#115 / As Everyone Knows....

  

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I guess I wouldn't be far off if I called out Heather Cox Richardson as "America's Favorite Historian." I presume that a lot of the people who might be reading this blog posting already know about Richardson. If you don't, you can click the link to her name, to get an introduction. If you don't already subscribe to her daily Substack postings, "Letters From An American," you can click that link and sign up. 

I do read Richardson, daily, and her posting on April 22, 2026, included the following (emphasis added): 

Virginia voters yesterday agreed to a constitutional amendment that would temporarily redistrict the state if any other state redistricted for partisan reasons: that is, in retaliation for the partisan redistricting President Donald J. Trump launched in Texas in 2025 in an effort to retain control of the House of Representatives. 

As Matt Cohen of Democracy Docket noted, Trump supporters immediately insisted the voting was rigged, probably through mail-in ballots. Trump himself took to social media to attack the election, repeating charges of rigging and then adding: “In addition to everything else, the language on the Referendum was purposefully unintelligible and deceptive. As everyone knows, I am an extraordinarily brilliant person, and even I had no idea what the hell they were talking about in the Referendum, and neither do they! Let’s see if the Courts will fix this travesty of ‘Justice.’” 

In fact, Trump himself began this mid-decade partisan gerrymander race with his pressure on Texas to rejigger its maps to give Republicans more House seats. That prompted California to retaliate with its own temporary redistricting to offset the new Texas Republican-leaning seats. Other states followed suit. Republicans redistricted Missouri, North Carolina, and Ohio, in addition to Texas, and expect those mid-decade redistricts will net them nine more seats. Democrats think their redistricting of California, along with a court-ordered redistricting of Utah, will get them an additional six seats. They are hoping that the temporary redistricting of Virginia will give them four more seats. 

State lawmakers in Florida will convene a special session next week to consider redistricting that state, as well, to benefit the Republicans. 

Journalist Brian Tyler Cohen noted that the Republicans have full control of the federal government and could pass a law to ban partisan gerrymandering any time they want to, as Democrats have called for, but they refuse. “Republicans aren’t mad gerrymandering exists,” Cohen notes; “they’re mad that they’re not the only ones using it.”

I disapprove of the wave of partisan redistrictings that our current president set off in Texas, followed almost immediately by the partisan redistricting sponsored by the Governor of California, in retailiation. Maybe someday I will write out my thoughts on that topic more extensively. For the moment, I have taken to my keyboard to document how astounded I was by the following statement from our currently serving Chief Executive: 

As everyone knows, I am an extraordinarily brilliant person...

As everyone "should know," our current president is almost totally out of touch with reality, being so preoccupied, as he is, with himself. 

A devotion to one's monumental self-regard is not the way to achieve a reputation as someone who is "an extraordinarily brilliant person." 

Sadly, and feel free to contradict me if you see it differently, our current president is absolutely the opposite of "brilliant," preoccupied, as he is, with every single little thought that passes through his brain, which he doesn't have the good sense to subjugate to a round of thinking before speaking. 

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#114 / "Mobilize" Versus "Organize"

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The New Yorker ran an article in February that compared "Mobilizing" to "Organizing." The article was authored by Charles Duhigg, and was titled, "What MAGA Can Teach Democrats About Organizing—and Infighting." Given The New Yorker's paywall policies, I doubt that non-subscribers will be able to read the entire article, though you can click the link to the title, provided above, and see how it goes. I think the article is well worth reading.

Citing to Johns Hopkins' political scientist Hahrie Han, Duhigg's article says that “Mobilizing is about getting people to do a thing, and Organizing is about getting people to become the kind of people who do what needs to be done.” Of course, Duhigg says, "it helps to be skilled at both mobilizing and organizing. But that doesn’t mean that both skills are equally important ... Organizing is more important than Mobilizing."

MAGA, according to Duhigg, has learned this lesson. Various Democratic-leaning and progressive political groups haven't (including, specifically, Indivisible, which has both a national an an impressive local presence, and that is best-known for its leadership in "No Kings" demonstrations held all around the country).

Large, top-down organizations, focused on "protests," and on "demonstrating" what people want, and what they care about, are great - and Indivisible is a prime example of how that has been done extremely well - both here in Santa Cruz County and throughout the nation. In terms of political effectiveness, though, here is what Duhigg's commentary says (with emphasis added). What he says definitely needs to be taken seriously:

Following Trump’s victory in 2016, a group of former congressional staffers inspired by the pugnacity of Tea Party conservatives posted a rousing twenty-three-page online pamphlet titled “Indivisible: A Practical Guide for Resisting the Trump Agenda,” which encouraged such tactics as setting up Google News alerts for local congresspeople and spreading out at town halls to create the perception of broad support. The group also created a Google Doc to help activists across the country find one another.... The initiative was quickly embraced by big donors and national leaders. In its first year, the group raised $2.6 million. Within two months, there were thousands of Indivisible chapters. 

