Republicans say cut government spending, but it's harder to be specific. Meanwhile there's still lots of money at the top of the wealth spectrum.

Washington State is facing a budget shortfall due to lower than expected state revenue. This news is met with the typical Republican response that spending needs to be cut with no specific cuts mentioned, so far in the news. What cuts to schools? What cuts to state salaries, parks and so forth? It's easier to just say spending is out of control than to really say what needs to be cut.

On the revenue side, there is good news that the state's capital gains tax is bringing in more revenue than expected. It's one bright spot in the otherwise weak revenue picture. This is due to the rising stock market and the continued rising fortunes of the very wealthy.

If the stock market takes a hit, however, it's seen as a volatile source of revenue that would be difficult depend on.

These issues face governments nationwide.

AI and other new technologies are often a boom to consumers, but a mixed bag for workers.

There is worry that we are in an AI bubble. Could it burst?

Through most of my life, new technologies, from automated factories to the internet, have brought a plethora of useful and sometimes free things for the consumer. This has not always been a blessing for workers.

During these decades, asset values have also gone way up compared to most wages. Assets like land, homes and stocks have appreciated so much in value that there is a lot of loose money, around the world, looking for lucrative parking spots. This vast amount of private capital drives a lot of investment in emerging technologies, such as AI.

There is great pressure to keep up with the Joneses. Everything from keeping up at work to the US feeling pressure to keep up with China has created a pressure cooker that leaves many workers behind.

In past decades, such as the 1970s and 80s, automation and globalization in manufacturing brought more abundance for consumers, but also brought layoffs and the hollowing out of high paid manufacturing employment to many communities.

The internet boom of the 1990s brought many low cost and free services to consumers. We have free long distance phone calls and 24-7 banking from home without having to conform to banking hours. We have social media as well as millions of websites and media channels at our fingertips. These blessings have been more dubious for workers and in the long run for consumers as well. Since consumers are often also workers, lower wages effect consumers as well.

The benefits of online services has brought the cost of more surveillance. There are algorithms pushed by the need for clicks so advertising can pay the bills. From this we get echo chambers of similar belief as well as what's called "manufactured outrage."

Now we have the AI boom, also driven by a desire to keep up, plus all that private capital, from rising asset values, looking for lucrative places to park money. Huge fortunes drives the AI buildout.

Consumers are now seemingly benefiting from the free AI services while workers fear the loss of control over the fruits of their intellect. Admittedly, I use AI quite a bit as it sorts through lots of reading saving me time as I research and fact check for my own writing. In the past, teachers often didn't have the time to provide individualized instruction for people, like me.

Yes, I know, AI can make mistakes.

AI can benefit the user providing personalized services, such as teaching, tutoring and counselling, while Professional services, from humans, can cost a pretty penny and have been subject to budget cuts.

Still, this comes with hidden costs and consequences that we can't predict for the long run, let alone the moment.

Behind these buildouts, whether it's been automation in factories, internet technology, or the most recent rush to AI, is the question of whether the whole thing is sustainable. Will AI ever make a profit, or will the bubble burst and lead to a panic?

Will there ever be a sustainable business model of paying consumers and workers, with livable wages, for continuing these business models into the future?

These are questions that we keep needing to ask?

Two conservative teams battled to a standoff in Seattle. The city, itself, won by calling it the Pride Match.

While both countries are culturally conservative about gay rights, Egypt and Iran's teams played to a tie score in the World Cup. This game took place in the US city of Seattle, noted for liberal attitudes on gay rights; the city calling that game "The Pride Match."

Some rainbow flags were flown in and around the stadium to the dislike of both Egyptian and Iranian officials. Meanwhile, back in the Middle East, war is still more deadly than a soccer game. Missiles fly between Iran and Gulf state Sunni nations more aligned with Egypt. The Sunni and Shiite split, in Islam, is one of many friction points among conservatives in the Middle East.

Ironically, the "elephant" in the Middle Eastern room is the United States with its ally Israel, each with the most powerful weapons of all. These countries are leading a sputtering war against Iran under the leadership of their conservative leaders Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu.

Still, within the belly of the US elephant, rainbow flags fly peacefully in Seattle, in spite of more conservative leadership at the top of the US government. Freedom of speech is still alive in USA.

The soccer match between Egypt and Iran took place to a stalemate, as rainbow flags flew and crowds cheered more peacefully than the war that is now taking place in the Middle East itself.

Here in Bellingham, far out in the hinterlands of Seattle, some rainbow color projected on our Acid Ball Sculpture. Sculpture, a leftover from former Georgia Pacific Pulp Mill.

Both moderate and more left leaning Democrats, electable in different districts, can still provide votes to counter Trump if elected to Congress.

