Good morning from foggy central Florida. Our humidity is moving back in after all the cold weather we had in January. I’m certainly glad we are not driving to Gainesville at this time. The fog is dense. Mark is off to Dr. Wilson’s with Robbie for his wart removal. The last wart removed was melanoma, so any warts have to be removed now … we are aware of two. 🐾 At the age of 14, we don’t like to put him under anesthetic, so it has to be a light dose, just enough for Dr. Wilson to manage the wart removal. Robbie is also very sensitive around his mouth so we will ask her to see if there’s any problems brewing there.
My old boy will be mad at us later today.
Mark has his doctor appointment at 9 o’clock to get results of his last MRI on his back. At the moment, he seems to be doing OK but the back pains are recurring frequently. Fingers crossed for a good report and some solution options for him.
Yesterday morning, Mark was able to replace the heater element in our swim spa. That saved us a $200 service call fee. We are still under warranty, but every service call is $200 … we were able to buy the part online for under $30. 😅
It’s my birthday month, but I haven’t begun to celebrate yet.
The American news is pathetic with MUSK rooting through our federal government. He’s not an elected official and has no right to access federal employee files, including their Social Security numbers. You know it is going to go way further than retaliation.
Here’s Dan Rather’s take on it …
The mission of this newsletter is to be a steadying presence amid the chaos and danger of these times. But that means often we have to confront unpleasant truths.
Elon Musk is a one-man wrecking ball trying to take over the U.S. government by dismantling centuries of political norms and practices.
It was James Madison who in 1787 first introduced the idea of three branches of government in our new country’s Constitution: the executive, legislative, and judicial. But now, 238 years later, Musk has apparently decided all that is superfluous. All the American people really need is Donald Trump and the world’s richest man.
Case in point: Musk’s weekend antics. They started on Friday night at the Treasury Department, where he and his so-called DOGE kids, a small squadron of 20-something tech bros loyal to Musk, took control of the federal payment system, which includes personal information of the almost 2 million federal employees. The Treasury employees who tried to stop him were put on leave or quickly retired.
If that isn’t troubling enough, he also gained access to the federal “checkbook” that handles the $6 trillion of annual transactions. With this power, he says he has the legal authority to cancel payments for any government program he believes is acting illegally. No proof necessary.
He then moved on to USAID, the U.S. Agency for International Development. USAID has an annual budget of $40 billion appropriated by Congress; that, by the way, is less than 1% of the annual U.S. budget. The agency employs 10,000 people around the world and is the largest provider of international food assistance. It also supports global health initiatives and humanitarian relief in 100 countries.
On Saturday, Musk and his band of mercenaries entered the USAID office demanding access to, well, everything. When the agency’s two top officials resisted, they were threatened with removal by U.S. marshals.
After gaining access to, well, everything, Musk dismantled the agency. The office was closed, the website taken down, the social media presence terminated. To finish off the complete eradication of an agency whose sole mission is to help the world’s most vulnerable populations, he denigrated it on X, accusing USAID of being “a criminal organization” and “viper’s nest of radical-left marxists who hate America.”
