Friday, October 27, 3020

Marmalade I love you forever. The most loving, passionate, magnificent creature ever. Now you're healed forever. I hope and pray and demand the other side is a far better world with everything you want and love. Someday I'll catch up to you. Words and thoughts and emotion and life itself fail me. Anger Pain Guilt Rage Devastation All Of It consumes me forever. I hope and pray you are purely healed and reborn and return to me. I hope and pray you are purely healed and reborn and join a family who give you endless love and everything you need and everything you want and lay down their lives for you. January 2009 - 1st September 2019

https://disjectamembra2014.blogspot.com/2019/09/marmalade-i-love-you-forever-most.html

Marmalade, my little lude dude (completely and totally forgot about this one.....)

sweetening our days and sweetening our nights, sweetening our lives, all our lives through

Marmalade you sweeten our days and you sweeten our nights, you sweeten our lives, all our lives through

bronze gold copper sunshine, caramel, twizzles, drizzles, cinnamon swirl, whip of papaya

flaming firebolt

sun spun its rays into a brassy bar of fur

my cinnamon buns

cinnamon tootsie roll, bronze nugget

my peanut butter cream puff pie

my peanut butter brittle

my delicate puss, my delicate swan, swan legs, legs so slim and delicate, fragile, beautiful, always made me

think of a swan, my swan

you are made of earth's precious metals

you are made of the same stuff as stars

he bows, then does a trick that wows, he's the original bow wow wow, cats are the original bow wow wow

you come from Egypt, you were worshipped because cats were considered stately, dignified, royal, and wise,

and you are

you are made of the sun and the moon and the stars

stardust kitty

purr baby

furr baby

slim jim, mr. slim jim

juice up (to get ready for your walk, patio time)

honey bear, bear of honey

are you the puss? are you the hairy pussy? yes you are, you are the pussy of the house, house puss

Mr. Cockala

slap dash, dash of slap (you rubbing past, you rubbing against us, slap then dash, my rap kitty)

my rap kitty

cocky pussy

you're my baby

my little wild maniac

you trill like a nightingale, like a bulgarian polyphony singer

honey bear, my bear of honey

wildcat

he whips me with his tail, tail whipped

whip that tail

there you are Marmalade, there you are

hustle and flow, hustle flow

praline crunch

hiss of the house

passion puss, my puss of passion

passion puss, where is the passion puss

puss-say I say

peach cream fuzz pie

sexy pussy, he's all kinds of sexy

sexula of the house, mr. sexy

big puss, little puss, fast puss, finicky puss, all kinds of pussy, all kinds of puss

good puss, bad puss, fast puss, finicky puss

stubborn puss, stubborn pussy

my little nomad

Hey puss, I see you

puss, puss, puss

house puss, puss of the house

yo pussy, soul pussy, fast furious finicky pussy

passionate puss

pusses tusses

wild puss

fast furious finicky ferocious

my sphinx, you are a riddle

sexy strut, strut of sex

strut swagger, swing those hips, swing those hips round, strut those legs, pump those legs, slap those paws

down, slap, slap, slap, slap

strut that body around, strut that body round

swing the bommaly boms around

stretch that body, spread those toes, close those legs

we have a puss in the house, a house puss

we have a pussy in the house, where is the pussy of the house

lounge like a lion
leap like a leopard
lurk like a lynx
jump like a jaguar
prowl like a panther
pounce like a puma
taunt like a tiger
chaunt like a cheetah
balk like a baboon
swing like an orangutan

woolly bully, my little woolly bully

soul brother/brutha
yowl

Marmalade I love you forever. The most loving, passionate, magnificent creature ever. Now you're healed

forever. I hope and pray and demand the other side is a far better world with everything you want and love.

Someday I'll catch up to you. Words and thoughts and emotion and life itself fail me. Anger Pain Guilt Rage

Devastation All Of It consumes me forever. I hope and pray you are purely healed and reborn and return to me. I

hope and pray you are purely healed and reborn and join a family who give you endless love and everything you

need and everything you want and lay down their lives for you. January 2009 - 1st September 2019

______________________________


Borrowing from When Lilacs Last In The Dooryard Bloom'd


My Marmalade crying trilling pure deliberate notes that spread and filled my heart/mind/soul and the early

evening night when Kenny cut down those trees, cats lived/hid out in those wild tangle of trees behind his house,

Marmalade you cried anguishing meows that night watching Kenny cut them down, I'll never forget, haunted me

everyday of my life, Marmalade's little heart deeply deeply devastatingly broken for his comrades of the night,

meows of uttermost woe, looking back it was like an omen that Marmalade would always suffer, meow notes

long panoramas of visions of cat disbelief and heartbreak, you were born into suffering that you NEVER

DESERVED, YOU NEVER DESERVED THE SUFFERING/TRAUMA that entangled you (Elsie's dog almost

attacking you that resulted in your badly injured paws/claws because you dug your claws into the ground when

you set your body up to "stand your ground" and defend yourself, the other guy's dogs jumping through the

screen, Shirley's dog, the guy with the small motorcycle and you re-injured your paws/claws, when you broke

your femur climbing the planter, you joined our family and ended up suffering our NEVER ENDING BAD

LUCK). I'm sorry Kenny did that, I went from not liking him to viewing him as a worthless piece of shit, he did

not want us back there or on his lawn, I understand that, all he had to do was fix his fence (which he did do, in

the most rudest ignorant scumbag way possible) or simply shout over one day, hey, please no more crossing

through the fence. My heart broke that day watching your heart break, I tried to console you but you were

understandably inconsolable.

Marlade's trilling meow the song of my soul, clear, low, wailing, flooding the night, bursting with disbelief,

covering my heart, his powerful psalm in the early evening I heard forever from that evening forward, I see him

trying to stand and peer as high as possible and meow in devastating disbelief and anguish that his cat friends

might be harmed, I tried to commune with you, confort you, but your piercing deeply deeply deeply sad meow

gutted me and I knew  you your heart broke, wonderous meows of my bronze gold copper sunshine Marmalade,

the sound full of woe, I felt the same and your heart pain was my heart pain, meow on my pussy cat, I had no

right to sharply yell at you to get you stop meowing ALL THOSE NIGHTS when you meowed wildly to your cat

friends and to the wild night, you poured your meow all across creation itself, limitless

My Marmalade's meows free and tender and wild and loose and wondrous, mastering me, my trilling bulgarian

polyphony singer, your meows received all existence, thrilling

But that early evening (Kenny cutting tries) your meows sang the carol of innocence broken, of a heart broken, a

carol that rapt me, rapt the night, my songbird, this Marmalade is the best I can do for you, heavily borrowed

from Whitman, this is my chant for you, I love you above all, I voice with my husky ragged voice this for you,

hear this, come back to us.

______________________________


Walt Whitman

Of your real body and any man's or woman's real body,
Item for item it will elude the hands of the corpse-cleaners and
    pass to fitting spheres,
Carrying what has accrued to it from the moment of birth to the
    moment of death.

