February 27l,

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We have had rain, sometimes heavy, and just got the tornado warning on the TV. It isn't here yet or the sirens would be sounding. The news has been focused on that Murdaugh trial and I don't give a damn about that. I have been avoiding it. The news from Ukraine are also very repetitive. As is the insanity in Washington. And the speculation about who is going to run for what in 2024. Instead I have actually made some progress on a couple of crochet projects that had been languishing for a while. And I have cleared a couple of books I have been reading and lined up a couple of more.

Just read this post on Tomdispatch.com this morning. The basic story of the abuse of power by militarized police unites didn't really add anything to what I have already learned. However, a couple of phrases mentioned in the article are interesting: neighborhood life-cycle theory, planned abandonment, and community-based development. I have a note to look up more info. The few indications I have found so far remind me all to much of the Indian Removal Act (and Trail of Tears) and multiple examples of Russian/Soviet large scale forced removal of suspect populations followed by replacement by more reliable peoples (usually ethnic Russians.)

Robert Reich posted this morning on the new AI tech like Chatbot. We have already removed so much of human labor out of the economy. We were promised that everyone would benefit as machines took over the boring, repetitive processes because those displaced could then work in more "creative" jobs. Unfortunately, there were fewer "creative" jobs available. Issac Asimov wrote a short story that might be relevant now. As an antiquated, outmoded robot walks by an inebriated human, the man swears at it and throws the nearly empty bottle which smashes on the robot. The automaton turns and sadly tells the man "at least you can get drunk" before walking on. The robot replaced man and was replaced in turn by a newer model of robot. The cycle continues. Another question: is a universal basic income really the solution to the problem.

Another continuing thread in the news has been the situation in Israel which seems to be going from bad to worse to worst yet. I keep wondering what will it finally take to change the U.S. stance on Israel which seems to be unwavering, almost uncritical support. Whatever the hopes we might have had in Israel's beginning have evaporated in the heat of the current political situation. The current Israeli Jews are not the Holocaust survivors or even the children of the survivors. They aren't the survivors of pogroms and other oppressive, deadly societies throughout Europe (mainly). They are the grandchildren, great-grandchildren, and perhaps even the great-great-grandchildren of the founding immigrants. They are now the oppressors. And their values no longer mesh with ours.

Interesting.