First notes…

227.2 lbs

… second day of No S diet observance… weight down again…

… i spent most of yesterday installing the new storm door… it went pretty well… i have to make some adjustments to the frame that will be a bit of a pain, but it is installed and we are happy with it… the door was not as custom as i would have thought we paid for… it came with extension pieces and was more than an inch short of the full height required… it was, at least, just short of the full width of the rough opening as it should have been… the door cost us $850… its a good door… well insulated, weatherstripped, and features a screen that automatically drops down when the top window pain is lowered… for the good weather… i practiced what i learned from 4K Weeks… embrace what one is being asked to focus on in the present moment… let the other priorities stand in abeyance while this one thing claims center stage… return to the rest when it is done…

… we watched more Station 11 last night… i fell asleep… i find the current rage for telling stories in non-linear fashion a bit tedious… i get the artfulness of it… i suppose it develops a kind of suspense that might keep some hanging on waiting to figure out what it is all about… it seems more device than art to me in this case… at this moment i compare it to Georges Perec’s life which in a way, is this concept on steroids, but it works better in Perec… perhaps it works better in the book the series is based on…

… Heather Cox Richardson this morning, as expected, is all about the J6 Select Committee asking Sean Hannity to appear before it and answer some questions… Hannity will likely decline to do so on first amendment (freedom of the press) grounds… the committee’s questions were narrowly aimed at communications between Hannity and 45’s administration and it is clear that he is acting as adviser, not journalist, and, in any case, Hannity has said in public, on air, that he does not consider himself a journalist… there is a good chance the committee could compel his testimony should they wish to… whether they will or not is probably dependent on how effectively they can steer clear of the violation of first amendment rights accusations that will certainly be leveled by Trumpist conservatives… one needs also to have a clear eyed view of whether 45 will become president and how the tools of government might be used to exact revenge…

… every day, Liz Cheney is more a hero to me, as is the entire Select Committee, as every member is enduring death threats and threats to their careers in general… Cheney is currently not expected to survive the next election cycle…

… i have allowed myself to think that Democracy will not win this current struggle… one of the key ways it could stay in the game, national voting rights legislation, seems unlikely given the intransigence of Manchin and Sinema on the filibuster rule… personally, i don’t think Mitch McConnel would hesitate for a second to throw it overboard if it stood between him and something he wanted to accomplish…

… the other thing that could save democracy is the work of the J6 Committee… they appear to have a pretty clear picture of what happened… there appears to be criminal culpability on the part of 45 and senior members of his administration… but… the attempt to overturn democracy is ongoing and the partisanship is so fevered and delusional that over 70% of Republicans believe the last election was stollen from them, even though there is no audit of the election, official or otherwise, that has turned up any wrong doing, any fraud… Facts said Kelly Anne Conway, don’t matter. What people believe matters… the truest words ever uttered by a political operative… whatever you can get the people to believe is what matters… and, a majority of the people is not needed, only radicalization of enough of the minority to a fevered pitch… Trumpian conservatives are winning the belief and fever pitch game at the moment…