More on the Birthright Decision

Today we cut back the red maple.  It was over hanging the gutters, which is bad.  It was really hot.  The Lace Cap hydrangea has started opening flowers.  Those are happy bushes.

Here is more about the Supreme Court ruling on birthright citizenship.  It's more understandable than what I was reading yesterday.  This is from Reuters, it's somewhat clarifying.  Sometimes they are behind a paywall, so I'm cutting and pasting some of it. 

The court's conservative majority on Friday granted President Donald Trump his request to curb federal judges' power but did not decide the legality of his bid to restrict birthright citizenship.

The resulting decision said Trump’s policy could go into effect in 30 days but appeared to leave open the possibility of further proceedings in the lower courts that could keep the policy blocked. On Friday afternoon, plaintiffs filed an amended lawsuit, opens new tab in federal court in Maryland seeking to establish a nationwide class of people whose children could be denied citizenship. 

If they are not blocked nationwide, the restrictions could be applied in the 28 states that did not contest them in court, creating "an extremely confusing patchwork" across the country, according to Kathleen Bush-Joseph, a policy analyst for the non-partisan Migration Policy Institute.  "Would individual doctors, individual hospitals be having to try to figure out how to determine the citizenship of babies and their parents?" she said.

This is just stupid.

DOJ has announced that their number one priority will be pursuing denaturalization of people who have committed a crime.  NPR wrote about it here.  This was a popular thing to do during the McCarthy era.

That's it, that's all I've got for today. 

 

Ride and Badness

We rode this morning.  It's been awhile since the last one, events have conspired against riding.  Anyway, it was a hot ride because we got a late start.  We are never going to be any good at the early start.  Instead of the usual route we rode a flatter road, which looks like it has been carpet bombed.  It's unfortunate, it's very pretty out there, but the bumps and pot holes hurt too much.  Then we went on the other side of the river, which has better surfaces and hills.  All in all, it's a good route.  We see these guys pretty much in the same place, doing the same thing, every time we are out there.

This is from the other night.  An illuminated cloud.

We really need to go somewhere so I can get photos of something new.  

Lisa Murkowski agreed to vote for advancement of the Big Ugly Bill if Alaska could have a carve out on cuts to Medicaid and tax relief for whaling.  There was some other stuff, but I can't remember.  Anyway, she was willing to inflict this disaster of a bill on the lower 48 and Hawaii, but not her state.  Surprise, surprise, the Parliamentarian announced that this was not allowed under Senate rules.  Too bad, so sad.  Now they can suffer with the rest of the country.

The BUB contains these points and more:

17 million would lose health care - 30% higher electricity costs due to elimination of federal subsidies on renewable energy - Millions of manufacturing and construction jobs destroyed - Biggest ever cut in food assistance for families, kids, veterans - $4 trillion in deficits - $1 trillion in tax cuts for millionaires & billionaires - The return of burning coal

- ICE is authorized to become the largest domestic federal law enforcement agency. - ICE is authorized to become the largest jailer in our nation’s history. - The pace of mass deportations would skyrocket as ICE could acquire dozens of new aircraft

 

The Supreme Court essentially ruled that they, and only they, get to rule on stuff 47 does.  Lower courts can't issue nation wide injunctions.  They could under Biden, no one had an issue with that, but now they do.  It was a convoluted and arcane ruling.  Here is a decent article on what it means.

Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson is not mincing words about the Birthright Citizenship decision: “The Court’s decision to permit the Executive to violate the Constitution with respect to anyone who has not yet sued is an existential threat to the rule of law.” She’s sounding the alarm, loud and clear.  

Bill Kristol :“Fresh insults to constitutional norms and settled practices of governance occur daily. That is why the phrase constitutional crisis no longer describes our situation. The Constitution has failed, and we no longer know which institution will rescue it.”

Laurence Tribe: "We fought the good fight from emoluments to impeachment to criminal prosecution but Congress failed us and the Supreme Court has been fully complicit. We must keep invoking the lower courts’ fidelity to law but will need massive political mobilization."  This article was reference in the tweet and it's a good one to read.

 

The high fences have been put back around the White House.  One wonders what heinous thing is being planned for us now.  

Kellyanne Conway always an insight to share with us.  I love this response.
 

Tornado alley used to be Oklahoma, Missouri, and Kansas.  Every year entire small towns would be wiped out.  This year it's South Dakota.  Guess they better start building tornado shelters.

 There's more, there is always more with these people.  But I think this is enough.

Something Pleasant

 These are teenage quail.  Cute Cute Cute.

