The Supreme's Sing A Reactionary Song: Saturday Political Soap Box 187

The Supreme Court is a'fixin' to change.

Justice Anthony Kennedy is retiring on July 31st.

This will give the Russian influenced narrow electoral college winner, Donald J. Trump, a second Supreme Court Justice.  Justice Kennedy had a reputation for rare jogs off the reservation (gay marriage, Roe v. Wade), and this change will put a lock on a reactionary agenda.

Most would say conservative, but I believe reactionary would be a closer fit.  Their primary goal is to turn back time, by taking away hard-fought-for rights, whether it's women's rights, voting rights, minority rights, and more.  They will consistently side with large corporations and the wealthy. 

Justice Kennedy was no prize.  He sided with the reactionary majority much more often than not.  His vote could be counted on with most decisions involving corporate power,  He wrote the Citizens United decision that helped flood our system with big money donors.  He was no friend to the working man.  He was the swing vote that selected Bush, Jr. to be President of the United States.

There was some consternation that Justice Kennedy chose this time to retire, and did not wait a few months when election results would make more evident the intent of the American people.  Surprise!  Mr. So-called Moderate is more tied to the Trump administration than perhaps any other justice  Turns out, and this is so amusing that we didn't know this earlier, that his son has been Trump's primary contact at Deutsche Bank in Germany, the only bank  that would lend him money for quite a stretch (not including private lenders, like Russian oligarchs).

This will not be a significant change then, except that it shores up the majority for quite awhile, as Trump will pick a consistent reactionary, one who is much younger, and could theoretically serve for decades,

And this might not be the only one.  If one of the four moderate/liberal judges leaves, the majority could be locked at 6 to 3. 

So what will this mean to the future?

Well, it's always hard to know for sure, but really, the future looks bright,  This last week, the incredibly talented Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez upended the number four ranked Democrat in the House by decisively winning the Democratic primary in her Congressional District.  A young, dedicated, hard-working progressive replaced a moderate Democrat who believed in the power of special interest money.  She was outspent ten to one, and she still won.

The future is bright, and the future is progressive!

But none of that may matter if the Court is solidly reactionary.  We may be faced with a period where great progressive legislation is finally passed, only to be subsequently overturned by a reactionary Supreme Court.

Can Democrats stop this nomination, at least delay it until after the election when they might gain a majority in the Senate?

No.  I don't think they can.

They are counting on the McConnell  Rule, that you can't vote on a nominee close to an election.  Ha!  Like that's a real rule!  That was just a power play by the Republicans.  And now they'll reverse course, without a sense of guilt or shame.

They are counting on a couple of Republican women to hold out on principle, notably Senator Susan Collins of Maine and Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska.  Ha!  They'll cave with the Republican majority.  It's the Democrats who will have trouble staying united.  Some of their blue dogs are already getting queasy.

For my Christian Right friends who think this means Roe v. Wade will go down, you may be right.  But it won't do what you think it will do.  States will still have the power to allow abortion or not, and there will be states that will keep it.  So the total number of abortions will probably rise instead of fall, especially as birth control access is interfered with, and more schools switch to the ineffectual sex education substitute of abstinence-only.

Also increasing will be the number of back-alley abortions that will physically damage women, and lead to more deaths.

Not to mention the increase in mortality due to other actions of a reactionary Supreme Court.  Fewer environmental regulations lead to a more polluted environment which will kill more people.  Rejecting plans to increase health care coverage will lead to inadequate care and more deaths.  Fewer workplace regulations will lead to more deaths.

I know.  I paint a grim picture.  But you know what?  It is grim.

Grim, but not hopeless. 

Stay tuned. 

Cliff Notes: Flash Fiction Friday

I stand on the edge of a cliff.

The wind is blowing hard.  My jacket flaps, the loose sleeves snaping back and forth, a blue wave saluting the sixty foot fall down towards the Atlantic.    The cliffs are bare, just layer upon layer of sedimentary rock alternating with limestone rocks.  Grays and sivers and browns, with only a few juts for seabirds to perch.

A fall would definitely be a death plunge.  So why do I stand at the edge?  My feet are an inch away from dangling off.  My heart is pounding hard.  Keeping my vision from turning red is hard.  I am dizzy.  The world spins.  The next gust could disorient me, and then I don't know if I could stop myself from going over.

I am not alone.  There are dozens at the cliff's edge.  Some stand a little farther back than me, but most do not.  Some are sitting on the edge, their legs from the knee down pumping back and forth as if they are on a playground swing.

A loud whistle blows.  It startles me and my reactions lurch my upper body forward.  It is the park ranger warning us to get away from the cliff's edge.  I see the stark cliff face by looking directly below me.  I see a small rock jut twenty feet below.  Maybe I wouldn't fall instantly into the ocean.  Maybe that jut would catch me, and my body would land on that.  Or maybe I would bounce off it and arc into a deeper part of the ocean.  It wouldn't matter.  Once I hit the jutting rock, I wouldn't know anything that happened after that.

