EVERYTHING IS CONNECTED TO EVERYTHING ELSE

The first law of ecology is that title above, at least as written in Barry Commoner's 1971 The Closing Circle:  Nature, Man and Technology.  

A further search indicated that the adage is attributed to Leonardo da Vinci, who died in 1519.  But there is very little to support this contention.

From German  philosopher Gotthold Ephraim Lessing in 1769:

In nature everything is connected, everything is interwoven, everything changes with everything, everything merges from one into another.

Close, but what about U.S. jurist Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr., who wrote:

If the world is a subject for rational thought it is all of one piece; the same laws are found everywhere, and everything is connected with everything else; and if this is so, there is nothing mean, and nothing in which may not be seen the universal law.

And there is an environmental inspiration from U.S. naturalist John Muir in 1869:

When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the universe. One fancies a heart like our own must be beating in every crystal and cell, and we feel like stopping to speak to the plants and animals as friendly fellow mountaineers.

In any case, as I pondered over the House of Representatives follies, Donald Trump's indictment woes, the wars in Israel / Gaza Strip and Ukraine and virtually everything else I have posting on, it occurred to me that almost every breaking news story affects so many other events.  For example, Sidney Powell today surprisingly pleading guilty in the Georgia election subversion case...one day BEFORE her trial was set to start, nailing the first hammer in Donald Trump's re-election coffin.  

• 
  She flipped and will now only get 6 months of probation time.  No jail.
• She will also testify at any future trials, as for example, Trump's, and a few more minor inconveniences.
• She was the second person in the Georgia racketeering case to plead guilty, for bail bondsman Scott Hall also did so last month and will also need to testify at future trials.
• The other 17 defendants, including Trump, have all, so far, pled not guilty.  Let's see if there is now a tidal wave of flips.

So, any way, this development certainly will influence what will happen in the U.S. House.  

• 
  There will be no vote today because it looks like Jim Jordan has given up running, and there seems to be declining interest in Patrick McHenry getting temporary approval for becoming speaker.  
• This Powell decision, I would think, has a few more Republicans visualizing a future of a convict, Donald Trump, becoming the Republican nominee for president.
• No question that a larger core of Republicans are now conniving to insure for a candidate other than Trump.  
• Jim Jordan has been crippled, and so too Matt Gaetz and all those MAGA lovers.
• A bipartisan House might now be possible.

So if Powell catalyzed stability in Congress, the nation can go on to provide funding for Ukraine and Israel, maybe $60 billion for them will soon be approved, and the wars can continue for the sake of democracy. President Joe Biden asked Congress for $100 billion in supplemental funding, mostly for them.  He will deliver a prime-time speech tonight at 8 PM EDT on this matter.

You ask, why is there no U.S. ambassador to Israel?  Well, the previous ambassador left in July, and Republicans in  the Senate have been giving nominee Jack Lew a bad time.  Republicans have found some weakness, but this now coming bipartisan spirit could well also spill over to the Senate to have Lew confirmed earlier than expected.  

I can go on and on, but let me stop on this Covid Thursday and report that I took my updated Covid vaccination two days ago.  My arm hurt for a while, but feels fine now.

Whew, I seem to be losing my needle phobia.  I think this was my seventh Covid injection.  The great thing about living at 15 Craigside is that they arrange for everything, including getting a company to come here.  Then they check your vitals later in the afternoon, and again the next day.  Also, our Federal government is ending free shots and free Paxlovid.  Pfizer prices these pills at $1390 per course.  Except at 15C everything continues to be free, but that is because we all have adequate plans, as do most Americans.

Finally a couple of meals.  Shanghai soup dumplings and o-toru sashimi with pork tonkatsu.  Have you ever paid $76/pound for fish?

Tacos salad with margarita.

Wagyu beef, maguro sashimi and matsutake and trumpet mushroom meal.

-