Sapphire Towers at San Diego Botanic Garden (and a rant)

Hello Friends,

Last year in the spring we went to the San Diego Botanic Garden in Encinitas, California, and there were treated to seeing flowers called sapphire towers. Their dark teal blue color was spectacular. I took this shot with a Panasonic Lumix GX7 with 3-D lens, using frame sides for phantogram processing. Some of the subject flower extended onto the frame sides, so I masked the images, which produced this nice thru-the-window effect. I hope you like it.

Following the news of late, I've been feeling a strong need to rant, so here goes:

Make America America Again

Is it just me or is the world going mad?

In my child's mind growing up in the suburbs of Chicago, raised by the generation that fought off the Nazis and their allies, America stood for freedom and opportunity. We had the ability to travel anywhere in the 50 states, to be of any religion, and believe whatever we wanted, without government prohibition. Those were our inalienable rights and American values, altough I now must confess I was blind then to my white privilege.

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances." That's the specific wording of the 1st Amendment to the US constitution.

"No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws." That's the start of the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution.

The main problem as I see it lies largely in that some choose to kick and scream about their rights under one, the 2nd Amendment, which allows them almost unlimited access to deadly weapons, but choose to ignore the key cornerstones of American life found in the 1st and 14th Amendments.

There's a current push by right wing zealots and Christian nationalists in the USA and several places in the world toward minority rule, to sieze power and reserve power for white Christian men.

And so I ask, is the US republican party now anything more than a dangerous clown show? Are they largely just useful idiots for Trump and Putin?

Embryos in Alabama now have full citizenship rights. The destruction of embryos there now carries criminal liabilities, effectively shutting down in vitro fertilizations, making the pro-life crowd, in fact, very much against life.

I don't believe this is entirely or even mostly on Donald Trump. The real problem is with the army of pushers and enablers, many to most of whom are smart enough to understand and know better than his lies, but see him as an avenue to obtain power.

Time will tell where all this is headed. The notion of making America great again is insane. Mostly I want it to be America again.

Regards,

Barry Rothstein

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