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Yup. And even the people who love and respect me get all glassy-eyed if I poke at any one aspect of this on-going enshittification* of everything that once mattered to people of good heart. So, I'll get back to work on my 2-cord woodshed in the side yard, splitting and stacking two winters' worth of deadfall Oak and Ash, and improve my rain barrel arrangement. And I've got another solid 1960's English bicycle to re-furb in queue in the shop. I, too, see this machinery of financialism's dreams clanking up the hill; but, then,

I was the skinny, twelve-year-old kid at the kitchen table after dinner, in the summer of '64, listening to my Dad and his old Seabees friend talk Pacific theater stories, but, with the addition of his friend's experience in Dallas, who was the owner of the largest camera and photo shop in town, describe how a bunch of pretty serious-looking men in dark suits, carrying sidearms, walked into the store and handed him an 8mm movie camera, and watched over him as he developed the film; and, him describing to us, frame-by-frame where he saw the first rifle bullet hit JFK from behind, and a couple frames later, the second round hit him in the forehead.

And neither one of those two old Navy guys were particularly surprised that the Warren Commission fibbed in its findings about the assassination. And I learned. Learned that folks who want impunity will go to any length to have things their way, and expect the rest of us to just shrug.

Keep writing.

*Thanks to Cory Doctorow for this ever-more relevant term

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This: Some readily accept that everything is falling apart because women were given access to independence and “traditional roles” upended. I think this may be the heart of the hysteria on the right. Proof: the overturning of Roe because Roe was a nail in the coffin of patriarchy and it’s favorite son, market driven and unregulated capitalism. Looking back I grew up in the most free of times for U.S. women. The current oligarchical class have shut that down, haven’t they?

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Keep the flame alive! Let's not obey in advance! I was surprised and encouraged when Dr Ruth Ben Ghiat, when asked what do we do if Trump gets in the White House, indicated that there were groups of thought leaders working on something. I have no idea what that means but I believe there are Bunches of very smart people on the right side of History working hard to figure out a solution to all of this. The only role that I can figure out to have is to donate to democratic candidates in the state level. Also will donate to folks getting IDs to voters that don't have them and working on getting people out to vote. I encourage everybody else to do the same

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"We are in a moment of awareness in which the flame still burns, in which there are signs the sparks are lighting elsewhere."

I'll run with that . . .

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