Heather Cox Richardson | The Direction of Intention

Open Space [David’s blog on DR Thursday]

Posted on November 13, 2025 by davidrobinsoncreative

“In individuals, insanity is rare; but in groups, parties, nations, and epochs, it is the rule.” ~ Friedrich Nietzsche

We awoke this morning to a foot of snow and a mountain of disappointment as 8 Democratic senators betrayed their party and their constituents, joining the Republicans to end the shutdown and any hope of affordable healthcare in the foreseeable future.

And so we sink ever deeper into the insanity of our times.

Insanity (noun): extreme foolishness or irrationality.

We are transforming rooms in our house, repainting rooms, cleaning out cabinets and repurposing old shelves. It is a balm for the insanity. It is to exercise a modicum of control in the only place we can: our home.

Heather Cox Richardson suggests that the same thing is happening in our nation. We are witnessing a changing of the guard. A cleaning out. A new generation of ideas and leaders are emerging as the old guard – on both sides – seems more and more inept. Hers is a message of hope.

Here’s how hope sounds: I urge you to take 20 minutes and listen to Bryan Tyler Cohen’s interview with Michigan senate candidate Dr. Abdul El-Sayed. It is the most coherent, clear-eyed conversation about healthcare that I’ve yet heard. It is the sound of a new generation of leaders. Dr. El-Sayed is one of many well-intentioned believers in democracy, capable of debate, willing to fight for the good of the people of the nation, eschewing corporate money so those leaders are not beholden to the corrupt take-over of our government.

During COVID we transformed rooms of our house into sanctuaries, spaces of intentional peace. Our isolation became a retreat. Now, we are opening space, creating spaciousness. Spaciousness is our response to the airless insanity, the utter cowardice and incompetence at the helm of the nation.

And, to our expanding spaciousness we welcome the quiet that the snow brings. Rather than dwell in the disappointment of betrayal/capitulation, we’ll turn our eyes to the vast hope that open space and a new generation of bright lights promise to bring.

Greet The Day, 48″x48″, mixed media on canvas

read Kerri’s blog post about SNOW

likesharesupportcommentthankyou

Filed under: DR Thursday, Edges, Emergence | Tagged: Abdul El-Sayed, artistry, Brian Tyler Cohen, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, democracy, foolishness, Heather Cox Richardson, hope, insanity, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, Nietzsche, spaciousness, story, studio melange, the melange | 1 Comment »

Silence [David’s blog on DR Thursday]

Posted on September 11, 2025 by davidrobinsoncreative

It is 9/11, the 24th anniversary of the terrorist attacks on our nation. I remember the day like it was yesterday. The assault on our nation (mostly) brought us together.

On the eve of this anniversary, the current occupant of the White House, in a speech to the nation, used the murder of Charlie Kirk, a right wing provocateur, to incite violence on his political opponents and the “radical left”. Keep in mind, no one knows anything about the assassin. Statements of empathy poured from the left, statements of violence poured from the right.

Keep in mind that there was yet another school shooting in our nation, in my home state of Colorado. There was no mention in the president’s speech about the latest example of the continued and incessant violence enacted on our children.

In the past several months, the conservative justices of the Supreme Court of the United States have suspended due process, habeas corpus, and just this week, the conservative justices ruled to allow racial profiling. They’ve elevated the president above the law.

All of these rulings are in direct violation of the oath they swore to uphold The Constitution. They are systematically dismantling our constitutionally-protected freedoms.

Along with a feckless congress, the Supremes deconstruct the checks-and-balances of our democracy, and are consolidating power in the executive branch. This is fascism. I do not use that word as an insult. I use that word – a word with a specific definition – to ring the alarm.

On this anniversary of 9/11, it is imperative to recognize that the current attack on our nation is coming, not from outside, but from within. A rogue Supreme Court and a republican Congress enable the authoritarian desires of a serial criminal. They support the absolute suppression of opposition and are moving to militarize the clampdown on democratic ideals.

