Please Quit Helping...

Our Secretary of Agriculture, Sonny Purdue, addressed the World
Dairy Expo in Madison Wisconsin, (my hometown, right now that is)
last week, and he could have brought better news.  He told a gathering
of dairy farmers that, and I quote: "In America, the big get bigger, and
small go out.  I don't think in America we, for any small business,
we have a guaranteed income or a guaranteed profitability". Thank
you, Mr. Purdue!  Farming is not just any business, we all eat Mr.
Purdue, and just looking at you, you do your share of eating.

Wisconsin has, for many years, been known as the 'Dairy State', and
with good reason.  The independent dairy farmer has been the
backbone of the state's economy for over a hundred years.  But
things are changing rapidly, Wisconsin has lost 551 small dairy
farms so far this year, as of August 31, 2019. Last year, 2018, we
lost 638 and in 2017 465 dairy farmers gave up milking.  That is
a 37% increase in loss of dairy farms in 2018 over 2017, and lordy
knows how many there will finally be this year.  And much of it is
due to the tariff wars between the United States and China, the
exports of dairy solids to China fell by 43% this year due to those
tariffs.

The sad news is that Wisconsin leads the nation in farm bankruptcies
even though it is eleventh in number of farms.  And sadder yet, is
that suicide among farmers is five times higher than the rest of the
population, figures that have not been seen since the depression.
Much of this is due to the projected rate of return on their farm assets.
the Farm Bureau calculated the rate of return will be 1.3% in 2019,
that is below the ten-year average of 2%.  Last year farm subsidies
accounted for 73% of production returns.  Farmer's think that these
subsidies are hurting more than helping, as family farms are being
bought up by huge corporations.

The Farm Bill lacks the language to keep these large corporations
from taking advantage of the subsidies that were designed to help
the struggling family farms.  Dairy lobbyists in Washington DC,
spent $7.5 million in 2018 to insure their piece of the pie. The top
spender, was Land O'Lakes, a multibillion-dollar Minnesota
agricultural co-op.  They spent $1.3 million alone.

Across the nation, the projected net farm income, in 2019 will
be the third lowest in the past decade, though higher than 2018
which the second lowest in the past decade.  Farming is, and
always has been, a risky business.  In 2018, there was $15+ billion
in agriculture and dairy subsidies, Wisconsin's share of that
was more than $352 million, and of that, $4+ million went to
out-of-state addresses, and $580,000 went to addresses within
fifty miles of Chicago

However, 58% of Wisconsin farmers did not collect any subsidy
payments.  Wisconsin is 16th on the list of subsidies received,
and receives approximately $9 billion or 2.3% of the government
pie, far below its neighbors; Iowa - 8.3%, Illinois - 6.9%,
Minnesota - 5.8% and Indiana - 3.5%.

Trade wars and the stalling in Congress of NAFTA 2.0, have caused
farm markets to plummet, as there is a backlog of normally exported
crops and dairy products.  And all the signs lead toward consolidation
of agriculture and dairy businesses into factory farms, squeezing out
the family-owned farmers who have acted as stewards of the land
for generations.  These factory farms produce waist on a grand
scale and present a real danger to the environment.  The term
'factory farm' is a misnomer, these are not farms as much as they
are large scale productions, and those that operate them are not
farmers, they are producers with a greater eye to the bottom line
than the health and welfare of the animals and the land.

And this is the future that the Trump administration is promising
you.  Thanks, but no thanks, Mr. Purdue, you can stop helping
any time now.

I'm just sayin'.

Those Who Forget History Are Bound to Repeat It

The legal description of conspiracy is: An agreement
between two or more persons to commit a crime at
sometime in the future.  It is not required that any
steps have to be taken to put the plan into effect.
note: repentance by one or more persons involved
does not affect liability, but may reduce sentence time.

I bring up the matter of conspiracy because it is what
brought the Nixon White House down in 1974, not that
long ago.  What began as an innocuous break-in by five
men at the Democratic National Committee headquarters,
in the Watergate Hotel, on June 17, 1972, to bug the offices
and garner information on the Democratic presidential
campaign.  After the five perpetrators were caught with
money in their possession from the Republican Presidential
slush fund, the depth of the conspiracy began to unravel.
Ultimately, sixty-nine persons were indicted, and forty-eight
were convicted.