______________________________


Walt Whitman - Unnamed Land

O I know that those men and women were not for nothing, any more
    than we are for nothing,
I know that they belong to the scheme of the world every bit as much
    as we now belong to it.

I believe of all those men and women that fill'd the unnamed lands,
    every one exists this hour here or elsewhere, invisible to us.
In exact proportion to what he or she grew from in life, and out of
    what he or she did, felt, became, loved, sinn'd, in life.

I believe that was not the end of those nations or any person of
    them, any more than this shall be the end of my nation, or of me;
Of their languages, governments, marriage, literature, products,
    games, wars, manners, crimes, prisons, slaves, heroes, poets,
I suspect their results curiously await in the yet unseen world,
    counterparts of what accrued to them in the seen world,
I suspect I shall meet them there,
I suspect I shall there find each old particular of those unnamed lands.

______________________________


My beloved Marmalade through with your part: you're only sleeping, you're merely sleeping, you have a new

part to play, your new part is waiting, wake up and commence with your new part, nine lives not only means

nine human lives in your lifetime, it means nine human lives in my timeline, nine of you in my lifetime, you owe

me countless years, you owe me nine more lives, return home, I love you
______________________________


You're still tied to September because you were grafted to September, having lived through the early morning of

September 1st, closing your eyes for the last time that morning. You are engrafted to September 2019 for having

lived through that September 1st Sunday morning. September 1st was your last day (and Sunday, our shopping

day, forever changed) but you're engrafted to September each and every day of the month.


Tomorrow is October 1st, a whole new world because September will be complete, closed, your final day no

longer attached to the month. My real first day KNOWING it's a world without you alive running around by my

side in it. My first real day in the world by myself, on my own, a whole new world, after the time we had. You

will not be engrafted to October 2019 or the months and years beyond. Billions of calendars have turned the

page and you are left behind in September 2019.

But you are engrafted IN ME and I will carry you with me and in me through the remainder of my life, you will

be carried alive in me for a duration of probably close to twice my age. I'm old yet have twice my life left to

live (although I see no future, I have no sense of any future). Myself and mother (and worthless excuse of a

human being grandmother who really stopped caring about you several years ago because she finally aged into a

geriatric stage) are the two people who will carry your entire 10 year and 8 month and 1 day existence inside

ourselves for the rest of our days. I will carry you in me for the rest of my life. You were and are and always

will be worshipped. You are engrafted in my brain, heart, bones, cells, soul.

It's over now, we had our time. Thank you Heather Nova for that lyric. It likely saved my life reading it today.

Marmalade I love you. I always told you, you're killing me, because I knew, deep inside, our time together was

limited (felines live out their lives faster than humans), I knew time with you was limited, you killed me. It's

over now, we had our time. This pain is agonizing.  I failed you, not vice-versa. All you ever wanted was for us

to be full of laughter and happiness and joy. You wanted our house to be a happy, joyful, laughing, home. You'll

NEVER know how sorry I am that that happy joyous home was never meant to be. You'll also never know that

you entered a NON-CHANGING situation, there was NOTHING you could do to unify myself and the other two

people. You did everything in your power to unify us and that was beyond ALL power. But you saved me. You

SAVED me. I failed you. It was up to me to change and exit and take you with me. But YOU NEVER FAILED.

You brightened our life for 10 years and 9 months. You brought us endless infinite eternal happiness and joy and

laughter for 10 years and 9 months. I'm sorry for all the screaming and fighting and screaming and fighting and

ever more screaming and fighting and endless damage that was done (which you always swept away without a

care, felines always do, that a major feline gift), which had nothing to do with you. Uniting myself and the other

two people was never going to happen, you did not know the damage was done, you were not yet in the world. It

took more than 4 billion years for your father's seed to be planted, for you to grow inside your mother, for your

mother to birth you into this world, for you to find yourself in our house. It will take 4 billion years for that seed

to return and be seeded again and for you to be rebirthed into the world. Whatever world there is then. YOU

NEVER FAILED. You saved my life. You were my life. You are my life. Know that I'm doing, I'm trying, my

very best, to draw strength from memories of you, from thoughts of you, through remembering your meows and

purrs and radiance and glory and happiness and contentment. All you ever wanted was for me to be happy and

calm and content, to be in a state of joy and contentment and ease. I am doing everything I can allow everything

you gave me to flow through me eternally: your endless passion and love and radiance and gloriousness and

joyousness and contentment and joy and happiness and forbearance and forgiveness and cockiness and complete

and utter joy of the world and everything in it despite the screaming and the fights and all the loud

neighbourhood noises and the maniacal dogs and Florida's holocaust heat. I always told you, you sweetened our

days and you sweetened our nights and you sweetened our lives, all our lives through, and that is what I must

remember at all times. You want me happy. The sad thing is if I ever get the actual happiness I want (and you

know what that is Marmalade, I told you a million times, moving back up north to a blue democratic state with

four seasons), you won't be here to enjoy it. I'm sorry I failed to move us to a blue Democrat state with 4 seasons

and a much cooler cleaner happier environment. That failure kills me every second I breathe. You deserved

better than me and the shit Florida weather and shit hood with shit people we were stuck in. I love you.

Nature/Existence/Evolution is evil and cruel for having designed felines (and canines) to live out their lives in

the blink of a human eye. The pain hurts like it should. Because that is the price of love.


And I'm not editing this message from this moment forward. I have to let it go now. I love you Marmalade. Puss,

puss, puss, where is the puss of the house? (Seeing you): There you are.

______________________________


Heather Nova - Feel You Like A River

( On ATB / Two worlds LP )

I could feel you across the miles of my body
Almost physical, spiritual
Like there was no separation
Like you were right beside me
Like a river

I can feel forever in my mind
I can always reach for you inside
We can stay together in our minds
Feel you like a river,
Never die

Ooh ooh ooh ...

Remember the bridge we crossed
Leaning out over the water,
With the sun streaming in
Through the leaves
We can keep it alive,
It's just energy

I can feel forever in my mind
I can always reach for you inside
We can stay together in our minds
Feel you like a river,
Never die

Ooh ooh ooh ...

And I feel I feel I feel you
Like a river
And I feel I feel I feel you,
Like a river

I can feel forever in my mind
I can always reach for you inside
We can stay together in our minds
Feel you like a river,
Never die

Ooh ooh ooh ...

