Crazy Town during War

It has been a tumultuous week, with the Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy removed from his seat at the instigation of the far right of his Party as represented by Matt Gaetz.   It has been a struggle for him to lead since he was given the gavel due to the inability of the far right of the Republican Party to compromise.  His standing up to prevent a government shutdown, instead of being lauded was instead derided by this group of people.  There are those who say they don’t want to govern.  I would go one better and say they don’t want to govern a democracy.  Given the rule change which allowed only one person to move to vacate the Speaker’s seat it was probably a forgone conclusion that the rule would be invoked eventually.  It is why it was a condition for their support in the first place.

This is just the latest in a long string of actions the far right Republicans have taken in various areas of the country.  The reactions in some areas have been rather interesting.

In North Carolina:

There are other young people who are looking very critically at the MAGA Commander in Chief:

So there is a glimmer of hope that people are starting to understand that MAGA Republicans’ desire is not to govern a democracy.  The reason behind our government of checks and balances was to prevent the rule of a single individual.  

In the wake of the bumbling actions of those in the House the United States is ill prepared to deal with international crises such as what is happening in Ukraine and what has happened just the other day in Israel with the attack by Hamas.  One of the things President Biden has been intent on in the Ukraine war was trying to prevent the spread of fighting.  Now we have Israel declaring a state of war.  While this is not, on the surface, connected to the Ukraine war Hamas’s backer is Iran, which is also involved in supplying Russia with weapons to use in Ukraine.   No they are not connected, yet both Ukraine and Israel are supported by the United States.  

Israel has been racked with division recently with the right leaning government of Netanyahu passing a law that removes the power of Israel’s Supreme Court to cancel government decisions deemed “extremely unreasonable”.  Some have speculated that this distraction has led to Israel’s not being prepared for this kind of attack.  It is something we should be thinking about in our own House. 

It only takes a spark and the Middle East has always been volatile.  The spread of the war in Israel is a very real concern.  

I stand with all the innocent people caught up in the horrendous fighting in Ukraine and Israel.  

I Want My Flag Back

Today is the 22nd anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. It was a shocking day that had us all reeling from the pictures pouring from our television sets. No one realized at the time that this day would change so much in our lives. Nor did we realize that what happened that day would bind us all together in a way that we hadn't seen in a long time. That day we were all Americans, there were no Democrats, Republicans or Independents. Just Americans. We flew our flag proudly in defiance of those who had attacked us. Because it truly was a symbol of all of us.

I want that flag back.

 

Lately it seems that the flag has been co-opted by those who follow Donald Trump.  They somehow seem to think it is his flag.  You will see it waving at his rallies and billowing behind pickup trucks filled with his supporters.  Yet democracy is not on Trump's agenda.

 

Lately you see some Republicans who are intent on marginalizing segments of our population cloaking themselves in the flag even while they are repudiating the basic principles of a democracy.   They are supporting the banning of books which depict things they don't agree with.  They are harassing elected officials for doing their jobs.   They are doing everything in their power to force people to ascribe to their religious beliefs by curtailing women's reproductive rights.  We have Senator Tuberville of Alabama single handedly holding hundreds of military nominations hostage, threatening our national security,  because he opposes the Pentagon's policy of paying for service members to travel to states where abortion is legal for health care. By supporting this behavior Republican loyalists are leading our country down the path to an autocracy.

 

On 9/11 we stood as one against the external forces that would try to tear us apart.  It is time to realize that there are internal forces that are trying to do the same.  

Robin Williams said it right.

I want my flag back. 

Paradise Lost

The scent of flowers. That is what I remember about my first moments in Hawaii. I remember the beautiful sunny days where a passing shower cleared up almost as soon as it showed up. I remember standing under that famous Banyan tree in Lahaina taking pictures. There was history around every corner. As a vacation destination it truly was paradise.

This fellow has a nice video on the Maui I knew.

That was then, this is now.

Lahaina will not be the last casualty of climate change.

It is a very sad day. But I know that the spirit of the people of Hawaii will not be broken.

"Barbenheimer"

A number of weeks ago a friend talked me into seeing The Little Mermaid. Not my usual movie genre. But it was surprisingly good. Anyway, during the previews of coming movies Barbie popped up. At the time I looked at the trailer and thought, who on earth would want to see that? If looked totally without substance. And, well, totally pink! Fast forward to the opening weekend of what was labeled “Barbenheimer”, the release of Barbie and Oppenheimer in the same weekend. Barbie totally demolished Oppenheimer at the box office, garnering almost twice the box office take. Don’t get me wrong, Oppenheimer had a very good take for opening weekend at $80.5 million. But Barbie garnered $155 million.

