The Great Pause

     What’s not to like about this situation? The Rat Race has shut down, although in fits and starts, it will come roaring back soon enough; the government is sending everyone money (after stealing it from us, and profiting off of us, for once we get a share of the take) and the natural world has had a chance to take a breather from the relentless Assault of the Seven Billion upon it.

     Times like these were built for those who get a little kick out of seeing things driven into extraordinary situations. For once, soldiers have not been forced to duke it out, although some continue to do just that; for the most part, the industrial nations which rule the world’s hegemonies have for the last two months been forced to freeze in their tracks. Politicians have had to face watching some of their dirtiest secrets exposed, and the Deep State revealed itself to have really blown it for once in instigating the whole Russiagate brouhaha. And while most musicians who depend on entertaining and the gig economy have been hurt, the sheer proliferation of folks just making their own noise coming out of homes across the world means that music isn’t suffering this so badly as some might have claimed, after all.

     There are always bright sides to things and silver linings and unicorns still play in the sunshine meadows of frolic.

On Bicycling 2

     Well I figured I would take a little time and revisit the topic, since the last time I wrote about this, I was still beholden to my analog bike (a Raleigh Mojave 2.0 mountain bike) - I upgraded in late 2016 to an Emazing Daedalus, which served me well until earlier this year, when an inept mechanic made it generally un-serviceable & the need arose to replace it (with a sister bike, the Emazing Artemis).
     The first of these two had a throttle-only setup, but the new one has pedal assist, and it's a wonderful help. I should note that, since acquiring an electric bike, my trouble with my knees (always aggravated by what few spills or mishaps I'd be recovering from) got much less, in fact, the electric has given me Years of Life to my knees which otherwise it would not have...
     My daily commute generally is 16 miles a day, which is easily handled by the bike's range (18-20) and speed (I've come close to 22 tops). Half of that is uphill, half of that is downhill. The trouble with the commute is that is happens twice a day (4 miles per trip) and that was just more than my poor knees could take, on an "analog" bike. I was constantly in a state of recovery and/or strain, and having to chug uphill twice a day- morning and afternoon- was certainly as much work as the chore I had to get to. Which is, being a school crossing guard, at a pretty dangerous expressway intersection with a blind corner, in Los Altos California.
     Working there I get to see behavior of the best, and worst, kinds, performed by drivers in a town which is probably the highest-rent and income zip code in the entire nation. Many of these people do drive like they are indeed "entitled" even if their entitledness amounts to merely blowing through  a guy with a handheld stop sign trying to protect their neighbors' children from their bad driving & attitudes.
     The attitudes in America still are very much auto-centric ones. A pedestrian, or a person on a bike for that matter, are still not seen as relevant and deserving respect as are other motorists, apparently. For all their civic crowing about "bicycle friendliness", towns like Palo Alto, Mountain View, and Los Altos are still full of "high-minded professionals" who want to get out on the freeways just as fast as they can, damn all the torpedoes, come morning's rush hour.

     As a bicyclist I have had my share of these sorts of comments-
     "You're too old for that bike anyway- "
(like it's anybody's business what someone else of any age does for transportation)
      "You're not a car-"
(Because I want to cut my corners here on my left turn, and you are too far out in to your own left turn lane that I will ram you the hell over if you don't respect my idiotic ego)
     "I ride a bike too, bro, so can you move over so I can turn?"
     "Wait your turn! Right now, you're just another asshole in a car!"
     (No I didn't actually say that, but maybe I should have.)

     The "war" between auto-motorists and bicyclists is apparently not over, and maybe never will, until bicyclist finally outnumber the folks in cars... But I try not to escalate it myself.
Lots of bike books will tell you "make eye contact with drivers!"
But-
that eye contact often is just what keeps the wars simmering. I prefer to make eye contact only to make sure a car turning out sees me approaching, and ring my bell. I go out of my way to be the LAST possible thing someone is going to run into on the road, and would rather you pass me up than have someone sitting "on my six" for five minutes, because I hate hearing things coming up in back of me. I always bike defensively and take these words of caution.

     "There are a lot of old bicyclists, and there are a lot of bold bicyclists.
      But there are not very many old, bold bicyclists..."
   
     You stay out of my way and I will stay out of yours, OK?
     Happy Trails.

Musings from the Big Top

     Recently there's been even more disturbances on the circus stage we know as Washington DC.
The latest big buzz is about how the former director of the CIA is experiencing "repression of his free speech rights" by having had (long overdue) his security clearance pulled. Well, it is a security clearance, his still free to spread his blather, just cannot do so from that point of privilege. What is so wrong with that? The privilege of a security clearance is not the same as a right.
       Now, it used to be, once upon a time, (about the same time John Brennan voted for the head of the Communist Party USA for president), that Democrats were the leading and fiercest critics of the CIA. Ah, but now that he's had his security clearance taken away, he's their latest martyr in the grand slaughter which has accompanied President Stumpy's great stumble into the driver's seat of the ship of state. No, now they're all quite upset Mr Brennan cannot use what he learns from available secrets to make his comments and drive his continued attempts to help create an authoritarian state in the US. Of course, if that's what he'd like, we've got an authoritarian at the helm now, but then for the last eighteen years we've had something of the same thing going on, just trading places. He just wants one that will pay him better, (politics and prostitution being somewhat kin to each other in their methodologies.)
     In a world where both political parties have major blood on their hands, they are both reduced to finger painting with the sanguine knowledge that, if I'm as bad as you are, then I'm OK, and you're just sick, bro. {And I guess by extension they were also all OK with his spying on members of Congress, and Obama's drone assassination program, etc etc et al}
     Of course for Democrats,when the Republicans run the CIA, it's evil, but when the Democrats do, it isn't. This is bullshit too. The entire beast must be deconstructed and slate wiped clean if we are to regain the control of our government to the People and not these various cabals, composed of various members of both parties, which have turned our country into something like a simmering caldron of civil war inspiring grievances. And it will only get worse.
                                                                           *****
    But hey -what a great country America is, where even a boy who votes for a Communist for president can grow up to become Director of the CIA!
                                                                           *****
      Americans should be (but they do not seem to be) outraged that an American war profiteer, Lockheed Martin, built the missile that slammed into a Yemeni school bus and killed 49 obvious enemies of the Saudi Arabian state. Nope, it's just business as usual for Lockheed Martin, for the various folks who signed off on the deal to ship these weapons to the Saudis, and those who work for Lockheed Martin, sleeping comfortably in their American homes, where bombs will most likely never fall on a school bus carrying their kids to school. That's our tax dollars at work bro. Are you still OK with this? I haven't seen much evidence yet to the contrary. Americans just love their bombs, doesn't natter who is using them, is the only conclusion one can take.
                                                                          *****
It's also sad when you see people who you consider longtime friends to be taking sides in this entire thing based on their political allegiances and not critical thinking, and drawing the conclusion that if you hold a position in any way contrary to their own, then you are A) a Stumpy supporter or B) a Stumpy-hater.  (If you are not for A, then you must be for B, and vice versa!) Actually you can be Stumpy-indifferent, which I still am. Presidents do not impress me, even boorish real estate guys that get there by appealing to the lowest common denominator of  public thought. And neither do any presidents intimidate me, not even Obama with his "collect it all" NSA and his "indefinite detention privileges." The only answer I can draw from the whole "Russiagate" farce is that there's a lot of KoolAid drinkers out there. It doesn't matter who mixes it- the poison is still central to the brew.
To sip from the chalice of American politics is to slip into the deep well of Alice's Wonderland, for reals.