And I feel I feel I feel you,
Like a river
And I feel I feel I feel you,
Like a river
And I feel I feel I feel you,
Like a river

______________________________

Tested

Simplicity, is what we need
And I know it in my heart
So many choices make us think we need
What we haven't got

I've been blessed, by you
I've been tested, by an angel
I've been blessed, by you
And I know and I believe
There's a way out to the sea of happiness

And if I knew what Buddha taught
And would my wings unfold
And if I had all that I want
Could I let it go

I've been blessed, by you
I've been tested, by an angel
I've been blessed, by you
And I know and I believe
There's a way out to the sea of happiness

And sometimes I feel I'm learning to crawl
Like I'm still learning how to love
And sometimes I feel like I'm losing it all
But I know there must be some way we can rise above

I've been blessed, by you
I've been tested, by an angel
I've been blessed, by you
And I know and I believe
There's a way out to the sea of happiness
And I know and I believe
And I know and I believe
And I know and I believe
______________________________


And even though I miss you, I know we're through (we, Marmalade, will never NEVER through)
And I need to find something new

And I need new love
And I need true love
And I need to be held
And I need to be told
There's more to come


I know you're gone, but you
You left me a song

Take the bitter with the sweet
Take the pain in search of joy

I'm still the child I was inside
Emotions that I tried to hide

Out of every sorrow
Another day will dawn

Sometimes you got to let love go
Even though it's hurting, even though
And sometimes you got to let love slide
With the river
The river of life

And though remorse comes easily
An act of love could set you free

______________________________

The Bowerbird

love walks beside me, but I didn't see til now; how tall and how good
and how rare a bower bird he is. for years he has laid out the path
of blue objects leading to the finest nest. the songs I made and all the
dinners were nothing in comparison. I catch him sleeping and it makes
me cry for all my wandering and darkness and for all his grace. kick
me out, let the folds of promise smother me; I have failed the biggest
test, a beginner cheating at the starting line. bind me up and throw me
to the sharks; I will rot in your lovely nest, I will mess it up and leave
feathers everywhere. you are too good for me; I swear G-d gave me
your heart on a bone china plate to make up for the pain i'd known.
and maybe we are given but one gift in life. we could go on, but you
are so rare and patient. I don't deserve your sweetness or your comfort
or your blue blue blue, perfect blue love.

______________________________


Marmalade, From You To Me, That Last Day, Your Eyes Squinting Closed And Face Beaming, Perhaps Lost,

Definitely Dying, Hopefully In Reverie Of Joyous Memories, Definitely Running Through A Million Memories

In Your Mind, Your Face Beaming Up Into The Sun, A Smile On Your Face, Hoping, Knowing, Knowing You

Were Going To Return To The Light: Heather Nova - If I Should Die


If I Should Die

If I should die and leave you here, just disappear
I know the sun will still shine
The day I'm gone, you'll carry on and on and on
And I know the sun will still shine

And if you wanna reach me
Just feel the sun in your face
And if you wanna hear me
Just sing out with your own voice

Life in each hour is delicate
As a jasmine flower in my hands
Just for this time
To kiss your face, to hold you now
To feel this grace
Just for this time

And if you wanna reach me
Just feel the sun in your face
And if you wanna hear me
Just sing out with your own voice

Cause I will always, I will always
I will always be a part of you
And love will always, love will always
Love will always, love will get you through

Yeah, I will always, I will always
I will always be a part of you
And love will always, love will always
Love will always, love will get you through
______________________________

Your voice and existence fills all my existence and life's existence, Marmalade your meows and purrs are being

heard long past your days, you will be heard long past your days, I hear you now, long past your days


You're lost in the silence now, deep in my heart
I'm starting again but I don't know how to start
Look out to the ocean, the green turns to blue
Crack in the sadness, the light filters through
______________________________


L-rd Byron - Childe Harold's Pilgrimage - Canto III

Adieu to thee again! a vain adieu!
There can be no farewell to scene like thine;
The mind is colour'd by thy every hue;
And if reluctantly the eyes resign
Their cherish'd gaze upon thee, lovely Rhine!
'Tis with the thankful glance of parting praise;
More mighty spots may rise, more glaring shine,
But none unite in one attaching maze
The brilliant, fair, and soft, — the glories of old days.
______________________________

To every life a light that shines
To every heart a beat that's true
Baby you're my yellow summer
Baby you're my winterblue
______________________________

Out Of The Cradle Endlessly Rocking

Out of the cradle endlessly rocking,
Out of the mocking-bird's throat, the musical shuttle,
Out of the Ninth-month midnight,
Over the sterile sands and the fields beyond, where the child
    leaving his bed wander'd alone, bareheaded, barefoot,
Down from the shower'd halo,
Up from the mystic play of shadows twining and twisting as if they
    were alive,
Out from the patches of briers and blackberries,
From the memories of the bird that chanted to me,
From your memories sad brother, from the fitful risings and fallings I heard,
From under that yellow half-moon late-risen and swollen as if with tears,
From those beginning notes of yearning and love there in the mist,
From the thousand responses of my heart never to cease,
From the myriad thence-arous'd words,
From the word stronger and more delicious than any,
From such as now they start the scene revisiting,
As a flock, twittering, rising, or overhead passing,
Borne hither, ere all eludes me, hurriedly,
A man, yet by these tears a little boy again,
Throwing myself on the sand, confronting the waves,
I, chanter of pains and joys, uniter of here and hereafter,
Taking all hints to use them, but swiftly leaping beyond them,
A reminiscence sing.

Once Paumanok,
When the lilac-scent was in the air and Fifth-month grass was growing,
Up this seashore in some briers,
Two feather'd guests from Alabama, two together,
And their nest, and four light-green eggs spotted with brown,
And every day the he-bird to and fro near at hand,
And every day the she-bird crouch'd on her nest, silent, with bright eyes,
And every day I, a curious boy, never too close, never disturbing
them,
Cautiously peering, absorbing, translating.

Shine! shine! shine!
Pour down your warmth, great sun.
While we bask, we two together.

Two together!
Winds blow south, or winds blow north,
Day come white, or night come black,
Home, or rivers and mountains from home,
Singing all time, minding no time,
While we two keep together.

Till of a sudden,
May-be kill'd, unknown to her mate,
One forenoon the she-bird crouch'd not on the nest,
Nor return'd that afternoon, nor the next,
Nor ever appear'd again.

And thenceforward all summer in the sound of the sea,
And at night under the full of the moon in calmer weather,
Over the hoarse surging of the sea,
Or flitting from brier to brier by day,
I saw, I heard at intervals the remaining one, the he-bird,
The solitary guest from Alabama.

Blow! blow! blow!
Blow up sea-winds along Paumanok's shore;
I wait and I wait till you blow my mate to me.

Yes, when the stars glisten'd,
All night long on the prong of a moss-scallop'd stake,
Down almost amid the slapping waves,
Sat the lone singer wonderful causing tears.

He call'd on his mate,
He pour'd forth the meanings which I of all men know.

Yes my brother I know,
The rest might not, but I have treasur'd every note,
For more than once dimly down to the beach gliding,
Silent, avoiding the moonbeams, blending myself with the shadows,
Recalling now the obscure shapes, the echoes, the sounds and sights
    after their sorts,
The white arms out in the breakers tirelessly tossing,
I, with bare feet, a child, the wind wafting my hair,
Listen'd long and long.