That's it, I'm skipping the terrible parade tonight.

Plants and the Usual

Yesterday was just horrid, although not as horrid as the heat dome that is forming over much of the country.  It was cold, it rained, there was no sun.  It was the summer solstice for heaven's sake.  Last night we were lamenting our decision to turn off the pilot to the gas fireplace.  Socks and flannel pants were the outfit du jour.  Anyway, today is better.  This has been a very windy spring, please make a note of it for next year.

In May 2023 we took out the elderberries we had planted the previous year.  They did not do well in their space.  We replaced them with two red twig dogwoods. They both looked like this.

Now they look like this.  They seem to be happy here.  They are doing an effective job of blocking the side yard next door.  

Disaster is growing in the grass in the front yard.  I think this is Yarrow, google lens thinks that, I have no idea.  Anyway, it's a rapidly spreading weed that has rhysomes that form thick mats where it's living.  The thick mat part is true, they're impossible to dig up.  So in the spring, I guess there will be weed and feed.  We've avoided that so as not to kill the clover which the bees like, plus clover is green.  So, there will be much death in the area, which will require reseeding and multiple waterings a day.  Grass is evil. 
 

For those of you who did not watch 47's inaugural address, we have this.

There is this, as well.

I remain convinced that they stole it.

We're seeing commercials for Gemini, which is the Android AI.  The one I find most disturbing is three college kids essentially asking it to explain gene mutations like they're five year olds.  The phone obliges by stating the obvious about errors in transcription.  College kids should be reading text books, or scientific journals on why there are mutations, diagramming where on the allele it happened, learning what the outcomes of these errors are in the human body, not sitting around like it's story time.  Sure, they can always ask again, but at some point you have to know stuff, remember it, learn it.  There's a belief that facts are immutable, AI is about to change all of that.  This is from the master manipulator himself.  Grok has already told people its programming was changed to make it believe in South African white genocide.  This could just as easily have been the Holocaust, or the Tulsa Massacre, or the Tuskeegee Experiments.  I'll be dead by then, but I can see a future like 1984, where truth and history are what the AI says it is.  

Yep, we bombed Iran yesterday.  They were not a direct threat against the US, there was no advice and counsel from Congress, he just up and did it.  This put the lives of the military at risk and spent millions of dollars repositioning equipment, and then deploying it.   The Iranian Parliament has voted to close the Strait of Hormuz, get ready for higher gas prices, 20% of the world's crude oil passes through there.  Netanyahu is already hedging on how much damage was actually done.  NYT is reporting this, "The Israeli military, in an initial analysis, believes the heavily fortified nuclear site at Fordo has sustained serious damage from the American strike on Sunday, but has not been completely destroyed".  Later update: Iran claims thay knew the strikes were coming so they removed all uranium from their facilities. The facilities according to Iran were empty boxes. This would check out since US says no leak has been detected.  Senior officials tell the NYT that they do not know the whereabouts of Iran’s stockpile of near-bomb-grade uranium

This is an interesting article about the 22 year old former landscaper and grocery bagger who has been placed in charge of anti-terrorism on US soil.  If I am lying, I'm dying. 

Here is an excellent interview of Harry Littman.  Well worth your time reading.

So, another cheerful post on current events.  I am currently looking at my red twigs and enjoying their exuberance.

Data Breach and the Middle East

Grok is twitter's AI.  The MAGAts don't like it because it is actually even handed in its opinions.  There was that time that someone changed its programming to make it believe in South African white genocide, but that has been fixed.  Anyway, Grok maintains a profile on each twitter user, I have no idea why.  This is mine.

Allison, a retired RV adventurer, champions progressive causes like taxing the rich and women's rights while savoring NASCAR and poutine debates.

Phyleaux passionately urges world leaders to arm Ukraine and dives into diverse chats, from curtains to telecoms

Anthony Bourdain always wanted to punch Henry Kissinger over Cambodia

I have no idea where the NASCAR and poutine references came from, or curtains to telecoms.  I think this might be an example of an AI hallucinating. Phyleaux is my user name on twitter, in case you are wondering.

There has been the mother of all data breaches.  16 billion passwords have been hacked.  This is the Forbes article.  So, over the next few days we'll be changing passwords.  I hate doing that, I'm always afraid of doing something wrong and losing access to Google, which has my blog.  The other thing I've read is that Microsoft is going to force us all to quit using passwords and switch to passkeys.  I know nothing about this, it's going to require viewing some you tubes on the subject.  I think these were the first people to talk about the breach.

