Varieties of Wonderful and Miserable Lives

Biden declared that the national bird is the bald eagle. Another landmark achievement in the long struggle of bald rights. 

December 27, 2024

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I've thought about Trump too much in my life, I knew it was going to happen the second he won. If he wins again, he won't but if he does, I'm going to think about him the way that the Acoma people of New Mexico think about tribal members who get too uppity. They all share the water, and once in awhile there's a guy who decides that he needs a nice lawn out in front of his. They're no real laws, but people just kind of scoff at it. If Trump runs again, he's driven by money, and his idea of status, so let him have some money, who cares.

December 27, 2022

Postscript- He won. And this is good advice.

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The Onion- Crowd Roars In Approval As Makeup-Smeared Trump Begs Rally To Tell Him He’s Beautiful

The Onion really nailed it this year. Can't be shared enough.

https://trib.al/Su44jZU

December 27, 2019

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I only watched a minute and 22 seconds of Jimmy Carr: His Dark Material and I had to stop it. I'm going to love it too much.

Jimmy- So what do you think, have we over-reacted to Covid-19?

Some in the audience- "Yeah!"

Jimmy- "Yeah, a lot of the survivors think so. Now raise your hand if you're not going to get the vaccine."

A few hands raise.

Jimmy- "Now take that hand and slap yourself in the fucking face. Voice of reason right there.

December 27, 2021

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If I were a Trump supporter my cognitive dissonance would be off the charts after discovering that Christianity Today, founded by Billy Graham, and The National Review, founded by William F. Buckley, both came out in support of Trump's removal. I'd have to ask myself, why do those bastions of conservative establishment agree with the Democrats' argument??? 

(It's because it's airtight... Trump is an amoral degenerate who abused the power of his office by bribing a weak country to brand his #1 2020 political rival a criminal, and obstructed Congress's duty to investigate.)

December 27, 2019

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Steinbeck- "Power does not corrupt. Fear corrupts... perhaps the fear of a loss of power."

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Nice to have some Constitutional lines drawn in the sand, before his presidency begins. We knew what kind of guy he was, and what he was sure to do. By not divesting from his company, the Chinese government was paying him on day 1... a bank run by them rents a floor in Trump Tower. But what would he care?

Robert Reich

Just 24 days to go before Trump is sworn in. The next question: How long before Trump is impeached, and what will he be impeached for? Some possibilities: 

1. Taking money from foreign governments, in violation of Article I Section 9 of the Constitution.

2. Colluding with a foreign power against the interests of the United States, considered treason.

3. Using the presidency for private gain, in violation of federal law (5 Code of Federal Regulations 2635.702). 

4. Seeking to intimidate critics, in violation of the First Amendment. 

5. Undermining the freedom and independence of the press, in violation of the First Amendment. 

6. Attacking freedom of religion, in violation of the First Amendment. 

7. Undermining the rule of law through arbitrary and capricious statements and orders, in violation of the Due Process clause of the First Amendment. 

8. Suppressing the votes of minorities, in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment. 

9. Other?

What do you think?

December 27, 2016

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I found the grave today of Jacob Kreider, who lived from 1735 to 1818. His great-great-grandson was my great-great-grandfather.

December 27, 2018

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Joseph Campbell, The Inner Reaches of Outer Space

“As viewed by astronauts from the moon, the Earth lacks those lines of sociopolitical division that are so prominent on maps. And as recognized here below, the web of interlacing socioeconomic dependencies that now enfolds the planet is of one life. All that is required is a general change of vision to accord with these contemporary facts. And that this will occur is certain. It is, in fact, already occurring. Moreover, the vision required is nothing new, nor unnatural. What are unnatural, artificial, and contrived, are the separations.” 

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Dru- Alright Friends. I'm ready to share thee most weird events tonight. First, I played racquetball with one of my oldest grade school friends, Ben Kreider at his gym. Second, I saw my highschool geometry teacher at the same gym. Third I saw the geometry teacher's balls as he towelled them off in the locker room afterwards. Man being back in PA rules.

December 27, 2012

Postscript- "Spheres," not balls.

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I kept feeling chilly drafts of wind while watching the Christopher Hitchens documentary on Mother Theresa. A demon? No, a door upstairs had blown open. But what if a demon blew it open? :(

December 27, 2011

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If you people knew how much scrabble I play, you'd hide your zyzzyvas.

December 27, 2011

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Tragedy on this day in 1763 here in lancaster. The Paxton boys murdered the last of the Conestoga Indians who were locked up in the basement of the Fulton Opera House.

https://unchartedlancaster.com/2019/12/27/lancasters-darkest-moment-the-massacre-of-the-conestoga-indians/

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On this day in 1831, Charles Darwin embarked on his journey aboard HMS Beagle, during which he will begin to formulate his theory of evolution.

