bolero

december light
grey mist
pavements glistening with a touch of frost
passers by scurrying in scarves and coats
breath pluming on the air
shop windows glowing
seasonal good cheer
poetry in the early onset of evening
little birds with feathers fluffed for warmth
craggy doubters believing for once
coffee brewed to a froth
sophia humming something about love
heaven and earth are closer than they appear
all the promises of god are true

in re trump

Many if not most honorable Republicans and indeed other Americans of goodwill and discernment, will never under any circumstances vote for Donald Trump to be President of the United States of America.
Consider his campaign style.
Vituperation directed towards any he deems not just a threat but an inconvenience.
The use of internet style trolling invective.
Insults to other candidates families and wives.
Mafioso style research into rivals' backgrounds.
His repeated suggestion that politicians are generically ignoble and that Mr Trump is himself somehow different from them.
Let me say this.
Mr Trump is in my best estimation of him not what he pretends to be.
He is not a Republican.
He is not a believing Christian.
He is not a successful businessman.
His ungentlemanly behaviour in mocking the appearance of one candidate's wife renders him in my opinion unfit to be President of the United States of America.
That.
On it's own.
That should be enough.
Here is the news.
Contrary to what Mr Trump has proclaimed, politicians generally are not ignoble.
There is a certain public frustration at present with them because they do not represent some of the things some of us want represented.
Personally I want a politician who will stand against abortion, euthanasia, assisted suicide and the culture of death, who will wage all out war with drug dealing people trafficking devil worshipping mafias and secret societies, and who will decisively end the influx of Muslim Jihadis into the Free World.
Such politicians are rare enough.
But all politicians are not discredited by the fact that they do not agree with me.
Nor all all politicians discredited by the fact that they cannot satisfy all of the people all of the time.
Nor are all politicians discredited by the failings, errors, corruptions or sins of omission, of some politicians.
Politics is in fact a noble calling.
Perhaps the noblest.
Politicans are people who courageously subject themselves to the will of the people at election time and offer their lives in service to the broader community.
We should respect them for that even when we oppose them.
The alternative is anarchy.
Or evil.
Or Trump.

boggling

The mind boggles at the notion of eternity.
It's not God that's hard to believe in.
Nor is it mindless energy as a creative force that is hard to believe in.
It is the eternal element in our consideration of the universe which in our more self reflective moments tends to stump religionists and atheistic scientists equally.
Between an eternal God who creates a universe,
and
An eternally existing energy which creates a universe,
I suggest it is, in terms of purely philosophical credibility, a Fifty/Fifty call.
If the notion of eternity was my only reference point, I would be an agnostic.
For a million other reasons, perhaps an eternity of reasons, love, friendship, animals, plants, flowers, the cosmic battle, oceans, rivers, sunshine, rain, wind, the Church, providence, mountains, forests, intimations of truth, women, music, song, science itself, languages, the Bible, the Jews, for all of these, I believe in God.
If our intellects perceived more completely, I would think even the Fifty/Fifty call would be a slam dunk for the Lord.
What is amazing to me is that otherwise quite brilliant atheistic scientists cannot bring themselves to admit it is a Fifty/Fifty call.

meditation on the decision to remake the film willie wonka and the chocolate factory with tim burton as director and johnny depp in the role of willie wonka

Why didn't they just take Willie Wonka outside and shoot him.