Readers, Welcome to my blog (formerly Birds, Blooms, Books, etc). I'm entering a new decade taking on the challenge of moving from Maryland after living there 46 years and learning about my new home here in New England in the Live Free or Die state - New Hampshire. Join me as a write this new chapter of my life.
Saturday we traveled with friends to our first Sottish Festival held in Lincoln, NH at Loon Mountain Resort. It was the 51st festival. Our friends have attended many times, so not knowing what to expect we told them we would follow their lead.
We headed first to the Parade Square where the opening ceremony and massed bagpipe bands were assembling. From there we went to see a dance contest and then ended up watching some of the highland games. There was so much going on, all at the same time on the schedule throughout the grounds. We only got a sampling.
For me one of the highlights was seeing all the people showing their Scottish heritage in their dress. I've never seen so many men in kilts and looking like in was a natural thing for them.
If you knew your clan, you could register at a tent set aside for it.
The opening ceremony started with a bagpipe band leading in all the clans represented here.
Not sure what the significance of this group was but we did see them later as we passed an area showing old crafts.
After the clans left it was time for the massed bagpiper bands.
I'm not one for bagpipe music in a confined space but here with the mountains around us the sound was wonderful.
We stopped in later to see a sword dancing contest. This was a young lady in the under 12 category.
These two were older and I was surprised to see a young man dancing it too.
Here's who provided their music.
Isn't this a lovely couple?
This man sang all the national anthems on the parade ground. He sounded much better in this setting. The anthems were for Canada, Scotland, Great Britain and USA.
Highland games included a type of shot put for women and men, caper toss (like tossing a telephone pole) and something with a pitchfork and make believe hay bale.
I'm hoping Blogger will let me load a video.
No luck with 39 second one.
We lucked out with the weather. It was a beautiful blue sky day with a high in the 60ºs. Sunday as I write this it's raining all day.
Sometimes, it is hard for pro-democracy forces to take “yes” for an answer. Wary of “crediting” the egregiously partisan U.S. Supreme Court majority with any principled ruling, and conditioned to expect another assault on democracy, many Democrats greeted even a win as convincing and critical as a decision on the merits in the U.S. Post Office case with shrugs and eye-rolling. Worse, many remain suspicious about mail-in voting (which is entirely safe, secure, and vital to maximizing turnout).
The Supreme Court decision blocking Donald Trump’s war on mail-in voting is an undiluted win for democracy.Trump knew how big it was, and lashed outat the justices he had appointed in response, thereby confirming the enormity of his defeat.
It’s important to emphasize the magnitude of the victory defending mail-in voting, not only to reassure Americans that voting by mail is safe and secure, but to sustain voters’ sense of agency, a critical part in any battle against an authoritarian regime.
Political science research confirms, unsurprisingly, that people want to be on the winning side in political contests, writes voting advocate and litigatorTyler J. Hagenbuch. He explains:
Political scientistsErica Chenoweth and Maria Stephan spent years studying why some movements against authoritarians succeedwhile others fail. … People are very good at deciding whether a fight is worth their effort, and their decision usually comes down to whether the fight seems like it’s working. This is exactly why political campaigns are always talking about who has “momentum.” More people join the side that seems to be winning.
In the context of Trump’s total failure to hobble the Post Office, which would have disenfranchisedpotentially millions of voters, it is critical to remind voters that the authoritarians do not have some magical powers or secret sauce for staying in power. “[E]very time an attack on our elections fails so completely and so publicly, the country learns that none of this is inevitable and that we aren’t powerless. Americans have agency in this moment, and that terrifies Trump,” Hagenbuch observes.
Voting law guruRick Hasenagrees about the importance of the convincing legal win. “[T]he court’s conservatives and liberals came to the brink, saw that ruling the other way risked serious election subversion, and said ‘No,’” Hasen wrote. “The Supreme Court has been terrible on voting rights, but so far, it has held the line on actual election rigging. Let’s celebrate that, even as we gird for more battles to come.”