Neocon Zeppelin Crashes & Burns

The election of Donald Trump as President of the United States of America has sent shock waves through America’s political elites and Establishment. They were all so sure they had it in the bag- Indeed- this election was always Hillary Clinton’s to lose, and so, she has.

There are a good many reasons I’m not completely displeased by these results, personally. I found Ms. Clinton’s delusional ranting about “the Russians” to be hyper-bloviating nonsense, and I’m certainly breathing easier knowing that finally we will have a president that’s deciding that the US and Russia ought to get along. The idea of my friends in Siberia vanishing in a cloud of plutonium-impacted fallout will be just that- an idea, something from a bad dream.

Of course, that’s not to say Hillary and her crowd of now discredited warhawk “experts” won’t keep rattling their wheelbarrows about the asylum screaming yet, “The Russians did it! The Russians rigged Our Election!” and waving their limp dicks at Julian Assange and Wikileaks for their uncovering the vast and dirty secrets that lie beneath the mud in the Democratic Party, the nerve of them, informing the American People as to how politics is actually conducted in the USA.

And the Republican Establishment is no doubt sucking their thumbs in wonder as well, most of them having defected to Hillary’s camp, most notably, both Bush presidents, Henry Kissinger, and the Wolfowitz-inspired war criminals at the New American Century. Weren’t they all hoping for more of the same “humanitarian” interventions and regime change, more international entanglements, and wars where they could get ‘em. No, the election of a populist Trump has set them in a tizzy, and expect them to be out and about raising as much dust as they might continue to, in the hopes that Trump will be every inch as interventionist as Ms. Clinton. Except that, he won’t.

Trump stated in the second debate he would NOT resort to first use of nuclear weapons, but most of that seemed to have gone right over the Democrats' heads as they continued their rants about how Trump “can’t be trusted” with The Button. If anyone could not be trusted with The Button it was Hillary Clinton, who has shown the American public, and the world, what her type of diplomacy actually means- drones, falling bombs, endless wars, and millions more refuges on the unarmed roads of flight across the Middle East. There won’t be any more speculation as to “Russian aggression” since what amounts to :Russian aggression” was is and will always be the Russians taking care of their own sphere of influence as it is, reacting to US and NATO pressures on their borders.

Hillary’s fanatical hatred of Putin won’t get any play, either. Wouldn't sensible people rather get along with a large country like Russia, especially since they’ve also got The Bomb, and they’re actually doing more at the moment to contain and defeat ISIS? Haven’t the US done enough by arms sales to Israel and Saudi Arabia to inflame the conflicts of the ME into further unsolvable conundrums than they already were?

All these worries will vanish like a bad headache now. Ms. Clinton can go back to New York, or Arkansas, or Illinois, or wherever it is she is actually from, shake her doddering head, and remove herself from the political arena like a good Grandma. For after all, Americans apparently still prefer assholes to bitches when it comes to Presidents.

A Parable

The following is dedicated to any who believe that the previous blogpost is somehow evidence of "inaction", "copping out" or somehow "not meaning to live responsibly in the face of evidence. (What evidence? Show me.)

Lemming Leap

You are at the edge of a serious pair of precipices.

Whichever lemming leader amasses the tallest pile of dead lemmings at the bottom of the cliff will be judged “the winner.” It has also been said among lemmings that to take part in this “great sacrifice” is one’s “highest civic duty.” “If you don’t jump, don’t complain about who wins!”

It’s not your fault - all the other lemmings have driven you there,  but,  now  they have split in two directions. One set of lemmings is headed one way- toward a 100 foot cliff. The other is headed to a 200 foot drop.

At the bottom of each is a massive pile of the skeletons of other lemmings, from previous jumps. 

No matter how many lemmings die, the ritual is to be re-enacted, every four years.

The thought occurs: “Either way I go if I fall (or I am pushed) I’m gonna die!”

“Choose the lesser of two evils! Minimize the damage!” yells a voice behind you.

You take the 100 foot fall.

At the bottom, you are still dead, just as dead as the lemmings on the 200 foot fall (only that they had twice as long to think about where they were headed, while falling, theoretically.)

You’re dead! So then you see the ghost (or the actual body of) your leader! 

“Congratulations. You jumped with us, but thank god, you are so lucky, you will sit tonight with God and the angels because you chose the lesser of the two evils, you didn’t let THEM win!”

My my, you think, My jump meant as much -or more!-  as that of all the others!

OR:

Your other choice would have been- step back from the precipices, let all your fellow lemmings choose whichever hell-death- they chose for themselves, turn to the leaders and say “Aw,fuck you, I’ll be just as dead as the rest of you, I want none of this!”

Looking down at the two piles of your dead lemming brothers and sisters, all you can say is

“What a bunch of dumbshits!”

Value added question:

Which lemming exercised critical thinking best?

The Most Insulting Election In History

The Most Insulting Election in History

It’s that season again, folks. Everywhere across the land, neighbors are oiling their automatics and sharpening their pitchforks. Yes, it’s another Presidential Election, and it looks as though this one is bound to be a doozy. In fact, it could be said, we have never had an election like this in our lifetimes. Just look- One candidate has been under scrutiny by the FBI for improper use of governmental communications (and just happened to squeak past judgment, on the recommendation of a coy FBI Director, who did all but say, the lady is just stupid, folks) and a real estate con artist up for a civil lawsuit regarding some shady practices enticing his “students” into tutelage at his “university”- on charges of fraud. Well. since when have politicians ever been innocent of stupidity and fraud?

Let us look at the two candidates which the major political parties have chosen to foist upon us, as this year’s “choice.” Let’s go with the one who looks like she leads the pack, because her polls show 75% likelihood of winning this highly corrupted and incurably evil office, the Democrat, Mrs. Clinton. You know, I don’t call her the “Teflon Goddess” for nothing. Mrs. Clinton has been the source of a good number of scandals and political imbroglios over the years, and yet, somehow, has managed to eke her way past each and every rapid without nary a scratch. Some would lay claim that this is somehow “proof” of her incipient innocence of all allegations. Others, like myself, just call it “1%er privilege”.

It is no secret she has taken great sums of money from the same big Wall Street donors that gave huge sums to the election of the current president, who also contributed to the meltdown of 2008, and like the Teflon Goddess, suffered no recriminations from the justice system for their machinations. Mrs. Clinton’s refusal to release transcription of the speeches she gave for six figure pocketbook change equals the refusal of her adversary to release  his recent tax returns. But we’re not at him just yet. She managed, during her term as secretary of state, to destroy the regimes in at least two nations, engineer chaos in a third, and create for the US two new bellicosities (Libya and Syria)  and is now setting us up for a shooting match with another nation with whom we have no actual beef- Russia.

Killgrrl’s recent embrace of a draft for women assures us that yes, not only will our sons continue to be brutalized into PTSD situations, but, our daughters too. And what better reason to start up the roll for the slaughterhouse than another unpopular, undeclared, presidential fiat war? Of course, operatives of the Democratic National Committee are already ginning it up, with their so far unproven allegations that “the Russians” leaked the Committee’s emails to that treasonous Julian Assange’s Wikileaks. No matter that the emails themselves reveal even more of the sort of Dirty Tricks Killgirrls’ first Washington job (on the Watergate Committee) was graciously uncovering on behalf of the American public during the Nixon years. Oh and did  mention she was actually fired by the head of the committee, Samuel Dash, for being (in his words) “a liar?” But again, we don’t call her the Teflon Goddess for nothing.

