Day of the Cat, 43rd Day of Childwinter, 526 M.E. (Aldebaran): The front page of the EPA's website proudly announced that, at the Stable Genius' direction, the agency just took the "single largest deregulatory action in U.S. history." They did it, folks - they repealed the Endangerment Finding that ruled that greenhouse gases are a threat to human health and the environment, and thus broke the back of the U.S. climate-change regulatory framework. The announcement, written in a highly partisan and unscientific manner, reads as if it were written by the oil and gas lobby, which it probably was.

The Endangerment Finding was the legal basis that recognized greenhouse gases as a public-health threat, allowing the EPA to regulate the gases under the Clean Air Act. The finding meant that the EPA could set and enforce emissions standards and could defend their actions in court. That legal backbone shaped everything from power-sector rules to vehicle standards, and created the framework in which emissions reductions were expected. Without the finding, EPA authority is narrower, more fragmented, and far easier to challenge.

Meanwhile, as The Guardian pointed out this week, continued global warming could trigger an irreversible course of multiple climate tipping points and feedback loops, creating a hellish "hothouse Earth." In short, as ice, which reflects away much of the incoming solar heat, retreats and more of the underlying bedrock is exposed, the rock absorbs more heat and further melts the ice, which exposes more bedrock, which melts more ice, and so on and so forth in a feedback loop. A tipping point is when the system reaches a point where a feedback loop can't be avoided and may already be occurring in the Greenland and West Antarctic ice sheets. Permafrost, mountain glaciers, and the Amazon rain forest appear to be on the verge to tipping, and other potential tipping points include loss of polar sea ice, retreat of sub-Arctic forests, and collapse of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation (AMOC), the system of ocean currents that strongly influences global climate. 

Runaway feedback loops would lock the world into a climate far worse than the 2-3°C temperature rise the world is on track to reach. The climate would be very different than the conditions of the past 11,000 years, during which the whole of human civilization developed.

Human activities have massively upset the global balance of greenhouse gases. The planet has some buffering capacity for carbon imbalances, but the geological cycle for carbon is on the order of millions of years. We can't put tens of millions of years worth of CO₂ into the atmosphere over the span of a few centuries and expect the planet to be able to adapt without serious consequences. There's no way that isn't going to massively upset the ecological and chemical balances we rely on to keep us and everything around us alive.

Repealing the Endangerment Finding and effectively limiting the government's ability to restrict the continued emission of CO₂ is literally the worst thing to do at this fraught moment. The EPA's justification of their move claims the Finding was "massively unpopular" (it probably was among the oil and gas lobbyists influencing the agency), and that repeal would somehow save consumers billions of dollars and give them more choice (the choice to buy big, gas-guzzling vehicles that emit tons of carbon dioxide). 

That all seems colossally short sighted. An unlivable planet with a unstable climate is even more massively unpopular, and the costs associated with hurricanes, floods, droughts, and crop losses will dwarf the money consumers may potentially save in the short term.

It's a bad day for planet Earth.

One final note on the colossal stupidity of this decision. Interior Secretary Doug Burgum said in an interview that repealing the finding would boost the coal industry.  “CO₂ was never a pollutant,” he declared. “The whole endangerment thing opens up the opportunity for the revival of clean, beautiful American coal.”

"Clean coal" was a catch-all term for a range of potential technologies, none of which have yet been implemented, to burn coal without emitting the carbon to the atmosphere. You know, scrubbers, closed-loop systems, and so on. But somewhere along the line, the Stable Genius heard the term "clean coal," and mistook it for a term of endearment of coal as it is without those technologies. "Good, clean coal," he says wistfully as if it were cool, running water, and now his administration knows they can call the dirty fossil fuel "clean coal" without fear of contradiction.

 

The Numb Recall, 42nd Day of Childwinter, 526 M.E. (Helios): I spent (wasted, squandered, threw away) some five hours of my life today watching Pam Bondi testify before Congress today about the Epstein files. It's hard to imagine a more vile and nasty witness then Bondi as she responded to questions with personal insults, non sequiturs, and outright lies meant to flatter the Stable Genius. 

