November 30

Sunny so far this morning but not expected to stay that way. We got a surprise looking at our calendar--we don't have any appointments between now and January 4 when I have to see my dentist for a cleaning. That is very unusual. And it is the last day of November. Tomorrow starts meteorological winter. Astronomical winter starts with the Winter Solstice around the 20 or 21 of December.

So the news last night reported the death of Henry Kissinger at 100 and what an eventful century it has been. The reporters noted that he was one third of a very influential trio: Kissinger, Zbigniew Brzezinski, and Madeleine Albright. Interesting that they came from the same "neighborhood:" Albright from East Germany; Brzezinski from Poland, and Kissinger from pre-WWII Germany.

The New York Times reports this morning that the Biden Administration will propose new standards for lead levels that will require the removal of lead water pipes nation wide. After the problems with lead in water in various places in the country over the last few years that would be welcome. But I can see a couple of problems. First, only about $15billion would be available through the Infrastructure Act. The rest of the $20-30billion would have to be on the utility companies which probably means the rate payers. I can hear the howls of pain already. Second, the regulations will come through the EPA. But there is a case before the Supreme Court that could upend any agency's power to set and enforce such standards.

Erin Brockovich boils down the Fifth National Climate Assessment Report. It isn't pretty and it is expensive.

November 28, 29

 Nice and sunny but COLD. The predictions say we won't get out of the 20s today. Mom had her doctor's appointment and we decided to do our grocery shopping. It has been a busy day today already. I got our "pantry" sorted out. A while ago I cleared a set of shelves of books that I had room for in more convenient places and put extras up there. Then I rearranged the cabinet of canned goods in the kitchen and the shelves for bulk goods. Tomorrow I plan to sort out our dishes.

Who knew there was Trumpism before The Former Guy came down his gaudy escalator? Well, Robert Reich did. But the trends he mentioned in his speech 29 years ago were already building steam and have only intensified in the intervening years.

29*********************************************************************

Supposed to be a bit warmer and sunny today. We'll see.

Bill Astore had a cute post yesterday: Operation Ongoing Bullshit. I would make an observation: The differences between liberals and conservatives, Democrats and Republicans can be handled easily enough IF both parties are willing to agree to disagree and respect each other.

I found this article on The Free Press that tries to explain how long time political gadfly and outsider Geert Wilders pulled off a substantial win the the latest Dutch election giving him a chance to become head of the dutch government. The trends that led the two authors to leave the Netherlands afflict other democratic countries in Europe and, I would argue, the United States. Very striking was the authors' condemnation of the elites (social, political, economic, and media) who either ignored the concerns of ordinary citizens or insisted that those concerns were illusory. Reminds me of economists who tell us in the U.S. that inflation is under control (or about to be) and things are improving. And I didn't get any feeling that there is any recognition that the crises of immigration and economic stagnation have anything to do with the climate changes and violence in the parts of the world the immigrants are fleeing.

November 25, 26, 27

Cloudy today. And quite cool. I think we are both recovering from a more active week than usual. We visited my youngest brother and his wife on Wednesday after failing to connect on Tuesday. Had Thanksgiving dinner with my other brother and his son and grandsons on Thursday. I am tired. I saw an article on which the author talked about everything falling apart rapidly after you reach 70 years old. Some days I could agree with him but usually those days are fairly far between. So today I plan to do as little as possible.

Freddy Deboer has an interesting post. It is a bit of a long read but I think his argument can be boiled down to a simple premise: we are on the down side of the S-curve of technological development and growth based on continued development is a pipe dream.

26*********************************************************************

We have our first real snow. Not much sticking because the pavement is too warm. The remaining plants and the dead stalks are coated. The temperatures are predicted to be much colder over the next few days.

27**********************************************************************

Very early yet. And cold. The weather channel predicts more seasonal temperatures for the next few days.

Looking at the news sites this morning on-line. Found this story which looks at a couple of aspects of the Israeli-Hamas conflict that hasn't made the broadcast news: the disruption of the Israeli farms and the exodus of foreign farm workers who provided the labor those farms need. We forget that the kibbutz is a farming village. And like much of American agriculture rely on large numbers of foreign laborers.

Robert Reich has a good critique of how our "mainstream" media is quietly helping The Former Guy and his campaign.

Tom Engelhardt has a post I saw yesterday that has percolated through my thoughts. Are we already fighting WWIII but it isn't against Russia or China or what ever might mutate from the Israel-Hamas war--but against Nature?. Will, if so we have already lost. Nature bats last and wins. And the "Slow Motion Gaza" isn't so slow motion after all. Many of the effects of Climate Change that were thought once (not so long ago) to be showing up in 2100 are very likely to hit us by 2030 or 2040. And something Englehardt doesn't mention is that for two day this month (November 2023) the average global temperature rose above (barely) the 2*C temperature every climate scientist fears. One thing he said that I didn't realize is that one-third of October days broke the 1.5*C set by the Paris Accord only 6 years ago.

Ilya Shapiro does a good job of dealing with the question of "Where Free Speech Ends and Lawbreaking Begins"? Unfortunately, we have devolved into a society when some of us think that if we can't beat up those whose ideas don't jibe with our own, or shout them down, or deface their property, or crowd them menacingly, they aren't being heard. I started to say we had devolved into such a society but remembered that absurd spectacle of a Republican member of a Senate committee and the labor leader he was questioning challenging each other "outside." That "Senator" later referred, in an interview on the Capital steps, to an episode which most of the audience probably didn't know because we aren't really taught history. Look up the Sumner-Brooks Affair and ask yourself if that is the kind of country you really want. I am not sure we have devolved so much as some of us have revealed what we are and have always been.