Killgrrl makes a big to do about how her use of a private email server to conduct official US Government business as head of the State Department exposes her inherent stupidity as well. What would get her fired from her local construction company gets her walking papers from the FBI, and from her erstwhile, belittled, and cheated Democratic  opponent. Is it any wonder folks feel they can’t trust her? Apparently, the scepter of a “two-family presidency” just hasn’t struck a shadow of fear enough into a vast majority of Democrats, as if, the Bush family wasn’t enough in the first place.

And then there is her opponent on the Elephant party side, in the corner, Mr. Orange Julius himself, Donald Drumpf (as John Oliver would have us remember, is his natural original pre-immigration family name). There aren’t enough words, perhaps to describe him, he must be seen to be believed, but believe me, he is now giving the Teflon Goddess a run for her money. A conniver, a reality TV star, a Real Estate mogul (perhaps the second most odious occupation in America today besides that of politician) whose business practices are under scrutiny in a court of civil law. Dare we trust another used car salesman at the head of our nation? At least Mr. Drumpf is making sense on the issue of a “WWIII” with Russia. he would rather have us gain the support of Russia’ president in fighting the international threat of ISIS than pick a fight with him. This may be the only part of his platform that makes sense to me, but indeed it does. The rest of his program seems to be an inflation of Barry Spybot’s mass surveillance cyberstate, directed against those of Mexican or Muslim persuasion, and promising a new Great Wall. Like most operations of Drumpf, it will have to have his name spelled out in big lights, it will offer 24/7 casinos, and “Princess Towers” every ten miles so you  can drive your family there for a great vacation overlooking the wild and wooly Rio Grande. Of course, he promises that Mexico is going to pay for it, and not only that, more than likely the labor involved will be those poor deportees awaiting the next lane back across the border.

It’s pretty obvious to me that nobody ever seeks the office of President of the United States without a long consideration beforehand of the powers attendant to it. Thanks to Barry Spybot, these powers now include the ability to assassinate anybody anywhere on the planet, with drones, if necessary, to hold in detention for indefinite periods anyone consider suspect of “terrorism” (however some future president chooses to define it) and the ability for the US Army to act in civilian operations, as they did in Boston, committing house to house searches while residents “sheltered in place.” These powers ought to be particularly attractive to a narcissistic egoist like Drumpf, but, having tasted her share already of some of the benefits of the office (being First Lady just wasn’t good enough) they are damned attractive to the Teflon Goddess, herself.

Let us look though a little closer. Nobody honest, and certainly that goes for Mr. Sanders, who ran an admirable campaign against the Goddess only to sell out when the chips were down, will ever hold the office of Killer-In-Chief. The office itself is incurably corrupted and corruptible. Whoever wins it must sell their soul to the devil- figuratively, or perhaps, even literally- to hold the title of “most powerful person in the world.” Wasn’t that the very same temptation offered to Jesus in the desert by Beelzebub? “Dominion over all the nations and peoples of the earth?” How could you refuse!!! Because the office now wields these (“awesome”-G. W. Bush- powers) and therefore is no longer a presidency, but a kingship- I feel as though I cannot “consent to be governed” any longer by any man, or woman, who is elected to it.

Nay, I do not feel, as a well informed, educated American voter, that I can offer any consent at all to any future holder of the office, nor even grant the consent implied by vote, for the foreseeable future of my lifetime, unless, and until, these powers are repealed. And who gave Barry these “awesome” powers? Why, a shitting-their-pants Congress, of both Republicans AND Democrats, afraid of the terrorist under the bed, drunk on the possibilities that somewhere, somehow, the US will have to come to grips with some of those very forces they themselves unleashed on the world- like the Afghan Mujahedin that became Al Qaeda, the “Syrian Rebels” who became ISIS, or any number of homegrown whackjobs intoxicated with maladjusted interpretations of the Koran.  I cannot, by casting my vote in any direction, give my consent for these ideas, that the President is a King and not subordinate to the Congress any longer, nor to accountability under national and international law. People say it is our civic “duty” to vote. No, it is not a “duty.”

     Voting is a right and a privilege, and it is our right to exercise it where, and when we choose, in secret, and nobody has the right to tell us how or even when we must, if we choose to use it, or not. “Duty “ is something that matters only when you are helping the neighbors take out the invading North Korean Army barricaded down at the end of the block, or getting a jury summons, or filling out an IRS 1040 return. Don’t give me that bullshit about voting being a “duty.” I will vote as, if, and when I choose. And that’s why I come to, in conclusion, saying that, this is the most insulting election in US history. Two very questionable and obnoxious characters are competing for the role of “King and Queen” of the world. And I just don’t buy it. 

Bernie and the Messiah Complex

I feel so sorry, fellow Americans, that as a collective entity, your political weathervanes love to shift in the direction of the most persistent, the most prevailing, and most revealing winds. I speak of the Messiah Complex as it populates America’s politics, and it is a recurrent wind, which while blowing hot air most frequently, always blows in the perfect candidate to perpetuate unimaginable devastation.

Look at how the American people received Barack Obama. Hope! Change! Yes, things were going to be Different! The oligarchic, militaristic, and plutocratic evils of the Bush years were to be swept away, and replaced by a new fresh tide of young ideas! Boy, that man is sure some orator! Why, he’s a Constitutional scholar! My, oh my!

Until three weeks into his presidency he is walking back the promises as to putting the BushCo torturers under prosecution and telling us all it’s “time to move on”. forget I said that, puh-leeze! Oh, we are going to close Guantanamo, because its very existence is a stick in the eye of Miss Liberty. Let her hang on to that torch there, of course, we are going to need it! To relight another fire in the Middle East... This time Libya... this again, Syria! We are here to prevent a humanitarian cataclysm! Right.

So where had we heard all of that before?

In the very funny and oracular movie Idiocracy, Joe Not Sure is called upon by his president- many many years into the future- to solve a number of national crises.  “And he’s gonna fix EVERTHING!” crows the President, about his new Secretary of Agriculture. This same approach- we’ll sit back and do our part, and vote- and the (new) president will fix everything- seems to be the easy way out, and the one under which the Messiah Complex forms, in the context of which I am speaking.

Wait for the next president. He is gonna fix EVERTHING! Why, we just had most of our civil liberties vacuumed out from under us by Bush’s AND Obama’s NSA. There might be some ground regained yet, the 2 Billion dollar Megamind in the Utah desert is not going to be going away any day soon, whether or not anything is put forward by our ever-contrary Congress, nor by the next president, whether Bernie Sanders or not.  (The campaign promises of Rand Paul must remain as scrutinized, until the highly unlikely event of his own acquisition of the office and any post election result.) Maybe it is the characteristic “perpetual optimism” of the American people, that same one that drives many of our politicians to lofty and shallow praise and sentiment about the character of the American nation, en masse. I can’t say. But...

I hate watching Americans fall for the same old crap twice. Remember that old Who song “Won’t Get Fooled Again”? How true and appropos it came to be, when we discovered that Barack Obama was no fresh wind, he was just a more-erudite version of the same old stagnant amoebic-bearing gusty mistral. How different it will be with Bernie! Woohoo! Get on the bandwagon now, don’t get left behind!  Grow the cult of personality!

Sanders is growing his popularity for some damn good reasons, but I only offer this as a caution to everyone that when it comes to politics, there can never be any “messiah.” You are laughable if you believe any president can retain the miraculous powers of, so to speak, multiplying the loaves and the fishes in order to feed the tired huddled starving masses, collected around the feet of Miss Liberty, straining at the bit to get in.