The pull is irresistible.  What's wrong with me?  I'm not suicidal.  I'm not a lemming.  Why can't I stop thinking about going over the edge?

It takes everything I can muster to take one step back, to move away from the abyss.  I hear my family calling out, "C'mon, Tom!  Get away from there!  You're scaring us!"

I look at the others who stay at the edge.  Are they oblivious?  Or do they hear the same siren call that I do?

Someone grabs my shoulder.  I turn to see who it is.  It's my wife.  She hates the edge, but she has dared it to pull me back.  My first look at her is puzzled.  Why?  Why are are you here?  Why are you pulling me away from what is beckoning me?

The look of worry emanating from her shakes me from my stupor.  I hug her fiercely and holding her, we move to the central pathway,  away from the cliff's edge.

No one fell that day.  At least, not while I was there.  But when you operate at the cliff's edge, you never know who may fall away.

Throwing It Back Thursday Style!

My week-long celebration of older features continues, with the return of Throwback Thursday!

For this, I used three of the oldest pictures on my phone.

My father, Eugene Evertt Strait, who passed in September of 2013, kept his mental facilities up until the end, even though his physical capabilities deteriorated.  He loved playing games, especially RummiKube, as pictured here, and Poker Bingo, a game that he created a game board for.  He never stopped being tough to beat.  You think he would show some mercy to us youngins', but he never did.

I miss him every day.

In November 2012, Benjamin played Little John in Young Robin Hood, a play that I co-wrote with Karissa Cook.  He and the other young people put in fantastic performances, and I think they had a great time.  I thank the Flying Dragon for indulging me in letting me write and direct this musical, and I thank Karissa for all the hard work she put into ensuring its success.

Steve Bean and I shared a vision of turning a property on the Okefenokee Heritage Center campus, The Studio, into a usable facility for the performing arts.  I am happy to say that it is presently being used that way, particularly by Purlie Productions. 

Steve was a good friend and a  tremendous Executive Director for the Okefenokee Heritage Center.  His kindness and loving relationships were an essential part of my church, Grace Episcopal Church, and helped transform into one of the most loving and open parishes in South Georgia.

Like my father, he has also passed, but his accomplishments and kindnesses live on.  

Wandering Wednesday is Back, Baby!

Is a part of me still in Ireland?  You better believe it!

It's back! One of my most popular blog features!  Wednesday Wanderings!

Ok, that's not entirely true.  It actually ranks quite low in views compared to some of my other kinds of posts.  Stuff with BenJerMan - that gets a lot of views.  As irritating as it may be to some, my political stuff gets a lot of views.  Things where I shut up and mostly show pictures do quite well.  Well, Wednesday Wanderings are more popular than my poetry.  That's something, right?

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My work status for the next two weeks is on call.  Get that, my work buddies?  Let me know if something comes in.  And then give me time to sober up, get dressed and get in.

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Speaking of sober, I fell in love with a drink in Ireland.  Guinness? Whiskey?  Ale?  Nope. Orange Soda!  Turns out of the ten most popular soft drinks in Ireland, three are orange sodas!  And, if you get one with your meal, they're more likely to put ice in your glass!  Viva la ice! I know, my love of ice makes me hopelessly American. But that's okay.  I'd rather explain to Europeans why I like ice than try to explain how America elected a dim-witted racist narcissist like Trump.

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Funny thing on the way to worrying about Trump - turns out that the stealing of Obama's Supreme Court nomination may be almost as destructive as the orange democracy-wrecking ball.  Expect many decisions that benefit corporations and the wealthy, and decisions that narrow and restrict democracy and access to it, that promote and encourage those who would discriminate.

This means when Progressives take control of the Presidency and Congress (which I believe they will), their initiatives will be reversed by a profoundly reactionary court.  We could actually pass Medicare for all, only to have it taken away by a Supreme Court that just hates to see everyone have access.  We could try to combat global warming only to have those initiatives over-turned.  And on and on it will go.

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We're gearing up the college application process for Benjamin.  Isn't that just crazy?

The cost of college is so high, I have no idea how anyone does it.  He should have Zell Miller level Hope Scholarship (covering tuition), but room and board are higher for one year than my college was for all four years, tuition and room and board COMBINED!

Student loans are like putting a massive yoke around their necks, dragging them down for the rest of their lives.  I don't know why Americans are willing to accept that.

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We're watching The Handmaid's Tale.  We at first had to catch up, settling in after our Ireland trip.  We're now caught up and can't stand the wait each Wednesday for a new episode.  The parallels to what's been happening in our country to what's happening on that show are eerie and spine-tingling. It's like a scary vision of the future where Mike Pence is President.

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For those who want me to end on an up note, here's another picture of Ireland.

Better yet, heeeere's Benjamin!

Wanderingly yours,

T. M. Strait

The Return of the Monday Musing!!!

