Thanks to Mike C.
WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report)—In a move that could tip the scales in the war against Russia, U.S. President Joe Biden and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky have reached an agreement to ship Americans’ four hundred million firearms to Ukraine.
“The Second Amendment calls for a well-regulated militia necessary to secure a free state,” Biden said. “I can’t think of a better description of what’s going on in Ukraine right now.”
Not news to some of us, but still a little unsettling.
Thanks to Sybil-Ann
1. The Post Office– Get ready to imagine a world without the post office. They are so deeply in financial trouble that there is probably no way to sustain it long term. Email, Fed Ex, and UPS have just about wiped out the minimum revenue needed to keep the post office alive. Most of your mail every day is junk mail and bills. Seldom are there personal letters anymore.
2. The Check– Britain did away with checks during 2018. It costs the financial system billions of dollars a year to process checks. Plastic cards and online transactions will lead to the eventual demise of the check everywhere. This plays right into the death of the post office. If you never paid your bills by mail and never received them by mail, the post office would absolutely go out of business.
3. The Newspaper– The younger generation simply doesn’t read the newspaper. They certainly don’t subscribe to a daily delivered print edition. That will go the way of the milkman and the laundry man. As for reading the paper online, get ready to pay for it. The rise in mobile Internet devices and e-readers has caused all the newspaper and magazine publishers to form an alliance. They have met with Apple, Amazon, and the major cell phone companies to develop a model for paid subscription services.
4. The Book– You say you will never give up the physical book that you hold in your hand and turn the literal pages. We all said the same thing about downloading music from iTunes. We wanted our hard copy CD. But, we quickly changed our minds when we discovered albums could be downloaded for half the price without ever leaving home to get the latest music. The same thing will happen with books. You can browse a bookstore online and even read a preview chapter before you buy. And the price is less than half that of a real book. And think of the convenience! Once you start flicking your fingers on the screen instead of the book, you find that you are lost in the story, can’t wait to see what happens next, and you forget that you’re holding a gadget instead of a book.
5. The Land Line Telephone– Unless you have a large family and make a lot of local calls, you don’t need it anymore. Most people keep it simply because they’ve always had it. But you are paying double charges for that extra service. All the cell phone companies will let you call customers using the same cell provider for no charge against your minutes.
6. Music– This is one of the saddest parts of the change story. The music industry is dying a slow death. Not just because of illegal downloading. It’s the lack of innovative new music being given a chance to get to the people who would like to hear it. Greed and corruption is the problem. The record labels and the radio conglomerates are simply self-destructing. Over 40% of the music purchased today is “catalog items,” meaning traditional music that the public is familiar with. Older established artists. This is also true on the live concert circuit. To explore this fascinating and disturbing topic further, check out the book, “Appetite for Self-Destruction” by Steve Knopper, and the video documentary, “Before the Music Dies.”
7. Television– Revenues to the networks are down dramatically. Not just because of the economy. People are watching TV and movies streamed from their computers. And they’re playing games and doing lots of other things that take up the time that used to be spent watching TV. Prime time shows have degenerated down to lower than the lowest common denominator. Cable rates are skyrocketing and commercials run about every 4 minutes and 30 seconds. We say good riddance to most of it. It’s time for the cable companies to be put out of our misery. Let the people choose what they want to watch online and through Netflix.
8. The “Things” That You Own – Many of the very possessions that we used to own are still in our lives, but we may not actually own them in the future. They may simply reside in “the cloud.” Today your computer has a hard drive and you store your pictures, music, movies, and documents. Your software is on a CD or DVD, and you can always re-install it if need be. But all of that is changing. Apple, Microsoft, and Google are all finishing up their latest “cloud services.” That means that when you turn on a computer, the Internet will be built into the operating system. So, Windows, Google, and the Mac OS will be tied straight into the Internet. If you click an icon, it will open something in the Internet cloud. If you save something, it will be saved to the cloud. And you may pay a monthly subscription fee to the cloud provider. In this virtual world, you can access your music or your books, or your whatever from any laptop or handheld device. That’s the good news. But, will you actually own any of this “stuff” or will it all be able to disappear at any moment in a big “Poof?” Will most of the things in our lives be disposable and whimsical? It makes you want to run to the closet and pull out that photo album, grab a book from the shelf, or open up a CD case and pull out the insert.
