middle East and adjacent countries are balking. The decades of diplomacy necessary to keep a shaky level of peace in the region are coming undone just to placate the ego of a maniac.

Worst case scenario: noon passes on Saturday, which is about sundown in Israel (which is important), and Israel decides the abandon the ceasefire and bomb ‘the hell’ out of Gaza. Iran retaliates and brings both Egypt and Jordan into the fight, possibly along with Syria, Saudi Arabia, and Turkey. Turkey’s involvement would put pressure on European NATO countries to be involved. Putin hates NATO, so if they become involved then so will Russia, initially sending weapons and ammo, but troops if the conflict grows. Should Russia become directly involved, it’s doubtful that the Punk-In-Chief is going to sit on the sidelines. This would be the excuse for war that he’s been wanting. Once the US is directly involved, it’s WWIII and all bets are off the table.

But we have the superior armed forces, right? Uhm, about that…

Ebola cases in Uganda have risen to 9, while 265 others are being monitored under quarantine. This is the level at which it begins to spread to other countries, including the US.

Scientists warn Punk’s medical research cuts endanger patients as judge blocks the move for now. Remember how quickly a vaccine was found for the last pandemic? Punk would remove funding for the agencies that can prevent millions of people from dying. So much for healthy troops.

Fifteen cases of measles were reported in a small West Texas county with a high rate of vaccine exemptions. Do stupid things, get stupid results. However, 15 cases in one county are alarming and are almost certainly going to spread to adjacent counties.

AND THEN, A new strain of bird flu is detected in a Nevada dairy worker. Because, you know, the two strains that we already had going weren’t enough, apparently.

Now put all that together, let all those bacterium mix and mingle around in the human body. Anyone is sufficiently deadly on its own. In any combination, the lethality is something no health organization in the world is ready to fight. Troop strength, across the board, plummets quickly as everyone is at risk.

Now there’s some fear-mongering for you. This is all hyperbole. There is a decent chance that absolutely nothing will happen. Saturday will come and go as we rant and rail about more irrelevant and idiotic executive orders being handed down. The sun might even shine.

So, why write about it at all? Because in the flood of nonsense coming out of Washington, we easily lose our ability to think critically and strategically. One tends to not worry about the rain when being swept away by the water. We look to secure our personal security first and when that appears to be at such high risk, we become ignorant of larger, more dangerous monsters sneaking up on our backside. While worst-case scenarios are highly speculative, we still have to acknowledge the possibilities and, at least in the back of our minds, have an adequate response waiting.

The Internet is full of comparisons between this administration and the rise of Nazism in Germany. Too many of them are accurate. It has gotten so bad that yesterday, the American Bar Association felt that it needed to release a statement supporting the Rule of Law. One would think that attorneys supporting the Rule of Law would be a given, but the situation in DC has gotten so out of hand that they need to make sure everyone’s on the same page.

Today, we’ll likely see how the administration responds to a federal judge saying that the White House ignored his ruling on aid spending. There’s that whole Rule of Law issue, again. There’s so much going on that no one seems to be standing up to the ‘pause’ in federal law prohibiting foreign bribes. A new survey of global corruption shows the US slipping from a score of 69 to 65, putting us in 28th place. Who’s the least corrupt? Denmark, Finland, Singapore, and New Zealand, in that order, to no one’s surprise.

I was out with the dogs last night, trying to get Hamilton to tire out a bit before settling down for the night. We were roughhousing and playing when I took a hard faceplant. My first thought was to call out for help, but I didn’t. Everyone had a tough day. No one needed to add me to their list of problems. Nothing was injured beyond my pride. As both dogs came running to make sure I was okay, I picked myself up, brushed off the mud, came inside, and changed out of my clothes.

This morning, I’m in pain. I’m hoping meds and a hot shower will help. Perhaps this is a metaphor for where we are as a country. We’ve fallen, but the safeguards that would normally help us up are missing. We’ve endured so much that we’re in pain, hoping that we can fix everything that’s wrong by taking a hot shower and hoping that the Rule of Law makes everything better.

I’m not sure which is worse: too little fear or too much. Both are dangerous. Good luck finding the balance point.

Current Issues / Morning Update / News & Comment / Personal / Politics / science / Social Commentary

Saturday, February 1, 2025

February 1, 2025

Rodentia

Rats. You remember them, don’t you? We’ve seen them train turtles to be ninjas, drag large pieces of pizza upstairs, and… oh yeah, they were partially responsible for the black plague that devastated most of Europe. Over the ensuing years, cities and health agencies have made a huge push to rid cities of the large rodents, and overall they’ve been successful. However, thanks to the specter of climate change, they’re set to return in larger numbers than ever.

While the fact that Washington has been singled out as one of the cities where an explosive rat population is most dangerous is somewhat humorous, the realities are frightening. “When rodent populations are high, people get sick, motor vehicles become disabled, mental health declines, fires are started and foods fouled,” said Houston rat expert Michael Parsons, who wasn’t part of the study. People are rightly bothered by rats because of “an innate fear caused by an organism that can make us sick.”

This comes at a time when government health information is disappearing from websites. Exercising extremely questionable authority, Musk aides have locked out a number of federal employees from critical computer systems. And then, there’s that whole mess with RFK, Jr. wanting to head the Department of Health and Human Services.

Que sounds of ominous music as Morgan Freeman says, “They were not safe. No one was safe.”

Oh, and that’s not the only terrifying health news this morning. Mosquitos. Yeah, we’ve not seen them in North America for a couple of months thanks to the cold. They’re coming back, though, and we’re finding that high-altitude winds help them spread diseases far and wide. So, what may start in some remote village deep in Central Africa could easily spread around the world carried by the high winds of the jet stream. Isn’t that fun news?

On top of everything else, we woke this morning to news of yet another plane crash, this time in Philadelphia, killing at least six. There’s still a severe lack of information regarding this flight and multiple fires have delayed determining whether anyone on the ground was killed. The plane crashed less than a minute after takeoff but explanations for why are still nothing more than speculation.

Both AOC and Mark Cuban are asking people to keep a lid on cynical and insulting rhetoric. I understand their position, trying to go high when everyone else is going low. I will, again, pose the same question I’m asking everyone, though: How many people have to die before we’re willing to get aggressive about stopping the insanity? Would another global plague do the trick? Are concentration camps in Colorado and Guantanamo not already enough?

WHAT THE FUCK IS IT GOING TO TAKE TO GET ASSES OUT OF CHAIRS AND INTO THE STREETS?

The most logical thing to do would have been to hit back hard on Day One of this administration. Every time Felonious Punk issues a new edict, the American people should forcefully fling it back in his face with all the power we can muster. That would have made sense and possibly at least slowed down the barrage of criminality we’ve seen from the White House.

Instead, we’re waiting to see exactly what tariffs get imposed on Canada and Mexico later today. Business leaders could be calling the members of Congress they have in their pockets, but they’re not. Everyone’s just clutching pearls and buying avocados.

This was posted yesterday:

How much of your life are you willing to sacrifice to the goons in DC? What is it going to take before you stand up for yourself?

We have no military support. We’re losing legal support. Even local police are increasingly helpless. No one else is coming to help us.

What’s it going to take?

Current Issues / Long Read / Morning Update / Nature / News & Comment / Personal / science

Thursday, January 30, 2025

January 30, 2025

Watch Out For That Rabbit Hole!

Blue-skinned alien figure walking along a beach at sunset

One of the worst things to do to my brain is to feed it a headline without context. Within seconds, my mind creates its own context, then proceeds to take that context out of context and head off down rabbit holes from which there is no return. The first partial headline I saw this morning, just at a glance as I was getting dressed, read, “Are we all aliens?” As I snapped the last button on my shirt, my brain began singing Petra’s 1983 song, “We are aliens. We are strangers. We are not of this world.” The song is based loosely on I Peter 2:11, which uses a similar phrasing but is in conflict with Ephesians 2:19 which specifically says that we are not strangers and aliens, both of which have issues with I Chronicles 29:15, which claims that our ancestors were “aliens and pilgrims before you.” This was one of those times when having all that Bible stuck in my head could be a problem.

Oh, but then my brain jumps completely out of context while I’m outside with the dogs and somehow, “We are aliens” becomes “Everything’s Coming Up Roses” from the musical Gypsy, but specifically the version sung by the late Ethel Merman. Why? Because I’m just that old. As my brain is singing, “You’ll be swell, you’ll be great, Gonna have the whole world on a plate!” Belvedere walks around the side of the house with a large paper plate in his mouth. I asked him if he had the whole world on that plate. He put the plate down and looked up at me as if to say, “I ate that part. Can we have breakfast now?”

Hound dogs; they’re always hungry.

The story on everyone’s mind this morning is the collision of an American Airlines regional jet with a military helicopter at Ronald Reagan Airport just before 9:00 last night. I saw the alert come across as I was getting ready for bed last night, but the event was too new for there to be any detail. What we know this morning is that the plane, which originated in Wichita, KS, was carrying members of the US Figure Skating team, their families, friends, and coaches. Officials are warning that the precise number of victims is unclear as rescue crews hunt for survivors. One headline I saw claimed there were at least 19 fatalities, but crews are still searching the Potmomac and no names have been officially released.

This is the first major aircraft collision in the US in almost 16 years. There are going to be a lot of questions over the next several days stretching into months and possibly years. Did the president’s firing of the head of TSA last week have any impact? Was there a shortage of aircraft controllers in the Ronald Reagan Tower? Who was given permission to enter the airspace first?

A 2023 article in the NYTimes claimed that near misses between commercial aircraft happen more often than people realize. FAA Data Reveals 1100 Runway Near Misses in 2024. This raises the inevitable question of who the fuck’s in charge? Expect a lot of finger-pointing as no one wants that responsibility laid at their feet.

Last May, we had an older couple park on our lawn for the 500. He was a retired aircraft controller who had been in that job since Ronald Reagan (yeah, the same guy for whom the airport is named) fired all the nation’s controllers for attempting to go on strike. I asked him if all the horror stories I’d heard were true. He confirmed them and more. Burnout among controllers is high. They are overworked, undertrained, and under constant pressure to work longer hours. They are inherently aware that they hold the lives of thousands of people in their hands as they guide aircraft across tarmacs. While English is the default language, many pilots don’t understand it that well and miscommunications are common. Equipment frequently breaks down, especially at night when there are no maintenance people available. While flying has always been considered one of the safest modes of transportation, he explained that it is a mixture of miracles and hard work that has prevented more accidents from occurring.

I know that for many people, last night’s collision is a tragic break from the neverending political horrors being shoved down our throats. Ten days in, we’re tired of the nonsense from this administration already. One can safely assume at this point that every decision made in the White House is unconstitutional and is going to have a significant legal fight ahead of it.

As I’m typing, an alert just came through my phone saying that 27 bodies have been recovered and all are feared dead.

You know, if the base DNA material that allowed life to develop on this planet is foreign, that could explain why this planet is always trying to kill us; it sees humans as a disease that needs to be eradicated. That would so easily justify the high number of biological elements that conflict with our health and well-being. We get cancer and are susceptible to plagues because our DNA was never designed for this planet.

But if we came from stardust, then it may well be that we leave the same way. Another headline well below the fold this morning warns that a newly spotted asteroid has a tiny chance of hitting Earth in 2032. This news isn’t as ‘new’ as one might think. Astronomers have been watching this thing for a while, concerned that its potential path might bring it close enough to Earth’s orbit that a collision would be inevitable. The chances for severe damage currently sit at about 1%. They could drop to zero in the next few weeks. Still, it’s interesting to ponder the possibility that the same type of event that allowed us to form on this planet could be what takes us all out.

Rabbit holes. Damnit. Kronk, aka Pinball, just crawled up in my lap, put his head in my hand, and closed his eyes. I think that means I’m done typing for the morning. We have naps to take and more rabbit holes to explore.

And coffee. Must drink the coffee.

Health / Long Read / News & Comment / science / Social Commentary

Saturday, January 25, 2025

January 25, 2025

Some Things Are Satire

There is a lot of ‘stuff’ I could talk about, but it would take me forever to type it and I’m not sure my body is going to give me the grace to sit upright for that long. I’ll do what I can today and we can continue the conversation tomorrow. During my doctor’s visit yesterday, I was given a flu shot and the first half of the shingles vaccine. Kat reminded me last night that I’m older than the last time I received those shots. My body isn’t up to fighting as hard. I know, not everyone thinks vaccines work. There are some pretty nasty side effects if you don’t stay on schedule, though. My stamina is going to take a hit for the next couple of weeks.

Another concern is that Americans are becoming bored with being outraged. Felonious Punk has been in office less than a week and already, the NYTimes is declaring that the era of ‘Hyperpolitics’ is gone, and with it the whole concept of Resistance. Fellow Okie and deep thinker Krista Trippet wrote in this morning’s “On Being” post, “The news that is, as we say ‘breaking,’ is never seeing things whole.” She encourages us to take a deeper look and consider the aspects of deeper time, much as a geologist views the world. She writes, “It is harder for us to train our eyes and imaginations on the beauty and creativity that are so alive in our world, the generative learning and stretching that are underway. These realities of our time are most visible close to home, in the worlds that we can see and touch. They are quiet. They do not trip the fear center of our brains, which inclines us to attend more seriously in every moment to what feels dangerous and destructive. And, in our time, that narrative of danger and destruction comes to us a thousand times, a thousand ways, each day.”

That “narrative of danger and destruction” was a hard slap in the face this morning. It’s bad enough that a drunken serial abuser is now in charge of the Department of Defence. Our new Secretary of State has already been warned by China to watch his step. The pause on foreign aid could threaten the distribution of lifesaving drugs. The ban on gender research puts NIH programs at risk. The shutdown of the federal diversity office at the National Science Foundation breaks the law that created it. In all the places that actually matter to our lives, there is fear, uncertainty, and panic. Should the planet be struck with another pandemic, our lack of international cooperation places us among the most vulnerable, and most likely to die.

There’s also the false narrative being pushed by the White House. The Associated Press is one of the few outlets still fact-checking the lies and misdirection coming from the talking mouths in Washington. There seems to be little regard for what is true or factual. Without anyone doing fact-checking anymore, lies and conspiracies run rampant across all forms of social media and far too many people are believing all the wrong stories.

Meanwhile, 2024 US home sales hit the lowest level in nearly 30 years with ownership increasingly out of reach.

Part of me still wants to scream “FIGHT BACK!” but in the rare moment of sanity, I have to admit that going to war against a well-funded and reasonably trained government is a fool’s game. Even if I gathered all my neighbors together and armed them well, the government has a history of bombing the fuck out of neighborhoods it doesn’t like (think Tulsa and Philadelphia). It would be naive to think such horrors won’t happen again.

Perhaps the best move for any of us is to take a more defensive position. We don’t need to go charging against ICE to be effective, all we have to do is wait for them to come to us and then stonewall. We don’t know any undocumented people. We haven’t seen anyone illegal in the neighborhood. Post “Private Property” signs on every side of your house. Get big dogs that don’t like uniforms (we have two, and the UPS guy is their sworn enemy). ICE can only operate in public areas without a warrant. Reduce the number of ‘public’ areas and we reduce the number of places where they can catch people off guard.

Already, a New Jersey ICE raid has detained a US veteran and citizens, according to the town’s mayor. Such events are only going to grow in size and number. Are any of us safe? Is carrying a driver’s license enough or do we need to carry copies of our birth certificates to prove our citizenship?

What protections do we all need to take? Since my general inclination is to avoid conflict at all costs, I feel ill-prepared to potentially have to confront anyone, especially an authority figure brazen enough to violate the Constitution. If we’re going to ‘stand up’ against the crimes of this administration, then we need to take some precautions to protect ourselves. So, I decided to take a page from those who’ve never trusted the government and look at tactical gear that makes sense for people like you and me.

Let’s start with basic chest protection. Be aware that not all tactical vests are created equal. You want a plate carrier that can handle the right size of protective plates to keep you safe. Looking around, I think this Shellback Tactical Banshee Plate Carrier is probably a good starting point. Click here for more info.

Plate carriers are useless if you don’t have plates in them. The challenge is knowing which plate is best for you. WARNING: DO NOT USE METAL PLATES! METAL PLATES ARE FOR TARGETS, NOT PROTECTION! As far as I can tell, these LTC 26605 Multi Curve Level 4 SAPI Plates are among the best in the business. They should stop almost anything that a DOJ employee (such as ICE) might be carrying. What’s important here is making sure you get the size that fits you. Shop carefully.

Ya’ gotta have a belt and a belt liner to help hold shit together. The DM Mech belt pad and it’s companion inner belt should keep you in good shape and they’re not as expensive as some others. Tactical people I (sort of) trust say these are the best on the market.

Next up: This dump pouch from DM. Why? ‘Cause ya’ gotta hold things like your Gatorade, evidence, gun magazines, etc. This one lies flat and unassuming when empty, hangs nicely on your belt, and won’t rip or tear when you get too excited and catch it on a door frame or something.

If you’re carrying a gun you’re gonna need a mag pouch or two. Which one depends on what kind of weapon you’re carrying. Generally speaking, the Esstac KYWI pouches seem to be top-of-the-line. Ask yourself, though, are you really prepared to get into a firefight with anyone? If you don’t have the training to know when and how to change mags under pressure, then maybe you should ease back on the aggression a little bit, ‘kay?

