Fear is a powerful emotion. Some/Many of us enjoy being frightened. Perhaps it’s because of a desire to experience the elevated levels of endorphin release. Horror movies and roller coasters provide a way to get a “fear rush” without experiencing any real danger.
We can call that good fear. There’s another kind of artificial fear. It’s what republicans use to divide us. Their leadership and captive media cynically exploit their platform by intentionally promoting and reinforcing baseless fears in their base.
Fear of the other; fear of change; fear of science; fear of compromise; fear of non-conformity. Almost everything they do is couched in terms of Us versus Them. The enemy (i.e. us) is portrayed as irrational, radical and unpatriotic. Since they abdicated any pretense to coherent policy positions, their only play is to make it all about tribal identity and membership in the ‘club’. Fear is the glue they use to stitch it all together. They don’t actually stand for anything concrete. It’s all shifting sands and momentary whims of the leadership. There’s no purpose, except to maintain power at any cost.
While they are busy whipping their base into a horde of fear-crazed dupes, ready to echo every idiotic or dubious thought uttered by the leadership, they are also working on undermining our will.
The republicans want to demoralize, intimidate and paralyze us with a different side of their fear machine. They want us to think they are an unstoppable, overwhelming force. They want us to doubt the evidence of our own eyes. They want us to question reality.
How can we be expected to combat the fear mongers?
Well, the first thing, is to be consciously aware of what they are up to. Knowing what they are doing is most of the battle. Forewarned is forearmed and all that. Shouting, “Balderdash,” at the television might not look good in front of the dog, but it’s still an effective technique. Just remember, half the country is above average. Half of the rest are republicans.
More importantly is making a commitment to not giving up or giving in to the fears they try to force upon us. Not. Now. Not. Ever. ← It’s my mantra. You are welcome to share it.
Up the Resistance
(to continuing republican depredations)
After taking a couple of weeks off, Seth Meyers was back with another Closer Look [14:45].
If Seth isn’t your preferred cup of disdain, Stephen Colbert was back too [13:38].
During Stephen King’s Colbert appearance, the two Stephens were not gentle with Ron DeSantis [3:34].
Ok, that’s enough of Late Night, it’s on to the news.
Facing Down Our Climate Problem
The, at least for me, most important news over the last several days was the UN climate report. Vox has a good think piece on what we can do to make a difference and how can avoid curling up into fetal balls. So, if you find yourself thinking about throwing in the towel, give it a read. It might help.
Vox: Anna North: How to fight climate despair
✂️ But experts say we’re not completely powerless, and there’s a way to live in an age of climate change without giving up or sticking your head in the sand. It’s not necessarily about going vegan or making your home zero-waste, either.
The idea of reducing your personal carbon footprint, while not inherently wrong, has often been used as a distraction, “pitting working people against each other with morality choices about how sustainable you are,” rather than “realizing how much you actually have in common,” Mejia said.
Instead, many say the key to fighting despair is to think beyond the individual and seek community support and solutions — especially those that put pressure on governments and companies to make the large-scale changes that are necessary to truly curtail emissions. As Heglar put it, “the most detrimental thing to climate action is this feeling that we’re all in it alone.”
Public Health Wins
The reasons for having to do this are all on the republican party’s politicization of our public health crisis. Don’t let anyone gaslight you about it. It’s also a really good thing.
The Hill: Pentagon to require all troops to get coronavirus vaccine by mid-September
The Pentagon will require all military personnel to get the COVID-19 vaccine by Sept. 15, according to a new memo from Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, released Monday.
“I will seek the president’s approval to make the vaccines mandatory no later than mid-September, or immediately upon” final approval by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) “whichever comes first,” Austin wrote in the memo to troops.
He added that Pentagon officials “will also be keeping a close eye on infection rates,” currently on the rise now due to the highly contagious delta variant. If the rates begin to impact military readiness, “I will not hesitate to act sooner or recommend a different course to the President if l feel the need to do so. To defend this Nation, we need a healthy and ready force.”
