And I Rant On

Everyone I know seems angry and depressed.  Those of us who find the Trump administration both immoral and embarrassing feel like our country is being disgraced by an ignorant bully.  Our moral compass - which, granted, we have not always lived up to - is quite literally being shredded and tramped on with a kind of remorseless and gleeful hypocrisy.

I turned on CNN this morning to unending discussion of yet another crude stupid tweet from our narcissistic "leader,"  who apparently made a graphic of himself wrestlng CNN to submission.  A stupid tweet and what is probably a slightly hyperbolic response from CNN... but then it isn't me he is calling an "enemy of the people."  CNN has plenty of flaws, but I do find it ironic that my right wing acquaintances who are addicted to propaganda from FOX and Rush Limbaugh have swallowed and regurgitate the idea that the rest of the media is "fake."  What every happened to fact checking?  What ever happened to thinking.  It is apparently a dead art.

I stuck with CNN through Fareed Zakaria because he has guests who are knowledgeable and have actual conversations and don't just throw inane sound bytes (most talking head "debates" are the equivalent of monkeys through feces at each other).   What is most frustrating - I think I'm repeating myself, but if I keep this up, I will probably repeat myself a lot - is that the media continues to pretend that Donald Trump has a clue about anything.  They cover him as though he knows about issues and is making actual decisions.  You only need to listen to him for a couple of minutes to realize that he knows nothing at all, for example, about health care in general or about the bill he is pushing.  He doesn't actually care what's in it or who it hurts. (Unless you count our former President.  The Trump presidency is in many ways guided by a desire to erase everything Barack Obama did.  It is a blend of hatred of the first black president and narcissism. I'm sure psychologists - if the planet survives - will spend decades studying the psychological pathology.  But I digress...)   Besides hating Obama, Trump wants to score a point.  It's all about himself and how great he thinks he is.  Some in the news media hint at this, but they always add some qualifier that pretends the man is actually informed on any subject.  One only has to listen to the vague inanity that issues from his potty mouth to realize that there is no there there.  "It's going to be awesome," isn't a policy discussion.  "We had a great meeting," even if the participants had a grand old time - is not a reflection of substance.  It's theater.   So anyway, six historians sat around and pretended that this man who apparently spends something like 5 hours a day watching coverage of himself on TV is sitting in the oval office formulating policy.  He isn't.  He's spewing political chum for his followers. engaging with is family in an ethical free ride in which they are using the presidency to line their own pockets, signing horrible decisions with no thought to their repercussions because he is not a person who gives thought to anything except his own ego gratification.

I fear that the US has been lucky and prosperous and free for so long that we don't really understand that it is frighteningly easy to lose those treasures.

I guess I'll stop now.

Happy Independence Day Weekend.  May we wake up and recognize the gift we are at risk of losing to a self-serving bully who wouldn't recognize greatness if he tripped over it.

I Don't Want to Rant But I Can't Stop Myself

It has been a really, really long time since I last posted anything here.  Lots has happened.  Tara Grace and Angel Joy both died and after a bi of an empty time, Merlin and Melissa - aka "the Twins" because they are brother and sister came into my life.

On another front, after 12 years of not doing so, I left my house 4 times - 3 of them in an ambulance, unfortunately, the 4th in my neighbotr's car.  Bless her.  Although I'm not (amazingly) diabetic, I developed a big hole in the bottom of my foot  (hospital visit 1) which led to trouble walking which led to a blood clot  (hospital visit 2 with a 3 week interment in a nursing home for rehab) which led to coumadin which led to misery and a leaky blood vessel in my eye and something called a fistula (hospital visit 3).  Luckily for me - against doctor's advice - I stopped the coumadin.  I'm sure it caused the fistula (not all medical professionals will admit that I'm right),  but I think it would have been worse if my "little voice" hadn't literally bellowed at me one morning - after a month of so of polite warnings - "STOP TAKING THAT STUFF.  IT'S KILLING YOU."  Anyway, I lived.

One of the reasons I stopped posting way back when was because I ran out of photo space.  That was half the fun of posting for me, but after Angel died and I stopped blogging, I kind of stopped taking pictures as well, so maybe it will be OK to have just words or maybe I can reuse pictures that are already in old posts.  I guess I'll figure it out if I post more than just this day's rant.  And I warn you.  I'm guided here by a desire to rant.  Two people asked me in the last few weeks if I had been blogging so maybe that's a sign.  Or maybe it's just two people asking a question.  I know that I am deeply angry and depressed about what is happening to my country.  It feels to me - I know there are some who are elated - like the forces of darkness are winning and it makes me sad and angry and deeply depressed.  

