That Kind of News
It’s the kind of news never wanted but always and never expected.
Dolly Parton, queen of country music and humanitarian hero, dead at 80
Never met her nor saw Dolly Parton live in concert. But she’s just ten years older than me and contributed song writing, singing, and acting to my life’s experiences. Dolly always seemed real and genuine — and you can make whatever joke comes to your mind — but I think the world is a better place with more people like Dolly Parton.
This one stings.
RIP forever, Dolly Parton.
Tuesday’s Theme Music — Walk On
Ashland, southern Oregon. Tuesday, August 25, 2026. We’re into August’s final week. September begins next week.
Cooler day today. Cloudy this morning, there remains plentiful sunshine. 73 F, we’ll climb to 94.
Mom fell from her bed yesterday at the assisted living facility. We don’t know details, whether she rolled off or slipped off while sitting or missed the bed when she tried sitting on it. My niece, May, visited there yesterday and reported that the bed is very high. Mom texted me, the fix-it man was supposed to fix it but couldn’t because he was the cook. ?
Gina visited there today and reports, yes, it’s a tall bed. It’s stripped and she saw that it’s two thick mattresses. I asked, “Has it always been this tall?” Yes; this is the same bed Mom has used since arriving in February.
Mom has now been there a half year. It’s been a tumultuous time.
My wife and I are pissed about the Roberts Court decision regarding mail-in ballots. Basically, the POTUS, who has nothing to do with voting. That’s the states and Congress. But the Roberts Court walked a very fine line. Oh, the states filed too soon because they’re not yet being harmed by Trump’s efforts.
WTAF.
Not that Trump’s action are legal or illegal, or if has the authority to do this, etc. No, let’s wait and see, the Roberts Court declared. Kick it down the road. Wait till the election gets fucked up because the USPS isn’t delivering ballots. Then they’ll talk about it.
I was a conspiracist, I’d say the Roberts Court is trying to walk us into the state of midterm election chaos Trump wants so Trump can step in and declare an emergency.
Election fraud is another Trump boogey man. Just like his racism and his commie screams, he uses these words to instill fear and manipulate others.
Evidence of the voting fraud Trump screeches about is as scant as the cancer caused by windmills. Trump’s claims make as much sense as he did when he declared he’d lower prescription drug prices by more than 100%.
Trump is a weak person who thinks himself strong. I suspect the midterms will be as messy as Trump’s Iran War — reaching six months now, after he claimed it would be over in weeks — the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool fiasco, or the White House ballroom. It’s another case built on lies and false claims. It’s as reliable and substantial as AI-generated pictures of Trump as Jesus or Superman, or Trump with George Washington.
That is Trump: a fake. A con. A charlatan.
Thank you for your attention to this matter.
Trump has always called himself a great negotiator. But progress with Iran and Canada both verify, no, Trump is not a great negotiator. Despite Trump claims about what was done to Iran, the war continues. Prices continue rising and the affordability crisis grows.
Now, Trump’s negotiations with Canada has resulted in yet more pain for US consumers.
WSJ is dumbfounded by Trump’s dumb beef with Canada: it just ‘got dumber’
That’s Trump, too: dumb, and dumber.
Thinking about the court’s narrow approach, The Neurons gave me “Walk On” by U2 in the morning mental music stream. The song came out in 2000.
Sample Lyrics
And if the darkness is to keep us apart
And if the daylight feels like it’s a long way on
And if your glass heart should crack
And for a second you turn back
Oh no, be strong
Walk on, walk on
What you got they can’t steal it
No, they can’t even feel it
Walk on, walk on
Stay safe tonight
Yes, Trump is the darkness, trying to tear our nation apart.
Walk on. Stay safe. Be strong.
Cheers
Monday’s Theme Music – Wrapped Up
Ashland, southern Oregon. Monday, August 24, 2026.
Damn hot today: 100 F, but it feels warmer. A red flag warning is in effect. We are expected to cool down again on Wednesday.