Among the high-profile figures in the Nixon White House
were:
   E. Howard Hunt and G. Gordon Liddy, both members of
the intelligence community, and referred to as the 'plumbers'.
Hunt was convicted of burglary, conspiracy, and wiretapping.
Liddy was convicted of burglary, conspiracy and refusing to
testify before the Senate. Both spent time in federal prison
  John Mitchell, United States Attorney General, was convicted
of conspiracy, obstruction of justice and perjury.  He spent time
federal prison.
   H. R. Haldeman, White House Chief of Staff, convicted of
conspiracy and obstruction of justice, he spent time in prison.
   John Ehrlichman, Assistant Domestic Affairs Officer, convicted
of obstruction of justice and perjury, he spent time in prison.
   Charles Colson, White House Counsel, convicted of obstruction
of justice, he spent time in prison.
And who can forget baby-faced, John Dean, the White House Counsel,
on the witness stand, his wife, with her little pearl earrings, sitting
in court, so stoic.  They both looked so young.  Dean, who was the
'master manipulator' of Watergate, pled guilty to obstruction of
justice, and agreed to testify.  As a result, he received a lighter
sentence, and he was disbarred.
While all these men had their sentences reduced, they all spent time
in federal prison for felonies.
Articles of impeachment were being drawn up against President
Nixon on one count of Abuse of Power, however, he resigned
before they could go to the Senate for trial.

As Yogi Berra once said, "It's deja vue all over again."  It now appears
the necessary requirements for a conspiracy have been met, even if
there are only four participants: Donald Trump, William Barr, Mike
Pompeo, and Rudy Giuliani.  Giuliani began the process by convincing
the president that the Ukraine, not Russia, was responsible for the
interference in the 2016 election, and that somehow, they had information
on the whereabouts of the Clinton e-mail server.  The President then
made an unscripted call to the Ukrainian President-elect, and it is
purported that the Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, was listening in
on the call, a fact that he first denied to the press, and later confirmed.
During the call, President Trump asked the President-elect of the Ukraine
to 'do him a favor'.  The favor entailed getting dirt on Trump's 2020 election
rival, Joe Biden.  That, in itself, would be a problem.  But the President's
staff, realizing that the phone call might pose a problem, decided to put
the transcript of the call in a hyper-secure data base, hence the cover up
begins.

It is unrealistic to believe that there are only those four participants
involved, as we've seen, the President's staff participated in the
cover-up.  At this juncture, Attorney General, William Barr, is in
the EU soliciting help to try and dispute the Mueller Report.  He
is introducing United States Attorney, John Durham, who will
be leading the investigation of the investigation, hoping to discredit
the intelligence services; the FBI and the CIA.  So far Barr, has been
to the UK, Italy and Australia.  It is widely felt, by the Democrats in
the House, that Trump is again using the powers of the Presidency
for personal retribution of his adversaries.  Is that abuse of power yet?

The House has requested that former Ambassador to the Ukraine, Marie
Yovanovitch, who was brought home early, as Trump tweeted that she
a 'joker', Kurt Volker, Deputy Assistant Secretary, George Kent,  EU
Ambassador, Gordon Sondland, and State Department Counsel, Ulrich
Brechbuhl, testify before them in the next two weeks.  So far, only
Kurt Volker, who resigned his position in the State Department, has
agreed.  The House has also subpoenaed documents from Barr's
office.  Barr has said that those State Department people do not have
to appear, citing harassment.  If so, they will be subpoenaed, forcing
them to testify under law.  Is that obstruction of justice yet?

As it appears this impeachment inquiry bears a strong resemblance
to the Nixon inquiry.  Nixon believed his popularity would help him
ride out any notion of impropriety, that and the destruction of the
tapes that implicated him in the conspiracy.  He was wrong, in the
end, the Republicans saw the gravity of the actions of the President
and put the country ahead of their party loyalty.  Nixon also put
the country first, and rather subject the country to an impeachment
trial that he most likely would lose, Nixon resigned.  Donald Trump
will never resign, he is a man obsessed, first with the fact that he
did not win the popular vote, he was confirmed by the electoral
college, not by a vote of the people.  Second, his popularity has
never reached the fifty-percent mark, and third, he is running behind
all three of the top candidates in the polling for the Democratic
nomination.

