I dump my Paramount stocks

As you probably would guess, I am not a major player in the stock market.  Way back in the 1980s I received a cold call from who I think was a Merrill-Lynch intern asking me if I wanted to buy some stocks.  He recommended something called “Blockbuster.”  I didn’t know what that was, but I thought that was a really cool name, so I bought some shares.  Over the years Blockbuster was sold to another company, which was sold again.  In any case, my few stocks were now part of Paramount, the parent company of CBS.

You know, CBS.  The one that caved and paid off Trump when he sued “60 Minutes” over editing decisions.  The one that cancelled Colbert.  The one that is the definition of “anticipatory obedience.”

So I called Merrill-Lynch and told the representative I no longer wanted to be associated with Paramount, not even to own a few stocks.  Unlike CBS, I do not compromise with evil.  With the money I got from the sale, I invested in something called “Lands End.”  I think they make clothes.  I like the way that sounds.  I don’t know if it has an apostrophe.

(And just so you get the complete picture of my “portfolio,” I also own stock in the New York Times, my go-to source for posting info.  The rest of my savings are in a lard can buried under an apple tree.)

Here's my latest letter to my Congressman, Ryan Mackenzie

Dear Rep. Mackenzie:

I was cleaning out my bookcase when I came across an old elementary school text entitled The First Book of Congress by Harold Coy, c. 1956.  The book explains in simple terms what the House and Senate do.  Obviously some of it is out-of-date, but the basic lesson that Congress is a co-equal branch of government and is in charge of the “purse strings” remains valid.  

Given your votes and those of your Republican colleagues, it is obvious that you do not understand either “checks and balances” or “the separation of powers.”  You and your colleagues in the House and Senate are a co-equal branch of government.  The President does not tell you what to do.

I thought you knew that, but if not, I would be happy to send you the book.  Don’t worry about the cost–even with the ever increasing cost of postage, I will be able to afford the book rate.

Let me know if you would like a copy.

Sincerely,

Roy Christman

 

We don't need no stinkin' energy from windmills

Sen. Josh Hawley said he has a commitment from Energy Secretary Wright to stop a loan guarantee that the Energy Department had previously offered to the company Invenergy.  That company was ready to build an $11 billion transmission line from Kansas windmills to Indiana and Illinois.  The line would cross Missouri.  The governor of Missouri and Missouri senator Josh Hawley want it killed.

Trump is all in on this, since he doesn’t like electrical power generated by windmills.

It is difficult to believe how stupid and short-sighted these guys are.  By the way, one of the reasons they say they opposed the transmission line was because it could use eminent domain for the right-of-way.  They have no problem with using eminent domain for fracking gas pipelines, however.

I speak from experience on that one.

Some of the information for this post is from David Gelles, “Hawley Gets Trump’s Help in Bid To Quash the Grain Belt Express, New York Times, (19 July 2025), p. A10. 

Nixon Redux

One of the advantages of being old is that you remember stuff.  After we discovered that Nixon had taped conversations in the Oval Office, Nixon said, in effect, The tapes prove I am innocent, but you can’t hear them.  Of course, we all knew that if the tapes proved he were innocent, he would have delivered them to the special prosecutor with a Brinks Armored Truck.

Now we get the same story from Trump.  I am innocent, I didn’t do anything wrong, I hardly knew that Epstein guy, but you can’t see the papers even though they would prove this.  

Yeah, right.

At least Nixon didn’t force himself on underage girls.

Lies from the Department of Homeland Security

First, here is what Mayor Bass said about the raids in L.A.:  “These reckless, unlawful raids are fueled by racial profiling that has driven fear in communities, tearing families apart, crushing entire sectors of the economy because people are afraid to go to work and flying in the face of American democratic values.”

That is the absolute truth.  How many white people are caught up in the raids?  How many undocumented Irish in Boston have been picked up?  How many Russians?  This whole raid business is pure racism.

Tricia McLaughlin, an ICE spokeswoman, will now give you the line of bullshit:  “The intensity and pace will continue until we get the terrorists, gang members, murderers, rapists and child abusers off Los Angeles streets.”  

If they  are looking for rapists and child abusers, maybe they should be going after the people mentioned in the Epstein report rather than the guys picking lettuce and hanging drywall.

The quotes from Mayor Bass and the ICE spokeswoman are from Hamed Aleaziz and Orlando Mayorquin, “Arrests of Immigrants Spike in Sweep of Los Angeles Area,” New York Times, (July 12, 2025), p. A 17.

Slow Down: The Degrowth Manifesto

Written by Japanese philosophy professor Kohei Saito, Slow Down has become an international best seller.  The book has been translated into 14 languages.  I have not read it yet, but from the reviews I have seen, it sounds like something we all need to read.

I’ve been thinking about this since the early 1970s, when Gov. Jerry Brown held up a copy of E. F. Schumacher’s book Small is Beautiful and told us to read it.  Schumacher said he didn’t know what would cause society to collapse.  He added, “I do know that a society which seeks fulfillment only in mindless material expansion does not fit into this world for long.  There simply is no place for infinite growth on a finite planet.”

While everyone is excited about AI and all the money that is being invested, very few people seem bothered by the need for “rare earth” materials or the electricity needed to run the machines or the amount of water needed to cool the machinery.  

In the meantime the Trump administration is doing what it can to INCREASE global warming, which it dismisses as a hoax.

Yes, Israel is committing genocide

The word ”genocide” dates to 1944 when a Polish lawyer, Raphael Lemkin, coined the word, combining the Greek word for race or tribe and the Latin suffix “cide,” which means “killing.”  In 1948 the UN adopted a convention to punish the crime of genocide.  

It is important to remember that genocide as defined does not only mean the killing of a particular groups, although that certainly qualifies.  It also means causing serious bodily or mental harm to a group, deliberately inflicting conditions calculated to bring about a group’s physical destruction, imposing sterilization on members of the group, or transferring children from the group to members of another group.

Now Israel is proposing to herd the Palestinians in Gaza to one small section (already a scene of large scale destruction) in the south.  It is also clear that Israeli settlers are doing their best by physical violence and intimidation to drive Palestinian residents out of the West Bank with the connivance of Netanyahu’s government.  Both of those actions clearly fall within the definition of genocide.  

And I probably need to remind everyone–criticizing the actions of Netanyahu’s government does not mean you are anti-Semitic.