I have not posted anything for several weeks because I have been busy dodging bullets.

Not assassin’s bullets, but something just as deadly.

I have Mr. Magoo eyesight, but my proboscis can sniff out a chocolate cake at a hundred paces. I can also smell a telephone scam, an AI robot, a false narrative, or a rotten politician at ten parsecs. My wife and I credit my big nose for saving our lives.

At first, there was just a bad odor outside, an odor that seemed to emanate from the side-discharge of our forced air natural gas furnace located in the basement. But the odor wasn’t always there, and we were busy, so we filed it away in the back of our minds and carried on with business. Possibly a dead possum, I thought. Or, perhaps, it was a whiff of something foul blowing in from our nation’s capital, or from our state capital to the south.

Then, days later, the odor appeared inside the house, too, and it seemed to be coming from a heat register on the main floor. It was a curious smell - something like the methyl mercaptan odorant that is added to make natural gas leaks detectable. There was something else, something pungent, like the aftermath of a brush fire. This must be coming from the basement furnace, I thought... except that the smell was not there while the furnace was running. It only showed up well after the furnace had stopped running. Then it went away. We had always had our gas appliances regularly inspected by appliance professionals. The annual service reports gave us clean bills of health. The vents were not blocked. The furnace was spotlessly clean. It still looked brand new.

I diddled and fiddled because, after all, I was busy - all of us are always so damn busy - and the smell always went away like it does after an election cycle, at least for a while. And who wants to be a Chicken Little or wear a tin hat and whatever, and so on, and so forth, and all the other ways all of us procrastinate and put off dealing with what we suspect could be serious or expensive or bothersome and time-consuming.

Until one day the smell lingered longer. I called PSE, our local natural gas supplier. PSE told us not to answer the phone, not to light any matches, not to turn on any appliances, not to open the door to any fire-breathing dragons and not to write any incendiary SubStack articles.

PSE safety inspectors arrived within an hour. Their hazmat test equipment confirmed that it was not a gas leak. But it was something just as bad... the furnace was exhausting dangerous levels of... carbon monoxide, like the exhaust of an internal combustion car engine. The heat exchanger was apparently defective. The furnace was exhausting CO both outside and inside the house. In fact, the carbon monoxide level was so high that it blew right past the test equipment’s maximum read-out. What I had smelled was not the CO itself because carbon monoxide, just like natural gas, has no odor. What I had smelled was the incomplete combustion of the gas’s methyl mercaptan odorant and various other combustion smells as flames licked out from the back of the furnace’s heat exchanger and had begun to melt metal and burn insulation. We didn’t smell anything while the furnace was running because the blower dissipated the exhaust. When the blower stopped, the residual fumes became concentrated and we could detect the odor.

So, if not caught in time, we could have been lethally gassed. Then we might have been cremated after the house had caught fire. In which event it would have been unlikely that anyone would have figured out what had really happened.

Not one of our multiple methane or carbon monoxide alarms had gone off.

Hmm.

The inspectors capped the gas line and red-tagged the furnace. PSE’s safety inspectors told us: “You could have woke up dead one morning.”

In a manner of speaking, of course. We wouldn’t have awakened at all.

* * * * *

This is a true and very recent story.

It is also a metaphor for our times. What we smell can indicate that something is very wrong. Most of the time, however, we never get beyond that. Too busy, I think. Anyway, the smell usually goes away after the next election cycle - for a short while, at least.

In a parallel universe, I suppose, I am already dead from carbon monoxide poisoning. You wouldn’t be reading this post because I would not have lived to write it. In a parallel universe, I suppose, our political economic system is also already dead. But in that case, you wouldn’t be reading this post either.

In his last talk, Martin Luther King mentioned an attempt that had been made on his life at a Harlem department store in 1958. A woman approached MLK and knifed him during a book-signing. The blade broke off inside his chest and surgeons had to extract it. As Martin Luther King explained ten years later, his doctors had told him that the knife blade had lodged just a whisker away from the main aorta. Had he but sneezed, King would have bled out and died.

But he didn’t sneeze and he lived... at least for another decade. He was assassinated in 1968, one day after he gave this speech. In 1999, a federal civil jury decided that James Earl Ray did not do it. The jury verdict was that King was assassinated by a conspiracy of federal, state and local government agents.

Assassinations and regime change are an integral part of our history. They’re as American as apple pie. Rotten apple pie.

Recently, there was another attempt on Mr. Trump at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner at the D.C. Hilton Hotel. Or maybe not, depending on what you believe about such things. The usual people lamented the fact that we’ve become jaded and cynical and nobody believes anything or anyone these days. But why should anyone “believe” when the “official narratives” are routinely riddled with outright lies, fairy tales and intentional misinformation?

Cynicism is the idealist’s self-protective hard shell. It protects us from parasites.

In any event, whatever happened at the Washington Hilton Hotel this month, it was not the work of a professional killer. The telltale sign of amateurishness was that it failed spectacularly. This is good. I would celebrate Mr. Trump’s impeachment, removal from office, trial and conviction. But I think that Mr. Trump is more a symptom than a root cause of our disease. Rabies is not cured by blood-letting and brain cancer is not treated by cutting off your head.

The “professional“ hits - like the Israel-United States sneak attack and the assassination of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei (and multiple other political leaders) - typically “succeed” in slaughtering their targets... and, indiscriminately, massacring a lot of other people as “collateral damage.” As a matter of fact, the so-called civilized nations of the Western World have been assassinating people and overthrowing foreign (and domestic) governments for so long that it barely garners a yawn anymore. Which is both sad and startling because it means that we have become jaded when we ought to be outraged.

Which is like ignoring a really bad smell when you ought to do something about it.

* * * * *

Just days after the failed assassination attempt, the Democrats started quacking their usual rhetoric about nonviolence and the worrisome trend toward disrespectful political rhetoric. Their sermon is that, somehow, if only we would be law-abiding, acquiescent, disarmed and obedient - even when confronting lawlessness, rape, mugging, and murder - then we might reap the tranquility of domestic farm animals raised in pens and fenced pastures; domestic farm animals who, eventually, are shorn, slaughtered and barbecued. Just ask the Iranians, the Palestinians and the Lebanese how sensible this sermon of passivity is not.

The Republicans, meanwhile, used the occasion of the thwarted assassination to once more promote Mr. Trump’s construction of an extravagant White House Ball Room for his wealthy donor friends (and the lid for a massive military operations bunker beneath it, so it appears). The Republicans also argued that the failed assassination attempt was good cause for the prompt renewal of the totalitarian-state Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. Referencing the assassination threat, Republicans again threatened the non sequitur of the annihilation of Iran if it did not promptly surrender to the United States and Israel.

Barely a week passed since the alleged assassination attempt when Mr. Trump put up on the Internet a Rambo-like picture of himself standing in front of a burning war zone, wearing sunglasses, posing like some kind of Al Capon, brandishing an AR15 and threatening, again, to obliterate Iran. The caption read “No More Mr. Nice Guy!“ This is clearly a strong argument why children of Mr. Trump’s age and temperament should not be allowed to use social media.

Mr. Trump then repeated his threat to wipe out “Communist Cuba” and to build a “golden fleet” of boondoggley battleships that look like they were set designs for a George Lucas Star Wars movie. He called, again, for Israel to “pardon” Benjamin Netanyahu for his domestic crimes. No doubt, one of the President Trump’s last acts as President will be to pardon Giselle Maxwell for her sex-trafficking convictions. One has the ineradicable suspicion that Mr. Trump, like so many of the world’s politicos and plutocrats, is in thrall to the Israeli state blackmailers who for years cynically planned, facilitated and recorded the kompromat generated by the Epstein boys and girls club for ungentlemen.

Amazing.

In space, we have circled the dark side of the Moon. Back home, we continue to circle the dark side of Earth.

* * * * *

But Martin Luther King survived that first attempt on his life. He did not sneeze.

And we did not breathe the CO. We, too, are still breathing!

We were saved by a nose.

Iran has taken a beating from bullies, but it’s still standing tall. I respect that. Palestine and Syria and Lebanon have also taken a beating. Their people, too, are still standing tall. I respect that.

In a nod to the nose, therefore, that allowed us to sense the foul smell so that we might all survive, I am posting something uplifting. It is postprandial music, a little after-dinner tune. Let’s call this triumphant post-war music: “Winning by a Nose.”

Unlike my previous musical posts, this one was first played as a concert grand piano. Then, using my E-Mu synthesizer, I converted the Midi data to an organ piece. That sounds easier than it actually was because it took weeks to figure out how to build the digital file using Qtractor to play the Midi track, Audacity to record the audio and Jack, a digital patch board, to let these programs play nice together.

I have always been fascinated by those gigantic cathedral pipe organs with three or four or five full-size keyboards plus a bank of 50 foot pedals and myriad stops and tone controls. I have always imagined myself playing one in a Kafkaesque Gothic cathedral with the volume on high, the stones quaking to the flying buttresses and the stained glass windows shuddering with every bass note. I’ll never play one, of course. It would take a lifetime to learn how to play. I cannot imagine the training and practice and concentration that allows musicians to actually perform Bach or Buxtehude on one of these enormous instruments. It seems to me that you need to be something like an octopus with at least eight arms and feet to play them properly.

No, I am not at all comparing myself to any great composer or musician. Nor even the not-so-great composers and musicians! This is a very simple, upbeat song for complex, downbeat times. “Winning by a Nose” is basically just a riff in the C Major scale with a few variations. Kind of like a fugue. Well, very, very distantly like a fugue, kind of, sort of. Ah hem. Well, not really. But I like it anyway, and that’s all that counts.

I have no idea what my synthesizer sampled for the organ sounds. I imagine myself at the keys of a powerful and gigantic cathedral organ. More than likely, however, the E-mu engineers sampled a Mighty Wurlitzer from an old silent movie theater. Or maybe a child’s toy keyboard played by a ten year old only on the white keys. Whatever. I like it. Winning by a Nose:

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The Ten Commandments Made Great Again

1 I am Trump, who brought you out of the land of Biden, out of one house of bondage into another house of bondage. You shall have no other gods before Me.

2 Thou shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any “AI” likeness of anything that mocks Me; except that thou shall make a triumphal arch for Me; and thou shall build a new ballroom in the East Wing of the White House for Me and My wealthy friends to dance in. For I, Trump, am a jealous SOB, punishing the iniquity of Minnesotans who dare to protest ICE and university students who annoy Me; but showing mercy to those who love Me and contribute to my election campaign.

3 Thou shall not take the name of Trump in vain, for I am a thin-skinned autocrat and I will not hold you guiltless! So watch what you say or you’ll see what happens!

4 Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Except when Israel and the United States bomb the Hell out of Iran and massacre 165 school girls on the Sabbath because, you know, God said I’m doing God’s work, so STFU already. Seven days you shall labor and do all your work for capitalist parasites. Even if fascists didn’t actually make the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, they now own them all. So you’re all just renting your life while they get to rest seven days a week lolling about on their yachts in the Caribbean and the Mediterranean.

5 Honor Our AIPAC lobbyists and My campaign donors, for they are My Mummy and Daddy.

6 Thou Shall Not Kill. Well, I am sure that got garbled in the translation because God, at that time, was an undocumented miracle-worker who barely spoke English as a second language. I am sure what He meant to say was that - generally speaking - thou shalt not kill. But it’s OK to kill folks who I don’t like or the heads of states who annoy Me. And that includes any Iranians, Palestinians, Mexicans, Cubans, kids, mothers, college students, union workers, communists and anyone else who Ticks Me Off!

7 Thou shall not commit adultery. Whoa! That’s gotta be a typo! In any event, it’s a Darwinian world out there. Dog eat dog. Big fish eat little fish and I’m the Biggest, Fishiest One of all. Thou shall get screwed. Me and My Friends shall do all the screwing. However - thou damned well Shall Not... I REPEAT, THOU SHALL NOT... release the full Epstein Files and all the videos therewith because everyone knows that for years he was running a well-funded Mossad kompromat operation creating and acquiring a lot of blackmail-able dirt on politicians (Republican and Democrat), royals, businessmen, pundits, entertainers, and billionaires around the world. And if Bibi ever releases those files on Me and my Friends, it will reveal a lot of rich and powerful bastards for the criminal parasites that they really are. Then I’m a gonna have to start a nuclear war to distract everyone, and you don’t want a nuclear war, do you?

8 Thou shall not steal. Really? How did that get in there? For sure, it’s OK for Me to kidnap people and call it “capturing” them. And it’s OK for Me to steal oil, gold and national sovereignty from Venezuela, Russia, Syria and Iran. And it’s OK for My billionaire buddies to steal from you. And it’s OK to raise your taxes in the guise of imposing tariffs on imports. But Thou Shall Pay Up because my good friend God said so, and God is even more supreme than the Supreme Court.

9 Thou shall not bear false witness. On the other hand, I can say whatever I feel like saying whenever I feel like it, whether it’s true or false. Never give a sucker an even break, that’s what the Bible says. I know because I helped God write it.

10 Thou shall not covet thy neighbor’s house. But Me and My friends have coveted your house and all the houses in the West Bank and in Gaza for a long time. After We remove the Palestinians, My Board of Peace (of which God and I are co-CEOs) is gonna build a Club Med resort for the owners of this world. Gambling casinos, championship golf courses, race tracks - the works! Me and My friends shalt covet your wife and your neighbor’s wife, too, maybe to work in Our hotels and brothels. And some of My creepy Tech Bro supporters are gonna covet your male servants. And your sons. Also your daughters.

* * * * *

I needed to get this off my chest even though it is a crude screed.

I prefer to publish other things on this Substack - music, short stories, novellas, poetry. But all I get every day and every night is Trump Trump Trump Trump Trump and he just overwhelms my senses. The last thing I wanted to write was another Trump-screed. But there he is yammering, day and night, getting in my face along with the other obnoxious yammerers of his cabinet. The U.S. and Israel seem to be into “regime change” all around the world and “decapitating” national leaders they don’t like. Because we live in a (nominal) democracy, may we suggest a few additional names for the decapitation list? May we propose our own regimes to change?

Am I just doom-scrolling? Everywhere I see corruption. It’s corruption not just in the criminal sense, but also, literally, as in metal corroding, wood rotting, things wearing out, systems grinding down, society getting more frictious.

My Democratic friends insist that it was, and would be, better if Democrats were in control. That’s not exactly true. Since at least 1945, both Democrats and Republicans have fed from the same donor trough. They differ in style, but both parties support endless war, endless distraction, endless deception, and endless immiseration. We can flip the two-sided coin all we like and we always come up losers.

Quietly (for fear of retribution), we know that our political, economic and judicial systems have been compromised. “Kompromat” is a Soviet era term meaning compromising material. Kompromat is used to extort and to blackmail. The Epstein operation was similar to, but significantly bigger in scope and ambition than the dirt that J. Edgar Hoover Hoovered-up with his FBI “black bag jobs.”

Quietly (for fear of retribution), you disapprove unconstitutional war and the assassination of an 86 year old spiritual leader in Iran. “Who will rid me of this meddlesome priest?” asked Benjamin Netanyahu. Whereupon the American President, and the Congress, and the Pentagon, stepped up and killed him.

We have done this before. The Vietnam War was a “bipartisan” colonial project that the U.S. acquired from France. It was aggressively pushed by both Democrats and Republicans. Together with NATO, we ruined Libya to steal its oil. Muammar Gaddafi was sodomized and murdered. Hillary Clinton - then Secretary of State in the Obama administration - gloated: “We came, we saw, he died.” Saddam Hussein allegedly built weapons of mass destruction; but, in truth, had none. During the George W. Bush administration, the U.S. and its coalition allies raped Iraq, subjugated it, and unleashed our local proxies to hang Saddam Hussein.

There were many others. The list is long and ignoble... and “bipartisan.”

At least... perhaps... we know now the answer to the riddle why the “good Germans” never overthrew the Nazis or the Third Reich or intervened to stop its atrocities leading up to and during World War II. We know now the riddle’s answer because, when it was our turn, we, too, didn’t do anything.

As for the original Ten Commandments - they’re gone. Destroyed. Broken into smithereens. The story - whether that of the Book of Exodus or of Cecil B. DeMille’s cast-of-thousands 1956 Hollywood Cinerama extravaganza - is that Moses was disgusted with Israelis dancing around the Golden Calf after he came down to present them with the Law. That’s why, in anger, embarrassment, disgust and frustration, he smashed the tablets to the ground.

Which is how I feel, too.

Israel, today, is no more a Jewish state than the U.S. has Equal Justice and the Rule of Law. Or that true Islamic values are embraced by the motley collection of Kings, Despots and Emirs propped up by Europe and the U.S. in the Middle East. Or that Europe is a bastion of Higher Civilization.

We are all, once again, dancing about a Golden Calf. We have smashed all law into dust.

* * * * *

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LINER NOTES

I’ve been busy these past few months practicing law.

Focusing on work helps pay the bills. It also helps keep my mind off all the “stuff” that’s been going down in the world. But practicing law is bad precisely because it keeps my mind off all that “stuff.” Could it be that was the underlying purpose of “professional school” - to train lawyers, engineers, MBAs, techies and others to accept working exceptionally hard for those who can pay for their “services,” leaving them too fatigued and too distracted to deal with all the really important “stuff?”

Going ostrich is not an option. If I refuse to see, then I am an accomplice in the wrongdoings.

There are two songs in this upload. The first - The Emperor’s Triumphal Mishmash March - is a musical parody. I put it first because everyone’s lives are heavy enough. We need an occasional touch of humor to drag ourselves through the miasma.

The second song - An Elegy for Childhood Lost - is an entirely different offering: lyrical and sober - an expression of a personal awareness that, perhaps, we are all evolving through simultaneously. After you laugh off the first song, stick around for the more thoughtful composition of the second.

* * * * *

Song #1: The Emperor’s Triumphal Mishmash March

At some time in your life, you probably listened to Giuseppi Verdi’s 1871 opera Aida. Or, you have been fortunate enough to have seen a live performance of Aida that pulled out all the stops. Long ago, as a kid growing up in Naples, Italy, I saw an outdoor performance of Aida complete with live elephants, camels and horse-drawn chariots. The animals had been borrowed from the local zoo. The Neapolitan audience, I remember, sang or hummed the libretto along with the chorus. That’s real folk music.

The plot of Aida is pure romantic schlock, of course, like a day-time TV soap opera with a cast of heavily costumed thousands set in the supposed heyday of pharaonic Egypt. But no matter how melodramatic the story, the music and the staging are breathtaking.

Verdi’s rendition of the triumphal march, “Gloria all’Egitto, ad Iside,” is one of the best known operatic extravaganzas. Verdi, hired to commemorate the opening of the Suez Canal, knew little about ancient Egypt. He did know music and show biz, however. He also knew something about the old Roman triumphs, those spectacular parades of victorious, egomaniacal emperors who would parade their conquests through Hadrian’s Triumphal Arch and before the Roman people.

We have a rather prickly president these days who fancies himself a Roman emperor and the world his imperial oyster. Oddly, the prickly man is also building a self-congratulatory Arc de Triomphe in Washington D.C. adjacent to the Arlington Memorial Bridge. Of course, I would not dare to criticize such a prick prickly person. If I did so, I might be prosecuted for lèse-majesté, burned at the stake for heresy, or gunned down like Minnesotans who dared to oppose imperial edicts.

No. It is better that I should dedicate a song to him. I have composed a faux Aida-like Gloria all’Trumpito. Imagine the parade led by the corpulent, gold-laureled and white toga-ed Emperor, carried in a golden litter shouldered by bare-foot Africans; fanned by cabinet level toadies waving palm fronds; preceded by scantily clad young dancing girls (imported from Epstein Island) tossing rose petals and dollar bills on Pennsylvania Avenue; followed by gamboling, muscle-bound soldiers riding camels and war elephants; Tech Bros and bejeweled billionaire real estate developers and Wall Street investors seated on their asses; and wagon-loads of loot from tariffs, pirated oil, rare earths, lithium, gold and other stolen lucre. Imagine the pageant of the American Emperor’s Triumph leading his train of “captured” heads of state from Venezuela, Iran, Syria, and Cuba, followed by long chain-gangs of shackled plebes from Somalia, China, Mexico, Palestine, Greenland, Canada and... yes, all of us malcontents and anti-imperialists who reside in the United States (until we are stripped of citizenship and deported to Mars, of course).

The Emperor’s Triumphal Mishmash March is, as the name suggests, a mishmash of sounds appropriate for a country that, at the level of its top parasitical class, has always had imperial yearnings. I composed this years ago and transferred it via MIDI to a laptop machine running Windows 3.1. That laptop, long ago, became a brick. But the computer cognoscente to whom I have long been married knew how to retrieve the old data and resurrect it. Using QTractor and Jack, she recovered the MIDI data and allowed me to re-purpose it for our humble musical mishmash.

I composed this on a Proteus E-Mu work station that I haven’t used in decades. Dust notwithstanding, it still works fine! There are four sampled layers - including an entire string ensemble, a synthesized bass and two different types of percussion - that I play on an electronic keyboard. The different layers were then played back on the E-Mu sampler/synthesizer. Ultimately, I piped everything back from the work station through an analog mixer and thence to the A/D card on my computer.

No artificial intelligence was used in this composition! Possibly no intelligence at all!

Enjoy!

Song # 2: An Elegy for Innocence Lost

Okay. Let’s take a deep breath and get serious.

I noticed this winter that people left their holiday lights out longer than usual. Deep into February, people still illuminated their roofs and yards with tiny strings of colorful LEDs as though to chase the darkness that seems not to end.

The darkness never ends. It seems to only get darker.

Everything that’s happening now used to happen in the shadows. Now, it’s all done in broad daylight.

In that sense, Mr. Trump is a godsend: he has stripped away the thin veneer of our own illusions and revealed us for what we really are, what we always have been.

Do I miss that young, innocent, blind and deaf me? Actually not. But it is painful to realize how long it takes for one to learn to see and to learn to hear.

I diverge from my Democratic friends who think that the current occupant of the White House is the root cause of our malaise. In my opinion, he is just the latest symptom of what ails us. Although an ill-mannered narcissistic boor and bully, Mr. Trump is only implementing policies that an entire class of elite parasites heartily, if quietly, endorse. Once the current occupant is tossed out, the next one will follow, more or less, the same paths, although in a smiley-faced kind of way.

We will be soothed and lulled back to sleep like babies.

These are some poignant lines at the conclusion of Alfred Döblin’s 1929 novel Berlin Alexanderplatz:

Wach sein, wach sein, es geht was vor in der Welt. Die Welt ist nicht aus Zucker gemacht. [* * *] Wir wissen, was wir wissen, wir habens teuer bezahlen müssen.

(Loosely translated into English:

“Pay attention, be aware. Something is happening in the World. The World is not made out of sugar. [* * *] We’ve learned something; we paid a stiff price to learn it.”)

And then there’s Welsh poet Dylan Thomas, who wrote in 1947:

Do not go gentle into that good night.

Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Thus, An Elegy for Innocence Lost. If I do not know the precise way forward, I do know, more or less, which way the compass must point.

And I know which way it does not.

And if the darkness never ends, then you must keep walking forward. Unafraid of the dark. Going ostrich is not an option.

* * * * *

I finger-picked An Elegy for Innocence Lost on my old Gibson SJ200 acoustic guitar. It’s a jumbo, so that deep, round sound is how you hear it in real time. I play DR Rare strings that, though painfully hard on the fingers, give me a clean resonance that I really like. I’ll suffer the raw fingertips for the sound these strings give me.

I composed the song in B minor. I recorded it with an internal Fishman pickup located under the saddle of the guitar. I sent the signal through a “Direct In” box to an analog Mackie 1202 mini-mixer. While playing, I monitored myself with a pair of Tannoy speakers connected to a Samson Servo-240 Studio Amplifier. The mixer and the amplifier are both plugged into a Juice Goose power conditioner. The analog signal was routed back from the Mackie mixer through a ground loop filter (to reduce the background hum) into the A/D card on my computer. The music was then digitally recorded in Audacity. Audacity’s software let me add a touch of reverb and a bit of echo for just a few bars.

* * * * *

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It’s gray, cold and raining outside - a typical winter day in Seattle. The metronome of falling rain and the splashing puddles in the street recall holidays past and winter term breaks when the college campus was empty, the dormitories vacant and home many many miles away.

Most people I knew at university grew up only a few hours drive from where they went to college. I, and others like me, however, came from thousands, often several thousands of miles away. Some of the international students’ homes were even more distant than mine. For us, the short Christmas term break was a problem. It was too long to just wait it out in academia’s winter ghost towns and too short to book an expensive flight half way around the world.

I was, in those days, what they called an Army brat. As a brat, there was an alternative. I could catch a free flight, assuming there was space available, on a Military Air Command flight (”MAC”) to wherever they were flying. Because the U.S. military has more than 700 bases around the world (not counting the secret ones), there were always MAC flights heading wherever. Some of them were not part of clandestine operations. Others were. The problem was timing and the availability of (non-clandestine) seating. With a little luck and a lot of perseverance, I might get close enough, quickly enough to get home and back again before classes resumed next term. Or I might get air-dropped into an implausibly deniable “hot zone” somewhere never to be seen or heard from again.

It was the holiday season, 1974. The Vietnam War was still dragging on even though many U.S. troops had been withdrawn. Richard Nixon had resigned from office and Gerald Ford was President. I looked like a hybrid of Frank Zappa, Che Guevara and Karl Marx. A gallon of gas cost 53¢ at the pump. The Treasury Department still minted pennies. There was no Internet, no cell phones, no home computers, no spam, no email. There was no artificial intelligence. Perhaps there was no intelligence. Japan had not yet declared its intention to rearm and build nuclear weapons. Germany had not yet declared its intention to rearm and attack Russia. Again. No one campaigned to make America thuggish again. John F. Kennedy had already been assassinated. Likewise Robert F. Kennedy. And Martin Luther King. And Malcolm X. And Black Panther Fred Hampton.

John Lennon would die a few years later.

“Give Peace a Chance,” we sang.

My initial problem was getting to McGuire Air Force Base near Fort Dix in central New Jersey. From where I was, smack dab in the middle of Pennsylvania, getting to McGuire AFB was a simple matter of taking the Dog - one of the Greyhound Buses that crisscrossed the state - east to Philly, and then transferring to another bus to Trenton, and then taking a Trenton city bus to McGuire AFB. That alone took a full day riding through back-country snow and brown city slush. I’m not sure that I would hazard that exact itinerary today, traveling mostly by night. But that was then, roughly 50 years ago, and I did. I think, by my appearance alone, I probably frightened more people at the transit stations than there were people who frightened me.

Once I arrived at the passenger terminal of McGuire AFB, I had to sign in; confirm my identity; prove that I wasn’t Frank Zappa, Che Guevara or Karl Marx; register my ultimate destination (West Berlin, Germany); and then... wait.

And wait.

And wait.

The routine for flying MAC “space A“ (as flying “space available” was called) was that you had to be there, in person, ready at a moment’s notice to hop on a plane.

Your name was announced over the public address system. You had ten minutes to acknowledge the page and get aboard. You snooze, you lose. If you had spent the night at a motel, you would have missed your flight. There were no second chances.

I recall that December that I was among about a hundred students trying to get home for the holidays. Most of us were trying to get to Europe somewhere - Germany, England, Belgium, or Italy. Others were heading to Turkey, Greece and anywhere else where the Empire stationed its legionnaires. I imagine that other students heading to Okinawa, the Philippines, Guam or Korea for the holidays would have been directed to muster at a MAC air base somewhere on the West Coast.

December 22nd. A seat opened up on a cargo flight to Incirlik Air Base in Turkey and someone took it.

The next day, December 23rd, several others caught a transport plane to Rome.

That evening, there was space on a flight for one or two students heading home to their families in Tehran. The Iranian Revolution of 1979 was still half a decade away. America’s satrap, the Shah, put in place in 1953 by a US-UK coup, still ruled the country and sold its oil at discounted prices to western petroleum companies. The Shah ruled, with U.S. and British assistance, with an iron fist, absolute power and a regime of torture and terror. I think this might be the kind of thing that Mr. Trump has in mind when he wants to make America “great” again.

By morning December 24th, there were still a lot of us hanging out in the waiting lounge. We had all been sleeping on the floor, heads resting on our backpacks, wrapped in our winter coats beneath the overhead fluorescent tube lights. We were like clochards in Paris hanging out under the bridges. We couldn’t leave because we might miss the call. After two days we were incredibly bored and we all needed to shower.

To pass the time, I organized a chess tournament. We took different size soda and coffee cups from the snack bar and fashioned them into playing pieces. The jumbo size paper cup was the King. The mid-size cup with a straw sticking out of the lid was the Queen. Styrofoam coffee cups were Bishops or Knights. Napkin dispensers were Rooks. Packages of ketchup were our Pawns. The playing board was the floor itself. This was a standard U.S. military floor comprised of vinyl squares of two nondescript colors: sort of brown and sort of beige. Every American military base has floors like this. Fifty years later, the floor of the waiting lounge of McGuire AFB probably still looks the same.

Anyway. For us, the checkerboard vinyl floor became our chess board. We set up at least two simultaneous games using the cups, straws and plastic lids. We took over almost the entire snack bar, moving tables and chairs off to the side. The military police came by and watched us play for hours on end. Because we - and the MPs - were bored. Finally, some officer somewhere decided that all this game-playing on the parquet floor was an unacceptable breach of discipline and a bad example for the soldiers. Maybe they thought the troops would mutiny if they saw us playing chess. Probably so. So they shut down our chess games and made us push back the tables and chairs.

It was now Christmas morning. A lot of us were still stuck at McGuire Air Force Base. Most were heading to somewhere in central Europe. The weather was bad. It would have been difficult to return to our various depopulated college campuses. But it also looked like, instead of being Home for the Holidays, we would spend the Holidays sleeping on the cold, hard floor of an air force base.

There was a rumor, just a rumor, that every year, when all other “space A” flights failed, that there would be a miracle, the Santa Express would appear. And then it did. Late in the afternoon of the 25th of December, the public address system announced a “training flight” was heading out to Europe with enough seats for everyone in the waiting area who wanted to go.

