All the Secrets of the Universe and Some Really Important Stuff Too!
Great nations write their autobiographies in three manuscripts—the book of their deeds, the book of their words, and the book of their art. Not one of these books can be understood unless we read the two others; but of the three, the only quite trustworthy one is the last. The acts of a nation may be triumphant by its good fortune; and its words mighty by the genius of a few of its children: but its art, only by the general gifts and common sympathies of the race.
John Ruskin
Hard to call for 2026. Right now the house is held by 5 republicans plus an independent who caucuses with them. with the California redistrict vs Florida and the lame one seat win in Louisiana (which could have been 2) AND Indiana going AWOL I think it’s going to be very tight, likely slightly Democrat (5-10 seats). The big question on the Senate side is Platner vs Collins. Collins is not the best candidate from a conservative view, But probably better for us than Platner most days. Platner is such a fricking mess and there’s likely far more dirt that Collins can use that the elderly and upstate folks probably will swamp Portland and Southern Maine. The thing that would be good to do is close out Iran but resolving that such that things recover before 11/3 will take some really lucky breaks that I just don’t see happening. We HAVE to stop them from getting a nuclear weapon they make North Korea look like a calm reasonable opponent.
One race to watch is the LA mayor. If LA unblues enough to elect Pratt all then things get really odd.
2028 is a totally different situation. Likely, the major issue (Iran) will be resolved at some level. That unblocks large parts of the economy. Although the last half of the Trump administration probably gets stalled due to a blue house (and tied or slightly blue senate) they really cant do much as they haven’t got a veto proof majority and are unlikely to get one. So we get 2 years of sitzkrieg unless a miracle occurs.
Problem is the Democrats have no one that can easily steal states from the electoral coalition that Trump used. Newsome is an idiot and anathema to middle America, AOC is worse. Spanberger might have been an option but her run at the gerrymandering and the gun nonsense makes it clear she is just a traditional far left Liberal cosplaying as middie of the road. Buttigieg? Please don’t make me laugh. Shapiro from PA? If they would take him he MIGHT have a chance. Except he is never getting by the primaries because of the massive antisemitism of the democrat far left base. Kamala? She couldn’t even hardly touch Trump who had massive negatives in her base. The blue Gerontacracy that was boosted by Obama backstabbing any up and coming Pols means their bench is essentially all folks politically based in deep blue one party states. They have no clue where the middle is and any attempt to go there will get you slammed in the primaries. And because these are such lame candidates they will have basically no coattails. I’d expect things in 2028 to swing back to a more 2024 like situation with likely small Republican margins. And that takes us to 2030 where the big prize is fixing the ersatz 2020 census. That census is going to be absolutely critical, not controlling it will mean you’re headed to the edges for up to 10 years. It will already slame the blue states even if the questionable practices of 2020 are not removed. If they are removed the house might lean 20+ seats red in the 2032 elections.
The one big worry is we have 2 fairly old Supreme Court members who are the bulwarks of originalist interpretation (Thomas at 77 and Alito at 76). Should we lose them and the Senate is blue or evenly divided replacing them with other than some squishball moderate gets REAL hard. Add Roberts at 71 who although not SUPER dependable tends more to the originalist side unless he is trying to curry favor or look wise.
So, everybody wants to know if all the redistricting for the race-based districts that is going on down south will offset the midterm disadvantage for the Republicans. My guess is it will absorb the bulk of the blowout and the Democrats will take the House by a handful of seats. Right now, they’re talking about the Senate being a toss-up. If I were to guess I’ll say it’ll be a fifty-fifty Senate with Vance as the tie breaker and thus keeping the Senate for the Republicans. So that deadlock means nothing substantive will be legislated for Trump’s last two years. And that’s okay. Executive orders will be the name of the game.
But what happens in 2028? A lot of people are very pessimistic. Personally, I’m optimistic. Two years should be enough time for Trump to break Iran. After the midterms I see him closing down the Straits of Hormuz for as long as it takes to bankrupt Iran and cripple China. It won’t be pain free. Iran will lash out and who knows how crazy they may get. But I don’t think it will take two years to get them to give up their nuclear program permanently. So, if he gets past Iran, I can see oil prices dropping drastically and that will have a profoundly positive effect on the economy. Now what comes after Trump?
Let me take a pessimistic scenario. Suppose everything goes wrong and the Democrats take the White House, Senate and House in 2028. According to their leaders, they will nuke the filibuster, pack the Supreme Court and make all illegal aliens, citizens. That will have the effect of providing them with a permanent majority in Washington. That is what they say they’ll do. But will they do it?