No, there never is any Messiah in American politics. On this, you can call me an atheist, unequivocally.

America’s Dialog Problem

     It’s become de rigueur in chat rooms, newspaper and magazine comment sections and social media, for Americans to take a “me against the universe” position. Not only Americans, of course because this is basically an internationalist problem. But it boils down to an equation in essence, of this:

Whomever does not believe as I do is an idiot.

     It does seem that when some people are taxed to the point of a maximal intellectual box canyon, the common reply is not to offer a counter-argument, but to throw out the canard “You’re a moron!”; “You're an idiot!”; “Libtard”; “Repugnican” ; “Demorat” and the like. I am sure you’ve seen your share of this, so I presume that you, the reader, have had significant encounter with it. If not, believe me, you shall before you die, somewhere! Just state our opinion forcefully and succinctly enough, and there will be someone who crawls up from the bushes to raise this cheap shot. It’s probably all the ammo he has left anyhow.

     One of the big arguments that has become something of a leftwing meme in defense of President Spybot is that he is “faced with an obstructionist Congress”. Actually in a society which is built on a principle of checks and balances, loyal opposition to question the moves and motives of Executive authority - of either party- seems like they’re pretty much doing what they’re paid to do- not “obstructing.” But part of the problem is the partisanship which IS of itself, “obstructionist.” But neither party is immune from this illness.

     It seems that this loyalism to Spybot is rooted in the partisanship which accompanied his political victory, and which seems to get worse with each passing election. Americans who have achieved an election then begin behaving like lager louts at a football match” “Our team won! Your team sucks!” and taken to an extreme, you hear one party saying of the other, that the opposition must be driven completely from the field. No, they are not allowed to the corner of the ring to nurse a wound, regroup, come up with alternative positions. Just get rid of them, because: THEY are morons!

     This euphoria however only goes so far. It rarely if ever lasts longer than the first year and a half after each election. This is true for a few reasons, but the biggest, of course, is that we live in a liberal democracy. Let me explain what I mean when I call it that, so nobody goes all haywire and screams I’m writing out conservatives myself.

     The classic definition of “liberal” means, able to tolerate opinions held contrary to one’s own. Toleration in this society does involve the extension of the rights of minorities- minority viewpoints, not just minority demographically speaking. Therefore, one would think that “liberals” would welcome the expression of diverse viewpoints to the political dialog. But what do we find? We find those who otherwise champion first amendment rights often calling for the censorship of commentators they deem distasteful: “Pull their license! “ “Ban them from the airwaves!” “the man is a moron!” etc.

     While a true liberal would shrug, and say, “Okay, that’s just HIS opinion...What a great country we have, that people can be so wonderfully whacko”, “progressives” often wish to take things to the next step, which is the equivalent to censorship and inability to tolerate ideas and persons who make them uncomfortable. But fortunately, the Constitution does not settle for people just being comfortable. There have been a great number of societies where that was attempted, but almost all of those which have held that chosen goal are those who can be blatantly labeled totalitarian. But then we are on our way to a totalitarian society in America, anyway. You can notice that in the social media and other commentary spaces, where Americans cry for the “extermination of all Moslems!” in a manner reminiscent of the Nazi pogroms against Jews. One sector of society, by dint of religious adherence, is the stain and infection of the nation, and must be eliminated! Gee, but where have we heard that before?

     American exceptionalism is not limited to a belief held by “conservatives”- the old right wing that sent America into a losing war in Vietnam, and rushed the USA into another hornet's nest in Iraq. American exceptionalism is actually something of a national religion akin to patriotism (q.v., my blog post dated 6-14-13 Our State Religion: Patriotism). This theory rests on the belief that the United States, (at one time) the first and best world hope for  a “Novus Ordo Seclorum” after two hundred some odd years is STILL the first best hope for same. And that despite all evidence to the contrary, American interventionism anywhere in the world is justified by that alone.  Somehow it is proving itself. Somewhere. It must be because, God Bless the Greatest Nation on Earth!

     Americans are all exceptional individuals, this is true. A nation is not its government, its people are more virtuous than those with lack of sense enough to meander into what is charmingly called “public service” but which amounts to (basically) public robbery, insider trading, and corruption. But calling the other guy an idiot, well, that’s just part of free speech ma’am.

     But here I have to refer to the other great Latin sentence at the heart of our democracy, “E Pluribus Unum”- Out of Many, One. It need not only refer to the nation itself in the furthest macro cognition. From the other end, it recognizes that out of a diversity of opinions, the people of America choose that which they deem best to hold their self-governance. It recognizes that minority opinions have a place (even if it’s just sitting back in the corner) but that minority opinion has a right to its existence. No place in the Constitution does it claim we have a “two party system.” This has been a myth fostered by the major parties to justify their bullying other competition from the ring, and continuing the charades of “Big Evil” vs. “Bigger Evil” each party poisons its partisanship with before during and after each election, that same force which drives people to yell “Our party rules! Your party sucks!” as if that should substitute for debate, and dialog. All too often, unfortunately, it does.

Happy Anniversary!

     Today, August 9th, is the 69th anniversary of the atomic bombing of the city of Nagasaki, Japan, by the United States of America. By now, we have been insufferably treated with the yelps of the “greatest generation” with their unconvincing rationale, “if it wasn’t for Hiroshima, millions more lives would have been lost.” Now there, indeed, is an arguable point. No doubt, Hiroshima lessened the value of human life to the Allied powers of the western Alliance that fought Hitler back across the Rhine and Japan to the nexus of the Home Islands. But something in this also rings hollow. If Hiroshima is understandable, as a “last resort” against an indomitable irreducible enemy, what was Nagasaki? Rubbing it in?

    No doubt if Hiroshima cheapened the value of human life, Nagasaki rendered it worthless. In a matter of milliseconds, in both cities, the United States achieved the same feat as .009166  of the European Holocaust perpetrated by the Nazi’s, and joined the competition for “best atrocity photos of stacked up dead bodies” hitherto engaged in by Germany an the Soviet Union , and later, Maoist China, or Pol Pot’s Cambodia,  in the race for “Most Efficient Genocidal Methods.” Surely the USA won that one, for no other mass slaughter in human history was ever so effective nor as instantaneous. The atomic bombings of Japan achieved in seconds what months/weeks were needed for the Nazis. Now THAT is industrial scale efficiency!

     At the time of the bombings a full 13% of Americans approved of “annihilation and extermination” and a “wiping out” of the Japanese nation, and 27% approved of building and dropping even more bombs. America’s transition from moral victor over the genocidal fascists to an equivalent moral pariah in mass murder was complete. So long as the United States continues to drone to death innocent civilians in Afghanistan and Pakistan, she has absolutely no right, nor the moral standing, to criticize Israel for its own “collateral damage” in Gaza- unfortunately.

     So Happy Anniversary, America! Don’t choke on the olive in the martini!

http://rare.us/story/7-conservatives-who-thought-dropping-the-atom-bomb-was-barbaric-and-unnecessary/

A recent poll has shown that Americans regret having chosen President Spybot over the competition by a poll of 55%-43%, if an election were held today. Having voted in the 2% qualifying as “Innocent” vs the “Big Evil”-“Little Evil” Tweedledum-Tweedledee Party race, I find this completely unsurprising. Here’s a look at Prez. Spybot’s legacy and what it means six years into “it’s all Bush’s fault!”

http://www.city-journal.org/2014/eon0806mm.html

LEMMING MARCH IN PROGRESS - JOIN, OR DIE!

