Friday, August 28, 2015

of splebes, diagonadl & z "é booby''


dish yere is made me loif completL! it's a jen -u -wine  DIAGONADL SPLEBE.

My life's great desire & purpose is fulfilled, & come on, relly, this perfect SPLEBE  has gone unremarked, tho in my possession 4 a cupola yrs now...it's just a matter of 'C-IN'G things As THeY riLLy R.


There;s the signpost, Up ahead(!) -- You're entering...














Definitely not a What Were We Doin? story; it was more like "What did us?"

This is a screen shot of z haboob that was spoze 2 smite us day B4  yistidday (8//26).  At this pt. it was 10-12 mins south of here, and all dust out in front.

By the time it hit us at 8-50pm it was heavy rain & dust mixed 2-Gether ---- woreded inuit joansing pretty guid, ye rain alasted long enoug & was sufre intense enough 2 wash it all 'clen.'

Thursday, August 27, 2015

fear & loathing in d.c.



It isn't hard to figure what's driving the Biden 4 preznit thing. 

The Dem establishment is desperate 2 find an alternative 2 Mrs. Clinton who isn't Bernie Sanders.




DC politicians fear & hate this guy to the same degree some of us R devoted 2 the cause.

Monday, August 24, 2015

worse than hitler

For once, I have nothing to add.

Welcome to clusterfuck nation.

Sunday, August 23, 2015

high crimes

The first presidential cabinet member convicted of a felony while serving was Warren G. Harding's secretary of the interior Albert Fall, who did two years after his 1922 conviction for accepting bribes in connection with the Teapot Dome, Wyoming oil lease scandal.

Fifty-five years went by before John Mitchell, Nixon's Attorney-General, was convicted of conspiracy, perjury, and obstruction of justice in connection with the famous burglary of Democratic headquarters at the Watergate Hotel. Mitchell, to be fair, had recently resigned his office at the time.

Earl  Butz, President Ford's secretary of agriculture, was not convicted of a felony while in office, but was forced to resign after telling a joke on a public flight which was overheard and reported by the TV correspondent Geraldo Rivera, to wit: "The only things a nigger cares about are having loose shoes, a tight pussy, and a warm place to shit." In 1978, 4 years after his resignation, Butz pled guilty to income tax evasion in excess of $100,000, served 25 days in jail and paid the money back.

Two members of Reagan's Cabinet, Attorney-General Edwin Meese and interior secretary James Watt, barely avoided felony convictions. Watt pled guilty to a single, lesser, misdemeanor charge as he stood accused of 25 counts of perjury and obstruction of justice in connection with influence peddling at the department of housing and urban development Meese resigned in a timely fashion when he was being investigated by a special prosecutor for selling his influence over his long-time friend, the president.


The foregoing is an example of opinion writing with no opinion ever expressed.

Every sentence is an easily-verifiable fact.

To point to abuse is to condemn it.

Also, I find it interesting that all 4 presidents mentioned are of the same political party,

Friday, August 21, 2015

ping-pong politics



Trying 2 discern larger patterns of US presidential politics, it looks to me as if voters have spent the last 40 yrs getting whipsawed from pillar to post.

Starting with Carter, an ineffectual liberal who discovered that good intentions don't mean a thing if you don't have the swag to intimidate Congress, voters turned in frustration to the hard right-winger Reagan, and loved him until he proved 2 B a habitual liar and tax cheat. Michael Dukakis was such a mediocre candidate he couldn't even best the elder Bush, but  Clinton had no trouble doing so.

Of all the occupants of the White House in the past 40 yrs, Clinton was closest to being a magician, and pulled at least a couple of rabbits out of hats. His welfare reform, for example, though it hurt a lot of people as well as helping some, brilliantly stole a march on his opposition. But in the end he played ball with the oligarchs, gutting bank regulation by allowing Larry Summers to sabotage the Glass-Steagall Act. Next was the stupidest president (so far) Dubya, followed by the most ineffectual liberal ever, Obama.

To some degree it's not Obama's fault. He naively underestimated the ferocity of his racist opposition, and due to his habitual narcissism induced by doting grandparents, failed to learn the lessons Carter left 4 him 35 yrs earlier concerning the intractability of a hostile Congress. We endured 8 yrs of Obama & all we have to show for it is the crappy Affordable Care Act. It sets a good precedent, but then so did Jimmy Carter's Environment speech of so long ago. 


As we look @ the current field of candidates, voters have little 2 B cheerful about. Between a boatload of ludicrous Rehooligans who appear 2 B attempting 2 outdo each other in stupid macho posturing and Hillary Clinton, whose skin-deep liberalism covers everything & touches nothing, the shallowness of our political system stands exposed.