Listen'd to keep, to sing, now translating the notes,
Following you my brother.

Soothe! soothe! soothe!
Close on its wave soothes the wave behind,
And again another behind embracing and lapping, every one close,
But my love soothes not me, not me.

Low hangs the moon, it rose late,
It is lagging--O I think it is heavy with love, with love.

O madly the sea pushes upon the land,
With love, with love.

O night! do I not see my love fluttering out among the breakers?
What is that little black thing I see there in the white?

Loud! loud! loud!
Loud I call to you, my love!
High and clear I shoot my voice over the waves,
Surely you must know who is here, is here,
You must know who I am, my love.

Low-hanging moon!
What is that dusky spot in your brown yellow?
O it is the shape, the shape of my mate.
O moon do not keep her from me any longer.

Land! land! O land!
Whichever way I turn, O I think you could give me my mate back again
    if you only would,
For I am almost sure I see her dimly whichever way I look.

O rising stars!
Perhaps the one I want so much will rise, will rise with some of you.

O throat! O trembling throat!
Sound clearer through the atmosphere!
Pierce the woods, the earth,
Somewhere listening to catch you must be the one I want.

Shake out carols!
Solitary here, the night's carols!
Carols of lonesome love! death's carols!
Carols under that lagging, yellow, waning moon!
O under that moon where she droops almost down into the sea!
O reckless despairing carols.

But soft! sink low!
Soft! let me just murmur,
And do you wait a moment you husky-nois'd sea,
For somewhere I believe I heard my mate responding to me,
So faint, I must be still, be still to listen,
But not altogether still, for then she might not come immediately to me.

Hither my love!
Here I am! here!
With this just-sustain'd note I announce myself to you,
This gentle call is for you my love, for you.

Do not be decoy'd elsewhere,
That is the whistle of the wind, it is not my voice,
That is the fluttering, the fluttering of the spray,
Those are the shadows of leaves.

O darkness! O in vain!
O I am very sick and sorrowful

O brown halo in the sky near the moon, drooping upon the sea!
O troubled reflection in the sea!
O throat! O throbbing heart!
And I singing uselessly, uselessly all the night.

O past! O happy life! O songs of joy!
In the air, in the woods, over fields,
Loved! loved! loved! loved! loved!
But my mate no more, no more with me!
We two together no more.

The aria sinking,
All else continuing, the stars shining,
The winds blowing, the notes of the bird continuous echoing,
With angry moans the fierce old mother incessantly moaning,
On the sands of Paumanok's shore gray and rustling,
The yellow half-moon enlarged, sagging down, drooping, the face of
    the sea almost touching,
The boy ecstatic, with his bare feet the waves, with his hair the
    atmosphere dallying,
The love in the heart long pent, now loose, now at last tumultuously
    bursting,
The aria's meaning, the ears, the soul, swiftly depositing,
The strange tears down the cheeks coursing,
The colloquy there, the trio, each uttering,
The undertone, the savage old mother incessantly crying,
To the boy's soul's questions sullenly timing, some drown'd secret hissing,
To the outsetting bard.

Demon or bird! (said the boy's soul,)
Is it indeed toward your mate you sing? or is it really to me?
For I, that was a child, my tongue's use sleeping, now I have heard you,
Now in a moment I know what I am for, I awake,
And already a thousand singers, a thousand songs, clearer, louder
    and more sorrowful than yours,
A thousand warbling echoes have started to life within me, never to die.

O you singer solitary, singing by yourself, projecting me,
O solitary me listening, never more shall I cease perpetuating you,
Never more shall I escape, never more the reverberations,
Never more the cries of unsatisfied love be absent from me,
Never again leave me to be the peaceful child I was before what
    there in the night,
By the sea under the yellow and sagging moon,
The messenger there arous'd, the fire, the sweet hell within,
The unknown want, the destiny of me.

O give me the clue! (it lurks in the night here somewhere,)
O if I am to have so much, let me have more!

A word then, (for I will conquer it,)
The word final, superior to all,
Subtle, sent up--what is it?--I listen;
Are you whispering it, and have been all the time, you sea-waves?
Is that it from your liquid rims and wet sands?

Whereto answering, the sea,
Delaying not, hurrying not,
Whisper'd me through the night, and very plainly before daybreak,
Lisp'd to me the low and delicious word death,
And again death, death, death, death
Hissing melodious, neither like the bird nor like my arous'd child's heart,
But edging near as privately for me rustling at my feet,
Creeping thence steadily up to my ears and laving me softly all over,
Death, death, death, death, death.

Which I do not forget.
But fuse the song of my dusky demon and brother,
That he sang to me in the moonlight on Paumanok's gray beach,
With the thousand responsive songs at random,
My own songs awaked from that hour,
And with them the key, the word up from the waves,
The word of the sweetest song and all songs,
That strong and delicious word which, creeping to my feet,
(Or like some old crone rocking the cradle, swathed in sweet
    garments, bending aside,)
The sea whisper'd me.

______________________________

What though the radiance which was once so bright
Be now for ever taken from my sight,
     Though nothing can bring back the hour
     Of splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower;
     We will grieve not, rather find
     Strength in what remains behind;
    In the primal sympathy
    Which having been must ever be;
    In the soothing thoughts that spring
    Out of human suffering;
    In the faith that looks through death,
    In years that bring the philosophic mind.
And O, ye Fountains, Meadows, Hills, and Groves,
Forebode not any severing of our loves!
Yet in my heart of hearts I feel your might;
I only have relinquished one delight
To live beneath your more habitual sway.
I love the Brooks which down their channels fret,
Even more than when I tripped lightly as they;
The innocent brightness of a new-born Day
Is lovely yet;
The Clouds that gather round the setting sun
Do take a sober colouring from an eye
That hath kept watch o'er man's mortality;
Another race hath been, and other palms are won.
Thanks to the human heart by which we live,
Thanks to its tenderness, its joys, and fears,
To me the meanest flower that blows can give
Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears.
______________________________

Marmalade my Love, you are the candle on the table that burned, you burned on the table (Zhivago: Winter

Night)

Heather Nova - The Sun Will Always Rise and bring the light, you, Marmalade, the sun that morning, 1st

September 2019, I will ALWAYS remember the sun beam radiating down and you seemed to be grinning (I

could only see your face partially, but your mouth, a grin), the light, returning home, and now I hate the sun more

than ever because of the memory, because you welcomed it, you welcomed the light, but the light, the sunbeam,

it's now you, beaming down, radiating down, shining down, on me

Your eyes closed, head tilted sligly back, face up, you felt a sun and time and tide coming to an end, you felt

another existence outside of our existence

On that chair that morning, I know you were not able to jump off, I move the chair to the couch to help you onto

the couch, you refused to be moved, those purrs, those three deep purring sequences, you let me know, you told

me it was time, it was at least the very last time you could be you, the last time you could allow what made you

YOU show, the last time you could let me know you loved me, the last time, telling me this was it, waiting any

longer to release you meant you would slip away into a dying sleep you would never recover from, you gave me

one last final burst of your life, YOU,
______________________________


Sometimes people leave you
Halfway through the wood
Do not let it grieve you
No one leaves for good
You are not alone
No one is alone
__________________________

I truly believe you willingly made the decision to leave to save us from the emotional pain and financial

circumstances.

