our 86th weekly open mike
Let’s see what happens when your host (me) has nothing to say. Step right up, speak your mind, tell a story, sing a song, whatever.
6/27/2026
itsdougholland.com
← PREVIOUS NEXT →
-
Anything goes: 6/27/2026
-
Four items, none particularly interesting
First, some good news: My legs have been swollen for months, the left leg large, the right leg huge. Swollen legs were the beginning of the chain of events that ended with my wife’s death, and I don’t have health insurance, and I’m thoroughly irresponsible, so I ignored the swelling, even after the right leg’s skin was stretched to near-ripping and hurt like a sunburn.
The swelling is one of the reasons I’ve assumed my death is approaching, but then the strangest thing happened. Woke up a few mornings ago with two normal-sized legs. Not the ‘normal’ of the past few months, but the pre-swollen normal. My socks won’t stay up!
Now it’s three days in a row, with legs the size of legs. And the only reason I can come up with is, my vegan/vegetarian diet over the past month and a half. Which is, I think, going to be my menu for the rest of my life.
♦ ♦ ♦
Next, some bad news: Mom’s physical and mental state varies from day to day, but she’s been on an upward trajectory, so I’d been hoping to cut back from being at her house seven days a week to maybe 3-4. For the past week or so, though, she’s been shaky, and she fell both yesterday and the day before, and my 365-day duty continues.
She forgets that she can’t get to her feet from a chair without someone helping her up, so she tries, and sometimes she succeeds. Succeeding, though, reinforces in Mom’s mind that she can stand without help, so she does it again, and maybe again, and maybe she’s successful again, but pretty soon she’s on the floor and we’re dialing 9-1-1.
Worse, yesterday she went to the bathroom — which she’s been able to do unassisted for a month now — but when she finished, she forgot her walker. Simply left it in the bathroom and walked back to her room, without the walker’s support. Ker-plop, she went down again.
Katrina lacks the strength to lift Mom off the floor, and she’s never fallen while I’m there, but I’m pretty sure I lack the strength too, or maybe I’d accidentally rip Mom’s arms out of their sockets trying to pick her up. So Katrina called 9-1-1, and paramedics showed up as they often do, and they brought Mom to her feet, and checked her for bruises or broken bones.
There have been a dozen 9-1-1 calls in the past few months. Yesterday, Mom asked the paramedics, “Do I win a prize for being your most frequent call?”
They said no, lots of old folks fall and can’t get up, and Mom isn’t in their top ten most frequent fallers.
But still, one of these falls, she’ll break something, so it’s urgent that we get through to her, make her understand that things have changed.
Problem is, walking is a hard habit to break. You walk for years and years and decades and decades, and it becomes something you do, without thinking about it.
Mom’s a constant reader, always has either a book or a newspaper at her side, and she reads aloud the words that flash on the TV during commercials. “Hemorrhoids,” she’ll say. And then, “St Jude’s Hospital.” And then, “Save the Children.” All afternoon, she reads the commercials out loud.
So my bright idea is something for her to read: notes that say, “Mom! Please don’t stand up unassisted — it’s dangerous,” and, “Mom, please don’t walk without your walker — it’s dangerous.”
I’ve ordered a few plexiglass note-holders, and we’ll put one note & holder on the coffee table in front of the couch, one on the nightstand beside her bed, etc.
I’m optimistic that this’ll work. Mom’s not Evel Knievel, taking risks for the thrill of it. She honestly forgets.
♦ ♦ ♦
More good news: The rat traps in my room have been less and less productive. It’s been a week since even one rat corpse needed to be tossed off the porch and into the neighbor’s yard, but that’s because there are fewer and fewer rats in my room. Haven’t seen any in weeks.
In the wee hours of the night sometimes I’ve heard one, though — a scratchy sound coming from deep under the rubble of boxes and bags and empties in my room.
Judging by the noises, I’m pretty sure I’ve been sharing my room with only one rat. And when I came home from spending Sunday afternoon with Mom, that rat was waiting for me — belly up, dead in a trap.
Darkness seems to encourage rat activity, so I’ve been sleeping with the lights on, but that night the lights were clicked off. Even in darkness, no rat sounds. And again Monday night, darkness, silence, and sleep.
19 rats have died in my room over the past month or so, and most have been launched onto the neighbor’s lawn. None remain.
More rats might wander in, but the traps will stay out, and there are enough traps to keep the rats under control. Like President Trump, I’m declaring victory!
And also, yes, I’m making progress in cleaning the room.
♦ ♦ ♦
Last item of the day: Everyone in my family knows I don’t do telephones. Want to reach me? Text or email. Don’t call. I announced that four years ago, when I moved back to Seattle.
