Wednesday: Hili dialogue

November 11, 2026 • 6:50 am

Welcome to a Hump Day (“Сряда – преломният ден от седмицата” in Bulgarian), Wednesday, November 11, 2026 and it’s Veteran’s Day, an official federal holiday in America.

It’s also Origami Day, Pocky Day (celebrating the Japanese snack), and National Sundae Day. According to Guinness, this is the world’s largest ice cream sundae:

The largest ice cream sundae was one weighing 24.91 tonnes (54,917 lb) made by Palm Dairies Ltd under the supervision of Mike Rogiani in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada on 24 July 1988. It consisted of 20.27 tonnes (44,687.64) of ice cream, 4.39 tonnes (9,678.28) of syrup and 243.7 kg (537.2 lb) of topping.

I have no photos of that behemoth, but here’s a FB video of what’s surely the largest sundae in Chicago, available at the fabled Margie’s Candies. I haven’t eaten one, but I’ve seen one. If you’re in Chicago and you want an old-fashioned ice cream parlor, I heartily recommend this place. The ice cream, hot fudge, and turtle sundaes are terrific. Have a gander:

As for origami, I asked my friend Robert Lang, physicist and origami master, to contribute one of his pieces in honor of Origami Day, and I got this:

Or, for something entirely different, this is “The Distance of the Sun,” a mobile of origami representations of transportation across history, culture, and imagination, a collaboration with artist Glenn Kaino (who conceived and spearheaded the project), installed at the Los Angeles Metro Connector train station (the connection station between LA’s light rail system and the Los Angeles Airport people-mover). The description is here.

The original was modeled in paper, but this large installation is of course made of more durable materials.

.

Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this day by consulting the November 11 Wikipedia page.

Oh, and there’s a Google Doodle celebrating Veteran’s Day today. Click below to see where it goes. Note that the medals change, beginning with the Medal of Honor.

Da Nooz:

UPDATE: The first item below is now obsolete as yesterday evening the Republicans in the House unified to deep-six the impeachment charge against Hegseth.

House Republicans on Tuesday blocked an effort to impeach Pete Hegseth, rejecting allegations that the defense secretary had repeatedly violated the constitution through his handling of the Iran war and other conflicts globally.

The vote came a week after Republicans lost control of the Senate and House of Representatives in their worst midterm election in more than a half century, and underscored how lawmakers remain wary of crossing Donald Trump, who has signaled his continued support for Hegseth.

Thomas Massie, a Republican congressman who lost his primary after breaking with the president, had proposed impeaching Hegseth in September, alleging an array of illegal acts, including killing civilians in Iran, launching unauthorized operations in Venezuela and Yemen, and retaliating against a Democratic senator.

Top Democrats announced their support for the resolution, but Republicans moved to kill it by referring it to the judiciary committee. Their motion succeeded on Tuesday, by a 211-204 vote, largely along party lines. Massie was the sole Republican to oppose the motion, along with all Democrats.

*“Secretary of War” Pete Hegseth has at best a mixed record, but has soured his relationship with Congress and much of the public with his grandstanding and dumb decisions.  The Democrats, fired up by midterm victories, are trying to impeach him, with a Republican Congressman having prepared an impeachment proposal centered largely on the war with Iran:

Rep. Thomas Massie moved Monday to force a vote to impeach Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, pressing his fellow Republicans to remove one of the Trump administration’s most prominent figures following sweeping election losses blamed in part on fallout from the war in Iran.

Massie, a Kentucky Republican, read the impeachment resolution from the House floor just hours after it opened for the first day of sessions after the midterms. It largely focuses on the war in Iran but also includes references to Hegseth’s role in carrying out military actions in Yemen and Venezuela.

The congressman, who was defeated by a Trump-backed challenger in a primary earlier this year, said Hegseth’s actions amounted to “high crimes and misdemeanors.”

Hegseth, he said, “knowingly executed and implemented unlawful orders” and “remains a threat to the Constitution.”

A vote in the House could come by mid-week, but next steps are highly uncertain. House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries supports the measure. If most Democrats follow him, Massie would only need support from a few Republicans to impeach Hegseth.

. . . . If the House votes to impeach, it would fall to to the Senate to either dismiss the charges or hold a trial. Republicans remain in the majority in both chambers, until the new Congress convenes in January with Democrats in control.

But Hegseth will not go quiet into that good night:

.Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth dug in for a fight Tuesday against his potential impeachment in Congress, contending that a rogue lawmaker is undermining American troops in war zones by targeting him over mere “policy disagreements” and not the high crimes required in the Constitution for his possible removal.

The embattled Pentagon chief has launched a counteroffensive against outgoing Republican Rep. Thomas Massie’s effort to force him from office over his handling of the unpopular Iran war and other actions. A House vote on whether to move forward with the impeachment is expected later Tuesday.

Hegseth gave a defiant and politicized defense of his stewardship of the U.S. military in his first news conference at the Pentagon in six months. He chose to hit back at the rising bipartisan anger over battlefield strategy while offering few details about intermittent operations against Iran or fatal strikes on alleged drug-smuggling boats in Latin America.

Not a good move, Democrats, especially not now.  While it’s barely possible that the House could vote to impeach him, the trial would be in the Senate, which requires a 2/3 majority vote to convict. The Democrats have only 54 seats there after January, and the impeachment will fail. It will be a show trial, and smacks of retribution when the Democrats should be moving forward. Believe me, if Hegseth were to go (VERY unlikely) Trump will, in further retribution, replace him with somebody worse.

JAC THIS MORNING: I told you so!  But they can try again after the newly-elected Congress takes its seats in January. But the Senate will not vote to have an impeachment trial, so if Republicans continue to stick together, it’s all futile.

*In a referendum, California rejected America’s first attempt to tax accumulated wealth: the so-called “billionaire’s tax.” This represents a setback for “progressive” Democrats, who want to level out incomes by taxing the rich.

California voters rejected a billionaire tax, The Associated Press determined on Monday, rebuking a measure that would have created the nation’s first wealth tax by targeting the assets of residents with a net worth beyond $1 billion.

Under the tax measure, Proposition 40, the state would have imposed a one-time, 5 percent tax on the personal assets of billionaires and devoted most of the revenue to health care.

The Democratic voters who dominate the California electorate generally support the concept of making wealthy people pay higher taxes. But Democratic leaders were divided over the proposal — Gov. Gavin Newsom opposed it while the California Democratic Party endorsed the tax. And some of the California billionaires who stood to pay the tax contributed heavily toward a campaign that slammed the proposal with attack ads on TV throughout October.

Proposition 40 also suffered from having a weak coalition of supporters who could not compete with those ads and relied on cheaper methods, such as social media and influencer campaigns, to rally support.

The race was not called until almost a week after the election as California counted mail ballots at a deliberate pace. Though the vote gap shrank as more ballots were tallied, the measure ultimately failed to get enough support despite it being a hugely

Here’s the vote as of yesterday afternoon:

It’s pretty close, but I would have expected it to pass given the public’s increasing denunciation of economic inequality. But the taxes haven’t worked in places they’ve been tried (which include several European countries) as they don’t raise a ton of revenue, and cause the very rich to simply leave the area for others. In addition, they impose double taxation on rich people who have accumulated wealth by paying, say, capital gains taxes.  Billionaire’s taxes, a plank in the Democratic Socialist and “progressive” Democratic platform, may sound good, but the Democrats should stay away from them, too.

*Lauren Boebert (R-CO), probably the dumbest person in the House, was finally defeated by a Democrat, even after Boebert tried to retain her seat by moving to a more conservative district.

Retired Rear Adm. Eileen Laubacher, a Democrat, will flip Colorado’s 4th District, CNN’s Decision Desk projects, ending conservative firebrand Rep. Lauren Boebert’s tenure in Congress.

Boebert’s loss comes after she elected to run in a more conservative district last cycle in an effort to preserve her political future. But Laubacher, who served more than three decades in the Navy, capitalized on the national headwinds against the GOP and focused her campaign on affordability issues.

The win denies Boebert, an ally of President Donald Trump and one of the most outspoken conservatives in the House Republican conference, a fourth term. Boebert was first elected in 2020, after she upset a fifth-term Republican incumbent in a primary.

. . . In that time, she has emerged as one of the most recognizable, and at times polarizing, faces of the GOP’s MAGA wing, drawing attention from both Democrats and Republicans. Former President Joe Biden, whom she heckled during his 2022 State of the Union address, once billed her as “one of the leaders of this extreme MAGA movement.” The 39-year-old has also been a source of frustration for Republican speakers Kevin McCarthy and Mike Johnson.