9. Joined Handwriting (Cursive Writing) – Already gone in most schools. They no longer teach “joined handwriting” because nearly everything is done now on computers or keyboards of some type.
10. Privacy – If there ever was a concept that we can look back on nostalgically, it would be privacy. That’s gone. It’s been gone for a long time anyway.. There are cameras on the street, in most of the buildings, and even built into your computer and cell phone. But you can be sure that 24/7, “They” know who you are and where you are, right down to the GPS coordinates, and the Google Street View. If you buy something, your habit is put into a zillion profiles, and your ads will change to reflect those habits. Every transaction, every mail order, every department or grocery store purchase is recorded and shared with others who want your business. So “They” will try to get you to buy something else. Again and again and again.
Thanks to Karen K.
Hunters wear orange signifying “Don’t shoot”. This is the message from the multi-faith march on Thursday night that came down Madison.
Thanks to Mary R.
THE SISTERS: A CONCERT TO BENEFIT UKRAINE – Saturday, June 11 at 8:00pm, The Esoterics presents THE SISTERS, featuring the sacred choral music of Ukrainian composer Bohdana Frolyak and her late sister Hanna Havrylets. Both are composers who were teaching in conservatories before this year’s Russian invasion of Ukraine. Hanna, the elder sister, died tragically on the third day of the war, when she suffered an aneurysm and was unable to get medical attention. The younger sister, Bohdana, has recovered Hanna’s scores and shared them with director Eric Banks along with her own works. All of the proceeds from this concert will benefit humanitarian organizations in the Ukraine that have been selected by Bohdana. No tickets or reservations required. Information, https://www.stjames-cathedral.org/music/concerts/2022-06-11-The-Esoterics.aspx.
By David Brooks
Opinion Columnist in the NYT
We here at Opinion Headquarters don’t merely offer you controversial opinions on world events, we offer priceless life hacks to help you float effortlessly through the miasma of modern existence. These are the kind of bits of golden wisdom that get earned over the decades of experience but that can be shared for free.
We’re inspired by the legendary tech journalist Kevin Kelly, who, for his 68th, 69th and 70th birthdays shared his life learnings on his Technium blog. Here are some of Kelly’s life hack gems (I’ve reworded several for concision):
When you have 90 percent of a large project completed, finishing up the final details will take another 90 percent.
Anything you say before the word “but” does not count.
Denying or deflecting a compliment is rude. Accept it with thanks.
Getting cheated occasionally is a small price to pay for trusting the best of everyone, because when you trust the best in others they will treat you the best.
When you get invited to something in the future, ask yourself, Would I do this tomorrow?
Purchase a tourist guidebook to your hometown. You’ll learn a lot playing tourist once a year.
The thing that made you weird as a kid could make you great as an adult.
It’s not an apology if it comes with an excuse.
Just because it’s not your fault doesn’t mean it’s not your responsibility.
Ignore what they are thinking of you because they are not thinking of you.
If you think you saw a mouse, you did, and if there is one, there are others.
Something does not need to be perfect to be wonderful, especially weddings.
The biggest lie we tell ourselves is, “I don’t need to write this down because I will remember it.”
Bravo to Kevin Kelly. Everybody learns life lessons. Not everyone clarifies them with such precision and shares them with such generosity. But even Kelly does not have a monopoly on practical wisdom.
For example, over the last few years I have embraced, almost as a religious mantra, the idea that if you’re not sure you can carry it all, take two trips.
A friend shares the advice: “Always make the call. If you’re disturbed or confused by something somebody did, always pick up the phone.”
A search around the world of online advice givers uncovers some other diamonds of practical wisdom, both prosaic and profound:
Job interviews are not really about you. They are about the employer’s needs and how you can fill them.
If you can’t make up your mind between two options, flip a coin. Don’t decide based on which side of the coin came up. Decide based on your emotional reaction to which side came up.
Take photos of things your parents do every day. That’s how you’ll want to remember them.
Build identity capital. In your 20s do three fascinating things that job interviewers and dinner companions will want to ask you about for the rest of your life.
Marriage is a 50-year conversation. Marry someone you want to talk with for the rest of your life.
If you’re giving a speech, be vulnerable. Fall on the audience and let them catch you. They will.
Never be furtive. If you’re doing something you don’t want others to find out about, it’s probably wrong.
If you’re traveling in a place you’ve never been before, listen to an album you’ve never heard before. Forever after that music will remind you of that place.
