All Things Considered, Considered

photog Current Events, Trump , , ,

Donald Trump has changed America.  Mr. Trump didn’t shift the Overton Window.  He put a brick through it.  His take on what’s wrong with America isn’t shocking anymore because his view has become the mainstream opinion.

So, all of that is true.  But has he changed America?  Well, yes.  On this and that he’s made changes and they are changes for the better.  His immigration policy and the results he’s getting on deportation are important.  His birthright citizenship fight is historic and if it succeeds it will change the dynamics of immigration into this country.

But how will I gauge whether Donald Trump’s second term is a success or failure?  For me success is permanently defunding PBS and NPR.  That’s the whole thing in a nutshell.  That is the litmus test.  I want David Brooks and Jonathan Capehart laid off by PBS due to lack of funding.  I want to see them on YouTube or Patreon making silly noises whenever someone pledges ten dollars for a super chat or whatever it’s called.  I want Big Bird and Elmo forced to go back to being waiters in the NYC theater district and I want that woman who runs NPR and testified before Congress that there was no bias on her watch, fired and forced to start an Only Fans channel.  Let’s face it.  As long as all of us are still paying for these people to insult and slander us on the public airwaves, we are not winning anything.  We’re just losing less.

Now don’t get me wrong.  I don’t need NPR or PBS to cease to exist.  I absolutely want leftists to have their own echo chambers.  This is a free country (theoretically) and if they want to buy tote bags and overpriced wine from their favorite fake journalists at “All Things Considered” or the “PBS New Hour” then let them go ahead and knock themselves out.  By all means do so.  But let them pay for the damn thing themselves.  They’re always saying how public funding is only like 15% of their total funding.  If that’s the case then they won’t miss our money at all.

But everyone knows that’s not the case.  If they suddenly had to get along without the federal government they would be broke.  Brooks and Capehart wouldn’t be able to afford their bow ties and spats.  And there wouldn’t be any money to fund their hard-hitting exposes on the health benefits of attending drag queen story hour in the Tenderloin.

So that’s it.  Trump can announce that he’s winning so much that people are getting tired of winning but as long as NPR still has journalism hacks in hushed tones declaring the body count from the break up of USAID then I won’t declare him the winner.  He’s just losing slightly less hard.

But I haven’t given up hope.  There’s still a window of opportunity for the bill that defunds these stations to be passed in the Senate.  Sometime in August that bill will expire and our last best chance to kill Sesame Street and fake news will end.  So come on Donald from one kid from the Outer Boroughs to another put your shoulder behind this thing and make us both winners.

Tom’s World – 05JUL2025 – Subject Isolation – Part 2

photog Guest Contributors, Photography, TomD , ,

Tom | Flickr

TomD

Need a method of picking a subject and isolating it. You can do that with depth of field, lighting or post processing methods.

Picking a subject and isolating it.

DSC7394
DSC7394

Isolating the subject. This is post processing using Photoshop. Sorta like cheating.

BTW: This Dauntless dive bomber is the last existing aircraft to have actually taken part in the Battle of Midway.

DSC03221m
DSC03221m

Isolating a subject. This museum, the US Naval Air Museum onboard NAS Pensacola, is so crowded as to make it extremely hard to come up with an effective photo due to all the visual competition.

DSC00744m
DSC00744m

On Patriotism

photog Current Events ,

All week long I’ve been seeing polls on patriotism.  Apparently, the Millennials and Gen Z aren’t patriotic.  Okay.  But why would they be?  Patriotism implies pride in a nation.  But we aren’t a nation.  We’re at least two nations, probably more.  Maybe these younger people are proud of people like them whom they feel are good people who believe in the right things.  And in fact, for many of them the right thing is globalism.  So, the “nation” they believe in isn’t a nation at all.  It’s the borderless “family of humanity.”  Instead of pride in the history and people of this “nation” they are deeply disturbed by the Europeans who settled and built America.  All they see is theft from the indigenous people and the enslavement of the Africans.