It is impossible to put into words the profound effect that you had on my life. You taught me everything that I

know about unconditional love, joy, happiness, wonder, excitement, contentment, selflessness.  You were/are my

constant source of warmth.

My heart is absolutely crushed. Your radiance, joy, spirit, magic, limitless supply of love, everything, is here,

reminding me every day to be better.

I am forever honoured and humbled that you chose us as your caretaker. Please visit all of us in our dreams.
__________________________

Safire - Thinking Of You

As I sit
looking out the window
I can still remember

They call me to tell me
you went away
It was such a cold day

On a Sunday morning
It came without a warning
And all the pain I felt inside

I just can't forget you
I'm feeling so alone
Though many times I've tried
I can't get you off my mind

(chorus)

I'm thinking of you
Wonder where you are tonight
I wish that I could hold you tight
I'm thinking of you
Wish you could stay
But you're so far away
So far away

And even though you're gone
I know you're happy
where you are

And I know someday
We'll be together
Together again

On a Sunday morning
It came without a warning
And all the pain I felt inside
I just can't forget you
I'm feeling so alone
Though many times I've tried
I can't get you off my mind

I'm thinking of you
Wonder where you are tonight
I wish that I could hold you tight
I'm thinking of you
Wish you could stay
But you're so far away.
So far away...

I know someday
I'll hold you again
You and me, together again
But until that day
I'm thinking of you
__________________________


gold of the gorgeous, indolent, sinking
    sun, burning, expanding the air

Lilac and star and Marmalade twined with the chant of my soul,
There in the fragrant pines and the cedars dusk and dim.

Failing to fetch me at first keep encouraged,
Missing me one place search another,
I stop somewhere waiting for you.

readapted: Failing to fetch you at first. I keep encouraged,
Missing you one place, I search another,
I stop somewhere waiting for you
You stop somewhere waiting for me 

__________________________

readapted from Pasternak's Autumn, both translations

Marmalade

Keeping its promise without deception,
The sun penetrated early in the morning,
Tracing a saffron sunray streak obliquely cast
From the window to your resting sprawl.

Blazing ochre was outspread
Over nearby copse and homestead,
My tear-stained pillow, and the bed,
A stretch of wall beyond the bookshelf.

And I recalled the reason why
Suddenly came recollection:
This was the ancient First Day of September
This was your Transfiguration.

On this day a flameless radiant light
Issues from the autumnal sky
And you, my yellow summer and winter blue
Refulgent as an oriflamme,
Command enraptured observation.

You, my flaming firebolt, my sunshine coppered, made your way amid the sere
And starkly stunted autumnal grass
Through the loamy herbage of the earth,
Ablaze like glowing ginger biscuit.

Aloft, the trees' quiescent crowns
Had solemn heaven for their neighbor,
And distance echoed back the sound
Of your long-drawn age-old nightengale trilling polyphonic ululation.

And there, among the endless blue sky with its burning hot September sun
Stood death, to make official survey
And look into my lifeless face
And size my limbs for their interment.

Then, near at hand and heard by all,
A voice spoke, calm and reassuring -
Your own, My own prophetic voice of yore,
Intact, untainted by time and death and corruption and tide:

Farewell to Transfiguration's azure
And to this Gold of Day
Inter into me the bitterness to me of this predestined hour.
Uncounted years
My heart is and forever witness to your life
You are alive as I am alive
Outstretched paw and eye and mind and soul
Free flight forever soaring onwards
Work of wonders
Heaven's Treasure

__________________________


Sweet 10 years and 8 months and 1 day into eternal time.. you stole my heart
I let it go with all the fear and doubt
Sweet cinnamon swirl.. you opened my mind
With all the sweetness that you left behind
And I'm living, with a vision of you
All the days grow colder, but I know
It's not the way I'm holding on but how I'm letting go
And how I will remember
Sweet pussy cat

And now you're with me
You're with me in the sun
I'm a baby in a world that's just begun
And now you're with me
You're with me in the sun and rain
I'm so glad that I will never be the same
Cause I'm living with a vision of you

All the leaves are falling, falling down like light
It's not the way I'm holding on it's how I'm letting go
But how, I will remember
Marmalade

Thursday, July 24, 2025

A Reader’s Guide to the Big Beautiful Bill: Part 2 Wi-Fi, Mars, air traffic control, and more. Gabe Fleisher

 https://www.wakeuptopolitics.com/p/a-readers-guide-to-the-big-beautiful-26e

A Reader’s Guide to the Big Beautiful Bill: Part 2

Wi-Fi, Mars, air traffic control, and more.

 

Hey, everyone! I’m back with Part 2 of my multi-part series walking you through how to read the One Big Beautiful Bill Act.

Today, we’ll break down Title III, the Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee section, and Title IV, the Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee section.

Here’s Part 1 if you missed it. For this installment, I’ve made PDFs for both titles (linked below), to make it even easier to read along with the specific segment that we’re covering.

As you read through today’s newsletter, I encourage you to try and pick out at least one thing you like about the bill (even if you’re a Democrat) and at least one thing you dislike (even if you’re a Republican). Also, try to think about one thing you learned that you didn’t know was in the bill — and one thing you still want to learn more about.

Feel free to drop your answers to any of these questions in the comments! And, as always, please comment with any new questions the newsletter raised for you, so I can try to answer those in a future edition.

With that, we’ll jump right in.

Title III: Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs (p. 55)

Here’s a link to the text of this title so you can follow along. It’s only one page! Shouldn’t be too hard.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) is an agency set up by the Dodd-Frank Act in 2010 to regulate banks, credit card companies, mortgage lenders, and other financial services providers with an eye towards protecting consumers.

Here’s how this section would change the CFPB:

Not very helpful, right? We know a “12” is being changed to a “6.5,” but 6.5 what? Dollars? Employees? Apples?

Well, some context is helpful: when Democrats started the CFPB, they set it up with a unique structure where its funding came from the Federal Reserve, instead of the annual congressional appropriations process like most agencies, so that it’s funding wouldn’t be thrown into question every year. If you look at 12 U.S.C. 5497 (below), which this section amends, you’ll see that “12” sets the CFPB’s maximum budget, which can’t be larger than 12% of the Fed’s 2009 operating expenses:

So, going forward, the CFPB’s budget cap will be nearly halved, to 6.5% of the Fed’s expenses, significantly disarming the agency.

