There was a copy of a small newspaper called the Epoch Times in our mailbox today.  Front page was a full page, full length color picture of President Trump.  There was also an envelope inside.  My first thought was that it was just political fundraising.  But we are the wrong people to be mailing this too.  But in our neighborhood, it would be a good bet.

The name of the paper was not very political sounding and vaguely religious.  My curiosity got the better of me and I Googled.  Turns out it is put out by the Chinese spiritual / political protest group Falun Gong.  They are in some sort of battle with the Chinese government and seem to be anti-communist in a serious way (how “communist” the current Chinese state is would be a different question).  Seems they are all in for Trump though.  Strange bedfellows.

Back in Austin and watched the Horns beat TCU in the semifinals of the NIT.  Been enjoying this old Jackson Browne tribute album, Looking into You.  One from Griffin House.  Lots of good stuff on this one.

Some March Madness, brunch at the Biltmore and cacti at the Botanical Gardens.

From Bloomberg.  Some nice maps.

Here’s How America Uses Its Land

By Dave Merrill and Lauren Leatherby
July 31, 2018

Going to be lots of talk coming about the US media and politics.  Ran across this interview from last year that is a great read.  Matt Taibbi interviews Noam Chomsky for his (Taibbi’s) upcoming book, Hate, Inc.

Preface: An Interview with Noam Chomsky (Hate Inc.)

A nice Bob Schneider cover of and old Jackson Browne song on this Saturday night.

Got some good seats for the UT vs SDSU NIT game (7th row).  I could get used to this. Horns won and we have 8th row tix for the game on Sunday.

After these White Terror attacks I keep going back to the New Yorker article from two years ago by Toni Morrison, Mourning for Whiteness  This is an artists take on this problem.  Today the Sydney Morning Herald calls it out explicitly as journalism.

Broken white men and the racist media that fuels their terrorism

The bring up the fact that:

… 100 per cent of all terrorist attacks carried out on US soil in 2018 were carried out by right-wing extremists.

Time to take this seriously yet?  I’m guessing the people in charge largely don’t feel threatened because they aren’t the targets. Is that the way it is supposed to work?  I know if any other ethnic group were shooting up non-ethnic places of worship like this action would be swift and extreme, almost certainly too extreme.  We are waiting.