Interesting opera scheduled for today – called “Innocence,” by a Finnish woman composer, conducted by a Finnish woman conductor, libretto in six or seven languages. Set at a wedding reception. The waitress there is a woman who lost a child in a school shooting. The groom turns out to be the brother of the shooter. No spoiler from me – I have not looked up where it goes from there. But it certainly sounds like something which would be powerful. Tomorrow I visit Virgil.
Robert Reich dismisses the 25th Amendment for one of the same reasons I do – getting the approval of the majority of this cabinet is just a fever dream. But now, I think we are both wrong on this point. The 25th Amendment strategy which the Democrats are now considering (which still needs to wait until we have majorities) is to appoint an independent commission – an alternative authorized by the 25th Amendment in lieu of the Cabinet. Kudos to those who wrote the Amendment.
Archived from The Military Times, which does not appear to have a paywall, but does want you to turn off your ad blocker. Referred by VoteVets, which now has a Substack (probably has for some time, but I only recently found it.) I have not seen this bit of information anywhere else, and it is an excellent illustration of why the DoD should be run by people who know what they are doing. not by people who can just do pushups and pullups.
This by Harry Litman could well be the headline any time a Republican is replaced with another Republican. Which is one reason why I am so lukewarm on impeaching or 25thing the Orange Ogre. I will say, if we had done it during his first term, it might have worked better than now. Then, there were a few adults in the Cabinet, even though they were Republicans. Now, there are none.
A bonus, because it’s good, for a change. From Democracy Docket, referred by The Smile. A bit of political good news, though I must say it took long enough.
Yesterday, Malcolm Nance apologized for failing to do a scheduled Substack video – because he had had to do interviews on three BBC entities and on ABC (down under.) Apparently I am far from alone in respecting his experience and analysis (and also his choices of co-hosts – Jacob has been missing for three says because he was doing interviews, not just in Denmark, but all over Europe.) Fertilizer was in the spotlight. I am no chemist, but a huge component of fertilizer is urea which is a major (or the major) source of nitrogen for fertilizer. Aren’t we all running around every day full of urea, and flushing most of it? Is it time for someone who is a chemist to come up with some way to capture that and refine it? Or am I dreaming?
Harmeet Dillon’s name has not yet, as far as I know, come up from the White House as a potential AG. But if Robert Reich thinks it is a possibility, I’m confident it is a possibility
Jesse Wegman is part of the Brennan Center for Justice. He has some thoughts about the courts here, and at least one of those thoughts is colorful.
We may as well look at this. The devil, as they say, is in the details.
Yesterday, I heard something that I had not heard for years – but tht I have heard more than once just in the past week. A pundit on a webcast said, “I don’t want to be a Pollyanna.” The implication is that Pollyanna was an unfailing optimist. She was not. (If you want a literary optimist, go to Doctor Pangloss in Candide (Voltaire.) Pollyanna was a clear-eyed realist. What she did do was use “one weird trick” to keep herself going – keep herself afloat – when faced with bad news or bad circumstances. That technique is simple, and easy to use, and it is psychologically sound. It is to find something, even something completely unrelated, that isn’t bad – that one can feel good about. And it works. This is why my email inbox – and probably yours – keeps getting emails saying things like “Last night (referring to Tuesday), Democrats held the State Supreme Court in Wisconsin, keeping the court’s majority.” That’s the Pollyanna tidbit to help us all keep going. And that is just one example. “Count your blessings – the phrase and the song – is another. Of course Pollyanna is a fictional character, but dammit, even a fictional character does not deserve to be turned into her exact opposite. (OK, end of rant. Although I’m getting to the point where I may do one on “decimate.” Or possibly “perverse.”) The featured image to the left was produced by Iran with a nod to the Evil Emperor’s Easter “truth.” And I did finally electronically file my federal and state tax returns. Federally, I owe notheing and will receive nothing. State, I may or may not get $19.00.
You know, this from The Conversation would have been 100% predictable, had anyone thought about it in advance. It is also IMO 100% disgusting. But don’t take it from me. Y’all have perfectly good minds.
This from POGO is old – it was originally posted in 2025, but reposted last week for fairly obvious reasons. It’s still pertinent.
This by Wajeeh Lion is details on the rescue of the pilot which took the longest. It isn’t going to affect the war in general, but it’s quite a story and will give you an idea of the hazards, and maybe also of the terrain of Iran – which is a lot more mountainous than desert-y and even has some mountains higher than ours in Colorado – a neat trick when a nation also has sea level and at that so close to those mountains.
