Tuesday, July 24, 2018                                             3:23 AM

Should We Meet Again   (2018Jul24)

Our president is lacking in some key areas. He’s without experience, without education, without fitness, without aptitude, and generally without understanding of the meaning of the presidency. He’s without honor, without honesty, without ethics, without morality, without impulse-control, without responsibility, and deeply neurotic.

Furthermore, he can’t spell, can’t admit to a mistake, can’t apologize, can’t empathize, can’t be faithful, can’t be trusted, and, for the most part, can’t be understood—in tweets or while speaking. All he’s got is that big fat mouth of his and the big mobs of embittered scum who enjoy his live hate-fests. (Let’s not call them Klan rallies—Yet.)

Now we have proof that the Republican whores in Congress will ignore all of the above, and continue to chow down on their sh*t-sandwich and call it filet mignon, as long as they get tax-breaks for the rich, and deregulation for the environment-rapers and the greedy, soulless bankers.

Those insubstantial excuses for men (and some confused women) will never admit that a public servant should serve one term, and let the results do the campaigning for anything more than one term. Hell, they even go to court to get unmonitored campaign funding, a rollback of the Voter Rights act, and race-based gerrymandering. They don’t even pretend to believe in democracy.

So, the president’s a traitorous con-man, the Republican party is a bunch of corrupt weasels, the Democratic party is just embarrassing (and just different corruption waiting its turn, really). Damn, I used to be proud of this country—even though I knew there was some corruption and some hatred—I still thought my principles were shared by a significant part of the country.

But no more Mr. Proud Patriot. This place is a shithole now.

Babies get locked in cages.

Industries are encouraged to go back to dumping shit wherever.

Medals of Honor, and the bereaved families of the recipients, aren’t worth a damn anymore.

Every effort to avoid WWIII, since WWII, has been discarded as ‘unprofitable business’ by the big ‘deal-maker’ who never wore a uniform.

There’s no mystery to why Putin wanted to help Trump become president. There’s no mystery to why the Republicans keep pretending he’s not dangerous, refusing to impeach in spite of unhinged episodes on the daily. And that jumpy, can’t-stay-long-enough-to-look-you-in-the-eye Press Secretary—how do you figure she rationalizes her little daily tap-dances, huh? There’s not even a mystery as to why people voted for him—people are fucking stupid as hell.

Media, you can stop now. You’ve made your pile off of helping flush us all down the shitter—and the mystery is gone, the spark has dimmed. There are no more surprises. Yes, Trump will do and say this or that—but we already know. He’ll be lying. He’ll be doing something un-American, cruel, and unproductive. He’s a liar and a traitor. What else can we expect? The sideshow has become a repulsive banality that won’t even get clicks anymore—so fuck along off.

The Republicans aren’t threatening the American way anymore—they’ve strangled it. They’ve killed our country, what most of us believed was our country. If I ever meet a person who votes Republican, ever again, I’m just gonna haul off and belt’em—fuckin’ deplorables. Do they deserve a random punch in the face, out of the blue? Maybe not, but I didn’t deserve theirs, either.

Monday, July 23, 2018                                             1:29 PM

Bulls**t Walking   (2018Jul23)

The Earth’s surface is lush with a profusion of life—not as lush, not as profuse as a century ago, but still. If some wildlife is endangered, it’s not in my backyard’s biome, so why should I care? The Earth attempts to provide oxygenated, non-toxic atmosphere and drinkable fresh water—and so what if we sprinkle in a few toxins or carcinogens or hormones? It’s still good—you’re still breathing, aren’t you? Don’t be a wuss—it’s all good until we literally start to choke—and die of thirst—then will be plenty of time to deal with all this.

Money talks, BS walks. The Money says ‘full steam ahead’—and if that turns our atmosphere literally to steam, so be it. Money does a lot of stuff these days. It entertains you. Twenty-four hour news, websites tailored to your paranoia—are you not entertained? Ain’t it dramatic?