I’m required to add, yes, yes, of course this is weird of me. But so what? I’m weird. I hate phones. I don’t even check voice mail.
The point is, when someone says please don’t call, you don’t call, unless you’re a jackass. Everyone in my family has stopped calling, except two people.
Jackass #1 is my stoner nephew George — he keeps asking why I haven’t returned his calls, but having answered that question several times, now I don’t even answer his texts when that’s all he’s saying. He’s a sad case — smart kid when he was young, but hundreds of pounds of marijuana and years of always being high have addled his brain.
Jackass #2 is my brother Clay, which is harder for me to understand. I’ve told him many times, please don’t call, I don’t do phones, my ringer is off, etc, and he’s not high. He’s mentally alert. He’s not argumentative. We get along fine. We text several times daily, but once or twice a month, “Please call,” he texts, and I reply, “Why?” And he texts again, “Please call.”
For too long and too many times, I gave in, and Clay & I talked on the phone. Which was a big fat mistake, every time. Now he expects me to call. And why wouldn’t he? I’ve broken my own rule too many times.
A week or so ago, he texted me, “Please call. It’s important.” I sighed so loudly he could probably hear it at his home in Prairie Dog City, deep in the next county. But “it’s important,” he said, so maybe someone’s sick or dying?
I called, of course, and it wasn’t important, of course. He wanted to talk about the once-monthly movies we watch together, and nominate a few fresh titles, and wanted to invite me to watch a baseball game on TV at his house. Both subjects could’ve been handled via text.
Next time he says, “Please call,” the answer will be no, or no answer at all, even if “it’s important.”
6/23/2026
-
And now the news: 6/22/2026
When this is over, US rights abusers must be tried for crimes against humanity
Excerpt: Because when all this nonsense is over — and I swear one day it will be, at the ballot box or in the streets or by any means necessary, even though I might not live to see it — I want more than just people feeling ashamed of their role in this spree of inhumanity.
I want justice.
Me again: Enjoyable column, certainly, but just as certainly: If Trump & the Republicans are ever removed from office, and Democrats take power again, I expect nothing like this. Nothing. Dems will repair 5% of the damage done by Trump, and prosecute nobody.
Promoter of election conspiracy theories wins Republican primary for Nevada Secretary of State
How Republicans are gerrymandering black votes into irrelevance
Looming Supreme Court decision could narrow mail-in voting
Federal Judge blocks Idaho law criminalizing going to the bathroom
Trump administration seeks to halt first local reparations program for Black people
Secret vetting and blocked promotions: Inside Hegseth’s war on women and minorities in the military
Excerpt: “When I think about my career in uniform, in almost every instance where there has been poor leadership or people in positions they’re not qualified for, it was based on either the reality or the perception of a ‘diversity hire,’” Mr. Hegseth, a former major in the Army National Guard, wrote in his 2024 book “The War on Warriors.”
Frustrated by courts, Trump weighed suspending habeas corpus
Excerpt: In the case of the Insurrection Act, Vice President JD Vance pushed to invoke it just days after federal agents shot and killed Alex Pretti, a Minnesota critical care nurse who was protesting the administration’s immigration policies.
Claiming an antifa plot, US charges 15 in Minneapolis with conspiracy
‘Rejected’: How federal prisons stonewall grievances and deny care for years
Justice department says it will investigate Major League Baseball amid Pride hats controversy
Apparently the real reason Anthropic’s models are offline: a six-year-old Trump grudge
Trump’s new acting intel chief Bill Pulte arrives early, eyes firing hundreds
Gavin Newsom says Justice Department is investigating him and his wife
The President of the United States posted this at 3:38 AM today
Manager at Trump’s New Jersey golf club helped plan Reflecting Pool repairs
ICE spent $700 million on 7 warehouses. Now it wants to get rid of them.
Woman’s hypothermia death in Pittsburgh after her release from ICE custody is ruled a homicide
Report authors say feds violated Minnesotans’ human rights during ICE surge
Excerpt: “During Operation Metro Surge, federal authorities used serious human rights violations, they were not accidents: extrajudicial executions, enforced disappearance, arbitrary detention, some of the most chilling and potent human rights violations there are, to terrorize Minnesota’s immigrant and refugee communities,” McKenzie said.
As punishment for organizing a hunger strike at an ICE jail, Cuban immigrant was deported to Ecuador
Cubans are being unjustly deported under Trump even if they have bona fide asylum claims
25 babies and toddlers are in ICE custody on an average day
A mom’s worst moment is costing her everything. How ICE is tearing this New Jersey family apart.
