The Importance of Water.

The temperatures here have been near or over 100 F for months, and there’s been considerably under an inch of rain. It’s like living in a tinderbox. I’ve put a sprinkler on low, and have just been moving it about, day by day. Yesterday, tiny baby Sparrows which can’t yet fly were launching themselves from the trees, landing with thumps, to be able to get a drink of water. There’s no life without water.

© C. Ford.

Made In ‘Murica.

Vice President Mike Pence laughs as U.S. President Donald Trump holds a baseball bat as they attend a Made in America product showcase event at the White House in Washington, U.S., July 17, 2017. REUTERS/Carlos Barria.

It seems this is “Made In Murica” week, one of those mind-numbing idiocies of the Tiny Tyrant. As usual with all of Donny’s ideas, this one means absolutely nothing. Very little is manufactured in uStates anymore, and for that to be different, oh my, radical changes would be needed, to say the least. What this all comes down to is Donny playing with some toys, and puffing hot air around a bit.

Donald Trump promised on Monday he would take more legal and regulatory steps during the next six months to protect American manufacturers, lashing out against trade deals and trade practices he said have hurt U.S. companies.

Trump climbed into an American-made fire truck parked behind the White House, took a swing with a baseball bat in the Blue Room, and briefly donned a customized Stetson cowboy hat in front of cheering manufacturing company executives from all 50 states gathered to hear him praise their products.

“I want to make a pledge to each and every one of you: No longer are we going to allow other countries to break the rules, steal our jobs and drain our wealth,” Trump said.

Other countries are not breaking rules, nor are stealing jobs. American corporations hand them jobs. That’s a bit different. They aren’t draining “our” wealth. The people doing that, gosh, they would be you, your family, and others who have mass amounts of money which is never ever enough.

He was speaking to a trade show – albeit one with a protectionist bent – organized by the White House to spotlight his efforts to revive the flagging manufacturing sector.

[…]

Trump did not give details about what his administration would do to protect manufacturers, but he railed against tariffs charged by other countries and unfair trade practices.

“That includes cracking down on the predatory online sales of foreign goods, which is absolutely killing our shoppers and our shopping centers,” he said.

“If you look at what is going on with shopping centers and stores and jobs and stores, it’s been very, very tough for them. They’ve have had a very hard time, closing at numbers and records that have never been seen before,” he said.

Who in the fuck knows what Donny means by predatory online sales. Pretty sure he’s not talking about Amazon. The world is full of amazing goods, why shouldn’t people buy those things? When I have a bit of extra pocket money, I like to shop at Novica. Every now and then, I get a fierce craving for Yorkshire Gold Tea or other such goodies, and I love being able to buy them, and no, I don’t buy anything through Amazon. For the most part, I try to support independent businesses, whether they are in uStates or not. I don’t see the slightest thing wrong with that. What Donny misses is that shopping in uStates is near dead because most people don’t have money to spare, and big box corporation stores are eating everything else alive. Not that I expect the Tiny Tyrant to have the very least understanding of economics. All he knows is graft, tax write-offs, and not paying anyone except himself.

Trump spoke in front of a panoply of iconic American-made products: Gibson guitars, Maryland crab pots, a Delaware-made NASA space suit and Cheerwine soda.

Ah, well, I’m sure we’ll all run out and purchase all those things.

He discussed sales of Sikorsky helicopters – “I have three of them!” he said, lifted horseshoes made with Nucor Corp steel, and strolled past vacuum-sealed Omaha steaks.

Jesus Fuck. Divorced from reality does not even begin to cover it.

He told the manufacturers that he was working for a “level playing field” for their wares.

“But if the playing field were slanted like a little bit toward us, I’d accept that also,” Trump said.

Mmmm hmmm. But it better not be level or slanted a little bit towards anyone else, oh no! Asshole.

Via Raw Story.

Now, when it comes to all the crap the Trumps sell:

The White House on Monday refused to say whether President Donald Trump’s business would cease manufacturing in China and other countries during the administration’s “Made In America” week.

[…]

But it wasn’t clear if Trump — who manufactures his products in Bangladesh, China and Mexico — was ready to give his jobs to American workers.