Money has a close, personal friendship with Carbon Dioxide. Maybe you’ve heard?—CO2, the by-product of Power and Energy. Well, that’s the ‘story’—actually, it’s the by-product of burning fuel. There are other ways to acquire Power and Energy—but Money made its first million with CO2, so we’re gonna call everything else ‘alternative energy’, just so no one forgets how inferior it is to petroleum. Hey, shut up—Money does the talking here.

Money is kind enough to govern us, as well. You didn’t think all those Republicans in both Houses of Congress just naturally turned out to be faithless whores, did you? No, no—Money pays them to be this way—the same Money that broadcasts all the rationales, that voters must swallow, to vote for those whores.

The truth is that Money is killing us, but it still speaks loud enough to keep us from hating it. It’s funny—originally, money was a great invention—portable assets, liquid assets—it was the first ‘internet’, in its way. But no invention of humanity has ever evaded our worst impulses, or our worst representatives—hell, we’re lucky we’re not all radioactive already. Money has become a weapon—and it’s pointed straight at our whole planet. So tote that barge and lift that bale—‘cause you don’t want to be poor when the grass starts burning.

Sunday, July 22, 2018                                              2:46 PM

Republicans: How Embarrassing!   (2018Jul22)

I see similarities between the McCarthy Red-Scare era and the Amoral Republican era. You’d expect it to be called the ‘Trump era’, I know—but it’s more accurately described as the Amoral Republican era. It began with Reagan’s shameless pandering to the rich and his marginalizing of the low-income population.

The bankruptcy of the Soviets, which we all hail as our victory in the Cold War, led to a revolt won by the Russian people—and the independence of the satellite states was a simple fact forced by that bankruptcy.

The US failed to secure their nuclear arsenal—which outlived the state that built it—and those nukes sit, still today, littered about the globe and under the sea. The US failed to provide a ‘Marshall plan’, after we finished slapping each other on the back for defeating the Soviets without the use of American lives lost. We turned our backs on the people who did the dying for us—and that led to Al-Qeada, Boko Haram, and ISIS.

Then came 9/11—which had many heroes and martyrs amongst the common men and women, of uncommon bravery— ever since which the Republicans have used the tragedy. They used it to lionize an inept President and his mistaken wars. They used it to lionize an elitist, bigoted mayor who just happened to hold office while real New Yorkers did all the hero-ing.

The Republicans have used 9/11 to promote cowardice and Islamophobia, panic and inhumanity. They’ve revived racism, in a country that seemed only years ago, to be headed in the proper direction. And they have done all this out of obedience to their paymasters—they laugh at the phrase ‘public service’.

Everyone knows one can’t do the people any good if you don’t get elected—and thus it follows that nothing you do to get elected can be wrong. This part of their amorality is the part that is opposite from the McCarthy era—McCarthy’s amoral egotism was exposed by the televising of the HUAC hearings—and by Edward R. Murrow’s reporting.

Today’s Republicans have hacked mass-media—and hijacked all of it as a megaphone for their misinformation campaign. They did the impossible—convincing Americans to worry about a great female candidate with no real scandals (but endless imagined ones) and not to worry about a blatantly, embarrassingly unfit male candidate. Even more embarrassing—the Russians were helping them the whole time. How’s that for an endorsement?

Wouldn’t it be nice to have a do-over election? Too late—y’all had yer chance—and now Putin’s in charge. Ha- ha! The Republicans are doing a great job—a perfect impersonation of the band on the deck of the Titanic.

MILWAUKEE, WI – NOVEMBER 10: Presidential candidate Donald Trump gestures after Carly Fiorina says she met with Russian President Putin at a one on one meeting, during the Republican Presidential Debate sponsored by Fox Business and the Wall Street Journal at the Milwaukee Theatre November 10, 2015 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The fourth Republican debate is held in two parts, one main debate for the top eight candidates, and another for four other candidates lower in the current polls. (Photo by Scott Olson/Getty Images)

Thursday, July 19, 2018                                           1:32 PM

Olio   (2018Jul20)

My darling, my sweetest one!