It's past time for an end to ping-pong politics. let's see -- there must B SOMEone out there who's different...

Thursday, August 20, 2015

good golly miss molly



Right. She's been dead these 8 years, but some of us haven't forgotten that Molly Ivins may have been the best pure political writer America ever produced.                                

If not the best, she was the funniest in her daily handling of a naturally depressing topic. On the event of the Elevation of St. Ronald in 1980 Ivins wrote:

"As a life-long Texas liberal, I have spent the  whole of my existence in a political climate well to the right of that being created by Ronald Reagan and his merry zealots. Brethren and sistren, this can not only be endured, it can be laughed at. Actually, you have two other choices. You could cry or you could throw up."

Ivins read today reminds us that before there was Donald T. Rump there was Dubya, and before Dubya there was Reagan, and that things aren't getting any better. But while there's nothing in contemporary politics to celebrate, you don't want to make things harder on yourself. "You want to end up looking like Jeane Kirkpatrick? So smile."

The fight of her life was not political, however, and when she succumbed to inflammatory breast cancer in 2007, aged 62, only those very close to her even knew she was sick. Self-pity was not the style of this strong six footer, who left us so much and asked so little.

Even after 8 yrs I still miss her. RIP, Molly, and yes, you can say that. Who's gonna stop you?

Tuesday, August 18, 2015

arguing with counter-revolutionaries

Just about all of the good (material) things in your life is supplied by corporations.  You are greedy and want more, so you are about to kill the golden goose (sic).



Ah yes, the classic lament of the counter-revolutionary: "You guys will wreck  EVERYTHING; nothing will be                     like it is now."

Yeah, that's kind of the idea.

No more megabucks flowing to the .1%. No more war for those parasites to batten on.

No more crappy & useless paper pushing "jobs" in cubicles. Just listen to crazy Jim:

The more detached from reality American culture becomes the more strictly ceremonial leadership gets, as illustrated by the raft of bromides Barack Obama floated past the assembled vassalage of government last week in another grand effort to avoid the necessities of the moment.

Those necessities include freeing a hostage public from the tyrannical clutches of corporate despotism — the evil empire of big boxes, big burgers, big pharma, Big Brother — and the atrocious rackets fostered by them that masquerade as an economy. The template of the life we have known is broken and the pieces within are flying apart, and no amount of wishing or promising can keep them going. If this society is even going to survive, the people have to smash their way out of this template prison, probably against the efforts of the people and organizations now running it merely for their own benefit. (Januay 2015).


Don''t listen to the siren song of the counter revolutionary. I'd rather drink muddy water & sleep in a hollow log / than to stay around here gettin treated like a dirty dog.

What's so bad about it? War & racketeering mostly. Russia fell when the Czar refused to acknowledge the war (WWI) was a lost cause, France when the monarchy refused to force the .1% off the backs of the people. What hapens is that the people look at the thin layer of "leadership" holdig society together, realize "they don't give a damn about us," and then recognize how easy it is to shake em off.

If you're thinking our situation here today is unique, you're dreamin. The last time this almost happened (1929-30) it was brought on by a nearly identical situation, in which the oligarchy, ater wrecking the economy, left the people holding the shitty end of the stick. 

One more thing, Seraphim: civilization is a lot tuffer than you think. It won't go away...

Sunday, August 16, 2015

reality sandwiches



12 years ago, Pope Greenspan* sat smirking as then-Rep Sanders attempted in vain 2 acquaint him with reality.

Reality eventually caught up  with him, embarrassingly causing his ideology 2 crash, as he admitted to Rep Waxman 5 yrs later.

By that time the money was all gone, but better late than never I spoze.


*"A Jewish Pope?" you scoff. America is the land of equal opportunity!

get yer head outta that box

Randy Paul is the latest. It seems in every presidential election now, some Republicabrone or other comes up with a brilliant new idea -- the flat tax. It sounds so fair.

We need to be reminded in the US that the purposes of a graduated income tax are

1. to raise money, so the gov't can function, and

2. to redistribute income.

A flat tax doesn't get it.

I know that #2 contains that word that gives lots of Americans shingles. But  that's only because you live under the propaganda regimes of either Foxist News or CNN. and for that reason haven't thought about what would happen to your beloved capitalist, "free" enterprise system if there was no redistribution whatsoever.

As the late Mr. Rogers would have asked, "You know what self-destruction is, down't you?"

