New Stuff

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֎ Beginning next year, FedEx will deliver seven rather than six days a week, to accommodate our insatiable online shopping habits. “Online shopping is seven days a week,” the company’s COO told the Wall Street Journal. The company expects that the number of package deliveries in the U.S. will double by 2026. [The Wall Street Journal]

Mariner’s wife, and a zillion other inveterate shoppers, is dismayed at this kind of news. Box stores of every ilk are disappearing on a daily basis. Where will folks shop? Online doesn’t count; one must arrive and walk the aisles, touching and musing about every item then going to a competitive store to start all over again walking the aisles. Mariner’s wife confesses that often nothing is actually bought – unless there is probability that it will be returned anyway. Online stores try to emulate shopping by sending several examples from which to choose but it isn’t the same. Where is the parking lot? Where are the automatic doors? What’s down this aisle? Where is the checkout line?

֎ Billionaire inventor and entrepreneur Elon Musk wants to transport you from Los Angeles to San Francisco at a speed of 600 miles per hour. To do this, he is proposing to create a high speed train system called the Hyperloop that will cut travel time between the two cities to just 30 minutes! [Inhabitat.com]

When mariner was young, he remembers reading an account of a person riding in an early version of an automobile before they were a common sight. The person feared for his life as the automobile approached 30 miles per hour. “Humans aren’t made to move this fast,” he said. Young mariner remembers urging a friend of his father, who was taking them for a ride on a new, unopened airport runway, to go faster – go 60 miles per hour! It was exhilarating! Bon voyage, travelers – and don’t pull the emergency stop cord.

֎ Daniel Neiditch is seeking $85 million for a 15,000 square foot space located at 42nd St. and 12th Ave. in Manhattan. He is offering a list of perks to go along with the property to justify the high price:

– A pair of seats on an upcoming Virgin Galactic space flight (retail price: $250,000).

– Two Rolls-Royce Phantoms and a Lamborghini Aventador roadster.

– A $1 million, 75-foot yacht that’s included (along with five years of docking fees on the Hudson).

– A summer stay in a mansion in the Hamptons that typically rents for $350,000 a season.

– Courtside seats to the Brooklyn Nets (worth $225,000),

– A live-in butler, private chef, and a year’s worth of weekly dinners for two at the flagship restaurant of Michelin star chef Daniel Boulud.

– $15 million to pay for renovation. The condo has been on the market for five years, in large part because of its exorbitant price, but also because it requires renovation and the new buyer will need to displace current residents. (The ‘penthouse’ is actually 13 separate units on one floor which are filled with month-to-month renters.)

Do readers feel as mariner does that this offer is too surreal? It just doesn’t seem to have any excited expectation about it. Perhaps one would be more interested if one had a billion or two and could take on the property just for something different to do. But mariner likes the new idea of packaging goodies with a home for sale. How would that alter market pricing? One could sell a junk house for a lot of money by including some neat stuff.

Ancient Mariner

 

In Defense of Criticism

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From time to time mariner is chastised for his skepticism toward what he refers to as ‘pew’ Christians. Similar to his favorite prophet Amos, mariner criticizes the behavior of those who come to church on Sunday for a social hour with some ritual thrown in and that’s the end of it. Prophet Amos said,

“Seek the Lord and live, or he will break out against the house of Joseph like fire, and it will devour Bethel, with no one to quench it. Ah you, who turn justice to wormwood, and bring righteousness to the ground.” (5:6-7)

Throughout his lamentations Amos focuses on duplicity. The Israelites feign allegiance to God but sell slaves, will do anything for improved self-interest, wealth and comfort, and who visit harm on perceived dissidents and the poor. That sounds a lot like a modern nation with which we may be familiar.

Every religion has rules for social behavior whether it’s Moses’ Ten Commandments, the Sermon on the Mount and the parables of Jesus, the Eightfold Path of Buddhism, or the Five Pillars of Islam. Some of the rules at least appear to be easy to follow; some rules strike at unpleasant and unfair attitudes that often do not survive a day. Fortunately, all major religions contain a central kernel based on love. Each religion holds love to be a creative force that makes one’s life and all of reality a better, healthier and growing experience – a life in synchrony with the Great Creator.

