Julian

President Trump recently told us that it was okay for Iran to attack America. I think his point was that he wanted Iran to teach us a lesson.

"Let them take out San Diego," he said on television.  I suppose a nuclear attack would include sinking the 50 ships of the Pacific Fleet stationed in San Diego harbor. 

I disagree with Trump. East of San Diego sits the town of Julian.  I do not want the town nuked. 

Julian is more than 4,000 feet up in the mountains, where it is cold enough to grow apples. The town is small, fewer than 2,000 people, but it's the place to go if you want a nice drive and some fresh apple pie. The town is mostly locals baking apple pies, and the pie is really good. Or it was when I visited 60 years ago.  

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Sorters

For 15 years Susan and I lived in Healdsburg, a town of 12,000 people about  75 automotive minutes north of San Francisco. As a visiting Italian once told me, "Healdsburg is a very rich town." It's a center of the American fine wine industry and a destination for foreign drinkers. 

An old train line is being repaired, and soon  people from Oakland will be able to ride in public transportation to wine country. 

The pressing local question is where should the town open its train depot? The choice is between a location at the town square with its hotels, restaurants and shops or a location six blocks away. The city council recently voted 4-1 in favor of a site six blocks away. Arriving passengers will walk six blocks in the blazing sun to reach a water fountain. 

If you are rich,  you can ride by in a limo.

I recently asked a transportation expert if there were good reasons to vote for a passenger depot six blocks away from the action. He said, "No." 

If there are no good reasons, there must be bad reasons. 

Can a train station be used as a kind of sorting device? 

Mentor

I started college teaching at Empire State, then a sparkling new branch of SUNY.  We had to invent or modify our own programs. 

In 1973 we helped pioneer individualized programs and we granted credits for life learning. In a few years we jumped into computers and distance learning etc. 

Faculty members had the usual titles on the unseen payroll: full professor, associate professor, etc. But officially we were called mentors.  I tried to get mentors switched to oracles, but the administration would not even give us sages.

Which side am I on?

In California we get to vote on a proposition to tax billionaires. My belief is that billionaires should be stripped of their money, treated for advanced avarice and put to useful work. 

But I don't consider the California proposition sound. I want greed handled by raising taxes nationwide, back to the level they were when Eisenhower was inventing Camp David. 

I had planned to vote no on the California proposition.Then I saw a vote-no ad on television. A cascade of ugly lies, of course. 

Which side am I on, boys? Which side am I on?

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second chance

Should we give J. D. Vance another chance? He's asked for one.  Is he eligible?

Martha Stewart rebounded from a prison sentence. Michael Vick returned to professional football after strangling a dog. Donald Trump was elected president after a failed attempt to learn the flute. (The failure came when he was very young, when his lips were less prehensile.) 

In 1932 F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote, "There are no second acts in American lives." But that was 94 years ago, when American lives were shorter. 

Gods

 

Our newspaper recently printed a letter by a Christion reader who praised Charlie Kirk. In the letter the reader wrote: “There is one God, and we are not him."

The writer meant well but overlooked the 14 different gods mentioned in the Old Testament, ranging from Baal to Molech to Marduk. Then there are heavenly beings, lower ranking gods like Michael, Gabriel, Satan, and the angel of destruction (Psalm 78). 

To that we could add more minor gods like the Heavenly Host, Cherubim, Seraphim, etc.This rich tradition includes El, the Canaanite deity who sent the war god YHWH to protect the Hebrews. Hence, “Isra-el.”

As Psalm 82 states, “God stands in the divine assembly; he judges among the gods.”

Idiots

I sometimes wonder why voters elect mentally ill idiots to public office. One theory is that voters prefer rich candidates who are always certain they are right. That's leadership. 

You are thinking of Sen. Fetterman, aren't you?

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Where We Are

This is what I think. 

Trump is incompetent. The people working for him are stupid. He's going to cheat in the election and still lose. Like most morons, Trump has left things until it is too late. 

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Travel

 

Fear of ICE has contributed to a slump in Europeans visiting the United States. Visitors from Germany, for instance, are down 12% from last year. 

Widely reported cases of Europeans with good documents being seized, detained and deported have led vacationers to choose more welcoming places to spend their money.