Think about it. But don't hurt yourselves. 

jelly rolls




Foxist News anchor & homecoming queen Megyn Jelly announced an unplanned 2-wk vacation on the air today.

It's the most-read story at Salon.com at the moment.

She's been famously and furiously feuding with candidate D Trump, who made disparaging remarks about women generally in attacking Ms. Jelly. Network honcho Roger Ailes jumped in 2 referee the dispute and ruin everybody's fun. 

With today's announcement, Meg Jelly shows just how tuff she is -- not very. 

It's hard not to ber on her side, however. I can't wait until some reporter, when D Trump gets snappish with the press, asks the candidate "Wotsamadda U, Don? Is it ragtime?"

Jusrt a note: I'm A FOXIST NEWS watcher, but not really (I'll only watch it if the sound is off, for reasons I've explained in some detail.)

Friday, August 14, 2015

Monday, August 10, 2015

The Conquered Banner

...a poem by Father Abram Joseph Ryan, Civil War Chaplain who served with the Confederacy, was easily the most popular of the Post-Bellum appreciations of the defeated cause.

Furl that banner...


THE CONQUERED BANNER by Abram Joseph Ryan (1838-1886)


Furl that Banner, for 'tis weary;
 Round its staff 'tis drooping dreary;
 Furl it, fold it, it is best;
 For there's not a man to wave it,
 And there's not a sword to save it,
 And there's no one left to lave it 
In the blood that heroes gave it
 And its foes now scorn and brave it;
 Furl it, hide it--let it rest!
We see from the start that Ryan's message is clear and unamibiguous; give it up, boys; the 
fight is finished. 
 Take that banner down! 'tis tattered;
 Broken is its shaft and shattered;
 And the valiant hosts are scattered
 Over whom it floated high. 
Oh! 'tis hard for us to fold it;
 Hard to think there's none to hold it;
 Hard that those who once unrolled it
 Now must furl it with a sigh. 
Furl that banner! furl it sadly!
 Once ten thousands hailed it gladly.
 And ten thousands wildly, madly,
 Swore it should forever wave;
 Swore that foeman's sword should never
 Hearts like theirs entwined dissever,
 Till that flag should float forever
 O'er their freedom or their grave!
 Furl it! for the hands that grasped it,
 And the hearts that fondly clasped it,
 Cold and dead are lying low;
 And that Banner--it is trailing!
 While around it sounds the wailing
 Of its people in their woe.

I found a hand-written copy of this poem 
among my Great-Grandpa Tim Brice's
papers in his family Bible, which I was
researching in an attempt to 
dig out his attitude toward the late conflict. 

For, though conquered, they adore it!
Love the dead hands that bore it!
Weep for those who fell before it!
Pardon those who trailed and tore it!
  But, oh! wildly they deplored it!
  Now who furl and fold it so.

Tim, born in 1838, was 23 when the war started,ed, and though there was technically speaking, no draft at the time he and his brother David "enlisted" in 1862, the Confederacy was already desperate for manpower.
Furl that Banner! True, 'tis gory,Yet 'tis wreathed around with glory,
 And 'twill live in song and story,
 Though its folds are in the dust;
 For its fame on brightest pages,
 Penned by poets and by sages,
 Shall go sounding down the ages--
 Furl its folds though now we must.

For David, who went on to serve in Lee's Army of Northern Virginia, the glory was everlasting. A veteran of Chancellorsville and Gettysburg, Dave 
met a Yankee Minié Ball in the Wilderness in spring of 1864. Tim could claim
veterans status too, but only on very slim pretexts; he got the fever during basic
training, and ended up returning home from the hospital in Macon.

The camp fever was real and deadly, and kille\d as many boys on both sides as
enemy shot and shell. I still don't know my great-grandpa's Real attitude toward the war.

Furl that banner, softly, slowly!
 Treat it gently--it is holy--
 For it droops above the dead.
 Touch it not--unfold it never,
 Let it droop there, furled forever,
 For its people's hopes are dead!

Father Ryan's poem, though still celebrated in some places, seems like an artifact from another planet to me, with its overwrought emotionalism and drippy
sentimemt. It was obviously sincere, and Ryan, writing shortly after 
Appamatox,had seen more than his share of bad fuggum -- humans at their worst -- but still loves the extinguished cause, and contributed to the glorifiction of it by modern-day American whites, for whom adoration of Dixie, until 
now, has been a common cultural theme. 
 

 

Sunday, August 09, 2015

Friday cat missing


yas,  I know there wasn't a friday catte this weak bcuz the. Cat was left 2 sleep en chair in 
Saint George.

