Trudy Wischemann

“Sea drone rescues U.S. army helicopter crew near Strait of Hormuz” read a BBC headline on my phone’s news feed one morning last week. A photo of an Apache helicopter, like the one that went down, sat below the words, looking like an enormous armored insect. Knowing the vulnerability of helicopter crews, I thank God they survived their mission. But I can hardly bear the truth that we have not found better ways to live, better use of our manpower and natural resources.

“Iranian hacker group alleges it breached Bakersfield, Visalia, Chico water systems,” read the headline of an article June 12, 2026 on sjvwater.org . I wondered “Could that be CalWater?” Sure enough, it was.

“Iranian hacker group alleges it breached Bakersfield, Visalia, Chico water systems,” read the headline of an article June 12 on sjvwater.org. I wondered “Could that be CalWater?” Sure enough, it was. On June 15, SJV Water published a second article reporting that CalWater denied that it was hacked, and assured everyone that their ability to provide water had not been hampered in the least.

This morning a song fragment interrupted my meditation on the Four Freedoms. It was “land that I love,” from “God Bless America,” not my favorite patriotic tune.

This morning a song fragment interrupted my meditation on the Four Freedoms. It was “land that I love,” from “God Bless America,” not my favorite patriotic tune. I read somewhere that Woody Guthrie wrote “This Land is Your Land” to counter that song’s suggestion of divine backing no matter how we act.

This morning a song fragment interrupted my meditation on the Four Freedoms. It was “land that I love,” from “God Bless America,” not my favorite patriotic tune. I read somewhere that Woody Guthrie wrote “This Land is Your Land” to counter that song’s suggestion of divine backing no matter how we act.

It's one thing to write about the four freedoms, and another to protect them. What's eroding them?

It’s one thing to write about the four freedoms, and another to protect them. What’s eroding them? More than any foreign threat or “invasion” of immigrants, I think it’s the power of the wealthy to craft legislation and litigate legal interpretations in their favor, disadvantaging everyone else.

It’s one thing to write about the four freedoms, and another to protect them. What’s eroding them? More than any foreign threat or “invasion” of immigrants, I think it’s the power of the wealthy to craft legislation and litigate legal interpretations in their favor, disadvantaging everyone else.

Last week I pulled a paperback from my bookshelf where it had been sitting, unread, for decades: Peter Matthiessen’s “Sal Si Puedes: Cesar Chavez and the New American Revolution” (1969). My copy is a discard from the Lindsay Unified School District, pages now yellowed and brittle.