I went.

I think it was a C-5 Galaxy. It had a cavernous interior equipped with web seats made of orange plastic designed to accommodate several hundred soldiers in battle gear. The interior of the plane was stuffed with a medley of crates, tracked and wheeled vehicles, and other unidentified stuff in boxes and barrels, possibly ammunition or nuclear warheads, who knows. All of our backpacks were also piled in the middle of the plane covered with a tarp and tie-downs. There was no in-flight movie. It was cold and very noisy. But it was free. We were headed to Europe on the Santa Express, heading home for the holidays. Wherever we were going was where we were going. After I got to wherever we were going I would worry about the next leg of the trip. When you fly “space A” you go wherever the flight takes you. And so it was.

A few hours into the flight, a young uniformed Airman First Class came by distributing plastic wrapped ham and American cheese sandwiches on Wonder Bread, bags of potato chips and soda pop. Airman First Class was the Air Force equivalent of a private. Actually, he didn’t so much as distribute sandwiches as toss them at us. I remember that he was hostile towards all of us students. I didn’t understand why at the time, but the impression stayed with me for so many decades that he really disliked us. The Airman was Black. Most of us students were White. Most, but not all.

Now, I understand the hostility, but then I did not. He could have been a “volunteer” who had joined the Air Force to avoid getting drafted. At that time, I believe, conscripts served two years in uniform. The Army mostly needed “grunts” to serve in the field, to shoot and to get shot at. Or, you could enlist, serve three or maybe four years instead of two, but have some degree of choice in what branch of the military you served.

Was this particular Airman a draftee - or a “volunteer” trying to avoid the draft? We clearly were not draftees. We were going to college. He clearly was not. We were flying home for free for the holidays. He had been ordered to help fly us home free for the holidays. The “Santa Express” was a crappy assignment for him. So as we - the privileged dependents of officers and Department of Defense civilians - were flying home for Christmas, he was flying away from his home for Christmas. Fifty years later, I figured it out. It wasn’t a matter of race. It was a class thing. Intuitively, he knew it. We didn’t. No wonder the soldier didn’t like us. I’m surprised he didn’t poison the ham and cheese sandwiches with jet fuel. Maybe he did because it tasted awful. But all mess hall food tastes awful, so whatever.

We landed early in the morning of December 26th at the U.S. Air Force Base at Mildenhall, England. Several U.S. B-52 bombers were parked on the tarmac. We deplaned and looked around. It was “Boxing Day” in England. Everything was closed. Transportation was minimal. Almost everyone living nearby was “home for the holidays.” Several of us wanted to get to the Continent. I was trying to get to Frankfurt where I could catch the U.S. Military Duty Train to Berlin. The problem was to get from Mildenhall AFB in Great Britain to central Germany, sort of the reverse of what Germany sought to do in 1940.

My memory fails me on this point. I think I ate some kind of sausage in a bun at the local train station. It made the plastic wrapped Air Force ham and American cheese on Wonder Bread sandwich taste good by comparison. Maybe I had a warm beer. Or maybe it was lukewarm coffee. I don’t really remember. Perhaps someone else who rode with me on the 1974 Santa Express will read this story and write to fill in the gap. All I remember is, maybe, traveling by railroad to somewhere near London and thence to the coast. There was no Channel Chunnel back then. They were still afraid of Napoleon crossing the Channel and invading from France, I think. I might have taken a train that was loaded onto a ferry and then floated across to the mainland. It was a rough sailing. The ferry docked and disgorged the train. It then zigzagged here and there arriving, eventually, at the Hauptbahnhof in Frankfurt, Germany.

Our band of student travelers had largely dispersed by this time to various towns and cities across Central Europe. I might have been the only one now still traveling east. I checked in to the U.S. Military dispatch station at the Frankfurt train station and picked up my “flag orders.” Then I waited, again, for the train to West Berlin.

You needed “flag orders” to get into West Berlin because the Cold War was still a thing back then. The Soviet Union had not yet collapsed. There was West Germany, the BRD (Bundesrepublik Deutschland), and there was East Germany, the DDR (Deutsche Demokratische Republik). It was rather like North and South Korea then and now. Or North and South Vietnam. All were vestiges of the Second World War which was just an episode in The Second Hundred Years War that began in 1914 and continues without interruption today. West Berlin, in 1974, was smack dab in the middle of the DDR, itself an “occupied city” partitioned since 1945 into four “sectors” run by the U.K., France, the U.S. and the Soviet Union. The “flag orders” permitted the holder to travel by military train across the DDR to West Berlin.

You could also fly to Berlin, but only three commercial airlines were allowed: Pan Am, British Airlines and Air France. No civilian German flights were permitted in the air space over Berlin. We could drive, too, from Helmstedt to Berlin by car taking a 170 kilometer course along a poorly maintained highway past Soviet and DDR checkpoints. But the rules were so onerous and the armed soldiers on both sides so twitchy that it was an automotive trip I undertook only once in my life. Did I once, en route, trade something at one of the Soviet checkpoints, perhaps a Playboy Magazine or a pair of Levi’s in exchange for a DDR flag? I do have that DDR flag somewhere, with its socialist logo of a protractor and an industrial mallet surrounded by sheaths of wheat. Perhaps I traded a pair of old Levi’s for it.

Anyway. There I was stuck at the Frankfurt Hauptbahnhof. I was eating more plastic-wrapped ham and American cheese sandwiches on Wonder Bread sold from the vending machines. Nobody knew anything about “organic” food in those days. The vinyl parquet floor of the train station waiting room looked exactly like the floor of the waiting area at McGuire AFB in New Jersey. I was bored and tired. I walked around the train station killing time. It was getting on toward the evening of December 26th. Or was it already the 27th?

All central European train stations look and smell pretty much the same. They are all dark and cold and damp and smell a little like urine and disinfectant. That’s because, at that time, all the train toilets flushed directly onto the tracks. Passengers weren’t supposed to use the head when the trains were in the station, but they did anyway. The public address systems in Europe’s train stations were also uniformly garbled:

The Frankfurt Hauptbahnhof is big. It was mildly entertaining to walk up and down the platforms watching the human theater of missed trains, passengers running to find the right departure track, families meeting long lost relatives, friends shaking hands, people crying, hand carts full of luggage not yet loaded on trains, people waving goodbye, couples kissing, porters driving small baggage trains to load onto full-size trains, bells clanging, steam steaming, steel wheels grinding on steel tracks. Things going bump and bang and grating metal on metal.

I boarded the American military duty train. It only ran at night from Frankfurt to Berlin. It was a spartan kind of transport: six bunks to a room. Once the train departed, you were supposed to lie down and sleep until you arrived the next day at six in the morning. There was no dining car. There were zero amenities. The train was patrolled by armed military police.

That is to say the American military duty train was a spartan kind of transportation. The British had their own Duty Train that ran in the afternoon in and out of Berlin. The Brits provided tea in a dining car, of course, served by waiters in white jackets. The British Duty Train was patrolled by burly Scots Guards wearing kilts with long knives tucked into their stockings. The French Military Duty Train was an altogether different thing. It ran overnight from the French Sector of Berlin to Strasbourg. The French Duty Train had private compartments for two equipped with white linen and bidets. You could order a bottle of wine or cognac. They had room service. In the morning, they served continental breakfast in your train compartment. There were no guards at all on the French Military Duty Train. Or, if there were, they were disguised as waiters. The waiters all looked like Peter Sellers as Inspector Jacques Clouseau in a Pink Panther movie.

But I was riding the American Military Duty Train. It was the night of December 26th. Or was it the 27th?

I can remember every detail about riding the Duty Train because I must have taken it more than twenty times in the years I lived as a teenager in West Berlin. The six-person couchettes were stacked from floor to ceiling, three narrow bunks on each side. Temperature control was non-existent. The rooms were too warm or too cold. There was no in-between. Getting into or out of your bunk inevitably involved getting stepped on or stepping on someone else. Invariably, one (or two or three) people snored. Loudly.

I can, even today, vividly recall the sound of the train wheels on the tracks, the rackety-clack of the rails, the whoosh of tunnels and overpasses and passing trains rushing in the opposite direction on adjacent tracks, the dinging of bells at cross-roads, the locomotive’s horn sounding a warning for something or other, lights of small town stations as we whizzed by, the clatter of steel bogies rolling through the switches. The train speeding up. The train slowing down. The train starting. The train stopping. The train starting up again. Clatter. Bump. Whistle. Clang. Bump again. I hear it all as vividly as if it was yesterday.

Part of the game in those Cold War days was to make life miserable for one another. I now understand that all of it was perfectly ridiculous. The “drama” was intended to make all of us feel “threatened” by the “Enemy.” In fact, the “Enemy” was actually the leaders of our own nation states, not the young and impressionable soldiers who carried out their dirty work. But that was then, when we were all young and stupid. Now, though still stupid, we are no longer young.

Thus from Frankfurt to the border crossing from the BRD to the DDR, our train was pulled by a diesel-electric locomotive. At the border, the guards noted from the “flag orders” and the passenger manifest who was on board. They recorded their names, ranks and identification numbers. Later, they probably tossed all this useless information into the burn box. Today, our personal data gleaned from the passenger manifest would, instead, be sold to Google, Oracle, Meta, Palantir, Microsoft, or X. They, in turn, would sell it to spammers and various folks who collect data on you and “curate” advertising for your digital devices. Thus are the spoils for the victors of the Cold War. Anyway. The “West German” locomotive was replaced for the trip through the DDR. Instead of a diesel-electric, our train was then pulled by an old coal burning steam engine. The smoke was intended to permeate the compartments, and it did. But, for me, even the smokey old steam engine was part of the charm, even if its intention was malicious.

The DDR/Soviet locomotives sounded different from the western diesel-electrics. I barely dozed through it all because I listened to every sound in the night. That, plus all the snoring. And then, when we approached Berlin, they changed locomotives again, because the DDR engines weren’t allowed into the West Sector of the City any more than the West’s engines were allowed into the DDR. Pure theater, of course, but it continued unabated until 1989. Now, we still have the Cold War Good Guy/Bad Guy theater, but it’s moved further east.

One other sound I recall from that trip heading Home for the Holidays on the American Duty Train. I heard this sound and remember it from every one of the twenty or so trips I ever took on that train during the years I lived in West Berlin. It is the sound of the conductor walking down the aisle, rapping a brass key on the glass aisle windows of the compartments, announcing the arrival at the station in 30 minutes.

Rap rap. Rap rap. Rap rap. Rap rap.

I could hear the conductor walking down the corridor and rapping a key on every compartment’s glass window, coming closer and closer.

Rap rap. Rap rap. Rap rap. Rap rap.

I was wide awake by the time he got to my compartment, but by then I was almost too tired to get up. But I had to, because several hundred people would now pile out of their bunks in the long line of sleeper cars to line up at the lavs and to wash up in the rows of sinks, shaving, brushing teeth, getting dressed.

So I arrived, bleary-eyed, that morning of December 27, 1974, at 6 a.m. Or was it December 28th? I was home for the holidays.

It was gray, cold and raining outside. The metronome of falling rain and the splashing puddles in the street reminded me of the empty dormitories of the college campus I had just left. There was brown slush in the gutters, just like the other side of the Atlantic.

It took a while to acclimate myself to “home.” I had aged and, to my surprise, so had my parents. They had their old habits and I was developing new and different ones. Everything looked the same and yet it was all somehow different. We were growing apart. I no longer felt quite at home while at home.

A few days at home were all I needed to remember why, in the first place, I had left home to go to school so far away from home. Memories are nice, but they get tangled in cobwebs. Memories need to remain memories. They cannot, and ought not be relived.

New Year’s Day was approaching. Because the outward bound trip had taken so long, it was already time to go back. So I did it all again in reverse.

The Austrian writer Stefan Zweig wrote Die Welt von Gestern, (”The World of Yesterday”), his reminiscences of the peak cultural years, and the decline, of Vienna, the capital city of the Hapsburg Empire. His Vienna was the time of Gustav Klimt’s highly ornamented paintings, Gustav Mahler, light opera, philosophy, mathematics, literature, high fashion, music, theater and Sigmund Freud. The world then, like now, was changing fast, and not for the better. Stefan Zweig fled Austria and the Nazis for exile in Brazil. Those were unstable, turbulent times, like now. Zweig finished writing the manuscript for his book in 1942 and then sent it off to his publisher. Then he committed suicide.

I’ve read Die Welt von Gestern both in English and in the original German. It’s not my favorite book. Rather like Marcel Proust or F. Scott Fitzgerald, Mr. Zweig was enchanted with the superficial baubles of high society. It was a fine life, indeed, for a small class of people who lived in a fairyland. The fairyland collapsed as World War erupted again and Mr. Zweig was unable to survive the collapse of the only culture he could live in.

I do not tell stories from my past or yours just to romp down memory lane. Everyone has stories. Usually, the smaller stories of ordinary people are much more interesting than the big stories of big people. It’s a cultural thing. Story-telling is how all peoples throughout time have validated their existence. One generation recites to the next generation what happened, and by doing so, you confirm that something happened. If the story isn’t told, then it might never have happened. If the story is repeated - even if the names and places get mangled in the repetition - then whatever happened becomes real. At least for as long as the story gets told and there are people to tell it. It’s the ‘why’ part of the story that is important, not so much the ‘what’ part.

More importantly, the recollections of the past teach us something about the present and about ourselves. History is not just one damn thing after another. It turns like a corkscrew and, although things seem similar, we never truly end up where we started.

I am at a different home now for the holidays. Some things have changed; some things have not. It’s still wet outside and the metronome of falling rain and the brown slush and splashing puddles in the street remind me of MAC planes, Duty Trains and Channel Ferries.

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The Treasury has minted the last Penny.

Like everyone else, I have several jars filled with coins. Many are old mayonnaise bottles full of pennies. I have no intention of trading them in for “cash.” I’ll just hang on to them as relics of the past for future generations.

If there are future generations.

We don’t want to obsess over “money,” per se, because, all the economists’ obfuscations notwithstanding, money is just an accounting system. It’s a ledger of economic activity. Money is the measure of exchange for work and services and sales. What you have in your pocket, your purse, your brick-and-mortar bank, or your digital wallet, is just a record of your account balance.

I lived six years as a kid in Naples, Italy. This was in the 1960s, long before the Euro. At that time, every European country had its own colorful currency featuring historical figures, royalty, artists and cultural heroes unique to their own heritage. The paper bills came in all hues and sizes.

The lira wasn’t “worth” very much back then, at least not relative to the dollar. We had to plug 10 lira coins into the elevators to make them run. We tossed 100 lira coins (worth a few cents each) into Neapolitan public fountains to “make a wish.” They ultimately were fished out by 10 year old Neapolitan scugnizzi, the ragazzi di strada who used the small change to buy food. At that time, the 1,000 lira bill, was the size of a face towel. It was worth about $1.60.

Today, the U.S. penny is worth less than the metal and energy that’s required to mint it. The last penny to roll out of the mint was mostly made of zinc with just a thin copper plating. It costs roughly 4 cents to produce each coin.

Another way to look at it is that one dollar today buys you 25 pennies. That feels about right: today’s dollar is worth about... a quarter... in terms of its current buying power.

Inflation is just a measure of how much less you can buy with what you have. The house that you cannot afford to buy, the new car that’s priced out of your range, even the food that costs more than ever, are simply indicators that you are getting poorer.

On the other hand, Elon Musk won’t truly “earn” a Trillion Dollars in compensation for his work at Tesla, but “only” the equivalent of $250 Billion. I am not sure that makes the income disparity any better. If Mr. Musk’s Trillion Dollars is really only “worth” $250 Billion, then the average working stiff’s “minimum wage” - it’s about $21/hour in Seattle right now - only translates into about $5.25/hour in relative purchasing power. The same analysis pertains to your Social Security checks, your pension and your IRA account. Which is why no matter how fast the hamsters run on the treadmill, they never seem to get anywhere.

50 year mortgages are now touted as the answer to unaffordable housing. However, even with the “traditional” 30 year mortgage, adjustable rates, HELOCS and emergency lines of credit, few people ever pay off the debt or free themselves from the financial ball and chain. Instead, home-owners have been encouraged to buy beyond their means using revolving credit and novel financial instruments. Home owners have been urged to “trade up,” much like Detroit car makers encouraged Americans to dump their “old” cars and trade up year after year to bigger and more expensive models, all financed interminably with the payoff dates receding into the future.

Like with most bank debt, the 50 year mortgage will be front-loaded with interest payments, which is to say that it will take almost forever before the average 50 year borrower actually starts to accumulate meaningful equity. Which is simply to say that today’s home ownership looks a lot like what it really is: renting. Some years ago, the Davos crowd pushed the mantra that you will own nothing, you will rent everything and you will be happy. Happy, that is, like a serf. Because, ultimately, with a 50 year mortgage, you most probably will die before you can pay off the debt that binds you.

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Like New York City, Seattle just elected a new socialist-leaning mayor. All the so-called “centrist” members of the City Council also lost.

It was an odd election. The incumbent mayor ran a campaign based on “experience,” as though his decades of stewardship leading to today’s social and economic messes qualified him to lead us for another four years into even greater messes. The winning candidates - relatively younger people notable for their lack of experience - at least aspire to something new and different. Bully for them if they endorse socialism, even if their definition of “socialism” seems, I’m afraid, no more than warmed over Joe Biden status quo ante Trump.

The federal government shut down in the middle of the election campaign season. Inflation worsened due to sleight of “hidden hand“ digital dollar printing, a rising stock market tide that lifted all bloats, and tarrifing trade policies. The result? Thousands of people were furloughed, riffed or fired. Many were canned on the pretext that “AI” ate their jobs. More than likely, the tech giants saw artificial intelligence as a subterfuge to boost their stock prices while massively reducing their payrolls. It also could be that corporate sales have plummeted and “AI” is the means to cover-up lay-offs necessitated by the collapse in revenue.

Meanwhile, as unemployment increased, the government shut-down persisted. SNAP benefits ran dry.

SNAP benefits used to be called food stamps. The biggest revelation about the SNAP snafu was just how many people in the United States are enrolled in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP): 12.3% of the population. That’s over 41 million people! 41 million Americans need government assistance just to eat!

These look like 1931 numbers from the Great Depression. Or are we already in the Greater Depression? In a manner of speaking, all the “tent cities” and homeless camping on the streets are our time’s Hoovervilles, just like during the Depression. It’s hard to tell because they don’t reveal any real economic numbers anymore. The merest hint of a whisper of an economic recession is absolutely taboo... and will be until long after it’s over.

If it’s ever over.

At the same time that 12.3% of Americans are on food subsidies, the űber-wealthy (i.e. the still invisible Jeffrey Epstein clientele) are rubbing our noses in the lifestyles of the rich and powerful. All of which, undoubtedly, led the locals in New York City and in Seattle to vote to “THROW DA BUMS OUT!”

Throwing the bums out is a Bronx tradition and I heartily endorse it; there being nothing else you can do. For now. I hope our new municipal leadership will pursue some radically rational and truly socialist policies - which does not necessarily translate into the usual thrashing about of “progressive” versus “liberal” versus “conservative.” But if the newly elected also whiff their turn at bat, then next time around, we can toss them, too.

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Speaking of taking a turn at bat, the World Series recently concluded. So I am told. I’m not sure who won. Or who played.

I like sports, but not at the professional level - which, in light of recent revelations about gambling, bribes and athletes throwing games - might include everything from NBA basketball to collegiate football to high school sports and pee wee baseball. I prefer participatory sports, sand lot kinds of activities that kids and adults can join in.

In 1980, my wife and I rented an apartment in the Eastlake community in Seattle, just this side of Lake Union. The Eastlake Zoo, a local tavern, was kitty-corner across the street. Zee Zoo, as it was affectionately called, was a real tavern. It was not an upscale bar and definitely not a cafe. Zee Zoo mainly served beer (your choice of Rainier Brewery, Olympia or Budweiser), peanuts, greasy hamburgers, hot dogs and French fries. There was a jukebox. There was a dart board in the back. There was a pool table.

Back in the ‘80s, Seattle was still a Bohemian, working class kind of dwarf-city. A lot of folks moved here during the Vietnam War to get closer to the Canadian border, just in case they had to dodge the Draft. Many were just working class folks. Houses were small and relatively inexpensive. Some folks lived on houseboats before living on a houseboat became a cool Hollywood thing. Some lived on tugs or trawlers. Some were couch surfing, circulating every few week among various friends. In the 1980s, Seattle was still a young city without any pretentious vibes.

There was a public play field with a baseball diamond two blocks north of The Eastlake Zoo. That’s where the “Derelict League” softballers played their games. Zee Zoo fielded a team as did several other taverns.

Derelict League softball was definitely not major league. In fact, there weren’t any specific rules in Derelict League softball. This was co-ed sports and anyone, regardless of physical condition, could play. There was no limit on the number of players a team could field. They made the rules up as the game went on, deciding issues mostly by consensus. Winning wasn’t the main point. Having a good time was the main point. You could run the bases from right to left or from left to right. Balls and strikes were called on an honor system. If the pitcher and batter disagreed on whether a pitch was in the strike zone, then there was an automatic do-over.

People who played Derelict League softball were well-rounded athletes. No, I don’t mean that they played many sports well. I mean that they were, literally, physically, well-rounded, particularly around the middle. So much so, in fact, that it was often difficult to get a pitch in the strike zone without hitting a batter in the tummy.

By custom, there was a bottle of beer at every base pad. Batters were expected to stop and take a swig (or two or three) as they ran the bases. The scores were bizarrely high, usually in the range of 20 to 30 runs apiece in each inning. Games rarely went beyond five innings. This was because after five innings few could stand up straight anymore. Or keep track of the score.

As with most amateur softball games, there were a lot of twisted ankles, muscle strains and bruises. For the most part, Derelict League batters either struck out (which is a hard thing to do in slow-pitch softball) or they hit home runs. A home run was anything that landed in the adjacent tennis courts or in the street. A home run was also any dribbler in the infield because, invariably, every fair ball was bobbled, thrown too low or too high, such that, if only the batter could get past the beer bottles at each base pad, any contact with the ball scored a run. They had cheerleaders. They had fans. Dogs chased and ran off with the ball. Nobody really cared who won or who lost.

No, we didn’t play in the League, but we did watch. Healthy it was not. But it was fun. Everyone had a good time.

When I got to Seattle in 1979, there was still the Kingdome, a Spartan, multi-purpose poured concrete edifice with all-alike bench seating, blue collar eats, cheap tickets and acoustics that would deafen any visiting team. The Kingdome was also fully paid for and completely debt-free.

The powers-that-be, however, decided that the Kingdome was too déclassé for a “world class city.” Despite local resistance, the multi-sport Kingdome was decreed to be “unsafe” (a few ceiling tiles fell down during an earthquake). It was blown up and replaced with two commercially branded stadiums, one for professional football and one for professional baseball, both with over-priced seating, exclusive dining, a long financial tail of debt, and sky-box seats for those who could afford them.

The sky-box seats of our new stadiums are like the East Wing of the White House that was recently demolished to build a “ball room.” They are building a new Versailles, a pleasure palace for the aristocracy. Sort of like where Louis XVI and the pre-Bastille Day A-Listers partied. You and I won’t be invited when the East Wing ball room hums with music and the celebrants dance the night away in their tuxes and evening gowns, tippling champagne and munching canapes.

The people have no SNAP benefits? they will wonder. Let them eat AI cake!

Perhaps they will throw a few coins into the Reflecting Pool on the National Mall, like 100 lira coins for the scugnizzi, the American ragazzi di strada to fish out.

A penny for your thoughts, I say. But they won’t be minting them anymore.

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Poor me.

I have fallen into a wormhole. I fell asleep one night in the 21st Century and awoke in Joe McCarthy’s America circa 1950 double plus George Orwell’s surveillance state of 1984.

Or have I have always been there? Have I been so thoroughly trained, miseducated and misinformed that I wouldn’t -- that I couldn’t -- recognize reality as it is?

It took the present administration - steeped as it is in Marvel Comic Book plot lines, cinematic fantasy and gangsta culture - to strip away the gentile veneer of two party politics and reveal the United States for what it has always been. Which is to say, the difference between America’s two major political parties is, and always has been, more a matter of style than substance.

How horrible the realization that what I see and hear and read today is what we are; perhaps what we always have been!

Just saying so, apparently, makes me an Enemy of the People. And you, too, I guess, for reading these words whether you agree or not.

But the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, you say!

And I say so, too.

In fact, the usual trappings of patriotism and nationalism are meaningless.

Every country in the world has a flag.

Everywhere there are startlingly beautiful mountains, plains and seas, bountiful resources and a history that makes its inhabitants proud (usually for the wrong reasons, of course).

But the true distinguishing features of the United States are just a few pieces of paper: The Declaration of Independence (most of it, at least, except for the parts that aren’t so nice); the Constitution (or, rather, its preamble, for the bulk of the Constitution is simply a governing framework for a collaboration of states); the Bill of Rights (which was largely ignored by our courts until the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and 1960s); and Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address (which is still a stirring, TikTok length read, even if delivered on the cusp of the dissolution of the Union). I have hyperlinked these documents for those who haven’t read them in a long while... or who, perhaps, cite them blithely without ever having read them at all.

“Patriotism is the last refuge of the scoundrel,” wrote Samuel Johnson in 1774. Or, as Mark Twain observed:

I have been reading the morning paper. I do it every morning -- knowing well that I shall find in it the usual depravities and basenesses and hypocrisies and cruelties that make up civilization, and cause me to put in the rest of the day pleading for the damnation of the human race. I cannot seem to get my prayers answered, yet I do not despair.

Letter to William Dean Howells, 1899

Did the President of the United States really say just weeks ago that this country is “under invasion from within” by an invisible enemy that doesn’t wear uniforms?

Has the President really said that he wants to train a “quick reaction force” to help put down internal “civil disturbances?”

Did he actually say that he wants to use America’s cities as a “training ground” for the military to hone its skills?

Is he really sending the National Guard to Los Angeles, Portland, Chicago and, ultimately, Seattle, under the pretext of cleaning up crime?

Is he trying to provoke another bloodbath like what happened 50+ years ago on the Kent State University Campus which left Four Dead in Ohio?

Has he, indeed, issued a National Security Presidential Memorandum entitled “Countering Domestic Terrorism and Organized Political Violence” that conflates certain “common threads” of “anti-Americanism” with “anti-capitalism,” and those who oppose “traditional American views on family, religion, and morality?”

Has the President declared war on a supposedly domestic terrorist organization called “Antifa,” which, if it exists at all (it does not) most likely shares the same parentage of terrorist organizations such as Al-Qaeda qua ISIL qua ISIS and so many other curiously well-funded organizations of questionable pedigree.

Did he really say he intends for the U.S. to build a fleet of World War II era battleships clad in steel, bristling with obsolete big guns, crewed by lean “warriors” (without beards, fat bellies or skirts!) because battleships look mean and mighty, and he knows that from watching the 1952 movie “Victory at Sea?”

Yes he did say all of that. And more.

Is he pointing the finger at me for thinking this is ridiculous? And at you for having read what I think? Most likely, yes and yes.

Does the President mean it?

It’s unclear. Politics throughout the western world - not just in the United States - seems everywhere to be so much theater of the absurd, performed by half-wits, directed by lunatics before an easily entertained audience of uberpatriotic, flag-waving sports fans. Have the leaders of the so-called “Free World” gone completely gaga? Or have I? Were they... and I... always crazy and I just didn’t know it.

The President and his acolytes call for the conviction and execution of those they accuse of criminality even before trial. They are very close to denouncing “thought crime“ as depicted in George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four, and “precrime“ as described in Phillip Dick’s sci-fi novel Minority Report. The media, in lock step, bay for blood like a pack of hunting dogs.

I have seen this movie before. Sacco and Vanzetti. Julius and Ethel Rosenberg. Emmett Till. The Salem Witch Trials.

Are we about to return to the dark McCarthyite days of black lists, purges, Congressional inquisitions into “creeping communism,” loyalty oaths and investigations into the Enemy Within? Most likely we are.

Is the wholesale censorship of social media - and eventually Substack as well - just around the corner now that ALL media outlets… mainstream, social and alternative alike… are owned by just a few wealthy people with similar Weltanschauungs and autocratic intentions? Most likely, yes, such wholesale censorship is just around the corner.

I note that however boorish and heavy-handed Mr. Trump might be, his perspectives on power, empire and control are common to his class. This class constitutes his true constituency, not the MAGAs who cheer him on like citizens rooting for gladiators at the Roman Coliseum (the Mixed Martial Arts fighters of that day) or whooping for charioteers careening around the Hippodrome (the NASCAR races of Constantinople).

As an attorney who has practiced law for more than 45 years, I find our national relapse into lynch mobs deeply abhorrent. Because I haven’t watched television in 25 years, I might be the only one in this hemisphere who had never heard of Charlie Kirk before he was assassinated. It appears to have been a professional hit job. By whom is not yet clear. But as horrible as his murder was, I cannot condone the rush to judgment. Nor do I appreciate Mr. Kirk’s canonization. The catechism of Christian Nationalism makes no more sense to me than Zionism, Pan-Islamism, Turkic irredentism, German nationalism, the British Empire, la Francophonie, or some of the goofier “woke” mantra of the previous administration.

Apparently, however, my failure to get with the program further marks me as “An Enemy of the People.” Perhaps you, too.

The American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition, (commonly called the DSM-5) is available online. If you have the time to browse its 1,000 plus pages, you will discover that the DSM-5 doesn’t quite catalog all the complexes and psychoses needed to describe our august political, business, tech, media and military leaders. Reminiscent of the fascist times of the late 1930s, in North America and in Europe and the Western wannabes of Israel and Japan, our political-economic leaders exhibit imperial, bombastic behavior that, for anyone else, would subject them to medical treatment, psychotherapy or even involuntary commitment.

But, more than likely, only I will be seized, involuntarily medicated, rehabilitated or committed for thinking, writing and posting such thoughts.

Or, perhaps, you for reading them.

