C’est La Vie…

…say the ol’ folks

The hand of politics is so visible from their vantage point that they don’t know how they could have missed it at first. It’s utterly manifest in every detail of the view, just as the sculpting force of gravity has made a spare of the planet and pushed and pulled the tides which shape the coasts, so has politics sculpted and shaped and left evidence of itself everywhere.
They come to see the politics of want. The politics of growing and getting, a billion extrapolations of the urge for more, that’s what they begin to see when they look down. They don’t even need to look down since they, too, are part of those extrapolations, they more than anyone—on their rocket whose boosters at lift-off burn the fuel of a million cars.
The planet is shaped by the sheer amazing force of human want, which has changed everything, the forests, the poles, the reservoirs, the glaciers, the rivers, the seas, the mountains, the coastlines, the skies, a planet contoured and landscaped by want.
—Orbital, Samantha Harvey

1.
CBS Sunday Morning actually produced a piece a week or so ago on how climate change is related to the recent fires in LA and the destructive flooding in North Carolina last year.

In the segment, John Vaillant, author of “Fire Weather: On the Front Lines of a Burning World," was interviewed and he came right out and said that automobile CO2 being pumped into the atmosphere by millions of vehicles for decades has brought us to this point; "We don't feel it; we don't smell it; we don't notice it," he said. "But if you were to take the car engine that brought me here and set it up on the floor here and fired it up, we would go deaf, and then we would die from its emissions.  And that's under the hood of every internal combustion engine car. And there are hundreds of millions of them. So, the emissions from fire, these trillions of fires that we make every day, has created this artificially warm climate."

Even though the first use of oil may have been by the Chinese in 600 B.C. and transported in pipelines of bamboo, the current oil economy and dependence began with the discovery of oil in Pennsylvania in 1859. But it was a gusher at Spindletop in Texas in 1901 that changed the world. The discovery of the Spindletop oilfield had an almost incalculable effect on world history, as well as Texas history. Eager to find similar deposits, investors spent billions of dollars throughout the Lone Star state in search of oil and natural gas. The cheap fuel they found helped to revolutionize American transportation and industry.

Our collective great-great and great grandparents began an era that revolutionized everything we use in the modern world. I remember vividly as a pre-schooler my family would be driving from northern Kansas to the Oklahoma border where my Aunt and Uncle lived, as well as my maternal grandparents. We would drive through El Dorado and Augusta, Kansas, where there were large oil refineries belching out black smoke and fire. I can still smell the burning gases seared into my tiny child brain. At that time my Aunt and Uncle owned and ran a Texaco (1958-59) station right on the Oklahoma border just south of Arkansas City on the Kansas side. My father then owned and operated a Skelly station in Riley, Kansas, from 1960-1970. The smell and fumes were always present growing up. Toss in a little DDT and it’s amazing I’m walking this earth.

Here’s just a short list of products that are petroleum based (besides gasoline, jet fuel, propane, motor oil, asphalt, and lubricants) which I’ve mentioned in previous posts: boats, nail polish, fishing lures, golf bags, tool boxes, shoe polish, shag rugs, paint, epoxy, lipstick, deodorant, footballs, caulking, tires, shower curtains, bandages, soft contact lenses, candles, dentures, dishes…you get the idea.

We watched the series Landman (mainly for Billy Bob Thornton) about the Texas oil industry, and how dangerous and ruthless it is. Thornton plays Tommy Norris, the hands-on manager of a fictional oil firm near Midland, Texas. One of his monologues with an attorney stuck in my mind as a warning that unless alternatives are found for what petroleum provides, we are in for a world of hurt.

While we’re all worried about the price of gas, it’s the price we pay for petroleum use that should be of paramount concern. My generation on this issue may well be in the c'est la vie period, but young folks, especially ones with children, should perhaps take a moment to consider the ramifications of the warming planet and a world buried in plastic.

Robert Crumb

2.
Regarding the second week of unadulterated flurry of executive orders flowing from the WH spigot, it is Steve Bannon’s strategy from the previous orange term, “The Democrats don’t matter. The real opposition is the media. And the way to deal with them is to flood the zone with shit,” that’s being used once again to overwhelm us and the media.

I don’t know about you but I don’t want my elected officials working across the aisle with Nazis, rapists, and racists. You’re either helping the GOP/Christian Fundamentalist/ornageman’s agenda or you’re doing whatever it takes to oppose every mandate coming across his desk.

The Laken Riley Act was passed recently which eliminates due process for many immigrants, including some who have been living and working legally in the U.S. for years. Under this law, they would be placed in indefinite detention if accused—not convicted—of low-level crimes like shoplifting. That could include children who are mistakenly arrested and accused of crimes they did not commit. 

Nayna Gupta, policy director at the American Immigration Council, said “This bill does nothing to improve safety or fix our broken immigration system. Under the guise of preventing violence, the bill forces immigration officers to indefinitely detain and deport non-citizens who pose no public safety risk, without access to basic due process. The bill also gives state attorneys general unprecedented power over immigration policy. The bill strips people of their basic rights and upends how the U.S. government enforces immigration law.”

Note that the Democrats who actually voted for this bill are all from swing states; Catherine Cortez Masto (Nev.), John Fetterman (Pa.), Ruben Gallego (Ariz.), Maggie Hassan (N.H.), Mark Kelly (Ariz.), Jon Ossoff (Ga.), Gary Peters (Mich.), Jacky Rosen (Nev.), Jeanne Shaheen (N.H.), Elissa Slotkin (Mich.), Mark Warner (Va.) and Raphael Warnock (Ga.).

Yep, two of our own here in Arizona voted for this. What the f••k. You can write to Ruben here and to Mark Kelly here.

Here is the message I sent to both:

Thank you for your service but I feel compelled to share my view that collaborating with the right-wing agenda was not on my plate when my wife and I cast our votes for you. We, the Democrats, do not need four more years of Sinemas and Manchins agreeing with the GOP.

The Laken Riley Act, which you voted for, ‘eliminates due process for many immigrants, including some who have been living and working legally in the U.S. for years. Under this law, they would be placed in indefinite detention if accused—not convicted—of low-level crimes like shoplifting. That could include children who are mistakenly arrested and accused of crimes they did not commit.’ Source: https://www.americanimmigrationcouncil.org/news/misguided-laken-riley-act-fails-to-fix-broken-immigration-system

And Nayna Gupta, policy director at the American Immigration Council, said “This bill does nothing to improve safety or fix our broken immigration system. Under the guise of preventing violence, the bill forces immigration officers to indefinitely detain and deport non-citizens who pose no public safety risk, without access to basic due process. The bill also gives state attorneys general unprecedented power over immigration policy. The bill strips people of their basic rights and upends how the U.S. government enforces immigration law.”

A.J. Bauer, an assistant professor in the Department of Journalism & Creative Media at the University of Alabama, wrote, “When Democratic policymakers accept Republican policy proposals as though they are good faith assessments of empirical reality, they unwittingly cede the struggle over framing the problems we face to the right.”

We both hope you will make better decisions and vote on the side of Democracy. Our futures depend on it.

And now…

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