Review: The Sympathizer: A Novel

Amazon

From The Sympathizer: A Novel, by Viet Thanh Nguyen:

The month in question was April, the cruelest month. It was the month in which a war that had run on for a very long time would lose its limbs, as is the way of wars. It was a month that meant everything to all the people in our small part of the world and nothing to most people in the rest of the world. It was a month that was both an end of a war and the beginning of . . . well, 'peace' is not the right word, is it, my dear Commandant?"

"The Sympathizer" is a novel of the aftermath of the Vietnam War from the point of view of an undercover Vietnamese agent who describes himself as "a spy, a sleeper, a spook, a man of two faces." His ability to see any issue from both sides makes him an invaluable narrator for Americans to make sense of that horrible war.

POTD: Great Moral Conflict

From 2016 10 10 Washington DC

Today's photo-of-the-day is from the Martin Luther King Memorial in Washington, DC.

"The hottest place in Hell is reserved for those who remain neutral in times of great moral conflict."
— Martin Luther King

Evergreen words. One of our generation's great moral conflicts is the battle over universal health care.

OTBR: Illinois Farm Land

Latitude: N 42° 06.870
Longitude: W 088° 31.524

A child on a road trip with his family asks, "Where are we?" and the father answers, "Let's check the map. We're off the blue roads [the Interstate Highways marked in blue on the road atlas]. We're off the red roads [the US and state highways]. We're off the black roads [the county highways]. I think we're off the map altogether." It was always my dream to be off the map altogether.

After the jump, a few of the random places (and I mean random literally) that I visited vicariously (not actually) last month that are "off the blue roads".

POTD: Happy Fourth

From 2016 10 10 Washington DC

Today's photo-of-the-day is from the base of the Washington Monument in Washington, DC. George Washington. Now he was a President.

Repeat Tweets: CEO of GE: Climate Change is Real

Repeat tweets from June, 2017:

• Jun 1 2017: RT @JeffImmelt: "Disappointed with today’s decision on the Paris Agreement. Climate change is real. Industry must now lead and not depend on government." CEO of GE is just discovering what the rest of us have known for months. This government can't be depended on to do the right thing, ever.
• Jun 1 2017: Right move by Elon Musk, but a little late to shower him with any praise. Only when his electric car business was threatened did he act.
• Jun 1 2017: RT @rachelheldevans: "It's just so damn short-sighted, so isolationist and small, so gleefully ignorant, so pointless. #ParisAgreement" But it does piss off liberals, so there's that in its favor, according to scorecard used by Trump and the right.
• Jun 1 2017: "A crucial crack in an Antarctic ice sheet grew 11 miles in only 6 days." Make Antarctica Great Again.
• Jun 1 2017: Five Came Back (TV): Doc of 5 Hollywood directors who enlist in WWII to make movies for the war effort. Fascinating behind-the-scenes look.

After the jump, more repeat tweets.

Day Zero

The Prelude is over. In the next movement, shit gets real.

The day you receive your new cells is often called "Day Zero". It's your new birthday. The cells are put into your body through an intravenous line. The procedure is like a blood transfusion. The donated cells 'know' where they belong in the body. They move through your bloodstream to settle in your bone marrow. This is where the cells will begin to grow and produce new red blood cells, white blood cells and platelets.

Schutze vs Lieber; Toler vs Schutze

In May, Lynn Davenport lost her bid for a place on the Richardson ISD school board. Afterwards, Dave Lieber of The Dallas Morning News wrote about the election campaign. Lieber listed a harassing tweet, rumors about Davenport's conservative politics, and a hack of her website that redirected traffic to a porn site. Lieber wrote, "Her problems stemmed, she believes, from her opponent's veteran political consultant, C.P. Henry of Dallas." That accusation in Lieber's column caught the attention of Jim Schutze of The Dallas Observer.

Anne with an E (TV 2017)

IMDB

Anne with an E (TV 2017): Simple story of a charming, imaginative girl turned into something much darker. Whimsy is lost. So is Anne. C+

POTD: The Test of Our Progress

From 2016 10 10 Washington DC

Today's photo-of-the-day is from the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial in Washington, DC.

"The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little."
— Franklin Delano Roosevelt

Evergreen words. Will this generation fail the test?

E Pluribus Unum. Or Not.

E Pluribus Unum. A sentiment as dead as the Latin it's written in.

I'm collecting words that I used to think were universally considered to be virtues, like motherhood and apple pie. You know, words like tolerance, and compromise, and civility. And even kindness. Spoiler alert: many conservatives no longer consider those to be virtues. Now there's another word to add to the growing list: unity.