Telescopes Used For Good and Evil
I really enjoyed the Democratic convention, particularly all of the Republicans who spoke to the truth of Trump's unfitness for office.
They had the former lieutenant governor of Georgia saying that he's voting for Harris, not because he's a democrat, but because he's "a patriot." Why? Because we all heard the recording of Trump calling Georgia's Secretary of State, demanding for him to find the 12,000 votes that he needed to win.
Does that seem normal to you? Is that the type of thing you tell somebody when you think the law applies to you? Or is that what you say when you have no regard for the will of the people?
Then there was Stephanie Grisham, saying that as a communications director, Trump told her just to say things over and over, that even if something is a lie, people will believe it is true.
Adam Kinzinger said, “Donald Trump is a weak man pretending to be strong. He's a small man pretending to be big. He is a faithless man pretending to be righteous. He is a perpetrator that claims to be the victim. He puts on quite a show, but there is no real strength there.”
These are the Republicans who chose to no longer participate in Trump's charade, and there were many more.
(Contrast them with people like Bill Barr who believes Trump is unfit, but he'll vote for him anyway. Fascinating.)
I love the criticism that there was no depth to Harris's policy initiatives, as if they would have preferred that she read the text from actual bills. Everybody knows what they'd be saying then- "What a BORE!"
I particularly love the nuanced language of her approach to Israel/Gaza.
If someone doesn't believe that Israel has a right to exist, historically they are not in the best of company.
And if someone doesn't care about the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, once again, they are not in good company.
It was an example of the politics of vaguery, where you fine tune the language in a way that people have to agree with you, but you're not really saying anything too substantive. What was she supposed to say though? Let's just admit that this is a very complicated situation.
Her words can still guide us, even with their vagueness. Israel does have a right to exist, we can still be critical of them, the people of Gaza deserve respect, the hostages need to be released, and let's aim for a ceasefire. Easier said than done, but isn't everything?
While the convention was going on, Trump gave Democrats a boost by continuing his descent.
He said that he's better looking than Harris. Oh really? Is that so? To suggest this is unpresidential behavior is to overlook the fact that it wouldn't be worthy of anybody with any job.
He said that if she is elected, people are going to pay four times the amount of taxes they pay now. Is that so??? We're going from 27%, to 108%?
He said that energy costs will drop by 50% if he's elected. Really??? Could you give us a brief outline on how that's going to happen? We'll try not to laugh.
He said that the price of groceries has gone up because... friends, this is embarrassing... he said that the price of groceries has gone up because we need to do more oil drilling. (As an aside, take a second and imagine Trump pushing a grocery cart through a grocery store, comparing tomatoes, hoisting kitty litter, opening the carton of eggs to see if any are broken, haha.)
Don't forget that he said Harris's Michigan crowd was AI-generated, and he used it as an example of "election fraud" so egregious that she should be "disqualified." He knows the polls have shifted, and his fragile ego needs an excuse for her momentum. It couldn't be that he just sucks, no, of course not! It must be that she's cheating. You know, with her, again... AI-generated crowds, haha. So embarrassing for him. (Btw, he said it, therefore people actually believe it! I've talked to them. They exist. Paging Stephanie Grisham.)
Albert Camus had some advice for Trump. “Always go too far, because that’s where you’ll find the truth.”
Or in the current vernacular of the peasantry, "Fool around and find out."
Trump is dropping in the polls because Harris's charisma, competence, and and obvious level of basic sanity, but also because he's become a predictable bore with no tricks left to play.
I'm not kidding, I had a countdown going in my head until the day he would say that he was better looking than her. This is the same garbage from his 2016 primary, when he criticized Carly Fiorina's face. He said, "Look at that face. Would anyone vote for that?" On second thought, maybe this IS presidential behavior now, at least perfectly worthy of the 45th president.
This schtick used to remain in the headlines for a few days, but now it's barely a blip. It's hard to figure out where the meanness ends and where the cognitive decline begins. Also, does it matter?