47 has decided to un-ban asbestos.  Yes, he's bringing back the source of mesothelioma, a terrible form of lung cancer.  Great, really great.

This happened yesterday.  Which one will he obey?  My money is on Putin.

So, we're all waiting with bated breath to see what happens next in the Mid East and in Ukraine.  47 seems to have completely abandoned Ukraine, the EU must step up immediately.

 

Riding, Dead Heading, and the Usual

 Hoo boy, it's been a week, and it's only Tuesday.  We finally got the rhododendrons dead headed.  I think I'm not doing that again.  The internet says you should, to encourage flowering, but I think I'm ok if they bloom less.  It took the two of us quite awhile, I was repeatedly stabbed in the leg since I was between the rhody and the house.  So, next year, no dead heading.  Allison, please make a note of this.

One of the days we rode to the lake, the wind was calm.

Sitting at the top of the hill in the recreation area is interesting, people go, they plan to make a day of it, and they bring stuff.  She is towing a charcoal grill down to that little tent.

He's got a pop up tent on his shoulder.  There are four children in his party.  His wife drove away, we wondered when she would return.

The neighbor's clematis is having an outstanding year.

The 2025 G7 summit started June 15.  47 left early, allegedly due to some emergency that only he could handle.  I personally think he was not getting enough attention, and was mad at Premier Carney for cutting off his rant to the press.  Afterward there was pouting.

During meetings with other heads of state, there was napping.  Look at Premier Carney looking at 47.

The question of the year, is why do people accord 47 so much deference and respect?  Look at this photo, it was taken early on in the summit, and he's basking in the presence of important people.  This is a good tweet thread about the whole thing.  The comments below get petty, you can skip those.

It was not a success, 47 remains Putin's creature, he will not sanction Russia, and he will not allow Ukraine to pay cash for US weapons.  Putin's idea of peace negotiation is to bomb the living crap out of Kyiv.  Last night was bad.

The rat bastard that shot Representative Melissa Hortman, their dog, and Senator John Hoffman has been captured.  The MAGAts have tried to spin this as a Democrat killer to no avail.  Senator Mike Lee completely humiliated himself by posting a tweet with a still from a horror movie, implying that this is what happens when liberals are angry.  Senator Tina Smith pulled Lee out of a meeting and told him his behavior was disgusting.  Oddly enough, no republican has had any words of sympathy for the two families, nor did they have anything bad to say about Lee's conduct.  Later, Senator Klobuchar spoke to him, and he deleted his terrible posts.

Apparently, we are going to war with Iran.  Never mind that only Congress can declare war, 47 is doing it all by himself.  I wish somebody would arrest him.  Iranian state media is now reportedly claiming that there will be a surprise tonight that the "world will remember for centuries."  I wonder if they have nukes.

Looks like the administration is going to sell off public property, 250 million acres.  Places like the Grand Tetons, or the Olympic National Forest.  It's despicable.  FEMA grants for flood control in Louisiana and Florida have been cancelled.  Those would be red areas, they voted for this.  Other agencies have lost funding, they're too numerous to call out.

And finally, here is humor.

That's it, that's all I have to say.
 

Riding Yesterday and News of the Recent

Yesterday was still warm.  We were up and out early to beat the heat.

The park's grass is browning out, too. We had our good grass season, it's over now.

This afternoon Senator Padilla (D-Ca) was in the room where DHS Secretary and Puppy Killer Kristi Noem was speaking.  After identifying himself, the Senator wanted to ask a question.  Instead, he was man handled out of the room, put on the floor and handcuffed.  A sitting senator was treated like this.

The administration is planning to send detainees to Gitmo.  What's really shocking is who they're sending.  This is from the WAPO article.

The foreign nationals under consideration hail from a range of countries. They include hundreds from friendly European nations, including Britain, Italy, France, Germany, Ireland, Belgium, the Netherlands, Lithuania, Poland, Turkey and Ukraine, but also other parts of the world, including many from Haiti. Officials shared the plans with The Washington Post, including some documents, on the condition of anonymity because the matter is considered highly sensitive.

The administration is unlikely to inform the foreigners’ home governments about the impending transfers to the infamous military facility, including close U.S. allies such as Britain, Germany and France, the officials said.

I find this to be spectacularly shocking.  They're just going to disappear Brits and other allies.  Way to exercise soft power. 

Charlie Angus, Canadian MP,  gets a lot of face time on Twitter.  He's an effective speaker.  He had this to say:
Canada can no longer view the United States as an ally. We know that Donald Trump doesn’t believe in liberal democracy—he doesn’t believe in the rule of law. Prime Minister Carney is not welcoming the leader of the free world to Canada. He is welcoming Vladimir Putin’s sock puppet.

