Category: Uncategorized

It Is What It Is

Equality in our founding documents — just as in MAGNA CARTA — pertains only to EQUALITY BEFORE THE LAW.  It does NOT mean SAMENESS or ECONOMIC EQUALITY.  Capitalism — the other side of the AMERICAN COIN — contemplates NO SUCH THING.

As for POWER, it’s EARNED, FOUGHT FOR, PROTECTED and ALMOST NEVER FREELY RELINQUISHED.

So, despite a San Diego school WITHDRAWING its WHEEL OF POWER/PRIVILEGE graphic from its “professional development materials,” it’s a cinch the usual grievance tactics will pop up elsewhere.  And to that I say, cry me a river.

The image below is from a story on this subject that appeared in The Epoch Times:

Yes, standard, conventional-minded, middle class Americans who’ve played by the rules and within the system — THEY’RE TAKING AIM AT YOU.

Biden Can Afford This?

This is how to reach BELOW-ZERO poll numbers in not only red states but anywhere that’s still broadly CONVENTIONAL.

Meanwhile, Republicans, Russians and Chinese salivate.  Though not over THIS GUY.

Sure, he has a right to be who he is.  But he won’t be much help in SWING STATES.

Remote Work Here to Stay?

From location tracking company TomTom. 

“Slumping congestion resulted in the potential decline in gasoline demand in late 2021 and extending into the new year. To show this, we overlay Kastle Systems data of US “Back to Work” barometer and gasoline demand, only to find a strong correlation between the two.”

Hell, NYC may not need congestion pricing AFTER ALL?

Black Crime in America

This piece NAILS IT.

Black Crime: Facing Down the Elephant in the Room

Because as difficult as it is for ALL OF US to admit, most violent crime in the US is committed by YOUNG BLACK MALES.  And no amount of REPARATIONS or COMMUNITY ORGANIZING will reverse this.

While the piece itself is from April 12, 2021, it only recently came to my attention.  Yet, it doesn’t matter because as the more time passes, THE MORE TIMELY THE PIECE BECOMES.

Some previews:

  • Blacks who’ve grown up in urban areas without fathers grow up extremely violent and dysfunctional.
  • “That dysfunction is passed down to succeeding generations because rather than making the hard decisions to accurately define and solve the problem, leaders and activists excuse the bad behavior by blaming all the mayhem on slavery and Jim Crow. The message?  ‘It’s not your fault.'”
  • “Blacks are a third of the population in Chicago but commit 80 percent of all shootings . . . .  In Los Angeles, blacks commit 44 percent of all violent crime but make up 9 percent of the population.  In St. Louis, blacks are less than a third of the population but commit 90 percent of all homicides. In New York City, blacks commit about three quarters of all shootings although they’re 23 percent of the population.”

Have we heard EVEN A PEEP ABOUT THIS from BLACK LIVES MATTER or the PRO-REPARATIONS CROWD?

NO.

The last time I looked 67% of black children are born into single-parent households.  And in almost 100% of those cases the SINGLE PARENT IS FEMALE.

FATHERLESS MALES ARE MORE LIKELY TO BECOME CRIMINALS.

AFTER THE ICE STORM

PHOTOS/POEMS

In summer, reenactors could fight a Civil War battle in the SMITHFIELD VALLEY.  But in winter, it looks like this.

December Finale

A day of graying
Austerity,
Of winter in
Madison Square,
Of cold-stiffened edges
Now softened by fog,
Of neon turned on
Before four --
Returns me to moments,
Once filtered through dreams,
Still bobbing, now years
In my wake.

JAD, 2021
Directionless

Some never find true north.
Simple objectives are
Never achieved.
Shiftless inertia objects.
Immersion, a presence,
The rotors of time;
Space, its own vacuum,
Or graced as a place --
Alter the angle of
Hope's eager arc,
Divert it from all
That could be.

JAD, 2022

BROCCOLI HALL

Gloved

I stare at my zippered glove.
How it leathers my
Quiet hand.
How it lends it an
Animal texture,
One that my hand understands.
I see in that glove
Numb winters.
See them in fistfuls or splayed.
See them through loosening
Stitching.
See them by flicking my wrist.

JAD, 2022
January

The snow that brightens hillsides,
That forces eyes to squint,
That concretizes winter
And cleanses frigid air --
Produces scant sensation,
No sense of what's to come,
No fool's anticipation 
In short unspooling days.

JAD, 2022
Broke

They trundle through
Grand Central's tunnels
The way US trains
Tend to do.
The tech we employ
Is outdated,
But how do we
Upgrade old rail?
It isn't the cost 
Of fresh capital
But the goosing of
Runaway debt.
Of what worth is
Printable money
When value no
Longer exists.

JAD, 2022
Death Came Knocking

When did these mornings grow stale?
And why does the past,
Like a voice softly pleading,
Haunt me on dull afternoons?
There was always that something,
That one thrill ahead,
That promise of love 
In the night.

But are graveyards not littered
With pledges?

There was also the notion
Of nothing at all,
But it always implied
A perspective.
A vantage or sideline
Or shoreline or stance --
A pulsing of time
On its own.

Until subject and object
Combined.

And what of the town
I grew up in;
The schools I attended
And touted with pride;
The work I selected;
The friends I forgot;
The moments of meaning 
And loss?

Were they anything more
Than a dream?

And what of that sense
Of an ending --
A tally, a fullness,
A toting of deeds;
That notion that purpose
Exists to endure
Despite what our senses
Report?

Does the truth only work
When it soothes us?

A rare, stabbing sadness
Has stuttered my step.
Suggesting what options
Remain.
Shall I mount its momentum,
Prepare my defense
Or fence with my
Clenching regret?

Can I muster the mettle
To guess?

Death came knocking.  I
Wasn't at home.
The neighbors explained
That I'd died.
Near where the river
Still shines in the sun,
The list of my losses
Survives.

Call it the cost of
Advantages won.

JAD, 2022
Maintenance

The toilet whistles,
The faucet drips,
The washer shimmies,
The furnace thuds.

Had I known I'd face
Such pushback,
I'd have learned to
Use my hands.

JAD, 2022
Stalking Damp Manhattan

Ravaged by riches
Till rancid with fear,
Festooned with the novel
Or trite,
We dally in portals
Of stale disarray.
Unwilling to enter
Or leave.

Is privilege what sends us
Reprising these streets?
Is it plausible grounds
For suspicion?
Or is it regression
Projecting escape
From salvos of
Ambient grief?

Masses unmasking
Then masking again
Are massing in
Shiny Times Square.
They've gathered like pilgrims
Awaiting their gods,
Their altars those
Glossy red steps.

There's rain in the forecast,
Concern in the air.
What passes for privilege
Ferments.
We're streaming like photons
In particled waves
From nowhere remembered
To nowhere foreseen.

JAD, 2022
After the Ice Storm

The valley sitting
Frozen still,
Portends some final state.
The sun's bold fires glare.
Branches, iced and diamond bright --
The thrill of nearly
Blinding white --
Distract the road-ward eye.

Winter, halfway through its run,
Has paused to honor light.
A glimpse of time's enduring
Might
Devoid of tracking bits.
Across the valley's
Icebound snows,
We drive as though preserved.

JAD, 2022
Back in Town

Widening skies 
Over Washington Square
Welcome my wandering
Thoughts,
Suggesting that even
This winnowing season 
Is likely now nearing
Its end.

I'm pooling my wishes,
My worries, my feints,
My misses and losses
And loosened constraints
If only to sense
The next crisis.
I've made it again
This far.

JAD, 2022