If you’re cutting cake at a birthday party with a bunch of kids howling around you, it’s quicker and easier to cut the cake with dental floss, not a knife. Lay the floss across the cake and firmly press down.
When you’re beginning a writing project, give yourself permission to write badly. You can’t fix it until it’s down on paper.
One-off events usually don’t amount to much. Organize gatherings that meet once a month or once a year.
Make the day; don’t let the day make you. Make sure you are setting your schedule, not just responding to invitations from others.
If you meet a jerk once a month, you’ve met a jerk. If you meet jerks every day, you’re a jerk.
Never pass up an opportunity to hang out with musicians.
Don’t try to figure out what your life is about. It’s too big a question. Just figure out what the next three years are about.
If you’ve lost your husband (or wife), sleep on his (or her) side of the bed and it won’t feel so empty.
Don’t ever look up a recent photo of your first great love.
If you’re trying to figure out what supermarket line is fastest, get behind a single shopper with a full cart over two shoppers each with a half-full cart.
Low on kitchen counter space? Pull out a drawer and put your cutting board on top of it.
You can always tell someone to go to hell tomorrow.
That last one I got from Warren Buffett. If you follow the life hacks above, you may not wind up as rich as he is, but you may wind up as serene.
Excerpt from my book ms:
Now let me briefly borrow a direct analogy to our climate reasoning. People often believe that the gun problem can be fixed by limiting gun sales. The gun problem, however, is not proportional to this year’s gun sales so much as the number of guns readily available to a person who becomes angry or suicidal or is harassed by classmates (mental disorders are only a fraction of the setups).
It seems obvious that reducing the stockpile (there are more guns than people in the US) would be a good course of action to pursue. Would not a gun buyback program be the first thing to try?
But it is not obvious because people seem to have an inborn blindness in the form of a tendency to mix up an accumulation with the inflow rate that created it.
Who would have guessed? Yet there are many examples, and our climate reasoning is one of them. We suppose that, simply by stopping the annual additions from emissions, something is being done about the accumulation of legacy carbon dioxide that promotes the global overheating.
Wait, you may say. Emissions reduction has worked for similar problems such as limiting visible air pollution. We were just applying that principle to invisible pollution rates.
Indeed. But input is often confused with net input, inflow minus outflow. Nature cleans up visible air pollution with the next good rain—and so reducing the rate of visible emissions actually does reduce the maximum air concentration of irritants between rains. Ask people to estimate the time it takes to clean up visible air pollution, then ask about the cleanup time for the invisible carbon dioxide excess. They will guess about the same for each. It is a good reason to never use analogies to visible air pollution.
Unfortunately, even with zero annual emissions, we now know that nature’s cleanup of the 50 percent excess of carbon dioxide will take more than a thousand years.
It was obvious in 1996 that we will have to do the cleanup ourselves, though it was 2018 before the big climate reports got around to emphasizing it, likely because “speculation” about means was officially discouraged.
Thanks to Ed M.
Coming to a neighborhood near you.
Canadian Speed Control!
How’s this for effective speed control?
I don’t know about you, but
this would certainly slow me down!
People slow down and actually
try to “straddle” the hole.
This is an actual speed
control device that is currently in use.
It is MUCH cheaper than speed
cameras, radar guns, police officers, etc.
Pretty clever — especially when they move them around every day.
Isn’t Art Wonderful?
Thanks to Mary M.
 Interfaith Prayer Vigil for Uvalde, TX June 2, 2022  Contact Info The Rt. Rev. Greg Rickel Bishop of Olympia 1551 10th Ave E Seattle, Washington 98102 206-325-4200 206-325-4631 FAX grickel@ecww.org Bishop Rickel’s Blog |
Thanks to Mary Jane F.
When the police department in Sacramento, Calif., held a gun buyback event on Saturday, they didn’t just give residents a no-questions-asked chance to turn in their unwanted firearms: They also gave out gift cards for gas.
The Sacramento Police Department said on Facebook that 134 people had dropped off firearms in exchange for $50 gas gift cards. The day’s collections included at least one assault weapon, components of privately manufactured “ghost guns” and “multiple other illegally configured firearms,” they said.
While the gift cards appear to have been an incentive – especially with gas prices climbing across the country – officials said they weren’t the only motivating factor.
