Tag: Soviet Union

Sundaz Wandering Political Thoughts

The Trump Regime announced its foreign policy during this past week, quietly dumping it .

Donald Trump’s bleak, incoherent foreign-policy strategy

Trump’s security strategy slams European allies and asserts U.S. power in the Americas

Anyone who has been paying attention notices that Trump is pretty okay with Russia and is eager to abandon established international protections and orders. The Trump Corollary pretty well spells that out.

Several things are made much clearer for me now.

  1. The Trump Regime, embraced and empowered by the Heritage Foundation and IAW Project 2025, has decided that the only elected political office that matters is the presidency.
    • They’re pulling hard on the unitary executive theory. The POTUS can do whatever he wants so long as he declares it as a threat to the United States.
    • Reinforced by the Roberts Court shadow docket, they are confident that this will advance with little challenge.
  2. Trump and his minions will employ the United States’ military power and reach to do whatever they want.
    • This is along the lines of Russia’s thinking. It’s basically an imperial “we’re bigger than you” attitude, so go screw yourself.
  3. Bombing ships and killing the people onboard was their deliberate statement that the Trump Regime thinks it can and will get away with it.
    • They believe the POTUS is bigger than history and law, whether it’s national or international.
    • POTUS makes policy and executes wars as he sees fit, in the Trump Regime’s opinion.
    • The boat bombings of 2025 were a test as well as a statement to see how everyone else reacted.
  4. That the attacks are illegal and horrid and counter to law doesn’t affect the Trump Regime at all.
    • That they’re purportedly Venezuelan boats and citizens have everything to do with fossil fuels and Venezuela’s reserves, and nothing to do with whether drugs are onboard and destined for the United States.
    • The target and efforts were perfect test scenarios for them after they first flexed military power by bombing Iran under the guise of protecting Israel.
  5. The Trump Regime is aware of blowback from previous efforts to bully other nations and/or conduct regime change.
    • That’s one reason why they’re shutting down inroads and making the U.S. hostile to people coming to our nation.
    • By aggressively doing so and making migrants, immigrants, tourists, and foreigners less prevalent among our population, they can more easily keep tabs and more heavily surveil them when they’re here, and more swiftly and ruthlessly come down on them. In their minds, that probably equates to being less susceptible to terrorist activities.
    • They’re discounting what could happen to U.S. bases and corporations doing business outside of the United State, or what can happen to tourists beyond our borders. It’s another amazing example of how they think with blinders on. They think the threat of military retaliation will keep U.S. businesses and citizens safe in other nations.
    • That’s part of their ‘obey or else’ doctrine as Trump has warned others several times.
    • The Trump Regime is encouraged by how NATO and others responded to Russian aggression.
  6. Trump’s economic policies completely align with the Trump Corollary.
    • Trump claims that he wants to return manufacturing to the United States. That’s clearly just another promise to satisfy his base.
    • By breaking trade agreements and increasing tariffs, the Trump Regime has slowed the flow of goods to the United States.
    • Via this slowdown and tariffs, the Trump Regime can now manipulate what materials enter the country, affecting food supplies, consumer goods, manufacturing, construction, and prices. This becomes another weapon for Trump to coerce cooperation from states, businesses, and people.
  7. Putting U.S. national guard units in ‘blue’ cities along with attacks on the media and the persecution of his political enemies is a deliberate and orchestrated Trump Regime three-pronged strategy.
    • Their goals are clearly to mute criticism of Trump and his policies.
    • The strategy permits the regime to control the flow of information and to have boots on the crowd to quell public protests and outcry.
    • The Trump Regime knows that’s coming. Trump might not know of increasing unpopularity of him and his policies but his regime knows, are they’re expecting it to grow worse, and are planning against it.
  8. Dismantling the Department of Education and shifting focus from public education to private schools empowers the Trump Regime.
    • The Trump Regime is basically following the old communist game plan. Teach them young, and teach only the ‘facts’ which the Regime wants the young to hear.
    • This practice creates an easily malleable young population, perfect for expanding military forces.
  9. The icing on the strategy is ICE.
    • By establishing and heavily funding a huge paramilitary organization, the Trump Regime has created a de facto national police force.
    • They can then use that ICE force to curtail and restrict travel and enforce curfews in the name of ‘national emergencies’.
    • Trump, as POTUS, can declare a national emergency at will. Given the nature of the GOP-dominated Congress, Congress would only make mewling noises about it.
    • That would leave relief about Trump’s declared emergencies to the judicial system, where the Trump-friendly Roberts Court rules.