Theologian Paul Tillich identified the influence of culture, politics and economy on Christianity – and other religions by inference – and concluded that Christianity is highly, almost fatally modified by three ‘quasi’ religions: capitalism, authoritarianism, and communism. There were other examples as well but these three were the primary examples. Add to Reverend Tillich’s philosophical insights mariner’s street pragmatism: Never work with Christian volunteers who are participants in one of Paul Tillich’s quasi religions.

In one sentence, in this case focusing on Christianity, the difference between Christianity and the quasi religions is the quasi religions placate an individual with worldly benefits and advantages while Christianity requires unending personal sacrifice and 24-hour compassion for the wellbeing of all others. In mariner’s generalist manner, he has adopted the Two Great Commandments as the core verb of it all and reworked them into a phrase that fits any cultural or religious environment: Pass it forward – with continuous and fervent intent. That goes well beyond the pews and out into a needy world. Sunday services are for renewal in commitment and energy – not for a social hour once each week and reciting a bit of liturgy, turning it into wormwood.

Ancient Mariner

 

Are Government Budgets Adequate?

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Mariner, like many citizens, notices that the 114th Congress (January 3, 2017, to January 3, 2019) left the nation $21,683,971,652,591.44 in debt. For clarification, that’s 21 TRillion; it’s a record; Republicans held both houses, which is ironic. Despite this indebtedness, Republicans along with Donald fight to keep tax policies in place that guarantee insolvency without even considering new costs related to infrastructure et al. However, the grenade in the well is not any current budgetary conflict. It is the cost of climate change. The next paragraph is the latest assessment and targets thirty years from today:

֎ [curbed.com] A growing body of work underscores the dangers facing coastal real estate. In addition to the “Underwater” report, the U.S. government’s most recent National Climate Assessment found that between $66 billion and $106 billion of real estate will be below sea level by 2050, and that within an eighth of a mile of U.S. coastline lie businesses and homes valued at a total of $1.4 trillion [will be below sea level].

That’s current value. What would it cost for mariner or the reader to trash their current residence (who wants to buy a home underwater?), purchase new property in an increasingly competitive real estate market, and build a comparable home at three times the original cost? If mariner figures rightly, the cost is more like $4.6 trillion. These stakes are too rich for state governments to even imagine what could be underwritten by a state tax base.

Racist conservatives are discontent with the rate of immigration on the southern border. Wait until they realize that a wholly American emigration of 280,000 citizens will encroach on everyone’s backyards. Housing, already a troublesome topic, will suffer its own tidal wave of space, cost and adequacy.

Mariner’s assumption is that the US will suffer severe solvency issues (spelled ‘depression’) if the tax code is not seriously retargeted to garner trillion dollar amounts to cover costs above and beyond infrastructure and discretionary spending – to say nothing of building a wall and going to war with somebody, anybody will do.

Ancient Mariner

Where in the world is Carmen Santiago?

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This line is a ditty from a children’s television show that gave clues to her whereabouts. Today, there is no question – everyone always knows where Carmen Santiago is. Between the cellphone, Wi-Fi, the GPS, car radio, doorbell technology, health tracking, drone surveillance, street cameras, facial recognition, gait recognition, tollbooth cameras, gadgets like Fitbit, etc., everyone knows where the reader is at any given moment. Even one’s pets are tracked.

To older generations, tracking seems unnecessary, invasive and controlling. The newer generations have been born into the tracking world and generally find it a convenient tool and are not bothered by Big Brother aspects. This difference in attitude between the generations is truly significant despite its subtlety and, sadly, any sense of how to manage the ethics of corporate and government manipulation of individuals without their individual authorization.

Cognizance of Big Brother is spawning a new movement to live off-the-grid. Move to the Northwest; move to Alaska; move to Central America; live below the radar of electric service, telephones and other implied intrusions by Big Brother (Big Brother is synonymous with government regulations and corporate capitalism). Of course only a small minority can accomplish an escape from tracking.