“Among other reasons, community members most commonly cited a lack of experience or knowledge with firearms, lack of knowledge of the legality of the firearms, or an inability to safely store the firearms as the main reasons for participating in the exchange,” they wrote.
Whatever the reason, Saturday’s event – which was supposed to last for five hours – got more takers than expected. The department announced just 45 minutes into the event that it had exhausted its supply of gift cards “due to overwhelming response” and would be stopping an hour early.
It continued to accept firearms even after running out of gift cards, with officials praising the event as a success.
“I truly believe violent crime prevention is a shared responsibility and today’s overwhelming community participation is evidence of the success we can achieve together,” said Sacramento Police Chief Kathy Lester.
Cities across the U.S. hold gun buybacks (typically offering some sort of incentive) with the overall goal of reducing gun violence in their communities – though research suggests these programs don’t quite accomplish that.
Sacramento wasn’t the only city to host a fruitful buyback over the weekend. New York City officials said that people turned a total of 69 weapons in to a Brooklyn church on Saturday, at an event co-sponsored by cheesecake chain Junior’s Restaurant.
People turning in rifles, shotguns and air guns got $25 bank cards, according to Forbes, while those turning in assault rifles or handguns got a $200 bank card and an iPad.
Thanks to Diana C.
Relentless mass shootings, a million dead from Covid — How much do we value a single life?
A memorial in Uvalde, Texas.Credit…Christopher Lee for The New York Times
By Elizabeth Dias in the NYT
Two days after the massacre of children in Uvalde, Texas, and 12 days after the racist mass killing in Buffalo, Chenxing Han, a chaplain and teacher, told a Buddhist parable.
A man is shot with a poisoned arrow, Ms. Han recounted as she drove a group of high school seniors to visit a Thai temple in Massachusetts.
The arrow piercing his flesh, the man demands answers. What kind of arrow is it? Who shot the arrow? What kind of poison is it? What feathers are on the arrow, a peacock’s or a hawk’s?
But all these questions miss the point, the Buddha tells his disciple. What is important is pulling out that poison arrow, and tending to the wound.
“We need to be moved by the pain of all of the suffering. But it is important that we are not paralyzed by it,” Ms. Han said. “It makes us value life because we understand life is very precious, life is very brief, it can be extinguished in a single instant.”
Recent days have revealed an arrow lodged deep in the heart of America. It was exposed in the slaughter of 19 elementary school children and two teachers in Uvalde, and when a gunman steeped in white supremacist ideology killed 10 people at a Buffalo supermarket. The United States is a nation that has learned to live with mass shooting after mass shooting.
And there are other arrows that have become subsumed into everyday life. More than one million people have died from Covid, a once unimaginable figure. The virus is now the third-leading cause of death, even with the availability of vaccines in one of the most medically advanced countries in the world. An increase in drug deaths, combined with Covid, has led overall life expectancy in America to decline to a degree not seen since World War II. Police killings of unarmed Black men continue long past vows for reform.
Opinion from the Washington Post
A prominent journalist of the World War II era complained once about the frequent use of the word “boys” when speaking of U.S. troops in the field. After what they’d been through, he said, they were not just a bunch of kids out on an adventure. In fact, the average age of those who died in the Second World War was about 27, and their numbers did include a good many youths. But the term was meant more as an expression of affection and solidarity — “our boys in uniform” — than as a description. It also reflected the poignant truth of their untimely deaths: much too young.
This element of vulnerability, fear and helplessness is hard to express in a Memorial Day speech or remembrance. Nothing can quite convey the devastation of those who knew and loved “the fallen,” a euphemism that ennobles their sacrifice but also fails to capture the awfulness of violent death.
The words that are perhaps most suited for Memorial Day were written 78 years ago by the war correspondent Ernie Pyle, whose name became known in just about every American household during World War II. He described in simple, powerful prose the lives and deaths of the soldiers he accompanied through some of the worst fighting, with a special feel for the enlisted infantry.Advertisement
Pyle’s account of the death of a beloved young Army captain named Henry T. Waskow during the fighting in Italy was first carried by the old Washington Daily News. He described the scene as bodies of the American dead were brought down from a hill on the backs of mules: “The Italian mule-skinners were afraid to walk beside dead men, so Americans had to lead the mules down that night.” As the grim work proceeded, the bodies being laid out alongside a low stone wall, one of the soldiers said quietly, “This one is Captain Waskow.”