The concept of the big tent works for the Democratic Party. Some districts, such as in New York City can elect candidates who are pretty far to the left. They likely would not win elections in most districts, but their voice could still be welcome in the big tent. Just about all Democrats, whether left or moderate still provide the votes needed in Congress to put guardrails on dangerous dictatorial tendencies of Trump.

Populism can swing to the right or to the left depending on what causes gas prices to go up.

When gas prices go up due to environmental regulation or taxes, it often causes populism to go toward rightwing politics. Trump winning popular vote in 2024 and things like Yellow Vest protests in France.

Now it's Trump's mistaken war on Iran that has pushed up prices, possibly leading populism to swing left.

In some cases, a slower economy might be better.

An expanding GDP isn't always good news. If the GDP goes up, it could be just due to inflation. This doesn't necessarily mean progress.

Some people think an ideal world would not have money, but I don't go that far. I think money is a needed tool to keep track of the math. Instead I just think a high GDP should not be the bottom line goal. Health, happieness and good stewardship of the planet should be the bottom line. These things can be measured also. In some cases, a slower economy might be better.

Some economists do call this Triple Bottom Line Accounting, I hear. I apply it to the whole economy.

Higher GDPs and faster growth, just measured in dollars, isn't necessarily better. It can also mean higher costs of doing business and more hardship for people as well as the environment.

I do find economics interesting, so I still think about money, but I don't see it as a god or the ultimate goal. I see it as a tool for running business and government, but the ultimate goal is not just money.

I recently biked to a small concert and party around 15 miles south of town.

Also see my 2026 trip to Anacortes Pride

Lots of art at that place including this little house.

The carrot is often better than the stick.

Seems like the "go to" solution for Republicans is war rather than foreign aid. The War Department is highest priority.

A better strategy could be to offer aid to Iran in exchange for Iran's corrupt government making reforms, such as western expertise in dealing with the Iranian water shortages and so forth.

If the Iranians refused to do some reforms, we could have withheld the aid. Instead, Trump chose war as the response to what was seen as an opportunity for change when Iran was having civil unrest.

As the news is now saying, we nearly have to beg them to reopen the strait of Hormuz. Looks like the demonstrations in Iran are now supporting the government as people rally behind their country being attacked.

Bad planning is now leading to an algae bloom and paint peeling at the Washington Mall.

At least they ahve reversed another bad choice announcing a halt to the dismantling of NSF's floating scientific observatories in the oceans.

Why they wish to remove climate monitors from the oceans, rather than just turning them off.

Trump's NSF plans to remove around 900 sensors from the oceans. Sensors for monitoring water temp and so forth. Yes, a bad idea, but I also have a question that hasn't been answered in the media I've seen, so I ask AI.

Why go through the trouble to remove all this hardware, rather than just turning it off and let it sit? Why, especially if the goal is to save maintenence costs since Trump doesn't believe climate change needs to be studied.

AI said, in short, that some of the equipment would present a navigation hazard, if left unmaintained in the ocean; buoys cables and so forth. Ironically, there are lots of environmental laws about leaving junk in the ocean. This system has some expensive cameras, lithium batteries and so forth that can be repurposed or recycled.

Then I went to a discussion where one of my friends said she wasn't quite as kind as the AI I got. She said they want to undue anything that wasn't about Trump. If Obama supported it, it's trash. They want to make it harder to ever find the funds to rebuild such a system again, as monitoring climate change is woke.

No, she didn't actually use those words. I'm embellishing it a bit. Basically, it's, "forget pluralistic society." "If Trump doesn't like it, it's trash."

I tend to think and live local, but am I provincial?

In the 1960s, my grade school was trying to teach us Spanish. My language aptitude was bad so I was even struggling with English. I did better in the section of the class about Latin American geography. My aptitude is better at special reasoning so I developed a fascination in South America. It could be my own world as I wasn't that interested in the world of my other classmates. I wanted to be different. Thinking local was mundane.

Photo my sister Judith took, in the 1980s, of our shared grade school, Edison School in Pullman, WA. The Palouse fields and Kamiak Butte in the background. Edison School has since been torn down.

More recently, my interests have flipped to local. It's now Washington State and Bellingham, where I live. It's still my own world as I see Bellingham from the perspective of a bicyclist while almost everyone else drives.

Sometimes I jokingly say that my friends, who know their way around Europe, still don't know how to get across Bellingham without going on I-5. I know the surface streets, alleys and trails as I have a perspective so many others don't share, bicycling.

In grade school I studied maps and read about that favorite "other" continent of South America.

Now days, my own world is local, but it's my perspective of bicycling and interests that many people don't share. I have big interests in the economic underpinnings that make this world work while others tend to follow the arts and the movies. I'm interested in technical things that other folks just pass by, like the heating systems, power systems, radio towers and so forth.

