This architectural monstrosity is a cathedral that will be built in the capital of Ukraine. The architect is known for building Hyatt hotels. The cathedral will be paid for with public funds because, clearly, a country at war where nobody has practiced any religion for a century is in urgent need of an ugly-ass church. Kiev has beautiful historic cathedrals, of course, but it sorely misses a Hyatt-type cathedral.

Few things are more embarrassing and sad than the attempts of Soviet people to fake religion.

What I didn’t know was how fast babies develop. Klara, for instance, has learned to make sounds, and we have long, interesting conversations. As opposed to noises, sounds will form a basis for her future capacity to talk. She has figured out that when I make sounds at her, she should make sounds in response. We look into each other’s eyes and take turns “speaking.” And what really blows my mind is that she knows that sounds only make sense in the context of an interaction. She’s not even 3 months old yet, but she’s already sociable!

For some reason, I thought that formation of sounds was supposed to happen much later so this is really cool.

Since Rauner’s office started to disseminate false stories about our university closing, our enrollments dropped. It is understandable because if people see a news segment that shows our university and features interviews with our students who are saying, “I don’t know what I would do if the school closes”, they are wary of applying.

Please note how Rauner operates: he refuses to give us the money that the state owes us and simultaneously tries to rob us of the only remaining source of income, tuition money. We are pretty much the most self-sufficient of Illinois’s public universities. Our administration has come up with a way to keep the university afloat even when the state money doesn’t come our way. In response, Rauner singles us out for these lying reports aimed at destroying our self-sufficiency.

It is, of course, a lie of Rauner’s that he wants public schools to cost the state less. If that were true, he wouldn’t single out my university and try to destroy it. Remember how I told you about that visit from the director of the Illinois Board of Higher Education? He said very clearly that the residents of the state only needed 2 or 3 public schools to stay open. Everything else had to close or be converted into an online degree mill.

There are powerful interests whose stated goal is to destroy public higher education in this country. All of these news stories about evil, self-involved academics who produce unreadable and worthless research, about colleges promoting groupthink and squeezing out all diversity of political opinion, spoiled bratty students who run around with idiotic slogans instead of learning – all they do is try to manipulate you into a position that will help Rauner and his ilk to destroy public higher education. The schools with bratty students, and stuck up academics with outdated theory are not the ones needing public funding. Forget about them and turn your attention to us instead. We are doing good work and people like Rauner are trying to destroy us.

The father of a 17-year-old student is campaigning to change Britain’s banks because he cannot find one that will give his child, who identifies as genderqueer and non-binary, an account – because all the online application forms require customers to be either male or female.

Of course, if the goal here were really to open a bank account, the student in question could have simply flipped a coin and entered anything into the online form. But that would deprive the narcissistic daddy of a chance to get on the news and play a hero.

A normal parent would not encourage his kid in this lunacy but would react to the teenage playacting with quiet, mild indifference, following the rule of “hear, see and say nothing”, which is the only practical way to deal with the teenage acting out.

Instead, the poor kid is being exploited to let daddy draw attention to himself. Nobody seems to care that the teenager is taking all this shit seriously and might go through life feeling rejected for his “identity.” The greatest enemy here is not an online form but a stupid Dad.

Is it true that children around here are first taught to write words the way they are pronounced and then are taught all over again what the correct spellings are?

This sounds very strange.

So I decided to learn more about the Green Party, and here is an explanation given by one of its supporters as to why people should vote Green in this election:

Trump is right about one thing that the electorate has grasped: illegal immigration is a labor issue. If you’re against immigration for undermining labor conditions, pundits insist you’re a racist. I fully support everyone’s right not to live in a shit hole, but it is possible to improve the quality of life in foreign countries to a standard they find in America and to do so without invading them. Making the adoption of Occupational Health and Safety Act and Regulations and an Environmental Protection Act international law with strict enforcement a requirement for free trade agreements might do quite a lot to raise quality of life globally.

This is truly priceless, people. I can just imagine this earnest Greenie traveling to Syria, Mexico, Palestine, or Ukraine, and telling people there, “Sheesh, this is such a shit hole. I will now totally improve your life by making you adopt Occupational Health and Safety Act and Regulations and an Environmental Protection Act. This will so make your shit hole just like the perfect country I come from!”

The only thing I don’t get is why the voters who want to support self-involved, condescending, American-centrist prickdom don’t all go straight to Trump. 

If there ever was a one-issue voter, it’s my former classmate Jay. He’s obsessed with Putin, and his hatred of the Russian president borders on pathological. And yes, it’s me saying this, so you can imagine how bad it is. When Jay is on his dying bed, it will be enough to say to him, “Look, there’s Putin!”, and Jay will jump up and rush along to spit on the object of his virulent hatred.

So you can imagine how stunned I was to hear that Jay is a Trump supporter.

“But how is this possible, Jay?” I ask. “Trump is the only candidate who keeps singing Putin’s praise. And you know how much Putin loves Trump.”

“Oh, but Trump doesn’t really mean it,” Jay waves me off. “It’s a ploy to trick Putin into complacency and then deliver a fatal blow.”

Kay, a colleague of mine, is not as much of a one-issue person as Jay but she’s pretty heavily into pro-Israel activism. We all know not to mention Israel or Palestine in her presence if we are to spare ourselves an endless rant about the importance of doing all we can to protect Israel.

You can imagine, of course, how taken aback I was when Kay said she was going to vote for Trump.

“But, Kay, didn’t Trump say he was indifferent towards Israel and not interested in moderating the relationship between Israel and Palestine?”

“Yes, but he didn’t really mean it,” Kay shrugs.

“Didn’t you notice that he is supported by the KKK, though?” I persist. “You are Jewish; doesn’t it bother you to be on the same side with these folks?”

“But they don’t really. . .”

“Mean it, yes, got it,” I grumble.

Fay, a former colleague from back at Cornell has been trying to get in touch. She used to volunteer for a non-profit that was offering legal and financial assistance to undocumented immigrants. I’m wary of reconnecting with Fay, though, because I fear hearing yet another “But he doesn’t really mean it!” If even Fay comes at me with this statement, I might lose all faith in humanity. Issues aside, I will never understand why people would want to vote for somebody who, in their opinion, doesn’t mean any of what he says.

There is no such thing as being good at learning foreign languages. A language has to correspond to one’s inner reality in order to be mastered. As a result, one person can find it extremely easy to learn, say, German but be completely stumped by French.

A language is not simply a collection of signs and sounds. It’s a universe of its own, and you will only learn a language if you are comfortable in its universe.

It’s cheesy, I know. But that’s how I feel.

I agree w/ Hillary, it’s time to elect a woman for President. But I want that President to reflect the values of being a mother. #MothersDay
— Dr. Jill Stein (@DrJillStein) May 8, 2016

OK, is that the Jill Stein people are planning to vote for? Because that’s some really vicious sexist assholery.

What a stupid freak, seriously.