Good riddance.  (Remember that she’s also infamous for canoodling in a movie theater and getting kicked out.) Here’s the vote from CNN: which is pretty close, but remember that the district is conservative. Boebert has not yet conceded the election even though 98% of the votes are in.

*British entertainer Russell Brand, 51,was convicted of rape and sexual assault and was sentenced two days ago to 10½ years in prison. Over at the Free Press, Douglas Murray says that this marks the end of an undesirable era of British culture (Murray’s article is called “Russell Brand ran out of enablers”).

Brand emerged at a very peculiar moment in British life. The “lads’ mags” culture of the 1990s was still around and leaking into the 2000s. It was a period where a certain type of male—never female—promiscuity was admired and even encouraged. Brand himself was crowned “shagger of the year” several years in a row by Britain’s leading tabloid. Even a future Liberal Democrat deputy prime minister boasted in those days of the number of women he had managed to get into bed.

It was also a time when the nudge-nudge, wink-wink, say-no-more sauciness of British humor was still alive but not well. Elderly BBC executives imagined that perhaps in Brand’s effeminate, piratical popinjay persona they had stumbled on the much-coveted “voice of youth.” It soon became clear that their chosen voice was a liability.

. . . Sadly, there was nothing that Brand’s detractors could do. The political left in the UK fell in love with him. Writers like Guardian columnist Owen Jones enabled him and did public events with him, and each puffed the other’s books with absurd hyperbole. Brand labeled Jones “this generation’s Orwell,” showing that Brand had never read George Orwell. Jones returned the favor by describing Brand’s work as “funny, full of charm, and engaging.” Britain’s leading magazine of the political left, the New Statesman, gave Brand a guest editorship of the magazine and had him photographed with the staff sitting around him in wonder in a tableau meant to represent Jesus and his disciples.

. . . .Brand rose and fell because he emerged from a strange, highly specific, and confusing culture which still existed in the 2000s and started to dwindle in the mid-2010s. That was when, for better and worse, men—including, sometimes, famous men—were made to account for their past actions. Whether Hollywood is a good place to either set or reset the sexual ethics of the era is a question which was pretty much answered during the #MeToo era: yes and no. Yes, in that there are people who got away with things because they were “powerful.” No in that the entertainment industry is a very untypical ecosystem. A world in which Brand could whip his member out in a BBC studio or play the lothario title character in the lackluster and unneeded remake of the Dudley Moore vehicle Arthur was a time quite content with boundaries being crossed. Those who sought to enforce boundaries were denounced as “stick-in-the-muds” and “prigs.”

But then the music changed. The once-cheering supporters and partners slunk away or spoke out too late. The laughter died. Many questions remain in the rise and fall of Russell Brand. But the most obvious is why the culture so relentlessly celebrated and promoted him in the first place.

I neither worshiped him nor hated him, for I never watched him. Now he has his just deserts, and will be forgotten when he emerges from prison at age 61.

*And a quickie: a deer rescue recounted in the UPI’s odd news:

Animal rescuers in the Detroit area announced a deer with a plastic Halloween pumpkin stuck over its face has been rescued after over a week of sightings.

The Detroit Animal Welfare Group said members had been tracking sightings of the deer for about 10 days before they caught up to the animal on Sunday in Westland’s Hines Park.

The deer, initially thought to be a doe but later revealed to be a young button buck, had been repeatedly sighted with the plastic pumpkin over its face, which rescuers feared would affect its ability to eat and drink.

The rescue team followed the deer through the woods and waded through a 20-foot-wide river “not once, not twice, but four times,” the DAWG said on social media.

The deer was tranquilized and the bucket was removed. The rescuers administered fluids to the deer before reversing the tranquilizer and releasing the animal back into the wild.

A yellow tag was placed on the deer’s ear to warn hunters about the tranquilizer.

“We will finally get some sleep tonight even though we are cold, wet and smell like swamp,” DAWG officials wrote.

Here’s a two-minute video and Ceiling Cat bless the rescuers!

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Hili rests beneath a pear tree. And we resurrect an old Hili dialogue:

Hili: Why are you so stuck on the Sisyphus myth?
Andrzej: Because I’m trying once more to reconcile with the absurdity of continuance.

In Polish:

Hili: Czemu się uczepiłeś tego mitu Syzyfa?
Ja: Bo próbuję raz jeszcze polubić absurdalność trwania.

*******************

From Bad Spelling or Grammar on Signs and Notices:

Screenshot

From Cats Doing Cat Stuff:

From Terrible Maps.  Actually, besides the U.S. and Palau, three other countries use Fahrenheit: Belize, Bahama, and the Cayman Islands.

From Masih about her “brother in arms”, Garry Kasparov:

From Luana, one of many challengers that will undoubtedly vie for Fetterman’s seat. This one was born in Gaza.

From Barry, a hilarious AI cat-and-music video:

Larry speaks up about Russell Brand:

One from my feed. English translation from the Russian:

A large Hamas demonstration was supposed to take place in Brisbane, Australia. When Māori activists heard about it, they immediately organized a spirited haka in support of Israel at the site. As always, the Hamas crowd ended up being too chickenshit to show up for the demonstration. Thank you, my dear Māori people, from childhood! 🙏❤️🙏

One I reposted from The Auschwitz Memorial

And two from Dr. Cobb. We must look up this category!

important category on wikimedia commons

— depths of wikipedia (@depthsofwikipedia.bsky.social) 2026-11-09T20:13:42.904Z

A squirrel with gas. Matthew swears this is genuine:

Nothing says the weekend like a squirrel farting in the bath.

— SlenderSherbet (@slendersherbet.bsky.social) 2026-11-07T14:10:09.333Z

.No music today; few seem to listen.

Prognostications about 2028

November 10, 2026 • 11:00 am

I’m not a pundit, so I’m not going to predict which Democrat will get the Presidential nomination in 2028.  All I can predict is that the overwhelming vote for Democrats in the midterms raises the likelihood of a Democratic President in two years— a good thing. As for candidates, right now my favorite is Mayor Pete, and I’m partial to my governor, J. B. Pritzker, though their elections are unlikely given that Buttigieg is gay and Pritzker a Jew. (Sadly, I don’t think America will go for those identities, though I think being a woman is no longer a bar to being President.)

Oh, and anybody but AOC, who I’ve said repeatedly has no substantive record of accomplishment in anything but promoting herself on social media. But perhaps that’s what America—particularly young America—wants in a President. She’s also desperately hungry for status and a better position, like being a Senator or even the President, and so she’s figured out that she has to sound more moderate, which is a transparent ploy to get elected but not believable.

A friend of mine visited Congress last week to lobby Representatives, and went by AOC’s office. He sent photos and wrote this:

AOC’s politics are neither yours nor mine, but the public contributions to the entrance to her Cannon office underscore what a phenomenon she is.

Of course AOC’s office proffers a supply of empty stick-on notes and a pen so you can add your approbation to groundswell.

Don’t bother telling me why she’s a great candidate, for I look down on people who feel that way. . .

In today’s column, NYT writer Frank Bruni sizes up the candidates, and though he doesn’t pick a winner, he describes their pros and cons. Click below to read, or find the article archived here.

Excerpts from his take are indented, my own kneejerk reactions flush left:

Kamala Harris: Will she even throw her hat into the ring? Many party insiders say no. But due in significant part to her superior name recognition, she placed first in many early polls of Democratic voters. And she’d be the only possible nominee with the experience of playing that grueling part before.

I think many Democratic leaders and voters will regard her as a painful look backward — to the deceptions about President Biden’s fitness and the clumsy rush to replace him — when they’d prefer to look forward. But another question hovers over her. Will Democrats want to nominate a woman again?

She lost once and cannot win again. In my view she lacks both eloquence and neurons, and has the potential to become way too progressive.

Gavin Newsom: Most of the smartest political analysts I know say that Newsom’s biggest problem is heavily regulated, highly taxed, crushingly expensive California, which he has governed for the past eight years. It’s the antithesis of affordability — an issue that powered Democrats’ midterm triumphs — and his rivals would have a field day with that.

But he contradicts the spirit of the midterms in an additional way. All around the country, voters seemed to be rebuking the nastiness, pettiness and mockery that President Trump modeled and that so many of his aides and acolytes imitated. . .

. . . Newsom has at times asserted himself as the dauntless Democrat who can summon the snark and spite to match the meanest Republicans insult for insult and meme for meme. But might Democratic voters prefer a leader who can credibly pledge to make America civil again?

The word “California” will rule him out for many Americans, and, like AOC, he changes his positions to become electable. The more candidates do that, the less I like them, though of course many Dems think that candidates should say exactly what would get them in office, not what they believe.