Finally, because you’re reading this page, I am pretty sure that you’re going to need an Individual First Aid Kit (IFAK) to go with your gear. Again, I’m going with this DM Fast Pouch because if you’re been injured, you need to act quickly to keep yourself from bleeding out all over the place. What do you put in it? North American Rescue has a one-handed tourniquet that is the kind used by military forces. They have plenty of other first aid considerations as well. Some of you are more clumsy than I am so you might want to consider multiple IFAKs.

Yeah, I know that for some people that feels like a lot. For others, it may not be enough. I strongly advise that you not get in over your head here. There’s a damn good reason Kat doesn’t like the idea of me carrying a gun. The Marine is the marksman in the family anyway and there’s little point in carrying a weapon you don’t know how to use accurately. Mishandling weapons will kill you faster than ICE will. At the end of the day, no DOJ or law enforcement official wants to kill anyone because the paperwork alone is suffocating.

There’s still so much more I could write about this morning, but breathing is a challenge at the moment so I need to stop and address that issue. Am I advocating that you arm yourself? Not really. I suggest considering what you can do to protect yourself. You alone know where your comfort level is. All I ask is that you keep yourself sufficiently prepared for whatever level of stupidity comes knocking on your door or your workplace.

And stay caffienated, please. You don’t aim well when your eyes are half shut.

Health / Long Read / Morning Update / Mythology / News & Comment / Personal / Politics / science / Social Commentary

Wednesday, January 15, 2025

January 15, 2025

You Can Die If You Want To.

Zero. As I type this morning, that’s how many degrees of warmth we have in Indianapolis. Zero. Granted, the US still uses the Fahrenheit scale so we’re not talking about absolute zero, in which case I would have kept the kids home from school and the dogs would just have to hold everything until later this morning. As it is, I made sure children were well-layered, capped, and gloved before they walked out the door with what I hope is sufficient warning about the amount of ice everywhere.

G has a visit to the state house scheduled for today, something to do with entrepreneurship and economics. I’m hoping his trip is interesting and educational. If not, be sure that his review will be more scathing than anything I might write. The child has no filter and is not shy about expressing his viewpoint. The same goes for a couple of his school friends. I’m not sure the airheads in the state legislature are ready for what’s about to hit them this morning.

Like many states, Indiana does most of its law-making during the first two months of each year. There simply isn’t enough going on to justify longer terms in most states, and governors always have the ability to call a special session if an emergency pops up. So far, there are 503 bills introduced to the state senate and 519 bills in the state house. If that sounds like a lot, don’t worry too much. In previous years, fewer than fifty bills actually make it to the governor’s desk for signing. Some are combined, but most are dropped because they are, in a word, stupid.

For example, Senate Bill 364 and House Bill 1335 both lack any understanding of real-world science. The bill “Prohibits a person who has the intent of affecting the intensity of sunlight, temperature, or weather from discharging a chemical or apparatus into the atmosphere, except in certain circumstances.” That’s right, folks, they’re outlawing chemtrails and weather manipulation machines because Indiana science education has failed that badly.

Senate Bill 35 requires that “each school corporation, charter school, and state accredited nonpublic elementary school to include print handwriting, cursive handwriting, and spelling in its curriculum.” Because, you know, this generation does so much handwriting.

Here’s a fun one. Senate Bill 11 proposes that “a social media operator [to] restrict a minor user’s access to social media without first obtaining verifiable parental consent for the minor user. Defines a “minor user” as an individual who is less than 16 years of age. Establishes a civil cause of action to allow a parent or legal guardian of a minor user who accesses social media without verifiable parental consent to bring a suit against the social media operator. Allows any person to bring an action for injunctive relief against a social media operator if the social media operator fails to implement a verifiable parental consent method. Allows the attorney general to: (1) bring an action against a social media operator that fails to implement a verifiable parental consent method; and (2) issue a civil investigative demand if the attorney general has reasonable cause to believe that any person is engaged in a violation. Creates a civil cause of action if a minor user is subject to social media bullying.” I get that online bullying is a problem, but this isn’t the answer.

House Bill 1170 eliminates gun-free safe zones. Heaven forbid there be anywhere that Second Amendment nut jobs can’t get to you.

House Bill 1008 wants to adjust the Indiana/Illinois state line. Damn good thing we don’t border Greenland.

Senate Bill 286 makes it illegal to wear a mask at a public assembly. Let’s all just get sick and die.

House Bill 1231 requires the display of the Ten Commandments in all schools. Because iron-age mythology makes more sense than science education.

There’s plenty more to read through if you have absolutely nothing better to do with your day. The greater majority of bills are housekeeping details that keep everything funded and running. Most bills won’t see the light of day, especially if they encounter any serious pushback.

One bill I was surprised to see but wholly support is House Bill 1011 which would allow for end-of-life options. Specifically, “Allows individuals with a terminal illness who meet certain requirements to make a request to an attending provider for medication that the individual may self-administer to bring about death. Specifies requirements a provider must meet in order to prescribe the medication to a patient. Prohibits an insurer from denying payment of benefits under a life insurance policy based upon a suicide clause in the life insurance policy if the death of the insured individual is the result of medical aid in dying.” Given the state’s stance on abortion, I don’t expect this bill to make it out of committee, if it even gets that far.

Right-to-die legislation makes far too much sense for an aging population where up to 4 in 10 people could develop dementia after 55. Anyone who has witnessed a loved one slowly, painfully, withering away, not knowing where or who they are, understands the level of mercy this type of legislation shows. Republicans don’t understand compassion or mercy, though, and they’re sorely lacking in common sense, so don’t expect this one to hit the governor’s desk.

I can’t overemphasize that most of the bills proposed in this state legislature or anywhere else will ever actually come up for a vote in any form. State legislators like to act all big and grandiose as they introduce their insipid little bills, but rarely does anyone actually give a shit. For that matter, rarely does anyone even know who they are. I’ve often wondered if someone could walk into the chamber wearing a suit with a flag lapel pin and just start talking. Would anyone know the fucking difference?

States are likely to become the front line of the Felonious Punk’s agenda because it will be easier to pass ridiculous legislation in state houses than it is at the federal level. State legislators tend to be an empty-headed sanctimonious lot that relishes any attempt to garner favor at a federal level. Watching them genuflect to a convicted felon and rapist makes me want to puke.

Meanwhile, LA is still on fire and celebrities don’t want you to forget about them. There are photo ops everywhere.

What matters most is that we all are warm and safe and that there’s more coffee in the pot.

Current Issues / Morning Update / Mythology / News & Comment / Personal / science / Social Commentary

Tuesday, January 14, 2025

January 14, 2025

The World Is Fine Except For People.

Solaris isn’t talking to me this morning. You see, Sol likes sleeping on top of me, typically on my shoulder or hip as I tend to be a side sleeper. Last night was no different. Normally, he approaches from the foot of the bed, finds a comfy spot, and snuggles in. Sol also gets up and wanders around the house during the night. Again, a very typical cat thing to do.

This morning’s problem occurred, though, when he was blocked from taking his normal route back to my shoulder. There were dogs in his way. Sol decided the best solution was to jump over Hamilton, which should have been fine, in theory. However, I was in the middle of a WWII-themed dream when all four sets of his claws hit my hip. My response was instinctive. Thinking that Nazis were attacking me, I yelled (for real), and sent poor Solaris flying into the bedroom wall.

If my scream woke anyone else, they haven’t said anything. Sol retreated to the relative safety of my desk chair. I got up and gave him hugs and he eventually came back to bed, settling back down on the same hip he’d attacked. That was at 4:10 this morning. The tone for the day has been set.

We’ve hit that point in the four-year cycle where a lot of people and businesses are making decisions and changing directions as government shifts. Like many states, Indiana has a new governor, an ardent supporter of Felonious Punk who will likely be eager to do the orange one’s bidding. Yet, it’s the new Lt. Governor that has everyone, including many Republicans, concerned. Starbucks now requires that one buy something before using their bathroom or hogging their wifi. There are far too many better places to get coffee, so the only people I see being negatively affected are those whose Depends are already at a breaking point. Amazon is ending its ‘Try Before You Buy’ option for Prime members. I never thought this was a good idea in the first place, as return costs were overwhelming the system. One can still return garments in the usual fashion, so I don’t see a significant number of people losing anything.

At the same time, I’m noticing that a number of people are planning to leave Meta and some other social media platforms. For many, the combination of a million-dollar donation to Felonious Punk’s inauguration and ending its fact-checking policies is too much to bear. I get it. In some ways, I ‘left’ Facebook over a year ago when I started posting my morning updates here so they wouldn’t get flagged. I still scroll through and look at your pictures and such, but I spend little consequential time there outside of when I’m taking a shit.

Here’s the problem with a wholesale departure from a platform: all that remains are the dregs of online society. The misinformation problem gets worse because there’s no one to call out or block those who share it. Good people leaving Meta platforms ultimately end up feeding the monster rather than hurting it in any noticeable way. I’ve already seen an increase in the number of Russia- or Iran-backed fake profiles. While I report and block them as fast as I see them, I know there are thousands more that I don’t see, and that’s a problem.

I also see more people falling for conspiracy theories that, if one looks at them with a modicum of reason, make no sense. I see you making statements like, “There’s too much that doesn’t make sense for some of those theories to not be true.” Really? That reminds me of people who still say they believe the myths of some holy book because science is too much for them to comprehend. Both attitudes are steeped in a willful ignorance that demonstrates a lack of critical thinking by people who have deluded themselves into thinking that they’re being thoughtful and critical.

No, I’m not leaving anything more than I already have. Seeing pictures of your babies and family adventures brightens the days when I have difficulty walking across the floor. There’s still good on social media, we have to curate it for ourselves.

Meanwhile, the Justice Department released Jack Smith’s report yesterday. You can read the whole thing for yourself. Short version: the orange one is guilty as hell and would be indicted if he weren’t about to be a sitting president, again. Therefore, I will, from this point forward, refer to him only as Felonious Punk. Everything he does, everything he says, needs to be couched in the knowledge that this individual knowingly and intentionally broke the law. I will also continue to point out that I’m not the one who re-elected his punk ass.

Now, I have to try and prepare myself for another round of stupidly cold weather. We have enough food, blankets, and clothing for everyone. My biggest concern is the safety of the kids while they’re on city buses. Tipper has already told me of one event where the bus was unable to avoid sliding into an intersection. The bus is still probably safer than a car, though. I wish I could trust the dogs to take themselves outside, but if you’ve met Hamilton you know that’s never going to be possible. Fortunately, he doesn’t like sub-zero windchill more than the rest of us.

Pour yourself another cup of coffee. The day is still young. Remember, life isn’t all that bad as long as you have enough medication.

Health / Morning Update / Personal / science

Saturday, January 11, 2025

January 11, 2025

Clean Your Brain.

Waking up this morning disrupted one of the more interesting dreams that I’ve had of late. In this dream, which mixed generations of people who had never met in real life, Tipper and I were going to the movies on a Sunday afternoon. Tipper was seeing an animated film about a futuristic robot. I was watching a biopic about a composer, with the added benefit of a seminar with said composer following the film. Anchoring the mall in which the movies were being shown was a massive library, which really isn’t a bad idea, in my opinion. My dream never showed either film, but both had a somewhat disturbing thread connecting them: Communism.

The composer, whose name I don’t remember, was famously autistic and legitimately didn’t give a shit about anyone’s opinion of him. Divorced several times, he was known to pick up his paper and pens and disappear, not telling anyone where he was for weeks at a time. The color of ink he used on his manuscripts varied from day to day: green, blue, red, black, and orange. There was no particular reason for his choice of color beyond how he was feeling on a given day.

Among those seated around me at long banquet tables were composers from earlier times in my life, not necessarily Communist composers, but still influential to my education. Nancy Hill Cobb. Alan Bush. Dmitry Kabelevsky. We all chatted as if we’d been long-time friends, which is possible only in dreamland. Dr. Cobb was the only one in the group I’ve known in real life, and I’ve not seen her in over 40 years. Conversations swirled around problems such as uncooperative conductors, lack of respect or interest on the part of audiences, and the seeming futility of attempting to educate a new generation.

The cats woke me before I ‘saw’ the movie. I looked out the window to a yard just as full of snow this morning as it was Tuesday morning. Once again, an arctic blast is forecasted to send temps below 0 by Wednesday morning. A sad fact is that I don’t think anyone is living especially comfortably at the moment. Either one is cold and roads are slick, or one’s house is on fire. The fact that insurance companies dropped fire coverage on thousands of California homes just before the fires began magnifies just how incompetent late-stage capitalism is in addressing the needs of people. There is no ‘up’ side to this past week.

What we did learn this week is that our brains clean themselves while we sleep. The good news is that you don’t have to be in deep REM sleep for this to happen. In fact, the good stuff happens outside of REM areas. The bad news is that sleep-inducing drugs such as Ambien inhibit the brain’s ability to flush out the day’s toxins. I’m taking this to mean that I must have one of the cleanest brains on the planet, or that the toxicity level of my brain is so severe that frequent naps are necessary to keep the damn thing operating. I suppose it’s possible that both are true.

My next question, one not answered in this study, is to what degree, if any, the pulsating cleaning movement affects our dreams. How are our minds getting any rest if our brains are spending our sleep time scrubbing away the bad stuff? Perhaps this might explain how it is possible to sleep all night and still wake up feeling tired. That’s probably not the case, but it’s one of the many questions I’d love for science to answer.

The dogs don’t seem to be in any hurry to go outside this morning. Despite the cats demanding that I wake up and get moving, the pups still haven’t asked to go out. In fact, Hamilton is lying here snoring rather hard. I’m a little jealous. Sleeping sounds like a very good way to spend the day.

Along with finishing this pot of coffee.

Current Issues / Health / Morning Update / News & Comment / Personal / Politics / science / Social Commentary

Tuesday Morning Update:12/17/24

December 17, 2024

The first morning after is impossible. You wake up hoping it was all just a dream. The inevitable jolt of reality hits harder than it did yesterday. Denial is more difficult. The US is the most dangerous place in the world for going to school. Yes, bombs drop on people in Gaza. Schoolchildren in Ukraine have had to stop classes because of the danger. But those are areas of declared war. The enemy doesn’t know the names of the people they’re killing. Here, a boy stabs a girl to death as she walks to school. In Wisconsin, it’s an upset 15-year-old girl who kills another student and a teacher, then shoots several others before turning the gun on herself. And just like that, more families have joined the list of those waking up on what should be a school day and realizing that nothing’s ever going to be the same again.

There have been 323 shootings at K-12 schools in the country this year. Texas, Louisiana, and Maryland have the most. They range from small towns to large cities, both public schools and private. When our children leave for school each morning, we have no guarantee that they are safe. We jump when the phone rings and our heart drops when we see that it’s the school that’s calling. When you’re braced for the potential that something has happened to your child, them having a D in History class isn’t such a big deal anymore. You’re thankful that they’re still breathing.

The Associated Press released its list of ‘influential’ people who died this year. Of course, there’s always some old film star that passes during the last five days of the year, but the list is largely complete. You’re not on it and neither am I. Chances are pretty good that we never will be on one of those lists. What passes as being ‘influential’ does not mean that one is a good person. For many on that list, talent triumphed over character. There are no school shooting victims on the list. Apparently, our children are not ‘influential’ enough.

The kids are not okay. Tests show math skills are in decline. Whether you like math or not, this is important because math helps develop critical thinking skills. And while there are plenty of opinions about education, the fact remains that we’re letting the kids down in more ways than anyone can count. The curricula are insufficient. Arts programs that aid cognitive learning are non-existent. Over seven million students have Individual Education Plans (IEPs) for specific education needs. Their nutrition sucks. Each day 47 US students are diagnosed with cancer. And perhaps most insane of all, we’re actively debating the efficacy of the vaccines that have all but eliminated polio, smallpox, and many other childhood diseases. If we’re wilfully creating this environment for our kids, do we even love them at all? Do we care if they come home from school alive? Our actions and our words don’t match.

I have more years in the past than I do in the future. I probably won’t see the day when this year’s kindergarten class is running the country or the world. But then, that’s assuming that there’s still something to run. The world doesn’t need government if there are no people to govern.

The planet goes on spinning. A self-induced extinction event might help clear the air. Literally.

Tuesday coffee hits differently.

Current Issues / Health / Morning Update / News & Comment / Politics / science

Saturday Morning Update: 11/09/2024

November 9, 2024

20241109_07012010922814495025489 — Here. You Are Always Safe [2024]

Look at this morning’s picture. Normally, they don’t have much, if anything, to do with whatever I’m talking about. This morning is different. I’ve decided to do something controversial and wear a safety pin. Not a small one, mind you. I ordered the largest one I could find. I’m not hiding it under a collar, either. It’s right there on the front of my shirt where everyone can see it. Yeah, I’m aware of all the backlash. If you doubt my solidarity with women, immigrants, and the entire LGBBTQIA+ community, try me. I may be small and weak, but goddammit, the head of my cane alone is enough of a weapon to render someone senseless and I’m not the least bit afraid to use it. You won’t be the first time I’ve had to stand up for someone. I have five of these huge pins because I have a bad habit of losing things. I’ll wear them until I know that everyone is safe.

