A Fresh New Perspective of Our Globe

Photo courtesy of DonkeyHotey Flickr Page: https://www.flickr.com/photos/donkeyhotey/6143809369

Creative Commons License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/

The old button from the Environmental Club days. It is a little beat up (particularly the ends of the ribbon), but no worse for the wear, I think. And it is one of the few items that I have left from those days, so it carries a lot of great memories for me! Nothing Changes Until You Do!

I thought it would be good to take a pause today, and to get back to one of the fundamental things that seems to me more and more important the older I get, which is to take a moment to appreciate life’s blessings. To be thankful for the positives in this delicate balance that we know of as life.              

Gratitude indeed seems more and more important to me, the older I get. In fact, it seems urgent to remember to feel simple gratitude for everything. We get so wrapped up in our lives sometimes, and too often, define our lives by what we do not have, and by what we still strive to obtain. Sadly, many of us look at life in that way, as a seemingly never-ending journey to try and obtain more and more and more. Here in what is known as our mostly affluent western society, that often is translated into a blind pursuit for more and more material things.

              

Life is more than that, however. It might sound like a cliché to say that, but it is true. I believe indeed that there is more to life than simply making as much money as possible, and then surrounding ourselves on all sides with a wall of material wealth, to effectively close ourselves off from the rest of the world.              

When I look at my life now, I recognize that it is not perfect. However, it is important to remember to be thankful for some things. My son, who to me, embodies the future. He is a good person, and that is the most important thing to me. That is a sliver of hope for the future, knowing that, yes, there are still decent people out there in the future. He makes me happy, and I feel most blessed for his presence in my life.

Also, I feel blessed for my family, my girlfriend, and my friends, and feel blessed for all of the things that have helped me to reach this point in my life. That includes pretty much all of the experiences, both good and bad, since even bad experiences are, nonetheless, human experiences, as well as teachers. Nothing teaches you as thoroughly as having to deal with painful lessons and/or mistakes.

Everyone is different, yet on so many levels, we are also the same. There was a video that I just saw earlier today, which was beautiful and thought provoking. It was from a few decades ago, back when space exploration was relatively new, and still held the power to fascinate the public imagination. The guy who made the video is an astronaut, and he was understandably in awe of being witness to going around the world in about one and a half hours. He saw various parts of the world, including his own corner of it, and he saw well over one hundred sunrises and sunsets in his ten days up in space.

This video was pretty powerful, and so it seemed like something worth sharing here. I recommend it, so please click on the title and/or link below:

The Most Beautiful Speech I Ever Heard - David Hoffman

https://youtu.be/zmHrnKY6crE

Last Remaining Nuremberg Prosecutor Gives a Warning Regarding Trump & His Attacks on the Constitution

Recently, I have been trying to remedy a problem with unpublished posts on my blog page. Really, there are a ton of posts that I mean to develop and/or publish, but never quite get around to doing.

Here, below, is another one.

This is from slightly less than a year ago, prior to the 2020 election, and Trump's defeat. Still, it is relevant, or certainly seems so to me. Trump himself may no longer be the sitting president, but he still clearly exerts some serious influence over the Republican Party, or what has in reality become the party of Donald Trump.

The last surviving prosecutor from the Nuremberg Trials, Benjamin B. Ferencz, was warning about Trump's assault on the rule of law. Remember, Trump often times seemed to feel that he was above the law, and that minor obstacles like legal limits did not apply to him. That was bad enough before he ever ran for the White House, as a selfish and narcissistic real estate tycoon and reality TV personality. However, it was infinitely worse once he ran for, and eventually reached, the White House. Then, his abuses no longer were exclusively the domain of an entitled rich prick born with a silver spoon in his big mouth. Now, it was a direct threat to democracy, especially with his tens of millions of mindless, cultlish supporters, or the Cult 45, as they sometimes have come to be known.

Ferencz has seen the results of leaders of a powerful nation who did not know or recognize any limits to their power. Again, he was a prosecutor during the Nuremberg Trials just after World War II, and the defeat of Hitler's Germany. No, I am not comparing Trump to Hitler. Still, I would think that we should take the warnings of someone who played such a prominent role in prosecuting Nazi war criminals - and thus, knew some intricate details of how those horrors came about - when he is specifically warning us in the present day that we might be playing with fire, having an erratic leader with a false sense of entitlement continually overstepping his legal boundaries.

Here is the short piece that I wrote (but never quite got around to publishing) last year:

There is something that I found quite alarming recently.

The last surviving prosecutor from the Nuremberg Trials - yes, believe it or not, there is one prosecutor from those trials who is still alive, and that is not the shocking nor the alarming news - spoke about the Trump presidency. Specifically, he warned about Trump's war on law, his constant attacks on Constitutional rule of law. 

Benjamin B. Ferencz was a young man back in the postwar years, when he was one of the relatively elite prosecutors entrusted with a truly historic trial, one that set the basis for international war crimes trials that have followed. To that point, nothing of the sort had ever really been attempted before. But it was clear, following the unprecedented criminal activity of the murderous Nazi regime in Germany, that they needed to be held accountable for their crimes. 