A White House official ducked the question when CBS Correspondent Mark Knoller asked about products made abroad.

“I will get back to you,” the official reportedly said.

Uh huh. Full story here.

A Momentary Companion.

The lack of water situation here is dire; I am trying to feed a bit of life where I can. The scent of water on the wind is intoxicating, it’s quite easy to forget what a wondrous thing it is. That scent calls to all, and this little beauty decided to keep me company for quite a while, in between bouts of chasing a grumpy dragonfly. Click for full size.

C. Ford, all rights reserved.

Terrorism Tourism.

A group of tourists take part in a two hour “boot camp” experience, at “Caliber 3 Israeli Counter Terror and Security Academy ” in the Gush Etzion settlement bloc south of Jerusalem in the occupied West Bank. It is part of a counter-terrorism “boot camp” organised by Caliber 3, a company set up by a colonel in the Israeli army reserves.
REUTERS/Nir Elias.

A tourist takes part in a two hour “boot camp” experience, at “Caliber 3 Israeli Counter Terror and Security Academy” in the Gush Etzion settlement bloc. Entrance to the gated compound in the Gush Etzion settlement bloc – built on land the Palestinians want for their own state – costs $115 for adults and $85 for children.
REUTERS/Nir Elias.

A tourist carries a poster as he takes part in a two hour “boot camp”. The aim of the mock scenario is to teach foreign visitors how to deal with an attack on a market.
REUTERS/Nir Elias.

An Israeli instructor speaks to children from overseas holding wooden cut-out rifles. Yasser Sobih, mayor of the nearby Palestinian town of al-Khader, condemned the Israeli venture. “The participation of tourists in training in these camps built on occupied Palestinian land means that they support the occupation and we ask them to stop it,” he told Reuters.
REUTERS/Nir Elias.

Here’s one stupid fucking idea. Unsurprisingly, the majority of tourists having themselves all kinds of fun at terrorist boot camp are Americans. Reuters has an extensive slideshow, and article about this particular bit of idiocy, catering to morons with superhero fantasies run amok in their heads.

Story.

Holy Laughter and Privy Secret Information.

Who are all these people? I can’t keep track of them.

Last week, President Trump met with a variety to right-wing pastors in the Oval Office, where the group laid hands upon him and were led in prayer by pastor Rodney Howard-Browne.

Howard-Browne, a pioneer of the Holy Laughter movement, posted a video late last week in which he explained that he had been moved to pray over Trump because he is privy to secret information about a “planned attack on our president.”

Uh huh.

“There is a planned attack on our president,” he said, “and that’s all I can tell you about right now; I know what I’m talking about, I’ve spoken to high-ranking people in the government and this is being planned by people that hate God, hate America, hate our president and we have to stop this, in Jesus name.”

Yes, yes. It’s a terribly privy, and of course, no one actually knows a damn thing except you. I imagine if “high-ranking” people in government knew anything about an actual plot of any kind, they would simply deal with it. Of course, given what ‘government’ has been reduced to these days, I suppose there would be much flapping of arms and denials, while no one did anything.

People that hate “god.” No. Again, let’s be god specific, please. The planet is littered with gods. So, people that hate Jehovah. Bad news, Rodney – the only people who might hate Jehovah are those who believe in it. People like myself, atheists, we know your psychopathic figment is simply that, a work of imagination. You don’t hate that which is not real. (And no, please do not make asinine comments about ‘hating’ fictional characters. That’s not genuine hate, it’s more of a sport.) People that hate America. Well, I can’t say I’m fond of your version of it, which is a fucking nightmare for all decent peoples. Hate our president. What president? We don’t have one at the moment. We have an engorged, malignant narcissist of an idiot sitting in the white house, weaving a web of fascism and nonsense, manufacturing hate by the truckload. I would love to go back to not caring one whit about Donny Trump, and being only marginally aware of him, if at all.

Howard-Browne stated that he is going to have the photo of the group praying over Trump posted in the prayer room at his church where, 24 hours a day, there will be a prayer warrior stationed “just for the purpose of praying over our president, that God would protect him, that the plan of the wicked would be cut off … that if the enemy digs a ditch [for the president], that he will fall into himself.”