Water-cool joy flows through

My body, turned to aether,

Quintessence of love

And like a drug, it soothes me.

My ever-loved, my only star!

Fire consumes my chest,

Which bellows with yearning,

Throat parched with a longing

Only your kiss can slake.

====

Don’t tell me both sides hate.

What I feel is outrage—righteous wrath against enemies of the United States of America (even if they live next door).

I bridle at the hate, the destruction, the loss of hard-won yardage towards a more perfect union—I can’t deal with ignorance so sweeping as to equal treason, against a nation dedicated to enlightened humanity.

What you’re feeling is hate—what I’m feeling is outrage.

There’s a difference.

====

Friday, July 20, 2018                                                3:58 PM

I can’t imagine what Trump supporters must be going through—now that there is clear proof and common knowledge of the con they’ve fallen for. Lied to by dishonest Republican leaders, stirred up by an army of Russian spies, tricked into voting for a sorry excuse of a man—a man who made them laugh when he said, “You’re fired!” on TV—these people will eventually be furious. I just hope they’ve learned enough to redirect their anger in the proper direction.

People didn’t see the harm in reality TV. It was cheaper than hiring writers and actors—it was silly and raw—what could be the harm, right? The harm is that their ‘reality’ was and is heavily edited, to tell whatever story the producers decided to show. Producers knew that bad behavior attracts more attention—thus, bad behavior was promoted as ‘reality’ and still is.

Young people who watch TV are taught that idiocy and selfishness are the standard of behavior—so of course they see nothing wrong with a selfish idiot running for president. Especially one of their favorite stars. If they’d grown up watching The West Wing instead of Big Brother, this never could’ve happened.

But imagine the naked shame—of all that full-throated support of a crook who conned them—of all the lies they swallowed like scripture—of thinking they knew better than the pencil-necked geeks. I’d hate to be a Trump-supporter right now. Or that lone woman who sat behind Trump at rallies with the ‘Women for Trump” sign—or that lone man with the “Blacks for Trump” sign (so sad that neither could find enough people to justify the plurals).

Be gentle with them all, bless their hearts.

This nightmare will end.

Wednesday, July 18, 2018                                                7:21 PM

The Russia-publicans   (2018Jul18)

I’m disappointed that no one publicly asks why the agendas of Russia and the Republicans were so conveniently aligned during the 2016 election. Personally, I believe it has to do with Russia becoming a gangster-state with a mob boss for a leader, concerned with nothing but money and power. The Republicans are of the same mind, but feel hindered by having to pose as public servants.

The Republicans can’t overtly threaten their voters—they have to settle for disinformation campaigns that only do violence to the national consciousness. The Russian people have been at this longer—they know their leaders lie to them. They know this because it is against the law to question what they are told.

It’s not that Republicans are inherently bad (though that’s true enough for most of the elected Republicans) it is only that Republicans are the party of the rich. Cutting taxes and blocking regulations has always been their battle cry. (Ah, remember the days—Republicans used to tie themselves in knots to deny their link to wealth.)

Recent studies suggest a link between personality-type and political party. Thus, when I call Republicans the party of the rich, that would include those who are rich, those who are approaching rich, and those who dream of becoming rich—but use magical thinking to get there. The Republican party also attracts those who dislike change and those who avoid making waves.

As near as I can see, that makes about half the country. Elections, until recently, were not forgone conclusions in any race. However, if you have a charismatic candidate with a spoiled, pervy, quasi-criminal life-style, the Republican’s 50% drops down to 30-40%—which, sadly due to the Electoral College, is enough to win by.