There may be further additions and changes to my attire and attitude as well. I am beyond disturbed that at least four of the people closest to me are now at high risk, not only from the coming policies of a deranged and horrible president but more likely from those who put him there. Policies don’t hurt nearly as many people as do actions and we’ve already seen those actions in place. The Orange Felon isn’t going to show up at my daughter’s school and directly threaten her safety. Students indoctrinated by his rhetoric may, though. We’re fortunate that our kids go to schools that protect them against aggressive behavior. There’s still the bus ride there and back, though. No one’s protecting them there. If I have to start riding the damn bus to keep them safe, I will.

Of course, there’s also the danger that I’m apparently losing my fucking mind. My dreams have been unusually lucid of late, but they went over the top this morning around 2:30 when a dream was interrupted by what I thought was a young woman standing at the side of my bed. She had shoulder-length brown hair, was wearing a simple dark blue dress, and smiled as she said, “Hello.” That’s what caused me to sit straight up in bed. I heard her. I rubbed my eyes and she was gone. I looked around the room, Both dogs were still sound asleep. Cats had draped themselves here and there, none of them appearing to be disturbed. But, I heard her! Her voice was pleasantly sweet, just loud enough to wake me from my dream. Since when does a dream wake one from another dream? Am I hallucinating again? I thought we had cured that problem by changing chemo meds two years ago. I really don’t want to return to a state where I can’t trust what I think I’m seeing. I closed my eyes and immediately went back to sleep. Who does that?

Then, because once a day is tainted it stays that way, as I was sitting down to read this morning’s news, I heard a horrifying crash coming from the kitchen. I knew before I left my chair that the cats had knocked something off the counter. What I didn’t expect was the complete explosion of porcelain across the entire kitchen floor and even into the living room. Fortunately, I was still wearing boots from having taken the dogs out earlier. I grabbed the broom and dustpan and started sweeping. I’ve warned the kids that I’m still not sure I got all the little pieces of porcelain.

As I sat back down in my chair, Hamilton, who is the closest thing I have to an emotional support animal, started pawing at my arm. I assumed he wanted some attention and pets. Typically, I can pet him for a couple of minutes and he’s cool. Not this morning. I started petting him and he put his paws on my shoulder and pulled. Not expecting this behavior, I was rather slow in getting the message. He wanted me to lie down and he didn’t stop pestering me until I gave in. I lay next to him on the bed and checked the health monitors on my watch. My oxygen was below 90 and my heart rate was 137. I stayed put and cuddled with Ham until the numbers were better. This is why we’re running late this morning.

Kat didn’t have a good day yesterday, either. Her original plan had been to take G to his shadow day, then he would join her at the salon. They never made it to the salon. After dropping off G, Kat went to her mom’s and slept on her couch until it was time to pick him up. Then, they came home, and she chilled in her big chair until Tipper got home. I don’t know if she’s going to even try going to the salon today. I’m hoping she just goes on up to Fishers and stays there for the weekend. Her recovery is going to go slowly and I don’t want anyone rushing her.

Amidst all this, I must say that the kids are doing well. They were both up before I was this morning. They’re each busy doing their own thing. I have projects for both of them later in the day, but they can have the morning to themselves. They’ve definitely earned it.

Saturday morning is normally my science catch-up time and there’s a lot to read this morning, most of it concerned about continued funding. One of the top stories this morning is How much power do Trump and Kennedy have to reshape health agencies? Throughout the campaign, scientists have sounded the alarm that science funding and agencies are at risk. Of course, no one listened. Why would the people who deny climate change and question the validity of vaccines suddenly start paying attention to what the scientists are saying? [sarcasm]. Supposedly, Kennedy is vetting the resumes of those who might head various health and science concerns. That could definitely shape the future of those agencies. However, there’s no shortage of concern that the National Institute of Health is in for a major shakeup.

However, the new Republican administration isn’t the only threat to the science world. Russia has postponed three major science projects. In Greece, warming water temperatures completely wiped out this year’s mussel harvest. In fact, over the course of the week, I’ve seen reports of cutbacks of various kinds on every continent except Antarctica. As nationalism and right-wing fanaticism grow across the world, so does distrust and dismissal of established science.

This is concerning for any number of reasons. For example, there’s considerable concern that infections of H5N1, or “cow flu,” are going undetected. What are the odds of the world having another pandemic during the next four years? Much tighter than anyone cares to admit on the record. Best advice: wash your hands frequently and keep those masks close.

Health isn’t the only concern, though. In Botswana, there’s research actively taking place that may show that the whole fucking continent of Africa is about to split. The repercussions of such an event would change everything from tidal flows to the movement of the jet stream around the world. Entire weather patterns would be affected. And there’s not a damn thing anyone can do to stop it from happening.

Look, I can’t predict the future any more than anyone else. We’ve all seen the plan this administration has for us, though. The number of people it puts at risk is horrifying. These aren’t just abstract numbers on a page. These policies affect real people, you and your neighbors, and millions of lives are going to be destroyed if we don’t act. This isn’t the time to be a pacifist. Loving your neighbor doesn’t stop them from being an asshole. From where I sit, we have no choice but to be unusually aggressive in our response to everything this new administration does.

As I’ve been typing, I’ve been listening to an old Deutsche Grammophon recording of Vladimir Horowitz at the piano. His complete mastery and domination over even the most tender and careful of pieces is precisely the kind of mood we need to foster right now. No note gets away, nothing skipped.

Hamilton is pawing at me again. I need to eat breakfast and take my meds. I’m not well. I’m not strong. But you are always safe here.

Current Issues / Health / Morning Update / Personal / science

Morning (barely) Update: 11/02/24

November 2, 2024

Yes, I’m getting a late start this morning because I took advantage of the opportunity to sleep. Fat Guy did wake me up to feed the cats at 6:25, but I went right back to bed and slept until 8:00. The dogs didn’t seem to mind one bit. In fact, they’re already back to napping. This is going to be one of those days where I don’t dare promise anyone anything because there’s a good chance that nothing gets accomplished.

Kat came home yesterday afternoon, giving us a chance to chat a little bit before the kids arrived. I’m finding it difficult to explain how incredibly weak she is at the moment. She spent the night in an oversized chair so that she could sleep sitting up. The cats didn’t give her a lot of rest, though. Fat Guy was noisy all night and the other cats were running around, knocking over side tables and making a mess. She’s still coughing up dark masses of blood. She’ll go back up to Brandon’s this afternoon where it will be quieter. She can have her own room there and Brandon watches over her like a mother hen.

Both kids came home in a good mood, having had decent days at school. Tipper is spending tonight with some of her Furry friends, which means G and I will have the house to ourselves. Don’t worry, that just means he’ll be playing games in his room and I’ll be watching football in mine. There’s no wildness of any kind on tap. That’s not who G is, and I’m too damn old.

I’m fighting against a lot of pain this morning. My right forearm feels as if it’s on fire and the right side of my head seems to have someone stepping on it. I’m assuming all the other aches and pains are a result of this morning’s frosty coldness. Even now, it’s still only 34 degrees out. The heater works well, but that still doesn’t seem to affect the way my body responds to the meteorological changes. I’m doing my best to not let depression take over but the struggle is severe and there’s a part of my brain that just doesn’t give a shit.

As we know, most Saturday news is just a rehash of the previous week. So, I want to take a look at what’s going on in the world of science, particularly in the field of battling misinformation. At the center of the research is Kate Starbird, at the University of Washington (UW) in Seattle.

“Starbird and her colleagues have spent more than 4 years studying the rumors that swirl around elections. It’s not purely an academic interest: As they amass data, the team writes rapid research blogs explaining to journalists, election officials, and the public what rumors are circulating and where they are coming from—and correcting the record. “I jokingly call our group the ER [emergency room],” Tomson says. “What we do is triage information.”

What has all this work gotten her? Harassment and threats, particularly from Republicans in the US House of Representatives. As Starbird and her team sift out truth from fiction, their work often blunts the ideological rhetoric that the GOP has been putting forth. So far, Starbird, whom colleagues describe as ‘tough as nails,’ has stood firm, waving off the nonsense from people who don’t know what they’re talking about. They’ll be going strong all the way through the election.

Fighting misinformation, from a scientific standpoint, is far from easy. An article in Science magazine, supported by the Pulitzer Center, identifies five significant obstacles.

Defining what is misinformation. “A committee convened by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine that is currently working on a report on misinformation in science adopted an early working definition: information that counters the consensus in science. That phrasing raised two difficult questions, acknowledges Kasisomayajula Viswanath, a researcher at the Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health who chairs the committee: When is something a consensus? And when is it legitimate to dissent? After all, the consensus can turn out to be wrong, too, Viswanath says. “You want to be very thoughtful and careful of labeling something as misinformation.” Researchers around the world are all using different definitions which then leads to confusion. This isn’t an easy obstacle to overcome.
Politics gets in the way. Bottom line here: Republicans absolutely hate misinformation research because it frequently skews to the right. Funny, the GOP doesn’t seem to realize that it’s their own damn fault. “It’s possible that Republicans are more likely to share a given piece of misinformation they come across, or there simply may be more of it being produced on the right in the first place. Either way, the rightward skew of misinformation creates a problem for researchers, says Lisa Fazio, a psychologist at Vanderbilt University, because they can appear politically motivated. “You look like you’re being harder on the right than the left,” she says.” Unfortunately, the attacks work, causing critical research to be shut down.
The harms are tough to pin down. Linking misinformation to specific real-world consequences is a challenge. People are quick to blame social media, but that’s not nearly as accurate as it may seem. Researchers are urged to stop blaming misinformation as the cause of all the world’s problems because that’s as false as the misinformation itself. Complicating matters is the fact that correcting misinformation rarely changes people’s beliefs. The “pizzagate” scandal of 2016 is a good example. The truth was out there, but a large group of people refused to believe it. Proving anything definitively is an almost impossible job.
The data is not public access. “Previously, scientists could access a treasure trove of data shared through Twitter’s application programming interface, enabling researchers like Pierri to routinely collect millions of tweets a day for their studies. Twitter’s easy access made it a kind of model organism for social media research. But in early 2023, a few months after Elon Musk took over the company, it shut off free access, instead charging scientists tens of thousands of dollars per month for much more limited data.” Because social media companies control most of the data, they’re able to influence how it is studied, potentially skewing the results. A new law in the EU is promising to some extent, but there are still plenty of obstacles.
Research is not global. Lesser developed countries, such as the Philippines, are just as subject to misinformation as are the big guys such as the US and EU. However, most of the research is being done in the United States and the United Kingdom. Misinformation can be more prolific in non-English speaking countries because most of the research is done in English. The field tends to focus on the US and its two-party system, but the problem is much broader as other countries are subject to rumors and lies that affect their populations in very different ways.

Those are extremely tough issues to overcome and the more one digs into them, the more confusing and hopeless it can seem. I’ve been down the rabbit hole and, damn, it’s depressing. One wonders if there is any hope of solving the problem of misinformation.

So, what if there was a vaccination? Oh, this gets good. We’re talking about taking a Cold War strategy to prevent people from believing lies and misinformation. What the fuck? As head of the Social Decision-Making Lab at the University of Cambridge, Sander Van der Linden, whose family were Holocaust victims, is studying the power of lies and how to keep people from believing them. He has become academia’s biggest proponent of a strategy pioneered after the Korean War  to “inoculate” humans against persuasion, the way they are vaccinated against dangerous infections.

There are two steps to Van der Linden’s method: “First, warn people they may be manipulated. Second, expose them to a weakened form of the misinformation, just enough to intrigue but not persuade anyone. “The goal is to raise eyebrows (antibodies) without convincing (infecting),” No, it’s not an actual shot that you can get at your doctor’s office. Damnit.

Van der Linden’s focus on stopping the spread of misinformation comes under a lot of criticism. His approach doesn’t target the source of the problem at all. The medical analogy confuses in its own way as well. Still, by his estimation, it has a better outcome than other methods being studied. Is that enough for it to be more widely adopted? Probably not, but at least someone’s trying.

This is an important topic because, should the Orange Felon win, he’s likely to put Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. in charge of a lot of health issues. Exactly how that would work, no one seems to know. However, Kennedy’s long-standing war against vaccinations would certainly be a point of concern. His extreme views are certainly a large reason for why his own attempt at running for president failed, but they’re also scaring the shit out of a number of researchers. They fear that giving Kennedy any control over federal programs could cause the misinformation and lies to become mainstream. This would severely set back disease research and, as a result, millions of people could die if they are denied access to critical medicines.

Yes, there are real-world consequences to how you vote.

The fact is that science and politics don’t mix well. Science relies on facts and has ways of ensuring that what is published is as true as possible based on current understanding. Politics, on the other hand, relies on unproven conjecture, misinformation, and rhetoric. To the extent that one believes the politicians over the scientists, the world suffers. Politicians, as a whole, aren’t nearly as smart as they pretend. They rely on their staff to tell them what to say and when they go off script they usually get themselves in trouble.

I would very much like for you to delve deep into this week’s NYTimes interview with Peter Singer, perhaps the world’s most influential philosopher who’s still living. A hard-core utilitarian, Singer believes that it isn’t enough to do what is best for ourselves, but that we should focus on what is ultimately best for all beings, and by all beings he does not mean only humans. There’s a lot to unpack in this interview, so carve out some time for yourself. This gets deep.

This is as far as I go for now. My brain is overloaded with all the reading I’ve done over the past couple of hours and my head was hurting before I started. Am I deeply concerned about what happens over the next week? Yes. I hope you are as well. The fight is real and the battles, unfortunately, may get bloody. I’m not willing, at this point, to dismiss even the wildest of outcomes.

I think I’ll refill my coffee cup and put Vivaldi’s Four Seasons on the Victrola. There will be football to watch this afternoon, naps to take, snacks to eat.

Be safe, my friends.

Current Issues / Holidays / Mythology / News & Comment / Personal / pop culture / science

Morning Update: 10/19/24

October 19, 2024

Today will be a beautiful day almost anywhere you live in North America. Sure, there are some scattered showers in Minnesota and Wisconsin, and Southern Colorado, and Northern New Mexico are a bit damp this morning. Still, the whole planet is on the dry side today, and temperatures are moderate for this time of year. The leaves are changing colors, there are fall festivals everywhere one turns, and there’s a furry meetup this afternoon, which is why Tipper is up early.

Yeah, that’s Tipper in the giant furry head. She’s excited about hanging out with friends this afternoon. G is still in Florida, not really missing us at all, just his cat. Kat’s the one not having a good time. Her double ear infection is leaving her dizzy and nauseous as fuck. I spent much of yesterday at the salon with her, “just in case.” I’ve not talked with her yet this morning, but I’m concerned about her driving all the way up to Fishers this afternoon.

Of course, the idea of me being anyone’s backup option is almost laughable. Is it any safer to put me in the driver’s seat of a car? Hmmm … would you rather drive with the person who’s light-headed or the one whose brain wanders off in traffic, not paying attention? I would be the latter. Maybe Kat needs a better option.

Being Saturday, I think we need to keep the conversations lighter because all the politics makes my head hurt. For example, were you aware that Halloween has become a retail juggernaut? Costumes are big business now, as are decorations and candy. The emphasis has shifted from little kids running around being cute to young adults trying to figure out how to define “sexy.” There’s less concern about someone giving your kids drugs and more concern about them being hit by drunk drivers. And doing Halloween at church may be the scariest thing out there. Some of those deacons are more devilish than anyone’s comfortable admitting.

Oh, and did you know that your cat may be smarter than your kindergartener? When it comes to word association, the family feline recognizes and understands a lot more than they’ve been letting on. Now, like your preschooler, just because they know what you’re saying doesn’t mean they’re going to acknowledge your presence. If anything, what this shows is that their attitude is a deliberate denial of human authority.

By the way, where do you stand on the candy corn controversy? Despite all the jokes, it turns out that people have strong feelings one way or the other and friendships have ended over the topic. This is getting worse than the Easter Peeps controversy.

Want to Rent a Panda? Here Are 5 Things China Demands in Return. Zoos aren’t normally where one expects to find deep political controversy, but the popularity of these rolly-polly bears gives China the ability to make some severe demands. Could Panda Wars be on the horizon?

Could gem dust be the answer to global warming? Imagine actual diamond flakes in the sky. No, you’re not on an acid trip. This is real science hypothesizing that the reflection could send deadly ultraviolet light back out into space. The cost, of course, would be stupidly expensive because you can be sure that DeBeers is going to make a buck anywhere they can.

These are the questions burning in the back of our minds, the things we care about more than politics and war. These issues sizzle. Our parents didn’t have to worry about these things. We’re forging new ground here as we try to get a grasp on the reality handed to us. No wonder we all need therapy.

Or, at least, a bigger coffee pot.

Current Issues / Morning Update / News & Comment / Personal / Politics / science / Social Commentary

Morning Update: 10/18/24

October 18, 2024

Welcome to Friday and all the cheer and joy that it brings! Yes, I’m being quite facetious. Friday is trash day around here, both literally and figuratively. For whatever reason, the dogs and I woke up early. I took a shower, attempted to dry this graying hair, gathered the trash and set it by the curb, then took the dogs out while chatting with Tipper. She was angling to stay home, saying her stomach hurt, but I didn’t give in and sent her on her way. I think what she’s experiencing is more anxiety than illness. Yes, anxiety is real and its effects are nothing to laugh about, but if she stayed home every time she felt a bit anxious, she’d rarely go to school!

