Welcome to Sunday Stealing. Here we will steal all types of questions from every corner of the blogosphere. Our promise to you is that we will work hard to find the most interesting and intelligent questions. Cheers to all of us thieves!
This week we stole from Follow That Dream. Bonnie, who posted it, admits she stole it from Stella. Now here it is, just waiting for you to steal it for your blog …
Stolen from Follow That Dream
1. My bestie and I once …
One of them and I went to Las Vegas in September 2024, which was my first time and likely my last, though I had a good time.
2. When I’m nervous …
I look around a lot.
3. My hair …
Has been receding since I was 17.
4. When I turn to the left, I see …
A shred bag blocked the front window.
Adenia
5. My favorite aunt …
My great aunt Deana (Adenia) Yates was born in 1908, the youngest of my maternal grandmother Gertrude Williams’ siblings. She is to the right in the picture above with her sister, mother, and niece (my mom). There are more descriptions here.
My sisters and I visited the house that Deana and Gert shared, 13 Maple Street in Binghamton, NY, almost every day during lunch and after school during the academic year.
If I hadn’t been watching JEOPARDY with Deana on weekdays at noontime, I might not have become so obsessed with the program that I tried out for the show in 1998. I taught her canasta, and she taught me 500 rummy. She played SCRABBLE with me a lot. Sometimes, I would watch her “programs” with her and her sisters, the CBS soap operas Guiding Light, Edge of Night, and Secret Storm.
I was sad when she died in 1966, in part because she was a buffer between her sister and me. Gert didn’t think a boy should wash the dishes, which I did at home. More than once, Deana said to her sister, “Leave the boy alone!”
6. I have a hard time understanding ….
Consider this an expletive-filled rant about the politics in the last six months in the United States, and the capitulation by media (I’m talking about you, ABC, CBS…) More people will become sick and die.
Kelly tabbed The Authoritarian Regime Survival Guide. It was “published in social media in January 2017 in a series of improvised, spontaneous tweets, which reached 3 million views within one month.” The piece also resides here. It was compiled in 2018 by Martin Mycielski, the Vice President and Executive Director of the Open Dialogue Foundation in Brussels. This is an extensive, annotated excerpt, with the guide in italics.
They will come to power with a campaign based on fear, scaremongering, and distorting the truth. Nevertheless, their victory will be achieved through a democratic electoral process. But beware, as this will be their argument every time you question the legitimacy of their actions. They will claim a mandate from the People to change the system.
From the Guardian (who I give money to, BTW): “The world’s most admired democracy is being held hostage by a clique of far-right thugs. It would be a mistake to placate them.” Watch Jon Stewart’s Daily Show intro from 24 March.
They will divide and rule. Their strength lies in unity, in one voice and one ideology, and so should yours. They will call their supporters Patriots, the only ‘true Americans.’
I read this even more from the supporters of FOTUS. “DOGE is saving you money. Why aren’t you grateful?”
They will subjugate state media, turning them into a propaganda tube. Then, through convoluted laws and threats, they will attempt to control all mainstream media and limit press freedom.
See the ABC News capitulation to FOTUS, the AP ban at press conferences, et al.
They will create chaos, maintain a constant sense of conflict and danger.
You have likely said, “I can’t keep track of these things; it’s coming holus-bolus.” There have been over 100 executive orders.
Liars!
They will distort the truth, deny facts, and blatantly lie.
Watching the national security team lie before Congress about the Yemen attack leak was remarkable. “Nothing to see here! ” FOTUS LIED 30,000 times in his first term, and he lies now. The LA Times noted on 26 March, “Elon Musk has benefited from his close alliance… as [FOTUS] has ousted federal officials who had overseen departments investigating the billionaire’s multiple companies.”
They will propose shocking laws to provoke your outrage. You will focus your efforts on fighting them, so they will seemingly back off, giving you a false sense of victory. In the meantime, they will push through less ‘flashy’ legislation, slowly dismantling democracy.
You have noticed announcements about everything, especially tariffs, start and stop. What’s the rule now?
“When invading your liberal sensibilities, they will focus on what hurts the most – women and minorities. They will act as if democracy was majority rule, without respect for the minority. “
They will paint foreigners and immigrants as potential threats.
Tom Homan, head of Homeland Security, says all of the Venezuelans sent out of the country were thoroughly investigated and shown to be in gangs. Since they often lie, I remain unconvinced. Not incidentally, the CECOT prison in El Salvador is awful.
They will challenge women’s social status, undermine gender equality and interfere with reproductive rights.
The reversal of Roe v. Wade continues to resonate. Plus all of the anti-DEI crap, et al.
