STEPPING OUT OF THE PRESENT

Strolling around older neighborhoods of a community like mine, it’s quite possible to feel yourself moving through another era. Imagine horses instead of cars and let the utility lines overhead fade from sight. I find a tinge of time travel is especially likely to kick in around dawn or sunset.

Mentioning that to my wife prompts memories of her own experiences while working in a museum comprised of a district of historic houses in nearby Portsmouth. For her, the sensation would settle in during late afternoons in the tourism shoulder season as she’d step from the kitchen into the outdoors. No wires in the air, no traffic, no tourists to spoil the perfect scene. Truly harmonious and timeless.

Maybe even a vision of the future in an eco-friendly environment.

A WAKE-UP CALL FOR SELF-DEFEATING IDEALISTS

The realm of politics, as has been observed, has much in common with making sausage. It’s messy, even bloody, seldom includes premium ingredients. And there’s butchery at points.

Look, if Donald Trump wins the White House, everything Jill Stein stands for in a Green Revolution’s toast. It doesn’t take long to destroy the hard-gained agencies we have, much less to strip-mine hillsides and rip up forests. That’s why a vote for Stein is a vote against a Green agenda — it’s blatantly a vote against Hillary Clinton. If you think there’s no difference in the major parties on this issue, you’re deluding yourself. Or listen to what Trump thinks about real women like Clinton and Stein.

There’s a huge gap, too, between articulating policy and implementing it, as well as moving from the ivy tower into nitty-gritty management overseeing a host of federal agencies. You want to get anything done, you’re going to get dirty. It’s the nature of working with others. It’s the reality of winning battles, too.

Radical movements have a history of fragmenting, as Christopher Hill notes looking at the waves of ferment during the English civil wars and Protectorate.

Let’s not do it again. Rally around Hillary Clinton and regroup later, on the high ground.