“The unburdened mules moved off to their olive orchard,” Pyle wrote. “The men in the road seemed reluctant to leave. They stood around, and gradually one by one I could sense them moving close to Capt. Waskow’s body. Not so much to look, I think, as to say something in finality to him, and to themselves.”
A soldier “squatted down, and he reached down and took the dead hand, and he sat there for a full five minutes, holding the dead hand in his own and looking intently into the dead face, and he never uttered a sound all the time he sat there.”
“And finally he put the hand down, and then reached up and gently straightened the points of the captain’s shirt collar, and then he sort of rearranged the tattered edges of his uniform around the wound. And then he got up and walked away down the road in the moonlight, all alone.”
The story of Capt. Waskow’s death became an instant classic in the United States and has been reprinted many times over the years. It does not deserve to become a neglected classic now, not when it is only a few keystrokes away and when young people continue to be deprived of their lives and their futures — by neglect, greed, orchestrated hatreds or delusional aggressions — in places from Ukraine to Uvalde, Tex.
Thanks to Gordon G.
From the Economic Times.
For many years, Memorial Day was observed to honor those who had fought and died in the Civil War — but on separate days in the Union States of the North and the Confederate States of the South. The southern states celebrated the day on May 10 or June 3. But the huge casualties of World War 2 brought about a change of heart and everyone agreed upon a single Memorial Day for all. The day is now observed on May 30, a day that does not coincide with any specific war.
However, the occasion has evolved into public ceremonies, marked by speeches and colorful parades. It has become just another holiday, with plenty of marketing and campaigning.
Restoring the significance
Though Memorial Day was intended to commemorate those who have laid down their lives for the nation, considering how the day has lost much of its historical significance, it has been decided that Memorial Day 2022 will go beyond honoring martyrs: will honor war veterans. War veterans include all who have served their nation.
The intention is to ensure that Memorial Day is observed to remember the ultimate sacrifice of those who fought for the nation, and the day is not spent only in fun and frolic.
Traditions will be continued
Memorial Day traditions will continue to be observed. These include laying a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknowns in Arlington National Cemetery, followed by parades and speeches. The national flag will be lowered to half-staff until noon and raised until sunset.
Thanks to Donna D.
To those in the general public screaming “Arm the teachers! Give the teachers guns!”…let me get this straight…
You don’t trust us to teach our content – there are so many bills going to state legislatures undermining the expertise teachers bring to the field. We need to publish a year’s worth of lesson plans because you don’t believe we’re actually teaching, right?
You don’t trust us when we say your student is the reason they’re failing when they are skipping class, aren’t submitting assignments, are playing both sides of the field and are dropping the ball, but it must be the teacher’s fault, right?
You don’t trust us to hold your student accountable for their behavior, standing firm on commitments and expectations, because it’s the teacher asking too much, right?
You don’t trust us to discipline students when they act out or abuse the system, because they’re precious little angels, and we’re the problem, right?
But you’ll trust us, no…EXPECT us to take a bullet for them when the system – when, at this point, not if – fails them.
And NOW you’re saying you trust us, trust me, to add firearm safety and defensive firearm training to my plate? You don’t trust me to execute a lesson plan but you’ll trust me to execute an intruder?
Incredible teachers are leaving the field every day. Phenomenal teachers are barely hanging on as they go through our day to day. Accredited programs and universities all over the country are closing their education programs because no one is enrolling.
When your kids, or grandkids, nieces, and nephews are being taught by actual undertrained people who are the only option to hire, will that make you happy? I mean…at least they’ll have guns!
In the wake of the Texas elementary school shooting, there will again be calls for gun restriction–and there again will be well funded resistance by the NRA (see The Letter from an American sent in by Diane C about the history of the NRA). Here are two articles well worth reading. Ed M. sent one in from the NYT and Pam P. sent in one from The New Yorker. It’s sad, tragic and embarrassing to live in a country that’s wonderful in so many ways, but one that’s incapable of addressing gun violence. As sung by Peter, Paul and Mary, When will they ever learn?
Thanks to Mary Jane F.
7:00 PM ON KCTS 9 Wed, May 25
Public safety in Seattle.
Ed note: There will be an upcoming talk about this effort at Skyline in early June. Stay tuned!
Click here for information on the I-1922 effort to reorient the war on drugs.
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