Is there substance in Trump's North Korea posturing? There was some substance in the Iran nuclear deal, but Trump tore that one up.

Trump has stepped over the line into North Korea to shake hands. An innovative act, or just posturing?

Some commentators and politicians, including quite a few Republicans, are asking if there will be any substance to a deal. Will North Korea actually denuclearize, allow inspectors across the line and so forth?

I say we had a deal like that with Iran that Trump tore up. It may have not been perfect, but there was verification, so I hear in the news. Of course I can't see it with my own eyes. I think we had a deal with some substance, but Trump has torn up that deal.

Other countries, such as European nations, are trying to still hold that deal together, but it may be slipping through their fingers; our fingers also. Iran is on the brink of restarting their uranium enrichment. We may have painted ourselves into a corner that we don't know how to get out of. Going to war could be one out, but it's definitely problematic. It's problematic for sure. I'm often noted for making an understatement. Okay, it's more than just problematic.

Our leadership does make a lot of bad choices.

The competitive nature of dating is part of the problem

A very interesting, tho quite long article about loneliness and problems that persist in spite of progress toward acceptance of gay people. Great food for thought. I think, also applies to non gay people as well.

Personally, I see a big source of these problems coming from the competitive nature of dating. It seems like the concept of finding that ideal "soulmate" can be problematic. Even for young people, or maybe even more so for young people, one is never good enough. On the dating apps, there's always someone "better" just a few swipes away. It can be kind of a stressful situation.

In my opinion, the higher expectations in our more progressive society can also cast a dark shadow. One is often haunted by the question, "is my life what it could be?"

Even before the era of phone apps, I found the whole dating scene to be problematic. That was back in the days when it was more about classified ads and meeting in bars. It still seemed kind of shallow and competitive to me.

I have to say that, personally, I never really participated in the dating world. Maybe I'm a bit biased against it as I do know of many happy couples, but I also know of a lot of problems.

Myself, I value different things from different people. In some cases, it may be an erotic appreciation of body shape, but there are so many other things I value as well. Good conversation, for instance. Finding all these things to line up in one person may not be impossible, but it seems improbable.

I may have not found the solution for everyone, but for me, I enjoy a wide range of different people for different reasons. Like a circle of friends and community.

Believe it or not, I had some camping experiences with Fundamentalist Christians when I was a teenager

I am thinking about this experience after reading the news about The Firs Campground near Bellingham and it's firing of Jace Taylor for being gay. Some people were surprised when this happened as, I guess, the Firs seemed pretty mellow. A stricter theology lies underneath the fun.

I grew up in a very liberal church that is now pro gay rights, but when I was in 6th grade, a friend invited me to join the Boy Scouts. He was in the Mormon Scout Troop; Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.

Being good liberals, my parents said, "we don't necessarily believe the theology in that church, but if your friends are there, have a good time."

I enjoyed the first few camping trips and scout meetings.

By the time I got to 7th grade, it was becoming evident that I wasn't motivated. Scouting was kind of like a para military organization. Maybe too macho for me? I wasn't motivated to achieve any ranking beyond second class; a badge in scouting. They also have a system of merit badges and my merit badge count was zero. One other badge I did get, come to think about it, was something called "Order of the Arrow."

I still hung out in the troop mostly as a social outlet. Friends were there, it was a place to go.

By the time I got into high school, I was beginning to realize that it was politically more conservative than my own upbringing.

Still, as a teenager, I had mixed feelings. Part of the time, I was drawn to the more liberal leanings of my parents and siblings. At other times, I was sort of rebellious toward my own family so I trended toward conservative. Military service both inspired and frightened me. The Vietnam War and the military draft were hanging over people's heads.

Another one of my friends, named Jeff, who was in that troop, got Eagle Scout; the highest rank in scouting, I guess.I was somewhat inspired and also intimidated as I wasn't motivated to climb that ladder. My mom pointed out a nice thought tho. When a picture came out in the local paper about the scouting awards. My mom noted that the picture showed a Methodist scoutmaster pinning the Eagle Badge on a Catholic kid who was in the Mormon Troop. She thought that was a statement in ecumenical-ism.

Later in high school, during one of my liberal leaning phases, I decided to write some kind of statement and pin it to the bulletin board in that church. It was some kind of rambling theological essay. The only part I remember, today, was a statement I made that went, "if a stick doesn't bend, it breaks."

I tacked that essay to the bulletin board on the main entryway of the church outside the scout room. It felt like Martin Luther tacking the poster to the church doors.

I left it up a few days and then must have gotten nervous as I eventually took it down.

It was a bit surprising, to me, that no one paid any attention to it. Life in the church and the scout troop went on as normal. No one said anything to me about my essay. Maybe they couldn't read it as the writing wasn't the best.