Pete Buttigieg: No Democrat is a nimbler thinker or more fluent communicator, and those attributes, along with the youthful optimism about America that he often radiates, have won him legions of devoted admirers. In 2020, he came from nowhere to win the Democratic caucuses in Iowa and to place a close second to Bernie Sanders in the New Hampshire Democratic primary.

But he never caught fire with Black voters, who are an essential Democratic constituency — the midterms demonstrated that as well — and who will be hugely important in 2028, when the new primary calendar puts the first contest in South Carolina, where Black voters resurrected Joe Biden’s beleaguered candidacy in 2020.

That is a pity.  I’m not convinced, though, that Mayor Pete couldn’t energize blacks (and Hispanics).

Ocasio-Cortez: No potential 2028 candidate has been more fascinating to watch over the past year. She worked hard to promote progressive candidates, putting particular muscle behind the successful Senate bid of Abdul El-Sayed in Michigan, and collected a whole bunch of chits. But she simultaneously made all sorts of statements and gestures to moderate her image and send a signal to centrists that her views aren’t doctrinaire and her tent is big. She’s savvy beyond her years.

That may be savvy, but it’s also dissimulation.  More:

But, ah, those years. Aren’t that many of them. [AOC] is 37 now and would be 39 when the next president is inaugurated. Too young for voters’ comfort? Or an emphatic repudiation of the Democratic gerontocracy and a powerful symbol of generational change — which many midterm results also seemed to endorse? The measures of seasoning or freshness that voters prefer could boost or diminish any bids by members of the younger crowd: Senator Jon Ossoff of Georgia, 39; Buttigieg, 44; Beshear and Gov. Wes Moore of Maryland, both 48. Ditto for possible contenders who are over 60, including Gov. JB Pritzker of Illinois, 61; Harris, 62; Senator Mark Kelly of Arizona, 62; and Rahm Emanuel, 66.

It’s interesting to imagine Pritzker and Ocasio-Cortez squaring off. They would be separated not only by a nearly 25-year age difference but by also by economic station. She was working as a waitress and bartender just before she was first elected to Congress in 2018; he’s an heir to the Hyatt hotel empire who’s worth more than a billion dollars. How much will such attributes matter at what seems to be a time of rising economic populism?

I could give a rat’s patootie who rich candidates are, especially if being poor means you’re more “progressive.” And age and repeated election, unless you have dementia, usually denotes wisdom and experience. Pritzker has made his way through the thicket of Illinois politics and actually done stuff, while AOC has been pushing herself forward on social media. None of the bills of which she was the primary sponsor have passed or made it to a vote, though she’s been one of several secondary sponsors of bills that have become law. Her view on Israel is abysmal, and would become more so were she elected.

Ossoff: As he focused on winning re-election to the Senate — which he just did, by an impressive 18-point margin — he proclaimed “zero interest” in a presidential campaign. Polymarket doesn’t believe him: As of Friday afternoon, it placed him atop the potential Democratic field, with a 27 percent chance of winning the party’s nomination. I promise you that he’s powerfully tempted to run.

And he emerged over the past year as one of the Trump administration’s most effective detractors. But the race for the Democratic presidential nomination won’t be about neutering Trump, now a lame duck quacking into the void.

Let’s keep our eye on Osoff. Unlike AOC, ten of the bills he’s introduced have become law, some of them with bipartisan support.

Ro Khanna. The 50-year-old House member from California has, like Emanuel, been more detailed than some of his peers about where he thinks the country should head and how it should address Americans’ economic frustrations. He, too, is a geyser of oratory and essays.

But something else about Khanna catches my eye and speaks to an important variable in any presidential election: Which Democrats can fold the agenda they put forward into a succinct and accessible narrative that stirs feelings as it kindles thoughts? Khanna seems acutely conscious of the need to do that, as he showed with his leading role in demanding the release of files related to Jeffrey Epstein. He cast the Epstein case as emblematic of rich, powerful elites doing as they pleased and evading accountability — and he turned that into a metaphor for many of government’s failings.

Khanna has been sole or primary sponsor of 13 bills enacted when he was in the House. His views on Israel are mixed: he is a “Zionist” in thinking that Israel has a right to exist, but he’s gone along with the dumb accusations of genocide by Israel. I wouldn’t hesitate to vote for him, though I favor others more.

Finally, Bruni has words of praise for Josh Shapiro, but you know Shapiro’s problem: he’s a member of the “tribe” and doesn’t demonize Israel. If that’s enough to keep him from the Presidency, then we are truly lost:

Josh Shapiro: The Pennsylvania governor, 53, should be formidable. He was just re-elected — by a staggering 22 points — in the nation’s most populous battleground state, which Trump won in 2024. He’s bright, measured, sensible.

But his obvious presidential ambitions are hostage to two forces perhaps more consequential than his virtues. As Democrats move on from the midterms, will the party’s progressives or moderates come to the fore? Shapiro has presented himself as a proud, practical-minded consensus builder who eschews extremes.

And how important will a candidate’s views of Israel be? In both political parties, there are voters more insistent than ever that America downgrade its alliance with Israel. But Shapiro, who has written and spoken extensively about the importance of his Jewish faith, takes a less censorious, more nuanced position. That might not be a big obstacle in the general election, but Democratic primaries are a different matter.

The point, however, is not to make recommendations, but simply to tender my own tentative views and ask readers to say who, at this point, they favor. Campaigning for 2028 will begin sooner than we think, and it’s good to air potential candidates for the Democrats, some of whom have emerged from the midterm elections.

Readers’ wildlife photos

November 10, 2026 • 8:47 am

There is fungus among us! Today’s contribution comes from Jan Malik, who photographed mushrooms in the Adirondacks.  Jan’s captions and IDs are indented, and you can enlarge the photos by clicking on them:

In this little presentation, I will show a small selection of fungi I found during my hikes in the Catskills, Adirondacks, and the White Mountains this year. Fungi receive little love, undeservedly, and their fruiting bodies – mushrooms – can be a fascinating subject for a nature enthusiast and a culinary experimenter alike. Most of fungal life occurs underground in the mycelium, and for an amateur naturalist, mushrooms are all that can be observed. Besides basic mushroom facts, I also offer some culinary advice, but be warned – accidents can happen either as a consequence of eating mushrooms or reading about them; the former by poisoning and the latter by boredom.

True Yellow Morel (Morchella americana), photographed in the spring. They grow on forest edges, in meadows (especially in former orchards), and the like. I’ve never found them in quantity, so I can’t attest to whether they are good eating, but one needs to collect lots of them for a meaningful meal, since they are hollow inside:

Many edible mushrooms have their doppelgangers – species that, to the untrained eye, look somewhat similar but are poisonous. Morels have their alter ego in the genus Gyromitra (I can’t say which species it is exactly), which grows in mixed woods or disturbed areas, similar to true morels:

For me, the king of edible mushrooms is the Chanterelle, here represented by the genus Cantharellus. The picture shows what to look for: a yellow color and folds, not true gills, on the underside. It looks a little different from its European cousin (Cantharellus cibarius), so it could be Cantharellus phasmatis or Cantharellus paleoxanthomus. They are mycorrhizal (growing in symbiosis with plants, usually conifers), and I usually see them growing singly:

But sometimes, one gets lucky and finds a whole colony of chanterelles. They are delicious when seared in butter with some onions, and they taste even better if cooked on a campfire after a whole day of hiking. Some compare fresh chanterelle aroma to apricots, but to me, it is just vaguely “pleasant” without being fruity:

The chanterelle’s Mr. Hyde is the Scaly vase (Turbinellus floccosus) and other “false chanterelles”. To me, they look different and I can’t imagine mistaking them for true chanterelles, but then I learned to recognize mushrooms before I learned to read:

A close cousin of the true chanterelle is the Cinnabar chanterelle (Cantharellus cinnabarinus). It tastes pretty much like a regular chanterelle but, while widespread, grows in smaller groups. I had no luck finding another member of this family – the black trumpet, which really doesn’t want to be found thanks to its cryptic color:

It is said that the poisonous Jack-o’-lantern mushroom (Omphalotus illudens) can be mistaken for chanterelles, but for me, they differ in everything: a different hue, a different shape and growth pattern, and the fact that the jack-o’-lantern has true gills rather than folds. Reportedly, it shows weak bioluminescence in complete darkness, but I never had enough time on my hikes to confirm that:

Another chanterelle relative is the Yellowfoot chanterelle (Craterellus lutescens or Craterellus tubaeformis – it’s difficult to tell them apart), perfectly edible but less desirable than the true chanterelle. They can be stewed in a buttery sauce with vegetables, leeks, and garlic (my motto is: “If it doesn’t taste good, it doesn’t have enough butter yet”). A little gummy but fine eating still:

They grow gregariously in colonies, in moist, mossy areas under conifers, quite often together with hedgehogs (below). If you find a colony, your basket will soon be full:

The hedgehogs (genus Hydnum, possibly Hydnum rufescens) can hardly be mistaken for anything else: they have small, fragile spines on the underside. In the Adirondacks, they grow in mycorrhizal symbiosis with spruce and fir, going up to 3,000 ft elevation. They are good when dry-sauteed first to reduce water,, and then seared with butter and minced garlic. They remain tender after cooking and form an ideal side dish to roasted potatoes:

Another Adirondack specialty is the mycorrhizal Orange milkcap (possibly a member of the Lactarius deliciosus complex). This is thought to be a European species, but mushrooms are unlike plants or animals, with species’ names being in constant flux. It grows in soggy, mossy areas in the presence of conifers. This picture shows one characteristic feature: rings on the cap:

When broken, they ooze dark-orange or carrot latex and bruise coppery brown. They are excellent as pickles (in brine), but I like their caps best seared in a pan with some butter or even plain with a pinch of salt. They release the aromatic latex and remain crispy even after cooking:

Rounding up this batch of mushrooms, here is the Chicken-of-the-woods (Laetiporus sulphureus). It is a decomposer of dead wood and its bright colors light up a dark forest from afar. It is best to harvest only the outer parts, as the center is often fibrous. Then, scald it with boiling water to soften it, dust the pieces in flour, add salt and spices of your choice, dip them in egg batter, and then roll them in breadcrumbs. Fry for several minutes in oil to get a chicken-like, umami snack:

Tuesday: Hili dialogue

November 10, 2026 • 6:45 am

Hili dialogues are back today, at least for a while, as Andrzej has resurrected a bunch of the cat’s philosophical musings. See below.

Welcome to The Cruelest Day: Tuesday, November 10, 2026 and National Vanilla Cupcake Day, which shows what a blah day it is. But it’s also the Báb’s Birthday (see below), honoring ʻAlí-Muḥammad Shírází (1819-1850), also know as “the Báb”, founder of Babism and one of the central figures of the Baháʼí Faith, which teaches that sequential prophets will occur, including Jesus, Muhammad, and, of course, the Báb.  He was executed for apostasy at the age of 30, but there are still 7-8 million followers of Bahái.

But the Báb was really born on October 20, so it’s unclear why his birth is celebrated today.

Here’s what Wikipedia calls “a historical depiction of the Báb”, and I’m not sure if its a drawing or a drawn-over photograph.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

It’s also Area Code Day, the Birth of the Báb,

Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this day by consulting the November 10 Wikipedia page.

Da Nooz:

*There’s an op-ed by Megan McArdle in the WaPo that has a clickbait title, “Democrats won the midterms. Republicans may have won something bigger.”  WHAAAT?  The subtitle gives one part of the answer: “Social Security and Medicare will force painful choices for the party in control.”

Democrats have been celebrating since Tuesday, and well they should. They swept safe seats and won long-shot races, racking up win after win in the reddest of red states. It was the most resounding victory for the party in 50 years, and it was also a victory for the country, which thoroughly repudiated the chaos and corruption of the Trump administration.

But the biggest win may have been for the Republican Party. Now look, guys, I know it doesn’t feel that way. You not only took an epic thumping; you’ve probably lost any hope of holding the presidency in 2028. That doesn’t feel great, especially because Democrats are already murmuring about retribution. So I don’t blame you for failing to look on the bright side. But there is a bright side. In fact, there are two.

For one thing, you have a chance to rebuild your party around something other than Donald Trump. That needed to happen. At 80, Trump has neither the energy nor the actuarial lifespan to lead the party into the future. But Trump didn’t want that to happen, and until now, he has had the power to prevent it, by ruthlessly purging anyone who tried to build an independent Republican identity.

. . .Yes, I know: In the meantime, Democrats will have the House and the Senate. They will use them to do things you hate. I can’t erase that pain, but perhaps I can ease it by pointing out that if they win the trifecta by capturing the White House in 2028, they will almost certainly end up holding the bag for the looming entitlement crisis.

In the last quarter of 2032, the Social Security trust fund dedicated to retirees is scheduled to run out of money. (There is another trust fund for disability insurance, which is better funded but comparatively small.) At that point, by law, benefits are supposed to be cut to match outflows to inflows, which would mean an across-the-board cut of over 20 percent. Six months later, the Medicare hospital insurance program will deplete its trust fund and is scheduled for an 11 percent cut in reimbursements.

You’ve been hearing about it for decades, but the day when the trust funds are exhausted is almost upon us. If Democrats are in charge when it happens, that will be on them, not you.

McArdle points out that several suggested solutions—raising the cap on payroll taxes and raising the retirement age—will tick people off and the Democrats will get blamed. Her solution is for Democrats to tackle this question NOW, but Trump will be President for two more years. I suspect that the next President will be a Democrat, so the party better get its act together now.

*The NYT reports that Joe Biden won’t be very active in promoting his new biography as he has metastasized prostate cancer (article archived here).

Former President Joseph R. Biden Jr. said Sunday that his health would prevent him from making as many public appearances to promote his forthcoming memoir as he had hoped.

The former president, 83, whose health has faced scrutiny since his time in the White House, was diagnosed last year with an aggressive form of prostate cancer that spread to his bones. Mr. Biden underwent radiation therapy and surgery to remove skin cancer lesions, and his son Hunter Biden said in an interview over the summer that his condition was worsening and causing him pain.

Mr. Biden said he had started writing the memoir, “Promise Me, America,” which covers his years as president, when he received the diagnosis. He indicated afterward that he felt intense pressure to finish quickly as he battled the disease, saying he was “working like hell” with his publisher.

Now, he says his cancer will also affect his ability to promote the book.

“Some days are better than others. It hasn’t stopped me. But sometimes it slows me down,” Mr. Biden wrote Sunday in a post on X. “What that means is, unfortunately, I won’t be able to do as many conversations about my book as I’d hoped.”

He added, “My doctors continue to be encouraged by how I’ve responded to treatment.”

Mr. Biden’s age and health set off an intense debate during his final year in office. Mr. Biden ended his re-election bid after a disastrous June 2024 debate performance against President Donald Trump, during which Mr. Biden repeatedly lost his train of thought.

Hunter Biden said on a podcast in July that he believed his father was unknowingly suffering from cancer during that debate. (Medical experts who were not involved in Mr. Biden’s care said it was unlikely that his debate performance was affected by the cancer diagnosed months later.)

This looks pretty much as if Joe doesn’t have that long to live, especially because he had to rush completing his book.  Although I’m not happy when anybody is suffering, Democrat or Republican, and I voted for Biden, we should prepare for his death, as I’m sure the NYT obituary section is doing.

*Texas voted Democratic (“blue”) in the midterms, but the Free Press claims that what went through Texas was a “purple tornado.”

Texans like [Suzanne] Bellsnyder have always had an independent streak, and the pent-up frustration that had been building for years toward establishment Republicans and the status quo finally reached a breaking point last week.

Abbott was swept out after three terms, James Talarico became the first Texas Democrat to be elected to the Senate since 1988, and Democrats won control of the state House for the first time since 2003. It was the first time any Democrat has been elected to statewide office in Texas in over 30 years.

While many pundits are calling what happened in Texas a blue tsunami, it was more like a purple tornado: a shift among moderate voters weary of extremism, cronyism, and corruption. Every single county in Texas—and there are 254 of them, the most of any U.S. state—swung toward the Democrats, but that doesn’t mean traditionally conservative Texans were swept away by the promises of the party’s ascendant left.

“Democrats didn’t necessarily win rural counties, but there was a shift in a lot of counties that made all the difference,” Bellsnyder said. “Rural Republicans have served as a firewall for the party for the last couple of decades, and the Republican Party lost their insurance policy last Tuesday.”

Much of Texas still appears solidly red on maps that show the election results based on which party earned a simple majority of the votes. Still, the results also show rising shades of purple in even the reddest and most conservative rural counties. An analysis by The Texas Tribune concluded that turnout increased by a lower amount in rural counties than in urban and suburban ones. The swing toward Democrats in some of the reddest counties was dramatic.

. . .What will political life in Texas look like now that Democrats have swept the state? Bellsnyder welcomes the return to a bipartisan Texas government, with Democrats in the governor’s mansion and in control of the board of education and state House, but Republicans still in charge of the state Senate.