Ferencz knew what can happen when transparently leaders hungry for power keep thwarting and undermining the law and grabbing more and more power. As the prosecutor of the most famous war crimes in history, he understood in horrific details just what this can lead to when gone unchecked. 

The crimes that he prosecuted happened in another time, in another country, and even on another continent. That much is true. There are differences, and nobody is going to make comparisons to the horrors perpetrated by Hitler and his Nazi regime.

Still, he is warning us, here in the United States in the present day, about the dangers of allowing a transparently power hungry regime - and in particularly a notoriously power-hungry megalomaniac in the White House - who make it known, time and time again, that they feel themselves above the law, and not beholden by any kind of legal limits. He knows only too well that this can lead to disaster. Already, Trump has been allowed to get away with far, far too much. But we may now be on the precipice of an abyss, and it may well be what remains of our democracy can plunge into that abyss, never to fully return or be restored.

Please take a look at the article (see link below) that elaborates on what Ferencz sees wrong with what is presently going on in the United States. It is certainly worth a look:

Nuremberg Prosecutor’s Warning About Trump’s War on the Rule of Law The Daily Beast Benjamin B. Ferencz ,The Daily Beast•July 19, 2020

https://news.yahoo.com/nuremberg-prosecutor-warning-trump-war-090342221.html?soc_src=hl-viewer&soc_trk=fb

35 Republican Senators Block January 6th Commission

The events of January 6th of this year were unlike anything that this nation has seen in it’s entire history. A sitting president, who had lost an election and was effectively a lame duck, but who claimed that the election was stolen from him even while failing to provide a shred of proof to back this claim up, directed an unruly crowd of his supporters towards the Congress, where the election results were officially being ratified and finalized. The president urged his crowd not to be weak in what he insisted was nothing short of, in his words, taking back their country. The crowd obviously believed that the election was stolen, despite their president not offering any proof. Still, they were willing not only to follow his advice – apparently not bothered by the president’s obviously untrue promise to join them – and went over to the Capitol building. It did not take long for this crowd to turn violent, and they stormed the Capitol building, scaling walls and bullying their way past police barricades, ultimately smashing through windows and doors and gaining access into the most iconic building of American democracy, intent on thwarting the efforts of Congress and the sitting Vice President in finalizing the election results. They were intent on keeping their president in power, despite his having clearly lost the election. 

When something this unique happens in American history, it most assuredly warrants investigation It is a big deal. Frankly, given the description of events that actually happened, and which can be verified on video of and even leading up to the day - a sitting president promising something big would happen on that day, the sitting president giving a fiery speech and urging the unruly crowd to go to the Capitol building and take back the country, and then that mass of supporters violently forcing their way into the Capitol building to destroy and in some cases steal property and threatening members of Congress - then it fits the bill of a major event that demands to be taken seriously. It requires investigation.

Yet, the Republican party, which has effectively become the Trump party, has bent over backwards to protect the criminal conduct of their former president time and time and time again. They have glossed over his blatant corruption and xenophobia, and become apologists for his outright criminal conduct, whether it is with payouts to porn stars or seemingly supporting outright white supremacy or trying to bribe or intimidate a leader of another nation or the countless lies that he professed before, during and after his presidency, or repeatedly undermining the nation's democratic institutions, or finally, trying to start an insurrection. In short, they have effectively abandoned democracy itself, and seem to favor a totalitarian takeover by their former president.

You might think that they would hesitate to fall in line like this for someone who was historically unpopular when actually in the White House, never once cracking 50 percent approval ratings, and losing the popular vote in both elections in 2016 and 2020, the last one by a very decisive margin. He also lost both chambers of Congress, to boot.

Still, they are too cowardly to stand up to him, and to move on from his shadow and into the sunlight of reason and normality. Nope, they are afraid of his supporters, and what some mean-spirited comments on Twitter might mean to their own political ambitions. And so time and time again, this pathetic leader has been allowed to get away with despicable, reprehensible, and increasingly criminal behavior. The lesson that he learned, time and time and time again, is that his fellow Republicans will, by and large, let him get away with it. So he keeps pushing the envelope even further, time and time and time again, to the detriment of the entire country.

This latest move should signify the death of the Republican party. It had been coming closer to this point, but once a man like this gets away with an attempted insurrection - an actual attempted coup d'état of a legitimate democracy, for all intents and purposes - then that political party is dead. Already, some groups are splintering off, and forming another party. But the party that is left has shown an inability and unwillingness to keep itself, and especially it's de facto leader, in check, even after he has shown downright anti-democratic tactics and conduct, time and time and time again.

Shame on the 35 Senators who blocked this investigation. And shame on those increasingly spiteful and fascist Americans who continue to support this tyrant.

Michelangelo Exhibit at the N.Y. Met

A few years ago, there was a Michelangelo Exhibit at The Met in New York City. This exhibition only lasted for a limited time, and I wanted to take advantage of it by taking my son to go see it.

And so we did.