Yesterday, Adam Klasfeld interviewed my man Phil Weiser – my state Attorney General (who is running for Governor) on the 64 or 65 cases in which our state is fighting the Regime, and also on the resentencing of Tina Peters – why it was decided to do it, and why it’s unlikely to get her out of prison any sooner than the old sentence. It took about 28 minutes. I’m not asking anyone to listen (or read the transcript), but am sharing the link in case anyone wants to do so.
From Common Dreams. Humans have survived so many natural an man-made disasters over the billions of years since the earth was made that I expect we will survive this too. But – we may end up wishing we hadn’t.
Archived from The New Yorker. Quick quote: “In the past several years, the phrase ‘alpha male’ has seeped into the language around us, like the contamination of an underground aquifer.” These techniques are basically brainwashing. The techniques can be used for good – but rarely are.
Robert Reich – “Memories of Vietnam” – so I am not the only one experiencing those memories.
Yesterday, SCROTUS took oral arguments on a Birthright Citizenship case. Adam Klasfeld was there, and spoke afterwards with Jen Rubin for The Contrarian, and the head of LULAC was also there. Then Klasfeld spoke with Andrea Flores, who works with immigration issues usually not involving Latinx, but often involving TPS. The Supreme Misleader was present in court (the first time in history a sitting US President has been present at SCROTUS during oral arguments), apparently just to intimidate by his presence. It doesn’t appear to have worked, although we won’t know for certain until the opinions come down. (Incidentally, I am not the only person who has noticed that Neil Gorsuch has a soft spot for Indigenous Americans. (Klasfeld phrased it differently, though – he says Gorsuch is “all about Native Americans.”) Thomas surprised by making the point that it is important that the 14th Amendment addresses citizenship in the States as well as in the nation (we may want to amend the Amendment to specify territories as well.)
Archived from Forbes, shared with me by Carrie B. I figure if we want to humiliate him by pointing and laughing (which seems to be about the only thing those of us not in public office can do to really get under his skin), we need things to point and laugh at – and this one looks to me like a doozy. (I am not old enough to actually remember seeing a Duesenberg, but I have it on pretty good authority that that is what the word derives from.)
I see this from The Independent as another example of Kristi Noem’s taste in men – which is, to say the least – unusual.
Whether or not this from Talking Feds deserves a short take as opposed to just a mention, it’s getting a short take. If you can think of an emotion, other than anger, that can lead to change in one’s life or in the world, I’d be interested to hear it. (And yes, I realize it doesn’t always work alone.)
Yesterday, No Kings 3.0 brought out over 8 million participants within the US. This is closer to 3.5% than you might think. I looked up the adult population of the US this time along with the total population – because that historical 3.5% is supposed to be applied to the adult population – and that number is 8,925,000. This time around, there were expats – many of whom are still citizens and still vote – and vacationers holding rallies outside the US. Robert Hubbell has photos from Madrid (Spain), Geneva and Zürich (Switzerland), the British Virgin Islands, Rome (Italy), Uzes (France – today’s cartoon is a poster from that one – the featured image is from Brattleboro VT), Amsterdam (Netherlands), Milan and Camogli (Italy), Paris (France), and Barcelona (Spain). May 1 has been announced for No Kings 4.0 On the other hand, Malcolm Nance posted this – I thought it was important enough to put it in a comment yesterday – but there were already comments, so I’m repeating it here.
This is an extra because I know not everyone will want to follow this link – But my message is here. Last week, John Pavlovitz posted a series of videos, some numbered, some not, under the umbrella title of Love Loathe Your Neighbor, addressing how and why Christian denominations (particularly evangelical ones) have slid into the mix of patriotism, misogyny and general fascism the are now mostly mired in. One of his guests (Diana Butler Ross) brought up the history of The Great Awakenings. She has her doctorate in American Religious History, and looks at the Awakenings through the lens, not of organized anything, but through the lens of real moral progress. And she noted that each Great Awakening has been followed by pushback which is at least morally, and often also physically, violent. You won’t find her descriptions in the history books or encyclopedias – but she made much more sense to me: 1. Abolitionism (pushback – Civil War) 2. Reconstruction (pushback – Jum Crow and lynching) 3. Civil Rights movement starting with Brown v. Board (pushback – School vouchers push, gated communities) 4. The Obama Presidency (pushback – MAGA, “Christian Nationalism”). The last two occurred in my lifetime – and both times I thought we had made real progress. And I was not alone. Decent people in general did not see the pushback coming. I’m fairly certain I won’t be around for the next one – but those who are – please, at least try to anticipate the pushback and prepare for it.
