Life Is Very Short and There’s No Time…
Life is very short, and there's no time
For fussing and fighting, my friend.
I have always thought that it's a crime,
So I will ask you once again.
"We Can Work It Out” Lennon & McCartney
Out here in the far West, people are running into the ocean to escape the flames from the wildfires devouring Maui. Speaking of the ocean itself, the water is getting a lot hotter here in Northern California. And Arizona? Forget about it. It burned up weeks ago.
And that's the weather report from here. How's YOUR neck of the woods this extremely hot summer?
Meanwhile, as the world burns, President Joe Biden is escalating his feud with the two powerful nations which could make the biggest difference in a global climate alliance: China and Russia. Brilliant, visionary leadership.
But we have bigger fish to fry these days.
We're busy prosecuting Trump for his crimes. The only problem with this strategy is that Trump's multiple indictments -- including the last big one, for trying to steal the 2020 presidential election -- is just making Trump MORE popular with Republican voters, who think he's being politically persecuted. (Read the lead editorial in today's NYT by Harvard law professor and Hoover Institution fellow -- but anti-Trumper -- Jack Goldsmith, "The Prosecution of Trump May Have Terrible Consequences.")
Then there's the Biden problem. If you're a worried Democrat like me, the president is doddering and old and pro-war and a weak reelection candidate. He could very well hand over the White House next year... to Donald Trump!
But no Democratic office-holder has the guts to break party ranks and challenge Biden in the primaries. The "leaders" of the party are cowardly careerists.
Only Bobby Kennedy Jr. has the necessary courage. And it takes courage to go up against the venomous DNC and the corporate powers behind it. President Biden will not even order the Secret Service to protect RFK Jr. -- despite what happened to his father when he ran in 1968. Even Bobby-haters can question the wisdom and compassion of THAT decision.
And so, as humanity torches itself this summer, we find myriad things to argue about -- none of them related to the rapidly escalating climate crisis.
But don't worry -- Big Tech will save us. Won't it? Oh, that's right, the tech industry is now enamored with AI, which uses HUGE amounts of energy, and driverless cars.
Robot cars have flooded the streets of San Francisco, and some city officials and activists have cried "halt" to Google and GM's plans for the human-less vehicles to start taking passengers. It seems the taxi industry, firefighters, public transit advocates and concerned citizens are fretting about unemployment, traffic congestion, emergency mishaps and vehicular manslaughter.
Oh, well, there is always resistance to technological progress. Or as impatient Big Tech investor Garry Tan announced on YouTube, the city officials standing in the way of automated cars are "ideologically driven" and "hate technologies."
Try to see it HIS way. True, AI and driverless cars will put millions out of work and worsen the climate meltdown. But, hey, people like him will make a killing!
I tried to make my post today fun and upbeat. I watched The Last Waltz yesterday evening in honor of Robbie Robertson. I once sat next to his entourage in a seaside cafe in Italy, after they came ashore from their docked yacht. He was with Barry Diller and Diane von Furstenberg. They seemed to be having fun -- who wouldn't that moonlit night in Portofino? And he looked, at age 72, fabulous.
Robbie Robertson in The Last Waltz