What’s the Point????
June 1, 2024 7:58pm
I write much less because I don’t believe that any effort on my part will affect anything that happens in the future. Once, I thought that my thoughts, my actions would affect (in some tiny way) the fate of the universe. Now I chuckle at these recollections. Just now a doe ran across the front yard as a lady walked her dog up the road in the Cul de sac. Chaos theory in action. Yesterday, a raccoon and chipmunk had the misfortune to enter the traps we set. I often think of the traps set by the universe to catch my own sins…which some day must be paid.
Chores and ennui have absorbed most of my writing energy so in May there was only one entry. I may stop writing altogether…. what’s the point? Nothing ever changes. For millennia, the history of mankind has been the same. All the literature, all the politics, all the philosophers, and all the psychoanalysts, have not changed the trajectory of history. All our “progress” comes down to an increasingly efficient manner of taking what we want and giving less. That is the history of mankind. Maybe Rust Chole was correct: maybe we should give up procreation and walk hand-in-hand to extinction!
American Spirit Resurrected
June 5, 2024 11:39
People often report strange animal behavior prior to earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and tsunamis. There is a sense of anticipation roaming the land these days – it’s as if we all know there is something cataclysmic just over the horizon but what it is we can’t tell. The middle east is on fire, rumors of WWIII are everywhere, and half the country thinks a former President was brought before a kangaroo court to be convicted of a non-crime to insure victory by his opponent in the upcoming election.
Add to this, the crime, inflation, open border, national debt, and the weak economy and it’s easy to see why the deplorable zoo animals (aka the US middle class) in fly-over country are howling in their cages. Cages created by “elite” politicians, bureaucrats, and academics to force us to grovel for rights that are given by our creator and not bestowed by any arrogant pseudo-aristocrats.
For too long, many have focused on the distractions created by elites and have failed to notice that they are indeed living in cages…. cages created by a ruling class that constantly shrinks the gilded prisons in which we live.
When Donald Trump ran for president in 2016, I did not vote for him in the primary. And when liberals went berserk after the election, I could not figure out the extreme reactions from progressives. OK, you don’t like the guy, I get it. Many democrat celebrities threatened to leave the country – there was much weeping and wailing – the country was controlled by an uneducated and uninformed electorate – Trump would follow in Hitler’s footsteps, they said.
It all seemed like an extreme reaction to a footnote in history…Trump would hold office for four years, probably have an uninspired term during which he would not follow through on many campaign promises, and it would be business as usual in the subsequent election.
Instead, the country went off the rails. Democrats used every weapon in their arsenal to ruin Trump’s presidency. Why would they do that? If he was such a bad candidate and an ineffective leader, why not back off and watch him commit political suicide, then wash your hands and walk away? But no, they doubled down on everything, pulling out all the stops and crossing what many believed to be legal and ethical barriers. Trump was not fazed. He seemed to grow stronger with each attack – like some sci-fi creature that feeds off the hate of its enemies.
So, the mystery became more and more opaque – what is it about this man that generates such irrational fear in his detractors?
As Americans began to resist a central government that takes care of its sycophants while flexing over a middle class that pays its bills and tries to follow the law, it became clear that all the fear is because elites saw the end of their reign. Average people began to realize that for all the make-believe money we spend on a supposedly competent Federal Government, we have an eroding economy, a debased dollar, rampant inflation, too much crime, a two-tiered justice system, an open border, 100k fentanyl deaths a year, an incapable and expensive military, drag-queen story hour in every library, failing schools, etc., etc., etc.
Everyone that casts a shadow now sees the handwriting on the wall. We are a nation in decline and the elites want to pretend otherwise as they distract from the real problems, stuff their pockets while arranging for seats in the lifeboats as the ship of state sinks with all hands aboard.
This is the truth of why Trump is hated by the left…. he represents the awareness that has dawned on the American public since 9/11….we’ve been played.
A Lapsed Atheist
June 17, 2024 8:13am
“I’m a lapsed atheist… I go to church every Sunday, precisely because having been brought up as an atheist, I came to realize in my career as a historian that not only is atheism a disastrous basis for a society… but also because I don’t think it can be a basis for individual ethical decision making”. – Niall Ferguson
I suspect that even those who grew up in the church (or whose ancestors were believers) and who now have dismissed any faith tradition, still carry the remnants of belief and the benefits of the accompanying self-reflection (the tangible usefulness of prayer) with them buried deep in the crevices of the mind where our souls linger. These memes of faith, hope, and love carry the seeds of positivity necessary for an orderly and efficient civilization and for the development of a fully self-actualized human.
Pascal Revisited
June 19, 2024 7:27pm
The “lapsed atheist” quote form Niall Ferguson reminded me of a line of thinking to which I return periodically. It is similar to Pascal’s Wager.
There are two possibilities: (1) There is a God or (2) Man invented God and everything that “he ” has tried to teach us. If (1) is true…well, no need for further elaboration. If (2) is true, all the best wisdom we have comes from our wise men and we can embrace it fully. The fact that we invented “God” should not be a barrier to anyone seeking truth and enlightenment. As in the case of Pascal’s Wager, I see no downside to adopting the morality of our sacred texts. So, I am sympathetic to Ferguson’s position…. have I not written that I consider myself a Christ follower – without the God part?
Bee vs. Human
June 30, 2024 10:59pm
Late June in Kentucky. I am driving north through rural vistas. It is 3pm, 93 degrees, and humid. I will cross the Ohio at Madison, IN and proceed upriver on IN56….following the river that courses 981 miles from Pittsburgh, where the Monongahela and Allegheny join to create the Ohio, to Cairo, IL where the Ohio empties in the Mississippi.
The highway follows the Ohio closely so that the river is in view for most of the 20 miles I drive to reach Musee de Venoge just outside of Vevay, IN. The site is hosting a live stream, an early commemoration of the Fourth of July. Many of my reenacting friends are participating and I am an invited audience member.
Along the route, I pass fields of oats that have been harvested and the straw is cut and windrowed ready for the square baler. My father recently bought two bales at Home Depot for $12 each. I guess inflation is everywhere.
I note the flood plain along the river and the distant hills that were once the bank of this 3rd largest river in the US and the 6th oldest on the North American continent.
Most of the early settlers entered the KY wilderness on the Ohio – coming down from Pittsburgh on flatboats while avoiding the Native Americans on the north bank. I wonder what the river would have looked like 100,000 years ago or a million years ago? We are a brief intrusion on the natural world and are not critical to the continuance of life on the planet. In this respect, we are far less important than a bee – for example. Gotta have pollinators…humans, not so much.
Noting my insignificance, I drove on through the heat and humidity and enjoy the flashing water of La Belle Riviere.