Daily Blues & Views

 I had a student once who wrote that she liked to "collect people." In the 1990s back then, she meant literally.  I suppose people can comprise a collection.  On Facebook, isn't that exactly what we do? But does a person really have 4000 friends?  Perhaps it should be called Namebook? Aside from a handful of real friends, what most folks seem to have accumulated is a pile of names. Something you can get in the thousands if you circulate petitions.   Facebook, like Linked-in, has a feature called "People You May Know," wherein a series of profiles appears, not unlike a line-up and you can decide if you know them or would like to.  When I see these profile pictures I often see a montage of people who live and continue to live in the corners of my life.  If we're not connected by now, there might be a reason.  Seldom, if ever, do I contact any of these folks and I doubt if/when I appear on their feed do they contact me.   What fascinat...

 All the signs are there.  Last night one of them included the crowd at the Dodgers-Padres game in San Diego.  Maskless, for the most part, eating hot dogs at 10 pm and trying to do the wave.  Restaurants are opening, for the most part with a streetside table, events that were canceled last year are returning, albeit, re-invented in appearance, venue, and duration.  This year in my town we will again have the Portland Waterfront Blues Festival, and the annual Mt. Hood to Coast run.  There are even a few indications that new businesses may be opening. By September, schools will be open for classroom learning.  The collective sigh of relief will be audible, no doubt.  By June, the snow in the mountain passes will have melted, for the most part, and campgrounds and day-use areas from the mountains to the prairies, to the ocean, white with foam, will see their parking lots full.  God Bless America, and especially those who had no trouble realizin...

The state of Georgia, after passing some new voter regulations, is getting a stiff dose of consequences have actions.  Most notably, Major League Baseball (MLB) decided to pull its plans to have the 2021 All-Star game in Atlanta.  MLB is getting stiff feedback from many of Georgia's politicians who vehemently bemoan the loss of revenue that the game would have provided.   This is a classic example of an economic sanction.   But Georgia's Republican government led by the governor tried to pull a fast one by passing a law straight out of the Jim Crow era.  The numbers are clear unless severe voter suppression is used, the Republican party is facing an uphill battle to win anything in Georgia.  Perhaps it is the blatant nature with which this law was passed that created such a strong response.  When you have a provision in a law that purports to enhance democracy that would prevent someone from giving a drink of water to someone in a long line, ...