I recall Rachel Maddow once noting that the Stable Genius seems to like a little, let's say spice in his attorneys. Not just lawyers who will unquestioningly defend him but aggressive little weasels who will stick it a little extra hard to his opponents, who will walk away from the mildest little disagreement with blood on their hands. Hatchetmen, henchmen, backstabbers, and graverobbers. Bondi filled that role to a T today. Shrilly shouting and with her dyed blond hair and rhinoplastic nose, she was a textbook definition of white trash, the Real Housewives of Palm Beach Circuit Court. Imagine a female Kid Rock with a law degree.

Around three p.m., I couldn't take it any more, the sun had finally came out, and I went for a short, 4.5-mile Madison. I could have been doing that all along, I realized, rather than listening to her invective and lies all day. I hate these times and I can't stand the gooners, creeps, and swindlers that have taken over our government.

Christianity is Stupid Dept. (a random thought while walking): Jealousy is a most human of foibles, a psychological illness stemming from longing, clinging, and desire. Yet the Bible repeatedly describes its god as a "jealous God," a supreme being with the weakest of human weaknesses - "For you shall worship no other god, for the Lord, whose name is Jealousy, is a jealous God" (Exodus 34:14); "You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the Lord your God am a jealous God" (Exodus 20:5); "For the Lord your God is a consuming fire, a jealous God" (Deuteronomy 4:24).    

The Ten Commandments, which couldn't even bother to forbid slavery or racism or child abuse, still has a whole commandment forbidding "coveting," which is a form of jealousy. The "jealous God" forbids his creations from jealousy, but otherwise encourages them to act like him. Just not that. At least with regard to thy neighbor's house, wife, and livestock. 

The jealous God also has another commandment, "You shall have no other gods before me." Who are these other gods of which the jealous God is jealous? I thought the Bible taught there was only one god - nowhere does it mention other gods. Is he jealous of imaginary gods? 

The Buddha taught that our suffering is caused by clinging and desire. Jealousy is considered a particularly toxic form of clinging, causes suffering to both the person and the object of jealousy, and leads to delusion. The Christian God is obviously suffering, as manifest by his jealousy and delusion that there are other gods, and as a result his followers suffer as much as any abused spouse of a jealous partner.

 

The Infant Footprint, 41st Day of Childwinter, 526 M.E. (Electra): Well, now I know that the FBI's seizure of my 2020 election ballot was initiated by a Kurt Olsen, the Stable Genius' Director of Election Security and Integrity and a leading election denier in the administration. The search warrant relied heavily on claims about the Fulton County ballots that have been widely debunked. An affidavit on which the search warrant was based referenced several debunked conspiracy theories including arguments about fraudulent and duplicate absentee ballots, election machine tabulator tapes, and missing ballot images.

However, there was no allegation of a foreign interference in the election, which makes it all the more unusual that Tulsi Gabbard, the Director of National Intelligence, was present when they seized my ballot. Her agency’s role in elections extends only to foreign interference, but the Stable Genius reportedly told her to investigate the 2020 vote. “You go do that," he told her. "You get it done.” The day after the search, she arranged a call with FBI agents in which the Stable Genius praised them and thanked them for their service.

Last week, the Stable Genius called for the Republican Party to “nationalize” elections. He also said that “the federal government should get involved” in elections, and cited a list of cities in which he claimed there was voter fraud in 2020. “Take a look at Detroit,” he said. “Take a look at Pennsylvania. Take a look at Philadelphia. You go take a look at Atlanta.” There is no evidence of widespread fraud in any of those places but his words remind me of The Talking Heads' Life During Wartime: "Heard about Houston? Heard about Detroit? Heard about Pittsburgh, PA?"

I'm waiting for his goons to show up on my doorstep to ask me to confirm that my mail-in ballot was really mine. "Are you aware that someone submitted a ballot with your name voting for Joe Biden?," they'll ask. "You did mean to vote for the Stable Genius, didn't you?," the armed goons will ask. 

Fascism is here, boys and girls. This ain't no party, this ain't no disco, this ain't no fooling around.