Spoke to She-Ra last nite & learned.that Sammy is fine, has taken possession of The Chair and sleeps  there 19 or 20 out of every 24/7.  No doubt she defends it from Roxy,. the Chihuahua who has been sent in 2 entertain her during our absence.

We'll be goin home to San Giorgio on Monenday, and thence after the hay boobies have all departed, and the monsoon is busted & getting weak, we'll wend our way bak 2 Mesa, Aridzona

Saturday, August 08, 2015

koch whores




the comprehensive list                                                                                                                               

Let's recall, as their friends in the print medta enjoy doing, all the money these philanthropic brothers regularly give to GOOD causes, such as PBS. Then let's recall the introduction of the brothers  to the world at large through what some have called a "hit piece" by Jane Mayer in the New Yorker back in 2010.






It was what I call a "True Hit Piece."


Mayer detailed the political education of the brothers via their dad, a self-Made Texas oil millionaire, and one of the founders of the John Birch Society. They've never repudiated the fascist, pro-war ideology in which they were raised; they have grown into the modern embodiment of it. 





Like the birchers? Sympathize? RU a BIRCHSIMP?? If so, vote for Koch Candiadates. Look for the seal of approval stamped on their gonads -- they're mostly men, but women candidates will send copies of their ovarian x-rays to voters on request. 





If a Birch/Koch candidate represents YOUR values, I feel sorry for you. Backwardness, and a belief that the Status quo is sacred, do not serve your fellow man as well as $20 & spot of cofeee or lemonade would.


If you detest the influence of big money in politics, and the presence of slugs like the Kochs & Mistah Adelson, & If your answer to that mierda is "no," then vote for Bernie Sanders for presnit in 2016. He's not superman, but he'll get things rolling. Revolution isn't a game.

          

Monday, August 03, 2015

In the heart of the empire





Here in Salt Lake City, the promised land, the Heart of Utah, you'll find the most densely
populated, not 2 mention intense, places in the state. Unlike most of the United States, Utah has a functioning government, a theocracy, which collects taxes, mainly the tithe of 10% on household incomes, then redistributes the money both fairly & efficiently.

The freeways in Utah are intensively patrolled by cop cars, marked and unmarked, with 
the result that drivers R strongly motivated to avoid acting like imbeciles. I'm as opposed  as any body 2 over-policing, but putting the cops on Freeways 2 make the roads safe for traveling strikes me as a rational use of tax 
resources.

Likewise the disbursment of tithe money to aid the poor, indigent, widows and orphans of the state, for Utah famously takes care of its own. 

The Epicenter of this Empire of Deseret, a governmental entity which grows stronger as the official, US govt grows weaker & less able 2 project power, represents real power in an age of relative powerlessness.

The thing is you're not required to pay a tithe if you're not a church member, and just wanna live here among the Saints. I actually would feel kinda guilty about it if we lived here, but then if I thought about the Golden plates  the Nephites & the Lamanites & bands of Gadianton Robbers lurking in the hills, and all the rest of that moonshine, I think I'd prolly just wanta make a contribution... 

But I must say I like Utah, an orderly, functioning place set in a remote section of a largely dysfunctional DisUnited States. Some might describe the Republican & paternalistic theocracy as "semi-fascist,"& they may be right, but you'd be surprised how preferable it is 2 a void.

Illustration: Salvaged capstone from the nauvoo (Illinois) Temple.

Sunday, August 02, 2015

people vs. money


That middle class generation has an aggregate accumulated wealth that is estimated to be somewhere between $17 and $34 trillion dollars.  Most of that wealth is tied up in primary residences, pensions, and savings accounts.


Boy, I wish I Was in that lucky cohort...missed it by 2 yrs (b. 1944) -- 


I'm kidding of course -- most everything in yr essay applies 2 me.

Politics in the US today is nearly all about money it's true. That & taxes, is the whole Republicabrone agenda. Why else would they wanna sell us a nice portfolio for our Social Security? 


Their failure to get that done & thereby get their mittens on that remaining part of our portion will cause them 2 weep bittterly. That's O.K. it's their party and they can cry if they want 2.


The first priority of course is to hand em their asses on the tax issue as a means of estblishing fiscal sanity & also gaining the upper hand over the big money boys once & for good.  

That done , I'd like to see politics look to wider horizons, thru such things as establishing peace & demcracy. 


But for right now our hands are full with a simple message to the other side: we (the people) WILL govern you (the money), and you WILL NOT be able to freely root about, attempting to rip us off.

Illustration, engraving from an original drawing by Pietr Breughel the Elder, (Dutch, 16th cent.)  "The Battle between the money-bags & Strong Boxes."