My morning routine, which includes cold brew and writing; a good breakfast, then reading through the local paper online; having lunch and watching clips of the previous late night monologues from Colbert and Kimmel; sitting in a comfortable chair by the front window on a sunny day; pouring a glass of wine and taking the time to cook a nice meal.
Woe Is Us
China is roughly 16 times older than we are. Its culture goes back 4,000 years. We’re coming up on 250, maybe a bit older if we go back to the Mayflower or the first settlers in Florida or on the west coast. I suppose if we look at the indigenous cultures on this North American continent, then we might be in the same league or even older than China. Technically, the Peoples Republic of China wasn’t founded until 1949, so… And now we’re in the weeds.
Anyway, if Trump wants to go toe to toe with China, we don’t have a snowball’s chance in hell of holding up, because Trump has no appreciation for history or civic pride or cultural heritage or sheer brain power. He doesn’t have the patience for diplomacy, for sitting at the table and hashing things out. He merely figures it’s all about the art of some deal, about talking tough and expecting everyone to bend the knee.
China’s not going to bend any knee. In fact, Xi and the rest probably look at Trump and the U.S. as unruly adolescents in need of a good talking to, in need of a good whoopin’. It seems unlikely that Trump is the one playing chess.
Ah, the downside of looking for cheap labor, coming home to roost. And the downside of having a clown sitting at the Resolute Desk.
Sensory and Otherwise
I learned a bit about anatomy when we dissected a frog in Biology class. I contributed to the noxious aromas wafting through the hallways when we created esters in Chemistry class.
Mostly, what I remember to this day was learned in Spanish class with Mr. McGregor. I learned a bit of the language and witnessed what passion for one’s work looks like.
Heart Breaking
Will we be ready this time? Will we have learned anything from the disaster in 2020?
Given who’s back in office, I’m gonna go with No. The decimated HHS is run by RFK, Jr., and Trump himself has never seen the use for preparedness or research or anything that might make sense to most rational human beings.
The next pandemic—respiratory or hemorrhagic—will likely not take us by surprise but will nonetheless find us shamefully unprepared, and largely because of a mind-numbing, inexplicable lack of a sense of urgency.
Vaccine hesitancy—if there’s even a vaccine available—will once again rear its ugly head, fueled by Fox News and other outlets—not to mention the head of HHS himself. We’ll argue about “freedom” versus precautions, we’ll all be expected to ignore the man behind the curtain, the elephant in the room, in the form of a total abandonment of reason in the face of ongoing threats.
We’ll have little in the way of defense to depend on, including enough knowledgeable nurses and doctors and other staff, because they fled the fields after the Covid nightmare and have not returned. A shortage of PPE would be the least of our worries.
America has been commandeered by a collection of misfits and impostors motivated by profit margins, quack philosophies of governance, and blinding self-interest. The way forward looks fraught with blind spots. Our fall looks to be precipitous.
Up and at ’em
Probably turning the occasional and well-intentioned trip to the YMCA into something more regular, to the point of realizing some of the benefits of regular exercise. Better late than never.
Real World Evidence
I suppose for many the jury’s out on Sam Harris. In some circles, I imagine he’ll always be the devil incarnate. I used to feel that way, but not anymore. I saw a clip the other day of Mr. Harris explaining what’s going on with Trump’s penchant for lying, and it clarified some things for me.
I’m sure many have known or suspected all along that Trump has always been a lying son of a bitch, but Harris offered an insight that makes total sense with regard to developments since Trump elbowed his way onto the scene: Trump lies on purpose.
He lies in ways that are clearly not meant to deceive anyone. His lies are transparent and serve more as a loyalty test, Harris maintains. Lance Armstrong, for example, lied about doping in hopes of getting away with it. Trump doesn’t care whether or not he gets away with it, whatever “it” is. His lies serve a different purpose.
He may not be able to help himself, but the purpose for the steady stream of bullshit that exits his mouth is to create a climate, to confuse people and wear them down. As Harris explains, anyone can go out after Trump brags about one of his buildings being ten stories taller than it really is, and count the floors for themselves, which will confirm that he’s lying. But in today’s climate, in these days of influence from the Heritage Foundation and fears of fascism, the purpose of the steady barrage of falsehoods is to get us to throw up our hands in frustration and to give up on ever being able to know for sure what is real, or whose opinion we can trust.
Harris quotes Hannah Arendt, who observed that the purpose of this particular brand of lying is not to get people to believe the falsehoods, but to get them to believe nothing, to declare “epistemological bankruptcy,” to shrug their shoulders and declare, “who knows what’s going on in the world? I’m just gonna keep quiet and keep my head down…”
This, Harris maintains, is where authoritarianism, where fascism, always leads.
Trump is a puppet with authoritarian tendencies. Why else, one might wonder, would a 78-year old man who will have served his Constitutionally mandated two-term limit– at which point he’ll be 82– not rule out running for a third?
Just Doing It
I don’t very often equate exercise with fun. It’s not that I don’t derive satisfaction from knowing I’m doing myself some good by getting to the Y on a regular basis. It’s just that I don’t spend much time trying to figure out how to make it fun. I just do it, and feel good when I start seeing progress and an increase in strength and stamina.
I suppose the fun quotient is raised when I’m giving horsey rides to the grandkids, throwing a football or playing catch, golfing, working in the yard, or taking a hike with friends.
Nothing More Than Chaos
I seem to be a glass half empty guy when it comes to Trump and the current state of things.
China retaliates with tariffs of its own, so it is a foregone conclusion that Trump is going to muster his own dumb tit for tat. And China won’t be the only one. It’s all so hard to watch.
To make matters worse, how long will it be before people who show up at these nationwide protests start disappearing? Isn’t that what starts happening—facial recognition software does its thing and your average concerned citizens start not being heard from or seen? Or at the very least, they’re suddenly much less interested in voicing dissent?
Too much? Too dark? Can’t happen here? How can anyone believe that, given what we’ve already seen?
As much as I hope the protests will be enough to sway opinions and effect positive change, I predict the gloves will be coming off shortly. On both sides. Especially once the tariff insanity and market instability start really hitting home.
What the hell is the endgame here? Maybe it’s time for reasonable people to call Trump in for an intervention (insert derisive laughter here).
Slim Pickins
There aren’t many that would fit that bill. Maybe To Kill A Mockingbird, or something by Hemingway. Certain passages of Scripture might be worth revisiting– in search of a spark.
An Interesting Character
Daily writing prompt
If you could be a character from a book or film, who would you be? Why?
The low hanging fruit might be Tom Sawyer or Atticus Finch, from the days when I read something besides non-fiction.
But since it’s fresh in my mind, I’d have to go with Dr. Martin Ellingham, from the British tv series Doc Martin. He’s a quirky GP, a former top surgeon in London who developed haemophobia, a brilliant diagnostician, a person with impeccable credentials but also a product of an unhappy childhood– at least with his parents. He seems to know only one way to be– rigid though honorable and forthright in his speech and behavior, learning his way in his role in the small but charming English seaside community of Portwenn.
I guess I identify with the Doc’s cold professionalism, or his strict understanding of his purpose, his work– which doesn’t mean he doesn’t have room to grow in matters of the heart, or work on his sense of humor or his ability to read a room.
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