Month: April 2026

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I was watching the trial by 7 (a joust of 7 men against 7 men) match in the new Game of Thrones iteration “A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms” and it dawned on me on how attracted human beings are to violence even in our games. Think boxing, rugby, football, hockey. Think the games at the Roman Colosseum.

Even more interesting is that men will engage in these games, despite the very real danger which could include death. Think about in the modern world people continue to play football even after numerous medical studies have concluded that irreparable damage is being done to the brain. People continue to watch.

Vivid depictions of violence are seen every day in television shows and movies. People might complain but people, nonetheless, continue to watch.

Why is it so fucking attractive?

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I think if you want to get plastic surgery and it makes you happy, by all means, get it.

I won’t. Mostly because it won’t make me happy. I just don’t have the time or the energy or the money to keep working on my looks. It is, after a certain age, a losing battle.

No matter how much plastic surgery I get, I am still 68 years old. A 21 year old guy, even just a regular old 21 year old guy, not some super good looking movie star/model type of guy, walks into the room and then I walk into the room. The half way good looking 21 year old guy has me beat. By a mile. By 10 miles. By 100 miles. If I get talked about at all, which, let’s face it, is a very big if, it won’t be about my good looks but on how he has had work done.

Then there is the cost. People who I know investigated plastic surgery are talking thousands of dollars and, with my luck, it will turn out making me look worse. I know some people who have had excellent plastic surgery. I also know people who were disappointed with their surgery (see awful plastic surgery). It is a roll of the dice and if I am rolling the dice, I would much rather be rolling the dice in Las Vegas than rolling it on surgery.

Besides, I am that age where I need procedures and surgeries just to stay healthy. If I were to also get plastic surgery with the other surgeries I need, I might never leave the hospital. I just don’t want to take up residence in a hospital, at least not yet.

At this point in my life, I would rather fall back on my vast supply of charm and joie de vivre than attempt to alter my looks any further.

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Donald Trump acknowledged that he calls the Iranian military operation instead of a war because of legal reasons. Congressional Authorization, then, boils down to what the President calls his action rather than a universal understanding of what war is. You say potato, I say … Sorry, that old saying does work in writing but you catch my drift. Also, just as a reminder to the President, parsing phrases to avoid the unlikely retribution of Congress only really works if you don’t tell everyone what you are doing otherwise, in legal terms, this is known as a confession.

But, never mind — a military operation it is. This military operation has been going on a good month. Now I can quibble, and I will, about bombs and targeted assassinations being acts of war, but, say I wanted to be generous to Trump here, and agree with his characterization of those actions as being a military operation instead of a war.

When does a military operation become a war? And, just like that, an answer appears — when you send 50,000 ground troops. Bombing plus troops surely adds up to war. Or are we in some semantic Hell where Trump can call a war anything he wants and the Congress will agree to in order to avoid the wrath of Trump’s more rabid supporters. Apparently it is semantic Hell.

This whole operation is caught up in different definitions of words. Trump supposedly can only act without Congressional Authorization if it is an emergency. The USA would have to be in immediate and grave danger. My understanding of this power would be an impeding attack of USA was about to take place. There is absolutely no evidence that this was the case.

But the Iranians were trying to restart their nuclear program. No doubt, however, according to Trump the Iranian nuclear program was destroyed in a previous attack so the idea that so the idea that the Iranians had miraculously resurrected their nuclear capability to the point of an immenent attack is unbelievable. I am fairly certain there was more than enough time for Congress to review the problem and give its consent.

The Iranian, dare I call it, War is a disappointing display of hubris on the part of Trump and cowardice on the part of Congress. The whole point of Congressional Authorization for wars is that war is a serious business for a country. If we are going to take on such a responsibility it needs to come after careful consideration from the body that represents the all the people of the USA. For wars, particularly messy and potentially long term commitment wars to be won, everyone needs to be on board. This has not happened.

Instead we have semantic parsing of words so one man can drag a nation of 300 million plus people into a war dressed up like a military operation.