And In Other News

Fistfights in the Durham City Council chambers, in delicious detail. Read the INDY all about it HERE.

Only His Hairdresser Knows For Sure

 I'm running a poll now on Mastodon (vastly better than Twitter - highly recommend) that raises the following question: Will The Former Guy:

A) Turn himself in.

B) Barricade at Mar-A-Lago.

C) Flee to exile.

The numbers, so, far, favor A (65%) over B (26%) and C (11%).

I can see an argument for any of these outcomes, but personally I'm in the B category. The question, as I see it, is whether or not he is more dedicated to:

A1) Turning this indictment into a payday, or

B1) Destroying the institution of democracy.

Turning himself in favors A1. But B1 has the virtue of potentially incorporating a payday into his very public denial of the rule of law. His base are largely criminals, or people who believe that everyone else is a criminal, so why not? They all hate democratic governance, because they see everything as transactional. Their distrust of institutions and systems runs deep, and sometimes with good reason. Guile, manipulation, and the cis mostly-White male power of Christianity are their stock in trade. The rule of law doesn't even make the list.

This is what I believe TFG is aiming for - no less than the end of American democracy. Once he ascends the throne, the payday becomes permanent.

To be fair, he may be playing an even longer game than the one in my estimation, turning himself in so he can drag it out and mount his battle in the 2024 elections. I can't think of why he would do that, though, when he's got DeSantis running interference for him on the extradition front. Trump has DeSantis deliciously jammed up, and I'm sure he's savoring the fact. 

For my part, I hate these people with the heat of a thousand suns.

Just sayin'. 

Selective Prosecution

I see that one of our City Council people - a person with whom I am distantly acquainted - is being censured for asking city employees to do campaign work for her during normal work hours. Worse yet, she is now being investigated by the SBI for "extortion." Apparently she told a developer that she'd back their development plan if they would contribute to her campaign.

What? So now that's a crime?

I mean, I know she's a City Council member and not a US Senator or ex-President or something, so . . .

Un-huh.

Promises, Promises

If there's one thing you can count on, it's that politicians will pull the football out, Lucy-style, any chance they get. I'd like to say these "I didn't say Simon Says" stunts are more popular with the beer-and-christianity crowd, but, honestly, I'm not sure the libs aren't just as prone to some underhanded machinations. Today, however, it's the right-wing North Carolina legislature that is insisting, "Go ahead, Charlie! I'll hold the ball so you can kick it! Promise!"

The ball, in this case, is the extension of Federal Medicaid benefits to about 500,000 more mostly-poor North Carolinians. The program has been available for years, but the Berger-Moore cabal has held off on approving it until now. They're making big hooey about this being "bi-partisan" legislation, but it's only bi-partisan because the party in charge has finally relented to something most Tar Heels have long sought. The Legislature celebrated this accomplishment by giving themselves a round of applause.

I suggest you don't bring out the streamers and noise-makers just yet.

There's a catch.

The deal is, this legislation cannot go into effect until after the budget is approved. Soooo, if the (did I mention, mostly right-wing?) state legislature sends a bunch of ban books/outlaw abortion/deny CRT/restrict Trans therapy/end LGBTQ rights budget items to the Governor for his likely veto, they will all stand as if the head of a single snake and hiss "Cooper just shot down Medicaid expansion." 

See how that works?

That's the way we get shit done, bless our hearts.

The New Normal

 I don't know who Cristopher F. Ruto is, but I'm gonna make some guesses about him, based on the attached post. For starters, I'd guess he's a college admin somewhere in the Midwest or South - probably not a big university, but some smaller school.

I figure he went to college himself, probably a business major. He certainly never willingly took a humanities course - you can tell by how he thinks and speaks. No student of English in their right mind would publish the jargon-filled wheelbarrow of manure that Chris has delivered here. I'd credit him for having been in the Military ("mission-aligned") but he probably just watched Top Gun: Maverick. Apparently the student body will be "recomposed," which is code for "indoctrinated into the ways of the Schutzstaffle."

I'm a professor whose tenure spanned the time when Universities - including apparent bastions of liberal thought and progressive ideology, including HBCUs (I'm looking at you, NCCU) - began the shift (the fucking "mission-alignment") from a focus on liberal arts to the trades. More jargon - they called it "the new normal." Confession here: I was safely positioned teaching Criminal Justice. The country always needs more cops, more private security, more prison guards. The thinking, then and now, is that a college degree is of no use unless it gains the student a paying job. Forget philosophy, sociology, history, literature, fine arts. Up with PE, Criminal Justice, Library Science, STEM, Nursing, Architecture, Law - that's where the Benjamins are. Those are the students most likely to pay their student loans.

Of course, it's a little more complicated than that, but not much. First we gut the institution of any courses that require true intelligence and critical thinking, any sense of human development and transcendent experience (that would be your "ideologically captured," right there). When schools are little more than shop classes, students are much easier to indoctrinate and manage. Public universities must step in line or their enrolments will fall and they will fail. But they have already failed, because they have become for-profit ventures and have re-defined "education" as "employability." Public universities have succumbed to the Christopher Rutos of the world, and they have become "mission-aligned." 

Of course, you CAN still get a good liberal arts education. It's a feature of all best - and most expensive - private schools.

Addendum: I didn't know this guy but now I do - according to today's post by H.C. Richardson, he is "right-wing activist Christopher Rufo, the man behind the furor over Critical Race Theory and one of DeSantis’s appointees to the New [College of Florida] School board. . .".

Early Early Voting

 As teachers we learn a valuable fact about the attention of our students - if we want to be sure they heard something, we have to repeat it at least four times, because they only tend to hear about 25% of what we have to say. (Honestly, for some it doesn't matter how often you repeat yourself, but that's an issue for a different day).

I mention this little gem about teaching so that when you gripe at me about repeating myself I can refer you back to this. Here's the repeat: If you are willing and able to register as an independent, and thereby vote in the Republican primary - as we in NC are allowed to do - please, please, do so, and vote for Ron DeSantis. 

