1/. Bill McKibben with "Surviving On Trump'sDangerous Planet"......
He also gives us the REAL reason we have attacked Iran - so the fossil fuel companies can get Iran's oil.
An excellent article....
For what seems like the fiftieth time in my long life, the U.S., with Israel, has attacked another nation, as per usual without an honest debate in Congress and so far with the reported deaths of both Iran’s leader and eighty or so of its schoolgirls. I’m not going to pretend that I understand the workings of Trump’s brain well enough to gauge the casus belli, but I will note—because again I’ve been around a while—that Iran has the world’s second-largest reserves of natural gas and the third-biggest pool of oil (trailing only Saudi Arabia and, um, Venezuela). As oil executives helpfully explained to Politico last month, they are generously prepared to be a “stabilizing force” in Iran should the regime fall—indeed, they’d rather do it there than in Venezuela because, as executives explained, “Iran’s oil industry, despite being ravaged by years of U.S. sanctions, is still considered to be structurally sound, unlike that of Venezuela’s.” Bob McNally, a former national security and energy adviser to former President George W. Bush who now leads the energy and geopolitics consulting firm Rapidan Energy Group, said the prospects for growing Iran’s oil production are “completely different” from Venezuela’s.
“You can imagine our industry going back there — we would get a lot more oil, a lot sooner than we will out of Venezuela,” McNally said. “That’s more conventional oil right near infrastructure, and gas as well.”
2/. Trump declares war......SNL cold open, good one.....5 minutes.
3/. Heard of the Cato Institute? It's a right wing think tank, which makes this report they did so surprising.
They say immigration has reduced deficits by trillions.....
Today, the Cato Institute published “Immigrants’ Recent Effects on Government Budgets: 1994–2023,” a study on the fiscal effects of immigrants—legal and illegal—that builds upon the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM) fiscal effects model. The paper, which I coauthored with Michael Howard and Julián Salazar, is the first to analyze three decades of federal, state, and local government budgets to determine how immigrants affected the total US government debt and deficit. https://www.cato.org/blog/cato-study-immigrants-reduced-deficits-145-trillion-1994?fbclid=IwY2xjawQMDV1leHRuA2FlbQIxMQBicmlkETJ5ZHlOUXc2TWl6eTVpM3Vuc3J0YwZhcHBfaWQQMjIyMDM5MTc4ODIwMDg5MgABHkFGMql_rZbz6BDoNEtuReJ-lSF45LcgKb2cxtghZ0Ln-icYRRxESZImAUkr_aem_lJ9M5cs5PrAauoPQ-2wrQQ
4/. Tom Tomorrow summarises where we are......perfectly
5/. Some of the old, spineless Democrats in safe seats are being primaried around the country.....
About bloody time....
They are impatient, unafraid and hungry for change. Inspired by Zohran Mamdani’s shock victory in last year’s New York mayoral race, a wave of insurgents is mounting primary challenges against Democratic incumbents ahead of November’s midterm elections.
The emboldened lineup of primary challengers – often, but not always, from the party’s progressive wing – has been fuelled by anger over the party’s tepid response to Donald Trump’s authoritarianism, complicity in the war in Gaza and a crushing affordability crisis.
It has left entrenched Democrats, who for years were able to cruise in safe seats in the House of Representatives, reportedly panicking that they could be swept aside in an anti-establishment revolt reminiscent of the tea party that rocked the Republican party in the 2010 midterms. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/feb/28/democrats-midterm-primary-elections?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other
6/. Kids in our concentration camps.....plenty for brown kids to do all day!
7/. Haven't posted anything from Umair for quite a while because he was getting too dark
and also repetitive, but just as a reminder here he is on our next decade......
Who knows, he might be right, but let's hope he isn't!!!!!.
You can sense it around you. In the wrenching feeling in your gut when you look at the headlines. Things are going wrong. For us. For this world of ours. For our civilization.
We’re now entering a period that I’ve come to call the Anti-Future. Let me try to summarize it for you. If you want to treat this disposably, shrug, that’s your choice. Up to you. My warnings and my efforts fall on deaf ears because I’m not a white guy, let’s just say it like it is. Those who listen find themselves richer, happier, healthier. I suggest you read this carefully.
The Anti-Future means what it sounds like, in a way. We are entering a period now of regress, where the wheel of time will unwind. It already is, by decades every year, in some places, like America. As a civilization, we are now at at standstill, and are moving backwards with incredible, implosive speed and violence.
8/. Tom Tomorrow [Sparky] runs for President.....
9/. Michelle Goldberg in the Times, on how public opinion in the US has changed on Israel......
