32 thoughts on “A Pox on this Apocalypse”

  1. are we enraptured yet? old john of patmos, ezekiel and zack’s prophets couldn’t have written it worse about the last year and a half –  make that the last 5 1/2  years counting you-know-who, the disgraced former guy as the anti-christ.  but they were spot on with some of the more salient features.  i’ve been surprised we haven’t heard more from the end of times crowd what with the raging wildfires, floods, pandemic, their failed insurrection and having to wear masks.

  2. We are victims of problems we create and/or refuse to fix. Afghanistan, check. Covid, check. Right, we didn’t cause 911 or create the Covid virus, so look to the refuse to fix part of the equation. 

  3. <msnbc benen‘s analogy today spot on:

    There was a curious moment on CBS’s “Face the Nation” yesterday in which Major Garrett asked Nikki Haley whether the Trump administration’s 2020 deal with the Taliban “set in motion what we’re seeing now” in Afghanistan. The former ambassador to the United Nations apparently didn’t like the question.
    “You know, I think everybody’s wanting to go back and talk about Trump,” Haley said, quickly changing the subject in her next breath.
    As regular readers know, one my favorite scenes in Monty Python and the Holy Grail is the one in which John Cleese’s Sir Lancelot, certain he’s doing the right thing on behalf of a damsel in distress, storms into a castle during a wedding party, indiscriminately slaughtering most of the guests with his sword. The castle owner, eager to curry favor with Lancelot, urges the survivors to let bygones be bygones.
    “Let’s not bicker and argue about who killed whom,” he tells his few remaining guests.
    The scene came to mind watching Haley avoid an important line of inquiry. Asked about the Trump administration’s policy toward Afghanistan — after playing an integral role on Donald Trump’s foreign policy team — the South Carolina Republican effectively said, “Let’s not bicker and argue about which administration struck a bad deal with the Taliban, laying the groundwork for future disasters.”
    Whether Haley wants to avoid the subject or not, the relevance of the Trump administration’s February 2020 agreement with the Taliban is unmistakable — and the former ambassador isn’t the only member of the former president’s team who isn’t at all sure what to say about it.

    [continues with former guy aiders and abettors varying views on the former guy’s fault/no fault for pull-out screwup]

    Nikki Haley is annoyed that “everybody’s wanting to go back and talk about Trump.” With the benefit of hindsight, it seems everybody shouldtalk about the extent to which the Trump administration created the conditions that Team Trump is so eager to complain about now.

  4. patd, that would be too much like taking responsibility for something that did not go perfectly.  That’s not in the Dumbass the Former sycophant DNA.

  5. NFL preseason football was on tv Saturday. College football fall camps are underway and Bama plays its first game in 12 days. Yahoo and Roll Tide. 

  6. I actually thought about making a little wall hanging (perhaps even getting it quilted) made of my cloth masks.  At this rate, though, I’ll be wearing them until 2023.

  7. https://www.texastribune.org/2021/08/23/texas-border-immigration-greg-abbott-enforcement/

    “The DPS officials told Pimentel that once Abbott’s order went into effect, troopers would constantly watch Catholic Charities’ shelter in McAllen, the largest in the area for migrants seeking asylum in the U.S., according to a brief the shelter filed in court as part of a federal lawsuit against the governor.“

    “In the court documents, Pimentel said if the shelter couldn’t transport migrants to the nearby airport or a hotel, the shelter would become overcrowded — and increase the risk of COVID-19 if staff could not transport infected migrants to a hotel to be isolated.“

    “Abbott’s office is collecting donations to continue building barriers at the Texas-Mexico border. He has sent roughly 1,000 state troopers and Texas Rangers to arrest migrants on state charges, dispatched National Guard to help Border Patrol agents and turned a state prison into an immigrant-only detention center. His order to intercept civilian vehicles transporting migrants was temporarily suspended by a federal judge in El Paso until Aug. 27.“

    Greg Abbott is NOT pro-life.

