The last word

I've said it before and will say it again, the blog gods and goddesses always mandate what actually happens on the blog. In the last posting, near the very end, a vertical column has appeared, never posted there like that. Erasing it and doing it over several times did not help, as that particular section of tex still persisted as a column. I then decided to give up, since the deities apparently wanted a column. So OK, it will remain a column. Yes, dear gods and goddesses, you always have the last word. 

Last evening, when my son was working late, I decided to let the dog out. But when I looked for her in my son's room, where she usually stays, I didn't see her. The window was open, but is screened, so she couldn't have jumped out. I started to panic, wondering where she was. After I called her name repeatedly, she slowly emerged from under the bed to my immense relief. I let her outside, where she ran around, ate some grass, then dashed toward the road, so I called her back. Finally, she did her business, so I was able to let her back inside and gave her a treat. I've owned dogs my whole life, once even a black lab that gave birth to 8 thoroughobred puppies, back when I was much younger, more energetic, and a working single mother of 4. Now at age 87, I find taking care of just one dog to be a challenge.

Here is Willow sitting next to me in the car.

 

I really didn't want to focus again on Mr. Trump, but that man has a way of inserting himself into every news cycle. Maybe we just have to endure him until he leaves office or departs this mortal coil. I hope to live to see the day when he is no longer president.  

Wash. Post, Trump to take over D.C. police, deploy National Guard

President Trump said that he was temporarily taking control of the Washington, D.C. police department and deploying 800 National Guard troops to the city, painting a dystopian picture of the nation’s capital that stood in sharp contrast to official figures showing violent crime in the city is at a 30-year low.
After Mr. Trump’s claims that the city was overrun by “bloodthirsty criminals” and “roving mobs of wild youth,” Mayor Muriel Bowser struck a diplomatic tone that acknowledged the president’s authority to enact a 30-day takeover of the city’s police. But she disputed his rationale and his depictions of life in the city, calling his actions “unsettling and unprecedented.” 

Wash. Post, Budget office says GOP’s ‘big, beautiful bill’ will make rich richer, poor poorer

Wash. Post, New chatbot on Trump’s Truth Social platform keeps contradicting him 

Chatbot apparently knows that Trump is dishonest and a blatant liar. 

 Self-driving cars are coming to DC, but who is responsible if one is involved in an accident? 

     

Wash. Post, Palestinians mourn Al Jazeera journalist Anas al-Sharif, crew in Gaza

This certainly seems like a war crime. 

     

Wash. Post, Australia to recognize a Palestinian state, joining France, Canada and U.K.

Trump has said that he will “probably not” try to run for a third term. Thank goodness for that!  Maybe he is getting tired of being president, which must be somewhat stressful. Ever since Musk moved on, Trump seems less anxous to fire federal employees, so on behalf of my own family in the federal workforce, I am feeling somewhat relieved. 

Trump says Qatari jet could be ready for use as Air Force One in 6 months. Experts are deeply skeptical

Trump really wants that Qatari jet. 

Maybe he wants to keep it for himself after he leaves office? 

The Hill, Bolton says Trump ‘wants a Nobel Peace Prize more than anything else’

Maybe Trump wants that Peace prize even more than the Qatari jet? Former national security adviser John Bolton, a vocal critic, said the president “wants the Nobel Peace Prize more than anything else.” Bolton said leaders like Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu have discovered that “the way to his heart is to offer to nominate him." If  Donald Trump should actually be awarded that prize, it will become virtually worthless. 

Wash.Post, Trump is only US president to never have enjoyed majority support

Gallup, “Trump remains the only elected president with sub-50% initial approval ratings." 

President Trump has never once enjoyed majority support in this country. He lost the popular vote in 2016, and since then, his approval has never once cracked 50 percent.

Even though Donald Trump is the only US president to never have garnered majority voter and citizen support, he desperately wants to project the image of being a popular president. Even James Buchanan and Ulysses S. Grant, not really very popular presidents nor given high marks by the history books, actually enjoyed majority support for brief periods. 

Donald Trump is alone as a president who never has been shown to have ever won 50% of voter support, even briefly. Most Americans have never supported him. In fact, probably a majority have opposed him. Yet flukes in our electoral system have still awarded him the presidency twice. Trump is unlikely to ever become popular with a majority of American voters and he is never going to go down in history as a great president. He may even be remembered as our worst president ever.  

The Hill: DC attorney general: Trump actions ‘unprecedented, unnecessary, and unlawful

Washington, D.C,: Attorney General Brian Schwalb (D) denounced the Trump administration’s move to federalize the city’s police force as “unprecedented, unnecessary, and unlawful.” Schwalb said Monday in a post on social platform X, after President Trump’s announcement in the morning, that no “crime emergency” exists in the District, that violent crime reached a 30-year low last year and is currently 26 percent lower this year than at this same point last year. 

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On a more positive note, I'll share a message now from a former Peace Corps volunteer, who retired to Honduras after his volunteer service there. He has just introduced recycling to his community. The letter L stands for Lempira, the local currency. 

Searching just now on the internet, I see that one dollar equals 26 Lempiras, so do the math. However, I must note that this recycling system works in large part because my friend is a retired American and the recycling plant is also owned by an American. I'm not sure it would have gone so smoothly in Honduran hands as the mentality is different. I'm not sure quite how to explain it. 

My retired American friend just sent this message:

I have been recycling for my community for 3 years now and have been able to give my local Catholic Church plenty of money gained by recycling. My neighbors leave plastic bottles, aluminum cans, glass bottles, scrap metal at my house or in neighborhood recycling bins (4) and I go door to door as well. 

I process, sort, and bag it in very large sacks. Once a month, a worker from the recycling plant comes to my house and delivers the materials to the plant (owned by a gringo). They weigh the materials and pay me the price based on that day's rate for the materials. I in turn give all the money raised to the church I attend in my neighborhood. Generally we raise L4,000 monthly. Believe it or not we have installed a solar electric system in the church with the funds.

Here's what I found on Google about Latin American culture, showing why successful recycling in that community may depend on gringo involvement. Recycling had never happened there before.

• Extreme Inequality: Latin America remains the most unequal region globally, with a significant concentration of wealth in the hands of a small elite.
• Limited Social Mobility: Low educational and occupational mobility contributes to income disparities persisting across generations.
• "Luck" and predestination: There's a cultural notion that becoming wealthy can be attributed to luck or serendipitous events.