I digress, but with a purpose—there is a syntactical quandary here. Whenever I lambast the Republicans, I can expect some Republican voter to take offense at my aspersions—as if I specifically meant him or her. Likewise, when I reach out to Republican voters, I cede undeserved humanity, even humanitarianism, to Republican politicians who have left their consciences far, far behind.

In the past, Democrats and Republicans went head-to-head—arguing the issues, not the candidate that represented their point of view. What could be said of the candidate (barring scandal—which used to matter) could be said of his or her voters.

But today we have Republican politicians and Republican voters—two entirely separate groups. If we try to damn the politicians, the voters take offense. If we try to tell the voters that they’re being duped (and, admittedly, it is bizarre) by both the Republican Party and the Russians—they get on their high horse and tell us that they are just as smart as we are. And contradicting them, at that point, is a waste of breath.

The fact is the Republican party, by being the party of the rich, has become the instrument of the rich—huge corporations and fabulously wealthy donors govern Republicans far more than Republicans govern the country. Money is all that matters to that power base—just as it is with Putin’s empire. So, the lack of connection to The People, and the obsessive greed, make Republicans and Russian Oligarchs a natural alliance.

And this is where the panic sets in—our very way of life is threatened, yet the threat stems from the dull wits of the next-door neighbor who hated Obama. We can’t make ourselves intelligent—and we have not made any provisions for the hurt feelings of slow people in a world under constant acceleration. Our Free Speech becomes a weapon on the Internet—and Trump has knee-capped America’s digital counter-intelligence forces (while waving the Space Cadet Force at us with his other hand).

This disgusting turncoat should have been impeached already. Continuing to give him the respect due to a serious president has gone past the point of farcical hypocrisy, into the area of ‘clear and present danger’. Thus, Trump and his family and goons are no longer the problem—he has given them ammunition for a hundred impeachments. The Republicans are the problem, here at the end, just as their unprincipled tactics created the opening for this era of mindless, hate-filled disgrace to our history.

The only thing more dangerous to our children’s futures than Climate Change—is being too stupid to worry about Climate Change, or the people it will kill. In a world where that is beside the point, you know something is terribly wrong.

Impeach !

Monday, July 16, 2018                                             11:02 AM

Half-Assing the Presidency   (2018Jul16)

When Trump’s cheerleaders say he does things differently, I cannot argue—however, that seems to put an unwarranted shine upon doing things poorly, incompletely, and without any sense of responsibility. Today’s New York Times Arts-Section reports that Trump’s administration has failed to award Presidential Medals for the Arts (or Sciences) thus far, creating yet another gap in the traditions of the White House. This is the same First Family that would have spaced out on the Easter Egg Roll last year, if the Easter Egg manufacturer hadn’t chivied them about their missing pre-order for the special wooden eggs.

The same article points out that Trump has an ‘awkward relationship with the arts’. He can hardly be called a patron (though, if you’re talking over-sized portraits of himself, his fraudulent charity might be interested). Collectible art has become its own investment-sector among the wealthy, but even so, Trump’s base precludes any public support of culture on his part, even if he had the wit to appreciate it. Culture, like science, is way off-brand for this administration.

Trump has no use for diplomacy or, for that matter, any function of the State Department. Even after replacing the top brass, Trump still has no use for the FBI. He gets uncomfortable with all the intelligence services, because they have this theory about the election. Also, they expect him to read this special morning briefing, every morning—and Trump doesn’t like to read—so he doesn’t read it.

Let me preface my next comment with some personal history—when I was little, my dad was fresh from serving as a Marine in Korea. He and my mom had five children, little money, and few prospects. But they sure knew how to work—my parents worked so hard, they worked nearly as hard as their parents had to, during the Great Depression. My parents were good parents—some of my friends’ parents’ behavior made that quite clear (other people’s families are like other planets—and some of them are cold and deadly).

Having said that: when we were very young, my father had the draconian and megalomaniac tendencies of the man who would become a self-made millionaire. He mellowed with time, but back then he could be strict, unreasonable, quick to take offense, and even quicker to lose his temper—a violent prima donna.

