The Prophets Isaiah and Ezekiel dined with me, and I asked them how they dared so roundly to assert that God spake to them; and whether they did not think at the time that they would be misunderstood, & so be the cause of imposition.
Isaiah answer'd: "I saw no God, nor heard any, in a finite organical perception; but my senses discover'd the infinite in every thing, and as I was then perswaded & remain confirm'd, that the voice of honest indignation is the voice of God, I cared not for consequences, but wrote." —William Blake, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell
Greetings from the far left coast where the morning is damp and breezy here at the Portable Bohemia nerve center in the shadow of Mt. Tabor, an extinct volcano whose summit offers glorious views of downtown Portland to the west and snow-capped Mt. Hood to the east.
Thoughts turn to friends in California, Mendal and Debbie, Sue and her sister and the doggies, Devon, Sharmagne. As of yesterday morning's text exchange with Mendal, Monday was dicey, the Carmel River came way up, but they were fine. He added that Hollingshed Creek never got that high. That would be the creek that ran through the woods between our childhood homes. Our thoughts and good wishes go out to friends and strangers alike.
Thoughts turn too to last summer's catastrophic flooding in Pakistan:
By late August, writhing under a monsoon on steroids that was almost certainly exacerbated by climate change, a third of a country typically preoccupied with water shortages was drowning. Nearly 33 million people—one in seven Pakistanis—have been affected, with nearly eight million displaced. More than two thousand are dead, initially from rain-related accidents, then from waterborne diseases such as malaria and typhoid; the toll continues to climb. (Alizeh Kohari, Pakistan Submerged, The New York Review of Books, November 24, 2022)
As we all know by now, weather is erratic, once in a century stuff happens, no individual weather event in isolation can be put down to climate change. However, the frequency, scope, and intensity of weather events we currently experience almost surely can. Thick-headed Republicans and other fossil-fuel enthusiasts claim to fret about harm done to the economy by government action to address climate change while ignoring consequences for the economy resulting from catastrophic weather events. I repeat myself: we are not yet doing things that should have been done decades ago.
I knocked out the final installments of the Ginsberg project (links below in the usual place). Whew. Always good to put these behind me. More time and effort went into it than was anticipated. The conclusion comes with second thoughts about passages that might have benefited from judicious edits and clarification and topics that might have been taken up in greater depth. I hope I was fair to Ginsberg, a complex and influential figure in the second-half of the twentieth century, neither Saint Allen, as some of the faithful might have it, nor a roaring ass hysteric who did great harm to the craft of poetry, as some of his less kindly disposed critics held.
Classified documents. This is a mess. No matter that Joe Biden's attorneys did the right thing when they found classified documents dating from his tenure as vice president in an office he uses and at his home in Delaware. They notified the national archives and the Department of Justice and turned the documents over promptly.
Republicans are already slavering and screeching about the scandal, in stark but not surprising contrast to their indifference when the former president defied repeated requests from the national archives and a grand jury subpoena to return a far greater number of classified documents, property of the US government, that eventually had to be seized from his Mar-a-Lago compound.
In another contrast, Senate Intelligence Committee Chair Mark Warner (Dem-Virginia) is calling for his committee to receive a briefing on the BIden documents. Imagine, a committee chair conducting oversight of a president from his own party. Novel idea.
Hillary Clinton and her email trove, Trump, now Biden. How is it this stuff keeps happening, even if inadvertently? Review of protocols for handling classified documents is clearly in order and overdue. That should be the takeaway.
Kevin McCarthy's capacity for public humiliation is in its way as amazing as it is cringeworthy. Showing himself yet again to be a man utterly devoid of principle and substance, McCarthy endured vote after vote and made concession after concession to a band of Bannonite nihilists that left the speakership he craved stripped of authority and power. We are left with the desperate hope that moderate House Republicans will team with Democrats to stave off default on the debt, fund the government, and generally try to make government function for the general welfare and common good instead of tearing the whole thing down. There is at present little reason for hope that they will rise to the occasion. The country appears set to lurch from crisis to crisis for as far out as the eye can see. Nowhere is it writ we will emerge from them all intact.
Zut! There must be some better note to close on. Hope springs infernal with spring training looming just over the horizon. My Phillies signed highly regarded shortstop Trea Turner in December and have since added starting pitcher Taijuan Walker and stockpiled an array of flamethrowers in the bullpen. Even with Bryce Harper on the mend after elbow surgery and with the proviso that the NL East is a beast, the outlook for 2023 is bright.
The NFL playoffs opened yesterday with a remarkable performance by Jacksonville quarterback Trevor Lawrence, who began his professional career at Clemson University. After throwing four interceptions in a dismal first half as his team fell behind San Diego 27–0, the unflappable Lawrence came out after intermission to hurl four TD passes and score on a two-point conversion that set up a game-win winning field goal as time expired for a 31–30 Jaguar victory. One for the books.
Two new blog posts:
Keep the faith.
Stand with Ukraine.
yr obdt svt
Pictured below: The Ginsberg Project
