Ignore Xi Jinping’s Deceptions. China Is Struggling, Therese Shaheen, National Review, December 20, 2021…
… this is a long and interesting article that makes the case that China is not as strong as one might get the impression it is through American news media… it made its case thoroughly and if that case is correct, it makes the China-US tensions seem less worrisome assuming a world where the US and Europe are united in containment efforts…
OMG, this is a must read! Against the Trap of Efficiency: Mortality, Meaning, and the Antidote to the Time-Anxiety that Syphons the Joy of Life, Maria Popova, The Marginalist…
… MP is one of my main spiritual guides and in this post she strikes spiritual gold, so to speak:
The exercise instantly clarifies — and horrifies, with the force of its clarity — the empty atoms of automation and unexamined choice filling modern life with busyness while hollowing it of gladness. What emerges is the sense that making a meaningful life is less like the building of the Pyramids, stacking an endless array of colossal blocks into a superstructure of impressive stature and on the back of slave labor, than like the carving of Rodin’s Thinker, cutting pieces away from the marble block until a shape of substance and beauty is revealed. What emerges, too, is the sense that the modern cult of productivity is the great pyramid scheme of our time.
… and then there is this quote from the book MP is telling us about:
Most other resources on which we rely as individuals — such as food, money, and electricity — are things that facilitate life, and in some cases it’s possible to live without them, at least for a while. Attention, on the other hand, just is life: your experience of being alive consists of nothing other than the sum of everything to which you pay attention. At the end of your life, looking back, whatever compelled your attention from moment to moment is simply what your life will have been.
… this is the foundational idea of what this blog is about!…
Bob Thompson’s Provocative Challenge to Euro-American Art History, Billy Anania, Hyperallergic, December 20, 2021…
Bob Thompson, “Black Monster” (1959), oil on canvas, 56 x 67 inches (© Michael Rosenfeld Gallery LLC, New York)
… if i were anywhere near Maine and the Colby College Museum, i would go see this (assuming adequate safety measures for COVID)…
In 28 years of life, Thompson created more than 1,000 paintings, including hundreds of expressive reinterpretations of Renaissance and Early Modern artworks. These variations, much like those in jazz music, allowed the artist to riff on familiar favorites, and his standards of choice were Poussin, Tintoretto, Manet, and Goya. Approaching renowned white artists from the margins allowed Thompson to tease out Euro-American tensions with Blackness, and the 85 works on display here portray the terror and splendor of public space, the persecution of Black sexuality, and the fine line between assimilation and fugitivity.
… here is a Wikipedia article on him…
… he strikes me as a primitive, almost outsider artist, though he had formal training…
Heather Cox Richardson, December 20, 2021…
… about the betrayal of Joe Manchin… makes a compelling case for an economy centered around ordinary people and how BBB would have helped create that… it notes that Goldman Sachs downgraded economic growth projections by 1% upon news of Manchin’s betrayal… there is more to this than meets the eye though… it sounds like someone in the administration really pissed him off and he is having a temper tantrum… he has also, from what i see, left the door open for a reformulation of the bill into something more to his liking… i suspect we haven’t seen the end of BBB… politics is complicated, there are always steps back and steps forward…
First Notes
228.2 lbs
… departure day… will leave a little later than hoped, but, there is no ferry to catch, so we should be good…
… FB friend of Holly’s told her to beware I95 corridor gas stations… seems to be a spreading vector for COVID… i do an internest search, don’t find any new articles but find one from 2020 citing research of spread along the corridor so it makes sense that it would be a vector for Omicron… i have packed latex gloves and disinfectant wipes which i have not been using lately but will start using on the trip…
… did watch The Ice Harvest last night… slept through most of it… H says it was good… i guess we will add it to the roster…
… did a lot yesterday… not quite enough, but a lot… there is no absolute departure time today, so we should be fine… at least all our Christmas gifts got sent off and delivered…
… check utility bill, had been thinking automatic pay didn’t work… i was right… set up payment… one more thing off my mind…
The New West Side Story Brings the Show’s Father Issues to the Fore, Kyle Turner, Hyperallergic
… compelling review of Spielberg’s take on this classic reimagining of Romeo and Juliet…
Spielberg’s understanding of West Side Story and the role of inheritance in it (the love he’s inherited for the show, the love or hate the characters inherit for one another) is not uncomplicated. He doesn’t find a satisfying, saccharine answer around resilience the way he usually does in his characters, even though that idea easily could have manifested here in the form of María and Tony’s romance. Nor does he lean into the sentimentality of working on such a beloved title. His approach is dynamic, as shown by how he deepens (without “solving”) the story. Though evincing a classical Hollywood sensibility, he makes the personal and political violence more harrowing, their cyclical nature more tragic. The aesthetic in-betweenness — both breathtakingly old-fashioned and sharply modern — feels like his way of situating West Side Story within both his filmography and broader cinematic and political history. “Somewhere” is a utopian song, but finding a “new way of forgiving” doesn’t seem possible without grappling with the past. María and Tony ultimately can’t escape it, but can the show? Can Spielberg himself? Maybe “tonight” …
Keep Christ in Christmas?