And,sadly, a mainstream press long ago abdicated its responsibility to inform (rather than entertain) the public. They’ve worked hard to normalize the violent rhetoric of the current administration. The media on the right has worked hard to create a straw man, an enemy in the democratic left.

The current threat to our democracy is far more dangerous than the attacks on 9/11. On that day, planes took down buildings.

On this day, on this anniversary of an attack on our nation, an authoritarian and his enablers are taking down our democracy.*

Soon, if we do not stop this assault on our nation, all that will be left to us is silence.

(*again, I do not toss the word “authoritarian” as an insult or to provoke. I use it to describe the actions of the executive and his enablers).

***

During the Jacob Blake riots and martial law in our town, we learned that we could not get up-to-date or factual news on mainstream media. We had to seek independent media if we wanted accurate and immediate information. The same is proving true now.

Democracy Docket (Mark Elias)

Brian Tyler Cohen

Historian Heather Cox Richardson

read Kerri’s blogpost about CLARITY

Filed under: DR Thursday, Perspective | Tagged: 9/11, artistry, Brian Tyler Cohen, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, Democracy Docket, Heather Cox Richardson, independent media, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, story, studio melange, terrorist attacks, the melange | Leave a comment »

Before It Is Gone [David’s blog on saturday morning smack-dab]

Posted on May 31, 2025 by davidrobinsoncreative

Our democracy is almost gone. The judiciary is under attack for doing their duty to the Constitution, acting as a check on an out-of-control executive. Mindbogglingly, Congress, rather than performing their duty to check the rogue executive, is attempting to neutralize the courts. They’ve written the final straw that breaks democracy’s back into their big-beautiful-bill.

“When authoritarian leaders attack judges as “enemies,” history shows us exactly where this leads. Trump’s assault on “USA HATING JUDGES” isn’t just inflammatory rhetoric—it’s following a script written by strongmen worldwide. But other countries show us how to fight back.”

“So how do we combat this? BUILD broad coalitions beyond party lines. MOBILIZE professionals, not just activists. SUSTAIN pressure through strikes and protests, FRAME it as defending democracy, not partisan politics.” ~ Adam Bonica

“Every authoritarian who successfully destroyed judicial independence did so because civil society failed to unite in time,” Bonica writes. “The key difference? Whether people mobilized.” ~ from Heather Cox Richardson, Letters From An American, May 27, 2025

“None of this is easy. But democracy never is.” ~ Adam Bonica

It seems that we have a clear choice: to mobilize now and save our democracy – or to miss it.

read Kerri’s blogpost about BEFORE IT IS GONE

likesupportsharecommentsubscribestandupmobilize…thankyou.

Filed under: smack-dab | Tagged: Adam Bonica, artistry, authoritarianism, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, democracy, Heather Cox Richardson, judiciary, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, mobilize, story, studio melange, The Constitution of The United States, the melange | 7 Comments »

Ancient Oak Wisdom [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on April 25, 2025 by davidrobinsoncreative

“Oak may live for 1,000 years, although 600 may be more typical on many sites.”

It’s very possible that this oak tree is older than our nation. It stands in a field plowed and prepared for planting, visible from a trail that we recently explored. The trail passes through a stand of ancient oaks, gnarled and twisted with time.

There is wisdom in the oaks, something not found in our leaders who view the world exclusively through the lens of dollars and cents. Power people who play let’s-make-a-deal with the lives of others.

Even though we knew it was coming, even though it was a trumpeted intention in the fascist blueprint, Project 2025, the sale and privatization of our public lands for short-term profit has arrived like a surprise unwelcome visitor on our doorstep:

“Elon Musk is now effectively in charge of America’s public lands,” says Jennifer Rokala, executive director at the Center for Western Priorities. Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum just issued an order ceding oversight of the Department of the Interior to the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (which is not a government department at all)…”

The ruse is – of course – that our protected public lands, our national parks, are nothing more than waste, abuse and fraud. To the fundamentally greedy and terminally myopic, they are resources ripe and ready for exploitation. Destroying them, so the marketing spin goes, will not only save the nation money, it will make lots of money for the privileged few. And then there will be trickle down! (insert eye roll here).