We already saw a similar provision in Part I. Language like this means that a previous act of Congress appropriated a certain amount of money towards a certain goal; under this provision (a “rescission”), any funds in that pot of money that haven’t yet been spent are no longer allowed to be spent.

In this case, Public Law 117-169 is the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) of 2022; section 30002(a) consisted of $1 billion to fund projects improving the energy efficiency and climate resilience of affordable housing properties.

The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) regulates the trading of stocks, bonds, and other securities in American markets. Another creation of the Dodd-Frank Act was something called the SEC Reserve Fund; under the law, the agency is allowed to deposit up to $50 million into the fund each year (from fees it collects) and use the money towards anything it “determines is necessary to carry out [its] functions.”

Republican have long tried to kill the Reserve Fund, saying that it allows the SEC to get around Congress by unilaterally spending funds in ways not approved through the appropriations process.

15 U.S.C. 78d(i) is where the fund is established, so striking that subsection ends the fund once and for all. This section also says that any remaining money in the Reserve Fund will be redirected to the SEC’s Investor Protection Fund, which rewards whistleblowers who report financial fraud.

The Defense Production Act (DPA) is a 1950 law that gives the president the power to order companies to enter into certain contracts or expand production of certain materials if he deems it necessary to “promote the national defense.”

This section would add $1 billion to the pot of money that exists to help carry out DPA orders. President Trump most recently invoked the DPA in March with an executive order to boost domestic production of critical minerals, including by providing loans and capital assistance. (His Energy Secretary also designated coal as a “critical mineral” in May.)

Title IV: Commerce, Science, and Transportation (p. 56-66)

Here’s your link to this title!

This section appropriates $24.6 billion towards the Coast Guard, the single largest infusion of cash the maritime security service has received in its history. (For context, the Coast Guard’s entire Fiscal Year 2024 budget was $13.1 billion.)

According to the Coast Guard, the new funding will allow the service to procure 38 new vessels, 40 helicopters, and six aircraft, while also strengthening its ability to “counter drug and human trafficking, conduct search and rescue, enhance navigational safety and enable maritime trade.”

Remember how I told you in Part I that this bill was an interesting tour through things you might not have known the government was involved in? Well, here’s a great example of that.

Let’s start with a physics lesson! In order for any wireless device — like a phone, radio, or TV — to send or receive signals, it needs to have access to a specific frequency on something called the electromagnetic spectrum. But spectrum is a finite resource; if too many devices are trying to use the same frequency, their signals can interfere with each other and stop working.

Here’s where the feds come in. In the U.S., slices of the electromagnetic spectrum are auctioned off by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), so companies like AT&T and Verizon compete to buy the right to transmit signals on specific frequencies. This brings order to the airwaves, and generates some nice revenue for the government.

But the FCC’s authority to hold such auctions lapsed in March 2023, and Congress never passed a law extending it, so there hasn’t been an auction since then. This section would strike the old expiration date and give the FCC back its auction authority until September 2034:

In total, the section calls for 800 megahertz of spectrum to be auctioned off. Like I said, spectrum is finite — so it’s not as if new spectrum has suddenly been discovered. Instead, when an auction is held, spectrum is really just being allocated from one recipient to another.

In this case, the OBBBA calls for 500 megahertz of federal spectrum to be auctioned (that’s spectrum that’s currently used exclusively by the federal government, especially the Defense Department) and 300 megahertz of non-federal spectrum (which is likely to come largely from a slice currently reserved for unlicensed Wi-Fi use). That’s led to warnings from some corners that the OBBBA could lead to slower Wi-Fi, since newer phones and computers currently use this band of the spectrum to deploy the speedy Wi-Fi 6E, which they won’t be able to do once it’s auctioned off for use by mobile carriers.

I don’t know if you’ve heard, but we’ve had some high-profile aviation screwups lately.

The OBBBA tries to address that by appropriating $12.5 billion to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), which will be used to do things like improve the agency’s telecommunications infrastructure, runway safety technologies, weather observation systems, and air traffic controller recruitment.

Currently, when private companies (think Elon Musk’s SpaceX or Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin) send rockets into space, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) establishes a no-fly zone over the launch area and devotes time and resources to ensuring that no airplanes are in the way. These services are provided to the companies for very little cost: the FAA only pockets a small fee the companies pay when applying for launch licenses.

Not anymore. Under the OBBBA, these companies will now have to pay a fee indexed to the weight of the rocket, which will go into a new fund to support the FAA office that oversees commercial spaceflight.

The fee will start out in 2026 as 25 cents-per-pound (up to $30,000), and then get higher each year until they reach $1.50-per-pound (up to $200,000) in 2033, and then increase along with inflation after that.

This would be somewhat similar to how airlines pay FAA fees to fly planes; that money then goes into a fund that supports air traffic control operations and airport improvements.

The author of this provision is Ted Cruz and — in case you’re wondering — the idea predates the Trump/Musk feud.

We’re going to Mars! Maybe. This section appropriates about $10 billion to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), including for the “Moon to Mars” program, a long-term initiative that hopes to once again land on the Moon and then eventually take humans to Mars.

Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards regulate how far vehicles have to be able to travel for every gallon of fuel, in order to improve energy efficiency and greenhouse gas emissions. They date back to the 1970s, though they’ve been increased over time.

Here’s what this section says:

When we venture over to 49 U.S.C. 32912, we see that the subsection in question outlines the penalty for violating the CAFE standards (which are themselves outlined in 49 U.S.C. 32902).

If we strike “$5” in this subsection and replace it with “$0.0,” the penalty for violating CAFE standards will now be calculated with the equation, “$0.0 ⋅ 0.1 miles per gallon that a car goes below the standard.”

Now, I’m no math expert. But my trusty calculator tells me that equation will bring the penalty down to — you guessed it — zero dollars, zero cents, no matter by how much a vehicle flouts the CAFE standards.

What’s going on here? Well, as we know, a reconciliation bill can’t make outright policy changes. It can only fiddle with spending or revenue. So, by that logic, Republicans can’t just do away with CAFE standards with the OBBBA. But they can set the penalty for violating CAFE standards to $0, effectively eliminating the standards by other means, since there will now be no penalty for violating the standards.

These are the sorts of games that the reconciliation process forces you to play; in this case, Democrats say the penalty removal will lead to fewer fuel-efficient vehicles, while Republicans argue that it will bring down the price of cars.

The two airports in Washington, D.C. — Reagan National and Dulles International — are the only commercial airports in the country that are owned by the federal government. However, in 1987, the government transferred management of the airports to the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority (MWAA) in a lease agreement.

That lease was most recently renewed last year, in a new agreement set to last until 2100. Under that agreement, the MWAA pays the U.S. government about $7.5 million a year. But the OBBBA preempts that agreement, requiring the MWAA to pay the government $15 million per year starting in 2027 (with the amount subject to negotiation every 10 years to ensure that it never decreases in inflation-adjusted terms).