He was a bit late to the party, but hey, he paid for his tardiness.
Slate: Daniel Politi: Anti-Vax Radio Host Urges Friends to Get Vaccinated Before Dying of COVID
A right-wing radio host from Florida who publicly criticized vaccines told his friends to get vaccinated shortly before he died of COVID-19, according to NBC affiliate WPTV. Dick Farrel, who was also an anchor on Newsmax, frequently railed against vaccines on Facebook. “Why take a vax promoted by people who lied 2u all along about masks, where the virus came from and the death toll?” Farrel wrote on Facebook on July 3. In another post, Farrel raised doubts about the effectiveness of vaccines because he claimed two people he knew who had been vaccinated were later hospitalized with the coronavirus.
Farrel, a fan of former President Donald Trump, frequently criticized Dr. Anthony Fauci, characterizing him in a Facebook post as “a power tripping lying freak.” Some of his posts were flagged by Facebook for spreading false information. But Farrel’s friends said he changed his mind about vaccines after he was hospitalized with the coronavirus. “COVID took one of my best friends! RIP Dick Farrel. He is the reason I took the shot. He texted me and told me to ‘Get it!’ He told me this virus is no joke and he said, ‘I wish I had gotten it!’ ” Amy Leigh Hair wrote on her Facebook page.
Jeffery Clark Is No Longer a Happy Coup Camper
The stench was too pungent for even Billy Barr, who resigned and his last minute replacement Jeffrey Rosen, so the Former Guy turned to mediocre hack, Jeffrey Clark, to push his blatantly unconstitutional coup project forward. Donnie tried to make Clark into his new Barr. I guess he needed a candy man? Or, maybe another co-conspirator?
Wonkette: Liz Dye: Trump Goon Jeffrey Clark Tried To Cancel Election Because Chinese Thermostats Hacked Voting Machines, LOLWUT
The gold medal for sprinting in the DC heat goes to former acting Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen, who raced over to Congress this weekend to tell them all about Donald Trump's efforts to overturn the election in December and January, and to make sure everyone knows that he, Jeffrey Rosen, stood tall and thwarted the evil plot.✂️
Rosen huddled up with the Justice Department inspector general on Friday and spent six hours Saturday testifying to the Senate Judiciary Committee. Richard Donoghue, Rosen's principal deputy during his tenure as acting AG, testified to the Judiciary Committee for five hours on Friday, according to CNN.
At the center of the allegations is Jeffrey Clark, former acting head of DOJ's Civil Division, who devoted himself to staging what looks an awful lot like a coup, doggedly working to get DOJ to declare swing state vote tallies fraudulent, giving Republican legislatures cover to seize the electoral votes and award them to Donald Trump. The Times reports that Rosen testified to a shocking degree of coordination between Clark and the White House — an absolute violation of DOJ rules barring contact between lower level officials and the White House.
Oh, No! She Didn’t. Spoiler: Yes, She Did
Color me not surprised. Not even a teensy, tiny bit. You can’t spell unearned privilege without “Boebert.” Is that the echo of a cell door locking I hear in the background?
Salon: Zachary Petrizzo: Lauren Boebert's midnight run: Capitol tour happened after she attended "Stop the Steal" rally
Salon's continuing investigation of Rep. Lauren Boebert's unexplained late-night tour of the U.S. Capitol on Dec. 12, 2020 — three weeks before the Colorado Republican became a member of Congress — has revealed further information. Earlier that day Boebert attended a march in Washington to support Donald Trump's baseless theory that the 2020 election was stolen. Evidence suggests that the Capitol tour itself — involving Boebert, her mother, her teenage son and a Capitol Police officer — apparently took place close to midnight, at an hour when the Capitol complex is normally completely shut down.
Amy Kremer, chairwoman of the pro-Trump group Women for America First, posted a tweet on Dec. 12 thanking Boebert for attending what some participants called the "Million MAGA March," which involved a number of street clashes between marchers, counter-protesters and police, four stabbings and at least 33 arrests.