A friend of my voted for Donald Trump.  She's a woman with a gay son whom she loves and in whom she takes pride.  She's a woman with a pre-existing condition.  She's a woman who's family members survive because of HEAP and SNAP (as do I).  She also - though she denies it - hates Muslims.  She listens to Rush Limbaugh and follows Judge somebody from FOX news who foments blatantly dishonest propaganda.  I confess to the sin of stalking her Facebook page to some degree.  I hate Facebook, but I went to S's page initially to try and understand how someone who is a kind, decent person could vote for someone who preached racism, lied non-stop, bragged about molesting women - the list goes on and on  - and is generally ignorant on pretty much every subject there is..... How could she vote for him?  How could she vote for someone whose Vice Presidential choice would, given the chance, send her gay son away to be reprogrammed?

What I found was a lot Conservative and Tea Party propaganda, a lot of  disturbing (to me) "Muslim watch" posts, which are basically distorted fear mongering and half truth about how scary and evil Muslims are.  And I found posts about George Soros which were obvious lies.  Fine with me if you want to hate George Soros, but to post a photo of a Nazi commandant and say it's George Soros and have a false quote about how he loved World War II was something I couldn't just not fight back on... not because I care that much one way or another about George S, but because, as I said to S, because I care about truth and lies.  I offered her proof from SNOPES that her post was a lie.  Soros was 14 when the war ended and was Jewish, thus very unlikely to be a Nazi commandant. The identity of the man in the photo was also know and he was not Soros.  She and her friends dismissed this proof because SNOPES in their view is "left leaning."  So I went and found alternate sources... the BBC and other places.  They didn't care.  She has posted similar things since and feels that because - in her view - George Soros is a bad man, that it's OK to lie about him.  That REALLY bothers me.  She has bought the Trump mantra about Fake News, without recognizing that he is one of the prime purveyors of falsehoods and fake news.  She doesn't care and neither do her friends.  This breaks my heart and it makes me angry as well. Mostly it breaks my heart.

I will say that I DO think our news media sucks across the board.  They don't inform, they entertain.... or try to.  Most is more gossip than news.  FOX is propaganda laden gossip,  CNN (the station I can get) is gossip laden dribble.  They have all the Trump bot people who make absurd rationalizations about things he says and does and more left-leaning people who toss opposing sound bytes back.  It's all just stupid and angry and pointless.  (There are exceptions like Fareed Zakaria, who has guests who have actual conversations with content and information in them.)

I think what makes me craziest is that CNN continues to cover Trump as though he is rational, as though he knows or give a hoot about health care or anything else.  They cover the vacant photo ops of a man playing at being President as though he was anything more than a self-involved narcissist with the power to do enormous harm to the US and the world.  They hint at his lies and his fundamental incompetence but they won't go out on a limb and actually say that the Emperor has no clothes, that he doesn't understand or care to understand how health care works, that he doesn't understand history or government or the Constitution, that he has no ethics.  The right says everyone is picking on him? Nobody is really picking on him.  He, not the media or the left, has turned the Russia investigation into something that's all about him.  The media has helped him to do that, but the primary source of that distortion it the Paranoid, Distorter/Distractor in Chief.

The man is a disgrace. An embarrassment.  He shames and humiliates us in the eyes of the world.  The people who think he is going to save them are the ones who will pay the heaviest price for his dishonesty and cruelty.  The rich will thrive and the poor will get poorer.  The planet may pass it's tipping point.  Hate and bigotry are tacitly (and not so tacitly) encouraged.  Meanwhile the man who led the birther movement complains about people being mean to him.   Give me a break.

Where are Republicans of conscience?  They seem to share the President's disregard for truth.

I could just rant on and on, but I guess maybe I'll stop here.  I know many (assuming anybody finds and read this) will disagree with me.  That's fine.  We're still a free country, although I'm not sure we will remain that way if  Mr. Trump and his minions have their way.  Bullies don't like free speech.  Narcissists don't really care about the rights of other people.  They only care about themselves.

