Chechnyans Really? Wow. I thought they were mad at Russia. 19 and 26 and one's dead so far. Stupid, hateful bastards. Good riddance. Alas, poor Chechnya, you cannot ask for sympathy ever, past, present, or future, if this is what you export.

Cruel Leaving aside for the moment that it is probably inappropriate to the event, but how cruel to set off a bomb at the Boston Marathon, and to have it go off four hours into the event. This is when the most ordinary people would have been coming through, people like me, in fact. It's so deliberately targeted at being mean. I am reminded of the Swedish killer, Brevik, who went after children in the same way. In this case, I am left at the moment to wonder what the motivation was, what could possess someone to do this, and this way Annoyed, of course, at the media, who seem intent, post-Benghazi, at scoring points on who calls something "terrorism" first. This is obviously terrorism, regardless of motive, or whatever else unfolds in relation to it. Nevertheless, when officials use the term they have a specific meaning in mind, which the media are ignoring just so they can point fingers, or, even better, get politicians to do it for them, generating more acrimony, more noise, more "news". Shame. Annoyed, too, at the inevitable politicians who will use this to deny that gun control is still a problem. It is; it's separate; deal with it - and this, too. Very sad for the injured and the killed and their families. Heartfelt condolences and sympathy.

Part of the Family Annette Funicello was a regular presence in our house, on television, that is, and is better remembered than any of her fellow Mouseketeers. She died tough, though, developing MS and living for 25 years with the degenerative disease. Her charity will continue, and leave a more lasting legacy than her television shows or films, but there are still some heartbroken boys remembering a first crush out there, I’ll bet.

Thatching I don’t want to celebrate anyone’s death, except maybe a few people’s, and Margaret Thatcher had only a minimal direct effect on anything I experienced during her period as Prime Minister, so, too bad, so sad, and let’s all move on. Nevertheless, I was in England in that period, and I remember the society I encountered, a concept she denigrated and did all she could to despoil. It was a very troubled time, much more oppressive than a free society would be expected to be, although you also need to keep in mind the IRA, whose activities certainly weren’t helping. (But Bobby Sands, remember, too.) There’s a reason, more than just the excesses of “prog rock,” that we got punk music there and that it went the way it did, with its hard political edge. We got that in the States, too, although remember we also had St. Ronnie. I had no regard for Ronald Reagan, and insofar as his regime and hers fed into the triumphalism of each other, allowing them greater leeway in crushing unions and demonising the poor, that’s a big part of how I will remember Thatcher, right there in the same special circle of hell occupied by the Gipper. Not that I expect them to languish there alone for long. No small part of Clinton’s policies was all that dissimilar from Reagan’s, nor Blair’s from Thatcher’s. In fact, they could not have enacted the “reforms” they did without Reagan and Thatcher having been so successful in wearing down the opposition. It’s a great shame to all of us in democratic countries that we haven’t been able to develop the political will to truly stand in opposition to the kinds of policies Thatcherism represents. We have yet to see, in the US or Britain or Australia, a national government devoted to uplifting its citizens. We seem endlessly to play at “culture wars”, pitting rich against poor, a game only the rich can win, which seems the intent. Daughter of a shopkeeper, Thatcher betrayed her class, when she could have made things better.