Here's the logic: If Trump wins the Republican primary, which seems to be fully possible, along with invasions of locusts and ice in Hell, he will have a clear shot at the presidency. BUT, if anyone else wins the Republican primary, they'll be screwed. Because Trump is going to run again, hell or locusts, and he will split the ticket with the presumptive nominee, paving the way for a likely Biden win. Simple, no? Vote in the Republican primary, vote for DeSantis. A single bullet in the campaign heart of two fascists. It's a primary vote well spent.

Today's Weather

 

I have travelled to Russia and much of it is just this bleak, vast stretches of uninspired apartment blocks. The sign, for your amusement, is a typical piece of anti-Ukrainian propaganda: "Russia's border ends nowhere."

The oligarchs and wanna-bes in this country support Putin and would have this be the View From Your Window. I'm referring to Trump and Carlson, Murdock, McCarthy and Green, and a bunch of others. MTG is now openly calling for red-state succession (in, as Liz Cheney notes, clear violation of her pledge to uphold the Constitution).

As for me, it's a nice warm day, I figure I'll go outside and clean the dust out of the barrel of the 9 mm auto my old man took from a Nazi POW at the end of WWII.

When Motives Don't Matter

    There's quite a bit of talk lately about truth and accuracy in speech and print, and what we are to make of the various ways in which we are being misled. It has been recently reported that the AI wonder, ChatGPT, is capable of being wildly wrong, pretty much at the top of its artificial voice. It lies, it argues with people when called on its lies, and it cites to sources that do not exist. That's a lot like Tucker Carlson, whom (among others at Fox) has been just outed in a lawsuit as being well-aware of the deliberate nature of his duplicitous double-dealing -- for example, praising Trump on-air while calling him a "demonic force" behind his back, capable of "easily destroying (Fox News)." If only. Then of course there's the Liar-In-Chief himself and all his lying MAGA minions, of which little more needs to be said. 

    One of the more interesting questions about all this is the extent to which these walking, talking misinformation generators are dissembling because they

A. Believe their bullshit is true, or

B. Don't believe what they're spreading, but do it just to agitate the snowflakes, or

C. Are playing some kind of "Overton Window" game, or

D. Are self-dealing Fascists who will do and say whatever it takes.

    I recognize that those are not exclusive categories, and that human psychology is such that a person could hold all of those perspectives virtually simultaneously. (See "Tucker Carlson" and "Trump," above.)  That being the case, I therefore propose the following rule: If someone is lying, and they reject valid evidence of their mistake -- much like ChatGTP -- just pull the plug. Save your breath. Move on and don't look back. You may be the sort of person who suffers fools (gladly or otherwise), but liars are a whole next level.

Sez You, Spense

(Full Story)

Utah Governor nixes immigration

Wants no “refugees” from California nation

Speaking for myself, I have to say

Wouldn’t move there for love or pay

From the Great Salt Basin to polygamy

That’s too much sand and sex for me

Book of Mormon taught in schools

Women demure, patriarchy rules 

Harriet Potter?

 

I've been grappling with the idea of states and traits. As you probably know, a trait is a a permanent, immutable characteristic or quality, not susceptible to change. Alternatively, a state is a characteristic that is subject to revision and modification. Here's where it gets a little tricky: A genotype - the DNA containing genes that are the building-blocks of development - is a trait, in the sense that a particular genotype restricts development to a single species. (I.e., "The hereditary information of the organism is in the form of genes in the DNA and remains the same throughout the life," according to the Interwebs.) All living humans are the product of homo sapiens sapiens DNA. However, the genes in the DNA, in interaction with the environment, produces a unique phenotype - the physical person that is you. Ergo, things that may be viewed as a trait from one perspective translates into states as the process of development occurs. So, who cares? Well, speaking as a Developmental Psychologist, I do. The simple minds of this world believe that there are two sex-traits, one male, one female, period. Anyone with a Freshman-level acquaintance with human biology knows that this is a convenient fiction - at the genetic level, things are a lot more complicated, and more complicated still when the phenotype interacts with their environment. Upshot? J.K. Rowling, for all her talent, knows shit-all about genetics and development. You cannot tell the human book by looking at the cover, Joanne. Please butt out. Thanks. Happy Valentine's Day, Regards, Tom.

Curmudgeon Cat

 Our cat sits at the front door and watches the squirrels scampering on the lawn.

She has never voluntarily gone outside and runs away when the door is opened.

She has never chased a squirrel or even sauntered up to say "hello."

They fascinate her in the abstract, but she has no desire to deal with their reality.

I get that. Squirrels are the hucksters and hustlers in life beyond the front door.

Your Periodic Reminder

 

The high temperature for Durham, NC today is 73 degrees, two degrees short of the all-time high. Chances are that if you're alive today, you will never experience a year that is cooler than this one. If you're not alive today, this likely is not a problem. 

Warning Signs

 

Daffodils: the harbinger of Spring -

Tall green shoots

(lawns that need to be fed, watered, mowed)

Bright yellow flowers

(trees and bushes that need to be pruned)

Busy, buzzing bees

(wasps, yellowjackets, horseflies, mosquitos)

Fading, falling petals

(sweeping and raking and mulching)

Wasting, withered stems

(weeds to be pulled, invasives to be poisoned) -

Daffodils: the curse of summer chores.

 

Shoot The Messenger

I'm always tempted, when I start one of these screeds, to dot it with references and other sorts of supporting evidence. Then I remember that this is a blog post, and references are not required, plus, nobody cares anyway. NO ONE, EVER, has disagreed with one of my blog posts. I presume that's because I have zero readers, Occam's razor and all.