. . . .“Whether it is the Republicans or Democrats, single-party rule isn’t healthy for democracy,” Bellsnyder said. Newly elected Democrats and other party leaders in Texas hopefully realize that they must deliver the bipartisan results that they campaigned on, because “if the blue doesn’t do what they said they were going to do, then I guarantee we’re going to go back red.”

Well, that’s clear, and if there’s any lesson for Democrats from the midterms, they are going to have to unify to some degree and deliver—and by that I don’t mean allowing men to participate in women’s sports or create free public transportation.  Somehow I sense the Democrats are going to have a big dust-up over their priorities, at least for a while.

*If the pro-Palestinian and anti-“Zionist” bike rally intended to shake up Jewish businesses, it was a miserable failure.

Massive crowds of counterprotesters waving Israeli flags and holding signs condemning antisemitism responded Sunday morning to a bicycle “boycott ride” targeting Philadelphia businesses that organizers said were owned by supporters of Israel.

State and local leaders widely condemned the bikers’ demonstration, saying it was targeting six Jewish-owned businesses. The cyclists on Sunday were met by what appeared to be hundreds of people protesting the ride, sparking some verbal confrontations in Pennsylvania’s largest city.

“Show your faces!” one counterprotester shouted as he flipped off a group of bikers in Rittenhouse Square in the heart of Philadelphia’s Center City neighborhood. Many of the bikers were wearing disposable face masks, helmets and sunglasses. Several bikers held Palestinian flags and were draped in keffiyehs.

Michael Balaban, president and CEO of the Jewish Federation of Greater Philadelphia, decried the scene.

“When people come to attack the Jewish community, we want to meet those attacks tenfold, a hundredfold with people,” Balaban told CNN affiliate WPVI. “Philadelphia is the city of brotherly love and we want to make sure it stays that way and get the haters out of here….Don’t protest us because we’re Jewish.”

On one side of the road on Walnut Street downtown, a woman quietly held a sign above her head reading: “HATE is not Brotherly LOVE.” A few dozen feet away on the same side, a man held one that said: “Money loving Zionists.”

The protest was organized by Philly Bike On Your Left, a group describing itself as “anti-Zionist.”

The group has rejected the criticism, saying it was “grossly misrepresented” and is “firmly against racism and oppression of all forms, including fascism, antisemitism, islamophobia, and colonialism.”

“Ride around Rittenhouse with us as we show these zionist business owners that we see them for the disgusting humans they are,” the group said in its original October 30 Instagram post announcing the ride.

You’ll want to see it, of course, and there’s a long and boring video on YouTube, but I’ve put a short Here’s a short news video of the demonstration.  There seems to have been very little violence, although of course there was animosity on both sides.  Fortunately, in the main the peace was kept, and the restaurants were apparently packed. Note the trop of “Money loving Zionists”, which of course really means “Money loving Jews”: an obvious blood libel. And the cowardly protestors were largely masked, and you know why (I didn’t see any masked counterprotestors!):

I love this screenshot I took from one video, showing Jewish self-deprecating humor of the protestors:

*At It’s Noon in Israel, Amit Segal details the countdown to form a government coalition in Israel.

It’s Monday, November 9, and for all the frenzy in the country, the electoral process is far from instant. Last night, Gadi Eisenkot was handed the mandate, and a 91-day timer began.

Thirteen weeks. That’s how long coalition negotiations could drag on: six weeks for Eisenkot, four for Benjamin Netanyahu and three more for the rest of the Knesset.

“No one will be able to meet all the commitments they made,” Eisenkot declared last night at the President’s residence. “And all of us will be required to compromise.” “We must form a national emergency government” he added, “this will require creative and unconventional political steps.”

Eisenkot made three promises at the outset of this election: no Arabs, no Haredim, no Bibi. Last night’s speech gave little indication of which commitments he will meet and which will require compromise and creativity.

For months before the election Eisenkot signaled a creative approach to the Arab parties. His original plan for a “national emergency government” was, in reality, binational, resting on 19 Arab votes from parties that reject Israel’s Jewish statehood and refuse to label Hamas a terrorist organization.

That was until Yisrael Beytenu chairman Avigdor Lieberman pulled a sharp 180 and proposed a softer form of anti-Zionist support: the ultra-Orthodox. For reference, imagine the Democratic Party conceding a national abortion ban in exchange for evangelical support to oust Donald Trump. The man who triggered Israel’s political crisis in 2019 over his refusal to sit with the Haredim has chosen to don a shtreimel rather than a keffiyeh to defeat Netanyahu, in effect challenging Eisenkot to a game of chicken.

Eisenkot has already broken one promise; he would like to avoid breaking a second on the chance he is thrown into further elections.

Israeli President Isaac Herzog appointed Eisenkot (former head of the IDF and head of a centrist party) to try forging a consensus. Eisenkot ruled out using the Arab and ultra-Orthodox parties to do that, but it may not be possible, and he’d have to choose one, and it look likes he’s leaning on putting the ultra-Orthodox into a ruling coalition. But of course the ultra-Orthodox are at odds with the government because, in violation of government decree, most of them refuse to serve in the IDF or in alternative service; they think that Israel should honor their desire to spend their time studying the Talmud. As a formally secular state, Israel should not allow that, nor give the group a stipend for their religious labors.

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Andrzej has just collected a bunch of old Hili posts in a Substack section called (in Polish) “Philosophy on four paws”, so let’s have one bit of wisdom a day for a while. Today she shows off her learning.

Hili: Horace was right.
Andrzej : About what?
Hili: Almost everything.

In Polish:

Hili: Horacy miał rację.
Ja: W jakiej sprawie?
Hili: Prawie w każdej.

*******************

From Kitty Litterposting:

From Science Humor.  Whenever I see a Facebook post starting, “I’m honored to. . .”, I know some bragging will ensue.

From Give Me a Sign:

From Masih, who introduces Iranian protestors in the German Parliament (in the tweet with a Farsi title, Masih speaks in English):

From my feed: The Italian Prime Minister and her cats:

From Luana. Colossal is plowing old ground with the “woolly mice” because, I get, their progress on making Woolly Mammoths and dodos is slow. Look how they tout these mice, not saying that more than half of the edited changes came from mutant mice and not elephant or mammoth genomes. Let’s see them make an elephant look like this–and then add big tusks, physiological tolerance, and a surrogate mother!

From Malcolm, interspecies love:

A Diwali post from the Number Ten Cat:

One I reposted from The Auschwitz Memorial: a survivor who turns 97 today:

A survivor of Thesienstadt, Mauthausen, and Auschwitz, this Czech Jewish woman turns 97 today. She's one of the few survivors who is still with us.

— Jerry Coyne (@evolutionistrue.bsky.social) 2026-11-10T11:49:49.071Z

Two from Dr. Cobb. First, office safety. I can’t say I squealed with laughter, but it was funny. Another tweet gave its source: “It’s a 1991 Barr Films instructional video from the ‘Excellence in Training’ series, I don’t think any of the actors are famous.”

“Office Safety”If you don’t squeal with laughter five seconds into this you may be clinically dead.

— David J (@damjef.bsky.social) 2026-11-08T12:33:58.545Z

A murmuration:

saw some starlings

— Lev Parikian (@levparikian.bsky.social) 2026-11-07T19:14:33.113Z

Music, from reader Bryan, who calls this rehearsal video “Best rare Beatles I’ve heard for a long time!” The song is by Harrison and it’s “For You Blue” from the Beatles’ Let it Be album.  

Readers’ wildlife photos

November 9, 2026 • 8:30 am

Glory be! I got two batches of wildlife photos yesterday, so we’re set for today and Tuesday. The rest of you reprobates—get to work!

Today’s batch comes from our regular contributor Mark Sturtevant. Mark’s captions and IDs are indented, and you can enlarge the photos by clicking on them.

Here is another set of critter pictures from two summers ago. That time is the measure of my back-log in processing these images. There will first be spiders.