Can anyone say Iron Curtain? Through the ‘Trump Corollary’ and the Trump Regime’s already well-established practices, this administration is creating the Trump Wall. They, with ‘they’ defined as the primarily white fascist Christians of Trump’s base and the oligarchs courting Trump’s favor, believe that this policy will make the United States stronger and more successful by isolating it and using its military power to bully others. It completely discounts twentieth and twenty-first economic, cultural, political, and military history. It also belies the truth about how the United States advanced through education, opportunity, and international military, diplomatic, and economic cooperation. But remember that those successes and advances were often done when Democrats were in charge. This Trump Corollary is a reactionary throwback to a far different time, one well before computers and the vast technological communications systems that now exist.

The Trump Regime is on that, though. By developing relationships through business, profits, and grift with the techno brothers, they’re establishing the framework for shutting down and manipulating the social media information flow. AI will only enhance the Trump Regime’s ability to manipulate facts and the truth…just as foretold in 1984.

Bottom line, the Trump Corollary is a death knell for true freedom, democracy, and equality in the United States. Unless you have the money or power to procure them.

Good luck, people. Good luck.

    2

    Fridaz Wandering Political Thoughts

    Lemme get this right.

    Blue states and blue cities are run by Democrats.

    Trump hates Democrats.

    Democrats are Americans. United States citizens.

    So Trump hates Americans. United States citizens.

    To prove the depths of his hatred of United States citizens, Trump is following a course to destroy United States blue cities.

    First, he disrupted supply chains by breaking trade agreements and declaring outrageous tariffs. That slowed imports. That damaged business, business planning, and employment.

    That severely affected farmers in rural areas. In red states. Which means the nation produces less food. Which drives up the cost of food. So more food needs to be imported. Like beef. But tariffs increase the costs of importing food. Like beef.

    Right?

    Trump then marched in national guard units to patrol city streets, but only in blue cities. Even though they were safe.

    The Trump Regime threatened media outlets that are less than flattering to Trump. Trump threatened to take away licenses to broadcast if they are critical or factual in their reporting about what he’s doing. He threatened networks which allowed comedians to make fun of him.

    In parallel, Trump expanded his ICE police force and filled cities with ICE in masks, with guns, to sow terror, grab people and disappear them, just as we’ve seen and read about happening in all those stories about nations led by dictators, or places like the Soviet Union, NAZI Germany, North Korea, and Red China. Without due process. Without evidence.

    Right?

    Trump began persecuting political opposition through DOJ. If a prosecutor failed to fall in line, they were removed and replaced. As we’ve read about happening in the Soviet Union. NAZI Germany. North Korea. Red China. And many other countries ruled by despots.

    Then Trump installed federal law enforcement units to protect the storm troopers from Americans trying to save and help their fellow citizens.

    How am I doing so far? Do I have this right?

    And as Americans stand up to protest Trump and these actions, Trump and his mouthpieces like Ted Cruz, Mike Johnson, and JD Vance accuse these Americans of being anything and everything except Americans exercising their Constitutional rights.

    Then, this self-declared law and order prezzy cut funding to fight terrorism and other crimes, pouring Federal monies into his maligned destruction campaign against blue states and cities.

    But –

    Most revenues in the United States come from blue states and cities.

    Red states and cities are poorer. Proven fact. They receive more from the Federal government than they give. And red cities and states dominate the crime statistics.

    Blue states and cities dominate as centers of education, research, technology, business, and trade.

    The money these blue states and cities make are paid into Federal coffers as taxes and fees to support people in red states and cities.

    Right?

    If you destroy blue states and cities, make them unlivable with heavy military and law enforcement presence, and disrupt their business means, their revenue to the federal government will drop.

    Which means the red states will get less money. Which means red state voters and children will have less food to eat, less healthcare, be less secure, and have less education. So, red state citizens will be sicker. Poorer. Unhealthier.

    All this is supposed to ‘make America great again’?

    Do I have that right?

    This is Trump’s alternate world as designed by Project 2025.