A Conversation Worth Listening To

We need to have more honest conversations like this. We need to stop being coy about the impact of racism on our society and speak candid honestly like this.  All the blather about someone using the "N" word 30 years ago is a way to pretend we are dealing with our deep-seated bigotry and it's impact on the people who are on the receiving end of it. It's pretend doing something Conversations like this can actually change people. Or at least that's my opinion.

Liberty

I know I said I would be back soon.  I meant it, but somehow it was easier to STOP posting than to start back up.  Guess I'm still not ready, but I thought this was very funny and makes a good point at the same time.

Self Esteem and Other Things

Hi,

I WILL leap back into the void and do Wordzzles again soon. I have just needed a break. I've been obsessed (without entirely knowing it) with the parole hearing for the boy (now a man) who murdered my older sister. It's over. He was denied. He will have another hearing two years from now, but for the moment it is resolved.

I hate sharing commercials and I don't particularly like Dove as a product, but I think this ad is PROFOUND so I'll give them some free advertising (not that many people visit these days. I imagine even the faithful few have given up the ghost). Still. I want to share it because I think it's really thought provoking.

The First Lady Speaks

I so admire this woman.

Taking a Break

Well, since I never came back to finish up last week's exercises and it's 9:00 PM and I haven't done anything this week, I think perhaps a wee break is in order. Not sure when I'll be back. Maybe next week or the week after or in April.

My apologies.

UPDATE:  Of course on the week that I decide to quit for a while, someone else had planned to participate. I received this in my email from Gabrielle at Wild Goose Scoops Moon.   It's a tribute to Le Chat, Henri of You Tube fame and I think it's quite brilliant. For those who have missed it, here's a link to Paw de Deux.

Ennui

J’entend les mots

Du chat Henri

What is this life

But rank ennui?

A bald cadence

Where obsessions reign

Stupid, ancient

Glorious ,vain.

Measurements

Of gross demeanor

Futile now as

Hearts grow leaner

The knife is sharp

The keys are flat

According to

One weary cat

Why all this bother

To salivate

Cold fish again

Predictably late.

A frizzed red ribbon

Catnip filled mice

Glittery balls

Meant to entice

Charisma, swag

So overrated

Moi, je prefere

What’s understated

But I grow tired

Of all this rhyme

Perpetual  iamb

And metered time

The languid rays

Of morning light

Disturb a nap

Bring back the night!

J’entend les mots

Du chat Henri

The stars go darK

Epistrophy

Weekly Wordzzle Challenge # 236

Late again. I seem to be losing my enthusiasm for the task. Maybe it's winter blahs. I've posted the mega and the mini and will finish the 10-word after I have some supper... or tomorrow.  Sorry about my blahs and the weary heart of a lonely wordzzler.


Words for this week's 10-word challenge:  ennui, stars, salivate, charisma, perpetual, stupid, measurement, triangle, obsession, bother  And for the mini: gross, glorious, red ribbon, keys, sharp


My mega: 

Call it jealousy, but it really bothered her. Lucinda Jones could not understand for the life of her how that gross, odious and incredibly stupid woman Gracie - who went by the stage name Charisma and alternately (and perpetually) sang both sharp and flat, but never actually on key - had managed to find her way onto The Stars Have It and even to make it past some other contestants to the "red ribbon" phase of the competition. Ridiculous, unless "it" was a penchant for pretentiously overdone ennui, an obsession with her measurements and own image in the mirror. The woman had no talent and less brains, yet for some reason men salivated over her as though she was some glorious treasure. She had already been caught in more than one love triangle, but instead of making her the pariah she deserved to be, it seemed to increase her reputation as some kind of glorious celebrity. Life, Lucinda thought, was unfair.  Jack, her husband let her tirade run its course, smiling. Lucinda, my love. What do you care? Your talent is the real thing. I chose you over Charisma and so will any talent agent with half a brain and business sense. She's a flash in the pan. You are a gifted artist. You win across the board. Don't envy her. Pity her. 



My mini:

Looking at the keys hanging on the big red ribbon, Amanda Gross could not believe her good luck. She had entered the Sharp Estate win your own home contest on a whim. It had never occurred to her that she might win and now here she was, owner of a glorious new house.... and a car too. And a check for $100,000. Life was looking pretty darned good.


