Bush and Obama Ask Trump to Save14 Million Lives (He Says...Nah) & Beyoncé Gets Fan Backlash for Her T-Shirt
July 8, 2025
What I’m Discussing Today:
Kareem’s Daily Quote: Bob Dylan on the journey of growing up and growing old.
Obama and Bush Call Trump’s USAID Closure a ‘Travesty’ as Report Warns of 14 Million Extra Deaths: What kind of person—or country—is okay with this?
Trump Threatens to Deport Musk as Their Feud Boils Over: Musk is a dolt, but he still has a right to dissent without being threatened with deportation.
Trump Team Threatens to Prosecute CNN Over Reporting on ICE-Tracking App: This is how the loss of a free press begins.
Kareem’s Video Break: Can you outwit these schoolchildren trying to answer a teacher’s challenge?
Fans Criticize Beyoncé for T-Shirt Calling Native Americans ‘the Enemies of Peace’: Beyoncé is a fierce force for good in the world, but even she can get it wrong sometimes.
What I’m Watching on TV: Scrublands is a riveting crime drama, The Bear is back and still as moody and insightful as ever, Nautilus brings the spirit of Jules Verne alive.
Kareem’s Magical Moments in Sports: The most amazing bowling spare I’ve ever seen.
Tony Bennett Sings “Once Upon a Time”: The perfect voice to express the longing for lost love.
Kareem’s Daily Quote
I was so much older then, I’m younger than that now.
Lyric from “My Back Pages” by Bob Dylan, musician, winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature
Bob Dylan wrote this song in 1964 out of frustration with being pigeon-holed as a folk-protest singer. He felt the frustration of an artist trying to evolve his art but people always wanting him to be stuck in their personal nostalgic snow globe, repeating the same kinds of songs that they fell in love with. Joni Mitchell complained about the same thing: her fans only wanting to hear her early songs when she was excited to experiment with more jazz infusion. In “That’s Why I’m Here,” James Taylor sings about his fans who “pay good money to hear ‘Fire and Rain’ again and again and again.”
But there’s another aspect of the song—and especially today’s quote—that’s about reconciling the person you were in your youth and the person you are as an adult. There’s an episode of the classic TV show Northern Exposure in which 30-year-old Maggie reads a letter from her 15-year-old self describing what her life will be like when she’s 30. Of course, it isn’t anything like that. At first she feels some regret, then she realizes that her life is much better for having abandoned the childish notions of who she should be.
We often think about the young as being open and accepting of new ideas, but that’s not necessarily true. Sometimes I think back on the person I was from 18 to 28 and I’m shocked and occasionally ashamed at how smug I was in many opinions without looking at all the facts. I was “older then” because I was hardened to my opinions like viewers of Fox News. Not only were some of my political views biased, but so were some of my social views.
Today, I hold many of the same opinions, but I can defend them with logic, facts, and experts, not just the whims of passion or the pressure of my culture. Fortunately, there are many other opinions I flushed away where they belong. I haven’t become cynical but have maintained my optimism about people wanting to do the right thing even when they don’t.
It’s funny that youth fears old age because they worry they’ll lose their passion for life and openness to new things. But most polls show that the older you get, the happier you are. One reason is that you feel free to be more of who you are without worrying what others think of you. That’s a feeling young people claim they have, but it really isn’t. They are so fearful of being marginalized that they will bend and twist themselves into the person others will approve of. The need to belong is so full of anxiety that it stifles many young people from exploring other ideas, beliefs, and behaviors that might suit them more. Most of our movies set in high school are about that.
Don’t worry, youngsters, as you grow older, you will actually become “younger than that now.”