It's been quite awhile since I wandered, tidbitted or mused

So, here I go, with the return of a Monday Musing!


Topic #1

My work (accounting, that is) is subsiding a bit, and won't really pick up until a summer audit that will occupy much of late July and August, running until about Labor Day.  Since my retirement, I've been going in at least three days a week (except during tax season, when it was four to five days).  When I've had a full week off, it's usually been with family or vacation. 

One of the best writing times I've had in my life was when I took Benjamin to Robot Camp at Georgia Tech (three summers ago)  and wrote while he was in camp, finishing over a hundred pages of Crowley Stories: Swamp's Edge.

I may not get full weeks over the next five weeks, but I should come closer.  I'm looking forward to getting into a better fiction writing routine.

Topic #2

So, what exactly is my writing focus right now?

I am writing more on The Extra Credit Club.  Why this project?  I may be deluding myself, but I think I have a publisher, one whom I've corresponded with, who is very likely to publish it.  And you would agree, wouldn't you, that it is best to concentrate on something that has the best chance of getting published?  Anyways, that's my idea.

What is The Extra Credit Club about?  12 students of Huron University (an imaginary college in Michigan) participate in an extracurricular activity with a Professor of medieval literature.  The assignment proves to be much more dangerous than any of them anticipated. More on this later!

Topic #3

I finally broke down and obtained Grammarly Premium.   My goal is to edit Crowley Stories: Swamp's Edge for the tenth time.  When I edited with basic Grammarly, it said there were 981 premium issues but to find out what they were, I had to get the premium program. Well, a few days ago they offered the Premium program for half price, so I broke down and got it.

I applied it to The Extra Credit Club (at this point, a shorter project than Crowley Stories)  to see what kind of problems I have.  Well, I tend to overuse certain words that are not needed, like really, just, actually, and others.  It's hard to get it through my head that adverbs are evil, but I'm getting there.  Really, I actually am, or just about.  It also fussed about the ways I used commas.  Sometimes, I swear, it wanted me to change comma use differently than the way the basic program had told me to change.  That's right.  Premium would contradict Basic.  Oh, well.

More problematic was the significant number of issues I had with passive voice.  I tried to fix those, but I found it hard because most of the story is in past tense.  I also ended some sentences with a preposition.  I changed some but not all of those.

Topic #4

It's hard to believe, but it's time to prepare for Benjamin's college applications.  We're happy with his ACT score, so we're done with that phase.  But he needs to start working on essays and a resume.

He also needs to drive some more.  We'd like him to retake his driver's test this Fall.  He's not going to have his own car, and probably won't take one to college, but we'd like him to have a license anyway, just in case.


Topic #5

So, Melania's jacket was some sort of message, but I don't know what.  No, she didn't wear it to the shelters, just at the airport, or at least that's what I read.  It was 90, but there was some rain forecast, so I think she was wearing for that reason?  My questions - was this her jacket?  Or did she borrow from somebody else on the plane?  If she bought it, why?  If you buy something with writing on it, the written message on it must strike a chord with you, right?  What chord did it strike in Melania?  When she bought it (if she bought it), what was it saying to her at the time?  Has she worn it before?  How often and when? You can research and find out that Zara (the jacket's manufacturer) is a terrible company, with anti-semitic apparel and poor working conditions.  It's much harder to discover what was really going in Melania's head.  That we may never know.

Topic #6

We continue to be captivated by soccer.  Alison finds out when the Atlanta United games are on, and is absorbed by them the whole time they are on.  It helps that Atlanta is such a good team, with the best record in the MLS (Major League Soccer).

I've followed some of the scores in the World Cup, but I haven't watched much of it.  Hard to have favorites.  I like the idea of Senegal and Iceland, or as I call them, Fire and Ice!


That's it for now.  I could muse more, but I probably should get on to other writing projects.

Until next time,

T. M. Strait

We Really Do Care: Saturday Political Soap Box 186

Why did Melania Trump wear a jacket that said:  "I Really Don't Care, Do U?"  across its back?

I really don't know.  Do I care?  I'm not sure.  Did she mean the children?  Her husband?  The media?  The weather? 

But I think we do care.

We care about the children.  The separation of families has struck a chord with many of us, and we don't see a plan to reunite those families.  The American people's reaction is that we do care.  This was a step too far for even immigration hardliners.

We care about her husband.  At least we care about the damage he is doing to our country and the democracy it is founded upon.  We care that he has chosen to identify more with world dictators than he has with democratic leaders.  We care that his rhetoric is tinged with racist paranoia and that he is trying to get us to react in fear, rather than in reason or compassion.

We care about the media.  We care that we have a 24 hours news station that is basically state-run television supporting Trump, no matter how authoritarian he is, no matter what godawful thing he does or says, no matter how much they have to contort or change previous positions.  We care about how much of the media is controlled by only a handful of corporations.  We care that we're losing net neutrality, dramatically increasing the odds that the Internet becomes expensive and under the control of only a few large players.  Please keep reading my blog even if they slow down your access to it.

