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Brian Hines

@oregonbrian.bsky.social

Writer and blogger living in Salem, Oregon. Blogs are Church of the Churchless, Salem Political Snark, HinesSight. Books are Return to the One, Break Free of Dogma, Life is Fair, God's Whisper Creation's Thunder.

78 Followers  |  70 Following  |  331 Posts  |  Joined: 16.11.2024  |  1.7769

Latest posts by oregonbrian.bsky.social on Bluesky

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City Manager Namburi and Mayor Hoy said nothing interesting at Salem City Club - Salem Political Snark Disappointing. Boring. Uninteresting. I could add more negative adjectives, but those do a good job of describing my reaction to what City Manager Krishna Namburi and Mayor Julie Hoy had to say at las...

Tonight's blog post: "City Manager Namburi and Mayor Hoy said nothing interesting at Salem City Club"
salempoliticalsnark.com/2025/11/city...

17.11.2025 06:10 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0
Maybe we humans are smart enough to ask ultimate questions, but not smart enough to answer them Peter Zapffe was called “the bleakest philosopher of all time” in a Reddit post dealing with existentialism. That didn’t make me eager to learn more about him. But I still wanted to, having come acros...

Tonight's blog post: "Maybe we humans are smart enough to ask ultimate questions, but not smart enough to answer them"
churchofthechurchless.com/2025/11/mayb...

16.11.2025 06:13 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0
As an atheist, this is what I like about Buddhism's Pure Land Tradition Surprisingly, even to me, I’ve enjoyed learning about the Pure Land Tradition of Buddhism after buying a book by Taitetsu Unno four years ago. From time to time I pick up River of Fire, River of Water...

Tonight's blog post: "As an atheist, this is what I like about Buddhism's Pure Land tradition"
churchofthechurchless.com/2025/11/as-a...

15.11.2025 02:21 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0
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At my advanced age, it's tough to decide if I should get a 3-year subscription to a magazine - Hinessight Hate to break this news to you younger folks, but things get more difficult once you’re a senior citizen like me. I know, you’re familiar with stories of hearing difficulties, driving at night. openin...

Tonight's blog post: "At my advanced age, it's tough to decide if I should get a 3-year subscription to a magazine"
hinesblog.com/2025/11/at-m...

14.11.2025 06:26 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0
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If Trump did nothing wrong, why is he so eager to keep the Epstein files hidden? - Salem Political Snark If someone is innocent, they have every reason to want as much information as possible made public about a suspected offense. As the saying goes, the truth will set you free. Epstein and Trump But Don...

Tonight's blog post: "If Trump did nothing wrong, why is he so eager to keep the Epstein files hidden?"
salempoliticalsnark.com/2025/11/if-t...

13.11.2025 06:26 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0
Conversion therapy shows the danger of trying to be someone other than who you actually are I don’t believe that we humans have an enduring self, or soul. We’re too changeable and impermanent for that to be true. However, each of us certainly is something unique, a person unlike any other on...

Tonight's blog post: "Conversion therapy shows the danger of trying to be someone other than who you actually are"
churchofthechurchless.com/2025/11/conv...

12.11.2025 05:59 — 👍 1    🔁 1    💬 0    📌 0
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Initially irate, now I'm OK with Democrats giving up on government shutdown - Salem Political Snark This would have been a very different blog post if I’d written it last night, after I heard that eight Senate Democrats had agreed to vote with Republicans to end the longest government shutdown ever....

Tonight's blog post: "Initially irate, now I'm OK with Democrats giving up on government shutdown"
salempoliticalsnark.com/2025/11/init...

11.11.2025 07:04 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0
Thinking "It had to be" is my atheist way of saying, "God's will" Back in my believing days, before 2005, as that is when I stopped being an active member of Radha Soami Satsang Beas — an India-based religious organization headed up by a guru considered to be God in...

Tonight's blog post: "Thinking 'It had to be" is my atheist way of saying 'God's will'"
churchofthechurchless.com/2025/11/thin...

10.11.2025 06:16 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0
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Democrats need to continue shutdown as long as it takes to get Obamacare subsidies - Salem Political Snark I’m not a fan of government shutdowns. Hardly anyone is. But along with lots of other Democrats, I want my party to stand strong on not reopening the federal government until Trump and his fellow Repu...

Tonight's blog post: "Democrats need to continue shutdown as long as it takes to get Obamacare subsidies"
salempoliticalsnark.com/2025/11/demo...

