Weight loss maintained

My weight seems to have become fairly stable. At this time last year I weighed 164.6lb. It tends to go up over vacations when I stop counting calories carefully and to drift back downward when I am: for example, a couple of months ago I weighed 164.8lb and this morning I am down to 163.4lb which, given natural variation, is close enough that I consider it to be broadly the same. I doubt that my recent hiatus in exercise made much difference. I eat more than 15Mcal each week so that is plenty.

I will see how I do over this Thanksgiving and Christmas. I am taking this Thursday through Monday off work and plenty more time over subsequent weeks. To reduce my holiday weight gain I will try to be a little stricter while slacking off as I would rather stay more comfortably within the healthy region of the usual BMI charts. For me that region's center is below 150lb so I would rest more comfortably at a few pounds less than where I am now. I have not yet weighed below 160lb.

If I remain poor at my vacation habit of trying to guess without actually counting then I may consider making 15Mcal a hard limit for typical working weeks to give that downward drift a gentle extra push. Fortunately my new reading glasses help with nutrition labels.

Divide and exploit

( American elections are unfair. )

Economic inequality follows from electoral inequality.

( Lies routinely have currency. )

Even if people's voting intentions were to have their proper effect on electoral outcomes then that would not prevent their choice from being based on poor information. Democracy appears to be under considerable threat.

Joseph Stiglitz has been uncomfortably pointing out the clear rise in corporations' monopoly rent-seeking. Needless exploitation drags the economy down as a lack of accountability harms both equality and productivity. The Roosevelt Institute's Untamed: How to Check Corporate, Financial, and Monopoly Power (2016) asserts that, … American workers increasingly perceive that the rules of the economy do not work for them. I wonder if their justified anger can find its way toward political solutions despite how news and social media help to shield their users from having their beliefs challenged.

( The electorate may be too divided to … )

unite behind any real solution enough to force their representatives to think beyond their donors' interests in effecting meaningful change.