Grim News and Happy Stuff

 Frenzied, frantic, and fearful I am obsessively compelled to follow the news, watching Lawrence O’Donnell, following Robert Reich, Joyce Vance, and Heather Cox Richardson, reading foreign news sources, and fueling my despair. I feel shame that this is the world I’ll be leaving to my children, grandchildren and all the young of the planet. I am utterly confounded by the mentality and motivation that propel people to support our current national leaders. Wheelchair and housebound, I can’t take to the streets, but I do select organizations to support and with my limited means and mobility do what I can do speak out for measures and people that give me a glimmer of hope. I donate to the ACLU, participate in phone calls, emails, and write postcards with Indivisible and Card Campaign. I generate scripts of messages to influencers and provide addresses, phone numbers, email addresses, as well as stamps and blank postcards to people at several churches in my community. This is a shot in the dark, or more aptly, a scream in the wilderness, but I dedicate hours every week trying; I am so small, and the problem is so large. But I must feel like I’m doing something even if nothing comes of it. I get no feeling of satisfaction, feeling like I’m bailing with a thimble, while the deluge rages on our ship of state.

The wrecking ball has hit USAID, NIH, the Treasury Department's payment system, the US Attorney in the Southern District of NY (she resigned-a Federalist and a Republican - rather than accept Trump's offer to keep her job so long as she dismissed charges against Eric Adams the corrupt NY city mayor charged with all kinds of corruption). The eminently unqualified anti-vaxxer Robert Kennedy Jr has been confirmed as Secretary of HHS. Hegseth and Vance are in Europe alienating nations who have always been our firm allies. The coup continues.

But then there is this glorious victory: What you see here is my paper shredder, plugged into the wall with the green light on - proof that I was able to replace the broken plug - a prong had broken off in the wall, and that it is again in working condition, despite weak eyes, shaky hands, and no workspace. I feel very powerful as is the paper shredder once again.

Another lovely thing happened today. A resident at Atria came up to me today and said she had some money she planned to give away and she had distributed all of it except $50. She handed me the fifty and said you are active in so many things, I want you to decide what to do with this. So, while she was still standing there, I texted a friend who plans to be involved in feeding the homeless of Davis for the next week. I knew she was short of enough money to provide meals for the full week, so I gave her the $50. 

And in further lovely things, I was able to broker the transfer of a bunch of older electronic equipment, an old desktop MAC computer, a couple of notepads, some old digital cameras, and camcorders, from a friend who collects and then sells or gives them away to another friend who frequently travels to Tanzania to work with an orphanage. She provides the kids with equipment and teaches them how to use it. Made three of us very happy and still to come are happy children in Tanzania.

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More about me, Senior Living, and Political Grab Bag

Senior Living

Friday night (today is Sunday) I was up late and at 1 AM I decided to open a bottle of V8, prying the lid off with a steak knife. Predictably, the knife slipped and embedded itself into my hand at the base of my index finger. It was a jab sufficient that I had to pull the knife out of my flesh and release a geyser of blood. It was a very small cut, about 1/2 inch, but very deep. Two hours passed before I was satisfied the bleeding was under control enough to risk going to bed. I take blood thinners, so I bleed easily and profusely. None of that is particularly important, its healing nicely, but what is important is that I was quite sleep deprived Saturday. I played bridge Saturday afternoon (poorly) and at the conclusion of the game, could not find my phone. I spent all the rest of the day retracing my steps, combing through the trash, and enlisting several folks in my search. Today, Sunday, I still had not found it, went to church, searched all the places again and then went to play bridge. At the end of the game, one of the players was putting the cards and scorepads back in the canvas bag used to store them. Therein lay my phone! In the bridge bag in the conference room far from my apartment. The (nameless) player who put away the cards on Saturday had scooped up my phone with the other paraphernalia and stuffed it in the canvas bag. The nameless person is a bridge regular and quite a bit older with many infirmities, so I can't get mad at him, in fact I won't even mention it, but GEEZ!

