New Site: Keeping Up With Indiana's Education News?

 I just added Chalkbeat - Indiana to my links. Just in case anyone here has a particular interest in Indiana's educational issues. If we do not properly educate our children, there will be no future.

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A Blunt Post On Trump, NATO, Ukraine, and Our Future

 Isolationism is possible where there is enough space to buffer us from the evil intents of others.

We have not had that buffer space since Imperial Germany started unrestricted submarine warfare; maybe we have never had it - the British did come here and burn the Capitol during the War of 1812

Now I need to get to work, so I leave you to consider these articles:

NATO’s New Strategic Conscience - by Mark Hertling (The Bulwark)

Before this month, I hadn’t visited the Baltics in more than a decade. What I saw and heard on my recent trip confirmed a shift that, like an earthquake, had been building for years: The Baltic states are no longer on the periphery of NATO. They are part of its new core. They are now NATO’s strategic conscience—small democracies preparing for the worst. With Russian oppression still a living memory, the Baltic governments are leading because the Baltic people are serious about their defense.

As I left my last stop in the Baltics, I reflected not just on the terrain and strategy, but on the people. These are nations that remember tyranny because their fathers and grandfathers lived it and fought against it. Their citizens have no illusions and are not divided about Russia’s intentions. And yet, their response is not panic—it is preparation. Quiet, determined, and unified.

We in the United States—and across the broader alliance—would do well to study the Baltics. If American leadership in NATO is waning (and it shouldn’t), I hope we reconsider and instead emulate the strategic vision and courage of those in the Baltics. 

 Trump Asked Ukraine’s Zelenskiy Shocking Question in Private Call (The New Republic) - but does he mean it?

On Tuesday, The Financial Times reported that Trump, in a July 4 phone call, asked Zelenskiy, “Volodymyr, can you hit Moscow?” and also inquired as to whether he could hit St. Petersburg, the second-largest Russian city.

“Absolutely. We can if you give us the weapons,” Zelenskiy is said to have replied. Trump was apparently open to this, reportedly mentioning a strategy to “make them [Russians] feel the pain” to pressure Putin to negotiate a peace deal.

The Washington Post’s David Ignatius seemingly reported on the same conversation on Monday, writing that Trump had reportedly asked why Zelenskiy “didn’t hit Moscow,” and urged Ukraine to “put more pressure” on the two Russian cities in order to get Putin to the table.

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Writers: Plots

 8 Brutal Truths About Plot that Writers Learn TOO LATE

A story is a character growing and learning, twists and turns. Plot and character is entangled. Structure can limit, so maybe change your model. Watch out for the middle; break it into chunks. Aim for the point before the climax. Plot twists only work if properly set up. Pacing - it's the contrast between slow and fast. The ending needs resolution of character and plot.

When I finished "A Song of Fire and Ice", I was wondering how Martin was going to get out of the mess he had created with the plot, and that is what I have been waiting for. Now, George R.R. Martin Finally Delivers Good News About 'The Winds of Winter'

Martin acknowledged that part of the delayhasn’t just been his famously packed schedule or various TV projects — it’s the scale of the story itself. With more characters in play and more plotlines converging, the narrative has ballooned in complexity.

Perhaps, Martin should have listened to the above video?

Or check out my Writers: Anti-Novels? Anarchist Plots?

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Me at 53 (Part four): 3/6/2013–3/10/2013

 [ I am back working through my prison journal. It is out of order… Well, the order is as I have opened boxes. The date in the title is the date it was written. I hope this is not confusing. What you are reading is what you get for your tax dollars. Continued from Me at 53 (Part Three): 3/6/2013–3/10/2013. sch 7/14/2025]

Why write? I expect neither these notes nor my fiction ever to see the light of day. These notes will take too much effort to type. Who will punish this felon's fiction?

I write because I can do nothing else with my time. I have things to say, stories to tell. They are my notes to you, I send sailing over the walls surrounding myself. I experiment with the possibility of communication. If they answer a question, edifying you in any way, then we can count the experiment a success. You know who you are, don't you?