Trump's ego will not let that stand, he is Captain Ahab and his
'White Whale' is the 2016 election, and he will replay it until
he is satisfied that he actually won it, on his own, with the
most votes.  And like the white whale, it will be his downfall.
But his minions had best remember 1974; Nixon walked away
to that waiting helicopter, waved to the cameras, and flew off
to his home in California, while his staff walked thru the gates
of the federal prison.  I hope they think it's worth it.

I'm just sayin'.

When is it enough?

When is it enough?

When can I say I did my best?

When I pass the torch to the next generation?
And will they accept it?

I'm tired of fighting.  I took to the streets in the
60's, and the 70's , I marched for equal rights,
women's rights, I marched for a end of an unjust
war, and I took to the streets again after Trump's
inauguration,  along with my female colleagues.

I've been out in the cold, and the blazing heat,
I've been spit on, and called names, and now I'm
tired.  But everyday there is something coming
from this administration that boggles my mind,
it is so outrageous as to be indefensible.  Where
is the outcry, where are the people who should
be incensed by the lies, over 12,000 of them and
counting?  Why is everyone sitting there?  I can't
be the only one left who feels we are losing our
beloved country.

Or is everyone numbed by the constant onslaught?
They say the country is not in the mood for an
impeachment trial, why?  Did they not read what
I read, not see what I saw, not hear what I heard?
Am I Cassandra crying at the city gates?  Yes, I
know to overturn the vote of the people is very
serious, and should not be taken lightly.  God knows
it's been tried twice before, but this time it is not
driven by petty jealousy, by partisan bickering, it
has been well documented by a non-partisan
committee.  It has been parsed in print and the
testimony televised for all to see.

I give up, I cannot keep working for change that
will not happen.  I don't know how to reach those
people who refused to get involved.  Those who
think that this economy is good for their 401K.
Tell me what good will your retirement be when
the policies of this administration no longer
represents the beliefs of the country that you
love.  Will you take your money and go somewhere
else?  And where will that be?  America represents
all that is good and just in the world, and when we
no longer do that, what then?

One look around the world today and you can see
people risking everything; their freedom, even their
lives to protest the authoritarian rule of their
government.  This weekend there were fifty thousand
people in Moscow, and also in St. Petersburg, Russia
and even more in Hong Kong.  What do they see that
we here, in America, do not see?  They believe that
people can and will bring about real change, look at
Puerto Rico.

Ah, but I cannot give up, not as long as I draw breath.
This Saturday I was at the Farmer's market on the Square
in Madison, Wisconsin handing out brochures, bumper
stickers, campaign buttons and answering questions for
my favorite candidate for president in 2020.  I will be
there again next week and the week after that and every
week until the market closes down for the season.  Then
I will be somewhere else where the crowds gather, and then
I will be ringing doorbells and phoning my neighbors. It
matters not who I favor, only that they will serve my country
with honor and civility, and make me proud to be an American
again.  Won't you please join me?

I'm just sayin'.

I Come to Bury Not to Praise...

This is essentially the obituary of Joe Biden's
campaign for president. Even if there is
'no there there'.  I seriously doubt the campaign
will ever regain the momentum it had going in.
The old saying 'where there's smoke there's fire'
will dog the campaign going forward, and even
those who are Biden's fans will harbor that nagging
feeling that something is not right.  The question
will come up again of why isn't Obama openly supporting
him.  What does he know that we should?

The current President and the Republicans will keep
up the drumbeat of 'investigate Joe Biden' at every
rally.  The Committee to reelect the President is
planning to spend $10 million on television and
internet ads beginning today, and when they are done,
Biden's mother wouldn't vote for him.  But perhaps we
should look at what all this fuss is about.

Hunter Biden, Joe Biden's, second born son, is a graduate
of Yale Law School, class of 1996.  He has had a rather
checkered career, in and than out of the Naval Reserve
for testing positive for cocaine.  He registered as a lobbyist
in 2001, and was appointed to the Board of Amtrak in
2006, by then president George W. Bush.  He left the
Board in 2009 when his father, Joseph Biden, became
Vice President.  That is also when Hunter gave up
lobbying, and founded the law firm Rosemont Seneca
Partners.  Hunter Biden also founded the venture capital
firm of Eudora Global, and in 2013, Hunter partnered
with Chinese businessman Jonathan Li, to form a business
that invested Chinese capital outside of China.