Disorder in the courts
“They will try to take control of the judiciary. They will assault your highest court. They need to remove the checks and balances to be able to push through unconstitutional legislation.”
FOTUS Ramps Up Attacks On Judges, Calls Out Justice John Roberts
They will try to rewrite history to suit their needs and use the education system to support their agenda.
Judge Orders Administration to Stop Deleting January 6 Videos. See also FOTUS suggesting taxpayers may compensate the pardoned J6 criminals with taxpayer dollars. And the anti-DEI crap.
They will alienate foreign allies and partners, convincing you don’t need them. They won’t care for the rest of the world, with their focus on ‘making your country great again’ while ruining your economy to fulfil their populist promises. They will omit that you’re part of a bigger world whose development depends on cooperation, sharing, and trade.
They will eventually manipulate the electoral system. They might say it’s to correct flaws, to make it more fair, more similar to the rest of the world, or just to make it better. Don’t believe it. They wouldn’t be messing with it at all if it wasn’t to benefit them in some way.
The executive order, PRESERVING AND PROTECTING THE INTEGRITY OF AMERICAN ELECTIONS, does neither.
Oppose any changes to electoral law that an authoritarian regime wants to enact – rest assured it’s only to help them remain in power longer.
With love, your Eastern European friends
There is a helpful “authoritarian checklist” in The Authoritarian Regime Survival Guide.
6 RULES for Survival under an Authoritarian Regime
Don’t stay indifferent. Expose their scaremongering and show flaws in their arguments. Organize protest movements, mobilize civil society. Don’t let them DIVIDE you into different classes of citizens, “true Americans,” “patriots” vs “traitors,” “enemies of the state.” Don’t hope it will pass; it WON’T.
If you don’t get them to back off or to step down, you better make goddamn SURE that when the next elections come, assuming there’s still any democracy left, NO ONE will vote for the same bastard(s) again!
What if your neighbour, friend, or family supports the authoritarian regime?
Don’t look down on or patronize them, even if you know what they’re saying has no factual basis or you find it offensive. Don’t get emotional, and don’t get provoked into heated arguments. Focus on what you have in common. Use their language. Don’t block their news sources or turn away from their leaders and authority figures. Pinpoint the practical, adverse effects of their side’s actions, ones that affect them directly. If all else fails, don’t turn away, don’t abandon your friends and family, and don’t shun your neighbors.
I will admit that the last one, especially, is mighty tough. You should read the entirety of the original document.
“One of the saddest lessons of history is this: If we’ve been bamboozled long enough, we tend to reject any evidence of the bamboozle. We’re no longer interested in finding out the truth. The bamboozle has captured us. It’s simply too painful to acknowledge, even to ourselves, that we’ve been taken. Once you give a charlatan power over you, you almost never get it back.”
― Carl Sagan, The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark
13 Minutes To The Moon, the podcast about how NASA got to the moon. Produced by the BBC World Service and hosted by Kevin Fong from NASA, with fascinating interviews. Hans Zimmer did the music.
Joseph Wambaugh, L.A. Cop Turned Novelist and Screenwriter, Dies at 88. I used to watch Police Story.
Kevin Drum, writer of solid political commentary, died
Carl Dean, Dolly Parton’s husband of nearly 60 years, dies at 82
A collection of the Mickey Mouse shorts from 1929, including Mickey speaking his first words in The Karnival Kid
Captain America Co-Creator Jack Kirby Getting Definitive Documentary ‘Kirbyvision’
Now I Know: Bombs Away! (Cat Version) and The Jigsaw Puzzles Worth Their Weight in Gold? and A Whopper of a Way to Pay For Your Wedding and How Homer Simpson’s Comical Gluttony Saved Lives and A Classical Way to Save the Whales and Why 19th Century Britons Lost Their Heads
Albany Public Library
Two Open Seats on APL Board. Albany voters will select two trustees for the Albany Public Library Board in the May 20 election. Both positions carry full five-year terms, which commence on July 1.
The library is hosting the following public forums:
“So, You Want to be a Library Trustee” Information Sessions
March 22 (Sat) | 10-11:30 am | Howe Branch | 105 Schuyler St.
March 26 (Wed) | 6:30-8 pm | Pine Hills Branch | 517 Western Ave.
Hear from current trustees about what it’s like serving as an APL trustee, how to get on the ballot, and tips for a successful campaign.
May 6 (Tue) | 6-7:30 pm | Washington Ave. Branch | 161 Washington Ave.