So where does that leave the rest of us?  Well obviously, we have no solidarity with people who despise us.  They aren’t our countrymen because they feel no allegiance to this nation.  Their allegiance is to a future in which the memory of this country’s birth and rise are eliminated and anyone who shows up here is just as much an American as people whose families built it.  What we have is the story of America as a legacy for us and our children, at least the children who aren’t in the globalist camp.  We need to pass along the legacy and the understanding of what a remarkable accomplishment the European settlers achieved.  They took a wilderness and turned it into a magnificent patchwork of farmlands and cities and industrial might and communities of strong intelligent people who invented amazing things that had never been seen before in the history of the world.  And made their home the envy of the old world.

Right now, patriotism isn’t something that most people associate with 21st century America.  Maybe it will be necessary for a separation between those who love this country and those who are ashamed of its history.  Maybe we must split into two separate nations before there can be a patriotic rebirth in the United States.  If that happens, I think it would more quickly solve our problems.  It doesn’t appear as if any other ending will provide a solution to the division that has grown up within our ranks.  We no longer believe in the same things.  We no longer are the same people.  We are moving in two opposite directions.  It would only make sense for us to live in separate countries.

Maybe the current battles over deportation of illegal immigrants will inspire California to decide on secession.  It would require a constitutional amendment and possibly more.  But if they were willing, I think the rest of the country would go along gladly.  Who knows?  Maybe the rest of the west coast and the Northeast would join with them.  And Canada could act as a northern link between the coasts and maybe a few other states like Illinois and Minnesota could join them.  It could really work.  They’d be rid of us and we’d be much happier without them.  And then both new entities would be free to come up with their own version of patriotism.  And boy would they differ.

Happy Fourth of July 2025

photog Current Events, Life in Dunwich, OCF, photog's Corner , ,

I learned a lesson about planning.  It should be associated with thinking.  I had an auto maintenance appointment that I wanted to get done before last week’s big trip.  But because I’ve been distracted by unfortunate circumstances, I couldn’t get an appointment on time (bad photog!).  I said, “Well give me the appointment next week.”  So, I pick the day before the Fourth of July!  Well, you know what’s hard to get to work on the day before a long holiday weekend?  Auto-mechanics!  A one-hour maintenance job keeps me waiting there for four hours.  The sad part is I could watch all the lined-up cars sitting there for three hours and then they were all done in the last hour.  A nine o’clock appointment for a mechanic who’s showing up at noon is kind of a sad situation.  Of course, some people started flipping out at eleven thirty and by 1 pm they were demanding the site manager be summoned for the maintenance clerk’s summary execution.  Of course, the site manager was on vacation until next Tuesday but it was a noble sentiment.

Being old I realized my own culpability in the whole idea of scheduling something involving waiting for the day before a major holiday.  I tried to do some on-line stuff over their customer wi-fi network.  But I got bored so instead I watched the people.  It had a certain entertainment value.  I guess the thought that I had was there are definitely two kinds of people.  The kind you would want in a lifeboat and the kind who will get thrown overboard.

Later on, we had one of those thunderstorm/hail storm/minor tornado/mini-monsoon downpour thingies here today.  It had been very hot and muggy and just walking around the yard was a major effort.  Then all hell breaks loose, the power goes off, the dogs go insane and suddenly the air is twenty degrees cooler.  And we’re watching from the window and saying isn’t it great to watch this from inside?  And it was.  The trees were whipping around and the sky was full of water and ice and the clouds were moving fast.  And then in fifteen minutes the sun was out again.  Well, no trees came down and the dogs calmed down so I went for a walk.  The air was sweet and there was a strong breeze.  Just an interesting kaleidoscope of weather.

And now we have the Fourth coming up.  Sitting in the service station watching their television I saw a news item about how some of the more progressive towns and cities were replacing their fireworks shows with a swarm of drones forming shapes in the air and changing colors.  It looked so incredibly lame and so sad I just shook my head.  The newscaster went out of his way to say how much more environmentally friendly and carbon neutral the lame drone show was than a fireworks display.  And I thought, this encapsulates the difference between people who enjoy life and people who do what they’re told is good for them.  These are the same people driving Priuses and getting their fiftieth COVID booster shot.

Well Happy Fourth of July.