More Horse-Puckey

     In what’s sure to go down as a most signal imputation of the aims of the current administration, President Spybot announced recently his opposition to the idea of Scottish Independence.

     The one-time “Constitutional scholar” says that the status of his ally, Great Britain, is too tied to the security of the United States to brook such a thing as the notion of a free and independent Republic of Scotland.

     President Obama once again displays his ignorance of American history, by disparaging (as an inheritor of) the Scottish Enlightenment, those very philosophers who came to inspire thinkers in America such as Paine, Adams, Madison, and Franklin, in their hopes of creating a place where all are “equally endowed by their Creator with the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” Men like John Locke and Adam Smith who set the stage for an opposition to the very Act of Union (1706-7) which subsumed Scotland into the British Empire- an act of Parliaments, not a democratic plebiscite election. And ever since, a good many Scots have wished for a reversal of fortune, for however beneficial it may have seemed at the time, the general nature of their ethnic society is separate and apart, and always has been, from their southern neighbors.

     The Act of Union itself inspired movements of separatism such as the Jacobite rebellion, attempts by the Scottish people themselves to retain autonomy over their domain apart from that of the “subjects” of the King and Queen of England.

     Of course, President Spybot was also was recently seen at the beachhead site of the joint US-UK invasion of continental Europe in 1944, seventy years ago, while Europe was under the yoke of Nazi Germany and its secret-security state apparatus, the Gestapo. I’m sure all the brave Americans, English, Australians, Canadians, New Zealanders who were killed in the landings all died for the right of the USA’s NSA to spy on the entire population of planet Earth!

     President Spybot has done a number of  things (many of them have been pointedly documented in this blog) since taking power. But blatant nonsense on behalf of totalitarianism, is of course, nothing new to him.

     In fact, the USA sits tenuously but tenaciously and precariously perched in a state much akin to that of Great Britain in 1777. A global empire unrivalled and mostly unchallenged (lest we forget those pesky French!) to marshal forth military might in 180 countries and most importantly, in partnership with its imperial parent country.  Trade mercenary Germans from Hesse for "independent contractors" working for Blackwater and - hoy presto! Trade the monopoly over cotton and tea in India for opium and oil in Afghanistan, and voila! The use of surveillance over the telecommunications of all the countries on Earth without any probable cause, or open transparent process, equal to the rights of the forces of the King of England to process general warrants against its population, for any reason, to gather and collect information on everyone, reminds me of someplace else and what WWII was really all about to begin with.

     The United States should indeed welcome the coming into existence of a free and independent Scotland. Joining as our brothers with the Republic of India, and other ex-colonial victims of the British Empire, proudly shaking off the shackles of tyranny. Those of us who remember America for what she once was, and are insulted by what she has become, would welcome our Scots cousins with open arms in the community of nations. Unlike our current, shameful, Tory (in the US sense!) president. Of course, William Wallace died for nothing, isn’t that right, Barry?
              http://news.antiwar.com/2014/06/05/obama-tells-scotland-not-to-secede-from-britain/

http://america.aljazeera.com/opinions/2014/6/democrats-republicansforeignpolicy.html

World-Peepin’ with the Creepo Kids®

     Hi! I’m Despyfur Dawg®, and I’m one of the Creepo Kids®, and we work for the National Agency for Science and Technology! That’s NASTY, for short! Listen I want to tell you all a little story about my fello Creepos and what we’ve been up to lately! If you dig crazy stuff, like, using the internet to look up things, and maybe also, using your webcam to take hidden pictures and stuff, then hey, you might fit in real great with us! Let me introduce you to my Bros- and Sista!

     First of all, there’s me, Despyfur Dawg®. I guess I got into this stuff a little off the backend, because I was always real good at math. I guess I wasn’t so hot at English, but that’s no bones to me! (hahaha). My kick is getting and setting algorithms, you know, mathematical formulas that are triggered by words people use when they search the net? Like, terrorism, and surveillance, and drone strike. OK? Kewl!         

     Anyhow, I’m the guy in charge of the secret algorithms that tell our great NASTY agency just who in America is being naughty or nice, and whether they deserve a break on their income tax, or a drone strike down their Christmas chimney! I dig to play guitar, but since I only played it for a year and I’m still lame, I guess I’m not really as good as I think I am But I do it in my spare time, you see, when I’m not out spy-peepin with my peeps!

     So back to them. Along with Turdy Turtle®, who’s he big wizbang in cracking private citizen encryption, we’ve got my hot sista, Kreepo Kat®, she’s the one who figures out hidden codes and passes them up the chain of command to me! She’s kewl too. Her mom and dad set her free and she woke up in an adoption sheltir, she had nothing in life until NASTY came along and made her what she is! She flips houss in her spare time- she says she doesn’t really o this for the money, but cuz it’s FUN! Kewl!

     And there is Miraculous Mike®. He’s really the boss. They gave him four stars for beating the crap out of detainees in Iraq, but we don’t hold that against him! He keeps all of us running aftr our tails, though, when we can’t chase terrorists!

     Turdy Turtle®, he is sort of the Sad Sack of our Krew. He’s always good for saying some real DOWNER like, “What about the Constitution?” or, “you can’t do that, it’s against the Fourth Amendment!” or some bummer like that. But we need him, you see, becuse everything we do, Miraculaous Mike says is perfectly legal,  and we have to have someone to say “we researched it” before we tried it!

     But I have to tell ya about one day, because that was the day we got this BIG PLAN handed down to us from Miraculous Mike®. Kreepo Kat® took one look at it and said “WOW! This means we can spy on everyone!”

     Then, Miraculous Mike® smiled  with a little glint in his eye and said “I know! Don’t you think it would be kewl to spy on the WHOLE WORLD!”

     “Awesome!” shouted Kreepo Kat®.

     “Kewl!” I said.

     “What about the Constitution?” slumped Turdy Turtle®.

     “Aw come on, Turdy, that’s old fashioned stuff! Nowadays, keeping the country safe means breaking every law in the doman of God and Man!” Kreepo Kat® really caught the enthusiasm quik!

     “What’s God?” asked Turdy.

     “What’s Man?” asked Miraculous Mike®.

     Anyway, they handed us this plan, and we’re out to do just that, now, with the best minds on it! Spying on EVERYBODY in the ENTIRE WORLD! Don’t you want to be like us, and be a NASTY spy when YOU grow up? Well you can! Just contact your local US Army or other Federal employee recruiter today and ask about NASTY! We’re here to SERVE!

For the inspiration behind this short short, please check out:

http://www.nsa.gov/kids/home.shtml

An Underwhelming Admission of Ignorance

     I am not a representative of the United States government. I am only an American citizen. Suffice to say, the decisions made at levels far, far above mine are often responsible for myriad embarrassing situations which often make me wish, perhaps, that I were not. One such situation is evolving now over Ukraine- should or should not, the United States government and its NATO allies get involved in what is (first) a domestic crisis and (second) a regional crisis? These are questions the big muckymucks are deliberating on, but they are worth commenting on because at the citizen in the street level, here again are the potential making of highly embarrassing governmental activity, which needs first to be reined in, and secondly, refrained from in the future. As a concerned citizen I have a duty to point these out to those who claim to be my "leaders."