My 10-word:   Coming soon

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Words for next week's 10-word challenge:  elements, eyes, splatter, pragmatism, slate, foreign, smog, mustard, sand, copper

And for the mini: gratitude, animal speak, kissed by the moon, octapus, bargain

Thanks you for playing.  Newcomers can check here for some guidelines to make the game more fun. There are no rules, just some general guidelines and tricks.

Weekly Wordzzle Challenge # 235

OK.... Someone else is thinking of joining in this week, so I have no more excuse to not do my own exercises.... Just as I started to work on these, I got company, so I'm running later than I had planned to. Sigh. Will post the first two and add the 10-word later.  LATER turned out to be 300 am. But I did it!


Words for this week's 10-word challenge were:  perplexed, imagination, chandelier, ball of yarn, carpenter, crocodile tears, shape, drop, pouring, the last straw   And for the mini: gambol, scarf, red peppers, puzzle, praise


My mega:

Miranda Carpenter didn't know whether to laugh or cry as she watched the her 16-year-old cat - aptly named Red Pepper for her not so mild temperament - gambol happily around the room turning her favorite scarf back into a ball of yarn. It was a perplexing puzzle to her why Red had not only not mellowed with age, but seemed to have grown in imagination and destructive creativity.  She had tried yelling, she had tried pouring on  praise for good behavior, she had tried spray bottles. Red Pepper seemed impervious to any and all kinds of discipline. She also seemed impervious to aging. She was in magnificent shape.  Miranda was pretty sure that her late husband Fred had secretly encouraged the old cat in her antics, though the last straw for him had been the morning he walked in to the dining room as she dropped gracelessly from the chandelier bringing it down with her in a shattered heap. He loved to tell the story, though, replete with crocodile tears, since he had quite hated the gaudy baubles which he found ostentatious, so even at her worst, the old cat had served his happiness. Because of that Miranda herself was prone to forgive the old monster almost anything... even her favorite scarf. "Come here you old scamp," she said, grabbing the big cat and hugging her close. "You are a scoundrel, but you always made Fred happy and for that I love you and forgive you anything. I can hear him laughing when I watch you play and that makes me feel less sad that he's gone. Thanks for that, my old friend. I love you."



My mini:

Standing at the altar in her wedding gown, Gambol Grace Johnson felt joy sweep over her. She had spent her life trying to live up to the silly name her parents had given her, but knew she had failed. They were, good, kindhearted people who had hoped to inspire in her the sense of adventure and self-confidence that they craved but did not themselves have. They lavished her with praise and rejoiced in her eccentricities and it puzzled them that she had not become a traveler or adventurer, but instead a banker whose most eccentric act was to wear a scarf decorated with red peppers. But then she had met her husband George - the adventurer her parents had always dreamed of. George had somehow managed to flick the switch on the daughter they had always dreamed of and having sowed her tame oats during her younger years, she was not free to fly. Best of all, George had helped her parents take their own baby steps into a more daring life. She knew she was blessed. He was her Angel and she knew that with him the future was going to be a joyful journey from now on.



And the 10-word:

When carpenter and handy man, Frank Wilson had hung Miranda Weathersmith's chandelier 3 years earlier, marriage had been the furthest thing from his mind and in his wildest imagination Miranda would not have been on the short list of eligible women. She would not have been on any list. He had detested her since they were children. She was one of the smart kids, the kind who had made him feel insecure and foolish and out of shape. When his mother had insisted that he drop by and help her out with some home repairs, he had been furious at her meddling. He knew what she was up to and trying to fix him up with Miranda had felt like the last straw. Then, when he arrived at her house and she opened the door, she had seemed very different that the girl he had resented all those years. She had a ball of yarn in her hands and a young kitten and she seemed surprisingly beautiful to him. It perplexed him that he had not noticed how pretty she was until now.  But when he had cut his hand and she had tended to it ever so gently, shedding tears at his injury - and not crocodile tears, very real ones - everything had changed. He had been consumed with love. Two years later they married and now they were about to have their first child. His mother - in a rare burst of good grace - never reminded him about how lucky that last straw had been for him.

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Words for next week's 10-word challenge:  ennui, stars, salivate, charisma, perpetual, stupid, measurement, triangle, obsession, bother

And for the mini: gross, glorious, red ribbon, keys, sharp

Thanks you for playing.  Newcomers can check here for some guidelines to make the game more fun. There are no rules, just some general guidelines and tricks.

Voting Rights

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