1/27/35

 Monday, January 27, 2025

D+81

1825 US President James Monroe urged Congress to approve the creation of Indian Territory, west of the Mississippi River, for the relocation of Eastern Indian tribes to 'promote their welfare and happiness" 

1945 Soviet troops liberate Auschwitz and Birkenau concentration camps in Poland - now commemorated as International Holocaust Remembrance Day

1973 Paris Peace Accords signed ending America's then-longest war and the draft.

1992 Presidential candidate Bill Clinton & Genifer Flowers accused each other of lying over her assertion they had a 12-year affair

In bed at 10:15, up at 5:50 from a dream of being at a hotel in the Everglades with the Goldbergs and the Lowes, a booking mixup with the room, and an offer to buy swampland.   The temperature outside is 21° but the wind chill is 1° with wind gusts up to 36 mph.  WIND ADVISORY; West winds of 20 to 25 mph with gusts up to 45 mph expected and isolated 50 mph possible.  Geri got up around 6, very miserable from the side effects of pain medications.  She sees the surgeon at 9:15 this morning.

Prednisone, day 283, 5 + 2.5 mg, day 20, Kevlara, day 6/14.  Prednisone at  6:15.  N.B.  The sore right shoulder reappeared this morning.  2.5 mg. prednisone at 5:30 p.m.  Other meds at 6:45 p.m.

CSMO ER.  After Geri's visit with Dr. Graf to have her sutures removed and her condition assessed,  we went directly to the ER because of her continuing problem with abdominal pain.  We were there from 10:30 in the morning until 4:30 in the afternoon, mostly because of an almost 5-hour wait for her CT scan to be read by some radiologists downtown.  I will write some thoughts about this visit later.

My dick is bigger than your dick.  Trump got into a showdown with the president of Colombia over the weekend.  The Colombian refused to allow American military aircraft to land in Bogota with their loads of Colombian deportees.  Civilian passenger aircraft would be allowed, but not military aircraft.  So Trump slapped a 25% tariff on all goods imported from Columbia with the tariff to double to 50% in one week if the prohibition continued.  He also ordered visa sanctions on Colombians in the U.S., "enhanced inspections" of Columbians and Colombian goods entering the U.S., and other sanctions   Columbia at first ordered retaliatory tariffs on U.S. products but soon relented and agreed to permit the landing of U.S. military aircraft loaded with deported Colombians.  Trump claimed a major immigration, deportation, tariff, and foreign policy victory.  

Further thoughts on worldviews.  Yesterday I wrote about the Donald Trump worldview, life as a series of zero-sum games of winners and losers in which the goal is always to be a winner and never a loser, or Beat thy neighbor.  As TSJ used to say, it's also a game in which 'he who dies with the most toys wins.'  There is of course a contrary worldview in which our purpose in life is to love our neighbor, to support him and help him in in his times of need.  It is the worldview of the Good Samaritan and of Matthew 25: 31-46:

“Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. 35 For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, 36 I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’  

The Trumpian worldview is "an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth," retribution and revenge,  “My motto is: Always get even. When somebody screws you, screw them back in spades” and "“Be paranoid. I know this observation doesn’t make any of us sound very good, but let’s face the fact that it’s possible that even your best friend wants to steal your spouse and your money.”

The problem with loving anyone is that love opens one up to hurt, not only from betrayal but also from simple non-reciprocity or from loss. "Love, love changes everything  / Days are longer, words mean more  / Love, love changes everything  / Pain is deeper than before" Trump avoids the risk of loss and pain by loving no one but himself.  He is the man in Simon & Garfunkel's I Am A Rock:  "I am a rock / I am an island. / I’ve built walls / A fortress, steep and mighty / That none may penetrate. / I have no need of friendship / Friendship causes pain / It’s laughter and it’s loving I disdain."

[I had intended to develop these thoughts today.  I started thinking about them and writing the above thoughts before I drove Geri to the orthopedic surgeon's appointment at 9:30.  By the time we got back from the CSMO ER at 5, we were both worn out, too tired to think much or write.  Tomorrow's another day.]