09.11.2025 06:23 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0
Our dog is more attuned to reality than religious believers are I’ve become a big fan of Robert Saltzman. So much so, after reading his The Ten Thousand Things and The 21st Century Self, I ordered what must be his longest book, Depending on no-thing — which is 607...

Tonight's blog post: "Our dog is more attuned to reality than religious believers are"
churchofthechurchless.com/2025/11/our-...

08.11.2025 06:13 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0
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Mayor Julie Hoy lied about not wanting City Manager Stahley gone. That's her third lie about Stahley. - Salem Political Snark Salem Mayor Julie Hoy must have a desire to follow in Donald Trump’s lying footsteps. That’s a difficult task, given Trump’s almost constant battle against the truth, but Hoy is showing that when it c...

Tonight's blog post: "Mayor Julie Hoy lied about not wanting City Manager Stahley gone. That's her third lie about Stahley."
salempoliticalsnark.com/2025/11/mayo...

07.11.2025 06:29 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0
A death on Diamond Mountain shows the danger of religious fanaticism A friend gave me Scott Carney’s book, The Enlightenment Trap: Obsession, Madness and Death on Diamond Mountain. My previous posts about the book are here, here, here, and here. The book is interesting...

Tonight's blog post: "Death on Diamond Mountain shows the danger of religious fanaticism"
churchofthechurchless.com/2025/11/a-de...

06.11.2025 06:38 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0
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Democrats score major victories in today's elections. I feel great! - Salem Political Snark Turning on the television to watch election returns tonight, I had a bit of PTSD, since the last time I did that in November 2024, Trump beat Harris and I was hugely depressed. But things turned out p...

Tonight's blog post: "Democrats score major victories in today's elections. I feel great!"
salempoliticalsnark.com/2025/11/demo...

05.11.2025 06:25 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0
If a religion tries to coerce you into staying, you're in a cult, so run away from it! Here’s another right-on message from the person who shared thoughts with me that became a blog post, “A message for those thinking of leaving RSSB, Radha Soami Satsang Beas.” It’s on the same theme, t...

Tonight's blog post: "If a religion tries to coerce you into staying, you're in a cult, so run away from it!"
churchofthechurchless.com/2025/11/if-a...

04.11.2025 06:04 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0
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Base-running blunder cost Toronto a World Series championship -- by just a few inches - Hinessight I love to watch sporting events because they so often — heck, maybe always — reflect life as a whole. Meaning, victory or defeat often doesn’t go to the better team, or the most deserving team, but th...

Tonight's blog post: "Base-running blunder cost Toronto a World Series championship -- by just a few inches"
hinesblog.com/2025/11/base...

03.11.2025 06:24 — 👍 1    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0
Just this -- a simple yet profound Zen saying Zen Buddhism is known for focusing on the natural world rather than abstract concepts. Chopping wood and carrying water are favored over devotion to God and similar thoughts divorced from everyday rea...

Tonight's blog post: "Just this -- a simple yet profound Zen saying"
churchofthechurchless.com/2025/11/just...

02.11.2025 05:08 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0
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After eight years of using a urinary catheter, TURP is planned due to improved bladder function - Hinessight In May 2017 I had a serious urine retention episode — unable to pee, more bluntly put — that kicked off a lengthy period of depression and anxiety due to the difficulty I had with needing to insert a ...

Tonight's blog post: "After eight years of using a urinary catheter, TURP is planned due to improved bladder function"
hinesblog.com/2025/10/afte...

01.11.2025 06:49 — 👍 1    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0
Why keeping an open mind on the divine is a stupid idea Sometimes intelligent people can say some really stupid things. I know this as an experiential fact, because I’m intelligent and I’ve said some really stupid things. In conversations. In books I’ve wr...

Tonight's blog post: "Why keeping an open mind on the divine is a stupid idea"
churchofthechurchless.com/2025/10/why-...

31.10.2025 05:14 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0
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Check out demobrats podcast where we talk about Mayor Hoy's ethics violation and other juicy subjects - Salem Political Snark Yesterday I had the pleasure of being part of a demobrats podcast episode, “The Mayor, In the Office, With the Ballot Measure.” You can listen to it by either clicking on that link, or via this embedd...

Tonight's blog post: "Check out demobrats podcast where we talk about Mayor Hoy's ethics violation and other juicy subjects"
salempoliticalsnark.com/2025/10/chec...

30.10.2025 05:08 — 👍 1    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0
If hurricanes, trees, lions, and brain-damaged people don't have free will, why believe that most humans do? A massive hurricane just struck the Caribbean island of Jamaica. Aside perhaps from a few extreme pantheists who consider that consciousness exists in every part of the universe, nobody believes that ...