We care about the weather.  We care that global warming remains unchecked, indeed has even been accelerated by the actions of the Trump administration.  Rules and regulations concerning pollution have been reversed, and fossil fuels have been favored over alternative energy.  We care that extreme weather, exacerbated by climate change, has become the norm rather than the exception.  The negative effects of global warming will create millions of climate refugees as parts of the planet become uninhabitable.   The current level of refugees will look like a trickle compared to what's coming. There will be mass migration on a level the world has never seen before.

Not everyone who reads this blog cares about every single one of these concerns.  A few may not care about any of them.  But there are many of us who are concerned, about these issues and many others.  And as long as there is breath in our bodies, we will continue to speak out.

What I really don't care about is commenting too much about the lives of the first family.  I have never commented much on Melania Trump, one way or another.  Those of Trump's children who speak out on public issues, including adviser Ivanka Trump, make it fair game as it relates to whatever issue they've spoken out about.  But the rest is not my concern, and I really don't care what they do or don't do,  Do you?

So, I don't know why she wore that jacket.  It could have been completely unintentional with no ulterior purpose.  I doubt it, but it could have been. 

But I do know this.  We care.  And we will continue to care.  There will always be a reason to care.  There will always be people that need caring about, that need kindness and understanding.  There will always be issues that affect us all, that require our action and caring to make things better for all.

We care, Melania.  And I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt.  I think, deep down. you care too.

Only time will tell.

Nope. Can't explain it.

The Problem is identified

Huzzah!

The President has come in and cleared up a problem of his own creation!  He does have a heart!

Well, not really.

He did very little, other than to jail future families together indefinitely.

He did nothing to help the families already separated.  He has increased the penalties for crossing at the wrong point from civil to criminal.

The zero tolerance policy continues, basically unabated.

He didn't make his policy change because of any sympathy for the children and their parents.  He did it because the optics looked bad for him.  Our television President didn't like how it made him look on television.  Nothing else moved him.  Well, maybe Ivanka, but I'd rather not get into that.

So, Trump is nasty and cruel.  We knew that. No one should be shocked by that.

What it did identify, what it made crystal clear, is identify those who would support him no matter what.  Those who bought into the whole thing, those for whom being tough on immigration justified any measure, any cruelty.

For some of us, it was friends, neighbors, sometimes even relatives, whom we realized were too far gone to help.  People who otherwise seem kind and rational, who had no problem justifying this cruelty.  It helped identify the persuadable and the incalcitrant.  There may be some people who are never coming back.  And the rest of us have to find a way to live with those people.

For those of you who live in more liberal, progressive places, this may not be a big problem.  But for us living in rural areas and small towns, particularly in the South, we have to learn to cope somehow.  We still have to go to work.  Many of us go to church.  We all have to go into environments where we are outnumbered by madness.

There seem to be two objections to immigration, illegal or otherwise.  One is economic - fears of losing jobs that should go to Americans, and to the social welfare cost of sustaining them.  The second is cultural - that the naturally superior white culture will be drowned by people of different colors and faiths.  A Corollary to this is that this is a nation founded on Christianity and that accepting people of other faiths will dilute that.

The first problem I can address.  Some say there are jobs Americans won't take, therefore we need migrants to take them, who will be willing to work for substandard wages and tolerate substandard conditions.  Every single human being has a right to be treated with dignity and paid a living wage.

So, here's what we do.  For every job, no matter how crappy, employers offer a living wage to do the job (right now, that would be somewhere between $13.50 and $15.00 an hour).  If Americans don't take the jobs, then offer the jobs to migrants, but do so AT THE SAME LIVING WAGE.  Pay them what you would an American.  No more under the table and underpaying crap.    BAM!  Immigration problem solved!

The second problem I can't address.  Bigotry often knows no cure.  We can pray that bigots change, but we can't just hold our breath.  Cultures change and move on.  We are not a prehistoric fly preserved in amber glass.

Every immigrant group that has come here has eventually merged into the melting pot of America.  Well, except maybe Southerners, but that's another discussion for another time.  Eventually, blue jeans, rock 'n' roll, and the mini-mall rule us all.  Eventually, English wins.  Maybe with a few new colorful phrases added, but that is one of the strengths of English - it's ability to adapt and absorb.  We have more culinary dishes to choose from.  The combination of diversity and unity makes us the greatest nation on Earth.  When we behave and not give into nativism, we do it better than any other country.

When you consider immigrants. illegal or otherwise, something less than yourself, when you dehumanize them, you turn your back on this nation.  You turn your back on humanity.  You turn your back on God.

But, tragically, these people may not be moved by reason, as they ruled by fear.  There may be nothing we can do, except to make sure there are more of us voting than them.

The Age of Trump. It's exhausting, I know.  It's depressing.  We lose sleep.  We're heartbroken over our family and friends that are still onboard his terrible train.