Dollars. No sense.

“Project 2025 is a ‘wish list’ for the oil and gas and mining industries and private developers. It promotes opening up more of our federal land to energy development, rolling back protections on federal lands, and selling off more land to private developers.” ~ Heather Cox Richardson, Letters From An American, April 22, 2025

It is shortsighted hubris akin to the Taliban’s destruction of the Buddhas of Bamiyan. Two monumental statues carved in the 6th century in the Bamiyan valley in Afghanistan, a holy site for Buddhists, a cultural treasure for the people of Afghanistan, a UNESCO World Heritage site, destroyed [by the Taliban] in 2001, “..so that no one can worship or respect them in the future” Fundamentalists. Nationalists. Ideologues.

Islamic or Christian, nationalist fundamentalism, rigid ideology, leads to the same end. Purblind action, senseless destruction for short-term gain. Violence enacted on people and culture. Suppression of the many so the few might profit.

Purblind (adjective): having impaired or defective vision. Slow or unable to understand. Dimwitted.

Like the Buddhas of Bamiyan, once destroyed, our public lands, our Grand Canyon and Arches and Bears Ears, our old growth forests, our Yosemite and Yellowstone and Glacier National Park and Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, our protected ocean shelf ecosystem…once mined and drilled and developed, will never come back. Our national inheritance, sacred sites, reduced to rubble for profit so that no one can worship or respect them in the future.

Wisdom is the province of the ancient oak, borne of an acorn of understanding that grows beyond knowledge, beyond information, and far beyond the accumulation of data. It cannot be attained through fundamentalism nor through righteous nationalism wrapped in greasy paper-thin religiosity. It cannot be bought or sold or legislated. Wisdom transcends passing ideology since it takes time and perspective. Wisdom is an open hand, not a tight fist.

It takes no time and requires little in the way of perspective to recognize that the destruction of the sacred in the name of private gain is nothing more or less than the avarice of the purblind, the action of the profoundly dimwitted.

Kerri’s albums are available on iTunes and streaming on Pandora (among others)

read Kerri’s blogpost about the OAK TREE

likesharecommentsupportsubscribe…thankyou.

Filed under: KS Friday, Metaphor, Perspective | Tagged: artistry, Buddhas of Bamiyan, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, fascism, fundamentalism, Heather Cox Richardson, ideology, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, National Parks, Project 2025, Public lands, Purblind, story, studio melange, Taliban, the melange, wisdom | 1 Comment »

It’s In Their Plan [David’s blog on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on March 31, 2025 by davidrobinsoncreative

“Wisconsin is evenly split between the parties, but when Republicans control the legislature and the supreme court, they suppress voting and heavily gerrymander the state in their favor…Currently, the state gerrymander gives Republicans 75% of the state’s seats in the U.S. House of Representatives although voting in 2024 was virtually dead even.” ~ Heather Cox Richardson, Letters from an American, March 28, 2025

Wisconsin is a perfect example, a fractal, of what literally ails our nation. In brief: republicans do not believe in democracy. If republicans actually believed in democracy, they’d spend less time suppressing the vote, gerrymandering, misinforming, fearmongering – and more time bringing relevant ideas to democratic governance. They’d earn votes rather than stifle voters.

If they were honest with what they actually represent, they’d never win an election.

The current occupant of the White House knows he cannot legislate his Project 2025 agenda. It is so wildly unpopular that he disavowed it until after he won the election. Now, in a fit of unconstitutionality, he jams it through by executive order. He wraps it in a thick veil of lie and misinformation.

If you are paying attention you’ll note that republican representatives in Congress are not showing up to their town halls. They are afraid to face their angry constituents and accept responsibility for their (in)action. And, since taking responsibility is not in their wheelhouse, they’ve invented yet another fantasy to explain the discord: the evil libs are paying people to rabble-rouse.

