YEAH, Biden's good!
the Ol'Buzzard
The present danger to humanity is nuclear weapons.
But the present danger to the United States is
a cult called MAGA – the worship of one man above law and reason.
I am reading
American Prometheus by Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin. There are so many lessons, philosophical,
political, and psychological, to be taken from this tale that it should be
required reading in high schools.
Early in the
book Oppenheimer is studying in Germany for his doctorate in Physics.
This passage
I found particularly relevant and unnerving – an undercurrent that is too real
in American society today!
"He found many
Germans “bitter, sullen… angry and loaded with all those ingredients which were
later to produce a major disaster.“ "
I don’t know
what the answer is. Is our country,
after 250 years, about to disintegrate?
Are we all living
through the end-days of a great social democratic experiment – doomed to fail
because of the malevolence of human nature?
Twenty percent
of the insurrectionist that attacked the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021, were military
veterans.
The media
seems shocked as to the reason, but it takes another veteran to understand.
We take
young men full of testosterone and teach them to kill and indoctrinate them with
patriotic fervor; then we send them into a warzone.
These men are
away from civilized society and bond with their brothers and sisters-in-arms. They have no compunction about pulling the trigger
or thrusting the knife against an evil enemy that puts themselves and their fellow
warriors in harm’s way.
These young
men are conditioned to react aggressively and with violence.
Then we
bring them back and dump them into society and expect them to immediately act
with normal accepted civilized behavior.
Each and
every one is experiencing some degree of PTSD. You can’t see and experience the carnage of
war: living under constant threat of death, injury, or capture - view the death
and injuries to fellow warriors; and ever be completely ‘normal’ again.
Fifty years
later, I cannot watch Vietnam War movies.
Most of all
they miss the support and brotherhood of their sisters and brothers-in-arms
that was so cohesive in the military. They are among civilians that are foreign to
them in their experiences.
Even if
misguided, is there any wonder that feeling alien in society, they grab the
moment to reenact and relive the emotion of movement and aggression and warrior
that has become a permanent part of themselves?
the Ol’Buzzard
On October 6, 1945 the United States dropped an atomic bomb that detonated 1900 feet above Hiroshima, Japan killing 140,000 civilians incinerating 2/3 of the city.
Let’s get
this straight. Donald Trump will serve
no Jail time.
If Trump is elected
President in 2024 he will pardon himself upon taking office. If
any Republican becomes President in 2025 they will pardon Trump. If Joe Biden becomes president in 2025 he
will pardon Trump in an attempt to unify the enormous split that is fracturing
this nation’s population.
Trump will
not serve time in jail.
The most we
can hope for is that Donald Trump will be found guilty of all charges in a
court of law and go down in history as the most corrupt President in United
States history.
Reality
stinks
the Ol’Buzzard
This is not the nastiest thing in your house.
This is!
Then you are putting cooking and eating utensils in a sink that has a strainer full of bacteria.
I know we are talking about rot and slime; but we need a break away from Trump.
the Ol'Buzzard
The movie Oppenheimer opened yesterday at the local movie theater. I would like the see the movie, but three hours is a long time to sit and focus attention on what I am sure will be a traumatic theme. I have ordered the book American Prometheus, the basis of the movie. The title reminds me of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein - The Modern Prometheus. The movie would have been more properly subtitled Vishnu the Destroyer of Worlds.
We commemorate
September 11 and the destruction of the World Trade Center and the loss of
three thousand lives as a crime against humanity. But
history is perspective - written by the winners.
On August 6, 1945, the United States dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima Japan instantly killing 140,000 men, women, children, and old people – dogs, cats… and no birds sang.
Then five days later the good Christian people of America celebrated a second bomb killing 70,000 human beings in Nagasaki.
210,000 civilians - non-combatants
- died instantly; thousands more died from radiation, and for decades children
were born with deformities. This is
never mentioned in our classroom history books.
The movie Oppenheimer
should make us all pause and think.
There are
12,705 nuclear weapons possessed by nine countries, thousands of nuclear
powerplants each capable of catastrophic meltdowns, and the real possibility of
weaponizing the new cold-fusion science
How can a
violent species such as ours be trusted with weapons of mass destruction?
the Ol'Buzzard
"Elvis may be the king of rock and roll but I am the Queen."
1932 - 2020
The Ol'Buzzard
I am not a
zombie prepper, and I don’t believe I need to prepare for the apocalypse; but I
am witnessing unprecedented climate events and even more severe events
projected for the future.
I think it
is reasonable to expect severe weather conditions at some point to disrupt the
food/necessities supply chains as happened during the pandemic.
It seems
reasonable if everyone, who can afford to, consider keeping a three-month supply
of basic food/necessities above their normal daily/weekly needs.
This said, most
people purchase fresh meat as needed.
For several years, my wife and I have been vacuum-sealing our meats using a Food Saver vacuum sealer.