It is always exciting to come across the spider shown in the first two pictures, because it is of a size that would easily cover the palm of your hand. This is one of two very similar species of Fishing Spider in the area, and right now I am thinking Dolomedes scriptus, though I wish I’d taken clearer pictures of the abdomen to be sure. Females in this group haul their egg sac to the top of a plant and build a web “nursery” around it. The newly emerged spiderlings stay in their nursery for a time while the female guards them, and that is when it’s pretty exciting to find one of these scary-big girls just hanging there at eye level, plain as day. You can see the dark mass of spiderlings in the background of the first picture. The females usually barely react to my attentions other than moving to the other side of their plant, but this one repeatedly lunged at the lens when I got close:

Next up is a Long-jawed Orbweaver (Tetragnatha sp.). These spiders use their extra-long chelicerae and fangs to pluck small insects from their web. To us, though, they are as fragile and benign as a piece of fluff:

Lastly, we have one of the larger orb weavers that are very common in certain parks: the Furrow Orbweaver (Larinioides cornutus). They are typically well hidden inside a messy silken retreat near their web, but here I coaxed this one out for pictures:

It was during this summer that I came across a mature Luna Moth caterpillar (Actias luna). These of course develop into one of our largest moths, so naturally I had to take it home for pictures. But that very same day it started to spin its cocoon, so I had to wait for the moth to emerge. Fortunately, this was the first generation, so I did not have to wait long. When a moth or butterfly emerges, there is a period of several hours after their wings are expanded when you can take pictures with little risk of it flying off. I took full advantage of that here, as shown in the next three pictures. The last picture was taken with the 15mm Opteka wide-angle macro lens. Wide-angle macro is growing in popularity because it combines both close-up and wide-angle perspectives, and more photographers are discovering the unique look that this can provide. There exists a bit of a scandal with this lens, however. I bought a copy shortly after it appeared on the market because it was inexpensive, and I wasn’t willing to shell out hundreds of dollars for the better-known alternative lens. Then it came out that Opteka was being sued for infringement because their lens was seen as a blatant copy to that other lens! The Opteka lens virtually disappeared from the market, but it is still manufactured and sold as an “unbranded” wide-angle macro that can be found on other markets like eBay for a little over $100:

Moving on. The next three pictures are of some of the arrivals to my porch lights. The first is a Celery Looper moth (Anagrapha falcifera), followed by a rather cool-looking moth called the Juniper-twig Geometer (Patalene olyzonaria). The third picture is a lovely leafhopper (Gyponana sp.).

The final picture shows an encounter with Jagged Ambush Bugs (Phymata pennsylvanica) that I had never seen before. These little insects are in the assassin bug family, but they are specialized sit-and-wait predators on flowers. It is well known that they can handle dangerous prey many times their size, and so I am frequently drawn to the flower garden in our backyard, in large part just to see what these weird little bugs might be up to. Here I was photographing a mating pair, where the female was meanwhile feeding on a small bee. That in itself was not at all unusual, but then a second male approached from across the flower. As the female was already engaged, as it were, the second male proceeded to also feed on the bee. The other two did not seem to mind:

Monday: Hili dialogue

November 9, 2026 • 6:45 am

Welcome to the start of another “work” week: Monday, November 9, 2026, and they’re already putting up Christmas decorations nearly two months in advance.  We’re not even at Thanksgiving yet!  It’s British Pudding Day, though, and the Brits make the best puddings (I’m referring to real puddings, not the generic British term for “dessert”). My favorite is sticky toffee pudding, especially with vanilla ice cream, as in this photo from the Wikipedia article:

From Sarah Steirch at Flickr

SIt’s also Carl Sagan Day (he was born on this day in 1934), National Fried Chicken Sandwich Day, National Greek Yogurt Day (cultural appropriation), and National Scrapple Day (I love the stuff).

Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this day by consulting the November 9 Wikipedia page.

Da Nooz:

*BREAKING NEWS: The Philadelphia bike ride against “Zionists” was a bust: Jews and their supporters lined the streets around the “Zionist” eateries, and, though nonviolent, the loud and numerous counter-protestors apparently prompted the protest to end early. More later.

*The NYT explains newly-elected Texas Senator James Talarico’s “progressive” Christianity (article archived here).

Mr. Talarico slew his own giant this week, ending decades of Republican control in Texas with a decisive win that carried multiple other Democrats in the state to victory. He did it in part by speaking easily and openly about how his Christian beliefs inform his politics, starting with the biblical command to love God and “love thy neighbor,” as the sign on his lectern read on Tuesday night.

He was one of many successful Democrats across the country who framed their politics in terms of their Christian faith. The Methodist pastor Adam Hamilton pulled off a similar upset in Kansas. Two ordained ministers, Sarah Trone Garriott and Lindsay James, flipped House seats for Democrats in Iowa.

. . . More than a quarter of adult Texans are self-described evangelicals. But the state is also home to progressive Protestants like Mr. Talarico, millions of Catholics, and politically active Black congregations, including one in Dallas whose pastor was elected to Congress as a Democrat this week.

. . . .In a town hall hosted by CNN in October, a voter from his hometown of Round Rock, Texas, pressed him “Christian to Christian” about provocative past statements like “God is nonbinary.”

“Do you believe that the Bible is the absolute source of truth and God’s final authoritative word, even when our culture says otherwise?” she asked.

“Yes,” Mr. Talarico answered.

The Bible was written by humans, is full of bad stuff, and is historically inaccurate, as well as leaving out a number of things (e.g, the existence of disease-causing microbes) that surely a beneficent God would have wanted us to know.  How could Talarico have possibly answered “yes” to that question? And where did he get the idea that “God is nonbinary”? Seriously, if he can believe stuff like this, can he be trusted to be absolutely rational in his political life?  A bit more:

This week, some in the state wondered if they were seeing the end of one era of Texas Christianity, and the beginning of another.

“If that form of conservative Christianity was going to die out, this is what it would look like,” said Joseph Locke, an historian at the University of North Texas and the author of a recent book about religion in the state.

“It would start with these isolated victories, and you could see the cracks forming,” he said.

Well, good riddance to evangelical Christianity, but I have to say that I’m dubious about someone that religious. I wouldn’t not vote for them just because of that, but I would think less of them.  People like Talarico are simply interpreting the Bible, which paints the picture of a not wholly admirable God, in light of their liberal politics. He’s forcing the words of the Bible into the Procrustean bed of his liberal political views.

*According to the Times of Israel (and other sources), Shin Bet, the Israeli internal security agency, is in the process of doing away with everyone it can identify as having participated in the October 7, 2023 massacre (Mossad had a similar mission to track down the Palestinian killers of the Israeli Olympic team in Munich in 1972).

As Israel continues to target Hamas operatives in Gaza, the Shin Bet security agency reportedly has been calling members of the terror group ahead of strikes, offering them a choice: Leave their homes and be killed alone, or be killed along with their family members.

The report published Thursday in the Arabic newspaper Asharq Al-Awsat stated that such incidents occurred at least five times in recent months, citing Palestinian sources familiar with the cases, which could not be independently verified.

The Shin Bet and Israel Defense Forces have not commented on the report, which came amid intensifying scrutiny over civilian killings in the Gaza Strip that Israeli officials say are a result of Hamas’s tactics to embed its fighters and weapons caches within civilian areas.

The report said Mohammad Alyan al-Bayouk, who was killed in an Israeli airstrike in Khan Younis on Wednesday, was on the roof of his home when he was targeted. Before the strike, he received a phone call from Shin Bet officers, who allegedly told him to choose between being hit alone on the roof and sparing his family, or staying inside.

Al-Bayouk, who the IDF on Friday identified as a member of Hamas’s elite Nukhba Force, chose to go up to the roof, where he was killed.

The military said al-Bayouk was one of four Hamas operative killed Wednesday in IDF strikes across southern Gaza. It named the other three operatives as Hammam Jaber al-Sayed Abu Labda, Mahmoud Abu Naameh and Mohammed Hamad Shariq Abu Sultan, who the IDF said were together at the time of the strike in Rafah.

Later Friday, the IDF confirmed it also killed two terror operatives on Thursday in central Gaza’s Nuseirat, including Ihab Jamil Abu Taqiya. The military said he was a Hamas commander involved in holding hostages taken during the October 7, 2023, invasion of southern Israel that sparked the Gaza war, including Raya Rotem, Hila Rotem Shoshani, Emily Hand, Ohad Ben Ami, Noa Argamani, Andrey Kozlov, Shlomi Ziv, Almog Meir Jan, Maxim Herkin, Yosef Haim Ohana, Segev Kalfon and Alex Lobanov.

The war against Hamas is not over, and will not be until they surrender and give up their weapons. Those involved in the October 7 attack must also face justice. But al-Bayouk was given a choice: die with his family or die alone.  If this was a genocidal war, he would not have been offered that alternative: the whole family would have been killed.

*Incoming “progreessive” Democrats want Chuck Schumer dumped as the likely Senate Majority leader, for he’s a symbol of the “old” politics.  But it looks as if Schumer is going to keep the job. First, from the Guardian:

Incoming Democratic senators want someone other than Chuck Schumer to become the next majority leader in the US Senate, although Schumer likely still has enough votes in his caucus to remain the top Democrat.

Annie Andrews, the Democratic senator-elect from South Carolina, told Fox News’s Bret Baier on Thursday that the Democratic party needs new leadership. When asked whether she would support Schumer’s leadership bid, she replied: “I still very much believe it’s time for generational change on both sides of the aisle.”