With that in mind, let's get to today's topic: Why we should outlaw polling, or at the very least, label "poll results" as "fake news." I'm not sure there ever was a time when public polling was reliable, but I can assure you than in recent years, it has gone to hell. Two reasons -

1. It is no longer possible to have a reliable cross-section of respondents, and;

2. People lie.

As to the first point, the highly-regarded Quinnipiac University Poll claims that their "rigorous" methodology includes "large sample sizes, random digit dialing (RDD), (and) timely questions" - they "stay on top of the news." Swell. But let's go back to that random digit dialing. Mentioned in their discussion of how they telephone their respondents is the fact that about one-half of their potential subjects do not even own a landline, and so, of course, they include cell phone numbers in their RDD.

You see the problem, don't you? On one hand, almost everybody - landline or no - has some form of call screening. Virtually nobody, anymore - except maybe baby boomers and lonely Incels from North Dakota - picks up calls from unknown numbers. While Quinnipiac does make several call-backs, it appears that they do not leave voicemails, because the selection has to be random, right? Only it's not. 

On the other hand, virtually everyone under the age of 30 has some form of smartphone, and if it's anything like mine, it has the option to screen unknown numbers directly to voicemail. I never even hear it ring. The only people answering unknown callers these days are people who can't wait to answer polls, i.e., second-level self-selection.

As to the second reason, people lie. People lie all the time, about matters great and small. I might be lying right now. So am I lying about lying? Maybe. Do people lie all the time? You bet. The New York Times says people don't lie to pollsters, but the NYT is lying. In today's fascist vs. socialist political climate, lying is de rigueur - you can't even claim your political chops unless you know what lies the other side (and yours) are telling these days. What do you figure makes people willing to answer political polls? The chance to advance their agenda, duh. These days, when you see a poll that does not seem to square with what you know is actually going on in the public square, it's easy to see why. I give you the Midterm Red Wave as a case in point.

Why does all this matter? Because people are sheep. (Lying sheep. I'm almost ashamed to be one.) When they read a poll that contradicts their own beliefs, it takes the edge off of their enthusiasm. It depresses them. It keeps them home on election day. Hillary Clinton is the poster woman for this effect. In case SOMEONE out there disagrees, let me once again point out that she won the popular vote for President by seven million or so - a squeaker for her opponent, driven largely by negative polling in the final days of her campaign. It was the "undecideds" that killed her, and undecided voters make up their mind late in the game.

First thing we do, let's kill all the pollsters. We can get to the lawyers later on.

But Is It Art?

 

 The Tate Modern in the Blavatnik Building (opened in 2016, shown here) has a viewing terrace up there near the top. Apparently it's a very popular place for selfies and the like. Unfortunately, it also happens to be located just slightly more than 100 feet from the Neo Bankside apartment building, which ". . . sleek architectural design — floor-to-ceiling glass windows and breezy open-plan living areas — maximize natural light while minimizing privacy." 

 Not surprisingly, the residents of the apartment building (filthy capitalists all), many of whom have lived there since  the building opened in 2012, object to the hoi polloi peering into their "open plan" bedrooms and spying on the gentrified set as the bougies go about their daily business of ripping off poor people. So, naturally, apartment dwellers sued, and now they've won. Apparently the Tate could not successfully convince the high-rise folk to simply put up curtains. You can read all about it here. 

 If I had a little pied-à-terre in the sleek architectural extravaganza that is the Neo Bankside, I would have solved the problem shortly and without any resort to lawyers. A few minutes of my nude sunbathing and those folks at the Tate would have closed that terrace pretty damn quick. 

Impartial Justice(s)

 

This photograph implies that I am going to write about crooked judges. According to some statistics I didn't fact-check, there are many crooked judges (in the sense of, "on the take"). Sooo many crooked judges. Maybe. Maybe not. I don't care about crooked judges, much, because, well, who knows - maybe you can pay them to do the right thing. I'm concerned about a whole different kind of judge, and one that is far worse - the judge who won't do the right thing regardless of any moral or intellectual obligation to do so. Partisan Judges are not for sale - they're on a crusade, and you're either a Believer or you're screwed. Constitutions and laws are no longer their guiding principle. The law is what they say it is, and what many of them say is most likely to benefit a small group of people from largely empty rural states who have nothing to do at night but sit around the campfire and dream up whacky conspiracy theories. People frightened by balloons.

I digress. Political partisanship has become rampant in the American Judiciary for reasons that - once again - I don't have room or inclination to discuss here. Neither am I going to recount the dozens of instances when Supreme Court rulings, of late, have been "along party lines." You all know what I'm talking about. Closer to home, the Democratic-leaning (4-3) North Carolina Supreme Court (SCONC, which is how locals pronounce "skunk") recently - a couple of months ago - decreed that the electoral maps for the state senate created by our MAGA-lite legislature were an illegal partisan gerrymander. Two months later and with a Republican majority now in charge at SCONC (5-2), you can guess what's going to happen.

Some of you wits now will point out that the decision two months ago was also a partisan decision, and since that tends to support my point, I am happy to concede. (Note, however, that those Justices didn't take issue with the House districts.) The thing is, all these people take the same judicial oath - from SCOTUS to the lowliest magistrate - promising some stuff about the rich and poor that no one ever really believed, and to be "impartial," which heretofore was THE thing judges were supposed to be. "Sure," you say. "That never happened either." Except it has - a lot. Best example?  Earl Warren, a Republican, was appointed by Dwight Eisenhower in full expectation that Warren would get the liberal justices on the court to toe the line. Instead, and with surprising skill, Warren led what was probably the most liberal court in US history, on everything from segregation to voting rights to right to privacy to criminal law. It is the history of the Warren Court, and a little-understood principle of stare decisis that the current court is trying (quite successfully) to bulldoze into rubble.

I don't know where this leaves me, as a lawyer. We become lawyers because - all evidence to the contrary - we believe in the rule of law. Maybe in your corner of the world (or the legal profession) this shit doesn't effect you. Eventually it will. The whole practice is or will be defined by judge-shopping, looking for the court that most suits the political needs of your client: a liberal judge for your criminal, a conservative judge for your corporation. We're not supposed to judge-shop, but we are supposed to "zealously defend" the interests of our clients. And that's a quandary, when you toss judicial impartiality out the door.

