Was it COVID Brain Fog or Writers Block?

It’s time to let the creative juices flow once more!

It's been a while since I have done it.
Put words to the page and then I've spun it.
Sending to readers a timely missive.
Hoping my followers aren't too dismissive.

I'm not sure of precise causation
That caused two weeks of blog cessation.
What was it kept my fingers napping
Instead of on the keyboard tapping.

It started when two lines appeared
On the COVID test I'd commandeered.
The first line meant the test was working.
The second confirmed the virus's lurking.

Two Moderna shots then double boosted.
Yet still in my nose the microbe roosted.
With coughs and sneezes and feeling sickly.
Into quarnatine I disappeared quickly.

So empty moments were now my friend.
Hours  of leisure I thought I'd spend.
Writing blogs 'bout things that were popping.
I might have been sick but the world was not stopping.

My mind was all foggy, could not concentrate at
The things going on that I'd want to debate at.
But now it's much better and I'm seeing clearly
Here are some things I missed most severly.

There were hearings in DC that were causing a ruckus
They told how Trump and his friends were trying to f*ck us.
Thanks to Adam, Elaine and of course Ms Liz Cheney.
We were sure mesmerized learning about how insane he.

The planet is hotter, it's like a fire pit glowing
Who knows just what to our kids we're bestowing.
Heat waves, deadly storms, and still the President's action
Was blocked by refrains from coal's friend Hot Joe Manchin.

But up in the cosmos there was such delight
As the Webb telescope provided a sight.
Of the universe edges as they were at formation
I say it's Big Bang, some say God's creation.

Those topics I missed while my brain it was snoozing
So my silence for weeks I hope your excusing.
I'll do what I can to get back up to snuff.
For reading this verse, I can't thank you enough.

_________________________________

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Highland Park Reminds Us That Guns Kill People and Destroy Our Liberty

I did not want to be the first person to write about the outrage in Highland Park or even one of the first ten or the first hundred.

I was not there on that horrible July 4th morning. Nor was anyone from my family, nor any neighbors. And I don’t know any of the deceased nor any of those left orphaned or widowed or just bereft. I wanted those people to have a chance to tell their stories first.

But I have walked those streets in downtown Highland Park. I’ve had an apple pancake at Walker Brothers, bought canasta supplies at Ross, selected camp stuff for the kids at Gearhead when it was still Uncle Dan’s. This deadly act felt so personal.

My life has been touched by death many times. Natural causes, suicides, and even a few murders. But I can’t think of anything so senseless, so selfish, or so shameful as this tragedy. The gut-punch won’t go away.

We lament today but I fear that except for a handful of people whose lives have been irretrievably altered, nothing will change.

High-powered rifles will continue to be a fact of life and death. Handguns will continue to kill police, to kill offenders, to kill bystanders. And don’t tell me they are needed for self-defense. I’m not buying it, and these guys aren’t either.

I am not sure how and why our country reached this state of firearm saturation. I am not sure what we can do about it. The new Bipartisan Safer Communities Act is a first step, most significant in showing that congressional sanity is a possibility.

Freedom to yield a weapon needs to stop when it touches my freedom or your freedom or anyone’s freedom to live a long, loving, and legal life. That’s what Independence Day now means to me.

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A Look At The Week That Was. Donald Trump Emails Donny Jr.

Donald Trump in Illinois–photo courtesy Chicago Tribune

Les is More readers: I found this email in my inbox this morning. I don’t know who leaked it to me, but thanks.

Hey Donny,

What a week, hey? It’s the hugest since the Dems and Libtards and the LGBTQholes “stole” the election.

Just think, it is almost two years later and half the country still believes that bullshit. But as long as it keeps adding to my bottom line and keeps these idiot hicks chanting my name we’ll keep pushing the story. Good thing they aren’t watching the Congressional faux hearings, not that those cretins would understand a thing being said.

Speaking of those hayseeds, I just spent the day in Quincy, Illinois endorsing morons. What a shithole downstate Illinois is. Christ, it’s practically Iowa. If they allowed abortions after incest the population would be zero.

And while ~~incest~~ family is on my mind, what do you think of that crap from Ivanka? Doesn’t she know that if she stops the steal story she stops my money machine? And if she stops my money machine she stops the cash flow into her trust. What an airhead. She’s gotten to be as goofy as Jared, not that she was ever particularly bright.

