There was a time when I (naively) thought highly of Benjamin Netanyahu. When he first arrived on the scene, he came across as a stern, strong leader and defender of his country. But now, it seems, that façade is cracking and he is being revealed as just another strongman in the mold of what many probably think when they hear the word “strongman.”

Another right wing hardliner who appears to be protecting his own ass and attempting to undermine democratic principles in a country of people who value said principles very highly.

This doesn’t appear to be a matter of ignorance or misunderstanding on the part of Israeli citizens. They see what is going on elsewhere in the world. They’re aware of what’s happening in Ukraine and Hungary and Argentina and here in the U.S. And they’re not about to stand idly by and watch it happen in their own back yard.

Good for them, and anyone else with a nose for sniffing out authoritarianism when it rears its grotesque, ugly head.

It wasn’t a mistake or a coincidence that Trump spoke in Waco on the 30^th anniversary of the Branch Davidian siege. Who knows how many in attendance were there to support him, or just curious?

What I can’t and never will understand is the passion people have for the guy. He must be speaking their language. “God, Guns, and Trump” was one headline. A decent summary, I guess, even though Trump himself is a godless person and the deepest of fakes.

Of course he played the victim. Ted Nugent was there, Matt Gaetz and MTG as well, a real Who’s Who of brown nosers from the alternate universe. The guy is perhaps days away from being indicted, yet he can still stand before “his people” and spew his poison to applause and amens.

Waco, Texas. I wonder what the good people of Waco think of the visit. Is there anyone there who thought it a bad idea for Trump to show up, that his presence only dredged up unwanted memories and unsavory associations?

The Covid-19 virus was a hoax.

Sounds just as dumb and misguided today as it did in 2020.

That hoax has killed a million people and has left many others to deal with lingering health issues. It changed the way we think and behave and do business. I don’t begrudge anyone the freedom to continue wearing a mask. It might become just another accessory in many a wardrobe.

What still angers me, what I still find outrageous and unconscionable, is that Donald Trump and the cartoon cast of cold-hearted misfits around him refused to take a pandemic seriously, from the beginning. Because they viewed it as inconvenient?

It might be an illicit payment to a porn star that brings him down, but there’s a whole iceberg of shitty decisions Trump drags with him like an anchor, hopefully to the bottom of the sea.

Watched a documentary on the Great Lakes in winter and the customary focus on wildlife that live in that neck of the woods. Of course there was the food chain drama— ravens calling wolves to attack a deer trapped in the ice, a lynx pursuing a potential meal, first a rabbit, then a ruffed grouse, both of which survived to be prey some other day.

I want to know how they film such encounters—do they just happen to be in the right place at the right time, or are these scenes somehow staged?

The scenes of crashing waves were breathtaking, awesome spectacle, looking every bit like waves crashing somewhere along some stretch where ocean meets cliffs. But this is fresh water. Anyway, something different to watch besides the usual fare.

A tornado in LA—Los Angeles, not Louisiana. Another “possible, critical, huge development” in the Mar-a-Lago documents case. We’ll all be holding our breath, for sure.

And Ron DeSantis walks back his Ukraine comments.

Ah, the walk-back… only slightly less awkward– though a true staple in political circles– and more frequent than the perp walk Donald Trump is so psyched for. Throw Kari Lake into this mix and one can only marvel at the top-shelf cast of characters the Republicans are turning loose on the country.

The Fail Army has no worries about finding recruits. Idiots in cars are in plentiful supply. And the Republican Party has arrived in all its small-minded glory. Probably not apples and apples, but could there be a connection between all these things?

Donald Trump wants to make a show of his arrest, which would seem to indicate either he’s totally given up or he wants to show everyone how much of a joke everything is, as a way of belittling law enforcement and discrediting the process that will finally, maybe, give him a strong whiff of justice.

What better way to mock the significance of the moment than to keep being his ridiculous, pathetic self?  

What is the secret to not losing interest in something? I have always said I love music and playing the piano, but I’ve never gotten to a place where I practice regularly. Maybe I should actually make the effort to take lessons.