After the Ukrainian revolution of 2014, the largest natural
gas company in the Ukraine, Burisma, formed a high-profile
International Board and invited Hunter Biden to join, evidently
to make use of the name of Biden, and paid Hunter a handsome
salary of $50,000 a month for the privilege.  There is no evidence
that Burisma ever sought favor from either of the Bidens.  However,
Victor Shokin, the Prosecutor General of the Ukraine from
February 2015 to March 2016, began an investigation of
Burisma.  The investigation was thought to be nothing except
extortion against Burisma's owner, Mykola Zlochevsky,
and the case was quickly closed.  Hunter Biden was never a
subject of the investigation.

While Joe Biden was Vice President, the United States joined
with a large consensus of Western Nations to encourage the
Ukrainian government to oust Shokin for blocking corruption
investigations in the prosecutor office.  The deputy prosecutor,
Vitali Kosho, had resigned, citing corruption and cronyism in
Shokin's office, and after that, Joe Biden threatened the
Ukrainian government. on behalf of the United States, to
withhold American loan guarantees until Victor Shokin left.
The International Monetary Fund also threatened to withdraw
financial support from the Ukraine. One-month later the
Ukrainian Parliament voted Shokin out.

 While Shokin was still in power, the investigation of Burisma
was suspended before the Vice President made the threat to with-
hold the loan guarantees, and there was no evidence found that
Joe Biden did anything to thwart the effort to investigate Burisma.
Shokin's successor, Yuriy Lutsenko, also investigated Burisma, but
closed the case after ten months.  After meeting with Rudy Giuliani,
in 2019, Lutsenko reopened the case, the reason was unclear and
nothing came of it.  The new Ukrainian President, Volodymyr
Zelenski, requested Lutsenko's removal.  There has never been a
tie-in found between Joe Biden and any dealings with Burisma.
However, in politics perception becomes reality.

Now Biden is making his third run at the presidency.  His first
attempt was in 1988, when he was then accused of plagiarizing
from a Scotsman politician, Neil Kinnock, in Kinnock's run against
Margaret Thatcher, it was not the first time.  Biden admitted he did
plagiarize the speech and withdrew his candidacy.  He ran again in
2008, and left the race after doing poorly in the Iowa caucuses, and
was later selected to be Obamas running mate.  Biden contemplated
running again in 2016, but he was still grieving the death of his son.
Beau, who died of brain cancer the year before.

In Washington D C, Joe Biden has been know as being squeaky clean,
but I don't know anyone who could survive todays investigations
of the candidates. I know I couldn't get elected dog catcher, as the
saying goes, and I would not put myself through it.  Though the
present occupant of the White House survived three divorces,
five bankruptcies, several accusations of extra-marital affairs with
women of dubious character, and being an admitted sexual
predator.  Some resume!

Now Donald Trump is being investigated for trying to influence
the Ukrainian President-elect at the time, Zelenski, to; one, find
the e-mail server used by Hillary Clinton, and two, dig up dirt
on Joe and Hunter Biden.  At the time, Trump was holding back
$250 million in military aid that had already been authorized.

This has all come to light because a whistleblower filed a complaint
with the inspector general's office after receiving complaints from
numerous people about suspected conversations of Trump with various
leaders of foreign countries.  As a result Speaker of the House, Nancy
Pelosi, has opened an impeachment inquiry, and Trump has more than
suggested that Joe Biden is guilty of the same thing, if not worse.

So here we are, Joe Biden will either be a hero or a goat.  There is a
long way to go and a lot of testimony before the full story comes out
on exactly what Trump did or did not do.  Meanwhile the first caucus
is in Iowa in February, followed closely by New Hampshire.  In the
meantime the accusations against Biden will be unanswered, and the
doubt will be foremost in people's minds.  Elizabeth Warren is already
charging Biden's supremacy.  Is there a limit to how much the man can
take before the smile dims and his step loses its buoyancy, and he goes
quietly into history?  Will America be poorer because a gentleman and
a scholar was once again cast aside?  I can't answer that question, only
the voters can.  But then I came to bury him...