    The Federal government is made a political tool. Oppression through the government against citizens and the media is increased.

    Citizens are turned against citizens. The voter systems are handicapped. Protest and criticism are attacked. Employment falls. Health and safety systems are dismantled. Education is crated. They recklessly and wantonly destroy our national heritage and censor history. Only white history matters in their world.

    This is to make us as a nation, ‘greater’.

    Right?

    No.

    It is clear. Trump hates the United States. As do the leaders and architects of Project 2025. They’re out to destroy the nation. And Mike Johnson, JD Vance, the Roberts Court, and the GOP are happy to stand by and let them.

    No matter what it takes, no matter what it costs, no matter how illogical, depraved, illegal, immoral, inhumane, or un-American it is.

    I mean, it is only logical and makes sense if Trump is trying to destroy the United States. Because the actions he takes against the blue states and cities will affect and damage the red states and cities. That means that all United States citizens will be affected. If they have wealth, they can rise above the fray. Like Trump. Vance. Johnson. Billionaires.

    Did I get that right?

    3

    Fridaz Wandering Political Thoughts

    Trump and his enablers continue to remake the United States from a democratic republic into a one-party mirror of Joseph Stalin’s Soviet Union.

    Acting on fallacies which he promotes as genius, Trump continues cratering the economy. Economists are warning everyone that Trump’s ideas are misguided and that dire consequences are coming. The Hill reports on one in an article, Trump has resurrected one of economics’ oldest fallacies, in a recent issue, the ‘Broken Window Fallacy’. Frédéric Bastiat formulated the Broken Window Fallacy in the 1800s. Scott Burns and Caleb Fuller explain.

    Suppose a vandal hurls a rock through a shopkeeper’s window. The shopkeeper is dismayed—this cruel stroke of luck will cost him $1,000. But a local wise guy consoles him, saying, “Actually, there’s a silver lining in this dark cloud!” The broken pane, he explains, creates a job for the local glazier. Perhaps he’ll use those hard-earned shekels to buy shoes from the local cobbler, and so on. Society is ultimately made richer from the shopkeeper’s misfortune — all thanks to the domino effect of spending triggered by two seconds of petty mischief.

    It’s a nice story — but as Bastiat illustrates, it’s wildly incomplete. Had the window not been shattered, the shopkeeper could’ve spent his $1,000 on something else he valued. Perhaps he would have bought a new suit, creating income for a local tailor. Or maybe he would have bought some meat, ale, and bread for a party, creating income for the local butcher, brewer, and baker. 

    The fatal flaw in the wise guy’s analysis, Bastiat concludes, is confining his theory to “that which is seen” — the income earned by the glazier, the cobbler, etc. In so doing, he ignores “that which is unseen” — everything else the shopkeeper could have bought, had his window not been smashed.

    That example summarizes Trump and MAGA thinking. Notoriously short-sighted, they refuse to embrace facts or history and set to rewrite both. Not satisfied with destroying the government and its effectiveness by blindly cutting federal personnel and services, he’s eagerly trashing systems the United States methodically developed through centuries to harness data and give us insights into nature.

    As part of this, another FAFO tale has emerged. CEO Sachin Shivaram of Wisconsin Aluminum Foundry, wrote a WaPo OP-ED. In it, he explained how Trump’s trade war has already hurt his workers. Many of them were Trump supporters. Raw Story covered the piece: ‘Batten down the hatches’: CEO warns Trump tariff ‘tsunami’ about to wreck economy In his piece, Sachin Shivaram noted that the tariffs are having a negative impact.

    The fee that largely determines the cost of buying aluminum in North America has tripled in the past six months, and the company’s nonaluminum inputs have increased by 7 percent in the last month, and the foundry has had no choice but to raise their prices and lay off some workers.

    Sachin Shivaram continues:

    “What is not debatable is that our order rate is down 35 percent to 40 percent since the start of the year,” he wrote. “At other companies, too, demand is crumbling. In such a situation, companies have a fiduciary duty to bring costs down, and the one surefire way to do that is layoffs. At our company, we’ve had little choice but to lay workers off at all of our plants. Shareholders aren’t suffering — not yet — because the impact is being absorbed first by the very people Trump’s policies are meant to help.”