How’s Kimmy? Still hot?

Gotta love the Supreme Court though. Thanks to my humongous nominations of Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, and that Coney Barrett chick I get to take the credit, not that I give a rat’s ass about abortion rights. If I get anyone in ‘the family way” I can still fly ’em off to some other country for the necessaries…you don’t have to worry about any new brother or sister brats. I made THAT mistake 16 years ago.

But how about those back-stabbers McConnell and McCarthy letting some new gun legislation pass? I haven’t read it but I hate it. Like I said before, I could shoot either of them on Time Square and not lose a single vote. MTG would probably pin a medal on my chest–not that I would let that face within ten feet of me.

OK, I’m tired of writing. Carlson is on.

Dad

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Supreme Court Reinstates Slavery; Follows Up Roe V Wade by Declaring 13th Amendment Null and Void

(Washington, DC, Special to More about Les) In a surprise but unsurprising move, the Supreme Court today invalidated the 13th Amendment, returning to each state the right to declare slavery legal within its own borders. The Court also declared the Fugitive Slave Act, an 1850 law requiring all states to return runaway slaves to their owners, as the “law of the land.”

Although no legal case involving slavery was before the court, Associate Justice Sam Alioto told reporters “we are merely reestablishing this great nation, the nation that the Founding Fathers created. We feel this Court has that right, and that responsibility.”

The majority opinion, written by Associate Justice Clarence Thomas, stated that since nowhere in the original Constitution was slavery banned, Congress did not have the right to do so.

In a supplement, the Court stated they would be reviewing and potentially discarding all Constitutional amendments, except for the short portion of the 2nd amendment dealing with the right to bear arms, which the supplement states is a “God-given right inadvertently left out of the original Constitution by an inebriated James Madison.”

The majority opinion and supplement were signed by Associate Justices Alito, Thomas, Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, and Coney Barrett. The minority opinion, written by Associate Justice Sotomayor, and signed by Sotomayor and her fellow liberal appointees Associate Justices Kagan and Breyer read in its entirety “These guys are f-ing crazy.” Chief Justice Roberts signed neither opinion and was seen wandering the halls of the Supreme Court Building babbling incoherently.

Justices Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, and Coney Barrett stated that though their confirmation hearings were contentious, no one had asked them their views on slavery, so no one could complain about their opinion on this ruling.

Former President Donald Trump speaking at an NRA convention in rural Mississippi praised the move, stating “It was Giuliani’s idea, but I made this possible, I get all the credit. Hang Pence.” NRA CEO Wayne LaPierre announced the organization would consider changing its name to NRSA, the Nation Rifle and Slavery Association.

In an immediate response to the ruling, Governors Ron DeSantis of Florida and Greg Abbott of Texas announced they will offer tax incentives to any company within their states operating with slave labor. Other state governors and legislatures will likely follow suit.

In a possibly related event, a giant tear was seen on the cheek of the Abraham Lincoln statue at the Lincoln Memorial.

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To My Grandchildren After The Texas School Shooting.

A Chicago school shooting. Photo courtesy Chicago Tribune.

A Message To My Four Grandchildren

When I was in elementary school we had fire drills. Then when I was in high school I was part of the “Safety Unit,” manning the stairwells to ensure students only used the correct pathways to a safe exit during similar drills. Most students treated those drills as a joke, enjoying a break from classes, and getting outside on a nice spring day.

I never inquired, but I suppose things were the same for our kids, your parents, who were public school students in the late 80s and throughout the 90s, with those same drills that no one took seriously.

Then came April 20, 1999, and with Columbine, the beginning of the school shooter era.

So the drills that you, my four grandchildren will get used to are active shooter drills. And I fear you need to take them seriously.

Of all the countries in the world, only this one can’t figure out how to stop mass shootings — be they in the workplace, a shopping mall, or an elementary school.

The country you live in is overloaded with firearms. The adults are numb to the daily murder numbers until they impinge on the parts of the city they care about.

We can reel off the locations of mass shootings, but as a government, as a people, we have failed your generation.

I hope someday, someday soon, we adults will start doing the smart things, and you kids can go to school, to houses of worship, and to fun places too, and not have to worry about whether you will make it to tomorrow.

You deserve a safe, happy future.

With Love,

Your Baba

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South Korea Does What the USA Has Struggled To Do. We Should be Embarrassed and Ashamed.

