Summer Visitor

 Margaret spotted this butterfly sitting in a puddle near our mailbox.  

 

We thought at first it might be in trouble.  However, it flew away when I approached -- and then returned again and again.  Just thirsty.

re·dun·dan·cy

 noun: redundancy

the state of being not or no longer needed or useful.

 

 The founders of the Nation apparently believed that, whoever made it to the presidency, they would at least be a gentleman with some sense of propriety.
 

That was clearly a mistake.
 

It is probably too late to take on the task of converting the government to a parliamentary system as in more civilized societies.  How about just eliminating the President's job?  No guarantee that would work, of course, but it seems worth the gamble at this point.

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 Why Trump built a staff of incompetent sycophants

Robert Reich

Overdue for Statehood

 The United States has five major, permanently inhabited territories: Puerto Rico, U.S. Virgin Islands, Guam, Northern Mariana Islands, and American Samoa. These territories are geographically distinct from the 50 states and have their own local governments, but are also subject to the laws of the U.S. federal government. (Google)

Washingtn D.C should be added to the list as it has its own local government, but is also subject to the laws of the U.S. federal government.

I doubt that Trump's grasp of history and geography includes any of the above, or the fact that his current residence was built by slave labor.  If he did know that, do you suppose he would be bothered by it?

See Rebecca Solnit's current article in The Guardian for an overview of the current circus in the District of Columbia.

Trump Is Launching a Hostile Takeover of Puerto Rico (Jacobin)

Getting The News

 When we lived in San Francisco in the 1970s there were two big news services offices there, the Associated Press (AP) and United Press International(UPI).  I sold some of my news photos to them, and those were then distributed internationally. The UPI began a steep decline in the 1980s along with newspapers in general, and sold its broadcast services to the AP.

The news services were originally called "wire services" because their news accumulation and distribution were over telegraph wires.  Telephone wires and transatlantic cables then took over the job until everything moved to the Internet.

Now, the remaining big players are AP, Reuters and Agence France-Presse (AFP). The AFP requires a subscription, but AP and Reuters are free and good general news sources.  Google News accumulates stories from all over, but the sources vary widely in quality and objectivity. A lot of people these days -- perhaps a majority -- look to social media like Facebook for their news, and that, unfortunately. is pretty much the bottom of the news barrel.

Given the ongoing decline of newspapers everywhere, journalists have struggled to keep their profession viable, in part by founding state-level cooperative news agencies. In New Mexico that includes Source New Mexico and Searchlight New Mexico.

Linda Lens as Bourke-White