ICE is targeting the lawyers of immigrant children
ICE protester says he was shackled in hospital for days after agents’ attack
ICE removed detainee protections after private outreach from top contractor
‘It’s like Hell’: 60 lawsuits detail alleged medical neglect at New Jersey ICE jail
ICE agents defy Connecticut law on mask ban
Excerpt: “Tell them to arrest me,” the agent responded. “Tell them. I dare you. Who’s going to arrest me?”
US citizen says ICE detained him for 2 hours without explanation
A small taste of life the unprivileged live every day.
After US strike on Iranian school, months pass without answers
We know the answers that matter: It was intentional, it was a war crime, and nobody will be punished.
Tulsi Gabbard, her guru and the mysterious messages that helped shape her political career
Leak exposes members of Peter Thiel’s secretive ‘Dialog’ society
Colorado commutations board had twice rejected freeing election thief; Dem Gov let her out anyway
UAW votes to divest from Israel Bonds
Excerpt: “I don’t just hope, but I know,” said Olga Karounos, 33, a public defender in Brooklyn, New York, from Local 2325 who made a motion to call the amendment out of committee, “that this is going to send a message to — not just the billionaire class — but to politicians and any single person who is not afraid of standing up to genocide, to (Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin) Netanyahu, to the United States government, and will put the UAW again on the map for standing for international solidarity.”
8 great Americans killed in B-52 bomber crash at US Air Force base in Southern California
CNN resident fact checker disappeared from air as company waited for Trump merger approval
New York Times does a deep-dig, decides Jeffrey Epstein probably killed himself
[2020] Personal news: why I’m now leaving MSNBC, by Ariana Pekary
Why do these San Francisco gay bars have TSA-style face scanners?
Judge denies Biden’s bid to block release of transcripts linked to special counsel inquiry
What are the grounds for this? What legal theory gives an arch-rightwing bunch of bozos the right to off-the-record conversations between a President and his ghostwriter?
License plate cameras will soon track phones, wearables, infotainment, and even your pets
Autistic children being injected with unapproved stem cell treatments supported by RFK Jr
Scores fall ill at Air Force base after Hegseth makes flu vaccine optional
Federal Trade Commission sues leading transgender health group
They’re uninsured after Obamacare became too costly. And they’re far from alone.
RFK Jr. hosts meet-and-greet with infectious diseases
US faces triple threat of climate crisis, economic hardship, and Donald Trump
US accused of trying to ‘edit out’ climate change in Antarctic report
RFK Jr insists scientific journal explain retraction of anti-vaxx article he liked
RFK Jr roundup (includes optimism!)
New plan scales back CDC’s work on diseases abroad
How an addictive gas station drug found allies in Trump’s cabinet
Trump ramps up Education Department’s dismantling with changes on special education and civil rights
Disability groups fear RFK Jr.’s new special education role
Pokémon Go players unwittingly contributed to tech with military drone uses
Papa Johns is spying on your fridge to know when you can be influenced to buy pizza
Amazon retaliated against workers who supported regulating data centers, complaint says
Trump DOJ trying to protect Musk from lawsuit over Memphis AI data center pollution
DOJ lawyers argue xAI is ‘vital’ for national security in NAACP lawsuit
‘We will hunt you down,’ Trump says in pre-movie ad that stunned Portland theatergoers
Excerpt: “Seriously?? Is this really happening? Disgusting. Shame on Regal Theaters,” one commenter wrote. Another added, “I will never step foot inside of another Regal theater in my lifetime.”
Me again: We have some Regal screens here in Seattle, which I’ll now switch from accidentally boycotting to on purpose.
For World Cup, branding isn’t allowed, unless FIFA gets a kickback
After 95 years, Big Money kills Hockey Night in Canada
US plans to end AIDS funding for South Africa
In addition to the immorality and cruelty and all the dead bodies, I’ve heard rumors that AIDS doesn’t respect international borders. Blowback happens.
Military official admits boat strike may have murdered human trafficking victims
Canadian released from US immigration detention after 8 months in a “vile, wretched hellhole”
Israeli “settlers” set fire to two West Bank mosques overnight
It is trivially easy to use Reddit to manipulate AI search, research suggests
Student cheating is becoming impossible to detect in an AI era
Leaked financial docs show OpenAI is losing billions of dollars a year
Utah turns to AI doctors—and actual doctors aren’t happy about it
Will it take a ‘Chornobyl-scale disaster’ for us to regulate AI?