I read Michael Eric Dyson's "Hip-hop and Youth Culture" chapter of Can You Hear Me Now?, and not sure if I agree with his thoughts about the positive effects of rap on our culture. Yes, I am white and 53. What I can see in prison have me thinking rap has a detrimental effect. I figure now rap is as banal as album-oriented rock and heavy metal were 30 years ago. 

I realize now how superficial I was in all my relations. This applies not only to the women in my life, but also my male friends. I feel fortunate not to be lambasted by one particular friend. I find another's silence and inactivity boggles me. A fellow from Richmond, Indiana would probably like to kick my ass, as much as those who have known me longer - and better. You think prison protects you from me. I think it protects me from the outside world.

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[7/14/2025: Continued in Me at 53 (Part Five): 3/6/2013–3/10/2013. sch]

Coping With Reality - Indiana Shrinking, Inflation Going Up, Solar Power,

 I am coping better than the Tangerine Mussolini.

Tuesday, I came home and called the Open Door Clinic. I had had enough of the pain in my legs. Then I started revising "The Psychotic Ape". I go to the Clinic on Friday.

Wednesday, I went to work and asked my boss if he wanted me to come in on Friday and leave earlier than usual or to just take a sick day. He didn't care. Which is pretty much why I am tired of this job. Luckily, it was a short day. I came home and cleaned and organized and tried to stay conscious enough to go to the polygraph. CC did go with me. I needed a co-pilot. I was afraid the pain would distract me while driving. It worked. She spent most of the trip down to Carmel doing medical research on her phone. We stopped for a smoke and I showed her the damage done. She freaked. Now, she thinks I have blundered myself into diabetes. Just what I need. Turned out the guy doing the polygraph had texted me (always a mistake) that he needed to reschedule, he was becoming a grandfather, again. CC and I stopped at a Vietnamese restaurant in Fishers. She was game - got a sandwich and fried rice. I thought my Pho Tom was very good. We passed on stopping at St. George's. I wanted her to see the interior, and we were running late enough for vespers to have started, but thankfully she did not want to, had to get back to Muncie, because I am not sure if I could have made it from the parking lot to church. I dropped her off, and came home about 8. I got through a few videos on YouTube and went off to bed.

I hope the day at work is short - it is hurting my bank account, but I am running on sheer will power.

Some items for reading from this week:

The Democrats’ Message Is Broken. These Strategists Have a Few Fixes. (The New Republic)

“The good news is that, especially on bread-and-butter issues, the public is on the Democrats’ side. But the messenger is equally as important as the message, and too often, our messengers are emblematic of the reasons voters haven’t been satisfied with what we’re putting forward,” Democratic strategist Anjan Mukherjee said. “Change rarely comes from the top, and voters made it clear in 2024 that they want change. It would behoove us to listen to them.”

 It’s Official: Trump’s Tariffs Are Driving Up Inflation (The New Republic) - reality cannot be denied, folks.

People Can’t Wait to Move Out of the Fastest Shrinking City in Indiana (newberry-news.com)

Why Are People Leaving?

Economic Decline and Job Losses

Grissom AFB and similar shrinking cities grapple with limited economic diversification. Job losses, or slow job growth in key sectors, make these communities less attractive for young professionals and families seeking stable employment. Without strong local industries or investment, workers move to larger metros promising more opportunities.

Urbanization and Suburban Growth

Indiana’s fastest-growing cities—like Monrovia, New Palestine, and McCordsville—are benefiting from suburban expansion around Indianapolis and other urban hubs. These areas offer new housing, amenities, and proximity to vibrant job markets, drawing populations away from smaller towns facing stagnation.

Declining Middle Class

According to broader trends in Indiana, many shrinking areas are also witnessing a shrinking middle class, which exacerbates economic hardships and prompts more outmigration. The flight of middle-income families continues the cycle of reduced local spending and service availability.

California farmers identify a hot new cash crop: Solar power (The Conversation)

One such approach is agrivoltaics, where farmers install solar designed for grazing livestock or growing crops beneath the panels. Solar can also be sited on less productive farmland or on farmland that is used for biofuels rather than food production.