Having come this far, I still hesitate to say that Trump reminds me of my dad—it’s not fair to my dad, who was capable of both feeling shame, and seeing reason (eventually). All I’m really saying is: I’m familiar with the psychosis that inhabits the Oval today—I’m familiar with those shell-shocked, bug-eyed kids of his, too. I know when a man is substituting bluster for confidence—and when a man is more comfortable lying than allowing for imperfection.

But I hate to suggest an equivalence—my dad was no coward, no spoiled brat, and several-times-less of a bigot—and he worked his ass off, not just bossing people, but real working. His early parenting style, poverty-stricken and straight from boot camp, traumatized me more than my siblings—and he got better as time went on, slowly but surely. Still, this left me with a horror of people who insist on Authority taking precedence, even over Reason.

Which brings us back to Trump. At first, I felt fortunate—if he was without the slightest experience or in-depth knowledge of government, Trump would definitely do less damage than a real politician could, to forward his fascist deformation of America. Sadly, it turns out, the real politicians won’t behave so outrageously—but they’ll be outrageously silent in the face of Trump doing it. It’s tragic to learn just how shallow their lip-service to public service really is.

Trump’s agenda is two-fold: spoil anything Obama, and pander to the rich, especially himself. He doesn’t know from President—he just wanted to win a contest and purge his racist temper-tantrum. The greatest danger we face now is his growing awareness of and addiction to the immense destructive power of his office. Most people would be embarrassed to be torturing thousands of children and babies—and admitting that they started those internments without any plans to undo their violence. That would give most people pause. Not this clown.

Finally, to anyone who might suggest that Trump’s recent meetings with Kim and Putin are his ‘diplomacy’, let’s make a list of all the things those ill-advised coffee-klatches accomplished:

Abraham Lincoln, is shown November 8, 1863. Lincoln sat for 33 photographers and 127 portraits, 37 of them by Gardner – “Mr. Lincoln’s Cameraman”. (AP Photo/Alexander Gardner)

Friday, July 13, 2018                                                12:30 PM

Ask Me Why   (2018Jul13)

We never dwell on the root of the issue. Why did Putin want Trump to win and Hillary to lose? For the same reason I wanted the opposite: because Hillary would have been a strong, competent leader—and Trump would threaten our values and, ultimately, our way of life. Hillary would have been a strong adversary of Putin’s, whereas Trump makes a ‘useful idiot’.

But it goes deeper than that—it’s not just Trump. We saw yesterday, at Strzok’s Congressional Circus and Sideshow, the Republicans—unwilling to give up their presidential election ‘win’, unable to admit that everyone who voted for Trump was duped, and pretending they don’t own the immortal shame of having supported a foreign agent as America’s chief executive.

In pursuit of this misguided delirium, the Republicans remain silent as Trump pulls one boner after another—flouting the law to ban Muslims and to  cancel DACA, flubbing Puerto Rican disaster relief—killing thousands, instituting ‘zero-tolerance’ (which sounds better than ‘full nazi’) as an excuse to torture thousands of children—and break their parents’ hearts (as if those poor folks don’t have enough troubles).

Being against immigration—which made our nation great. Being against science—which made our nation great. Being against free trade—which made our nation great. The Republicans are entirely in the thrall of big business and the super-wealthy—they wait upon the pleasure of the enemies of the People.

The cognitive dissonance yesterday, at that joke of a hearing, was deafening: the Republicans, censuring the FBI hero for his personal comments about what a horror-show a Trump presidency would be—as if it were a crime to see the approaching fiasco for what it was—a criminal encroachment upon the American political system. And, jeez, that mess was corrupt enough before these neo-traitors made their move.

Impeach !

