Archives for September 2020

Sunday September 27, 2020

35 Days until the election on November 3^rd

115 Days until the Inauguration on January 20, 2021

I have a friend. He is trying to get his mother of off Fox News. He did some research. Turns out, Fox News is addictive. By stoking anger the brain releases dopamine or whatever chemical it is like what Oxycotin stimulates. It’s highly addictive.

Finally, I have an answer. I couldn’t understand how or why someone would continually listen to that crap, now I have an answer. They are addicts.

Fortunately, I have a solution. Frontal lobotomies – Come one. They aren’t using their brains anyway. And, of course, castration and forced sterilization. What’s the big deal? Most of them are past child bearing age anyway.

I had thought that people on the right had different views on problems, and I guess you could say they do, but not in the traditional sense of “How do you solve the problem?” No that’s not it at all. It’s, as Bob Woodward so aptly titled his latest book, RAGE.

Nothing else matters. Any issue is only important if it instills anger. Solutions? Forget about it. Can we agree on the problems? Ha. 

The local Republican congressman up here in Maine is a fellow called Dale Crafts. Dale is an older white guy. Big surprise, I know. He’s running against Jared Golden, who is young a military vet, drives a pickup, says he won’t take corporate money, and works for the folks in Maine. Golden is hardly liberal. He has been quoted as saying he thinks Trump is a strong leader. (Whether that is really true or some disinformation I haven’t checked into.)

Jared has been running ads the whole month we’ve been up here. He’s been stressing his hard working family values military background. He’s talked about what he has done for the people of Maine. There are testimonials from people in Maine saying how he has helped them. How he helped keep jobs in Maine at, for example, the famous Bath Ship Works.

I hadn’t seen anything from Crafts, until this weekend. What was his ad? Black and white reverse negative pictures of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortes with yellow lightning bolt like lettering and images of Golden mixed in. “Did you know Jard Golden has voted with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortes? Socialism! I’m Dale Crafts. I approve this message.”

Yeah, that was pretty much it.

Nothing about what Craft has done. Nothing about helping folks. Just RAGE.

And is that enough? Maybe, for 29-40% of the folks who seem to stick with Trump no matter what.

If I were Golden I’d start running ads asking “Craft what’s he done?”, “What’s he got?” And then I’d throw in a few things like “Craft supports Coved 19. He wants enough of you to die so he won’t have to. He never served in the military like I have. He’s a pussy.”

Now, I have no idea if Craft served in the military or if he supports the stupid Herd Immunity idea. But so what? Facts don’t matter to those people. Only rage. So be more outRAGEous. 

Moving on. Did you see Fauci put Rand Paul in his place? Quiet, but effective. I have to wonder about Paul. I mean he’s claims to be a board certified ophthalmologist. He had to create his own board to certify himself. He didn’t go to the regular board of ophthalmology. Doesn’t it make you wonder why? And then there’s the leaf blowing incident with his neighbor. I mean what do you do with a leaf blower and blowing leaves that so infuriates your next door neighbor that he comes over and beats the shit out of you crack three ribs?

Well, I guess if you’ve listened to Rand or his dad Ron and their nutty economic ideas and combine it with the fact that Rand is whatever he is socially (inept? dysfunctional? mal-a-somthing?) inappropriate. You begin to understand. I guess.

There are just so many like him on the Republican side of the aisle. Ted Cruz? The most hated man in the Senate. Lindsey Graham? The puppy dog, ass licker. Mitch McConnell? I don’t know of one piece of legislation that he has passed that has done anything to help regular people. I mean their must be some, but all he does is put conservative, and oftentimes unqualified but conservative, people in lifetime judgeships. Other than that, and passing give-away packages to the rich, what has he done? Thuyne? Barrasso? He stands behind McConnell at press announcements. Ernst? The castrating pig squealer? The only one I’ve heard equaling is her at a town hall that she ran away from. Blackburn? I give her the title of Dumbest Woman in the Senate. (Collins gets Most Naive.) Blunt, Boozman, Braun? What have any of them done? Collins, Cornyn, Cotton? There’s a trio of folks who have stood in the way of more good ideas than I can list. Cotton spouts right wing crazy talk all the time. Take the last “n” off of Cornyn and you’ve got what he’s about. Crapo? Take off the “o”. Enzi? A guy elected to the Senate with fewer votes than a district council person in California gets, and loses by. Fischer? Never heard of her. Grassley? Imhoufe? Johnson? Kennedy? Lee? Lankford? The only time I’ve ever heard from any of these folks is when they are saying or doing something stupid. Loeffler? Ms “I didn’t sell on insider information. My husband did.”

I had to stop. I read over the names of all of them and can’t find a single one that I know of that has done anything but get in the way and or say something outrageously stupid.

But there I go getting upset and thinking they want to do something. They don’t. They need to be called out. They need to be voted out. We need to get rid of the addicts and the people they elect.