This does not mean that Democrats need to declare the crisis of confidence in the Supreme Court created by its MAGA partisan majority is over. A broken clock is right twice a day, so an occasional decision striking down such an obvious constitutional power grab hardly cures the crisis at the court or alleviates the urgency forsystemic, dramatic reform. And let’s readily concede thatJustice Sam Alito’s dissent, joined by Justice Clarence Thomas, is among the most factually inaccurate and intellectually dishonest of his career, which is saying something. But refusing to recognize the significance of Trump’s humiliating defeat is counterproductive and unwise for multiple reasons.
Whether it is the USPS case, his slap-down in the companion Post Office case in the District of Columbia, or the critical rebuff of MAGA Republicans’ appeal from their devastating loss in the Missouri redistricting case, Trump has been losing repeatedly of late and finding himself on the receiving end of judges’ unsparing, harsh rebukes.
It is vital to recognize the stalwart work not only of litigators — including our own Norm Eisen — but of lower court judges (whose stellar opinions set the predicate for the win at SCOTUS on the Post Office case). Operating under a constant barrage of physical and personal attacks in retaliation for standing up to Trump, they deserve support and praise. Their continued service is essential if our democracy is to survive the rest of the Trump years. And when the Supreme Court upholds their work, they and their peers on the bench must understand that their work is not futile.
Moreover, victories in key election cases at this point in the midterm cycle are critical to maintaining voters’ faith in the electoral process and keeping the edge in enthusiasm/turnout. It is not false bravado or misguided Pollyanna-ism to recognize when things go in favor of democracy forces. There is no virtue in telling people wins don’t matter because something else bad will come along (or that Trump won’t follow the law or that he will invent a new maneuver to cheat).
Defeatism is the death knell of a popular democracy movement, playing into the hands of despots who spend endless energy and time trying to convince the opposition that resistance is hopeless. What is crucial for pro-democracy forces at this stage is to realize that many of the guardrailsareholding. Though re-redistricting and other voter suppression techniques make it harder for pro-democracy forces to prevail, robust participation in the midterms brings us closer to the end of Trump’s span of uncontested trifecta power.
Recognizing legitimate victories and spreading a sense that our elections will be secure and meaningful help spur citizen volunteers to participate in voting protection efforts (asstate partiesandunionsare now doing); encourage early voting (which helps build momentum toward Election Day), and drive participation at live, in-person campaign events. Keeping voters engaged and turning out the vote may now be the most essential component in preservation of our democracy.
Especially for Trump and his cult, who rely on Trump puffery as a “winner” and denigration of opponents as “losers,” frequent embarrassment in court (and in failed wars and in our economy) can be demoralizing, which in turn spreads in MAGA ranks.Running downTexas attorney general Ken Paxton, the Republicans’ Senate nominee, signals to voters he is damaged goods. Michigan Senate nominee Mike Rogers ducking a debate (leaving his opponent todebateandmockanempty podium) hardly inspires Republicans to trek to the polls.Republicansnow are the ones at risk of self-fulfilling defeatism.
In sum, we salute the undaunted, unwavering, and unbowed litigators and judges who are holding the line for democracy, and providing reassurance that if the people do their part and turn out to vote, the darkest era in modern American political history will end. It now is up to you, the voters who value democracy, to do the work necessary to defeat the MAGA regime.
I will be off on Monday for Yom Kippur. I wish all who are observing a meaningful holiday and an easy fast.
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First apple pie of the season. A big hit with our friends in Swampscott, MA who we visited last week.
We met Alison and Steve our our Greek trip.
They took us to Marblehead for a history tour of an old house once owned by Jeremiah Lee.
Here's looking across the cove to Marblehead's downtown.
In the Marblehead Townhall was this picture of Washington crossing the Delaware. Dan and Steve were there!
But the most famous piece is the original painting of The Spirit of '76 by Archibald McNeal Willard. Unfortunately in taking this photo the overhead lights were on and we couldn't find how to turn them off.
[AC - how can I eliminate those lights?]
*****
Photo from Sunday evening.
And progress continues on the new library next door.