I thought, what the heck? Have we fallen so low that a fluffy, pink movie would out perform the story of what was a world altering history of the father of the atom bomb? I went to see Oppenheimer on opening weekend. It was more than just the story of J. Robert Oppenheimer’s role in creating the atom bomb. It was also the story of the attempt to ruin him by one vengeful man. It was the story of the cutthroat world of government. The three hour length wasn’t a drawback. It went by very quick, because it was a very good film.

But in the meantime I was hearing from people who had seen Barbie and loved it. Adults, not kids, because contrary to my first thought it really isn’t a children’s movie. So, I talked a friend into going to see it this weekend. It is a clever fantasy that hits at gender roles into which not just women, but men, have been pigeonholed. It’s message of the unfair advantage some people may have due to their gender in its different worlds, Barbie Land and the real world, should resonant with everyone, not just women. It’s message of how people should be able to be who they are without being judged as worthy or not reminds me of the America I believe in. While it is pink it is certainly not fluffy.

Now we have people who are complaining that it is too “woke”. Really? This seems to be a catch all term used by some people who feel threatened by the empowerment of certain segments of our society. As of this writing Barbie has grossed $1 billion, and I realized I misjudged what America was saying with its movie vote.

Both of these films have powerful messages. They just say them in different ways.

I Still Believe in Us

 This 4^th of July we find ourselves still struggling to find unity in times of strife. We have recent Supreme Court rulings that have overturned long term precedent. If there is one thing that can be said of my country, it is that it is always changing. Sometimes for the better, sometimes not. Time will tell how we deal with those changes. But I still have faith that we can be what was dreamed of by those who found themselves on our shores, despite the actions of a few.

We just need to give everyone a chance to be what they are meant to be. We need to believe in freedom for everyone, not just a few. We need to believe in the dream of America.

A message from some friends:

If there is anyone who understands what happens when freedom is lost, it is our friends in Ukraine. I hope that someday they will be celebrating the liberation of their country and can enjoy what we have come to take for granted.

Happy July 4^th and Slava Ukraini!

Smoke

Last week in Minnesota we were on the receiving end of the wildfire smoke from Canada. You may have heard about the noxious blanket of the stuff that had taken up residence in New York and other areas of the east coast of the US. Well, it wasn’t just those states that were affected. Nor was this the first year that we were on the receiving end. But it appears to be getting worse.   

Some have compared the poor air quality to that of other notorious cities, such as those you might find in China or India. We seemed to have topped them. It has also forced some people to reach for, yes, those masks that were so prevalent during Covid. Although I am not sure that those would actually help, but they made one feel a little better.

Here where I live we are seeing drought conditions increase again. This after what was a very snowy winter and rainy spring. But it was like someone turned off a faucet. We haven’t had any significant rain for weeks now and it is a struggle to keep things green, and alive.

That there are those who still don’t believe in climate change boggles the mind. We were supposedly going to have rain today, but so far that has been a no show. The saying that it is too dry to rain is quite accurate.

Maybe we could use a little help?

Update:

Maybe that rain dance worked.  We did end up getting a half an inch of rain.  Not enough to turn things around, but I will take anything at this point. 

A Small Light

I was paging through my most recent copy of National Geographic and came across a short story about Miep Gies. I would not be surprised if you don’t know who she was. I didn’t. She was the woman who hid Anne Frank and her family from the Nazis. She was an ordinary woman who did an extraordinary thing. Although she never considered her actions to be unusual. Someone has made a miniseries, "A Small Light", about her life and the backstory behind what she did for the Frank’s. It aired on National Geographic on May 1 and Disney+ the next day. I will have to see if I can find it.

The actor who portrayed Otto Frank, Anne’s father, was Liev Schreiber, whose grandfather emigrated from Ukraine. This is what he had to say about Gies:

“The Miep Gieses of the world-the small lights, the extraordinary ordinary people who did something, who pushed back against tyranny, who pushed back against authoritarians, who pushed back against fascists-remembering what they accomplished, I think, gives us some perspective on what we can accomplish.”

In the world we are living in today it is important that those small lights be seen, and heard.

So I have a video of a statement made in court in Russia by a woman who was just sentenced to prison for telling the truth about Putin’s war.  Please listen.

"The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing."

Slava Ukraini