We bridge players sit together at dinner time at a table for eight. The food offerings that night were miserable! The dinner menu usually has two selections on the main menu and they are invariably pre-cooked meals from Sysco and loaded with sodium, so I tend to order either a "naked"chicken thigh, salmon or steak with whatever salt free vegetables they have. Last night they were out of all of those protein choices, so I ordered an omelet, no cheese with a bunch of salt free vegetables. The omelet arrived raw and runny in the middle, so I didn't eat it and ordered a plain hamburger patty which had bone chips in it. Also served at our table that night was an order of sweet potato fries that were stone cold, and an order of "cooked" sweet potatoes which were essentially raw. Complaining about the food is tedious, but our dining room has reached a new low. I can't wait for our scheduled meeting with the regional vice president. 

Political (or not?) stuff - judge for yourself

Today after church I handed out scripts for phone calls to the eight confirmed cabinet members asking them to advise the people in their organizations to refuse the buy out because it is unfunded and can't be trusted and will deplete the ranks of vital operations. We'll see. Next week, I'll prepare scripts to thank various religious leaders for standing behind Bishop Budde and condemning HR59 which vilifies Budde.

Transcript Of Rev. Budde’s Plea To Trump

 Let me make one final plea, Mr. President. Millions have put their trust in you and, as you told the nation yesterday, you have felt the providential hand of a loving God. In the name of our God, I ask you to have mercy upon the people in our country who are scared now. There are gay, lesbian and transgender children in Democratic, Republican, and Independent families, some who fear for their lives. The people who pick our crops and clean our office buildings; who labor in poultry farms and meat packing plants; who wash the dishes after we eat in restaurants and work the night shifts in hospitals. They…may not be citizens or have the proper documentation. But the vast majority of immigrants are not criminals. They pay taxes and are good neighbors. They are faithful members of our churches and mosques, synagogues, gurudwaras and temples. I ask you to have mercy, Mr. President, on those in our communities whose children fear that their parents will be taken away. And that you help those who are fleeing war zones and persecution in their own lands to find compassion and welcome here. Our God teaches us that we are to be merciful to the stranger, for we were all once strangers in this land. May God grant us the strength and courage to honor the dignity of every human being, to speak the truth to one another in love and walk humbly with each other and our God for the good of all people. Good of all people in this nation and the world. Amen”

Crucial Quote

After the sermon, Budde told the New York Times that she “wasn’t necessarily calling the president out,” but rather making a plea “because of the fear” she has seen among immigrants and LGBTQ+ communities. Budde said she wants Trump to be “mindful of the people who are scared,” and added “I was trying to say: The country has been entrusted to you…And one of the qualities of a leader is mercy.”

Chief Critic

Rep. Mike Collins, R-Ga., shared a clip of the sermon on X and wrote: “The person giving this sermon should be added to the deportation list.

And Trump said on Truth Social:

Trump, in a 12:39 a.m. ET post Wednesday on Truth Social, called Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde a "Radical Left hard line Trump hater" who "brought her church into the World of politics in a very ungracious way."

"She was nasty in tone, and not compelling or smart," Trump added

And then HR 59 was introduced

RESOLUTION

Expressing the sense of the House of Representatives that the sermon given by the Right Reverend Mariann Edgar Budde at the National Prayer Service on January 21st, 2025, at the National Cathedral was a display of political activism and condemning its distorted message.

Whereas the National Prayer Service is a longstanding tradition in which the United States publicly affirms dependence upon God and prays for the success of our President and Vice President;

Whereas, on January 21, 2025, President Donald J. Trump and Vice President J.D. Vance took part in the National Prayer Service at the National Cathedral in Washington, DC; and

Whereas the Right Reverend Mariann Edgar Budde, the bishop leading the inaugural prayer service, used her position inappropriately, promoting political bias instead of advocating the full counsel of biblical teaching: Now, therefore, be it

Resolved, That—

(1) it is the sense of the House of Representatives that the sermon given at the National Prayer Service on January 21st, 2025, at the National Cathedral was a display of political activism; and

(2) the House of Representatives condemns the Right Reverend Mariann Edgar Budde’s distorted message.