Boom I really can’t figure out North Korea. Throwing missiles around, let alone nukes, isn’t going to make them any friends, let alone reunite them with their prosperous southern cousins. The whole Kim dynasty thing is mysterious, too. Could the latest in the succession actually be the real power, or is this the military throwing up a façade? I don’t believe the they’ve got intercontinental ballistic missiles, but they seem to have rockets capable of hitting Japan, Russia, South Korea, even Indonesia, and possibly Hawaii, Alaska, and northern Australia. (Poor Darwin; last time it was Imperial Japan.) I’m similarly sceptical of their nuclear capabilities. Even assuming the actually do have the bomb, it doesn’t seem they’ve achieved the degree of miniaturisation required to stick one on the end of missile and launch it anywhere, which puts South Korea at risk, still, but fewer other places within their range otherwise. So what do they want? Well, they’re starving over there, and freezing, in winter (except, maybe, the military, who at least appear to have warm coats), so maybe they want a war, one they can lose. Losing a war isn’t the same as saying, hey, look, this whole business since the 1950’s was a mistake, so we’re going to change it up and see if the South will have us back now, so we can have jobs and fuel and food again, sorry. That’d be a loss of face. But losing a war, that lets you bluster along pretty nicely, all in all, except if you get hanged, or shot, or otherwise killed. Look at the collapse of Yugoslavia. The leadership over there did quite well for a very long time. And there’s always exile. Some murderous monsters managed to live peacefully and comfortably elsewhere in the world for many years after they lost their jobs. That might be a little harder to get away with if you throw nukes, but less so otherwise. I’ll bet Pakistan would take in a couple of Kims, although it might not be quite the safe haven these days that it might have once been, given how the U.S. managed to fly in and zap bin Laden. Maybe not. Could be this is just a little more of their usual bluster, trying to get the rest of the world to agree to food donations and fuel oil shipments and so forth in exchange for them stepping back from the line they’re threatening to cross. It’d be a loss of face, too, to ask for help, so getting it offered and accepting it, reluctantly, means they get to goose-step through the streets but go home to a bowl of rice instead of eating grass. Are they really all that crazy? Are there none who question their leaders? No Winston Smiths? It’s decades of propaganda, control, and punishment. It’s possible. It’s terribly sad.

61% What do I know? I'm not even in the census anymore.

Straight Up We hit the Enmore Theatre on Sunday to see Tedeschi Trucks, on the basis of their recent live recording CD, which includes some find blues singing from Susan Tedeschi and some very flash guitar from her husband, Derek Trucks. We had fun, but wondered at the stage configuration and sometimes lack of engagement from the performers, although there's a lot to be said for musicians that just get on with playing instead of capering. The music is pretty much just straight-up rock 'n' roll, which is no bad thing, and they concentrate hard on getting it done. The two drum kits were maybe overkill, but as one of the few live performances I've seen where that configuration is at work, I did get at least an inkling as to why you'd bother. Tedeschi Trucks were supported by Trombone Shorty, a New Orleans-inflected funk band, definitely worth checking out. I may have to hit the record stores to secure a copy, especially with the guest line-up.

Control vs. Out of Control The NRA solution to gun violence in schools is more guns. They have, over the years, prevented any scientific study of gun violence, but will categorically assert that the reason there are shooting at schools is because they are designated gun-free zones and therefore attractive to anyone with a gun and a grudge or whatever other motivation they may have to go shoot someone. This is a false narrative, of course, as many mass shootings occur in areas with no such designation. The idea that the “good guy with a gun” is an effective disincentive to deranged killers fails to note the “deranged” component of the equation, not to mention also that even trained individuals are shooting themselves and others regularly, as well as losing their guns from their cars, homes, offices, etc., although these things don’t get reported on a national level. How many times have we read of some idiot teaching his dog to retrieve guns who ends up getting shot by Fido? You won’t find it in the New York Times, but in your local paper you may very well. Check your police blotter, if your paper publishes one. Such stories are often treated as humorous exceptions, but they add up and they mean that people with guns are dangerous to themselves and others, regardless of whether they are themselves criminals. It is sensible in a country with millions of guns that those weapons should be regulated, like the militias they were meant, 200 years ago (when there were also a lot more dangerous animals in close proximity to humans, and when feeding your family required some deer to supplement what you could grow yourself), to empower against tyranny. How the NRA became the bastion of murder instead of an amateurs’ society devoted to actually keeping people safe around guns I cannot understand, just as I cannot understand how what is actually such a marginal group can wield such disproportionate political power. Well, that last point I think is probably attributable more to the lack of courage our politicians routinely exhibit than to any actual power the NRA may have, although they do have far too much money for advertising than is good for the country, clearly. Keep writing to and calling your representatives in Congress. We have to fight these bastards. Peacefully.