Refugees and hypocricy

The plight of poor Kim Davis, the county clerk who refuses to issue marriages to gay couples has probably generated more news coverage in the US than the flight of hundreds of thousands of refugees from the fighting in Syria and Iraq.  The thought that we would waste precious time worrying about a hypocritical adulterer when that many people have life and death problems turns my stomach.   As the Divine Mrs. M pointed out, the 10 commandments prohibit adultery, but say nothing about gay marriage.  Ms. Davis, a serial adulterer by biblical standards, will probably not begged to be stoned to death, the approved biblical punishment for that particular transgression.  Why do we even pay attention to this BS.  A more pointed question is how we will react to the refugee crisis.   I have not heard anyone from either party offering to take in a fraction of the number Germany has already welcomed.  Christian nation indeed...

Endless Summer

Even as I say I'll never complain about summer heat again, the thermometer is making me grit my teeth when I say it.   93 degrees on the NCR in September is pretty daunting.  The boaters are still out in force and it looks like the heat will hold on at least until the upcoming weekend.  Maybe it is just an anomalous event, but combined with all the other crazy weather being served up around the world it makes you think about climate change.  Of course, unless we get a bout of 90 degree weather in December, the deniers will just shrug off the increasingly warm weather.  All I know is it is too warm to plant spinach seed and that is a story in itself.

Labor Day and the New American work ethic

When a car company chooses "When did it become an act of courage to leave work on time". as its advertising slogan, you know we've reached a cultural crisis point.   As a child touring model homes with my parents in the early 1960s, we were told the electricity used to run them would soon be so cheap no one would bother to meter our use of it.  Productivity was up in all industries and some work weeks were being shortened to 35 hours.  Now, politicians say we need to work harder and longer hours from the end of formal education until our 70s, often toiling at two or more jobs in order to pay for electricity among other "too cheap to charge for" products and services.  Meanwhile the specter of robots taking over many middle class jobs raises the possibility of an impoverished class of workers unable to find the jobs they were trained for and sinking into a desperate poverty.    Even those who think about these contradictions on a regular basis don't have any prescriptions for dealing with these looming crises.  So we labor on, celebrating our ability to do so with a long weekend.  Then it's back to the 24/7 reality of American labor in the 21st century.

GOP trumped again

The Donald signed the pledge of allegiance to the Republican party yesterday and of course every media outlet had to dissect the motives and end games of the party and it's putative standard bearer.  For some, this was a triumph for the party.   By getting Trump to forswear a third party run, it preserves unity and avoids the specter of a third party candidacy which would doom its election prospects.  For the contrarians it was a takeover of the party by the lunatic fringe in the person of Trump.  By embracing him and legitimizing his brand of know nothing, anti-immigrant and policy free campaigning it has firmly tied the party's fate to the lowest common denominator.  This rapidly aging white male base is fated to get smaller and smaller, making the GOP weaker at best and probably irrelevant by the middle of the century.  Personally, I think Trump will treat this pledge as so much toilet paper and do whatever his evolving strategy dictates.  Either way, republicans are in for a wild ride as the election cycle really kicks in to gear.  Popcorn anyone...

Hot and Dry

Summer was a late comer to the NCR, but has arrived with a vengeance.  We have been relatively warm and dry for several weeks now and the long range shows the trend will continue.  The heavier soils in my garden are still moist, but even the wettest areas are tillable now.  Of course it is too late to plant much of anything but spinach and of course garlic later in the season.  Weeds are still germinating and will be a problem for a couple of more weeks.  All the late season crops of lettuce, broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage etc. look good.   If we get a timely shower sometime next week everything will stay on track.  I'm looking forward to a long, mild fall with my fingers crossed. 

Mixed signals

President Obama flew into Alaska to deliver a sermon about the urgent challenges posed by climate change.  All well and good, except the administration had just approved Shell Oil's bid to drill in the Arctic Ocean.  Mixed signals at best.  The juxtaposition of the two events caused whiplash in the environmental community of activists who naturally question the President's commitment to the fight against climate change.  Although not explicitly, the major oil companies were applauding sotto voce.  As with most of Mr. Obama's policies, I hope he is once again playing eleven dimensional chess while his opponents struggle with checkers.  Perhaps he is banking on Shell's ineptitude at drilling.  After failing miserably last year and being delayed again this year by mechanical problems and protests, the oil company is ripe for an accident.  Even a minor glitch could conceivably kill Ocean drilling before a major accident fouls the northern waters for decades.  The Exxon Valdez accident of the 80s comes to mind.  Meanwhile, the Obama administration pledges to fight hard for the environment and against climate change as it fades in to the 2016 sunset.  Let's hope for the sake of future generations he succeeds.

Tea Pot Tempests

Listening to Joe Scarborough on Morning Joe is probably preferable to incarceration at Guantanamo, but having not experienced the hospitality of the US government, I can't say with certainty which torture I would choose.  The bloviation of the "personalities" who pass through the green room is harmless at best and toxic to normal conversation on a regular basis.  Listening to the host lie outright about the Clinton e-mail "scandal" is a trip on the wayback machine to the late 90s when he chased Bill Clinton's penis around the capital.  To answer the classic question, no, he has no shame!  The scary thing is Morning Joe is the mildest of the right wing talk shows.  Considering the rest of the MSNBC lineup, it is still a wonder the show hogs 3 hours of broadcast time.