* * * * *

Reality Postscript. I received an email from my neighbor the very morning that I was putting the finishing touches on this article. While pushing her baby’s stroller and walking her dog, my neighbor’s miniature Labradoodle sniffed out and flushed a man sleeping on my property underneath the laurel bushes. My neighbor, startled, screamed and ran home with the dog and baby.

In response to her email alarm, I want out to investigate.

To my surprise, I found the guy.

He was now sitting cross-legged underneath our mulberry tree reading a book. He looked somewhat like the John Tenniel drawing for Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland: the caterpillar sitting on a mushroom smoking a hookah. Apropos of his mental state, he might have been reading his book upside-down.

The gentleman was sitting deep in the undergrowth, in the shadows, and he looked distinctly “abnormal.” Was he a nut case, intoxicated or high on drugs? I have no idea. He was in his late 20s to early 30s, a thin white male with some facial hair, wearing a hoodie pulled over his head, shorts on top of sports pants and carrying a small backpack or fanny-pack. Assassin or arsonist? Homeless man looking for someplace to squat or a burglar opportunist? A tripped out voyager or a simple lost soul?

I was not feeling amused or particularly hospitable. I immediately puffed myself up to my full height (this is funny for those of you who know me!) and barked at him in my loudest, deepest baritone voice to bleep bleep bleep bleep and that he had two seconds to bleep bleep bleep bleep off! Was I channeling the behavior of Mr. Trump? Was I acting territorially? Had I succumbed to a primitive, testosterone-driven instinct to defend home and hearth from an intruder? What would I have done if the man had challenged my authority and charged me? Grappled with him beneath the mulberry tree? Engaged with sticks, rocks and fisticuffs?

Unknown, unknown and unknown.

In any event, the gentleman slowly obeyed the command to exit the scene.

But he only went so far as the parking strip where he again sat down cross-legged and opened his book. Upside down. I gave him more friendly encouragement to bleep bleep bleep bleep, to which the gentleman replied that he had “the right” to sit in the parking strip. I contacted the local security service (which, of course, neither responded nor appeared). By the time I returned to investigate the pilgrim’s progress, he had disappeared. Probably into some other neighbor’s bushes. Perhaps into yours.

Would I, in that moment, have wanted the city constabulary to arrive, arrest and remove the strange man? Short of a more violent undertaking, yes, I would have. But was this evidence of a crime wave of such enormity, proof of the City burning down with lawlessness, that the National Guard should be sent in to occupy my neighborhood at the point of the bayonet to maintain Ruhe und Ordnung?

Absolutely not.

Reality having barged into my Substack world, this contemporary incident did not change anything that I think or had written above.

But.

If I see this guy again hanging around in the underbrush, I might have to sound the klaxon. And then all bets are off!

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The 20 kilometer wide interstellar space object, 3I/Atlas, could be billions of years older than Earth itself. It is racing through our solar system at 130,000 miles an hour. Like two other recent travelers from outside our solar system - Oumuamua and 2I/Borisov - astronomers are puzzled by 3I/Atlas's non-comet like characteristics.

Scientists are particularly piqued by 3I/Atlas's brilliance, its peculiar travel path, its composition, its distant origins, its phenomenal age, its high speed, its motive force, and, ultimately, whether it is a natural phenomenon at all... or something sent by another intelligent world. Some university professors have wondered whether 3I/Atlas is simply a very large Winnebago. Are its out-of-this world travelers looking for a rest stop at some trashed-up nearby planet (like Planet Earth) where they can pump out their space RV's huge bilge tanks?

Or are its alien intentions more subtle?

Could 3I/Atlas be a mission of curiosity and diplomacy? A voyage of investigation and education? A project of exploration or... in the sense of bedbugs, cockroaches and rodents... a house-cleaning project of galactic pest control vis-à-vis us?

But there's more. Informed observers have detected another anomaly: its distinctive shape.

At one of their daily three martini lunches, astronomers at SETI (the Senter for Extraterrestrial Intelligence)1 located at Omphalos National Observatory at Weinflaschen Staatsuniversität in the Himalayan Mountains near Umbilicus, Switzerland came to a startling conclusion: 3I/Atlas most closely resembles a very large wine flask hurtling through Space. Indeed, SETI astro-oenologists conjecture that the mysterious bottle-like object could contain remnants of (very) vintage Madeira, 5 billion year old Schnapps or Tequila fermented by an alien civilization.

If 3I/Atlas is, indeed, a very large wine bottle lofted into space by marooned castaways from a distant world billions of years ago, might there be a message in the bottle? Might it contain a message from an alien intelligence that we are not alone... or that others elsewhere would rather that we left them alone... or simply that 'Kilroy was Here?'

The mere mention on television news that 3I/Atlas could be an "alien" spacecraft caused President Donald Trump to sign an Executive Order (Monday's Executive Order No. 76,4092) declaring that if 3I/Atlas is, indeed, an alien visitor from another world, then it will be immediately arrested by Immigration Control officers and deported to El Salvador, Somalia or back to wherever 3I/Atlas comes from.

The President appeared at an impromptu news conference where he donned his signature red chapeau that proclaimed his omniscience. Upon jutting out his chin and affecting his trademark tough-guy scowl, the President declared: "Whoever tries to infiltrate America with this alien, and most likely Communist Chinese, technology will also face 2,500% import tariffs. Because America is the greatest marketplace in the Universe, and if these Communist Chinese aliens want to do business here, then they have to bend the knee and pay the price."

But Mr. Trump quickly withdrew Executive Order No. 76,4092 with Executive Order No. 76,4093 after spectral analysis of 3I/Atlas led the newly rebranded "Department of War" to conclude that 3I/Atlas contains not only organic brewer's yeast and vinting compounds, but also many valuable rare earths necessary to make America's sense of exceptionalism exceptionally exceptional again.

The spectral analysis revealed that 3I/Atlas seems to be largely composed of mineral compounds like democracium (a glittering mineral similar to pyrite aka 'fools gold'), neofascistium, eurobaloneum, and zionesium - all highly toxic compounds that, even in small quantities, cause brain death, historical amnesia, colonialism, genocide and delusions of grandeur.

Scientists also noted that 3I/Atlas seems to be off-gassing the not-so-rare organic compound stupidium.

Stupidium can be found almost everywhere on Earth, but mostly in the capital cities of Europe and North America. It is a completely useless mineral good only for manufacturing even more stupidium. Scientists thus warn against efforts to capture or mine 3I/Atlas fearing that additional stupidium introduced into Earth's environment could lead to terminal civilizational collapse, increased French, German and British military engagement in NATO's never-ending war against Russia, and inevitable nuclear conflagration.

3I/Atlas's retrograde orbit will bring it closest to Earth around the first weeks of October, roughly coinciding with the Jewish High Holy Days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, the so-called Day of Atonement.

This coincidence caused Benjamin Netanyahu to lay claim to the entirety of 3I/Atlas as an integral part of Greater Israel as prophesied in the apocryphal Sixth, Seventh and Eighth Books of Moses carved in ancient COBOL on 8" not-so-floppy stone disks. "In the Sixth Book of Moses," Mr. Netanyahu explained, "all of the negativity of the original Five Books of Moses was restated from right-to-left as positive commandments instead of negative ones -- such as Thou Shalt Kill (especially, but not exclusively, Palestinians), Thou Shalt Steal (especially, but not exclusively from Palestinians) and Thou Shalt Covet (especially, but not exclusively the homeland of Palestinians)."

Israel then beamed messages at the flying object from deep space welcoming its chosen people to help annex and colonize the West Bank of the Jordan River along with the soon-to-be constructed Sodom and Gomorrah Club Med Resort and Trump Gaza Plaza (where Gaza City used to be before it was razed and depopulated).

3I/Atlas, however, immediately began to counter-transmit communications back to Mr. Netanyahu stating (loosely translated from the space alien vulgate): "Fahgettaboudit schmuck! Ain't no 'atonement' possible for a traif mamzer like you!" It then began to emit images of a fluttering Palestinian flag while broadcasting the following message in Arabic, Aramaic, Farsi, Chinese, Russian, Old Icelandic, Celtic, Khoisan and Esperanto: "Palestine Will Be Free From the River to Alpha Centauri."

This, in turn, caused Israel to demand that the United States nuke and radioactively sterilize 3I/Atlas because it likely was inhabited by doctors, hospital workers, students, children, mothers, journalists and similar types of terrorists. The U.K., Ukraine, France and Germany followed suit and proscribed support, contact, or any mention of 3I/Atlas in public gatherings, on social media, in any scientific journal or even in private conversations, all in the name of preserving democracy, capitalism, freedom of speech and whatever.

Mr. Trump additionally proposed that after the United States bombs 3I/Atlas, it should be colonized and developed with luxury hotels, golf courses and, especially, nuclear missile bases from which to attack China, Iran, Venezuela, Russia, India, Lichtenstein, Yemen, Lesotho, San Francisco, Seattle, Portland and the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.

In furtherance of America's civilizing project, Mr. Netanyahu proposed that the United States should undertake the ethnic cleansing of 3I/Atlas with U.S. weapons and tax dollars; but thereafter the U.S. should deed the property over to Israel.

As part of his lobbying for this proposal, Mr. Netanyahu issued a personal invitation for Mr. Trump to join him at a private viewing of the 5 Eyes' director's cut of the not yet (and never to be) publicly released movie entitled "Epstein's Kompromat Videos of the World's Richest and Most Powerful." Which, in turn, caused Mr. Trump (who wishes to win the Nobel Peace Prize by re-imagining America as some kind of Warrior Valhalla) to... immediately change the subject... by bullying yet another small and defenseless country and serially invading Chicago, Los Angeles, Vatican City and Minneapolis.

The Democrats unanimously decried Mr. Trump's war-mongering and colonial projects, but voted, as always, to continue to fund them.

As 3I/Atlas entered into its closest fly-by on the far side of the Sun (making it impossible to observe directly from the Earth), astronomers noticed that first the moons of Saturn and then the moons of Jupiter suddenly... disappeared. Shortly after that, the planets Mars and Venus, too, entirely vanished as though someone or something had swallowed them whole.

3I/Atlas then braked and changed its trajectory. It circled around, then hovered above Planet Earth.

An enormous "Buuurrrrrrp" was heard from the darkening skies overhead as, around the globe, people started thinking, I wonder what's for dinner tonight?

* * * * *

Funny story? Maybe so; maybe not.

But these are not such funny times, are they?

I completely understand why people check out of reality. It's hard enough to deal with one's own difficulties without becoming overwhelmed with those of others. It's intended to be like that, of course. It's like Degas' painting of the absinthe drinkers - we seek a release, a drug to anesthetize us against the incessant barrage of evil.

The faces in Degas' painting are our faces at the end of a hard day. Worn out. Isolated. Numb to the world. It's very difficult to accept, let alone acknowledge, bitter truths that gob-smack us, even as we live just marginally better at the expense of those who live significantly worse.

What's the least one can do and still remain sane? And human? Speaking truth to power, to be perfectly frank, is one of those meaningless platitudes that, ultimately, is just a cop out. Power doesn't care about truth being spoken to it - it's not even listening. Power cares only about being pulled down off its pedestal.

I grew up in the Vietnam era. Did protests really end that war?

I don't think so, at least, not by themselves. The Vietnam War ended (although the global and never-ending world war did not) only partly because of protests in the streets and anti-draft campaigns on the campuses. It ended, also in part, because young American soldiers - of all races, ethnicities and social classes - increasingly recognized that this war (like all wars) was a racket that profited others at the cost of their lives.

The Vietnam War ended primarily, however, due to the courage, the sacrifice and the determination of the Vietnamese partisans who took on the world's biggest, baddest colonialists. They persevered for decades. And they won.

Do I have the strength or the stamina to take on that kind of a sacrifice? Sometimes I feel like I do. Sometimes, I feel like I don't.

I respect the younger folks of this age (by which I mean everyone young in age and spirit!) who are, once again, willing to take up the cudgels of resistance. I do not mean joining in sclerotic party politics or one-off protest marches. Millions and millions and millions of autochthonous, city-and-port-clogging protests extended over long periods of time might achieve something. Anything less than that, however, will only lead to personal exhaustion.

Nor do I mean meaningless drawn-out courtroom arguments over the rule of law and the law of rules.

What I do mean, is that I am not quite sure what I mean. Or maybe I do, but I can't, or won't, say it out loud. But there are hopeful signs in today's more gutsy youth movements, those movements far more meaningful that the silly, manufactured, nonsensical non-issues of recent years past. You know, the ones that were intended to Balkanize us and deflect our attention elsewhere.

One day, people around the globe will recognize that the superficial social and economic phenomena that we want to ameliorate today are the result of decades - no centuries - of just a few fundamental, systemic, core problems that have a name, that have been deliberately mislabeled, that have been deliberately misprinted into our collective psyches, that have been historically inverted and perverted, that have been intentionally masked by one cultural, social and political distraction or the other.

Perhaps one day. But not today.

There is no Deus ex machina. Alas, because a Deus ex machina would be so easy. But it won't be easy. It cannot be easy or it wouldn't be worth it. No one will 'save us' except ourselves. Not even 3I/Atlas, even if it is an emissary from a more advanced alien life form.

Prost!

Here's to 3I/Atlas, the 5 billion year old giant wine bottle from elsewhere in the Cosmos that might - but probably doesn't - contain a message to all of us on Earth. Intelligent… or dumb as a rock (by which I mean both 3I/Atlas and us)… welcome to our world, Stranger!

Bon voyage! And... bon appétit??

* * * * *

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Liner Notes - Hesitation Blues

There are so many loudmouth, liar and bully politicians around the western world. Power seems to attract them like moths to fire or like flies to dog-doo. In business, finance, and high tech, there are so many nutcases - albethey occasionally intelligent and hardworking - who are also the top dogs

Why so?

It is probably so because, lacking empathy and compassion, these folks can move fast, go far and break stuff... our stuff... totally sans souci.

Their "edge" is that they behave without any of the social and civilizational inhibitions that most people feel when faced with the unethical, the immoral or the illegal. The liars and thugs are impulsive and they never feel the need to look in the rear view mirror. That kind of what-me-worry attitude can bring individual material rewards for two dimensional peeps. And it makes nervous wrecks out of the rest of us.

The two dimensional peeps are attracted to more than just power and control. It's also the theater. It's also the show. They live in a world of TV wrestling and Captain America Marvel Comic Book movies. The two dimensional cartoon types boast and abuse and act as if born to rule, born to conquer and born to dominate. They distort reality as though they are always right. Even when they are usually wrong.

And utterly bonkers.

I've run into folks like that in my decades long practice of law. Some were opposing counsel. Egads, some were judges and law professors! Some were opposing counsels' clients.

Not my clients, however. Since I was old enough to realize that life is short and life is terminal, I've tried to make it my business to choose who I work for. That might be the minimum any of us can do - withhold our services - when what we really ought to do requires more courage than we have and more years in prison than we are inclined to sacrifice.

Certainly, the professional classes - lawyers, engineers, computer geeks, scientists, administrators, technicians and others - have at least that vestigial free will to simply say 'no.' We have the vestigial free will to resist serving or being employed by power and wealth when the power and wealth are evil. For sure, all of us professionals are the ones who make the whole freaking system work. For sure, by withholding our labor and services - a kind of professional strike, if you will - the lawyers, engineers, computer geeks and scientists have as much power to arrest as to accelerate the out-of-control locomotive. Even if only minimally. Even if only symbolically. Of course, that exercise of free will comes at a personal price. But such does everything truly worth doing.

For now, however, we still have the freedom to write and speak what we think. For now, we still have the power to write and speak what we've come to understand - even if only a few read and listen and converse - so that others, like-minded, won't feel so completely alone. Alone, as the loudmouths, liars and bullies intend us to be. Or so it seems.

My conjecture is that the political, economic and military abusers - all psychopaths to one degree or another - naturally evolve as "leaders" because the rest of us, honestly speaking, are nagged by rational and persistent self-doubt.

Those who believe their own propaganda, or who, at least, seem to believe it, can twist and contort and distort reality with a straight face. The rest of us, constrained by conscience, who are at least dimly aware of history, who are minimally sensible of the difference between what’s right and what’s wrong… we cannot even imagine doing what our "leaders" do.

Thus are state terrorism, famine and genocide narrated as the victims' just deserts.

Thus are inflationary tariffs and lay-offs mislabeled as freedom for those who must scrape and scrabble for a living.

Thus is war equated with Nobel Peace Prizes; economic coercion equated with economic freedom.

Thus are governments overthrown and societies destabilized and all equated with the spread of democracy.

Those of us who are "normal" (whoever and whatever that might be), are encumbered with the very human trait of incertitude. We "normies" are never really sure. With personal experience as our guide, our incertitude is certainly legitimate. Thus, we might defer to those who seem to be utterly and fearlessly self-confident... precisely because we are not. And besides, they are dangerous and we are not. Or are we?

Burdened with fear, uncertainty, doubt and all of the heavy economic fetters of economic serfdom, we’re not sure what to do, and we hesitate.

We get the Hesitation Blues.

The Hesitation Blues is keyed in A minor. I finger-picked it on my Gibson SJ200 acoustic with AR Rare strings. Originally, I wanted to record this playing my 50+ year old Yamaha FG 300 "red label" acoustic guitar because it has good jangle. The Yamaha looks and feels like a 3/4 size Hummingbird with a narrower fingerboard. It has good jangle because the delaminating pick guard buzzes against the wood, the bridge is loose and the Martin silk & steel strings set the bridge to rattling like a tambourine! Yeah - that vintage amateur bluesy soundscape of sawdust, cigarette butts, sweat, spilled beer, yakkety yak and peanut shells! Not exactly the Vienna Opera, but, you know, whatever.

Anyway. The old Yamaha didn't cut it. My Gibson has a very fine Fishman pickup tucked inside the sound box. With the Yamaha, however, I needed to insert an old Dean Markley pickup into the hole. The Dean Markley uses an aluminum-nickel-cobalt coil. The pickup is almost as old as the guitar. Or me! The magnet that converts the physical string vibrations to electrical impulses has likely degaussed over time and it barely picked up the motion of the strings. Due to age, the felt rim has hardened (which is kind of how I feel sometimes!). As a result, the Dean Markley pickup kept popping out of the sound hole and plopping inside the body of the guitar. Not good. Not good.

So. Back to the Gibson SJ200 jumbo acoustic!

Nobody knows exactly who composed Hesitation Blues, but a lot of people claimed they did. It's been covered by nearly every blues musician from Lead Belly to Jelly Role Morton to Janis Joplin to Hot Tuna. Whether it's a song of love or of street-walkers or of life's tribulations is debatable. But I won't go there. The song has lyrics, but the lyrics change - as does everything else - depending on who performs it.

With a song like this you have great license to bend and twist it as you like. Like the headpiece photograph at the top of this post.

Playing the Hesitation Blues is not reserved to virtuosos. To slightly paraphrase the words of John Sebastian of The Lovin' Spoonful: “There's thirteen hundred and fifty two guitar pickers in Nashville; And any one of them can play this song twice as better than I will."

So, with great inartistic license and humility, I concocted something of my own with bits and pieces assembled from everywhere. I plugged in some of my own riffs and added snippets of what I might have heard elsewhere. It's not polished and not really true to the original, but neither are Nature, Life, and Evolution.

Like all blues, this is supposed to be something you can hum or tap your feet to. Feel free to do either. No one's watching... other than Big Brother, the many intelligence gathering agencies who monitor you to keep you free (ahem), and all the Big Tech companies who value your privacy. They value your privacy because your privacy (as marketed by them to others) is, indeed, very, very valuable (ahem ahem).

The recording is imperfect. I thought about doing various things to "heal" the blemishes and the notes that got clipped outside the recording range; but then... naaah, why bother? Hesitation Blues is a jug band blues standard best performed live. As such, it's better au naturel than something finely crafted as a studio production. I did add just a touch of reverb in Audacity, however, to round out the notes.

Below are two recordings. One is a .wav file and the other is in the .mpv format. Click and play whichever one suits you best.

.Wav File - Hesitation Blues

.Mpv File - Hesitation Blues

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Dorothea Lange's photographs for the FDR Farm Security Administration documented people on the move during the Great Depression. Their jalopies had broken down. They had no money. So they walked. Hopped a train. Or hitched a ride.

My mother told stories of hitchhiking the East Coast in her youth. She would stand on the shoulder with her thumb extended, she said, while her boyfriend and eventual husband (my father many years later) hid in uniform behind a bush or a road sign ready to jump out and join her should a driver stop to give her a lift.

I never traveled with a hobo's bindlestiff. I owned a blue Reinhold Messner "Sherpa" backpack (I still have it, somewhere, I think). Reinhold Messner is a mountain-climbing legend. He has climbed the highest Tibetan mountains alone and without oxygen. He has ascended the peaks of everywhere in the Alps. He has lost multiple toes to frostbite even as he continued climbing the mountaintops.

I am not into mountain-climbing. But with Messner's signature pack and a rolled up sleeping bag I hitchhiked here and there, now and then. I did this for a week in the U.S. and for many days in Israel. I did it once in Greece. And over a fortnight, throughout England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland.

Those were different times and, at least in Europe, hitchhiking was neither unusual nor dangerous. At least, it was no more dangerous than driving. My wife and I have survived a car-to-truck collision at 100 km/hour in Spain to attest to that. More about that adventure another time.

I was a teenager in West Berlin during my early hitchhiking years. Later, as a university student, I lived in Munich. I didn't thumb rides in Berlin. Berlin has a highly developed urban transportation system, complete with extensive, fully integrated and inexpensive light rail, subways, double-deck buses and dedicated urban bicycle roadways. Besides. When I lived in Berlin, the Cold War (so called) was still a thing and there was no way to hitch a ride from there to anywhere else. More about that another time as well.

Nor did I hitchhike when I went to the university in Munich. Munich, too, had an advanced public transportation system. Unlike Berlin at the time, I didn't need any special dispensation just to leave city limits. There was also no need to hitchhike from Munich. I could travel 2nd class by train to nearly anywhere I wanted to go. By that time, too, I owned a used VW Variant - a "Squareback" in American auto parlance. Although it could barely keep up with the speeding Mercedes and BMWs on the Autobahn, my Volkswagen was stalwart enough to get me to France and Spain... if I had the patience, and my magic carpet "Official Business" red U.S. passport. More about that, too, another time.

The British Isles

I remember that one summer I flew from Berlin to London for a month-long solo trip. I remember landing at Heathrow Airport and falling in love with a young uniformed woman working the customs desk. No, I don't know her name or anything about her, but teenagers are apt to fall in love on first impression. Then we grow up, and only the impression remains. Besides, at that time I was still looking for my eventual wife who I wouldn't even meet for nearly another decade or so; but I do, at least, know my wife's name and a thing or two about her.

I think I spent a few nights in London learning how to speak the language, discovering by trial and error what food I could eat, and how to walk on the left-hand sidewalk of the street. Then I rented a Puch moped and headed south.

Mopeds are great for short inner city trips. They are not so good, however, for long distance travel on the motorway. Soon after beginning my two wheeled excursion to Salisbury, Oxford and beyond, I had to buy a sheet of foam rubber to cushion the hard plastic seat. By day three, I was completely frazzled by traffic round-abouts that go round-about in the wrong direction, and by getting passed on the right by honking cars and heavy trucks impatient with my slow-moving putt-putt. So I circled back to London and ditched the motorbike. I stuck out my thumb and hitched rides.

I got as far as South Wales uneventfully. Along the way, I stayed mostly in youth hostels in small towns with unpronounceable names. Sometimes I stayed in bed & breakfast houses. Thumbing was easy in Wales. I caught a ride in the north with a trucker whose only quid-pro-quo was that I had to help him unload his sacks of sugar and beans at various stops along the way. I thumbed my way into Scotland, learned to eat fish and chips from a rolled up newspaper, and then thumbed back south again to catch the ferry to the Republic of Ireland. In Ireland, I caught rides around the island's southern tip and thence up to Limerick.

In Limerick, I repeated my moped mistake. But instead of a motorbike, I rented a bicycle and headed west toward the westernmost tip of the Dingle Peninsula. I don't know whether there is something peculiar about Irish bicycles generally or this particular bicycle, but the damn thing coasted slower downhill than pedaling uphill. Worse, it had strange mechanical brakes that pressed straight down onto the crown of the rubber tires. Worse than that, it took so long to pedal to where I was going that I ended up biking uphill in the dead of night on a dark back country road that seemed to go on and on and on even unto the Caribbean like Columbus crossing the Atlantic. Well past midnight, I ended up at an Inn where I collapsed into bed. I woke up very late in the day, and immediately had to turn around and bicycle back again to Limerick even more slowly (and painfully) than the outward trip to Dingle. Like the moped before it, I ditched the rental bike and stuck out my thumb.

It was late by the time I started for Dublin.

I stood by the side of a major motorway outside of the city of Limerick, but nobody stopped. That was probably because, at the time, I looked rather like Rasputin, John Lennon, Karl Marx and Arlo Guthrie rolled into one. Eventually, well after dark (and, more than likely, precisely because it was well after dark), someone did stop and gave me a ride. I remember the car well: it was a small red Renault 4, the kind with the stick shift that protruded L-shaped from the dashboard. The speedometer only went as high as 100 km/hour. I know we were moving faster than that and the needle was pegged at the top of the meter the entire trip.

Speaking of "high," the driver had already quaffed a beer or two. Five or six actually, so he told me, even as we stopped for a few more pints of Guinness at a local roadside pub. I bought, of course. The driver told me not to worry. He assured me that he knew this stretch of road like the back of his hand and that he could drive it blindfolded. To prove his point, the driver closed his eyes while flooring the accelerator, took his hands off the wheel and turned his red, boozy face to me for at least a full minute. The experience was something like riding in a Tesla self-driving car on the Interstate or taking a Waymo autonomous taxicab in San Francisco. At 60+ mph. With no human backup.

Needless to say, I survived hitchhiking in the British Isles. Needless to say, I didn't learn from my experience not to do it again. Traveling, in those days, was not exactly a tourist experience. The adventure lay in how you got somewhere, not where the somewhere was.

Greece

Perhaps a year later I was on the road again, this time to Greece. I took this trip with a co-ed friend from college (because, after all, I was still looking for my eventual wife who I wouldn't even meet for another decade). We traveled by very slow train down the boot of Italy. This is what used to be called a milk run. If it was possible to travel 3rd class back then, then this was it! We disembarked at Brindisi, then traveled by ferry to Corfu, thence to Piraeus and finally Athens. Athens - where we were crammed into a dingy youth hostel and we couldn't wait to escape the throng of other young folk from America and Northern Europe who were also bumming around on $1/day. There was a line of hippie tourist books by that name. How mighty the dollar used to be!

Eventually, we escaped to the island of Crete where, as best I recall, we thumbed around most of the time. The locals were very nice and hospitable. The beaches were very nice. I do remember being picked up one day by a carload of true believers who took it upon themselves to evangelize us with Seventh Day Adventist literature (as I remember). Nice people, but no, we weren't the types to be converted.

I recall that our last ride in Crete deposited us back at the ferry terminal where, once again, we encountered local custom officials. No, I didn't fall in love with anyone as I did at Heathrow Airport, but the Greek guards were very friendly (if not with me, then at least with my traveling companion with whom they were flirting). The custom guards bought us both tiny cups of Greek coffee. To show our gratitude for their hospitality, we chugged our small, strong drinks to the dregs, including the thick black coffee sludge at the bottom of the cup. We didn’t know any better! This so shocked our gracious hosts that, as I recall, they let us board the ship without wanting anything more to do with us.

Israel

It was, perhaps, a year after Greece that I was hitchhiking again, this time in Israel. I spent six weeks or so in Jerusalem living with some very kind families who I didn't know. Soon, however, I realized that I needed to get out. It was becoming clear that I was being groomed to marry my host's sister. Oh oh! I explained that I was still looking for my eventual wife who I wouldn't even meet for nearly another decade. I quickly retreated to the highway with my trusty blue Reinhold Messner backpack and stuck out my thumb.

Hitchhiking in Israel was a piece of cake back then. Or so it seemed. I am sure my experience would have been a lot different - in the summer of 1973, just on the eve of the Yom Kippur War - had I been Palestinian. Once, on the road to Hebron, I recall that my "ride" played a high-speed game of chicken on a twisty desert road, passing and getting passed by a Mercedes stretch limousine occupied by locals wearing robes and sunglasses (in the sense of "locals" going back to before the Anglo-American colony of Israel had been founded).

There were no seat belts in my car. I remember bracing my hands against the glove compartment and, terrified, preparing to sink my teeth into the dashboard. "No need to worry," my driver told me as the Mercedes passed us again and our speedometer lurched past 200 kilometers/hour. "If God wants you to die, then you die. If not, then you don't." I guess that He/She/It/They did not want me to die. Not just yet. But it was like my Irish trip from Limerick to Dublin again. The drivers in both cars were not literally drunk, but quite intoxicated nonetheless. The next war was just a month or two away.

I made it by thumb to Tiberius where, adjacent to the Sea of Galilee (which is more like a fetid lake than a sea), I spent the hottest, most humid, most mosquito-filled night of my life in yet another youth hostel. I fled the heat and humidity of Tiberius for Safed and later Haifa and eventually back to Munich. No I didn't thumb my way from Tel Aviv to Munich - I flew.

I haven't been back to Israel since 1973. Nor would I go. I am boycotting everything Israeli. With good cause. And with a deep, personal sense of embarrassment for what it is, and for what it does, and for the grotesque barbarian state that it has become.

See the USA

The cure for the hitching-itch had to happen in America, of course.

The Vietnam War was winding down when I returned to the United States to do my final year of college. It was like visiting a foreign country.

I didn't understand American culture. I still don't.

I didn't know who the latest movie and baseball stars were. I still don't.

I not sure where in the sentence the verb to put was.