… it appears than in the United States, the Puritans were the biggest humbuggers of all…
While today’s hand-wringing about the supposed war on Christmas centers on imagined attacks on American Christianity, there is a rich irony in the fact that the longest and most sustained critique of Christmas—including its banning—came from those who were claiming to be the truest and purest defenders of the reason for the season.1
… read more here…
When Christmas Was Really Under Attack, Daniel N. Gullotta, The Bulwark, December 20, 2021 ↩︎
… the idea that there might be a supreme court vacancy in 2021 just came on my radar screen through this article on Reason.com about Biden’s potential impact on the federal court system (it’s been relatively substantial so far)… and, of course, its Justice Breyer… according to the article linked above…
Breyer has told several people who’ve made unofficial efforts to push him to retire that he thinks the confirmation process shouldn’t be political, according to people told of those discussions, and Democrats worry he’d remain as an act of resistance to show he’s not bowing to politics.
… and…
Privately, multiple Senate Democrats complain that Breyer seems to have let his ego overtake him and he is not being realistic to how radically Supreme Court confirmation politics has changed in the last five years.
… please let’s not make the same mistake as we did with Ginsberg… ego has got to give way to doing what’s right for future generations… current SCOTUS is awful… it would become more than tragic if conservatives get another seat to fill…
… there is a lot of ominous news on the world stage regarding Russia… the troop buildup on the border of Ukraine… a foreign affairs analyst commenting on MSNBC that signs are disturbing and this article on Havana Syndrome… it appears the US is getting closer to pinning it on Russia… the tension grows…
The Death of Build Back Better?…
… this article in National Review explains conservative opposition and concerns about the BBB bill as well as a detailed account of Senator Manchin’s concerns about the bill… i have to count myself as among the frustrated with Manchin, probably more over voting rights and the filibuster than this… but i am also one of the more progressive who hopes this will lead to a reformulation of its contents into a narrower selection of priorities with longer term funding which he justifiably claims will be more likely to last into the future…
We must realize we can’t over-consume our planet. This is urgent. We need to listen to all the indigenous people in the world who know how to live in harmony with the planet.1
First notes…
227.8 lbs
… 24 hrs till departure… things are more or less on track… a few more dangling ends than i would like, but they should be tied up by end of day…
… we watched A Very Murray Christmas last night… it was generally good except for the patriarchal configuration which was generally pretty traditional and maybe more than a little outdated?… it contained the song Baby, It’s Cold Outside, which has come to be known in some quarters as the “date rape song”… as i was listening to it the only thing that stood out to me was the “what’s in this drink” line, which suggests to some in present day audiences that the woman is being drugged… i get that, but, as usual the situation seems more nuanced… it’s worth reading this wikipedia article which outlines the controversy over the song… it is interesting that as contexts change, meanings change too… i generally like the song and the most significant thing to me is that the woman, while resisting, essentially consents… at no time in any performance of the song does she seem out of control… the “what’s in this drink?” line did hang me up a bit… the wikipedia article explains that this line essentially quotes “a common idiom of the period used to sidestep social expectations by blaming one’s actions on the influence of alcohol.”…
… we also watched Chocolat, which was a great movie with a wonderful cast, Jonny Depp, Juliette Binoche, Lena Olin… it was a Babbette’s Feast movie except it’s more direct target was the Catholic Church entrenched Patriarchy of a small town… i look up Babbette’s Feast and just reading the Wikipedia article explaining the plot i am in tears… what a beautiful film and story… i discover it is based on a short story by Isak Dinesen (Karen Blixen)… i find a pdf of the story and save it to Evernote… i want to read it…
… i’ve gone down a rabbit hole, one thing leading to the next… what bliss…
… wow! just wow!… the Editors of the very right leaning National Review arguing for electoral count reform based on the fiasco of 45 and making it clear that 45 behaved badly and caused the January 6 riot …
When these efforts failed, the Trump campaign simply had several slates of Trump electors “cast” public votes on the required day, without any sanction from any arm of state government. A lawsuit, objections in Congress, legal memos by Trump adviser John Eastman, and ultimately the January 6 “Stop the Steal” rally and subsequent riot at the Capitol were all directed at having either Vice President Mike Pence or Congress certify these fraudulent electors, or at least delay the counting of votes by electors properly certified by state governors.