We quick-freeze our
meats for a few hours or a day and then vacuum-seal the frozen meats. Our meats last easily up to three months
without frost burn or loss of flavor. We
buy salmon, pork, chicken, and beef when it is on sale in quantities suitable
for us. We freeze fruits and berries in season for vacuum sealing.
You can also
vacuum pack beans, coffee, popcorn, – almost any dry food, extending the use
time almost indefinitely.
I don’t
advertise for any company, but the Food Saver we bought through Walmart online,
and rolls of vacuum sealing material we buy on eBay have worked flawlessly for
us.
It might be
useful if each of us through our blogs posts tips that might be useful during these unprecedented
times and the uncertain future.
We were
warned by scientists about climate change, but people chose not to listen. It turns out that science is real whether or
not you believe in it.
the Ol’Buzzard
Youth is
wasted on the young,
Experience
is wasted on the old,
If I could
go back knowing what I know now,
As a young
man, I would have gotten laid much more often
the Ol’Buzzard
Rights
are nice ideas, a comforting window with which to view the world. But once the glass is broken, you realize
they were never really there.
Rain Falls
Michael
Marshall Smith
First
abortion rights
Then Affirmative
Action
Next Gay
marriage?
Draconian drug laws,
A dress code
for women?
There is an army of the night, now marching in plain daylight, with their bibles held high, convinced beyond doubt of both their righteousness and their rightness, set on making the United States a Christian nation.
Marching backwards into time.
the Ol'Buzzard
Aware,
conscious, cognizant, mindful, alive, apprehensive, regretful – acquiring knowledge
and understanding through experiences and senses.
We are sentient
beings on sparse occasions; mostly we go through our daily routine as androids unaware
of the world around us.
We place
high importance on our cognition, preferring to think of ourselves above and separate
from all other animal species on earth.
We invent gods in our likeness, and refuse to accept the finality of death.
We declare ourselves intelligent and separate above all living things;
when actually, we share 98% of our DNA with our cognizant cousins, chimpanzees.
We are not
special creatures. We are on this earth
through an uncontrolled application of chaos.
If we were to back up evolution to an earlier state there is no reason
to believe that the outcome would follow the same process.
We are each here as a matter of chance. One particular egg of the three hundred that our mother produced happened to drop at a time that she was sexually receptive, in a place and time that allowed for intercourse, with a random male who inseminated her with tens-of-thousands of sperm, and one particular of those tens-of-thousand happened to penetrate the egg fertilizing it with your particular DNA traits, producing an individual you. Total happenstance.
But we are here - sentient - and with the ability to enjoy our brief time.
Unfortunately, we produce chaos in our own life and waste our precious time by not being mindful of the moment.
If you
cannot remember what you ate for breakfast this morning or how it tasted, then you
were not alive in that moment; a waste of the precious time we have on
this chaotic earth.
Our time is relatively short. Like
all other animal species, we will pass and be no more.
Our life is
a gift. We are here as a result of chance. Like the Buddha, we must savor the
stimulations of our senses, bask in the beauty around us, and pause to enjoy
the pleasures of living in the moment, or this gift of life will have been for
naught.
In the legend, the Buddha, near death, became awakened when a beautiful young girl gave him a nourishing bowl of rice and a drink of cool refreshing water.
Wake Up!
the Ol'Buzzard
Rights
are nice ideas, a comforting window with which to view the world. But once the glass is broken, you realize
they were never really there.
Rain Falls
Michael Marshall Smith
the Ol'Buzzard
I know there
is a difference between weather and climate.
Maine has been in a freak weather pattern for the month of June. We have had only seven days this month
without rain – seven dry days.
This is
unprecedented, and only the future will be able to determine if this is a
changing weather pattern due to climate change.
However,
being a long-time resident of Maine I can declare through my observations that
I am witnessing the result of climate change by the encroachment of invasive
species.
Ticks are
now an epidemic in Maine, causing serious illnesses to people. Moose and deer are covered with ticks. Domestic and commercial animals are plagued
with ticks. There were no ticks in
Maine before 1990. I was a survival
instructor and avid hunter and fisherman between the years 1960 and 1985. I regularly slept on the ground and sat on the
ground, as did all of my students in survival training, and never once
witnessed a tick.
47,000 ticks on a moose ( New York Times)
The water in
the Gulf of Maine is warming and now becoming infested with green crabs that
feed on young lobster and shellfish, affecting the future of fisheries on the
coast. Fisheries are now moving farther
offshore because of the warming.
The
brown-tail moth is now showing up in the coastal regions of Maine killing trees
and carrying poisonous spines that can cause serious rashes similar to poison
ivy.
I spent
eight years in Alaska and witnessed the melting of glaciers, and shore ice in
the far north.
Herbert Glacier Juneau, Alaska
Bears hunted seals on the frozen ice, now they have become a danger to the villages.
The
indications are here but only visible to people old enough to have witnessed the
changes. To
young people, of course, the now is the norm.
Observations
from an Ol’Buzzard
There are three
reasons that former President Trump will never wear an orange jumpsuit.
