02APR2026 – This’N’That

photog Current Events, Trump , , ,

So, Trump gave his war update.  Well, he’s still the king of hyperbole.  Everything is the biggest and the greatest.  All the damage to Iran is total and catastrophic.  And he went through the length of all the wars the US has fought in from WWI on and after mentioning how many years each of these wars lasted, he said that this war has been going for only one month.  And then he said that it will only take another three weeks to finish bombing Iran into the “stone age.”  Hmmm.

I hope he’s right.  I don’t think staying in Iran for more than a few more weeks is going to help us.  The financial damage will start to build up.  And the chances of large-scale casualties keep growing.  At this point if there is no interest on the part of the Iranian population to rise up against their government by armed insurrection then there isn’t a realistic way of ending the current regime that doesn’t involve an American ground invasion.  So, blast all of the targets we can find and then declare victory and step back to our Middle East bases and block Hormuz and let the Iranians and the Chinese do without their money and oil respectively.  In the meantime, the Europeans can buy Venezuelan oil (at an elevated price of course) and do without their cheap Chinese crap for the time being.

I saw that the Supreme Court ruled in favor of the psychiatrist in Colorado who was practicing conversion talk therapy on LGBTQ adolescents versus Colorado’s ban of the procedure.  Now that is interesting.  That’s going to cause a lot of problems in blue states for sure.  Good for the Court.

Now Trump is going to visit the Court during its consideration of whether his executive order banning citizenship to the children of illegal aliens (so-called birthright citizenship) is forbidden by the 14th Amendment to the Constitution.  I wonder if Trump will request to address the court during these procedures or whether he just wants to show solidarity with his legal team defending his executive order.  Reading the news sites they all stress the fact that the initial questions from the Justices seemed extremely skeptical of the administration’s justification for the executive order.  Well, of course the news sites are.  They all lean to the Left and so they exhibit their preference in every way they can.  But I’m not pessimistic about our chances.  It’s pretty easy to see that the 14th Amendment was enacted to handle a very specific class of people, the former slaves and their descendants.  How this would be relevant today is not in any way clear.  Following the obvious intent is simple and if the Justices use logic, they can easily see that this intent does not extend to the children of people breaking the law by illegally entering this country.  Of course, I may be overly hopeful about the courage of some of the Justices but I’m willing to hold onto my optimism until the decision is handed down.

Well, that’s enough for now.

Time to Make the Donuts

photog Book Reviews, Current Events, Life in Dunwich, My Fiction, OCF, photog's Corner, Reviews, Science Fiction / Fantasy, SF&F Book Reviews , ,

So, I’m busy, busy, busy with my giveaway on BookFunnel (here’s the link).  I’m also seeing if I can put part or all of it up on a site called Royal Road.  And I’m posting links on my X feed to try to connect with the wider world.  And if any of you want a free copy or have any friends who might like the story, please pass the link along to them.

Well, in addition to all this I’ve been drafted into a publicity campaign for the Dunwich Republicans.  I’ve got to awaken a “sleeping giant.”  But it’s more like a geriatric midget in a coma.  So even if I can drum up new blood, I’m afraid they’ll just show up, hear there’s work to be done and say, “Looks like you’re doing a great job.  CARRY ON!!!

But one must do the best one can.  As old TR used to remind us it’s “The Man in the Arena” that counts.  Unfortunately, I feel more like the Christian being fed to the lions in that arena.

Well, the weather is just as uncertain as ever with one day being seventy degrees and the next day featuring snow flurries but we’ve definitely turned a corner and the Great Southern Ice Sheet is barely a foot thick and receding rapidly.  All the spring flowers are budding and the turtles are sitting on the dead log in the swamp.  The mallards must be awaiting the hatching of their eggs and even the local pair of hawks seem to be hyperactive, probably getting food for their nest.

Listening to Andy Weir talk to the Critical Drinker about his book “The Martian” was kind of exciting.  I think anyone who writes a book secretly desires to be that guy who hits the jackpot and has the world beat a path to his door.  I mean, I know it’s ridiculously unlikely for a number of reasons for my book to be a big seller.  It’s in a very restricted corner of the marketplace based on politics and demographics and trying to get advertising is like pulling teeth.  But I confess I not-so-secretly dream of the book going viral and selling tons and tons of copies.  I guess when the dust settles, I’ll probably be in a funk for a while but I think it was still a good experience to try my hand at something I’ve wanted to do since I was a teenager.

And I’ll say that I don’t think that writing a good book is beyond my talents.  But self-publishing and self-marketing is not for the faint of heart.  It takes money and a lot of hard work to promote a book in the current marketplace.  And that’s the part I don’t enjoy at all.  Playing cat and mouse with the Amazon algorithm isn’t my idea of a fun occupation.  It’s more like going to the dentist’s office than something associated with creativity.

Ah well.  Whine, whine, whine.  Time to make the donuts.  Onward and upward.  Excelsior!

Tom’s World – 31March2026 – Photo

photog Guest Contributors, Photography, TomD ,

Tom | Flickr

TomD

If you’ve ever been into cameras you’ll notice occasional affinity between a particular camera and lens combo. One such pairing is my #2 camera, a Sony a7IV, a Tamron 70-300 f5.6 zoom. The shots are crystal clear, the colors vibrant and a nice smooth bokeh (the out of focus area). The lens isn’t expensive as things go these days but I consistently get great results.

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Book Funnel Sniper Giveaway

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That’s right get your free pdf copy of “The Sniper.” All that’s needed is to provide your e-mail address and view my harrangue at the end of the book to leave a review on Amazon. What’s fairer than that? Don’t answer that! It’s a rhetorical question as part of my sales pitch.  Let me know if there are any problems with the download.  This is my first attempt to use BookFunnel.

 

Click Here for Link to Sniper Giveaway