Tonight's blog post: "If hurricanes, trees, lions, and brain-damaged people don't have free will, why believe that most humans do?"
churchofthechurchless.com/2025/10/if-h...

29.10.2025 05:18 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0
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I chose ATRIO Medicare Advantage after Providence dumped me, but wished for more options - Hinessight For eleven years after I became eligible for Medicare at age 65, I was mostly happy with my Regence Medicare Advantage plan. But near the end of 2024 Regence was enmeshed in a contract dispute with Sa...

Tonight's blog post: "I chose ATRIO Medicare Advantage after Providence dumped me, but wished for more options"
hinesblog.com/2025/10/i-ch...

28.10.2025 05:30 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0
The real danger of A.I. isn't that it becomes like a human mind, but that the human mind already is like A.I. Artificial Intelligence, A.I., is a big deal nowadays. I just heard a financial expert say that if the burgeoning investments in A.I. are subtracted from growth in the United States, that growth would...

onight's blog post: "The danger of A.I. isn't that it becomes like a human mind, but that the human mind already is like A.I."
churchofthechurchless.com/2025/10/the-...

27.10.2025 05:18 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0
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Trump fits narcissistic personality disorder diagnosis perfectly (no big surprise) - Salem Political Snark Donald Trump is a despicable human being and the worst president in the history of the United States. But that description doesn’t fully capture all of his flaws. That’s why we need to turn to psychia...

Tonight's blog post: "Trump fits narcissistic personality disorder perfectly (no big surprise)"
salempoliticalsnark.com/2025/10/trum...

26.10.2025 05:15 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0
Spiritual sickness arises from meditating too assiduously. Or viewing India as a promised land. Most people view spirituality and meditation as a good thing. Often, it is. But almost always, too much of a good thing can become a bad thing. Too much eating leads to obesity. Too much exercising le...

Tonight's blog post: "Spiritual sickness arises from meditating too assiduously. Or viewing India as a promised land."
churchofthechurchless.com/2025/10/spir...

25.10.2025 04:59 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0
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Seven reasons why Trump's destruction of White House East Wing enrages me - Salem Political Snark I’m used to being irritated by Trump. That’s to be expected when the worst president in American history almost daily challenges his own record for worst’ness. But there’s something about his destruct...

Tonight's blog post: "Seven reasons why Trump's destruction of White House East Wing enrages me"
salempoliticalsnark.com/2025/10/seve...

24.10.2025 05:39 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0
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No free will brings great news: You are innocent of your past mistakes There’s plenty of reasons not to believe in free will. The most important and basic reason is that free will is an illusion. Robert Sapolsky made strong arguments for this in his book, Determined. I w...

Tonight's blog post: "No free will brings great news: You are innocent of your past mistakes"
churchofthechurchless.com/2025/10/no-f...

23.10.2025 05:18 — 👍 2    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0
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Why a favored sports team losing hurts almost as much as physical pain - Hinessight I don’t follow professional baseball very closely. I’m much more of a college baseball fan, the Oregon State Beavers being my favorite team. But since the Seattle Mariners are the closest professional...

Tonight's blog post: "Why a favored sports team losing hurts almost as much as physical pain"
hinesblog.com/2025/10/why-...

22.10.2025 05:04 — 👍 1    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0
Regret seems useless to me, especially if there's no free will I regret quite a few things that I’ve done in my life. Everybody does. At least, everybody that I know. But recently it dawned on me that regret is almost always a useless emotion, whether or not we p...

Tonight's blog post: "Regret seems useless to me, especially if there's no free will"
churchofthechurchless.com/2025/10/regr...

21.10.2025 05:23 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0
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Photos and videos of No Kings rally in Salem, Oregon - Salem Political Snark Yesterday I joined at least 6,000 other people for a No Kings rally near the state capitol here in Salem. We protested Trump’s authoritarianism and inhumane policies. The rally was energizing. Also, h...

Tonight's blog post: "Photos and videos of No Kings rally in Salem, Oregon"
salempoliticalsnark.com/2025/10/phot...

20.10.2025 04:48 — 👍 2    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0
To look at life and deeply feeling one day it will end -- for me that's the essence of spirituality Everyone has their own personal approach to spirituality, even if it is to say, “Spirituality is a load of crap, I have no interest in it.” I’m sympathetic with that attitude, because I’ve become incr...

Tonight's blog post: "To look at life and deeply feeling one day it will end -- for me that's the essence of spirituality"
churchofthechurchless.com/2025/10/to-l...

19.10.2025 05:32 — 👍 0    🔁 0    💬 0    📌 0

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