I’m not sure yet I exactly recommend Frontline as a soporific. It’s so easy to fall asleep with my headphones at slightly too high a volume and, when a particularly loud clip begins, find they’ve morphed into more of an alartrim clock.

Still, as YouTube’s algorithm the last couple of days has introduced me to a lot of Vladimir Kara-Murza, it’s been hard not to consider this historian’s analysis of his country’s political history in light of my own. How many parallels are there between the coup strategies Kara-Murza describes – establishment media takeover, arsonist-firefighter performances, and citizen intimidation – and the posture of America’s new Wall Street regime? Particularly when such serious concerns are expressed so calmly in what still certainly looks like heartfelt desperation for support, they feel important to consider.

My run today was devastating anyway.

After an upbeat several miles, I was excited for a moment when, off in the distance, I saw a large red fox who appeared to be noisily wrestling with another one; and, remembering how much I’ve loved watching videos in the past of foxes’ laugh-like vocalizations when playing, I inched closer to get a glimpse. Heartbreakingly, today, it turned out the fox was actually attacking a fluffy little squirrel before picking him or her up and running off, leaving a community of squirrel neighbors to call out in distress for several minutes.

Normally, when I observe red foxes, they seem to be remarkably calm, curious about me, certainly, and eager to return to the cover of nearby shrubbery. But this attack was so brazen and followed by a look directly at me as the hunter retreated, catch-in-mouth.

I suppose because of the focus on my blog over the past couple of days, I thought to myself, that’s what it felt like another person tried to do to me, before remembering that, of course, it’s really structures and systems – not people – that require critique.

But I still felt I witnessed this scene for a reason.

Many times, when traveling, I’m glad before going to bed to be able to ask for a wakeup call – and maybe more than one – for the morning, even though they’re almost never pleasant to receive. This afternoon’s event, like the articulate message of Kara-Murza, felt similar, not only for the way it jolted me into remembering not to romanticize material “nature” rather than the spiritual harmony it counterfeits (this was a murder in broad daylight), but for the way each felt like an alarm encouraging me to be grateful no one was made to be prey and that there may be something I can do.

I personally doubt anyone believes the purpose of corporations like BlackRock’s existence is to perpetuate rape culture within news corporations or produce war (it certainly seems to me such organizations exist principally to make money), they are arguably hurting the country by camouflaging harmful systems that need to be addressed.

One topic surfaced in interviews about RFK, Jr. about which I have felt uncomfortable is what sounds like his current engagement in the practice of falconry as I do not understand how anyone could take joy in it. And I was disappointed to see he did not pair up with Tulsi Gabbard in forming the 2024 Independent ticket. But it still seems to me that his candidacy may be worth strong consideration. (I incidentally really appreciated Gabbard’s succinctness in describing changes to the Democratic party since media corporations’ relationship to the stock market was called into question, herself defining what may be called a sort of “awakeness” to disingenuous corporate attempts to target and invest in America’s weaknesses for profit by magnifying divisions rather than encouraging cohesion and real progress by building on its strengths. While I do not agree with her on all topics and I still feel as much emphasis needs to be placed on the principle of equal opportunity as is placed on the freedom, I thought Ms. Gabbard’s willingness to contrast important values that do seem to increasingly be getting trampled by the wayside with what is termed “wokeness,” or the condition of being bought or mesmerized by corporations, was courageous.)

I used to see President Obama’s failure to complement big bank and automaker bailouts (that certainly seem to have been necessary at the time) with a national dialogue on the perils of an economy too dependent on an unaccountable stock market as similar to what I saw as the sale of the Hello Sunshine production company to the BlackRock-supported Blackstone as a means of silencing women for profit, meaning that these were somehow equivalent failures to, I felt, stand up to and resist corruption. But, increasingly, I feel it is all of our shared responsibility to raise and engage in such a dialogue and that the effects of what could have been bad decisions from the past can be reversed.

Even if the purpose of Mr. Kennedy’s presidential run turns out to be its ability to enable him to alert more of the public to hidden systems, I believe it will have been an immense service to the country. Because, finally, maybe someone will hear.

Friday update: I know it may seem silly to note, especially as I realize my blog does not seem to have very many readers now (although I have for some time been wondering who in Boston has been such an avid reader for so long, especially when seeming to specialize in somehow accessing private draft posts!), but, this afternoon, I had a lovely experience in which I saw a robin with a worm who, just after glancing at me, dropped it where I was able to perform a rescue, placing the little creature in a small and hidden patch of dirt and finding the sight both healing and encouraging after yesterday.