This is war

[.Spectator]

Oh yeah – I should also mention that Trump has figured out that this is his “out” from any consequences he might pay from the Mueller investigation.

 

Once we are at war no one will care because impeaching a President during war would be a sign of weakness of our nation….and everyone will just say “oh well, we can’t do anything about it now because we are at war…”….

 

[.Spectator]

Mark my words

[.Spectator]

Trump just wants to play with his toys.

[StregaModerator]

Belle – Russia is poised to attack who?  Are you saying Russia is an ally of North Korea?  Or are you envisioning Russia just attacking the USA without preamble?  I’m mystified as to why you mention Russia and how you feel they are integrated with the North Korea situation.

[StregaModerator]

Now mention Venezuela and that’s a different situation – one in which Triggger-happy-Trump has no business messing in.

Trump threatens Venezuela with ‘military option’
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-venezuela-military-idUSKBN1AR2GR

[DianeParticipant]

My question, and that of others on this thread and all around the world, is What now? What do I do right now? Do I call my representatives and tell them I’d like to not have a nuclear war? Do I gather my offspring and some MREs in the basement, light candles and await our doom? Do I give water to my livestock, or my family?  Should I stay or should I go? I have to have some kind of workable balance between sensibly living my life/not being in a constant state of alarm, and being aware of the town/state/world/planet/galaxy around me, knowing that the inevitable and hideous end will come soon.

I don’t have an all-purpose answer. What I can tell you (and myself) is this strange story:

I am an occupational therapist. I worked on a skilled nursing facility, providing therapy to mostly elderly, sick folks. I was working with a patient who had Lewy-body dementia and Parkinson’s disease, which is an unfortunate and unpleasant combination. She was a lovely lady who had some paranoia, hallucinations, confusion, and difficulty with mobility.

I am easily distracted by nature and become more so when I feel pressured to get more done that I can do in the allotted time but this day my patient had 100% of my attention. She needed to use the bathroom so I helped her to walk across the room with her walker. When she got close to the toilet, she got stuck. She turned around in a half-circle and got stuck again. She said, “Tell me a toilet joke. Maybe that will help.” I replied, “I don’t know any toilet jokes but I know one with the word ‘ass’ in it. Will that do?”

She said it would be good so I went on, “A guy walks into a psychiatrist’s office with a duck on his head. The psychiatrist says, ‘Oh dear. How may I help you?’ ” The duck said, “I’m alright but can you get this guy off my ass?”

The lady started laughing, finished turning around, sat down on the toilet, enjoyed a deep belly guffaw, and died.  She literally expired right in front of me from a pulmonary embolism. What does this have to do with North Korea or WWIII, you ask? Nothing. Not a thing.

I had a few minutes of unusual (for me) ability to be fully present in the moment and changed the course of a woman’s death. She would have died anyway right at that moment. I am grateful I was focused on her in her last few minutes of life. Her family was comforted that she died laughing.

When I have enough presence of mind, or lack of presence of mind in fact, to remember how important those few minutes were, I think about how I might choose to live. To the degree I can be present in individual moments, I can affect change. I can have enough clarity to identify which issue I’d like to call my Representative or Senator about today. I can choose to try to drag my 14-year-old out of his den upstairs and join the rest of the species. Etcetera, etc.

This is not a lesson for anybody but myself. When I read about the dreaded future and horrible present, and leave the present moment to speculate, I start to hyperventilate. I lose the capacity to focus my behavior into anything that will affect positive change.  My blood pressure goes up – I probably shorten my life just a little.

So if when someone says the world is ending the first action I might take is to think of the woman’s laughter and the gifts it gave. Peace

[StregaModerator]

@diane beautiful post, thank you 🙂

[.Spectator]

@strega no no no…Russia is poised to attack US!….And they will once we unravel in chaos with NK…they’re just waiting…Patiently…..

[DianeParticipant]

Thanks, Strega!

[.Spectator]

That’s a great story Diane! So glad you are back!

Yes this is a thread not for the faint of heart….I am torn between speaking up and shutting up about a lot of issues….

I care because I have a son and one on the way (my niece)….and their future depends on US to stick up for them.

Maybe I can’t personally affect change all that effectively on a mass scale. But maybe I can inspire someone who can…The answers to all of these problems come from the bottom up, not the top down.