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Former Pakistani prime minister Benazir Bhutto was assassinated on this day in 2007. Of course she was. It's still crazy to think that a woman was running a Muslim country. I'm not making the case that Islam is misogynist, but there are certainly enough misogynist Muslims to make it that a woman leader wouldn't last long. Easier to destroy than to create.

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Johannes Kepler joined us on this day in 1571.

"I much prefer the sharpest criticism of a single intelligent man to the thoughtless approval of the masses."

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Emma's dad got me a homemade box of wine for Christmas today, along with wine making classes, and all the paraphernalia I need. It should yield 25 bottles worth. 

It also happens to be Louis Pasteur's birthday, born on 1822.

"Wine is the most healthful and most hygienic of beverages." 

Also...

"A bottle of wine contains more philosophy than all the books in the world."

Great present!

December 27, 2022

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Marlene Dietrich join us on this day in 1901.

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Andreas Feininger joined us on this day in 1906. He took one of my all-time favorite photographs, on Route 66 in 1947.

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Sarah Vowell was born on this day in 1969. One of my very favorite authors. Assassination vacation is my favorite book of hers. It's a nonfiction account of her and various friends and family members visiting historical places associated with the assassinations of Lincoln, Garfield, and McKinley. Believe it or not, it's very funny. She hasn't written a book since 2015. 

"From The Partly Cloudy Patriot:

"Just the other day, I was in my neighborhood Starbucks, waiting for the post office to open. I was enjoying a chocolatey cafe mocha when it occurred to me that to drink a mocha is to gulp down the entire history of the New World. From the Spanish exportation of Aztec cacao, and the Dutch invention of the chemical process for making cocoa, on down to the capitalist empire of Hershey, PA, and the lifestyle marketing of Seattle's Starbucks, the modern mocha is a bittersweet concoction of imperialism, genocide, invention, and consumerism served with whipped cream on top."

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Other notable birthdays- Cole Hamels (1983), Timothée Chalamet (1995), Hal Ashby (1988)

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We lost Carrie Fisher on this day in 2016. A nice, genuine moment:

https://giphy.com/gifs/l2SpOPL0uXHnQRYpa

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Cracked- Eight simple questions you won't believe science can't answer

Ahhh, the holidays... time to catch up on my internet reading.

http://www.cracked.com/article_19442_8-simple-questions-you-wont-believe-science-cant-answer.html

Dec 27, 2011, 10:05 AM

Spoiler alert- why we sleep, how many planets are in the solar system, why ice is slippery, how bikes work, how to win at solitaire, how many species of animals there are, the length of the US coastline (or any coastline), how gravity works

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Treehugger- Scientist Creates Lifelike Cells Out of Metal

http://www.mnn.com/green-tech/research-innovations/stories/scientist-creates-lifelike-cells-out-of-metal

December 27, 2011

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Cracked- 5 amazing ways animals can control their bodies

This is a perfect paragraph: "Every autumn, the sanest animals head south, fleeing the encroaching winter lest they freeze to death or get torn apart by yetis. But then there's the wood frog, which manages not to give even a single shit -- when winter comes, it simply lies down and freezes solid. When it thaws, months later, it just hops away and gets right back to the business of frogging."

http://www.cracked.com/article_20150_5-amazing-ways-animals-can-control-their-bodies.html

December 27, 2012

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David Lynch reads from his autobiography, Catching the Big Fish, about his experience with Stanley Kubrick. I can't imagine having this experience...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XLSWR2EnHEs

December 27, 2014

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Gibberish Is the White House’s New Normal

The bad art of the non sequitur.

BY TODD GITLIN

Holy mackerel...every sentence of this wonderful article is highlight-worthy.

"That was then. Now we have a president who, when he speaks, spatters the air with unfinished chunks, many of which do not qualify as sentences, and which do not follow from previous chunks. He does not release words into a stream of consciousness but into a heap. He heaps words on top of words, to overwhelm meaning with vague gestures. He does not think, he lurches."

"But the problem is not just that Trump lies, or that he lies about having lied. The problem is not just that he distracts — for example, changing the subject from his entanglements with Russians to the leakers who leak stories about his entanglements with Russians. The problem is that he insinuates more than he argues. He disdains not only evidence but logic. He asserts by indirection. This is bubble-think. It makes a sort of sense only if you’re trapped in the bubble with him."

