The Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant near Avila Beach in San Luis Obispo County, California.
I have begun serious research on my first extensive work of journalistic non-fiction, disguised as fiction until it is published, about the immense dangers of nuclear energy production and those plants related to the reality of adversarial cyber attacks to the power grids where nuclear energy is produced and distributed, especially as weapons of mass destruction in times of war. I have recently posted a blog article here, concerning my fears about this vital problem with nuclear energy and its vulnerability to such lethal attacks, titled “Nuclear Power Plants and Their Relevance to Nuclear War“. The draft title of the book is fittingly called “El Diablo”. ~llaw
A child walks past graffiti depicting Russian President Vladimir Putin, left, and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, on the walls of a bar in the old town in Vilnius, Lithuania, Saturday, May 14, 2016. (AP Photo/Mindaugas Kulbis)
The more we allow Trump to get away with Constitutional non-compliance (like with the emoluments clause ignoring court orders and subpoenas, and violating his oath of office every day) and continues to run roughshod over everything else in our American way, the less chance we have of saving our democracy. Congress must quit dragging its feet NOW, before it’s too late. Trump’s stonewalling, refusing to comply with congressional and court subpoenas, creating inane frivolous lawsuits, all serve to intentionally extend Congress’s foot-dragging and we are fast running out of time to get rid of him.
By the time the 2020 election rolls around, just a short year-and-a-half away, he may well have broken so many laws and violated the Constitution so successfully that he will be in a position to not even allow an election, or just as bad, refuse to leave office if he is defeated at the polls, and uses his authoritarian “presidential” powers to force America into a civil war and WWIII at the same time. He is already searching for a conflict with Iran in the Middle East, which could be only a bombing run away from starting a global war.
Of course that’s a worst case scenario, but looking back at the severe damage he’s already wrought upon our country and got off scot-free with over the past two-and-a-half years, and with the complicit Justice Department saying he cannot be indicted for his crimes, no doubt gives him and Putin, the GOP, et al, the power to simply bully their way into entirely destroying our American way of life within the next year-and-a-half.
I, for one, personally refuse to live under the shadow of a dictator, and life in Trump’s version of America is more than bad enough already. ~llaw
The remains of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant. The radiation leakage has now been covered by a stainless steel roof, but the city of Chernobyl will essentially remain a ghost town for thousands of years.
If you missed the first three episodes of “Chernobyl” on HBO, at least try to find a way to watch the last one, which aired tonight. I am sure it will be replayed for several days or weeks. Watch it if you can.
And then you will know that nuclear power is not safe, contrary to what the industry and our government would have you believe. Humans, intentionally or not, can interfere, mistakenly or deliberately, with anything that has lethal power, whether for good or for evil, and all nuclear plants are as dangerous and life-threatening as any nuclear bomb. They are a part of America’s power grid system and grid systems can be tampered with and attacked by ideologically or politically opposed foes in today’s cyber warfare world. It’s not just elections we have to worry about.
The midwest and eastern United States are dangerously infested with nuclear power plants.
Having spent nearly two decades as an administrator in the production end of the nuclear industry–uranium mining and milling, including a knowledge of enrichment fundamentals–I recently began writing a critical book about the serious international problem the world has with nuclear power plants and their strategic relationship to nuclear bombs, especially as the problem applies to the possibility of imminent nuclear war. I hope to finish it and find a worthy publisher before the crucial year of 2020 begins. ~llaw
Mueller needs to personally explain to the American people why his report came to the conclusions it did and exactly what its intended purpose was, if not to indict Trump, either via the judicial system or through congress, what the hell is its objective?.
I, for one, would also like to know if he was ordered by Barr (through Trump) to conclude his report prematurely, what is missing from the report (eg the counter intelligence information and conclusions), and why an unredacted report is not being given to congress as they have demanded. ~llaw
The House Democrats are being far too polite, patient and subservient toward Trump’s, Barr’s, and McConnell’s gaslighting and stonewalling over the Mueller Report and the White House’s blanket refusal to honor subpoenas, court orders, our Constitution, and the “Rule of Law”, which makes the Dems look tentative and unsure of their Constitutional mandate to defend America against autocratic tyrants like TraitorTrump and his imperialist master Putin.
