The phrase “drinking from the firehose” means someone is overwhelmed with new information or responsibilities. Changing jobs at age 64 I now have an intimate understanding of that idiom! I’m still paying attention to social and political issues but don’t have much time to write about them.
Here are a few observations.
- At age 71 Mitt Romney is running for the opportunity to represent Utah in the U.S. Senate. Ok. Me starting over at 64 doesn’t seem so odd.
- If you have read my posts over time you know I have trouble understanding or accepting President Donald J. Trump, but lately I have really wondered why he consistently attacks our allies while supporting tyrants such as Russian Vladimir Putin and Turkish President Recep Erdogan and North Korean bloody tyrant Kim Jong Un. I’ve also wondered why folks continue to accept his numerous excuses for refusing to release his tax returns (yes, he is hiding something).
- How can we as a society tolerate the policy allowing the separation of children from their parents? If you’ve missed this story, Attorney General Jeff Sessions used the Bible to justify taking children of immigrants from their parents and housing them in deserted Walmarts and tent camps in Texas. I think he might want to read the entire Bible. Maybe Mark 9:42, for example, which states “And whosoever shall offend one of [these] little ones that believe in me, it is better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and he were cast into the sea”. Read this story about a Brazilian grandmother and her handicapped 16 year-old grandson who asked for asylum at the American border ten months ago and have since been separated. She is being detained in Texas and he is in Connecticut. The grandson has severe epilepsy and autism. Where in the Bible is such treatment justified?
- A Justice Department report found that James Comey had actually used a private Gmail account to conduct FBI business, the same thing for which he was investigating Hillary Clinton. Geez. And, by the way, don’t believe the White House’s spin on that DOJ report. The truth is that President Trump should appreciate Comey because the letter he sent Congress eleven days before the presidential election announcing he was reopening the Clinton email investigation probably provided the final push Trump needed to win.
- One of President Trump’s campaign promises was to “drain the swamp”, yet his EPA administrator Scott Pruitt has been constantly embroiled in self-serving scandals. Most of the scandals involved using taxpayer money for personal use. Even conservative commentators are beginning to go after Pruitt yet he remains in office.
- Arctic ice is melting at near record levels.
- Uber has started investing in research to develop “flying taxis”. Um…no.
- Some colleges have started offering video game scholarship. Too bad pinball scholarships weren’t available years ago because I was pretty good!
- In addition to five guilty pleas, according to Fox News Robert Mueller’s “witch hunt” has thus far resulted in the indictment of thirteen Russians and four former associates of President Trump (Paul Manafort, Michael Flynn, Richard Gates, and George Papadopoulos).
- I’m really hopeful that President Trump has reduced the possibility of war with North Korea. Kim Jong Un’s reliability is still in doubt, however, and he is certainly no nice guy. A 2014 United Nations report concluded that atrocities in North Korea “entail extermination, murder, enslavement, torture, imprisonment, rape, forced abortions and other sexual violence, persecution on political, religious, racial and gender grounds, the forcible transfer of populations, the enforced disappearance of persons and the inhumane act of knowingly causing prolonged starvation”.
- You might want to pay attention to the growing trade wars with our major trading partners. In the end it is very likely American workers, consumers, and corporations will suffer.
- Thanks to conservation efforts the number of Mexican Jaguars has increased by 20% in eight years. Jaguars were once on the “endangered” species list but have now been moved to “near threatened”.
- Deforestation in Brazil was reduced by 90% after the Brazilian government began aggressively creating protected forests and parklands. Even better, “reforestation” in Brazil is catching on with one private group planning to plant 73 million trees during the next seven years.
I have had one post written for more than a year but could not publish it. I hope to be able to do so next week. Yes…that is a teaser!
Thank you for reading!