But, unlike the Tea Party, which at its founding was a chaotic jumble of anti-government viewpoints and competing leadership claims, Indivisible was tightly guided by its D.C. leaders and their dozens of employees. Tea Party activists often took the initiative to run in local races for school boards or county commissions; Indivisible’s headquarters focussed mostly on national issues and federal elections. The group’s national office scored some successes: it organized demonstrations against Trump’s Cabinet nominees and protested Republican attempts to repeal Obamacare. Yet there were structural problems. Initially, the group was a place for like-minded activists in numerous cities to convene, and various chapters started having success at backing local candidates. But organizational tensions emerged among Indivisible’s headquarters—staffed by young political professionals who pushed for Medicare for All, the Green New Deal, and Elizabeth Warren’s candidacy for President—and many state volunteers, who, a 2021 study found, were largely “older white women” who didn’t necessarily agree with those stances and “worked very hard to boost Democrats they understood held more moderate views.” 

The author of that study, Theda Skocpol, a political scientist at Harvard, told me that Indivisible represents “a tragic lost opportunity.” Local grassroots Indivisible groups were “very impactful on people running for office and winning,” she said, and they “operated pretty much on their own.” But the group’s top leaders, instead of building a sustainable and ideologically diverse membership, focussed on high-profile protests—and on maintaining ideological unity. At one point, the Indivisible headquarters discouraged chapters from endorsing candidates who were pro-life, or didn’t support gender-affirming care, or questioned making it easier for people to register to vote. 

In her study, Skocpol wrote that, “since 2017, national Indivisible leaders have raised tens of millions of dollars from major donors, but have not devolved significant resources away from Washington, D.C., to empower democratically accountable state and local leaders. Instead, Indivisible directors have invested most of their resources into running a large, professionally staffed, national advocacy organization.” (Indivisible disputes Skocpol’s assessment and sent me a statement saying that it has “enthusiastically campaigned for Democrats across the political spectrum.”) 

Skocpol went on, “If progressive-minded Americans want real change, most of the expertise, money and time we can muster should stop flowing into national advocacy bureaucracies engaged in symbolic maneuvers and purist politics.” 

Ben Wikler chaired the Democratic Party of Wisconsin from 2019 to 2025. He recently told me that “Democrats should be learning from the Republicans about how to build small, socially interconnected communities.”

Building "small, socially interconnected communities," sounds a lot like what I have been urging, in my various blog postings. "Find Some Friends," is how I have frequently put it, and I usually add that once you have a group, you need to meet, in person, on a frequent basis, decide things you can do, together, and make "politics," not online entertainment or other pursuits, your first priority, as you decide how to spend your time. 

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#113 / In Troubled Times...

 

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Here are some words from Henry David Thoreau:

“In Wildness Is The Preservation Of The World" 

"Wildness" is not exactly the same as "Wilderness," but there are some very significant connections between them. Here are some words from Michele Dieterich, who is the Secretary of the Board of Directors of Wilderness Watch: 

"In troubled times, Wilderness is the way."

I am a longtime supporter of Wilderness Watch, a nonprofit organization that is "dedicated solely to protecting the lands and waters in our National Wilderness Preservation System." The Spring 2026 issue of its newsletter, "Wilderness Watcher," spoke powerfully about our need to tell ourselves - in these troubled times - that we need to maintain our official "hands off" policies when we consider "improving" our designated wilderness areas.

Wilderness is a reminder - a reminder we will always need - that we live, "ultimately," in the "World of Nature," a world into which we have been rather mysteriously born, and which supports everything we, ourselves, have ever been able to build or do.

Our human powers are prodigious, and we do, most "immediately," live in a world that we ourselves create. Ultimately, however, we live in the "Natural World," the "World of Nature," the "World that God Created," a world which was once a "Wilderness" entire. 

Let us be sure to save what's left of our wilderness, to remind us of who we are and where we are. In these troubled times, reading the latest Wilderness Watch newsletter can help drive this lesson home!

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#112 / Student Exchange

  

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Many people have at least some experience with student exchange programs - at least they know about them. Some of these programs are officially sponsored by the United States Government. Click right here for the Department of State's website devoted to the exchange programs affliliated with the State Department's Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs. 

