Consciousness

Sometimes it's all just too much.

Michael Pollan's A World Appears has broken my brain.  I can't let my mind run free; I'm constantly wondering if I am thinking the thoughts before they are verbalized in my head.  

Is it my neurons firing or is it me, whatever that means.  Do I exist outside of the chemical and electrical impulses in my head?  Pollan notes that this problem is, in some ways, unsolvable since we cannot extricate ourselves from ourselves and observe ourselves from the outside.

See what I mean?  Thinking like that can really tie your brain in knots.

A kinesthesiologist chimed in on the subject this morning, giving me a very complex description of what goes on in my brain when I think or move.  Pollan calls this materialism or physicalism, the need for something quantifiable as an explanation.

But Pollan dabbles in psychedelics.  He meditates.  He spends time on silent retreats.  

Do plants have consciousness?  Do newborn humans?  Is consciousness a sense of self or is it the self itself.

There I go again.

I'll leave you to it.  

Todd Blanche

The presumptive Attorney General of the United States thinks he is the man's lawyer, not the country's lawyer.  L'etat, c'est moi seems to be the governing principal in DC these days, so his (misplaced) loyalty shouldn't be such a surprise.

But, it is.

John Cornyn is happy to let FFOTUS and family off the IRS hook now that he has a signed declaration that the pay-me-because-I-desecrated-the-Capitol fun is kaput.  I see no indication that Todd Blanche won't implement something similar once he's confirmed, nor do I foresee any such protection from tax audits for me and mine.

My favorite crooked AG is John Mitchell, Nixon's cohort and someone who actually spent time in prison (19 months for conspiracy, perjury, and obstruction of justice).  Does hiding and lying about the Epstein files in order to protect his client, the guy in the gilded Oval Office, count as conspiracy, perjury, and obstruction of justice?

I'm not a lawyer, and my personal legal eagle is napping so I can't ask him, but from my (hardly objective but vehemently held) position it sure seems that it is.

My Congressman's web page says nothing about any of this.  Mark Kelly is out in the field, fundraising for DCCC approved candidates while trashing the Administration.  Ruben Gallego is laying low; friendships with creeps have their price.

There are supposed to be checks and balances.  Three women on the Supreme Court are not enough to create a balance of power.  The House is stuck in the mud and the Senate seems to be going on vacation.

I agree with Mayor Pete:

I’m really worried about where we’re headed as a country. I think in many ways our entire existence has been about creating a different kind of political system and introducing it to the world. That’s what we’re about. And now that whole project is in question. That whole project is, in my view, it’s on the brink.