Future South Korean President Yoon, former US President Trump. — South Korean President-to-be Yoon; US President-that-was-Trump

According to the New York Times, the presidential election was “so plagued by a series of scandals and marred by mudslinging between the parties that some in the electorate took to calling it a contest between two “unlikables.”

Conservative vs. liberal, experience vs political neophyte. Soaring housing prices, gender issues, a resurgent virus. dirty tricks. It was politics at its dirtiest.

But when the votes (over 31 million in a country of 51 million) were counted earlier this week, one candidate in South Korea’s presidential election, Mr. Yoon Suk-yeol of the People Power Party, held a minuscule lead of about 0.8 percentage points. And at 4 o’clock in the morning, his major opponent, Mr. Lee Jae-myung of the ruling Democratic Party, did something that in the present-day US feels remarkable. Mr. Lee conceded the election.

Yes, you read that correctly. Not only did Mr. Lee concede to Mr. Yoon, as of today no one has called the election fake, fraudulent, corrupt, or a big lie.

Mr. Yoon will take office on May 10. At this time there are no lawsuits to deny him the presidency, no insane press conferences scheduled at Four Seasons Landscaping of Seoul, and the loser, Mr. Lee, has not been ignominiously banned from Twitter.

I lack in-depth knowledge of the politics of South Korea and know even less about the policies Mr. Yoon will favor. I suppose the talking heads on CNN and on Fox News will disagree about whether his victory is good or bad for the US. Not many people here will watch or care.

But what is most notable to me is that even in this day and age of social networking and misinformation, even with (or perhaps because of) a lunatic with a bad haircut staring at it from across its northern border, a country can still figure out how to do this most important part of democracy, the peaceful transition of power, and how to do it right.

And those of you in our country who don’t get that should be thoroughly ashamed.

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Do Not Roam, Senate Joe

To the tune of “Take Me Home, Country Roads”

With apologies to John Denver.

He’s the man from West Virginia,
He’s Joe Manchin, his name makes me shiver
On the Blue Team, that’s the way he sees
But today I’m feeling, with Dems he disagrees

Senate Joe, do not roam
Don’t misplace, or go wrong
Stick with Biden, and with Shumer
Do not roam, Senate Joe.

In the Senate, a three-termer
Moderation, never been a Berner 
Filibuster, the apple of his eye
He don’t want to change it, don’t want to be that guy.

Senate Joe, do not roam
Don’t misplace, or go wrong
Stick with Biden, and with Shumer
Do not roam, Senate Joe.

Now with Krysten, causing trouble
Own the libs, well, that could be your motto.
Fighting clean air, and the taxes too.
But without your votes, the Dems will have two few.

Senate Joe, do not roam
Don’t misplace, or go wrong
Stick with Biden, and with Shumer
Do not roam, Senate Joe.

You hear the news from the lobbyists, they call you
Remind you of the coal that lies ‘neath West Virginia clay
Deciding how to vote, you gotta know that
Fossil fuels, should go away, just go away.

Senate Joe, do not roam
Don’t misplace, or go wrong
Stick with Biden, and with Shumer
Do not roam, Senate Joe.

Do not roam, Senate Joe.
Do not roam, Senate Joe.

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You Go On Trial Today

You go on trial today.
They’ll say you incited
Your lawyers will fight it,
The riot, disquiet
In the city on the hill

Your talk was disruptive
You always did want this
The power, the glory
Your own favorite story, your quarry
Four more years laudatory
We’d all pay the bill

You have your defenders
Your fantasy blenders
With lasers more flavors
Of loony tune lies about liberal invaders
Who’d brainwash us, gun quash us
Until America was finally still

Your lawyers will story
It was all allegory
No violence no turmoil
Was ever to recoil
It was all just for fun, just to say that you won
To build up your branding, your standing, the fees you’re demanding
For your book and your speeches, ’bout living hell of impeaches
So two is better than one
When the time has come to chill

Your lawyers talk about process
Can the law really want this
Too tardy, too late, to wipe out the slate
While Constitutional scholars are betting their dollars
That it’s all elementary, to impeach is the sentry
Protecting our nation from a monster’s creation
As he delivers a poison pill

For a change you are quiet, your tweets on a diet
You won’t testify,
Won’t look in the eyes
Of the Senators, those jurors
Who will hear of your furors
And of the pretense as you challenged Mike Pence
His hiding, your chiding, over ballots presiding
He stopped being your shill.