That sliding door exits to a patio. We will be making a decision on what trees to plant to give us some privacy in our backyard. Our property line is at the bottom edge of that straw covering. The skinny maple tree is on our property. There's a black walnut on their property in amongst our aborvitae on the right side. That walnut will decide what kind of trees we can plant because of a toxin the walnut produces. We learned the hard way that rhododendrens aren't compatible with walnut trees. The one remaining rhodo we have, we are giving to Emily to plant.
[Tom - any tree recommendations? We ruled out magnolia.]
A screen shot of just three of the blogs I like to read showing they haven't had any new posts for several days. Except that isn't true if I click on the blog title.
I haven't posted this one in sometime, but with mid terms happening soon here are actions to take. I've done the first three already this morning.
Americans of Conscience Checklist
September 11, 2026
Openthis week’s Checklistto join us in taking action for democracy, justice, and kindness, then pause to recharge with ourlatest list of Good News. In this week’smessage from Jen Hofmann, get a mental reset about what it takes to create meaningful change. We’ve also got details below about our upcoming class, Living Justice. Read on!
Take Action with Americans of Conscience Checklist
Action 1:Urge your senators to support legislation restoring TPS for Haiti.
Action 2:Celebrate National Voter Registration Day September 15.
Action 3:Resist the administration’s attempts to remove the “Roadless Rule.”
Here's a sneak peek at our long list of good news items.
A federal court blocks the U.S. Postal Servicefrom advancing new mail voting restrictions that would have disenfranchised Americans who cast a mail-in ballot.
A U.S. District Court rulesthat the administration's attempt to cut farm workers’ wages is unlawful.
A federal court for the Northern District of California rulesthat deporting U.S. residents for political speech the administration disagrees with is unconstitutional under the First and Fifth Amendments.
Subject: Send a letter 👉 Tell Congress: Stop Trump’s Yosemite Giveaway
Blogging Friends in the USA,
Yosemite is public land. It does not belong to a developer.
The Trump regime is working on a deal that would transfer a strip of Yosemite National Park to Kingsbarn Realty Capital, a private firm that wants to cut a road through parkland to reach an 83-acre project just outside the boundary.
They are calling it a “land exchange.” It is a giveaway. Once that road is in, the pressure for more private development at the edge of Yosemite only grows.
Yosemite is already under strain from Park Service staffing cuts. Search and rescue, trash, trails, and visitor safety are stretched. Handing parkland to a developer on top of that is the opposite of protecting it.
Congress has been notified. They can stop this.
Tell your Representative and Senators to block any transfer, exchange, or easement that gives Yosemite land to a private developer—and to restore the Park Service staff this park actually needs.
Sunday for a family dinner I made a Huguenot Torte from Stephen Colbert's cookbook, "Does This Taste Funny?" I had made this once before after having it at the Cookbook Club dinner in the spring.
The recipe calls for one large granny smith apple but I had three small pears just ripe that I decided to substitute for the apple. I sliced them up and placed them in a large but not my extra large pie plate. Now the recipe says to use a 9" x 12" casserole. Somehow in my head I figured the torte was going to be smaller with the pears. First mistake.
I beat the 4 eggs, added the sugar, chopped almonds, almond extract, the the flour, salt and the baking powder. Quite a bit of the latter is called for. I think you can see where this is going.
I poured the mixture over the pears and it immediately it started going over the sides of the pie plate. I attempted to scoop some off but my second mistake was not dumping the whole thing into a bigger casserole. Instead I placed my larger pie plate under it so it nested.
Into the oven it went. I placed sheets of foil on the shelf under the torte and could hear it plunking there as it heated up.
Close to the time to pull it out, I pulled out the foil because I didn't want the mounds of overflow to burn. I put another sheet of foil under it. More came off. I tasted one of the mounds and it was delicious. Dan thought so too.
When the torte was done the overflow ran down the outside of the pie plate.
I served it with whipped cream and all agreed it was delicious. Next time I'll use my large casserole dish!
The Trump regime suffered two major legal defeats on Friday.
