This time last year, I was looking “through a glass darkly.” It was pretty obvious the Russians were going to invade Ukraine, and I didn’t think my friends there had much of a chance. I was wrong. My friends and their friends and everyone else there has surprised the world, and become the beacon of freedom, the examples for all of us.
I kind of hate to say it, but I love it when you're wrong, TC. Ditto for myself. And in this case, I'm only too happy to admit the error of my ways, since my views were quite similar to yours.
In that vein, with your permission I'd like to share an end of the year thought or two of my own. Actually, I posted this in comments yesterday in the Triad over at the Bulwark, in which Bill Kristol did a guest piece. Whatever one may or may not think of Kristol, I thought it was pretty good. Like many others at this time, he spoke of some of the political happenings of the past year, as well as some things that didn't happen. Along with those things, he spoke of "the curve of the future", and of hope.
The following is the reaction that elicited from me. And I hope my repeating it here will have the same effect on others. I've slightly edited the last paragraph, the reason for which should be apparent...
The curve of the future is always bending. In what direction and how far depends on who's pushing on it, and how hard.
In this country, our country, America, we would do well to remember that when it comes to the people who believe in liberal democracy, who believe in the rule of law, who believe in the self-evident truths of our founding documents, there's one hell of a lot more of us than of those who sneer at, shun and seek to undermine and destroy those precious values for their own personal gain, whatever that gain may be.
This New Year's we should all remind ourselves of why we are here. Literally. Some by circumstance of birth, some by choice, as far as living on this soil goes. But we are where we are in the greater sense because of all those who came before us who did not sneer at nor shun those values, who bent their shoulders against the curve of their futures in ways both large and small, and in doing so created a future for us to live in the freedom and with the liberties we enjoy today.
I'm not big on New Year's resolutions. They're more often than not hard to keep, and often are quickly forgotten. But we could all do worse than to resolve that in the coming year we each remind ourselves from time to time why we're here. And resolve to bend our shoulders against the curve of the future so that the efforts of those who came before will not be wasted, and the arc of history, however slowly and painfully, will continue to bend toward justice, and the attendant freedom, liberty and opportunity that true justice realized brings.
I wish you and yours a truly Happy New Year, TC, as well as all those in your TAFM family. I'm pretty sure we all know in the end why we're here. And as pessimistic as I often can be, that gives me hope for better things to come.
Being a closet optimist most of the time, I am happy to be wrong. What keeps the spark going is the realization that the mostly “silent majority” is us, and the destroyers are idiots “full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.” Greedy bastards all, may this be the year they jump the shark…
The bad stuff is what's dangerous. And for some reason, we evolved to better remember danger than good stuff. The parallel in behavioral economics is that people are more worried about losses than they are excited about potential gains. Which is why people so often stay in bad relationships--something I've done all too much.
I've made myself a copy of your statement to read several times in the next several days, hopefully to commit myself to remembering why we're here, and keep on bending the curve towards justice.
Well thanks, David. I copy things as reminders occasionally. I keep a copy of FDR's D-Day Prayer on the side of our 'fridge. Not a particularly 'honorable' place for it, but one in which I will see it every day.
I don't think one has to be particularly religious (though I am a person of faith) to feel the power of its words and the righteousness of its cause. And though I've not committed it to memory, I can't fail to remember every time I see it the lines in which God's blessing is sought to "Help us to conquer the apostles of greed and racial arrogancies. Lead us to the saving of our country, and... a peace invulnerable to the schemings of unworthy men." Words I think as appropriate today as they were all those years ago.
I don't expect the words I write here or elsewhere to end up on the side of someone's 'fridge. But that you think they are worth remembering for a time is quite flattering and much appreciated. So, again, thank you.
Thank you, TC, and Robert and Heather and Dan for your perspectives and encouragement to be the good citizens we must be to protect this cherished democracy. here’s to a happy, healthy new year filled with love and joy as we work to perfect this union of ours.
I’m suspicious of the DNC. But the RNC is utterly toxic. 2023 will show us humans what arrogance and stupidity willfully embraced result in. I hope I can stay in a good head space.
It’s I who thank YOU for helping me weather the storms of 2022 with your timely columns. We’re in a better place than expected, as you wrote. Thank goodness. Hope you have a wonderful New Year’s Day. ❤️🤍💙
Happy new year TC. To you and all your readers. What lies ahead we know not but we can be assured the future will provide lots for you to write about. And we are grateful for that.