     I have some regular readers in Ukraine, apparently. I have a friend through Facebook who used to reside in Kiev, but at the onset of these problems, they have relocated west to Romania. Smart move, perhaps, considering the violence and pillage taking place in the capital and in Odessa.  I have never been to Ukraine, I do not think I plan on going anytime soon, but apparently some readers of my blog take heart after certain notions I embrace, which includes the populist movement that eventually took down the Berlin Wall. I have friends in formerly Soviet Siberia, Russia proper, and in Latvia and other “Eastern bloc” areas, whom I dearly treasure, and so I stand apart from other Americans and their usual Cold War neurosis over people from that side of the earth.

“War is God’s way of teaching Americans geography”-Ambrose Bierce

    Now I just LOVE that quote, (recently I have found reason to use it, a lot!) as it’s so trenchant, so true, and telling to remember- Ambrose wrote those words over a century ago. But it’s timeless, because that is really the way most American function when it comes to knowing what is what where is where on the planet. It usually takes a war to get them to find out just where where is. A very good example of this was Vietnam. Before US involvement, not many Americans could tell you the correct answer. Now, there is no way in the world an American child can grow up not knowing it. And a similar situation existed with Iraq, and now also, with Ukraine.

     I do not pretend to have an answer for the issues dividing the Ukrainians, nor even a developed, reasoned position I can take based n the facts, but there are several things I do know, and which ought to be obvious, but which are not. One, the US was involved in trying to create regime change there for a number of years already. Now the instigation of the CIA have made themselves manifest, and regime change has come, although (as usual) the “friendlies” America has backed bear no resemblance to people who actually hold values resembling “American” ones. That the United States now occupies bases in over 175 countries, 93 nations have decided America’s “friendship” is barely worth the trouble, and the cost of doing business with America’s high tech industry is fraught with the taint of NSA involvement in manipulated hardware and international networking.

     It’s enough, I think, being a world citizen, to continually pray for peace, and hope that saner minds will prevail. But realistically, things tend to get worse before they get better, and all I am really praying for now, is that the United States leave behind its “overseas empire” kick and get started focusing on freeing those of us at home who languish in her prisons- more than any other nation on earth. I do not have a clue on how to solve the problems of the Ukraine. But unlike many American politicians, I have the sense to admit it.

YES WE CAN—Kill Whomever, Whenever We Choose

      Friday’s court decision in federal court by Judge Rosemary Collyer sends a chilling message to ordinary citizens of the United States. At issue was the rights of American citizens to due process and civil liberties under the First, Fourth and Fifth amendments. The judge tasked with defending the concept of the rights of the citizen against the rights of the state fell back and punted.

     Citing that “The same reasoning applies here. The powers granted to the Executive and Congress to wage war and provide for national security does not give them carte blanche to deprive a U.S. citizen of his life without due process and without any judicial review.” And “Plaintiffs further admit the inapplicability of Fourth Amendment principles by asserting that the United States killed the three men with missiles from unmanned drones. Unmanned drones are functionally incapable of “seizing” a person; they are designed to kill, not capture. As the decedents were not “seized,” Plaintiffs have not stated a Fourth Amendment claim.” and “The Constitution does not guarantee due care on the part of state officials; liability for negligently inflicted harm is categorically beneath the threshold of constitutional due process.” On the matter of Abdulrahman Alawki, Judge Collyer basically said that if the US government kills you in the attempt to wage its “war on terror” then they are not responsible for their accidents. The lawsuit was brought by the father of Anwar Alawki, who while admittedly becoming a citizen “at odds and arms against the US Government” was otherwise in no way charged with any crime, but due to his role as Al Qaeda propagandist (and even Osama Bin Laden didn’t take him as seriously in that as did Barack Obama, apparently) had been droned to death without charges or trial during the great “War on Terror” initiated by the Bush administration and carried on to this time by the Obama one. In my mind this case was less about that of Anwar (although having the ability to posthumously state one’s own Fourth and Fifth Amendment rights at law seems pretty tenuous) but more to do with the killing of his innocent son, who had no connection at all to the jihadi ideology of his father.

     It’s hard to wrap one’s head around this decision dismissing Mr. Nasser Alawki’s case. Here is a man who brought his grievance through the federal judicial system seeking justice for the “accidental” killing of his grandson. His personal faith in American justice was so laughably naive  that he actually thought the Constitution  provided him some means of redressing it. But instead, Judge Collyer worked diligently to find the legal loopholes through which the Executive branch could shove the drone that killed his grandson. And, apparently, now, going forward into the bleak police-state future, any citizen whom they should choose to place on their target list for secret “national security” reasons. Because “the courts are not the place” for this to be decided, but by Congress and the Executive”. Boy howdy, we all know what paragons of wisdom they all are, don’t we.

     This is Hitler-type justice at work, in my opinion. Now, any future president has the right though the use of secret accusations to disappear any citizen they choose, indefinitely detain them without course to law and access to legal remedy. The president has said you must die, and of course, with all the powers of the state at his command, the president will assure that you shall. We went from terrorists being criminals to legitimized warriors - subject to military law and not civil legal penalties- and Judge Collyer made it clear that the propagandized war on terror, rooted in fear and insecurity over the 9/11 attacks, will continue with the “battlefield” now extended to every inch of the globe, including the United States of America. Of course Mr. Obama didn’t want to kill young  Abdulrahman. He was “just doing his job”.

Actually, contrary to Ms. Collyer's opinion, there is an applicable section of US law that pertains to this case. This is sections 241 and 242 of the US Criminal Code which read:

US CODE 241 & 242

UNITED STATES CODE
TITLE 18 - CRIMES AND CRIMINAL PROCEDURE
PART I - CRIMES
CHAPTER 13 - CIVIL RIGHTS

§ 241. Conspiracy against rights

If two or more persons conspire to injure, oppress, threaten, or intimidate any inhabitant of any State, Territory, or District in the free exercise or enjoyment of any right or privilege secured to him by the Constitution or laws of the United States, or because of his having so exercised the same; or If two or more persons go in disguise on the highway, or on the premises of another, with intent to prevent or hinder his free exercise or enjoyment of any right or privilege so secured - They shall be fined not more than $10,000 or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both; and if death results, they shall be subject to imprisonment for any term of years or for life.

§ 242. Deprivation of rights under color of law

Whoever, under color of any law, statute, ordinance, regulation, or custom, willfully subjects any inhabitant of any State, Territory, or District to the deprivation of any rights, privileges, or immunities secured or protected by the Constitution or laws of the United States, or to different punishments, pains, or penalties, on account of such inhabitant being an alien, or by reason of his color, or race, than are prescribed for the punishment of citizens, shall be fined not more than $1,000 or imprisoned not more than one year, or both; and if bodily injury results shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both; and if death results shall be subject to imprisonment for any term of years or for life.

http://justification/crt/about/crm/242fin.php

"For the purpose of Section 242, acts under "color of law" include acts not only done by federal, state, or local officials within the their lawful authority, but also acts done beyond the bounds of that official's lawful authority if the acts are done while the official is purporting to or pretending to act in the performance of his/her official duties,. Persons acting under color of law within the meaning of this statute include police officers, prisons guards and other law enforcement officials, as well as judges, care providers in public health facilities, and others who are acting as public officials. It is not necessary that the crime be motivated by animus toward the race, color, religion, sex, handicap, familial status or national origin of the victim.