Bad news for libraries: ALA’s statement on the White House assault on the Institute of Museum and Library Services
Friends and Foundation of the Albany Public Library Author talks/book reviews in April, Tuesdays at 2 pm, 161 Washington Ave, large auditorium:
April 1 | To Be Announced
April 8 | Author Talk | C. M. Waggoner, who as a youngster ‘spent a lot of time reading fantasy novels in a swamp,’ discusses & reads from her mystery, The Village Library Demon-Hunting Society.
April 15 | Book Review | Piranesi, a novel by Susanna Clarke. Reviewer: Sarah Reiter, prolific local fiction writer & artist.
April 22 | Book Review | Tracing Homelands: Israel, Palestine, and the Claims of Belonging by Linda Dittmar. Reviewer: Jim Collins, PhD, professor emeritus, Linguistic Anthropology, U at Albany, SUNY.
April 29 | Book Review | Killed by a Traffic Engineer: Shattering the Delusion that Science Underlies Our Transportation System by Wes Marshall. Reviewer: Jackie Gonzales, PhD, environmental historian & project manager, Capital Streets.
MUSIC
Beethoven’s Opus 72 (Fidelio), Overture, which, of course, is all about me!
In February 2014, my wife and I attended the Albany Symphony Orchestra concert, which included Maurice Ravel’s Bolero. We got the tickets from friends at church who gave them up because one of them hated that piece of music, thinking it was boring. Seeing and hearing Bolero live was exquisite.
Flash forward to March 2025, and blogger buddy Kelly linked to a performance of Ravel’s Bolero despite his long-standing disdain for the piece. He wrote, “This one’s really very good, and the camera work in this video is pretty terrific.” Not incidentally, this being the 150th anniversary of Ravel’s birth this year, ASO is performing Bolero again on April 5, 2024, at the Palace Theatre in Albany. We are not going because of a conflict, but I recommend it. Incidentally, Maurice and I have the same birthday.
“ministry of presence, support, and advocacy for the victims of society’s injustice and neglect”
Making the effort is its own reward, someone said.
It would have been very easy not to go to church the Sunday morning of February 2nd. Even with my greatest effort, clearing our sidewalk of snow and ice the day before was impossible as the temperature plummeted, even with rock salt. Most of my neighbors were likewise stymied.
Moreover, the service wasn’t at my church but at Emmanuel Baptist, one of the FOCUS churches. “For more than 50 years, FOCUS has created a community called to be a collective voice – and a helping hand – for those in need.”
Yeah, I COULD have blown it off, but I like supporting FOCUS. Moreover, singing together with people from other congregations is fun. So I took the 910 bus down to the state capitol and walked the two slippery, frigid (<0F, c. -20C) blocks to Emmanuel, where about 25 of us got to sing a couple of songs together.
Pastor Kathy gave a good sermon. She noted that Jesus took a public stand against a faith system that offered religious cover for political violence. My, did THAT resonate!
Covenant
We always recite the FOCUS covenant. It has changed a bit since the collective formed in the mid-1960s, but the spirit of service has not been altered;
We believe that we are called by God to discern amid the many shapes of need and pain around us, the design of Christ’s mandate for our shared ministry. We covenant, therefore, with God and with one another: to engage in a search for faithful and effective forms of ministry; to provide a ministry of presence, support, and advocacy for the victims of society’s injustice and neglect; to speak the truth in places of power on behalf of the powerless; to equip ourselves for the service of Christ through joint educational and community-building ventures; and to celebrate in worship the meaning of our shared mission.
We commit to these purposes our prayers, our time, our talent, and our material resources with the hope that our life and work together in this time and place will demonstrate the liberating and reconciling power of the gospel.
What now?
After the service, I talked to several people about how they were doing and what they were doing to keep themselves sane these days. One worked at the FOCUS food pantry, and another served meals at the FOCUS breakfast club. Serving others gave them hope.
Another person I’ve known for a long time talked about volunteering at RISSE, whose mission is “to support refugees and immigrants to build new lives and thrive in the Capital Region… through language classes, immigration and employment assistance, youth programming, and case management. The service is not very far from my house. (Related: from WRGB-TV, Channel 6 -Local schools prepare for immigration policy changes.)
Yet another person suggested checking out a website called Indivisible. When I got home, I went to the website, but I was wary. The most geographically specific site was labeled: All in for Harris/Walz Action Team Capital Region NY.
Nevertheless, I wrote in an email titled, “What actions are you doing re: DOGE?” along with this Democracy Now video. Beth from Bethlehem Indivisible replied, “Lots of phone calls to electeds, and after last night’s Indivisible Mass Call, we are planning office visits to Schumer and Gillibrand, which is the most important thing right now.”
So, I’m “in the loop” on what I hope is a fruitful experience. (Oh, Kelly is writing to his Member of Congress.) I’m tired of being tired, frustrated, and angry without direction. Is this THE answer? Dunno. But I need to do SOMETHING that seems to be a response to political violence.