I'm just sayin'  

 

These Are the Times That Try Men's Souls . . .

the summer soldier and sunshine patriot will, in
this crisis, shrink from the service of his country;
but he that stands up now, deserves the love and
thanks of man and woman.   Thomas Paine, 1776

Nancy Pelosi has directed the House Judiciary
Committee to open an impeachment inquiry against
President Trump.  This is not how things are usually
done.  In other - and there have been many - impeach-
ment inquiries the whole House votes to open the
inquiry.  The House of Representatives may
open an inquiry at any time, it may also file
Articles of Impeachment at any time.  It is
usual, however, to defer to the Speaker of the
House.  It may surprise you to know that certain
Representatives attempted to bring impeachment
proceedings against; John Tyler, Grover Cleveland,
Herbert Hoover, Harry Truman Ronald Reagan, and
G. H. W. Bush.  All of these attempts failed to get out of
Committee and on to the whole House.  Only three succeeded;
Andrew Johnson, Bill Clinton and, had he not resigned,
Richard Nixon.  So, we should not get that excited about
yesterday's events we still have a long way to go.

Perhaps it would behoove us to get some background
on just what impeachment is.  Impeachment was first
established in Britain in the thirteen-hundreds.  Britain
has no formal constitution, so impeachment, as such,
was an unwritten law.  When the framers were writing
our Constitution, there was considerable discussion
about including impeachment at all.  The biggest
roadblock was the wording of just what constituted
an impeachable offense.  In the end they settled on
'treason, bribery, and other high crimes and misde-
meanors'.  It is the second half of that statement which
legal scholars still argue over today.

Let us define impeachment; impeachment is a process
by which a legislative body levels charges against a
government official.  Impeachment is written into the
the constitution of twenty-five nations, among then
are Russia, South Korea and of course the United States.
Impeachment is delineated in Article 2, Section 4, it
simply says:  The President, Vice President, and all
Civil Officers of the United States shall be removed
from Office on impeachment for, and conviction of
Treason, Bribery, or other high crimes and
misdemeanors.  Thirty-one words, that's all, nothing
more.

The House of Representatives and the Senate each set
their own rules regarding impeachment procedures,
as none were set down by the framers.  The procedure
begins with the Judiciary Committee of the House of
Representatives, they hold hearings, take evidence, and
hear testimony.  After which time the Committee may
formulate Articles of Impeachment - which may contain
one or more counts - then the Committee takes a vote.
If the Articles pass the Committee, they are referred to the
full House, which will then debate the matter and take a vote.
If the House votes to impeach, the Articles go onto the
Senate.  The Articles of Impeachment may die at any
point from the Judiciary Committee to the full House,
as six of the Articles we noted did.

The Senate is judge and jury in the case of prosecution
of impeachment, but if the officeholder charged is the
President, then the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court
sits as judge, as William Rehnquist did during the
Clinton trial.  There are attorneys for each side as in a
regular court proceeding. After both side present their
case, the Senate debates the issues and votes.  It requires
a 'super majority', or two-thirds of the Senators present
to convict the President.  The word present is stressed here
as any Senator voting abstain, would be counted as a vote
against impeachment.  It is thought, a vote to impeach
would trigger a Constitutional crisis, in that; would the
convicted president have the right to appeal - and if so -
to whom would they appeal.

The question has been, for years, what is an impeachable
offense?  Some jurist say; any bad act, though not necessarly
a crime, however they also say, not all crimes are impeachable.
In 1970, then Representative Gerald Ford said this, in part,
"what ever the majority of the House of Representatives
considers it to be at any given moment".  This would mean that
impeachment is not a legal proceeding, but a political one.
This is what the framers feared, that the president would then
be serving at the pleasure of the Congress.  James Wilson, one
of the delegates to the Constitutional Congress and later one of
the first Supreme Court Justices, argued that impeachment
procedures are "of a political nature. . . confined to political
characters, to political crimes and misdemeanors, and to
political punishment".

And so here we are today, there are those who rejoice that their
wish has come true, those who wanted from day one to impeach
Donald Trump.  Christopher Lewis Peterson, Professor, College
of Law, whose main  body of work is banking and lending, wrote
extensively on the subject. He feels strongly that Trump should
have been impeached on the day he was sworn in, based on his
prior bad acts, i.e. bank and insurance fraud.  I, myself, am torn.
There have been presidents whose politics I disagreed with, and
some that I didn't feel were up to the job, even some I disliked
personally, but never have I ever felt this strong a dislike about
a president.  It is visceral, I cannot watch him on television. and
the sound of his voice is like fingers on a blackboard.  Everyday
when I wake up, I think it can't get any worse, but it does.