The Washington Post has an article (which I was actually able to read--WaPo is usually behind a pay wall) which says the GOP is having financial problems as big donors aren't writing as many big checks and the small donors aren't as generous as they had been. Though the article goes into a bit of "both-sidesism" it is mainly about Republican angst. The problem with the party is who is pulling the strings and the quality of candidates. It is also that most of any real work getting done is the fault of Republican infighting and refusal to deal honestly with the Democrats. What they have done has only been because the minority party saved the day.

Naked Capitalism posted this piece that indicates the Baltic and North Seas are heating up again as Finland, Estonia, China, and Russia are all involved in the breach of an undersea pipeline and communication cables. The pipeline and cables run between Finland and Estonia, and a Chinese ship with connections to Russia is suspected of having cut them.

Reading this article from Naked Capitalism it occurred to me that humans have a history of developing substances that "solve" a problem and start using them prolifically before anyone becomes aware that people may be harmed. We develop jet fuel which does sometimes catch fire and then we invent PFAS chemicals to smother those fires but the chemicals seep into and contaminate the ground water resulting in illness in individuals depending on that water. In the case of PFAS CHEMICALS, 3M and Dupont have settled with the government and agreed to put up some millions of dollars to "help" water companies deal with the contamination. Next up: the lawsuits for personal injury.

November 24

 We had a nice Thanksgiving dinner with the older of my brothers and his family. Those boys do know how to cook.

Now the winter holiday/sales orgy kicks into high gear. I imagine your complaints about the number of commercials and the repetitive nature of those commercial breaks will also escalate. Mom has asked  many commercials they can cram into a slot. We have counted as many as 10. And so often we see those damned ads repeated back-to-back-(sometimes)to-back.

The New Republic has a long article on an on-going "brain drain." Red States are losing physicians, educators and other highly trained professionals because they refuse to go on living and working in the radical "conservatism" those states are enacting. I used quotes because I have never understand what they are conserving for whom.

Robert Reich started a 10 part series on American Capitalism. From his introduction it will be a very good series.

Bill Astore echoes some of my own feelings about our commercial culture.

Happy Thanksgiving

 It is barely dawn and, damn, it is almost 6:30 am. I hate the time change more every year. Oh, well. By the time I get used to it everything will be scrambled again.

We are vegetating today until we have to get ready to go to my brother's for dinner. Watching the Macy's Parade and puttering. I am going through my e-mail and discarding more than usual. I a not interested in those who proclaim we have the greatest country ever (by what standard?) or those that proclaim that the holiday celebrates our racist, colonial, and violent history (I wasn't around for most of that so I will simply enjoy the food and the company.)

November 22

 Well, we did have an unplanned errand yesterday. We had to go into and through areas we don't normally visit. Got lost both coming and going because the areas have changed so much since the last time. The process was frustrating and a bit alarming. Frustrating because we are used to our town which has gone to considerable efforts to make traveling our streets easier. We have more visible street signs and traffic lights and the city has repaved a lot of the streets, curbs and sidewalks. Several of the business districts have been refurbished. During our trip we had to deal with small, difficult to read street signs and streets that badly needed repairs. That was the frustrating part. The alarming part was the neighborhoods that could have been the settings for a post-apocalyptic novel. Boarded up houses falling down. Block after block of boarded stores in bad repair. On one stretch we saw stop signs but the decaying, broken stop lights were still there. No one bothered t take them out. We encountered traffic but not nearly what we remembered and streets that had been crowded weren't any more. I remember walking some of those streets fifty years ago and feeling safe but now even the car seemed little protection. We were very glad to get out of there. For some time, looking at the housing going up here, joked that we were getting refugees from Chicago. Now I wonder if we aren't getting them from areas between Chicago and here.

Yesterday we got a bit of good news in the mess of generally horrible news from the Israel-Hamas conflict: there will be a five-day cease fire to allow an exchange of hostages/prisoners and humanitarian aid (including fuel) to go into Gaza. That might be extended if the cease fire holds past the initial phase with 10 more hostages released for each day. I hope it lasts for a good long time.

November 21

 We had a couple of errands yesterday but nothing to do today. I have a couple of clean ups and sorting to do but otherwise nothing pressing. It is raining and a bit on the cold side. In a way, I don't mind the cloud cover because I can open the blinds and not be blinded by the sun.

Early morning news/commentary show had an interesting piece on the problems Biden might be having with African American voters. Robert Kennedy, Jr. might be peeling off some of that demographic--particularly with his vaccine skepticism. But that should not surprise anyone. During the pandemic a good many pundits noted that the black communities were skeptical from the start thanks to a not very happy history with American medicine. And there is another problem: how much should anyone trust the statistics that comes out of the "medical-industrial" complex? Especially since the statistics are put out to us filtered through a press establishment that isn't necessarily all that well educated in medicine or science. The early results were very promising but they were only preliminary. And the coverage in the press didn't often distinguish what the statistics indicated. Were they indicating the probability that the vaccine would prevent COVID altogether, or that it would prevent severe illness, or that it would prevent hospitalization/death? That was very murky. Lately, I have read some accounts from people collecting data about severe conditions that were linked to, but not necessarily caused by, the vaccine. The FDA approves new drugs based on the trial data provided by the drug companies. Since the companies have already invested a lot of time and money (their own and taxpayers') and they want a profit, they have a strong incentive to present "good" data. I won't continue but I think there are many reasons to be skeptical of modern industrial medicine.