I never was an exchange student, during my high school years, but I definitely knew a number of exchange students who came to Palo Alto High School from other countries. Recently, as it has become ever clearer to me that we are "all in this together" - globally, and not just nationally - I have begun entertaining the idea that there is a lot of potential benefit in promoting a greatly expanded program of student exchange. 

One of the great things about "self-government" is that every one of us can have an idea that might ripen into real action, affecting our local community, or even our state, or even the entire nation. So, here's an idea. What about expanding student exchange programs until such programs are, essentially, so extensive that almost every student participates?

We could do that! What if Congress could be convinced that building connections between every country in the world, and our country, the United States, would advance our national interest? I do think that there is a pretty good argument that such an expanded student exchange program would do just that.

If we decided to do it, we could make a national decision to spend some considerable amount of our tax dollars making arrangements to send U.S. high school students to virtually every country in the world, while simultaneously welcoming foreign students to come to our country. I am thinking of, perhaps, a six-month program, to send almost every U.S. high school student abroad (to virtually every country in the world), while bringing similarly aged students here, from other countries, so that they could learn, firsthand, about the United States. If we did that, we might find that the result, over the long run, would be a world that could better work together to deal with the planetary-level challenges that are going to be of increasing importance in the years soon coming. 

There is also another advantage to this idea, too. Right now, as most of us are painfully aware, there are a number of nations with nuclear weapons (including our own), and these nations are tempted, always, to consider using such nuclear weapons against another nations (including our own). So far, the only nation that has ever used nuclear weapons against another nation is the United States, and our current president has indicated, fairly recently, that this is definitely an option that he wants to continue to have available. China, Korea, Russia, and maybe even Iran could be in a position to consider using nuclear weapons against us - and Israel might be tempted to use its nuclear weapons, too, even if it's unlikely that the United States would be the target. You get the picture. We are all implicated in a kind of "nuclear hostage" situation, and dangers seem to be growing, not getting less.

If there were thousands, or even tens of thousands, of young students from these nuclear-capable countries here in the United States, the possibility that someone would want to fire off nuclear weapons that would end up killing their own students would certainly be discouraged. And, of course, if thousands of U.S. students were in places like China, and Russia, and Iran, the U.S. government would certainly have to think very hard before launching a nuclear weapon against such a country. 

Well, this is just a thought. New ideas are needed. It is ever more clear that we live in one world, and that "nationalism" is not going to be a solid basis on which the nations of the world can move ahead to a better future. Getting our young students involved in other countries, as a routine matter, might make our international interdependence ever more clear, with new possibilities for peace and cooperation. 

That's sure a problem we ought to be working on!

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#111 / Are You Losing Your Will To Work?

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We are all turning into "grasshoppers" now - at least according to Barton Swaim, writing in the April 18-19, 2026, edition of The Wall Street Journal. Swaim's column was titled, "America Loses Its Will To Work." Click the link if you'd like to read Swaim's argument. I am told that no paywall will prevent you! Click right here if you need to refresh your memory about that that Aesop's Fable about the ant and the grasshopper.

Swaim asserts that "evidence abounds that many Americans no longer consider gainful work a natural and necessary part of life." He points to the "explosion of online sports betting" as the main proof that this is, in fact, an accurate statement. 

I am absolutely in agreement that "betting," in all of its various forms, is a plague upon society - and with online sports betting mainly intended, the way I see it, to filch scarce money from the pockets of those who succumb to its allure. Back in the middle of April, as Swaim was writing his column, the Chief of Police in New Haven, Connecticut was arrested in connection with his online gambling habit. It's quite a story, let me tell you, and he was fully employed! Click that link to read it!

While I don't really buy into the idea that Americans (and particularly young Americans) have turned into a plague of grasshoppers, enamored of personal enjoyment, and unconcerned about the fact that the winter is coming, I do think that we should be paying attention to "employment" and "work" issues. 

Most of the news stories that I read are basically telling everyone in our society (and particularly young people, perhaps) that there aren't going to be any jobs in the future. A.I., we are told, will replace pretty much all of the jobs now available, and it's not welfare-dependent poor people who are carrying this message. To the contrary, it is the extremely wealthy (the A.I. giants who constantly boast of their billionaire status, and of the billionaire backers of the new A.I.-based economy yet to come). Those billionaires are the folks who are sending the message, to all the non-billionaires, that "work" isn't going to support them in the future. 

I think that this message from the billionaires, and not any moral failure on the part of a young "grasshopper generation," is likely to be much more the cause of what Swaim is writing about than any moral collapse, caused by a whole generation deciding that they should get something for nothing. 

