Speech Tyrants Would Seek To Suppress

Yes, if I were king, I would not allow people to go about burning the American flag.  However, we have a First Amendment, which says that the right of free speech shall not be abridged.  And it is addressed, in particular, to speech critical of the government.  I mean, that was the main kind of speech that tyrants would seek to suppress.

Burning the flag is a form of expression.  Speech doesn’t just mean written words or oral words.  It could be semaphore.  And burning a flag is a symbol that expresses an idea -- "I hate the government," "the government is unjust," whatever.

-- Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia (1936 - 2016) in an interview on Piers Morgan Live (18 July 2012), discussing his vote to protect flag burning as speech in Texas v. Johnson, 491 U.S. 397 (1989) (via CNN)

Some Awareness

To become different from what we are, we must have some awareness of what we are.

-- Eric Hoffer (1902 - 1983), American writer on social and political philosophy, The Passionate State Of Mind, and Other Aphorisms (1955) Section 151

Constitutional Harms

For the first time ever, this Court refuses to remedy a constitutional violation because it thinks the task beyond judicial capabilities.

And not just any constitutional violation.  The partisan gerrymanders in these cases deprived citizens of the most fundamental of their constitutional rights: the rights to participate equally in the political process, to join with others to advance political beliefs, and to choose their political representatives.  In so doing, the partisan gerrymanders here debased and dishonored our democracy, turning upside-down the core American idea that all governmental power derives from the people.  These gerrymanders enabled politicians to entrench themselves in office as against voters' preferences.  They promoted partisanship above respect for the popular will.  They encouraged a politics of polarization and dysfunction.  If left unchecked, gerrymanders like the ones here may irreparably damage our system of government.

And checking them is not beyond the courts.  The majority's abdication comes just when courts across the country, including those below, have coalesced around manageable judicial standards to resolve partisan gerrymandering claims.  Those standards satisfy the majority's own benchmarks.  They do not require -- indeed, they do not permit -- courts to rely on their own ideas of electoral fairness, whether proportional representation or any other.  And they limit courts to correcting only egregious gerrymanders, so judges do not become omnipresent players in the political process.  But yes, the standards used here do allow -- as well they should -- judicial intervention in the worst-of-the-worst cases of democratic subversion, causing blatant constitutional harms.  In other words, they allow courts to undo partisan gerrymanders of the kind we face today from North Carolina and Maryland.  In giving such gerrymanders a pass from judicial review, the majority goes tragically wrong.

-- Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan, joined by Justices Ginsburg, Breyer, and Sotomayor, dissenting in Rucho v Common Cause (27 June 2019) in which they anticipated the escalating gerrymanders attempted by Texas and threatened by California this year

Jargon That Gatekeeps

Being able to effectively curate information to captivate the audience while maintaining maximum value in the distributed information's fidelity is the most important part of dimensionality reduction for effective communication.  This will be the most important way humans will use AI in order to solve real world problems.

I might add that the ability to simplify information for any audience in order to democratize knowledge without depending on jargon that gatekeeps it is an obvious sign of great intelligence in an individual.

-- Jonathan Murphy, who bills himself as a "Solution Maker", in a jargon- & buzzword-filled response to someone stating on LinkedIn that they plan to train an AI to answer the question, "Am I explaining things at the right level" in this deliverable; this post seems to violate everything he claims to favor

The Height Of A Mountain

Never measure the height of a mountain, until you have reached the top.  Then you will see how low it was.

-- Dag Hammarskjöld (1905 - 1961), Swedish diplomat, second United Nations Secretary-General, and Nobel Peace Prize recipient, Markings (1964)

Opposed By Watchful Men

I am a member of a party of one, and I live in an age of fear.  Nothing lately has unsettled my party and raised my fears so much as your editorial, on Thanksgiving Day, suggesting that employees should be required to state their beliefs in order to hold their jobs.  The idea is inconsistent with our constitutional theory and has been stubbornly opposed by watchful men since the early days of the Republic.

-- Elwyn Brooks (E.B.) White (1899 - 1985), American essayist, columnist, poet, and editor, best known today for his work in a writers' guide, The Elements of Style, and for three children's books: Charlotte's Web, Stuart Little, and The Trumpet of the Swan, generally regarded as classics, Letter to the New York Herald Tribune (29 November 1947)

RIP Ozzy Osbourne

People look to me and say
Is the end near, when is the final day?
What’s the future of mankind?
How do I know, I got left behind

Everyone goes through changes
Looking to find the truth
Don’t look at me for answers
Don’t ask me
I don’t know

-- John Michael (Ozzy) Osbourne (3 December 1948 - 22 July 2025), English musician known as the lead singer of Black Sabbath and for his solo career, "Goodbye To Romance" (20 September 1980) From: Blizzard of Ozz (Expanded Edition)

To Be Responsible

To be a man is, precisely, to be responsible.  It is to feel shame at the sight of what seems to be unmerited misery.  It is to take pride in a victory won by one's comrades.  It is to feel, when setting one's stone, that one is contributing to the building of the world.

