Tag: Politics

Catching up on the campaigns

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

I had hoped that this would be the presidential primary year when I would finally be able to get out and meet the candidates – all of them – face to face. Get a measure of them. In the past, I was usually tied up at the office or in other scheduling conflicts.

In New Hampshire, many of the campaigns start out with house parties, where the candidates talk informally in people’s living rooms, or in fraternal lodges or town halls and the like, and then build up to larger venues. Since the televised debates often screen out those candidates struggling in the survey polling, serious voters will seek out opportunities to give everyone a chance to be heard and considered. This is, after all, grassroots politics.

Somehow, my calendar in the fall and early winter filled up with other activities. So I decided I’d devote the weeks just before and after the Iowa caucuses to the project. What I discovered, though, was that almost all of the remaining events were now scheduled in Merrimack Valley, over an hour away from the seacoast region where I live – that is, they’re in Manchester, Nashua, and Concord. And the U.S. senators in the running were all stuck in the impeachment hearings in Washington.

Well, there have been some surprises since then.

One was on Tuesday afternoon, the day after Iowa, when Amy Klobuchar spoke at South Church in Portsmouth. I attended and am glad I did. The sanctuary was packed, every seat on the main floor, and she really delivered. I had a much better appreciation for her as a presidential contender. Actually, she was amazing.

And Sunday afternoon, Pete Buttigieg appears at the middle school here in Dover. I’m planning to be there, for perspective, if nothing else.

I do regret not starting on this project earlier. I’m left wondering about those who simply failed to connect, what we’re missing.

Still, we’ve met with some interesting and devoted volunteers who’ve canvassed at our front door. And we’ve been following the local news. So it goes, down to the wire.

On thin ice

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 2 Comments

Contrary to the petroleum-industry pawns in public office, there’s no shortage of evidence of global warming – or climatic instability, to be more precise.

In the 20 years I’ve lived and gardened where I do, we’ve moved a whole growing zone ahead – out of 11. In effect, we’ve gained two full frost-free months.

For perspective, consider a friend who recently moved to town. He took cuttings of one shrub in his new yard to the local nursery and asked what he could do to assure their flowering next year.

Nothing, he was told. Our weather’s now too warm for that species to bloom.

~*~

Which brings me to January.

It’s typically the coldest month of the year, the one where we get subzero temps and freezing water pipes, if we’re not vigilant.

What we’re not supposed to be getting is readings up into the 60s, as we are now. Not 6 or minus 6. Sixty-three, yesterday.

We haven’t even had many single-digit numbers this season. A few in the teens.

It’s scary.

We remember the warm spell a few years ago that killed all that year’s peaches in the Northeast. Or, more accurately, the seasonally appropriate deep cold a few days later did.

~*~

Snowfall is another matter. Usually, much of January is too cold for it to snow. Instead, we got a half-dozen inches after Christmas, then followed by a slow, misty rain, which then froze solid. The white’s still there, but you have to be careful. You walk on top of it and slide, rather than sink inches into it. It’s treacherous.

Or was until yesterday. Our neighbor was out in his shorts and a T-shirt to finish shoveling his driveway, the part that his monster snowblower couldn’t quite handle.

I was able to get out on my cross country skis a few times in December, for the first time in three or four years. But after that I didn’t dare on this stuff, there was no way to control my movement. At my age, a fall could put me in traction. Banish the thought.

Meanwhile, I hear that the ice on our lakes is too thin for the ice fishermen, who usually populate the expanses with their colorful bob houses this time of year. Nope, not so far this one. Look, there’s a whole subculture devoted to that practice, and I’d bet the majority of them keep voting for the villains. It’s insane.

~*~

Well, the prophets of all this were poobahed back in the ’60s when their scientific projections saw it coming. And the self-interests of the oil industry have continued to decry it, shifting their stance along the way from “It’s phony” to “It’s just a normal fluctuation” to “It’s inevitable and we can’t do anything anyway.”

Doesn’t anyone else see how they’re on thin ice, just just as ignorant as the innocent polar bears caught up in their greedy blindness?

And as for the rest of us? I mean, if our temperatures here are running 20 to 40 degrees above normal, I hate to think about summer. How hot would that make it where you live? Maybe they’re hoping to rake in on our increased air-conditioning bills, too.

How about you?

Be the church

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment
These T-shirts worn by members of Durham Community Church (UCC) at a Jericho Walk around the federal building in Manchester uphold the perspective of the church as the body of believers rather than the house of worship or the organizational structure. This was at a vigil opposing the deportation of refugees.

OH, YES!

~ Jnana Hodson ~ 2 Comments

Think of this as a referendum. No nation can be great if its soul is ugly. Stand up for factual truth rather than unsupported claims.

As the bumper sticker says:

Love this bumper sticker. And to think, these days it’s a political statement.

