Aaaand it’s already the middle of August. Grandson Hudson’s birthday. Where did the summer go? Raining this morning with some distant thunder, so the now-regular Monday morning golf outing has been cancelled. Try again tomorrow.

I missed the big display of lightning and thunder last evening, as we were inside a movie theater watching The Odyssey. We could hear the thunder, loud. Sometimes it wasn’t clear if the thunder was part of the movie soundtrack or outside reality. The movie ended almost exactly the same time the storm moved on. The Odyssey was a good movie, great at times, but it was definitely 30-45 minutes too long. Glad we saw it, but won’t see it again.

The movie did have a great central theme, apropos to today. You can’t fight/kill your way into greatness – all that killing leads to moral decay, no matter how “right” your cause began. Ezra Klein and a commentor in The NY Times said:

“Odysseus and his men were not fighting the barbarians; they were the barbarians.”

By observing both the film and the world order (and American democracy) crumbling around us, Mr. Klein reminds us that we cannot make Western civilization (or America) great again by betraying its own fundamental values. Strength, rules and order are necessary, but without compassion and empathy, we risk becoming the very thing we abhor.

That’s the US in a nutshell – MAGA and Trump are rapidly erasing the things that made America a force for good in the world, and replacing those things with cruelty and hate. The rule of law, equal for everyone. Foreign aid. Domestic aid for the poor and infirm. America as a refuge for people fleeing from violence. A nation with vast and protected natural resources. A lawful and regulated financial system. All those things are in the crosshairs of our current “leaders”, under attack or gone. We’re not fighting the barbarians, we *are* the barbarians.

With the hot weather this week, I’ve stayed inside a lot more than usual. Watched too much TV. I’m ready to do some outside things, but most of that will have to wait until I get back to Socal later this week. Hopefully the hot/dry weather there will have abated. I have outside chores to do, things to fix, and some golf to play.