Eventually, I decided I was in the wrong pew; so to speak and I quite the scout troop.

More stories from my scouting days and other memories to follow.

Bellingham teen fired from working as a camp counselor with The Firs because he’s gay

Very informative article in Bellingham Herald.

Washington State has laws about discrimination against sexual minorities, but an exemption is made for religious organizations.

Here's more of my own commentary below.

There are a lot of accepting churches and organizations in this area. I wish Jace Taylor the best in finding an accepting place of employment and community. This exposes the brand of theology subscribed to by the Firs management. It's a different interpretation of Christianity than the way I was brought up. Kind of puts Bellingham on the map as it's making news on Seattle TV stations and so forth.

As for Washington State laws that exempt religious organizations, such as the Firs Camp near Bellingham, from the civil rights protection for sexual minorities, I am still okay with that. Being liberal, myself, also means I'm kind of into "live and let live," rather than necessarily forcing people to do things against their will. I am not a Libertarian anti government coercion sort of person, but I can see some of that point of view.

I would not wish to work for that kind of place anyway. I would seek more liberal religious or other types of organizations to work for and do business with.

Thinking about the degrowth movement. Saving the planet by working less. I'll add. and / or embracing better technology.

Here's an interesting article. The radical plan to save the planet by working less.

The degrowth movement makes lots of sense to me. First time I've seen the term degrowth, but I have been a fan of voluntary simplicity and shorter work week for many years. Quality of life and work / life balance is progress to me. There's more to progress than just increasing wealth and / or population.

That being said, I also am a fan of Technological progress. Technology might be able to help us squeeze more wealth out of the planet like converting to green energy, using efficient technologies like LEDs and possibly (dare I say this) nuclear power. Better yet, hydrogen fusion.

Still, the technology isn't solving everything. We do need to redefine wealth and learn to live in better ways. That's where shorter workweeks and more things like bicycling come into play.

I just realized a pun at the end of my post. "Shorter workweek and more things like bicycling come into play."

More time off. More time for play. Also adequate sleep and better relations with friends and family. Less rat race.

From comments on this post when I put it on Facebook.

I'm surprised that the word "greed" doesn't even appear in the article.
Maximus Gray.

I fully agree with this. What also goes along is the proverb phraise; you hate the job that you are stuck in traffic to, but you need the job to pay for the car that you are trapped in!
Mark Allyn.

13,000 years ago, Seattle was under 10,000 ft of ice, but Seattle wasn't a city then. Human caused climate change could happen while the city is there.

Some people say, "why worry about climate change?" "The climate is changing anyway."

Over 13,000 years ago, Seattle was under 10,000 ft of ice. Of course, Seattle wasn't there back then. 13,000 years is much farther back than all of recorded history.

The global warming worry is about the next 100 years. Can we make it through the next 100 years? Our kids and grand kids. That's an important question for civilization. After that, who knows. Maybe we will be building huge colonies in the solar system by then; if civilization survives.

It's the next century that's the time scale for global warming worry, as far as civilization goes. As for other species of plants and animals, yes, they have come and gone. Many have gone extinct over the millions of years before we were here to care.

Washington state health insurers propose lowest rate increase in Affordable Care Act era

Some good news here in the state of Washington. A very low rate increase; like just 1% for health plans on our Obamacare exchanges, According to an article in June 3 2019 Seattle Times. Seems like the system is stabilizing and starting to work well in this state. Work well at least for this year.

They are getting the bugs out, the system has arrived; like in "the Eagle has landed."

Washington is a state that created its own healthcare exchanges. Remember; states that refused Obamacare's Medicaid expansion often didn't set up their own exchanges so the Feds run the exchanges in those states. Our state seems to have managed it's exchanges well and at the local level. Ironically, accepting Obamacare may have meant more local control.

A public option is now in the works, here in Washington as well. Roll out for the public option is planned for 2021.

If Eastern Washington State were to secede, why not be more original? Name the new state Columbia.

From Komo News, January 2019.

Two Republican state lawmakers from Spokane Valley have submitted a bill to create a 51st state - again.

House Bill 1509, sponsored by Rep. Matt Shea and Rep. Bob McCaslin, would split Washington state in half along the Cascades, separating Eastern Washington from Western Washington.

The counties on the west side of the Cascades would remain in the state of Washington, while the counties on the east side would comprise an entirely new state named Liberty.

From my Facebook.

Seems like whenever there is a movement to split a geographic entity, the break off region goes for a name like "Liberty." Years ago, there was a move to split two regions off of Whatcom County. There was "Freedom" and also "Independence" Counties. Can't people be more original? Seems like every break off idea goes for the a name like Independence.

If Eastern Washington were to create the 51st state, why not call it something related to local geography? How about the state of "Columbia?" Yes, the Columbia River is a very important feature right through the heart of Eastern Washington. Much of that economy is dependent on the river.