“We the people” have forgotten that every member of government works for US…not the other way around. So WE ARE in charge!….

That is the way it is supposed to work.

Instead we’ve become complacent, indifferent, defeatist, selfish, unwilling to face reality, and scared. We elected Trump as a nation. We want to try to post fingers but even though we KNOW Russia tried to produce “fake news” to skew the election results, the bigger issue that NOBODY IS TALKING ABOUT…Is the fact that WE FELL FOR IT!!! Hahahahahahaha serves us damn right. And now we got what we paid for. A psychopath in office. It’s really our fault. No one else’s but ours. And the consequences of our actions can be traced back long before Donald Trump even announced his candidacy. He just knew how to play to our stupidity and he’s been doing it ever since.

What no one seems to be talking about is how HIS stupidity is playing into the hands of our enemies….It is his very character that has brewed the very circumstances that have allowed this war to start….

 

[DianeParticipant]

Thanks Belle. I and many others didn’t vote for him. I accept no blame for him and the asshats in Congress who are supporting him. I marched in Boston for the Women’s March, and in Concord NH during the March for Science. I have sat with members of my community to send post cards to our congressional delegation about specific issues. I have called my Senators and Representatives about multiple issues. I vote – these are legal,   and ostensibly helpful strategies. I worry about what will happen, and I keep resisting.  There are millions of people doing more than I am – to say nobody’s talking about what’s going on is absurd. The Republican Congress is complicit in their silence and shameful tolerance of an illicit President. I wish there was a Hell so they could all rot in it.

• This reply was modified 7 years, 1 month ago by  Diane.

[David BootsParticipant]

Arrogant with undeserved self-confidence and patriotic fervor combined with a distorted view of the world; this is the problem with having a psychopath for a leader.

[notSimpleParticipant]

Belle Rose wrote:

In any event, I don’t believe this will lead to a world war – I do think it’s possible that we have a contained war, but China has already stated that that if North Korea initiate aggression against the USA, and the USA retaliates, they will remain neutral.

What no one sees is that Russia is poised to attack as well. That is how this is going to become a world war. They are already playing with us right under our noses. Trump has played right into the hands of every foreign power that wants to take us out and burnt bridges with our ally’s….In a way that is pretty irreversible as long as he is in power.

–Actually you miss the point. Being an effective negotiator, like being a good poker player, has nothing to do with whether you’re a ‘good guy’ or not. It has to do with whether you can win.  There are many many thousands of people who tried to play that game and failed. And no one said anything about ‘self made’ (which seems to be an obsessive target of the Dems  who feel it shuts down the conversation).

Obama, and Bush W were ineffective negotiators, losing far too much to opponents, and leaving serious problems unsettled.

Per the Russia comment, they do not appear to be that interested in this issue. They have their own economic problems, their military infrastructure is pretty far behind on upkeep and they have little incentive to involve military action short of actual defense.

BTW the term ‘psychopath’, despite the craziness with which it is thrown around by people who probably don’t even know any CEOs, has very specific definitions, and most psychopaths don’t tend to succeed in interactions with others for too long.

• This reply was modified 7 years, 1 month ago by  notSimple.
• This reply was modified 7 years, 1 month ago by  notSimple.

[David BootsParticipant]

The lay definition of psychopath is – someone with a mental disorder that makes them behave in ways that can be dangerous to other people. Sounds about right to me.

[DianeParticipant]

I feel the need to clarify a point. When I hear “Nobody is doing anything” I cringe because millions of people are indeed doing whatever they legally can to stop this madness. It is the Republican Party which is allowing this to continue. They can stop Trump TODAY, yet they will let Trump continue until their prospects for re-election dwindle enough. I am furious about this but I can’t live in a rage. I am not a person of faith but somehow I think in a general sense, karma’s a BITCH.  See why I need to stay in the present moment? I share your outrage, Belle. I’m just stubborn and defiant enough to live the best life I can and help others to do the same. Living well really is the best revenge. Ok, back to my happy place….   Breathe in… Breathe out..  (I just watched footage of the goings-on on Charlottesville and read a tweet that said “Only 8 months into the Trump Presidency we are on the brink of nuclear war and Nazis are in streets of an American city. Seems about right.”) I am simultaneously crushed and comforted. Crushed by the hatred and fear – comforted by the tsunami of pushback against it. What’s happening is awful but it is not going unanswered.

[Author]

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