On the nights before the days I teach, not only do I set my iPhone alarm, I also set my clock radio. I want to be sure I am up in plenty of time to get myself centered, caffeinated and to gather everything I need for class.
Since I taught today, the clock radio went off, loudly, and the very first thing I heard this morning was “Trump.” Loudly, gratingly, irritatingly… The moment I heard his name I knew he had won big last night and I shuddered, hit the snooze alarm and buried myself underneath my pillow.
Trump did win big last night. On the way to class I purchased copies of the New York Times, The New York Post, The Albany Times Union and our local Register-Star. I broke the class up into four groups, giving each group a copy of the four papers and asked them to judge them against the points that Rex Smith had made about the ethics of journalism.
Not surprisingly, perhaps, the New York Times got the best reviews for objectivity, followed by the Albany Times – Union. One of the students pointed out that in the New York Post, owned by Rupert Murdoch, that all the coverage of the Republicans was in color and had more pages than they gave for the Democrats, whose coverage was all in black and white. Very interesting…
The poor Register Star didn’t really even register. It had almost no coverage of Super Tuesday.
Hillary Clinton won but not as decisively as her supporters would have liked. She battered Bernie but didn’t knock him out. Yesterday did make his march to the nomination more difficult and possibly impossible. Hillary won Massachusetts, which had been expected to go to Bernie.
Mitt Romney, the 2012 Republican candidate, is expected to give a speech shortly about the 2016 race. He has been very hard on Trump in his Twitter feed of late. It will be interesting to hear what he has to say on Thursday. I didn’t much like him as the Republican nominee as it seemed, to me, that he had no center which I had once thought he did. Perhaps now that he is finished with running he will have returned to the center and will say things from his heart.
Ben Carson has signaled he may be ending his candidacy. Ted Cruz is positioning himself as the only one who could possible beat Trump. Rubio won Minnesota, my home state, last night. I think they thought of him as the least of all evils.
Aubrey McClendon, an energy entrepreneur in Oklahoma, died today in a fiery crash while he was speeding down a road. Yesterday, he had been indicted. Today he is dead. It will take two weeks to figure out what really happened. He was fifty-six. He was accused of rigging bids.
Astronaut Scott Kelly returned to earth today after nearly a year in orbit. He has an identical twin brother, also an astronaut, and NASA is attempting to find out just what a year in space does to a person. They are thinking toward Mars. Pretty amazing, don’t you think?
The UN has imposed the severest sanctions on North Korea in twenty years as a result of its continuing to develop nuclear weapons and delivery systems. From what I have observed and certainly I am not a foreign policy expert, it’s the people of North Korea who will suffer and there is no way I can see they will push for a regime change. The pudgy little dictator of North Korea will still find ways to get his delicacies while his people resume eating grass.
The Pentagon has begun using Special Forces to capture IS leaders. They have had one success and aim for more. But the Pentagon doesn’t want to get back into the prisoner business so after questioning, the IS individual will be turned over to the Iraqis.
The evening is coming to a close. The dryer has just buzzed, announcing that the last load of clothes has been finished. The only sound I hear now is the ticking of an old clock that my parents had which one of their parents had. I think of it as the heart of the house, ticking time away, each moment taking us further into the future, which none of us can know.
I have some friends who live down in the Caribbean. I am tempted to ask them what it would take for me to go there should Trump become President.
Letter from the Vineyard 
Letter From New York 03 04 2016 Far from Damascus…
March 4, 2016Chet Baker’s “Jazz in Paris” plays while I am typing, courtesy of Amazon Prime, the service I am learning it is hard to live without. It pays for itself with free shipping around Christmas not to mention being able to find things there I can’t find easily in stores. I mean it seems like everything is there. They have just released a new device, Amazon Tap, that works with their Echo. Have to learn more about that…
When I woke this morning, it was chill but bright and light speckled on the creek as I looked out the window waiting for my electric kettle to boil the water for my tea.
It was an easy day. I spent the morning in the annual great American adventure, preparing information for my taxes for the accountant who does both my business and my personal returns. Finishing that, I went to Hudson and had lunch with my friend Dena Moran, who has moved her shop, Olde Hudson, into larger digs. Afterwards, I had my oil changed and then came home and gathered the piles of receipts and prepared for them to be stored away.
While we were at lunch, Dena and I both checked out what Mitt Romney said about Donald Trump. While I was doing taxes, Mitt was skewering The Donald, calling him a “phony,” “a fraud” and many other things. Good for Mitt… It’s the most I have respected him in years.
Trump responded in The Donald’s way. He looked back on 2012 when he said Mitt would have dropped to his knees to have The Donald’s endorsement. That’s not a pretty picture… According to The Donald, Mitt’s a failed candidate and the only person who “chokes” more than Mitt is Marco Rubio.
Does anyone get tired of this?
Shockingly, among Muslims who vote Republican, he’s the most popular candidate. What? Not something I understand but it’s real. It seems they think once elected, he’ll become pragmatic and work on economic issues, which is their greatest concern, and forgot all the anti-Muslim rhetoric. There is a part of me that suspects they are delusional, rather like Jews who couldn’t really believe Hitler was serious.
Caitlyn Jenner is supporting Ted Cruz, which seems as crazy to me as Muslims supporting The Donald.
In other happy news, Kim Jong Un of North Korea has ordered his military to be ready to use nuclear weapons at any time. Perhaps preemptively, as the UN voted in the most severe sanctions in twenty years against his country. The pudgy young man is determined, desperately determined, the world give him respect. I suspect bad parenting.
In Syria, the fragile truce has given some respite to the desperate inhabitants of that poor country. Thinking about them helped me realize how grateful I am to be here, poised above the Claverack Creek where sun speckles in the morning on the water, where I can listen to jazz and think about the issues of the world while not dodging mortar fire or bombs from above.
Tags:Caitlyn Jenner, Chet Baker, Claverack, Claverack Creek, Donald Trump, Hudson, jazz in Paris, Kim Jong - Un, Mat Tombers, Mathew Tombers, Mitt Romney, New York, Olde Hudson, Syria
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