… i know, i know, we lefties use the term ‘insurrection’ to describe what happened on January 6, but until that is fully established in legal proceedings, as we all believe it will be, i am good with ‘riot’ if it gets us to agreement on electoral count reform… you know, i say potato, you say potato…
… probably many of you, but not me… i have figured out how to get the best of both worlds and it involves a feature of Obsidian that i just stumbled on, which is ‘open in default app’… yesterday, as i was poking around, i clicked on it and low and behold, Ulysses opened up and was displaying the page i had just been working on!… i must have been asked what my ‘default app’ should be when i first installed Obsidian, but it was a complete surprise to me to discover the connection… so now, i start a page in Obsidian… open it in Ulysses and type away… post to Micro.blog when i am ready, tag it, etc… it continues to reside in Obsidian which becomes the archive upon which all the mapping magic can happen… what bliss!…
Texas Is Just Going to Build Its Own Border Wall Now… can we talk?… does anyone really think that this is anything more than political grandstanding?… immigration gets people’s blood boiling one way or another, so politicians exploit it… as far as i can tell, nobody in this country is really interested in a rational immigration policy because there is enormous labor value to the system as it currently runs… protestations to the contrary aside, this society wants illegal immigrants because they can be paid little and enticed (forced?) to work in dangerous conditions because they live in constant fear of deportation… the long history of our society is that we keep exchanging one slave system for another… and almost nobody here is blameless as we all enjoy the fruits of almost-slave labor…
Omicron, However You Pronounce It, Is Out of Control Right Now… the state of COVID in my neck of the woods… glad that we are vaccinated and boosted… still, as the article says, this sucks, and the bit about rapid tests being expensive?!!… bah! humbug!
Exhibition: ‘Freedom Must Be Lived: Marion Palfi’s America, 1940-1978’ at the Phoenix Art Museum
… this article caught my eye straight off when i opened Feedbin… and as i read the opening paragraphs i knew i would be reading to the very end… the story of yet another woman who didn’t get the attention she deserved in the male dominated world of photography…
… as i read i encounter this:
“We talk about the poverty of the Indian, their poor health, their substandard of living – we cry – ! Who is responsible for this? The murder of the American Indian has stopped as such. No more Indian wars, but all kinds of schemes are constantly working to take still their last piece of land (we found oil, uranium, and other valuable minerals and there is fish, timber, etc.) and above all to wipe the image away – erase – “to change the Indian” – Into what? Into a middle class personality with all the ambitions and drives of our society. Competition and exploitation are the most important assets, we think. Foreign to all Indian thinking! What do we actually do? We destroy the Indian completely, mentally, psychologically, and spiritually. You might ask – so what? What is so good not to assimilate with the predominant society? Let me tell you what. Our society destroys lives – with our “know how” destroy all living. We pollute the air, the water, poison the plants and animal life. The Indian knew no money, but the Indian knew security, happiness – the Indian was a supreme conserver of nature – of life. The Indian worked with nature not against it.”1
… competition and exploitation are the core values of our society, western civilization, the capitalist world… we destroy lives and the earth as we pursue these values to their destructive end… could it be that this grand experiment of life and “intelligence” is destined to failure?… or could it be that as significant as we think we are, we just aren’t anything close to the main show?…
… but i digress…
… Marion Palfi’s life and work are amazing… it is a long post, as almost all of them are over at Art Blart… but in depth informative on a remarkable woman…
via Art Blart: Marion Palfi. “Some Thoughts,” preface to the unpublished manuscript, “My Children, First I liked the Whites, I Gave Them Fruits,” in the possession of Martin Magner, pp. 1-2 quoted in Elizabeth Lindquist-Cock. “Marion Palfi: An Appreciation,” in The Archive Research Series Number 19, September 1983, Center for Creative Photography, University of Arizona, p. 9. ↩︎
First notes…
… week 52, last week of the year/Fall… but then i wonder, am i out of sync, is this actually week 51?… it could be… yup, it is… argh!!! ok then, week 51 it is… still the last week of fall, last few days… we are setting out on our trip on the winter solstice… hmmm… we need some sort of celebratory something to mark it… as i contemplate this, i find myself hoping that something magical will be the result of setting out on the solstice…