I think they know that if they do those things, they are effectively declaring war against the red states. That is a very big deal. And I think some of them are afraid that it will cause a permanent breach between the two separate constituencies that this country is composed of. And I think they know if they’re the ones who do it, they will force the other side to give up on the normal way things are done in Washington and begin using “unconventional” tactics to prevent the federal government from destroying their states. Now what this would exactly look like, I’m not sure. But I suspect it will not all be “passive resistance.” And eventually, this will bring about a permanent separation between red and blue states.
Some of this is already happening. Businesses and high net worth individuals are leaving blue states and blue cities in droves. The socialist mayors and governors are panicking because their budgets are in a shambles and the unchecked crime is frightening away the middle and working classes too. So, we’re already seeing a separation begin. If the Democrats flood the country with illegals, the red states are going to have to figure a way to prevent these invaders from harming their states. And making that happen will cause additional friction between the feds and the red states. And that is how it will escalate. How will that end nobody knows but it will not look like one country anymore. So, will they declare war against the red states?
For when we are interested in the beauty of a thing, the oftener we can see it the better; but when we are interested only by the story of a thing, we get tired of hearing the same tale told over and over again, and stopping always at the same point — we want a new story presently, a newer and better one — and the picture of the day, and novel of the day, become as ephemeral as the coiffure or the bonnet of the day. Now this spirit is wholly adverse to the existence of any lovely art. If you mean to throw it aside to-morrow, you can never have it to-day.
John Ruskin
So, as you get older you find that nostalgia is your favorite guilty (or guiltless) pleasure. Movies and songs that showcase things from your younger days are among the happiest moments you spend. Now don’t get me wrong, things happening in the present day can be fun and exciting and interesting for sure. But more and more, you become a stranger in the strange land that is the present day. You look around and you see that everything has changed; the culture, the people, the places, the language, the entertainment and especially the technology. Even the things that are supposed to be things from your time have been changed until you’re not even qualified to use them. As an example, look at the telephone. If you had handed a smart phone to a person in 1970, they would have no idea what it was but they would definitely deny it was a telephone.
So, we are experiencing the slow eradication of the world we knew. And if you came from a place that has been remade over the last half century it’s even more disconcerting. Your past has been basically erased and what’s left sometimes has nothing at all left that resembles the place you grew up in.
So, this is all true. And getting angry or depressed about it won’t change anything except make you feel worse. But recently I realized that nostalgia is a form of time travel. You get to use your memories and some touchstones (like people, movies, photos and music) and travel back to a magic place where you were a kid or a newlywed or a happy parent but definitely in the older world where everything was familiar and you were at the center of the universe.
So, you might be watching an old movie and suddenly a bus is moving down a street and it triggers memories when you were living there and were on an identical bus and you think of a day when you took a bus ride that was involved in an important event in your life. Or you hear a song that you remember hearing when you were on the beach with your best girl. Or you go to a classic car show and see a car that you owned or was owned by a friend. And the memories come flooding back and you’re walking around in 1969 or 1987. And your older relatives are still alive and none of your friends have moved far away and everybody you care about is a short ride away.
Sure, it’s a bit of an escape. And it doesn’t solve any of the problems you have in the here and now. The country is still overrun with illegal aliens and gasoline is almost $5 a gallon and your bones are really creaky but for a few minutes or an hour you’re living in the happiest place on Earth; your youth. Now, you can’t over do it. If you spend all day every day in the past, you’ll lose the ability to cope with the present. And you won’t be any use to people who think of now as the center of the universe. So, I plan to use it sparingly and save it for special occasions where I can share it with the other survivors from the golden age. Just something I thought of.
In painting as in eloquence, the greater your strength, the quieter your manner.
John Ruskin
I’ve long been an avid photographer and have, on a number of occasions, been paid for my work. My actual profession is (was) Civil Engineer and Project Management in the construction industry.
I have 2 cameras for different functions, a smaller, lighter and cheaper “carry around” camera to have with me for targets of opportunity and a larger, heavier and more expensive camera that I use for shoots and studio work. The specific cameras that I use have changed over the years but have followed that format. Currently, the small/light/less expensive roll is covered with a Sony A6600 which retails for in the $1600 range without lens though you could get a good used one for a little more than half that. The larger camera is currently a Sony A7RV, which are retailing in the $3300 range without lenses. Notice both are Sony. Because of the cost of the lenses which will only fit that brand camera, once you start with a brand (Sony, Nikon, Canon, Fuji, Fuji, etc.), you tend to stay with it. No way on earth am I gonna start over on a lens collection, which cumulatively over time can represent far more money than the bodies, if you’re a fanatic. Most normal people can buy one good multipurpose lens and live happily ever after.
