#Politics

I'm also feeling *so* excited for our US friends today.

This could be it! The long-awaited turn back to healing a deeply wounded republic!

Months to go and lots of dangers among extremists yet to be thwarted (especially at the polls, where most every vote in some regions will be contested by all the GOP watchers this year).

But what a long-overdue change could come out of this. We might finally start to wean ourselves from our 8-year nightmare of busted US and global civic norms. 🤞🏻

Today's newsletter won't be finished before a meeting at 12, but I enjoy having more time to let my readings sink in. I've now listened to a few histories of Bangladesh critical for the current conflict, and I'm mostly fascinated by the scramble for narrative control from the very start of the state in 1971. No bid to be seen as a distinct state is ever politically clean, but this is a country with *huge* taboos around talking about their liberation war.

(More later, but we're a messy species!)

All right, #Zine Team, the moment of truth:

Here's the mock-up of our digital version of abZurd - Volume 1, Issue 1. If folks want name changes, do let me know. Thoughts on colour, etc, very welcome.

The next step will be to prep this for printing, in a program that'll let me separate colour from b&w.

Congrats, team!
We have lift-off!

@JGSchaeffer @ceorl @corlin @IrelandTorin @Boyceaz @BosmangBeratna @JeniRizio @POOetryma @jenebene @AndersonArtwork @redenigma @phase2

https://www.canva.com/design/DAGLUlpKcFI/-mdprVInuOWGsRnf0pWtSQ/view

Today for Monday Media Review, we reflect on how the earliest episodes of the TV show Evil deftly held in balance competing cosmologies (atheist and theist) in its first season, to show how secular and religious humans use different vocabularies to address similar questions of safety and transgression.

This narrative approach reminds us of our shared humanity: a critical lesson for our highly stressed-out world.

#Humanism #Religion #TV
https://open.substack.com/pub/mlclark/p/whats-really-haunting-all-our-secular

Finished an awesome paid editing gig this morning. One of those archive projects that gives you a glimpse of how much excitement once existed in fields and around topics we sometimes take too much for granted today.

I'm now going to take my SOUPED UP HAND COMPUTER with me for a walk, and using the magic of FREAKING TIN CANS IN SPACE, listen to people from HALFWAY ROUND THE WORLD share what it means to them to be alive.

(Newsletter just needs a quick glance before sending when I get back, too.)

The latest episode of Rachel Maddow's Ultra is such a frustrating reminder that the scapegoating of queer lives has always been a huge part of how fascistic leaders gain and sustain power (in this case, McCarthy, a man who collaborated with German extremists *after* WWII, and for years successfully pathologized and suppressed pluralist democracy in US gov't and society).

Poor Buddy Hunt.
Poor, brave Lester Hunt.

Democracy has always been so fragile.

#Podcasts #History
https://www.msnbc.com/msnbc-podcast/rachel-maddow-presents-ultra/season-2-episode-6-pressure-rcna162986

I'm so thankful to @Minholkin for a wealth of posts on always keeping one's core guiding principles in mind.

Recent news cycles have normalized the extraordinary in a way that makes it difficult not to be trapped in a state of relentless reaction to the latest data expressly crafted to wind us up. How can we hold steady amid that fray?

I wrote a story about this a few months back. I thought it might offer comfort tonight, so I posted it somewhere free-to-read. #Fiction
https://open.substack.com/pub/mlclark/p/the-missing-lamb-a-short-story

US friends (and allies!), there's a virtual event on August 1 that might be of use to an activist near you.

"Love Is Not Enough: How We Can Strengthen & Expand Public Libraries" looks to offer "specific actions, toolkits, and resources you can use right away to make a difference in the face of book bans, censorship, privatization, and loss of funding." Pass it on!

#Democracy #Activism #MutualAid https://mobilize.us/s/M43fWc

Touching grass now.

Anyone need me to touch a patch for them, too, while I'm out?

(I can also pat a tree on your behalf, or say hello to a bee, if that works better for you!)

🧐 Signs you might be dealing with a Canadian infiltrator...

✅ There's an uptick somehow of both swears and sorries in local forums.
✅ Everyone's talking about Thanksgiving earlier than seems right.
✅ Double "l"s, "s"s in lieu of "c"s, and "u"s are everywhere in political commentary!

How do you get a Canuck to blow cover? Well, remember that Inglourious Basterds scene where a spy gives himself away by how he flashes the wrong 3-finger sign? Like that, but with "Z".

Good luck keeping us out! 😬

Okay. Speaking pro-democratically, here's the only thing this Canuck wants to offer as *advice* on another country's election (besides "vote!" and "arrive hydrated to voting lines!"):

Watch for foreign interference with even greater vigilance from now until November.

Amid this scramble, the "other side" might need some time to switch its pitch, but LOTS of third-parties will try to leverage this shift in candidate to their advantage.

This should be *your* choice.

We're all rooting for you. 🗳️

I thought I asked for a *calmer* week. 🤨

My discount store is expanding its fruit options. Who's coming over for papaya? 👀

Rainy morning in the park.

All my vendor friends shivering in the "cold" (for a Colombian) after a deliciously warm week.

Air still thick somehow with the scent of burnt wood from last night's food vendors.

Fair grounds dormant before their last day.

Rumba classes booming in two corners.

Nature doing its thing without any pomp or circumstance - indifferent to us all.

#Colombia

*assassination attempt.

(You knew what I meant, but I don't want to risk opening another timeline with a slip of the keyboard.)