More skunk

The little skunk is back.

Hot

NOW HIRING: Toledo Field Representative: https://t.co/jqZUOBoH3d pic.twitter.com/y84v9s7afC

— Oceana (@oceana) July 27, 2023

Another hot and dry day here. Need some refreshment!

Randy Meisner

Randy Meisner, founding member of the Eagles, dies at 77

You can see Randy on the far left, playing the bass guitar, in this video below of Hotel California ...

Reefer Madness

I'm watching this 60 Minutes story about the legal marijuana industry in California. I was surprised to learn that marijuana is the state's biggest crop, that the state is losing money on the industry, and that illegal growing and selling has actually increased since it became legal. I'm only partway into the episode, so who knows what else will be revealed.

I haven't used marijuana since I was in high school. It was my least favorite of the drugs we kids tried and I've not been interested in using it again now that it's legal. Weirdly, my stepfatther had a prescription for it, and I found that somehow disturbing.

Fom what I've seen in the news lately, using marijuana isn't great for your health: Marijuana linked to mental health risks in young adults, growing evidence shows ... Cannabis use linked to epigenetic changes in human DNA. Despite that, many states, including Red states, are now falling all over themselves to legalize marijuana use.

Sweet Tooth

The latest tv series I've been watching is Sweet Tooth ...

an American fantasy drama television series developed by Jim Mickle. It is based on the comic book series created by Jeff Lemire and published by DC Comics' ....

Sweet Tooth is set in a fictional world in which a virus has killed a majority of the world's human population, coinciding with the emergence of hybrid babies that are born with animal characteristics. Convery plays Gus, a naïve 10-year-old part-deer boy, who sets out to find his mother after the death of his father. The first season received critical acclaim and won two Children's and Family Emmy Awards.

I've only watched the first episode so far, but it seems very good. This is the first thing I've watched on Netflix's streaming site. I belonged to the DVD part of Netflix for many years but they are closing it down soon.

Death penalty

Liberal justices blast Supreme Court majority for allowing Alabama execution

The three liberal Supreme Court justices took aim at their conservative colleagues for allowing the early Friday execution of an Alabama death row inmate who had raised claims about the state's history of botching the lethal injection process.

The court, which has a 6-3 conservative majority, declined to block the execution of James Barber, who was put to death at about 2 a.m. local time ...

Yes, the "pro-life" and "Christian" Supreme Court conservative majority strikes again. Oh, I forgot ... the only lives that really matter are those of "innocent" and "umborn" humans.

Sorry to use so many quotation marks, but it's the only way I can express the dubious quality of the way conservatives use all these words. If I wrote those sentences correctly, it would look like this ...

Yes, the extremist right-wing Christian-ish Supreme Court conservative majority strikes again. Oh, I forgot ... the only lives that really matter to them are their own. But they will pretend to care about the lives of embryos and zygotes, calling them innocent, saying God loves those lives best of all, though something without a brain, heart, or nervous system has the same capability of being innocent as does your pet rock.

Skunk

The little skunk was out early - usually he and his family wait until dark to eat the cat food. I couldn't get too close so the picture is kind of fuzzy.

Bubba desert willow

Last year our electric company, which gives customers free trees, let us order three of them. We asked for an oak, a maple, and also a plant called the Bubba desert willow. We did get the oak and the maple, but the Bubba desert willow was so popular that there weren't enough.

But this spring they sent one along. That's him at the top of the page :)

Iowa

At the Evangelical Christian Family Leadership Summit. Iowa governor Kate Reynolds signed a six week abortion ban, calling it a "heartbeat bill".

One of religious conservatives' anti-abortion lies is that a six week old fetus has a heart and a heartbeat ...

‘Heartbeat bills’: Is there a fetal heartbeat at six weeks of pregnancy?

[...] according to experts, the term “fetal heartbeat” is misleading and medically inaccurate.

“While the heart does begin to develop at around six weeks, at this point the heart as we know it does not yet exist,” said Dr. Ian Fraser Golding, a pediatric and fetal cardiologist at Rady Children’s Hospital San Diego. Instead, at six weeks, the embryo will develop a tube that generates sporadic electrical impulses that eventually coordinate into rhythmic pulses, he said ...

But that's ok, because this bill has nothing to do with medical facts or science. It certainly has nothing to with what Iowans want either: a 2/3 majority of Iowans are pro-choice ...



Nope, this is about religion. The bill, like the many other "heartbeat" abortion bans passed in Red states, is about a small minority of religious extremists (less than a third of the country) forcing their questionable beliefs on the other two-thirds of Americans, including other Christians. They have the power because of the religious conservatives on the Supreme Court, and that's all that matters to them. This is what theocracies like Iran do to their people. Can our own "morality police" be far behind?

Opill

From NPR: FDA approves Opill, the first daily birth control pill without a prescription

Finally, an over-the-counter birth control pill. I first started using birth control pills when I was in high school. Conservatives say pills are not safe or effective, but in the 35 years that I used them, I never had any problems. This will make a safe and effective contraception available to more women, and give them more control over their lives. Here is a twitter post from Melinda Gates ...