     So Ms. Collyer felt herself incapable of judging these officials in a similar manner to the criteria used upon judgment of Nazi war criminals at Nuremberg. It’s not surprising, given the hubris of America’s leaders and appointed officials, at this time, that there should be a cringing from acceptance of any personal responsibility in this, and that the judiciary, which was actually our last hope against tyrannical powers assumed by the Presidency, could and would actually step in to uphold the rights of citizens. Nowhere in her decision does Ms. Collyer recognize the existence or relevance of this statute regarding ‘color of authority.’

     Never mind any attempt to actually arrest and bring to heel these criminals to our way of life, now, the expediency of a drone can conveniently discorporate them from a distance, and collateral damage- being the wrong person in the right place at the wrong time- can get you killed, and our leaders do not have to say “oops, sorry” any longer. They wouldn’t anyway, but that is beside the point. Once the slippery slope was defined to include Muslims or any other future out-group of Americans it can now be redefined by any US President under his “Commander in Chief” powers, subject to the decision. Your government is always right, and even with the judge herself saying it “raised serious constitutional questions” she decided she was not the person, and “the courts are not the place,”  for making the judgment in favor of a citizen over the long arm of the state. It is a truly cowardly position for a judge to take, but she has taken it, and now the Executive branch can decide just who lives and who dies. And go scot free when they make “a mistake.” We’re living under an official military dictatorship now.  Madison and Jefferson must be tossing by turns and throwing fits from their graves.

yes, call us old-fashioned, but some of us still believe in due process and the rule of law:

http://antiwar.com/blog/2014/05/15/drone-lawyer-kill-a-16-year-old-get-a-promotion/

*****

http://original.antiwar.com/andrew-p-napolitano/2014/04/23/a-legal-way-to-kill/

http://www.salon.com/2014/04/10/barack_obama_pulls_a_george_w_bush_lies_misinformation_and_chemical_weapons/
http://davidstockmanscontracorner.com/2014/04/14/seymour-hershs-blockbuster-obama-on-the-red-line-and-on-the-rat-line/
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/apr/12/silicon-valley-nsa-reform-taking-so-long

http://truth-out.org/opinion/item/23010-pass-the-drone-strike-transparency-act  

http://www.vice.com/en_uk/read/the-drone-ranger-obamas-dirty-wars

Our Sociopathic Political Class

     We’ve recently seen (or been subjected to) a great number of blatant exposures of just how screwed up the leadership of this nation truly is. While it’s long been a given that both major parties are corrupt, full of careerist opportunists, many of whom have never held legitimate occupations outside of government “service”, there are a good many of them (of late) showing ever more often the disconnect between those that gain a salary on the public dime and the manner in which the population themselves are expected to live.

     Case in point, numero uno. Dianne Feinstein. Here we have a woman in an important leadership position on the Senate  Intelligence committee. In a response to her constituency (those of us who took part in a massive international protest by sending letters and phone calls through the Electronic Frontier Foundation and American Civil Liberties union, in protest of the NSA’s massive ‘collect-it-all” campaign) she states that “the NSA does not conduct mass surveillance of US citizens.” Here point blank she states an obvious contradiction with the facts. Obviously she has a different sense of reality than the rest of us, otherwise, what is all this noise about the Edward Snowden documents all about? Why is it being protested to begin with if this is not what it is? Obviously, Dianne lives in a different world from the rest of us, for only a week after her response to constituents, the woman herself took the Senate floor to protest the CIA snooping into the committee’s computers themselves, in order to (most likely) prevent the Committee’s documents on torture and war crimes from reaching the public- which it still has yet to do. A double standard? Easily understood though when one realizes nobody in America has benefited more by the politics of “government by assassination” than Dianne Feinstein, whose rise into national politics began when she was propelled by the assassination of George Moscone into the seat of Mayor of San Francisco.

     Case in point, numero dos. Mike Rogers (who sits on the same intelligence committee as Senator Feinstein) comes out and says, as regards Mr. Snowden, that he is “Obviously” under the influence of Russian intelligence.” That is said despite Mr. Snowden’s repeated denials of that, and the NSA’s own agents saying there is no proof of same, and that Mr. Snowden obviously acted alone. Mr. Rogers is not alone in his attempts to bully-pulpit Americans into a new Cold War with Russia, however, by any means necessary. Take a look at John McCain (case in point, numero tres). After making pals with the anti-Semitic rightwing loonies in charge of the Ukrainian regime change (most likely covertly funded by US CIA operatives, as have been many of the turnovers in the Middle East and South Asia over the last five years or more) he beats his breast and screams for sanctions against Russia, for taking back the Crimea, an administrative error concluded in the Soviet era by Nikita Khrushchev. When the Crimeans vote to realign themselves with Russia, not only Senator McCain, but the Fantastic Colonel Numbnuts, John Kerry (case in point numero quatro) jumps in the ring to visit Poland in order to reassure our allies there (as well as Estonia, oh don’t forget them!) that the USA will stand by them and offer military assistance “all options on the table”) to defend against any possible (if unlikely) Russian aggression against them.

     Can you see where this is going? These people are so convinced that our foreign entanglements with so many numerous treaty parties around the world are more important than representing a constituency which is fed up with our national belligerence and “big stick throwing” to the point that we the people prevented them from rushing in on Syria and in so doing short-circuited their well oiled machinery of politics by gunboat. The American people are sick and tired of our treasure and prosperity being thrown away in foreign sands and our leaders continue to talk, and act, as if Russia were the very same entity she was under Communism, and that American “exceptionalism” gives us the right to intervene anyplace in the world we deem it necessary, or jump in when any of our weak sisters cry “masher.” Without the consent of the people, or, necessarily, that of Congress.

     Witness President Obama (case in point, numero cinco). His intervention in Libya even pushed further against the rules than George Bush’s invasion of Iraq. at least George went to Congress for approval. But Obama circumvented both the Constitution and War Powers Act by insisting that because American ground troops would not be involved, this did not constitute “American involvement” and was as such a right of presidential fiat, alone. You never hear Democrats bitch about any of Obama’s anti-constitutional moves. They insist he must be being used, that he is only a puppet of the M. I. C; but I am afraid there is more to it than that. He is trying to make a legacy for himself, and the cheapest, easiest way, for any President to do that, is by making war. Awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, solely for getting elected, Obama has turned into one of the most war happy presidents since LBJ. “I’m not against all wars, just stupid ones.” But what he apparently needs shown to him - by both veterans, and pacifists alike-apparently dramatically and graphically, since he likes visuals,  is that all wars are stupid wars. I do not think he has quite grasped that yet, since he’s willing to kill anyone who gets in his way, and “I’m getting pretty good at it.” If this is not the height of narcissistic sociopathy then who can say what is. There are guys doing hard federal time under the death penalty for similar cheek.

http://original.antiwar.com/giraldi/2014/03/24/foreign-policy-delusion-is-bipartisan/
http://www.opednews.com/articles/A-Military-Plot-to-Take-Ov-by-John-Whitehead-Corporate_Government_Government_Military-140326-560.html

You Will Never Be So Free Again

     The last fourteen years of American life have been terribly disheartening for those of us who thought, perhaps, that with the new millennium, we might see an actual expansion in American culture of the ideas of Freedom and Liberty. Surely there might have been a window in which culture might have been allowed the opportunity to break through. But several things have happened, and I wish to let people know, that America will never be your parents' America, ever again, in light of these changes.

     The first, and largest change, of course, was what seized the population after 9-11-01. Fear, and fear of “terrorists”, set us on a one way course to the point where now we see our own Constitution taken to task for its “oversight” allowing for Amendments One, Two, Four, and Five to be stripped of all meaning and reinterpreted in the hands of those who wield power over we, the citizens.

