Me too. And yet in a state of paralysis. Money is the only thing I have to offer, contributions for feeding frightened, hidden people, and for helping new representatives get elected, and for purchasing drones in Ukraine. A few social media comments that are no doubt ineffective, and since that involves reading others' heartless or ignorant comments, depressing.
I stand in my town square most days, with my signs; attend as many rallies as I can , and forward news and pertinent commentary, and some musical offerings (check out the Marsh Family, Randy Rainbow, etc), but feel like I'm not doing enough. (OK, Gene, Mr. Editor--that should have been "as though", not "like,"). I feel like a wimp when I don't go out in rain or snow, or when temperatures and wind chill are below freezing, while people in Minnesota are out in worse conditions. I'm 74, and lived through the 60's. I thought Kent State was bad. This is exponentially worse.
A question in the Mailbag refers to Trump's "botched management of COVID." That is too generous a description of what Trump did. A person might act in good faith but botch something because of incompetence. Trump denied the seriousness of the pandemic, and he interfered with the response to it. He wasn't incompetent; he was evil. (Of course, if he had acted in good faith, he would have been incompetent, but that's another matter.)
"Evil" was then, and almost inevitably will be, the byproduct of a malignant narcissist who characterizes or judges everything by his perception of its impact on his need for attention and admiration.
Agree. The reason that he denied the seriousness of the pandemic was his fear that it would hurt him politically. Other people's deaths do not enter into the considerations of a narcissist. (I think that "malignant" is redundant.)
Narcissism exists on a spectrum from healthy self-esteem to severe Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD). He is well on the upper end of the spectrum if not, as many believe, at its highest (worst) point. The only clinical demurral for this diagnosis is that he doesn't appear to be experiencing significant personal distress or impairment from his behavior --- yet.
Yes, he does have a kind of feral awareness and certainly when it comes to his survival. But everything negative has all to do with others and nothing whatsoever to do with him or his actions. And this is reinforced 24/7 by the enablers and apologists he has gathered around him.
Excellent. 'Feral awareness' like a cornered rat. We must find some pressure points to trigger that same survival instinct in his coterie that his ship is sinking and they should bail.
Indeed. What's more, from past newsletters, it would appear that both he and the lovely Rachel are vehicle maintenance-challenged or averse, which would put you (and him) in even greater danger. A lose-lose situation if there ever was one.
He did something like this in "No Time Like the Past" where a scientist uses a time machine in a failed attempt to fix horrors of the past.
"Exit one Paul Driscoll, a creature of the twentieth century. He puts to a test a complicated theorem of space-time continuum, but he goes a step further, or tries to. Shortly, he will seek out three moments of the past in a desperate attempt to alter the present, one of the odd and fanciful functions in a shadowland known as the Twilight Zone."
What's "wrong" is not putting enough in the collection box/plate (or "Zelling" a sufficient amount) to emphasize and encourage it. A couple of candles asking for divine intercession (intervention) wouldn't hurt either.
Praying for that may not be good for your karma, a concept about which I'm agnostic.
But Trump has stated that he intends to get into Heaven, and perhaps is worried that his opportunity is fast approaching. What if a popular movement arose in which participants declared that unless Trump withdraws ICE and resumes USAID he's canceled, they will collectively light black candles and pray that he be sent to Hell instead -- preferably ASAP?
It is illegal to make death threats, but I very much doubt supernatural ones are prosecutable. Care to initiate the movement, Suzy?
Perhaps even more telling than carrying a heavy burden or responsibility as the truck typically symbolizes, is the self-justification or even self-deception ("I wasn't REALLY at fault, after all") which too often characterizes why and how the Creature That Ate Democracy was allowed to emerge from the muck. Complacency, overconfidence, lack of interest or disengagement --- too readily deflected by too many by pointing at others. Little did that wise 'possum from the Okefenokee know that his quip about the environment would ring true in so many other ways almost 60 years later. "We have met the enemy and he is us."
I have no good argument to not take your thoughts seriously. But I see a problem when Biden did so much good and lies kept him from the credit he deserved. (As a painful slow process to spend the money his legislative wins gained for us. Al that money for internet access was neve spent.) Trump is undoing all the energy gains he can get his hands on. Lies are working. Still!!