At least the republicans are consistent up and down the food chain. “It’s all a witch hunt”. “Not my fault.” “Never heard of it”.

The nation’s pet oligarch is coming to town. He’s trying to buy the election for the open state supreme court seat. “Musk has told voters that if Crawford wins, “then the Democrats will attempt to redraw the districts and cause Wisconsin to lose two Republican seats.” Not only has Musk said he is going to Wisconsin to speak before the election, but also he is handing out checks to voters who sign a petition against “activist judges,” a suggestion that it would not be fair to unskew the Republican gerrymander. Last night, Musk advertised a contest that would award two voters a million dollars each, with the condition that the winners had to have already voted.” ~ Heather Cox Richardson

To be clear, in the current republican world view, an “activist judge” is one that does their job, interpreting and clarifying the law, serving as a check-and-balance to the other branches of government. An “activist judge” upholds their oath to the Constitution.

Paying voters for their votes to maintain gerrymandered maps is a well-worn-page from their playbook. It’s also an act of desperation. Again, if they believed in democracy, if they actually believed in our system of governance, they would attempt to win on principle rather than with a festival of misinformation and blatant corruption.

Whoops! I forgot. Their weak man in the White House is dismantling our democracy in favor of fascism. In an authoritarian government, a judge’s job is to facilitate the criminality of the leadership so why should it be a surprise that the oligarch is buying votes for the republican candidate for the state Supreme Court?

It occurs to me that this may be our last free and fair election. Voting matters more now than ever. After Tuesday we’ll either have a court that fights corruption and attempts to preserve our democracy – or one that plays for payola. On Tuesday, we’ll either send a message to the silent republican majority in congress and prompt them to apply some brakes to the fascist takeover of our country or we’ll greenlight the gaslighters, watch as they comply with the weak man and eliminate our right to vote altogether. It is, after all, what the weak man promised: Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump told Christians on Friday that if they vote for him this November, “in four years, you don’t have to vote again. We’ll have it fixed so good, you’re not gonna have to vote.” ~ Reuters, July 27, 2024

Voting is unique to a democracy. Fascism, not so much. They’re not even trying to hide it. It is, after all, in their plan.

read Kerri’s blogpost about VOTE

likesharesupportcommentsubscribe…thankyou.

Filed under: Merely A Thought Monday, Perspective | Tagged: artistry, Congress, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, democracy, election, gerrymandering, governance, Heather Cox Richardson, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, responsibility, story, studio melange, The Constitution of The United States, the melange, vote | 1 Comment »

Context [David’s blog on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on March 17, 2025 by davidrobinsoncreative

“The world and I reciprocate one another. The landscape as I directly experience it is hardly a determinate object; it is an ambiguous realm that responds to my emotions and calls forth feelings from me in turn.” ~ David Abram, The Spell of the Sensuous: Perception and Language in a More-Than-Human World

I sometimes wonder if we are capable of presence, of being somewhere. With our faces aimed at screens, gaming or doomscrolling every few minutes, lost in Facebook or Instagram, awash in advertisements designed to makes us feel as if we are lacking, perpetually breaking news, worshiping at the biz-altar of efficiency and effectiveness. Do-more-faster. Is it any wonder that we, the citizens of the USA, lead the world in drug-use disorders?

I suspect that we are not trying to escape reality but are trying to find what, if anything, is real. Or meaningful.

“Humans are tuned for relationship. The eyes, the skin, the tongue, ears, and nostrils—all are gates where our body receives the nourishment of otherness.” ~ David Abram, The Spell of the Sensuous

I had a revelation the other day about our current national mess. During my stint in software development we periodically discussed the context/content reality flip-flop. Essentially, our grandparents lived in a world in which their reality (context) was stable and consistent. They made sense of the news of the day (content) by sifting it through their mostly shared context.

