Ready or not, the future calls.  Science fiction and multiversal stories notwithstanding, time marches on, ever forward.  The future is inevitable.  Do we shape the future or are we shaped by it? As I have perused the news this last few days I have seen many pieces looking upon the future, generally with pessimism.  Such thinking presumes we shape the future – that what we do today shapes what happens tomorrow.  But is that really the case?. . .

British Labour PM Keir Starmer is stepping down after just two years.  Britain is in a shambles, but I have not followed the mess closely enough to get into the details.  What’s interesting is his resignation speech.  He is attempting to set a narrative for his service.  He is, by any objective measure a failure in the job, but he is doing his best to make it look otherwise.  The spin he is putting on current events may win the day for a moment, but history can be a cruel task master.. . .

Los Angeles has proven completely incapable of extinguishing a warehouse fire in four days.  I could carry on for hours about this, but I just want to focus on what an utter failure it represents.  There are a few fundamental things that a municipality has to get done and get done right.  One of those is fire prevention and fire fighting.  Between the devastating wildfires of January ’25 and now this, it would seem Los Angeles cannot get that one fundamental job done.  They may be able to make mayoral votes appear out of thin air, but dealing with a fire seems impossible.  Anyplace else and this would be a political

“Iran postponed negotiations that were meant to begin in Switzerland on Friday….”  The reason?  “Fighting between Israel and Hezbollah….”  The lede that is buried? “The Israeli military said it struck ‘Hezbollah terrorist targets’ after the group fired over 50 projectiles at Israeli forces in southern Lebanon.”  And now you know why the MOU does not matter all that much.  The important things to note are that 1) Iran is backing away from it already and 2) Iran proxies created the conditions necessary to justify their backing away.  As everyone knew from the beginning, Iran

The phrase “waste, fraud and abuse” now exists in politics-speak as a single word, bandied about with great and near-thoughtless regularity.  It is a linguistic nightmare.  But it is also an increasing reality.  Earlier this week, we looked at Fareed Zakaria’s fact-based takedown of California which included the fact that California spent over $24B (“billion” with a “B”) over a five year period on homelessness and yet homelessness had increased during the same period.  Somehow all that money is not making it where it belongs.  You know there is “waste, fraud and abuse”in

Impulsively, I do not like the MOU.  The reason is simple – I don’t trust Iran.  In point of fact, I would not like any deal with this bunch because I do not trust them.  It is just that simple.  And as I survey the uncountable press reactions that’s what it all boils down to.  We can’t trust them.  But does that make it a bad deal?. . .

Fox carried a story last Saturday about “guaranteed income” programs around the nation and groups pushing to make it permanent and national.  The amount of gobblity-gook spewed by the proponents of this scheme is immense and the fog of that noise is extremely difficult to penetrate.  It all sounds lovely until you get to that one major sticking point.. . .

It has been no secret for a long time now that Gavin Newsom wants to run for president.  So naked is his ambition that as soon as Trump got elected the second time, Newsom inelegantly and unmasterfully tried to position himself as a reach-across-the-aisle moderate with a quickly failed podcast.  It was so disingenuous that it fell flat on its face in a matter of weeks.  Since, he has only been able to find traction in being an ardent Trump troll.  But if you want to be president you need more than simply, “He’s awful and I’m not him.”. . .