The Bright Lights

 

As promised, I am obliged to mention the shows we saw during our recent NYC visit. The two stand-outs were "Kimberly Akimbo" and "Pictures From Home."

The musical Kimberly Akimbo is the story of a teenager (63-year-old Victoria Clark) suffering from a disease similar to progeria, causing her to age 4.5 times faster than normal. Her adolescent concerns are fairly typical, except for getting pregnant - she has already been through menopause. (In many ways, the jokes write themselves.) Kimberly struggles with her relationships with peers - naturally - and her dysfunctional family, including alcoholic Buddy, her dad, and sociopath Aunt Debbie (played by Bonnie Milligan, who nearly steals the show).

The play Pictures From Home is based on a book, a "photo memoir" of the same name by photographer and author Larry Sultan (Danny Burstein, in performance), who spent ten years photographing, interviewing and writing about  his parents: father Larry (played by Nathan Lane) and mother Jean (Zoe Wanamaker). A major player in this production is the set, and the manner in which the photos are introduced as the  centerpiece around which the action revolves. To know more about that you'll have to see it for yourself. You could also read the book.

This back-to-back description of these shows - both comedies of a sort - brings me to their common theme: how we deal with aging and mortality. This is a favourite topic of mine, with which I will not bore you further. These two shows are each excellent in their way, and you'll hear about them again, I have no doubt.

If, on the other hand, you have no desire to have any thought - deep or otherwise - and wish to be entertained in the manner of Fawlty Towers meets Monty Python meets the Marx Brothers playing Agatha Christie, go see "The Play that Goes Wrong," presently at New World Theaters, a nifty five-theatre Off-Broadway complex in Hell's Kitchen. It's quite fun. 

School Days

 

In my schooldays I read many books

Like Catcher in the Rye

And A Room With A View

And For Whom the Bell Tolls

 

I read many plays

Like Waiting for Godot

And Who’s Afraid Of Virginia Wolfe?

And The Dumb Waiter

 

I read many poems

Like Howl

And A Shropshire Lad

And The Waste Land

 

Now I read the news

That many of these lovely words 

Are secret, banned and hidden

And I’m so glad I’m old

Home-Style Cooking

 Back from another successful trip searching for cultchur in NYC. One bad meal, two great museums, three swell plays. And even the meal wasn't that bad, as long as you don't count the food. Let's start with the meal.

It was a joint called Carmine's (you've heard of it, right?) in the Theater District - just down from Sardi's.  Apparently, it's a chain (here). Of course, you don't expect clip joints in the Times Square vicinity to be all that good. Gotta say: Carmine's went the extra step. I would rather have eaten at Church's Chicken.

It was a crush when we got there, but we scored two stools at the bar, and broke our January liquor fast with two perfectly poured Negronis. Five points for bartending. We were seated at a nice table near the window in the front of the house after a not-unreasonable wait. We each ordered a glass of wine that came in a a hey-we're-just-a-homestyle-Italian joint pair of glasses. Small-ish glasses. Three points. The waiter was what you'd expect in a hey-we're-just etc. He informed us that Carmine's is famous for it's (home-style, blah blah) massive plates of food - apparently newcomers to the place expect normal-sized plates of food. Forewarned, we enquired about the hot antipasti appetizer and were assured that it was ample for two. We ordered the antipasti and a couple of stuffed artichokes.

Oh, what a sad decision. The artichokes were heavily breaded and cooked to within an inch of composting. One of the two had literally sagged into the plate. The remaining giant platter of miscellaneous items was variously over-baked, over-fried, over-breaded, over-greased, over-cheesed, over-sauced and 1. too hot, or 2. too cold (mostly the latter). We have never had such a mis-mash of nearly inedible stuff in our long dining experience. Minus five points, and minus two for the not-so-hot waiter who wisely did not ask us how we enjoyed our meal as he disposed of half of it and delivered our check. Total = one point. But, hey, it's a big family-style-Italian joint point. My guess is that the wise guys go there for the drinks.

We wound up the night (after a terrific play that will be the subject of a later post) at Sardi's. From the ridiculous to the sublime. It was such a delight to be drinking a Sardi's upstairs bar, uncrowded and well-served (our bartender is studying to be a biochemist), that we could barely tear ourselves away. Thus endth our dry January, and the first day of our latest  travels.

Just Released

 Best response to someone telling you that masks are no longer necessary:

"It's a condition of my parole."

In other news,  we'll be traveling to NYC tomorrow for a few days, hence there will be no updates until probably next week. I mention this knowing that the only person currently reading this blog is going with me, and knows our travel plans perfectly well. I might also mention that the only other person reading this blog has apparently STOPPED reading this blog, which I know from the handy statistics provided by Blogger.com. So, there's that.

My Home Town

 Sooo, the lead discussion on "Nextdoor" this morning was generated by neighbour Mimi Chitty, who said "Please do not put your dog poop in my trash cans. You are so annoying!"

Ignoring, for the moment, that she has called us "annoying" despite - to the best of my knowledge - never having met us, I have to say that I wholeheartedly disagree with her demand. Several rebuttal points were made, and I list them here:

1. Would you rather we leave it on your lawn, sidewalk or street? Does this look like San Francisco?

2. It's not "your" trash can. The city provides them for your use. I'm sure the city has no preference if the poop is in your trash or mine.

3. There is a legal presumption - backed up by precedent - that the owner of trash moved to the curb in anticipation of removal by trash collectors no longer has an of expectation of privacy over the material. In other words, we may remove (or add to) discarded trash as we see fit.

4. It is one thing to ask us to pick up poop, which we, as dog owners, are properly responsible to do. It is another thing to demand that we walk around the neighbourhood and chat with the neighbours while holding a steaming bag of dog doo.