As Salon reported last week, later that night Boebert gave what appears to be have been an unauthorized after-hours private tour of the Capitol building to a group of her family members. It remains unclear how this tour was arranged since everything about it fell outside the normal regulations regarding such visits, which require the presence of a member of Congress and a Capitol guide and must be scheduled between 9 a.m. and 3 p.m. on weekdays. There is no evidence that anyone accompanied Boebert and her family members, other than a single Capitol Police officer visible in one family photo posted to social media.
Fun with the Fools
This story is included because I just couldn’t skip over the headline. The responses were pretty good too. A response from @ShelKel2: “I'll sign it if you add one word ....“Donald J. Trump Lost Highway”
Huffington Post: Lee Moran: GOP Lawmaker Wants To Rename ‘Florida’s Urethra’ Highway After Donald Trump
Florida state Rep. Anthony Sabatini (R) drew backlash and mockery on Monday after saying he’d filed a bill to rename U.S. Route 27 — which runs through his state — after Donald Trump.
Sabatini, who is running for Congress in 2022, asked people on Twitter to sign a petition “to name Florida’s longest road” the “President Donald J. Trump Highway” to “honor one of America’s greatest Presidents.”
The Former Guy is Facing a World of Hurt
Rolling Stone put together a fairly extensive list of all the orange tinted court cases staring down the Hair Furor’s . For anyone who still thinks Donnie is going to skate, this summary should alleviate their fears.
He is known to be under criminal investigations by the Manhattan DA, the New York AG, the Fulton County DA, and the Washington, DC AG. Those are just the ones we know about. What are the Northern District of Virginia (remember Manafort) and the Southern District of New York (remember Cohen) doing? We don’t know. Has anyone been talking to Lev Parnas recently?
He’s also got a great deal civil exposure in Michigan (NAACP). Washington DC (US Capitol Officers, members of Congress), from assault/defamation victims (E. Jean Carroll, Summer Zervos), inheritance fraud (Mary Trump), inauguration fraud (Washington, DC AG), fraud around the Former Guy’s touting ACN’s bogus MLM scheme (class action), and more real estate fraud in Panama City, Panama (Ithaca Capital). Is there more? Smart money says, “Yes.”
This is one case where the ass blew his own jawbone and the walls are tumbling down.
Rolling Stone: Tim Dickinson, Ryan Bort: Donald Trump’s Legal Troubles: A Guide
Donald Trump is no stranger to legal trouble, but it’s never been anything he couldn’t solve with his checkbook. Just after he won the White House, Trump agreed to pay $25 million to settle charges that Trump University swindled thousands of students. He later paid another $2 million for misusing his charitable foundation, which was shuttered after authorities documented a “shocking pattern of illegality” and “repeated and willful self-dealing.”
But Trump isn’t going to be able to buy his way out of criminal charges, which he could soon be facing now that he’s the subject of an array of serious criminal investigations — including over shady business dealings and real-estate tax arrangements, as well as his incitement of the January 6th siege of the Capitol. (Trump has made light of the probes against him, writing: “There is nothing more corrupt than an investigation that is in desperate search of a crime.”
Trump also faces myriad civil actions, ranging from allegations he violated the Voting Rights Act and the Ku Klux Klan Act (which prohibits the intimidation of public officials), to multiple claims that he defrauded people, including a family member, an investor that bought into his troubled hotel ventures, and “economically marginalized people” looking to “pursue the American Dream.”
Your Biweekly Andy Borowitz Fix
Actually, I guess it’s my fix and you are all just along for the ride.
The New Yorker: Andy Borowitz: Satire from the Borowitz Report: DeSantis Blasts Other Forty-nine States for Making Florida Look Bad
TALLAHASSEE (The Borowitz Report)—In his most scathing assignment of blame to date, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis blasted the other forty-nine states for conspiring to make his own look bad.
“Our COVID numbers wouldn’t seem so terrible if other states’ numbers weren’t better,” he said. “You don’t have to be a detective to figure out who stands to benefit from this scenario.”