I’ve notice that I shoot as many of my favorite shots with the A6600 as with the A7R5 and really haven’t noticed much in the way of quality differences between the two, so I decided to do a test. Shoot the same object with both cameras while eliminating or adjusting for as many of the variables as possible. Then taking the images to do a side by side to see the actual differences between the camera images.
Below is a picture of the two cameras side by side wearing typical lenses.
Here’s how I set it up:
All shots were taken from a tripod
I put the subject, an old Rollei camera on a wood tripod in my yard, in the shade.
The same lens was used on both, a 90mm f2.8 Sony branded macro.
ISO was set to 400. I should have set it to 100 but———
The shots were manual mode 5 sec timer to eliminate camera shake, f5.6, 1/100th sec
Focus was center
For technical reasons, the effective magnification of any given lens is different depending on the sensor size of the camera. To keep the included image the same, I had to move the tripod to equalize a 1:1.5 magnification difference. The shooting distance was 9’ for the A6600 and 6’ for the A7RV.
There were no post production modifications, the images were straight out of the camera as RAW files.
The original images are far too large (24 meg and 70 meg respectively) to put on the net so these images have been changed to jpegs at a more usable file size. But still with no modifications.
Results
The images are below, with the top being from the A6600 and the bottom the A7R5.
Looking at image quality, there is very little detectable difference. There is a slight difference in white balance and color saturation but I easily and commonly alter any of those attributes in a few seconds with Photoshop. The bokeh is slightly different mostly because ASP-C cameras all have a slightly greater depth of field than full frame. That’s due to optical physics, not camera quality. Usually, you have to shoot an ASP-C camera 1 stop lower to match full frame bokeh.
Looking at image resolution (sharpness), below is a side-by-side isolation of the camera face. Just above the top lens is printed “Made in Germany” in small (less than 1/16’’) print. In addition, there is the company logo on the bottom lens with the line thickness in the 1/100” range. If I was required to choose a clear winner, I would have to bore in to the point that the test would have no relevance to what most of us do. Astronomers, perhaps.
The image from the A6600 is on the left and A7Rv on the right
Conclusion:
I really don’t see any substantial differences in image quality I have no doubt that the differences are there but only at levels that would make it moot for the great majority of people. My self too, probably though some of my studio work pushes it hard enough that I’ll keep the full frame.
If you and a friend go on a shoot armed with one of these cameras, given close to equal skill levels, who ever has the best lens is going to get the best images.
Here’s a parallel: For a number of years in my native Atlanta, my profession commonly had me evaluating old abandoned buildings in the downtown area. I was usually by myself and there was almost always lots of evidence of “tenants”. I’m ex-Marine and life time competitive shooter in several different disciplines, so I commonly carried a weapon. When anyone asked my for my recommendation on the best carry pistol, I would reply, “The one you’re most likely to have with you.” That works in cameras too.
Given the marginal differences in image quality between the two formats coupled with the anything but marginal differences in camera weight, size, camera costs, lens cost, & camera portability, it’s hard not to conclude the ASP-C format is superior for 90% of the population. There are advantages to full frame, making large prints for example. A full frame camera will usually be better at low light, high ISO situations such as indoor sports, concerts, night time street photography, some wedding shots, etc. I’ve gotten some indoor shots at an ISO of 12,000 that look fine right out of the camera. An APS-C would be close (at least) to useless at that ISO.
This is based on Sony because that’s what I have but you can get equivalent models with equivalent performance at equivalent price from any of the major camera makers. I also recommend exploring the used markets. Skip Ebay though and look at major camera dealers like B&H or Adorama. Cameras these days are engineered to make it well past 100,000 snaps. An average photographer shoots, what, 1000/year?
Cell phones? Cell phones make decent snapshots but if you want a photograph— Also, cell phones do fairly well as long as the conditions are ideal but the images degrade rapidly otherwise. Then, there is no adjustability. Say, you’re shooting photos of mostly still subjects and everything is fine but later you want to shoot something moving, maybe rapidly. You’re SOL. Cell low light capability truly sucks.
Better a cell than nothing but if you aspire to more.
Below is a sample of one of my high rez product photos taken with a full frame. This is one of a series on Mexican coins taken for a online dealer.
TomD