The industry that is making the largest splash at the moment is the insurance industry. Today, policies are being rewritten to include tracking as an element of premium cost and even whether one can purchase insurance. Don’t skip one’s exercises or eat unacceptably, or have to use COPD or have a pacemaker – the rates are higher or, God forbid, one is denied coverage because of pre-existing conditions or … one has a history of not complying with tracking devices.

As 5G emerges, industry will be able to track an individual’s wear cycle of clothing, that is, one does not determine for themselves that it is time to recycle a shirt, refrigerator or automobile. A new one will arrive when Big Brother decides it is time by tracking electronics built into one’s clothing and devices. In that time, the last drop of profit will be sucked from the human cash flow creature.

For the sake of decency, mariner will not describe the centralization of income, debt or personal investment. Simply, there will be no need to carry a few dollars in one’s wallet. Yet, everyone must pause while we endure Donald – an individual who has no sense of the broad reality that confronts the entire human existence on this planet because of technology, environment, the ethics of individuality, and the economy of diminishing returns.

Please vote intelligently in 2020.

Ancient Mariner

 

Now to the Court

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The electorate has been misinformed by the Executive Branch and uninformed by the Congress. Now it is the Court’s turn. Aside from the many legal challenges percolating from the mire of political infighting, the Supreme Court is considering some cleaving decisions – cleaving in that large portions of American society will rise or fall on those decisions.

Increased activity largely is from the conservative side of society trying to leverage a newly conservative court. But long overdue Constitutional issues also are on the docket e.g., citizenship, gerrymandering and Native American rights. Needless to say, soon Roe v. Wade will be addressed; one or two Presidential authorities as interpreted by Donald eventually will come before the Court. In the near future, voting rights will be addressed – especially as they are violated in Dixie.

֎ Native American rights – In a 5-4 decision, the court ruled Monday in favor of Native American rights in a Wyoming hunting case. There is another Native American rights case to be decided this term — a case from Oklahoma that deals with tribal territorial rights. Justice Neil Gorsuch — who is a champion of American Indian rights has been the deciding vote on several cases including Monday’s — is recused from this particular case. That means the court could deadlock.

֎ Political and racial gerrymandering – Three states, Virginia, North Carolina and Maryland, are before the court dealing with redistricting. Gerrymandering by race is one issue. The others are political party gerrymandering. Any rejection of gerrymandering will have immense impact on future elections.

֎ Separation of church and state – This particular case is known as the “cross case.” It’s about a World War I memorial concrete cross that sits at an intersection in Bladensburg, Md. — and whether it should be allowed to continue to stand on public land. The Federal government asked the Supreme Court to rule in favor of the cross, which critics say is an unconstitutional state endorsement of Christianity as the state religion.

Mariner notes other religion/state conflicts in many places – even money – where Christian doctrine and state authority are represented as co-equal. This confusion, generated in an early age of the nation despite the freedom of religion clause in the Constitution, is what causes consternation among Evangelicals and conservatives when the state takes actions in behalf of the US citizen which do not represent the authority of Christian doctrine.

֎ Census citizenship question – Donald’s administration is trying to add a citizenship question to the upcoming census. The court will decide whether it can. Based on questioning during oral arguments, the court’s conservatives agree with the Trump administration and allow it by a narrow 5-4 majority. The Census Bureau, however, states that there could be an undercount of 6.5 million people if the question is included.

֎ Race, murder and jury selection – This is a case about bias in jury selection. A Mississippi death row inmate was prosecuted six times for the same crime by a prosecutor with a history of racial bias in jury selection.

֎ When is a word too dirty to be trademarked? – A clothing designer, Erik Brunetti, tried to trademark his “FUCT” line, but it was rejected. The US Trademark Office has not exactly provided standards about what constitutes “immoral,” “shocking,” “offensive” and “scandalous”, leaving the justices to decide whether the term will be allowed.

Other potential cases of consequence:

-Gundy v. US: A sex offender case dealing with how much power is too much to give to the US attorney general for his application of the law.

-Gamble v. US: A double jeopardy case to decide whether a state and federal government can try someone for the same crime.

