"According to [David] Thomson, movies — especially American movies — have whitewashed history, glorified violence and made role models out of thugs, narcissists and murderers."

"The consequences shape our public life. Donald Trump 'is our movie man,' Thomson writes, meaning that Trump’s presidency, which Thomson sees as a catastrophe, was foretold and to some extent made possible by Hollywood. Not just bad movies.... Turning our humanity upside down and our values inside out is what good movies do.... 'We are no longer the selves we hoped to be,' Thomson concludes. 'We are not exactly alive any longer.' It’s the movies that condemned us to this limbo."

Writes A.O. Scott, in "Did Movies Ruin Everything? How the film writer David Thomson found himself in a lover’s quarrel with cinema — and America" (NYT).

"What if he’s right?...

"I was just a curious, concerned citizen. I guess I was there at the wrong place, wrong time."

Said David Carter Hearn, 67, "a cyclist and three-time Olympian as a canoeist who says he stopped at the [Reflecting Pool] on Friday just to have a look, then reached down to touch a strip of peeling blue paint mixed with the algae. The U.S. Park Police arrested Mr. Hearn shortly after, accusing him of destroying government property, a crime that can carry up to a 10-year prison sentence."

I'm reading "Trump, Claiming Vandalism, Says Reflecting Pool Will Likely Need to Be Drained/The pool has taken on clouds of algae after a hasty renovation. A three-time Olympian was charged with destroying government property after he says he touched one of the strands of blue paint peeling off the pool’s bottom" (NYT).

"The administration has not released the names of others accused of vandalizing the pool, a crime that Mr. Trump said on Saturday could lead to 'years in jail.' In a later post, he said without evidence that vandals had 'poured corrosive and destructive chemicals into the Pool.'"

I don't know if the claims of vandalism are true, but the temptation to vandalize was obvious and strong even before Trump started talking about vandals. Now, it's unavoidable, and I think we will never have our pool back where it belongs in the American psyche. It's a mess, a bone of contention, a symbol of everything and anything people don't like about Trump. The pool never worked as it was intended, and now its essential badness is glaring at us, and it will never calm back down into the serene murky swamp it once was. 

"A possible referendum in Oregon on animal rights would end fishing, hunting, even pest control, just when Democrats are trying really hard not to be seen as 'weirdos again.'"

I'm reading "Protect Every Animal From Cruelty? Not in 2026, Oregon Democrats Say" (NYT).

The measure, known for now as Initiative Petition 28... would give all animals the same protections from cruelty that Oregon grants dogs and cats.... Hunting, trapping and fishing would be outlawed, along with scientific research on animals, lethal pest control and conventional livestock production.... 

The fight is in some ways very Oregon, long a proving ground for ideas that initially seemed politically impossible only to enter the mainstream, such as medical aid in dying, universal vote-by-mail and legalizing the hallucinogenic compound in magic mushrooms for therapy.

When people think of "animals" — as in "I love animals!" — they're not thinking about cockroaches and mosquitoes.

ADDED: According to Ballotopedia, the initiative "Applies to mammals (including vermin), birds, reptiles, amphibians, fish." So I think "lethal pest control" is meant to call to mind mice and rats, not the various troublesome insects. The NYT article says "all animals" and also, more than once, says "pest control." 

In the comments here, Tom T. said, "Then would come the court decisions defining pet ownership as cruelty and outlawing it." That got me looking into the argument that pet-keeping is a form of cruelty to animals. Here's an interesting Vox article from 3 years ago: "The case against pet ownership/Why we should aim for a world with fewer but happier pets." Excerpt: 

It often leads to the trivialization of serious subjects...

Writing the previous post and trying to get to Meade's YouTube page, I googled the name of the page, Meadeification, and got this:

Here's more of Meade's trivialization of a serious subject:

The Purple Path.

Video by Meade, at the first sunrise of summer.