5. In general, the shit is in bags (I can't imagine otherwise). As such, it is less likely to smell or draw flies that most of the other crap you put in your bin.

Finally, we have Nick Mothershed, who had what I thought was the best response: "Get a hobby," he said. To which Mimi responded "FU." Chitty thing to say, Mimi. Way to give up the high ground.

Dining Out

 

CBS17.com: Kathryn Hubbard

DURHAM, N.C. (WNCN) — A restaurant in Durham received a ‘C’ grade for several health and safety violations, according to a report.

The restaurant, Church’s Chicken, located at 942 North Miami Boulevard, also had 12 critical violations, according to the N.C. Department of Environmental Health.

According to the report, a manager was not seen during the inspection and the person in charge could not answer any of the inspector’s questions. The facility did not have an updated health employee policy stating the reportable foodborne illness or associated symptoms, according to the inspection on Jan. 10.

The report also said that raw meat was uncovered in the walk-in cooler, and other foods were not temperature controlled. The report said that multiple food items did not have labels including expiration dates. The inspector noted that all three sinks cannot drain at the same time without causing the small drain in the floor to flood.

The inspector noted a repeat violation of “soiled walls (food debris and grease) and floors throughout the facility.”

The inspector “observed a container of raw chicken stored uncovered in the walk-in cooler with mold, dust, and debris build-up on condenser fans and ceiling over the food.”

Whoops. Somebody greased everything but the inspector. According to the article, a "C" grade means that the restaurant's permit will be "immediately revoked."

Authenticity

 People, well, person, asks, "is it real bolognese if there's no milk in it?"

By "real," I assume one means "authentic," as in the original way things were done when the dish was invented. 

Obviously, there are various levels of authentic. For instance, I am not cooking the dish in a cast iron sauté  pan over a wood-fired stove, somewhere on the Amalfi coast.

Our Supreme Court struggles with these same questions. A couple of them likely insist on wood-burning stoves and meat freshly slaughtered in the courtyard. They wouldn't be caught dead cooking, though, because that's women's work.

For me, it's real bolognese enough, milk or no milk. Shut up and eat.

High Finance

 In today's news, Mystic Distillers, a local (Durham, NC) producer of bourbon and such, has decided to send their product into space. Teaming up with SpaceX, they plan to send 5 casks of bourbon into space in 2024 to age for a year. Upon recovery, the casks will yield 1,500 750ml bottles of product, of which 1,000 will be sold. It's not clear what will become of the remaining 500 bottles, however, buyers will also receive a 50ml shot of the liquor so they can taste it without having to open the original bottle.

The price tag? That's the kicker. Buyers will be issued an NFT (remember those?) for their investment of a mere - drumroll - $75,000 a bottle.

Words fail me.  Bottles are expected to be available after some further time on ground, probably 2028.

In other news, the debt ceiling is upon us once again, and some nitwits in Congress are going to try to hold raising the limit hostage to, oh, I dunno, exterminating all newborn Democrats at birth, or something similar. Other wits (less nit, more wit) have pointed to a law that allows the Treasury to mint any kind of collectable coin it should so choose, and to make said coins legal tender. All the Pres has to do is have Treasury mint a trillion-dollar coin, and use that legal tender to pay off debts. Presto! The expectation is that at some point rational minds will prevail (when did this ever happen?) and the coin spending can be replaced with "normal debt," whatever that is.

There's more to this all than meets they eye. Congress passed a spending bill back in December that requires the President and executive branch to "operate the government at specific spending levels through the end of the fiscal year . . .".* The failure to raise the debt ceiling exchanges one illegal act for another.  Actually, it appears there's a legal way out of this bind - ignore the debt ceiling, and take the matter to SCOTUS. The 14th Amendment to the Constitution states in part “The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law … shall not be questioned.” Scholars will debate whether "questioned" means "thwarted," and in the newspeak of the current Supreme Court it probably doesn't, but it's worth a try.

*January 18, 2023, at https://www.msnbc.com/opinion/msnbc-opinion/avoid-debt-limit-biden-learn-love-platinum-coin-rcna66316

Mastodon

 

I do not like the TV news, don’t care for false neutrality

The anchors lead with that which bleeds, invest in triviality

Newspapers speak in measured tones, reducing to banality

While the internet, as bought and sold, is ruled by partiality

 

I prefer a more uncertain form, a freedom of expression

Woodstock without the pouring rain, a live nation federation

Of all manner of poets, artists, ideas - a rich conglomeration

A place to practice and to fail; to soar with wit, imagination 

And The Word Went Forth

 Turns out George Santos is a foreign agent working for the Russians (possibly true), a drag queen from Brazil (probably true) and safe in office because the Republicans would put up with Satan herself if it meant having a majority in the House (absolutely true). He's going to linger and malinger until he is either impeached, arrested or deported. Impeachment could come in a couple of years (unlikely), likewise deportation (ditto). The DOJ will never arrest him because as we have seen time and again lately, the DOJ is loath to arrest anyone where it might cause a ruckus at the Legislature.

DOJ: You're under arrest!

George: No, YOU'RE under arrest!

DOJ: Wait - you can't do that! Can he do that?

McCarthy: Well, sure. According to the new commandments, there are good people on both sides.

Will there be snacks?

 So while everyone is chirping and moaning about whether or not to give up their gas stove, Wyoming legislators are resolving to outlaw electric vehicle sales in the state after 2035. 

"The proliferation of electric vehicles at the expense of gas-powered vehicles will have deleterious impacts on Wyoming's communities and will be detrimental to Wyoming's economy and the ability for the country to efficiently engage in commerce," the resolution says.

And that, folks, right there - performative politics at its finest, tied tightly to the fiction of "individual rights" (responsibilities be damned) and the worship of capitalism - is why I no longer believe in the survival of our species, and the end of our reign is probably a good thing. Nature (who is still kicking herself) was doing just fine until we came along.