 

Day of the Mists, 40th of Childwinter, 526 M.E. (Deneb): "Love is a beach, there is no shore to its opening." - Bad Bunny

 

The White Sun, 39th Day of Childwinter, 526 M.E. (Castor): It's one thing to live in "interesting" times and another to live in "exciting" times. But we appear to be living in "ridiculous" times where I have to check multiple sources to ascertain that a headline isn't, in fact, from The Onion. I literally could not believe that even the Stable Genius would post a meme as blatantly racist as the notorious video he posted last week until I saw it referenced in the NY Times, The Guardian, and whatever they're calling MSNBC now, my triangulation of sources for confirming the veracity of current events.    

Not The Onion: "Rightwing Critics Blame Mamdani as New York Snow Fails to Melt" (The Guardian). Actor Debra Messing complained, “The streets are a disaster. It hasn’t snowed in 5 days and the streets still haven’t been cleared.” Michael Rapaport posted a video showing snow on a New York street, and said, “I need to know who’s responsible for the dog doo doo” (um, dogs?). The New York Post noted, “The snow is still here," and "we’ve got record cold temperatures.” Sadly, The Guardian needed to point out that the mayor has little power over the temperature of the city. 

As a point of fact, some 2,500 sanitation workers worked 12-hour shifts to remove snow and collect garbage after the storm, and the issue wasn't just the snowfall but the lingering cold. Previous mayors have also been criticized for their response to NYC snow - in 2014, Bill de Blasio was accused of neglecting the wealthy Upper East Side in favor of Brooklyn and Queens, and Michael Bloomberg faced criticism when some streets went unplowed for days following 20 inches of snow.

Separately, in not a Not-The-Onion headline, the Guardian reported that US companies are falsely blaming artificial intelligence for job losses. The unsurprising actual reasons for the layoffs include greed, i.e., maximizing profits, the effects of the Stable Genius' tariffs, and possibly over-hiring during the covids. In short, the CEOs are engaged in “AI-washing.”

In 2025, AI was cited as a reason for more than 54,000 layoffs. Amazon explained they trimmed staff because AI, "the most transformative technology we’ve seen since the internet," requires them to "be organized more leanly.“ Hewlett-Packard said the company will use AI to “improve customer satisfaction and boost productivity," which also requires the company to cut 6,000 people in the next years. Duolingo announced that the company will “gradually stop using contractors to do work that AI can handle.”

However, a January report from a market research firm notes that while companies can use AI to replace people working in call centers and technical writing, apps don't currently exist that can replace most other occupations and probably won’t anytime soon. They project that only 6% of US jobs will be automated by 2030.

The report noted that tariffs were cited as the reasons for fewer than 8,000 layoffs, a fraction of the number attributed to AI. However, there's a reluctance for companies to say anything negative about the economic impacts of the Stable Genius' policies due to fear of retribution, but by saying that the layoffs are due to efficiencies created by AI, they avoid a potential confrontation. 

Companies also over-hired during the pandemic due to low interest rates and talent wars, but rather than admit errors, CEOs blame "right-sizing" on AI. 

 

The Doubletake Walk, 38th Day of Childwinter, 526 M.E. (Betelgeuse): Met the daughter and son-in-law for brunch today. Ran into Atlanta traffic both going there and coming back. Later, walked a 6.8-mile Quincy. 

Completed the NY Times Saturday crossword puzzle in 33:22. Solved today's Wordle in six attempts (phew!). Reached the Genius level on the Spelling Bee with 34 words worth 166 points.

I'm going to relax this evening by watching the last couple episodes of Fallout, Season 2, and playing The Outer Worlds 2.    

I'm in a Faulkner phase right now in my reading, so I'll get in a couple of chapters of As I Lay Dying before bed.

How was your day?

 

Quickglint Sidelong Blur, 37th Day of Hagwinter, 526 M.E. (Aldebaran): Did you see that racist video the Stable Genius posted to his vanity social media? You know the one - I'm not going to share it here or even describe it in detail, other than to say it's a derogatory AI image of Barack and Michelle Obama.  

