As I begin this post, the President is railing on against the Supreme Courts decision on Tariffs.  There is such an avalanche of issues, one wonders where to start.  More later in this post.  There are a few thought starters I’d like to suggest today.

THE RIGHT TO VOTE

There is a continuing effort to make it as difficult as possible for certain persons to vote in this country.  Saturday morning, Feb 21,  Joyce Vance and Stacy Abrams discuss this matter.  While I do not yet have it, absent something like paywall, the link will probably be here Saturday morning by 11 a.m. Eastern Time.  

My brief personal opinion on the matter of IDs:

A couple of weeks ago I accessed my Passport.

I’m an old guy, so when I opened my Passport, I saw it expired 29 Nov 2025.  It noted that in the 10 years it was in effect I hadn’t been outside the country.  The likelihood I will renew the Passport is uncertain.  When I renewed my Drivers License last year I went with the Enhanced License, which required more money and more time and more documentation, which I provided.  It supposedly covers most situations within country.

Re voting, every personal story is unique, which makes understanding the nuances more important.

In my case, I have lived at the same address, under the same name, for the last 25 years.  No aberrations.  For me, voting is easy.  Now.

I qualified to vote at age 21, in 1961 (I wasn’t old enough to vote in 1960).  I was a college student, who’d been at the college for three years.  I don’t know what the nuances of residency were, then.  But my home town, was not the town where I went to college….  North Dakotan.

Then I was in the U.S. Army in Colorado.

Then I got my first post college job in Minnesota, the fall President Kennedy was assassinated.  In the fall of 1964, election year, I had been back in North Dakota for three months, after essentially a three year absence.

In 1965 I returned to Minnesota, and in the following 35 years, before 2000, I resided in 7 different communities.

100% of the time I was a U.S. citizen, residing in a U.S. state.  But….

The takeaway for me, when I think about voting, is that I can be deceived into thinking that it’s no big deal since so much of my life has been at one single address; in the earlier years, however, I had to deal with the same kinds of circumstances that other ordinary Americans have to navigate, including a time when my personal economics and savvy were by no means the same as now.

A suggestion: as you begin to navigate this question for yourself and others you know who may never have engaged in the process of registering to vote, do the same thing I did, and learn the specifics of participation in elections in your state.  It is not difficult, the Secretary of States office is usually a good entry point.  There are general elections in every state every two (even-numbered) years for every member of Congress, and every four years for President.  It will help you, personally, come to understand the situation better.

POSTNOTE: I went to check on renewing my passport this afternoon. I’ve had probably four passports, so the process isn’t new, but neither is it simple.  And it will cost about $150 to renew, and be time consuming.  I can renew in person or by mail.  No mistakes.

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THE TARIFF DECISION BY THE SUPREME COURT: PAUL KRUGMAN on the Supreme Court Tariff Decision.

and JOYCE VANCE, and HEATHER COX RICHARDSON.

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PAUL KRUGMAN on the extreme wealth in this country: Billionaires Gone Wild; The Ultra Rich are Different from You and Me.

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A PERSONAL COMMENTARY ON COMMUNICATING IN THE INTERNET AGE; Finally, A Pause to Refresh from Paul Krugman.  About the top subscriber platforms on Substack.

As you know, I frequently reference and attach op eds from on-line sources I have come to trust over a long period of time.  This is especially true here, today.  Those referenced above: Joyce Vance, Paul Krugman, along with Heather Cox Richardson and Robert Reich, are commentators I subscribe to.  There are a few others with significant followings to whom I subscribe: Garrison Keillor and Mary Trump come to mind.  I don’t subscribe to the Bulwark or Mehdi Hasan though I often see their work, the former from a multiple of authors.  I am a paper (as in newsprint) subscriber to the Minnesota Star Tribune; and on-line subscriber to New York Times.  Like you, I am not a bottomless pit of financial resources, but I try to do my best to contribute to contributors.

I could go on.  I strongly encourage subscribing to sources you trust.

The free press is not free.  Back in the day I was very careful of getting permission to reprint anything, and back in the day there was an easy process to get such permission.  Today there are so many varieties of opinions, it is impossible to keep track of, much less afford, doing much other than making sure that anything I send along is fully sourced.  In a sense, what I do now is similar to what we used to do with clips from newspapers, which would be sent person-to-person.

This is a dilemma of course. The media generally is trying to deal with this.  So into the mix comes paywalls, gifts articles, etc., etc. etc.

For me, this isn’t personal laziness, and for sure not because of lack of respect.  We need to inform each other, and I’m thankful for each such signed opinion, particularly if it at least is someone I’ve heard of, especially in particular is the source of the writing is someone I actually know in the ‘real world’.

Keep contributing.  I censor nothing.  I can’t and won’t respond to everything, but I do print it.