  8. Another shame on CNN, this time for a sob story about a town in Texas shutdown due to most of the people in quarantine due to COVID.  Cry me a river.  If you read the article you will not see one word which is most critical to beat the virus (hint it starts with vaccine).

  9. My gas station lady ( manager)  is in the hospital  with the virus, she has lost 2 family members to it. 
    My car battery died along with Don Everly .  Talk about sticker shock.  Spent most of this day looking for one that was cheaper  than the value of the car.   The guy at Texas Battery said ,  ” I got one , it’s not used , more like day old bread “.
    $78.00 bucks still in the bag ,  when I’m gone they can still make croutons . 

  10. There is a public meeting at 1 PM tomorrow where the city of Lubbock hears citizen input on how to spent $55 Million dollars in “Covid Relief Money” . 
    If I can fire up my engine  I plan to offer , my input. 
    A. Homeless relief. 
     
    I will open with this –
    Everyone who has been homeless raise your hand . I raise my hand. 

    B. A  large series  of 3  gardens on city land.  In the barrio  I grew up in , and still live there.  They form a chain of grass and weeds  the city has to mow. 
    The key to  this seed money to get Texas Tech  to throw in with the city. 
    Get their students to throw in  at all levels of study . 
     The key is a board of locals that run it. 
     
    It’s a lock with a lot of keys. 
     

  11. Phil and Don. LA Times sums their musical influence up nicely. 

    Don and his younger brother, Phil, were in the first group to be inaugurated in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1986, alongside Elvis Presley, Chuck Berry, Little Richard, Buddy Holly and Jerry Lee Lewis. Their family harmonies set them apart, as did an out-of-time gentleness: the Everly Brothers’ well-crafted songs floated between country and city and moved with the rhythms of a dream.

    In a five-year span from 1957 to 1962, they had 15 top 10 hits, among them: “Bye Bye Love”, which launched them; “All I Have to Do Is Dream,” written by Boudleaux Bryant; which was a No. 1 hit in 1960 and a No. 1 country hit for Reba McEntire in 1989.

    Their harmonies influenced the Beatles and Simon & Garfunkel in the 1960s, and a decade later their Appalachian roots inspired country rockers such as Gram Parsons and Linda Ronstadt, who had a hit covering their “When Will I Be Loved” in 1975.

    Do you need to know anything else about the Everly Brothers? Nope.

  12. OM – Go, get ‘em!

    Housing, food, something sustainable that can add to a sense of community. Here’s hoping they don’t waste it on something frivolous.

    https://www.texastribune.org/2021/08/23/texas-pfizer-vaccine-approval/

    “Abbott had banned public schools and local governments from enacting their own vaccine mandates. But the governor’s executive order specifies that the ban on mandates applies to COVID-19 vaccines that are under emergency authorization — a designation that no longer applies to the Pfizer two-dose vaccination.“

    “The state’s ban on so-called vaccine passports — authored by state Sen. Lois Kolkhorst, a Brenham Republican, and passed by Texas lawmakers earlier this year — prevents businesses like restaurants and retailers from requiring customers to show proof of vaccination.“

  13. So I am going to speak  to the city tomorrow,  as a “Son of Lubbock” .
    I am planning to wear my top hat , and Lennon dark glasses .
    I will not rant  but I plan to get print ,  after my introduction.  I will ask for everyone in the room who has been homeless to raise their hand,  after I scan the room of no hands I will raise mine. 
    At that point , I got them by the short and curlies .
    Then I make my pitch  about the homeless , and how to help them, 
    First they need a hot meal , then they need a hot shower , next they need clean clothes , and a safe place to sleep.  
     
    Then we can  catch them and save some. 
    And I plug in this idea  into  a real wage to work via    garden  a big garden  as a way to  make a way.
    We pay  kids  and  bums , to tend it. we create a purpose. 
     A way to  make a way.

  14. This camp  fire set me to thinking about words , and writing them .
    And their power. .
    “A way to  make a way.”
     
    This may be the best line I ever wrote here. 

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