But I can't stop.  I will continue tilting at the windmill.  You never know. 

America's Hostage Crisis

This will not be a pretty blog posting.

This will not be something I can use for a newspaper column.

It won't be something I can submit to a writing contest.

Nevertheless, I will attempt to transcribe my scattered thoughts.

I have been engrossed in using my limited writing time in telling the story of my Ireland trip, using plenty of pictures and entertaining descriptions.

Meanwhile, our American politics continue to descend further down Dante's Inferno.

Insulting our allies and starting a tariff war with them that will create economic losers, and deteriorating our relationships with them in a spectacularly boorish performance at the G-7, approaching toddler-lever tantrums,  He treats democratic leaders like Prime Minister Trudeau of Canada like weak and ineffective scum, and then showers praises on the most brutal dictator of our time, North Korea's Kim Jong Yun, and then ends a summit where North Korea gets what they want and we get vague promises in return.  His campaign manager is jailed pending trial and he acts like he barely ever met the guy.  The New York State Attorney General is prosecuting ghastly crimes of greed and corruption associated with the Trump Foundation.

On and on it goes.

But the internment of children for reasons of deterring future immigration, as a tactic of intimidation, is a new low, one that even many Republicans recognize as particularly foul.   And the President himself explicitly states that it is the Democrat's fault?  Why?  Because they could end it by giving him everything he wants on the immigration issue, including the wall.

That's right.  He's holding children hostage in order to get his god-forsaken, useless wall.

I'm not making this up.  This is pretty much what he is saying.

America's hostage crisis.  And it's of our own making.

The outcry is loud enough that he should cave on this issue,  How many times has every living first lady decided to speak out on an issue, and all have basically the same position on it?  True, Melania Trump's response was a little more clouded than the rest, but think of the miracle it is that she spoke out at all.

Yes, a rational player would cave on this issue.  But we're not dealing with a rational player, are we?  His base has rewarded him for every vile step he's taken in connection with immigration.

SPOILER ALERT:  please disregard what's next if you haven't yet seen Season 2 Episode 9 of The Handmaid's Tale.


In that wonderful but horrifyingly prescient series, June (Offred) found some hidden letters from other handmaidens that revealed how ghastly women were being treated in Gilead (think what a Mike Pence America would be like).  She was burning them when a sympathetic aide to the Commander (the brutal Gilead leader and one who keeps June as, well, basically a sex slave)) rescued and saved the remaining letters.  In Episode 9, he managed to get those letters to June's husband, who had been able to get to Canada.  The husband was able to get the letters posted to the internet, and they were so horrendous, that attitudes changed about Gilead overnight, as they realized that the dictatorial was even worse than they imagined.

And that's where we are with this crisis.  Pictures and audio are starting to come out of the children's concentration camps (does my using that term give some of you the vapors because it sounds too extreme?  too bad so sad - the warning cry of where we're headed must be given now and not when it's too late), and they are starting to wake up a larger swath of the American public.

Maybe we'll get out of this.  Maybe Trump will be forced to cave.  Maybe we've finally hit a turning point in this most grotesque of Presidencies.

Because if we don't, then we have truly lost the America that many of us know and love.

We will truly become one of the world's greatest villains, no longer the beacon of light, hope, and freedom that we should be.

And I'm not ready to see that happen.

Are you?

The Dublin Proposal: Ireland Vacation 7

This wraps my series of photo blogs about our trip to Ireland.

Let's start with the lead.

When we got back to Dublin. we were thrilled to be witness to the Dublin Proposal, where Doug asked Paige for her hand in marriage (and the rest of her as well).  She said yes almost before he could the words out.  They are a great couple, whose bonds of love and affection draw out the best in each other.

The proposal was made in the beautiful garden grounds of the Irish Museum of Modern Art.  Alison did the research to pick the perfect spot, and I think she made an excellent choice.

We return to a chronological sequence of events.

We had left Belfast to spend a day and night in Londonderry (or Derry, depending on how you stand on independence from Britain).  It was very interesting stop because it was the least touristy place we went.  Unlike Dublin, where you heard as much of the American accent as the Irish, or Killarney where you often heard German, this town was predominantly locals.

There is a wall all around the inner city, and we walked its length.  Above is a picture of a small part of it, including cannons that were once used to defend it. 

This is a view of Londonderry from beyond the wall.

Just inside the wall was a view of one of the prettiest little churches we saw, an old Anglican church.  We saw many great and grand cathedrals on our trip, but this little church was one of the most charming.

This is not the Poundland we saw in Londonderry.  It's just a picture of another location I stole from public photos on Facebook.

Doug and Paige's special focus, something that we did not join them in, were tours of local breweries (including Jameson Whiskey and Guinness).  What we did without them was almost as exciting.  We visited a number of the equivalent of America's dollar stores.  This included Poundland in Northern Ireland and Euro World in Dublin.