Wednesday, July 11, 2018                                                5:07 PM

Ethics have No Promotional Budget   (2018Jul11)

Lies are funded—partisanship spends most of its time fund-raising—lobbyists get paid the big bucks—and sensationalism sells. If anything is coming at you from a screen right now, the odds are high that it’s trying to sell you something. The games and movies, too—but those things are their own product—they try to sell you more by showing you pieces of the whole entertainment experience, and reminding you where to go to pay the money.

The other shows include advertising– trying to sell you something—as ‘brief’ interruptions—and they try to appeal to us strongly enough that we’ll endure the interruptions. Here’s where it gets convoluted—a televised (or streamed) news-show with sponsors should be bending over backwards to convince the sponsors of the professional and journalistic ethics of their shows.

One might blithely assume that the sponsors would be afraid to be associated with a new organization that couldn’t be trusted. This, sadly, is not the case. More often, the sponsors are only concerned with the numbers of eyeballs—and, to that end, the shows tend to hunt for sensationalism, violence, and conflict.

Which reminds me: Initially, public broadcasts were required to be, at least in part, providing a community service. That’s why the first TV news broadcasts were scrupulously journalistic.

Edward R. Murrow once famously said, “The speed of communications is wondrous to behold. It is also true that speed can multiply the distribution of information that we know to be untrue.” In his era, TV-news reporters seemed to be taking on the mantel of the printed press—becoming champions of the people’s right to know the facts. (I identify with Murrow—he died of chain-smoking—up there in Pawling, in 1965.)

Then the nature of ‘show business’ soon brought that sort of idealism to a close. It’s lucky that journalism wasn’t named ‘the news business’, or papers would be just as worthless as the video-whores.

And, truth to tell, the papers are not the ethical ivory-towers they once purported to be, if they ever where—the printed word, having ceded the field to the digital, can no longer referee in squabbles of note. The papers, too, have shifted towards partisanship—or appeared to, where reason and common sense makes one side feel obligated to oppose the other side as an evil, rather than a difference of opinion.

My point is: greed, fear, and ignorance have limitless backing—everybody wants a piece of that pie. Fairness and justice go begging.

Tuesday, July 10, 2018                                             12:40 AM

War On Our Enemies   (2018Jul10)

There are armies of highly-paid lobbyists swarming all over Washington, D.C.—their only object: to subvert the will of the people in any way that will profit the industry that sent them there, be they Monsanto, Mobil, NRA, Pfizer, et. al. That makes them, QED, enemies of Democracy. We must fight these people—for they threaten our livelihoods and our Constitutional freedoms.

There are a plethora of media outlets, radio, TV, in print, and online, which propagate misinformation in the guise of journalism or political opinion—these greedy rumor-mongers aren’t really ‘Big Evil’, they’re miserable grubs who see an easy buck—bilking the gullible. The Big Evil that results from their greasy scam is collateral damage, the toxic scum that this industry dumps into our clear water of discourse—the parasites that engage in it are only amoral pigs, not masterminds. In most cases, their ‘sponsors’ aren’t buying airtime for ads—they’re simply using these traitors as useful idiots. We must fight these enemies of Democracy: Limbaugh, Hannity, the entire Fox media, that asshat on InfoWars —for they threaten our livelihoods and our Constitutional freedoms.

There are entitled, self-obsessed billionaires who bypass the lobbies (or more likely supplement them) by dumping money on some craven pol who thinks he or she is ‘swimming with the sharks’ on the road to power and position. The pols must overlook the quasi-criminal nature of such as Charles and David Koch, Sheldon Adelson, and Foster Friess, before they can accept the backing of people who think money equals wisdom (what is it about being rich that makes people so stupid?). We must fight these people—for they threaten our livelihoods and our Constitutional freedoms.