No Fries, Cheeps

 There's been a small debate among certain members of my family lately on whether or not a baked/air fried round of squashed cauliflower dusted with parmesan qualifies as a chip. Well, of course it's a "chip," in much the same manner as "cow chips," but is it an adequate substitute for potato chips?

Let's settle this. Potato chips (the American kind, not the English version of French Fry) have a long, rich and varied history. And in that regard, I will say flatly that a cauliflower floret, ground up, flattened and seasoned, and cooked in any other manner than deep-frying, is not a "chip." Evidence for this? Pringles. I rest my case.

Least one argue, perforce, that cauliflower chips are healthier than potato chips - not so much. There may be an argument to be made that air-frying is healthier than deep frying, just as one might suggest that a steak with most of the fat and sinew boiled out is healthier than a steak seared  on the grill. You can always make something healthier if you don't care how it tastes. More to the point, the recipe for Cauliflower Chips identifies the following virtues: Egg-free (duh), gluten-free, low carbohydrate (this is where cauliflower wins, but not by all that much), nut-free, soy-free and vegetarian (again, egg-free. Also, beef-free). So, unless you're frying your potato chips in bacon fat (yum!, now that I think about it), cauliflower has a negligible edge in the health department. Also, it tastes like cauliflower. Which is fine, but not as a substitute for a bag of Utz's Wavy. I hope that clears things up.

MLK Day, 2023

 The fact that historically oppressed people - particularly Black and Native Americans - are now ascending to certain political posts for the first time in American history says all you need to know about the current state of race relations in this country. That is: 1) it is very good that we are finally expanding our political diversity, and 2) it is a stunning indictment of us that we are STILL expanding our political diversity, inch by begrudging inch.

Alabama and Mississippi celebrate Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert E. Lee on the same day - today. Sort of like inviting John Wayne Gacy to a Boy Scout brunch. I used to think that Confederates were all those raggedy decrepit old nose-pickers with their bellies sticking out from under their flannel shirts and skinny women with patchy hair, missing teeth and shrill voices, all carrying Confederate flags and guns of various sort, usually about 7 of them showing up to protest whatever. Tip of the iceberg, as it turns out.

That Southerners still celebrate their treasonous past, their racist history and their happy plantation fantasies is not as uncommon as I once thought. Actually, like many people my age, I see-sawed back and forth on the matter. When I was young I watched the race wars on TV and was terrified; the South seemed like some evil country where the powerful put innocents up for sacrifice. As I got older I began to recognize the subtle and not-so-subtle ways racism was practiced in the North, and began to understand the structural nature of the beast. In the meantime the South settled down and I started to believe that King's dream of overcoming was a real possibility. It peaked with the election of Barack Obama.

It's been all downhill since. I don't need to review the evidence. I don't like living in the South, but only marginally less than I like living anywhere in the USA. I'd go back to where I came from but I'm not sure where that is. My family has been in this country since sometime in the 1700s. So far, it just hasn't really worked out as we might have hoped.

Rhymes

There once was a fellow from Dur’m

Who had nothing to say or affirm

He wrote in his blog

It became quite a slog

Swimming upstream like a trout

Wine In Cans

So the current stink in the news (pun intended) is word that gas stoves are major pollutants, and calls by some environmentalists for them to be eliminated (Outlawed! Cancel Culture!) and replaced by electric models. Politics of this aside, I confess that I have a gas cooktop, very deliberately, and I'll give it up when they pry my cold dead fingers etc. Oven is electric - dual fuel. Very trendy.

Electric stoves will not solve the climate crisis. What WILL solve the climate crisis is a general agreement across all strata of society that things like gas stoves are a bad idea and should generally be eliminated. This is a perspective with which I heatedly agree (yes, there's another one) but I'm not gonna be the first guy on my block to solve all the problems. My gas range will go the way of all things in time, in the meantime, I'm UP TO FUCKING HERE with being made to feel guilty because I use plastic bags while the real polluters and the voting public and the governments-at-large merrily continue to manufacture, support, and purchase all manner of earth-destroying chemicals and implements.

I'll tell you what - you start drinking wine out of cans and I'll consider taking my cooktop off-line. Wine in cans? Yes, as it turns out, the most carbon-producing, inefficient step in the production of wine is producing glass bottles in which to contain it. Wine bottles generate tons of carbon to make - more than the transportation costs for the vino - and contrary to what you may think, only about 1/3 are actually recycled. What? Wine doesn't age in aluminium cans! So what? The vast majority of wine is produced to be consumed immediately or within the next few years. Ageing wine is mostly a hobby for vineyard owners and the incels who count themselves as connoisseurs. I'll gladly take mine in a can, or carton.

This defending the environment is tricky business. I was down with it on the very first Earth day, and in my younger years considered myself particularly virtuous for riding my bike to work. But at this end of the string, I'm not going to shoulder the whole go on my own. I'm not trying to lead, but if the real polluters ever do take the lead - not in my lifetime, probably - I'll consider falling in line. 

Tennis

 Played tennis yesterday. Our former group of eight or ten souls who would take turns signing up to play - sometimes eight on two courts - has whittled down to four, on a good day. More often than not we are three, and we play a game we call cutthroat, in which the serving player (using a singles court) goes up against the other two, using the doubles court. Every game we rotate and each person serves once every three games. All I have to say about this is what I said on the court yesterday: "I have been playing this game for 39 years and I STILL haven't learned to watch the fucking ball!" It seems to be a common lament.

Musk and Bardin and Zuckerberg, Oh My!

 There are presently three social media sites listed under my "usual" bookmark: Mastodon, Post, and FaceBook. (I also have a link to Patreon, but that's in connection to a writer we support and follow, and I am also on Instagram as far as I know, which tells you how often I log into Instagram.)

I bailed on the bird site (as it is not so affectionately known) about the same time that Elon let Mike Flynn back on (Jan. 6th), for that and similar reasons. I have nothing more to say about Twitter that hasn't already been said better by others. I wish it and its "owner" all the worst. In the news this am, Singapore police escorted Twitter employees from their Singapore building for failure to pay rent. In the immortal words of another noxious cretin: So Much Winning!

