Mary Oliver - Saved by the Beauty of the World

This documentary about the poet Mary Oliver came out in August and is currently available on YouTube as well as on PBS streaming services. I was really looking forward to watching it and after I did, have to say it is wonderful. Here are some great short clips from the show where various people are reading Mary Oliver's poems and an older clip where Mary Oliver is reading "The Summer Day" at the 92nd street Y in NYC.

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The Summer Day 

Mary Oliver 1935–2019

"Who made the world? 

Who made the swan, and the black bear? 

Who made the grasshopper? 

This grasshopper, I mean— 

the one who has flung herself out of the grass, 

the one who is eating sugar out of my hand, 

who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down— 

who is gazing around with her enormous and complicated eyes. 

Now she lifts her pale forearms and thoroughly washes her face. 

Now she snaps her wings open, and floats away. 

I don’t know exactly what a prayer is. 

I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down 

into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass, 

how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields, 

which is what I have been doing all day. 

Tell me, what else should I have done? 

Doesn’t everything die at last, and too soon? 

Tell me, what is it you plan to do 

with your one wild and precious life?"

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Fox News vs. North Korean State TV | The Daily Show

This is an old video but it's still pretty hilarious and sadly points at the truth. We muricans are in fact number one at least when it comes to political propaganda. The Daily Show put this video up 8 years ago but nothing has changed in the interim. 

Diaper Don is telling people at the GOP convo in Dallas that the arena is full and people are waiting outside - even though the cult members inside the arena can see (if they could only believe their own eyes) that is a lie. Jimmy Kimmel puts it much better than I can and includes the twits on Fox and the Squeaker of the House repeating the lie :-) 

The party of corruption is worried that anti-corruption candidates are gaining popularity, so they and their owners are dumping tons of money into attack ads and even using the FCC to prevent James Talarico from appearing on Kimmel. 

You can watch the James Talarico interview on YouTube though and learn fun facts like - his opponent (and dementia Don’s fav), James Paxton increased his wealth by 7000% while he was AG of Texas, he was caught stealing a 1000-dollar pen from a fellow attorney (who had received it as a gift from his wife) and Ken Paxton owns 15 homes even though his salary is $150,000 a year. No wonder Eloon and diaper Don support the guy. If your anti-corruption - vote for political candidates that are also anti-corruption..in other words don't vote for Republicans or Republican lite Democrats. 

On the plus side a few hours ago that Talarico interview had 2 views now it's approaching half a million. Brenden Carr is crying like a baby. It's so weird to think these people purport to love the constitution never deviating from it’s original meaning, cry about cancel culture and censorship and yet when it comes to trampling on the first amendment, they forget all that talk and show their true fascist (or certainly authoritarian anti-American) colors.

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Abdul El-Sayed Talks Michigan Senate Race, Big Pharma, Capitalism, Mike Rogers, Islamophobia + More

This is a great interview. Abdul El-Sayad is a doctor who is smart, articulate and charismatic. I hope he wins the race for Michigan Senator next month - if the not so Supreme Court lets us vote ;-(

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Hasan Piker On Techno feudalism Replacing Capitalism, Anti-Zionism + More

Who's afraid of Hasan Piker? The same people who are afraid of Zorhan Mamdani, Abdul El-Sayad, Ilhan Omar etc. The same people who hear paid propagandists call FDR style democrats - communists and can't recognize they are being manipulated to serve the oligarch's goal of dividing the working class...the 99% or however you'd like to put it.

It's great that the Breakfast Club did this long form interview with Hasan Piker and let him talk about his ideas If you are a consumer of much of popular media in the USA you may be quite confused about who he is. 

It's something to see how the billionaire owned corporate media and their paid spokespeople are attacking this guy. Hopefully the disingenuous hand wringing and fear mongering backfires as people, compare the actual Hasan Piker to the caricature created by so many "news" outlets, influencers etc. I also hope more people begin to recognize the extent of right-wing propaganda in the USA. Not much hope for people my age but I think young people might have an opportunity (which of course is why Bibi Netanyahu) and other fascists are so interested in meeting with social media influencers like Tim Pool, the purchase of TikTok etc.

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We Need Another Moral Panic About Pronouns

I'm not talking about a moral panic like the hobby horse Jordie P. rode into town on when he freaked out himself and various other idjits into thinking the Canadian government was going to force people to use specific gendered pronouns. 

It's weird that his first lecture in the pronoun war was only a couple of months before his favorite U.S. politician was elected president. It's also weird that he has fallen off the face of the earth of late and that his daughter who promotes a meat-only diet is nicknamed stinky, but I digress.

Let's take a break for a second and announce today's secret word -

🔔🔔🔔Anthropomorphize🔔🔔🔔

To anthropomorphize something means attribute human characteristics to a non-human object. 

Why panic about that?

Because one of the features programmed into AI bots is to refer to the machine in human terms. Bots refer to their mechanism in human pronouns to nudge real humans into thinking of a machine as a human or human-like entity/friend/confidant. This is done to drive engagement - to keep people's attention. 

So, bots should be forced to stop referring to machine capabilities using pronouns like I, we, me and begin referring to the machine as it, bot, thing, 

You can force a bot to stop using human pronouns maybe, but you can definitely remind yourself at all times that machines are not human and the things you see and hear on screens are not real.

Go outside or stay inside and meet some real people - the world is a much better place than the screens would like you to believe.

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