John McCain’s Final Message to Trump

“We weaken our greatness when we confuse our patriotism with tribal rivalries that have sown resentment and hatred and violence in all the corners of the globe. We weaken it when we hide behind walls, rather than tear them down, when we doubt the power of our ideals.”

Although there was more to his farewell statement, this part  seems to be intended solely for Trump without mentioning his name, but Trump will probably say that McCain’s statement was not directed at him because he is the one bringing the people together. But, regardless, he will ignore the message. ~llaw

R.I.P. JOHN McCAIN

Cathedral Rock near Senator McCain’s ranch in Sedona, Arizona

Senator McCain was a brave military officer and just as brave as a United States Senator, one of few during his career where he served our country for thirty-six years. He not only had the courage to take on his GOP contemporaries, but also often reach across the aisle to work with Democrats on important critical legislation. America could use more men like John McCain. ~llaw

Singing in the Rain? In the Desert?

I feel like singing in the rain tomorrow, but since it won’t rain,
I’ll just have to sing in the sunshine!
~llaw

Could it be that Mueller is After Them All?

Joy in America tonight!

Wow! This has been a really really really bad day for Trump!
Not that he doesn’t deserve every bit of it.! ~llaw

The Most Vital Aspects of Sustaining Human Life

A friend asked me a while back if there was anything more important than politics, money, corporations, religion, and philosophy concerning the fate of our future on the planet. This was my response: “There are three things–respect for science and the feminine way, and hope like hell for help from above.”

There are many apolitical and economically frugal things we can do to improve all of our lives, both individually and collectively, but the most important issue right now and on into the foreseeable future is to reverse our environmental relationship with Mother Earth before it is too late for politics, religion, money, or anything else to matter.

The summer months in the northern hemisphere over he last five years (2014–2018) comprise the five warmest June through August global temperatures recorded in scientific history, and the entire 2018 year was globally the fourth warmest ever, only cooler than the three previous years. We know that the cause is because of human activity despite what climate change deniers and conspiracy theorists (like our president, his administration and sycophants) would like you to believe.

We are fouling our own nests here on earth, not to mention the natural sanctuaries andrefuges of our innocent victimized fauna and flora. We are on the verge of making our planet uninhabitable. Why and how are we doing this? The answer is simple. We have lost touch with our once natural affinityto respect and love our Mother Earth, long forsaken in exchange for insatiable greed and unsustainable personal comfort. We have given virtually nothing back to her, failing to recognize her for all that she has given us to prosper and thrive. But our constant abuse of her for the sake of  human consumption, coupled with our growing lack of thought, appreciation, or consideration for the critical balance between humanity and nature, has resulted in her rebellion, not because she is vengeful or unwilling to help, but because she is ill, infected by viral hordes of human parasites, so she has no choice but to fight back against us in order to survive.  Yet the wealthy tycoons, the arroghant politicians, the behemoth corporations and their minions pay no attention except to ignore, refute, hide, or destroy the scientific warnings, evidence, and data..

As global warming continues to heat up, mainly from carbon emissions, we are faced with growing pollution of air, water, and soil (even the ocean has become a contaminated waste dump), rapidly rising sea levels, wild atmospheric conditions including more severe droughts, tornadoes, hurricanes, forest fires, freakishly intense any-season storms, and unbreatheable air. And all this is happening at a rate almost exponential from climate change models of just a decade or two ago. No longer can we  afford to ignore or deny climate change or global warming r, yet the Trump administration is feverishly rolling back environmental regulations, deleting EPA, NOAA, and NASA historical records, and purging scientific data from government records, libraries and websites.

If we are to survive as a species here on earth–and not take down millions of other species right along with us–our most important mission, bar none, is to reclaim that old natural affinity of respect and love for Mother Earth and hold her in the highest esteem because she is the only one who ultimately provides us with a home that allows us to continue to exist and even thrive on her soil. But if we continue rebukng, procrastinating and ignnoring her modest expectations, we–according to  our most recent scientific evidence–face extinction in the imminent future. We are already feeling the effects, and science is telling us that global warming may be irreversible in less than a decade. Keep in mind that this planet is the only home we have and we cannot survive Mother Nature’s wrath if we continue to despoil her–unless we are  somehow awakened, blessed with a highly unlikely epiphany of some kind– or maybe even a tough-love intervention by a wiser life form from somewhere else in the universe. What are the odds? ~llaw (updated 05/10/2019)

Nuclear Deterrence or Nuclear Disarmament?