    The education system that helped the United States grow and succeed as a world power is being deliberately and systematically dismantled. He has no substitute in mind, just as he had no substitute in mind all those times when he promised a new healthcare program to replace ACA. Notice that he’s quietly quit saying anything about that.

    Trump used to pretend that Democrats and their demonic behavior was documented in the Epstein File. Throughout his campaign to be elected, he kept promising to release that file. Now he claims that file was created by Democrats. Desiring nothing to do with releasing it because of the photos, accusations, and testimony against him existing outside of the file, he’s trying to make the Epstein matter go away.

    Ignoring the Constitution’s checks and balances, and the power of the purse given to Congress, he’s again played Congress, refusing to release legally legislated funds, daring them to take him to court again. The general belief is it will be taken to court and will end up before the Roberts Supreme Court. There, if the past is a predictor of what’s to come, Roberts and his right-wing justices, will give Trump another victory, dealing greater damage to our nation and system of government.

    As a self-professed ‘man of peace’, Trump has activated national guard units to patrol cities where no patrols are needed, upping the nation’s divisions, increasing tensions, and further polarizing politics. He does this without regard to his promise to lower the deficit. It costs millions to deploy these troops and distracts from real issues. The troops are not needed there because facts and statistics show that crime is down in those cities. Instead, it is Red States and Red Cities, led by Republicans, who are showing the most violent crime.

    Is it ironic that Trump and the Red State MAGALand inhabitants are rebuilding a Red State nation that is so similar to the old communist Soviet Union which was featured in so many Republican ‘red scare’ tactics?

    In short, Trump is remaking the nation in his graven, greedy, ignorant image. As bad as that is, he’s delusional, irrational, and detached from reality. The gestalt creature which will emerge from this insult to truth, history, facts, and logic, will forever stain the nation’s Founders’ history and intentions.

    0

    Wenzdaz Theme Music

    Today’s music was almost “Smoke on the Water”. After a day that peaked at 93 F, clouds swollen with thunder and lightning climbed over the mountains to fill our valley last night. At one point, smoke coiled out from the pass north of us and hustled down the street, congregating in the valley like a well-organized demonstration. After a recce, I came in and told my wife, “It sounds like the drum section of a drum and bugle corps is marching down the street.”

    She shook her head. “I don’t understand what that means.”

    “It means there’s a lot of thunder out there. Sounds like drumming.”

    “Oh. I got you.”

    The smoke surrendered, though. I never did learn a source.

    Today is Wenzda, August 27, 2025. 84 F, a hazy blue sky hosts lurking cumulo thingies. Gonna get to the mid 90s F again. Thunderstorms are on the menu, but they sometimes run out before their time here. We’ll see how it flows.

    Papi the ginger master of all he surveys doesn’t appreciate thunderstorms. They’re loud and ominous. He goes into the master bath to outwait them. After their passing, he heads back out to his floofdom. A bit south of midnight, cat singing commences. I go out to see Papi chatting up a black and white tux. The tux is dismissive of Papi. I’ve seen this one before. They weren’t real concerned. I asked, “What’s your name?”

    That suggested a song to The Neurons. “What’s Your Name”, a 1977 southern rocker by Lynyrd Skynyrd, was pushed into the morning mental music stream. I protested to Les Neurons that the song refers to a ‘little girl’ who is a groupie. This tux was not anyone’s groupie. Being as obstinate as granite, The Neurons dismissed this objection faster than the Roberts Court rules in favor of the Trump Regime.

    I’m encouraged by arguments rising out of Iowa. Democrat Catelin Drey defeated a Republican by 10 points in a state legislative contest. Okay, good news, but it’s too early for me to celebrate its significance too much. Trump still rules MAGALand and can do no wrong in their estimate. Much of what he’s doing, declaring that he’s the president and can do whatever he wants, is gut-wrenching to hear. Checking polls, many GOPers are quite happy with his declaration, continuing to support and cheer him on.

    Meanwhile, much of his activities reminds me of the U.S.S.R. under Joe Stalin. Stalin’s means of governing involved one party and a police state. Stalin established purges based on his declarations that those he purged were ‘enemies of the state’ and ethnic cleansing through deportations. Any of this beginning to ring any bells when thinking about Trump’s efforts to control the media, imprison enemies, send the national guard out as a police force, and ICE disappearing people off the streets?