This was yesterday's press conference.  I think, maybe today.  Anyway, 47 is now walking back deporting the agricultural workers, hospitality workers, and etc.
Fox reporter Doocy: “What made you change your mind about targeting in California, farmers and people in the hotels and leisure business?” 
Trump: “Our farmers are being hurt badly. They have very good workers…They’re not citizens, but they’ve turned out to be great. And we’re going to have to do something about that.”

This translates to the big donors are having a cow and have been calling 47 to tell him to knock this shit off.

Les Mis played at the Kennedy Center last night.  He was righteously booed, and there were drag queens.  I love that for him.

I'm really not a conspiracy theorist, despite what I am about to say.  The 2024 election was stolen.  In the seven swing states 47 won, democrats won down ballot.  This is statistically a never event.  He also  barely won by a margin that did not trigger a recount.  How could this be?  This is how.  

Update 7/12/25:  The case is proceeding through the courts.

A lawsuit is making its way through the courts.  Unfortunately, even if the case is proven, we're still stuck with him.  Anyway, read the first linked article.  It's not that long, it's not full of IT jargon, and it clearly explains how voting tabulators that were not on the internet were interfered with.  Oddly enough, mainstream media is not giving this much, if any attention.  It barely surfaces on twitter.  One would think this might be a bigger story.  

Here is my humor for the day.

Currently, the moon is uninhabited.

 

Development and Advertising

This morning we went to Costco.  We got 10 pounds of oatmeal for $8, which is what Safeway is charging for two pounds; four packages (24 muffins) of Thomas English Muffins for $8.99, vs. Safeway's $5.99 for one package.  Costco is not as convenient, but one can not argue with the pricing.  However, having said that, Costco is now being surrounded by new development.  A Fred's Appliances is going in, and there will be more retail. 

Also being developed is Mead Works.

Mead Works is a 300+ Acre project located south and east of the intersection of Farwell Road and the Newport Highway (SR 2).

    • 300+ Acre Mixed-Use Project
    • Designated 55+ section
    • 1,400 Proposed Single-Family Homes
Here is map:  That's Costco on the right, you can see the flat roof.

They have a model home constructed.   

The garage is in the the back of the house, accessed by an alley.

Utilities are in, so they'll start construction when people start buying, I guess.

 

There is a shiny dinosaur at the entrance.

Traffic in the north end is bad, and I guess it's going to get worse.  Spokane has been working on a connector road that is supposed to take part of the load, but they don't seem to be able to finish it.  It's been years.  Feh, I hate progress.

Christy Walton, a Walmart gazillionaire paid to have this full page ad placed in the New York Times.  She is the widow of John T. Walton, who was one of the sons of the Walmart founder Sam Walton. In June 2005, her husband died in a homebuilt ultralight plane crash, making her the main heir to his fortune of US$18.2 billion. She is a major benefactor of "No Kings".  She's doing good with her money, unlike the Publix heiress who funded January 6.

This should be the headline for every newspaper everywhere.

That's it, that's all I've got.  I can't talk about Ukraine, too sad.  Russia bombed citizens again last night.

Things Are Bleak

The last peony, before their petals fell off.

Every day, every damn day, I think it can't get any worse, and yet, it does. 

First 47 sent 2,000 National Guard troops to L.A. against the governor's wishes.  He's claiming authority under Title 10.  I can't discuss the validity of that intelligently.  Only 300 of the 2,000 guardsmen have anything to do.  The rest are not being utilized.  They're parked somewhere.  Today he sent 700 Marines to L.A.  This is definitely against the law.  He only gets to send troops in after a declaration of insurrection.  However, who is going to stop him?  Later this same day he sent another 2,000 guardsmen.  

However, 47 is not sending housing, food or water.  This is how they're sleeping.  Shows a lot of respect for the troops, eh?

Yesterday's raid was conducted at Home Depot.  Basically, ICE went in and grabbed brown people.  No warrants, no nothing.  Just scooped them up and took them away.  Sounds like kidnapping to me.  ICE was supposed to get the criminal element, not the cooks, landscapers and construction workers.   Apparently Stephen Miller wants more apprehensions, damn the facts.

Anthony Bourdain said this years ago, and it's still true.  "Despite our ridiculously hypocritical attitudes towards immigration, we demand that Mexicans cook a large percentage of the food we eat, grow the ingredients we need to make that food, clean our houses, mow our lawns, wash our dishes, and look after our children. As any chef will tell you, our entire service economy — the restaurant business as we know it — in most American cities, would collapse overnight without Mexican workers."