-- Antoine de Saint Exupéry (1900 - 1944), French writer, poet and aviator, Terre des Hommes (1939) Ch. II : The Men

A Nation Of Laws

We, the undersigned, proudly defended the rule of law as attorneys at the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ).  We are all alarmed by DOJ leadership's recent deviations from constitutional principles and institutional guardrails.  We also share a grave concern over the senseless attacks on the dedicated career employees who are the backbone of the Department.

Emil Bove has been a leader in this assault.  Despite that, he now stands before you as a nominee for a lifetime seat on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit.  We ask that before the Judiciary Committee votes on this nomination, you rigorously examine the actions Mr. Bove has taken at DOJ and the effects they've had on the Department's integrity, employees, and mission-critical work.  It is intolerable to us that anyone who disgraces the Justice Department would be promoted to one of the highest courts in the land, as it should be intolerable to anyone committed to maintaining our ordered system of justice. ...

Each of you was elected through a democratic process that, for nearly 250 years, has been anchored by the rule of law.  But the law is only as strong as the institutions that interpret and enforce it; foremost among them, the federal judiciary and the Department of Justice.  By elevating those who've degraded one of those institutions to lifetime seats on the other, you will have abrogated your duty to ensure that we remain a nation of laws.

We ask that you vote your conscience only after thoroughly and honestly investigating Mr. Bove's actions at the Justice Department, including by questioning current and former DOJ employees with information relevant to the aforementioned incidents and others.  We also urge you to zealously exercise your oversight powers to protect the Justice Department against further attacks.

-- Letter to the Senate Judiciary Committee, released Tuesday with signatures of 75 former U.S. Department of Justice employees, now (Wednesday) with more than 900 signatories (15 July 2025)

Our Tax Dollars At Work

Five months into its unprecedented dismantling of foreign-aid programs, the Trump administration has given the order to incinerate food instead of sending it to people abroad who need it.  Nearly 500 metric tons of emergency food -- enough to feed about 1.5 million children for a week -- are set to expire tomorrow, according to current and former government employees with direct knowledge of the rations.  Within weeks, two of those sources told me, the food, meant for children in Afghanistan and Pakistan, will be ash.  (The sources I spoke with for this story requested anonymity for fear of professional repercussions.)

Sometime near the end of the Biden administration, USAID spent about $800,000 on the high-energy biscuits, one current and one former employee at the agency told me.  The biscuits, which cram in the nutritional needs of a child under 5, are a stopgap measure, often used in scenarios where people have lost their homes in a natural disaster or fled a war faster than aid groups could set up a kitchen to receive them.  They were stored in a Dubai warehouse and intended to go to the children this year.

-- Hana Kiros, "The Trump Administration Is About to Incinerate 500 Tons of Emergency Food", The Atlantic (14 July 2025)

Odious

The power of the Executive to cast a man into prison without formulating any charge known to the law, and particularly to deny him the judgment of his peers, is in the highest degree odious and is the foundation of all totalitarian government.

-- Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (1874-1965), British politician and statesman, in a telegram (21 November 1942) by Churchill from Cairo, Egypt to Home Secretary Herbert Morrison; cited in In the Highest Degree Odious (1992), Simpson, Clarendon Press, p. 391

In Dreams

In dreams begins responsibility.

-- William Butler Yeats (1865 - 1939), Irish symbolist poet, dramatist, and mystic, 1923 Nobel laureate in Literature, Epigraph to the book Responsibilities (1914)

None Of This Was Charity

Russia, despite a rickety economy and unsustainable manpower losses, is escalating this fight in an attempt to win through diplomacy -- pouring everything into a renewed effort to break the West's resolve because they can't break Ukraine's lines.  And Ukraine continues to hold at great cost.  If we falter now, the United States risks more than just a battlefield setback.  We risk sending a signal to adversaries and allies alike that America no longer has the stomach to stand with those who fight for freedom.  To give up now sends the message that we have no will to commit to our own national interests.

The history of diplomacy has many euphemisms for disengaging from a fight before the enemy: "ending wars," "retrenchment," "refocusing," "a decent interval," and so on.  The military has a simple word for it: surrender.

The past three U.S. administrations understood both the stakes and the complexity of supporting Ukraine.  They helped Ukraine take the difficult steps toward interoperability with NATO while provided critical military equipment and training.  Our policy and our delivery timelines weren't always perfect, but Republicans and Democrats agreed that a free, strong Ukraine in a position to defend itself was an asset to our security.  And Americans supported that approach.