“Nice try, other forty-nine states,” he bellowed. “I’m onto you!”
Will You Be Wantin’ Another Wee Dram, Laddie?
Glennfiddich is not my favorite peaty libation (that would be the Talisker), but I may have to grab a bottle or six, now that they are greening up their Scotch.
GoodNewsNetwork: Judy Cole: Glenfiddich Distilleries Launch Fleet of Trucks That Runs on Whiskey Waste
Drinking and driving don’t mix when the alcohol is inside the driver, but what if the leftover dregs from a whiskey distillery could replace the fuel inside the tank?
Whiskey is a potent potable that’s fueled many things—rebellion, imagination, and some pretty epic hangovers. Now, it is powering the huge tractor-trailer trucks that deliver the Glenfiddich Scotch itself.
A fleet of low-carbon trucks powered by biomethane will be soon carrying Scotland’s iconic whiskey, thanks to a partnership between Glenfiddich and a sustainable transportation company.
A Brief Instrumental Bridge
Some music from that bastion of 60’s west coast surf rock nostalgia — Toronto, Ontario, Canada
The Schittzenpantzen Files: Rudy Is Such a Useless Tool
999 times out of 1000, when you cross the worst of the Keystone Kops’ failed imitators, a delusional ghoul , and a vat of ineffective hair dye, you end up with shoe polish on your socks. The other time you get Rudy Giuliani. Rudy is whining about how he’s been surgically stapled into a hot seat and his cheeks are on fire. I try and try again, but I just can’t feel any sympathy. I’m giddy in anticipation of his upcoming shackled perp walk.
It’s been commonly observed that everything Donnie touches turns to crap. People are missing the fact that everything Rudy touches turns to self-satire. It didn’t all start with Four Seasons Landscaping and Borat, and it’s not going to end there, either. Rudy’s going to jail and it looks like he knows it.
Mother Jones: Dan Friedman: The FBI Is Investigating Giuliani’s Attempt to Make a Movie About the Bidens and Ukraine
Last year, after Rudy Giuliani’s effort to dig up dirt on Joe Biden in Ukraine had already helped lead to the impeachment of his client, President Donald Trump, Giuliani continued the effort. The former New York mayor joined with George Dickson III, the owner of California cannabis and earthquake warning businesses, to try to produce a documentary advancing discredited allegations about Joe and Hunter Biden’s involvement in Ukraine during the Obama administration. The would-be producers wanted to help Trump. And they also wanted to make money, people involved in the project said, plotting ways to profit off material they had assembled. ✂️
Three people involved in the film project described it to Mother Jones as incompetent and scrambled, with the producers squabbling over money and unable to commit to a line of inquiry. “They couldn’t get their shit together,” said Matthew Galvin, a California video producer whom Dickson hired to work on the effort. “They were always distracted.”
Galvin added, “The thing I took away from it was, ‘Jesus, these guys are morons.'” ✂️
On June 22, FBI agents executed a search at Dickson’s home in Aptos, California. Dickson told associates that agents questioned him about Giuliani and the movie, people according to people who spoke to him. It is not clear what the agents sought in their search. But Dickson’s statements to associates suggest the probe is linked to an ongoing investigation of Giuliani’s work in Ukraine by federal prosecutors in Manhattan. (Federal prosecutors in Brooklyn are reportedly separately investigating whether some Ukrainian officials, including several Giuliani dealt with in 2020, helped orchestrate a plan to meddle in the 2020 presidential election.)
I think it’s called trying to hitch a ride on a falling star bonespur.
Daily Beast: Asawin Suebsaeng, Adam Rawnsley: Trump Sails Away as Rudy Giuliani Drowns in Legal Bills
As Rudy Giuliani’s legal bills have piled up in recent months—and as federal investigators intensify their probe into Donald Trump’s longtime associate—the former president appears willing to provide just as much help as he usually does when his friends are in need: next to nothing.