PS The house* from the water – medium low tide. Dean is in the kayak lower left. “Did you get a picture of me?” “Yes, of course.” 

35 Days until the election on November 3^rd

115 Days until the Inauguration on January 20, 2021

*Www.barharborviewcottage.com

Wednesday September 23, 2020

39 Days until the election on November 3^rd

119 Days until the Inauguration on January 20, 2021

I had occasion to watch part of the pro football game from Las Vegas. It’s a brand new stadium with a fancy top the can unfold to the sky. Most of the locals didn’t want to pay the money for a new stadium because it was taking away money from the school system. However, the local politicians and business people forced it through. Now Covid, now what? I wondered if we’ve seen the end of big stadium football. Will we instead see colossal TV studios? Few fans, more cameras. Would that be so bad?

I also have fantasies about attending a Satan rally and having a sign up table with a big banner “Trump/Putin/Pence” and “Sign Up Here”. Underneath I’d have signs with arrows pointing down to various sign up sheets:

Suckers,

Losers,

Disgusting People.

Ah me, I can dream.

39 Days until the election on November 3^rd

119 Days until the Inauguration on January 20, 2021

PS Bald Eagle at Low Tide

Saturday September 19, 2020

43 Days until the election on November 3^rd

123 Days until the Inauguration on January 20, 2021

Well guess what? Mitch McConnell is a lying sack of excrement. Who knew? Well, anyone paying attention. 

Hillary was interviewed on Rachel last night and, as always, she described succinctly the situation. She’s been right so many times it is scary. She minced no words about McConnell. He doesn’t care about helping people. He’s only interested in power. 

Now an interesting situation is created with the death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg. McConnell has said he will jam through Trump’s nominee. He will be flogged with his own words. As will Lindsey Graham and many other Republican senators who so adamantly blocked Obama’s pick eleven months before the 2016 election.

How those senators respond will be interesting, as will how the people who have elected them respond with their votes in November. 

PS I was in deep shit, but now after the help of these fellows, I am only in shallow shit.

Sunday September 13, 2020

49 Days until the election on November 3^rd

129 Days until the Inauguration on January 20, 2021

Sorry, didn’t finish until six days later.

Yesterday morning the Western Bay was glass smooth. An excellent day to kayak across and see the seals. You don’t get those kind of days often. 

It was a harder paddle than I remembered. My seat wouldn’t stay upright and I was constantly lying back, which is a hard way to paddle. Sitting upright meant no back support. It made it much harder than usual. Dean and I to the area just north of Green Island where the seals like to sun themselves. I stayed on the shore and had dean approach the rock. I wanted him to see all the resting seals get excited and wiggle their tails and shimmy off the rock. It was hard to see them as they were bunched so close together. One white seal pup was easy to spot. The rest were just black lumps.

As dean approached the rock the pup slipped off the rock. The others didn’t move. It was then that I realized that black I was seeing was actually rock and not seal. We hadn’t seen any seals on the way over. It was curious. We didn’t see any on the whole trip except for the pup. Where had they all gone? 

There have been schools of fish out in the bay. You can see a black storm in the water as they move; no doubt away from some predator. We’ve seen osprey fly by with fish in their claws and bald eagles too. I don’t remember seeing that kind of activity before.

The painting is nearly done. One area of the deck and the handrails need a second coat.

Hopefully,  a hike tomorrow.

Shelby had discovered a French TV station, which showed the Tour de France. Tehn we found it on NBC. But yesterday, everything was showing football, both US and European – no Tour. Late yesterday, I switched on the French TV and saw the last 9 kilometers. It was an odd finish. One rider was out in front with the peloton chasing him just 23 seconds behind. Several riders broke away and caught him. He faded into the pack as one rider after another charged to the front and then got caught. Finally, one fellow made a breakaway and no one pursued. He took the race handily and the rest came in together.

PS Fire on the beach.

Friday September 11, 2020

51 Days until the election on November 3^rd

131 Days until the Inauguration on January 20, 2021

Wow, September 11^th. It wasn’t until I was writing this that I realized it was 9-11.

That was nineteen years ago. It’s seems two lifetimes.

I was thinking about the comparisons made about our current Satan. They fall into two types, maybe three. There are comparisons to Hitler and his rise to power. There are also comparisons to George Orwell’s “1984” and how prescient he was in outlining the behavior of authoritarian leaders and their followers. The third part is the lack of interest, ability, and understanding of the job. Nowhere is that more clear than in his doing nothing about the pandemic even when he knew what it could do. There was no preparation or call to action. This however has been his method of operation all along so it should surprise no one.

The last part are his accomplices: willing or unknowing. 

51 Days until the election on November 3^rd

131 Days unti the Inauguration on January 20, 2021

PS Penumbral Eclipse, January 19, 2019