    MAGAs and the GOP will never recognize or acknowledge any of this for the most part. They’re firmly in the ‘means justifies the ends’ corner, even if that means disavowing all the principles, tenets, and checks and balances our founders established when the United States became a nation. What is also distressing is listening and watching while so much of the established media downplays events. It seems like they fear Trump’s retribution to the point that they’re making themselves more and more irrelevant.

    Well, coffee has arrived in the system. I hope peace and grace gang up and reward you with a beautiful day. Time to go write like crazy, at least one. More. Time. Cheers

    0

    Friday’s Theme Music

    Mood: Freedayitis

    Our weather is continuing its pattern in Ashlandia. High today of 92 to 95 F. This is our average temp for the month. Smoke is up, stinging nostrils, bit of a bloody nose, congestd nose and sinuses, turning my throat into aching parchment. It’s 69 F now on this Friday, August 9, 2024. The air quality is moderate, ’bout 83 in my zone. There is an unhealthy air advistory out for us. It was s’posed to expire this morning but it’s been extended until tonight. Still, better than having a raging fire actually in town. And the air is good enough in my area that some windows are open a few inches. I know from observations and experience, the bad air is out in front of us, to the west. East, and north (today), is delivering decent air. It’s about the vegetation and topography.

    We continue to check on a friend who just disappeared. He has health issues; so does his wife. He does have children and grands in the area, so he might be with them. He was taken off by EMTs one afternoon, and that’s the last he was seen by friends and neighbors. They haven’t seen him where he volunteers. Haven’t heard from him. The car is gone, no one answers the phone or emails, or the door. It’s been a pensive month looking for a news update on him. He’s always been very private so we’re hopeful that he’s okay but just keeping to himself and fam.

    Today’s theme music goes with a free variation. The Neurons have Queen with “I Want to Break Free” alternating with Neil Young with “Rockin’ in the Free World” playing in the morning mental music stream (Trademark taxing). I can’t choose so I’ll go with both.

    Both songs are from the 1980s and established rockers. “I Want to Break Free” was released in ’84. The music video caused a social storm in the U.S. because, oh, no, cross dressing. *gasp*. There’s a small but vocal group of Puritanical Americans who always react with hand-wringing and gasps, and hisses, “Oh, the children, think of the children.” Yeay, I’m channeling some Southpark.

    Although this is a love song of sorts, we have those apt opening lines for Trump and the MAGAts:

    I want to break free
    I want to break free
    I want to break free from your lies
    You’re so self-satisfied, I don’t need you
    I’ve got to break free
    God knows, God knows I want to break free

    h/t to AZLyrics.com

    “Rockin’ in the Free World” was released in 1989. I initially thought it was in response to George Bush becoming POTUS but later learned, no, it was because planned concerts to the U.S.S.R. were canceled, apparently because the Soviets said, “Nyet.” As for its lines, they are poignantly political (h/t to Genius.com):

    We got a thousand points of light
    For the homeless man
    We got a kinder, gentler machine gun hand
    We’ve got department stores and toilet paper
    Got styrofoam boxes for the ozone layer
    Got a man of the people says keep hope alive
    Got fuel to burn, got roads to drive

    That’s America and our overall priorities: guns and wars, consumer goods and driving.

    Stay positive, be free, and remain strong. Vote Blue in 2024. Here is my coffee, here is my cup, part my lips and drink it down. Here are the videos. Let’s rock.

    0

    Thursday’s Theme Music

    Remember the peace dividend?

    Maybe, right. Hard to say. Depends on your age, education, and memory, and what I mean by the peace dividend. Well, I mean the supposed reduction in defense spending that would be seen after the collapse and break up of the U.S.S.R. With that major nuclear threat winding down, the thought was that less money should be spent military spending, allowing more money to be spent on social programs, while taxes were reduced. Thatcher and Bush 41 were said to be behind this progressive idea. They said they were being pragmatic.

    Didn’t last long, and the dividend didn’t go far. The U.S continues to increase spending and go to war more and more frequently to address problems.

