@gmcgath
Freelance writer. Lover of liberty, music, and cats. Author of The Magic Battery, Spells of War, Files that Last, and Tomorrow's Songs Today. On Bluesky I post a lot about classical music and silent film. https://garymcgath.com
Sinclair Lewis's _It Can't Happen Here_ has a Best Sellers Rank of #8,203 on Amazon. Not bad for a book that was published 90 years ago! It would be interesting to see what its rank was in, say, 2023.
VICTORY: Last night, the residents of Gorham and Hampton passed warrant articles opposing 287(g) agreements from existing in their communities.
These agreements, which are major tools for the Trump administration's deportation machine, deputize certain law enforcement officers to act as ICE agents.
If opera companies would set the works appropriately to the story, instead of showing off how clever they can be changing them to unrelated places and eras, people might start coming back.
That would explain a lot of politicians.
There was the rock and roll classic, "Bye Bye Love."
In New Hampshire, too, it used to be the case that something like half the restaurants were owned by Greek immigrants or second-generation Greek Americans. I'm third-generation myself, and I love Greek food!
"they were not bona fide journalists because they are participants in the political arena." That sounds ominous. If you express opinions, you're disqualified as a journalist?
This may help to explain a confusing reply I got to a post about calling bomb-throwers "counterprotesters." reason.com/2026/03/10/c...
NH Governor Ayotte's senior advisor John Corbett mocked the protesters who opposed the ICE human warehouse in Merrimack.
granitepostnews.com/2026/02/25/a...
#Ayotte #NewHampshire #ICE
Storefront of the Time Travel Mart
Buck Rogers went to the 25th Century, and all I got was this lousy T-Shirt. Want some souvenirs from other eras? Los Angeles' Time Travel Mart offers that, and supports literacy-based charity.
timetravelmart.com
The idea that people should be punished for saying any life matters is so vile that the plaintiff should have been thrown out with a rude admonition.
TIRED: a $640 toilet seat
WIRED: "an astronomical amount of shellfish, including $2 million for Alaskan king crab and $6.9 million worth of lobster tail"
A lot of people don't know the term FICO and just think of the score as their "credit rating." That's not really so alarming.
It's always "except for us." Just like telemarketing rules.
Beautiful warm day today, with snow all around. After reading a few grim chapters of _It Can't Happen Here_, I switched to _Toscanini: Musician of Conscience_ for lighter reading. But I'm at 1930, when Toscanini hadn't made a full break with Italy. It feels like a continuation of the same book.
"The Wedding of the Pale Count" sounds like a vampire movie.
It's distressing that the margin of opposition to so senseless a war is so small.
Most Americans today didn't live through the last war that took a major toll of American lives. If we remind people of it, they say, "OK, boomer."
It's the same basic thinking, but the action in Methuen has more of a left flavor. The statement favorably cites the Australian ban and claims to be grounded in science.
The #freedomToRead movement needs to pay attention to what we might call "bitbanning" as well as bookbanning: restrictions on library computer access by censorware and usage monitoring.
It's a familiar story: Politicians wanting to "protect" children's minds by restricting what they can read.
garymcgath.com/gagging-soci...
#Massachusetts #freedomToRead #Libraries
"We will take out easily destroyable targets that will make it virtually impossible for Iran to ever be built back, as a Nation, again." Trump's war is about ruining as many lives as possible.
www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-n...
#Iran
A bill in the NH legislature imposing complicated requirements on social media services has been marked Inexpedient to Legislate (i.e., killed in committee). It raised 1st Amendment concerns, as well as imposing state rules on interstate commerce.
gc.nh.gov/bill_status/...
#NewHampshire
Today I got a reply from WGBH for my query six days ago on my inability to activate my Passport status. In the interim I'd solved the problem, but a six-day turnaround isn't acceptable when the issue is not getting something I'd paid for.
#WGBH
This performance by Perlman on Ed Sullivan in 1959 really gives perspective. I saw him on stage just last year. www.youtube.com/watch?v=v8NO...
Rep. Ogles of Tennessee says "Muslims don't belong in American society."
He doesn't belong in Congress.
www.usatoday.com/story/news/p...
NH would be much better if we could give Salem to some other state, but I don't know who'd want it.
Signature Aviation aids and abets ICE's abductions. Governor Healey is calling on them to stop.
www.boston.com/news/local-n...
#ICE #Massachusetts
It's surprising how many people are against book banning in libraries but for bit banning.
garymcgath.com/gagging-soci...
"Against stupidity the gods themselves contend in vain."