Kat’s the one who’s ill. She ended up having to go to emergency care yesterday and was found to have an ear infection in both ears! She has meds and is still sleeping this morning. The question is whether she’ll be able to stand without getting light-headed. No one needs a dizzy stylist.

I finally got a text from G last night, after I’d gone to bed. Yes, he’s seen “a few” alligators. Yes, he’s having fun. That’s all the info he gave me. Can you tell he’s a teenager?

Tipper is still trying to get out of school. She’s texting me that a constant air horn noise on the bus is giving her a headache. I won’t be surprised if she’s home early today.

If anyone was thinking that the killing of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar might mean a cooling of tensions in the Gaza war, think again. Netanyahu is saying that the war will go on. No peace. That should tell you everything you need to know about the man who is bankrupting Israel, starving Gazans, and murdering civilians. Why the fuck is the US still supporting him?

Meanwhile, a Reuters investigation shows that the UN’s World Food Program allowed donated grain to go to all the wrong people. As a result, Ethiopians are starving. There’s only so much NGOs can do to take up the slack when corruption is at the core of the government.

AP’s deep dive takes aim at the increasing number of military veterans who are advocating violence against their own country. This goes well beyond the Jan. 6 debacle of 2021. These folks are advocating and prepping for civil war, and the outcome of the election either way may not slow them down. These are your neighbors, maybe your friends. They need to be stopped.

Then, there’s this:

Tennessee judges say doctors can’t be disciplined for providing emergency abortions
A three-judge panel has ruled that Tennessee cannot discipline doctors who provide emergency abortions to protect the life of the mother while a lawsuit challenging the state’s sweeping abortion ban continues.

Don’t be fooled into think that this is a major win for women. The ridiculous anti-abortion laws in Tennessee and elsewhere still exist and this ruling will be appealed. All it means is that doctors might breathe a little easier when trying to determine what procedures can be used to save a woman’s life. Maybe.

Here’s a fun one for your Friday: Scientists show how sperm and egg come together like a key in a lock. I bet you thought you already knew how babies are made, didn’t you? This brings to mind the 1971 by the artist Melanie that sings, “I’ve got a pair of brand new roller skates, you got a brand new key. Why don’t we get together and try them out to see…” Roller skates are an interesting euphemism, aren’t they?

The entire world is watching sleepy little Delphi, Indiana as the trial of a man charged with killing two teenage girls in 2017 finally begins today. This is way overdue. The judge has changed. Attorneys have changed. The whole thing is a mess where comma placement and scientific details are manipulated in attempts to either convict and prove the innocence of the person on trial. At this point, one has to question whether there is any remaining chance of actually getting to the truth.

Ya’ know what stinks? Thousands in North Carolina can’t flush their toilets amid hurricane damage. As if things weren’t already bad enough.

NOAA released its winter outlook yesterday. Remember, they’re focused on climate, not the daily weather. What we’re looking at is a 60% chance of a change in the jet stream that is likely to lead to a wetter but warmer winter here in Indiana, and a significantly drier winter for the South and Southwest. The drier, warmer weather along the Southeast coast may actually help hurricane-ravaged areas in their attempt to recover from back-to-back hurrricanes. Around here, it means we’ll probably have more snow than we did last year.

Okay, that should get your Friday kick started. Don’t expect much, if anything, to change over the weekend. You should be able to get out and enjoy the fall leaves, pick some apples, drink some cider, and all those fun things. I’ll be right here, snuggling with sleepy pups, worrying about everyone. Some of ya’ll need to wrap yourselves in bubble wrap.

More coffee.

Current Issues / Holidays / Morning Update / News & Comment / Personal / science / Social Commentary

Morning Update: 10/14/24

October 14, 2024

What a difference a day makes; twenty-four little hours. Fall break is over, but that doesn’t mean both kids are heading back to school. G will be in Florida until next Sunday. They arrived yesterday without incident. He told Kat that he didn’t see “that much” damage. That means the biggest danger he’s likely to face down there is ‘gators. I was so concerned about the storms that I didn’t think to warn him about the giant reptiles and their ability to hide in seemingly harmless bodies of water. So, now I’ll worry about getting him back in one piece.

Yesterday involved a couple of interesting conversations with Tipper as well. Since G won’t be here to take the bus with her in the morning, we gave her a can of pepper spray to carry. That required plenty of instruction and warnings against spraying it into the wind. She has to turn it in at the school when she gets there and pick it back up before heading home. We’re hoping she never has reason to use it, but statistics say she will. There was also a conversation about mammograms that Kat fielded beautifully. A friend of Kat’s discovered last week that she has breast cancer. As we were discussing that, Tipper asked about “that thing that squishes them.” Kat was straightforward but gentle in her wording. We’ve had too many friends diagnosed with various forms of the disease this year to ignore the questions.

Then, it had to turn around and get cold. The wind was strong yesterday as the cold front moved in. By this morning, the thermometer was reading 48 degrees. No, it’s not really cold, but we’ve been accustomed to 80-degree days for so long that the contrast feels dramatic. Today’s high won’t get above 60 and by Wednesday, there’s a decent chance of frost. I’m avoiding getting the heavy coat out just yet, though. I layered a hoodie with my lightweight jacket when I took the dogs out this morning. While I’m ready for fall, I’m not ready for the added pain that comes with the cold.

I’m a little pissed that the NFL wouldn’t let me watch the Washington/Baltimore game on Prime yesterday. For some stupid reason, it was blocked here. I never have understood the NFL’s blackout policies. They don’t make a damn bit of sense. Baltimore ended up winning, 30-23. But hey, the Colts won over the Titans, 20-17! That’s more of a comment on how poorly the Titans are playing than anything special the Colts did to win. The game could have gone either way. There were a couple of absolute routs. The Lions completely crushed the Cowboys, 47-9. The folks in Dallas need to be ashamed of that performance and should probably give ticketholders their money back. Steelers whomped the Raiders in Vegas, making those overpriced tickets seem ridiculous. And what the Bucs did to the Saints was anything but holy, taking them out with a score of 51-27. The Bills take on the Jets tonight and if Buffalo doesn’t win by at least two touchdowns I’ll be shocked.

Sadly, not everything is fun and games. Reuters is reporting that the US is sending to anti-missile system and troops to Israel. You read that correctly. We’re putting boots on the ground in an escalating war that has no equitable outcome. This comes as Israeli Energy Minister Eli Cohen accused UNIFIL peacekeepers in south Lebanon of being a “useless” force. Why? Because they won’t brutally slaughter every person they encounter? This has seriously become the most disgusting war of our lifetime.

China’s acting like a jackass as well. China sent 125 military aircraft in exercises aimed at Taiwan in a single-day record, Taiwan says. Taiwan is holding firm to the belief that China had “no right to represent” the island. Should China get too aggressive, both Japan and the US are likely to become involved. China should stop and consider that outcome for a moment. Japan hasn’t been involved in any conflict since WWII. We wouldn’t let them. Now, China’s aggression against Taiwan is also a threat to Japan. Don’t expect Japan to play nice. They’ve been waiting.

Daron Acemoglu, Simon Johnson, and James Robinson win the Nobel Prize for Economics. They studied what caused some countries to succeed while others failed. The question is whether anyone outside of the Nobel Committee will pay any attention to their findings.

Indigenous Peoples Day hits a bit differently this year as many tribes are pushing people to get out and vote. In 2020, tribal voting is what pivoted Arizona for Biden. This year, the effort to get indigenous people to vote is even stronger and there are several states in which a strong turnout could cause a decisive difference.

Meanwhile, research is now saying that Columbus was a Sephardic Jew from Western Europe. I’m not sure that has any bearing on the fact that he was a murderous SOB. I’m willing to forget he ever existed.

There’s some other stuff. Meteorologists are facing harassment and death threats amid disinformation about the recent hurricanes. Why? Because people are fucking stupid and believing GOP lies. Fisher-Price Recalls 2 Million ‘Snuga Swings’ After Five Infant Deaths. The US Consumer Product Safety Commission isn’t all that convinced that the recall will do any good. And you should Stop Carving a Hole at the Top of Your Jack-o’-lantern. Unless you have squirrels, in which case it really doesn’t matter because they’re going to eat the damn thing anyway.

If that wasn’t enough, it’s Monday. Not a damn thing we can do about that.

Perhaps, more coffee.

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Morning Update: 10/12/24

October 12, 2024

I am tempted this morning to let Solaris type the update. He’s being my shadow and keeps looking at the keyboard as if he could do a better job. If any of the cats could type, it would be Sol. I’m sure what he wrote would be interesting as well, given his acerbic wit. He doesn’t quite have a hold on the parts of speech, though, which limits his ability to be helpful on mornings like this one. But when Belvedere looks at me with those big hound dog eyes and asks, “You’re coming back to bed, right?” it really is tempting to hand Sol the keyboard and walk away.

If we’re all a little droopy this morning, it’s probably because Kat and Tipper didn’t get home until after 2:00 this morning. I wasn’t expecting Kat home early in the first place. She attended a comedy show with a friend for a much-needed night out. I wasn’t expecting Tipper home until later this morning, though. There was a big text conversation about that issue yesterday afternoon. But something changed during the evening. Tipper messaged her mom around midnight asking to be picked up out near Greenwood. When one of our kids asks for help, we don’t ask questions, we drive. Questions can be addressed this morning, but the bottom line is that her safety always comes first. We’ll sleep later.

This is also one of those mornings where news editors are grasping at straws to find enough copy to cover the empty space. The most compelling headlines I’m seeing this morning? Get a load of these:

How the elephant got its wrinkles. No, it’s not a fable. Actual sciencey stuff.
Gene therapy dilemma: Treatment that halts brain disease can also cause cancer. This only applies to a rare disease that affects young boys, but it’s still a bit troubling.
Ancient creature was a grizzly-size millipede-centipede hybrid, fossil head reveals. Wait, a GRIZZLY-SIZED millipede? Uhm, no, thank you.
Even a Single Bacterial Cell Can Sense the Seasons Changing. No word on whether they like pumpkin spice, though.
Bacon hogs the spotlight in election debates, but reasons for its sizzling inflation are complex. Bacon is political? Now I’m hungry.

There are a few things worth reading as you kill time before today’s football games.

Data shows migrants aren’t taking ‘Black jobs’ or ‘Hispanic jobs.’ Don’t believe the lies.
Children and adults transported to a Pennsylvania hospital after ingesting ‘toxic mushrooms’. You fed them to the kids? Really?
Woman pleads guilty to trying to smuggle 29 turtles across a Vermont lake into Canada by kayak. Hmm, I wonder how they caught her?
Sex bomb: The collateral damage of OnlyFans’ explosive success. Reuters did a deep dive on this one. Give in to the curiosity and read it.
Spirit Halloween will try its hand at a longer run this year with Spirit Christmas. No, really. Apparently, there’s a demand.
Why Do So Many Women Wear Giant Eyeglasses? The Times thinks you need to know.

Look, this may be the last decent-temperature weekend for the year. We’re looking at frost warnings by this time next week. Get out of the house. Do that thing you’ve been putting off. Enjoy what’s left of this late-season heat wave.

Me, I’m going back to bed.

Current Issues / Morning Update / News & Comment / Personal / science

Morning Update: 10/08/24

October 8, 2024

My mood is negative this morning, so I won’t delay getting straight to the news. I’ve taken some extra time to read additional articles regarding the whole Hurricane Milton situation. There’s too much incorrect information to avoid getting this right. While most of the US will not be directly affected by the storm, we will be affected by its impact on the economy and the availability of emergency resources. As you read, you have a responsibility to do the following:

Share what is important to the audience you have.
Offer shelter if you safely can to those leaving Florida.
Avoid misinformation from politically driven sources.
Gently correct friends on social media who share misinformation.
Stay informed throughout the day.

For the record, I’m writing this at 7:30 AM EDT. Updates from the National Weather Service, which is the most trusted information source, generally occur at the top of the hour, every hour. However, given the potential impact of this storm, they will often announce updates the instant a significant change is detected. Here is this morning’s map:

The yellow areas on the map are where the hurricane’s effect is likely to be the strongest. While the storm retreated slightly from a Category 5 to a Category 4 overnight, it could still regain power before making landfall Wednesday evening. This is likely to be the strongest storm to hit the Tampa area since 1921. It is rare for storms that form in the Gulf to move Eastward. This compact storm brings with it some of the lowest pressure possible, which makes it even stronger. Tampa’s mayor has warned that people who stay, “will die.” The state of Florida, still reeling from the effects of Hurricane Helene, is going to be permanently scarred by this storm.

Somewhat baffling, but not surprising, is the fact that Orlando attractions are not closed… yet. Disney World, Universal Orlando, and SeaWorld are still open as of this writing. All say they are “closely monitoring” the storm, and be sure that they will not close unless they feel visitors to the park are directly threatened. Now, take a look at the map above. Find Orlando. While it’s not in the bright yellow impact zone, it seems impractical that some closure either Thursday or Friday won’t be ordered. Milton will still be a Category 1 storm when it exits into the Atlantic. Don’t think that won’t put lives in danger.

For the sake of anyone who seriously thinks that the government is controlling the weather: they can’t. Controlling the strength and direction of a storm like Milton is impossible. People who share this kind of nonsense become responsible for the deaths of Floridians who believe this nonsense and choose to stay. Don’t be stupid. Misinformation takes much-needed resources away from disaster recovery. Have no part in it.

Your “thoughts and prayers” are not what is needed right now. President Joe Biden approved an emergency declaration for Florida, and U.S. Rep. Kathy Castor said 7,000 federal workers were mobilized to help in one of the largest mobilizations of federal personnel in history. That 7,000 won’t be enough. FEMA is already strained, still working on the large disaster space left by Helene. Once the storm pushes through, volunteers are needed to help in search and recovery efforts, clearing debris from roads, and getting utilities up and running. Please, do not volunteer unless you have experience in these areas and are well-equipped to take care of yourself. Otherwise, you risk becoming a liability that no one needs.

There are still a number of variables that cannot be predicted. Whether the storm directly hits Tampa Bay or just South of the Bay will affect which areas see the strongest storm surge. Rainfall amounts ahead of the storm depend on how fast it moves across the state. There is no way to know the exact strength of winds in any given area until they get there. Prudence in these situations demands preparing for the worst.

If you’re looking at maps of the Atlantic and Caribbean, you will likely notice that there’s a Tropical Storm Leslie out there looking menacing. As of the latest information from the National Hurricane Center, Leslie looks as though it will stay out at sea. This does not mean that we won’t see any other storms develop quickly behind it, though. This season is far from over.

Yes, this is going to keep my attention for the rest of the week. There are too many people in Florida that I care about to not keep this as the center of my focus. I also know that a lot of people from Indy like going to Florida this time of year. Maybe next year, okay? Let’s not contribute to the problem.

Fortunately, weather patterns over the rest of the US look rather quiet. If you don’t live in one of the areas affected by Helene, enjoy the luxury of sitting back and having another cup of coffee this morning while you consider tangible ways in which you can help.

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Morning Update: 10/07/24

October 7, 2024

Afternoon on the Lake [2024]

There are fresh cat scratches on my body this morning. For reasons I’ve yet to understand, the cats scattered around the room when I went to bed all decided they needed to not only sleep next to my head but to secure their positions by digging their claws into my flesh. Solaris insisted on sleeping on top of me and didn’t want to move when I got up. Instead, he dug his claws in and climbed up my back to sit on my shoulder. Frankie, the smashed-face wheezer kitty, grabbed hold of my hair and wouldn’t let go. Bit slapped me in the face when I tried to roll over. Kronk, aka Pinball, dug into my shoulder. I’m not sure how to interpret this behavior. I definitely look and feel like I lost a fight.

The highlight of yesterday was not football. In fact, I didn’t watch any of yesterday’s games. Instead, Tony Shaw picked me up and we sat out by the lake chatting and watching the boats on what was perhaps the last good-weather day of the year. I’m sure I looked ill, being the only one sitting out there in long sleeves and jeans. Everyone else was running around in shorts and swimwear. I was comfortable, though, and had a fantastic time. Kat even stopped by for a moment on her way to pick up the kids. This was the afternoon I needed. Besides, the Colts lost to the 0-3 Jags. I didn’t miss anything.

While we were sitting there swapping stories, Tony and I briefly touched on the topic of how we’re going to handle the winter. This is the second year in a row where I’m hitting Autumn and the looming cold feeling weaker and more exhausted than I was this time last year. Sure, the numbers looked great at the doctor’s office on Friday, and I’m grateful for that, but the day-to-day reality has me dreading the coldness of winter. My bones already hurt. I was comfortable out there in my long sleeves. I’m getting by, but I’m not okay and that is driving me sort of mad. I’m going to need some help getting through winter.

Both kids are home today and tomorrow. They’re not going to like me. Today, they need to catch up on all the chores they skipped over the weekend. Tomorrow, they need to mow the lawn one last time, without my help. We’re still not sure whether G will get to go to Florida; the situation there isn’t good. I’m anticipating them making alternative plans. Tipper will undoubtedly attempt to spend some time with her friends as well. All the more reason for them both to get their chores caught up now.