I’m off to a late start, courtesy of some animal fight at 2 AM. Woke us up. Went out, gathered our critter, who came in all puffy tailed, although he didn’t seem to be involved.
We decided to keep the cat in. That ignited his determination to go back out. Everything was done to convey that determination: beating on the door, meowing, beating on me. I finally succumbed after an hour and granted freedom. Then, though, I worried: was the cat safe? AAARGH!
I didn’t get up until after nine and had some calls scheduled which proved to be time sucks. Then, off to shower, dress, coffee and writing. Now I’m back home. Just finished lunch, finally posting the theme music.
Really, it’s my own fault for 1) having a cat and 2) for letting the cat worry and control me.
That led to “Wrapped Around Your Finger” in my morning mental music stream. This is a 1983 song by The Police. Charted around the world, so you may have heard it before.
Hope your day goes well. Be safe, be healthy.
Cheers
The Trump Logic
I laughed today, reading a few articles about Trump. For example, this one:
Haberman reveals why Trump ignores his own team’s plea to stop voter revolt
“During a Monday morning appearance on MS NOW, author and journalist Maggie Haberman revealed that President Donald Trump’s own team pleaded with him to address voter anxieties, but he has so far seemed content to ignore them as the midterms approach.“
I laughed because Trump has demonstrated that he’s so out of touch, it’s gone beyond surreal. As further news emerges about Trump’s relationship with Natalie Harp, I think she’s influencing him, bolstering ideas that Trump is doing great. So, ipso facto, if Trump is doing great, as he believes, he has no reason to change.
Secondly, I would not be surprised if Trump is already planning to declare an emergency, and in fact to create an emergency to intervene in the 2026 elections or even suspend them. Everyone except Republicans would be in an immediate uproar. What’s really scary in this scenario is that the courts would probably tell Trump that he lacks the authority, but the Roberts Court would probably let Trump do so while they schedule arguments.
Trump and his Project Heritage puppet masters, are expecting that. They’ve been probing the judicial system to see how it reacts to different situations and arguments. They know which courts and judges favor Trump. And they also see how much legal leeway Roberts is giving Trump.
It would be so weirdly Trump: he would simultaneously claim — as he has — that crime and violence is down and everything is great — but also declare an emergency because of how bad everything is.
At the same time, Trump has repeatedly argued that the economy is strong and that his economic record will help Republicans in the 2026 midterms.
When talking about the economy, Trump likes to say that we’ve entered a golden age. He then recites a laundry list of ‘good things’. The thing is, those measurements are typically the metrics for the wealthy.
Outside of the wealthy, the economy sucks. The national debt is at a record high. Dominos fall from that. Bond rates increase; interest rates rise; the housing market suffers.
Gas and diesel fuel prices are up. That drives up the cost of everything, including just going to the store to buy things. With prices up, people have to spend more to buy less.
Back to school sales will be a tell about the economy; so will the upcoming holiday months. But retail sales are trending down YTY for the same period, not a good sign. Although places like Walmart say they’re going to counter by slashing prices by using refunds of tariffs they paid, how much can they significantly offset. More importantly, in parallel to that, Trump is adding more tariffs, and energy prices are ticking upward.
The bottom line of that: the government gives retailers money back for tariffs because the Roberts Court ruled against them. Then retailers use some of it to reduce prices. But Trump imposes new tariffs that push costs back upward.
And Trump knows that his tariffs are costing consumes, even though he previously said that they don’t. That takes us to quotes about what Trump has said about affordability, prices, and tariffs.
Your Trump Quote(s) of the Day:
So, I get it!
According to Trump, he’s going to address affordability, and bring prices down on day one, except affordability is really a Democratic hoax and doesn’t matter, and he doesn’t care anyway. And affordability — that Democratic hoax — is better under Republicans, even though prices are higher and trending to go higher yet. Also, consumers don’t pay tariffs but he’s suspending beef prices to lower prices for you.
If you believe that, Trump has a bible to sell you, religiously used for him to pray every night.