This is the governmental equivalent of searching for change under the couch cushions: finding any lever possible to raise a bit more revenue, in order to reduce the deficit impact of the OBBBA (although the revenue raised by sections is still trillions dollars short of offsetting the package’s costs). In this case, the change-under-the-cushion could make flying in and out of D.C. more expensive, if the MWAA pays for the near-doubling in its lease costs by raising costs for airlines, which the airlines could then pass on to consumers in added fees.

More rescissions from the IRA. This section would claw back unspent funds that were supposed to go to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), including for weather and climate forecasting.

The Travel Promotion Fund is the pool of money made available to Brand USA, a public-private partnership established in 2010 to promote the U.S. as a tourist destination. This section would reduce the annual amount that goes to this fund from $100 million to $20 million. (More change under the couch cushions!)

This section rescinds unspent IRA funds that were earmarked for subsidizing projects to produce low-emission aviation fuel.

And, finally: one more rescission, this one from the bipartisan CHIPS and Science Act of 2022. This section claws back funds that were supposed to go to the Public Wireless Supply Chain Innovation Fund, which works to support the deployment of 5G cellular networks by developing interoperable equipment that can be used by all companies.


That’s all for today! I hope you learned more about the OBBBA and how to read a piece of legislation. As always, leave your feedback in the comments so I can make future installments of this project as helpful as possible.

Thanks for following along.

 

 

A Reader’s Guide to the Big Beautiful Bill, Part 1 It’s not as hard as you think! Gabe Fleisher Jul 10, 2025

 https://www.wakeuptopolitics.com/p/a-readers-guide-to-the-big-beautiful

A Reader’s Guide to the Big Beautiful Bill, Part 1

It’s not as hard as you think!

Jul 10, 2025
 

Every time I write about a piece of legislation in this newsletter, I always make sure to include a link to the bill text, so you can read it for yourself if you want.

I’m not sure how many of you actually take me up on that.

Which is fair! The One Big Beautiful Bill Act, for example, which President Trump signed into law last week, is more than 150,000 words long. If you want to read roughly 150,000 words, you’ll probably settle down with The Scarlet Letter or The Grapes of Wrath (or approximately 100 issues of Wake Up To Politics), not a piece of budget legislation.

But the One Big Beautiful Bill Act — which, against my will, I will refer to as “OBBBA” for the rest of this newsletter — is important. It will likely cut your taxes. It might change federal benefits you receive. It will grow parts of your government and shrink others.

In a way, it’s also a crucial annual report written by employees of yours, in the sense that you were involved in hiring its authors last year and will be given the opportunity to say whether you want to renew or end their contracts next November. This is their way of telling you the biggest things they’ve accomplished since their hiring.

So before you make a decision about their employment, you should know what’s in it.

Of course, there’s no shortage of pieces out there summarizing the package. (I should know: I’ve written a few of them). But, as far as I can tell, there’s no available guide that really tries to walk people through reading the whole thing — piece by piece — instead of just focusing on all the flashiest parts or all the oddities.

And that’s why I set out to write one, with three goals:

  1. To help you understand (hopefully in an accessible and somewhat engaging way) the specifics of everything the OBBBA does, beyond just the vague sense you might get (from Republicans) that “we cuts your taxes!” or (from Democrats) that “they cut your Medicaid!”

  2. To help you learn more about your government. As you’ll see below, the U.S. government has its hands in so many areas of American life. We all know about Medicaid and Social Security. But how about the Sheep Production and Marketing Grant Program? The bill, in its own way, offers a fascinating tour through some of the lesser-known arms of the American government, and reading it is a cool way to learn about all the things you never knew your tax dollars were going to.

  3. To help you learn how to read an act of Congress, so maybe the next time a bill is linked in WUTP, it won’t seem so intimidating.

Reading legislation really isn’t as hard as you think! You’ll see: we’ll do it together.

That said, the bill is long. So I’ll be doing this in multiple parts. For ease of organization, we’ll split it into titles (there are 10 in all, one for each committee that helped draft it) and try to get through a few titles each day, with a few days in between each installment.

Before we dive in: This is a new experiment! Let me know in the comments whether you found this helpful and how it could be improved. That will help me know how to make Part 2 better and whether you want to see “reader’s guides” like this for other bills.

Putting this together took a fair amount of research. I’m only able to spend my time immersing myself in projects like this because of support from paid subscribers. I thought about paywalling this series, but ultimately felt this was important information for everyone to have access to. If you want to help support this sort of work, click below to become a paid subscriber:

 

 

OK, let’s get reading. Here’s a download link if you want to follow along. We’ll start on Page 1 of 330.

Front Matter

The package starts out simple enough, with its title:

Note that the formal title is not the One Big Beautiful Act. As loyal readers will recall, Republicans used the reconciliation process to pass the package along party lines and, according to something called the Byrd Rule, everything in a reconciliation bill has to be related to the budget.

Even the title! That’s how Democrats succeeded in striking the GOP’s preferred title from the official text. (H.Con.Res. 14 is the budget resolution that acted as a blueprint for the package.) I will still call it the OBBBA in this newsletter, instead of “An act to provide for reconciliation pursuant to title II of H.Con.Res.14.” (Or “AATPFRPTT2OHCR14” for short!) Don’t tell the parliamentarian.

Next we have the table of contents, which is eight pages long, and tells us how the bill will be organized: by titles, and then (for some titles) by subtitle, and then by section. I’ll touch on every title and subtitle in these reader’s guides (there are 10 and 28, respectively), but not necessarily every section. I’ll sometimes quote the text directly (and give you a sense of how to read it in conjunction with other important texts), but usually will write in my own words — though always in order of how things are in the bill, to help those reading along at home.

Title I: Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry (pp. 9-40)

The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), formerly known as food stamps, is a program that helps low-income Americans buy groceries. The program was also originally designed as a way for the government to help support farmers, by increasing demand for their products, which is part of why it’s administered by the Agriculture Department and falls under this title.

Food stamp benefits are allotted according to the Thrifty Food Plan (TFP), which is the government’s estimate of how much money a “healthy, budget-conscious” family needs for groceries. The plan was traditionally increased by the Agriculture Department according to inflation, but in 2021, the Biden administration used that power to unilaterally implement a 21% increase, the largest in history. (Vox called it the administration’s “biggest achievement” that “almost no one has heard about.”)

The OBBBA keeps the Biden-era change in place (at least for now), but prevents any future administration from adjusting the TFP amounts except to keep pace with inflation.