Major issues remain outside the priorities of all three branches of the Federal Government: cash in elections, Electoral College and misrepresentation in the Senate, antitrust enforcement, bank regulations, and not last and not least, privacy and state security.

Ancient Mariner

Pastimes

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Mariner’s back yard, typically a number of gardens surrounding a large circular lawn, has been for the last week or so an archipelago – a series of random islands amid a large body of water. The rain is relentless and endless. It is difficult to weed or otherwise work with plants while standing in several inches of water; cutting a lawn beneath standing water is comparable to one of Las Vegas’s water displays. The cattail ditch has become the deepest part of a large pond preventing mariner from reaching his compost bin.

So outdoor work is unavailable. There are endless projects in mariner’s workshop but they don’t spark any interest. Workshop projects are of three types: timeline projects which must be finished sooner than later (too much like work), waiting projects which are on hold for some reason (reasons which may become infinite), and big task projects usually involving furniture, shelves, repairing equipment or welding.

Another pastime is cooking. Something mariner hasn’t done for a while is bake. That’s because mariner is on a low carb diet – sort of.

To pass some time, today mariner will make English muffins Alton Brown style. Alton must have difficulty keeping interest, too. He invented a way to make English muffins using 3-inch tin cans sitting in an electric frying pan. Mariner has made these muffins before and it is fun to tinker with tin cans rather than to sit by the oven waiting for the timer.

Mariner also has some 4-inch tin cans to experiment with baking cake rolls in a similar fashion.

Mariner also has mail to process.

Finally, his last available pastime is to write a blog post.

Ancient Mariner

 

Will the shoe ever drop?

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There is a term that describes a period of Hebrew history leading up to the birth of Jesus – ‘the fullness of time.’ It refers to a promise made by God to the people of Israel that peace and happiness would return and everyone would be blessed. God didn’t exactly say when that would be; he just said, “In the fullness of time.” Habakkuk 2:3:

For still the vision awaits its appointed time; it hastens to the end—it will not lie. If it seems slow, wait for it; it will surely come; it will not delay.

It took centuries before Jesus was born.

Do the citizens of today have to wait centuries before this difficult time passes? Will the people of the world feel great relief and blessing – or as alter ego Amos would suggest, Armageddon? Religious faith provides hope and fulfilled expectation but today fullness lies in the hands of the three branches of the US government. Perhaps Amos knows something.

If one listens to environmentalists, the shoe will not drop – it will float away. If one listens to Congress, and listens, and listens, they say in the end, “What shoe?” If one listens to the Courts, they care very much about the shoe – should the shoe be made of horsehide and thong? Perhaps it would be more meaningful if it were a wooden sandal . . .

If, on the other hand, we turn to today’s version of the Pharisees, that is, the corporations and banks – the shoe definitely will not drop. Fullness of time is already here.

Yes, mariner knows he did not characterize the Executive Branch. It is just too painful.

To take another lesson from the New Testament, this cup will not be taken from us.

Our times are too painful to wait centuries.

Ancient Mariner

 

 

The Word is God

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Regular readers are aware that mariner is a fan of haiku. Indeed, he enjoys any short, insightful phrase that takes the mindset to another focus – a small stretch from habitual awareness. Unfortunately, mariner is too pragmatic for many of the ‘Zen’ sayings found on calendars and in greeting cards. But there are many other sources, particularly in literature and poetry that are rich and insightful for anyone. For example:

֎ Louise Glück’s “Field Flowers,” spoken from a flower’s point of view:

Your poor idea of heaven: absence of change.
Better than earth?
How would you know, who are neither
here nor there

. . A thought that leaves one hanging in purgatory without residence before or after. The following is a quickie from mariner’s wife:

The ground is flat
The Earth is round
The truth is never plain, I’ve found
The plane is never true.

Here’s a haiku:

The rain falls heavy
It soaks, it cleans, it feeds life
Rain is Earth’s gardener.

֎ Mahatma Gandhi said this one:

“Be the change that you wish to see in the world.”

֎ And Elie Wiesel:

“The opposite of love is not hate, it’s indifference. The opposite of art is not ugliness, it’s indifference. The opposite of faith is not heresy, it’s indifference. And the opposite of life is not death, it’s indifference.”