I tend to think breaking the state in two is a bad idea.

Here's some more of my thinking.

Where would the new state capital be? Spokane? That's an economic hub for both eastern Washington and Northern Idaho. Spokane calls itself the hub of the Inland Empire. It's like, "all roads lead to Spokane." Problem is, there's another Inland Empire. That Inland Empire is focused around east Los Angeles Metro area and San Bernardino.

Splitting regions can be problematic for sure; especially for a place like the town I grew up in; Pullman, WA. Pullman is home of a big University, Washington State University. Much of the money and students at WSU come from the populous and prosperous west side of the state.

Trivia question:

The last county to be created in Washington State. Created by a split is Pend Oreille County. It's up in the north east corner.

Here's my answer to the question, "do you caption all the photos in your collection?"

A photographer friend of mine put out the question on Facebook, do you caption all your photos? He does, but he finds that the task can be tedious.

Here's my answer.

I love captioning my photos on Facebook and Flickr. I find that a lot of people don't caption photos on Flickr, at least. Descriptions provide food for search engines bringing more searches to one's photo.

I also find descriptions are a means of self expression. I like to write in my blog, but not that many people read my blog. Breaking up my writing into various photo descriptions on Flickr, rather than writing to this blog. My photos on Flickr seems to bring a lot more readers.

Like Facebook, Flickr allows fairly long descriptions. There's the title / caption and then more space for a description below.

I have not been captioning photos that I don't post. That would be tedious. Some of these are close to being duplicates. Others are ones I don't think are worth posting, tho I often do change my mind given another look at the photo.

My photos are kept in folders on my computer under the label of the year the photo was taken.

The photos in my computer are not captioned, but I remember the circumstances for most of them. Also, a lot of those photos are taken around the time of the ones that I do post and label. They are usually photos from similar contexts.

One of many reasons for Facebook

Like Facebook or not, here's the kind of thing that keeps Facebook so pervasive as a tool for self expression. One of the NPR shows that I follow, The1A from WAMU Radio, has just shut down the comments section on it's website. It says there is too much abuse and too many bots. They don't have enough resources to moderate the comments section. The notice also says one can continue to comment on their - Facebook page. Also on their Twitter presence. This is because it's easier to verify who's making the comments using the existing Facebook system, rather than managing their own comments section.

Not that I used the comments section that much, but I did use it some. When using it, logged in with another system that I like. It's an alternative to Facebook, but a bit different. A system called Disqus. Disqus is a social media that manages one's comments to other media. I'm afraid Disqus may no longer work for The1A site, at least for now.

My feed on Disqus where I've signed in while to use the comments section in some other medias, such as radio stations and publications. You can get an idea how Disqus works.

One problem with big media outlets, which has been the case for decades. Information overload. This is a big country, now 320 million people. On national media, one's comments are usually lost among thousands of comments, since the internet age when comment pages became available. Before the internet age, one could write letters to the editor, like to the New York Times, but there was only room for a handful of letters given the volume of mail they got. Local media did better being on a smaller scale. The Bellingham Herald used to pride itself in being able to publish almost every letter to the editor it got.

One thing Facebook has done is create a system that breaks up the size of audiences to facilitate more discussion; like breaking a lecture class into group discussions. Except for celebrities, one's personal friends are usually one's most likely audience. Facebook builds from that as often the larger audiences start among friends and then spreads from there. I do think other systems, like Disqus also have merit.

If one can thunder on over 100 radio stations coast to coast, one might not need Facebook

There are quite a few people who don't use Facebook. One person, I know, is a college professor who enjoys teaching as an outlet for his creativity. One could say he doesn't really need Facebook. Also he's skeptical of it's corporate nature.

I still see Facebook as a common person's outlet for writing and photography.

This makes me think of a segment of a radio talk show I remember from the mid 1990s. Someone called the show suggesting the host get a website. Websites were new, back then.

The host was skeptical. He kept saying, "why would I need a website?"

The caller persisted talking about how he could post articles, archives and so forth.

The host eventually started thundering like the Wizard of Oz. He said, "My voice is heard on over 100 radio stations coast to coast." "It blankets America just fine, thank you." "I don't need no web what?"

Forward to now, I just looked up that host. I don't think he's got a show anymore, but his rants are available on a website.

In that discussion I had with the professor, the problem of junk mail came up. He admits that email is almost unusable now due to so much clutter of junk mail. I find the same problem with telephones. It's why I don't answer the phone unless people leave a message. One good thing about Facebook, it filters out a lot of the bulk stuff so it tends to be the more interesting responses from real people. Not flooded with a bunch of appeals for money from various organizations. Real people are more apt to value my thinking, rather than just my checkbook.

I do admit that Facebook would probably be better if run by a nonprofit.