Any approach to convincing people to vote for your candidate of choice that does not include listening and empathy is doomed to failure and likely to strengthen their opposition (see also: argumentative theory of reasoning and the backfire effect.) Proceed with caution.¹

Hooray, we're finally catching up with the rest of the Western world as well as a lot of developing countries!

Pet peeve: Whenever someone commits an act that is ethically/morally problematic and the first thing people say is "Well, it's not like it was illegal…."

Honestly, the ousting of DNC chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz was long overdue, well before Sanders started his campaign. It would've been only a matter of time before she ran the Democratic Party into the ground with her inept ground game and her active alienation of significant portions of the party membership. I can't help feel that if someone else more inspiring and diplomatic were at the helm, we might not have done as badly in 2012 and 2014.¹

There is definitely a contingent of Sanderistas who were never Democrats and who will never vote for Clinton, very similar to the PUMAs who refused to vote for Obama. Clinton will never win them over.

We've been influencing other democracies' elections for a long time now (Yay, Monroe Doctrine!) through propaganda, espionage, material support to our preferred regimes, and even overt military intervention. I suppose it was only a matter of time until what went around came around.¹

Positive thinking has a downside.

It occurs to me that July is pretty much over, and August is close at hand. This summer is flying by, and I kind of feel like I’m having to hang on tightly, lest I end up falling on my ass.

Actually, one of my favorite “there are wizards among us” stories is entitled “El Regalo” (The Gift) by Peter S Beagle (of The Last Unicorn fame.) Part of his anthology The Line Between, Beagle chronicles the misadventures of a 15 year old Korean American girl named Angie and her 8½ year old brother named Marvyn, both of whom come to discover that they have magical powers. In this tantalizing tidbit that is just calling to be expanded to a full length novel, they find themselves pitted against an ancient, malevolent sorceror only known as El Viejo, The Old Man.

It’s ironic, really. While I have thoroughly enjoyed the Harry Potter series for the past 7 years (I was gifted the first three books in 2000), I never really held it in high regard, especially in terms of literary merit. To me, it was the fantasy equivalent of a romance novel: lots of fun to read, but not something you would read again. As I’ve mentioned before, the only books that I’ve managed to read more than once have been The Lord of the Rings, The Last Unicorn, and The Wizard of Earthsea. (Actually, digging around in my memory, there are a few more: some of Madeline L’Engle’s books, in particular A Wrinkle in Time, A Wind in the Door, A Swiftly Tilting Planet, and Many Waters; and The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy trilogy series by Douglas Adams.)

My favorite quote:

I think I have a soft spot for this movie mostly because a lot of scene were filmed at my high school. Not to mention the whole time-travel, alternate-reality theme. And the psychotic bunny.

There is nothing that focuses my mind upon my solitary state than leaving home and driving down the empty Interstate just before midnight.

I don't know why I didn't feel so bad today. Maybe I've resigned myself to my fate. Maybe e-mailing everybody and their mom let me vent a little. I mean, sure, I balked a little when I saw [redacted]'s e-mail sitting in my inbox. [I was] afraid. But [reading it] I didn't feel much, just a [light touch] of regret. I've no intention of returning to L.A. any time soon. As I've said, I've begun to equate it with happiness and [also] with being trapped.

What is it that makes me think that I have been set apart, that I am a unique, special part of the universe? That I have been created to achieve a set purpose? And yet there is also in me the despair, the disbelief, the desire to shirk this not-so-voluntary responsibility. And yet I cannot disbelieve. But, yet, what is my purpose? Faith lets me believe that I will know when I get there, but skeptical doubt has me fear that my path has slipped out from under my feet, and that I am operating on mistaken assumptions.