"His con game requires the bending of millions of knees. Americans are invited to willingly suspend disbelief, play dumb and collude in his cynicism. We agree not to notice the nonstop gibberish that spreads from the Oval Office outward. We agree to brag about our democracy when the president of the United States is responsible neither to logic, nor to evidence, nor to the American people, nor to the English language. We are expected to live in an alternative universe which is not only post-truth but altogether post-language and post-meaning. Any journalist, any talking head, any pundit, any commentator, any politician who pretends that Donald Trump makes sense has volunteered to go to work in the tailor shop where his invisible clothes are weaved."

http://billmoyers.com/story/gibberish-white-houses-new-normal

December 27, 2017

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J. Edgar Hoover investigated It's a Wonderful Life as an example of anti-American propaganda. Anyone who would believe that is welcome to jump off a bridge to discover how much better the world would be if they had never existed.

Dec 27, 2017, 6:37 PM

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The Hill- The Memo: Five Republicans who could primary Trump in 2020

Huh...so if the president makes it through 2018 and is still just as unpopular, Republicans could join the wave against him by rallying around a different Republican in the primaries. The president will then run as an independent, split the vote, and wreck the Republican Party for a generation. Or he could continue on his Putin-style course of consolidating power (where all appointees are chosen for their loyalty over their expertise), maybe even keep some candidates from running, or certain voters from voting, and stay in power for as long as he wishes and wreck the Republican Party for all-time. Just spitballing here.

http://hill.cm/2jXzicj

December 27, 2017

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The Atlantic- All the President’s Crooks

Again and again, Trump’s core supporters have turned out to be criminals.

By David Frum

"Trump’s core supporters have proved again and again to be criminals: Michael Cohen, Michael Flynn, Paul Manafort, and Roger Stone, have pleaded guilty to, or been convicted of, federal crimes. Now Collins and Hunter, Trump’s earliest supporters in the House, have joined them. The attraction of such people—and so many like them—to Donald Trump tells us something important about who Trump is: a man who appeals to crooks because they recognize him as one of their own."

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/12/all-the-presidents-crooks/602965

December 27, 2019

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Sam Harris, Making Sense- WHAT HAVE WE LEARNED FROM THE PANDEMIC?

A Conversation with Nicholas Christakis

This podcast has just a million salient points. I expected to turn it off after 10 or 15 minutes but couldn't stop listening. Small handful:

-A doctor in the 19th century devised a way to determine the number of pandemic deaths... look at the overall deaths from all causes above what would be expected in the same amount of time. That would put the United States numbers up 20%, and worldwide deaths would be 18 million.

-Vaccines can be measured a variety of ways- if they eradicate the disease, if they make it less transmissible, if they lower the chance of death and debilitation. Any vaccine can be measured differently according to each of those points. People are hung up on a desire for a perfect vaccine.

-They dig into the difference between trusting a cherry-picked expert versus the consensus of institutions.

-All reasons for mistrusting the vaccine come apart at the seams through a variety of arguments and analogies.

-How much are vaccine phobias do to people's fear of needles?! If it was a pill, there's no question more people would have gotten the vaccine.

Glad I don't have to feel like I need to read his book anymore!

https://www.samharris.org/podcasts/making-sense-episodes/270-what-have-we-learned-from-the-pandemic

December 27, 2021

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In Holland, the graves of a Catholic woman and her Protestant husband, separated by a wall.

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Dale Carnegie- "If you want to be a good conversationalist, be a good listener. To be interesting, be interested."

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David Sedaris- "Everyone looks retarded once you set your mind to it."

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Isaac Newton- "I can calculate the motion of heavenly bodies, but not the madness of people."

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William Shakespeare- "The eyes are the window to your soul."

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Ambrose Bierce- "Speak when you are angry and you will make the best speech you will ever regret."

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Dylan Thomas- "I hold a beast, and angel, and a madman inside me."

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Arthur C. Clarke, 3001: The Final Odyssey- "Never attribute to malevolence what is merely due to incompetence."

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Anthony Jeselnik- "My brother-in-law is a cop. Yesterday he told me that the only way he'd let someone out of a DUI is if they'd give him a blowjob.

I said, "Hey asshole! You're *married* to my *sister!*

"Just give me the DUI..."

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Henry Miller- "One's destination is never a place, but a new way of seeing things."

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Steven Wright- "To the audience, it's like I'm changing the subject every five seconds, but to me, my show's almost like a 90-minute song that I know exactly. I wrote every note, and I know exactly where everything is."

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Hitchens- "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him will believeth in anything. - Hitchens 3:16"

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Vonnegut- "I tell you, we are here on Earth to fart around, and don't let anybody tell you different."