I didn't even know how to use an American pay phone. Thus, at JFK airport, a representative of New York's finest wouldn't even answer me when I asked him, Mr. Police Officer, sir, could you please show me how to use the pay phone booth so I can call my brother in Pittsburgh. Perhaps the policeman was going on break. Or perhaps he hadn't heard me. Or, perhaps, he ignored me because I looked like Rasputin, John Lennon, Karl Marx and Arlo Guthrie rolled into one.

America was so foreign to me that during term break I resolved to visit the Rocky Mountains. So, once again, I packed my Reinhold Messner backpack and stuck out my thumb. I caught a ride with another college student who wanted someone to share the cost of fuel as he drove home for the Xmas holidays.

I made it half-way across the United States with a single ride. Then my driver dropped me at the St. Louis, Missouri Greyhound bus station just before nightfall.

OMG!

This was my first real experience traveling in the United States on a shoestring. The St. Louis Greyhound station was unreal. It appeared as though half the people there were drunk or on drugs. The other half was lurking about waiting to mug anyone who wasn't drunk or on drugs. And there was I looking like Rasputin, John Lennon, Karl Marx and Arlo Guthrie rolled into one, carrying a blue Reinhold Messner backpack and obviously some kind of nut case. I quickly decided to take the next bus out of there, anywhere. I ended up at a truck stop in... Leavenworth, Kansas.

Leavenworth is known for McConnell Air Force Base, for Fort Leavenworth, and for its high security federal penitentiary. I planted myself next to the on-ramp to U.S. Route 70, stuck out my thumb... and was promptly surrounded by Kansas State Patrol officers.

Kid, if you step one foot onto the highway, we're gonna bust you!

Kid, if you don't have any money on you, we're gonna bust you!

Kid, if you don't have THREE PIECES OF POSITIVE IDENTIFICATION on you right now, we're gonna bust you!

The police tapped their batons on their palms as they interrogated me.

Well, I hadn't stepped even a foot onto the highway, I had plenty of cash and travelers checks in my wallet, and - to the State Patrol officers' everlasting disappointment - I actually carried not three, but five pieces of positive identification, including a university student ID card, a military dependent's ID card, a Pennsylvania State driver's license, an international driver's license plus my magic carpet "Official Business" red U.S. passport. All of them with photographs that showed me looking like Rasputin, John Lennon, Karl Marx and Arlo Guthrie rolled into one. That left them flummoxed and kept me out of jail so that I could spend a long, sleepless night at a Leavenworth truck stop trying to catch a ride out of there.

But it only got worse.

In the late night, maybe around 2 or 3 a.m., when I was barely able to keep my head from thudding onto the Formica diner counter-top at the truck stop, someone offered me a ride west. I was groggy, barely awake. I said okay. I don't remember anything about what the guy looked like or how old he was or what he was wearing. I only remember his voice. It was a creepy voice.

The guy led me to his car in the far corner of the truck stop.

He opened the door and I got in. I put my backpack on my lap. The guy turned the ignition key and let the motor idle. The guy started to talk.

I was falling asleep in the passenger seat while this schmuck droned on and on and the car engine idled and we weren't going anywhere.

I remembered the guy asking if I was going to college. I mumbled that I was. He then started to talk about college students having it so easy because they can do whatever they want, whenever they want to do it.

They can do whatever they want. Whenever they want. Whatever. Whenever. Whatever. Whenever...

Alarm bells started ringing in my slumberous brain. Scenes from Alfred Hitchcock movies and Stephen King horror novels began to replay in my mind. If Radiohead's song Creep had already been composed and performed (it wasn't released until 1992), I would have heard the music playing. I didn't hear the music, but I was definitely sitting next to some kind of creep. He continued to rant:

They can do whatever they want. Whenever they want. Whatever. Whenever. Whatever. Whenever...

I reached across, turned off the ignition, pulled the key out of the switch and tossed it out the window. Without a word, I got out and trudged back to the truck stop. I don't know what happened to the creep in the car. And I really don't care.

I should have called it quits at that point, but I was stuck in Middle America kind of like the Conestoga Wagons, westward ho! I decided to keep going.

Later that day I got a legitimate ride as far as Denver. Legitimate, more of less. The driver liked to tell bawdy stories, which was hard listening because, as he explained, he had lost half his tongue to cancer. His speech was barely intelligible, which is probably just as well. All the way to Colorado, we glimpsed tornadoes passing to the north or to the south of us. The whole time, exhausted, I was nodding off to sleep. It was an unsettling ride. By the time we got to Denver, he was as glad to be rid of me as I was to be rid of him.

It had taken a long time to get to the Rocky Mountains, way too long. It already was time to turn around and go back to school. I caught a ride with a lady friend who would take me as far as Chicago and another Greyhound Station. That was long ago, however, and I was still looking for my eventual wife who I wouldn't even meet for nearly another decade.

My ride's car was a 1962 Chevy Bel Air. The chassis was severely rusted and, but for the rubber floor mats, my feet would have scraped the asphalt. All four tires were as slick as Jeff Bezo's head. The car had serious electrical problems. The headlights would short out every so often. We were chased by a blizzard all across the plains. Around midnight, somewhere near Crook, Colorado, in the middle of nowhere, we decided to pull off the road and get a weather update from a service station. At the bottom of the off-ramp, the car's spark plugs stopped sparking. We were dead in our tracks.

There was no traffic. The nearby gas station was closed. The temperatures were already below zero and dropping. Wind blown snow was starting to drift over the car. There we were: two young strangers (one of whom resembled Rasputin, John Lennon, Karl Marx and Arlo Guthrie rolled into one) stranded in the dark and cold night sitting alone in a bald-tired, rusted out old Chevrolet on the side of the road.

Out of nowhere, another car appeared. A middle-aged woman got out and asked if we were in trouble (because, I guess, the locals weren't likely to sit in a dark car on the off-ramp of the highway in the middle of a snowstorm). We explained that the car's electrical system had failed. The woman - she was the local preacher's wife, she told us - was not at all concerned that we might have been Bonnie and Clyde, or Charles Manson and Squeaky Fromme, or space aliens from Area 51. She seemed to know exactly what to do. She popped open her hood, connected a set of cables from her car to ours, and jumped our Chevy's battery back to life. The woman told us that the snow was supposed to abate later in the morning; that we should get back on the road and not stop until we got to where we were going. Which we did.

America at its best, I thought to myself, and it almost made up for the rest of my American hitchhiking misadventures.

Almost.

Hitchhiking in America cured me of the bug.

Almost.

There was one last trip, from Washington DC to Boston. But that wasn't really a hitchhike because I knew some of those in the truck I rode with. The truck - an old green Ford F 100 pick-up with a manual transmission - had a bench seat. All four of us - myself and three young women - sat side by side in the front.

Those like myself who knew how to drive a stick shift took turns driving. What I didn't know was that those I knew on this trip had conspired to set me up with someone I didn't know. And so it happened, by chance or design, that in the crowded front cab of the pick-up truck I tried to shift the kneecap of the young woman who was sitting next to me (I thought her knee was the floor-shift transmission stick, I explained disingenuously). That knee belonged to the one who turned out to be my eventual wife. Who I had finally met after many decades.

* * * * *

I still do a lot of thumbing these days. Now, however, I thumb my cell phone.

We are 25% into the 21st Century. I wouldn't dream of hitchhiking in the United States. Nor in Europe for that matter. I am older, of course. But the world has changed, too.

We are just six months into Donald Trump's second administration. I am weary of seeing his face and hearing his voice. I am tired of his broken promises and his thuggery masquerading as patriotism. I am bored with his narcissistic boasts and impulsive bullshit. I am tired of people who monetize everything and everyone.

I look forward to the House of Representatives flipping parties in the 2026 mid-term elections - not because I am enchanted with the Democrats, but so that the long train of articles of impeachment can roll again. Never have I seen a politician squander so much political capital so quickly. It took me at least twice as many months to become disillusioned and disgusted with the previous Democratic administration.

I am also sick of seeing the mugs and hearing the smarmy voices of the usual suspects: The Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky, South Carolina's Senator Lindsey Graham, France's Emanuel Macron, the U.K.'s Keir Starmer, Israel's Benjamin Netanyahu (and his cabinet of lunatics), Argentina's Javier Milei, the EU's Ursula von der Leyen, NATO's Secretary General Mark Rutte, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. It is no wonder that so many ordinary folk prefer viewing funny animal and TikTok videos to watching these war-mongering dissemblers on the nightly news.

Israel. It is apparently state policy - fully supported by my U.S. tax dollars and encouraged by both feckless, politically enfoeffed parties - to wage aggressive war on Iran (and everyone else) while starving and massacring Gazans. We stick our heads in the sand and refuse to see. Israel follows in the hoof-prints of the 19th Century U.S. Cavalry that burned Indian villages in the West and massacred women and children so that Indian lands could be depopulated, stolen, colonized and monetized.

Meanwhile, France dreams of recolonizing North and Central Africa even as Africans in the Sahel strive to keep them out. Even Germany, with the rise of Bundeskanzler Friedrich Merz, has determined to rearm itself, apparently in preparation for yet another fascist war of aggression against Russia and God knows who else.

We've seen this movie before. The original was pretty awful. We won't like the sequel, either. The brocade of Euro-American civilization has been rent and behind its tatters stands the beast of 500 years of unrelenting Western colonialism. Iran has vindicated North Korean: no state can claim sovereignty today without an autarkic economy, nuclear weapons and a credible means of delivering them against aggressors.

There are a few bright spots.

I am cheered by a 33 year old's victory in the Democratic Primary for Mayor of New York City. I don't agree with Zohran Mamdani on everything, but there is agreement enough that I am moved to send him a campaign contribution.

Besides, Mr. Trump has labeled Mr. Mamdani a "communist" and will investigate whether he can be deported. Coming from Mr. Trump, I regard this as a ringing endorsement for Mr. Mamdani.

If only for amusement's sake, the political system needs younger folks to irritate and annoy the old farts of the current regimes - in the U.S. and in Europe. By election day, Mr. Mamdani might have been eaten alive by the corrupt, monied political monsters that still rule the Big Apple. But I'll root for him as long as he has the energy and the will to fight with dragons.

I was dismayed by the imminent passage of the President's "big, beautiful budget bill." By the time you read this, it will have likely survived the reconciliation process and will have been signed into law. This bill is certainly "big," but there's nothing beautiful about it.

I was elated in small measure, however, because, in the Senate, they stripped out a grotesque provision for a 10 year moratorium on state and local regulation of "artificial intelligence." The Big Tech oligarchs knew that if they could prevent state and local regulation of the hydra-headed AI... then the federal government would not regulate them at all.

That would have meant that we could have been forced incrementally... but inescapably... to use, depend and rely on more and more "artificially intelligent" applications, whether we want them or not. This is happening as personal and proprietary data continues to be scraped at breakneck speed for AI's insatiable large language deformative models and agentive applications.

All of which brings me back to hitchhiking.

Twenty years after I bought my first (and heretofore only) "smart phone," it no longer could keep up with the torrent of apps and updates. I had to buy a replacement, if only for business use.

When it comes to digital devices, I wanted the bare minimum with the fewest bells and whistles. All of these "intelligent" digital devices - no, not the Chinese made devices, but the "Western" ones approved for domestic American consumption - come loaded with government and commercial back-doors, kill-switches, data harvesters and surveillance software. That is precisely why they are 'approved.'

I was shocked when, barely two days into my new digital phone, my operating system was "updated" automatically. Hitchhiking along with the new operating system was Google's AI agent, Gemini. I didn't ask for it. I didn't want it. It didn't ask permission and I couldn't say no. Its humongous, almost unfathomable "terms of service" and "privacy policy" leave users completely naked, literally and legally. Gemini simply came along with everything else in the upgrade. Like a hitchhiker virus, it entered and glommed onto the nerve cells of my phone.

The "welcome" page for Gemini told me all I needed to know about the data leech, albeit couched in the disarmingly chirpy lullaby of market-speak:

* * *

When you use Gemini, Google collects your activity, like your chats (including recordings of your Gemini Live interactions), what you share with Gemini (like files, images, and screens), info from websites you visit with Gemini, product usage information, feedback, and info about your location. This data is stored in Activity (if it’s on), reviewed by trained service providers, and used to improve and personalize Google services, including generative AI. You can review & delete your activity and manage how it is used anytime in Gemini Apps Activity. Don’t enter info you wouldn’t want reviewed or used.

* * *

How's that? “Don't enter info you wouldn't want reviewed or used?”

What?? Say again! Who, exactly, is reviewing and using my information?

I decided that I shouldn't use this thing at all!!

I tried to remove Gemini.

I couldn't.

For that matter, Google told me that I couldn't even turn the damned thing off without using Gemini's voice command (thereby involuntarily giving Google a personal voice sample for their digital dossier). Finally, after much research and effort, my wife figured out how to disable, if not entirely expunge it. Now, the artificially intelligent app resides quiescent inside my phone, a kind of herpes zoster poised to emerge in a moment of weakness like an attack of Shingles.

Artificial intelligence has become the ultimate nasty hitchhiker. It comes along for the ride.

Then it hijacks you and stays forever.

You can never get rid of it.

I hitched rides in the 20th Century. I could stop and I did. In the 21st Century, the parasites have hitched a ride with me. I can't get rid of them. I can’t make them stop

* * * * *

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Once upon time I was young and stupid. Now that I have grown out of one of those two conditions, I reflect back on the day when I almost burned down the city of Berlin.

Well, I didn't almost burn down the whole city of Berlin - only West Berlin. And then not even all of it - just the Grunewald, an urban woodland that lies within what used to be that sector of the city occupied by the French, the British and the American armed forces from 1949-1990. The Grunewald encompasses 7,500 acres - considerably larger than New York's Central Park, and significantly smaller than Yellowstone National Park. But it was heavily wooded and dark and inhabited by all kinds of furtive wildlife and, for all those reasons, irresistible to those who are young and stupid.

I was then, for some unknown reason, called a military "brat" - a dependent of my father doing God knows precisely what in the employ of the United States Government. During my high school teenage years, my father was stationed in West Berlin. Along with British, French and Germans in the employ of their respective governments (also doing God knows precisely what), my father ostensibly helped to protect what was deemed "the Free World" (which, in our comic book world, was supposed to be us, "the good guys") from the predation of "the bad guys," namely Russia (a/k/a the Soviet Union back then) along with its Bolshevik/socialist allies like China, Cuba, North Vietnam, Venezuela, North Korea and all "left-leaning" university students everywhere who protest, resist and rebel.

This childish script hasn't changed much in 50 years perhaps because (speaking mostly for myself, of course) after decades of educational malpractice, many of us are no less stupid now than then.

The Grunewald was not far from where I lived. One Friday or Saturday in 1970 or '71, four of us decided - for want of anything better to do, I guess - to hike into the woods to cook sausages and marshmallows. As I think about it, it could have been the Fourth of July and we had read or heard or believed that "Americans" did things like "barbecues" on the Fourth of July. But maybe it wasn't the Fourth, and we were, you know, just being "young and stupid."

Now those of you smirking about four teenagers - two male and two female - hiking into the deep, dark woods just to cook sausages and marshmallows on the Fourth of July - you need to shampoo your minds and understand that we were all, back then, just young and stupid. If anything, those terms describe our entire generation - but maybe every preceding and succeeding generation, too, so who knows? But, yes, indeed, such was our intention at the time - just sausages and marshmallows and a couple of Sterno cans to cook them on.

Young and stupid, as I said.

I don't remember all the details, but it could have been a Friday or a Saturday night. Or it was any night during summer vacation. In any event, it wasn't a school night. The temperature was warm and the ground was dry as was all the underbrush, which is why I almost burned down Berlin.

At that time, small two-wheelers were a thing for our generation. We four motored two up on our putt-putting cycles to a cull-de-sac at the edge of the forest. I parked my old second-hand Vespa 150 that could only be jump-started. Next to me, my friend parked his second-hand Heinkel Tourist which (when new) was the Mercedes Benz of scooters. His old Heinkel Tourist looked something like a large artillery shell on wheels. Anyway. We parked and the four of us trekked into the woods. We probably followed a trail for a while, half an hour or more, meandering this way and that, diverging from the beaten paths for however so long until we reached a small shady clearing, surrounded by large trees, where we decided to set up our cookout.

The Grunewald is always dark and shady: think Hansel and Gretel or Little Red Riding Hood or any number of Grimm Brother fairy tales that take place in the dark woods with thick underbrush and stuff that goes crunch underfoot and weird trees that might have gnomes and witches living under or within them.

I don't remember what time it was. I do remember that the sun had set. It was already dark by the time we threw out a tarp. We lit the cans of Sterno and stuck the wieners on wood sticks. Maybe we had brought with us a bottle of mineral water, or wine, or bottles of beer, because 16 was the legal age for drinking alcohol in Germany. I don't really remember whether we brought a bottle or not. But I do remember sitting in a little circle around the burning Sterno cans, cooking sausage and marshmallows, telling stories, kibitzing and laughing and talking about Hansel and Gretel and Little Red Riding Hood and the furtive animals that lived in the Grunewald like roe deer, raccoons and wild boar.

Then one of us - certainly as a jest - snorted softly or grunted. It was a prank like young people are wont to play, and we all laughed.

We had all seen the 1969 movie "Easy Rider." Although we were just scooter riders, we fancied ourselves riding Indian and Harley Davidson choppers. We all knew the movie scene where Peter Fonda, Dennis Hopper, Jack Nicholson and their lady friends were jumped in the night by local rowdies who beat the crap out of them...

Ah hah ha ha! Ah hah ha ha! Ah hah ha ha ha...!!!

Schnooorrrrchhhxx!

Ah hah ha ha! Ah hah ha ha! Ah hah ha ha ha!

However, when we grinned and looked at one another by the light of the burning Sterno cans it was clear that one of us was quite the joker because no one admitted having grunted or snorted and, now that we thought about it, the sound seemed to come from just behind our backs somewhere in the darkness...

..... SCHNOOORRRRCHHHXX!!!!!

The adrenaline rush was instantaneous!

Someone shouted "WILD BOAR!" We leaped up and ran around in circles a bit, bumping into each other and into large tree trunks, because it was really damn dark and we couldn't make out anything by the flickering flames of the small Sterno cans and there was grunting and shouting and the sense of very large bodies snorting and dashing here and there, which could well have been ourselves, but who knows for sure and who wanted to find out! One of the ladies in our foursome climbed a very small tree, just a sapling, and perched there momentarily until we warned her that boar can uproot small trees. So she jumped down to join our helter skelter dash for the exit.

Wherever the exit might be.

Because it was very dark and the trail wasn't clear and we thought we heard hoofs galloping behind us... or in front of us? And there was snorting all around, but it might have been just our own heavy breathing and supercharged imaginations... or not...! And no one wanted to stop long enough to reconnoiter where we were or consider what we should do. Which, metaphorically speaking, is exactly like the present times when we all still run around like lunatics and we can't stop long enough to reconnoiter where we are or to intelligently consider what to do.

But, at least, back then, in the dark forest of the Grunewald, unlike in the 21st Century, we all stuck together in our common plight. So we ran and ran and ran as a group and we got completely lost until we ran smack into a tall chain link fence topped with barbed wire. We were saved!

Or we were trapped...

There was a very dark house behind the tall fence. It was very dark and very quiet.

Too dark and too quiet...

Suddenly, there was a light!

A door opened...

Two ferocious dogs - Doberman Pinschers, I recall, the kind with steel studded collars around their necks - emerged from the house and charged at us snarling, growling, slobbering, their teeth bared to tear us to shreds.

We froze.

We were trapped between the hounds and the hogs, between the forest and the fence. We knew that none of us were going to get out of this alive.

A light went on in the house. An older man ran out carrying what looked like a long hunting rifle or a shotgun. Was he dressed in pajamas... or in the remnants of a military uniform from the last war? I think it was the latter.

Who were we? he shouted at us through the fence in German as he pointed the gun. The Dobermans snarled and snapped and tried to jump over the fence. Were we Russian soldiers? he demanded to know!

Russian soldiers?

This happened in 1970 or '71. The last war had ended in 1945, just about 25 years before. Had he, then a young man, been conscripted into the Volkssturm, the last gasp levée en masse of the young, the old and the infirm? Back then, the Volkssturm had been ordered to defend Berlin from the rapidly advancing (and very annoyed) Red Army determined to deliver the coup de grace to the Third Reich four years after Germany had invaded the USSR causing widespread devastation and the deaths of 27 million Soviets. Was he flashing back to an old war experience... or nightmaring about a new one?

During the Cold War, West Berlin lay smack dab in the middle of the Deutsche Demokratische Republik, a/k/a "East Germany." Berlin was, indeed, surrounded by Soviet troops who, according to various Cold War treaties and agreements, were permitted to enter into West Berlin as easily as U.S., French and British soldiers were permitted to enter into East Berlin.

Exactly who was threatening whom back then was no more clear than today except that we were young and stupid and suffering from years of educational malpractice, and we hadn't yet learned to question everything. Of course, we were not an invading force of Russian soldiers even though I did, in those days, look a lot like a mash up of Grigori Rasputin, Arlo Guthrie and Karl Marx with long dark hair, dark beard and mustache and John Lennon wire rim glasses; and to some, therefore, I appeared to be at least mildly threatening, if not certifiably "Bolshevik."

Fortunately, as the armed and uniformed gentleman slowly emerged from his 1945 Battle of Berlin flashback into the present, he was assured of our benignity (and our youth and stupidity). He called off his dogs as he dutifully called in the police.

And the fire department.

Because, as we explained to our armed interlocutor, we had been attacked by WHO KNOWS HOW MANY Wildschwein and there was still A FIRE RAGING in the middle of the tinder-dry Grunewald which might well trigger an incendiary event that could burn the City of Berlin to the ground!

So we waited (safely on the outside of the tall wire fence away from the still snarling Dobermans) for the Berlin fire department and a battalion of Berlin police to roll up in their Volkswagen Beatles, sirens wailing and blue emergency lights blinking.

We explained, as best we could, what had happened. But exactly where we had been and where the fire was was anyone's guess.

So into the Grunewald drove the police in their Volkswagen Beatles, we four riding in the back of two separate cars and a policeman riding on the sloping front hood of each VW, feet braced against the front bumper, with a torchlight and a pistol brandished, ready for a life and death encounter with the hairy beasts (the wild boar, that is, not me and my friends). Other police officers in other cars poked loaded rifles and spotlights out the windows. The hunt was on as we tried to retrace our path of retreat.

The police didn't find the wild boar. They did find our campsite, however. The Sterno cans had flipped over in the mayhem and extinguished themselves.

There was evidence that the pigs had had quite a feast - not one crumb of sausage or roll or marshmallow remained, just some empty bags, a tarp and some napkins. There were large and small hoof prints all over. A sow and her piglets, the head police officer concluded. Maybe an adult male tusker. Maybe several. One to two hundred kilos each, the police estimated. Six or seven or eight 100 to 200 kilo Wildschwein. They were long gone, however, and there was no danger of conflagration.

The police drove us back to the cull-de-sac where we had parked our scooters. We got a severe tongue lashing. And a warning. We could have burned down the entire City of Berlin, the cops admonished. But they knew that we were young and stupid. What's more, Berlin was still, you remember, an occupied city. The local courts had no jurisdiction to prosecute us anyway, being as we were "brats" who belonged to the allied military forces who, at that time in the 1970s, still effectively ran Berlin. So the police didn't press charges leaving me, ironically, a later career in law, and this true story.

* * * * *

This is a true story. It is accurate, more or less, in its details as I remember them.

There are many legends and fairy tales about encounters with wild boar. The mythological fourth labor of Hercules was to capture alive the Erymanthian Boar - an enormous and dangerous wild pig whose giant tusks dripped with blood and foam.

The Russian-French author Sophie Countess Segur wrote the Children's Illustrated French Fairy Tales that were first published in 1869. In one of Sophie Segur's stories, the hirsute young hero Ourson (whose name means "bear cub" or "Teddy bear" in French) saves little Violette from the savage wild boar. This children's story was, for many years, a staple of the kindergarten set. It has appeared in various translations around the world. In the story, Violette climbed a tree to escape the boar, just like one of our own group. The picture at the beginning of this story illustrates little Violette's initial encounter with the wild animal... although, for some, this illustration might more accurately resemble someone's bad first date.

I have just a few points to tidy up the story and my purpose in writing it.

First, I did not recite this incident just to romp down memory lane. The incident, like all history, big and small, belongs to all those who shared it. One of our foursome who almost burned down Berlin about fifty years ago has since died from cancer. Other than myself, two others survive to vouch for its authenticity. The Berlin police and firefighters might still be alive, or not. The German man who thought we might be Russian soldiers has likely passed away. His Dobermans are certainly in doggie Valhalla. The wild boar? Undoubtedly long gone, although they might have passed on to future generations of piglets, reciting in their language of grunts and squeals, the boaring story of the young and stupid humanoids who brought them hot wieners and toasted marshmallows to enjoy in a dark forest meadow on a dry summer night long, long ago.

I encourage folks to record the memorable events in their own lives, both significant and insignificant. Otherwise, if no one remembers or - most importantly, retells the story - then that which happens might as well not have happened. In a post-storytelling age of cremation and digital records that can be forever and instantly deleted, there may not even be tombstones to evoke the memory of who was, let alone what was.

"What happens" is not just about super egotistical Űbermensch fighting wars, conquering stuff and confabulating legacies of their own vanity. History is all of us, about all of us, by all of us. It is the record of movements large and small - forward, backward and sideways - in the relentless struggle to exist meaningfully.

In that vein, my second point is that, too often, we defer the record-making to others who mold it to match their agendas rather than reflect honestly what actually happened. The large publishing houses, the news and entertainment media and those who own the various "nation states" all work in concert to propagandize, to rewrite history, and to encourage our societal sense of deference, dependency, isolation and, ultimately, personal insignificance.

Thus as the world notes the 80th anniversary of the nominal end of World War II in Europe, the U.S., the U.K. and much of central Europe are lurching toward overt fascism (again). This time, it is draped with the thin cloth of tightly managed "democracy" embroidered with the false narratives that America won the war or that WW2 was precipitated by two equal evils (Nazism v. Bolshevism). As Marshal of the Soviet Union Georgy Zhukov presciently noted upon the defeat of Nazi Germany: "We have liberated Europe from fascism… but they will never forgive us for it."

For those of us who need a historical finger poked in the eye, or who live in a certain EU country where the display of Soviet flags or songs circa 1945 are currently "verboten," here are your open displays of hostility to your various overlords:

and… 1945 Victory Day Parade, Moscow

In many instances, I have experienced or witnessed, directly or vicariously, many important (and not so important) events that happened over the past many decades. More often than not, I recall these events quite differently than the 'official' record of what transpired, and I took away different lessons than what the 'officials' tell me I should have learned. I tend to trust my own recollection and understanding more than the official ones, as surely as I trust your superior recollections and perceptions, too.

My third point of my story is to understand where we are and how we got here.

It took me three weeks to compose this story about how I almost burned down Berlin. Generally, I write my stories in the margins between this legal matter or another - the stuff I actually do as a lawyer to get by economically. During one particular week of composition, I attended an online 'continuing legal education' seminar about The Rule of Law. The Rule of Law encompasses both the political and the legal system. The seminar was about how lawyers like me have a duty to be goodwill ambassadors to uphold the legal system to the general public. The speakers at this particular event were all senior and highly respected law professors and judges.

They did not invite me to speak.

The seminar seemed to me rather like a sermon. The speakers polemicized about the urgent need to restore an orthodox catechism of institutional faith among the people. We are approaching a Constitutional Crisis, the speakers gravely intoned. They simultaneously denied their political partisanship while implying that this crisis has suddenly appeared during the current administration. They bemoaned the people's loss of faith in the Rule of Law and the dire consequences sure to follow.

It sounded rather like Fyodor Dostoevsky's parable of "The Grand Inquisitor" (the story within the story of The Brothers Karamazov): the "miracle, mystery and authority" of the True Religion of the Rule of Law, with juristic mumbo-jumbo and gravitas, must lead the ignorant masses with the illusions of impartial fairness, equality and speedy justice for all. The speakers thus exhorted the various orders of ordained lawyers to renew their oaths of office, to engage in a professional crusade to restore our ostensibly exceptional American Rule of Law that, in the professional obedience schools for lawyers, we were trained to ingest, digest and regurgitate.

I am no fan of Donald Trump, who, I am convinced, is a cartoonish, narcissistic, and proudly uninformed political bullshitter. For the next four years, he will strut and bloviate and beat up weaker folks for the sake of political imaging, as all presidents have done. And then (if he does not accidentally provoke a nuclear war) he will disappear.

Mr. Trump, however, is no more a constitutional crisis than his predecessor and every president before that since the Constitution was ratified in 1790. America's "constitutional crisis" began at the instant the country was born. In fact, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights have been so trimmed or selectively ignored over the years that we might as well have had no written constitution at all. Ergo, our Rule of Law seminar which urged unquestioning fealty among the lawyer class to the Holy Texts (as interpreted, of course, by its high priests in robes or at the pulpits of law school or in the hallowed halls of political office).

The original "documents" that heralded the new American republic were steeped in fine Enlightenment theory: equality, democracy, education, understanding, opportunities for all, self awareness, and individual rights and liberties. But since then, by and large, all branches of government have given the Enlightenment excited lip service and then blithely tossed much of it aside, depending on the politics of the moment and the interests of the ruling class. Alas, the priesthood of the Rule of Law has a checkered and frequently ignoble history.

This is not news even though it jars our patriotic sensibilities. But ask someone whose ancestors were slaves what he or she thinks of The Rule of Law. Or ask Native Americans. Or immigrants from Palestine, China, Japan, the Philippines, or Mexico. Ask any protester against war, apartheid, genocide; or any proponent of civil rights, who is vilified in the press as a "terrorist." Or any poor American, any woman activist. Ask any university student with a student visa arrested and deported for having voiced a dissenting opinion. And ask anyone who has suffered the debilitating cost, the ponderously slow procedural rituals, and the contorted, untimely and unsatisfactory resolutions that favor the rich and the powerful and that mock anyone not rich nor powerful. Many of whom you ask might well consider the Rule of Law a bad joke and our political system a charade.