First: The
Presidential Protection Act of 2012 gives Secret Service Protection to all
former Presidents for life, and there is no exception for incarceration. This would create an impossible situation for
any jail or penitentiary.
Second: No
judge will want to go down in history as the person who ruled to incarcerate an
ex-President. The violent factions of
the MAGA extreme would place a target on the judge and his or her family, their
lives would be in danger and they would require protection for the rest of
their lives. No judge is going to accept
this personal consequence.
Third: The
liberal-biased Supreme Court will never allow Trump to be incarcerated regardless
of his crimes.
The most we might
see is Trump being placed under house arrest with an ankle bracelet for two or
three years.
Trump must
be publicly charged with the crimes he has committed, but rest assured, Trump will skate while others go to jail.
the Ol’Buzzard
In 1872
William West was posted on the corner of 13th and M Street in
Washington D.C. West was one of only
two black policemen on the Washington Police Force. West had joined the force after serving in
the 13th U.S. Colored Infantry under the command of General Ulysses
S. Grant
Drivers often
sped down 13th Street, the three-mile straight stretch that ran
between the city and Brightwood Trotting Park. Earlier that morning a woman and her six-year-old
child had been injured by a hit-and-run carriage speeding toward the park.
West, seeing
a carriage speeding toward him, stood in the road with his hand up. When
the carriage stopped the driver was President Grant. West explained that an injury had occurred earlier
as the result of speeding and Grant assured West he would be more conscious of
his speed in the future. Grant complimented the officer for his diligence.
The next day
West stopped another carriage barreling down 13th Streed only to
discover it was again President Grant.
West
informed the President that he had to place him under arrest and the President
offered to drive them both to the police station.
General
Grant was arraigned and released on twenty dollars bail (the equivalent of $460)
which was the standard fine charged for speeding.
Grant did
not show up for trial the next day and his bail was forfeited which satisfied
the fine requirement.
This is not
making a comparison with Donald Trump, because Donald Trump is an ex-President
and the crimes he committed occurred, and are occurring while he is not in
office, and Trump is charged with sedition and espionage and multiple other
lesser charges.
If a sitting
President could be charged with a crime in 1872 there should be no question of precedence
for holding an ex-President accountable for his crimes in 2023.
I’m not a
lawyer
I’m
the Ol’Buzzard
During the
Trump reign, I often made reference to the dystopian world of 1984, but I was
in error.
1984 was a world where the government indoctrinated its citizens and governed through fear. A world where Dear Leader is watching you and your every action. This is North Korea and not the cult created by Donald Trump.
Trump is a
con man on the national stage. We have
seen this before and there is a name for it: Fascism.
P.T. Barnum said you don’t have to be smart to
con people, you just have to be smarter than the people you are conning.
A minority
of gullible people have been aroused to anger by a charismatic leader preaching
bigotry, white supremacy, and the demonization of people or ideas or religions
‘not like us.’
Hitler roused an angry vocal minority and the majority just fell in line.
This is what has happened to the Republican Party; they have been usurped by an egocentric paranoid fascist leader who now controls power over a loyal minority of Republican voters, and the majority of the Republican Party has fallen in line.
If we let this angry minority control us or even modify our norms, we have fallen in line, and our country will no longer be a democracy governed by laws.
Even though the Republicans have jerrymandered the states to favor Republicans in the Electoral College, we must Vote Republicans out of office in the 2024 election.
If you are a frustrated wannabee writer but haven't checked out SluthSayers blog -
then you should. It might be the motivation you need.
Myself, I'm just too busy doing not much.
the Ol'Buzzard
Bill Clinton discussing a soliloquy in
Shakespeare's McBeth said:
the danger of blind ambition, the
fleeting nature of fame, the ultimate emptiness of power disconnected from
higher purpose…
This is out of context but seems to
describe Donald Trump and the resulting situation we find ourselves in today.
This is a
volatile time, but in my eighty-plus years, I have seen many volatile times.
I was alive
during the Second world war. Men were
away fighting. Star flags were in
people’s windows to denote the number of loved ones at war; gold stars meant a
father, a son, or a daughter had died in action. Women were working in defense plants and basic
goods were rationed. People were
planting Victory Gardens.
I was six
years old when the world defeated fascism and the war ended.
I was eleven
when the Korean War started. It was a brutal war, but for some reason was
quickly forgotten.
I lived in
the segregated South during my teen years and had just joined the Navy when the
violent desegregation of the South began.
We thought the world was going to catch fire during the race riots in California during the 1960s.
And then the
Vietnam War.
The twin
towers.
Iraq and
Afghanistan.
Now after eighty years fascism again rears its
head, but this time it is here in the United States led by an ex-President.
To me, this
is the most dangerous time since the Second World War.
During the
Second World War Europe, and consequentially our nation, was in danger from a
foreign power. The war was ‘over there’, yet people here
were willing to sacrifice to save democracies.
This is
different. Our very democracy here in
the United States is now in danger from within, under threats of anarchy and
civil war, seeded and fed by a dangerous demagogue.
Our future
history will be decided over the next six years.