“Behold. The festering carcass of American rot shoved into an ill-fitting suit: the sleaze of a conman, the cowardice of a draft dodger, the gluttony of a parasite, the racism of a Klansman, the sexism of a back-alley creep, the ignorance of a bar-stool drunk, and the greed of a hedge-fund ghoul - all spray-painted orange and paraded like a prize hog at a county fair. Not a president. Not even a man. Just the diseased distillation of everything this country swears it isn't but always has been - arrogance dressed up as exceptionalism, stupidity passed off as common sense, cruelty sold as toughness, greed exalted as ambition, and corruption worshipped like gospel. It is America's shadow made flesh, a rotting pumpkin idol proving that when a nation kneels before money, power, and spite, it doesn't just lose its soul - it shits out this bloated obscenity and calls it a leader.”

― Oliver Kornetzke

Oliver Kornetzke

 

Suppressed Histories Archives

16h  ·

"250 years. Two hundred and fifty fucking years of the most powerful, most resourced, most theoretically capable nation in the history of human civilization and here is what we have to show for it.

Forty million people on food stamps, thirty million without health insurance, the highest maternal mortality rate in the developed world, the highest incarceration rate on earth, an opioid crisis that has killed over half a million people and counting, a housing market so broken that working people cannot afford to live in the cities they work in, an education system that buries young people in debt before they earn their first dollar, infrastructure that is literally collapsing, a life expectancy that is going backwards, a political system so thoroughly purchased by concentrated wealth that the laws it produces bear almost no relationship to what the public actually wants or needs, a working class that has not seen meaningful real wage growth in thirty years, a mental health crisis so severe we normalized it, a gun violence epidemic so routine we don’t even act when preschoolers are slaughtered, and a climate hurtling toward catastrophe while the people paid to address it collect checks from the industry causing it.

Two hundred and fifty years of that. And to celebrate, we built a wrestling arena on the White House lawn.

Not a hospital, or a school, or a housing development. Not a single fucking thing that addresses a single goddamn item on the list above. A wrestling arena. With cranes and pyrotechnics and a steel arch that probably cost more than the annual budget of three rural counties combined, erected in front of the building where Lincoln and Roosevelt and every president who ever tried to make any of this mean something once lived and worked and in some cases died trying.

Truthfully, this is not a departure from American values. This is the fullest possible expression of them. Because this is what we chose. Every single time the choice was presented.

We built a culture where a football coach makes forty times what a physics professor makes and then express genuine bewilderment at the outcomes. Where a reality television star becomes president and a school district cuts its art program in the same fiscal year. Where children know every statistic of every player on their favorite sport team and cannot locate their own country on a map. Where scientific consensus on vaccines, climate, evolution, and basic nutrition gets weighed against a Facebook post and the Facebook post wins at the dinner table. Where the school that wins the state championship gets a parade and the school that produces a Nobel laureate gets a budget cut.

We chose the bomber over the teacher. The tank over the clinic. The aircraft carrier over the water treatment plant. We spend more on military than the next ten countries combined, including our allies, while veterans sleep on the streets of the cities they came back to. We built the most expensive killing apparatus in human history and then told the nurse she made too much money. We sent young men to die in wars that made defense contractors rich and called it freedom and put a yellow ribbon magnet on the back of the car and called that support. We made the soldier and the police officer into sacred untouchable symbols of national identity and then cut their benefits, denied their PTSD claims, let them die waiting for VA appointments, and sent them back for third and fourth tours because it was cheaper than taking care of them when they came home. We worshipped the uniform and neglected the human inside it because the uniform is a symbol and symbols are cheaper than healthcare and housing and the therapy that would actually help. We built bases in a hundred and fifty countries and could not build enough affordable housing in fifty states. We funded a military budget that could have ended homelessness and medical debt and student debt several times over and we did it with bipartisan enthusiasm and called the people who questioned it unserious.

We chose entertainment over education so many times and for so long and at every available level of society that we forgot there was a distinction worth making. Spectacle over substance, performance over policy, the aesthetics of greatness in place of the actual thing, and the feeling of winning instead of asking what was being won and who was paying for it and what it would cost the people who came next.

Rome had bread and circuses. We Americans have food stamps and a wrestling ring outside the Oval Office.

250 years. This is what we built. This is what we chose. This is what we are celebrating. And the most perfectly, catastrophically, irreducibly American thing about all of it is that anyone pointing at this image and asking what it means will be called unpatriotic by people watching it on a television they bought on credit they cannot afford to pay back, rooting for a sport they cannot explain, in a country they cannot describe, celebrating a birthday they cannot contextualize, for a nation that has spent two and a half centuries confusing the noise it makes with the work it never did, all while claiming to be the greatest country on Earth.

Happy Birthday America! You have never looked more like yourself!"

