Not getting drunk or giving up

Here is a random selection of headlines from the New York Times on Tuesday, May 12, 2026.  Nothing special about that day–I just picked a paper at random.  

A.I. Push and Layoffs at Meta Pile Misery on Its Work Force (p. 1)

Trump Fumes at Iran Offer, Stoking Global Economic Fears (p. 10)

Conservative Group’s Links at State Dept. Raise Alarms (p. 14)

F.D.A. Moves to Allow Sale of Flavored Vapes (p. 15)

Scientists Press Congress on Trump’s Dismissal of a National Science Foundation Board (p. 15)

Cost to Fix Iconic Pool Increases Sevenfold (p. 18)

Land Conservation Rule Faces Repeal (p. 20)

Losing Science at a Federal Agency [That one is about the E.P.A. losing experts involved with wildfires, drinking water, and fertility, among other subjects.] (p. D1) 

I know we are supposed to be patient with people who voted for Trump.  I know that they were angry at Biden for failure to act on the border, for inflation, for a sense that things were out of control.  But damn it, we already had the example of four years of a Trump administration.  We already had four years of election denial.  We already had an attack on the Capitol.  We had a blueprint entitled Project 2025 which laid out the plans now being implemented.  

We are in a stupid war.  We are losing power to China.  We are trashing our environment.  We are emphasizing fossil fuels.  We are wrecking our alliances.  We are causing the deaths of Cuban children.  We are imprisoning and deporting people who were helping to build our country.  We have a President who calls his predecessors “treasonous.”  

I am so tired of this.  I am so tired of approximately four out of ten Americans continuing to support this crook and his enablers.  I am tired of ICE and Fetterman and the Supreme Court and the Republican Congress and Nick Fuentes and Marco Rubio and Kash Patel and Peter Hegseth and Elon Musk.

And no, I am not planning to get drunk or give up.  I am in this for the long haul.  I am hoping you are as well.

A Louisiana resident speaks on gerrymandering

My friend Bill sent me a Youtube link to a speech by a Louisiana resident on the redistricting in that state.  The testimony lasts under three minutes.  I recommend it.

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/P58otkVgZ2U 

A rumination on modern times and A.I.

I am not doing well in today’s world.  I go into a drugstore in Allentown today to buy some Vitamin B-12, and when I go to the check out, it appears that all the customers are checking and bagging their own items, paying by credit card.  I finally locate a cash register with a real live checker who takes cash.

Then I stop in at Menchies (I think that is the name–it is a soft ice cream establishment).  I have been there enough times that I got a discount by giving my phone number.  That no longer works.  You need an App on your cell phone.  But I don’t have a cell phone.  When I got out my wallet, the young clerk seemed to sneer–“Oh, you are paying cash?”

I recommend an article entitled “A.I. Is Too Good at Teaching Us to Do Things” by Carl Benedikt Frey, an economist at the University of Oxford.  Dr. Frey notes that increasingly we are expected to ,perform our own tasks.  A.I. is taking jobs away from people who once made plane reservations, collected turnpike tolls, traded stocks, managed our bank accounts, kept our medical records.  We are now expected to repair our own computers and printers.  If we can’t figure it out, there is probably a YouTube video.

Frey notes that when a company shifts work to the consumer, a paid job has disappeared.  The work is still performed, but we perform it.  Labor productivity is improved and corporate profits are increased, but you are doing the work–without pay.  And you probably aren’t doing it very well.

Christian Bartulovich

The 122nd PA House district (all of Carbon County) has been represented by Republican Doyle Heffley since 2010, about 16 years too long.  The district is MAGA country, although the Dems have been making some inroads recently. 

This year no Democratic candidate gathered enough signatures to run against Rep. Heffley.  Heffley then sent out a mailer asking Democrats to write in his name to ensure he would be running in both parties, just like elections in Russia.

Democrats are countering this ploy by running their own write-in campaign for Christian Bartulovich, a Penn Forest Township Supervisor.  Penn Forest is the largest municipality in Carbon County.  The interesting thing is that Bartulovich is a registered Republican.  

He is, however, intelligent, engaged, concerned about data centers and what they do the the environment, a real environmentalist, and willing to listen.  Tonight he was invited to speak to the Palmerton Area Democratic Club.  The questions were pointed, but I believe Bartulovich handled himself well.  I’m reasonably sure he will get everyone’s write-in who heard him tonight.  I know he got mine–my ballot was mailed in about two weeks ago.

A formation of Canada geese

I have seen Canadian geese flying all my life, but I never saw what I saw today.  Usually they go over in huge Vee shapes, sometimes five or six giant Vees, all honking away.

Today I saw, and I will swear to this in court, four flocks, one after another, and each flock made a number, and it looked to me like they were forming an 8, then a 6, then a 4, and the last flock a 7.  

It was one of the few times I really wished I had a cell phone because I thought to myself, No one is going to believe this.  I just hope some other person witnessed it.  I have no idea why those numbers.

Sometimes they land in our fields, but I think these were probably on the way to Ontario. 

Venezuela as the 51st state

Today I was prescribed a steroid and an antibiotic, and I m feeling just a bit queasy.  So I’m not going to pontificate at length about Trump's proposal to make Venezuela our 51st state.  I do approve, however.  I think the incoming Representatives and Senators are likely to be Democrats.   

A Warning for Republicans

The gerrymanders just instituted are based on past performance.  Red congressional districts will now have additional voters who have no connection with the incumbents.  Voters have changed as well.  In 2024 Mexican-American voters in the Rio Grande valley went for Trump.  In 2026, I’m guessing not so much.  Same for younger voters.  

Remember that quite a few special elections in the last year and a half have ended with Democratic victories in conservative areas.  You might just be in for a shock.