First, District Judge Indira Talwani in Massachusetts issued a 49-page preliminary injunction (replacing hertemporary restraining order) to block the Trump regime’s hastily thrown together scheme to enlist the U.S. Postal Service to massively disrupt mail-in voting. Brand new requirements imposed on the eve of voting to match voters’ names to a newly concocted voter-roll list rife with errors, redesign ballots, reprint envelopes, and revamp bar codes would have made compliance impossible and therefore disenfranchise millions of voters, all in violation of the Constitution, which gives states the responsibility for elections (subject tocongressional, not presidential, action).
Talwani held that the rule was unconstitutional and would haveinevitablydeprived millions of their right to vote with “no evidence relating to fraudulent mail voting to support the rushed implementation of the Final Rule.” The Trump crew is racing to appeal directly to its MAGA lackeys on the Supreme Court, determined to deprive voters of the ability to hold the MAGA regime accountable at the polls. Make no mistake: Republicans are bent on denying millions the right to vote or creating widespread chaos because they know they are heading for a drubbing at the ballot box.
Separately on Friday, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit in a 2-1 decision inLeague of Women Voters v. U.S.uphelda lower court rulingbarring expansionof the Systematic Alien Verification Entitlements (SAVE) database (an error-ridden system), preventing a massive purge of voting rolls. Had the change gone into effect, millions of Americans’ private information would have been disclosed in violation of the Social Security Act. Inapress release, the League explained that the court stopped “the Trump administration’s attempt to revive an unlawful voter purge system built on unreliable data and Americans’ personal information,” noting that Trump “has repeatedly tried to sidestep the law in pursuit of policies that threaten voters and another court has now ruled to protect privacy and our democracy.”
In short, the Trump regime’s nonstop plot to block millions of voters’ access to the ballot and undermine confidence in voting and its blatant disregard of Americans’ privacy will continue, stopped only by dogged litigation brought by pro-democracy groups and Democratic state attorneys general and by stalwart lower courts. Unless and until Republicans get booted from office, the onslaught will continue.
Organized Labor is front and center in our democracy struggle
Labor Day holds special significance for Americans this year. In a time of unparalleled economic distress inflicted on working Americans due to the incompetence and reverse-Robin-Hood schemes of the most anti-worker president since Herbert Hoover, organized labor has helped spearhead the fight for economic opportunity and for democracy. Labor has played a critical role in legal battles — from challenging a disastrous Paramount merger that would wipe out jobs and crush viewpoint diversity to protecting federal workers from disastrous unilateral cuts to fending off efforts to dismantle the Department of Education and impose new burdens on student borrowers — all while organizing a broad-based, pro-worker, pro-democracy political opposition to the Trump regime.
In her fourth annual “State of the Unions” address, AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler last weekdeclared: “This Labor Day, shit’s too expensive. That’s what 94% of workers told us, in our new poll. Four out of five say: paychecks aren’t keeping up with the cost of living—groceries, rent, childcare, gas.” She added, “This is happening, by the way, in a country where CEOs now make an average of 312 times what the median worker makes. CEOs got a 21% raise in one year—who else gets that? Democrat, Republican, Independent—whatever your politics, this economy isn’t working for working people.”
AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler
In response to the unprecedented assault on workers, organized labor (as Shuler recounted) did more than talk. Union membership climbed to a 16-year high. “Nearly half a million workers joined a union last year—almost all of them under the age of 40,” she said, with more to follow:
So this June, our unions voted to double down and organize 2 million more workers into unions over the next five years. We’re going to deliver a Workers’ First AI Agenda, making sure technology works for working people, not just billionaires and corporations. We’re going to keep fighting for good housing, better pay, health care and retirement—and bringing good union jobs to everyone.
Labor Day signals the traditional kickoff of the final sprint to November elections, and the labor movement is poised to engage up and down the ballot. Organized labor movements intend to turn out more voters than ever before (aiming for 16 million union members and families; 2 million more than in 2022) and will be out in force to defend voting with 50,000 election monitors in every battleground. We’re going to be there with our yellow vests at polling places, helping people navigate the process,” Shuler said. “Even after the election, we’re going to keep our election protectors right there on the ground, including legal support, making sure every single vote is counted.”