Evacuation orders have been issued for almost the entire state of Florida. Here is how this morning’s map is looking:

You’ll notice a couple of significant changes from this time yesterday. First, they’re anticipating Milton will reach Category 4 while still out in the Gulf. This makes perfect sense. In fact, I was telling Tony yesterday that there was no way that this storm was going to settle at Category 3. Second, the landfall projection is now about 50 miles South of Tampa. This is good news for those in Florida’s panhandle and the Carolinas, but bad news for Miami, who looked to dodge the storm in yesterday’s map. And again, if you live anywhere in Florida, you need to get the fuck out. Now. I know one friend has plane reservations for this morning, and another was already making travel plans. Some are suggesting that this is a ‘once in a lifetime’ storm, with a level of evacuations not seen since Hurricane Irma in 2017.

Don’t play. This storm is so bad, I’ll make an offer I probably shouldn’t make (Kat’s asleep so we haven’t discussed it, but I know how she feels). If you live in Florida and have absolutely nowhere to go, and aren’t allergic to cats, you can come here. We’ll pitch a tent in the yard if we have to. Sure, our little 900-square-foot house is already bursting at the seams, but you’ll do better up here than you will in Florida. I would be devastated if we lost a friend because they didn’t think they had anywhere to go. Just get the fuck out of this storm’s path. There’s no playing around with this one.

Today is October 7. Along Israel’s border with Gaza, reminders of the trauma of the Hamas-led assault are inescapable as the few who have returned try to start anew. This morning’s headlines look like this:

Let me be very clear: There are no good guys in this war. Every day, each of the parties involved is committing more war crimes for which they are unlikely to be punished. They are listening to no one, including their own people. If it were up to me, I would duct-tape the leaders of Israel, Iran, Hamas, and Hezbollah to their chairs so they can’t fire any more missiles, and tape their mouths shut to end the rhetoric. Don’t let them go until they’re ready to sign a permanent cease-fire. Egos are what is driving this war. The whole mess needs to stop. The world has better things to do.

Who’s doing better things? Victor Ambros and Gary Ruvkun, the two Americans who were awarded the Nobel Prize for Medicine earlier this morning. “MicroRNA provide genetic instructions to tell cells to make new proteins and that there were two main areas where microRNA could be helpful: in developing drugs to treat diseases and in serving as biomarkers.” This changes many games, including finding treatment for various forms of cancer. See? These are the kinds of things humans can do when they’re not having to dodge bombs or be assaulted by political rhetoric. We should be doing more of this, not ruining the lives of innocent peoples.

There are a couple of heads-up articles to take in this morning. Affordable housing could disappear by the tens of thousands. I know, for many of us this is a ‘duh’ statement. We’ve not had affordable housing since the pandemic. This warning, however, underlines the reality that an already bad situation is about to get worse. This inevitably leads to a higher rate of homelessness, which cities don’t know how to handle. Some crimes, particularly sexual assault and theft, are likely to increase as well. There are answers, but you won’t like them.

Did you know there are shyster dentists? Apparently, there are. The AP is warning people to not fall for fake dentists offering veneers and other dental work on social media. “These self-described “veneer techs” often promote themselves on Instagram and TikTok, promising a full set of veneers for less than half of what dentists typically charge. Some also market their own training courses and certifications for people looking to get into the business.

“It’s misleading, health professionals warn — and illegal. All states require dental work, including veneers, to be performed under the supervision of a licensed dentist.” Don’t be one of those who get taken in by all the flash and glitz of social media. It’s not real and it could seriously affect your health.

There are also a couple of sciency things I didn’t get to over the weekend. First up: Computers can be trained to exhibit pareidolia, the phenomenon of recognizing faces in objects. There are some interesting inferences here. One is that if AI can “see” faces where they don’t actually exist, what does that mean for facial recognition programs? Can they be trusted? Second, is pareidolia a learned behavior or a natural phenomenon? If AI can be trained to see faces, the implication is that humans can be “trained” in a similar fashion. Does anyone really need to see things that aren’t there? Can we take this in the other direction?

The second deals with the smoking habits of 18th-century English women. New research finds that women puffed away at various tobacco products during that time. Not just a few women, mind you. Almost all of them. At the core of this discovery is a novel technique analyzing metabolites of tobacco in bone that could be applied to other substances, potentially revising views of past health and behavior. The better we understand what killed people in the past, the better able we are to avoid such things in the future and understand the origins of some hereditary traits. It’s an interesting read if you’re looking to avoid actual work this morning.

There’s also news of a possible ovarian cancer vaccine in the works. The research is being done in the UK. If successful, it could eliminate the need to remove ovaries for women at high risk. Ovarian cancer is extremely painful and brings some nasty, life-altering side effects along with it. The development of a vaccine could improve the lives of millions of women.

That’s all I’ve got this morning. I’m looking over at the two dogs stretched out beside me, sleeping away, and thinking that I may just need to join them. No one else in the house is up yet, the cats have been fed and are quiet, so there’s no good reason for me to not catch a few more Zs.

Or a couple more cups of coffee.

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Morning Update: 09/21/24

September 21, 2024

Today is technically the last day of summer. The high here in Indy is forecasted to be 91 degrees. Tomorrow’s high is 80 and it falls from there for all next week. It’s time to start making chili and making sure the kids have jackets with them when they leave for school. I’m not aware of anyone who is terribly upset. The past couple of weeks have been oppressive to the point that even the dogs haven’t wanted to stay outside very long. Autumn will get a cheerful welcome here tomorrow morning.

There were some storms to our near North last night. In fact, I was sitting in the front yard for a while, enjoying the light show. After a particularly entertaining flash of lightning about a mile away, though, Hamilton decided that he was quite done and the anxious pup demanded we go back inside. We never did get more than a few sprinkles here at the hose.

I’m starting to feel better. In fact, I felt well enough last night to devour about three-quarters of a rotisserie chicken for dinner. That may be the most I’ve eaten all week. I’m still congested as hell, though, which makes breathing difficult, which tires me to the point of complete exhaustion. I’m glad my bed is comfortable, but it’s getting to be too familiar.

There’s not a lot of impactful world news this morning. This fact-checking article is probably worth a couple of minutes of your time, but it’s not likely to sway anyone’s vote. I don’t know if Hamas is getting a breather as Israel goes after Hezbollah, but they’re not showing up in any headlines this morning. There is a bit of an “oops.” Iran did not include mobile launchers with the close-range ballistic missiles that Washington last week accused Tehran of delivering to Russia for use against Ukraine, according to three sources with knowledge of the matter. Pardon me while I giggle at that one.

The American Academy of Pediatrics is getting some blowback over its criticism of GMO foods. Critics are saying that important evidence wasn’t considered in determining the safety of the foods. However, one is right to question the ties those critics have to major food conglomerates. Here’s the thing: GMO foods are cheaper to farm and therefore easier on the pocketbook, which is stretched to its limit. Are the risks worth the savings? Who do you want to believe?

The truly disturbing articles this morning are all local. Here’s a list of headlines from Indy’s CBS affiliate:

If anyone was thinking about moving here, those headlines would be enough to cause one to pause. For those of us already here, we hold our children a little closer and make sure their phones are charged when they leave for school. One piece of good news: Marion County proposal would let police impound cars used in street takeovers. I wholly support this idea. Here’s hoping it happens.

Of course, this afternoon/evening is full of football. I have a problem, though. Tennessee visits OU this evening. I have reasons for supporting both teams, but they’ve never played each other enough for there to be an established rivalry. For whom do I root? When OU plays Texas, we root for OU. When OU plays Oklahoma State, we root for the Cowboys. Those are easy. But this one? I dunno. I do have a sinking feeling that the Volunteers are likely to run all over the Sooners, but counting the Sooners out is never a good idea. The game doesn’t start until like 7:30 local time, though, so I doubt I’ll see much of it.

Between now and then, I think I’ll sleep. There doesn’t seem to be a good reason not to. The twins seem supportive of that idea. The dogs are already back to snoring. Seems like a waste of time to not join them.

Current Issues / Morning Update / News & Comment / Personal / Politics / science / Social Commentary / video

Morning Update: 09/13/24

September 13, 2024

Friday the 13th Edition

Welcome to one of the most dreaded days of the year (by some)! Those who are superstitious are likely staying in bed today if they can, or being extremely careful if they can’t. I do want to put something to rest quickly, though: THERE IS NO FRIDAY THE 13TH IN OCTOBER THIS YEAR. I’ve seen the memes going around since June. They’re wrong. There is a supermoon, but the 13th lands on a Sunday next month. I know some were hoping for a super spooky Halloween season, but that particular element isn’t happening. If you are a spooky-oriented person, celebrate today instead.

Only one person gave me any direct feedback on yesterday’s video edition, and views were down compared to other days this week. I think, at least for today, we’ll mix it up a bit, giving video coverage where it makes sense, but going ahead and typing out the rest. There was some mention that some of the videos were blocked for some people. I don’t understand that at all. Most of the videos came from YouTube and should have been available to everyone. For them to be blocked doesn’t make any sense.

Kat is still quarantined. Queen Bit and Fat Guy have been taking care of her, Bit insisting on lying on her head most of the day. I’m not sure what that’s supposed to cure, but she’s definitely committed to the task. At least no one here is running to AI for medical advice. According to this morning’s Times, many Americans are taking the advice of AI chatbots for medical information. The primary reason is that it takes too long to see an actual doctor. But, of course, the question immediately raised is whether the advice is accurate. The answer is obvious: not always. Go see a real, living, breathing doctor before doing anything stupid.

Can we stop with the Springfield-related memes already? Yeah, I’ve seen some cute ones, but the issue is that they’re causing problems. Here’s your first video of the day.

As much as anything, this is a clear example of the degree to which words do matter, and Republicans such as the Orange Felon and his idiotic running mate don’t seem to care. If anything, they’re delighting in the chaos because it keeps bringing people back to the concept that immigrants are ruining the country. They’re not. They’re not ruining Europe, either. Immigration is not out of control. This is clear fear-mongering from the GOP. In the case of Springfield, they need immigrants. So, let’s just cancel the memes, okay?

Of course, the big news of the day is that 33,000 Boeing factory workers went on strike after rejecting the contract offer. This is going to put a big dent in Boeing’s cash flow as it means they can’t deliver the 737s that airlines have ordered. Boeing is already cash-strapped thanks to its multiple failures this year. They really can’t afford to let this strike go much longer than the weekend, and even then the ripple effect is going to cause numerous problems for the company. Boeing workers have put up with a lot of flack and no small amount of bullshit of late. This is their first work stoppage since 2008. The folks in Boeing’s C-Suite need to get their act together and end this strike quickly.

I totally forgot that there was a football game last night. I can’t believe that I let that slip my mind. I was in bed shortly after 9:00 anyway, and the Bills pretty much handled the Dolphins without any problem. No one is terribly surprised by that. There was some drama, though. Tua Tagovailoa sustained a concussion after hitting his head on the turf. This was a scary moment for Dolphins fans as much of the team’s hopes for this season ride on the quarterback’s abilities. There have been a number of problems with the turf in various stadiums already this season. If you were watching the Colts/Texans game last Sunday, you saw both quarterbacks plagued with slipping on Lucas Oil’s new turf. There were plenty of complaints at other stadiums as well. None of the teams want to lose their highly-paid star players to an injury. But can the problem even be addressed now that the season is underway?

Time for another video. This one is actually a little frightening in my opinion.

Considering that North Korea isn’t supposed to have any nukes at all makes this a slap directly in the face of the UN and its member countries. Why should this bother us? First of all, the world does not need another nuclear power, especially not one controlled by a family of power-hungry deranged lunatics. No one trusts a nuclear-equipped North Korea to not attempt a takeover of South Korea. Most critical, though, is the Russian factor. Putin has been under increasing pressure to utilize the country’s nuclear weapons against Ukraine. Among the multiple problems with that idea, including the fact that fallout would likely blowback over Russia, is that their nuclear arsenal is decades old and operates on what is now horribly obsolete technology that hasn’t been tested since the 1980s. However, European intel is saying that Russia has a new kamikaze drone. Putin’s been getting cozy with North Korea’s Kim of late. If Russia were to put brand new North Korean nukes on kamikaze drones, it could spell danger for all of Eastern Europe, including several NATO countries. Now, see why this is really a big deal?

There is some interesting moon-related news this morning. On one hand, New research suggests the moon had active volcanoes when dinosaurs roamed Earth. Granted, this was millions of years ago, but it’s still important as it may mean that underground deposits of both water and magma may still exist. This could be extremely important if anyone wants to actually attempt colonizing the moon.

However, the Times is reporting that a new mini-moon is being captured by Earth’s gravity. There are a couple of caveats here. First, what scientists are tracking is an extremely small space rock. So small, that you wouldn’t likely be able to see it with the naked eye. Second, not everyone agrees that it’s a moon. Again, size matters, but so does the shape of its orbit, which is still up for questioning. Nonetheless, it would be exciting, in my opinion, if Earth were to join the collection of cool planets that have more than one moon. It will be interesting to see how this develops. Who knows, maybe the little rock will grow!

Locally, it’s looking as though the drought across much of Indiana is going to continue. Any rain effect from Tropical Storm Francine is going to be limited to the Southwestern part of the state, leaving the rest of us hot and dry for at least the next week. This is unusual since September is normally a fairly wet month. Without any rain, fall foliage is going to suck. Already, I’m seeing the leaves on trees in our neighborhood beginning to turn brown. Belvedere’s been digging holes to lie in because the surface ground is too hot. This is not a good sign at all.

Fortunately, there’s football tomorrow. The big game for everyone in Indiana is Purdue vs. Notre Dame. Purdue is 2-0 and ND is coming off a devestating loss to Northern Illinois last week. This in-state rivalry is always a big game, but this year it could possibly determine how the rest of the season goes for both teams. The winner gets a shove forward in the polls, which is important come bowl time. The loser could be down for the count, especially if it’s Notre Dame. Either way, we’re looking forward to an exciting game tomorrow afternoon.

I need to eat breakfast and then probably take a nap. Or two. Maybe three. Or four. Never underestimate my napping ability.

Nor my need for MORE COFFEE!!

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Morning Update: 08/24/24

August 24, 2024

On The Town [2011 original with AI background]

Friday was a better day, healthwise, than was Thursday, but my stomach was still a bit tentative so we were careful and stayed close to the bed to be safe. The animals certainly don’t seem to mind and I suppose it does a good job of keeping me out of trouble. I’m having more trouble maintaining a sense of time and place, though. Most frequently, I forget what day it is and have to consult my watch or my phone to keep me somewhat grounded. Even this morning, I first woke thinking it was Friday, not Saturday. I don’t think I was the only one, though, as both of the kids were up shortly after me.

Perhaps it’s just a sign of age, but I’m concerned about how rapidly friends are being diagnosed with cancer. Another friend revealed yesterday that he has stage-3 colorectal cancer. He’ll start five weeks of radiation soon. The husband of another friend was recently diagnosed as well. He’s looking at five-and-a-half weeks of radiation. Perhaps we’re paying for all the red meat we’ve eaten, the lifestyles we’ve lived, or other not-so-wise choices we’ve made. Maybe the natural course of being human has us caught in the cancer web. As I prepare for another colonoscopy this week, I find that I’m hoping all the chemo I’ve been taking has kept anything from growing anywhere else. I’m not sure chemo works that way, but until someone tells me differently, I’ll hope.

There’s a lot on the docket today. First up is the lawn. No one gets out of helping. Everything has to look neat and clean by Monday. That work will necessitate an overdue shower, which I’m rather eagerly anticipating. Depending on how schedules work out, I’m going to enjoy the first Saturday of college football and watch at least part of the Akron-Ohio State game. Finally, I hope to spend some time with a dear friend who’s facing a double mastectomy on Monday. That sounds like a lot when I list it, but trust me, I’ll be sure to get my naps in.

One of the things I look for when going over the morning news is what events are most likely to affect me or those I care about. Lately, every time I see the word Oklahoma in a headline, my heart sinks. I grew up in Oklahoma. I still have many friends there. This morning, it popped up in the AP feed twice. The first story is how Oklahoma classrooms seem to be ignoring the State Superintendent’s order to teach the Bible in all classes. School districts have been offered guidance from law firms that represent them, the state’s Attorney General, and the state’s largest teachers union, the Oklahoma Education Association, that the superintendent doesn’t have the unilateral authority to issue such a requirement and that the edict is unenforceable.

At the same time, though, an Oklahoma teacher lost her license to teach after giving her students the QR code to the Brooklyn library as a source for reading banned books. The firing was more performance on the part of the state board of education. The teacher involved now works for that same Brooklyn library in New York, so revoking her license to teach is mere pettiness, which the state’s superintendent is good at. What’s sad in all this is that students are the ones losing. Oklahoma education is near the bottom of the country now. It didn’t use to be that way. When we graduated 45 years ago, being from Oklahoma was a source of pride. Now, it’s a liability.