 

TEN GOOD REASONS TO VOTE

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

When it comes to election results in most of the locales I’ve lived in, I’ve awakened to find myself in the minority. Sometimes, discouraged, I’ve wondered if it’s even made sense to show up to cast my ballot.

On the other hand, believe me, being victorious can feel unbelievably vindicating.

That said, let me argue that casting your vote is not about winning. It’s about taking a stand.

Here are ten reasons you need to do it – especially if you live in the United States today.

  1. It’s witness. The Bible presents a sequence of prophets and faithful individuals who have publicly done what’s right, no matter what. There’s good reason to have a multiparty system and its loyal opposition. Voting is one way of strengthening your own convictions.
  2. It’s protest. In the current political climate, persecuted people and other nations need to know that not all Americans accept the tragic and reckless actions our government has been taking. History needs to know there have always been people of integrity, even when the current turns toward fascism.
  3. You’re a reader. That means you’re better informed than the average Fox channel viewer. At the least, you cancel his vote. (Whew!) Better yet, you one-up him. (Yay!) Go for it.
  4. As an informed voter, you can know who the big PAC money is supporting and cast your ballot against their candidates. Remember, in the end, the PACs want you to pay your taxes for their benefit. Defend yourself.
  5. Some good people are running. Contrary to nihilistic conservative voices, not all candidates are crooks – in fact, that argument begins to sound like a mea culpa. Win or lose, honorable candidates need support in knowing they’ve done the right thing in campaigning. Otherwise, you’ve endorsed corruption and we’ll all pay dearly. You wouldn’t want that, would you?
  6. Officeholders often feel alone when it comes to being true to their own moral values They need individuals to confirm their intuition. You can sway them in the direction events take, even into the next term.
  7. Public policy decisions affect real actions for good or bad. You can back a candidate who’s going to solve problems rather than make more. And please, don’t settle on blank promises like “create new jobs” – ask what it actually means in detail. A job at Walmart won’t put much food on the table or pay the rent, not where I live, and will likely wipe out someone else in the process. Frankly, I’d rather have the someone else. Yada yada. Also listen for what they leave unsaid. Anyone remember hearing anything about taking over the Internet in our last national balloting?
  8. Nurture future leaders. I’m encouraged to see talented fresh faces stepping up to the challenge across the nation. They need a boost. And we need theirs. Confirm their idealistic aspirations.
  9. Screw the bastards. You can vote against incumbents and register your complaint, at the least. Rotten apples are destroying the barrel and need to be purged. This may be our last chance to trash them and wash the container. Don’t lose it. Let the good win out, please. Just look at what the partisan takeover of the Supreme Court is doing to the nation’s workers.
  10. Defend your liberty. In essence, not voting is the same as not having the right to vote. Think about that. It’s time to come to the defense of your essential rights or else lose them. Democracy is being assaulted by reactionary forces.

~*~

What reasons would you add?

TEN WAYS THIS ‘DAFFODIL’ IS NEW

~ Jnana Hodson ~ Leave a comment

My newest novel, Daffodil Uprising, is a thorough revision of the earlier Daffodil Sunrise. Nearly half of the original book has been excised and replaced by twice that amount of new material, for good reason.

Here are ten of the big differences.

  1. The events and characters are now seen through the eyes and snarky voice of Kenzie’s daughter a generation later. They are Cassia’s discoveries about her father’s college years in the turbulent 1960s, pro and con.
  2. As the subtitle says, the focus is on the making of a hippie. The college and its good-old-boy network of abusive power and greed earn much of the blame.
  3. Kenzie’s growth as a budding photographer gets fuller attention, along with his artistic advances. It’s his basic reason for coming to Daffodil, after all.
  4. His girlfriend is a much more complex and troubled creature. She has good cause to be chafing in her relationship with him. And he, in contrast, is so truly naïve. Something’s got to give.
  5. Most of the characters have been renamed and are more uniquely defined. They and their actions have new grounding in everyday life.
  6. Kenzie’s buddies are no longer a pack of emerging radicals in action but rather a lineup of widely varied boyz stumbling along in a confounding environment. His dorm’s underground traditions are handed down through a band of quirky seniors and juniors who serve as wise elders and guides to neophyte freshmen like Kenzie. It’s a colorful crew – one that teaches him as much or more than his professors, in fact.
  7. The narrative’s giddy, upbeat, and sometimes sophomoric youthful optimism is now countered by darker forces of oppressive greed, violence, and despair. Bad drug trips and protest bombings accompany the scene.
  8. There’s now an element of Goth. This is a college campus, after all. Why should Hogwarts be all that different?
  9. There’s also a strand of the paranormal. You ever live in a creepy old apartment building or have the subject of a term paper start talking back to you?
  10. The work now stands in fuller correlation with What’s Left, a generation later, and the two other novels that follow him after college.
Daffodil Uprising

For details, go to Smashwords.com.