It will be a long road going forward, and I fear for the country.
I fear even if, and that is a big if, Trump is convicted, he will
not go quietly.  He has intimated as much on more than one
occasion.  When the House of Representatives voted for the
Article of Impeachment for Richard Nixon, he did the right
thing for the country, he resigned.  Nixon knew a trial in the
Senate would be very harmful for the country, especially in
light of the outcome of the Viet Nam war.  His first thoughts
were for America.  Donald Trump has ho such compunction,
he only sees things in relation to himself.  He does not believe
he could be convicted.  When things begin to go bad for him,
he instructs his lawyers to 'buy them out'.  Well, Donald, buy
yourself out of this!

I'm just sayin'

Have You Stopped Beating Your Wife?

There have been allegations by a whistle blower that President
Trump made improper suggestions during a phone call to the
president-elect of the Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenski.  Trump
supposedly asked Zelenski to 'look into', then Vice-president
Joe Biden's son, Hunter Biden, and his connections with a
natural gas firm where Hunter sat on the board. The
accusations had been examined and were found to be
baseless.  How thorough and unbiased the inquiry was
is not the question at this time.

Over the weekend, during an impromptu news conference
- aren't they all - Trump stated to the twenty-five or so
reporters in attendance that during that phone call he
congratulated the Ukrainian President, Zeleinski, and that
he might have mentioned Joe Biden and Hunter.  He told
reporters,  "It was largely the fact that we don't want our
people, like Vice President Biden and his son, creating
to (sic) the corruption already in the Ukraine".  WOW!
Trump is the master of the complex fallacy, he managed
to make not one, but two, false accusations in one
sentence.  He threw suspicion on Joe Biden and his son
Hunter, while also painting the Ukrainian government as
corrupt.

There is a saying, 'when you point a finger at me, you have
three fingers pointing at yourself'. Trump has elevated that
to an art, and he does it with aplomb.  He uses cognitive
biases with the skill of a surgical laser, he has created his
own subjective social reality.  He is a product of, so called,
reality television where Trump envisioned himself the mammoth
business tycoon who could berate job applicants and belittle
prospective employees, and still have them fawn over him,
groveling sycophants inflating his ego, until he turned on them
and said, "You're fired!'". There remains the question whether
Trump suffers from narcissism or solipsism.

Trump has elevated evasionary tactics to new heights, he uses
half-truths, out-right lies, red herrings, and straw men to
obfuscate and complicate any question of impropriety on his
part. His repeated declaration of 'no collusion, no obstruction'
was his answer to the Mueller Report.  He said it so often,
even the House of Representatives apparently believed it.  he
is capable of turning any question around, and diverting it back
onto the questioner.  The deflection of his statement that he
'could grab any woman by the p***y' and get away with it,
was pure terpsichory, oooooh, dance a little sidestep.  He
simply turned it into a discussion on ISIS.  He uses nick-
names like; little Marco, lyin' Ted, low energy Jeb, crooked
Hillary, sleepy Joe and Pocahontas, instead of dialogue in
the debates, and when the unwitting press picks up the
ad homs, they become self-fulfilling prophecies.

Claims of corruption and out-right illegality have had no effect
on his candidacy or his presidency.  It helps that he is shielded
by a willing Senate that is compliant in his wrong-doings,
a Senate that fears his ability to marshal his followers and to
'primary' anyone who dares to challenge him, though there are
House members who are feeling the pressure and some are
folding their tents and calling it quits, or maybe, just maybe
they have developed a conscience.

Trump uses false dichotomy to strike fear in the hearts of his
dedicated band of MAGAs; build a wall or have open boarders,
Chinese tariffs or no more jobs, vote for him or face a recession,
restrict Muslims or sharia law, the list is endless.  There is no grey,
only black or white.  When Trump says Mexicans are murderers
and rapists, and Muslims are terrorists, and Chinese are thieves
he is building a masked man fallacy.  He offers a false dilemma,
it is one way - his way - or disaster of immense proportion.  You
have only two options, which one do you like?

When faced with exposure, he cries 'fake news', when confronted
with logic, he argues from incredulity.  And when all else fails, his
fall back is; argumentum ad lapidem, appeal to the stone, or as your
mama used to say 'because I said so'.    