The economic productivity that is a fact of our modern life should be mobilized for the benefit of everyone - meaning that food, shelter, education, health care, and meaningful employment opportunities should be something that everyone in our society should be able to count on. Taxes, you know, they'd be involved in making that happen. Then... What about collabortative efforts to provide a job to everyone - a job they'd find worthwhile, a job they'd want to do not because they were trying to "make a million," but because they saw its importance and understood the benefits that the job would provide to them, as well as to others in society. 

I'm thinking of jobs like: (1) Childcare; (2) Assistance for the elderly, who are trying to navigate a complicated society with diminished mental capacity; (3) Wildland stewards helping to replant forests, and to prevent forest fires; (4) Building rail and similar transportation projects to replace our dysfunctional automobile-based freeway system; (5) Environmental restoration projects; (6) Solar Energy installations; (7) Teachers! (8) Public Art; (9) Neighborhood Cleanups; (10) Etc.

The United States is the wealthiest society in the history of the world, and we got that way through hard work. Telling everyone (especially young people) that there aren't going to be any jobs in the future, which is what they are being told, today, by the billionaire class, is totally counterproductive. There are LOTS of jobs that need doing, and we, with all our wealth, could make them available. The "Etc." category is huge!

Could we do that?

Well, yes! Duh!!

But it would require us - "we, the people" - to decide that this is exactly what we need to do. In other words, instead of articles trying to "describe" what exists, let's start writing articles about what we want to happen (so we can then get out, and get to work, and make it happen). This blog posting is one such article.

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https://www.wsj.com/opinion/america-loses-its-will-to-work-85d74fd6

#110 / Three C's Tell The Story

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The Wall Street Journal's "Bookshelf" section reviewed the above-pictured book in its Thursday, March 26, 2026, edition. The review, by Meghan Cox Gurdon, was titled, "Vehicles of Emotion," and was not very complimentary. Among other things, Gurdon calls Ashton's methods "tiresome." It may be, if you are not a subscriber to The Journal, that the link I have just provided will not actually get you to Gurdon's review; however, it should; I have been informed it will - and you can certainly give it a try.

As far as I am concerned, the value of the review - and perhaps the main value of the book - consists in Gurdon's identification of the three things that Ashton says are necessary for a "good story." They are, in short: (1) Character; (2) Chronology; and (3) Consequence. 

Gurdon doesn't spent a lot of time expounding on the importance of these three keys to a "good story," but I, personally, had never really thought about these three aspects of storytelling as the keys to determining whether or not a story is "good." Upon reflection, I do think that "character, chronology, and consequence" define a "good story." 

Those who might want to try their hand at writing a good story (I am always tempted to give it a whirl, myself, but have never really done so - at least not yet) could do a lot worse than blocking out those three C's in advance, and then getting to the writing. 

If Gurdon is correct about the merits (or lack of merits) of Ashton's book, you now know that you won't have to buy it, as Step #1 in your potential career as a writer of stories. 

Just pay attention to the Three C's. That'll do it! Take it from there!

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#109 / So, How Did Life Begin?

 

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The Bible has a story about how life began. You can read all about it in the Book of Genesis. God created life. That sums up the Bible story pretty well!

A recent story in The New York Times outlines evidence that life could have developed on Planet Earth by way of microbes coming from Mars. 

If you read that article, and no paywall should prevent you from doing that, please note that this article in The Times does not provide any explanation for how such living microbes might have found themselves on Mars, before their transportation to Earth by way of a cosmic collision between an asteroid and the Red Planet. 

So, here's a thought. From the first, human beings have been naturally curious about where they came from, and they have never ceased to think about this topic, and ponder, and experiment, and come up with stories to explain what is, actually, not "explainable" at all. At least, it's not "explainable" if we take "explainable" to mean "provable," and accurate, and clearly "true." An honest evaluation would have to admit that how we came to be, alive as we are, is not anything we will ever be able to "prove."

We do, though, of course, have various "stories," and they all shed some light on the subject. At least, that's my view. 

The "scientific story," of which the "Mars microbe" theory might be a part, is that inert matter, at some point (somewhere - and maybe on Mars), was transformed, somehow, into something that could self-replicate, and could "change" and "evolve" in the process of doing that. Self-replication, including the possibility of changes occurring during the process, does, it seems to me, provide a pretty handy way to describe what it means to be "alive." Hence: evolution and our "scientific" story of how we got to be the way we are.

To me, it's pretty obvious that the "scientific" explanation of what "life" is, and how it came to be, is a kind of "story" that is not totally different from the story told in Genesis. 

Out of nothing.... something (including life). No demonstrable proof of the actual "cause" of the realities we can track.