I did get a little excited when Nestle, one of the biggest food companies in the world, unceremoniously dumped Mark Schneider as its CEO yesterday. Schneider has been vicious in raising the cost of food since the COVID-19 pandemic, but that hasn’t been enough to satisfy greedy board members. Mind you, don’t look for any prices to drop voluntarily. Nestle is bound and determined to squeeze every cent out of every resource they can find. They are one of the primary reasons Kamala Harris is targeting price gouging in her campaign. Anything bad that happens at Nestle makes me happy.

Space is in the news a couple of times this morning. NASA will announce today whether the Boeing capsule is safe enough to bring its astronauts back home, or if they’re stuck up there until next year. I can only imagine how nerve-wracking this ordeal has been for the two astronauts and their families. The first private spacewalk is on the schedule for next week as SpaceX is sending up a new crew with new technology. There’s definitely reason to be concerned for their safety. In addition to new “slim” spacesuits, there’s no freaking airlock on this spaceship. The fact that one of the “astronauts” is a billionaire probably doesn’t bode well for the crew, either, as the universe seems to have a habit of slapping their egos back into place when they do something stupid. Let’s hope this doesn’t end in tragedy.

The sadistic side of me is laughing at a story in this morning’s New York Times. It seems that as women continue to make great strides, now earning more college degrees and being the breadwinners for their families, Many Gen Z men feel left behind. Actually, it’s pretty much those young men without college degrees who are complaining. They feel that the economic odds are stacked against them. As a result, they’re turning to the excuse-maker-in-chief, the Orange Felon, as their hope for the future. They want a more “traditional” patriarchy, with all the misogyny and sexism that their grandfathers exploited. Perhaps you can understand why I’d just as soon give the bunch of them a middle-finger salute.

Okay, there’s too much to do today for me to continue sitting here. There’s still plenty to read this weekend, so enjoy the time where you can!

Current Issues / Morning Update / News & Comment / Personal / Politics / science / Social Commentary

Morning Update: 08/13/24

August 13, 2024

How well do you know your kids? As parents, we want to think that we know our kids pretty well. We’ve taught them what to do in different situations and we’ve seen how they’ve reacted to surprise and change. Yet, all that can disappear in a moment when you get a text from the school saying, “Your child is marked present to school, but absent from advisory. Please talk with them about following their assigned schedule.” That hit my phone at 12:15 yesterday afternoon. Fortunately, I was awake and able to respond quickly.

“Why are you marked absent from advisory?” I messaged her. Sure, they’re not supposed to have their phones out at school, but I assumed that if she was skipping for some reason she would at least take her phone with her.

What was eventually revealed was that one of her friends, the one that took her to the far Saturday night, had gotten sick. Part of her message said, “…I had to watch him literally empty his stomach which was literally only water. I was scared for him.” We chatted briefly and soon after that I got a call from her support coach. She confirmed Tipper’s account and said that Tipper’s level of empathy left her exhausted. The coach recommended we pick her up. Unfortunately, Kat was booked and, of course, I had no way to go get her. Kat gave her permission to leave early and ride the bus home.

When she got home, I gave her a big hug, she cried a bit, and then she went to lie down.

Yeah, this is our child. We’re proud of her. And while her absence will be probably unexcused, her continuing education in caring about other people is just as important. Her empathy is immense and learning how to respond in a caring and appropriate way is more important than immersive Spanish.

Situations like this, however, are why I’m infuriated that women don’t have complete autonomy over their own bodies. The Associated Press ran a story yesterday about how hospital emergency rooms are turning women away despite federal law requiring them to be treated because of punitive state laws promising severe penalties, including long jail sentences if they end a pregnancy for any reason. This is the direct result of allowing Republicans to be in charge of anything. This also emphasizes why it is just as important to vote for Democrats down ballot as well as at the federal level.

We’re at this point where doctors and hospital administrators are afraid to do their jobs because we were lazy at the ballot and let Republicans win. We’re okay with autonomous cars, autonomous volocopters, and autonomous robots, but not autonomous women? As much as we can’t let Republicans grab control of Congress and the White House, we must wrestle control of state houses away from them as well. At the state level, dangerous plans such as Project 2025 are more likely to be successfully implemented. States are more likely to gut education systems, prohibit the teaching of critical race theory, eliminate DEI programs, ban books, limit or eliminate medical funding for poor and elderly people, cut or eliminate food assistance programs, and generally make the world a less tolerable place to live.

I find it interesting that both presidential candidates and President Biden support cutting taxes on tips, but no one’s talking about the fact that the minimum wage for servers remains at the bottom of the barrel where their work is being exploited by restaurant owners. Perhaps we’d rather have a nation where teens are so hopeless and angry that they don helmets and bulletproof vests and then randomly stab people.

The US stands at a tipping point. How we vote in this fall’s election will drastically shape the future and no one is going to be more affected than our children. What happens if empaths like Tipper help a trans friend get the gender-affirming medical care they need? That’s on the ballot this fall. What happens if schools provide a safe space for LGBTQ+ students? That’s on the ballot this fall. What happens if the rules requiring overtime pay are gone? That’s on the ballot this fall. What happens if water becomes undrinkable? That’s on the ballot this fall. What happens when people lose the right to organize at work? That’s on the ballot this fall. What happens when 48 million women lose access to contraception? That’s on the ballot this fall.

Are you beginning to get the picture? This year’s election is much more than winning the White House, which we must do. We have to win at the state and local level as well. Otherwise, living conditions in the US will inevitably suffer. Labor shortages will become common. Safety at every level will decline. More police violence as training programs are cut. Less aid for small businesses after a weather disaster. It’s all on the ballot this year.

Yes, there’s a lot of other news this morning, including the disastrous interview between Elon Musk and the Orange Felon. But you know what? Almost every issue comes down to how you vote this fall. Israel/Gaza. Russia/Ukraine. Global warming. Space exploration. Almost every corner of the globe is going to feel the effects of your vote.

Let’s not let up on the focus on this election. Even when the news seems positive, we must continue pushing all the way through November. Remember, a week before the 2016 election, polls held a 93% certainty that Hillary Clinton was going to win. We see how horribly that turned out. Apathy is a killer. We must keep up the pressure and make sure everyone votes.

We have great kids. Let’s not give them a shitty country.

Cancer Update / Current Issues / Morning Update / News & Comment / Personal / science / Social Commentary

Morning Update: 08/11/24

August 11, 2024

If I were a church-going person, and I’m not, I would be struggling this morning. Tipper did end up going with her school friend to the fair, but it was almost 7:00 PM before they picked her up and they stayed until the fair closed at 11:00. The trip almost didn’t happen. Her friend was dependent on their mother to drive and Mom didn’t seem to feel the same urgency the kids did. Tipper was close to canceling when she finally got the message that they were on their way.

It was almost midnight when she got home, and, of course, I couldn’t go to sleep until I knew she was back safely. She was excited, having won a stuffed elephant and purchased a unique water bottle. She wanted to pet all the cats and talk about the trip, so it was after 12:30 this morning before I crawled under the covers. I’m only awake now because the cats are on a schedule and demand to be fed on time. The dogs need to go out before I type the next paragraph.

[Hoo boy. Took the dogs out for about 10 minutes. Tipper joined me and we talked more about the fair. When we came back in, though, I was hit with really strong dizziness that has yet to go away. I’m sitting down and am safe for now, but if this doesn’t get better I’ll have to cut things short.]

G spent a large part of yesterday sprawled across his bed doing math; multiplying polynomials, specifically. What are polynomials? They’re letters and numbers all mixed up and doing stuff. Technically, an expression which is composed of variables, constants, and exponents, that are combined using mathematical operations such as addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division. You know, the kind of math that causes mere mortals to go insane. G was doing them on purpose. All morning. He then took a long nap cuddled with a cat. He likes it when the house is quiet. He also likes it when he’s not forced to interact with anyone else. So, I’m guessing it was a pretty good day for him, too.

I’m not seeing a lot of news this morning that warrants any comment. Of course, I’m sure there are people who are upset that Jordan Chiles has to return her bronze medal. I get it, but the Romanians were quick to challenge the decision and the matter was adjudicated by a court, so I’m not surprised. I’m not saying it’s fair, but I’m not surprised.

With the Olympics ending today, all eyes turn next to Los Angeles for the 2028 Summer Games. LA is already making the games interesting by announcing that the entire Olympic venue will only be accessible by public transportation. No cars. Given how horrid LA traffic is, I can see where this decision makes sense. They’re going to have to greatly improve their transit system, though, if they want things to go smoothly. Like many urban transit systems, the vehicles are dirty, smelly, and unreliable. If they don’t step up their game considerably, the whole thing could be a disaster.

However, there could be some alternatives. If you were watching early this morning, US time, you might have gotten a glimpse at the Volocopter, an autonomous air taxi, as it provided a test flight over Paris. They couldn’t get all the paperwork done in time for the service to be available for these games, but backers are anxiously hoping to have the service operational for the LA Games. I see some challenges, to be sure, but they have four years to work those out. Tesla’s autonomous taxis, though, still won’t be allowed even if they work without killing someone or blowing up.

The New York Times is boring today as well, which is disappointing. Normally, I head straight for the Times Magazine, but it’s a rare yawner today. There is an interesting article about the “orgasm gap” that women still experience but I would have liked a little more science and depth to the piece. So much of what I’m seeing seems redundant, remixed leftovers from what we’ve been reading all week. Even the opinion pieces feel “meh.”

Maybe I’m just difficult to please.

I’m still not feeling great, though. I may go back to bed after checking in with the kids. I should probably check my blood pressure, too.

There’s always something wrong. Fucking cancer.

Current Issues / Morning Update / News & Comment / Personal / science / Social Commentary

Morning Update: 08/10/24

August 10, 2024

Here it is 7:30 AM, I’m just sitting down to write, and there’s no other sound in the house. Kat and both kids are still asleep. Animals are all asleep except for Belvedere lying here on the bed watching me, wondering when he’s going to get breakfast. This is the tone set for the weekend. I think Tipper may have tentative plans with a friend but I’m not sure. She came in from school and crashed hard. G is, unsurprisingly, planning on getting some schoolwork done. He’s still a bit upset at how long it took them to get started. Kat will go to the salon and then head North for the weekend. I’m just here in case of an emergency.

It’s a chilly 57 degrees outside at the moment. Skies are clear. Not much different than 2:00 AM when the dogs decided they needed to go out. That’s really my own fault. Normally, I take the dogs out for the last time around 8-8:30 in the evening. That typically gets them through until 6:00 the next morning. I fell asleep shortly after 7:00 last night, though, which didn’t give them a chance to go out that last time. Thus, come 2:00, someone was needing to go pee quite badly. I slipped on my shoes and took them out only to be surprised by how cool it was. I’ll have a jacket on when I take them out again this morning.

Weekends like this are for reading and there’s plenty to read. Of course, dominating headlines this morning is the crash of an ATR 72 twin-engine turboprop in Sao Paulo, Brazil. This is a story you’ll want to come back to off and on over the weekend as more details become known. All that’s certain at the moment is that the plane went into a flat spin before crashing inside a gated community, killing the 61 souls on board.

We’re also just finding out that a Serbian competitor in the CrossFit Games died while competing in a swimming event Thursday morning at a Texas lake. Again, details are sketchy. An official with the Fort Worth Fire Department said they were called out around 8 a.m. to assist police because there was “a participant in the water that was down and hadn’t been seen in some point in time.” No cause of death has been given and CrossFit isn’t answering any questions.

Boxer Imane Khelif won gold to cap an Olympics marked by scrutiny over her sex. After all the ridiculous fuss, it only seems fitting that she should walk away with the top prize. Sha’carri Richardson was able to finally capture her first gold as the anchor in the women’s 4×100 relay. But 60-year-old swimmer Jim Dreyer apparently gave up after two days trying to cross Lake Michigan. Actually, no one’s sure exactly what happened. Dreyer isn’t responding to questions and the U.S. Coast Guard confirmed he’s no longer in the water.

Making Mars inhabitable seems to be a big issue this morning. The easy-to-digest version is on Reuters’ home page, but the more scientific version is in this week’s Science magazine. What it all boils down to is the possibility that soil samples from the planet can possibly be used to make rods that would warm the planet enough for it to terraform itself. Don’t hold your breath, though, Elon. Even in the best possible conditions, we’re still decades away from even thinking about putting people up there.

There’s an interesting feature in this morning’s New York Times that has cool graphics to go with it if you read it online. It seems that China has been building new villages and relocating people to live all along its Western border, including some disputed territories with India. This is interesting for a number of reasons. One, it feels an awful lot like it did when Israel first did the same thing along its West Bank border, and we see how disastrously that plan worked. Two, the previously uninhabited regions were uninhabited for a damn good reason. Villages in the Himalayas are subject to severe winters with roads impassible several months of the year. Other areas are too rocky for any type of agriculture to take place. China is digging in, though, saying that the towns are critical to the country’s defense. The article is worth the read.

Everything else this morning is war and politics and I’m not inclined to give any more oxygen to those situations when those who could do something constructive sit on their hands or make the situation worse.

I’m crossing my fingers for a nice, quiet weekend. We’ll see if that’s possible.

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Morning Update: 08/02/24

August 2, 2024

Rain, rain, everywhere, rain. The lawn may never get mowed at this rate. At least not before temperatures are back up in the 90s next week. We had so much rain yesterday, that a part of Interstate 465, which goes around the perimeter of the city, was flooded and stopped traffic at rush hour. You can imagine the mess and backup that caused. There was more rain off and on throughout the night and there’s a pretty decent chance we’ll see more this afternoon/evening before a low-pressure system moves through. That could make things a little dicey if you’re planning on hitting the Foghat show on the free stage at the Indiana State Fair tonight. Personally, I’ll be staying in, close to the bed, ready to curl up and metaphorically die. Again.

Between downpours yesterday afternoon, G helped me move some things out to the curb for heavy trash pickup that is, allegedly, supposed to happen today. In theory, the first Friday of every month is supposed to be heavy trash pickup, but for both June and July, that Friday fell on the week of a holiday, which pushed normal trash pickup out a day. For whatever reason, when that happens there is no heavy trash pickup. Of the things we set out, scavengers picked up the old refrigerator that died back in May. Good luck getting the damn thing to work, guys. We’ll see how long it takes for the rest of the stuff to disappear.

Tipper is proving to be a good friend. When her new furry friend was pulled out of class for an IEP evaluation, she was asked to sit in the room with him to help him stay calm. They’ve created a very fast bond that allows them to watch out for each other and be each other’s confidant. Someone tugged at Tipper’s tail yesterday and word got back to the school’s Dean. He promptly facilitated an apology from the student responsible, something that Tipper was not expecting. Again, this strongly reaffirms our decision that PPHS is the best high school for her. Her first week has been surprisingly positive all around.

Not every school is as safe as PPHS. Topping local news this morning is the story of yet another teacher/pastor being arrested for producing child porn. Seriously, is no one catching the trend here? The number of cases of sexual assault and child porn being committed by pastors and other church leaders has been off the freakin’ charts! I know pedophilia is a big issue among conservatives, but people, the problem is not with drag queens or trans people. The problem is right there in your own churches! Wake up and smell the bullshit! Just two days ago, Christian Post announced that one of the founding elders of Gateway megachurch was forced to leave amid allegations of child sexual abuse. Increasingly, it’s becoming obvious that the least safe place for your children is at church!

There’s bad news from the American Cancer Society this morning. A study published in Lancet Public Health shows that cancer rates among Gen X and Millenials are increasing, sometimes dramatically, for 17 different cancers. No one seems to be able to understand why. What is especially bothersome is several of these cancers have been in decline among older people. Specifically, the increases in the following cancers are disturbing:

Colorectal
Endometrial
Non-cardia gastric
Gallbladder
Ovarian
Testicular
Anal
Estrogen-receptor-positive breast cancers
HIV-linked cancer called Kaposi sarcoma

Endometrial cancer is not only the fastest growing in terms of diagnosis, but it’s also the highest in terms of mortality. This shit is kinda scary, kids! With there being no firm explanation for why these cancers are increasing within these two age groups, you’re pretty much on your own in convincing your doctor to screen for tests. Don’t be afraid to stand up and advocate for yourself!

Of course, the big news this morning is the Russia-US prisoner swap that happened early this morning. It’s the largest post-Soviet prisoner swap to date and has been forever in the making (almost two years). You’d think that this would be something everyone would agree is a good thing. Nope. The Orange Felon has decided that the prisoner swap was “bad.” The guy who hates cat ladies is desperately trying to give the Orange Felon undeserved credit for the swap. If you haven’t figured it out by now, the GOP knows no low that they’re not willing to exploit in this election. The head of the GOP in Kansas has vowed to rid the state of the “Democrat infestation.” They’re grasping at straws as the Felon’s own words are rapidly sinking the ship. There’s little question in my mind that the hate speech coming from the right side of the aisle is just getting started. Race, gender, and even Judaism are being set up as targets. This is going to get nasty.

The situation in Venezuela isn’t likely to get better soon. The US has officially recognized opposition candidate Gonzalez as the winner. Maduro still swears that he won, and is likely to manipulate the courts to keep control. Expect more chaos there over the weekend.