Adam Hamilton, the senator-elect from Kansas, told CNN on the campaign trail that he would not support Schumer as the party’s leader. Hamilton, the first Democrat to win a Kansas Senate seat in 94 years, had pitched himself as independent from the Democratic party.

Abdul El-Sayed, the senator-elect from Michigan, again declined to support Schumer as the majority leader on CNN on Thursday and said he wanted to consider other options.

Other incoming Democrats have also declined to support Schumer, including James Talarico, the senator-elect from Texas; Juliana Stratton, the senator-elect of Illinois; Chris Pappas, the senator-elect of New Hampshire; Peggy Flanagan, the senator-elect of Minnesota; and Troy Jackson, the senator-elect of Maine

Democratic voters have indicated they want newer and younger leadership in the party. Over the last two years, progressive Democrats have scored major victories in local and state elections.

It’s led some lawmakers to push for similar changes in decade-old leadership. Schumer, 75, has served as the Democrats’ leader in the Senate since 2017.

And here’s the NYT report Schumer will probably keep the job:

Last year, Democratic interest groups and voters berated Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the minority leader, for backing off a spending fight with President Trump rather than forcing a government shutdown early in his term.

Activists called for Mr. Schumer’s ouster. Some Democratic lawmakers seethed. Protesters jeered outside his Brooklyn home. The outcry reached such a pitch that he postponed public appearances to promote a new book he had written and hunkered down amid questions about whether he could continue as the Democratic leader.

Twenty months later and in the wake of a sweeping electoral victory he engineered and funded, Mr. Schumer’s aides say he has locked down another term in that post, having secured commitments of support from enough Democratic senators to be elected majority leader in a private vote scheduled for next month.

Senate Democrats have gained at least seven and potentially nine seats to capture the largest majority they have enjoyed since Barack Obama’s presidency.

None of it has quelled the outcry from the left against Mr. Schumer, 75, who was viewed favorably in a May New York Times/Siena poll by only about one-third of Democrats. Among Democrats in the Senate, there is still some resistance to his continuing at the top — including by some of the newly elected members — but no Democrat has emerged to challenge him.

I’m okay with Schumer, who has pushed through some important legislation when he was Majority Leader, and hasn’t made any notable gaffes. He’s a known quantity, surely helped promote the Democratic landslide, and it’s telling that the Republicans don’t like him because they see him as pushing the Democratic agenda. I’d just as soon have him stay on than risk him being replaced by a “progressive.”

*The WSJ names upcoming Democratic “stars” who won in the midterms and have the chance to run for President in two years.

Democrats have emerged from a resounding midterm victory with a deep bench and rising stars who have reinvigorated the party. But as they pivot to a 2028 presidential primary contest already informally under way, things could get messier.

Fresh faces helped Democrats swing deep-red states ahead of a primary that is expected to be among the most wide open in a generation for Democrats, with some candidates expected to announce their bids in the coming months.

With a sprawling field expected, the nomination race threatens to expose divisions unsettling Democrats: establishment vs. outsider, moderate vs. progressive, pro-Israel vs. Israel skeptics and youth vs. experience. And the party’s sweeping midterm success will allow for multiple interpretations of how it should move forward on politics and policy.

The “midterm stars” include James Talarico, Abdul El-Sayed, Bob Sand, and Jon Ossoff. I’ll highlight one in each category.

Sen. Jon Ossoff’s massive re-election victory this week—he won by 18 points in battleground Georgia—has spurred even more speculation about a presidential bid in 2028. Ossoff’s Sunday night rallies and viral short-form videos drove fundraising and attention—recall his reference to White House aide Natalie Harp. The senator has said he has “zero interest” in a presidential campaign. But if he changes his mind, he would be formidable.

It’s interesting that El-Sayed is not touted as a real candidate, but as a “valuable endorsement.” Doesn’t that depend on what he does in the next two years?

The “Obama/Biden alums” include Kamala Harris, Pete Buttiegieg, Rahm Emanuel, and New Orleans mayor Mitch Landrieu.  Mayor Pete has long been a favorite of mine:

Former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, a 2020 presidential candidate, was among the most in-demand surrogates in 2026 across the ideological spectrum, traveling to 38 states and campaigning for 102 candidates (so far, 90 have won). Buttigieg said in an interview that his midterm work was focused on “expanding the map and competing in more conservative places—it’s often about generational change—new people stepping up to make a difference.” Early polling has shown Buttigieg well-positioned in New Hampshire, slated to be the third state on the Democratic calendar.ble.

The governors include J. B. Pritzker, Gavin Newsom, Andy Beshear, Josh Shapiro, and Wes Moore. You can rule out Shapiro and Pritker because they’re Jewish. I like Pritker, though:

If he runs for president, Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker won’t have to aggressively court big-donor money. The billionaire, an heir to the Hyatt hotel fortune, won a third term on Tuesday and has invested hundreds of millions into his own campaigns. He used the midterms to make additional friends as a major party donor, giving Democrats and allied causes more than $38 million during the two-year election cycle, according to a person familiar with his giving. Pritzker rolled out a 75-page policy proposal the day after the election making suggestions to Congress.

Finally, the people on the hill include AOC, for whom I have no use (her big accomplishments are pushing herself forward on social media), Mark Kelly, Raphael Warnock, Ruben Gallego, Elissa Slotkin, Cory Booker, Chris Van Hollen and Ro Khanna. Slotkin is out because she’s a “Zionist” and several of these are too “progressive” for me.

Sen. Mark Kelly of Arizona campaigned in 23 states for Democrats during the midterm election cycle, his aides said, while helping raise more than $15 million for efforts to win back the majority. His military service and time as an astronaut—along with his advocacy work on gun safety alongside his wife, former Rep. Gabby Giffords, who survived a 2011 assassination attempt and mass shooting—would give him a unique role in any campaign.

But it’s early days, and we have a few years for a dark horse to emerge.

*Willie Nelson is 93, and despite his lifelong consumption of weed and other drugs, he’s still going strong. In fact, his autobiography, The Last Leaf (a great title, also with the subtitle: Reflections on Late-Life Creativity and My Longest Love Affair) comes out tomorrow.

In the book, Nelson looks back on his artistic journey, particularly within the last decade. Over the past 12 years, the prolific songwriter has created 21 studio albums and 50 new songs, and performed hundreds of live shows.

How does he do this? “Looking to the future as I look to the past,” Nelson writes in the book, per its synopsis. “I stay in the present.”

Nelson, however, also takes on mortality within the pages of The Last Leaf. The musician reflects on his “almost-certain death” during the COVID-19 pandemic — and how his wife, Annie D’Angelo, kept him grounded.

“The backbone of this book is a love story,” Nelson tells PEOPLE. “The heroine is my wife, Annie, who kept me alive when I was sure I was gone. COVID nearly got me. I was hurting so bad I wanted out. But Annie wouldn’t let me go. The years I’ve lived since then are because of Annie. And so is this book.”

, , , , Nelson has published several books over the last few years, including 2021’s Willie Nelson’s Letters to America, his 1988 autobiography Willie: An Autobiography and the 2022 memoir Me and Paul: Untold Stories of a Fabled Friendship. Nelson and his wife collaborated on 2024’s Willie and Annie Nelson’s Cannabis Cookbook.

The Last Leaf, however, showcases Nelson’s current mindset — and the joys within.

“In every great book, at least ideally, the last chapter is the best chapter,” the book’s synopsis reads. “The Last Leaf shows how true that can be.”

You’ll realize how long Nelson’s been around when you remember that he wrote “Crazy” for Patsy Cline—perhaps his best song and surely her most famous song. But I’ve put my own favorite Willie song below, one appropriate for this book.

Click on the cover below to go to its Amazon link:

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Hili rests beneath a pear tree. But Andrzej republished a Hili dialogue from 2018 on his Facebook page:

Hili: If you’ve been looking for me, here I am.
Me: Really?

*******************

From Stacy:

From Terrible Maps; Paraguat is the only exception in the world (see below):

Here’s the flag (from reddit Vexillology):

From Beth on Facebook:

From Masih: Iran has once again hanged three young and innocent protestors: three this time.