Maybe, there is no "Creator," and things have always been that way. We put that "Creator" into the story because we don't have any experience with a world (here, or on Mars, or anywhere else) where things just happen without a "cause" of some kind. Microbes from Mars, mutating on Earth, could be true, I suppose, but those "why" and "how" questions just don't go away. That "Mars microbes" story doesn't really explain anything about those "why" and "how" inquiries, which our hypothetically mutated minds continue to wonder about. 

Maybe it's just one of those "Sunday" things, but I'm sticking with the story that includes God the Creator.

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#108 / What Looks Large From A Distance

  

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Well, they’re not showing any lights tonight
And there’s no moon
There’s just a hot-blooded singer
Singing “Memphis in June”
While they’re beatin’ the devil out of a guy
Who’s wearing a powder-blue wig
Later he’ll be shot
For resisting arrest
I can still hear his voice crying
In the wilderness
What looks large from a distance
Close up ain’t never that big

      Bob Dylan, "Tight Connection To My Heart"

The next-to-last verse of "Tight Connection To My Heart (Has Anyone Seen My Love)" is cited in that "pull quote" just above. If you'd like to read the full lyrics, click on the link to the title of the song. Click right here if you'd like to hear Dylan sing the song, and if you'd like to watch his official video (which is pretty weird and mystifying, if you ask me).

What I want to comment on are the last two lines of that verse I'm citing, which I have bolded. Dylan's statement in those last two lines (at least to me) doesn't seem to relate very directly to the story being told in the song. Dylan's statement, in fact, is a stand-alone piece of significant wisdom that any thoughtful person might want to bring forward during a discussion of love, life and death - and other important topics we all know about. Those last two lines in that next-to-last verse provide us with a piece of wisdom we all ought to keep in mind!

What Dylan says in those two lines is true, isn't it, as a general proposition? What seeems to be so "big," so "important," the things that we're told are earthshaking and of critical impact, the odds we are informed are insuperable, only seem to be that way until we encounter them "close up." 

Dylan has such little pearls of wisdom scattered throughout his prodigious work - something that is also mentioned in another, and fairly recent, blog posting of mine, discussing a relatively new book about Dylan's literary and philosophically important work over the last thirty years or so. Let's take this quoted statement seriously - the statement I have bolded; that's what I am suggesting. 

The things that seem overwhelming, the challenges that present themselves to us, and to the world, as something impossible to deal with, the problems we "can't solve," only seem that way when we're not actually grappling with them "close up." 

Restoring democratic self-government to the United States. Making real progress on income inequality. Stopping the wars that are proliferating everywhere, abolishing the potential for nuclear war, providing meaningful work for everyone, etc. These are the kind of gigantic challenges which do, indeed, "look large."

When we get to work on any of those "looks large from a distance" problems and challenges, though - if we are bold enough, or "crazy" enough to take them on - we mostly find that they aren't really that big. Not once we're up close and personal, not once we get personally involved in dealing with them.

Courage to take on the monumental challenges that do, indeed, seem "monumental," is essential. Essential, anyway, if we want to accomplish what we must. The challenges that will determine the future of democracy, the future of the human race, the continued habitability of Planet Earth, the future of our children and grandchildren - all of these challenges seem "large," too large to take on. But are they, really, when we take them on "close up"?

Think about picking your own, "looks large" problem, but as you do that, remember this piece of wisdom from Mr. Dylan. "What looks large from a distance, close up ain't never that big." 

I'm old. I've been around, and I have been listening to Mr. Dylan for a long time. Think about it. He's right about this. I hope that's motivating!

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https://www.bobdylan.com/songs/tight-connection-my-heart-has-anyone-seen-my-love/

#107 / KYBO And KYMO

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I will begin my blog posting today with a clipping from The Sun magazine. That's an unusual magazine - just in case you haven't heard of it - and I subscribe. The Sun is worth checking out, in my opinion. Click the link and see what you think.

Now, here's an excerpt from that clipping I mentioned, from the edition of The Sun dated October 2025: 

Readers Write - Graffiti 

AT THE GROUP OF SLEEPAWAY CAMPS I worked for in Vermont, the outhouses were called “kybos”— one of those camp-lore terms whose origin is shrouded in mystery. My job entailed going from camp to camp, and as one of the few people there over the age of forty, I was picky about which kybos I’d use. My favorite, cantilevered off the side of a hill and accessible via a short wooden bridge, was at a camp for boys ages nine to fourteen—a demographic known for its poop jokes. But the users of this kybo decorated its walls with haiku:

This is Haikubo
the art of writing haikus
while on the kybo

Haikus are easy
but they don’t always make sense.
Refrigerator.
And, in response to the poem above:

“Haiku” when plural
is still “haiku.” It is
a Japanese word.