The video was among more than 60 posts and reposts the Stable Genius uploaded during a flurry of activity between 10:36 p.m. and 12:25 a.m. last night. Initially, his staff and loyalists said it was just a joke, "characters from The Lion King," and that people were over-reacting. Then, they had to admit that it really was some racist bullshit and took it down, and claimed the Stable Genius didn't post it, some unidentified staffer had.

I don't believe that alibi for a second, and encourage you to ask yourself honestly - which is more likely, that the Stable Genius posted a racist video among for flurry of tweets and mind farts late at night, or that a staffer thought he was helping the cause by posting it under the S.G.'s name?

I've worked for some very conservative, very Republican companies in my life, but anywhere I've worked, if someone had posted that from a company computer or on company time or in any way affiliated with the company, they'd have been fired. Immediately, no questions asked.

This will all be forgotten in a week as we move on to the next outrage, and there will be the next outrage, and then another and another, just as there has been for the past twelve months. How much more of this are you willing to take, America? Tided of "winning" yet? 

The Stable Genius is a hateful, demented, racist old fool, and it's time he was removed from the Executive Branch as expeditiously as possible for the good of this country and the American people.

 

Second Ocean,  36th Day of Childwinter, 526 M.E. (Helios): We're halfway through Childwinter! Six six-day weeks down, six (and a day) to go. We're three dozen days into the season and the year, and by the logic of the New Revised Universal Solar Calendar, today is not Third Dozen but Second Ocean. 

Weird day. I awoke this morning from anxiety dreams that my car wouldn't start, even though I started it the Monday after the deep freeze of the previous weekend and then ran it for 30 minutes to recharge the battery, and then started and drove it again this week to pick up groceries and pharmaceutical for Eliot, my cancer cat. 

Premonitions being what they are, however, my car didn't start today. The battery just totally died - didn't even try to pretend to turn over. I had to call a jump-start company ($75) who got me started although not without difficulty and I drove my car on the charge from their jump straight to the Lexus dealer who sold me my battery and they replaced it for free (people scoff at me for driving a Lexus, thinking I'm obsessed with appearance and social status, but service like that and the fact that my car is still running after 16 years is the real reason).  However, the whole ordeal, from first trying to start my car to getting back home with the new battery, took over four hours. 

Which left barely enough time to shit, shower, and shave, scarf down a quick dinner, feed Eliot the cancer cat, and drive down to East Atlanta Village to see a show at The Earl. It was my first time back to The Earl in six years - the last show I saw there (the singer Mattiel) was in early February 2020 right as the covids were crashing down on us. 

The band Rich Ruth opened promptly at 8:00 pm and then the headliners, Taper's Choice, took the stage just a mere few minutes past 9:00. They played a nearly 1¾-hour set, but I still managed to make it home only a little past 11:00 pm.

Weird Day. Ocean days are simply the oddest.

The Laden Bough, 35th Day of Childwinter, 526 M.E. (Electra): “When it is cold, let the cold kill you,” Tozan advised. Tozan (807–869), also known as Dongshan Liangjie, not only felt that the cold needn't be avoided, but advised something useful, something practical, to do with the cold - use it and practice with it to kill the ego-self that clung to its preferences.   

"When cold and hot come," Zen Master Dogen (1200-1253 AD) advised, "let go." He cryptically added, "Eyebrows totally fallen out, your empty name is killed."  Eyebrows falling out usually implies lying, the ever-helpful Shohaku Okumura explains, sort of like modern western culture associates lying with one's nose growing longer. But Dogen may have been saying that the eyebrows fell out because of our delusions about the cold, but once the eyebrows are gone, we have nothing left to lose and have to face the truth of our real self. 

The second of the Buddha's four noble truths states that our suffering is caused by our attachments and desires. It stands then that if we cling to a desire to change things that are outside of our control, we will suffer. Cold weather is an external event outside of our direct control, but our perception of the cold is not. The Stoic philosopher Epictetus (50 – 135 AD) advises us to accept the weather as it is rather than wish it were different. The Buddha would not have disagreed. 