During grade school, the local state of my classmates, Washington seemed mundane compared to another state which I thought had a much greater diversity of climates; California. It could also be mine versus Washington, the home of my classmates.

I remember hearing, during my grade school days, that Washington was, "nature's wastebasket." When naure got done making other places, she tossed the leftovers into Washington. Yes, this little state, in land area compared to other western states, does have great diversity in geography. It's just not quite as much as California.

Besides looking at maps and encyclopedia articles about California, I remember a book called, "California and the West." That book fascinated me as it described such a diverse state ranging from mountain glaciers to baking deserts. The state had giant redwoods as well as giant cities.

California and the West was mostly about California, but it had small sections about other western states, including Washington, on the back pages.

Recently I did an AI search and found that it was an officially adopted California State Series elementary school textbook. That's, I guess, why it focused on California. Published in 1963 by author John W. Reith.

Since then, my interests have shifted to more local focusing, instead, on my unique perspectives of the world around me. I feel pretty grounded in my own state of Washington and the city I live in, Bellingham.

Besides just my unusual "car free" lifestyle, Washington does provide another world that's other from the world of most friends. I grew up in Pullman on the Idaho border in Eastern Washington. Since college, I've lived in Bellingham on the west side of the state. Because most Washingonians live on the west side, I can be different as I still know about the east side.

Sometimes I get the feeling that most Washingtonians only experience the east side as "fly over country."

I have friends who have traveled to Europe on their frequent flyer miles. While they travel around, I may seem more limited and provincial since I've never been on a jet plane in my life. The farthest I've been, byair, was way back in the 1980s. It was across Washington State from Seattle to Pullman. The plane had propellers. That trip took around one hour, but my favorite way of crossing the state is by bicycle. That trip takes about a week, but it's a longer lasting experience.

The farthest I've ever been, from Washington State, is Salisbury Beach, Massachusetts. I got there by bicycle during my 1991 bike trip across USA.

I'm not totally against jet travel, though it does have a high carbon footprint. I just haven't really had an occasion to get places that quickly. My lifestyle is different than most people in USA.

Does a billionaire business owner need a huge personal yacht as business asset for the business to serve the public?

Mark Zuckerberg's 300 million dollar yacht is an example of wealth that I think should be taxed more. I can see a billionaire business owner needs to keep the wealth that runs the business, like server farms for instance, but a huge yacht for personal private use? Maybe he needs it to entertain for recruiting top talent to the company? That's all I can think of for it's possible justification. Somewhere, a line does need to be drawn.

Excerpt exchange from comments on my Facebook page.

YIKES. You're making the case that its cost was tax deductible as a business expense. -Phil.

My Reply. I don't know the specifics in these cases, but right wingers often say, "the rich need their money as they create the jobs and provide the products and services." Right wingers and other members of the rich do seem to find ways to justify whatever. They can afford the best lawyers money can buy. -Robert.

Phil's reply. We have the best Congress that money can buy. -Phil.

The science behind an eclipse of the moon is simpler and less nuaunced than the science behind climate change.

I hear people ask why folks don't question the science behind an eclipse of the sun, or moon, yet they question climate change science. I guess eclipses are much more simple and obvious while other some sciences are more nuauanced and complex.

There was a time when people feared eclipses thinking God might be mad.

The science behind a lunar eclipse is quite simple to figure out. Climate change is also real, but more nuanced as to how fast it's happening, how it effects each region and what the best strategy is for dealing with it, while juggling economics and other human demands.

I've been doing some AI research about the neighborhood I grew up in.

Picture my brother Bill took during my grade school years from the end of our driveway. Streit-Perham (back then) a new dorm complex at the the east border of our neighborhood.

When Washington State College (now WSU in Pullman) rapidly expanded after WWII to accommodate the influx of G.I. Bill students, the university desperately needed to attract and house top-tier researchers and professors. The Turner-Wexler Addition was platted on the northeast edges of College Hill to create a quiet, prestigious residential enclave tailored specifically for WSU faculty families.

Now, in my own words. 3 dead end streets constituted the addition. It is a small piece of private land, wedged between what eventually became two large dormitory projects.

While I'm normally not a fan of dead end streets, the little streets in that neighborhood had no place go, by car at least. They led to the property line of big dorms.

Through traffic continued, around a bend and into the university, farther to the east.

Pedestrians could take an easy walk from that neighborhood to the campus. Dad often walked over the hill and through the dorm complex at the end of our street on his way to work.

At the south border, Regent's Hill dining complex and dorms with other university buildings beyond. My photo.

The neighborhood was originally part of a farm that was later subdivided into both university and private properties. There was an apple orchard, among other things on that farm.

A little stream ran through the farm which was covered over by placing it into a large culvert. When the university built dorms, parking lots and playfields, the land was reshaped.