Genealogy blocked
Hey, I wrote to my state legislators about a potential change in NYS law that would hurt genealogical research.
“As part of New York State’s Fiscal Year 2026 budget proposal, Part U of the Health and Mental Hygiene Legislation would:
😡 Extend embargo periods to 125 years for birth records, 100 years for marriages, and 75 years for deaths — making New York one of the most restrictive states for vital records access in the entire country!
😡 Hike fees by more than 400%, raising the cost of a single genealogical record request to $95!
🤬 Eliminate even the basic vital records indexes, making it nearly impossible to simply confirm if a record exists in the first place!”
Read here and especially here, and if you’re in New York State, contact your state legislators before 5 pm on Tuesday, February 11.
I’m experiencing a tremendous degree of cognitive dissonance. Today is Martin Luther King Jr. Day, and it’s also the inauguration of someone who doesn’t seem to understand what MLK was about.
During the 2024 campaign, he supported a truly dreadful candidate for governor of North Carolina, Mark Robinson, a black man. 45/47 said that Robinson was Martin Luther King “on steroids.” The Tar Heel is a guy who left messages on a “porn site’s message boards more than a decade ago in which he referred to himself as a ‘black NAZI,” among other failings. Fortunately, he lost badly in a state that Orange won.
There were many online posts claiming that djt was never accused of being racist until he decided to run for president. Well, no. This AP story notes otherwise. Most of it is not new to anyone paying attention.
“In 1973, for example, the Justice Department sued the real estate tycoon and his father for their alleged refusal to rent apartments in predominantly white buildings to Black tenants. Testimony showed that applications filed by Black apartment seekers were marked with a ‘C’ for ‘colored.’
“The lawsuit ended in a settlement in which the Trumps acknowledged they “failed and neglected” to comply with the Fair Housing Act, though they were never required to explicitly acknowledge discrimination had occurred.
“In 1989, Trump infamously took out full page newspaper ads calling for New York state to reinstate the death penalty as five Black and Latino teenagers were set to stand trial for beating and raping a white woman in Central Park.” And he doubled down on this long after they were exonerated, so they sued him in 2024 for defamation.
HUD
djt includes many of his former rivals in his cabinet and his inner circle, including people of color. He named Doctor Ben Carson the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development; even though Carson had no experience in this area, it was convenient for him.
“Carson has allowed his family members to be involved in the operations of the department in ways that could benefit them. In particular, Carson’s son, Ben Carson Jr., and his daughter-in-law, Merlynn Carson, appear to have exercised an unusual amount of influence over certain government businesses. Emails uncovered by American Oversight and analyzed by news outlets reveal that both Carson Jr. and Merlynn Carson may have attempted to use their influence at HUD to advance their own private interests.” This shows that when he hires grifters, he doesn’t discriminate.
Black voters
Yet more black people voted for djt than ever before. Kamala “Harris appears to have won 80 percent of the Black vote, according to an exit poll by The Associated Press. But that’s a drop of 10 percentage points compared with 2020, when the current president, Joe Biden, won nine of 10 Black votes.
“The beneficiary? Trump, who won 20 percent of the Black vote this time, according to the exit poll. He had won 13 percent of the community’s vote in 2020 and 8 percent in 2016 — which in itself was the highest level of support by Black voters for any Republican since George W Bush in 2000…”
“Why? Today’s Black voters operate a bit more independently from previous generations, especially young Black voters, analysts say.
“Historically, the Democratic Party’s legacy with the civil rights movement is what kept it popular with Black voters. However, younger Black voters do not have those same civil rights legacy attachments…
“‘…this rising percentage of Black voters [is] taking a different look at the Republican Party in general and are exploring some curiosities with Trump despite his racial baggage.’”
I have no great insight here. The 47th president has the magic elixir that allows him to do things that I, as an old poli sci major, have never seen anyone else pull off. I hope that the country survives.
I will lean into the fact that, in the tradition of the MLK holiday, we act locally to make our country a better place despite what might happen at the national level. This isn’t easy, I know, but it is probably necessary. Here’s a Letter from a Birmingham Jail by MLK in 1963.
Welcome to Sunday Stealing. Here we will steal all types of questions from every corner of the blogosphere. Our promise to you is that we will work hard to find the most interesting and intelligent questions. Cheers to all of us thieves!
Trimmer 
Making the effort is its own reward, someone said.
I’m experiencing a tremendous degree of cognitive dissonance. Today is Martin Luther King Jr. Day, and it’s also the inauguration of someone who doesn’t seem to understand what MLK was about.