 Don’t give up on literature and reading despite the onslaught of thumb technology. The best of life is in the written word.

Ancient Mariner

Just so you know . . .

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֎ 415 parts per million

At the Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii, carbon dioxide levels were recorded at 415 parts per million last week. That is the highest level recorded there since it began such analyses in 1958. It’s also 100 parts per million higher than any point in the roughly 800,000 years for which scientists have data on global CO2. In other words, “levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere are now nearly 40 percent higher than ever in human history.” [Popular Science]

֎ Utah recently passed a law that requires doctors to give anesthesia to a fetus prior to performing an abortion that occurs at 20 weeks of gestation or later. The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) said it considers the case to be closed as to whether a fetus can feel pain at that stage in development.

“The science shows that based on gestational age, the fetus is not capable of feeling pain until the third trimester,” said Kate Connors, a spokesperson for ACOG. The third trimester begins at about 27 weeks of pregnancy.

To find out more, see: https://www.livescience.com/54774-fetal-pain-anesthesia.html?utm_source=ls-newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=20190518-ls

֎ Can students’ life circumstances be quantified alongside their SAT score? The College Board’s new “disadvantage” score attempts to add a measurable layer of context to each student’s test score, taking in environmental factors such as crime rates and housing values where the student lives. Test-taking students won’t see their score, but 150 participating colleges will begin evaluating applicants on this metric in the fall. Notably, the score doesn’t look at race, so it can still be used in states that have banned racial preferences in public-college admissions. [The Atlantic]

֎ The United States is facing an affordable housing crisis.

Nearly two-thirds of renters nationwide say they can’t afford to buy a home, and saving for that down payment isn’t going to get easier anytime soon: Home prices are rising at twice the rate of wage growth. According to research from the advocacy group Home1, 11 million Americans (roughly the population of New York City and Chicago combined) spend more than half their paycheck on rent. Harvard researchers found that in 2016, nearly half of renters were cost-burdened (defined as spending 30 percent or more of their income on rent), compared with 20 percent in 1960. [More at Curbed.com]

Now is the time to tour one’s favorite botanical garden. Make an outing of it with an outdoor lunch. This time of bountiful blossoms lasts only a week or two. Peace of mind may be discovered amid the tumultuous moment in history that everyone is experiencing.

Ancient Mariner

Abortion

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This post, to say the least, reflects advocacy, prejudice and disdain.

Mariner’s mother had congenital heart disease. He was born when she was eighteen. Four years later, she became pregnant with his brother. She was advised not to have the baby but no one would perform a safe abortion. Mariner’s father could find no one to perform an abortion. She carried to term and mariner’s brother was born. Mariner’s mother was bedbound for two years then spent her last year in a hospital in an oxygen tent. She died when mariner was eight years old, leaving horrendous hospital bills for his father and left mariner and his four year old brother without a mother.

For the holier than others conservatives, irrational religious fanatics and political hackers, mariner has disdain. They don’t understand that pregnancy has many reasons not to be in the best interest of people’s intimate lives. They don’t understand that abortion is not a political decision. They don’t understand that the Constitution in no way gives them the right to own the life of any woman – any more than owning black slaves. Mariner’s mother wasn’t even black.

Basing the political conflict on fetal arguments of any kind is useless. People who oppose abortion aren’t scientifically minded nor would those arguments matter. Mariner notes that these same faux aristocrats have the same disrespect for other life-taking issues:

Among all other issues, war kills more than any other political misappropriation. The last thing a sane, emotionally secure person would desire is to go to war – about anything.

Failure to provide medical care to the poor and indigent is another way of saying “Let them die before I measure my dollars versus their life.”

Should a woman give birth to an unwanted child, the curse of prejudice stays with the child. The United States tolerates one in five children living beneath the poverty line. Further, the United States and its anti-abortionists cause the United States to rank 47th among all nations in infant mortality per 1,000 births. Anti-abortionists are rife with hubris, irrational thought and no capability to feel empathy and compassion.

Ancient Mariner