Could have his great friend Kim Jong-Un been on the money when he called him a dotard??? (Man, as they say, with friends like these, who needs enemies?) Are both parties still requiring that their candidate has a minimum degree of sense?
Unfortunately insanity and stupidity is already baked into the Trump cake. (Just add 78-year-old flour, orange dye, and fold in the garlic from his soul?) We accept it in a sense, we've recognized that's who he is. For anybody else displaying this behavior though, stick a fork in their cake, they'd be done.
As a contrast to the Republican convention, where they ended it with a whimper... Trump rambling on, exaggerating, lying, and STILL with the name-calling, haha, with people leaving, bored, figuring the election was over anyway... Democrats ended their convention with a call to action. Harris has the momentum, yes, but this is not over by a long shot. I believe the election will be decided by something of which we're not even yet aware.
In 2016, Hillary had a 90% chance to win a week and a half before the election, which shrunk to a 68% chance the day before the election, courtesy of Mr. Comey.
After the 1988 Democratic convention, Dukakis was up over Bush by 17%, but someone took a picture of him in a tank or something, and Bush came back and won by 8% nationally. The electoral count was 426 to 111!
Really think about that. After all of this, Trump could still win! Seriously consider what Michelle Obama asked of us- "Do something!"
There are three main takeaways from the last week or two- Trump is clearly unfit which can be seen from the Republicans who have left him, Harris has a basic level of sense and decency even if you disagree with her, and there is no guarantee which way it's going to go.
So what's the answer? I don't know, but I do know a couple things. There's no value wasting time arguing with his most faithful followers whose version of truth is defined by what comes out of his mouth, and we all have the ability to rise to our capability. So let's do it!
August 25, 2024
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I saw a guy at the grocery store today with triplets, maybe like a month old. I mentioned that he had a lot of babies, but he wasn't in any mood to talk about it. I mean, that's way too many month-old babies for someone to have. He was way beyond seeing any amusement in the absurdity of it though. He couldn't even look me in the face. Reasonable.
August 25, 2019
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I think Buttigieg is right- "the biggest risk we can take is to try to play it safe."
August 25, 2019
Postscript- In the end I do believe Biden is the only one who could have beaten Trump. I can guarantee that he is the only one proven to be able to beat him.
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After watching the CNN series the 2000s, I was convinced that McCain could have been president if he wanted to be. The trouble was that he would have needed to want to be president above all else. When that lunatic from the town hall called Obama a Muslim and said that she could't trust him, McCain repudiated her, said that he knew Obama and that he was a good person, just a person that he disagreed with. That's how I feel about McCain. Without that repudiation I genuinely believe he would have been president. But McCain believed in the country, and he believed in his own voters. He wanted to be president of The United States, not president of Q's Court. He sacrificed the votes from the lunatic fringe of his own party. He had a moral code, it required him to take a stand although it would have been easier and more politically rewarding to deflect or ignore such a ridiculous untruth. That's an example we should all follow regardless of our political affiliation. We need more people who can set an example for everyone, even when half of us might disagree with them.
August 25, 2018
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One of my favorite books is A Universe from Nothing by Lawrence Krauss. I'm currently reading his follow-up, The Greatest Story Ever Told- So Far. He writes, "Many people have taken exception to my proposal that the universe needed no cause but simply popped into existence from nothing. Yet this is precisely what happens with the light you are using to read this page. Electrons and hot atoms emit photons- photons that didn't exist before they were emitted- which are emitted spontaneously and without specific cause. Why is it that we have grown at least somewhat comfortable with the idea that photons can be created from nothing without cause, but not whole universes?"
August 25, 2018
Postscript- once again, a ton of comments, see addendum.
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You know, maybe Trump's right. If he gets impeached the market might crash and we'll all be poor. Then again, maybe it'll double and we'll all be rich. Let's try it! Economics is easy for good brain people like me and Trump.
August 25, 2018
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I got blasted in the face with a racquetball tonight. I was laying on the ground and my opponent walked over and loomed over me. Know what he said? "Don't fuck with me." Haha, good one. He knew I would find that funny.
