Tag: politics

  • 6-8-26

    6-8-26

    It’s been quite a long time since I’ve posted anything. All of you clamoring for my return will be happy at last.

    It’s officially summer, and school is out. Well, the regular school program is out; the summer school program is just starting. I am driving summer school again this year. I’ve driven summer school every year since I started this job excepting one. It’s strange for me to say, but that year I was off too long. I became restless and consumed with boredom. Granted I didn’t and really still don’t have the means to do any fancy vacations or much traveling at all. If I can swing it I hope to do a bit of light traveling in July, but circumstances will dictate that.

    It’s Monday. When I wake up and drink my coffee I usually watch the ABC morning news show. I know, legacy media yuck, blah, blah, blah. And I tend to agree with that negative view of media in general, but I seriously doubt that journalists will out-right lie. Lies by omission, they’d do that all day long, but a bald faced lie, thankfully it hasn’t go that bad, yet…

    Anyway, what I saw on the news this morning, the thing I’m thinking about now, was more or less the same exact thing I’ve seen every Monday for the past two months, war. Yes the war that started last month that I mentioned in my last blog post. It’s not really a war by the way, even though everyone including the President of the USA call it a war, but that’s only when he’s talking unofficially about it. Officially it is an action or something like that. Double speak bull sticks! Anyway, we won that action/war the first three days of of the action/war, at least that is what the President of the USA told us. But… and that’s a big butt… it really hasn’t ended yet. Just last night Israel and Iran shot missiles at each other directly for the first time since the cease fire that is supposed to be in effect. But don’t worry! The President of the USA says that we are days away from a good deal that will bring peace to the middle east and return the world to normal business. Heh, yeah, okay.

    Every week it is the same thing. President reassures the world that peace is around the corner. More shooting and killing and bombing and whatnot take place to ruin the current optimism. Then on Friday that president goes on the verbal offensive, and offensive he is, and tells the world, “Well, we got that little mess under control and will work hard all weekend to find a solution.” The stock market rallies. The good people of the world leave work, go home, go swimming with their kids, or burn some hamburgers on the grill. Monday comes back around, and we are day’s away from a deal. Then Israel, or possibly our own glorious US war leaders, do something to muck it up. The cycle starts all over. Week after week. Month after month.

    Our leaders are so dumb. What I see happening is that this cycle is going to continue on for more months. Mid term elections will come around. That is going to be line of demarcation.

    I’d like to think both houses of congress will change leadership, but I doubt it will work out that way. I doubt it for several reasons, not the least of which is the current leadership have already proven to be unsupportive of the nation’s current standards and practices, to put it politely. Anyway, after the mid terms the ground invasion will start. It doesn’t really matter who controls congress at that point. The opposition party/Democrat party will be powerless to stop it. The current leadership/Republican party will have still have the President, and the President will do what he want’s regardless of what the people want. Of course it depends on which people you ask, as is always the case with war. The business people that stand to make a profit will be supportive of the war, and there are a lot of people who stand to profit from a new protracted, bloody, disgusting war. There will probably be more people, including the ones that will have to fight and die in the war, that don’t support the war. But the Republican party and MAGA’s have really got their ducks in a row this time. Business will win and poor people will die, as always. But we’ll remember them all fondly next Memorial day.

    Okay, enough of that. I really haven’t done much in the way of photography lately. I have been doing some novice gardening type things that have been one of my creative outlets. I’ve also been reading more lately. In the last few weeks I’ve finished “Wuthering Heights”, and the “Great Gatsby.” Both of which were excellent. Im currently reading “The Children of Strife” by Adrian Tchaikovsky. It is the fourth in a series of Sci fi books that I’m very much enjoying. I’d highly recommend them. They are kinda weird and deep, but that’s how I like it.

    With some of gardening experiments I attempted to start some seeds in my house. I am learning as I go. With my first attempt I used some “organic” soil. Apparently the soil had worm casings in it, which is basically poo. I think that the casings are probably the secret ingredient that led to my prolongs misery. At some point a fruit fly got into my house and found this rather desirable condition and decided to stay and put down roots. Before I knew it I was running a fruit fly, I guess that’s what they are, sanctuary. They breed fast. It was driving me insane having to share my space with all those little buggers. I thought about it. I thought there must be something I can do. The solution was simple. Fly strips. It’s not something I’ve really every used before myself. I’ve seen them used in some places, but never my house. I guess I’ve been lucky, or maybe hygienic, who knows. Those fly strips work very well. They aren’t a perfect solution, but they brought the population down to an acceptable level. I ate having them fly up my nose or around my eyes, yuck.

    I mention all this about fly strips and fruit flies because it is today’s photo. I didn’t spend much time on this. It is kinda morbid and gross. But I had an idea to photograph the fly strip. I took a few shots and decided to try to do a focus stack, which turned out pretty okay. It got a good bit more of the scene than without the stacking. It’s still a very narrow focal band, but it’s kinda cool.

  • March 1, 2026

    March 1, 2026

    War.

    Or something that is war but not called a war was declared yesterday. The President of the US along with his attack dog Israel decided to finally do what they’ve been drooling over doing for a long while. Israel has been drooling. Not the entirety of either want this, but it’s not like this is a democratic republic or anything. The US Congress with the express constitutional power to declare war was out of town for a week. No formal declaration came from the ones empowered to make such monumental decisions. No, the President Donald J. Trump has declared himself a dictator, but it won’t be framed that way by the vast majority of mainstream media. The Republicans in power at the moment are all too giddy with the power they expect to wield forever, at this point I believe they think they will have it forever. The publicly stated and released statements and plans of the Republican MAGA rightwing extremist party made it clear their intentions. Most people ignored it. Mainstream media ignored it for the most part. The Republican part obfuscated it. It isn’t over yet. The biggest piece of their slow coup has yet to be put in place, but it is coming very soon. It is reported over the last several days that the plans are already being circulated among the extremist MAGA party for consideration. The plan is to subvert the midterm elections in the near term and the next presidential elections thereafter to ensure MAGA rule in perpetuity. The new American Empire.

    My Dad seemed giddy yesterday. It makes me very sad to see that. My memories of him and the things he taught me don’t seem to align with the man he is now. Perhaps my memories are skewed by the second point of view coming from my mother, who always had a say, and was always there. She was there much more than my father, and perhaps her yang had more of a chance to shape what I am now. What I am now is very much upset at the state of everything the extremist MAGAs touch.

    Where I live, which is in the middle of the deep south region of the US, in a town that only exists because a US military Air force Base supports everything in the local economy with billions of dollars allocated to it, it’s peripheral military contractors, and research every year. The town basically didn’t exist until the base was established around the World War two era. It was just a wide spot on a dirt road. Anyway, where I live I’d say the vast majority of people are either enthusiastically pro MAGA , or at least supportive without really understanding what it is they are supporting. Based on what I see on a daily basis everything is coming up roses. War is good for business here. This town has the nickname of War Town. I find it very unsettling and try to avoid political discussions. The local types are by and large only worried about what is impacting their live in the immediate and what the mainstream zeitgeist is telling them with the factor that the mainstream zeitgeist is/has created multiple reality bubbles.

    I could go on and on for a long time if I had a long time and the motivation to go on. But I have neither right now. Right now I’m motivated to play with a photograph I took at the High Museum of a piece of art by cat named Jameson Green. Cat, yeah, I said cat, lol. I’ve been wanting to try some new things in Photoshop and this photo really fits the mood of the day.

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