Listening to Trump has all the exasperation and weariness of dealing with a toddler, except toddlers are make a lot more sense.
Joey Politano put it best:
“[E]very 6 months the Trump administration realizes lowering tariffs will lower prices, applies this insight to one specific good, and then proceeds to never introspect beyond that,” he wrote in a post on X. “It’s honestly beautiful in its stupidity.”
Even more beautiful in an ugly way is how so many MAGAts still trust and believe in Trump. Because the direction Trump has taken us in the United States is what they want.
That’s the Trump logic at work.
Sunday’s Theme Music — Beginning
Sunday, August 23, 2026. Ashland, southern Oregon.
We’re again fortunate to have ‘good’ weather. Sunshine, blue skies, 74 F now, 90 F later. Some rain would be nice. Through today, we’re at 7% of normal precipitation for the year. Seven.
My wife and I greet each other many mornings with, “What’s the news? He dead yet?”
Then we laugh and say, “I know he’s not or you would have shouting the news.”
You know, this is the only person in our lifetime together — over fifty years — that we have ever said such things about. And we never specify who we’re talking about. That’s. Not. Needed.
Mom is complaining about her relationships with her daughters. “Three of them live nearby and none of them will take me to my appointments. Which will only HASTEN my death anyway.”
My sister’s daughter, May, is going to visit Mom tomorrow. We’re interested in the after-visit report. Mom helped raise May, and she and Mom had a great relationship until about four years ago. Then Mom became so angry and bitter, complaining about so many things, May declared, “I can’t do that any longer. It’s just too much.” Which is the case with my sisters and the rest of their children. Mom just became too much. I’d seen that trend developing and told Mom over and over through the last several years that all she does is complain and scold, that she’s always angry and bitter. Once she said that her partner, Frank, had just told her the same thing.
Trump has big action happening in DC with the Freedom 250 Indycar Grand Prix. It’s all part of Operation Epic LOOK — SQUIRREL! He’s just trying to distract all he can from how crappy things are going. Lots of corporations are going along with him. Retail sales are down, reflecting people’s challenges with the increasing affordability of living in the US. But corporations overall are doing well, with energy and technology companies doing particularly well.
So, yes, many corporations are all in for Trump’s Operation Epic LOOK — SQUIRREL! distractions. Hey, they’re getting theirs! Make hay while the sun shines! So what if the wealth gap continues to widen, if personal bankruptices are increasing, rural hospitals are closing, measles outbreaks are increasing, and the extreme weather gets worse? Corporation execs and shareholders are making money. Later, when the situation changes, they’ll contritely reduce prices, announcing ‘we’re all in this together’.
No. We’re not. They make that clear. They’re only in it together with us if it’s going to affect their profits, and then, they’ll only act under duress.
Today’s music emerges from my dream. I didn’t hear it in the dream but as I went through the night’s third dream, I suddenly heard Karen Carpenter singing “We’ve Only Just Begun”.
That could be an apt song for now, as far as the title’s sentiment. We’re about to go through some heavy duty loads with Donald Trump. He tried staying in power when he lost his bid for re-election, encouraging his supporters to resist the bona bide election results, encouraging them to ignore the law, resulting in death and destruction while widening the trust gap and polarizing the electorate. This year, he’s been working on trying to undermine the system.
Here’s the irony: Trump is cheerleading the nation’s 250th anniversary while simultaneously undermining the system that we’ve developed and improved for 250 years, the system which actually delivered him victory — twice.
Yet, Trump keeps whining and complaining about stolen elections without evidence. Is cutting much of the federal government in order to shift loads to states because of states’ rights. Meanwhile, he’s working hard to hollow out the states’ role in the national elections, basically usurping it so he can mold it as head of the executive branch of the federal government. It’s such a naked, wanton, power grab.
Trump is doing it because he’s a failure. His policies are failures, and people are awakening to this. His only way to get ahead, as always, is to lie, cheat, and steal.
So get ready: we’ve only just begun.
May your day begin with love and happiness and end on a high note.
Cheers
Michael Seidel, writer 