… in two days we set out for Florida… much to do between now and then… i did manage to get Christmas packages off to R and J, still don’t have a gift for M to speak of… some little things… what sort of anything does M need/Want?…
… H in a bad mood yesterday… temporarily lost their watch band, which i later found, then their mood started to pick up… i also think they have the pre-traveling bad mood… it seems to be a thing with them…
… today we drive up to Hudson to see S and B, pick up the fruitcakes…
… i have been thinking about a number of things that i/we have that really work… my current shoulder bag, which i have had for a long time but which i recently started using again and discovered, wow, it really is just about the perfect bag… then there is the new electric kettle we just bought that has a coffee temperature setting and we both swear it has made a big difference in the taste of our coffee in the morning… we specualte on the absence of lime scale and the lower temperature when poured over the grounds make a difference… and finally, my upright mouse which seems to have solved my shoulder pain problems entirely and is a dream to use… so comfortable… it’s so nice when things work well…
… we watched a new Netflix movie, A Boy Named Christmas, that was very good… then i read another 10 or so pages of A Christmas Story out loud to H… we are going to make it a nightly ritual while we are traveling… hoping to finish up Christmas Eve… or maybe Christmas morning would be appropriate…
… been thinking a good deal about how this journaling/photography/reading/writing effort proceeds in the new year… part of me has always concluded that one just needs to do it as they feel compelled to do it… that there is no ultimate goal to it… but then another part of me wants something more solid to come of it… wants it to be more useful to others that might encounter it… i had signs of that, one of the Micro.blog community commented that i had shared something useful… i don’t need the aprobations of others, but i don’t mind getting it once in a while…
While walking…
Heather Cox Richardson, December 17, 2021... former governor Rick Perry fingered by the J6 committee as having sent a text to 45 the day after the election suggesting they appoint their own electors in three states, before the results are in, and throw the election to SCOTUS... gun smoking much?... Mitch McConnel is beginning to hedge his bets?... supporting the work of the committee on Spectrum News... Rodger Stone pleads the Fifth all the way down... 90% of adult Dems are vaccinated, only 60% of adult Republicans are... wondering if that will lead to a voting numbers advantage for the Dems due to higher number of deaths among Republicans... i won't cry too much... #politics #january6 #pandemic
Denounce Julian Assange. Don't Extradite Him... making the case that Assange is a schmuck of the highest order, but that espionage charges against him undermine freedom of speech and the press... the Biden administration is still pursuing the espionage charge and seeks to extradite Assange to the US to stand trial... #politics #firstamendment #julianassange
Global Freedom Is on the Decline... unfortunately, not many surprises in this article from Reason.com...
As _Reason_ [noted last month](https://reason.com/2021/11/23/covid-19-made-democracies-more-authoritarian-and-authoritarianism-even-worse/), the twin threats of political populism and the COVID-19 pandemic have triggered an erosion in democratic values across the globe. International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance, a nonprofit based in Sweden that has been tracking democracies around the globe since 1975, [warns in a new report](https://www.idea.int/gsod/global-report#chapter-2-democracy-health-check:-an-overview-of-global-trends) that the number of countries that are becoming "more authoritarian" by the group's calculus is three times the number of countries that are moving toward democracy. This year is the fifth consecutive year in which the trend has been moving in that direction.
Who Is A Woman for Purposes of Women's Only Spaces?... at the beginning of this year i was reading Simone de Beauvoir's Second Sex and learned that gender is a social construct... i myself have what i consider to be feminine traits, though i have never sought to be trans-gender... i have always identified as male and don't expect to change in that regard in this lifetime... still, of all the alternative sexual preference/gender positions that can be taken, i can most readily imagnine myself occupying the trans-woman space... in fact, none of the other sexual preference/gender spaces appeal to me at all... this article discusses when it is appropriate to declare a "space" as women (identified by sex) only spaces... for the most part, it concludes that there are relatively few spaces that should be declared women (by sex) only... professional sports being one of them... #gender #transexual
What Will 'Build Back Better' Buy? Inflation.... an argument supporting Manchin... i tend to be willing to hear Manchin's arguments on spending and the economy... i worry myself about too much spending... this article discusses why he might be right...