Certainly deflection by the otherwise well-meaning is a significant, but not the only, regrettable artifact of the rise of the Creature. My only point is that absent the complacency, the disengagement, he very likely would have remained in the muck.
And speaking of no pants on, there is a restaurant in Court House that advertises a bottomless brunch. I was shocked when they not only wouldn't let me enter with no pants, but they threatened to call the police. I should sue for false advertising.
I said Yes because I feel like this is all our "long national nightmare" that I would love to awaken from. The original "long national nightmare" seems quite quaint now.
Asleep? Awake? Woke? It all seems to land on a nerve. It must be a common fear. But when do we want results? It takes time to change minds. Some of Trump's lies took years of layers to work. And people think it is enough to have money if they want food. It also takes workers to process foods. When the virus closed packing plants and poultry processors that food was scarce. So we can make a difference. it takes work and time. Do not give up now. Congress can make workers legal with new legislation. The border was not so open. Most workers have been here for many years. Accept them.
Sleeping? Not after all I have done to waken my relatives to Trump. They ought to know now. And it was a surprise to me that all the time I spend in learning about Trump, government and foreign relations and how it has been discounted. it helps not to know stuff now.
I can't figure why it seems to be a common occurrence how members of a family, people who have depth and breadth of shared experience, can differ so drastically over The Regime.
Well, I understand what you mean sbout the degree of denial of reality.
Like Gary and Dale said. We may have broader, more varied life experience, and varying willingness to learn from our mistakes (in my case).
So very bothersome (angering) is bullying and unwillingness to let people lead the lives they choose AS LONG AS THEY'RE NOT HARMING OTHERS. And that doesn't include getting your fee-fees hurt. If one cannot handle that, one needs remedial childhood.
Some of us were out and about in the world and some were busy at home. But there was more than that going on. I am constantly examining my positions. I do want to correct errors.
Yes, no doubt there are legitimate grievances. There are few anyone is willing to believe who will say there are no significant flaws in the way we go about our democracy; we are after all, and always will be, aspirational, in trying to form that "...more perfect union." I am all ears for those legitimate concerns and may even share them --- and certainly when it comes to a reasonable (and rational) debate on how we fix those flaws. But don't expect my understanding when personal or religious beliefs enter into the discussion of what's best for the most of us, or a focus on how others go about their lives. You get to live yours. So do they. Simple, and yet excruciatingly difficult for far too many to accept.
I inferred that, somewhat, as I have the same problems with my fams and (mostly former) friends. I see enough of your comments to be certain you do know stuff. Not whatever those 'alternative facts' may be.
I just received an automated voice call offering me a small alert pendant that could save me in case I were to slip and fall, or suffer a medical emergency. I'd have given them the White House number if I'd had it at hand. Never too soon to be ready for such an event...
As for Trump & death responsibility...600,000 for ASAID...(The New Yorker) ... c. 180,000 on COVID (Lancet)...maybe 100 so far blowing up boats with drugs...Gaza, who knows? Make it an even mill and call it what it is: Genocide.
I said 'a little' because every time I think things have hit bottom, they plunge further. I'm a hair's breadth from 'no.' Maybe I should have clicked 'no.'
I have been painfully, fully awake.
Sleep is elusive when you don’t know when the knock on your door will come.
The whole thing is so deeply, profoundly disturbing.
Me too. And yet in a state of paralysis. Money is the only thing I have to offer, contributions for feeding frightened, hidden people, and for helping new representatives get elected, and for purchasing drones in Ukraine. A few social media comments that are no doubt ineffective, and since that involves reading others' heartless or ignorant comments, depressing.
I stand in my town square most days, with my signs; attend as many rallies as I can , and forward news and pertinent commentary, and some musical offerings (check out the Marsh Family, Randy Rainbow, etc), but feel like I'm not doing enough. (OK, Gene, Mr. Editor--that should have been "as though", not "like,"). I feel like a wimp when I don't go out in rain or snow, or when temperatures and wind chill are below freezing, while people in Minnesota are out in worse conditions. I'm 74, and lived through the 60's. I thought Kent State was bad. This is exponentially worse.
I march and stand vigil whenever I can.
