August 3

 It looks, for now, like a sunny day. I don't think the rain showers they predicted came through so I will absolutely have to water plants today. I am still ignoring most of the political speculations--I can't call it news--because it is irritating, boring, and, for the most p2art, meaningless. Even Mom is reaching the end of her patience with the way the commercials interrupt what she is interested in watching. Various pundits used to tell us that free wasn't really free: if it is "free" you are the commodity being sold. Well, it isn't really free if you are paying the cable, satellite, etc., bill. But we are still being sold. I prefer to read my news on-line where I can ignore the ads, ignore the articles I am not interested in, skim some for what is interesting and read more thoroughly those that are more interesting.

John Feffer has an interesting piece on Tomdispatch about the backlash against globalism. He makes a point that most writers miss: anti-globalism isn't a homogeneous movement; it has many moving parts. The political, economic, social, cultural strands are interwoven in a complex tapestry. I would add there is a strain that desperately looks back to an imagined "golden age:" when men were men and women tended the home and kids, when white men set the agenda and others tried to live with it, when China was the center of the universe, when Russia was a respected power in the world. Choose your own glory days. That is the power behind what Feffer calls the "sovereignistas."

Richard Haas also has a good post this morning. He notes a fact that seems to elude all of the enthusiastic pundits who crow about the U.S. as the most "powerful" nation in the world. They forget that power doesn't always mean influence. We have entered an era where we can't "lay down the law" and expect all the leaders of other countries to fall into line. That is complicating our relations with "friend" (Israel for example) and "foe" (see Venezuela and Maduro) alike.