If you travel with your kids, you’ll be interested to know that a proposed US rule would ban airlines from charging parents additional fees to sit with their children. Why this isn’t already a rule doesn’t make any sense to me, but then, the airline industry as a whole strikes me as being rather clueless. If you’re traveling anywhere remotely close to the Middle East, though, you might want to check with your carrier. More airlines are either canceling or diverting flights over what are considered dangerous regions. Tensions are high as it seems almost certain that the entire area is about to blow up.

Oh, this just popped up: Police are investigating hate speech targeting the Olympics opening ceremony artistic director Thomas Jolly. It doesn’t seem to matter how many times he tries to explain that there was no intended mimicry of DaVinci’s “The Last Supper,” right-wing idiots around the world are still issuing death threats, public insults, and defamation at a level that is illegal in France. This just further proves how intolerant, weird, and frankly, stupid the far-right is no matter which country they’re in.

Ugh. Why has this taken so long to write? Well, there might have been a rabbit hole or two along the way. When one consumes as much news as I do, it’s easy to become distracted. Let’s get on with our Friday, shall we?

Party on!

Cancer Update / Current Issues / Morning Update / News & Comment / Personal / Politics / science / Social Commentary

Morning Update: 07/26/24

July 26, 2024

How Many Of These Pictures Are You Going To Take? [2019]

Exhaustion reigns as I’ve completely over-extended myself this week. If there’s a theme for today, it’s “Leave me the fuck alone.” Not that I can even hold to that because I have a doctor’s appointment this afternoon, which will, once again, come right in the middle of nap time. It’s one thing to go a day or two without naps, but we’ve missed them three out of the four previous days this week. I came in from getting the kids set up for school yesterday and collapsed onto the bed, not getting up except for necessities. I’m not doing my body any favors by keeping this kind of schedule.

The kids are as set for school as they can be. It still seems odd that neither of them has a supplies list that has to be purchased. Most everything they do is on their school-supplied Chromebooks, so as long as they keep those charged they have what they need. Tipper was especially excited to meet some of her teachers yesterday. She especially likes her math teacher, who is also her advisor, and her biology teacher, who is also her support coach. She has almost too much in common with the support coach, including a love for art and colorful language. The coach actually has a wood medallion with the word “fuck” burned into it hanging next to her desk. She and Tipper are going to get along just fine. Tipper also signed up for the robotics club which may end up being something that makes her brother a little jealous.

I forgot to get a picture of G yesterday, though. By the time we finished getting his things in order, I was struggling to stay upright and forgot all about it. There are some changes in the Lab program this year that give them more space, hot meals from Cafe Patachou (a Lab partner), and a little more direction as to when certain tasks need to be completed. There was some exciting news as his advisory coach got married over the summer! Some technical issues still linger as the legal status of the Lab changed a little, but none of those issues directly affect the students, so we’ll let the administrators work out those bugs.

At the same time, there were these signs that the kids are growing up whether I like it or not. Tipper’s boyfriend showed up while we were at the school and she ended up spending the afternoon with him (with his mom keeping a close watch). They’re going on a sort of date on Saturday evening as well. I have this sinking feeling that this is going to be a more common occurrence than I’m ready to endure. G’s coach was talking strongly with him about college and what he wants to do with his education. That’s a conversation I can’t even participate in because the world he’s looking at holds practically no resemblance to the one in which I reside. My experience is of no practical use to him. I’m glad he has guidance that is better informed than what I had.

My disturbing dreams last night were all apocalyptic so perhaps it is no surprise that I woke this morning to the news that the trains running to Paris have been sabotaged by arson. That is still an ongoing situation so there’s not a great deal of information that is truly reliable. As these Olympics are perhaps the most politically charged since the end of the Cold War, it’s not surprising that something happened. Fortunately, it appears that no one was critically injured. Security is extremely high for the event, though, and especially for its opening parade down the River Seine. We’re going to cross our fingers that everyone stays safe. The last thing we need is a repeat of the 1972 games.

Speaking of security, the Secret Service has to be struggling to keep up. Not only are they without a leader now, but the advent of Kamala Harris to the top of the ticket presents a whole new bundle of security issues that they have to cover. The simple fact that she’s both a woman and a person of color riles a lot of backward-thinking people who can’t begin to accept the idea of the President being anything other than an old Christian white man. Harris’ religious leanings are broad and she certainly seemed to have no trouble telling Netanyahu that he needs to end the Gaza war immediately. All of that gets under the skin of the good ol’ boys’ club and the Secret Service is struggling to make the necessary adjustments to keep the Vice President safe.

Following the theme of religion, remember that whole dust-up about Oklahoma’s state school superintendent requiring schools to teach Bible stuff? At least eight of the state’s larger school districts have said, “Nope, not gonna do it.” Critical to this decision seems to be a memorandum to the state school districts from the Center for Education Law advising them that the superintendent’s statement is illegal under state law, which already allows for voluntary religious education. If you’re wondering whether any of this is a reflection of Project 2025, be aware that there’s no direct link between the two. However, the superintendent’s position certainly falls within the attitude and intent of the conservative plan for dominating government at every level.

Also, be aware that the Orange Felon is attempting to brand VP Harris as a Marxist. Why anyone would take the word of a felon, I don’t know, but there seem to be a few million lemmings who are repeating this rhetoric. If you’re not familiar with the economic and political ideas of Karl Marx and Frederick Engles, you might want to read up on the concept. On the surface, anyone fed up with the inequality of Capitalism may find Marxism interesting. The felon’s comments are likely based on the idea that Harris is committed to addressing inequality and fighting for the rights of the working class, both of which are strong Marxist pillars. However, the devil’s in the details and the VP is most certainly not a Marxist. Take the time to do the reading, please.

Finally, remember those two astronauts sent to the International Space Station aboard a Boeing capsule? Yeah, they’re still there and there’s still no timetable for getting them back home. If you’ve ever taken a trip and had trouble scheduling a flight back home, perhaps you can commiserate with the two astronauts. They’re more than a month late getting back. Fortunately, this counts as a business trip so they don’t have to explain to their bosses why they haven’t been in the office for a while.

That’s all I’ve got. The dogs are back to sleep and I’m considering joining them. Sleeping is the safest thing I can do right now.

Current Issues / Long Read / Mythology / News & Comment / Personal / Politics / science / Social Commentary

Let’s Talk: Common Sense From Founding Fathers

July 20, 2024

Ignoring The Disaster [2011 original image with AI background]

WARNING: some people may find the following content offensive. If they don’t, then I’ve missed the mark. I’ve sat quietly, more or less, for a whole week without going on any diatribes about how absolutely ludicrous it is to pay any attention to the Orange Felon, let alone follow him. There has been an absolute sea of misinformation on both sides and I’d really rather not wade into the muck and mire that is being perpetrated by those who genuinely want to see our country fail. I’ve had enough, though, and there are some things I think we need to straighten out. Fortunately, there were stupid people around during the American Revolution as well, so the Founding Fathers had plenty to say about many of the issues we’re still fighting over today.

One of the things precipitating this post was an item posted on Facebook by a group called Heavens Army For America. As far as I can tell, they’re no legal entity and it honestly looks like the work of one person, possibly even a bot. What brought them to my attention, however, was one of their posts was shared by a person I once respected. The post takes Leviticus 8, specifically verses 22-24, wildly out of context and claims that the blood coming from the right ear of the Felon is a symbol of his consecration by God. I saw the post and wanted to throw up.

First of all, Leviticus chapters 8-14 focus on one thing and one thing only: The consecration of Aaron and his sons as priests. Painful detail is taken in describing this multi-day event that involves the slaughter of multiple animals and the placing of blood on the lobe of the right ear, the thumb of his right hand, and the big toe of his right foot. This was done for Aaron only as a high priest, not his sons. The sons merely had blood sprinkled on their garments. If there is any correlation to be drawn between this and the attempted assassination of the political ass, and there isn’t, but if there were, it would only be for the establishment of a high priest for a temple located in a desert. There’s nothing here that equates to the deity in charge choosing a President for the United States some 6,000 years in the future.

Second, to believe such nonsense demonstrates an incredible level of Biblical naivete. In fact, after looking at the passage of scripture in multiple mistranslations (Christians are especially bad at translating ancient Hebrew texts), the only way one can jump to such a ludicrous conclusion as to think that there is relevance in the passage for anyone living today, regardless of their ambition, is to completely cast aside all historical context and read it as a far-fetched futuristic fairy tale! There’s no intelligence here! There’s no authority here! There’s no textual understanding here! This is all fabricated nonsense designed to pander to conservative Christians from Red Oak, Oklahoma who dream about the United States having a king.

A king? Honestly? We’re going to talk about the US having any kind of system that resembles a monarchy or any other type of system that defies democracy? What part of the Constitution are these people not understanding? How in the world does any intelligent person, or even semi-intelligent person, read the Declaration of Independence and think for one second that any type of authoritarian rule is what is best for the United States?

“Well, the Founders said…”

Shut the fuck up. You don’t have a fucking clue what the Founders said if you’re falling for this claptrap. Let’s take a look at what the Founders really had to say and LET’S TAKE IT IN THE FUCKING CONTEXT IN WHICH IT WAS WRITTEN!

Let’s start with Thomas Paine’s introduction to the pamphlet that was the metaphorical match lighting the dynamite of the American Revolution. Paine wrote:

Of the origin and design of government in general. With concise remarks on the English constitution.

SOME writers have so confounded society with government, as to leave little or no distinction between them; whereas they are not only different, but have different origins. Society is produced by our wants, and government by our wickedness; the former promotes our happiness positively by uniting our affections, the latter negatively by restraining our vices. The one encourages intercourse, the other creates distinctions. The first is a patron, the last a punisher.

Society in every state is a blessing, but government even in its best state is but a necessary evil; in its worst state an intolerable one; for when we suffer, or are exposed to the same miseries by a government, which we might expect in a country without government, our calamity is heightened by reflecting that we furnish the means by which we suffer. – Government, like dress, is the badge of lost innocence; the palaces of kings are built on the ruins of the bowers of paradise. For were the impulses of conscience clear, uniform, and irresistibly obeyed, man would need no other lawgiver; but that not being the case, he finds it necessary to surrender up a part of his property to furnish means for the protection of the rest; and this he is induced to do by the same prudence which in every other case advises him out of two evils to choose the least. Wherefore, security being the true design and end of government, it unanswerably follows that whatever form thereof appears most likely to ensure it to us, with the least expence and greatest benefit, is preferable to all others.

I especially like that part about, “The one encourages intercourse, the other creates distinctions.” By all means, can we please go with the side that encourages intercourse? Of course, I know Paine was not making a sexual reference (or was he?), but his point is far from lost. A restrictive government, however necessary in some situations, tramples on the general freedoms of good people to restrain the actions of bad people. The more authoritarian a Government is, the more freedoms are lost. The more power a Government claims for itself, the fewer rights exist for the people it governs.

What the GOP is currently proposing in their platform is a government so ardently authoritative that even King George III, as mad as he was, looks generous by comparison. What we see on page after page of Project 2025 is not the freedom to build an open society as the Founders intended, but rather, one tightly glued to the worship of a deity that never has existed, never will exist, and if it did exist would be despised by all. Sure, they’re using the language and literature of Christianity, but those with a scholastic understanding of the texts understand that what Republicans propose hardly brushes the shade of anything intended by the Bible or its characters.

So, it’s not the least bit surprising that when we examine the words of the Founders themselves, we’re more likely to find contempt for Christianity than an open embracing of the religion. Don’t believe me? Let’s take a look at more than one or two cherry-picked examples.

“Shake off all the fears of servile prejudices, under which weak minds are servilely crouched. Fix reason firmly in her seat, and call on her tribunal for every fact, every opinion. Question with boldness even the existence of a God; because, if there be one, he must more approve of the homage of reason than that of blindfolded fear.”
-Thomas Jefferson, letter to Peter Carr, August 10, 1787

“Christianity is the most perverted system that ever shone on man.”
-Thomas Jefferson

“A professorship of theology should have no place in our institution”
-Thomas Jefferson

“The priests of the different religious sects… dread the advance of science as witches do the approach of daylight, and scowl on the fatal harbinger announcing the subdivision of the duperies on which they live.”
– Thomas Jefferson, Letter to Correa de Serra, April 11, 1820

“Religions are all alike – founded upon fables and mythologies.”
– Thomas Jefferson

Yeah, Jefferson had a lot to say on the subject. Here’s more:

“Millions of innocent men, women and children, since the introduction of Christianity, have been burnt, tortured, fined and imprisoned; yet we have not advanced one inch towards uniformity.”
-Thomas Jefferson, Notes on Virginia, 1782

“But it does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods or no God. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg.”
-Thomas Jefferson, Notes on Virginia, 1782

“Where the preamble declares, that coercion is a departure from the plan of the holy author of our religion, an amendment was proposed by inserting “Jesus Christ,” so that it would read “A departure from the plan of Jesus Christ, the holy author of our religion;” the insertion was rejected by the great majority, in proof that they meant to comprehend, within the mantle of its protection, the Jew and the Gentile, the Christian and Mohammedan, the Hindoo and Infidel of every denomination.”
-Thomas Jefferson, Autobiography, in reference to the Virginia Act for Religious Freedom

“I concur with you strictly in your opinion of the comparative merits of atheism and demonism, and really see nothing but the latter in the being worshipped by many who think themselves Christians.”
-Thomas Jefferson, letter to Richard Price, Jan. 8, 1789 (Richard Price had written to him on Oct. 26th about the harm done by religion and wrote “Would not Society be better without Such religions? Is Atheism less pernicious than Demonism?”)

“I never submitted the whole system of my opinions to the creed of any party of men whatever in religion, in philosophy, in politics, or in anything else where I was capable of thinking for myself. Such an addiction is the last degradation of a free and moral agent.”
-Thomas Jefferson, letter to Francis Hopkinson, March 13, 1789

“I am for freedom of religion, and against all maneuvers to bring about a legal ascendancy of one sect over another.”
-Thomas Jefferson, letter to Elbridge Gerry, 26 January 1799

“They [the clergy] believe that any portion of power confided to me, will be exerted in opposition to their schemes. And they believe rightly; for I have sworn upon the altar of god, eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man. But this is all they have to fear from me: and enough, too, in their opinion.”
-Thomas Jefferson to Dr. Benjamin Rush, Sept. 23, 1800

“Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between man and his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legislative powers of government reach actions only, and not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should ‘make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,’ thus building a wall of separation between church and State.”
-Thomas Jefferson, letter to Danbury Baptist Association, CT., Jan. 1, 1802

Now, read this next one quite carefully, please. He’s talking to a congregation of Baptists in what has always been a conservative and highly religious state.

“Because religious belief, or non-belief, is such an important part of every person’s life, freedom of religion affects every individual. State churches that use government power to support themselves and force their views on persons of other faiths undermine all our civil rights. Moreover, state support of the church tends to make the clergy unresponsive to the people and leads to corruption within religion. Erecting the “wall of separation between church and state,” therefore, is absolutely essential in a free society. We have solved … the great and interesting question whether freedom of religion is compatible with order in government and obedience to the laws. And we have experienced the quiet as well as the comfort which results from leaving every one to profess freely and openly those principles of religion which are the inductions of his own reason and the serious convictions of his own inquiries.”

Those statements were made in 1808 and throughout the rest of his life, Jefferson never let up. Here’s some more:

“History, I believe, furnishes no example of a priest-ridden people maintaining a free civil government. This marks the lowest grade of ignorance of which their civil as well as religious leaders will always avail themselves for their own purposes.”
-Thomas Jefferson to Alexander von Humboldt, Dec. 6, 1813

“The whole history of these books [the Gospels] is so defective and doubtful that it seems vain to attempt minute enquiry into it: and such tricks have been played with their text, and with the texts of other books relating to them, that we have a right, from that cause, to entertain much doubt what parts of them are genuine. In the New Testament there is internal evidence that parts of it have proceeded from an extraordinary man; and that other parts are of the fabric of very inferior minds. It is as easy to separate those parts, as to pick out diamonds from dunghills.”
-Thomas Jefferson, letter to John Adams, January 24, 1814

“Christianity neither is, nor ever was a part of the common law.”
-Thomas Jefferson, letter to Dr. Thomas Cooper, February 10, 1814

“In every country and in every age, the priest has been hostile to liberty. He is always in alliance with the despot, abetting his abuses in return for protection to his own.”
-Thomas Jefferson, letter to Horatio G. Spafford, March 17, 1814
[Note: Horatio G. Spafford was the Presbyterian minister best known for writing the hymn It Is Well With My Soul. Mr. Jefferson didn’t seem to care about the pastor’s relative popularity.]

“If we did a good act merely from love of God and a belief that it is pleasing to Him, whence arises the morality of the Atheist? …Their virtue, then, must have had some other foundation than the love of God.”
-Thomas Jefferson, letter to Thomas Law, June 13, 1814

Remember this quote, and feel free to use it, the next time someone complains that you’re being too hostile in your argument against Republicans:

“Ridicule is the only weapon which can be used against unintelligible propositions. Ideas must be distinct before reason can act upon them; and no man ever had a distinct idea of the trinity. It is the mere Abracadabra of the mountebanks calling themselves the priests of Jesus.”
-Thomas Jefferson, letter to Francis Adrian Van der Kemp, 30 July, 1816
[A “mountebank” is a person who deceives others, especially in order to trick them out of their money; a charlatan.]