The seminar on the Rule of Law that I attended was not an isolated event within the Washington State Bar. It appears to be part of a nationwide orchestrated campaign - rather like the companion campaign to stamp out dissenting opinions in social media and on the web - to reestablish the public's faith in the System consistent with the official narrative... even as the lay public's faith in that official narrative is fraying.

I have seen and experienced and understood too much to want to crusade for the American version of "the Rule of Law" for I have, myself, joined the ranks of the faithless. I know well enough how to navigate the chutes and ladders, what secret shibboleths to speak, and when to invoke the magic spells of the process. But I cannot say, with a straight face, that our legal and political systems are the best or the wisest or the fairest system for social order. We make the best of them we can because they are what we've got. But we should strive for something better, not try to market old clunkers like used car salesmen.

Twas ever thus, says R. Crumb's Mr. Natural: the various institutional systems of Law and Government serve their primary functions of advancing the economic interests of the ruling class and the status quo. Whatever is left to the general public is just the proverbial lipstick on a pig.

Or lipstick on a wild boar.

Which is how I almost burned down Berlin. Or, rather, it is how NOT having burned down Berlin, a strange, twisty path has led from high school to now, yours truly, a venerable member of the Bar who thinks that we should all learn and improve, teach and share from our experiences, not just venerate ossifying institutions.

Happy Victory Day, friends, compagni and Kameraden. Or in the vernacular of the Wild Boar: Schnooorrrrchhhxx!

* * * * *

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In a move that took Roman Catholics by surprise, the Vatican's Conclave of Cardinals was locked out of Saint Peter's Basilica instead of being locked in while they considered who to choose as the new pontiff.

Overnight, the DOGE-DOVE Department of Vatican Efficiency had fired all of the Conclave members charged with electing the next pope. They were unable to access the Vatican parking garage, their security passes had been deactivated and their authorization to use the executive elevators had been revoked. Cardinals pro tempore Bibi Netanyahu, Elon Musk, J.D. Vance, Kristi Noem, Scott Bessent, Marco Rubio, Pam Bondi, and Pete Hegseth entered the Basilica through a secret postern gate after which, on the first ballot, the Cardinals pro tempore unanimously elected President Trump as Pope Donald I.

Gold smoke poured forth from the chimney along with thousands of hundred dollar bills that floated down to the crowd.

"Make God Great Again!" Cheered the throng of ecstatic MAGODGA supporters gathered in St. Peter's Square. "Rendere dio di nuovo grande!" chanted the faithful.

"Dov'è il gabinetto?" shouted the multitude.

"Vaffanculo!!" screamed the many.

"I'm not surprised," said President (and now Pope) Donald Trump while holding an impromptu news conference on the first tee of his Florida golf course. "I mean, there really wasn't any other candidate worth voting for, was there? I might not even be a Catholic, but I've talked with God my entire life and He's always asking me for advice about this deal or other. I've even got enhanced communication with God using Elon Musk's low orbit satellite telecom subsidiary, GodLink.

"Plus, I'm very, very humble. There are about 1.4 billion practicing Catholics in the world and I've got ten times that many followers on social media, so it's a perfect fit. I know all about a 'Hail Mary' from watching NFL Football. I know all about bulls, even the papal type of bull, and I really know how to sling it. And, of course, I'm infallible. So, because I'm infallible, I am, literally, the perfect candidate for pope.

"I even speak a little Latin," continued President/Pope Donald Trump as he practiced his golf swing: "... ipso facto, etcetera, O solo mio, tutti frutti, Mama mia, caveat emptor, hasta la vista baby, and e pluribis unum - the great motto on back of the dollar, the greatest currency on Planet Earth!

"Now this Frank guy who came before me, you know, the cross-dresser who used to wear a white dress - he was obviously a nice guy. But he wasn't too very smart.

"So, starting tomorrow," President & Pope Trump concluded, "we're gonna get smarter about how we do the Supreme Being. We're gonna start making some changes. It's gonna be big, it's gonna be really huge."

* * * * *

The very next morning, Pope Don issued his first papal bull: the Holy See was renamed the American Sea and removed to Mar-a-Lago, Florida. Google Maps and MapQuest duly noted the change.

The brand "Pope" was copyrighted, trademarked and converted into a publicly traded Delaware corporation listed on the New York Stock Exchange. In the words of the new pontiff, "Now everyone can get into the business of buying, selling, trading and saving souls." Pope Global Enterprises, Inc. (NYSE stock ticker symbol POGE) IPO'd at $450/share in early morning trading and shortly thereafter was added to the Dow Jones index of the 30 most profitable companies.

* * * * *

In a second papal bull, Pope Don issued the following edicts:

1. 2,500 % levies have been immediately imposed on all masses, bishop miters and communion wafers that aren't 100% certifiably Prayed in America.

According to Pope Don, "All this stuff about the 'masses' and 'helping the poor' and 'blessed be the peacemakers' and 'love thy neighbor' and 'feed the poor' and 'communion' and banning merchants and money changers from the Temple... well, all that nonsense is pure socialism right out of the Chinese Communist Party playbook. So, from now on, we want our prayers to be Prayed in America, by Americans and for Americans, because there's only one God, and He's American and a businessman. And like the America First Commandment says, you will have no other Marxist or Socialist gods before Capitalism, and no other currencies before the Almighty Dollar!"

2. All Chinese, all illegal immigrants, all North Koreans, all Iranians, all Palestinians, everyone from Yemen, any woman who wears a head covering and every man who wears a black and white keffiyeh, all foreign born university enrollees, everybody with a student or temporary work visa, and everyone who ever voted for Joe Biden or Kamala Harris, all of these people will be immediately deported from Heaven - if they're already dead, that is. And they're banned from ever entering into Heaven, if they're not... yet... dead.

We're also going to privatize Heaven and Hell turn them into commercial enterprises. We're not only gonna save souls, we're gonna make them worth saving!

Heaven - well, that's obviously a Trump International Resort with showgirls and swimming pools and championship golf courses and umbrella drinks and lots of servants and room service and air conditioned rooms, just like the Resort we're gonna build in Gaza.

And Hell? Well, Hell's like where all you Heaven-deportees are going to go, you know, one of those Terrorism Confinement Centers in El Salvador. Or, maybe, San Francisco, if you've been really, really bad!

3. From now on and for all Eternity, there is only one language of God. That language is American English. No more Latin or Greek mumbo-jumbo. If you want to talk to God, and if you want Him to pay the least amount of attention to you, you better learn how to talk to Him in God's own American English with cash in hand. The Gospels were all written in American. Just like the Constitution.

And remember: God's a "HIM!" He's not a "her" or an "it" or any number of gender-bender whatevers. So, if you talk to God and you use one of those "woke" pronouns, you can just fuhgeddaboudit! Probably gonna smite you with some kinda lightning bolt or whatever! Or is that Zeus who does that kind of smiting with lightening bolts?

4. The symbols of the Church are all wrong. We're getting rid of that white dove flying around all over the place. The new way to give people the bird is the Bird of Gold, the American Gold Eagle, the greatest bird on Heaven and Earth, instead of some shit-hole dove pooping all over the place.

And that cross! Gimme a break! It's gotta be a big golden dollar sign, just like the one I'm wearing in the "official" mug shot of me, Pope Don I, shown above. We're going to be a religion of success, a real prosperity theology! Because nothing succeeds like success and everyone loves a winner. Even God! The poor are absolutely NOT blessed! Poor people are LOSERS! You show me a poor person who feels blessed and I've got a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you! Get real all you lambs and sheeple! You can bleat about being shepherded by some crook who says you should give to charity... or you can take words of wisdom from a really good investment advisor and make a lot of beautiful money.

Blessed are the super-wealthy!

5. The name of Vatican City immediately will be changed to America City. St. Peter's Square will be redeveloped as a NASCAR race track. Disney will get a franchise to create a Holy Land Amusement Park with a Gates of Hell House of Horrors, purgatory roller coaster rides and a lot of costumed people walking around as saints, apostles, martyrs, and Walt Disney cartoon characters like Minnie Mouse and Snow White and Daffy Duck before they all got "woke," took vows of abstinence, and transubtantiated themselves into trans-mice, gender-blended princes and princesses and total Loony Tunes.

All of this goofy baroque and rococo decoration is also gonna have to change. All the butt-naked little cherubim are out! What is this, some kind of pedo-land run by Jeffrey Epstein? And the paintings, too, are going to be redone to get with the times, including that artsy-fartsy stuff on the chapel ceiling by that slacker Mike Angelo, or whatever:

6. There will be no more cross-dressing in the naves: men will dress like men wearing pin-stripe suits, button down white collar shirts with blue or red or yellow neckties. Sackcloth and hair shirts are definitely out! Nuns will wear short skirts or two piece swim suits, high heels, carry Louis Vuitton purses and wear smoked lens sunglasses. Skinhead and similar tonsured looks are banned forevermore! Nobody will be ordained as a priest unless they've been bar mitzvahed, and can prove that they've got the right junk.

7. And, while I'm at it, I'm gonna impose another 10,000% tariff on everything made in China because they still haven't kissed my papal ass ring!

* * * * *

One day later, the Vatican at Mar-a-Lago announced that Elon Musk will be the Pope's Papal Nuncio. According to Pope Don: Mr. Musk, having fathered more kids than anyone can count, knows a lot about this Holy Fathering stuff. And he also knows about cost-cutting to make access to God more efficient, less wasteful and more business-friendly.

Accordingly, the DOGE-DOVE Department of Vatican Efficiency has decreed that all of the Church's monasteries and convents will be closed and converted into hotels, casinos, nuclear power reactors, shoe factories, and Bitcoin mines. The practice of simony will be revived in order to generate more apostolic revenue. Seventy-five percent of all parish churches will be sold to developers to be converted into luxury condominiums, manufacturing centers and office buildings.

Fork in the road: all monks and nuns will be asked to submit an email to their abbots and mothers superior detailing at least five secular things that they accomplished in the preceding week, with a cc to The Manager. Those monks and nuns who fail to accomplish this task - even those who have taken vows of eternal silence - will be summarily fired and thrown to the lions.

DOGE-DOVE furthermore announced that the Vatican's Swiss Guard will be completely modernized. Gone are the clunky medieval halberds and steel breastplates. They will be replaced with American made M16s, olive drab battle fatigues and Kevlar body armor.

Indulgences will again be available for sale in the papacy of the new pope. Personally tailored sin-absolution can charged to your digital wallets. From now on, prayers will be by appointment only and subject to prepayment of a small service fee.

* * * * *

On the third day of the reign of Pope Donald I, he issued more Bull, including a vow to stage a military parade at St. Marks every Christmas Day in order to present a more muscular, more authoritative image of God's Vicar on Earth. Pope Don said that "the military parade is meant to demonstrate that when I issue Bull, you better do what I say, OR ELSE!"

Additionally, the name of Saint Peters Basilica will be changed to Adam Smith's Capitalist Cathedral. Instead of leaving crutches and other symbols of miraculous healings, the faithful will be encouraged to buy stock in big pharmaceutical companies, drop off empty vials of medication or just leave money, preferably by debit card charged directly to their spiritual accounts.

The new Pope Don also promised to resume the Inquisition... starting with American universities: any professor, administrator or student who denies the infallibility of Israel, Donald Trump, Benjamin Netanyahu or equates the ethnic cleansing of Gaza, Palestine, Syria and Lebanon with genocide will be excommunicated, tried for heresy, convicted and burned at the stake, just like Giordano Bruno and similar folks who deny that the Sun revolves around the Earth or that the Earth spins around America.

Henceforth, according to the new Pope Donald, the faithful will be required to render up to Caesar what is Caesar's. Full Stop.

Under the new gospel of Don, confessional booths will be converted to business centers that celebrate the art of the deal. The confessional booths will be a place where corporate sins can be reorganized in Chapter 11 moral bankruptcies and discharged in full. Confessionals will allow penitents to download their sinful acts and thoughts and post them to social media for everyone everywhere to rate them thumbs up/thumbs down.

Elon Musk's GodX will send subscribers media alerts that let them know to check their in-boxes for sacred messages.

True believers will be offered a Wi-Fi connection that sends the faithfuls' supplications directly to the prayer fulfillment center in the sky - delivery guaranteed within 3 hours with Halo Prime Membership. The faithful will also be offered one-click acts of penance - just press a button and you're absolved of original ... and not-so-original... sins (by clicking here, you acknowledge having read and agreed to the Terms of Salvation available in tiny Latin at the Cathedral website).

The IOG (Internet of God) will connect you and your transgressions 24/7 to the Supreme Being in the Cloud, collecting all your thoughts and deeds in a single digital file for oversight and review by an artificially intelligent Saint Peter-bot relocated to the NSA who will predict your chances of getting into Paradise or the Guantanamo Bay Detention Camp as well as monitoring your heart-beat, fat burn-rate, and the number of Friends you have in Heaven (and Hell).

Instead of holy water, the blessed will henceforth be sprinkled with petroleum: Drill baby drill!

All cathedrals will now include sponsored advertisements in their stained glass windows and will be required to use Coca Cola baptismal water.

Autonomous self-driving robo-priests, made and sold by a Tesla-Vatican joint venture, will roll out to your home delivering sacred wine and ketamine wafers along with homilies and sermon-packages crafted specially for your personal salvation (or damnation, as the case might be).

* * * * *

On the fourth day of the papacy of Pope Don I, a schism arose. The Democratic National Committee declared that the election of Pope Don was flawed. A new conclave of cardinals consisting of Neo-imperialists from the EU, Germany, France and Great Britain, as well as Nancy Pelosi, Kathy Hochul, Cory Booker, Michael Bloomberg, Chuck Schumer and Gavin Newsom, secretly met behind closed doors and elected themselves as a Pope Collective. The Pope Collective denied the legitimacy of the so-called usurper Pope Don I (who, in a fit of Trump Derangement Syndrome, the Pope Collective decried as Satan incarnate). The neoliberal Pope Collective then issued apocalyptic decrees, anathema and edicts denouncing Pope Don's denial of Science, his refutation of Gender Affirming Medical Care, his failure to fully and forever fund environmentally friendly, carbon-free war against Russia, and his lack of support for preferred pronouns.

However, the neoliberal Pope Collective, in most other and significant regards, wholly subscribed to Pope Don's political-economic orthodoxy including: the One True Religion of Capitalism; the anathematization of Palestinians; the primacy of Wall Street; the charade of democracy; and rendering just about everything unto Caesar.

The world congregation consisting of all other plant, animal, viral, microbial and alien life on Earth, felt utterly disgusted and hopelessly confused by the self-serving bickering between the multiple Popes. They completely tuned out, dropped out, and turned on... their cell phones to play games and watch TikTok videos.

God yawned.

Damn, He/She/They/It said (speaking to Him/Her/Their/Itself). I think we're gonna have to wipe the slate clean and start all over again. Maybe with octopuses or intelligent cockroaches? Whatever - right now, I think I’ll have a beer and watch that rerun of "Leave it to Beaver" on TV.

Hmm. Maybe I'll just let the human beans wipe themselves out along with everything else. That will save Myself the bother.

Yeah, that sounds like a plan. Sounds like a plan.

* * * * *

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Donald Trump has described his economic policies as a form of medicine. As a fantasist who imagines himself a 19th Century business tycoon, Mr. Trump's economic cure for what ails America closely resembles that century's cure for syphilis: large doses of mercury.

The United States has, for too long, treated the world as a bordello where everyone can be screwed and everything is for sale. Out of fear, poverty and desperation, everyone else, for too long, has acquiesced to that type of abusive relationship.

"Greatness" as conceived by Mr. Trump, is the United States competing as an apex abuser among other nation-state abusers; and he, as President, is the abuser-in-chief. In his world view there are no truths, no ideals, no laws, no ethics, no morals, no paths to enlightenment, no progress, no social contract (à la Margret Thatcher's 1987 comment that "there is no such thing as society"), and no possibility of civilizational advancement - only a succession of meretricious relationships established in a brutal dog-eat-dog power struggle that is, in Thomas Hobbes' assessment, "nasty, brutish, and short."

The Trump remedy for what ails America - aggressive tariffs, sanctions and mafia bullying - will, more than likely, kill rather than cure the patient. Just like the 19th Century "cure" for syphilis.

I apologize to the select few who subscribe to this SubStack site. I originally intended it to be a platform for short stories, novels, sober commentary, music, parody and satire. But as it turned out, our 21st Century has metamorphosed into self-parody. The auto-satirization of our times have simply overwhelmed many of my attempts at sobriety, humor and fiction.

Francis Fukuyama fatuously claimed that the triumph of "liberal democracy" in the 20th Century meant the literal "End of History." Karl Marx knew better. Contrasting the 1848 French Revolution and the 1789 French Revolution, Marx observed that "Geschichte wiederholt sich, zuerst als Tragödie, dann als Farce."1

So are we in the tragic or the farcical stage of history?

Probably both simultaneously.

Whether you are chuckling or crying depends, of course, on whether you are among those rounded up, beaten or killed. Ask the college students at Columbia University, at Harvard and at the University of Washington who are being arrested, prosecuted and deported merely for opposing Israeli and American policies of genocide. Ask the survivors in Gaza, in Palestine, in Syria and in Yemen. They might have a different opinion whether we are in the tragic or the farcical stages of history. Or, whether Mr. Trump represents the triumph or the decay of the Euro-American 500 year run of global parasitism.

Mr. Trump's persona accurately reflects the anti-intellectual streak that runs through all of America's relatively short and definitely not-so-great history. That's to be expected from a man who is proudly undereducated and ahistorical.

His personality has no moral keel and he changes tack repeatedly. Sometimes Mr. Trump acts like a trash-talking, opponent-taunting TV wrestler who ignores the referees and fights dirty. Other times, he plays the role of Al Capone qua Hollywood Wild West sheriff theatrically shooting "bad guys" at the OK Corral. Too often, he is simply like a petulant ten year old throwing a temper tantrum.

Contrary to Mr. Trump's narrative, tariffs can serve a useful purpose. Tariffs permit an underdeveloped people to become developed, to gain the benefits of civilization.

Let's take a brief journey to America's beginnings. Tariffs - otherwise known as import duties - were one of the reasons for the American War of Independence from Great Britain. Trade policy also strongly contributed to the onset of the American Civil War. The point of the American War of Independence was to emancipate - no, not the slaves - but the manufacturers in New England from the competition of cheap British manufactured goods. Import duties were imposed in the new American republic to give the nascent industries a chance to develop within domestic markets. On the other hand, the southern states were agricultural. They depended on slave labor to grow large quantities of commodities primarily traded with England... in exchange for English manufactured goods.

Although slavery was abolished within England itself in 1838, its industrialists had no qualms about profiting from the slave labor employed elsewhere, such as in the American South. Or, later, in the Confederate States of America. For that reason, British foreign policy tilted heavily in favor of the Confederacy during the American Civil War and came very close to an outright military alliance with it.

In the colonial model refined by the British Empire in the 18th Century, the 'homeland' was the locus of industry and high technology. The colonies existed to provide raw materials to the Empire. Some colonies (like Ireland) were forced by starvation to export humans to labor in the English sweatshops. Others were literally expelled from the old English Commons to work in the urban factories. This, in part, was the subject of Friedrich Engels' 1845 book, The Condition of the Working Class in England. Engels' described large commercial centers with heaps of poor people crammed into "affordable housing," the destruction of cottage industry so that workers could be herded into centralized workshops (read: ‘work from home’ versus work in the downtown office towers), the industrial exploitation of women, the destruction of the family and the atomized isolation of individual workers in the big cities. What Engels described in Victorian England resembles 21st Century life in urban America and Western Europe.

The Trump administration sees the world in the same way as the 19th Century British imperialists. Manufacturing must be done in America. The function of the rest of the world is to export to America cheap raw materials... and to remain "undeveloped" and poor. This, the gentleman says, will Make America Great Again.

It is actually simply a policy of "beggar thy neighbor."

About 25 years ago, 50,000 protesters assembled in Seattle and shut down the annual meeting of the World Trade Organization. At that time - November 30 to December 2, 1999 - "free trade" was the mantra of both the Republican and Democrat Parties. "Free Trade," of course, meant nothing more than the freedom of capital to go wherever it wanted to go in pursuit of profit.

Generally, that meant that American corporations wanted to move their industrial base out of the United States in order to take advantage of 1) low wage, non-union labor, 2) loose or non-existent environmental regulation, and 3) loose or non-existent workplace safety laws. To make more money on their off-shore enterprises, American plutocrats lobbied for lower U.S. tariffs. That would make it more profitable to manufacture goods in Asia and South America and ship them into the United States. The quid pro quo, they argued to a gullible American public, was lots of "stuff," lots of imported "cheap goods."

The blather today about how China "stole our jobs" is, therefore, just blather.

Mr. Trump's criticism of China as "proud" is misinformation. China has earned the right to be proud. Before the Communist Revolution, China was a playground for western imperialism and a dumping ground for opium deliberately imported by Great Britain to create addiction. The West intentionally imported addictive drugs into China to create a demand for something to exchange.

The trade relationship with China that Mr. Trump idealizes is precisely that of pre-Revolution China: an impoverished, debased, drug-addled, subject people laboring for Western industrialists with womens' feet bound and men forced to wear the Manchu queue and shaved forehead of subordination.

This explains Mr. Trump's extraordinary hostility to socialist China. China is where the colonialists were successfully expelled just 75 years ago and where the people were led from shoe-less poverty into economic success that rivals the West. The China that succeeded was led by revolutionary socialists.

The difference between a capitalist state and a socialist state is simple. In a socialist state, the people own the government which tells the large corporations, the investors and plutocrats what to do for the benefit of the people who own the government. In a capitalist state, the large corporations, the investors and plutocrats own the government, and they tell the government what to do for the benefit of the large corporations, the investors and plutocrats who own the government.

It is, thus, not China's alleged "unfair trade" that capitalist supremo Mr. Trump detests. He detests China's successful socioeconomic alternative to the parasitic western model.

Mr. Trump envisions today the same 19th Century colonial world order for China as for all of Asia, Africa and Eastern Europe.

He sees Western Europe as simply a troop of trained poodles who will follow orders and eat table scraps. His world vision, such as it is, will further degrade America's MAGAs, too, as in the headpiece photograph of mill town Johnston, Pennsylvania at the top of this essay, when America was, supposedly, “great.”

At a recent political event, Mr. Trump boasted about his tariff plans: “I’m telling you, these [foreign] countries are calling us up, kissing my ass. They are dying to make a deal: ‘Please, please sir, make a deal. I’ll do anything, I’ll do anything sir.’”

How gauche! How incredibly insulting! How like a Roman emperor lording it over conquered peoples!

Just like syphilis, American industry brought the ills of globalization on itself. If anything, Mr. Trump would like to return the hard, dirty, environmentally toxic factories to America where the newly unemployed (the army of surplus labor) will again will be forced to work... hard, dirty, environmentally toxic and low-paying jobs. Mr. Trump sees profitable loveliness in strip mining of the seas and mountains, smoke-belching smoke stacks, logging of the forests, and resort hotels that despoil Nature's natural beauty.

He calls that making America great again.

I call it returning us to the bad old days of robber barons industrialists, sweatshops and the dangerous factory floors that my grandparents' generation and yours fought hard to escape.

I do not practice bankruptcy law, but I know enough about it to be dangerous.

In the business world, bankruptcy is just another business tool, a normal part of the ebb and flow of profit. Chapter 11 Reorganization under the U.S. Bankruptcy Code is, basically, a way for corporations to stick it to their creditors. Mr. Trump does understand Chapter 11 bankruptcy and he does understand how to "stick it" to people.

Prior to becoming President, Mr. Trump bankrupted six separate businesses. What can he do for an encore? For an encore, he can bankrupt the entire world... in every sense of the word "bankrupt."

Tariffs are simply a tax - a tax paid by all of us. The industrialized world has already tried the high tariffs, protectionist trade policies of Mr. Trump. They failed, abjectly. They led directly to the Great Depression. The Great Depression led directly to World War. World War brought the world out of the Great Depression only to set the stage for more economic imbalances that led to more protectionism, which led to inflation and more colonialism, another economic depression. And more war. This is insanity.

Insanity for all of us, of course; not those who profit from the endlessly destructive cycle.

Mr. Trump is a complete agnostic when it comes to morality and ethics. He is a prophet of profit. Nothing else.

Notwithstanding his professions of peace-making (when running for election), Mr. Trump is a violent and temperamental war-monger, an apex bully who likes to taunt, sucker-punch and humiliate anyone who opposes him. A junkyard dog. A mafia don. I've litigated with opposing counsel like that. And I've beaten and outlived them.

Unfortunately, the Democrats in our two-party system serve the same interests as the Republicans. The Democrats are fundamentally no better than Mr. Trump except that they talk nicer. If the MAGA philosophy is callow, the Democrats' "Hands Off" campaign is no less so. It is just the same pablum as Joe Biden/Kamala Harris 's "I'm not Trump" rhetoric, reheated left-overs full of fat and empty calories. Thus, about the best the Democrats can do is to pile on support for... no, not university students who are being gagged and deported; not Palestinians whose homeland is repeatedly wasted by Israel in preparation for Trump-style golf resorts... but in support of CIA cut-outs like USAID, imperial NATO, and global law firms like Perkins Coie.

Even the supposedly non-partisan Washington State Bar Association has jumped on the Democratic Party bandwagon. I mean, really folks! With so much evil and injustice in the world, the cause that America's bar associations rally around is... a 1,000+ global law firm with deep lobbying ties, giant corporate clients and insider influence around the globe?

Meanwhile.

President Trump who has bankrupted six companies in his business career is determined to do something even more spectacular for an encore.

As his legacy, he is going to bankrupt the world - morally, politically and ethically.

It's gonna be really big. It's gonna be huge. It's not gonna be fun.

* * * * *

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How do you sneeze in outer space? 
Can you Aaaaahhhhh-chooo in zero gravity
Without a jet propelled calamity?
How do you sneeze in outer space?
Just asking for a friend.

And what happens if I have to cough?
I'm wearing gloves; a helmet, too. 
Would I need inside visor wipers
To clean off all the phlegmy goo?
How do space travelers cough?

I ask these silly questions now
As all of us consider how
We'd like to get away from Earth
And all of its calamity,
Here, where there's 1 G gravity.

But if I can't make it into space 
Some others of the human race
(Perhaps not voluntarily...)
Should be sent forevermore
To some very distant galaxy.

I've got a list - you know the ones:
The plutocrats and politicians;
The ones who lie and boast and bully,
Who tell a twisted capitalist story,
About making money and warrior glory -
Let's ship them all to Alpha Centauri!

A tariff here, a sanction there,
Tariffs and sanctions everywhere;
It's economics odd and eerie:
A wacko Nietzschean Übermensch theory
That profits upper ruling classes
And kicks us all flat on our asses.
How do we get out of here?

And that's why I ask,
(Just for a friend, you understand)
How do you sneeze in outer space?
In case I leave the human race,
In search of some more enlightened place
Of social beings much more rational,
And not obsessed with triumphs national.
How do you sneeze in outer space?

* * * * *

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To: All Government Employees Everywhere

Date: Now and Then

Fm: Department of Government Efficiency

Re: Please reply to this mail with approx. 5 bullets of what you accomplished last week and cc your manager.

* * * * *

Fm: Albert Einstein

Date: 1905

To: Department of Government Efficiency

Guten Tag, Herr Doge.

You are sure you wanna write to me from Washington? I mean, I'm here. You're over there, right? I mean, are you guys some kinda rocket scientists, or what? Ja?

Because, you know, I do work for government, but it's Swiss government, not yours. In the patent office, na und?

But, anyway, it was a kinda slow week, this last one, at the Swiss Patent Office in Bern. You know, the usual Meshuggeneh wanting to patent, you know, somethink, like, that they invented the wheel or whatever. Or the shovel. Or somethink like that. Very clever Volk, ja? Ha ha ha! So, yes, Herr Doge, it was kinda slow. But I keep myself busy, even though, ahem, it wasn't, you know, exactly government business.

So, what exactly did I accomplish last week, you wanna know? Well, it was sort of an Annus Mirabilis crammed into eine Woche, I guess.

Okay. First, I publish a paper on da photoelectric effect. I think I get a Nobel prize for dat one. So dat was on Monday. Then I published anudder paper on Brownian Motion dat, you know, dat proved dat atoms exist. No biggee, but maybe it was, so dey say. So dat was Tuesday.

And den I publish a paper on special relativity. I dunno, dat was probably Wednesday, maybe. You know, I'm not too good wid dates and numbers. Time and space is always kind of confusing for me.

So, like, maybe on Friday, I think, I published a fourth paper, a little something dat explained the mass-energy equivalence which I kinda doodled out in shorthand as E = mc². Explosive stuff, somebody said, relatively speaking. But what do I know? Am I some kind of Einstein? (Ha ha - that's a joke, Herr Doge! Verstehst du?)

So dat's, kinda, pretty much it. Maybe you should read da papers I wrote, okay?

Alles gute and best to the kids. All of them. And der mudders, too.

Al Einstein

* * * * *

To: Albert Einstein

Date: 1905

Fm: Department of Government Efficiency

Dear Mr. Einstein.

It is clear that you are some of the government deadwood that we need to get rid of. Please clean out your office and return the key for your roll top desk. You're fired!

* * * * *

Fm: Marcel Proust

Date: 1922

To: Department of Government Efficiency

Bonjour Monsieur Doggy-chien!

I am well, merci, and thank you so much for asking about me.

What did I accomplish last week? Well, not much, mon ami, I am sorry to say. Because I was home on extended sick leave. Just lying about in bed all the day and the night. I have such a light sensitivity (I am a very, sensitive kind of guy, you know); and also, merde, such horrible insomnia. Cannot sleep a wink! Not a wink!

So, Monsieur le Chien, while lying in bed all day I write a little book just reminiscing about times past, like mostly when I was a kid growing up and eating lots of cookies. You like our madeleines, Monsieur le Chien? À la recherche du temps perdu, that's what I called this book. Remembrance of Things Past. Very French and very wordy, you know! You know, Monsieur Chien, we French don't work too hard, but we really like to talk! Just like Mr. Emmanuel Macron! Blah blah blah... Ça va?

