Dispatches from Vilnius

Over the years pretty much everyone has come to appreciate Jimmy Carter.  He was a man who lived a truly virtuous life, although he admitted in a Playboy interview many years ago that he had committed " adultery in my heart many times ."  To think it almost derailed his 1976 campaign.   However, his legacy as president still remains contentious.  Recently, Trump vowed to reclaim the Panama Canal, which Carter "gave" to Panama during his single term.  The treaty he signed didn't turn the canal over to Panama until 1999, which Bill Clinton ultimately followed through on .  Oddly enough, neither Reagan nor Pere Bush chose to override the treaty, despite the hostilities that broke out in Panama when Manuel Noriega came to power.  Pere Bush infamously invaded Panama with the expressed aim to bring Noriega to justice, claiming that the "generalissimo" was trafficking drugs through his country.  An action that was decried worldwide.  Neverth...

I found myself looking at remote islands like Pitcairn and St. Helena .  Pitcairn Island is probably the most famous of the two as this is where Fletcher Christian led his mutiny against the Bounty and tried to settle his merry band of mutineers far from the long arm of the British Empire.  His legacy has lived on.  I couldn't help feel a touch of envy, but as much as one tries to distance oneself from events in this crazy mixed up world of ours, the bad news still has a way of seeping in.  Elon Musk has managed to reach Pitcairn, setting the 35 permanent inhabitants up with Starlink free of charge in his effort to leave no stone unturned on this planet. Elon has brought his DOGE and pony show to Washington, determined to make government accountable by slashing unnecessary spending.  Good luck with that after Republicans pushed through a whopping $895 billion defense bill  in their last month in session. The only thing they managed to cut was funding for...