Tozan was the cold as an opportunity to let go of the ego-self. Epictetus saw it as an opportunity to training for future challenges. "Neither a bull nor a noble-spirited man comes to be what he is all at once," he wrote in The Discourses (Book 1, Chapter 2.32). "He must undergo a hard winter training and prepare himself and not propel himself rashly into what is not appropriate for him." 

Epictetus' teacher Musonius Rufus (25 – 100 AD) said, "It is not good to be entirely without experience of cold and heat, but one ought in some degree to feel the cold in winter and likewise the heat in summer and to seek shade as little as possible."

The Buddha, the Stoic philosophers, and the Zen masters all seem to agree that patience and acceptance are keys to enduring the cold, and that denial of the changing seasons is not only unhelpful but makes things worse. Dogen once cited a Chinese proverb:  

In the jade palace, the kingfisher builds his nest

But the gold palace offers no shelter for the mandarin duck.

The kingfisher represents focus, patience, and at the right moment, swift and decisive action. It suggests a calm, mindful, and accepting state. Mandarin ducks, seen floating on the water in gardens and moats, following the currents and tides wherever they may lead, are associated with the transient nature of life. The jade and gold palaces, obviously, are happiness, success, nirvana. Contentment, the proverb is saying, comes to the patient and focused, and those caught up in the samsara of day-to-day existence will not find peace. 

To face the cold, as well as the other challenges of life, we should adopt a calm and accepting mind, embrace them as opportunities to strengthen our resolve and practice, and avoid trying to change or wish away those things which are beyond our control. I'll try to keep that in mind when the next cold front comes through here next week.

We'll let Dogen have the last word:

In spring hundreds of flowers, in autumn the clear moon,
In summer a cool breeze, and in winter the white snow,
If your mind is free of vanity, then every season is fine.

 

Plains of Paradise, 34th Day of Childwinter, 526 M.E. (Deneb): The cold is gone and today I walked an 8.4-mile Van Buren even though I missed my previous walk due to last weekend's single-digit wind-chill temperatures. Today's high temperature was about 55°, which felt quite comfortable after the previous days of teens and twenties. In the here and now of the present moment, there is no cold, and this goony bird forgot about building nests and frolicked in the warmth. 

There was a time of cold and a time of suffering and then there was a time of no cold and no suffering. There will be a time of heat and a time of suffering, and there will be a time of no heat and no suffering. Tozan suggests we meet the cold and shivering  as well as the heat and sweating with acceptance of those transient moments and leave the suffering behind. Epictetus just entered the conversation and agrees with Tozan.

Meanwhile, it's still sinking in that after the raid on Fulton County and seizure of the 2020 election ballots, Kash Patel and Tulsi Gabbard have my name, my date of birth, my social security number, and know for whom and how I voted. What they're going to do with that information is up to them and the Stable Genius, but I suspect I'll experience their retribution one way or the other, either directly or indirectly.   

Day of the Voyage, 33rd of Childwinter, 526, M.E. (Castor): Every time it gets bitter cold, I reflexively revisit Tozan's "Go to a place that's neither hot nor cold." I did it last November, when the first cold blast of Hagwinter hit the American South. I did it two winters ago. I did it way back in 2010. The problem with maintaining a blog for 20+ years is that the ruts my mind is stuck in become so painfully obvious. Yet when the temperatures aren't uncomfortably cold or hot, I don't think very much about Tozan or his advice. 

Zen Mater Eihei Dogen (1200-1253 AD) wrote a poem in apparent response to Tozan's advice:

How can the three realms and ten directions be all one color?

Who would discuss the difference between human and heavenly beings?

Do not convey talk of birds suffering in the cold.

The lake with no heat of anxiety is on the snowy mountain.

Contemporary Zen Master Shohaku Okumura (1948-present) helpfully explains that "birds suffering in the cold” is a reference to an allegorical pair of birds in the Himalayas. In the night, when it is extremely cold, the female bird repeatedly complains, “Cold is killing me. Cold is killing me.” Her mate replies, “Let’s make a nest tomorrow. Let’s make a next tomorrow.” However, when the sun rises and it becomes warm, they forget the plan of making a nest, and just enjoy the daytime. When night comes again, they complain in the same way. They repeat this every day and every night though their entire lifetime.

