Unflenching honesty . . .
Thursday, September 11, 2025. It's Thor's day . . . an the heat returns to TulseyTown this afternoon. Moderate Southerlies are forecasted to bring mid 90's with the bright sun.
Today in 2001, terrorists attacked the U.S. at multiple sites including the World Trade Center in New York.
Some right-wingers outraged by Charlie Kirk's killing yesterday in Utah are calling for retribution – Anna Merlan, at Mother Jones, 9.11.25.
If we are lucky … our leaders will understand that Charlie Kirk’s assassination was not just evil but profoundly dangerous for all of us. And if they understand this danger, maybe they will seek unity rather than division. – Jonathan V. Last, at The Bulwark, 9.10.25.
Why don’t Democrats tell America the truth — that these problems are largely due to monopolistic corporations and robber-baron billionaires? Because too many Democratic politicians are afraid to bite the hands that feed their campaign coffers. Hopefully, that’s beginning to change. – Robert Reich, online, 9.11.25
Speaking of truth-tellers. Today is the birth date of D.H. Lawrence. The author of novels, short stories, poems, plays, essays, travel books, and letters was born on this day in 1885 Eastwood, Nottinghamshire, England. His novels Sons and Lovers, and Lady Chatterly's Lover, among many, explored the human condition including its conflicts with unflinching honesty. Another truth-teller, the painter Georgia O’keefe, on her first trip to New Mixico, spent time with Lawrence at his ranch in 1929. The visit prompted a now famous work, “The Lawrence Tree.” She went on to establish what is now called The Ghost Ranch which became her primary winter residence and a subject of many works.
The world is calling for honesty, integrity and celebration of and for the greater good.
– jab
Number “one” on my list . . .
Wednesday, September 10, 2025. It's Odin's day . . . and the warming trend continues in TusleyTown. Forecasts indicate easy Southerlies, sun, clouds, and upper 80's. The mailbox was overflowing this morning…
Trump may try to declare that “there is a threat to the national sovereignty of the United States" in order to claim “emergency powers to protect the federal elections going forward,” overriding the Constitution’s clear designation that states alone have control over elections. – Heather Cox Richardson, in Letters From An American, 9.8.25
The Supreme Court is playing “Calvinball.” “This is Calvinball jurisprudence with a twist. Calvinball has only one rule: There are no fixed rules, “We seem to have two: that one, and this Administration always wins.” – Justice, Ketanji Brown Jackson.
[T]he president has ordered killings in international waters. Eleven people are dead, not through due process but by fiat. The defense secretary boasts about it on television. And the president will face no consequences....This is no longer abstract. The law has been rewritten in real time: a president can kill, and there is no recourse. That is not strength. That is authoritarianism. – Heather Cox Richardson, in Letters From An American, 9.10.25
Joyce Vance and Heather Cox Richardson in conversation. Facts mean nothing to Trump, but everything to these historically grounded essayists. 9.9.25
We need a whole-systems approach to our health-care, one that recognizes that health is not simply the outcome of personal choices and bio-hacks but the product of collective conditions. – Jeff Krasno, Health Is A Commons, posted 9.9.25
Johns Hopkins has been hosting a series of conversations on Ai, present and future. The most recent focused on how Ai could transform the future of medicine. Long but worthy. Check it out, if you are curious.
Ken Wilber's latest book – Finding Radical Wholeness – has just been released in paperback. If you are unfamiliar with Ken, he's one of the leading philosophers of our time. In every book, Wilber integrates the wisdom of spirituality, psychology, shadow work, science, and integral theory with application to a specific concern. Always challenging, worth the time.
And, today is Mary Oliver's birthday. At the top of my list of fave poets to read every day, she was born in 1935, Maple Heights, Ohio.
In the face of absurdity . . .
Tuesday, September 9, 2025. It's Tiw's day . . . and the weatherfeather indicates a warming week settling into TulsyTown with moderate Southerlies and sunny skies. Today in the mid 80's. 90's return Thursday.
Robert Reich asks and answers: Should democrats shut down the government?
Russian novelist Leo Tolstoy was born on this day in 1828 on his family's estate in the province of Tula, near Moscow.
It's Paul Goodman's birthday. The author of Growing Up Absurd was born in 1911 Greenwich Village in New York City.
“It then becomes necessary to stop short and make a choice: Either/Or. Either one drifts with their absurd system of ideas, believing that this is the human community. Or one dissents totally from their system of ideas and stands as a lonely human being. (But luckily one notices that the others are in the same crisis and making the same choices.)” – Paul Goodman, Growing Up Absurd, Vintage, 1960.
And it's the birthday of Otis Redding. The soul singer whose life was way too short was born in 1941, Dawson, Georgia.