Moonlight
Video stills series…
Reading Notes, News, Politics…
Heather Cox Richardson, December 16, 2021… a mixed bag today… Build Back Better Act has been shelved for the moment, due to the intransigence of Senator Manchin… voting rights has moved to the forefront and here again, Senator Manchin is a stumbling block… i believe Democracy is at stake and voting rights legislation is essential… there is no way to do it without amending the filibuster rule… Manchin is steadfastly against that so far… at the end, a bit about the Urghur Forced Labor Prevention Act, which passed the Senate unanimously… the US pushing back on China for human rights violoations… polysilicon, used to make solar panels, will become scarcer as half the wolrd’s supply comes from Zinjiang from which the Biden administration is preventing all imports unless there is clear proof that slave labor wasn’t part of its production…
What’s Polluting the Air? Not Even the EPA Can Say… how the EPA fails to act even when receiving reports that indicate a huge toxic release problem… i wish i was not surprised…
The Most Detailed Map of Cancer-Causing Industrial Air Pollution in the US
The FDA Just Made Medication Abortions a Whole Lot Easier to Get… a step in the right direction, but, easily reversable by a future administration and:
Yet the change won’t mean a whole lot in much of the country. Nineteen states(https://www.guttmacher.org/state-policy/explore/medication-abortion), including Texas, Mississippi, and Alabama (which recently introduced a “heartbeat bill” similar to Texas’) restrict the use of telemedicine for abortion. People across the South and the Midwest will have to travel to sanctuary states like California or New York for telemedicine appointments and to receive the medication. #abortion
Biden Administration Permanently Lifts Restrictions on Abortion Pills… an alternative take on the abortion pill story…
Manchin and Sinema Are Blocking Everything… it is so depressing… i am hoping that MJ is being overly dramatic, but the available evidence supports the doom and gloom scenario… Manchin and Sinema are currently blocking everything that would help most Democrats in the midterm, and, ultimately, 2024, since a disaster at midterm will prevent them from doing anything to make a case for their continuation in power in 2024…
Congressional Republicans Provide a Way Forward on Supply Chains… it takes pot shots at Democratic efforts but does offer what seem to be reasonable solutions… one thing that puzzles me is why the water transportation industry would favor regulation that makes it harder to expand port facilities and process larger ships?… this seems counterintuitive…
If We Don’t Get Inflation Under Control, It Could Unleash Some Dramatic Consequences…
First notes…
… watched My Dad’s Christmas Date and i was bewitched by Olivia Mai Barrett… there was something about her that was utterly engaging… the movie itself was very watchable but we couldn’t escape the feeling that something missed a beat… a dad/daughter team navigating the territory of having lost a wife/mother in a car accident… it is two years on, Christmas, and both are still trying to cope… it had all the plot elements of a feel good tearjerker but in the end failed to deliver… neither of us could figure out exactly why… the acting was pretty good, the characters sympathetic, and in the case of Ms. Barett’s character, pretty engaging, at least to me… i looked up OMB, not to be confused with Office of Management and Budget, and found that she has not been in very many productions… i will be on the lookout for her in future, i feel like she had something…
… my main accomplishment yesterday was chicken stock… i made a bunch… H had lunch with friends so i was tied down to house, dogs and stock pot watching…
… lots to do before we leave… today i think the main thing is to get presents wrapped and sent to R and J…
First notes…
… the great cookie bake is done… L came and joined H in baking an extravaganza of cookies and stollen… we have so many cookies… time to start giving them away!…
… watched The Shop Around the Corner, or rather H watched it while i slept through the middle… i had to give a report on it to B which i did, but it was H’s appraisal…
… i am drinking too much… i don’t feel bad, but falling asleep during movies and less than optimal sleep at night are the result of that… also, not getting the kitchen cleaned up…
… Fiona escaped again yesterday… turned my back for a minute and she was on the other side of the fence rolling in something smelly… when i went after her calling she went in the opposite direction… i finally caught up with her on the street behind our house… had to call H to bring me a leash so i could lead her back… i have no idea how she did it and we are worried she is able to leap the fence… she is very agile…
… i finished a difficult part of the stair construction, fitting a board to notch around the cmu wall that steps down beside the stair stringer so i can close the gap between stair and wall which lets the weather in… made a template from 1/4” thick plywood… it worked beautifully… now it needs a railing and in the spring, staining, and we will be done… it’s much more solid than the old stair ever was…
… i will be making soup stocks today… chicken and maybe beef stock… i also have to wrap presents and prepare for shipping…
… just did a search for the best multivitamin for men… found one brand twice as either first or second pick… it includes probiotics so i can forgo my separate probiotic and may actually save money…
… five days to beginning of trip to Florida…