Many years ago – centuries really – there was a phrase: “noblesse oblige.” In English – if you are born into a titled family, you have a moral obligation to behave in an honorable way at all times. I am not going to claim it was always observed in real life, because it actually never even came close as a general rule – though dome did respect it. We don’t have titles in the US any more than we have kings. But here richesse has been substituted for noblesse, and “richesse oblige” might be something that should be introduced into American English, forcefully if necessary.
Obviously, no one ever told the Mango Moron about the grains of wheat on the chessboard. (If you put one grain of wheat on the first square, 2 on the second, four on the next, and so on, you will not only run out of room on the squares pretty fast, but you won’t be able to finish, because the total will have come to the point where there are not that many grains of wheat in the world. The courtier [IIRC it was a vizier] who allegedly asked the king for that chessboard as a reward for some striking deed thought he was being cute but ended up losing his head.)
Yeah, I know, two by Reich. But all my other deep thinkers were either too tired to post anything, or just too tired to do it in writing, so did videos instead. And this is a really good purpose statement – and the other is or will be pivotal in establishing a government that works – for us.
Yesterday, Malcolm Nance speculated (and this is pure speculation, but it is history based – Malcolm’s life is packed with history) that, since the US tends to attack between midnight and 4 am local time, and because Friday is the Muslim Sabbath, that the strike which will put boots on the ground is likely to land in that (local) time frame this Saturday because our “leaders” will think no one is awake or active. But those like Hegseth and possibly Miller are ignorant of jihad tradition, in which Muslims literally anywhere in the world can be assigned to respond – in which case the surprise would be on us. In war, as in any other endeavor, ignorance is a sure way to get into trouble (and not good trouble.) And the treasured and cultivated ignorance of white supremacists may well be the most dangerous kind of all. I can almost guarantee that, if this is not the time that gets proven, nevertheless, that time is coming. Also, JoJo from Jerz (with “Brooklyn Dad Defiant”) started this weekly conversation by showing maps of No Kings events confirmed for Saturday – including events in Mexico and Europe. It will take less than 3 minutes of your time to see those maps here. And finally, the US Treasury declared that the United States is currently insolvent. Multiple sources, including Fortune magazine and Yahoo news.
On Tuesday, Heather Cox Richardson had a conversation with Timothy Snyder, mostly about his latest book, “On Freedom.” Something went wrong (Facebook failed), so Heather posted the video which gets made on to You Tube. It is 41 minutes exactly (at full speed), which is a lot less time than it would take you to read the book or listen to the Audiobook, though both are good ideas.) They did allude to his earlier book, “On Tyranny,” near the end, and I would guess that the two books would make good companions.
From Talking Feds. Not, certainly, the least bit surprising. But what it lacks in surprise, it more than makes up for in disgust.
As obvious as this from Robert Reich – and he is far from the only one, including people you would never expect to get financial advice from – one still isn’t going to see it unless one is looking at it. Let’s take a look.
Yesterday, I spent much of my day on Substack video, or YouTube, or, in the case of the F*ing News, just audio. Not because i intended to, but because there was so much, and so much of it seemed important. I left out the one about Mike Flynn getting awarded a large settlement with our money, and the one which did a deepish dive into our tax laws, and although I still think Malcolm’s is the best, there’s enough war news out there that I don’t need to report every day (Malcolm had the news already that Robert Reich’s report reports.)
This from the Root is, I believe, important. But it will become even more important if and/or when we achieve a Congressional majority again we will seriously need to put up – or we will be back to being shut up.
Robert Reich points to a report from the Wall Street Journal – which, as he also points out is “hardly an outlet of left-wing propaganda.” You can read – or listen to , your choice – the full article at the link Bob provides (unless they limit free stories and you have already used yours. If that happens, you – or I if I know it is needed – can archive it.) I don’t think these occurrences were predicted quite as loudly as some others, but they were predicted.
If you have about 42 spare minutes, and want to get the taste of the Evil Emperor’s disgusting Xeet about Robert Mueller out of your mouth and mind, this conversation between Joyce Vance and Andrew Weissman should help. Caution: it may also make the loss even more painful.
