gratitudes, window shopping, managing technology, let them eat cake, judge mark l. wolf
yesterday i was grateful for window shopping with holly...
today i am looking forward to a day without obligations and yoga with anne...
it was a good, if expensive weekend... we visited my cousin on saturday... sunday, after the farmer's market and before the sunday chores we took the dogs for a walk down main street... beacon bonfire festival was in its last day... lots of people and music and good spirits... our main objective on the walk was to buy holly a knit cap and maybe to buy me a new jacket from the vintage store... it had been on my mind all week, but was rather expensive and i wanted holly's opinion on it... she approved... i bought... i think it might be the most expensive garment i own... i love it though... does this make me bourgeois let them eat cake?... i hope not... i demonstrate, pay taxes willingly and contribute to the aclu and other good causes... maybe i need to do more...
right now i am listening to bach's st matthew's passion... i am not christian religious, or very religious in any direction... i am spiritual and i believe there is more to the cosmos than we can ever know... i allow for the possibility of a god... i do love choir music though... especially the full chorus parts... the sound of so many voices together has the power to blow me away in ecstatic contemplation of the power of unified humanity... soloists don't interest me nearly as much... i have said often that i think we place way too much emphasis on exceptional individuals...
just now i was reading a conversation between noam chomsky and jose mujica about the response society should have to technology... i believe in collective management of technological progress... we seem to be heading in the oligarchic direction of management...
Literary Hub » Noam Chomsky and José Mujica on the Double Edged Sword of Automation
I would like a humanity that cares for all creatures equally. If artificial intelligence or automation suddenly has capabilities that help us to manage ourselves better, let’s explore that, but it’s tragic when those opportunities pass through the filter of what fills the pockets of a few. I welcome advances in the economy and technology, if their purpose is to create and multiply human happiness. Otherwise, there is the possibility of a disastrous world, and we may see a kind of dictatorship that the Earth has never seen before.
the idea that one will buy longevity is disturbing... though it certainly exists in the present moment... but it will become worse in the future unless we act collectively... this is what the health insurance battle is about... at least in part...
Literary Hub » Noam Chomsky and José Mujica on the Double Edged Sword of Automation
it will be for those who have a lot of money, and that will be one of the greatest injustices that humanity has seen, because this advance will not be for everyone but just for a privileged few. For the first time it will be possible to buy many years of life with money.
scenes from the shit show...
https://open.substack.com/pub/heathercoxrichardson/p/november-9-2025?selection=c77c2cde-17a2-420a-a04b-8ea02a58e97e&r=3lmw0&utm_medium=ios
Amid the fight over SNAP during the longest government shutdown in history, President Donald J. Trump spent the weekend at Mar-a-Lago, where he hosted another extravagant dinner party complete with scallops, beef filet, and ice sculptures.
a judge in massachusetts has stepped down to enhance his ability to fight the encroachment of dictatorship... his successor had already been selected so he was free to act on his conscience...
Today, former U.S. district judge Mark L. Wolf, who was appointed to the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts by President Ronald Reagan, explained that he resigned on Friday because he wanted the freedom to do “everything in my power to combat today’s existential threat to democracy and the rule of law.” Wolf called out Trump’s use of the Department of Justice to hurt his political opponents, his firing of inspectors general, the administration’s pay-to-play policies in which wealthy donors get government favors, the corruption of cryptocurrency, unconstitutional executive orders, and the threats against judges as Trump attacks the rule of law.
some photographs from this morning's walk...