    Conversations with friends last night reminded me of the U.S.S.R.’s fall and the subsequent peace dividend. Back in the early 1990s, in the post-Soviet world, it seems like we were on the cusp of making some significant advances. Some will disagree, but I thought increasing the social net, helping others, recognizing and confirming people’s rights regardless of their sexual preference, gender, skin color, or religion were all strides forward to a better world. Environmental consciousness was increasing. It seemed like America was were trying harder as a nation. Now, to me, it feels like we’re sliding back into the 1930s. Sigh.

    I posted about this song, Jesus Jones, “Right Here, Right Now” (1991) in 2017 but without the political realities behind its inspiration. Forgive me for sharing it again, but it seemed right.

    A woman on the radio talked about revolution
    When it’s already passed her by
    Bob Dylan didn’t have this to sing about you
    You know it feels good to be alive

    I was alive and I waited, waited
    I was alive and I waited for this
    Right here, right now
    There is no other place I want to be
    Right here, right now
    Watching the world wake up from history

    I saw the decade in, when it seemed
    The world could change at the blink of an eye
    And if anything
    Then there’s your sign… Of the times

    I was alive and I waited, waited
    I was alive and I waited for this
    Right here, right now

    I was alive and I waited, waited
    I was alive and I waited for this
    Right here, right now
    There is no other place I want to be
    Right here, right now
    Watching the world wake up from history

    Right here, right now
    There is no other place I want to be
    Right here, right now
    Watching the world wake up from history

    Right here, right now
    There is no other place I want to be
    Right here, right now
    Watching the world wake up… 

    h/t to Lyrics Freak.com

     

     

    2

    Tuesday’s Theme Music

    A news article brought today’s theme music to mind. I was reading about Lucy McBath’s electoral victory in Georgia. Her son, Jordan Davis, was shot and killed in 2017 for being in a car where the music was being played too loud for a man with a gun and a grudge, Michael Dunn. Lucy McBath was running on a gun control platform, and the story about her victory included mention of Nena’s “Ninety-nine Red Balloons” (1983) (“99 Luftballoons”).

    Naturally, my mind was hooked. Streaming the song immediately commenced. Well, I thought, this is clearly today’s theme music, just so I can push it back out of my head. I like the song, but I had other things going on in my head, and it was distracting.

    I got into the car, and guess what was playing? Yarp, “Ninety-nine Red Balloons”. It ended. A Bee Gees song replaced it, so I flipped channels, where “Ninety-nine Red Balloons” was playing. First I thought, I wonder if that song was released on this day or this week, or if those folks read the same article that I read. Then I thought, well, that cements it. That song is destined to be today’s theme music.

    Enjoy.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wirRZsAvJGQ

    2

    Today’s Theme Music

    Sentimentality creeps up on me again.

    As I was walking, reflecting on my dreams, and writing in my head, a voice slipped past the disparate, disorganized words. Drizzle stole in past trees and fresh, cool air invited me out of myself. Looking around, I thought, “What a wonderful world this can be.”

    Not always, mind you. Yeah, we know. We’ve seen the images and we’re still reading the stories.

    Of course, the voice I was hearing was Louis Armstrong singing “What A Wonderful World.” Armstrong recorded and released it in nineteen sixty-seven. I first heard it before I was a teenager, but it leaped back into public awareness with the movie, “Good Morning, Vietnam,” in nineteen eighty-seven. Serving in the Air Force and stationed in Germany, I saw it in a theater at Rhein-Main Air Base. “What A Wonderful World” was a sobering moment in the film, as the music was juxtaposed against the young military and the weapons of war. Of course, this is a flawed moment; “Good Morning, Vietnam” was set in nineteen sixty-five. “What A Wonderful World” came out two years later. It works, despite that flaw.

    Life moves on. Rhein-Main Air Base closed. My unit and its mission, spying against the Soviet Union, is gone, as are the Soviets. We’ve lost Louis Armstrong and Robin Williams, but I’m part of an era where technology saves us from depending on memories alone, allowing us to more sharply and accurately revisit our past.  So, here it is again, “What A Wonderful World.”

     

    0

    Today’s Theme Music

    Today’s theme music streams in from the fall of the Berlin Wall and the massacre in Tienanmen Square.

    The Berlin Wall wall was first a fence and then a guarded concrete wall. Built in 1961, it made East Berlin an island of Soviet Union totalitarianism and communism amidst western culture, democracy and freedom. I traveled through East Berlin by train while the wall was up. Still scarred by the tanks and guns of World War II, the streets were ghostly empty avenues behind crumbling concrete and rusting steel.