—Oliver Kornetzke

Happy Fucking Birthday An exhausted America turns two hundred and fifty by Christopher Hooks

 https://harpers.org/archive/2026/07/happy-fucking-birthday-christopher-hooks-semiquincentennial/

 

How Black Tea Can Benefit Your Health

Flavonoids in black tea are good for your health, helping prevent strokes and heart disease

There are good reasons why black tea is one of the world’s most popular beverages, second only to water. It’s soothing to sip a cup of hot tea. And there’s nothing like a glass of iced tea to make a sweltering summer day more bearable. Black tea also has many health benefits.

Is black tea good for you?

Tea drinking dates back to the third century. And yes, your ancestors knew what they were doing when they simmered black tea leaves over a fire. “Black tea is rich in flavonoids,” says registered dietitian Kayla Kopp, RD, LD. “These plant chemicals are good for you.”

Health benefits of black tea

Black, green, oolong and white tea all come from the Camellia sinensis plant. These teas differ from herbal teas, which are made from dried herbs, spices or the leaves of other plants. Whether you prefer traditional black tea or something different, all teas can be healthy.

Kopp shares three health benefits of drinking black tea.

1. Fights inflammation and illness

Black tea is packed with flavonoids (a kind of polyphenol). These plant chemicals act as antioxidants to minimize damage from free radicals. “Your body makes free radicals, a type of molecule, in response to normal cell function. Free radicals also enter your body from the environment,” explains Kopp. “These unstable molecules can build up in cells and damage them.” Cell damage can cause chronic inflammation that contributes to heart disease, cancer and other conditions. Antioxidants “partner” with free radicals and keep them in check.

Antioxidants are also important for a healthy immune system. Your immune system helps your body fight viruses, bacteria and infections.

2. Improves cardiovascular health

Theaflavins, a type of flavonoid, give black tea its dark color. One study found that theaflavins may help lower cholesterol levels by reducing how much cholesterol your digestive system absorbs.

Black tea is also high in a flavanol (a type of flavonoid) called quercetin. Another study found that people who had a diet high in quercetin and other flavanols were less likely to experience a stroke.

The flavanols may improve cardiovascular health by keeping blood vessels open and flexible. This also explains the results of another study that showed how drinking three cups of black tea every day for six months may help control blood pressure.

In the U.S., tea is the most common source of flavanols. You can also get them by eating more onions and apples. In England, where afternoon tea is a tradition, researchers found that people who drank at least two cups of tea each day were less likely to die from heart disease or stroke than non-tea drinkers.

3. Peps you up

An 8-ounce glass of black tea has about 47 milligrams of caffeine. “Caffeine is a stimulant, which is helpful if you need more energy to get through the day,” says Kopp. But too much caffeine — especially close to bedtime — can make it harder to fall and stay asleep. Kopp also recommends avoiding caffeine if you experience high blood pressure.

You can also become dependent on caffeine, which is why you may have headaches or feel cranky when you don’t get your daily cup (or cups). Because black tea has about half the caffeine of coffee, it can be a good option if you’re trying to cut back on caffeine.

Due to caffeine’s stimulating effects, people who are pregnant or breastfeeding should limit their caffeine intake to no more than 200 milligrams a day. And experts recommend that children under 12 have no caffeine.

Potential health risks of black tea

Although black tea is generally safe to drink, some people may need to limit or avoid it due to potential health risks. In some instances, black tea can increase your risk of:

Kidney stones

People prone to kidney stones or at risk for chronic kidney disease may need to watch how much tea they drink due to black tea’s high levels of oxalates. This organic acid binds together minerals, such as calcium, which can cause kidney stones to form.

Esophageal cancer

One study found that regularly drinking three or more mugs of piping hot tea (above 140 degrees Fahrenheit or 60 degrees Celsius) can damage the lining of the esophagus (your food pipe). This damage increases your risk of esophageal cancer.

How much black tea should you drink?

Three seems to be the magic number when it comes to how many cups of tea to drink each day for good health. To get antioxidant benefits, stick to black, green, oolong or white tea made from the Camellia sinensis plant. You can also try kombucha, a fermented black tea that contains probiotics.

Herbal teas offer different benefits, like chamomile for sleep, ginger for upset tummies, and peppermint for nasal congestion and colds. Hibiscus tea also has several health benefits.

Should you add milk or honey to black tea?

Whether you like your tea on ice or steaming (remember, not too hot!), go light on extras like milk, sugar and honey. “Too much sugar in your diet can increase your risk of obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure and heart disease,” cautions Kopp.

A splash of milk in your tea adds a small number of calories (and, depending on the dairy type, some fat). More importantly, research shows that milk lowers antioxidant levels in tea. “It appears that flavonoids bind to protein in milk, reducing the protective benefits of antioxidants,” she adds.

