JROTC or Junior ROTC: a DOD program proposed for Portland schools. There are many reasons why not to embed this military recruitment program in our schools. Yet as our memory of past military misadventures fades, taking JROTC aboard may seem like no big deal. Nonetheless, I am distressed that JROTC teaches history(!) as part of its curriculum.

Will the students learn that many wars were wars of choice and subject to mission creep (e.g., bombing Cambodia)? Will they learn how often military leadership told whoppers, like Gen. Westmoreland’s seeing “the light at the end of the tunnel” in Vietnam? Will they know that marches through Portland in that era chanted: “Hey, hey, LBJ, How many kids did you kill today?” As my high schoolmates did, will they hear these lyrics, from the “Vietnam Song”: “One, two, three, four What are we fighting for? Don't ask me, I don't give a damn, Next stop is Vietnam; Will instructors mention the “No Blood for Oil” slogan of the Gulf War I and II protests? Will students learn that Portland protests numbered 20,000 or more in the lead-up to the 2003 Iraq war? Will the classes discuss PTSD or traumatic brain injury (from roadside IED’s or the flash grenades used for house raids)?

I once worked at the VA, in mental health. One lecture example: a psychiatrist, who had some of his education paid for by the military, had been sent to Afghanistan. He regretted taking the money. Eisenhower warned against “…the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex.” Do we want PPS to be part of this complex? The JROTC proposal is scheduled for the Portland school board meeting May 7th (6pm, 501 N Dixon St. Portland, PublicComment@pps.net). JROTC curriculum: https://www.usarmyjrotc.com/jrotc-curriculum-overview/

Do you remember those patriotic bumper stickers that say, “Support Our Troops”? Of course you do. Well, I hated those stickers and that message with every sphincter in my body. What I can’t abide is vacuous messaging and ritualistic posturing. And those stickers were guilty of both – in spades. You see, the stickers did not signify solidarity with America’s fighting men and women. If it did, veterans wouldn’t be made to wait for years for medical care at Veterans’ Administration hospitals. They wouldn’t be one the biggest subgroups of America’s burgeoning homeless population, roaming the streets in tattered clothes, badly needing a bath, and searching for food in dumpsters. They wouldn’t have the highest suicide rate of any demographic group in the country. Instead, they would have excellent health care, educational opportunities, adequate housing, and good jobs. No, what those stickers solicit is support for the chickenshit politicians who start criminal wars to prop up the wealth-generating and sequestering machines of the ultra-rich at the expense of everyone else, especially veterans. Putting the stickers on bumpers is just a mindless ritual, conveying no more legitimate concern than saying “Thank you for your service.” It’s an all too easy way to show insincere appreciation for the sacrifice of veterans, without actually having to think about all the wars our country has fought with no positive return on its vast, catastrophic human investment. It’s a way to pretend to assume a portion of responsibility, albeit tiny and symbolic, for the plight of veterans, without actually having to do anything to help them. Support Our Troops is a mantra, repeated by bleating sheep, slavishly devoted to the shepherd who leads them to the slaughter, to the meat-processing plants of the American war-making machine.

Clarity is a simple word used to describe a simple concept. The dictionary defines it as: “the quality of being coherent and intelligible.” The purpose of communication is to impart information, or perhaps to persuade someone to do or not to do something through the application of a well-reasoned argument. It would seem that both ends would be served by clarity. And since humans rely on communication as the basis of their social pattern of existence, clarity should be as common as air. So why is it such a rare commodity? I think it might be the persuade part of the definition that dominates and undermines the communication part. We humans want what we want and will generally say what we must to get it. Thus, clarity becomes an obstacle to manipulation, an impediment to self-service. All too often, clarity dies in the throat, is swallowed into the stomach, and processed to dung in the gut. When this happens, you have shit coming out of both ends.

Evolution is quirky. On the face of it, the genetically fittest survive long enough to reproduce faster and better, so their genes come to dominate the species gene pool. That works, that is, until the process produces an organ, the human brain, that is able to reverse-engineer genetic progress. Then things go to shit in a flash. Why? Because that organ evolves non-biologically faster than its host ever could through gene mutation and natural selection. Progress is no longer environmentally directed. It becomes socially defined. The result? Humans who vote against their legitimate self-interests. Humans who embrace conspiracies while eschewing logic and reason, evidence and facts, history, science, and mathematics. You end up with MAGA Republicans and the Orange Pustule on a dead rat’s ass they revere as their Chosen-One Leader. You arrive at your final destination: a post-fact, no-reality-testing world. Social selection over biological selection. Game over.

This morning I saw a picture of Trump sitting at the defendant’s table at his criminal trial in New York. I thought to myself, this bloated chump of ours is all veneer. I ask myself, how can someone so fat be so thin at the same time? Our forever-blond boy is the shimmer that obscures the rot; he is the gloss that masks the dearth of substance. He is MAGA: a Mirage Announcing Grand Artifice. He is a Kodak snapshot of America: a crinkled, faded, poorly focused dream of good; a razor-sharp image of goodness betrayed. Sometimes I catch myself wondering how you apply a veneer to thin air. That must be a pretty neat trick. I ask myself, what if veneer is all there is? Is he all veneer? Are we?