You and I may understand the Democrat’s caution and patience, but the general public and voter looks at their procrastination and apparent lack of anger or urgency, including hesitant use of their new-found power from the 2018 election’s political mandate to rapidly ameliorate a bad situation, as essentially offering credence to Trump’s claim of a ‘witchhunt’.
Then too, every day lost by following this courteous protocol and court procedures that would be proper during normal times with a normal president is critical in dealing with this dangerous criminal Trumpian organization that, for now at least, serves as anoter propaganda weapon for Trump and his mob, including Fox News and their right-wing conspiratorial affiliates, Russian cyber attacks, and the complicit GOP.
The mainstream media is only just now beginning to realize that these are not normal times, and they, too, will soon react negatively, adding more fire to the argument against the Dem’s perceived lack of concern and aggression to diligently expedite official impeachment investigations, charges, and proceedings, making it even more difficult, if not impossible to sway enough GOP senators to vote to impeach Trump.
Congressional Democrats cannot continue to bow to Barr’s and Trump’s feigned authority any longer or our government “by and for the people” will soon be nothing more than a sad and distant memory. ~llaw
Two recently recognized and extremely important global related issues with seriously concerning elements and rapidly encroaching ecologic disasters are embedded as links in this post. First, If plankton provides nearly 70% of the oxygen that humans breathe and if all the fish in the sea depend on it as a food source, this first story seems more like the beginning of a dystopian novel than a scientific article. We need to keep a close eye on this dangerous development, and hope that a cause is quickly found and that it can be promptly corrected.
Or will we simply go on treating our environmental crises with a yawn and a shrug? Our ecological and environmental world is rapidly coming apart at the seams, including human apathy and neglect, mostly resulting from economic or financial greed, or “Ecocide” as described in this second important article, but also in a large part from a general attitude of denial and knowledge. ~llaw (12/23/18)
Two years of hell has taken its toll on our flag, our country and you and me. . .
The difficult problem of removing Trump, et al, from the White House presently lies solely on the hunched shoulders of our elected representatives in congress. Until they are somehow persuaded to listen to the people, there is little chance of removing Trump from office unless Special Counsel Mueller and the judicial system indict him and find him guilty of his many atrocious felonies, and sentence him to prison.
The second possibility of booting Trump from office via political impeachment won’t work because the Republicans will not vote to impeach him and there are not enough Democrats to fill the Republican void. Also, there is no guarantee that impeaching Trump will result in removing him from office.
The third possibility is that Trump will resign, and that may well happen very soon. The pressure on him (that he has brought solely upon himself despite his constant whining and tweeting otherwise) is closing in around him, his foolhardy children and other sycophants, and those facts may well do him in. The incoming Democratic House of Representatives will pile subpoenas upon subpoenas of investigative hearings upon investigating hearings on him, as well as the whole complicit rest of them, until Trump simply cannot lie his way out of his corner any longer, bringing to bear immense public pressure, a burden that even Trump, with his delusional egomaniacal mind, cannot cope with any longer.
Accordingly, in my opinion. a combination of Mueller justice, Democratic politics, and public pressure will prevail in ousting Trump, by resignation, from the presidency sometime in the first half of 2019, and Trump may very well still wind up in prison where he no doubt belongs. ~llaw (12/19/18)
This political cartoon in the Reno Gazette Journal this morning did my old heart good! If the election wasn’t a high-tide blue wave for Democrats, it certainly was a tsunami of a “Me Too!” blue wave as liberal women “grabbed” congressional seats away from cowardly old Republican male incumbents who were deathly afraid of Trump.
Trump should be running scared from now on. He knows the Resistance will force him to pay the price for his white supremacy nationalism, bigotry, racism, xenophobia and misogyny ~llaw
Apollo’s Muses. Calliope, the muse of eloquent epic poetry and writing, is under attack in today’s world. . .
Writing allows us to more precisely and eloquently express ourselves, humorously or seriously, with neutrality or prejudice, happily or angrily, or even indifferently or passionately concerning those categories of issues we like and love, or disdain and hate, The latter includes journalistic opinions concerning and considering all the current administration’s political high crimes and misdemeanors such as cronyism, conspiracies, corruption, collusion, covert crime, and perhaps treason, placing America and the world in a dangerous and desperate place that threatens our questionable culture and social fabric as people —presumably civilized human beings.