August 25, 2016
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This is the last day of your life. Don't believe me? The sun never sets from the perspective of outer space. The length of your last day remains to be seen.
August 25, 2013
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Emma gave me a napkin so I'd stop wiping my hands on my pants. Nice try Emma! I just wiped them on my socks instead.
August 25, 2012
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Early birds gets too much attention. Let's hear it for the late worms, who also made out pretty good.
August 25, 2012
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Neil Armstrong left us on this day in 2012.
"I believe that every human has a finite number of heartbeats. I don't intend to waste any of mine running around doing exercises."
He had two pieces of the Wright Brothers plane with him on the moon, a small piece of fabric from the wing and a piece of the propeller. He helped the Wright Brothers plane fly to the moon.
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As Lance Armstrong became stronger and Neil Armstrong became weaker with age, there was an exact moment that they would been perfectly tie in an arm wrestling contest. I wonder what I was doing at that moment.
August 25, 2012
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Another great line from Crimes and Misdemeanors- "If necessary I will always choose God over truth."
August 25, 2011
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Dru- "It's about that time of year where my old friend Ben Kreider gets to comment on the age of my balls. Have at it you dirty dog."
August 25, 2011
Postscript- I text him every year on his birthday commenting on the combined age of his balls. I just texted him today asking how his 98-year-old balls are doing.
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Poop- excellent palindrome, awful onomatopoeia.
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Galileo Galilei demonstrated his first telescope to Venetian lawmakers on this day in 1609.
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The first Great Moon Hoax article was published in The New York Sun on this day in 1835. It announced the discovery of life and civilization on the Moon- bison, goats, unicorns, bipedal tail-less beavers and bat-like winged humanoids who build temples. You'll never believe this part. The New York Sun's readership increased dramatically.
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Errol Morris's The Thin Blue Line was released on this day in 1988. Interview footage ended up getting Randall Adams off death row. It was billed as, "The only murder mystery film that actually solves a murder."
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George Lincoln Rockwell, ever hear of him? Good. He founded the American Nazi Party and was assassinated on this day in 1967, by a former member.
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Monty Hall was born on this day in 1921. Ever hear of the Monty Hall Problem? It's the weirdest thing. If you're supposed to find a prize between three doors, and somebody lets you know one of the doors that it is not behind, and you're given the option to switch, it's mathematically in your best interest to switch. Very strange!
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monty_Hall_problem
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Rollie Fingers was born on this day in 1946.
Lon Simmons- "Fingers has thirty-five saves. Rollie has a better record than John the Baptist."
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Martin Amis joined us on this day in 1949.
"What is the only provocation that could bring about the use of nuclear weapons? Nuclear weapons. What is the priority target for nuclear weapons? Nuclear weapons. What is the only established defense against nuclear weapons? Nuclear weapons. How do we prevent the use of nuclear weapons? By threatening to use nuclear weapons. And we can't get rid of nuclear weapons, because of nuclear weapons."
He has the distinction of being one of Hitchens' best friends.
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Tim Burton joined us on this day in 1958,
"Certain things leave you in your life and certain things stay with you. And that's why we're all interested in movies- those ones that make you feel, you still think about. Because it gave you such an emotional response, it's actually part of your emotional make-up, in a way."
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Billy Ray Cyrus was born on this day in 1961, known of course for playing Gene in Mulholland Drive.
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Roman commander and philosopher, Pliny the Elder, left us on this day in AD 79.
"In wine, there's truth."
How is that for some ancient Roman wisdom?!
It sounds even better in Latin- "In vino veritas."
And how about this?
"True glory consists in doing what deserves to be written, in writing what deserves to be read, and in so living as to make the world happier and better for our living in it."
Damn.
In Mark Kurlansky's book, Salt, he said the Pliny the Elder considered salted pig vulvas a delicacy, particularly one that aborted the pig fetuses. Huh???
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One of my top favorite philosophers, David Hume, left us on this day in 1776. After learning he was terminally ill, he wrote his autobiography, My Own Life, in one day. From On Suicide:
"But the life of a man is of no greater importance to the universe than that of an oyster."