None of this was charity -- it was strategic investment with deliberate attention to what we could provide without compromising our own readiness.  That took rigor, discipline, analysis, and more risk mitigation than almost anyone who doesn't work in the Pentagon will ever realize.  But it paid off.  Ukraine, once reliant on Soviet doctrine and gear, transformed its military structure and operational capability under fire while defending its sovereignty with courage, combat savvy, and increasing skill.

Ukraine is holding on.  Barely, but bravely.  Let's not make them hold on alone or for much longer.

-- Lt. Gen. Mark Hertling (Ret.), former commander of U.S. Army Europe, "If We Don't Stand With Ukraine, What Do We Stand For?" (7 July 2025)

Our Willingness To Discipline

One of the widest gaps in human experience is the gap between what we say we want to be and our willingness to discipline ourselves to get there.

-- Harry Emerson Fosdick (1878 - 1969), American Baptist and Presbyterian minister, Living Under Tension : Sermons on Christianity Today (1941)

RIP Brian Wilson

All of us have the privilege of making music that helps and heals -- to make music that makes people happier, stronger and kinder.  Don't forget: music is God's voice.

-- Brian Douglas Wilson (20 June 1942 - 11 June 2025), American musician, singer, songwriter, and record producer who co-founded the Beach Boys, At the induction ceremony of The Beach Boys into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame (January 1988)

What Do We Get For That?

The total actual 2024 budget to run the country was about 7 trillion dollars.  That means the NASA budget was only 0.004 of the national budget -- less than half a percent.  For every hundred dollars the US government spent, it put 40 cents in the bucket for NASA.

And what do we get for that?  The Universe. 

Missions to Mercury, Venus, Jupiter.  Landers on Mars, telescopes that peer through the depths of the cosmos, a fleet of spacecraft monitoring the Sun, the star to which we owe our existence.  The abject awe and wonder of images of a glorious cosmos.  The first A in NASA is for Aeronautics, too; research that makes air travel better, faster, and safer.  NASA science includes observing and monitoring our own planet as well, making satellites that track our water, atmosphere, and land. NASA scientists study climate change, one of the single biggest existential threats to humanity.

NASA employs about 18,000 people across all 50 states (and that doesn't include contractors, of which I was one for many years, and people such as  academics who have NASA grants).  NASA partners with space agencies around the world, a diversified portfolio that guarantees the best scientific research always pushing past the cutting edge and accelerating our understanding of, well, everything. 

-- Philip Plait, Bad Astronomy Newsletter, "Trump threatens to eviscerate NASA" (2 June 2025)

By This Embrace

Love and art do not embrace what is beautiful but what is made beautiful by this embrace.

-- Karl Kraus (1874 - 1936), Austrian journalist, satirist, essayist, aphorist, playwright, and poet, Beim Wort genommen (1955); as translated by Harry Zohn

No Limits

Death is not an event in life: we do not live to experience death.  If we take eternity to mean not infinite temporal duration but timelessness, then eternal life belongs to those who live in the present.  Our life has no end in just the way in which our visual field has no limits.

-- Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889 - 1951), Austrian-born philosopher who spent much of his life in England, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus (1922) 6.4311

Very Nearly Allied

To tempt, and to be tempted, are things very nearly allied, and, in spite of the finest maxims of morality impressed upon the mind, whenever feeling has anything to do in the matter, no sooner is it excited than we have already gone vastly farther than we are aware of, and I have yet to learn how it is possible to prevent its being excited.

-- Catherine II of Russia aka Catherine the Great (1729 - 1796), Empress of Russia for more than three decades, Memoirs of the Empress Catherine II (1859)

Sa Dan

On Saturday April 12th I tested in front of my Taekwondo master instructor, 8th Dan Grandmaster Namsoo Hyong, for the rank of 4th Dan.  Tonight I received my new belt.  

Testing requirements included 20 poomsae (patterns or forms of about 20 movements each), including a creative poomsae of my own design, 40 different kicks, and numerous other combinations, with a few creative combinations of my own.  The testing culminated in sparring against a single opponent, and then sparring against two opponents at once.  

The last time I tested was April 2020, peak pandemic time, 5 years ago.  It took about 18 months to prepare for this test, including about 5 to 10 hours per week since the start of the year.

With this rank I have earned the title 사범 님 Sabeom Nim, meaning one who teaches, and who can perform all of the requirements at a high level.  In our system, you must be 4th Dan to judge Black belt tests, and to award others the rank of Black belt.  Achieving this rank checks off an item on my bucket list.  It will be about 4 years until I am eligible to test for 5th Dan, and from today's perspective, I wonder whether I'll test again.

Glad to have that behind me.