(Credit: FireAtDusk)
The example set by organized labor, as it has for over 100 years, should resonate with all pro-democracy voters. Since Trump returned to office, the pro-democracy, pro-worker coalition has had to play largely on defense (e.g., litigating against unconstitutional moves, lobbying Democrats to block Trump’s agenda). But elections are about going on offense, making the critical pivot from pleading in court to persuading voters, from countering re-redistricting and the disastrous MAGA Supreme CourtCallaisdecision to turning voters out en masse — no matter where district lines are drawn. That crucial transition gets underway with vigor this week.
Pro-democracy forces in their midterm push can draw on three lessons from the experiences of pro-democracy movements, most importantly from the toppling of Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán in April’s election.
First, the Orbán ouster underscored the importance of linking regime corruption to voters’ widespread economic angst. Hungary expert Kim LaneScheppeletells me that opposition forces started with evidence of corruption (i.e., they stole) and linked it to evidence that “the state was not functioning” (as evidenced by failing, decrepit hospitals and transportation, among other things). “The through-line connecting the two was that democracy had been damaged and people needed to get out to vote.” That unifying message (not right- or left-wing ideology) carried the day.
For our upcoming midterms, there is no issue more powerful and timely than corruption. AsGallupreported, “Americans’ perceptions of government corruption in the U.S. are at their highest level in 20 years, with 89% of U.S. adults [including 90% of independents] saying it is widespread.”That’s 10 points higher than last year. Plainly, Trump’s nauseating self-enrichment has hit home, giving Democrats the perfect opening to vow to end the orgy of corruption and to advance credible reform (e.g., claw back Trump’s ill-gotten gains, end crypto scams, ban building monuments to himself, and demand full financial disclosure and stock trading bans for all three branches).
Second, Democrats must be realistic about the current media environment. Media giants are so afraid of Trump that they have preemptively relabeled “Lake Ontario” as “Lake America.” Such institutions are not living up to their obligations to defend truth and uphold democratic norms.
When corporate and billionaire-owned legacy media curries favor with Trump, perpetuating ludicrous moral equivalence, Democratic insiders would be foolish to cater to those same legacy media outlets for coverage. Instead, Democrats should maintain a constant presence on podcasts, independent media outlets, and social media platforms to reach and motivate voters who don’t ordinarily turn out for midterms. Again, Hungary provides a positive model,Scheppeletells me, in which young people “were able to boost the campaign by calling out disinformation bots and meme-ifying the themes” (includingzebramemes that exploited a hysterical example of Orbán’s corruption!)
Finally, and most importantly, democracy forces must be additive, determined to embrace candidates and voters who do not share positions on all issues, even ones ordinarily at the top of the political agenda. Perfect alignment on all issues must not become the enemy of “good” — that is, solidarity with pro-democracy candidates who share broad goals such as restoring healthcare benefits, eliminating anti-immigrant abuse, and holding Trump and his cronies accountable. Flyspecking pro-democracy candidates on minute issues that are unlikely to arise anytime soon or rejecting a candidate in a fit of pique over a stray appearance with a fringe character years ago will enable continued MAGA rule. Defeating MAGA fascism requires formation of the broadest pro-democracy movement in U.S. history.
Laying out the challenge ahead, Ian Bassin, executive director of the nonpartisan Protect Democracy, told me, “One of the biggest errors the democracy movement made over the past decade was to respond to Trumpism by moving into a defensive posture. …The problem was: the system wasn’t working for people.” In setting out a pro-democracy vision for the future, the Resistance’s task will be to “focus not on what we need to preserve but on what we need to change and what we need to create: a democratic system that ismorerepresentative andmoreresponsive to the American people — not just those at the top, but more importantly, those in the middle and those at the bottom.”
For your Labor Day, we hope you enjoy what became an unofficial labor anthem, authored and sung by Nashville Association of Musicians (AFM Local 257) and SAG-AFTRA member, philanthropic giant, and musical genius, Dolly Parton:
Happy Labor Day, Contrarians!
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