August 15

Rain today with possible thunderstorms later. We have an errand so I hope anything severe holds off for a few hours more.

Stray thought: the news/talk show hosts we often watch have been covering segments of Project 2025 and the training "films" the Heritage has put out for civil service hopefuls. One was somewhat Orwellian. The snippets featured speakers urging the potential appointees to be sure to "erase" certain words and terms including "climate change," and "diversity, equity, and inclusion." They seemed to think that simply eliminating the terms would somehow eliminate the realities behind the terms. Erasing references to climate change won't somehow, magically erase the effects. Erasing terms that highlight the inequities and inequality in our society and economy won't change the fact that the U.S. is a very unequal society with little social or economic mobility. The Republican ostrich wants to bury its head and pretend nothing is wrong.

Stray though #2: one of the bloggers posted a headline that cited polls which suggest that moves to cut arms sales to Israel and a cease fire in Gaza would help Democrats win voters in some of the battleground states where sentiment strongly opposes Israel's actions in Gaza. Perhaps, but I don't expect any such move by the Biden Administration. First, the relationship with Israel is a "legacy" relationship some 70 years old. Changing such a relationship is very difficult because too much emotional and political capital is invested in sustaining it. Second, Pro-Palestinian leaning voters might come over to the Democrats but there is likely a sizable segment of both parties who would be very unhappy and might go the other way. Third, the other component of the equation--the cease fire--is exceedingly unlikely. There is an old saying that it takes two to make peace but only one to make war and at the moment we don't have any side wanting peace. I don't remember how many times Netanyahu has balked at agreements which incorporated ALL of the demands Israel made and made new demands on top of the old ones. The new Hamas leader is Yahya Sinwar who was the mastermind of the October attack and who has been quoted saying that even 100,000 Palestinian death would not be too high a price to pay to win. The cited poll was a waste of pollsters' time and of the time of anyone who might read it. Wishful thinking.