There are check-cashing businesses and loan cos. and banks and investment firms—all of whom long ago grew dissatisfied with merely using our money to invest in stable businesses, and splitting the interest earned—oh, no, no, don’t be ridiculous. No, a banker is a god—don’t you know? Some even see themselves as ‘masters of the universe’. The vertiginous mania of greed, as you can see, clearly makes them numb to the fact that such a label allows no plural. These people have computers now—their incessant drive, to separate us from our money, makes them dangerous in many new ways. The recent scandals at Wells Fargo, LIBOR, and Morgan-Chase show that customer-service has morphed into predatory behavior—joining advertising as a fellow ‘industry the world could easily live without’.

Our obsession with Capitalism has made it impossible for anyone to work in the banking industry and not suffer a psychotic delusion: that handling large amounts of money makes their skin glow and their shit stop stinking. We must fight these people—for they threaten our livelihoods and our Constitutional freedoms.

We all know who are enemies are. Even controlling the media doesn’t allow them to hide the simple truth—though it allows them to pile on so much bullshit that the truth is fairly obscured—still, if you look close, there it is. One Netflix comic has a line now: “They said, ‘the immigrants and single women are taking all the jobs’—yeah, right—the people with no money and no power are taking all the money.”

There is a group in America today that agrees with statements that are manifestly false—because they are couched in hate-mongering and finger-pointing. Those people, unfortunately, comprise a good 30%-35% of voters. The con-men will always get their votes, because they don’t listen to the words—they watch for the entitlement and the wink towards propriety. “Political correctness—bah!” There‘s their policy statement.

Somehow, the conservatives have conflated being tough with being dishonest (and that sounds like the reasoning of a criminal—not for nothing). I guess they got pushed into a corner—when we told them that petroleum-burning was going to kill us all. I mean, if I was filthy rich from gasoline, I’d have an argument or two, too. But I’d have to be a special kind of dick-head to keep doing it, even after the global flooding started, decades later.

Make no mistake—our own worst enemies are our apathy and inertia. I get it—the world may be in danger, but not today. Right? Sadly, our only ammunition is political involvement—running for office is like volunteering to be a political aircraft-carrier, volunteering is like the infantry—and votes, of course, are our bullets. Without the votes, we get slaughtered—and not just politically. Shit’s getting serious, dude.

Sunday, July 08, 2018                                              3:36 PM

The United States of Problems   (2018Jul08)

T’would seem the poisons we use to kill the bad bugs and plants are sometimes killing the good bugs and plants—the necessary bugs and plants—just as the antibiotics we use to save ourselves from bad bacteria are sometimes killing the good bacteria—the bacteria necessary for digestion. Our desperate need to fight evil—to save ourselves and our livelihoods—becomes a driving force. And that Force whispers to us, “The collateral damage is an unavoidable cost. Eat it!”

Everyone recognizes this situation—the paradoxical prison of high-tech civilization. Everyone knows that Climate Disruption is driven by humanity’s energy consumption—and everyone knows that we would suffer and die without the energy consumption.

But mere facts are only the beginning. We each choose our personal perspectives on those facts. The lowest perspective is a popular one: denial, dishonesty, ‘bargaining’ with logic—only the slack-jawed fail to see the self-destructive nature of that approach. The middling perspective is more mature, but still rather conservative: let’s compromise, let’s be bi-partisan, let’s move forward together. Problem: both perspectives dominate the social discourse—and both perspectives lead to inexorable extinction.

The most intelligent perspective on humanity’s tech/survival crisis is to examine our culture and commerce with fresh eyes—to make lots of changes that would all be non-starters in present popular opinion. It is sad that intelligence has gone so out of favor with Americans today—because intelligence is all that’s needed to transform a social-media full of trash-talk and dick-pics into a social-media that coordinates efforts to help each other.

Other nations have found out how strong the web is, when people feel oppressed. Well, America isn’t anywhere near that level of savagery—but we don’t need to riot in the streets. Uber was a bloodless revolution, as was Amazon, AirBnB, Google, EBay, and Etsy—but all these early paradigm-shifts had one limiting factor. They made money—in fact, they mostly made one guy rich. And many of us would consider their cultural disruption to take a back-seat to that one important result: rich! Americans think the Internet is only good for making people rich—but that’s only a small part of it.