Perhaps not a self-help book!
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Friedrich Nietzsche also left us on this day in 1900, not a great day for philosophers dying.
"Be careful in casting out your devil 'lest you cast out the best thing about you."
"Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster."
"Sometimes people don't want to hear the truth because they don't want their illusions destroyed."
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Truman Capote left us on this day in 1984. From In Cold Blood:
"The village of Holcomb stands on the high wheat plains of western Kansas, a lonesome area that other Kansans call “out there.""
Oh goodness, that lit the top of my head on fire.
Tennessee Williams on Capote:
"We jump always to the conclusions of stories, of lives. It's a habit, I think. Jump to the end to see how the health and the finances and the reputation bore the burdens. There is joy on every journey, within every life. I choose to remember the joy of Truman, the sense of glee as he threw words around so easily and beautifully, confetti with punctuation and the wistfulness of the lost and sweet boy always, like me, on the side, looking on and taking notes. We all end up on bad roads, those blind alleys I'm always talking about. Remember the moments in the sun, the sky full of words."
Here he is, photographed by his friend Henri Cartier-Bresson.
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Jim Jarmusch quoting Sam Fuller- "If the first scene doesn’t give you a hard-on then throw the goddamn thing away."
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Richard Dawkins:
"...if I met god in the unlikely event after I died, I think the first thing I would say is well, which one are you? Are you Zeus? Are you Thor? Are you Baal? Are you Mithras? Are you Yahweh? Which god are you? And why did you take such great pains to conceal yourself and to hide away from us?"
August 25, 2013
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Well how about that... intelligent people discussing Israel/Palestine intelligently.
http://m.samharris.org/blog/item/making-sense-of-gaza
August 25, 2014
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Politico- Trump’s Strange Tweet About Joseph McCarthy
Sounds so familiar! From the article:
McCarthy, after all, was “an essentially destructive force,” according to biographer Richard H. Rovere. He was “a chronic opportunist.” He was “a political speculator.” He was “a Republican who had started as a Democrat.” He was “a fertile innovator, a first-rate organizer and galvanizer of mobs, a skilled manipulator of public opinion, and something like a genius at that essential American strategy: publicity.” He was “a vulgarian.” He was “a man with an almost aesthetic preference for untruth.” He “faked it all and could not understand anyone who didn’t.” He “made sages of screwballs and accused wise men of being fools.” He was “the first American ever to be actively hated and feared by foreigners in large numbers.” He “favored the third person.”
He was “a great sophisticate in human relationships, as every demagogue must be. He knew a good deal about people’s fears and anxieties, and he was a superb juggler of them. But he was himself numb to the sensation he produced in others. He could not comprehend true outrage, true indignation, true anything. If he was anything at all in the realm of ideas, principles, doctrines, he was a species of nihilist," Rovere wrote.
https://politi.co/2PjDAc5
August 25, 2018
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The Hill- August 25, 2020- Hillary Clinton: Biden ‘should not concede under any circumstances’
What a dumb thing to say! Anybody who would criticize Trump for saying the same thing, has to criticize Clinton.
And for anybody supporting Trump, if you disagree with Clinton in principle, take a look at your own candidate who says that he'll either win or the election is rigged, i.e. Biden has a 0% chance to win legitimately, i.e. if Trump doesn't win, Trump will not concede.
If we believe in democracy, then we believe that when the will of the voters is understood, the loser needs to concede.
If Biden says anything as stupid as either of these two on the topic of the integrity of elections, let me know.
https://thehill.com/homenews/media/513527-hillary-clinton-biden-should-not-concede-under-any-circumstances
August 25, 2020
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The Onion, August 25, 2021- Vaccine Skeptic Does Own Research By Enrolling 45,000 Friends In Double-Blind Clinical Trial
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A little something for all the crumb creep lush cowards out there, courtesy of Frank Rizzo:
https://youtu.be/O8VBehdpOpI?si=NhzGSUZcwXirPHyt
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After a nationwide manhunt, John Dillinger was jailed in Crown Point, Indiana and photographed with his prosecutor Robert Estill. Taking advantage of the wide exposure, in this picture Dillinger is telegraphing that he wants somebody to smuggle the gun into the prison.