We live in the opposite circumstance. Our context is fluid, volatile. With an average of 100 new emails coming in overnight, with a never-ending-rushing-social-media-stream, with tweets sending shock waves through the system, our context changes every day. Our content now defines our context. We are perpetually trying to arrive somewhere stable. We are constantly trying to find sense in the stream.

We do not sense-make together because we do not share an agreed-upon context.

It’s why we doomscroll. It’s why we have impenetrable information bubbles. It’s why we are impossibly divided. It’s why the phrase “alternative facts” wasn’t cause for hysterical laughter. It’s why there was nary-a-blip this week when, to avoid being held accountable for their participation in the nation’s demise, “…Republicans just passed a measure saying that for the rest of this congressional session, “each day…shall not constitute a calendar day…” [NYTimes.com as quoted by Heather Cox Richardson, Letters From an American, March 12, 2025].

A day is no longer a day. No-shared-context. Reality avoidance. Content defines context. It’s upside-down. It’s insanity.

My revelation? An angry people with no actual shared context are easy marks for a content creator like Fox News. Anger becomes a shared context when people are fed a steady diet of outrageous fabrications meant to exploit their fear. Anger-driven victimhood is the identity-glue that binds maga. It’s a powerful drug. There can be no other explanation for a group so willingly swallowing obvious lies, so readily and eagerly participating in their own demise, so completely and deliberately unplugged from verifiable fact. An overdose of anger gives them a shared sense of belonging. A context.

Kerri and I walk in nature to regroup. We purposefully step out of the noise. We consciously practice being somewhere instead of racing, racing to get somewhere. We return to the trail again and again to reclaim – even for a few moments – a stable context. A known. A natural rhythm.

We might do better as a nation if we turned off our devices for awhile, looked up from our screens and stepped outside. We’d do better if we took a nice walk together in nature in a place (context) that calls forth something other than anger, a context that is easily shared, a context that is undeniably real.

read kerri’s blogpost about BE

likesharesupportcommentsubscribe…thankyou.

Filed under: Identity, Merely A Thought Monday, Perspective | Tagged: anger, artistry, belonging, content, context, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, doomscroll, drug use disorder, Heather Cox Richardson, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, presence, reality, shared reality, social media, story, studio melange, the melange, truth | 1 Comment »

Cartoon Possibilities [David’s blog on Flawed Wednesday]

Posted on February 26, 2025 by davidrobinsoncreative

Call it self-preservation. With the inspiration of MM, I am compiling a mountain of cartoon ideas borne of the laugh-or-cry idiocracy currently sweeping away the nation. There seems to be no bottom to the inanity of the red-hat cult and those that they’ve elevated to power.

The abundance of comic fodder spewing forth from overly sincere conservative faces has me meditating on what makes them both so horrific and so funny. It is this: they ignore – and expect us to ignore –Occam’s Razor. The Principle of Parsimony: It’s a good rule of thumb, if sanity is the goal, to seek the simplest explanation. It is usually the best. If insanity is the aim, seek conspiracy theories and complex machinations.

Take, for instance, the fires in California. Jewish Space Lasers meet unraked forests? Or, perhaps rising global temperatures and drought are to blame? The first requires a reliance on science-fiction and a multi-layer-cake of ill-intent, stupidity and bigotry. The second relies on science. And common sense.

Or, consider this snicker-worthy intrigue: Did the COVID-19 vaccine included microchips capable of tracking people? Or, was it protecting citizens from a raging pandemic? Again, the first requires a madcap sci-fi dystopian fantasy. Occum’s Razor would have us tip toward the reality of science responding to the pandemic. (note: if you use a cell phone or shop on line, there’s no need to vaccinate a chip into your body since you are infinitely locate-able. Google maps already knows where you are since getting you from point A to point B requires, well, knowing where you are…).

The red hats are awash in conspiracy theories. The fox revels in fueling the fantastic and muddling the minds of the easily led. In my comic-thought the actual red hats are lined with tin-foil to protect their brains from alien mind control. That, and better ham radio reception.