It’s been obvious for some time that Americans are souring on Israel, but a Gallup poll that came out on Friday marks a turning point. For the first time in the poll’s 25-year history, it found, more Americans sympathize with the Palestinians than with the Israelis. The shift wasn’t just among Democrats, whose opinion of Israel has been in free fall in recent years. According to Gallup, only 30 percent of independents now sympathize with Israel; 41 percent sympathize with the Palestinians. Among adults under 35, support for Israel has fallen to a record low of 23 percent. With numbers like this, bipartisan backing for Israel, long a constant in American politics, will in time become unsustainable.
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/27/opinion/israel-american-public-opinion.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share
10/. Weekend Update......pretty good! 4 minutes....
11/. A really interesting excerpt from one of Thom Hartmann's books which explains
a lot of what is happening to us now.
It's the complete lack of empathy being wielded by the likes of Stephen Miller,
here shown as he really is.....
In January, as another brutal Maine winter gripped the Northeast, Dwayne LaBrecque faced an impossible choice. The diabetic father of five, who’d lost several toes and part of his foot to infection, stared at his most recent heating bill with a growing dread. After losing his job as a shipping manager, Dwayne’s income had collapsed.1
For years, he’d relied on LIHEAP—the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program created by Congress in 1981—to keep his family warm through Maine’s harsh winters. But soon after his inauguration, Trump and congressional Republicans had put LIHEAP on the chopping block.
“If the president turned around and did away with that funding,” Dwayne told a local reporter, his voice breaking, “I have no idea how we’d survive the winter.”
His story isn’t at all unique. Across America, literally millions of families face similar crises every year, from heat to food to housing to medical and school bills, as the Trump administration dismantles the safety net that has protected vulnerable Americans for generations. But what strikes me most isn’t just the policy change; it’s the profound empathy deficit that enables it.
12/. Weekend Update - Beth's maid of honor reads the news......
A little strange, but amusing.....3 minutes.....
13/. Rod DeSantis has been quiet, and that's not necessarily a good thing.
He and Florida Republicans are creating a police state that will have the powers to regulate your thoughts......
Yes - the thought police!
Ron DeSantis, Florida’s Republican hard-right governor, will be termed out of office in barely 10 months’ time. Civil rights groups watching a slew of new restrictive laws passing through the state’s legislature say his bequest will be a “police state”, where government officials dictate what residents can do, say or believe.
They point in particular to two House bills they say restrict free speech, and which have already found favor with Florida’s veto-proof Republican majority:
HB1471 would give a handful of state officials unprecedented power to designate as a “terrorist group” any organization whose aims and policies they do not like, including non-profits operating for religious, charitable and social justice purposes.
HB945 creates a “counterintelligence and counterterrorism” unit within the Florida department of law enforcement that critics say will be used to spy on groups or individuals whose “actions, views, or opinions” are deemed “a threat or are inimical to the interests of this state”.
But there are others: an education bill that blocks state funds from any campus where students “advocate for diversity, equity, and inclusion, or promote or engage in political or social activism”, such as the gun control walkouts that followed the 2018 mass shooting at Parkland’s Marjory Stoneman Douglas high school.
14/. So......is this you? Can't bring yourself to get rid of "stuff".....
Millennials with Baby Boomer parents have not been shy about airing their complaints about the older generation. Millennials have previously noted that their parents tend to hoard food—and now Millennials are airing their grievances about Boomer “stuff avalanche”.
15/ Not often a columnist from the Times recommends a TV show, but as he says "The Pitt" shows all of
the dysfunction but also some of the strengths of the US Healthcare system.
And it's great drama!
I have read extensively and written occasionally about treatments from which our ailing country might benefit. Perhaps we should fashion a sweeping new national service program. Maybe establish open primaries and ranked-choice voting in more states.
Here’s something smaller, easier, doable tonight. You want a healthier America? Watch “The Pitt.”
It’s the medical drama, streaming on HBO Max, that won a bunch of Emmy Awards last year and has an intriguing real-time conceit, with each of a season’s 15 episodes representing a consecutive hour in one day at an overwhelmed Pittsburgh emergency room.
The second season is almost halfway done and feels even more relevant than the first. It’s also more open about its desire to be a mirror for a nation in need of help. To that end, this season takes place on America’s birthday, the Fourth of July. No subtlety there. In fact, my one major quibble is how blunt the show’s messaging can be.
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/23/opinion/pitt-america-tv.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share
16/. Still read books? Here are some for you, the Times lists the
best mysteries of 2025.....