As for Post, I haven't made up my mind. It's sort of Twitter lite, no surprise there since it and the bird site were created by the same guy. I have many reservations, not the least among which the element of capitalism present in having people tip others, presumably for posts that the readers enjoy. Seems to me that posts people enjoy bring in revenue for Post, and maybe it's Post that should be doing the tipping, but what do I know? When I open Post it takes me to a feed of my "favorites." Despite my having "favored" a number of people, most of the posts in this feed are from Seth Abramson. Slow down, Seth - take a breath! Post clearly has him in its crack-like grip. So sad. I usually quickly move on to "Explore," and, shrug. It's okay.

Big fan of Mastodon. It is quirky and there's a learning curve, but I like the set-up, I like the federated nature of the beast, particularly in that no one, or not even several, hold the reins. Most of all, I enjoy the posts, clever posts, deep posts, dazzling photos and art, and sufficient snark to fulfil my curmudgeonly needs. There are lots of nice touches. I can only urge you to try it for yourself.

I desperately want FB to be what it could be, and hang on mainly because it's my only connection to certain people and so far, Meta hasn't COMPLETELY pissed me off. But close. So close.

Travel notes

 I'm buying tickets here and there, almost frantically, flights and lodging, theater and museum. It is my respite from the ennui of Winter, my rejection of social media - well, Twitter, anyway - the few days this year that I am sober. Old habits die hard.

So at the end of this month is NYC, then Denver to Ess Eff in March, followed (not finally, I trust) a trip from Regensberg to Budapest on the Danube in April. Along the way irritants arise - some carriers will not let us select our seats, hotel rooms overpriced, rental cars in short supply. My life is so hard. 

I have no plan to slacken the pace. The best cure for that sense of being trapped and wriggling on the wall ("to spit out all the butt-ends of my days and ways," thank you Dr. Eliot) is mania. Run away fast and don't look back, run until it's safe again. Run in circles if you must - measure out your life in Apple watch activities. Whatever works, when the world is closing in and breathing down your neck.

Pronouns

 George Santos has disappeared again - not from the House, this time, but from the news cycle. We've moved on to voting on the new House rules, e.g., {Pronoun} Who Smelt It, Dealt It, that sort of thing. Except there's a raging argument over the use of {Pronoun}, with the 20-or-so Freedom Caucus members - an Orwellian designation, to say the least - in unison complaining that it's obviously "He," it's always "He." Anyhow, I think it's a mistake to let G. Santos slip from our focus, next thing you know he be swinging with Sean Spicer, dressed up in a tutu and dancing with the stars.

Who is George Santos, really? That's the question on the mind of every New York Post aficionado. It would probably be best if we find out before he runs for President, although it would be fun to see him and Donald Trump in a debate.

Donald: I am the greatest!

George: I am the best greatest!

Donald: I am rich beyond imagination!

George: I'll buy your imagination for 44 Billion dollars!

And so on.

On a mostly unrelated note, I am dazzled by what I assume to be the storyline of Jurassic World Dominion. Of course, I've only watched about 5 minutes of it, but here's my hypothetical synopsis:

        Dinosaurs, escaping from captivity in the previous iteration of the franchise, begin to breed in the wild, and eventually become so commonplace as to be something of an occasionally fatal nuisance, at which point we hunt them into extinction once again.

What terrific high concept. It has all the trappings of anthropocentrism, genetic engineering and just a soupçon of master race. Brilliant! I can't wait to see George Santos in his tragic role as "the last T-Rex."

Choices

 I see that law enforcement up in Iredell County has arrested 22 people for drug crimes over the weekend; a sweep, a roundup, an excuse to bust down doors and drag people out by their hair, a long awaited cleansing breath that will end drug use in Statesville for, what, a day? Maybe two? Less than a week, certainly. Drug dealers deplore a vacuum. 

I've stopped believing in crime. At least, I don't believe in the kind of crime that puts most people in prison. I don't think desperation is a crime, and don't give me all that sanctimonious bullshit about choices. Choices are for people who still think they have something to lose. Choices are for people who have a position from which to negotiate. Choices. Sure. But whether they had a choice or not, for most people incarceration is not the optimal outcome - for them or us.

After 50 years in the business I have a lot to say on this topic. I am not going to say it all today. Let me just start with this. We used to house crazy people in "mental hospitals," mostly whether they liked it or not. There wasn't much treatment involved, unless you could afford a private facility. Well, old Ronnie Reagan came along and said "this is wrong, it shouldn't be so." He rightly concluded that people should receive treatment in their own communities, among their friends and neighbours, and not hauled off to some state-run facility to be dropped on a locked ward and forgotten. Reagan proposed closing those mental hospitals and sending the mentally ill to community mental health centers. Everyone nodded and agreed and shouted "Huzzah," and it was done. Well, part of it was done. They closed the mental hospitals. But there was never any federal funding for community mental health centers and the states were not about to foot the bill. 

Upshot? We now house our mentally ill in jails and prisons. They are a significant chunk of the population. Don't tell me about choices.

Survival

 I just received word from my second oldest friend (we go back around 56-57 years) that my oldest friend (~60 years) is doing better in in care, and is being made comfortable with the terminal illness she has stood up to for longer than anyone expected - particularly the medicos, and particularly because she elected to forgo the usual round of crap that accompanies acute intervention. My mother had the same ailment and opted for the intervention - she lasted 10 years, a feat that my friend may have already surpassed. My second oldest friend - himself an MD, among other more sterling qualities - is lamenting the fact that he now has to deal with cardiologists (whom he doesn't like, much) to deal with an arrhythmia that he is convinced will kill him sooner than later.