I think I would love to learn my way around a wood lathe but have only gotten to the point of watching videos about it. And if I did have one available, would I actually use it and refine my skills, or eventually let it sit and gather dust?

What’s the secret to sustained effort? Is reward of some sort a piece of the equation? Positive reinforcement? You’d think so, at least as that applies to seeing progress, actually learning theory and learning to play the pieces one is working on, or finishing a bowl or some other project.

I have no desire to perform. Well, maybe subconsciously I do. But I don’t want that kind of pressure. I want to enjoy it all the time. Otherwise, I’ll probably stop doing it.

I can honestly say that I’ve never really applied myself to any substantial thing. I want to know what it’s like to pursue a passion, to have a strong enough desire to do something even when I don’t feel like doing it. I’ve half-assed pretty much everything, except maybe making the lawn and the yard look nice. So I’ve paid attention to details that don’t really matter, except from an aesthetic point of view—stuff that, in the big picture, is only about looking good to people who walk by. Appearances, window dressing. Yikes.

Actually, some of what I just said is not accurate. I do, in many pursuits, try to “measure twice and cut once,” so to speak. I do tend to the task at hand, I pay attention to detail in a lot of what I do, to the point of distraction and ridicule and inertia, and at the risk of being labeled timid or OCD, motivated by the fear and embarrassment of looking inept and screwing something up, which I sometimes do anyway.

The great thing about On Demand programming is that you don’t have to plan around being home in time to catch the show. So tonight we can wait to watch Ted Lasso until 7 o’clock, or 9:08, or we can wait until another day altogether.

Such a deal.

I’m sure some or most on the right will dismiss Rachel Maddow as a demonstrative, bombastic pariah, accusing her of over-reacting, for example, to the firestorm currently (always) engulfing Donald Trump, or the seemingly inevitable passage in Georgia of legislation that will conveniently give power to Republican lawmakers to dismiss prosecutors they don’t like. Think about that!

Anyway, I prefer to think of her as a needed alternative, as someone with a show on MSNBC who doesn’t see herself or speak as one who occupies the opposite end of the spectrum from Tucker Carlson and the rest at Fox News. Fox News. That’s funny. I see her as the steady voice in the midst of the maelstrom, calling us to take a closer look, to step back from the edge of looniness and the influence of domestic and foreign actors who are lying to us and simply trying to manipulate us.

She’s the one who sees through all that, or at least tries to navigate within it, and succeeds, most weeks, at offering a clear-eyed perspective. Which might sound like its own form of discipleship or hero worship, but it’s the choice I have made. What she says, most nights, makes sense to me, sounds rational, thoughtful, and well-researched.

An antidote to the paranoia and racism and small-minded blather that passes for platform for the likes of Kevin McCarthy and Jim Jordan, Rand Paul and MTG and the rest.

Maddow is right. Public figures are indicted and arrested and sentenced and jailed all the time in this country, which sounds a bit sad and not something to be proud of, but at least should have us growing a thick skin by now.

But not for Trump. Trump wants to be the exception because he’s Donald Trump, the victim, apparently innocent as the driven snow. He’s the one falsely accused, even though he’s lived a good portion of his life one step ahead of the jailer, above and just out of reach of the law.

Nothing Trump does should surprise us, and his pre-emptive announcement of his own arrest and the attendant appeal to his minions to protest this travesty would seem to only confirm not only his stupidity, but also the impunity which marks his existence.

And does he really have a groundswell of support anymore? Who’s gonna show up in NYC and Atlanta and West Palm Beach and, hopefully, D.C.? If yesterday is any indication, the media will outnumber the faithful. The Proud Boys and Oath Keepers may be plotting as we speak, but one might get the feeling that when it comes to Trump and loyalty, the numbers are dwindling, and he’s being revealed as the exposed, cornered rat he truly is.

Or maybe all of THIS, too, shall pass. If it does, then our days as a law-abiding nation are numbered.