The result is not debatable
The numbers not inflatable
Two-thirds of the Senate is not going to get it, they’ll let it
Give you your acquittal, your wrist slapped a little.
But still it is worth it, the House didn’t shirk it
You go on trial today.

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This Blog Has Decided to Dump the Trump

Photoe Courtesy Chicago Tribune — Photo Courtesy Chicago Tribune

Businesses everywhere are untying themselves from Donald Trump. From Twitter to the PGA to Deutsche Bank, Trump is out. To quote Gail Collins in the New York Times, “you get the impression a lot of people are just rooting through their offices, trying to find some minor Trump connection they could announce they’re severing.”

So let me get off the Trumpapalooza bandwagon too. “What?” you say. “You are a left-wing libber. You were never a Trump follower, contributor, or voter. What bandwagon were you ever on?”

Let me explain. As for so many in the media (am I really in the media?) many of my best-read blogs were devoted to the President. When no one else wanted a job in his administration I asked (tongue firmly in cheek) for a Cabinet position. I suggested (tongue even more firmly in cheek that Ivanka hire Barb as her personal designer. And after months of my harmless joshing, when Trump tried to drive a stake through Obamacare I wrote that it was time to repeal and replace the Donald. That proved to be the most widely read blog I have ever written.

I have written less about Trump through the succeeding years. What, after all, is the point of preaching to the choir. You, my favorite reader, already know how I feel about our leader, and most of you feel the same way. I doubt if I have changed one mind, though perhaps I have gotten a laugh or two from some of you.

And so, with one week left in the quagmire of Trumpolitik, I pledge to never again write about Donald, Ivanka, Melania, Rudy, or even Mike Pence. I promise if the name Jared appears it will be in a blog about the former Subway Guy. I give my word that there will be no talk in this blog about the 25th Amendment.

Believe me, from now on, all my blogs will be just perfect. Would I lie to you?

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Democracy in Action–Small Town Style

If all politics are local, our small suburban village proved last night, that tricky as it may be, it still works.

State law requires that municipalities of less than 5,000 inhabitants establish a caucus system for picking candidates to run for elected positions such as mayor or trustee. Both in 2018 and this year, I have served on the selection committee of the Caucus Party, charged with following state guidelines to pick a slate of candidates to be presented to the populace for placement on the final ballot.

Back in 2018 things were a breeze. Our committee met in person early in the summer and multiple times thereafter. We searched the community for interested candidates and reviewed their responses to questionnaires. We held a day-long session in Village Hall to interview each candidate and at the end of the day chose a slate to present to the community. The Village meeting to approve the slate was a dry affair, with barely a handful of registered voters joining us.

Those were of course the DBC (days before COVID.) This year the whole shebang was a bit more complicated. As with many businesses we spent our initial meeting figuring out how we would get a Zoom account that would provide us with all the bells and whistles we would need. We assigned various technological tasks that had not been necessary, or even thought of, two years before. We upgraded a website–and began to hope we could pull this off.

Using a combination of snail mail, newspaper postings, email blitzes, and personal contacts, the committee found an abundance of qualified applicants vying for a place on the slate. Questionnaires via email were a snap. All interviewing was done during a one-day Zoom meeting, which worked almost flawlessly thanks to a rehearsal by the committee a few nights before. On-line polling of the committee let us choose the candidates that we felt were appropriate for the slate.

That left one last hurdle. How to have a community meeting, limited to registered voters, at which the voters would approve the slate? Residents were again notified by multiple means that to attend the meeting they would need to send us their name and email address at least 2 days before the meeting. We would use their names to verify they were registered voters and their email addresses to send them a link to the Zoom meeting.

And word spread. We received over 100 requests to attend the meeting–a community record. I was appointed (or did I foolishly volunteer?) as the gatekeeper–matching the people arriving in the Zoom waiting room with the verified voters, and allowing them to pass into the meeting. That proved trickier than expected. The names that I saw in the waiting room were the names people have assigned to their computer/laptop/phone, not the name they had used to register. It took a bit longer than expected, but we figured it out.

So we had our meeting. And voters, using Zoom polling technology, approved the slate. Those lucky candidates will now be on the ballot for the (hopefully in-person) municipal election in the spring.

Every vote, every election, counts.

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