NEW BOOK RECOMMENDED !
AMERICAN STRUGGLE- Democracy, Dissent, and the Pursuit of a More Perfect Union
( by Jon Meacham ) 2026.
This is great American history, quite thorough. I must say the last commentary (“THE PATH TO AMERICAN AUTHORITARIANISM: WHAT COMES AFTER DEMOCRATIC BREAKDOWN” ) BY Steven Levitsky and Lucan A. Way ) is quite frightening 1. In its summary of the present and 2. In its vision of the looming future.
At one point, a fighter took the mic and made a nasty joke about Michelle Obama while standing in front of the house she once lived in with her husband, daughters and mother.
Even for a president with a lifelong penchant for P.T. Barnum-esque gambits, this one was in a league of its own. (NEW YORK TIMES )
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Raylan Givens: Sometimes, we have to make deals with lowlifes because we have our sights set on life forms even somehow lower on the ladder of lowlife than they.
(JUSTIFIED )
2) “You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing love to a thousand generations of those who love me and keep my commandments.” This command is against making an idol, a visible representation of God. There is no image we can create that can accurately portray God. To make an idol to represent God is to worship a false god.
“Where have you gone, Joe Dimaggio ? Our nation turns it’s lonely eyes to you.”
May 25, 2026–HAPPY 85TH, MR. DYLAN
1962 ? 2026 ?
Come senators, congressmen, please heed the call
Don’t stand in the doorway, don’t block up the hall
For he that gets hurt will be he who has stalled
The battle outside ragin’
Will soon shake your windows and rattle your walls
For the times, they are a-changin’
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You fasten the triggers
For the others to fire
Then you set back and watch
When the death count gets higher
You hide in your mansion
As young people’s blood
Flows out of their bodies
And is buried in the mud
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Mama, put my guns in the ground
I can’t shoot them anymore
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“…if God is on our side
He will stop the next war.”
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Quotes from Bob Dylan
War:
“If God is on our side, he’ll stop the next war.” (With God on our Side)
“And his brain has been mismanaged with great skill.” (License to Kill)
“Alright – where do you want this killing done?” (Highway 61)
“Is your money that good? Will it buy forgiveness? Do you think that it could?” (Masters of War)
“Things are breaking up out there, High water everywhere!” (High Water)
“Let’s disconnect the cables, over turn the tables. The place just don’t make sense
to me nor more.” (Senor)
“And I’ll tell it, and think it, and speak it and breath it.” (Hard Rain)
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I’m trying to love my neighbor and do good unto others, But oh, mother, things ain’t going well
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May you have a strong foundation, When the winds of changes shift
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“Bury the rag deep in your face, for now is the time for your tears.” (Hattie Carol)
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Something is happening here, But you don’t know what it is, Do you Mister Jones.
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”Is your money that good? Will it buy forgiveness? Do you think that it could?
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Don’t criticize what you can’t understand.—
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“There’s a big gaping hole in my chest where my heart was,
and a hole in the sky where God used to be.
My American dream fell apart at the seams.
You tell me what it means. You tell me what it means.”
Bob Dylan and Willie Nelson
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Here it is in ascii text for pasting onto the digital refrigerator.
Bob Dylan, on 80 years old
Grammy Award-winning singer-songwriter and Nobel Prize recipient
The best thing
The best thing about being 80 is that you outlive the clocks that have been chasing you. It’s freedom from that lie that anything was ever under control. You don’t chase the parade anymore. You’re an old king from some vanished country. You’re harder to program. You’re not rushing to become anything and you’re not haunted by things that you did. You’re haunted by how little of it really mattered in the way you thought it would.
The worst thing
The worst thing about being 80 is that you still want to say yes to everything, but the world moves without asking. The old fire in your heart still tells you to do this and that, but your body says we already did it. Also, nothing surprises you. It sounds like a luxury but it’s not, and also you’ve run out of illusions. People treat you like either you’ve solved something or you’ve lost something, and you haven’t. You see life repeating itself everywhere.
The really worst part about being 80 is that you find, at last, you’ve got an understanding of something that might have altered everything in the past, had it come at a time when something could still be altered. When you’re young you think that time moves forward. At 80 you know that it doesn’t, it stands still. We’re the ones that move.
Here it is in ascii text for pasting onto the digital refrigerator.
Bob Dylan, 85
Grammy Award-winning singer-songwriter and Nobel Prize recipient
The best thing
The best thing about being 80 is that you outlive the clocks that have been chasing you. It’s freedom from that lie that anything was ever under control. You don’t chase the parade anymore. You’re an old king from some vanished country. You’re harder to program. You’re not rushing to become anything and you’re not haunted by things that you did. You’re haunted by how little of it really mattered in the way you thought it would.
The worst thing
The worst thing about being 80 is that you still want to say yes to everything, but the world moves without asking. The old fire in your heart still tells you to do this and that, but your body says we already did it. Also, nothing surprises you. It sounds like a luxury but it’s not, and also you’ve run out of illusions. People treat you like either you’ve solved something or you’ve lost something, and you haven’t. You see life repeating itself everywhere.
The really worst part about being 80 is that you find, at last, you’ve got an understanding of something that might have altered everything in the past, had it come at a time when something could still be altered. When you’re young you think that time moves forward. At 80 you know that it doesn’t, it stands still. We’re the ones that move.
LUDDITE LITERATURE
I resisted the email, technology world that cropped up at the end of my coaching, teaching career.
We moved to the beach just before winter. I had never cut on my college issued computer. High school typing class was in 1956. Health issues, injuries, age, weather chipped away at my physicality.
I began to “hobby write “. Self-Publishing was possible and I waded in.
Any old person will tell you of the “nightmare of the new age”. Even now.
My seven “books” and 700 blog articles attest to one virtue–VOLUME. And while the process has been a retirement hobby, I haven’t changed my name to Shakes Parham.
Vanity has caused me to wonder “ is it any good ?”
In toto it is a jumbled mess. At 85 years and “ circling the drain “, finding out its worth is beyond me.
Here is a thought. With the galloping advances, will there be a way to edit out the good parts?
There are bigger questions:
Are there large numbers of people like me, who given self publishing, produced some unique period and worthwhile contributions?
The phrase “he could piss off the Pope” is a common idiomatic expression used to describe someone who is exceptionally abrasive, arrogant, or difficult to deal with. It has been attributed to various individuals in different contexts rather than originating from a single famous source:
OK–You are not Jesus, but you are Doctor Kildare !
Rule # 1: “First, do no harm.”
“Anyway you slice it, it’s still baloney.”
Mama, put my guns in the ground
I can’t shoot them anymore
“…if God is on our side
He will stop the next war.”
Are we really going to let some one person who doesn’t believe in the law, singularly write the rules ( i.e. laws )
for college athletics in America ?