For months now, Trump has consistently ignored or rejected Giuliani’s pleas for assistance. And it’s not just that Trump and other prominent Republicans have been unwilling to open up their wallets or war chests to help offset Giuliani’s mounting legal costs; in many cases, Giuliani’s former Trumpworld comrades have declined to even acknowledge the existence of his legal defense fund, which has struggled to raise much of anything from the public.
“There have been times when I’ve asked people in the [former] president’s orbit to see if Trump wanted to draw attention to the fundraising,” said an ally and longtime associate of the former New York City mayor. “That went nowhere. Many of these people wouldn’t even tweet or retweet [links to the legal fund] when I asked them to.”
He squandered whatever tiny bits of credibility he had left at the base of the clay-footed altar to the Former Guy.
Vanity Fair: Aatish Taseer: How Rudy Giuliani Went From 9/11’s Hallowed Mayor to 2021’s Haunted Ghoul
On a glittering day in May, ferries and barges charting a course over the diamond-strewn surface of the East River, Richard Ravitch, former lieutenant governor of New York, said something extraordinary to me: “You have to remember Giuliani wasn’t mayor on 9/11, was he?”
Ravitch, who had also been chairman of the MTA and a mayoral candidate in 1989, was something of a city elder—an embodiment of its institutional memory. The walls of his office at Waterside Plaza were hung with honorary degrees, yellowed clippings from the New York Post, and a print of the American Museum on Broadway, circa 1850. Did this man, to whom Giuliani, in 1995, offered the job of chancellor of the city’s school system (a post he declined), really not remember who the mayor was when the city he loved so much was attacked? He was 87. I feared his mind was going, but when at my insistence Ravitch realized his mistake—remember America’s mayor? Time magazine’s Person of the Year? The defiant figure, covered in dust and ash, emerging from the rubble of the World Trade Center?—I, in turn, saw that it contained a deeper truth: The grotesqueries of the Giuliani of today, here the supine figure of Borat fame reaching aimlessly into his trousers, there the bug-eyed death mask of Aschenbach in Thomas Mann’s Death in Venice, with runnels of hair dye streaming down his cheeks, had erased all memory of the man who went before.
“Well, it may be,” Ravitch said, now a touch embarrassed, “that my view of him today has colored my memory.”
Ravitch added, “I don’t think Giuliani is an important person. He’s a peripheral character. I think he’ll be a footnote in the history books of the Trump era.”
Musical Interlude
The Highwayman’s Johnny and Willie shine on this Cash standard, from a Stan Jones original (with Waylon and Kris hanging around for yucks and grins; legendary studio guitarist Reggie Young handles the featured guitar solo)
Did you think I was going to skip Playing for Change this week? Nope, not gonna happen. Turnaround Arts is part of the Kennedy Center’s Educational Outreach that aims to transforms schools through the strategic use of the arts. It’s the kind of thing we need to see happening everywhere.
WineRev’s History Lesson
Our resident history professor’s always interesting history lesson will appear here as soon as I notice he’s posted it in the comment section. Until then look for it in the comment section.
Take it away, Wine Rev.
Well I had a couple nuggets to put up this morning but NNNE, you have covered them all, and far more so I’ll just move on to Back to the Future with the History Corner. (And a measly 6 hours sleep does not help; hello nap time!)
August 10ths full of historic and at least giggling if not hysterical, Good and Goofy moments that you can load into your Kodak Carousel projector and show the slides on the basement wall to your own Good and Goofy moments today so they can snicker over clothes, hairstyles and off-beat slang from yesteryear.
1628 Stockholm, Sweden Starting in the middle 1500s Sweden became a political player on the European scene, sending troops for years at a time to fight for the Protestants in the religious wars. Now in the 1600s Sweden ups its game and goes naval. On this day the Swedish warship ‘Vasa’ is launched in Stockholm harbor in front of the city populace and all sorts of foreign dignitaries. She was the largest Swedish ship ever built, so cutting edge a Dutch builder had designed and led the work.) She mounted 64 locally cast, bronze cannons, 48 of them the brawny “24 pounders” that threw such balls and shells. She slipped down the ways, rocked in the water, raised sails and, after 1400 meters, promptly capsized, killing 30. (All those cannons made her top-heavy beyond her load of ballast.) She was re-discovered in 1961, and due largely to the low salt levels of the waters in Stockholm harbor, rather intact. She was raised and is on display in a dripping museum to this day (very high humidity to keep the 400-year-old wood from drying out and crumbling to dust. Worth an edgy visit!)