California admits using high-risk AI — including systems it failed to report last year
AI facial recognition software leads to false arrests and ruined lives in Florida
Pension fund claims Microsoft duped investors about AI growth
How Ukraine uses AI to knock deadly Russian drones out of the skies
AI Slop: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver
Guy who sucks at being a person sees huge potential in AI
How cops are turning traffic stops into immigration arrests
Arizona officer guilty of manslaughter after shooting unarmed man
Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass orders probe into fatal dog shooting by LAPD
I don’t know anything about Los Angeles politics, but I suddenly know Mayor Karen Bass is an absolute tool. Cops anywhere in America, everywhere in America, kill dogs so routinely, they must be trained to do so. If there’s a police presence at any residence and a dog so much as barks at a cop, that dog is likely to be shot. An investigation into one cop shooting one dog is like, I dunno, an investigation into one unlicensed hot dog vendor at Third Ave & Union Street. There are unlicensed food vendors everywhere, and cops kill family dogs more than daily, and everyone knows it, and claiming there’ll be an “investigation” is just the set-up for public relations that accomplishes nothing.
Cop driving San Diego police cruiser hits and kills pedestrian, and it’s ruled a suicide
Colorado trooper is finally fired for falsification of taser records, excessive force
Video contradicts FBI agent’s account of shooting during undercover sting in Country Club Hills
Family sues Detroit officer who stumbled, accidentally shot & disabled teen at 2024 block party
Family files wrongful death lawsuit after unarmed Navy veteran is killed by Michigan deputies
Ohio corrections officer charged with illegal cavity search over bar of soap
Second federal lawsuit alleges unconstitutional strip search by Oklahoma police, jail staff
Former San Antonio cop who fed homeless man shit-filled sandwich gets big promotion
Former Virginia officer sentenced to 5 years for indecent liberties with 16-year-old
A disease of deforestation: how Ebola is linked to the smartphone in your pocket
All it takes is a broken car air conditioner for climate change to kill you
Damage to boreal peatlands fast-tracks climate change
American government to pay $765 million to cancel 4 more wind projects
Trump administration allegedly backs off plan to end ocean monitoring
Pope Leo: Safeguarding minors ‘is a mandate’ for the Church
Can you hear me laughing across the internet?
Arizona pastor gets seven years in prison for abusing minor
Arkansas: Immanuel Baptist Church tells members it’s reached settlement in sexual abuse lawsuit
So says Pastor Willy Rice.
Florida diocese places priest on administrative leave after unexplained ‘serious charges’
Louisiana pastor gets 80 years in prison for sexually abusing teens
A sexual abuse case against a Michigan church leader keeps growing even after 60+ felony charges
Missouri pastor resigns after child molestation arrest
North Carolina: Former seminary student pleads in child sexual abuse material case
Founder of Pastors for Trump drops from Congressional race amid extramarital texting scandal
In this Wyoming church, child sexual abuse has gone unchecked for so long that it spans generations
Chris Evert & Martina Navratilova: The Final Set
Maridee Bonadea
bicyclist in a car countryJames Burrows
sit-com maestroDaveigh Chase
actress, Donnie DarkoTom Dreesen
comedianCarlo Ginzburg
microhistoryAlan Greenspan
husband of NBC News Chief Foreign Affairs Correspondent Andrea MitchellAbdullah Ibrahim
piano jazzMona Khalil
sea turtlesThe Major Oak
Sherwood Forestname withheld
forgotten personname withheld
forgotten personJames Blood Ulmer
rock’n’roller, “Are You Glad to Be in America?”Gregory Williams
what is race anyway?Jane Yolen
author, The Devil’s Arithmetic
Nothing will meaningfully improve
until billionaires fear for their lives.6/22/2026
Logo illustration by Jeff Meyer. Tip ‘o the hat to the Anderson Valley Advertiser, Daily Grail, Voenix Rising, What Not’s, Jamie Zawinski, and anywhere else I’ve stolen links, illustrations, or inspiration.
Special thanks to Linden Arden, Becky Jo, Joey Jo Jo & John the Basket emeritus, Jeff Meyer, Dave S, Name Withheld, and always extra special thanks to my lovely late Stephanie, who gave me 21 years and proved that the world isn’t always shitty.
News always and only from reliable sources, and I decide what’s reliable — no right-wing bullshit, no Substack because fuck Nazis, and no RawStory, Newsweek, or other clickbait sites. Written news is preferred; video links will be rare, and damned near never to videos where the reporter sits, stands, or strolls in front of a camera — that’s show biz, not news.
If you’re blocked from reading anything linked above, please send an email, and I’ll reply with the article’s complete text, via my computer’s fine ad-blockers and paywall-vaulters.