TC. I think that identifying and giving voice to what we fear gives us strength and the capacity to see our fears verified and to recognize the successful victories. A wise psychiatrist one dared me to put into words what I feared and what I did not understand. Amazing what light doing so shines outside our silent thinking. It is so satisfying to be wrong, not because we are vigilant, but because we can disabuse the false or, better yet, presumed conclusions of the time in country.
It is nice to look back and think of where we were, where we thought we were heading, and where we actually ended up this year. From 6 January to the release of tax returns this week, it's been a roller coaster. Thanks for your writings, and your comments on other Substack writers I follow.
Thanks for the Year End message of 'things that turned around" !! A lot of good things happened, even though the pitiful main stream media didn't seem to take much notice. Hope you are having a great New Year's Eve. The future is in the hands of "We the People" Time to make it happen. You've been a beacon---and this is a great, warm, and welcoming community. Peace and Love to you and Jurate, TC (and to the cats; amazing stories of wonderful cats)
Well, the country survived another year without completely imploding, so there’s that. Here’s hoping 2023 is better and things work out for many more good things to happen. As it is said, hope springs eternal, so here’s to hope! Happy New Year to everyone, except for a certain TFG at MaraLardo and a human sack of shit in the Kremlin.
Wishing you, Jurate, and the kitcats a new year of love and peace. Thank you for all of the work you do to inform and keep the important conversations going. This community you have nurtured continues to grow and effect positive change. Thank you TC and Happy New Year! 💖🥂
I make an entire center ring show out of being wrong. None of those small mistakes for me.
I am giddy with gratitude to have discovered TC hanging around a couple of websites making comments that were finally too intriguing to resist and doubly thankful to have been welcomed into this community.
Happy New Year to everybody and my hope for 2023 for all us liberals and Democrats is:
I originally came to Substack to read "Sustain What" by Andy Revkin, and Dan Rather. I have bumbled around, reading what I felt drawn to. Substack is a fairly big pond. Over this past week I have come to realize that I read your posts before Dan Rather, before , Jeremy Faust, before your suggested reading L. Truscott, and many others. I can't subscribe to everyone so that realization made it an easy choice who I would to subscribe to, and why.
I like the candid way you voice your fears about what might happen. I like your profanity, it correctly punctuates how I feel as I'm reading your take on things. I like that you could admit that you were wrong, not in this article, but in the one about your Rusty. Not sure where you went wrong, but she appreciated your patience, eventually. That is no small feat. I'm not much of a follower, but I'm smart enough to know that the feeling of good company is something valuable. Another Fine Mess is a good place for me. Looking forward to more.
As to Rusty, the way to domesticate a feral is to reduce their fear level. Eventually that happened with her on her own, but there's a way to speed it up. The main thing is to catch them the week before they "go feral," the week momcat weans them and they're put on their own. Bring them in and don't just dump them in the living room - take them to a quiet room where you can keep track of them and let them learn sounds and smells, and feed them so they understand that, and be gentle with them. And in about two weeks, you will have a domesticated kitten.
So you can see I made all kinds of mistakes with Rusty, but she eventually forgave me.
And wow - ahead of Dan Rather? - that's a prize to value!
You and Dan Rather are similar. His blog is "Steady" He is reassuring. TCinLA takes that risk of being personal. I get to read emotions that I have felt. That is more than reassuring, that is a common bond. I think we all need more of that in our lives, so I read your readers comments too.
I kind of hate to say it, but I love it when you're wrong, TC. Ditto for myself. And in this case, I'm only too happy to admit the error of my ways, since my views were quite similar to yours.
In that vein, with your permission I'd like to share an end of the year thought or two of my own. Actually, I posted this in comments yesterday in the Triad over at the Bulwark, in which Bill Kristol did a guest piece. Whatever one may or may not think of Kristol, I thought it was pretty good. Like many others at this time, he spoke of some of the political happenings of the past year, as well as some things that didn't happen. Along with those things, he spoke of "the curve of the future", and of hope.
The following is the reaction that elicited from me. And I hope my repeating it here will have the same effect on others. I've slightly edited the last paragraph, the reason for which should be apparent...
