9/16/24

 Monday, September 16, 2024

1920 The "Wall Street bombing" occurred at 12:01 when a horse-drawn wagon exploded on Wall Street, New York, killing 38 and injuring 143

1987 Pope John Paul II ends his Los Angeles tour with an interfaith meeting at Dodger Stadium with leaders of Judaism, Islam, Buddhism, and Hinduism

In bed at 9 after dozing from about 8, awake by 3, and up by 3:30.  Sarah left a few minutes before 6 a.m., and I let Lilly out at 6.

A drawing I did two years ago this time.

Prednisone, day 125, 7.5 mg., day 4.   Prednisone around 6.  All Bran and berries around 7.  Morning meds at 7:30. 

Another assassination attempt on Trump, according to the FBI, this time on his golf course in West Palm Beach.  Another nut case with delusions of grandeur.  House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) said he and his wife spent “a few hours” with Trump at Mar-a-Lago after the shooting. Johnson wrote on social media that he and his wife “are thanking God for protecting [Trump] today — once again,” and said, “No leader in American history has endured more attacks and remained so strong and resilient. He is unstoppable.”  I'm afraid that he and Oriana Fallaci may be right: "No matter what system you live under, there is no escaping the law that it's always the strongest, the cruelest, the least generous who win."  To paraphrase Marx and Engels: There is a specter haunting America, the specter of assassinations and gun violence.

Cold Turkey reprieve.  I turned on CNN when I heard the news that there had been another assassination attempt on Trump.  I will probably also check in on Rachel Maddow's program tonight to see what she may have to say about the apparent second attempted assassination of Trump.

I drove Geri to CSMO for some tests in advance of her appointment on Thursday with Dr. Baugrud, saving her from the long uphill walk from the parking lot to the hospital entrance with her still-painful knee recovering from its second surgery.  We stopped at MetroMarket where she picked up some flowers to give to E. on her 10th birthday.

Budiac plumbing is here today, dealing with the blockage in my shower drain.  It's taking quite a bit of time, much moving between my bathroom and the basement.  Big bill coming . . . $302.50.  We ought to have the galvanized steel drain pipes replaced by PCV pipes, at an estimated cost of  $700 - $800.  We also need to have the two driveways repaved at a cost of many thousands and the dying tall pine tree on the corner of the lot taken down, also several thousand dollars.

The New Yorker report on American war crimes coverup.  I did an internet search to discover mainsteam media coverage of the report.  The only coverage I found was on Tolnews.com, a news source in Afghanistan.

Running out of steam>  I've been losing interest in continuing this journal.  Is this temporary or am I truly out of steam?  Mental dullness, lethargy.

Anniversaries thoughts.  From On This Day: "On September 16, 1920, at exactly 12:01pm, a bomb carried in a horse carriage - approximately 100 pounds (45kg) of dynamite - exploded outside the J.P. Morgan building at 23 Wall Street. The bomb killed 30 people instantly and a further 8 died of their injuries later on.  The driver of the wagon managed to escape, and this greatly complicated efforts to find the perpetrators. Investigators initially thought it might have been an accident, given the lack of a specific target, and given that most of the dead were young people working jobs such as messengers and stenographers.  The FBI was never able to decisively say who carried out the bombing. Today, historians and investigators believe it was the work of anarchists, who had been responsible for a series of attacks across America in 1919. that.

JPII and the other poobahs met for a big interfaith confab.  I have to wonder if any of them, in TSJ's memorable question to me put it, "really believe that shit."  Or perhaps more accurately, how precisely they believe that shit, literally or poetically, metaphorically.  Those leaders were all top dogs, ambitious men who presumably sought and obtained their high positions in competition with other ambitious men.  They were all smart and to some extent probably cunning in so managing their lives to arrive at their high leadership positions.  They didn't become religious leaders because of their great piety or holiness, but because of their political skills and perhaps some ruthlessness, like other corporate leaders, many of whom we are told are sociopaths.  Indeed their sociopathy is in large measure how they reached their top-dog status.  Do they really believe that shit?  If so, how do they believe it?