Sometimes I want to spend time with characters I can root for, ordinary people vaulted into extraordinary situations. Other times I want to savor every sentence and have all of my senses challenged. Or maybe I just want to be swept away by a breakneck plot. For me, these 10 crime novels were the pinnacle of pleasure reading this year.
Today's Jewish joke
An Arab is sitting in a millionaire's restaurant in Dubai having lunch, when a little, old, Jewish man comes into a restaurant, and says to the Arab "I have a golden lighter. You will probably want to buy it, but l warn you immediately, it costs a million dollars"!
The Arab says "Have you lost your mind? A million dollars? That lighter is not even worth a dollar"! The LOJM proceeds to click the golden lighter, at which point a genie pops out of it and says: "Sir, what do you wish for"?
Everyone in the restaurant is shocked when the LOJM orders the genie "Bring me a glass of tea with sugar"! The genie claps his hands, and with a flash of fire, a glass of tea on a platter, a container of sugar, and a spoon appear as if by magic!
The Arab rubs his eyes to assure himself what he just saw, then grabs the lighter and writes the LOJM a check for a million dollars on the spot. The LOJM says "Not so fast. How do l know this check is good"? So they both go to the Arab's bank and have the check cashed, at which point they shake hands and part ways.
The Arab jumps in the car and is driven home. At home, he sits at the table, clicks the golden lighter, and sure enough, the genie re-appears and says, "Sir, what do you wish for?"
The Arab says: "First, l need you to return to me the million dollars that I paid for you. In addition, I need a new yacht, my own private jet, and two Mercedes in my garage.
The Genie makes a sad face, and says: "l am very sorry, Sir. I can only serve you tea or coffee. Do you want sugar with that?"
Today's Irish joke
An old Irishman, Paddy, is about to go to his eternal reward.
He looks at his grieving friend, Mike, and says, "I have one last request, Mike."
"Anything, Paddy," Mike says. "What is it?"
"In me kitchen pantry you'll find a 100- year-old bottle of whiskey.
When they put me in the ground will you pour it over me grave?"
"I will, Paddy," Mike says. "But would you mind if I passed it through me kidneys first?"
Today's guy joke - Classes for Women
Men Teaching Classes for Women at
THE ADULT LEARNING CENTER
REGISTRATION MUST BE COMPLETED
By Fri, January 27, 2012
NOTE: DUE TO THE COMPLEXITY AND DIFFICULTY LEVEL
OF THEIR CONTENTS, CLASS SIZES WILL BE LIMITED TO 8 PARTICIPANTS MAXIMUM .
Class 1
Up in Winter, Down in Summer - How to Adjust a Thermostat
Step by Step, with Slide Presentation.
Meets 4 weeks, Monday and Wednesday for 2 hrs beginning at 7:00 PM..
Class 2
Which Takes More Energy - Putting the Toilet Seat Down, Or Complaining About It for 3 Hours?
Round Table Discussion.
Meets 2 weeks, Saturday 12:00 for 2 hours.
Class 3
Is It Possible To Drive Past a Wal-Mart Without Stopping?--Group Debate.
Meets 4 weeks, Saturday 10:00 PM for 2 hours.
Class 4
Fundamental Differences Between a Purse and a Suitcase-- Pictures and Explanatory Graphics.
Meets Saturdays at 2:00 PM for 3 weeks.
Class 5
Curling Irons--Can They Levitate and Fly Into The Bathroom Cabinet?
Examples on Video.
Meets 4 weeks, Tuesday and Thursday for 2 hours beginning
At 7:00 PM
Class 6
How to Ask Questions During Commercials and Be Quiet During the Program
Help Line Support and Support Groups.
Meets 4 Weeks, Friday and Sunday 7:00 PM
Class 7
Can a Bath Be Taken Without 14 Different Kinds of Soaps and Shampoos?
Open Forum ..
Monday at 8:00 PM, 2 hours.
Class 8
Health Watch--They Make Medicine for PMS - USE IT!
Three nights; Monday, Wednesday, Friday at 7:00 PM for 2 hours.
Class 9
I Was Wrong and He Was Right!--Real Life Testimonials.
Tuesdays at 6:00 PM Location to be determined.
Class 10
How to Parallel Park In Less Than 20 Minutes Without an Insurance Claim.
Driving Simulations.
4 weeks, Saturday's noon, 2 hours. Class 11
Learning to Live--How to Apply Brakes Without Throwing Passengers Through the Windshield.
Tuesdays at 7:00 PM, location to be determined
Class 12
How to Shop by Yourself.
Meets 4 weeks, Tuesday and Thursday for 2 hours beginning at 7:00 PM.
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