132 Comments

We wish you a good night's rest, Heather! I've decided I'm giving copies of your book to most of the folks on my Christmas list. Getting them to read your book will be a great way to prod them into action in 2024!

Expand full comment

I'm giving one sister the new one and the other sister How the South Won the Civil War so we'll have them both in the family and can share them around! Thank you Heather!

Expand full comment

You cheat!

Expand full comment
Dec 4, 2023·edited Dec 4, 2023

Linda, I sent two copies to my sisters in Texas as well! I don't know if they read the other stuff I send them. Both sisters are Republican BUT they have issues with Trump. BUT, they are bathed in the far right propaganda machine (which, honestly, is one of the greatest political successes in US History). So, they don't like Biden because, after all, "China owns him". The far right propaganda really works.

At any rate, Prof Richardson has been drumbeating good economic news since Biden took the helms. Below is some more amazingly positive evidence of her focus. To me, it is amazing. My whole adult life American corporations were outsourcing to China and then granting themselves gigantic bonuses on the back of paying nothing to the poor worker in China. Think Jack Welch (Harvard Business Review hero in the late 1980's).

It looks like, after all this time, even the Harvard Business Review might have learned that their fawning over Welch was, umm, exactly wrong. Or maybe not. One never knows about the blind when led by the blind. No disrespect to blind people intended. Just an old saying (which, might not be appropriate anymore, except for Welch and Harvard BR, its perfect).

https://wolfstreet.com/2023/12/02/the-eyepopping-factory-construction-boom-in-the-us/

Expand full comment

Good idea! Hopefully the magnuts will open the book and their brains. 🥴🙏🏼

Expand full comment

Gigi, if they are a MAGA nuts, they are operating with their reptilian brain which hisses and snaps. We have both read the book and will offer it to our neighbor to borrow if he has not read it yet.

Expand full comment

Gave 3 away already. Ordering 3 more - one will be mine at last!

Expand full comment

Heather, you are remarkable!

You deserve more than one night off a week.

You put your heart and soul into every letter you write! I have learned so much about politics, history and life from Letters From An American.

Thank you.

Aaron Daniels

Expand full comment

All I want for Christmas is a country/world so peaceful and SANE that Heather can take off two whole days and nights.

Expand full comment

But Karen, how on earth would some of the rest of us maintain OUR sanities if Heather took TWO nights off?!! : >/

Expand full comment

We can fend for ourselves for 48 hours! It does sound scary.

Expand full comment

Enjoy the rest, and thank you again for reporting of the moving speech by Senator Schumer. It revealed even a person of his status feels some sense of racisim in America. I myself feel closer to Senator Schumer now.

Expand full comment

Good call. I’m exhausted watching all your interviews and politic chats. 😝 Where on earth do you get your energy?!

Expand full comment

Love to you and Buddy. Always great to see his and your photos.....I just got your book from Amazon in India! 😻 I LOVE IT!

Expand full comment

His photos are beautiful 😊

Expand full comment

Agree with Kathleen, be safe. Love Buddy’s calming photo, as usual.

Expand full comment

I can recall chartering a ketch or yawl out of NE Harbor, trolling the winds and waves of Casco or Pennobscott Bays, putting in to small town harbors for the night, and cooking up the chicken lobsters we had earlier bought for $1/apiece from lobstermen returning to harbor from a day hauling traps.

So much has changed since those lazy Summer days cruising the deep Maine waters and its rocky shores, but the same watery aesthetic with its coastal traditions yet remain to attract weekend sailors and other land-bound “down East” flotsam.

Expand full comment

Jon, the last part of your comment about weekend sailors and flotsam gave me a smile. I lived along the Maine coast for a number of years in the Brunswick/Topsham area, and I still considered myself 'flotsam' since my job has always been sitting in front of a screen instead of any of the industries based on the natural resources of Maine. 😊 I was grateful to have learned a lot about coastal professions and the rhythms of the seasonal work for many of the people who had generational connections to the area. I was a 'from away' newbie even years into residing there, lol! But I ended up with great friends that had the distinctive New England drawl from being born and raised along the coast. I appreciate the years I spent there.

Expand full comment

More rreminnders of Bert and I, "New England drrawl," Natalie.

Expand full comment

M-m-m-m-m. I'm a sailor and that is a very appealing picture. But .... what is a 'chicken lobster??'

Expand full comment

Small, 1#ish lob-stuh 🦞

Expand full comment

A nice memory! Have to ask though, what is a chicken lobster?

Expand full comment

Reminds me, Jon Gilmore, for some reason this am of Bert and I humor in their stories which we listened to over and over when we were teenagers growing up in Groton, CT!

Expand full comment

Well deserved time for a little R & R and self care. Books for Christmas - I like that idea Linda. Night all. Tomorrow is a new day - 3 weeks till Christmas

Expand full comment

Pat, my husband and I buy each other books for Christmas, a nice pile of them. The rule is that you have to finish the one you have before getting the next one, so we are reading well into the new year. We have already read Heather's book.

Expand full comment

Thank you for commenting, Michelle. I wish it was an audio book too. HCR’s “history lessons” are invaluable and adds so much perspective to most of the everyday news that most folks see.

Expand full comment

It is

Expand full comment

Thanks, Buddy, for another picture that shares the Maine atmosphere that very few non-natives ever get to see. Heather, thank you for helping us to see, and understand the import of, current politics and the way history has gotten us to this point. Sweet dreams to both of you.

Expand full comment

Have a restful sleep.

Expand full comment

A little R 'n R is good for all of us. Thanks to you, Heather, and Buddy and Peter!

Expand full comment

Rest well and sweet dreams, HCR.

Expand full comment

Sleep well in your well- deserved night off. And please take good care of yourself. You have maintained our sanity and centeredness in the world for several years. Blessings wished for you and your family.

Peg in Placerville CA

Expand full comment

Safe travels!

Expand full comment

Lord knows you deserve it, and I am sure you need it. Rest well, Heather

Expand full comment