And, I'm just sayin'.

A Time for All Things Under Heaven...

Fall has always been my favorite time of the year, I have
never thought of it as an ending but rather as a beginning.
When I was a young girl, it was the start of the new school
year; new school uniform, new shoes, new books, new
pencils, and a new 'school bag' to put them in (those of you
under fifty Google the term). I remember the smells, nothing
smells like new leather shoes, new books which have never
been opened by anyone but me, and newly sharpened pencils,
that still smell of the forest from whence they came.  And is
there anything more reminiscent of school than the smell of
library paste.

Fall is the beginning of the holiday season for me, the last
holiday, the Fourth of July, is long past.  Now corn stalks
and pumpkins foretell of Halloween and Thanksgiving.
The earthy smell of mums, mingles with the smell of wet
leaves and wood smoke.  The trees, which were dressed in
a thousand shades of green, now don robes of rust and red
and gold and garnet, muted or magnificent, they put on their
brief show and then fade away.

It is half past the middle of September, and warm still, the
usual chill that portends the first frost, has yet to arrive.
I have chosen today to put my garden patch to bed, the
weatherman says there is rain coming for the next three or
four days and I have only a small window of time available,
as I am going to the Middle-East in two weeks. I had pulled
out the summer squash last week and heaped them in a plie
to be dried and reduced to a more manageable size.

Setting about to pick my meager harvest, I collect the last
of the green peppers and the lonely eggplant clinging to the
bush.  My green beans have suffered the past weeks with bean
mosaic, and there isn't enough to bother with.  There are a
few ripe tomatoes that I place in my basket.  I'll leave two plants
to see if the remaining green tomatoes will ripen before I leave.
The swiss chard has done well away from the heat of summer,
I select only the larger leaves and leave the smaller ones for
the deer and rabbits, as they will be able to reach them when
I remove the fencing that kept them at bay since early spring.

Time to pull up the plants; pepper, eggplant, tomato, and beans
and put them on the pile of squash leaves that have shrunk
to less than half their size.  The pole bean fencing, that made
picking beans so easy all summer, now has become a chore
to clean, as the beans have wound the their way round and round
the 2x4 inch weld-wire openings in the fence.  If I don't remove
them now, while they are still green and pliable, I will have to
do in the spring when they have dried and have a stranglehold
on the wire.  Though not a strenuous job, it is boring and will
consume most of the time I will spend in the garden.  My mind
wanders to a dear friend who used to share this chore with me.
We gardened on this little plot, though it was bigger when we
worked it together, for several years.  She passed away; it will be
three years this November.  I have lost four other friends this
year, it doesn't seem possible.

The fencing, now clean, gets rolled up for storage, along with
the poultry fencing that covered the chard.  The fence posts are
pulled and stacked alongside.  Time to hoe and pull the weeds
that had sprung up amongst the veggies, and all goes on the heap
for composting, there are four wheel barrowsful.  Lastly, I cut
an armful of zinnias, I always plant flowers in my patch, they
are food for the soul, and their beauty sustains my spirit as well
as the vegetables sustain my body.  They are especially radiant
today, it is as if they know their time is short.  I leave the plants
for my fellow gardeners, they will produce blooms until frost,
and who knows, they may still be here when I come home.  I have
cut enough flowers to deck out every room in my house.

I take one last look at the garden, the tomato plants at the far end
and the zinnias at my end, stand like lone sentries guarding an empty
plot.  It was a good garden, they always are, and it will be here again
come spring, whether I am or not.  I always say I don't think
 I can do it for another year, my back is sore, I worked up two
blisters on hands that grew soft over the summer, my nail are ragged
and dirty.  But I know come February, when the seed companies
inundate my mailbox with their colorful catalogues, I will once again
long for the smell and feel of the earth.  Like childbirth, I will forget
the pain and only remember the joy of watching what I sowed grow
to fruition.  I will do it until I can no longer turn a spade or rake a
clod of soil.

As I stow my harvest in the trunk of the car, along with my garden gloves
and shoes, the wind begins to pick up, there are ominous clouds on the
western horizon, and the first drops of rain splatter on my windshield.
I will have the chard and tomatoes for dinner, they will taste especially
good, as good as the first ones of summer.  Next week I will have to
vacuum summer's soil out of the car.

I'm just sayin'.