Whenever the temperature drops below the mid-20s here in Atlanta and my furnace can't keep my house as warm as I'd like, I turn to Tozan. "Help me make it through the night," I beg. "Give me some words of wisdom to help me endure this bitter cold." Spring comes as it always does and I need the Wikipedia page to even remember who Tozan was.

The "three realms and the ten directions" in Dogen's poem is a poetic reference to the entire universe throughout space and time. It's not all one color and we can't expect it to always have the same comfort-zone temperature in all places at all times. It is a basic Buddhist understanding that there is no difference between human and heavenly beings. Depending upon how we look at it, life can be either heaven or hell. When they suffer with cold, those birds complain and make up their minds to build a nest where they can sleep comfortably, but when the sun rises and it becomes warm, they forget about the cold night and their plan to make a nest is never carried out. Dogen ends the poem by pointing out that despite the bitter cold, in the same snowy mountains where the birds live there also supposedly exists a mythological lake that was thought to be the paradise source of all rivers in the world. Warmth in the cold, cold in the warmth.

It's 41° outside today. My furnace is easily able to keep me comfortably warm and I've stopped dripping my faucets. The storm has passed for now. Time for this goony bird to forget about Tozan until the polar vortex fails again and another mass of cold Arctic air spills over the North American continent.

 

Day of Domain, 32nd of Childwinter, 526 M.E. (Betelgeuse): Philosophy can't keep you warm in winter. You can't skin it and wear it, you can't burn it, you can't sit beside it and feel the warmth emanate off of it. It's truly worthless in the cold. 

But still, it does put things in perspective. The weather's never hot nor cold; hot or cold is our experience of different temperature ranges. Given time, we can acclimate to different temperatures - last night's official (NWS) low of 19° F might seem downright balmy to an Inuit or an Antarctic explorer. I've seen people sweat and complain when the temperature gets up into the 80s, although here in Georgia anything below 90 is considered "mild."

I like temperatures in the 90s. I'm comfortable in the 90s. I wasn't comfortable last night. 

It's perfectly acceptable but not quite correct to say, "it's cold outside." People understand what you're saying, which is the whole point of communication, but what is that "it?" "It's" not cold - you're cold. We can say "a cold air mass" has moved into the region, but it that air mass is only cold relative to the temperature of other air masses and our 98.6° bodies. A 19° air mass is incredibly warm relative to the unimaginably cold zero-degree Kelvin temperature of interstellar space. In fact, there's virtually no difference between a 19° F air mass and a 91° F air mass compared to the 0° K cold of outer space. 

Those thoughts didn't make me feel any warmer last night.

My furnace has been running virtually non-stop for some 36 hours now, and the thermostat still hasn't caught up to the setting. The temperature in the house never dropped below 70 last night, at least while I was awake, but there was a chill in the air that felt far below 70°. To prevent the pipes from freezing, I let every faucet in the house drip overnight, and they're still dripping now. I started the car today and the battery didn't want to turn over, although with some coaxing I finally got it to start, and I let the car idle for a half hour to warm the engine and charge the battery.

No, there's no "hot" or "cold" other than our own response and disposition toward the temperature, but there's also no escape from the sensations of "hot" and "cold." "Hot" and "cold" is just the universe being the universe and our experience of "hot" and "cold" is just us being ourselves. 

That thought still didn't make me feel any warmer last night, and it wasn't supposed to.  But it did help me understand that what I was shivering through was just my reaction to things as they are, and instead of fruitlessly wishing things were different perhaps I should just observe them and myself, put an extra blanket on the bed, make sure my cat Eliot was comfortable, and wait for the sensation to pass. 

Zen and Stoicism agree that suffering exists and also that it's mainly self-imposed. Zen's solution is a sort of annihilation of the ego-self through the practice of meditation; Stoicism's solution is through application of logic. My approach is contemplative stoicism, a bit of both.

Update: At 4:04 pm, the outdoor temperature reached 35°, my indoor thermostat finally caught up to its setting, and the furnace finally got like a five-minute break.