The curve of the future is always bending. In what direction and how far depends on who's pushing on it, and how hard.
In this country, our country, America, we would do well to remember that when it comes to the people who believe in liberal democracy, who believe in the rule of law, who believe in the self-evident truths of our founding documents, there's one hell of a lot more of us than of those who sneer at, shun and seek to undermine and destroy those precious values for their own personal gain, whatever that gain may be.
This New Year's we should all remind ourselves of why we are here. Literally. Some by circumstance of birth, some by choice, as far as living on this soil goes. But we are where we are in the greater sense because of all those who came before us who did not sneer at nor shun those values, who bent their shoulders against the curve of their futures in ways both large and small, and in doing so created a future for us to live in the freedom and with the liberties we enjoy today.
I'm not big on New Year's resolutions. They're more often than not hard to keep, and often are quickly forgotten. But we could all do worse than to resolve that in the coming year we each remind ourselves from time to time why we're here. And resolve to bend our shoulders against the curve of the future so that the efforts of those who came before will not be wasted, and the arc of history, however slowly and painfully, will continue to bend toward justice, and the attendant freedom, liberty and opportunity that true justice realized brings.
I wish you and yours a truly Happy New Year, TC, as well as all those in your TAFM family. I'm pretty sure we all know in the end why we're here. And as pessimistic as I often can be, that gives me hope for better things to come.
Excellent!
Being a closet optimist most of the time, I am happy to be wrong. What keeps the spark going is the realization that the mostly “silent majority” is us, and the destroyers are idiots “full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.” Greedy bastards all, may this be the year they jump the shark…
Truckloads of 💖's for you, Ms. Chilcutt!!!!
Same here!
Very well said sir. Happy new year to you and yours. We will yet prevail.
Thanks for this superb statement. I will try to keep it in mind.
Funny, innit? We have no trouble remembering bad shit and have to go out of our way to remember good stuff.
Survival relevance. Usually the good stuff won't kill you but the bad stuff needs to be spotted right away.
The bad stuff is what's dangerous. And for some reason, we evolved to better remember danger than good stuff. The parallel in behavioral economics is that people are more worried about losses than they are excited about potential gains. Which is why people so often stay in bad relationships--something I've done all too much.
That's from being both predator and prey, so far as evolution is concerned. Being a cautious predator meant less likelihood of ending up prey.
I think it's more complex than simply being both predator and prey, but that's definitely part of it.
I've made myself a copy of your statement to read several times in the next several days, hopefully to commit myself to remembering why we're here, and keep on bending the curve towards justice.
Well thanks, David. I copy things as reminders occasionally. I keep a copy of FDR's D-Day Prayer on the side of our 'fridge. Not a particularly 'honorable' place for it, but one in which I will see it every day.
I don't think one has to be particularly religious (though I am a person of faith) to feel the power of its words and the righteousness of its cause. And though I've not committed it to memory, I can't fail to remember every time I see it the lines in which God's blessing is sought to "Help us to conquer the apostles of greed and racial arrogancies. Lead us to the saving of our country, and... a peace invulnerable to the schemings of unworthy men." Words I think as appropriate today as they were all those years ago.
I don't expect the words I write here or elsewhere to end up on the side of someone's 'fridge. But that you think they are worth remembering for a time is quite flattering and much appreciated. So, again, thank you.
BTW...if unfamiliar with the above...
http://docs.fdrlibrary.marist.edu/odddayp.html
Couldnt have been said better in any way.
Beautiful. Thank you
Thank you, TC, and Robert and Heather and Dan for your perspectives and encouragement to be the good citizens we must be to protect this cherished democracy. here’s to a happy, healthy new year filled with love and joy as we work to perfect this union of ours.
My advisors as well, along with Greg Olear, a worthy companion..
Ah, yes, Greg as well.
I’m suspicious of the DNC. But the RNC is utterly toxic. 2023 will show us humans what arrogance and stupidity willfully embraced result in. I hope I can stay in a good head space.
Eyes not wide shut.
It’s I who thank YOU for helping me weather the storms of 2022 with your timely columns. We’re in a better place than expected, as you wrote. Thank goodness. Hope you have a wonderful New Year’s Day. ❤️🤍💙
Happy new year TC. To you and all your readers. What lies ahead we know not but we can be assured the future will provide lots for you to write about. And we are grateful for that.