 The attached opinion article offers well-considered food for thought on the question of nuclear deterrence or nuclear disarmament, something that I will explore in depth on this website as time goes by.

In a truly sophisticated civilized world there would be no question that disarmament is the only choice, but we have a world full of governmental leaders who are full of megalomaniacal hubris who cheat and lie behind the scenes of public discourse, so it would seem that true disarmament could never be achieved.

But by the same argument, how much faith can we have in deterrence when we already have a world with nuclear missiles pointed and poised to fire at each other? ~llaw

The attached article was written by Matthew Bunn, who is a professor of practice at Harvard Kennedy School and is co-principal investigator for the Project on Managing the Atom at the Kennedy School’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs.

Updating the Status of My New Website

Welcome to my recently opened Writing/Blogging Website that has been (and still is) in the travails of development and cosmetic polishing since late June. I am happy to say that today is a milestone in that the website is mostly functional.

And that means beginning tomorrow I will be able to start using  it for its intended purpose rather than as an experiment in progress. Improvements will always be a part of it of course, but at least now I will be able to do the thing I love best, and that is to do battle with all the political corruption that has put America and the world in a desperate situation that threatens our very social fabric as civilized human beings.

In 1839 Edward Bulwer-Lytton said ,“The  pen is mightier than the sword.” We shall see. The 4th Estate is under brutal attack in America and other countries, and I, for one, am here to fight for the cause. The court of public opinion will be the final judge in this fascistic authoritarianism rampage of chaos and anarchy that may be the most serious issue to ever threaten the concept of democracy and freedom. Stay tuned, my friends. ~llaw

Trails’ End: Lament to The Lonesome Land

~ a poem by Albert Pendergraft (1894 – 1944)
(revised and edited by Lloyd Albert Williams)

You’re a lonesome land, an empty land
A hard land that is rugged and bare
You’re a wild and untamed lonesome land
A proud land that’s demanding but fair

When I pause on some sun-blistered hill
And gaze far o’er your broad boundless range
Where the brisk restless winds never still
And swift sunlight and cloud shadows change

There’s a song in my heart and an ache
A longing, indefinitely sad
There’s contentment that sorrow can’t take
And my troubles seem gone, and I’m glad

In the night when the hours slowly pass
And a wolf wails her long lonely cry
Where the wind whispers low in the grass
And the stars circle silently by

Your magical spirit holds me fast
In a spell that cannot be undone
While the days of my lifetime shall last
You have blessed me and made me your son

Then softly to me comes your low voice
When I’m so weary and far away
Faintly I hear you, and so rejoice
For you are calling me home to stay

More often now I hear your calm call
While I so long and wearily roam
And my eyes fill with tears that would fall
Were it not that you’re calling me home

Your voice promises comfort and peace
When I rest on your nurturing breast
Then all my cares and sorrows shall cease
And my somnolent soul shall find rest

Give me strength till my battles are won
While along life’s lonely trails I plod
Then at last when my journey is done
Let me rest for all time ‘neath your sod

Let my spirit roam free in your hills
And keep watch as the ages pass by
Till the clamor of humankind stills
When mere men and their follies shall die

Till the heavens and earth have grown old
And the endless dark night has drawn on
When the sun in your path has grown cold
And the days of creation are gone

by Albert Pendergraft, 1944
& Lloyd Albert Williams, 2018

(Original poem retained for posterity)

About this poem: Albert Pendergraft was one of my many uncles, and I was given his given name as my middle name, but I remember meeting him only once, when I was just two or three years old on the main street of Worland, Wyoming. Albert committed suicide not long after that, in 1944, leaving a poem he called “Lonesome Land” behind as a kind of self-penned epitaph, I suppose, although it was written in more of a ballad kind of poetry, repeating the title “Lonesome Land” every other line, which made it a much simpler poem than this revision, although the meaning of the original poem and several of the lines have not been changed, but all of the stanzas have been altered for length, meter and the rhyming scheme. ~llaw

Why the World Cannot Survive Trump

Three years ago–when Donald Trump was still just a candidate for the presidency–on the eve of the American congressional ratification of the Iran Nuclear Agreement between them and the free world, I  wrote this:

Continue reading “Why the World Cannot Survive Trump”