Because the camps had a strict no-screens policy, I couldn’t distract myself with my phone while on the toilet. When I used Haikubo, I didn’t miss it at all.

Celia Barbour
Garrison, New York

"Readers Write" is a section featured in each monthly edition of The Sun. A "topic" for each upcoming issue is announced - a couple of months in advance - and readers send in their response, focused on the topic for the month. Selections from the readers are then published in the magazine. I enjoyed the submission above, submitted in response to the prompt for that month, "Graffiti," but it left a question in my mind: What does "KYBO" actually stand for? Why was "KYBO" chosen as the name for "outhouse." What "camp-lore" resulted in KYBO = Primative Outdoor Toilet?

I got an answer - but I had to wait a few issues. The January 2026 edition of The Sun had a letter in its "Correspondence" section that said that the term "KYBO" stood for "Keeping Your Bowels Open."

Now, that phrase, the key to the use of "KYBO" as a shorthand for "Outhouse," provides some helpful advice. I have been given that advice before, actually, sometimes in a "medical" context, though this advice has never been conveyed by way of the "KYBO" abbreviation.  

For whatever reason, learning the meaning of "KYBO" made me think of another four-letter abbreviation which also carries some good advice. Here's my suggestion for all of us: 

KYMO - "Keep Your Mind Open" 

 

Thanks to The Sun, I am now providing you with a shorthand way to convey some very pertinent personal and political advice!

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https://toiletology.com/resources/history/history-of-the-outhouse/

#106 / Citizen Circles

 

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An article in the April 15, 2026, edition of The Wall Street Journal explored the implications of the recent vote in Hungary that defeated Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán. Online, the article was titled, "How An Upstart Politician Reclaimed Hungarian Nationalism To Topple Orbán."

In the hardcopy version of the paper, in a little "box" included in the middle of the article, a headline proclaimed, "We Didn't Have A Choice, One Voter Says." The text that appeared under this statement noted that the successful candidate, Péter Magyar, "energized a budding grassroots campaign by urging Hungarians to start organizing 'citizen circles' made up of ... volunteers pushing for change."

Small groups, organized around a strongly-desired political change, played a dramatic role in achieving this incredibly important transition in Hungary, taking the country from an authoritarian government to a much more democratic one.

If those "Citizen Circles" sound like what I often advocate for in my daily blog postings, that's because they are! What happened in Hungary exemplifies the power of a politics based on voluntary associations of small groups of concerned citizens (in the American Revolution they were called "Committees of Correspondence") which collaborate and coordinate to make nation-level political change.

There is still time to mobilize such "citizen circles" before our upcoming midterm elections, here in the United States. As I said in my blog posting yesterday, "It's Time For The Shy To Step Right Up." 

And, as a reminder, there will be a workshop on this coming Saturday, sponsored by Indivisible Santa Cruz County and Indivisible Pajaro Valley, that will focus on some of the ways we ordinary people can get more directly, and effectively, engaged in local government and politics.

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(1) - https://www.wsj.com/world/europe/how-an-upstart-politician-reclaimed-hungarian-nationalism-to-topple-orban-2e2d1611

(2) - https://www.indivisiblesantacruzcounty.com/events/voter-registration-training-hmm8r-6xmnr-59msg

#105 / It's Time For The Shy To Step Right Up

  

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A guest essay by Hélène Landemore was published in the Friday, April 10, 2026, edition of The New York Times. In the hardcopy version, the essay was titled, "Jury Duty For Politics." Online, Landemore's essay was titled, "No Shy Person Left Behind."

Politically speaking, a lot of us are pretty "shy." Here's Landemore's take on the phenomenon (emphasis added): 

Over the past two decades, my research on collective intelligence in politics, democratic theory and the design of our institutions shows that the system structurally excludes those I call, in my new book, “the shy.” By the shy I mean not just the natural introverts, but all the people who have internalized the idea that they lack power, that politics is not built for them, and who could never imagine running for office. That is, potentially, most of us, though predictable groups — women, the young and many minorities — are overrepresented in that category.

The early-20th-century British writer G.K. Chesterton once offered a striking and unusual metaphor for what democracy should look like. He wrote, “All real democracy is an attempt (like that of a jolly hostess) to bring the shy people out.” What would our democratic institutions look like if we took that metaphor seriously?

One solution to the problem, advanced by Landemore, might be "jury duty for politics." In other words, why shouldn't policy decisions on important issues be made by "citizens' assemblies," comprised of randomly-selected citizens, and with these "citizens' assemblies" being analogous to juries? We trust randomly selected citizens to make life and death decisions in both civil and criminal matters; why not use the same principle with respect to key budget and other policy decisions at every level of our government? The Hannah Arendt Center at Bard College is definitely promoting this idea. Click that link for a discussion. 