I suppose if human beings are capable of believing that the earth is flat, that climate change is a hoax, that the massacre of children at Sandy Hook Elementary was a scam, that Democrats are drinking baby’s blood beneath the streets of Washington D.C…they are also capable of believing in the big boogeyman, the Deep State. It’s the reason we’re been force-fed for the dismantling of our Democracy. Woke waste and fraud! George Soros secretly controlling the world’s economy! Lions and tigers and bears! Oh, my!

It is worthy of cartooning and lampooning. Or a good cry.

This just in from historian Heather Cox Richardson: “…the relative stability of American democracy in the late twentieth century allowed politicians to win office with the narrative that the government was stifling individualism, taking money from hardworking taxpayers to provide benefits to the undeserving…But the Trump administration’s massive and random cuts to the federal workforce are revealing that the narrative of government waste does not line up with reality.“

Does not line up with reality. Occum’s Razor. It’s the simplest explanation for how we find ourselves in an era dominated by lies and lunacy. It’s a rich (and increasingly sad) field of cartooning possibilities.

read Kerri’s blogpost on THE CLOUD

an oldie from the archives at Flawed Cartoon International

likesharesharelikesupportcommentsubscribejumpupanddown…thankyou.

Filed under: Flawed Wednesday, Pattern, Perspective | Tagged: artistry, cartoons, common sense, conspiracy theory, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, Heather Cox Richardson, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, lemmings, lies, lunacy, Occam's Razor, reality, story, studio melange, the melange, truth | 3 Comments »

And Bok Choy [David’s blog on Two Artists Tuesday]

Posted on February 4, 2025 by davidrobinsoncreative

This week we made a miso pot-sticker soup (Japanese). 20 made for us a red curry noodle soup (Thai). We often make pasta dishes and will soon cook chicken marsala (Italian). Later this week we will make fajitas (Mexican). In one of our soups we used for the very first time bok choy (Chinese cabbage).

We drove on errands and passed Panda Express (Chinese), Pimmy’s (Thai), Masala House (Indian), Buono Beef (Italian), La Fogata (Mexican), La Caribeña (Columbian) Madame Pho’ (Vietnamese), Gyro Grill (Greek), Bisi (Ethiopian)…There are many more. A not-so-surprising statement of food diversity borne from a nation comprised of diverse people.

We passed a mosque, a Buddhist temple, a synagogue, churches of all shapes and stripes. A few miles north is a Sikh temple, a Hindu temple, an Amish community, and a Taoist Center to the west.

A quick look (less than a minute) at the labels on my clothes reveals items from Vietnam, China, Mexico, India and Bangladesh. I recently bought a pair of shoes from Columbia Sportswear Outlet store. They were made in China. My favorite Frye boots were also made in China. Frye is a company founded in Massachusetts. Massachusetts is an Algonquin word meaning “at the great hill.” Colorado is a Spanish word meaning “colored red”.

My name, David, comes from the Hebrew word “dod” which means “beloved”. It is a name that “has been adopted into languages all over the world, including Syriac, Greek, Latin, and Quranic. Quranic means “relating to or contained in the Koran.” Syriac is a literary language, Aramaic, used by several Eastern Christian churches. Kerri is named after a county in Ireland. Her parents cleverly exchanged the “Y” for an “I”. Kerry is a Gaelic word meaning, “Ciar’s people.” Ciar was a legendary warrior (This is new knowledge to me and explains a lot!)

In our history we find the word “settlement.” English, Dutch, French, Spanish. Another word, “migration”, shows up later in reference to the arrival of the Irish, Italians, Germans. “Immigration’ is a word that includes the arrival of the Chinese, Japanese, Mexicans and many people from Central America. Of course, we cannot forget the word “slavery” which was the path of Africans to this land, and “displacement” which is the sanitized word referring to the fate of the native peoples. “Attitudes towards new immigrants have fluctuated from favorable to hostile since the 1790s.”