A question in the Mailbag refers to Trump's "botched management of COVID." That is too generous a description of what Trump did. A person might act in good faith but botch something because of incompetence. Trump denied the seriousness of the pandemic, and he interfered with the response to it. He wasn't incompetent; he was evil. (Of course, if he had acted in good faith, he would have been incompetent, but that's another matter.)
"Evil" was then, and almost inevitably will be, the byproduct of a malignant narcissist who characterizes or judges everything by his perception of its impact on his need for attention and admiration.
Agree. The reason that he denied the seriousness of the pandemic was his fear that it would hurt him politically. Other people's deaths do not enter into the considerations of a narcissist. (I think that "malignant" is redundant.)
Narcissism exists on a spectrum from healthy self-esteem to severe Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD). He is well on the upper end of the spectrum if not, as many believe, at its highest (worst) point. The only clinical demurral for this diagnosis is that he doesn't appear to be experiencing significant personal distress or impairment from his behavior --- yet.
Except for the Epstein fiasco and his poll numbers. Ignorant as he is, there may be some awareness.
Yes, he does have a kind of feral awareness and certainly when it comes to his survival. But everything negative has all to do with others and nothing whatsoever to do with him or his actions. And this is reinforced 24/7 by the enablers and apologists he has gathered around him.
Excellent. 'Feral awareness' like a cornered rat. We must find some pressure points to trigger that same survival instinct in his coterie that his ship is sinking and they should bail.
OK, I'm never driving with you ...
T
Worse yet Mr. T. If you see him in the cab of a semi behind you, immediately pull over to the shoulder or breakdown lane.
Damn good advice... But who in their right mind would ever give Gene a Commercial Vehicle License???
T
Indeed. What's more, from past newsletters, it would appear that both he and the lovely Rachel are vehicle maintenance-challenged or averse, which would put you (and him) in even greater danger. A lose-lose situation if there ever was one.
Should I now call you Mr. T? Do you wear gold chain necklaces? I would ask if you pity de fool, but I think I know the answer.
Just T will do, Mr. is way too formal...
Your dream would have given Rod Serling a great storyline if GPS had existed in the early 60s.
He did something like this in "No Time Like the Past" where a scientist uses a time machine in a failed attempt to fix horrors of the past.
"Exit one Paul Driscoll, a creature of the twentieth century. He puts to a test a complicated theorem of space-time continuum, but he goes a step further, or tries to. Shortly, he will seek out three moments of the past in a desperate attempt to alter the present, one of the odd and fanciful functions in a shadowland known as the Twilight Zone."
Wow. And then there’s Ray Bradbury’s short story "A Sound of Thunder.” (It has its own Wikipedia article.)
I am so awake. Dreadfully awake. Dishearteningly awake.
But I’m so fucking tired.
I sympathize with your fatigue, but I AM ANGRY, instead.
I'm with ya, Big Daddy.
I’m always in a state of mad/sad.
Is it wrong to pray for….. uh well you know!!
What's "wrong" is not putting enough in the collection box/plate (or "Zelling" a sufficient amount) to emphasize and encourage it. A couple of candles asking for divine intercession (intervention) wouldn't hurt either.
Praying for that may not be good for your karma, a concept about which I'm agnostic.
But Trump has stated that he intends to get into Heaven, and perhaps is worried that his opportunity is fast approaching. What if a popular movement arose in which participants declared that unless Trump withdraws ICE and resumes USAID he's canceled, they will collectively light black candles and pray that he be sent to Hell instead -- preferably ASAP?
It is illegal to make death threats, but I very much doubt supernatural ones are prosecutable. Care to initiate the movement, Suzy?
The heaven he'll get into will be as realized as the Nobel certificate and medal he was unsuccessfully bribed with.
Clearly not seen pam blondi and krash spitel in action....
Perhaps even more telling than carrying a heavy burden or responsibility as the truck typically symbolizes, is the self-justification or even self-deception ("I wasn't REALLY at fault, after all") which too often characterizes why and how the Creature That Ate Democracy was allowed to emerge from the muck. Complacency, overconfidence, lack of interest or disengagement --- too readily deflected by too many by pointing at others. Little did that wise 'possum from the Okefenokee know that his quip about the environment would ring true in so many other ways almost 60 years later. "We have met the enemy and he is us."