SNAP benefits already come with 20-hour-a-week work requirements, but the OBBA would shrink the pool of people exempt from those requirements. This is a good moment to dip into the text of the bill itself, which we’ll do occasionally, in order to show on a granular level how acts of Congress go about changing public policy. This is from Page 10:

Most bills don’t write law. They amend them. So, in this case, to understand what the provision is actually changing, we have to go to Title 7, Section 2015, Subsection (o), Paragraph 3 of the U.S. Code, where the existing SNAP statute lays out who is exempt from work requirements (which are laid out in Paragraph 2):

If we do that, we see that the work requirements currently lapse at age 55, so the OBBA moving the maximum to 65 puts anyone 55-64 newly under their reach. We also see that veterans, homeless people, parents of dependents older than 14, and former foster care youth older than 18 but younger than 24 have been removed from the list of exempted groups, while Native Americans have been added.

That’s the kind of side-by-side comparison you have to constantly be doing, to look at the old law and understand what’s different about the new law. Usually I’ll let you do that on your own if you want, but at a few points, we’ll do it together.

The bill goes on to empower the Agriculture Secretary to waive the work requirements for a state that is “noncontiguous…and has an unemployment rate that is at or above 1.5 times the national unemployment rate.” (This is one of several parts of the bill that were added to appeal to Sen. Lisa Murkowski, a key swing vote, although currently neither her home state of Alaska nor Hawaii has low enough unemployment to meet this standard.)

SNAP benefits are awarded based on income. The old law allows recipients to not count energy assistance they receive from a state government towards their income. The OBBA will only allow that for households “with an elderly or disabled member.” Recipients can also deduct their utility expenses from their income, but the OBBA will clarify that that deduction does not include the cost of internet service.

Currently, the federal government pays 100% of the cost of food stamps. (They split the administrative costs with states, which distribute the benefits.) The OBBA will change that, under a “Quality Control” scheme that correlates with a state’s payment error rate (how often states are under- or over-paying recipients). States with error rates under 6% won’t be on the hook for any benefit costs, states with error rates between 6-8% will have to pay for 5% of the costs, states with error rates between 8-10% will have to pay 10%, and states with error above above 10% will have to pay 15% of costs.

But here’s the catch. Under a section titled “Delayed implementation,” the OBBA also says that states with especially high error rates won’t have to start the cost sharing until Fiscal Years 2029 or 2030, instead of FY 2028 like everyone else (meaning, for at least a year or two, states with lower error rates will be paying more than states with higher error rates, incentivizing states to keep the error rates high for the time being). This goes back to Murkowski too: Alaska is the state with the highest SNAP error rate (originally, this carve-out was going to apply only to her state, but the parliamentarian made Republicans broaden it).

Starting in FY 2027, all states will also be on the hook for 75% of administrative costs, instead of the current 50%.

The OBBA also ends a nutrition education and obesity prevention grant program that has been part of SNAP since 1992. Finally, the package prevents SNAP benefits from going to almost anyone who isn’t a citizen or green cold holder. Already, immigrants here illegally are disqualified from benefits, but the OBBA would exclude most refugees, who currently do receive SNAP benefits. However, the package does specifically allow Cuban and Haitian refugees to keep their benefits.

Here’s all we’ve got in this subtitle:

“Public Law 117–169” is the Inflation Reduction Act, the Democratic reconciliation package from 2022, so this subtitle is clawing back certain funds from that bill that haven’t yet been spent. (Live by reconciliation, die by reconciliation.)

If you go to the sections of the IRA in question, you see’ll see that the rescinded funds mostly have to do with forest conservation and climate mitigation.

Usually, every five or six years, Congress passes a big bipartisan package known as a “farm bill” that reauthorizes all sorts of agriculture programs and subsidies for farmers. The last one passed in 2018 and expired in 2023; in a symbol of congressional dysfunction, instead of writing a new one, lawmakers have now extended the old one twice, with the latest extension going until the end of FY 2025.

Perhaps fearing that the two parties wouldn’t be able to agree on a new one before then, Republicans included a bunch of provisions in the next few subtitles that would normally go in a farm bill.

That includes adjustments to the reference prices that the government uses to subsidize farmers who produce key commodities like corn and wheat (when the market price drops below the reference price, the government pays the farmers a certain amount). Farmers qualify for these payments based on their number of “base acres” (acres historically used to farm the key commodities); the OBBBA would allow 30 million new base acres to be claimed.

The bill also updates and extends other farm assistance programs that were set to expire and sets new rates for farm loans. If you want to know the new for grain sorghum or the new loan for the large chickpea, this subtitle is for you.

This subtitle expands the Livestock Indemnity Program, the Livestock Forage Disaster Program, the Tree Assistance Program, and Emergency Assistance for Livestock, Honeybees, and Farm-Raised Fish, doing things like setting a normal mortality rate for honeybee colony losses (15%) and creating an aid category for farmers facing losses due to attacks on their farms by “piscivorous birds.”

Piscivorous birds are birds that eat fish. You learn something new every day.

The government also gives crop insurance benefits to beginning farmers and ranchers in their first five years of starting out. The OBBA increases the benefits, and offer them to farmers and ranchers in their first 10 years.

Among other changes, this subtitle also creates a Poultry Insurance Pilot Program, to insure poultry growers from “extreme weather-related risk resulting in increased utility cost.”

Here we’ve got funding for all sorts of agriculture programs, including the Environmental Quality Incentives Program, the Grassroots Source Water Protection Program, and the Feral Swine Eradication and Control Pilot Program. (Feral swines, beware!)

The Emergency Food Assistance Program, which purchases food to go to local food banks and soup kitchens, was also extended through 2031. A bunch of other programs were also extended, from the Emergency Citrus Disease Research and Development Trust Fund to the Sheep Production and Marketing Grant Program.

A program to boost agriculture trade was created, and more scholarships were authored for 1890 Institutions, which are historically Black colleges and universities that offer agriculture education.

Congrats, we made it through our first title! 40 pages down!

Title II: Armed Services (pp. 41-54)

This title isn’t split into subtitles, but it’s much shorter and everything is pretty straightforward. There are no cuts, just a bunch of new money appropriated to the Defense Department. ($157 billion in all.)

One notable thing here is $25 billion set aside for Trump’s proposed Golden Dome missile defense system. It’s not called that in the text, though. Here’s how it describes itself, on page 44:

On Page 54, you also see $1 billion appropriated for the Defense Department to play a role in border operations:

I won’t walk through everything funded by this title, but these are the pages to look at if you’re curious about how the Pentagon is spending its new funds. Here are a few other line items from the title that caught my eye…

Several categories of AI funding, including:

More child care assistance for troops:

Money for 5G and 6G systems for the military:

Remember the Chinese spy balloon? Yes, we do the same thing:

And funding to purchase B-21 bombers, which are the next-generation aircraft set to replace the B-2 stealth bombers that were used to drop the “bunker buster” bombs used against Iran last month:


I could go all day — isn’t this fun?!? — but, out of respect for your time, we’ll call it there for our first installment.

We’ll pick up with Title III (Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs!) soon. In the meantime, let me know what you think of this new experiment in the comments. And, as always, send any questions or things you’re curious about.

Thanks for embarking on this reading journey with me! See you next time.