My family, my career, & my life as I know it were all made possible by contraceptives—and I’ve talked to many women around the world who feel the same. I’m encouraged to see the U.S. take this monumental step to expand access for women across the country. https://t.co/ulOqxaRw4q

— Melinda French Gates (@melindagates) July 13, 2023

A study

Here, where I live in the suburbs, the homeless are evident. We used to see a small encampment of them at the public library, but they were recently ousted. There are some at the grocery store too. And I live near the river, where many homeless encampments are.

What is dispiriting are the pervasive myths that most homeless people are unhoused because they are mentally ill or because they are drug addicts. It's a blame-the-victim mentality that lets you distance yourself from them .... "that could never happen to me".

I'm all to aware how easily one could become homeless. Rents are very expensive. There is Public Housing for those who qualify, but it too costs money and you can be waiting on a list for years. I feel so lucky that my sister and I inherited this house when my mother died.

I don't know why the state government can't get it together to help these people. Why not take a look at an example of success on this subject, like Finland. They first give homeless people a stable place of their own in which to live, and everything else follows that basic necessity.

Cluster bombs

So, Bisen is giving cluster bombs to Ukraine now.



OK, I'm on the side of the conservative David Brooks for a change. And I'm not alone.

Top Dems break with Biden over sending cluster bombs to Ukraine

Key Democratic lawmakers are breaking with President Joe Biden over the controversial decision to send cluster bombs to Ukraine, arguing that providing the weapons, which are banned by more than 120 countries, cedes the moral high ground and will end up indiscriminately killing civilians ...

What is a cluster bomb, the controversial weapon the U.S. is sending to Ukraine?

I don't think we should be sending cluster bombs. Beating the bad guys by becoming the bad guys seems a flawed practical strategy, and morally wrong too. Churchill talked about "victory at all costs" because without victory, "there is no survival". I guess that's the thinking here. But then all our high and mighty rhetoric about good vs evil is just BS?

Freedom

Hundreds of animals lost after 4th of July, PACC works hard to reunite pets with families

Area animal shelters packed day after Fourth of July fireworks

July 4 considered the highest intake day of the year for animal shellters across the US

But hey, that's ok. They're just animals. As long as those who love exploding loud, toxic, and often illegal fireworks for untold hours (and days) get to exercise their freedoms, it doesn't matter how much damage is wrought. Cuz this is American, where personal freedoms are more important than anything or anyone else (unless you need an abortion, of course).

Hottest day

How can anyone vote for Reppublicans, given that they, as a party, pretend that man-made climate change doesn't exist. And it's not just that they will refuse to deal with the problem, it's also that they are actively trying to make it worse with their policies!

July 4

Today at the grocery store I heard a man say that his mother had spent more than $1000 on fireworks for tonight, and I think she wasn't alone.

I'm surrounded by a neighborhood full of brain-dead (and doubtless deaf) jerks who have been blowing up their mostly illegal fireworks for literally hours and hours and hours.

The outdoor cats are hiding under the house, terrified, and I will spend all night worring that my home here in drought-world will catch fire.

‘It sounds like a war zone.’ Sacramento tries to prevent the explosion of illegal fireworks

The cheating Court

One weird thing about the recent Supreme Court decision which makes it legal to discriminate against gay people, is the fact that the case is based on a purely hypothetical situation. More ...

The Supreme Court Doesn’t Care That the Gay Wedding Website Case Is Based on Fiction

If the Supreme Court persists in making rulings based on fiction, how can we take any ruling seriously?

Certainly, this is not a sentiment uniquely inspired by or limited to the opinions the court has issued in its latest term, which ended today with rulings on anti-discrimination law and student debt relief. One of the cases handed down today was brought by a Christian website designer who wants to reject the business of same-sex couples who have in fact never sought her services and may have been invented, while the other involved a student loan debt servicer as an unwilling plaintiff in an effort to end President Biden’s student debt forgiveness program. Just these two cases alone should be enough to throw the court’s legitimacy into question—but they join a long line of recent rulings based on shaky (at best) claims and pure wish fulfillment of the militant Christian right.

Still, it feels unnerving to some, even those caught in the crossfire, to see injuries invented wholesale and lies accepted by the highest court in the land; to see rights so openly trampled on the flimsiest of pretense ...

More from The New York Times ... What to Know About a Seemingly Fake Document in a Gay Rights Case

The Christian Right has finally achieved the Supreme Court it always wanted. They will continue to bring cases that would never normally have been heard, much less have won, to their extremist Court . They will target every issue they obsess about. I expect cases to be brought soon to overturn the right to contraception and tto overturn he right to marriage for LGBTQ people. The Right want sto drag America back to the 50s ... I was there, and it wasn't a good place for anyone who wasn't white, Christian, straight, and male.

Joe Biden doesn't want to expand the Court, but why not? Americans' opinion of the Court is at rock bottom, and Republicans are going to do their worst no matter what Democrats do. We have to fix this problem while we can, before there is nothing left to save.