I have no good argument to not take your thoughts seriously. But I see a problem when Biden did so much good and lies kept him from the credit he deserved. (As a painful slow process to spend the money his legislative wins gained for us. Al that money for internet access was neve spent.) Trump is undoing all the energy gains he can get his hands on. Lies are working. Still!!
Certainly deflection by the otherwise well-meaning is a significant, but not the only, regrettable artifact of the rise of the Creature. My only point is that absent the complacency, the disengagement, he very likely would have remained in the muck.
Celebrated only by a minority of ignorant and/or stupid bugwits.
In my dreams I'm just trying to find the right bus stop.
Without my pants on, in a crowd.
Not denying it…
And speaking of no pants on, there is a restaurant in Court House that advertises a bottomless brunch. I was shocked when they not only wouldn't let me enter with no pants, but they threatened to call the police. I should sue for false advertising.
I said Yes because I feel like this is all our "long national nightmare" that I would love to awaken from. The original "long national nightmare" seems quite quaint now.
Asleep? Awake? Woke? It all seems to land on a nerve. It must be a common fear. But when do we want results? It takes time to change minds. Some of Trump's lies took years of layers to work. And people think it is enough to have money if they want food. It also takes workers to process foods. When the virus closed packing plants and poultry processors that food was scarce. So we can make a difference. it takes work and time. Do not give up now. Congress can make workers legal with new legislation. The border was not so open. Most workers have been here for many years. Accept them.
Sleeping? Not after all I have done to waken my relatives to Trump. They ought to know now. And it was a surprise to me that all the time I spend in learning about Trump, government and foreign relations and how it has been discounted. it helps not to know stuff now.
It only helps those who wish to remain ignorant, disengaged, complacent, or malicious.
I can't figure why it seems to be a common occurrence how members of a family, people who have depth and breadth of shared experience, can differ so drastically over The Regime.
Well, I understand what you mean sbout the degree of denial of reality.
Like Gary and Dale said. We may have broader, more varied life experience, and varying willingness to learn from our mistakes (in my case).
So very bothersome (angering) is bullying and unwillingness to let people lead the lives they choose AS LONG AS THEY'RE NOT HARMING OTHERS. And that doesn't include getting your fee-fees hurt. If one cannot handle that, one needs remedial childhood.
Some of us were out and about in the world and some were busy at home. But there was more than that going on. I am constantly examining my positions. I do want to correct errors.
Yes, no doubt there are legitimate grievances. There are few anyone is willing to believe who will say there are no significant flaws in the way we go about our democracy; we are after all, and always will be, aspirational, in trying to form that "...more perfect union." I am all ears for those legitimate concerns and may even share them --- and certainly when it comes to a reasonable (and rational) debate on how we fix those flaws. But don't expect my understanding when personal or religious beliefs enter into the discussion of what's best for the most of us, or a focus on how others go about their lives. You get to live yours. So do they. Simple, and yet excruciatingly difficult for far too many to accept.
I should have said that it does not help us if we know stuff now and others believe lies.
I inferred that, somewhat, as I have the same problems with my fams and (mostly former) friends. I see enough of your comments to be certain you do know stuff. Not whatever those 'alternative facts' may be.
Like Zelig in the film, I was at many places where I learned. And one thing was to never believe your own propaganda.
I just received an automated voice call offering me a small alert pendant that could save me in case I were to slip and fall, or suffer a medical emergency. I'd have given them the White House number if I'd had it at hand. Never too soon to be ready for such an event...
Why give them a survival tool? (I’m going on a domestic terrorist watchlist for that comment.)
As for Trump & death responsibility...600,000 for ASAID...(The New Yorker) ... c. 180,000 on COVID (Lancet)...maybe 100 so far blowing up boats with drugs...Gaza, who knows? Make it an even mill and call it what it is: Genocide.
I said 'a little' because every time I think things have hit bottom, they plunge further. I'm a hair's breadth from 'no.' Maybe I should have clicked 'no.'
NO. Have watched this approach since the Vietnam war and Nixon's election.
I have been feeling so angry, upset and lost that I couldn't sleep last night. I deeply get your nightmare.