Usually, my son and I go into a visit of the city maybe two or so times per year, and we always seemed to enjoy it. I get him some unusual treats, like a street corner kabob or some roasted peanuts, and he always seems to enjoy it.

We got to see the Michelangelo Exhibit, and while he probably proved a little too young to truly appreciate it (he almost literally raced across it and bragged about how quickly he had seen everything, almost pointing an accusing finger to me for taking much longer, as I was trying to soak it all in), nevertheless I was very happy to have taken him.

We then spent some time going through the rest of the museum, and I took him to some things that I figured he would definitely show interest in. This included the Meditation Garden, as well as the room full of knights armor, among other things.

Never did publish that particular bog entry, nor the pictures that went along with it. So here, now, is my attempt to remedy that.

Enjoy!

Champlitte, France

Here is yet another blog entry that I was meaning to publish a lot earlier than I did.

A while ago, I ran into some of the old postcards from childhood (and teenage) trips to France. And while I did not exactly have a camera for each of these trips to take good pics with, one thing that I did manage to do was obtain some postcards.

One of the towns that I got several postcards of, as well as stickers of (see the pictures) was of Champlitte, which is right by another town that I posted about already, Gray.

Champlitte is a charming little town, with a stream running through it. It has a chateaux, with some formal gardens in the front, as well as a beautiful old church with an impressive tower. Also, there is at least a decent part of the town that looks much as it has for hundreds of years, with little to no major changes in the intervening years and decades and even centuries.

So while these postcards are now a bit dated, I am almost certain that the town itself has not changed much since my small purchase of these postcards all the way back in the eighties.

Enjoy!

Past Show Review: Bob Dylan at the Beacon Theater in New York City, November 26, 2019

Photo courtesy of F. Antolín Hernández's Flickr Page - Bob Dylan: https://www.flickr.com/photos/f_antolin/1428148840

Creative Commons License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/

When I published that entry about Bob Dylan’s 80th birthday earlier this week, it was surprising to find out that I had never in fact published a concert review of the Dylan show that my son and I went to in the fall of 2019. Not sure how this happened, or why it slipped my mind, but clearly it did.  

And so, it seemed important to remedy this.  

As mentioned also in that earlier blog entry, Dylan was one of those artists who had such a profound impact on his times – particularly but not exclusively the Sixties – that it felt like a necessity to not miss an opportunity to see him. Sure, I could have pushed it off a bit, but again, when an artist like him – at that time he was already 78 – is coming near you, you might want to take advantage of it, because you never know when that opportunity will come again. That perhaps is even more the case now, as we saw a pandemic arrive and alter the lives of almost everyone the world over. Things like concerts and getting a chance to see events, either sports or entertainment – no matter how legendary the artist may or may not be – became a very difficult task indeed. So all the more reason that I felt pleased to have actually went ahead and gotten the tickets, and then taken my son to see him.  

Who knows when – or even if – that opportunity will come again?  

I am not saying that Bob Dylan will never tour again, or come near us. Hell, it is not impossible that we will go and see him again. My main objective was to get my son to see Dylan, to add to the list of some major, even iconic artists that I had taken him to see. Those included the two surviving Beatles (not at the same time), the Rolling Stones, the Who, Robert Plant, John Fogerty (of Creedence Clearwater Revival), Temple of the Dog, Paul Simon, Fleetwood Mac, and some other artists, as well.  

So how was the show?  

Well, it was pretty good, of course. Dylan had a predictably mixed setlist, with some old classics and some newer, lesser known songs. Some of his most famous, iconic songs were not played, although that is something that I kind of understand he does sometimes. You sometimes cannot tell what he is going to do, although he apparently had the same basic setlist for pretty much all of his area appearances that month, and indeed, perhaps throughout this particular tour (It was called the “Never Ending Tour”), although I did not go through all of the dates to check, but just the New York dates.  

In any case, while I had some pictures up of the theater, and advertisements for this particular show, in that earlier birthday blog, I never actually did either publish a post on the show itself, nor post pictures of the show itself.  

It seemed time to remedy both of those things, and so here, without further ado, is my attempt to correct that.  

Below is the setlist for the show, as well as some pictures that I never before did get around to publishing. They did not come out particularly great, or anything, but at least I have a few semi-decent ones.  

Enjoy!

Bob Dylan Setlist at Beacon Theatre, New York, NY, USA NOV 26 2019:   

https://www.setlist.fm/setlist/bob-dylan/2019/beacon-theatre-new-york-ny-239ac003.html     

Things Have Changed  (Bob on guitar)  

It Ain't Me, Babe  

Highway 61 Revisited  

Simple Twist of Fate  

When I Paint My Masterpiece  

Honest With Me  

Tryin' to Get to Heaven  

Make You Feel My Love  

Pay in Blood  Lenny Bruce  

Early Roman Kings  

Girl From the North Country  

Not Dark Yet  Thunder on the Mountain  

Soon After Midnight  

Gotta Serve Somebody  

Encore:  Ballad of a Thin Man (Bob on guitar)  

It Takes a Lot to Laugh, It Takes a Train to Cry