We found Daddies Ketchup, a product aimed directly for me, as I am both a Daddy and a ketchupaholic.  John Oliver on Last Week with John Oliver had an even scarier version of this - Daddies Brown Sauce,

We returned to Dublin for the final two days of our trip.  Aaaand...for some reason my picture taking dwindled to almost nothing.  We had a good time. but there was a lot of bus travel that was not conducive to picture taking,  And I also just forgot I had a camera.   

From outside our room rental, I saw the Dublin branch of the OHC - Okefenokee Heritage Center.  Glad to see we're branching out.

I conclude the Ireland series with a picture of the newly engaged.


What a couple!

What a trip!

Giants Beyond the North Wall: Ireland Vacation 6

Doug sits on a Throne of LIES!

Ok, not really.

It's just an oversized size wooden chair outside of the restaurant that the tour uses for lunch, just prior to entering the Giant Causeway.

Yes, we had left the confines of the beautiful confines of the Irish Republic, and had begun touring the Northern Republic.

This could be a picture of Belfast.  I'm not 100% sure, but that where its sequenced in my phone camera "roll".

I admit.  I was a little out of it by the time we hit Belfast.  So it was a bit of fog to me.  I didn't get many pictures.

It was one of the grittier cities we visited.  It felt like working-class Britain as much as it did Ireland.  The song "Come On, Eileen" kept running through my head.

Pounds relaced Euros.  Ketchup became harder to find (sorry - I'm a ketchupaholic).  It didn't rain, except for a brief sprinkle, but things were not as bright and sunny as they were in the Irish Republic.

This may be Queen's University in Belfast.  I', pretty sure it is.  Well, one building of it.  Paige went to school here for a year or so.

It's interesting that American students can often travel abroad, and find school cheaper here than in the states, even factoring in the cost of travel.

America has to do something about its exploding and prohibitive college costs, and the devastating, crippling loans many are taking out to pay for it.  Whatever's done will probably not occur while Benjamin's in college, but for the sake of future generations, it needs to be done.

Our first full day in Northern Ireland was another bus tour.  Once you got out of Belfast, the scenery was as breathtaking as it was in the Irish Republic.

One of our first stops was to a castle.  This would be our third and final castle visit of the trip.

As you can see, another beautiful coastline.  Cliffs not quite as spectacular as the Cliffs of Mohr, but impressive nonetheless.

The highlight of the day was a trip to the Giants Causeway.  This is the area as described in Wikipedia:

The Giant's Causeway is an area of about 40,000 interlocking basalt columns, the result of an ancient volcanic fissure eruption. It is located in County Antrim on the north coast of Northern Ireland, about three miles (4.8 km) northeast of the town of Bushmills.

This is a picture of the columns.  Natural formation!  Like God was playing with his own Mega-Blocks.

Alison sits on a throne of LIES!

Okay, not really.

There were parts of the Giants Causeway that were climbable. We and about a thousand of our friends enjoyed doing that.

One of the biggest busts of the trip was the so-called Dark Hedges, a tree-lined street where the tree limbs extended across the road and almost interlocked with the tree on the other side.  Having seen some of the peach tree-lined streets near Macon and Central Georgia, we were not overwhelming impressed.

Much of where we visited in Northern Ireland were locations used for the television series Game of Thrones.  That included the Dark Hedges, which, I imagine, with the right time of day and the careful use of photography and effects, could look quite impressive.  Just not so much at 4 O'Clock in the afternoon.

Beleive it or not, this is the second to last blog story about our Ireland vacation.  The series wraps up with...

THE DUBLIN PROPOSAL!

Posting soon to a Strait Line Blog near you!

Heritage

This was an Okefenokee Heritage Center Writer's Guild assignment - tell your life story in 400 words, and give it an uplifting ending.  I don't know how well I did that, but...exactly 400 words, baby!  Woohoo!

I’m not a Southerner.  I was born in Michigan.

I’ve lived here 40 years, since I was 23, but that doesn’t matter.  People still see me as a Yankee.  It doesn’t even matter that Michigan is the Midwest.   I’m still a Yankee.

If I had chosen to blend in, adopt more of the Southern culture, I’m not sure anyone would notice.  But I have not.  I am a particular failure when it comes to the Southern male stereotype.  I don’t hunt or fish.  I don’t play golf.  I don’t go to a conservative Christian church, and I don’t cotton to right-wing politics.  Country music is not my thing, except Johnny Cash.  My accent is not pronounced, unless I have a Southern part in a stage play.

it’s my own fault.  People think of me as a Yankee because I don’t behave in a way conformist to Southern culture.

Am I being stubborn?  Am I refusing to assimilate because I am trying to preserve my Michigander roots?  No.  I don’t think so.

Facebook, that social media phenomenon that is both an uniter and divider, has a group where my Bridgeport High School Alum participate.  They are a diverse bunch, and a harsh reminder that had I not moved, had I stayed in Michigan, I would not have fit in.