It wasn't until I got to Bellingham that I made a connection in my mind. One day, while I was sweeping stairs at my custodial job, my mind made a connection between two streams in childhood memories. One was out by the university golf course and the other was through the back yards of folks on my paper route. Those are the same creek separated by the large underground culvert.

My old picture.

Willow trees, but actually the branches of one willow tree. Buried under regrading to build the culvert and the dorms. Branches pointing toward a common trunk.

This little grove is now gone as yet another new dorm has been built.

The original Wexler farmhouse is still in that area. It's life story used to interest me, during childhood. It went from being out on a farm to being in an urban setting, surrounded by other homes and large buildings.

Google Streetview image.

Today, the houses in that neighborhood, are mostly student rentals as faculty tend to live in other parts of town these days.

During my childhood, most of the houses were occupied by faculty families with some rental apartments for students in a few homes.

At one end of our street was a small house rented to a grad student. This many years later, I met someone at a discussion group here in Bellingham who lived in that small house. I met her here in Bellingham, where I now live; some 400 road miles from Pullman. Another one of those small world experiences.

Regents hill at the other end of our dead end streets. This photo I took in 2022 after most of the apple trees were gone.

Regents Hill is university property, but basically it was our neighborhood park. We had Fourth of July picnics there. It served as an ampatheater for folks watching kids set off little fire works. I remembr many neighbohood kid slumber parties, in sleeping bags, up on that hill.

The interplay of grounds and buildings of Regent's Hill. My picture.

Picture my brother Bill took in the 1960s out over the neighborhood from a balcony of Striet Perham Dorms.

Redefining progress and the American Dream.

Hearing a radio interview about career opportunities for today's young people brings me back to my first years out of college as if nothing ever changes.

It's said that this generation may be the first to have lower standards of living and smaller homes than their parents. I heard that before and I keep thinking, smaller homes, but maybe better social lives?

Since my college days, I've been thinking that we are running out of room on planet Earth. If not actually running out of room, at least economic development has been constrained by more and more regulations. These regulations are attempting to protect the environment, such as farmland preservation, wetland rules, zoning and so forth.

If not actual limits to growth, we have imposed red tape limits which is basically what people, on the right, keep harping on. I still think most of these limits are there for good reasons. Yes, we do need to protect the environment. Still, this does have an effect on the ease of attaining economic growth and prosperity.

For years, I've kept thinking it's a tradeoff. We can live better without necessarily consuming more space on the planet.

Examples of this come from social progress in personal fulfilment and community life. Progress in gay rights is one example. More use of public transit, versus the space hogging private automobile, is another example.

For the entirety of my adult life, at least, cities, such as Seattle, have delt with traffic congestion. I keep thinking we could solve that, but people have just acquiesced to it instead; for the most part.

Back in my days right out of college, the big issue was lack of job creation. Industry faced red tape limits. Mining was going overseas and so forth. We faced the energy crisis with gas rationing during my college years. Since then, new technologies have brought more fossil fuel energy from fracking and so forth. Innovation and substitution has brought new wealth around the limits. We've had the tech boom.

Lack of affordable housing is a big issue now, whereas back in my past, it was more the lack of jobs. Today, there are more jobs, but they don't pay enough to afford the same space in housing.

Somehow, I still keep thinking we need to make fundamental changes in the way we define as the American Dream. I still think life can be better now than in (for instance) the 1950s. "Better" can be defined in different ways. Information and personal choices can be seen as wealth. Free time can be seen as wealth.

We need to think differently about the definition of the American Dream. Just taxing the super wealthy isn't going to solve this problem. Yes, I'm for taxing the rich, but even just taxing the super rich still has consequences for all consumers. Today, people are worried about Washington State's wealth tax chasing away the super rich and businesses with them. Will this impoverish our state?

We may need to learn to redefine what wealth means. Can one have a happy life while not necessarily living in a bigger house than their grandparents lived in?

An energy saving air conditioning trick.

Today was a lovely warm day. I thought I might try out my new air conditioner, but it wasn't really that warm. I do like retrofitting things so I decided to try just putting a small fan, that I have, in the air tube that the conditioner uses with the window. Just that works well for bringing cool evening air into my apartment without even using the air conditioner itself.

My apartment doesn't have a cross breeze as both windows are on one side, yet it stays fairly cool being on the north side of the building. This little hose fan setup gives the airflow a boost.

My power bill is covered by my rent, but it is good to think about energy saving solutions anyway.

Maybe no motor vehicle signs should be updated to say no fossil fuel vehicles.

On trails, there is often a sign that says, "no motor vehicles." Now with the advent of electric bikes, skateboards and even wheelchairs, the sign should say, "no fossil fuel vehicles." Electric motors tend to be quiet and okay; especially if the vehicles are not going too far over 15mph. It would be hard to ban motors these days. I'm glad to see them as more people are discovering bicycling.