January 9

 Chilly today and the temperatures over the next few days should fall to more normal with possible snow.

Stray thought: I said when Charlie Kirk was killed that it was murder, an assassination, and that the murderer should be tried in court AFTER a thorough investigation. I say the same about the Renee Good murder. It was a murder conducted under the cloak of law but murder nonetheless. The efforts of the administration to smear the victim is abhorrent starting with The Gnome's publicity stunt before any investigation was even started. Trump and his sycophants followed the script. They are doing everything they can to make sure no one is held accountable. The ICE actions at the high school immediately after Good's murder was almost as reprehensible.

Another stray thought: With all the emphasis Trump has placed on destroying the "green" energy sector and pushing "drill, baby, drill" I have to wonder what amount of oil are we harvesting from our own resources. He is certainly repaying the support of the fossil fuel industry. And the reports say he wants to get the price of oil down to about &50/barrel which would be good for consumers (for a while) but disastrous for many oil producers. It would make their margins even narrower, and make further exploration and development unlikely. Trump is finding out that actions, as Newton said, have equal and opposite reactions.

And a third stray thought: I have been watching and reading about the disarray in Europe with the latest winter storm with heavy snow, very cold temperatures and hurricane force winds. Schiphol Airport in the Netherlands has had to cancel over 3000 flights over the last few days. The weather is so unpredictable and so extreme that our infrastructure is stressed. It wasn't built for the extremes we have seen. It reminds me of parts of a couple of books I have recently read about the Little Ice Age. Critics of climate change remark that it is only variable weather but we are finding out how much we depend on reliable weather to grow our food, to allow us to travel, to keep ourselves warm or cool.