I confess here that I am somewhat a fan of modern medicine, because, unlike my old pal, I've not so much seen how it's practiced as I have had it practiced on me. The sausage is always tastier when you don't have to see how it's made. I started with Type II diabetes and an arrhythmia of my own, leading to the prescription of various blood glucose meds and, eventually, a pacemaker. More recently, I had open heart surgery to replace two valves. Along the way I picked up a couple of lens to replace the ones that had cataracts, and a new right knee. 

I imagine that if you don't know me, you'd guess that I'm totally an invalid at this point. Au contraire. I play one or another racket sport two or three times a week, I shop, I cook, I travel, I take out the recycle, I clean the pool. I hate cleaning the pool. Anyhow, I'm the fucking million dollar man (thank you, Medicare) and the only part that's obvious are some scars and the thing I share with everyone else my age: we're all pretty damned old.

Flip-Flop Follies

 Today is January 7th, 2023. It is the two-year and one-day anniversary of Kevin McCarthy voting to overturn the 2020 election results, and exactly two years minus 6 days when the same Representative went on TV to fault Donald Trump for the January 6th insurrection (albeit he did not call for Trump's impeachment). McCarthy's incredible progress as a chameleon, championing any platform on which he happens to be standing at the moment, has led, finally, after 15 votes plus some pushing and shoving, to McCarthy being elected Speaker of the House, not to mention Flip-Flopper in Chief. He has demonstrated for all the world to watch how a terrible negotiator can give away everything and still get little in return. I say this because McCarthy now rules from a vastly weakened position, and we don't expect to see him long in the role. It depends, mostly, on how willing he is to be Lauren Boebert's bitch. From all appearances, he is eager to strap on the ball-gag and bend to the whip.

We opted for pizza last night, for those of you breathlessly awaiting that decision.

Pizza Friday

 Not to sound like some middle-aged Karen with two kids and a husband in finance ("Well, we're comfortable. We have some little indulgences - the Maserati and Lake Como in the Spring - really,  though, we're just regular folk. . .") but the hardest thing I do on a daily basis is try to decide what to have for dinner. Shmandie, quire reasonably, doesn't want everything to be beef sautéed in pork fat, and I get that. On the other hand, did you read the article about how vegans have more depression than meat eaters? No doy! Anyway, Wednesday when it rained it was beef stew, and yesterday was chicken Tiki Masala - from a jar, what am I, Chef Bhatia? - and Aloo Gobi. Yes, I can follow a simple recipe. Today I'm going to mix it up again (more Beef with Veg), in this case Porterhouse steak, salad, and maybe a side of pesto pasta. Or pizza and save the steak for another day. I remain undecided.

Still no Speaker of the House, and still on the wagon. Do you think there's a connection?

Profiles in Ignorance

 The title of this post is the title of a book by Andy Borowitz, in which he traces the decay of the US Presidency from Dan Quayle onward to Donald Trump. It's a book that is as distressing as it is amusing. In the epilogue, Borowitz offers the recommendation that criticising politics is a mere spectator sport, and is of little intrinsic value, because - oh, I dunno, because everyone has an opinion, I suppose. He cautions that if you really want to have a effect on politics you must get "involved" and engage is such things as deep canvassing, so you and your neighbours can hone a more finely developed hatred of one another - kidding, of course, sort of. I have two non-exclusive responses to Borowitz's suggestion:

1. Borowitz has made a healthy living off of criticising politicians, and in squarely in the circle-jerk of political fundraising, in which he plays a part by selling books to those of us who want to be amused by what assholes the Republicans are in their day-to-day lives.

2. I don't want to be "involved." I have NEVER wanted to be involved. I would have stopped voting a long time ago except that friends and loved ones hectored me into it. I would no more knock on someone's door to advance a political cause that I would pass out "Lighthouse" tracts.

Just sayin'.

Day 3 - No Speaker of the House in sight. Send water and provisions.

You Don't Need a Weatherman

 In today's episode of how screwed up is Congress, Kevin McCarthy is still not Speaker of the House after three votes, and George Santos has disappeared again. Voting resumes today at 3:00. I fully expect to see George Santos show up in a powdered wig, cape, and jodhpur boots, claiming to have amnesia and speaking with a German accent.

In the weather, following some of the coldest days we've seen across the country in late December, comes a 73-degree day in North Carolina and a bomb cyclone set to hit San Francisco, with untold flooding forecast for the West Coast. I'd encourage y'all to sell your trucks and install solar and recycle and shit as I have done, but realistically, it won't help. Global Climate change is a corporate-funded Titanic, and the capitalists are the captains of this ship. The World Wide Working poor: Fucked since 1066 and before. 

At least we have pickle ball.

Incredibly, I'm still sober.

The Eeyore in the Room

 Robert Reich has posted today about the implosion/end of the Republican Party. In the fact-free manner of critics everywhere, may I say that predicting the demise of the GOP is not only premature, it is probably never going to happen. Names may change, new people may come and go, but there are (as I see it) at least four groups of people who are relatively entrenched in American politics: from left to right - 1. Socialists, Social Democrats and Progressives, 2. Moderate (corporate) Democrats, 3. Moderate (non-evangelical/neo-conservativet) Republicans, and 4. Evangelicals, White Supremacists, and assorted Fascists. You can quibble around the edges with this, of course, everyone thinks they're special, but these groups have been around in some iteration since the beginning of the Republic, and they're pretty much here to stay.

In a further welcoming gesture to the soon-to-arrive dystopian future (in which I hope to play no more than a cameo), we have mounted a ring camera/light/motion detector on the corner of our house, so we'll have a record of it when they come for us.

January 2, 2023

   

For the third time, today is the second day of 2023. In an unusual turn of events, not much has happened so far this year. I am going on the wagon today. It is 9:30 am and I have not yet had a drink. I'll keep you posted.

Addendum: I should mention that I am restarting this blog after a 2 3/4 year hiatus brought on by the Trump administration, Covid, and general malaise. It is now 10:22 am and I am still sober. That's the kind of hard-hitting news you can expect to find here.