Depression – Politics Plus

Open Thread January 23 2025

Posted by Joanne Dixon at 6:01 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Jan 232026

Yesterday, Rethuglicans in the House defeated even so much as a toothless rebuke to the Saffron Sauron over Venezuela. I blame gerrymandering – polls show that well over half of us are strongly opposed to his unconstitutional and otherwise despicable actions there, and if we were truly proportionately represented in the House, Rethuglicans would not be able to do that. Also yesterday, the prediction for snow today had disappeared – they are still predicting some for tomorrow, but only an inch. Well, we’ll see.

Joyce Vance summarizes the year 2025. Not that there’s anything we don’t know, but there is so much that we may have forgotten some things. Personally, I think the month of January 2026 was “a very long year.”

Y’all probably don’t need any incentive from me or from Common Dreams to be upset with Democrats. (My rep isn’t a Democrat, so I am upset with him all the time anyway.) But – in case you did – here it is.(Apparently only 7Dems did vote with the Rs, but that was more than enough. Now it’s in the Senate.)

Robert Reich on axioms applying to the Apricot Antichrist. I like his use of the word “axiom” – something there’s no need to prove because it’s self-evident, nd can therefore be used to prove other things. So many similar words, like “postulate” and “assumption” are much weaker.

This with Heather Cox Richardson is long – but then, as she says, it was a fire hose of a day – and iI could find it all in writing (from different sources, too),I’d probably still be looking.

Open Thread October 7 2025

Posted by Joanne Dixon at 7:04 pm Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Oct 072025

Yesterday, I heard from Carrie after her visit to Barry. I’m quoting much of it because we are all so used to brain strokes and how to tell if you or a loved one may be having or have had one, and none of that will work for a brain stem stroke. “I was able to speak to him and he was aware I was there. That is the saddest thing about this type of stroke. His brain functions well, but everything the brain stem controls is gone. Because brain stem strokes are so rare, they are easily missed. That’s why he was not correctly diagnosed when he first arrived in the ER. His doctors had only had one other such stroke victim in the past four years. Barry will be transferred to Warm Springs, Georgia to a hospital / rehab facility. After 2 to 4 weeks, they should be able to give us a prognosis.” In other news, our Supreme Court is corrupt – but not corrupt enough to consider Ghislaine Maxwell’s appeal (Axios). Also, I can at least say that I have one Senator who has a clue how to message.

I agree with Robert Reich that this needs to be discussed – or at least thought about – by everyone. I personally am absolutely unqualified to talk about it with people who voted for it, but no doubt there are people who are. Will those voters be willng to listen to or even talk to such qualified people? Anyway, for us – therapy animals can help. for those lucky enough to own one or be near a professional one.

Harry Litman with a this-is-how-it’s-done article on a judicial opinion. As he points out, All judges have occasions on which they need to defer, but they should never to lies. Other courts should take this message to heart – immediately. (Incidentally, this judge was appointed by the Mango Moron. How she got past the Heritage Foundation, I can’t even guess.)

This may brighten your day and maybe even look into the book. There is a Little Professor bookstore in Athens, Ohio, and another in Owatonna, Minnesota, but Joyce lives in Alabama, so this has to be in Birmingham or its suburb Homewood. Although cities are more liberal than rural areas, that’s still a lot of books for Alabama (I wonder how much her signature changed from the first one to the last one.)

Open Thread September 29, 2022

Posted by Joanne Dixon at 6:55 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Sep 292022

Yesterday, Colorado Public Radio preovided an update on the death of Christian Glass, which was in a short take on September 15th’s Open Thread. Who knew that (sadly) commonplace police outrage in rural Colorado would turn out to be an international incident? You see, we give birthright citizenship to anyone born on American soil. The UK and New Zealand probably do too, but they also give it to children of there citizens born anywhere in the world. Christian Glass had one parent from each of those countrues … so he had triple citizenship. So now both countries have some questions for the Clear Creek County Sheriff’s Office. Oops!

Cartoon – 29 0929Cartoon.jpg

Short Takes –

Robert Reich – Are record levels of stress inside us — or outside us?
Quote – Studies show that women have nearly double the risk of depression as men. Black people also have higher stress levels — from 2014 to 2019, the suicide rate among Black Americans increased by 30 percent. Are women and Black people suffering from a “disorder,” or are they responding to reality? Or both? White men without college degrees are particularly vulnerable to “deaths of despair” from suicide, overdoses, and alcoholic liver diseases, with contributions from the cardiovascular effects of rising obesity, according to the American Council on Science and Health.
Click through for article. As a person who has experienced clinical depression, controlled with medication, I suggest that both are real. And that stress anxiety/depression and clinical anxiety/depression do not respond to the same coping mechanisms. But also that external stress from an unhealthy society should certainly be minimized, and everyone would feel better if that could happen.

Mother Jones – Don’t Try Serving Ken Paxton With a Subpoena, Unless You Want to Get Shot
Quote – Paxton responded angrily to the Texas Tribune’s write-up of the incident on Tuesday morning, framing the encounter as a precautionary maneuver at a time when elected officials are being subjected to violent threats…. But if it was concern for the safety and well-being of his family that compelled Paxton to flee from a suspicious man with a manila envelope, it’s not really clear why his wife dealt with him. If anyone is familiar with what it’s like to be subpoenaed, it’s the scandal-plagued attorney general of Texas.
Click through for story. Beau of the Fifth Column made a video on this incident also. Paxton must hate the Texas Tribune – it has a deserved reputation for honesty and reliability.

Food For Thought

PHP is a programming language used to build websites. We have it at all through our hosting partner, BlueHost. In order to update it, we have to go through Bluehost. During his life, TomCat was the only one who had access to our account there. I (JD) am now the only one. I have been to BlueHost and investigated updating our PHP to 8.3 or even to 8.1. I found instructions to do so - in fact, I found two conflicting sets of instructions. I went through one set of the steps and got the message that Our site could not handle 8.3, but that it had successfully updated to 8.1. I then went back here to see what it looked like. But I couldn't get in - either as an administrator or as a reader. It was just gone. I had to reach BlueHost by phone. It was determined that Politics Plus is in fact not compatible with any version of PHP newer than the one we have. BlueHost therefore uninstalled it for me, and the site came back to normal. Of course, like everyone else, I care about security. But I also am aware that TomCat elected to use different providers for several of the services that BlueHost provides, for instance backups. We are backed up daily - but not by BlueHost. However, out PHP is through Bluehost. I feel that if they are not worried about the older version, I am not going to worry about it. I believe that our security here is all or mostly through WordFence, whom I trust.