Pray all you want. Indulge in hysterical laughter. Who the fuck cares? It won’t do a damn thing. Jehovah doing something about wicked people, right. Seems to me you’re flourishing just fine.

“Some of you might not understand that, you might think we’re crazy, but I tell you, if you knew what I knew, then you’d understand the urgency of the hour,” he said.

Right. There’s always some “urgency of the hour” with you people. You’ve been waiting on your big one for a couple thousand years now. Pardon my yawn. I don’t know what you supposedly have under your hat, but I don’t need to know, either. It’s all emptiness, whipping people up into a nonsense froth of fear, so you can shake their pockets out, and they’ll be grateful for it. Unfortunately, I don’t think you have the defense of insanity, all you assholes are greedy, cold, and calculating to the last penny. Fear is an easy business, easy as sex. They both sell.

“There is a fight on for the soul of the republic and God had raised President Donald Trump to be the trumpet that is going to sound in this hour …

The republic doesn’t have a soul. Neither does anything else. Trump as a Trumpet? :laughs: Out here in reality, all we’re getting is a stream of broken tweeting.

There are many traps being set all the time and already the Lord has averted many things just in the short time that he’s been in office. Let’s pray for him like never before. Maybe you didn’t vote for him, I don’t care; if you want to live a peaceful life, then pray.”

If I thought it would help, I’d pray to all the gods to have Donny drop dead in a timely manner, and we might possibly work our way back to that peace business. If any gods read this, and want to strike a deal, you know where I live.

Full article and video at Right Wing Watch.

Gimme That Old-Time Noonday Demon.

Acedia, engraving by Hieronymus Wierix, 16th century.

The sin of acedia, primarily a working of Evagrius of Pontus. Evagrius was an interesting character, who felt himself saved from being vainglorious and other problems by taking the advice of a woman, and becoming a monk. Naturally, that didn’t stop other christians pointing fingers and branding him a heretic later on.

The Demon of Acedia was known prior, and has been defined to mean many a mental condition, but the basic christian definition was “a state of restlessness and inability either to work or to pray”.  Evagrius’s particular concern was with monks, and he distilled the major problems down in Eight Logismoi, with this written about the Noonday Demon:

The demon of acedia, which is also called the noonday demon, is the most burdensome of all the demons. It besets the monk at about the fourth hour (10 am) of the morning, encircling his soul until about the eighth hour (2 pm). [1] First it makes the sun seem to slow down or stop moving , so that the day appears to be fifty hours long. [2] Then it makes the monk keep looking out of his window and forces him to go bounding out of his cell to examine the sun to see how much longer it is to 3 o’clock, and to look round in all directions in case any of the brethren is there. [3] Then it makes him hate the place and his way of life and his manual work. It makes him think that there is no charity left among the brethren; no one is going to come and visit him. [4] If anyone has upset the monk recently, the demon throws this in too to increase his hatred. [5] It makes him desire other places where he can easily find all that he needs and practice an easier, more convenient craft. After all, pleasing the Lord is not dependent on geography, the demon adds; God is to be worshipped everywhere. [6] It joins to this the remembrance of the monk’s family and his previous way of life, and suggests to him that he still has a long time to live, raising up before his eyes a vision of how burdensome the ascetic life is. So, it employs, as they say, every [possible] means to move the monk to abandon his cell and give up the race. No other demon follows on immediately after this one but after its struggle the soul is taken over by a peaceful condition and by unspeakable joy.

Going by that description, seems to me that the Noonday Demon is still with us. Perhaps if that was shifted to the Demon of Noonday Naps, everyone would be all kinds of happier, and less restless. I’m a firm believer in naps m’self. They are good for everyone, and since most employers are firmly in the camp of forcing workers to be up and productive at awful hours of the early morn, official Noonday Naps would be extra beneficial, allowing for many to catch up on sleep, and allowing the naturally early risers a nice refresher or rest time.

Cultures which embrace the concept of siesta have done the right thing, cooperating with the Noonday Demon. Why fight, when the reward is a lovely nap? Atlas Obscura has a nice article up about the sin of acedia.