Intelligent organization via the web can give super-powers to any endeavor popular enough to support crowd-involvement. Money only limits the choices, in that paradigm. And since our ‘Democracy’ seems to be slightly hacked, right now, maybe this would be a good time for community-minded folks to start uniting into more powerful forces. It’s in our country’s name, y’all.

People talk about how united we were during the Second World War—everyone pulling together to win the war. Well, Congress (such as it is) is not going to declare war—but if you think we’re not presently in a war for survival, well, you haven’t been paying attention to the nuclear arms and the hurricanes and floods and habitat-loss and mass violence and floods of refugees. And you certainly haven’t noticed the soulless, greedy bastards who make money from delaying public awareness of the dangers we face, right now.

Friday, July 06, 2018                                                2:14 AM

A Republican Will Look You In the Eye   (2018Jul6)

Capitalism, commodification, monetization—all lovely stuff, and anyone that thinks up a new way to ‘package’ a need, gets to be a Baller—cool, how exciting.

Except for lobbyists, who corrupt our legislators and bedevil our laws, all in the name of profit; for extremists and hypocrites, who conflate our politics with their oh-so-profitable zealotry, and hold the line against legislation that might really enforce equality and fairness; for arms-makers, who are the richest pigs on earth (mostly because they’ve sold death for so long, they can pretend it’s a basic necessity); for investors who refuse to connect their personal profit with the ubiquitous inhumanity of banks, industries, and the overly entitled.

It’s true that changing this nation-turned-crackhouse back into a halfway-decent home is a seemingly impossible task. The only thing that stopped them before was politicians—politicians who got votes by promising to protect you from these greedy, soulless bastards. Somehow, in the eighties, people starting talking about the economy—about how everyone’s lifestyle hinged on a healthy economy, so it was bad to yell at the rich people.

I saw that for the bullshit it was, back when everyone else was talking about how cool Charlie Sheen and Michael Douglas were in “Wall Street”. But I was, and am, in a tiny minority of people. For over thirty years, wages have frozen, benefits and profit-sharing are history, work hours are longer, and work environments have become ever more dehumanizing.

When big industries lie to us now, we don’t laugh in their faces anymore—we actually listen to them, as if they had no profit-motive for every word, deed, or decision. We don’t even laugh at a clown like Trump—he has a whole TV news channel dedicated to spreading his ignorance and lies. And at least 30% of us are bitter and ignorant enough to hear what we want to hear, even when it’s so false, it contradicts logic. Thank you, Fox News—and Fuck you—very much.

A Republican will look you in the eye and tell you the $15/hour is just too much money to pay some people—that making the minimum wage $15/hour would only hurt business. Poor business—it might get an owie.

Let’s ignore the fact that that’s total bullshit—let’s just consider the fact that a politician (who presumably needs votes to keep the job) is publicly stating that paying a living wage, across the country, is no concern of the government—and that if it is, the businesses are more important anyway, so go fish.

A Republican will describe their big new bill as a ‘tax cut’, instead of the embezzlement it truly represents. A Republican will tell you they oppose abortion for ethical reasons—which would be easier to believe if they didn’t scoff at the ethical considerations of any other plank on their platform. A Republican will tell you that Trump has done nothing wrong—and is doing a great job. A Republican has nothing to say, however, when thousands of children are kidnapped, and are stilled being held in ‘detention centers’, denied reunification with the parent they were torn from, weeks, sometimes months ago.

A Republican will tell you that only 46 Puerto Ricans died from last year’s disaster—and that relief was provided, and all is well. A Republican will tell you that it was right to hold up Obama’s SCOTUS nomination, but it would be wrong to hold up Trump’s.

(Oh, and they’ll also tell you Trump is Not a racist). Though, if that is the case, then I have been using that word wrong all these years.