The South’s culture is not as static as it thinks it is.  No matter what you do, things change.  There are fewer hunters than what there was once.  Golf is a fading sport.  And even though race relations are nowhere near where they should be, they have improved.

Heritage is a wonderful thing.  It should be remembered and celebrated.  But it should not be frozen in time.  Because there is a more important idea, beyond heritage, beyond devotion to one tribe of humanity.

I was lucky.  Growing up, my father taught me something that superseded heritage.  And that was the foundation of Christianity, that God loves you, and you demonstrate that love by how you treat your fellow man, regardless of their cultural tribe.  It’s a common thread running through all the great religions, and humanism as well.

No, I may not be the ideal of a Southerner.  Nor a Yankee, for that matter.  But I am a fellow human.  And, as nice as it may be, I have learned it is not a common heritage that binds us. 

It is love.

At the Edge of the Cliffs of Mohr: Ireland Vacation 5

Our last bus tour!  I hope this shot of Bunratty Castle helps demonstrate that 1) I am definitely on a bus, and 2) I am using my phone camera.  Many of my pictures are unusable for reasons of getting other things in the way, or of being blurry.  I am trying to post the best 10% of what I took.

Once we got into the castle, there was this guy in the Great Hall talking to us about the castle and its history.  I missed a lot of it because we were far back, and the accent was a little hard to decipher.  I got that the place was old (the 1400s?) and that they had large groups eating in there sometimes. Sorry.  On some of this stuff, I think Alison and I are going to have to read more or see a YouTube video.

 

I did get that they liked big tapestries.

We went to try to see some rooms higher up in the castle.  To get to them, you had to travel these narrow staircases that only accommodated people going up or down.  There was not enough space to do both.  We finally got up to a pantry room, only to find ourselves stuck there for ten minutes, as the stairs were too crowded with people behind us, who wanted to get into the room, but it was too crowded to go forwards or backwards.   Briefly, we thought we might have to live in that room, but it slowly cleared up.

The Bunratty grounds were huge, with many other buildings and homes to see.  One was a schoolhouse.  One room of the schoolhouse was occupied by a group of schoolchildren singing The Wheels Go Round and Round.  Love their uniforms!  They looked prepared for the rain.  It rains a lot in Ireland that time of year.  By some miracle, Alison and I avoided the rain, except for some brief sprinkles in Belfast, and a short smattering on the day we left Dublin for the airport to go back home.

The highlight of the day - the Cliffs of Mohr!

Here's brief proof that I was actually on this trip.

This is about as close to the edge of the cliffs as I got.  There were other spots where people would climb past the fence and stand closer to the edge.  Some even sat on the edge and dangled their feet over it.  given the wind, these people were insane. 

Walking to another section of the cliffs, we found a memorial with an inscription, "For all those who have lost their lives on the Cliff of Mohr".  Watching those near the edge, I had no doubt that that occurred.  I just didn't want to be witness to it.

I find that I'm not so much afraid of heights for myself, as I am watching other people (particularly children) near heights.

Another view of the cliffs.  That would be some fancy beachfront property.

Another thing special about the park is that there was only one bathroom for men and women.  You just had separate enclosed inside a large facility.  One of the effects of this was that men had to wait in as long a line as women normally had to wait in.   I don't know how comfortable I was with it, but I had to admit - if we had it in the states, it would end a lot of silly arguments as who could go to whose bathroom.

As we traveled on, we came to a large section of Ireland called the Burren.

I'm not even going to pretend this is my writing.  This comes straight from Wikipedia - The Burren is a region of County Clare in the southwest of Ireland. It’s a karst landscape of bedrock incorporating a vast cracked pavement of glacial-era limestone, with cliffs and caves, fossils, rock formations and archaeological sites.

Yeah.  That's what it was.  It felt otherworldly.  I loved it.

Proof that Alison was on the trip as well, as she sits in The Burren.


Keep watching this blog!

More to come!

Strength in Ballot Diversity: Saturday Political Soap Box 185

Choice is always good.

You wouldn't want to go to the grocery store and find only one brand of peanut butter.  You want to be able to have a variety of tastes and to be able to comparison shop for price or other factors.  And since we all have different filters for our choice, not everyone will walk away with the same brand.

No one wants to walk down the aisle and only see GENERIC Peanut Butter, GENERIC Lima Beans, GENERIC Corn Flakes, and on and on.  It would be like shopping in the old Soviet Union.

Speaking of the Soviet Union, and other autocratic countries (including the new Soviet Union, known as Russia), their lack of diversity is not limited to their consumer markets.  It's also seen on their ballots.  There is only one viable option.  Either there is no choice on the ballot, or opposition is just for show.

I can't imagine living like that.  I like having choices in the stores.  And I love having choices on the ballot.

Unfortunately, ballot choice has not existed in my adopted home state of Georgia.  For decades, the Democratic Party dominated across the state.  The opposition was paltry and uncompetitive, and often Democratic candidates would run in November unopposed, with the Republicans unable to mount even a token opponent.