Then, too, there is Gaia’s world for us to protect and advocate for, because Mother Earth is life’s common home at a time when we humans are ravaging Her once pristine habitat to the point that we, our children, and our fauna and flora friends may soon no longer be able to survive on this human-polluted planet — and there is nowhere else to go. There are already huge ocean dead zones along the continental coastlines, particularly along America’s eastern and southern coasts and along the northern Mediterranean coast, where no sea life can survive, and obviously, environmental death is rapidly coming ashore. We all have an obligation to protect the natural environment that was gifted to us so long ago in the latter stages of creation. Yet we, the self-proclaimed intellectual ones, are demeaning, damaging, despoiling, and even destroying the only home we have. We call it progress, but it is really just mankind’s parasitic gluttony and greed. Extinction is not a pretty word, and it is sad that we continue to forever fail to learn from our mistakes of the past. When we become too much for Mother Earth to be comfortable with, She will shake off our parasitic pandemic like water off a dog.
As for the the Fourth Estate, in 1839 Edward Bulwer-Lytton declared that ”the pen is mightier than the sword.” We shall see. The 4th Estate is under an overt brutal full-frontal attack in America and other countries, and I, for one, am here to defend and help fight for the cause of freedom of speech and our First Amendment liberties.
The court of public opinion may have to be the final judge against the rise of the 4th Reich’s fascist authoritarian rampage of chaos and anarchy that could be the most serious issue to threaten the concept of a self-governing democracy and our inalienable rights and freedoms since the American Revolution. But thankfully, at least in those days, we had a few leaders with a common sense of values, and especially, a President, on our side. ~llaw
Mary, John, and Jesus (from Da Vinci’s ‘The Last Supper’)
Mary, I’m not sure why I love you
Or why my heart yearns so intensely
Nor what created our strange milieu
Or my soul-indulgent fantasy
But my mind is filled with thoughts of you
That consume my nights and all my days
With such hopes and dreams that shan’t come true
Since we live our lives in disparate ways
What might have been is all that I have
To comfort me in my sad despair
When with my Muse I find words to salve
My heart for mending with Wisdom’s care
Your bright eyes reveal your inner light
Illuminate your divinity
You are our lost Goddess in plain sight
Sent from Pleroma’s infinity
You are Mary of old Magdalen
Reborn through divine androgyny
Sent to awaken the souls of men
To errant ways of misogyny
Old Christian clerics rewrote the Books
Turned the secular world upside down
In order to reverse the spiritual looks
From Sophia’s smile to Yahweh’s frown
Priests stole the Texts of the Gnostic times
Perverted the role of the priestess
From goddess of love to harlot’s crimes
And scribed the myths of that god they bless
They burned those Texts and switched the places
Of women and men and life and death
They moved the holy dwelling spaces
To far distant realms beyond our breath
Those priests hid the Truths once known so well
While Yahweh with hubristic grandeur
Led the world into the depths of hell
His archons draped in unctuous splendor
Eve was impugned for Adam’s weakness
Beguiling him of the ways of life
By eating from the Tree of Gnosis
And Yahweh cursed them to lives of strife
When Jesus was sent to right the world
Bursting with our sins and corruption
He found the Truths and tried to herald
That Yahweh’s way was blind deception
Christ was forsaken and left to die
While Magdalene with love’s treasure trove
Grieved at his feet knowing the lie
That the clerics with their archons wove
They tore Hypatia the lovely mind
To pieces in the Egyptian streets
Because she told of the truth behind
The lies of the Coptic Christian priests
Our Joan of Arc the Maid of Orleans
Burned at the stake by ecclesiasts
For heresy though yet in her teens
Made a martyr for their priestly castes
Mary, I am called to help you learn
And instruct you of your destiny
To inform the World of your return
And of your gifts for humanity
Now for us all with your heart laid bare
Our Lost Goddess has arrived once more
To right the wrongs for the ones who care
To conclude this Patriarchal War
~ from your loving John, for just one more of those ten thousand lifetimes during which I shall wait for you