    The massacre in Tienanmen Square is sometimes called the June Fourth Incident. The People’s Republic of China was experiencing a spring of democratic thought in 1989, with its people hoping for greater freedoms and independence. They dissented with their government’s position and were killed by their government for their ideals.

    Now, in 2017, the Berlin Wall has fallen. The Union of Soviet Socialists States has fragmented into smaller nations, dominated by Russia. The PRC, often just called China, remains. While shifts have occurred there, it remains a nation of oppressed people with little freedoms.

    Here in America, a billionaire has been elected POTUS with less than the popular vote. He wants to build a wall to protect us. As a child and adult who lived with a wall as a symbol of political differences and repression, I’m dubious of his motives and ideals, and leery of what might come to pass.

    The events of Tienanmen Square and the fall of the Berlin Wall inspired Seal to write this song. Let’s hope this song inspires us and we avoid becoming the people behind the wall.

    Here, from 1991, is Seal with ‘Crazy’. We’re never going to survive unless we get a little crazy.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1A-hqZf7xQs

    1

    Downstreams

    Some mental activity racing along my axons today.

    • Love that first slurp of my quad shot mocha at the Boulevard. The baristas know my preferences and do a great job of blending everything and then topping my coffee drink with with a skim of dark chocolate powder. I love the contrasts of flavors in that first tasting. Sensational.
    • It’s National White Shirt Day! This day recognizes the end of a 1937 UAW strike at GM for better working conditions. I have my white tee shirt on, under my natural wool sweater.
    • I don’t recall any dreams from last night. That’s unusual. Wonder why. Sleeping period, six and a half hours, seems about normal.
    • I’ve been reading a series of articles on sleep and whether we’re evolving from being biphasic. The latest article was on Van Winkle and provided a brief summary of the last eight thousand years of sleep.
    • I realized Part I of my  science-fiction novel in progress requires some serious editing and revising. I first realized that about a week ago and tried rejecting it. My writer within was willing to overlook changing it; the resident interior editor was reluctantly accepting of it. However, the reader in residence said, “Oh, no. That needs work.” Trust the reader. After we argued a few days, the writer and editor agreed with the reader’s points. However, the writer came up with some interesting ideas to explore in parallel.
    • The editor, though, urged us all not to make any changes until it’s all done. He pointed out that Part I is the way it is because the stories and concepts were still being explored. True; I write to understand myself, to order and structure and expand my thoughts. He pointed out that since I’m still writing the other parts, I can save myself some potential work by fully completing an entire draft before making major revisions. I accept his contention and put it on hold until the first draft is completed.
    • The novel in progress is ‘Long Summer’. Science-fiction, it’s not quite a sequel but is collateral to ‘Returnee’, as it stars Brett and Castle Corporation, and continues with many of the same themes of technological alienation and isolation, and socializing with yourself via virtual beings you develop to help people cope with life as they live far longer.
    • Talking with the barista today. “Fun plans?” she asked. Because, it’s Saturday; in her working and school world has meaning that has left my writing world. I don’t segregate the days into weeks and weekends any longer. I barely notice the date. “Movies,” I answered her. “We’re going to see ‘Lion’.” She wasn’t familiar with it. I mentioned Dev Patel and a few of his movies. Yes, she remembered ‘Slumdog Millionaires’. It didn’t occur to me until later that she was eight years old when Slumdog was released.
    • That conversation pointed me onto new vectors of changes and the differences in my values, perceptions and experiences as a sexagenarian and the same in her as a young adult. It’s the same conversation I had as a young adult with those forty to fifty years older than me. I was twenty in 1976. Those who were sixty in 1976 had been born just after World War I ended. They fought in World War II and remembered the atomic bombs dropped on Japan. Grandparents had been part of the American Civil War. The Soviet Union was founded during their lifetime and the Cold War dominated world politics.
    • It’s interesting to put into perspective. What I think of as ‘normal’ isn’t the same as the previous generation or the next generation. Besides when we were born forming us, so do our education levels. More strongly and interesting, we saw how where we live and our education and economic situations affect national politics during the 2016 presidential election. Now, this article on FiveThirtyEight tells about how where we live affects our deaths. It’s a telling insight to me.

    Cheers

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