But this did not last forever.  In recent years, the Republican Party has taken a chokehold on Georgia politics.  The great switch, primarily provoked by the national Democratic Party's stance on civil rights, and then egged on by religious leaders of the conservative right, so much so, that by the early 2000s, the Democratic Party had been reduced to minority status, only able to hold sway in a small number of districts.

In my own neck of the Georgia woods, there would be very few Democrats appearing on the ballot.  Everyone around me seemed to accept that the real election was the primary, and were completely undisturbed by the Soviet-style ballot in the Fall.

But not me.  It bothered the bejeezus out of me.  I grew up in an area of Michigan that had very competitive elections.  Sometimes the Republican won, sometimes the Democrat.  No one could win by only appealing to party.  Splitting ballots was more common than not.  And those who were elected, if they refused to compromise and get stuff done, their jobs were in peril.

Not so today.  And this is true in many parts of the country.  Districts have been gerrymandered to be uncompetitive, to protect one party or the other.  The reason Republicans have dominated so much the last decade has as much to do with their surge election in 2010 as anything else, when they captured an enormous number of state legislatures.  This enabled them to control how districts were formed coming out of the  2010 census, and shape them to favor Republicans for the next decade.

In 2020 this could flip if the Democrats have a wave election.  And that would be just as wrong.  Elections districts should be determined by geography and population, not by granting one party or the other dominance.

But all is not doom and gloom in Georgia.  The Democrats have mounted competitive candidates this year, at both the state and local level.  And many of them are real choices, not just faint echoes of the other party.  Will this improve the percentage of the vote the Democrats get?  I don't know.  But at least Georgians get to hear a real choice for once.

Even locally, our ballot is slightly more competitive.  We have a real go-getter, a really vibrant choice, in our Congressional race, with the introduction of an effective, articulate Democratic candidate.  The incumbent Republican Congressman, Buddy Carter, is not going to be able to sleepwalk his way to victory.  He's going to have explain himself and defend the decisions he has made, and that is as it should be.

And the race for State House Representative is actually a two-party race for the first time since I can remember.  The last time I recall was in 2002 when the Democrat actually won.  And then immediately after winning, announced his switch to the Republican Party.

Things are not ideal yet.  There are still many local races, including every county race, where there is no November opposition.  Much of the ballot is still Soviet style.

But it is getting better.  And that, I think, is to the benefit to us all.  Choice makes democracy stronger.  Choice makes democracy real.

Face it.  Choosy voters choose choice!  Works for peanut butter, really works for democracy.

This year, spread the choice.  Shop around.  We'll all be better off for it.

Dangling in the Dingle: Ireland Vacation 4

This day of the Ireland trip we toured the Dingle Peninsula.  The motto for Michigan is "If you seek a beautiful peninsula, look about you." This should surely be Dingle's motto as well.  And given its size, it feels like a peninsula a whole lot more than Michigan does.

I think for this day, I'm going to keep the chatter to a minimum and let you enjoy these extraordinary views.

This last is the westernmost tip of Ireland, and is also another place that they did Star Wars filming.

The town of Dingle's main attraction (other than the breathtaking scenery) is a dolphin that frequents their harbor, Fungi.  They even have boat tours to go out to see him.  Fungi is getting up in years, and there is some concern that when he passes, Dingle will have no replacement.

The picture above is not the real Fungi.  That's like a statue or something.

This fancy house built near the end of the peninsula was built by the Cranberries lead singer, Dolores O'Riodan.   She took a trip to the area and fell in love with it, and built the house there.  She only lived there a few months, and found the winters too brutal, and sold the house.  Tragically, O'Riodan died recently at the age of 46.

At evening's end, back in Killarney, we saw a very special show of Irish music and dance, called Celtic Steps.  It was very enjoyable.

During the performance, the emcee of the program asked to hear from those in the audience who were from any of the counties of Ireland both the Irish Republic and Northern Ireland.   There was a smattering of applause.  Then he asked to hear from those who were a part of the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth.  The applause was louder.  He asked if anyone was from the States.  Much louder applause followed, representing a very robust contingent of statesiders.

Then he asked to hear from any Germans.  The thunderous response was so loud I thought the roof was going to come down!  Germans were EVERYWHERE this part of the trip.  I guess that's what happens when you have a country of well-paid people who take a minimum of six weeks of vacation a year!

I was brought almost to tears when a beautiful female Irish singer did a soul-scalding rendition of U2's With or Without You.  There was a man behind me responding to the music who reminded me of my Dad.  My parents loved to travel, and I was reminded of how much they would have loved this trip.  I still miss them both every day.


These bus tours may seem choady to some, but it enabled us to see much of the island and get to some of the most beautiful parts of it in the short time we had.  The only other option was to rent a car, and I'm not sure Ireland was ready for me to take their narrow roads, especially when I might not remember which side of the road I 'm supposed to be on.

More Ireland posts soon!