I don't have anything against "citizens' assemblies," or juries, but my own idea about how to get "shy" citizens back into self-government is by encouraging the shy to "find some friends," and to join or form a friendship group that is centered on accomplishing some prized governmental goal. 

I learned how this worked back when we "Saved Lighthouse Field." It's a winning formula! In fact, anyone who is interested in thinking about this might want to attend a "We Have The Power" workshop that I'll be giving on this coming Saturday, April 18th. The workshop is sponsored by Indivisible Santa Cruz County, and Indivisible Pajaro Valley. Below, I am providing you with a copy of the online flyer announcing the workshop, and if you want to attend, just click this link to sign up.

 

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Image Credits:

(1) - https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/07/opinion/political-power-citizens-assemblies.html

(2) - https://www.indivisiblesantacruzcounty.com/events/voter-registration-training-hmm8r-6xmnr-59msg

#104 / Apology Time

 

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From An Article In The New York Times

By engaging in a war of choice in a critical region for global trade and utterly ignoring the probable consequences for the economies of its closest allies, the Trump administration has destroyed the legitimacy of American power,” asserted Anatol Lieven of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft.

What do I say to this assertion? 

TRUE!

The United States of America (actually, our current president, acting as though he, as president, was entitled to make an individual decision that the United States should go to war) has made a huge and consequential mistake. 

When someone (an individual or a nation) makes a mistake, the responsible party needs to apologize. And to be effective, an apology needs to be more than simply "verbal." The apology needs to be accompanied by some sort of action that fully acknowledges the error made, and that demonstrates an effort to show genuine remorse, and some significant effort to set things right. 

We, the people of the United States, are bearing the responsibility for the mistake made by our current president. I don't think there is a way to set things right without an apology accompanied by doing something to make clear that we, the citizens of the United States, do fully understand and apologize for what has been done. 

Our Constitution provides a couple of ways for the nation to make such an apology, in a manner that would have a chance, at least, of being accepted by the nations of the world (and particularly our "friends," our "allies," those whom have been so dramatically impacted by what has been done). 

Who can take such an action? First, our current president's Cabinet.

Second, The Congress of The United States of America. 

Absent action by the Cabinet, there isn't a way to make the right kind of apology, other than by Congressional action. If the nation wants to recapture the "legitimacy" of our conduct affecting the world, Congress must take action, and "partisan" votes are not going to do the trick.

Action! 

Promptly Undertaken!

That might have a chance.

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Image Credit:

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/09/world/europe/iran-war-suez.html

#103 / Our National Degeneracy

  

 

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Steve Schmidt is a former Republican Party political operative and was the co-founder of the Lincoln Project. Nowadays, Schmidt writes a Substack blog, which he titles, "The Warning." 

On March 16th, Schmidt's blog posting was focused on Pete Hegseth, pictured above. Schmidt says Hegseth's appointment as the head of our Defense Department (which Hegseth calls our "War Department") is a proof of our "national degeneracy." The link I just provided should take you to Schmidt's March 16th blog posting, in which he makes that claim. Here's another link, which will take you to a video of Schmidt discussing Hegseth, and specificallty Hegseth's efforts to strip Senator Mark Kelley of his armed forces pension.

I absolutely agree with Schmidt that Hegseth should never have been appointed to head the Defense Department, and that he has proven inadequate to the job - and that he is not only an embarrassment but is actually a danger to the nation. Hegseth should be removed from his post - and removed forthwith. I do not believe, however, that the fact of Hegseth's appointment indicates our "national degeneracy." The "nation" includes all of us, and and all we do. When we start believing that the "nation" is degenerate, we start thinking, even without realizing it, that we are not really capable of doing the right thing, and of governing ourselves in a way that we can be proud of. 

In fact, though, we are capable of doing the right thing - changing what's wrong, and doing the right things, instead of doing the wrong things. I want our social and political commentators to encourage us to do that - to make the changes we need to make. Calling out our own, supposed, "national degeneracy" is not my idea of the best way of inspiring the kinds of actions we need to take. As I have pointed out in one of my earlier blog postings, selecting Donald Trump as our president was a terrible mistake. One consequence of that mistake has been the appointment of Pete Hegseth. 

I think we need to understand what's happened without stigmatizing our entire nation and stipulating to our "national degeneracy." Let me, in other words, endorse something that Robert Reich said in a March 19, 2026, column that ran in The Guardian: "Dear allies of America, please don’t confuse our president with us."