Skim milk seems to lower antioxidant levels in tea the most. So, if you must add milk, opt for whole or reduced fat. Or try a lower-protein milk alternative like almond or oat milk. If you’ve always been a black tea drinker, keep enjoying those healthy cups of antioxidants. And if you haven’t been, now you have a new, healthful and refreshing drink to add to your diet.

The Red Hand Files ISSUE #370 / JUNE 2026

Back then I thought I was remaking the world, tearing down the old and erecting something new in its place. That unwavering self-belief was electric. There was a terrifying vitality that poured out of me, that beautifully dynamic and deluded incandescent force of youth. I truly believed I was reinventing everything.

Over time, that fiery intensity ebbed away, and I realised that the past wasn't something to discard but to respect. I began to approach the creative process with greater humility, recognising that although we draw on the wisdom of the ages, these enduring themes could be filtered through our own individual nature, allowing us to create something distinct, even if not entirely new. Nick Cave RED HAND FILES

a Long Winter Coat, a Magnet and a Cast Iron Dutch Oven

 Treasures I found today walking out my door.

The first act of insight is throw away the labels. In fiction, while we do not necessarily write about ourselves, we write out of ourselves, using ourselves; what we learn from, what we are sensitive to, what we feel strongly about — these become our characters and go to make our plots. Characters in fiction are conceived from within, and they have, accordingly, their own interior life; they are individuals every time.

EUDORA WELTY

Postnasal Drip: Can It Really Make You Queasy? YES

 https://health.clevelandclinic.org/postnasal-drip-can-it-really-make-you-queasy

Allergy Medications

• Antihistamines: Over-the-counter options (like Claritin, Zyrtec, or Allegra) block the histamines driving your mucus production.
• Nasal Steroid Sprays: Sprays like Flonase or Nasacort reduce inflammation in the nasal passages.
• Decongestants: Medications like pseudoephedrine can dry up mucus, but use them cautiously as they can sometimes cause a jittery, upset stomach in certain individuals. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]

Advice? I don’t have advice. Stop aspiring and start writing. If you’re writing, you’re a writer. Write like you’re a goddamn death row inmate and the governor is out of the country and there’s no chance for a pardon. Write like you’re clinging to the edge of a cliff, white knuckles, on your last breath, and you’ve got just one last thing to say, like you’re a bird flying over us and you can see everything, and please, for God’s sake, tell us something that will save us from ourselves. Take a deep breath and tell us your deepest, darkest secret, so we can wipe our brow and know that we’re not alone. Write like you have a message from the king. Or don’t. Who knows, maybe you’re one of the lucky ones who doesn’t have to.

ALAN WATTS

Mint Honey Lime Beverage

 https://www.sustainablecooks.com/clvirgin-mojito-recipe/

How to Make Southern-Style Honey Sweet Tea

Whip up a classic, half-gallon batch of sweet honey iced tea at home with this simple recipe: [1]

1. Brew the Tea: Bring 4 cups of water to a near boil and steep 4–5 black tea bags (such as Luzianne) for 10–15 minutes.
2. Add the Honey: Remove the tea bags and stir in \(\frac{1}{3}\) to \(\frac{1}{2}\) cup of raw honey while the tea is still warm so it dissolves completely.
3. Chill: Pour the mixture into a large pitcher, add 4 cups of cold water, and refrigerate until chilled. Serve over ice with lemon slices or fresh mint.
   Tip: Clover honey is an excellent all-around choice since it provides sweetness without overpowering the tea's natural flavor profile. [1, 2, 3, 4]

 

Amish Noodle Cutter: Lehman's Hardware

 

The Breath of Sacred Africa: Powerful African Choir Experience | Ubuntu Rising Song

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R7Xs1LXFC_U

Happiness is different from pleasure. Happiness has something to do with struggling and enduring and accomplishing. George A. Sheehan

Aqua Dance

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4JHbCMixlfM&t=59s

Hot Weather

Extended Forecast for

Woonsocket RI

• Today

  

  High: 83 °F

  Patchy Fog
  then Chance
  Showers

• Tonight

  

  Low: 60 °F

  Partly Cloudy
  then Patchy
  Fog

• Monday

  

  High: 86 °F

  Becoming
  Sunny

• Monday Night

  

  Low: 62 °F

  Partly Cloudy

• Tuesday

  

  High: 88 °F

  Mostly Sunny

• Tuesday Night

  

  Low: 66 °F

  Chance
  Showers

• Wednesday

  

  High: 95 °F

  Hot

• Wednesday Night

  

  Low: 73 °F

  Mostly Clear

• Thursday

  

  High: 101 °F

  Hot

Detailed Forecast

Today

A chance of showers, mainly after 3pm. Patchy fog before 9am. Otherwise, cloudy, then gradually becoming mostly sunny, with a high near 83. Calm wind. Chance of precipitation is 30%. New precipitation amounts between a tenth and quarter of an inch possible.