The Elon/47 cat fight was weird yesterday.  This was on twitter.  I wonder if he's back to threatening to take Dragon out of service.

This was all over twitter yesterday.  47 tripped going up the low stairs to Air Force One.  When Biden did this, it was all over main stream media, Fox had it on repeat for days.  47 does it?  Crickets.  He looks bad here.  He has looked bad all day, sort of slack jawed and vacant eyed, spewing nonsense.

The war in Ukraine carries on.  47 sent 20,000 anti-drone missiles that were approved for Ukraine during the Biden administration to the Middle East, claiming their need was greater.  Israel sent Ukraine some of its older Patriot missile systems.  Russia is preparing for its spring offensive by encircling a city whose name I have forgotten.  Since 47 is of absolutely no use in this situation, one can only hope the Europeans start shipping arms.  RFK Jr fired all 17 members of the vaccine advisory board.  I guess vaccines are over. 

Thus ends my aide de memoir for this day. 

Peonies and Stupid Politics

Today we took my bike in to get the derailleur adjusted.  Tomorrow we ride.  It is warming up here.  It's not yet 103F, but it is warm enough for our wimpy grass to start browning out.  Here are three of the peonies, I cut them off because they were face down in the dirt.  Their stems can not support their weight.  I really love peonies.

Today there was a massive spat between 47 and Elon.  Jim and I are convinced that it's a distraction.  Vought is in charge of DOGE now, and perhaps he's about to unleash something terrible.  Or, perhaps they'll impeach 47, and put Vance in as president.  Peter Thiel out right owns Vance, so that would allow him to advance his agenda.  Who knows.  Anyway, here's part of the back and forth.

Dragon is the rocket that takes supplies to the International Space Station.

There was more, but you get the drift.

Chancellor Merz was in the oval office today.  He wants 47 to put pressure on Putin to stop the war.  He reminded 47 that tomorrow is the anniversary of D-Day.  47 made a typically stupid response. “D-Day? That wasn’t such a great day for you, was it?” MERZ: “That was the day your country liberated mine from Nazi rule.” You can’t make this stuff up. The man looked a German politician in the face on the anniversary of D-Day… and implied it was a bad day for Germans. History is not just lost on Trump, it’s offended by him.  There is video of the exchange here.

Gabrielius Landsbergis is the former Minister of Foreign Affairs for Lithuania.  He gave a keynote speech at CANSEC2025, Canada's largest defense industry conference.  He's advocating for Canada and EU to work together and arm Ukraine near term and be ready to repel Russia long term.  The text of his speech is here, and it's a good read.  If you are still on twitter, he's a good person to follow.

Other than feuding bullies and once again being embarrassed by our president on the world stage, I have not too much to say. 

Riding to the Lake and Science Marches Away

It's June 4 - it has finally started to warm up a little.  We're still riding in vests and arm warmers, I am continuing to wear flannel pants in the house at night, but it's warmer.  I guess May is no longer part of spring.  We've been riding, which is good for the soul.  

The peonies bloomed, the Fried Egg variety is having a year. They are very exuberant.
 

The pink and the burgundy plants are not producing much this year.  Peonies are good for here, in the fall we cut them down to the ground, and then it snows on them.  No harm, no foul.

The iris are growing by the lake, some of them are in the lake.

This is an interesting boat, we have not seen one like this at the boat launch.

WAPO has an op-ed up on the subject of how the current administration is killing this country.  In addition to Palantir creating a database of everything, like China has done, they're doing away with science.  Billions of dollars in grants have been cancelled.  One of the most stunning cancels was for an HIV vaccine.  The reason given was this:  Researchers were told that the Department of Health and Human Services instead wanted “to go with currently available approaches to eliminate HIV.”  There is no cure for HIV.  There really are no available approaches for poor countries.  This condemns many millions to develop AIDS, and grants for PEPFAR are on the chopping block.  There is an article here.

A neuroscientist who came to the US from Lebanon, got a PhD, started a lab, won a Nobel in 2021 has had his funding cut.  He lamented his fate and the fate of science in general in this country on Bluesky, and within hours received an offer from China to build him his own lab, with guaranteed funding for 20 years.  Europe is also trolling our de-funded scientists, making offers to bring them to the EU.  Think of the intellectual capital that is sprouting feet and leaving.  This is damage that can not be undone for decades.  We are so doomed.

I could go on, but it's too depressing.