Instead of identifying a supposed "national degeneracy," let's correct our mistake(s)! Let's not suggest to ourselves, by the labels we use, that we have lost the capacity to do that! We haven't!

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Image Credit:

https://steveschmidt.substack.com/p/our-national-degeneracy

#102 / They Say Ev’ry Man Must Fall

 

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They say ev’ry man needs protection
They say ev’ry man must fall
Yet I swear I see my reflection
Some place so high above this wall

Bob Dylan, "I Shall Be Released" 

As I have revealed in my blog postings, on more than one occasion, I have compiled a set of "Last Day Songs." I often listen to them as I walk around town. "I Shall Be Released," by Bob Dylan, is one of those songs, and the lyrics I have set out, just above, are my favorite part of the song. 

If you click the link to the "I Shall Be Released" title, you will be able to listen to Dylan sing the song. The complete lyrics are below. 

In addition, as a kind of "bonus," I am providing a link, right here, that will take you to a video with Dylan and The Band singing, "I Shall Be Released" during The Band's "Last Waltz" performance in San Francisco, on Thanksgiving in 1976. I didn't take the video, but I was there at the performance, and as I am recalling it, "I Shall Be Released" was the song that summed up and ended The Band's final concert. 

What I like about those lyrics that I feature at the top of this blog posting is their rather unassuming, but confident, statement of faith. It speaks for me, too!

oooOOOooo

I Shall Be Released

They say ev’rything can be replaced
Yet ev’ry distance is not near
So I remember ev’ry face
Of ev’ry man who put me here
I see my light come shining
From the west unto the east
Any day now, any day now
I shall be released

They say ev’ry man needs protection
They say ev’ry man must fall
Yet I swear I see my reflection
Some place so high above this wall
I see my light come shining
From the west unto the east
Any day now, any day now
I shall be released

Standing next to me in this lonely crowd
Is a man who swears he’s not to blame
All day long I hear him shout so loud
Crying out that he was framed
I see my light come shining
From the west unto the east
Any day now, any day now
I shall be released

Copyright ©1967, 1970 by Dwarf Music; renewed 1995 by Dwarf Music

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Image Credit:

https://www.jerrysguitarbar.com/guitar-video-lessons/individual-songs/bob-dylan-i-shall-be-released/

# 101 / A Disturbingly Demonstrative Dog

 

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I live on a short, one-block long street. I also go for a lot of walks. This means that I frequently find myself walking by the dog pictured above. Coming or going, and no matter what side of the street I'm walking on, if that dog is outside (which the dog usually is), the dog will immediately and vociferously begin barking at full volume as I pass by, jumping around and lunging at the fence, making me think that the dog would like to tear my throat out. Luckily, that fence shown in the picture is pretty strong, and pretty high. I am not really in any significant danger.

You might think I would be prepared, by now, for these auditory assaults. I should be, but I am almost always surprised and unnerved by the dog's clamor to get free and kill me - which is the way I think of this dog's full-volume barking assaults. That worst case scenario is what comes into my mind, every time. 

Or, at least, that was true until several weeks ago. 

Several weeks ago, instead of pretending not to be bothered and quickly walking on by, I actually stopped, and turned to face this demonstrative dog. I expected to see evidences of blood lust in the dog's face, because, as noted, that is definitely how I have interpreted the meaning behind that high-velocity barking with which I am always assaulted. 

But wait! When I stopped (the dog didn't stop barking and jumping around as if it would like to break free and attack me), I noticed that the dog's tail was wagging, too. I hadn't ever noticed that before!

Could it be that the dog was just starved for attention, and was trying to get some from me?

I have started entertaining that idea upon my subsequent forays, up and down my block, which I am hoping might help me lower my heart rate and sense of imminent peril every time I am subjected to one of those incredibly high-volume barking attacks, which I have just described. 

As I have thought about it, it has also struck me that human beings have been known to engage in tactics similar to those utilized by this irritatingly demonstrative dog. A lot of times, I have observed people who engage in verbally assaultive behavior, in print, or even in real life, usually expressing their reaction to some sort of disagreement with me, or with somebody else, near by, and I have found that they are not really interested in killing me, and eating my heart and liver (though that is, sometimes, my immediate impression, based on the way they are acting). People, like this demonstrative dog, are sometimes just trying to get some attention. They may even be friendly, underneath all the clamor.

No excuse for the bad manners, in either case - dog or human - but it is helpful to keep in mind that even vociferous and ugly verbal attacks do not, necessarily, and always, indicate that those engaging in such attacks really want to see you dead in order to feast on your carcass. 

With dogs and humans, that's a good lesson to remember.

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Image Credit:

Gary A. Patton, personal photo