This morning I read this from Heather Cox Richardson (Letters From An American, Feb. 1, 2025): Trump’s loyalists overlap with the MAGA crew that embraces Project 2025, a plan that mirrors the one used by Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orbán to overthrow democracy in Hungary. Operating from the position that modern democracy destroys a country by treating everyone equally before the law and welcoming immigrants, it calls for discrimination against women and gender, racial, and religious minorities; rejection of immigrants; and the imposition of religious laws to restore a white Christian patriarchy.

Given the reality of what is all around us, of what actually populates our lives, can you possibly grasp the magnitude of delusion and utter amorality in the minds (there are no hearts) of the current republican administration?

read Kerri’s brilliant blogpost (though she regularly disparages everything she writes)

likesharesupportwakeuplookaroundyoucommentsubscribetoreality…thankyou.

Filed under: Education, Identity, Perspective, Two Artists Tuesday | Tagged: artistry, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, DEI, delusion, discrimination, Diversity, equity, Heather Cox Richardson, immigration, inclusion, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, patriarchy, species diversity, story, studio melange, the melange | Leave a comment »

Serve Chicken [David’s blog on saturday morning smack-dab]

Posted on January 25, 2025 by davidrobinsoncreative

“As wealth moved upward, lawmakers chipped away at the postwar government that defended democracy. And now, since the inauguration of President Donald Trump on Monday, the dismantling of that system is happening all at once.” ~ Historian Heather Cox Richardson, Letters From an American January 24, 2025

All this week, in honor of the nation’s Republicans, we served chicken to our guests. But not just any chicken, we offered rubber chicken as sustenance.* The kind of chicken used in jokes. The kind without bones, particularly spines. I’d suggest a change in the Republican Party mascot since a chicken would seem more appropriate than an Elephant, but I just read that both mascots were the invention of cartoonist, Thomas Nast. It’s from his name that we have the word “nasty”.* Get this:

“It’s a little weird that both of the major American political parties have embraced their mascots so enthusiastically, considering how poorly the two animals come across in Nast’s original cartoons: how stupid, how pliable, how easily confused.” ~ Jackson Arn, Artsy, Why Democrats are Donkeys and Republicans are Elephants (republished by CNN)

Stupid. Pliable. Easily confused.

Appropriate. And utterly exhausting.

*I lied. “Nasty” doesn’t come from “Nast.” I lied again. We didn’t serve rubber chicken. But, in this brave new world, my newly found dedication to lying-about-everything makes me not only eligible but very attractive for high public office.

read Kerri’s blogpost about EXHAUSTING

likesharesupportcommentsubscribe…thankyou.

Filed under: smack-dab | Tagged: artistry, cartoons, chicken, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, easily confused, Heather Cox Richardson, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, mascots, pliable, republicans, spineless, story, studio melange, stupid, the melange, Thomas Nast | 2 Comments »

Stay Clear of the Avalanche [David’s blog on saturday morning smack-dab]

Posted on January 11, 2025 by davidrobinsoncreative

It’s a strategy. “During a typical Gish gallop, the galloper confronts an opponent with a rapid series of specious arguments, half-truths, misrepresentations and outright lies making it impossible for the opponent to refute all of them…” ~Gish Gallop: Wikipedia

We have, of course, unbelievably, elected for the second time, a champion galloper. A liar extraordinaire. The Gishiest of gallopers.

It’s a strategy. Chaos is a distraction. When it’s impossible to cut through the daily avalanche of hooey, be certain that what’s happening behind the crap-curtain is ill-intended, deliberate and self-serving.

As Heather Cox Richardson suggests, the only thing to be done is not get caught in the avalanche. Stand back and look for patterns. In this case, we have a lifetime of pattern available for study, easy to see. A career criminal. A bankrupt soul. A parasite in a baggy blue suit.

And so, we canter the other way, just far enough to stay clear of the avalanche – and do as journalist Mehdi Asan suggests to counter the Gish galloper: Call it out. “…do not be fooled by the flood of nonsense you have just heard.”

read Kerri’s blogpost about THE GISH GALLOP