1787 Vienna Wolfgang Mozart is working on the second act of his opera Don Giovanni. In his day ledger for day he records that on the side he finished a little piece (likely for a commission, although no name of a patron is noted). He noted it was “A little serenade” and (as he often did in his ledger) he wrote in the first two measures to remind himself of just which piece this was. Mozart died in 1791. In 1799 his widow Constanze, hard up for money, sells a collection of Mozart’s manuscripts to Johann Andre, a music publisher . He paid her but put some of the pieces on the shelf…..until 1827! Only then, on this day, forty years after Wolfgang wrote it down, did he start selling the “little serenade.” The world got to hear the cheery, upbeat, even fun, “Eine Kleine Nachtmusik” for the first time, at which even non-classical music fans perk up, gesture with a small smile, and say, “Ah, Mozart!”
1793 Paris In a moment of cultural history, The Museum Central des Arts officially opens today to the public, a re-modelled palace called the Louvre. It has a few pieces (like 36,000 pieces from ancient Egypt forward throughout human history), and some statues from here (like the Venus de Milo). On the walls are a bunch of paintings from some guys (my tongue is so firmly in cheek I won’t be able to talk for 2 days….) Should be on your Bucket List Top 5 .
1813 Philadelphia Birth of William Henry Fry, composer. Son of a prominent printer and editor, Fry received a college education in Maryland, then studied composition with a former bandmaster for Napoleon. Fry was one of the first American composers of opera (Lenora; Notre Dame of Paris---based on the book by Victor Hugo, and both quite popular) and lectured tirelessly on the need for America to develop its own musical character and traditions. Composed 7 symphonies (Christmas Symphony—also called ‘Santa Claus’, featuring the first use of the recently invented saxophone for orchestral use; his Niagara Symphony uses 11 timpani and several snare drums to represent the roaring water and the hissing spray, and a series of discordant chords as the water flow breaks up on the rocks below), as well as some overtures and some chamber music. The first person ever hired as a newspaper music critic in America (and held the job for 20 years.)
1846 Washington DC Back in 1836 British scientist John Smithson died and left his estate to the United States government with the proviso the assets be used for the advancement of knowledge and science. Since 21st century Republicans hadn’t been invented yet, President Andrew Jackson sent Richard Rush, the US Secretary of the Treasury, to London, to personally collect the Smithson inheritance and bring it to the States. Rush did, met all the requirements, got all the papers and arrangements done, and returned (with some beefy bodyguards you might imagine) with 104,960 gold sovereign coins, worth, at the time, about $500,000. (Today, about $12 million.) Now Congress passes the appropriate legislation and on this day President James Polk signs the bill into law, legally establishing the Smithsonian Institution (now world's largest museum and research complex.)
1859 Boston An early example of socialist liberalism, government over-reach, burdensome regulation, interference with the free market, etc. etc. (as would be reported today on Faux Noise) on this day the city deploys the first public squad of milk inspectors. (Clean, wholesome, non-sour milk? All the fly-by-night dairies in those back alleys and in the shady parts of town were appalled; this could cut into sales, and it could cost money to upgrade their facilities instead of operating like always……tough.)
1885 Baltimore, MD Trams and trolleys had been around a long time for city mass transit. But now, less than 10 years after Edison patented the light bulb, Leo Daft, President of Daft Electric Company throws a switch to send 220 volts of electricity into a “third rail” under a Baltimore streetcar, putting the streetcar company’s mules out of a job and opening America’s 1st commercially operated electric streetcars. Daft went on to design and build the Los Angeles Electrical Rail company in the 1890s.