Even in these areas, arrays can be designed and managed to benefit local agriculture and natural ecosystems. With thoughtful design, siting and management, solar can give back to the land and the ecosystems it touches.

Farms are much more than the land they occupy and the goods they produce. Farms are run by people with families, whose well-being depends on essential and variable resources such as water, fertilizer, fuel, electricity and crop sales. Farmers often borrow money during the planting season in hopes of making enough at harvest time to pay off the debt and keep a little profit.

Installing solar on their land can give farmers a diversified income, help them save water, and reduce the risk of bad years. That can make solar an asset to farming, not a threat to the food supply. 

And back to coping with reality - and a question:

 Does Donald Trump dream tangerine dreams?

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Fred Says Read Hard!

 Looking over the references in Ioannes Chountis de Fabbri's Nietzsche's manifesto for reading (Engelsberg ideas), I think everything cited I had read by the time I was 25. Naturally contrary, I must give credit now for Nietzsche making me even more so: there is no fun in reading what does not challenge you.

Reading, according to Nietzsche’s writings, is not inherently or unconditionally ennobling. Some books, he believed, could poison as readily as they could strengthen. ‘There are books which have an immense value for the soul and health.’ The reader must bring discernment as well as patience. Books are no universal remedy; many are actively corrosive. They sap originality, flatter mediocrity, or drown the self in slogans. The true Nietzschean reader approaches books not to flee from, though, but to grow through them and at times to think more dangerously.

In his view, careful and deliberate reading served as an antidote to modernity and the restless spirit of the industrial age. To read well demands a range of intellectual virtues: sustained focus, openness of mind, critical acuity, sensitivity, and reflective judgement. Above all, one must learn to read before rushing to analyse or interpret. This emphasis reflects Nietzsche’s broader philosophical commitment to Perspectivism, the principle that animates his entire corpus. In our world, increasingly governed by algorithmic speed and the impulse to judge, Nietzsche’s call for slow reading is not merely a scholarly habit but a philosophical act of resistance.

The final lesson in Nietzsche’s view of reading is stark: true reading should wound us. The best books are not those that soothe or confirm, but those that demand something of us. ‘Of all that is written’, he said, ‘I love only what someone has written in his blood.’ Such writing is not to be skimmed, but endured, survived even. In Nietzsche’s eyes, the true reader is an adventurer: one willing to be marked by meaning and perhaps transformed by it.

But am I writing anything that matches how I read? If I could muster even a bit of the anger I had 15 years ago.... Only I think that anger fostered my depression.... That is a place I am truly frightened of returning to. Which marks me a coward.

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Me at 53 (Part Three): 3/6/2013 - 3/10/2013

 [I am back working through my prison journal. It is out of order… Well, the order is as I have opened boxes. The date in the title is the date it was written. I hope this is not confusing. What you are reading is what you get for your tax dollars.

Continued from Me at 53 (Part Two): 3/6/2013–3/10/2013. sch 7/14/2025] 

The felony conviction also insures my disengagement from the outer world until my dying day. The conviction creates a broader, higher wall than ever I could have constructed on my own. No more foreign entanglements complicating my life. Prison adds to my isolationism. Prior personal entanglements will have faded away or outright died by 2022. I shall go forth from prison into a world I shall not bother and which will not notice me.

I fantasize about the good I could do now that I see the errors of my ways. Prison breeds fantasies. No one cares if I do good; my future consists solely of punishment. I lost my opportunity for doing any good when I violated federal law. I may not do good, but I am kept from doing harm. Hence, I no longer see suicide as a solution.

I almost got in a fight today. A black fellow was trying to cut in line in the dining hall. He barked like a small dog. I realized how we never really grow up. We carry our past with us. We dress differently, we cat out in ways superficially different, but in the end we behave at the bottom as if we were sixth graders. I cannot always see any good purpose for our species.

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[7/14/2025: Continued in Me at 53 (Part four): 3/6/2013–3/10/2013. sch]