From Luana, an oldie but goodie from The Onion:

From Bryan. Here, in an interview, Eminem tells us that the word “orange,” long said to have no rhymes, can, with some rapper’s latitude, actually be made to rhyme:

From Malcolm, a remarkable video of Buffalo Bill Cody communicating with a Lakota Chief who was his friend:

One from my feed: how to peacefully disarm a boycott by haters.  This is lovely—from yesterday’s Philadelphia “Boycott of Zionists”

One I reposted from The Auschwitz Memorial. This one remembers the November pogrom by the Nazis, which included Kristallnacht:

And two from Dr. Cobb. First, a rolling orang:

Orangutan just rolling through life: #AGoodPlaceSource: http://www.reddit.com/r/NatureIsFu…

— Michelle says: Be kind. Always. ❤️ (@snarkysillysad.bsky.social) 2026-11-08T11:56:07.125Z

And look at all these rays!:

Underwater footage of the massive Cownose Ray gathering near Tampa, Florida this year. The camera is attached to a long carbon fiber pole, which is in turn connected to a drone with rope. The pole eliminates the possibility of a ray getting caught in the rope. #nature #animals #naturephotography

— See Through Canoe (@seethroughcanoe.bsky.social) 2026-11-08T14:11:58.327Z

.

***************************

Music: Here’s Willie singing “September Song“, written by Kurt Weill and Maxwell Anderson, and released in 1938.  I think it’s the best version, for his voice is incredibly plaintive and it’s appropriate, as the object of the song could be his beloved wife.

“Zionist” = “Jew”

November 8, 2026 • 10:00 am

What I want to emphasize here, and what I’d like rational people to consider, is that the word “Zionist” has become a euphemism for “Jew”: a way to normalize Jew hatred while pretending to promote an unbiased political or ideological view.  Likewise, I would suggest that instead of using the term “anti-Zionist,” we use the term “antisemite” or “Jew hater.”

There was a time when Jews did debate whether there should be a Jewish state, but that was before the UN voted 33-13 (10 abstentions) to create a Jewish state—as well as an Arab state and an “international zone” for Jerusalem. Note that instead of accepting an Arab state (the Jews accepted Israel), the Arab League rejected the plan, just as Arabs have rejected a Palestinian state several times since. Instead five Arab states attacked Israel the day before the state was to declare independence, trying to wipe out the Jews. Instead, the Arabs lost.

Arabs and Palestinians have never accepted this loss (it’s exemplified in the word “Nakba”, meaning “the catastrophe”), and, as Adi Schwartz and Einat Wilf have emphasized, these opponents have since demanded the “right of return” of displaced Arabs and their descendants, a tactic envisioned to wipe out Israel. (Note that the Arabs left the Jewish state in 1948 because Arabs fighting Jews were expelled, while most of them left under orders of Arab states, who thought they’d win the war but wanted Arab residents temporarily out of the way while they conquered Israel.)

But I digress.  There are two reasons why the term “Zionist” is both inappropriate and confusing.

A. The first I’ve mentioned before. The vast majority of Jews are Zionists in the sense I and many others use: “those who believe that the state of Israel has a right to exist as a place where Jews can exercise self-determination.” (Of course the 20% of Israelis who are Arabs also participate in this self determination.) Although many Jews don’t characterize themselves as “Zionists” (see below), As the Jewish Democratic Council of America notes,

“A study released by the Jewish Federations of North America (JFNA) found that only 37% of American Jews today identify as Zionists, while 86% believe that Israel has a right to exist as a Jewish state. Zionism means different things to different people, and – when considering what it means to be “pro-Israel” in 2026 – we should focus less on labels and more on values.”

And those are American Jews. I suspect that close to 100% of Israeli Jews think Israel has a right to exist.

The confusion about what Zionism means is one reason why “Zionist” has become synonymous with “Jew”. When the many people who go after Jews make their verbal or physical attacks (as they are doing in Philadelphia today), they don’t ask the objects of their ire if they favor the existence of a Jewish state, nor do they ask them if they self-identify as “Zionists.”  No, they simply target Jews, but call them “Zionists” because it’s more acceptable. Seriously, though do you think these people even care whether a Jew supports the existence of Israel? If they did, they wouldn’t be attacking schools or businesses just because they are Jewish, or committing physical hate crimes against random Jews on the street.

The reason the term “Zionist” is used, as it is in today’s Philadelphia Bike Boycott, is because it’s a way to say “Jew” without seeming to be antisemitic. Below is the poster for today’s demonstration. Note that it names the businesses to be boycotted as “Zionist establishments,” though at least two and probably three of the six restaurants have not explicitly said they are “Zionists”. The thing these eateries have in common is not that they’re owned by “Zionists,” but that they’re owned by Jews. The bikers are simply Jew haters, which has been implied by people ranging from the governor of Pennsylvania to the mayor of Philadelphia.

B. Second, there are plenty of Zionists who are not Jewish—people of other backgrounds who nevertheless think that Israel has a right to exist as a self-determining Jewish state.  If you’re going to go after “Zionists” in that sense, well, you should be going after these people, too:

Winston Churchill
Harry Truman
Justin Trudeau
Boris Johnson
Douglas Murray
Mike Huckabee
Nikki Haley
Ritchie Torres
Marco Rubio
Ayaan Hirsi Ali
Bassam Eid
Jon Voigt
John Fetterman

I could go on and on, because the West is full of people who are “Zionists” in the sense above, aligning with the views of 86% of American Jews. I suspect many of the non-Jewish readers here also hold that view. Bloody Zionists all! Boycott them!

Note that “Zionist” in the sense I mean above does not mean you agree with Israeli government policies or, in particular, with Benjamin Netanyahu. The equation of “Zionist” with “supporter of Israeli government policies” is one of the big deliberate lies that opponents of Israel bandy about.

It’s time to start calling out people who use the word “Zionist” to characterize their opponents.  Stand up to them and say that they are really “antisemites” or “Jew haters”.  The state of Israel is already in existence, and it’s nonsensical to push for the retraction of that UN decision,

Finally, I asked Grok the question at hand, and here’s its answer (indented):

My question: Does “Zionist” in today’s political discourse really mean “Jew”?
Grok’s answer:

No, not literally or always — but in large parts of today’s political discourse, especially activist, campus, and online left-leaning spaces, it frequently functions as a euphemism, dogwhistle, or code word for “Jew.”

Definitions matter (Zionism is the Jewish national movement for self-determination in the historic Jewish homeland (the Land of Israel). Its core modern form holds that Jews, as a people, have the right to a sovereign state — the same principle applied to many other groups. It is a political/national ideology, not identical to Jewish ethnicity or religion.

  • Not every Jew is a Zionist (small minorities of ultra-Orthodox groups like Neturei Karta and some secular leftists reject it).
  • Not every Zionist is Jewish (there are Christian and other non-Jewish Zionists).

In principle, one can criticize Israeli government policies without rejecting the existence of a Jewish state. The IHRA working definition of antisemitism (widely adopted, including by the U.S. State Department) distinguishes ordinary criticism of Israel from antisemitism, while listing as examples denying the Jewish people the right to self-determination (e.g., claiming the existence of Israel is a racist endeavor) and applying double standards.

How the word is actually used. In practice, “Zionist” is often deployed far more broadly and pejoratively:

  • As a slur or exclusionary label (“Zionists not allowed,” “Death to Zionists,” signs equating Zionism with racism or Nazism).
  • As a substitute in classic antisemitic tropes: “Zionists control the media/government/banks,” dual loyalty, bloodthirstiness, or collective blame for Israeli actions (or global ills).
  • On campuses, in protests, and online, hostility is directed at “Zionists” in ways that track Jewish people, Jewish institutions, or anyone with a connection to Israel — while speakers insist they only oppose an “ideology.”

Jewish organizations (ADL, AJC, CST) and others document this pattern. The term has long been used this way by far-right figures (e.g., David Duke) and has been widely adopted in some progressive and anti-Israel activist circles, especially since October 7, 2023. A common diagnostic: replace “Zionist” with “Jew” in a statement — if it becomes clearly bigoted, the original was likely antisemitic.

Martin Luther King Jr. is often quoted (from a 1967 conversation) observing that criticism of “Zionists” in that context meant Jews and amounted to antisemitism. NYU’s conduct guidance has noted that “Zionist” can function as a code word targeting Jews.

The polling gap reveals the issueRecent data show a mismatch between the label and the substance:

  • A 2025 Jewish Federations of North America (JFNA) survey found only about 37% of American Jews identify as “Zionist.” Yet 88% affirm that Israel has the right to exist as a Jewish, democratic state. Self-identified anti-Zionists are a small minority (~7% overall, higher among the youngest adults). Many avoid the label because opponents have redefined “Zionism” to mean uncritical support for every Israeli policy or something extreme.
  • Earlier surveys (e.g., JPPI) showed higher self-identification with the term or support for its content. In Israel, large majorities of Jews identify as Zionists.

This gap exists because the word has been successfully pejorativized in some milieus. The substance of basic Zionism — Jewish self-determination — remains mainstream among Jews. Targeting “Zionists” therefore lands on the overwhelming majority of the Jewish people while offering deniability.