“My opinion is that there would never have been an infidel, if there had never been a priest. The artificial structures they have built on the purest of all moral systems, for the purpose of deriving from it pence and power, revolts those who think for themselves, and who read in that system only what is really there.”
-Thomas Jefferson, letter to Mrs. Samuel H. Smith, August 6, 1816

“You say you are a Calvinist. I am not. I am of a sect by myself, as far as I know.”
-Thomas Jefferson, letter to Ezra Stiles Ely, June 25, 1819

“As you say of yourself, I too am an Epicurian. I consider the genuine (not the imputed) doctrines of Epicurus as containing everything rational in moral philosophy which Greece and Rome have left us.”
-Thomas Jefferson, letter to William Short, Oct. 31, 1819
[Epicurus and his disciples believed either there were no gods or, if there were, the gods were so remote from humans that they were not worth worrying about. Similarly, humans would not have to worry about the afterlife. Instead, humans should live by maximizing their pleasure. You can read more about the doctrines of Epicurus here.]

“Man once surrendering his reason, has no remaining guard against absurdities the most monstrous, and like a ship without rudder, is the sport of every wind.”
-Thomas Jefferson to James Smith, 1822.

Among the sayings and discourses imputed to him [Jesus] by his biographers, I find many passages of fine imagination, correct morality, and of the most lovely benevolence; and others again of so much ignorance, so much absurdity, so much untruth, charlatanism, and imposture, as to pronounce it impossible that such contradictions should have proceeded from the same being.”
-Thomas Jefferson, letter to William Short, April 13, 1820

“I can never join Calvin in addressing his god. He was indeed an Atheist, which I can never be; or rather his religion was Daemonism. If ever man worshiped a false god, he did.”
-Thomas Jefferson, letter to John Adams, April 11, 1823

“And the day will come when the mystical generation of Jesus, by the supreme being as his father in the womb of a virgin will be classed with the fable of the generation of Minerve in the brain of Jupiter. But may we hope that the dawn of reason and freedom of thought in these United States will do away with this artificial scaffolding, and restore to us the primitive and genuine doctrines of this most venerated reformer of human errors.”
-Thomas Jefferson, Letter to John Adams, April 11, 1823

“It is between fifty and sixty years since I read it [the Apocalypse], and I then considered it merely the ravings of a maniac, no more worthy nor capable of explanation than the incoherences of our own nightly dreams.”
-Thomas Jefferson, letter to General Alexander Smyth, Jan. 17, 1825

“May it be to the world, what I believe it will be, (to some parts sooner, to others later, but finally to all,) the signal of arousing men to burst the chains under which monkish ignorance and superstition had persuaded them to bind themselves, and to assume the blessings and security of self-government. All eyes are opened, or opening, to the rights of man. The general spread of the light of science has already laid open to every view the palpable truth, that the mass of mankind has not been born with saddles on their backs, nor a favored few booted and spurred, ready to ride them legitimately, by the grace of God.”
-Thomas Jefferson, letter to Roger C. Weightman, June 24, 1826 (in the last letter he penned)

Those comments alone should be enough to put away any argument about the United States being founded by Christian men with Christian principles. But, just in case there’s any lingering doubt, here are the opinions of additional founders.

“Persecution is not an original feature in any religion; but it is always the strongly marked feature of all religions established by law. Take away the law-establishment, and every religion re-assumes its original benignity.”
– Thomas Paine, The Rights of Man, 1791

“The legislature of the United States shall pass no law on the subject of religion.”
– Charles Pinckney, Constitutional Convention, 1787

“The American states have gone far in assisting the progress of truth; but they have stopped short of perfection. They ought to have given every honest citizen an equal right to enjoy his religion and an equal title to all civil emoluments, without obliging him to tell his religion. Every interference of the civil power in regulating opinion, is an impious attempt to take the business of the Deity out of his own hands; and every preference given to any religious denomination, is so far slavery and bigotry.”
– Noah Webster, calling for no religious tests to serve in public office, Sketches of American Policy, 1785

“Some very worthy persons, who have not had great advantages for information, have objected against that clause in the constitution which provides, that no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States. They have been afraid that this clause is unfavorable to religion. But my countrymen, the sole purpose and effect of it is to exclude persecution, and to secure to you the important right of religious liberty. We are almost the only people in the world, who have a full enjoyment of this important right of human nature. In our country every man has a right to worship God in that way which is most agreeable to his conscience. If he be a good and peaceable person he is liable to no penalties or incapacities on account of his religious sentiments; or in other words, he is not subject to persecution. But in other parts of the world, it has been, and still is, far different. Systems of religious error have been adopted, in times of ignorance. It has been the interest of tyrannical kings, popes, and prelates, to maintain these errors. When the clouds of ignorance began to vanish, and the people grew more enlightened, there was no other way to keep them in error, but to prohibit their altering their religious opinions by severe persecuting laws. In this way persecution became general throughout Europe.”
– Oliver Ellsworth [Philip B Kurland and Ralph Lerner (eds.), The Founder’s Constitution, University of Chicago Press, 1987, Vol. 4, p.638]

Knowledge and liberty are so prevalent in this country, that I do not believe that the United States would ever be disposed to establish one religious sect, and lay all others under legal disabilities. But as we know not what may take place hereafter, and any such test would be exceedingly injurious to the rights of free citizens, I cannot think it altogether superfluous to have added a clause, which secures us from the possibility of such oppression.”
– Oliver Wolcott, Connecticut Ratifying Convention, 9 January 1788

“A man of abilities and character, of any sect whatever, may be admitted to any office or public trust under the United States. I am a friend to a variety of sects, because they keep one another in order. How many different sects are we composed of throughout the United States? How many different sects will be in congress? We cannot enumerate the sects that may be in congress. And there are so many now in the United States that they will prevent the establishment of any one sect in prejudice to the rest, and will forever oppose all attempts to infringe religious liberty. If such an attempt be made, will not the alarm be sounded throughout America? If congress be as wicked as we are foretold they will, they would not run the risk of exciting the resentment of all, or most of the religious sects in America.”
– Edmund Randolph, address to the Virginia Ratifying Convention, June 10, 1788

“It is contrary to the principles of reason and justice that any should be compelled to contribute to the maintenance of a church with which their consciences will not permit them to join, and from which they can derive no benefit; for remedy whereof, and that equal liberty as well religious as civil, may be universally extended to all the good people of this commonwealth.”
– George Mason, Virginia Declaration of Rights, 1776

“In regard to religion, mutual toleration in the different professions thereof is what all good and candid minds in all ages have ever practiced, and both by precept and example inculcated on mankind.”
– Samuel Adams, The Rights of the Colonists (1771)

I especially enjoy this one from a largely overlooked President.

“It is only when the people become ignorant and corrupt, when they degenerate into a populace, that they are incapable of exercising the sovereignty. Usurpation is then an easy attainment, and an usurper soon found. The people themselves become the willing instruments of their own debasement and ruin. Let us, then, look to the great cause, and endeavor to preserve it in full force. Let us by all wise and constitutional measures promote intelligence among the people as the best means of preserving our liberties.”
– James Monroe, First Inaugural Address, March 4, 1817

“Experience witnesseth that ecclesiastical establishments, instead of maintaining the purity and efficacy of religion, have had a contrary operation. During almost fifteen centuries has the legal establishment of Christianity been on trial. What has been its fruits? More or less, in all places, pride and indolence in the clergy; ignorance and servility in the laity; in both, superstition, bigotry and persecution.”
– James Madison, “A Memorial and Remonstrance”, 1785

“What influence, in fact, have ecclesiastical establishments had on society? In some instances they have been seen to erect a spiritual tyranny on the ruins of the civil authority; on many instances they have been seen upholding the thrones of political tyranny; in no instance have they been the guardians of the liberties of the people. Rulers who wish to subvert the public liberty may have found an established clergy convenient auxiliaries. A just government, instituted to secure and perpetuate it, needs them not.”
ibid.

Almost as verbose on the topic as Jefferson was John Adams. The fact that the two were political opponents makes their agreements on these topics all the more powerful. Let’s take a look:

“As I understand the Christian religion, it was, and is, a revelation. But how has it happened that millions of fables, tales, legends, have been blended with both Jewish and Christian revelation that have made them the most bloody religion that ever existed?
– John Adams, letter to F.A. Van der Kamp, Dec. 27, 1816

“l almost shudder at the thought of alluding to the most fatal example of the abuses of grief which the history of mankind has preserved – the Cross. Consider what calamities that engine of grief has produced!”
– John Adams, letter to Thomas Jefferson

“What havoc has been made of books through every century of the Christian era? Where are fifty gospels, condemned as spurious by the bull of Pope Gelasius? Where are the forty wagon-loads of Hebrew manuscripts burned in France, by order of another pope, because suspected of heresy? Remember the ‘index expurgatorius’, the inquisition, the stake, the axe, the halter and the guillotine.”
– John Adams, letter to John Taylor

“The priesthood have, in all ancient nations, nearly monopolized learning. And ever since the Reformation, when or where has existed a Protestant or dissenting sect who would tolerate A FREE INQUIRY? The blackest billingsgate, the most ungentlemanly insolence, the most yahooish brutality, is patiently endured, countenanced, propagated, and applauded. But touch a solemn truth in collision with a dogma of a sect, though capable of the clearest proof, and you will find you have disturbed a nest, and the hornets will swarm about your eyes and hand, and fly into your face and eyes.”
-John Adams, letter to John Taylor

“The United States of America have exhibited, perhaps, the first example of governments erected on the simple principles of nature; and if men are now sufficiently enlightened to disabuse themselves of artifice, imposture, hypocrisy, and superstition, they will consider this event as an era in their history. Although the detail of the formation of the American governments is at present little known or regarded either in Europe or in America, it may hereafter become an object of curiosity. It will never be pretended that any persons employed in that service had interviews with the gods, or were in any degree under the influence of Heaven, more than those at work upon ships or houses, or laboring in merchandise or agriculture; it will forever be acknowledged that these governments were contrived merely by the use of reason and the senses.”
– John Adams, “A Defense of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of America” 1787-1788

“Thirteen governments [of the original states] thus founded on the natural authority of the people alone, without a pretence of miracle or mystery, and which are destined to spread over the northern part of that whole quarter of the globe, are a great point gained in favor of the rights of mankind.”
– John Adams, “A Defense of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of America” (1787-88)

“We should begin by setting conscience free. When all men of all religions shall enjoy equal liberty, property, and an equal chance for honors and power we may expect that improvements will be made in the human character and the state of society.”
– John Adams, letter to Dr. Price, April 8, 1785

Oh, and we dare not forget the senior statement of the Revolution, Benjamin Franklin, who had these words to say:

“Lighthouses are more useful than churches.” – Benjamin Franklin

“If we look back into history for the character of the present sects in Christianity, we shall find few that have not in their turns been persecutors, and complainers of persecution. The primitive Christians thought persecution extremely wrong in the Pagans, but practiced it on one another. The first Protestants of the Church of England blamed persecution in the Romish Church, but practiced it upon the Puritans. They found it wrong in Bishops, but fell into the practice themselves both there (England) and in New England.”
– Benjamin Franklin

“You desire to know something of my religion. It is the first time I have been questioned upon it. But I cannot take your curiosity amiss, and shall endeavour in a few words to gratify it. Here is my creed. I believe in one God, Creator of the Universe. That He governs it by His providence. That He ought to be worshipped. That the most acceptable service we render Him is doing good to His other children. That the soul of man is immortal, and will be treated with justice in another life respecting its conduct in this. These I take to be the fundamental principles of all sound religion, and I regard them as you do in whatever sect I meet with them…

As to Jesus of Nazareth, my opinion of whom you particularly desire, I think the system of Morals and his Religion, as he left them to us, the best the World ever saw or is likely to see; but I apprehend it has received various corrupt changes, and I have, with most of the present Dissenters in England, some doubts as to his divinity; though it is a question I do not dogmatize upon, having never studied it, and think it needless to busy myself with it, when I expect soon an opportunity of knowing the Truth with less trouble. I see no harm, however, in its being believed, if that belief has the good consequence, as probably it has, of making his doctrines more respected and better observed; especially as I do not perceive that the Supreme takes it amiss, by distinguishing the unbelievers in His government of the world with any particular marks of His displeasure…

I shall only add, respecting myself, that, having experienced the goodness of that Being in conducting me prosperously through a long life, I have no doubt of its continuance in the next, without the smallest conceit of meriting it… I confide that you will not expose me to criticism and censure by publishing any part of this communication to you. I have ever let others enjoy their religious sentiments, without reflecting on them for those that appeared to me unsupportable and even absurd. All sects here, and we have a great variety, have experienced my good will in assisting them with subscriptions for building their new places of worship; and, as I never opposed any of their doctrines, I hope to go out of the world in peace with them all.”
– Benjamin Franklin, letter to Ezra Stiles, President of Yale, shortly before his death; from “Benjamin Franklin” by Carl Van Doren, the October 1938 Viking Press edition pages 777-778 Also see Alice J. Hall, “Philosopher of Dissent: Benj. Franklin,” National Geographic, Vol. 148, No. 1, July, 1975, p. 94

“It is pity that good works, among some sorts of people, are so little valued, and good words admired in their stead. I mean seemingly pious discourses, instead of humane, benevolent actions. These they almost put out of countenance by calling morality, rotten morality; righteousness, ragged righteousness, and even filthy rags, and when you mention virtue, pucker up their noses; at the same time that they eagerly snuff up an empty, canting harangue, as if it were a posy of the choicest flowers”
– Benjamin Franklin, 1758, to his sister, Mrs. Jane Mecom, Works, Vol. VII., p. 185

“My parents had early given me religious impressions and brought me through my childhood piously in the dissenting [puritan]way. But I was scarce fifteen, when, after doubting by turns of several points, as I found them disputed in the different books I read, I began to doubt of Revelation itself. Some books against Deism fell into my hands; they were said to be the substance of sermons preached at Boyle’s lectures. It happened that they wrought an effect on me quite contrary to what was intended by them; for the arguments of the deists, which were quoted to be refuted, appeared to me much stronger than the refutations; in short, I soon became a thorough deist”
– Benjamin Franklin, “Autobiography,” p.66 as published in *The American Tradition in Literature,* seventh edition (short), McGraw-Hill,p.180

And finally, for the holdouts who still mistakenly think George Washington signed the Declaration of Independence, here’s what the nation’s first President had to say.

“If I could conceive that the general government might ever be so administered as to render the liberty of conscience insecure, I beg you will be persuaded, that no one would be more zealous than myself to establish effectual barriers against the horrors of spiritual tyranny, and every species of religious persecution.”
– George Washington, letter to the United Baptist Chamber of Virginia, May 1789

“Of all the animosities which have existed among mankind, those which are caused by a difference of sentiments in religion appear to be the most inveterate and distressing, and ought to be deprecated. I was in hopes that the enlightened and liberal policy, which has marked the present age, would at least have reconciled Christians of every denomination so far that we should never again see the religious disputes carried to such a pitch as to endanger the peace of society.”
– George Washington, letter to Edward Newenham, October 20, 1792

“We have abundant reason to rejoice that in this Land the light of truth and reason has triumphed over the power of bigotry and superstition… In this enlightened Age and in this Land of equal liberty it is our boast, that a man’s religious tenets will not forfeit the protection of the Laws, nor deprive him of the right of attaining and holding the highest Offices that are known in the United States.”
– George Washington, letter to the members of the New Church in Baltimore, January 27, 1793

After all of that, it seems to be disingenuous that the phrase “God bless America” should ever come out of our mouths. Moreover, it is disturbing the accuracy with which these Founding Fathers predicted the ills that would befall us if we ever allowed religion to take the place of reason, science, and our ever-expanding understanding of nature. They understood the history of how horribly religion had corrupted Europe and its leaders for hundreds of years and were explicit in their warnings and determination that the United States should not follow down the same path.

Yet, here we are, dangerously close to destroying everything that the Founding Fathers fought so hard to achieve. How can we in good conscience let them down by voting for anything resembling a Republican, any member of the GOP no matter how compromising they may appear in the campaign, anyone who claims to represent God first, or to be a prophet of a church, or in any way, shape, or form dare to put the principles of their misinterpretation of the Bible before the clear intent of the Founders?

Again, these are not new conversations. If there had not been people in 1776 with the same arguments that we’re hearing from the GOP platform now, there would have been no reason for our Founding Fathers to have made such a strong and continuous rebuttal. There have been bad actors all along the way and to this point we have managed to hold them in check and prevent them from undermining this careful balance between government and society.

Sadly, it appears that such a balance is on the verge of tipping into Fascism and Authoritarianism using the name of God as a battering ram, and ridiculing those who dare to stand up against them. Yes, people are being doxed. Yes, people are being threatened with retribution. Yes, people are losing their jobs. Our Founding Fathers were willing to lay down their lives and while I hope that we would never be pressed to make such a decision, we have to attack this election with that same attitude that we would rather die than let the country fall to a felonious orange-color despot and his henchmen.

I hope you will take these quotes and use them as the weapons they are against insanity and absolute stupidity. While my words may hold no weight in any theater of debate, those of the Founders most certainly do. Use them. Use them repeatedly and without apology.

Do not let this country die.

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