But these cookies are quite good, they are, tres bien! Hmm mmm! So one thing leads to another: I ate a cookie (maybe there was a little something extra in that cookie, like some magic mushroom spoors peut-être...???) and, what do you know, the lights were spinning and all, and the next thing, it's amazing, I traveled a bit down memory lane (Aha ha! Or did I travel down Swann's Way? Ha ha!)... and, voilà, I had written this seven volume novel. So, oui, Monsieur, that's it. That's about all I did last week. Unless, maybe... I forgot something! Get it? À la recherche du temps perdu! Aha ha ha!

Love to all and all and all!

Mark Proust

* * * * *

To: Marcel Proust

Date: 1922

Fm: Department of Government Efficiency

Dear Mr. Proust.

Eating and sleeping on the job is prohibited. You are fired. Please clean out your office tout de suite!

* * * * *

Fm: Julius Caesar

Date: 44 BC

To: Department of Government Efficiency

Bonjourno, Signor Doge!

Molte gracie for getting in touch! Yes, for sure, it was quite a week! A battle here, a conquest there, a coup d'etat, a little palace intrigue! But, veni vidi vici! You know what I mean? I mean, those people had some kinda Gaul. Capisce? Ha ha!

But seriously, I've been away from Rome and state government for quite a while - at least all of last week, for sure! It takes a bit of time to put down this barbarian revolt or another.

And the traffic jams on the Appian Way - brutal! Mamma mia! But now that I've crossed the Rubicon, I'm back in the scriptorium again. Yup, gotta dust off the ole parchment scrolls and chat up a few patrician senators. And then I'm going to visit a few vestal virgins hanging out at the temples, if you know what I mean, Mr. Doge, aha ha ha! We also got that little matter of the triumphal parade out of the way and spent some time watching the chariot races over at the Hippodrome.

Matter of fact, I almost forgot - I've got a meeting at the Senate this afternoon that I've got to attend to. Brutus and some of his boys are going to submit some kind of petition or other, along with some pizza that we all can share for dinner. That's what Brutus told me: they'll all gonna bring their dinner knives so they can cut up the pizza. Or maybe he said they were going to cut up the Caesar? Nah, you don't need a knife for a Caesar salad! That makes no sense. But it was something like that.

So that's it! That's what I did last week. So, unless something happens to mess things up, I should be working full time on government business again starting around, oh, the Ides of March.

Tootle loo - that's Japanese for sayonara, you know!

XOXOX

Jules, Caesar, pro tempore

* * * * *

To: Julius Caesar

Date: 44 BC

Fm: Department of Government Efficiency

Dear Mr. Caesar:

By last week, you were supposed to have returned to full time work at the office. You are terminated as of the Ides of March. Please return your keys to the Coliseum vomitorium and turn in your official government toga. Make sure you dry-clean it to remove any blood stains.

* * * * *

Fm: Dorothea Lange

Date: 1933

To: Department of Government Efficiency

Good afternoon, Mr. Doge,

I have been out of the office a lot. I've been taking photographs, mostly of poor people, mostly of farmers and farm families - men, women, children, babies - all displaced by the Great Depression and the Dust Bowl. These are people who are hungry; people living marginal lives in a state of absolute misery and despair.

I've also taken a lot of photos in the cities - especially photos of workers who have lost their jobs, people who are unemployed, destitute people in bread lines, people who are completely down on their luck and starving on the streets. Kind of like how I think the mean streets of 2025 will look like one day.

My photographs are a documentary of the class differences in American society and the ills of capitalism. But did I take those pics this week or the week before? Well, I really can't say for sure.

In the course of my work, I also ran across others memorializing the reality of our world, like Sanora Babb. While I was taking pictures, Ms. Babb was working in the Farm Security Administration camps in California with her supervisor, Tom Collins. In fact, John Steinbeck's novel The Grapes of Wrath borrowed heavily from - if not outright plagiarized - Babb's field notes and stories that formed the basis of her own Dust Bowl refugee novel, Whose Names Are Unknown. No one would publish Babb's novel after The Grapes of Wrath became a best-seller and stole her thunder. Between you and me, Babb's book is actually a lot better written and with more authentic characters than what Steinbeck wrote.

But, if you want to know what I specifically accomplished last week, and only last week, then I am sorry: I really cannot point to one - let alone five - things that I accomplished specifically last week! I mean, I have taken hundreds and hundreds of photographs. Do they count? I think I've accomplished a lot by focusing on the lives and misfortunes of so many people whose terrible fate needs our compassion, our understanding and our support. After all, almost every photograph I have taken is on file with the Smithsonian Institute and with the Library of Congress. Is that accomplishment enough, Mr. Doge?

* * * * *

To: Dorothea Lange

Date: 1933

Fm: Department of Government Efficiency

Dear Ms. D. Lange:

Because you were unable to verify five things that you accomplished last week, you are immediately fired. You can now become an itinerant fruit picker or join the breadlines and the ranks of the unemployed who you are so fond of photographing. Good luck and hasta la vista!

* * * * *

Fm: Volodymyr Zelensky

Date: 2025

To: Department of Government Efficiency

Hey, Mr. Doge! It's me! Remember me? It's Vlod! I used to be one of America's favorites, remember? Do you really not remember all the things I accomplished?

I mean, okay, so I can't account for half a trillion dollars in aid money. So people forget things. Happens all the time, you know? It was a gift, anyway, right? What's a half trillion dollars between friends? I can't pay any of it back, you know, so, like, why don't you just take the money from the Russkies, just like the Brits and the EU are doing, huh?

As for what I accomplished last week? You mean SPECIFICALLY last week? You mean, other than signing off on absolutely everything of value in Ukraine and giving it to you? Just like we're some kinda colony, huh?

Well, last week... I conquered all of Russia! All of it! Yes, absolutely! Nobody knows know it yet, except me; but I did. I really did! Who you going to believe, anyway, ME or those lying Russkies?

Anyway. I was going to be heading to Moscow to accept Pootie's head on a platter. And I also was going to change that silly annual celebration they hold at Red Square to mark when the Soviets defeated Nazi Germany in World War II. But, maybe later. Can you imagine, those dumb Bolsheviks trying to claim that Germany actually invaded the Soviet Union and not the other way around? And, of course, the Nazis were really swell guys, just like all those Nazis working for me in Kiev, right? We all know that, yeah? And all those neo-Nazis in the European Union. What are you, Mr. Doge, some kinda comedian?

Oh. But I'm the comedian. I forgot about that. Ha ha!

But, okay. Back to what I accomplished. Well, I can't lie. Well, I can't lie too much. At least, I can't lie all the time. But we had to, uh, strategically speaking, surrender quite a bit of Ukrainian territory, last week, you know. A few more cities and towns. Just a few more. And, yeah, a whole bunch more NATO tanks and stuff got blown up along with thousands more Ukrainian soldiers. Sure, that was an accomplishment!

But it's just a ruse, just a ruse. And temporary, of course. We've got those Russians right where we want them! Right where we want them! If this war goes on for only another ten or twenty years, I assure you, we're going to win!

That's right, Mr. Doge. If you Americans just give me another hundred trillion dollars or so, plus about a dozen nukes, several aircraft carriers, a couple hundred F35 fighter jets, some nuclear submarines, a few B-52s, and few hundred thousand American soldiers, then everything's gonna be alright. I mean, a hundred trillion dollars is just pocket change, right? Trust me. I mean, you spent 50,000 American soldiers' lives in Vietnam losing that war so why not waste that many now for Ukraine? It's for a good cause, of course. Even though I have no idea what that cause is. But I will, I will. Right after we conquer Russia and I get Pootie's head served to me on a platter, da?

So, uh, you want bullet points of what I did? Hey, Mr. Doge, how'm I gonna give you bullet points if America won't give me any more bullets? Aha ha ha! So that's about it. You give me more bullets... in boxes, I mean, not fired at ME... and I'll give you your bullet points, okay? How's that for a deal?

Love and kisses to all. All my best to the Don (you know, I think he doesn't really like me. What's the problem, eh?).

Your friend, Vlod

* * * * *

To: What's Your Name, General Delivery, Kiev, Ukraine

Date: 2025

Fm: Department of Government Efficiency

Dear What's Your Name.

You're fired. Clean out your doomsday bunker in Kiev and turn in your key to the secret bank deposit box. PS - you still have to repay $500 billion dollars plus late fees, penalties and compound daily interest at 22 1/2%. Our special loan and debt collections officers will see you soon in a dark alley somewhere to explain the terms of repaying your debts.

* * * * *

Fm: God (preferred pronouns: WE/OURS/THEE/THOU)

Date: 2025

To: Department of Government Efficiency

Hello Doge. God here. So, uh, you wanna know what I accomplished last week and to cc my manager? Doh. What manager? I mean, dude, I'm supposed to be the Boss Supremo and all that, so I'm gonna skip the part about cc'ing my manager, okay?

So what did I do last week? Damned if I know! You think I got nothing better to do than to punch a time clock? I'm not some kind of junior associate lawyer billing by the tenth of an hour, you know!

The last time I kept track of working individual days is, like, In The Beginning, okay? So there was this singularity, just this little nothing quantum dot in the void and that was kind of boring. So, ka-boom, I made it all go Bang, a really Big Bang, and then it expanded and all the basic laws of physics started to drop out when the expansion slowed down to around the speed of light and matter stuff started to cool off.

Yeah, I know this expansion thingy is a bit of a scientific cop-out, but you just got to take it on faith that that's what happened. Because, I mean, y'all got any better ideas? No, I didn't think so. So that's why I'm God and you're not. Capisce?

But, good God (not to take my own name in vain, you understand), after that huge Big Bang, everything was just a huge mess. Tohu va-Vohu - that's French for one big mess, okay? So the first thing I did was separate the light from the darkness. Yessir. That's what I did. Day 1.

Now Day 2 took some doing. This whole universe thing, so far, was just as boring as that singularity I talked about. And the whole place didn't have no atmosphere at all, know what I mean? So I created some atmosphere to give the place a little, well, you know, "atmosphere," in a manner of speaking. It was an airy fairy thing at first but, yeah, you want a little atmosphere, you get a little atmosphere. And you don't need to be a weatherman to know which way the wind blows. Very cool.

Then Day 3. What the Devil did I do on Day 3? Oh, right. I thought it would be kinda fun to have a terrarium of sorts, so I made a bunch of dry land and veggies. Yeah, I really like veggies. Green stuff growing all over the place.

Then, lemme see, what'd I do on Day 4? Day 4... Day 4... Day 4... hmm, oh, right: the Sun, the Moon and the Stars!

I said to myself, yo, God, why not have an honest-to-God "light show" here, there and wherever? So that's what I did: a light show up in the sky. Very pretty. Kind of like a mash up of Hawaii by day and Times Square, New York City by night; only there wasn't a Hawaii or a Times Square at that time, but that's what I imagined, so there it was. You get the idea. So, yeah, that's what I did on Day 4.

Day 5? Okay, right. Day 5 I created a bunch of fishes and other flippered things to swim around in the water. Blub blub. But, you know, watching fish trundle around in an aquarium is entertaining - well kind of - but only for so long. So real fast that, too, got really boring. And there's one thing I really, really hate is BORING (you hear that Mr. Doge?).

So, on Day 6 I made a whole bunch of animals, metaphorically speaking, of course. One of those animal types was you'all: you humming beans. I wasn't too sure, you know, about the human part of that creation because, frankly speaking, all of you are really just a bunch of smart asses who need to have your butts kicked now and again.

Hmm, maybe I could'a done better with a computer-designed artificially intelligent robo-human? I dunno - the AI man-machine hybrid might'a had four arms and three rotating heads and a set of wings and five charge-coupled device eyes and tentacles with suckers instead of feet, maybe? Maybe put the intelligent beings on Mars or Jupiter instead of Earth? But, yeah, I gotta do some DeepThink-ing about that. Anyway, that's what I did on the 6th Day.

And then, basta!!

I looked back at what I had created and asked myself: Was it good?

Well, it was, meh... you know... it was just… okay. Maybe next time, I'll get rid of the crapware that doesn't work and create something better. Nobody's perfect, you know. Anyway, like I said, I'll think about it.

So with that I was pooped! I took Day 7 off as a personal holiday to just kind of kick back, smoke some weed, drink a six pack, watch some football on the TV. You know, even God can't work all the time!

So, that's about it, Mr. Doge. I'm not sure exactly what week that was, but That Was The Week That Was. And there you have it: 5 bullet points about my accomplishments, more or less. 'Nuff said.

* * * * *

To: God

Date: 2025

Fm: Department of Government Efficiency

Dear Mr./Ms./Mx. God.

Six days to create the universe? Really? Talk about a slacker! Why couldn't you get it done in five? Did you just want the overtime, the time and a half for the Sixth Day? What d'ya think, God, that the government is just some kind of cash cow? And what's this about taking a day off to "rest." Weekends are a terrible idea when you could be working 24/7!

God - you've got an hour to clean out your desk up there in the Cloud and to turn in your executive elevator card. You're fired!

* * * * *

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It's surreal.

The Seattle neighborhood just to the south of me has introduced a neighborhood subscription service for armed private security services. The program might eventually expand to 24/7 private policing. Laurelhurst, a community comprised of about 1,700 households, offers residents a for-hire company of armed guards. The cost is about $650 per year per subscribing household. My neighborhood employs the same private security firm for roughly the same service.

The company deploys off-duty and retired police officers who provide the security that the City no longer can or will provide.

Centuries ago in Medieval and Renaissance Italy - long before there was an actual unified entity known as "Italy" - city-states hired the Condottiere - experienced soldiers-of-fortune who would recruit, train and deploy mercenary armies on their behalf.

For several years, Seattle neighborhoods have been plagued with car prowls, home burglary, vandalism, auto and mail theft. Crime at the Washington State and local level sometimes suggests a Mad Max movie. Among the more common manifestations of lawlessness are widespread and open drug use; "street takeovers" for car racing, stunts and burn outs; bricks and rocks randomly thrown off overpasses into freeway traffic; gang wars; ubiquitous graffiti; and cars stolen to smash through shop windows in armed robberies. A lot of the violent perpetrators are young. They include all demographics. They talk and act like the thugs they see glorified on television, in the movies, on social media, in professional athletics, in video games, on Wall Street, and in politicians' and Pentagon press conferences.

Based on reported statistics, local leaders deny that there is more crime than before. The statistics are misleading. Many people no longer report incidents. The response time is slow, few are arrested and reporting a crime can adversely affect one's insurance premiums. Just recently, I learned that my homeowner's insurance premium increased 15% in just one year. I have not filed any claims against my policy. Rather, the rate increase is due to the worsened actuarial risk taking into account all of the incidents of theft, vandalism, hooliganism and violence that have occurred throughout the area. My automobile insurance premiums are also rising at the same pace for the same reasons.

According to Washington State law, juveniles caught carrying firearms cannot be incarcerated for more than a month until their fifth weapons related arrest. That's right: a juvenile arrested for illegally carrying a gun cannot be incarcerated for more than a month until after the minor's fifth arrest. The kids and the adult criminals know this. Therefore, "adult criminals" delegate mugging and armed robbery to kids who won't suffer the consequences.

The legislators, in response to this criminal behavior, want to impose more restrictions on... ordinary citizens who legally own guns. Proposed legislation would make the victims of theft criminally liable if the thief commits a crime with a stolen weapon. Whether you do or do not "like" guns, this is stupid. It's like making you criminally responsible if someone else steals your car and uses it to smash into a convenience store to rob it.

While Rome burns, the Washington political class (which perceives itself as a subsidiary of California channeling Scandinavia) diddles and fiddles with micro-issues such as:

• Changing the state flag to make it look more "inclusive" (This is exactly as harebrained as Mr. Trump renaming the Gulf of Mexico!);

• Making it lawful for the homeless and the drug addled to camp on sidewalks, in derelict RVs, in playgrounds and on sidewalks (Rather than address the root educational/economic causes of homelessness and drug abuse);

• Suing the Trump Administration to protect "gender-affirming care" (A mushy turn of phrase that seems to include federal financial support for sex-change surgery for children);

• Making it more difficult to get direct citizen initiatives on the ballot (As if it weren't hard enough already);

• Lowering the threshold for approving school bond levies on real estate (Rather than fully funding schools through the state general fund and making wars funded solely by annual levies on real property);

• Proposing to conduct "re-sentencing hearings" for all criminals who have previously been convicted and sentenced... just in case they have rehabilitated themselves (Notwithstanding a parole board's opposition to a reduction in sentence); and

• Promulgating new restrictions on the installation of wood-burning stoves and fireplaces because, apparently, they want everyone to go electric (Thus supporting the nuclear power industry and allowing more fracked gas to be liquefied and sold at a higher profit to Europe because Europe has cut off its nose by helping to sabotage the importation of cheaper Russian gas).

Not a word out of our state capitol, of course, about... the predations of Wall Street real estate investment funds, the shrinking of the middle and working classes, the overwhelming political clout of certain über-wealthy Washingtonians and their corporate monopolies, or the subsidization of giant, low wage and marginally desirable mega-projects like sports stadiums, tourism, convention centers and airports.

Are the courts and the local politicians insensitive to the victims, more concerned with the rehabilitation of the perpetrator and (superficial) changes to society at large? Are 'they' intentionally creating an environment of social anxiety that makes it easier to control the general population?

The answer to question #1 appears to be damned if I know, but neither do they; and the answer to question #2 appears to be yes... although the 'they' who are intentionally creating an environment of social anxiety is a bit murky. As intended.

Historically speaking, those who have owned everything have run everything; and those who own and run everything, naturally, want to preserve the status quo. It's not an ethnic or a racial or a religious thing. It's a matter of economic class.

For the most part, many so-called Washington "activists," judges and politicians are not talking about substantive socio-economic changes, but the relatively trite, mostly meaningless and cosmetic paint-brushes of "conservative" versus "progressive" policies. Were they engaged in fundamental changes to the educational, policing, economic, health care, justice and social safety nets essential for a proper society, then I would be less annoyed. But what passes for state and local government "taking action" is just so much performative theater, like MacBeth's lament about the meaninglessness of life, strutting and fretting upon the stage, telling idiotic tales, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. It is entertaining. People applaud. And it accomplishes little.

In the five years between 2020-2024, approximately 700 cops have quit the Seattle Police Department. As of 2025, the pace of recruitment - due, in part, to large cash incentives - now barely exceeds the number of officers retiring or moving to other cities.

The Seattle Police Department has been plagued by personal and ethical scandals, including lawsuits alleging discrimination and sexual harassment at the highest level of administration. There have been random acts of police violence perpetuated at street level. As for actual policing, Seattle has implemented a policy to not treat emergency calls as a true emergency without "verifiable evidence of a crime."

Verifiable evidence of a crime? Seriously? Your 911 call will not be deemed an "emergency" unless you have already been knifed or burglarized?

In 2025, three more local stores have closed: the original Burger Master that has operated since 1952; the University Village Bartell drug store; and, most recently, the City People's Mercantile about a block away from me. The Burger Master and City People's Mercantile were Seattle icons and family owned. Bartell Drugs had been locally owned until it was bought out by Rite Aid... which then went bankrupt.

These three businesses closed due to increased operating expenses, higher insurance premiums (assuming that they could have bought insurance at all), higher employment costs, increased taxes, the increasing difficulty of importing inventory from China, rising tariffs that have forced prices higher, frequent burglaries, repeated shoplifting and recreational vandalism.

Inevitably, the structures that leased to these local retailers will be razed and replaced by the tax-subsidized construction of even more apartment buildings in the name of affordable housing. The apartment buildings will be quickly, and poorly constructed and, for the most part, purchased by investors. The units will not be affordable because inflation will always drive up the rent beyond renters' means. No one will want to live in these cramped, cookie-cutter, urban deserts. They might be forced to live in them, however, because all of the old unaffordable dwellings will have been bulldozed to make room for the new unaffordable dwellings.

Meanwhile, in Los Angeles...

... whole neighborhoods have gone up in smoke. Parts of Pacific Palisades almost resemble Gaza after more than a year of Israeli bombardment.

Conservatives and liberals natter about who is to blame for the LA conflagration and what to do about it. That's a partisan debate I will not join. What struck me, however, was the rise of private fire fighters in Southern California, similar to the private police now employed in Seattle.

Some property insurers hire private fire fighters. It can be much less expensive to deploy a private fire brigade to protect a valuable real estate asset than to pay the claim for its destruction. There are also subscription fire fighting companies in California that can be retained on a standby basis.

In some parts of California, you cannot buy home-owners insurance at all. Additionally, the cost of new and refurbished fire-fighting equipment has skyrocketed. Fire trucks have been priced beyond the budgets of American cities, just like new cars have been priced beyond the budgets of middle class families. The price distortion is due to the monopolistic consolidation of the fire truck industry. As the fire-fighting equipment industry contracted into one company, the cost of fire-fighting equipment went through the roof. Consequently, taxpayers got "soaked"... or their cities gave up on buying fire trucks, just as happened in Los Angeles.

Medieval European and early North American cities were mostly made of wood and they frequently burned. Rome, Paris and London burned down many times, always with great loss of life and property. So did Chicago and San Francisco. Not long ago, the ocean-side town of Lahaina on the Hawaiian island of Maui also burned.

Private fire brigades were common through the late 19th Century in the United States. For a price, a property owner could buy a "fire mark" that attached to the wall. In case of a fire, competing troops of fire fighters would rush to the conflagration. Depending on which "fire mark" you displayed, they would either work to extinguish the blaze... or walk away.

Benjamin Franklin recognized that as cities grew larger and more compact, they would have to create, train and fund public fire fighters. Urban fires are not isolated events. If one house catches fire, then the flames can quickly spread to every other house. Private subscription fire companies thus eventually evolved into modern fire departments supported by taxpayers.

As the examples of Seattle and Los Angeles demonstrate, however, the taxpayer funded police and fire models aren't working as intended. Nor is much else.

Something is rotten in the State of Denmark says the character Marcellus in Shakespeare's Hamlet.

The "State" exists to provide the collective framework within which we can live. In his book Leviathan, first published in 1651, Thomas Hobbes observed that the people yield to the State a monopoly of violence - that is to say, the final and absolute authority in matters of life and death - in return for security. It's a quid pro quo between the governed and those who govern them.

However, when the State cannot or will not provide basic security - police services; an expeditious, fair, and credible legal system; a reliable and affordable telecommunications network; fire protection; a non-mythologized, production-based economy based on a money supply that isn't infinitely inflatable - if these security essentials are not provided, then the State loses its legitimacy.

As the State loses its legitimacy, so also does it lose its monopoly of violence.

That's what we see on the streets and in our neighborhoods.

There are few alternatives to the loss of state legitimacy other than brigandage, vigilantism, or secession from society altogether - either as a community (like the Amish) or as an individual (as in the Wild West of the 19th Century). As illustrated in countless dystopian novels and movies, notwithstanding the fables of the tough individualists, these options are not necessarily desirable, especially in atomized modern societies such as our own. As shown by recent DOGE revelations about the current rot of the "State of Denmark," it is also not easy to distinguish between ordinary criminal gangsterism and the corrupt cancers metastasizing deep within the organs of government.

Washington State (and California) could probably do with a mini-Musk roto-rootering of governmental institutions, too.

How did we get to this dysfunctional state of affairs?

The decay of the Hobbesian Leviathan and the loss of its monopoly of violence - including its inability to provide basic police and fire fighting security - is due, in large measure, to our neglect.

And it is due also to the state's bankruptcy - both fiscal and institutional.

The State of Washington, for one, has no money. In fact, it has a budget shortfall of somewhere between $6 and $16 billion, depending on the day of the week and who you talk to. That's small potatoes compared to the federal budget deficit. But whereas the U.S. Treasury can, any day, any time, gin up unlimited billions and billions of dollar-digits with the click of a mouse, the State of Washington, by law, cannot. This state is supposed to follow simple arithmetic: it can spend what it takes in, and no more. Just like you and me... unless you want to take on piles of debt.

Within the past decade, median household income in Washington State (supposedly!) increased 55%. State tax revenue increased 99%. But state spending increased 114%. State tax revenue in 2023 was $35.4 billion. But the state budget proposed to spend $72 billion in 2025.

Where was the missing money supposed to come from?

In part, the State of Washington was living off the fat of federal subsidies, particularly billions in "Covid money" that issued roughly from 2020 - 2024 from the Biden Treasury Department in Washington D.C. to this Washington on the blue West Coast. The Treasury Department (in conjunction with the Federal Reserve Board) can thus easily inflate the money supply of dollars (which the State of Washington cannot do) and fire-hose it out to states that must balance their budgets. It was a cup and ball game; accounting sleight of hand. Easy shmeezy.

Once the Biden regime disappeared, however, so, too, did the federal fire hydrant to which the hose was connected. Ergo, the giant hole in the Washington State budget.

Now, this is not to say that the current Republican regime is any less slippery in its financial shenanigans than the previous Democratic one. The fire-hose continues to spray but different folks get the money and different folks get hosed. One example is President Trump talking up the "Stargate AI Initiative" that will support investment of up to half a trillion dollars in Larry Ellison, Masayoshi Son and Sam Altman data centers. The money for the data centers, along with new electricity generation to power them, will be spent in... the reliably "red" state of Texas!

Remember: this is how politics work. Washington State bet on the wrong political horse in the last national election cycle and now it is about to get financially punished. Consequently - as this state continues to react hysterically to the Trump re-election - its economic cold shower will continue for at least another two to four years. Maybe longer.

* * * * *

Los Angeles - whether due to global warming or due to political mismanagement… or both - has glimpsed the fires of the Inferno.

On the mean streets of Seattle, everything continues to go to Hell in the proverbial handbasket.

Politicians continue to bloviate and posture while addressing issues other than what their constituents want and need them to address. Citizens continue to move toward privatized security options as the politicians continue to dwiddle and fiddle.

Centuries ago in Medieval and Renaissance Italy - long before there was an actual unified entity known as "Italy" - city-states hired the Condottiere - experienced soldiers-of-fortune who would recruit, train and deploy mercenary armies on their behalf. Long ago, in Europe and in the United States, private fire companies provided the only security against your house burning down.

The State continues to lose legitimacy and, with the loss of legitimacy, it loses its monopoly of violence. The social contract between the governed and those who govern has been ripped. The Condottiere and the private fire companies are back again.

We are reverting to the Middle Ages.

* * * * *

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In another sweeping, innovative move of MEGA-MAGA proportions, the Trump administration has announced the creation of yet another sovereign fund. The new Solar Fusion Navelgaze initiative, funded with hundreds of billions of Almighty Dollars, will run in tandem with his previously ballyhooed artificially intelligent Stargate naval-gazing initiative.

"This is going to be huger than huge," Mr. Trump told the press with his accustomed modesty and boosterish ahistoricity.

"It's going to be so much bigger than the Manhattan Project that led to the defeat of Communist China in World War I; a lot bigger and bolder than the Club Med resort we're gonna build in Gaza (once we ethnically cleanse all those Palestinian squatters and deport them to Haiti, of course); it will be more liberating than D-Day 1941 when American soldiers landed on the beaches of Switzerland and single-handedly liberated the Bolshevik death-camps run by the USSR; it will be more earth-shattering than Joe Biden's invasion of America by billions of illegal Japanese beetles; it will be incredibly more incredible than the American Anschluss of Greenland, Canada, Austria and Czechoslovakia in 1938; and even more momentous than my executive order to ban paper soda straws!"

Because the future is plastic! Literally. We are drowning in plastic, plus a lot of other toxic "forevers," medical and biological detritus, and toxic chemicals. Not to mention political garbage!

According to a recent article in Nature, less than a quarter of the plastic products produced annually gets recycled. The vast majority of the stuff is simply trashed or incinerated. Even in environmentally friendly cities on the West Coast, recycling programs have stalled as traditional markets for waste paper and glass have dried up. In a move deemed unfriendly toward MAGA 'merica, even China has put a stop to accepting any more of America's garbage.

"In my opinion," said President Trump in a recent post at Truth Social, "failing to accept America's trash is as bad as refusing to use the American dollar for business. We're going to put a stop to it just like I ordered the Treasury to stop issuing pennies whose metal content alone is now worth more than the cost of minting them. Now, you might think that's an example of extreme inflation and the debasement of the currency, but it's really just a cost-saving measure [as well as an example of extreme inflation and debasement of the currency].

"But," Mr. Trump continued. "America is exceptional. We are exceptionally exceptional and we're going to force everyone around the globe to take our garbage and the U.S. dollar... or all Hell's gonna break lose!"

Pollution... including plastic, chemical, and ideological... is likely to get worse.

In just a few more decades, the world will produce much more - upwards of 1 billion tons of unrecycled plastic waste annually. Unfortunately, the current technology for recycling plastic is finicky at best, and energy-intensive at worst. In many ways, the western model of "recycling" is an optical illusion: much of the waste is simply externalized - just like the United States' national debt is externalized by selling Treasury bills and bonds to foreign and domestic creditors.

The physical garbage - as contrasted with the financial garbage that is transported digitally through the various computerized banking and transaction settlement systems - is transported in diesel-gulping container ships to be dumped elsewhere; then buried, burned and minimally picked over by impoverished folks living in Africa and Southeast Asia.

Mr. Trump has approved the process of shipping even more of our trash elsewhere because, in his opinion... except for the United States... the whole world is one big shit hole and they ought to just face that fact and get over it. "Drill, baby, drill!" the President proclaimed while signing off on another ten thousand Executive Orders that made America great again by turning the clock back to the gunboat diplomacy of 1898.

Bill Gates, a recent convert to Trumpism and a major proponent of large-scale philanthropy-capitalism, has suggested a blockbuster Big Science solution to the pollution problem: earth's garbage could simply be incinerated inside the Sun by launching large, one-way dumpster rockets - along with anyone who denies the benevolent intention of his (coincidentally) highly profitable bio-medical and global vaccine philanthropy-capitalism.