It's no secret what Trump is telegraphing- seething hatred of a system that would hold him accountable, and a promise to go after anyone who participates.
If you haven't read the indictment, read it. Read the last one too about January 6th, and the one about withholding documents he was demanded to return. This is not a good guy. This is a bad guy. Look at him.
Fun fact- since Dillinger got Estill to smile in the photograph and let him act all chummy, he ended up losing his job.
August 25, 2023
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I couldn't wait to get home and show Trump's mugshot to Gretel and ask her what she thought. She's a Kubrick Stare aficionado and I saw this meme a few places earlier today. I thought there was a good chance she would recognize it.
A year or two ago she told Emma that the dog and the cat were each giving each other the Kubrick stare. Emma asked what that meant and she told her to look it up, haha.
When I showed it to her, at first she just said that he looks mad. I told her to think about it harder. She stared, and then lit up and said, "Kubrick stare!" Yes!
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Herodotus, The Histories- "If a man insisted always on being serious, and never allowed himself a bit of fun and relaxation, he would go mad or become unstable without knowing it."
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The Onion- Guess Trump's Weight!
https://www.theonion.com/americans-guess-trumps-weight-1850775314/slides/20
Haha, 215... Maybe my new favorite Trump lie.
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Norm Macdonald:
A gay guy asks his roommate to play hide and seek.
“I’ll hide and if you find me I’ll suck your dick.”
His roommate asks, “And what if I can’t find you?”
The guy says, “I’ll be behind the couch.”
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Hunter S. Thompson, The Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967- "To make a point of declaring friendship is to cheapen it. For men's emotions are very rarely put into words successfully."
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Edward Abbey:
“No more cars in national parks. Let the people walk. Or ride horses, bicycles, mules, wild pigs--anything--but keep the automobiles and the motorcycles and all their motorized relatives out.
We have agreed not to drive our automobiles into cathedrals, concert halls, art museums, legislative assemblies, private bedrooms and the other sanctums of our culture; we should treat our national parks with the same deference, for they, too, are holy places.
An increasingly pagan and hedonistic people (thank God!), we are learning finally that the forests and mountains and desert canyons are holier than our churches. Therefore let us behave accordingly.”
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Capote again- "You can't blame a writer for what the characters say."
Phenomenal.
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Hume again- "Generally speaking, the errors in religion are dangerous; those in philosophy only ridiculous."
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Dorothy Parker- “If you have any young friends who aspire to become writers, the second greatest favor you can do them is to present them with copies of The Elements of Style. The first greatest, of course, is to shoot them now, while they’re happy.”
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Julio Luis Borges- "To fall in love is to create a religion that has a fallible god."
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Stephen Fry, Moab Is My Washpot- "It's not all bad. Heightened self-consciousness, apartness, an inability to join in, physical shame and self-loathing—they are not all bad. Those devils have been my angels. Without them I would never have disappeared into language, literature, the mind, laughter and all the mad intensities that made and unmade me."
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H. P. Lovecraft- "I couldn't live a week without a private library - indeed, I'd part with all my furniture and squat and sleep on the floor before I'd let go of the 1500 or so books I possess."
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Howard Zinn- "Historically, the most terrible things - war, genocide, and slavery - have resulted not from disobedience, but from obedience."
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Let's end on Pliny the Elder:
"Contact with menstrual blood turns new wine sour, crops touched by it become barren, grafts die, seed in gardens are dried up, the fruit of trees fall off, the edge of steel and the gleam of ivory are dulled, hives of bees die, even bronze and iron are at once seized by rust, and a horrible smell fills the air; to taste it drives dogs mad and infects their bites with an incurable poison."
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No, that would be a terrible way to end. How about this?
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Steve Martin- "You want to know how I think art should be taught to children? Take them to a museum and say, 'This is art, and you can't do it."
Addendum
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