1889 Barnsley, England Bottles have been around for quite a while now, but there is still the matter of the cap, or cork, or wax plug. How to seal it, and maybe, how to re-seal it? Dan Rylands, owns a factory that makes glass bottles, so this is a professional issue for him, and a personal one as well. Rylands enjoys wine, but he wants to replace corks with something more modern. On this day he receives a patent for his invention of a screw cap. His newly-invented machinery allows him to add a spiral ribbon of glass to the neck of a bottle and now his cap would seal it. Whiskey makers adopted it first, followed by jars makers and then other liquids, but ironically, wine reacted with the metal and spoiled, so it wasn’t until the 1960s that wineries solved the problem for their bottles.
1897 Leverkusen, Germany Back in 1832, French chemist Charles Gergardt had been experimenting with willow bark and had isolated a compound called “salicin,” and produced salicylic acid. There had been some medical experimenting, but nothing had come from it. Now, in the laboratories of the Bayer Chemical company, chemist Felix Hoffmann, has dusted off Gergardt’s work. On this day he first synthesizes acetyl-salicylic acid. This chemical change made the stuff (literally) much easier to swallow. The Bayer Company got a patent on the process and product a few months later and in 1898 would start marketing the stuff under a trade name of “aspirin.”
1942 London A couple days ago, Winston Churchill, disappointed with how the war is going in North Africa, sacks General Auchinleck and appoints General Bernard Montgomery to command of the 8th Army. His simple order: “Beat Rommel. Nothing else matters.” Montgomery arrives three days later in the Desert and on the map soon picks out an Egyptian oasis and railroad stop called El-Alamein……
May all your News be Good, comforting and inspiring.
Shalom.
On the Lighter Side
Quote(s) of the Day
Men are conservatives when they are least vigorous or when they are most luxurious — they are conservatives after dinner. — Ralph Waldo Emerson
Conservatism makes no poetry, breathes no prayer, has no invention; it is all memory. — Ralph Waldo Emerson
Conservatism discards Prescription, shrinks from Principle, disavows Progress; having rejected all respect for antiquity, it offers no redress for the present, and makes no preparation for the future. — Benjamin Disraeli
Conservatism, however, is too often a welcome excuse for lazy minds, loath to adapt themselves to fast changing conditions. — Sigmund Freud
If you're a liberal, anything you say is protected. If you're a conservative, anything you say is hateful. — Laura Schlessinger
Conservatism is less a set of ideas than it is a pathological distemper, a militant anger over the fact that the universe is not closed and life is not static. — Bill Moyers
Required Pet Photo
Pressley’s Picks
We are in the midst of the diēs caniculārēs (dog days) of summer. This is the time of year when Sirius (the Dog Star) rises along with the sun. The ancient Romans thought that Sirius added its heat to the sun and caused the warming of the planet. This ludicrous theory is a lot more plausible than whatever nonsense the climate change deniers are spouting today.
Regardless of how they got their name, the dog days give us a reason to look for chances to cool off.
You can avoid sweating too much by just laying back and partying, while listening to classic stoner music
Or, you could hang out on the beach.
Then again, you could go for a swim.
We call this swimming lite.
Closing Notes
Thanks for slogging on through to the end of another Roundup. Remember to stay active and involved, while also looking out for your health. Your country needs you!
hpg keeps on keeping on. Last night’s Evening Shade: PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN---DAY201---Evening Shade-Monday
It was 26 years ago, yesterday, that we lost Jerry Garcia to a heart attack. Today, we’ll flash back to the reintroduction of a song that had disappeared from the playlist for 7 years. The Dead re-introduced this tribute to Janis Joplin in a rare acoustic version on Halloween Eve, 1980. The electric version stayed in the mix until the end. When Jerry died, Phil switched the her/she to him/he and changed the focus into a tribute to Jerry.
All I know is something like a bird within her sang
All I know she sang a little while and then flew on
Disclaimer: The republican party is a criminal organization, clearly guilty of fraud, malfeasance, graft, and corruption.