Tonight

Patchy fog after 5am. Otherwise, partly cloudy, with a low around 60. South wind around 5 mph becoming calm in the evening.

Monday

Partly sunny, then gradually becoming sunny, with a high near 86. Calm wind becoming northeast around 5 mph in the afternoon.

Monday Night

Partly cloudy, with a low around 62. Southwest wind 3 to 5 mph.

Tuesday

Mostly sunny, with a high near 88. Light southwest wind increasing to 5 to 10 mph in the morning.

Tuesday Night

A chance of showers and thunderstorms, mainly after 9pm. Mostly cloudy, with a low around 66. Southwest wind around 8 mph. Chance of precipitation is 30%.

Wednesday

Mostly sunny and hot, with a high near 95. Southwest wind 7 to 9 mph.

Wednesday Night

Mostly clear, with a low around 73. Southwest wind 3 to 7 mph.

Thursday

Sunny and hot, with a high near 101. West wind 5 to 9 mph.

Thursday Night

Mostly clear, with a low around 76. West wind 3 to 5 mph.

Friday

Sunny and hot, with a high near 100. Northwest wind 3 to 8 mph.

Friday Night

Partly cloudy, with a low around 72. Northwest wind around 5 mph becoming calm in the evening.

Independence Day

A chance of showers and thunderstorms. Partly sunny and hot, with a high near 93. Calm wind becoming northeast 5 to 7 mph in the afternoon. Chance of precipitation is 40%.

Love this piece: Even in utter darkness, I have my breath and my body. My body is my anchor. My breath is a beacon I’ve learned to trust even in uncertainty. When a whirlwind moves around me, even when the ground beneath my feet dissolves and I’m suspended in air with nowhere to rest, I have a stillness that allows me to observe. It doesn’t make the threshold less frightening. But it makes it crossable.

 https://gabrielbarsawme.substack.com/p/the-door-is-open

E. Wedel 80 Percent Cocoa

 

The Playlist for my Dance Class: Dames and Dudes Dolphin Dance

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8qOA9dtTkBQ  emotional detox

peter paul mary blowing in the wind 

brave combo

dylan blowing in the wind 

neil young

bizet carnen

verdi la traviata

 mozart

david bowie Heroes

rolling stones Start me Up

ry cooder buena vista social club

paul simon graceland 

 marvin gaye i heard it through the grapevine

 sukay

micheal triona

will the circle be unbroken

chubby checker let's twist https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eh8eb_ACLl8 

Willie Nelson  Highwaymen https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nOWjX4BpC24  

the Beatles good day sunshine, Maxwell's silver hammer Penny Lane

Stevie Ray Vaughn

Brian Ferry 

bonnie Raitt Dolly Parton Linda Rondstat

Willie Nelson Khris Kristofferson Rita Coolidge Cher Tina Turner Aretha Franklin

Mahalia Jackson

BBKing

Buddy Guy 

https://youtu.be/JoUb9OUNiek?list=RDJoUb9OUNiek blues 

Dance with Annette Funicello https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AtSA8cQXsu4 

Sufi Dance FLOW Music https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GCddgxadfzs

La Traviata https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ejUcekC2giQ 

Neil Young a little love and affection 

https://www.youtube.com/watch v=qgDESXM2XMk&list=RDqgDESXM2XMk&start_radio=1&t=5425s  

Crosby Stills and Nash https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dfheqbqoGGg&list=RDqgDESXM2XMk&index=10  

Judy Collins

Dory Previn Michael Michael https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W5vQYC60ChE&list=RDW5vQYC60ChE&start_radio=1 

Beware of young Girls https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qnxdpkLOSy0  

Big Mam Thornton https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lFnex9jIe6U&list=RDlFnex9jIe6U&start_radio=1   

Chapman https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OsF9cU_SnY8&list=RDOsF9cU_SnY8&start_radio=1&t=2423s

 Harry Chapin

Jefferson Airplane

Heroes David Bowie

Muddy Waters https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dhFfJOWPzBQ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MOWXB_3bOF8&list=RDMOWXB_3bOF8&start_radio=1 memphis minnie muddy waters 

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O5APc0z49wg OKLAHOMA

 

 

 

Behind the complicated details of the world stand the simplicities: God is good, the grown-up man or woman knows the answer to every question, there is such a thing as truth, and justice is as measured and faultless as a clock. Our heroes are simple: they are brave, they tell the truth, they are good swordsmen and they are never in the long run really defeated. That is why no later books satisfy us like those which were read to us in childhood—for those promised a world of great simplicity of which we knew the rules, but the later books are complicated and contradictory with experience; they are formed out of our own disappointing memories.

GRAHAM GREENE