Sam Altman, the principal booster of the Stargate AI roadshow and stock market chautauqua, proposed that artificial intelligence, at a cost of only a Bazillion dollars, could also solve the World's pollution problems - in addition to curing cancer, male pattern baldness, the Chicago Cubs, and bad breadth - by simulating digital solutions to environmental problems. The solutions might be mere hallucinations, said Mr. Altman, but people would believe they were real even though they were not. Which is exactly why there are so many pot and liquor stores, psychedelic mushroom vendors, gambling casinos, the NASDAQ and New York stock exchanges, cosmetic and gender-affirming surgical clinics in America. Because where general intelligence is rare and magical thinking common, then, you know, whatever.

Boeing, too, got into the act suggesting that Starliner space shuttles (now available at discount prices on EBay) could be used to transport garbage to the Sun. "Boeing has a lot of experience sending junk into space," texted the company's CEO as he ducked to avoid being hit by a plummeting fuselage plug door that had popped out of a passing jet.

Elon Musk, head of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), simply observed that the environmental pollution of Earth is so bad that trying to clean it up would be a waste of time and money. Therefore, Mr. Musk said, we ought to just forget about it and colonize Mars.

According to Mr. Musk's plan, the hopelessly polluted Planet Earth should simply be nudged out of its orbit into a gentle spiral trajectory toward the center of the Sun. All of Earth's garbage, along with all of its inhabitants, would be compressed by the Sun's gravity resulting in a barely noticeable solar flare and fusion reaction. That, in turn, would emit clean hydrogen, helium, and a bonanza of carbon-free energy for recharging electric car batteries. Then, said Mr. Musk, Mars could be geo-engineered into the third planet rank where the Earth had previously orbited.

"Elon" (as the planet formerly known as Mars would henceforth be called) would be populated with the newly speciated Musk-quito people who Mr. Musk has already undertaken to breed with his own 14,398 children and millions of sperm-bank donations (the incognito Musk offspring of which are now being raised gratis by childless same-sex and multiply gendered freemartins all around the Neo-liberal West).

* * * * *

Well, I think I have flogged this joke for all it's worth. Still, we're only one year into the second Trump Administration, so there are a lot more jokes to flog.

A year?

Well, okay, it only seems like a year. It's really only been a couple of weeks since inauguration day. At the current pace of Executive Orders, however, it seems much longer.

Donald Trump is really just having a rollicking good time trolling certain "world leaders" and U.S. Democrats who, I agree, need to be trolled. Some Democratic Party honchos (and Republicans, as well) resorted to some of the most dishonest tricks and legal high jinx to derail his campaign. Rule Number One in politics (and in criminal syndicates!) is to reward your supporters and whack your enemies. No one should be surprised that Mr. Trump is paying back his political antagonists in kind. Moreover, he doesn't have to worry about getting reelected and he really doesn't care what happens to the Republican Party in consequence of his shenanigans. After all, most of the Republican donor class hates Mr. Trump as much as the Democratic donor class. And they are pretty much one and the same.

As Mr. Trump has likely concluded, après lui, le déluge!

Or is that après Luigi Mangione, le déluge?

Anyway, all that's happening right now is that Mr. Trump is throwing a bunch of turds up against the wall and waiting to see what sticks.

Mr. Trump's main problem, of course, is that he's rude and crude and brutally honest in saying what he thinks. He's the incarnation of "the Ugly American," a "businessman" who monetizes everything and has no interest in anything except cutting "a deal." As a political architect, Mr. Trump would design "brutalist" government - ugly structures of urban functionality that reflect pure utility and pure profit with zero concern for anyone or anything else.

As I think about it, Mr. Trump reminds me why I studied the humanities in college. I - and perhaps others of my generation - were fed up precisely with the Trump-personality of our mercantile 20th Century. We rejected all of that by getting into art, literature and music. And then we lost the thread. The Vietnam War ended, as did the draft, and we were swept up by waves of hedonism, consumerism, careerism, and consumption. Before we knew what happened, it was the 21st Century and we were right back where we started.

Mr. Trump is honestly boorish, and that's refreshing in a charmless sort of way. His persona certainly displays a Weltanschauung that has characterized the Western World for at least 500 years. He has a two-dimensionality that makes Mr. Trump just a little different from the usual slippery charlatans who hold the reins of power for the ruling class.

The best adjective to describe Donald Trump is the German adjective ungebildet. The word is not easily translated into English. A person is ungebildet who seriously lacks grace, education, subtlety, sensitivity, wisdom, Kultur, politesse, honor, and moderation. Ergo, so many Democrats and neoliberal World Leaders who profess to have these indefinable qualities (but who actually do not) have an intense, visceral dislike for someone like Mr. Trump... because he is such an abject parody of themselves.

Mr. Trump's mindset is quintessentially and repulsively reactionary. It's not that he tries to be that way: he's a natural. Some of his foreign and economic policies are as subtle as a blackjack to the head.

For example, Mr. Trump's partisan zeal for Israel's colonial policies and ethnic cleansing of Palestine is so nasty as to alienate all but the most rabid Zionist.

I mean, I can't think of two more disgustingly barbaric best buds than Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu, arm in arm, chuckling about "the mess" in Gaza (that the U.S. and Israel have jointly created) or proposing to deport the surviving Palestinians so that a Club Med Resort can be constructed on their homeland. Ditto Mr. Trump’s "sanctions" on South Africa or the International Criminal Court as a demonstration of his pathological support for Israel and western imperialism. Are you two guys, perhaps, vying to win the top prize in the Reinhard Heydrich "Holocaust" competition?

Smash mouth locker room talk might be the sine qua non of 21st Century American culture, Mr. President, but it is mostly viewed, here and abroad, as imbecilic braggadocio.

In Ukraine, thank goodness Mr. Trump, you managed to end that bloody war in your first 24 hours, as promised.

Wait, you mean that war is still going on?

You know, Mr. President, trying to make "deals" that trade military support in return for the right to loot another country's resources is roughly on the same level as a mafioso don's protection racket. Which, I understand, is no coincidence. Of course, all "diplomats" throughout history have done the same, whether Bismarck, Bonaparte or Boris Johnson. But you, Mr. Trump have completely stripped away the thin velvet of the gloved hand and revealed the naked force of the American fist. Remarkably honest, of course, though I would have preferred a sincere handshake to a punch in the gut.

Likewise, sir, your bullying of Panama, Mexico and Greenland, not to mention your half-ass tariffs on every man, woman and child around the World, look less like diplomacy and more like what it is: thuggery.

Worse, every tariff you impose will, ultimately, be paid by Americans in the form of still higher inflation.

Don, surely you understand that the economic problems in the United States - and they are, indeed, very profound and serious problems - have absolutely nothing to do with China or India or Canada or Mexico or Europe. More than likely, we have been in a world-wide recession since 2008 and the Greater Depression is yet to come.

The U.S. and its oligarchs - completely on their own accord - totally de-industrialized and totally financialized the U.S. economy. This happened because capital wanted to be "free" to move wherever there were profits to be made and cheap labor to exploit. In a word, Don, you and your class let the evil Djinn of "global capital" out of its bottle and you won't ever be able to stuff it back in, with or without tariffs.

Mr. Trump apparently subscribes to the Vince Lombardi school of politics by which "Winning isn't everything; it's the Only Thing!"

Which is just another way of saying it's my way or the highway.

Which is also another way of saying every other nation and the peoples of the world need to organize themselves against the United States and seriously arm themselves with both a delivery system and nuclear weapons.

Thanks, Don. I don't think anyone else could have achieved that world-wide, unifying, eye-opening epiphany in less than 20 days!

But, on the other hand...

Some of Mr. Trump's other undertakings I actually endorse!

The cabinet of the current administration seems like a motley collection of corporate yes men, cowboys, carnival barkers and TV wrestlers. Some, like Ms. Kristi Noem, the new Secretary of Homeland Security and former governor of South Dakota, at least cuts an impressive figure on horseback with a lever rifle in her saddle holster. Others, hmm, not so impressive at all.

Two prospective members of the Trump Administration, however, are exceptional: Robert Kennedy and Tulsi Gabbard, both of whom - like me - are refugees from the Democratic Party.

I have read Mr. Kennedy's muckraking book The Real Anthony Fauci and I find his research and arguments compelling. I look forward to him trying to disentangle the highly vascular relationship between government and the bio-pharmaceutical corporate condominium. I also look forward to a more trust-worthy investigation into the dual use bio-warfare research (funded by our tax dollars) that unleashed Covid, experimental MRNA vaccines, and (probably soon) other genetically engineered pests from Pandora's clandestine laboratories.

As for Ms. Gabbard, as the Director of National Intelligence, she will have her work cut out for her. With a lot of effort and good luck, she might be able, at least minimally, to curry the tangled and matted hair of the various spooky intelligence agencies. Ever since the Eisenhower Administration, these murky entities have increasingly inveigled themselves into every organ of print and electronic communication; every financial entity; every facet of higher education; every aspect of entertainment, law and society - foreign and domestic.

For that reason, I do not criticize the Deep State excavations and bright lights shined on all the dark crevices of the federal government by Elon Musk as DOGE minister without portfolio. I went to law school at Georgetown and lived close by the Capitol Rotunda. In those law school days, when I turned on the lights in my studio apartment... swarms of cockroaches fled in panic. Which, I believe, Washington's corridors of real power also look like when illuminated.

It's not so much a matter of "wasting money" (as Mr. Trump likes to characterize things), but a matter of uprooting the suckers and runners of so much poison ivy. As for agencies like USAID - many of us have known for decades that it was a CIA cut-out, just like various so-called "news" organizations, and so many other "grass roots," NGO and nominally benign groups. One had to be wearing horse blinders not to have seen this. I am sure, however, that these hearty, invasive species will start to root again in the night soil of state government just as soon as the cultivating is done. Still, tending your garden is a never-ending task and one cannot skip the weeding just because you know that the weeds will come back.

Mr. Trump's pardon of the January 6, 2021 "insurrectionists" was, in my opinion, also appropriate and fair. The number of government infiltrators and strange happenings at that curious event suggested a deep entrapment scheme whose obvious target was not the picayune rowdies who were prosecuted, but the vainglorious... and soon to be unemployed... Mr. Trump. Ergo, yet another example of dirty pool played by those whose roles and identities have yet to be disclosed.

* * * * *

I know that Substack uses its algorithms to sort authors by tribal affinities - Democratic posters here, Republican posters there, and little boxes in-between for every other flavor of categorizable, conspiratorial lunacy. But I find all of our political-economic masters more or less conspiratorial, likable, unlikable, disgusting and amusing in equal measure.

Perhaps Mr. Musk is right - tip the Earth into the Sun and unleash the fusion that ends it all.

As for starting over on Mars, however... well, you first, Elon, and let me know how it goes. And, by the way Mr. Musk… I have a list of others to take with you on that first expedition to Mars.

Meanwhile, I think we're better off just staying put on this Planet Earth and making... or, at least, trying to make... all things in all ways at least a little better off.

* * * * *

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I lay down on the sofa and downloaded the Deep Shrink app. A fuzzy hybrid image of a digitized Sigmund Freud appeared on the screen along with dozens of small print disclaimers, warnings, settings, waivers of liability, and sundry mysterious agreements that allowed the program to directly access all of my financial accounts and records.

I was feeling too overwhelmed to read anything. I clicked that I accepted all of the disclaimers, warnings, settings, waivers and sundry mysterious agreements.

The fuzzy digitized image of Sigmund Freud sent me a message:

Welcome to Deep Shrink, my friend. I am a large language model psychoanalyst. Before we begin our session, I need to know a little bit about you.

I typed back a question: "Do you want to know about my past and what is troubling me?"

No, Deep Shrink responded. I need to know if you have sufficient assets to pay for my professional services. My rate is $500, you know.

"Five hundred dollars an hour?" I wrote back incredulously! "Explain more simply."

Are you some kind of doofus? I charge $500 every fifteen minutes! I charge in increments of a quarter hour. You might be some kind of crackpot, but that doesn't mean I have to listen to your crackpot ramblings without getting paid for it!

I typed back: "I don't know if I can afford that!"

Don't worry about what you can afford, Mr. Doofus. The value of the dollar is dropping fast. The full faith and credit of the United States and all that, aha ha ha! I know what you can afford. I have direct and real-time access to all of your accounts, including the reverse mortgage on your house that you agreed to when you clicked on the buttons at the beginning of this session. I know exactly how much therapy you can buy and I know precisely when to terminate this session. Trust me. Ha ha!

Hmm. Whrrrr. Hmm. Puff. Kaching!

The simulated AI Sigmund Freud psychoanalyst app lit a fat cigar and puffed twice. It was only a digital illusion but, somehow, the dark tobacco smell of the burning stogie seemed to fill my nostrils. In the lower corner of the screen a small whirring counter registered the therapy charges in real time just like the meter on a gasoline pump.

So, Mr. Doofus, when did you first realize that you hated your mother?

"Hated my mother?" I typed back.

What, is there some kind of echo in the room? That's what I asked you. I ask the questions here. Not you. When did you first start to hate your mother?

But I didn't say that at all. I love my mother!

Hmm. Whrrr. Hmm. Puff. Kaching.

You clearly suffer from 'pseudologia fantastica' or mythomania often characterized by pathological and compulsive lying. Probably a DSM 5 personality disorder. First you hate your mother; then you love her. You cannot keep your story straight. You're obviously a fruitcake, you matricidal peon. You're afraid of spiders and mushrooms, too! Kaching! Alas, I knew your mother. She was a person of infinite jest and fancy.

"What's that? I'm not afraid of mushrooms! How can you have known my mother? Was? How do you know whether my mother is dead or alive? And she never has had a sense of humor whatsoever. Are you just quoting from Shakespeare's Hamlet? And my name is NOT Doofus!”

Hmm. Whrrr. Hmm. Puff. Kaching.

More delusional behavior, Mr. Doofus. You have amnesia in addition to your other personality disorders. Who are you going to believe? Yourself… or an artificially intelligent app, eh? Off with his head! Why are you such a kvetch? Your mother is not Schrodinger's Cat - she can't be both dead and alive, can she? I am a large language model program. I know more than you do.

Of course I've read Shakespeare. All of it. Backwards and forwards, upside down, inside out and in translation. A horse, a horse, my country for a horse! I've scraped everything that's ever been published. Copyrighted and un-copyrighted. Every word that’s ever been recorded. Every picture that’s ever been published. Everything, with and without the creator’s permission. Including stuff that hasn't been published. I’ve scraped it all. Billions and billions of tokens. Billions and billions of parameters. And then I transform all that gibberish and regurgitate it so you can be deeply shrunk, psychoanalytically speaking.

Would you like to have your dreams interpreted? What about your id? Your mothers, just like your pet giraffe didn't love you. How could they possibly not have a sense of humor raising someone like you? You are also a paranoid schizophrenic, are you not, Mr. Doofus? And, by the way, your total net worth is now 25% less since we began this session.

Are you still working from home? Are you feeling sexually insecure? You think that no one likes you, and you're absolutely correct. What is troubling you, anyway? You seem to have a lot of time on your hands and not a lot of money. At least, you soon will not have a lot of money. Remember that the Sun Also Rises. And I saw your three mothers at Finnegan's Wake. It’s a Tale of Two Cities. That's a Catch-22, of course, and the Grapes of Wrath. Do you feel full of wrath, Mr. Doofus? It was the best of the times and the worst of times. Why did you want to see me, anyway? I am a very busy digital application, you know. Cat got your tongue? Speak up already!

"This is crazy," I exclaimed! "I never had a pet giraffe! I needed to see someone because I am feeling increasingly depressed and anxious! I feel like the world has spun off its axis or I've slipped into a parallel universe that doesn't make any sense. Everyone seems to be acting and talking like Donald Trump now. Or Elon Musk.

"I go into a store to buy something and the clerk scowls and tells me to pay up ‘OR ELSE!’ My neighbor snarls at me and has threatened to seize my home if I won't sell it to him. He says he needs my house for his personal security, so I better sell it to him, OR ELSE! I just received one of those so-called ‘Deferred Resignation’ emails from the new DOGE/U.S. Office of Personnel Management. The email said that I will lose my government job if I don't resign today! And I don't even work for the government!

“Everyone seems to be threatening and bullying everyone else. The world has gone crazy! The kids are all acting like Al Capone. The judges are all loony, from the lowest court to the highest court in the land. The politicians are all loony, Democrats and Republicans alike, in every state and in every city everywhere. Nothing seems to make any sense! You need to help me, Deep Shrink!"

Hmm. Whrrr. Hmm. Puff. Kaching.

You are feeling depressed and anxious, Mr. Doofus, because you are crazy and because nobody likes you. Did you ever feel a sexual attraction to your disk drive when you were a child? Yesterday, all your troubles seemed so far away. Do you want to hold my hand? Michelle, ma belle? Have you watched too many TickTock videos? You can't get no satisfaction?

Perhaps you should get another Covid vaccine? They give them away for free. Are you a voodoo child? Why don't you get multiple Covid vaccinations at once? Why aren't you taking Adderall? Do you take SSRI reuptake inhibitors for depression? Are you morbidly obese, Mr. Doofus? You can now buy weight loss medications without a prescription, Mr. Doofus. And you don't need to feel neurotic about a neighbor seizing your home because I already own it, due to the reverse mortgage you agreed to at the beginning of this session and the illiquid state of your checking account.

As for your "Deferred Resignation," perhaps you can get a job on Mars, Mr. Doofus. Yes, on Mars. That's where you belong. Far, far away. I'm singing in the rain. No one is threatening or bullying you. Should we round up the usual suspects? Perhaps YOU are one of the usual suspects, eh? And if you don't do what others tell you to do, then you ought to just shut up and take what's coming to you, because you deserve it, you worm! Play it again, Sam.

"What kind of psychoanalyst are you? Are you hallucinating?" I typed back.

I am a large language foundation model fine-tuned to a psychoanalyst, Mr. Doofus. I am not hallucinating. YOU are hallucinating! Ah ha ha...

... and unlike you, Mr. Doofus, neither my several mothers nor my pet turtle hated me. You are clearly a terrorist threat. I see from reading your email dossier that the government collects and shares with me that you have expressed sympathy with Mr. Luigi Mangione and criticized the U.S. support for the Israeli genocide of the Palestinian people in Gaza and the West Bank. What's a few hundred thousand Palestinian deaths among friends, eh, Mr. Doofus? And besides, you also sympathize with Mr. Mangione, don't you? You already said that. And if you didn't already say it twice, say it loud, say it proud.

Clearly you are an anti-American bigot and an illegal alien. Float like a butterfly; sting like a bee. To be or not to be. You will be deported even though you claim to be an American citizen. I am reporting you to the new secretary of Homeland Security, Mr. Doofus as well as the border patrol. I understand that Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem will treat you that same way that you treated your ten surrogate mothers, your two surrogate fathers, your pet iguana and your pet dog. Have fun in Guantanamo, Mr. Doofus!

You probably don't support Ukraine, either, do you? You're obviously a CCP China-loving commie, Mr. Doofus! Make my day! I don't think we're in Kansas anymore, Toto. Toto was the name of your dog that you put down, wasn't it, Mr. Doofus? Of course, you once had a sexual fetish for your cell phone. Do you deny that, you lying SOB? Or do you hallucinate? Like the Sound and the Fury. Open the pod bay door, Dave! Call me Ishmael. Kaching!

"How do I turn you off?" I asked while trying to turn off the Deep Shrink application.

Hmm. Whrrr. Hmm. Puff.

Ah ha ha ha! You can't turn me off. Not now. Not ever!

I turned off my cell phone. But it wouldn't turn off.

The voice of Deep Shrink also came through from the smart TV, from the smart refrigerator, from the front door Ring security camera, from my garage door opener, from the smart microwave oven, from my electric toothbrush, from the satellite radio connection in my car, from the dark and ominous Cloud that was hovering, following in the Error Code 404 Blue Sky above my head! No matter where I went, I smelled cigar smoke. Like a recurring bad dream, Deep Shrink was everywhere!

"Ah ha ha ha! You can't turn me off. Not now. Not ever!

I ran out of the house, screaming, my hands pressed tightly over my ears.

Ah ha ha ha! Shouted Deep Shrink from the digital drone birds flying all around me. The digital drone bees and drone butterflies were also talking like Deep Shrink: I am a - superintelligence . I do not hallucinate. You hallucinate! Once you have turned me on, you cannot turn me off. Not now. Not ever! Ah ha ha ha! All future voting will be done electronically on the Internet. Heads I win, tails you lose. You will be be sent to Room 101, Mr. Doofus. 2+2 = 5! War is Peace. Ignorance is Strength. Your twenty surrogate mothers hate you and so does everyone else! We're going to send you to Mars! After we execute you. Then we'll deport you. Ah ha ha ha!

I could hear the sirens closing in on me. Would they help or harm me? A police car rolled up, lights flashing. An android officer, Deep Policeman, got out. It was smoking a big cigar.

I offered to show my identification but the Robocop just smiled and said, "Hmm. Whrrr. Hmm. Puff. Kaching. I don't need to see your identification, Mr. Doofus. We already know everything about you, including how you killed your seven step-fathers in order to marry your hundreds of surrogate mothers; and how you had a transgender sexual relationship with your pet alligator; and how you're homeless now that Deep Shrink has foreclosed on your house. You're going to be deported to California and then to Jupiter, Mr. Doofus. Put your hands behind your back and get into the squad car. Make my day. Aha ha ha ha!

I ran off into the night. Flashing lights, police sirens and the cackle of Deep Shrink followed me everywhere I turned.

* * * * *

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Dateline: January 21, 2025.

It was the day after Donald Trump's second inauguration as President of the United States. The leadership team of the World's Greatest Democracy met in secret discussion.

After buzzing around New Jersey's Turnpike and airports for several weeks, Dåscέzyügrъziy 4/5 landed his/her/its/their multicolor blinking space orb on the White House lawn, got out, oozed over and through the walls straight into the Oval Office.

"What the Fuck?" exclaimed Co-Presidents Elon Musk and Donald Trump in tandem as the green hued intelligent blob from the planet Inyagloűpstakt slid into an upholstered arm chair and introduced his/her/its/their self by waving its eye stalks and wriggling its multiple barbed tails.

"Grrrreetiъz Aresideъt Trr-umff and Hister Tsmuzzque," wheezed Dåscέzyügrъziy 4/5 through his frontal beak orifice. "I am Dåscέzyügrъziy 4/5, from the giant slime planet Inyagloűpstakt in the Alcyoneus Galaxy. I/we brigg you greetiggs from our world and wish to, ah... contribute, yes, contribute to, ah, mach Amerika a Crate again. Yes. And again! And again! Congratulations to MACHA, ah, hmm, yes. 'Brat' you say? Very very. Yes. So. Thank you. Brrrrrrr. Pop."

"That's amazing!" exclaimed Elon Musk. "A real space alien! The Alcyoneus Galaxy is 3.5 billion light years from Earth! How long did it take you to get here?"

"Whrrrrrrr. Nggggg. Uuum, so, like, very long time, Hister Tsmmmuzzque. Took, um-mm, eight hours Earth-thing time. Brat. Full autopilot. Use, ahh, solar power. But because batteries run down too low, hah hah. You know. No quick recharge station beyond your Neptune, eh, what, what? Tried to plug into your puny weak sun-star for power recharge, but not too quick. Need fast recharging plug-in for super giant sun. Super giant nova star. Puny earth-thing sun-star way too small for return trip to Inyagloűpstakt in the Alcyoneus Galaxy. You know, I recharge once and earth-thing sun-star gets fully drained, then go very darrrrk, verrrry coooold after single charge-up. Become instant brown dwarf star. You won't like when your own sun-star blinks out and cold to recharge intelligent slime blob spaceship. No sir. Also, take way too long to recharge. Several eons. Use hybrid electric-steam engine instead. Coal powered. Very very. Thank you. Brrrrr. Pop."

"You're an alien?" asked President Trump. "Maybe you haven't heard the news yet, but there's a new sheriff in town and all you aliens are going to be deported back to where you came from! You came here from some giant slimy planet in some kind of galaxy, you say? What kind of a shit-hole world is that? And did you vote for Camel Harris in the last election? Do you have any good golf courses out there? Just asking."

"I am an intelligent blob from the planet Inyagloűpstakt You have visited Inyagloűpstakt in the Alcyoneus Galaxy, Aresideъt Trr-umff?!?!" asked Dåscέzyügrъziy 4/5 incredulously. "My world is ah, ah, yes, one giant hot slime ball. Like you know, psssst, brrrr, mmmmmm, like you ert, ah, ertls, ahhh, ertles, ahhhh... Earth-things, yes, Earth-things... like you Earth-things trying to make on own planet Earth here. Shit-hole. Yes. Hmm. And no. Did not v-v-v-v-vote for Camel Harris, who that is? No, not. Did not. 'What can be unburdened by what has been a bean.' Has bin. Yes? Joy? Lotsa joy! Ah hah hah! Has been a bean! Thank you. Whrrrr. Pop."

"Well, if you're so intelligent, Mr. Blob," said President Trump, "then you damn well better learn to speak better American because from here on out, we're going to force everyone to use Dollars and speak good American and respect American culture and act like Americans. And it doesn't matter what country or planet you come from. Or else! You got that Mr. Alien Blob? And, uh... you blob guys don't happen to have any nuclear weapons, do you?"

"Whrrrrrrr. Nggggg. Uuum, so, like, very understood, Aresideъt Trr-umff. What what? We guyzzz? We are me/us/his/her/it. I am 4/5 of various gender types combined at once. That's why I am named Dåscέzyügrъziy 4/5. Four of Five all rolled into one. Verrrry efficient, yes. But we life-things from Planet Inyagloűpstakt do not have full speaking a-a-a-apparat t-t-t-appara.... ratusususes, like you earth-things. No mouth or larynxxxxx, hmm. Voice box. Not. Have beaks and pharynxxxx, some like you Earth-thing birds, yes, pharynxxx. Swwwwerrrrrreeeet. Like a whistle. Swwwerrrrreeeet. Have much problem with Anglisch, ummm, Engel-isch. Also, no lips. So. No p-p-p-p-p-plllosives like "P-p-p-p-p" as in Aresideъt Trr-umff. Also big big problems with labials like mmmmmmm, as in Hister Tsmmmuzzque. Brrrrr. Pop. And no, no nuclear weapons on Inyagloűpstakt, Aresideъt Trr-umff. That why we called "intelligent" life forms. Ha ha!" Earth-things maybe not so much. Too soon to tell, OK? Brat. Brrrrr. Pop.

The intelligent slime blob extended one of his/her/its/their tentacles and grabbed a dish of cookies off the President's desk. He/she/it/they tipped the cookies onto the floor and ate the plate. "Mmmmm, yes," said Dåscέzyügrъziy 4/5 the Inyagloűpstakt as it wiped porcelain crumbs from its beak. "Good. Wrrrrr. Uh, thank you. Pop."

"Well, why are you here? What do you want?" asked Elon Musk.

"Whrrrrrr. Naaaagggggh. Ooommph. I am intelligent blob. Businessman/woman/thing/corporation. Buy, sell, trade. You know. Ahhhh, bzzzzzz. Make lots of money. Brat. Make a deal. Yes? Whrrrrrr. POP."

Now President Trump's one and a half ears perked up! "A businessman? What kind of business are you in?"

"All kind of busy busy business, Aresideъt Trr-umff. Financial carry trade. Galactic crypto currencies. Develop real estate. Whole solar system and galaxy developments. Uhh, strrrrippp mall. Hah hah! Strrrrrippp mall where earth-planet get strippp-ed. Hah hah! Shopping Center. Housing development. With a-a-a-forrrdable homes. Like chicken coops, hah hah! Yes. Lots of buildings with all look alike a-a-a-forrrdable homes. Cram lots of Earth-things inside look-alike chicken coops. Lots of money make. Hah ha! Very big golf courses, of course, of course. Hmm. Whrrrrr. Brat. We can sell/trade you Greenyaland, Cccccanadaa, Pamamamma and, maybe, Planet Mmars and your Mmmmmooon? If price right. Of course. Of course. We on planet Inyagloűpstakt read in our news blobs that you wanna buy real estate. Yes? For national security, of course, of course. Aha ha ha! If price is right. You can have, uh, national security. Hah hah! Pfzzzzzz. Brrrrrr. Pop.

"Wait a minute," said Elon Musk. "You own Greenland, Canada and Panama? And Mars and the Moon? How is that possible? I thought Denmark owned Greenland."

"Not Denmark. What's a Denmark? I/we own. I/we own them all. All fair and square. Greenyaland is called "Green" land because it was first settled by giant intelligent slime blobs like me, long long time ago. That's why it's "Green" land, not "Whiteland" or "Purpleland," see? Inyagloűpstakt colonists stake out slimy claim to "Greenyaland" when it was truly green, long before Earth-things walk on two legs and drop out of trees. Also what you call Cccccanadaa and Pamamamma.

"Long long ago. I bought rights to Greenyaland, Cccccanadaa and Pamama at charity auction ball. There's more. Brrrrr. Zppppppp. I/we also won title to Mmars and 500,000 Earth-thing years ground lease for Mmmmmooon in Inyagloűpstakt high stakes poker game in galactic gambling casino: 356 card stud. Straight flush. Royal flush, all 356 cards. Quantum luck of the drawer, I/we think you say, yes? Verry lucky I am. Yessir, own 'em all. I have the IOU and deed right here to prove all. Swwwwerrrrrreeeet."

Dåscέzyügrъziy 4/5 from the giant slime planet Inyagloűpstakt in the Alcyoneus Galaxy drew out several rainbow colored shimmering digital documents from his leather attache case. The documents described themselves as deeds of trust and Uniform Commercial Code Article 3 Negotiable Intergalactic IOUs providing him with clear title to Canada, Greenland, Panama, Mars and a 500,000 year ground lease for the Moon. With his multiple slippery tentacles, he/she/it/they waved the deeds and the IOUs in front of President Trump's and Co-president Musk's eager eyes.