TC. I think that identifying and giving voice to what we fear gives us strength and the capacity to see our fears verified and to recognize the successful victories. A wise psychiatrist one dared me to put into words what I feared and what I did not understand. Amazing what light doing so shines outside our silent thinking. It is so satisfying to be wrong, not because we are vigilant, but because we can disabuse the false or, better yet, presumed conclusions of the time in country.
“What I fear and what I do not understand”. What an idea! When I was young, I would have written, well, not much. The old me would write volumes…
It is nice to look back and think of where we were, where we thought we were heading, and where we actually ended up this year. From 6 January to the release of tax returns this week, it's been a roller coaster. Thanks for your writings, and your comments on other Substack writers I follow.
Cheers for a good New Year!
May the MSM not forget the tax returns, or the J6 fiasco.
Yeah, Jeri - wouldnt it be a novel idea to print actual news rather than the same old same old.
Thanks for the Year End message of 'things that turned around" !! A lot of good things happened, even though the pitiful main stream media didn't seem to take much notice. Hope you are having a great New Year's Eve. The future is in the hands of "We the People" Time to make it happen. You've been a beacon---and this is a great, warm, and welcoming community. Peace and Love to you and Jurate, TC (and to the cats; amazing stories of wonderful cats)
The cat epistles remind us to be cognizant of the needy among us and to provide a helping hand when possible; the rewards are blessings upon us.
Well, the country survived another year without completely imploding, so there’s that. Here’s hoping 2023 is better and things work out for many more good things to happen. As it is said, hope springs eternal, so here’s to hope! Happy New Year to everyone, except for a certain TFG at MaraLardo and a human sack of shit in the Kremlin.
Wishing you, Jurate, and the kitcats a new year of love and peace. Thank you for all of the work you do to inform and keep the important conversations going. This community you have nurtured continues to grow and effect positive change. Thank you TC and Happy New Year! 💖🥂
Cheers of every sort, TC!
Happy New Year!
🗽💜✨🇺🇸🙋🏻♀️🙋🏼♀️🙋🏽♀️🙋🏾♀️🙋🏿♀️
I make an entire center ring show out of being wrong. None of those small mistakes for me.
I am giddy with gratitude to have discovered TC hanging around a couple of websites making comments that were finally too intriguing to resist and doubly thankful to have been welcomed into this community.
Happy New Year to everybody and my hope for 2023 for all us liberals and Democrats is:
Could we continue not to be idiots this year??
Thank you, TC, for daring to be wrong!!!
Best wishes for this New Year!
Thank you for your perspective on the New Year. May you and yours have a special New Year.
I originally came to Substack to read "Sustain What" by Andy Revkin, and Dan Rather. I have bumbled around, reading what I felt drawn to. Substack is a fairly big pond. Over this past week I have come to realize that I read your posts before Dan Rather, before , Jeremy Faust, before your suggested reading L. Truscott, and many others. I can't subscribe to everyone so that realization made it an easy choice who I would to subscribe to, and why.
I like the candid way you voice your fears about what might happen. I like your profanity, it correctly punctuates how I feel as I'm reading your take on things. I like that you could admit that you were wrong, not in this article, but in the one about your Rusty. Not sure where you went wrong, but she appreciated your patience, eventually. That is no small feat. I'm not much of a follower, but I'm smart enough to know that the feeling of good company is something valuable. Another Fine Mess is a good place for me. Looking forward to more.
As to Rusty, the way to domesticate a feral is to reduce their fear level. Eventually that happened with her on her own, but there's a way to speed it up. The main thing is to catch them the week before they "go feral," the week momcat weans them and they're put on their own. Bring them in and don't just dump them in the living room - take them to a quiet room where you can keep track of them and let them learn sounds and smells, and feed them so they understand that, and be gentle with them. And in about two weeks, you will have a domesticated kitten.
So you can see I made all kinds of mistakes with Rusty, but she eventually forgave me.
And wow - ahead of Dan Rather? - that's a prize to value!
You and Dan Rather are similar. His blog is "Steady" He is reassuring. TCinLA takes that risk of being personal. I get to read emotions that I have felt. That is more than reassuring, that is a common bond. I think we all need more of that in our lives, so I read your readers comments too.
Happy new year TC. We end on a high note and have a steadier platform to build on in the new year.