I worked for you for five years. You gave me raises and promotions. The whole team took pictures with my toddler daughter at our all staff meeting. Carrying her around like a little football. Later, a group of teenage girls disguised as middle aged women you hired came forward and told you they want me gone so they can hire their friends. I told you two weeks ago that my husband has cancer and I’m pregnant with my second baby. So you fired me. You couldn’t look me in the face when you did it. You are the smallest man in the world.

Wow Elvis Costello is coming to PDX and he's not playing at the urine soaked Roseland but my favorite concert venue Edgefield. Got to get tickets, but something has changed! Oh it's the seating, they took the area close to the stage and filled it with chairs for $400 a seat upper class twits. Nothing says concert to me like watching self inflated dolts take pictures of themselves, attempt to awkwardly dance, and leave to ruin some other event halfway through the first set. OK I get it you need to make as much money as you can as quickly as you can, but you might be making your concert experience like every other shitty venue and killing the goose in the process. Fond regards a former fan.

I had just sang the Beatles, and walked off the karaoke stage. You were dancing in the crowd, I kept noticing you. Your hair is gold blonde, and you had on a classy long coat. When I walked over to talk with you, you said you’re a 60’s person, I was thinking that’s pretty cool, because I like the 60’s too. We did the can can and later on you told me you’re 33, and I was shocked because I thought you were 24. I said, “How do you look so good? What’s your secret?” And you told me that you bathe in Baby’s Blood. Wow, you’re a real fox, an electric lady, I hope to see you again one day.

I refuse to explain myself and the special needs of my seriously physically disabled son to anyone, because that feeling is humiliating and degrading. So, let’s just say that my son was playing fetch with a couple service dogs on an EMPTY field with easy access to and from a paved parking lot to see if maybe my son might be independent enough to care for a service dog himself. So, next time someone tells you to leave them and their disabled child alone, especially when they are neither hurting anyone nor even remotely bothering anyone, you should probably mind your own @&#$?&! business and #$@! off. Sure, laws are laws, but ethics are ethics. You failed the ethics test just like all the bigots in the world who currently and historically have harassed POC, women, LGTBQ, and most definitely the disabled - for simply existing in the public sphere. Go crawl under a rock and die, Princess Karen. I hope you get help for your menopause. Gosh, that must be really hard on you.

I applied for a position posted on my LinkedIn page, a public service job with a major Multnomah County organization. I'm fine with the job I have but since I had most of the listed qualifications I applied out of curiosity. The online application process took me through a number of steps that didn't seem to relate to the job posted, including providing contact information to a recruiting company called Lensa. It was impossible to proceed with the application itself without filling out this info - no Skip button. I've solved the resulting email deluge problem by blocking any message with "Lensa" but it made me wonder: why would a reputable public organization's HR go through a company that uses such aggressive strategies? This is as bad as mail ordering one item, then getting 6 emails a day from the company thereverafter.

To the owner of the Audi Q5 with studded tires driving around our pothole-pocked street this April — first off, your car doesn’t need them. All wheel drive and some decent snowflake tires will allow you to get to the top of Timberline, much less your West Hills driveway, during the briefest of our ice storms. Also, end of March was the time to take them off, not mid June. When I hear the crunch of your approach on our dry, daffodil-lined neighborhood roads it is everything I can do to not toss a brick through your windshield.

Regarding the giant piles of mulch that appear in parking spots all over the neighborhoods this time of year, but quickly migrate into the middle of the street and limit car and bike traffic: dudes. I'm happy you killed your water-sucking lawns, and I bet you didn't realize you'd need to re-mulch every year or two to prevent your yard from turning into weed central (not the cannabis kind). But seriously, wait to have it delivered until you (or maybe your landscaper) are ready to distribute the whole pile away from the street and onto your garden. The piles that last weeks are a nuisance. Buy beer and have friends over to help. Also, that giant chunky yellow mulch is for playgrounds. You want medium dark hemlock, you're welcome. Thanks for taking care of your yard though, I do love all your lovely plants.

No matter how diligent I am about turning off all auto play settings on all my accounts, devices, and even thumbnail settings, videos still start playing by themselves. Moving images are not only incredibly distracting, but often are disturbing to the mind. Not to mention that they often feature content that I don't wish to see. It's sad that this was quickly adopted as the norm as soon as the technology became available and able to be implemented (no surprise), but we need to change this as a society.

You’re are so performative with your advocacy. It’s honestly embarrassing. You absolutely lack any amount of self awareness. You have caused immense harm to other people but act like you are doing so much for others. You’re not charitable. You’re an awful mother and human being parading around your do-good acts for validation. You are bothered by the use of “struggle bus”? Really? But it’s ok to call people “psycho” and “crazy”? Good luck selling that house!