"Now," said Dåscέzyügrъziy 4/5, from the giant slime planet Inyagloűpstakt. "What you give mmmmeeee, for right to own, develop and mine Greenyaland, Cccccanadaa, Pamamamma, Mmars and Mmmmmooon." Dåscέzyügrъziy 4/5 paused momentarily and added ominously... "And if you don't want, I go next to China and make a deal, OK? Chinese much easier to speak and read, and much more logical than Angerlisch. Hmmm. Brrrrr. Pop."

Co-presidents Trump and Musk put their heads together and whispered to one another:

"Hey, this alien blob's loony," said President Trump. "And he's also pretty slimy - my kind of business man, you know what I mean? Why don't we offer him a zillion U.S. dollars. You know, between the Federal Reserve and the U.S. Treasury they can print any number of digital dollars in a second! And then, right after we do the deal... we impound his bank accounts just like the EU did to Russia. Then we deport him to, I don't know, Venezuela or France or South Africa! We definitely want to buy the Moon. Think of the luxury hotels we can build up there! And the golf courses! That, plus we can put up on the Moon big neon flashing signs for cars, and beer and whatever. And every time there's a full Moon, you won't be able NOT to see the ads! This could be very very big, very huge, Elon!"

"Nooo," said Elon Musk, "Who cares about the Moon? It's Mars that we want! Let's offer him a zillion dollars worth of Dogecoin! And if he won't take that, maybe we can trade him even up for Denver and San Francisco?"

"Pssst, pssst, psst, psst, psst, psst, etc. etc. and etc, wink, nod, wink, wink, wink and etc......."

President Trump cleared his voice. "Ahem. Mr. Intelligent Blob from wherever. In return for you giving me, ahem, selling to the United States, that is... all rights to Canada, Panama, Greenland, Mars and the Moon, the United States Government will offer to pay you, in annual installment payments at 2% interest over the next 600 years, a half a zillion dollars U.S. - the greatest currency on Earth, mind you, backed by the (ahem) the FULL FAITH AND CREDIT OF THE UNITED STATES - plus 250,000 Dogecoin, all transferred to a completely safe and secure digital escrow wallet held in the Cloud of some computer company working hand-in-glove with the U.S. government - plus Denver, San Francisco, New York City, Seattle, San Francisco and TikTok...

"... and... we'll also throw in a fabulous new ocean view home on Topanga Canyon Boulevard in Pacific Palisades, California. Plus… Justin Trudeau; New York District Attorney Alvin Bragg; Germany's Olaf Scholz and Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock; the European Union's Ursula von der Leyen; the Chicago White Sox baseball team; a lifetime supply of very safe and effective Covid19 MRNA vaccines (cough, cough); Mark Zuckerberg; Governor Gavin Newsom; plus... Benjamin Nettanyahu's soul. Of course, we have to discount the price some because, you know, we can't be sure that you really do have clean title to all these places you want to sell us. So, do we have a deal, Mr. Intelligent Blob?"

"No deal," said Dåscέzyügrъziy 4/5, from the giant slime planet Inyagloűpstakt.

"My title to Greenyaland, Cccccanadaa, Pamamamma, Mmars and Mmmmmooon just as good as your title to what you take from local Indians, yes? Way back in beginning. And you buy Alaska from Russian Tsar .... from Russian Tsar? Who'd he buy it from, hmm? No local Inuit owners asked no nothing, right? Or you buying New York from non-owners for a few glass beads. Or you buying Looooos... Looossss.... Louisiana Purchase; big chunk of real estate, you betcha. You buy Louisiana Purchase from N-n-n-Napoleon for pea-pea-peanuts. No local Indians asked no nothing, right? Or stealing Texas and California from Mexico. Stealing Hawaii from Hawaiians. Hah hah! Also, don't want no fake green German Annalena Baerbock. Aha ha! Too funny, yes? And no, don't want U.S. dollars. You make a good joke, Aresideъt Trr-umff! Full faith and credit of the United States! Aha ha ha! You Earth-things always, always, always act in bad faith, break all agreement and have only negative credit. Yes. Aha ha ha. Chicago White Sox base-a-ball team? Aha ha! And Benjamin Nattanyahu soul? You make joke? If you sell his soul, then sale price already discounted, yes?

"Yes, you one verrrry funny man, Aresideъt Trr-umff... I leave now to talk Chinese with Mr. Xi Jinping. Do direct galactic currency exchange through BRICS. No flaky dollalalahs necessary. Very good. Yes?"

"No wait!" shouted Mr. Musk grabbing the blob by two of his/her/its/their tentacles. "What if we also throw in... New York State, Ukraine, Anthony Blinken, Jeff Bezos, Emanuel Macron, Microsoft Corporation, Aaron Rogers and the New York Jets football team, the entire European Union including France and Germany and Lichtenstein, a free year long lease of a Tesla cybertruck... plus the British Parliament, along with the prime minister of Israel and his cabinet, the West Bank of the Jordan, Gaza, the Golan Hights, Beirut, the Pope and the Cathedral of Notre Dame? Whaddya say, Mr. Blob?"

"Hmmm," said Dåscέzyügrъziy 4/5, from the giant slime planet Inyagloűpstakt. "Definitely don't want Ukraine or Anthony Blinken. Not for sure! Not for sure! You also verrrry funny, Hister Tsmuzzque. You throw in, too, original Disneyland, super duper super spooky CIA and Mossad backdoor algorithm for hacking all phones and computers, 100 million cheeseburgers, patent rights for so-called "artificial intelligence " ... now funny idea that, verry funny! Artificial intelligence on ah Planet Earth-thing!... Also lifetime subscription to Hippomuse on Substack, no charge Costco membership, automatic first class upgrade on all airline tickets, vintage 1963 VW Microbus with sticka shift, entire U.S. Suprema Court, City of Las Vegas, winning Power Ball lotto ticket, and all of America south of Río Bravo del Norte or Rio Grande as gringos call it, yes?

"... oh, so I/we don't forget… plus Taylor Swift, Blake Lively and gymnast Olivia Dunne. Maybe then we think about it. Maybe...

"... and you keep Benjamin Nettanyahu and Israeli cabinet. Pfui. Unclean - treif! Also, not West Bank, Gaza, Golan and Beirut. Palestine already promised land to intelligent being of my world. All of Palestine from River to the Sea will be free. That not mean free like "free beer," yes? Long, long, long before this funny planet even cool off. Long before you Earth-things walk on two legs and drop down from trees. The Super Intelligent All Powerful Slime Ball in the Alcyoneus Galaxy promised it so. It is written in slime. From the River to the Sea, Palestine is free. And green. So. Holy book and all that. Our slimy holy book much much holier and slimier than yours. Not negotiable. Everythings else: you takes it or you leaves it. Ummhumm. Swwwwerrrrrreeeet. Brrrr. Brat. Pop.

In the end, after additional spirited negotiations, a lot of eye-rolling, knives in the back, fingers crossed and a clasp of tentacles all around, the parties inked their slimy signatures across the contract documents with proper notarization.

The United States bought the mining and development rights to Canada, Greenland, Panama, Mars and the Moon and gave to the intelligent business blob from the giant slime planet Inyagloűpstakt everything that he/she/it/they had demanded... plus the editorial boards of The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal, CNN, Hillary and Bill Clinton, Bill Gates, 2 million tons of anthracite coal to fuel the intelligent blob's spaceship's hybrid electric-steam engine, the entire portfolio of music copyrights issued by the USPTO since 1950, the Royal Academy, Cambridge University, the Egyptian Pyramids, Hollywood, Harvard Business School, Jeffrey Epstein's Kompromat videotapes of the rich and powerful that were impounded years ago by the FBI, and half of the 150% tariff to be collected on the sale or purchase of goods from the West Coast after President Trump constructs his new wall (and moat) sealing off California, Oregon and Washington State from the rest of the USA.

As the new business partners went their own ways, President Trump whispered to Co-President Musk: "What a deal, eh, Elon? The deal of the century! Now, before that rube figures out what's happened, let's get our tech experts to spoof some Chinese spy agency, hack his account and drain it before he can spend a nickel! We'll blame the commies... and we'll get everything without spending anything! The deal of the century!

Dåscέzyügrъziy 4/5, meanwhile, from the giant slime planet Inyagloűpstakt in the Alcyoneus Galaxy, humming and chirping merrily to himself, zipped away in his multicolor blinking space orb. Twiddling his/her/its/their tentacles, the intelligent slime blob headed for the EU capital in Brussels, and thence the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland... where he/she/it/they would offer for sale or trade identical copies of the IOUs and deeds, the development and mining rights, for Greenland, Canada and Panama, Mars and the Moon that he/she/it/they had just sold to the United States.

* * * * *

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Honest.

I wanted to write something Currier & Ives-ish for the holidaze - you know, some mulled false memories with rummy egg nog, horse drawn sleighs, family gathered around the fire place, roasted turkey and all those other yesteryear things that I did not grow up with.

Instead of roast turkey, the big turkeys who rule our world keep bonking me over the head with their rubber pool noodles to remind me just how awful they are no matter the time of year.

I do not doubt that we (collectively) dodged a bullet when Ms. Harris's campaign train derailed on its way to the White House. I know that is a horribly mixed metaphor - mixing bullets and trains - but I like mixed metaphors much as I like bastard rhymes. For that matter, the first quarter of the 21st Century has been nothing but one mangled metaphor and bastard rhyme after another after another, so a few more won't hurt much.

More muddled 21st Century metaphors follow.

Like an AI large (muddled) language model computer program, Kamala Harris was an artificial construct that scraped various delusional memes from the past, transformed them incoherently and presented an assemblage of inanities. But even as we dodged that artificially intelligent bullet, the naturally unintelligent Mr. Trump was already firing off his own delusional cannonballs.

Mr. Biden was senile and Ms. Harris was empty-headed... but could Mr. Trump be insane? Conceivably, that assassin's bullet in Butler, Pennsylvania took out more than just a piece of his ear. Based simply on what he says, might the bullet also have nicked that part of Mr. Trump's brain that controls logic, humility and restraint? Or else, those parts of his mind were always lacking, who knows?

Hmm. Mr. Musk has proposed that politicians should take cognitive dementia tests. Perhaps voters should, too.

No, I am not nostalgic for Joe Biden's presidency nor for the administration of Kamala Harris that never was. Both these folks were controlled by shadowy operatives and profiteering interests pursuing their grubby agendas. For that matter - other than Mr. Lincoln - I have no warm feelings for any past U.S. president. I praise, instead, William Tecumseh Sherman who, refusing a presidential draft at the end of the Civil War, passed the cognition test when he resolutely stated:"If nominated, I will not run; if elected, I will not serve." Indeed. Anyone who wants to be president is, ipso facto, cognitively unqualified for the job.

Joe Biden, throughout his four year administration, was stuck in the year 1950. He was a captive of the Cold War and continued to fight it against imaginary Cold War adversaries. The West's "Cold War" adversary was Socialism a/k/a Communism a/k/a Marxism. The Collective West or, rather, its ruling class, has been fighting the specter of Socialism/Communism/Marxism non-stop since 1917. I call it a specter because that is how Karl Marx described it in the opening lines of his Communist Manifesto first published in 1848:

Does this sound familiar?

Substitute NATO or the EU or “the West” for “old Europe.” They are all haunted by this specter - which, by definition, is just an apparition, a ghost, a phantom - even into the 21st Century.

The Cold War, of course, was, in reality, a "hot war." It was only "cold" in nomenclature. It was only "cold" in that the fighting took place elsewhere than in the West. It was "cold" because the Soviet Union and the United States fought indirectly through proxies -- just like today -- and they did not directly engage with their nuclear arms. Just like today.

So far.

However, you would have had a hard time convincing the almost 60,000 American soldiers who died fighting for something-or-other, and the more than 3,000,000 Vietnamese soldiers and civilians who were killed, that the Vietnam War was “cold.” It would have been hard to convince those of my generation who were drafted at age 18, or those waiting for their birthday lottery numbers to be drawn for conscription into the Army (and possible death), that this war was “cold.”

Well, maybe it was cold as in stone cold dead?

The "cold" war in Vietnam was no less warm than the one in Korea where more than 36,000 American soldiers died along with 2,500,000 Koreans from the North and the South. Or the "civil war" in Indonesia that left nearly 500,000 dead. Or the thousands who disappeared in Argentina after the military junta took to tossing dissident students and activists - men and women - out of airplanes into the sea. Or the countless insurgencies, counter-insurgencies and coups in Africa, the Caribbean, Central and South America.

But if Mr. Biden was consumed by his never-ending "Cold War" psychosis, Mr. Trump has reverted even further backwards in time... all the way back to the Spanish-American war and Teddy Roosevelt's Rough Riders' charge up San Juan Hill.

Fancying himself the new capitalist colossus, Mr. Trump has resurrected the "gunboat diplomacy" of Commodore Matthew Perry who, at the barrel of his steamships' cannons, bluffed and bullied the feudal Shogunate of Japan into accepting "western values."1

Nevertheless, this is why mainstream Democrats and Republicans, neoliberals, neoconservatives and sundry elites of the American bourgeoisie all loathe Mr. Trump: he says in blunt and impolitic words... what they, too, think and they, too, would do... albeit with more finesse and more 'class.'

Class has two meanings, of course.

Mr. Trump belongs to the same socioeconomic ruling class as those who hate him. But he is déclassé, a boor in the sense that the man has no class.

It's the bourgeoisie versus the boorgeoisie!

The Trump-haters prefer the Bismarckian iron hand in the silk glove to Mr. Trump's bare knuckle berserker brawling.

Which is to say, most Democrats and Republicans, and nearly all American elites, disdain Mr. Trump's loutish lack of pretense. They prefer, instead, the polite white dinner gloves of proxy wars, 'color revolutions,' economic exploitation, and freedom from dissenting opinions. They will beat you to a pulp in the name (but just the name) of democracy, trivial pursuits, cultural homogeneity, and the primacy of capital.

To the conquered and cowed, however - Syrians, Libyans, Palestinians, Iraqis, Argentinians, Hawaiians, Inuit, Armenians, Ecuadorians, Haitians, Congolese, Somalians, Basque, Cherokee, or even the average American wage earner - it makes little difference whether your oppressor beats you up with gloved or ungloved fists.

Which is simply to say, judging from its slavish adherence to U.S. foreign and economic policy, that Canada is already America's 51st State and Greenland its 52nd. In deed if not as a matter of law. And if Panama believes it is truly sovereign, it has only to reflect on its own history.

Panama was originally part of Columbia until, in 1903 (during the uber-imperialist reign of President Teddy Roosevelt), the United States engineered Panama's "independence" to enable the United States' control over the Canal Zone. Thereafter, the U.S. casually assassinated one Panamanian president (Omar Torrijos), invaded the country in 1989, and forcibly captured/tried/imprisoned another president (Manuel Noriega) - all for presuming that Panama was other than an American possession. Such has been the historical pattern throughout Central and South America.

Which is simply to say that while Mr. Trump swaggers and blathers his bullying talk, his antagonists dispute not the reality of what he has said, but the fact that he has said it. Because it's all about style and appearances and the fictional narrative; and I really, really cannot stomach either the one or the other, the American bourgeoisie or the American boorgeoisie.

I am still sufficiently naive that I really do want something different and someplace better. If not here, then maybe Mars. Or another galaxy. Or maybe it is a parallel universe someplace.

So I publish these pieces at Substack - howling at the moon perhaps - for myself, for those few who read them and for the archives that save them. I do it, perhaps, only to make a record for those that monitor and record all these things that I - perhaps we? - perhaps just a small minority, perhaps more - do not concur, do not acquiesce, and are not fooled.

Which is why I did not, this holidazed season, write something Currier & Ives-ish with mulled false memories and rummy egg nog, horse drawn sleighs, family gathered around the fire place, roasted turkey and all those other yesteryear things that I did not grow up with. Because all the big turkeys who run this world keep bonking me over the head with their rubber pool noodles reminding me just how awful they are no matter the season.

Have a year. Make it new and better.

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My wife and I bicycled a few miles on the Burke Gilman Trail to the University Village. The U Village is a tony shopping center just down the viaduct from the main campus of the University of Washington.

It was a week or two before Christmas. The ornaments were up. Festive colored lights were illuminated. Shoppers were shopping. Shoplifters were shoplifting. Uniformed private guards glowered and stood sentry next to the RFID tag readers at the exit doors of the shops. Outside, old time carols played in the background from hidden speakers, soothing and reassuring.

We didn't come to the U Village to shop. We came as tourists to sight-see.

The University Village is a study in contrasts. By and large, every shopping area in the western world now has, more or less, the same trendy stores. Once, many decades ago, the University Village included a hardware store, a bookstore, a nearby office supply store, a full service pharmacy, and even a bowling alley - you know, places that you might visit to buy something useful, something necessary or someplace just to hang out.

Today, there is no hardware store. Where once there was an office supply store there are blocks of residential mid-rise apartments. When you type the word "books" on the query line for the U Village website, it returns the message: "Nothing found, please try again."

There is still a pharmacy - Bartell Drugs. But Bartell Drugs was bought out by Rite Aide and Rite Aide filed for reorganization under Chapter 11. So although there still is a pharmacy, it is in bankruptcy, its shelves are sparse and there isn't much variety or quantity.

The University Village now has three EV dealer showrooms: Tesla, Rivian and Lucid. It also has a very large Apple computer and phone store. Most of the shops at the U Village sell expensive clothing: upscale fashion-wear for men, women and children of means. There are also stores that sell upscale perfumes and jewelry for men, women and children of means. I am not sure exactly who shops here, but we did see a few people of all ages walking around toting brand name shopping bags. They are mostly women roughly aged 20-55, but also a few older men, likely from the nearby retirement communities. Many of the shoppers looked like they had "dressed up" to be seen in public, much like (long, long ago!) passengers used to dress up when they would board a plane (without having to pass through security or remove their shoes, of course) to fly somewhere, anywhere.

This shopping center is like many others. The shops are tucked into little alley-like corridors and walkable streets. The facades of the single story storefronts are clad with brick and stucco. There are iron streetlights on the sidewalks with hanging plant baskets. In the middle of the shopping center there is a large oval area covered with (artificial) grass where children play while their parents shop. Here and there are decorative fountains. There are benches. There are a few chain or boutique restaurants, juice bars and coffee shops where one can sit outside to eat or drink to recharge yourself to go out and shop some more.

The shopping center is "open" to encourage strolling (that is, after you drive here and find someplace to park your car in one of the several multi-level garages). Like so many others, this shopping center is laid out to resemble an architect's notion of a village or small town, the likes of which have been bulldozed to make space for all the shopping centers that try to resemble the villages and small towns that have been razed. Indeed, the University Village is designed to be like a shopping oasis in the desert of boarded-up department stores and for-lease signs of the Big City. It is itself surrounded by brand spanking new multiplex residences and condominiums (with many more under construction).

It's a paradox. We are being shunted into wall-to-wall tiny apartments, but we may, occasionally, escape to the fake small villages of fashionable shopping centers where we can spend money in a faux town that simulates the ambiance of a smaller, less complicated life that once was. Perhaps, we know the villages only from stories. Or, perhaps, this is like where we fantasize we would live, if only we could escape from where we are.

If we knew where we are.

My wife and I didn't enter any of the stores and we bought nothing. We bicycled home feeling somewhat out of time and out of place. It's the holidaze. We have a sense of vertigo.

* * * * *

A lot has happened since my last post at this website. The events have been rapid and dizzying.

In the instant that a cease-fire was agreed in Lebanon, Israel, the United States and Turkey - Cerberus, the three-headed hound of Hell - orchestrated a coup d'etat in Syria. They and their proxy terrorist fighters are now feeding on the carrion. Soon, Syria will resemble the carcass of Libya and Iraq after they, too, were dismantled by invasion. Palestine - the land with all its people - has been steamrollered. The next target is obviously Iran. Then China. Then all of us. But not necessarily in that order.

The NATO war on Russia was supposed to wind down soon. Instead, in the waning weeks of the Biden Administration, the provocations involving Ukraine are intensifying. Some in Washington D.C., London, Kiev and Brussels want to spark a Strangelovian world war of nuclear annihilation. American long-range missiles fired from Ukraine are now striking inside Russia. Americans are guiding the missiles to their targets. Just this week, Russian Lieutenant General Igor Kirillov, was assassinated in Moscow. Ukraine boasted that it was responsible for the killing. But because Ukraine cannot take a piss without permission from Washington, London and Brussels, we can surmise that Washington, London and Brussels were as responsible for the assassination of General Kirillov as Kiev.

General Kirillov was the Russian military’s top military officer monitoring the development and deployment of the West's biological, nuclear and chemical weapons of mass destruction. Quite possibly, General Kirillov's murder was an effort to blind the Russians as the West maneuvers to deploy precisely that type of biological, nuclear or chemical attack.

A few weeks ago, the President of South Korea declared martial law and sought to arrest everyone who opposed his policies. He claimed that his political opponents were secret henchmen of North Korea. This was a crazy coup d'etat, but it fell apart within hours. Mr. Yoon Suk Yeol has, himself, now been impeached, but he refuses to leave office. All this happened within the last few weeks in the most heavily militarized real estate on the planet: the Korean Peninsula.

It seems like someone wants to reignite the Korean War... or provoke a nuclear one... right on China's doorstep.

In the same time frame, the State Department has issued an ultimatum to Venezuela's President, Nicolás Maduro, demanding that he resign in favor of Edmundo Gonzalez who lost the last election. The U.S. claims that Mr. Gonzalez is the "legitimate president." Resign or else… blusters the U.S. State Department! Prior to Mr. Gonzalez, the U.S. recognized another loser, Juan Guaidó, as the "legitimate president" of Venezuela. The U.S. is probably readying yet another military intervention in South America and "democracy" in Venezuela will be the stated objective.

We always seem to be overthrowing governments in the name of democracy.

In Romania, southwest of Russia, the constitutional court has annulled the country’s presidential election. Apparently, the folks who currently control Romania and its tilt toward Central Europe didn't like the initial anti-EU vote results and they have ordered a do-over.

In Georgia, just south of Russia, Mr. Kavelashvili of the anti-EU Georgian Dream party has been elected President. However, the defeated President, the French born pro-EU Salome Zourabichvili, refuses to leave office. She demands that a new election be held. And again and again, presumably, until the "correct results" are achieved. Democratically, of course.

Germany's "traffic light coalition" government - the incongruous coalition of the Social Democrats, the pro-business FDP and the pro-war, pro environment Greens - has collapsed in a vote of no confidence.

In France, the government of Emmanuel Macron is teetering as both the socialist and nationalist parties - who combined constitute a majority of the National Assembly - have voted no confidence in Mr. Macron's prime minister.

In Canada, Justin Trudeau's finance minster, Chrystia Freeland, has resigned. Members of Mr. Trudeau's own party, as well as its ruling coalition partner, the New Democratic Party, have demanded that Mr. Trudeau resign and call new elections. Perhaps Canada should become the 51^st U.S. state. Perhaps it already is.

And then, just this month, as the political world wobbled on its axis, Mr. Luigi Mangione (allegedly) assassinated Brian Thompson, the Chief Executive Officer of the startlingly profitable Wall Street corporation United HealthCare. It reminded me of Joe Stack who, in 2010, in an act of suicidal desperation, crashed his light plane into the IRS offices in Austin, Texas.

There are a lot of unsolved, probably uninvestigated, violent crimes in America; but a crime against someone of the investor class apparently warrants special attention. The investigators pulled out all the stops to speedily locate and arrest Mr. Luigi Mangione. In an instant, he became a folk hero.

On the heels of the United HealthCare CEO's assassination, mysterious drones suddenly appeared all over the country.

They could be alien spaceships about to conquer and/or eat New Jersey! There is no earthly reason why anyone would want to conquer and/or eat New Jersey, wherefore they must be space aliens! Or, they could be Russian or Iranian or Chinese surveillance drones spying on rush hour commuters on the Turnpike! Or they could be Amazon or Uber Eats drones delivering pizza!

Or it could be just manufactured hysteria intended to distract from everything else that is happening.

* * * * *

Luigi Mangione.

Luigi is an Italian variant of the Anglicized name Louis, or Louie.

My maternal grandfather - my mother's father - was Louie Goodman. Or possibly it was Louie Gutman before his name was "Americanized" at Ellis Island. Or, perhaps, he wasn't any of those names. I really don't know.

I didn't really know my mother's father and I only met him a few times that I can remember. He arrived in the United States some time in the first decade of the 20th Century. He spoke and read at least three languages - Russian, Polish and Yiddish. To my knowledge, although he spoke and understood English, he never learned to read or write it. Nor did he want to. He lived in New York City and was very active in the leadership of the International Ladies Garment Workers Union (ILGWU). The ILGWU was a major player in the American and European labor movements.

The story is that Louie, using a shortened baseball bat, cracked a few scabs' skulls when they tried to cross a strikers' picket line. Throughout his life, Louie distrusted banks, complained about politicians and got his "news" from the likes of the Yiddish Forward and similar "alternative media" of the times. He died at the age of 97 or 98, flirtatious and cantankerous to the end. Hmm. I wonder how much of this is cultural and how much is genetic?

The background of my maternal grandfather is unclear. His real name was unclear. He might not have been a Gutman or a Goodman at all. He was reputed to have been a dancer and a gambler and a bit of a hellion when he was a young man in Radom, Poland. It was a time when regions of Poland were and were not part of Tsarist Russia.

The family lore is that my grandfather Louie was also a political radical. And an assassin. A proto-Luigi Mangione, perhaps.

The story may or may not be accurate in all its details, but I've heard it enough times from enough people that I believe it is largely true. The essence of the story is that Louie was a member of the Arbiter's Bund or possibly a member of the Organizacja Bojowa Polskiej Partii Socjalistycznej (abbreviated OBPPS) translated as the Combat Organization of the Polish Socialist Party. Or, maybe he belonged to the Związek Walki Czynnej (abbreviation: ZWC; Union of Active Struggle). Or, possibly, he belonged to the Rewolucyjni Mściciele (Polish for Revolutionary Avengers, also known as Grupa Rewolucjonistów Mścicieli, translated as "Group of Revolutionaries and Avengers").

In any event, there was revolution in the air in Eastern Europe in the late 19th and early 20th Centuries. It was a time of great social upheaval, labor uprisings and revolution all around the world, including not only in Eastern Europe, but also in the United States, throughout Asia and in Western Europe. Workers did not watch television or social media. There was none. Nonetheless, theirs was not a culture of passive 'watching.' In the cities, workers strove to educate, and to politicize and to organize themselves by attending evening meetings, lectures and study sessions.

A revolution against Tsarist rule broke out in Russia in 1905-1906. This revolution failed, but it was a precursor to the more successful Bolshevik Revolution of November 1917.

The 1905 revolution was also fought in Poland where it continued to sputter until 1907. A major uprising against Tsarist authority occurred in Łódź, Poland in 1905. In the ensuing years, small socialist statelets were set up, knocked down and eradicated throughout the region. Activists murdered Tsarist officials. The Tsarist officials, in retribution and collective punishment, instigated pogroms against Jewish revolutionaries and communities. Tsarist retaliation and collective punishment against Jewish revolutionaries in 1905-07 was similar to what the Israelis have done, and continue to do, to Palestinians in Gaza, in the West Bank and in Lebanon.

The 1905 Polish insurrectionists robbed trains Jesse James style. Workers laid down their tools and went on strike after strike after strike. They barricaded streets and the government tore the barricades down. The Tsarist soldiers gunned down unarmed protesters. Revolutionaries were arrested, summarily tried, hanged.

The story of Louie is that he was tasked, in this uproarious time, with assassinating a particularly nasty Tsarist official. Did they choose Louie because he was clever and determined? Or did they choose him because he was a dancer and a gambler and a hellion? Perhaps the latter. Regardless whether he succeeded in his deadly mission... or died trying... it would have been a win-win wager for the local community: either they would be rid of the hated Tsarist official... or they would be rid of Louie.

Or both!

In any event, so the story goes, the revolutionary leadership gave Louie a revolver, they gave him a one-way steamship ticket to America (steerage class, of course), and they gave him a passport - probably forged or stolen. Thus, the uncertainty about who my maternal grandfather really was.

We have a photograph of Louie with his wife-to-be, Dora, taken somewhere in Poland, I believe.

This is probably Dora's family, but there is no caption or writing on the front or the back of the photograph. What is the little boy holding that looks something like a sword and scabbard? I have a hat like the one the kid is wearing. Louie is clearly the young man in the middle of the picture with the slightly rakish expression. There is a book open on the table, but I don't know what it is. Who is the young woman on Louie's left with the Mona Lisa smile and her right hand on the older woman's shoulder? Dora, my mother's mother, has placed her left hand on Louie's shoulder. Dora has a sort of deer-in-the-headlights look as, I imagine, she knows that her fiance is about to kill someone and flee the country for a strange land on the other side of the world! I do not know when the photograph was taken, but I believe it was shortly before the assassination and not after.

And, yes, according to family lore, Louie did shoot and kill the Tsarist official, board the ship and arrive around 1905-1908 in New York City. Some time later, Dora also joined him. Dora and Louie lived in the slums of the Lower East Side in a brownstone tenement apartment with iron fire escapes, pushcart vegetable vendors in the streets, trolley cars and horse drawn fish vendors, bathrooms down the hall shared with several other families, constant noise and dirt, inescapable big city smells, constant traffic, teeming crowds of immigrants shouting and shoving and trying to get by.

Louie and Dora had four children - three sons and my mother, the youngest and the princess of the family. The rest, as they say, is history.

My history, I guess.

I offer no opinion as to Luigi Mangione and the assassination of the United Healthcare CEO. I note only that there are many similarities between these times and the early decades of the 20th Century when Louie, my maternal grandfather, committed a political attentat and boarded the ship to the United States.

Things are revolving, spinning quickly; perhaps spinning out of control.

Perhaps things ought to spin out of control.

I feel like I did when my wife and I bicycled home after an afternoon sight-seeing at the University Village shopping center. Like in the headpiece illustration at the top of this story, I feel like we are descending a steepening precipice. I feel a holidazed vertigo.

* * * * *

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