     Besides the scourge of the Free Love generation, AIDS, which swept in like an avenging Victorian angel at the end of the 70’s to chill any chance remaining of the idea of “casual sex” ever regaining the status it had held for a decade, the social climate of the 1980s- that there was nothing which could not be commodified, and nothing worth living unless commercialized in the name of profit and greed- “loss leading” gatherings like the original Woodstock were seen as naive, Utopian fantasies, “proven” unworkable by the exceptional phenomenon of its doppelganger, the Altamont festival. Of course, Altamont was a disaster waiting to happen for a number of reasons, but the existence of a receptive counterculture to its idea was never one of these, not the way it was later sold to America by “Law'n'order”.

      A situation like the Woodstock Festival of 1969 will never happen again. It just can't. In part, it is because the reactionary community led by the likes of Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan took umbrage to the extent of making many such mass gatherings impossible to recreate. As well, their “War on Drugs” enabled a community of law enforcement officers to enact their own cultural war in revenge, punitively seeking to destroy wherever possible the growing “counterculture” attended to by a community of mostly young people. Those who foresaw a more healthy recreational lifestyle in the use of marijuana over that of alcohol. That the youth of America were automatically suspect of UnAmerican ideologies was half of the problem- the other half of the problem were those among America’s youth who actually were taken by UnAmerican ideologies (such as Marxism and Maoism) and self-appointed themselves to lead the lemming charge against the Military Industrial Complex. And if we need bombs to do it, by God, let’s build some bombs to do it with (i.e, the Bill Ayres and Bernardine Dohrns). Such persons never represented the leading edge of the movement, even if historical revisionists of both the right and left would like you to think they did.

      Another element of the culture war, of course, is the revision of historical truth over how and why the Vietnam war was lost by America. They would like you to believe it was lost either on the battlefield by a mutinous soldiery, or in the streets of America itself, where people took to mass protest in order to end an illegal occupation of another nation. Defeatism, and not the possibility that the other side held the moral cards- it was their country after all. Of course, illegal occupations of sovereign nations have become de rigeur now for those charged with enforcement of American foreign policy. Some, like John McCain and Lindsey Graham, never see a prewar situation they do not approve of. They would love to escalate each and every situation into an excuse to throw more Americans into a slaughterhouse, for that is where their own greatest “service” to America took place. If it is good enough for us, then it ought to be good enough for you. Stupid peaceniks are always the problem.

     Then there are the ones who would like you to think that the whole nation would go to hell if drugs were legalized, particularly, pot. Well, you know, any drug is a gateway drug, if it happens to be the first you use. And it could be said that many would never turn to alcohol, (or worse, heroin or amphetamines) if the safer alternative of pot as a culturally sanctioned intoxicant were to be normalized and alternatively available instead.

     Mass gatherings like the Woodstock festival will never be possible again, despite their benign and nonviolent nature, because of law enforcement’s “need and desire” to be in control of mass assemblies. Anarchic opportunities such as Woodstock truly represented are seen as opportunities- if not for sheer out and out rebelliousness, then, as opportunities for “terrorist attacks.” Better to keep the population in line, than allow them the freedom to come together in such a disorganized (or unprofitable) fashion. The commercialization of the festival is not the issue (to be fair, it was a noble attempt to begin with- but the organizers did not count on the actual popularity of the attractions to be presented, nor the ability of a movement of highly mobile young people to assemble at what was, in those days, something of a moment’s notice) It goes without saying that even in the case of a national mobilization of militia in response to a governmental military coup that such a large mass gathering could only be seen as something to be nipped in the bud with helicopters, drones, and SWAT teams.
    The legacy of Woodstock was to be reduced and distilled into a small stream more easily channeled by authority into the phenomenon of “the Grateful Dead concert community.” Dead concerts, indeed, became a trap for the unwary, targeted by law enforcement as “havens of drug taking and sales” and sure-fire opportunities for drug bust press. That the Dead themselves rarely, in later years, played into this mentality (as they once might have in early years, when they actually were members of the activist psychedelic community) only points up the pathetic hopelessness in conceiving that somehow it was also “the last hope” for such freedoms as it could stand to represent. The Dead, eventually, endorsed the crypto-police state candidate Barack Obama (not merely once, but twice) and the possibility of a world where such extreme opposites as Ann Coulter and Al and Tipper Gore might meet over bong hits evaporated in a mist of PRISM-inflected super-spy paranoia. You never can know who your real friends are, now, can you? Only that we are all suspects in a bigger game which has been played by powerful shadow figures, ever since the death of John F. Kennedy.

Hillary Clinton, Token Candidate En Perpetua

   It is always amazing the way some characters in American politics just never seem to go away, no matter how much scandal and schadenfreude appears in their wake. Hillary Clinton, like Dick Cheney, is one such individual. Not content in having been the power behind the throne for two terms of husband Bill (and always, always, turning a blind eye in the matter of his marital infidelity, in order to keep a firm hold on such osmotically-attained power) Mrs. Clinton is poised, and lauded, as she ever is, as the “most popular contender” for the titular role of “next President of the United States.”

     Goes without saying that there are millions of American women who will offer up their sacred votes for Mrs. Clinton on the premise that “America deserves a woman president” on much the same grounds millions of blacks voted for Barack Obama on the grounds that America deserved a black one. Never mind  that his record shows him to have been an absolute monstrosity on the issues on which he ran—Civil Liberties, Economic Recovery,  Health Insurance “you can keep”, a Lessened International US Military Involvement—Barack Obama has succeeded in outpacing and defrauding his core constituencies a dozen times already, and for what real gain of the nation, and, specifically, what particular gains for blacks themselves?

     Mrs. Clinton, herself the favorite of a class of individuals who see no problem with political nepotism in  the United States, glides into her comfortable “edge as the leading Democratic candidate” on the heels and coattails of husband Bill. One would hope that by now Americans have grown sick of family dynasties- the Rockefellers, the Kennedys, the Bushes, the Cheneys. But apparently just creating a meritocratic system which was designed to exclude hereditary and familial patronage just has not been enough for Americans, who despite their bright shining democratic city on a hill, ever yet bow and scrape to monarchs and royalty wherever they happen to coincide with agreements on foreign policy, (like Saudi Arabia) or “just plain tradition.” (the United Kingdom.)

     And yet, I see no reason to elect Mrs. Clinton on her merits, for there are, indeed, few merits. I will give couple of examples which show her in her true colors.  Alexander Cockburn, writing in his A Colossal Wreck, relates this story, (dated 1-18-2001) which I apologetically must quote verbatim.

     “Joann was recently traveling in a limo from Baltimore to a town in West Virginia and fell into conversation with the driver, who related some of his ferryings to and fro of various bigwigs. One of these was Hillary Clinton. “An ornery woman,” the driver commented. “And what a mouth on her!”

     The driver went on to describe an occasion on which he was driving the First Lady and a couple of her female friends through a poor area of Washington, DC. They passed a beggar, and as they did so the First Lady expressed her disgust for the mendicant, adding “He wouldn’t be a bum if he had a piece of ass.” The driver was able to shed no light in how or why she had arrived at this conclusion, stunned as he was by the coarse nature of her observations. Then they passed two young black women with babies. “There go two welfare cases. They make me sick. They’re too lazy to work,” said Senator Clinton, champion of mothers and children everywhere.”

      Mrs. Clinton was also captured on film chortling in glee over the lynching of Moammar Qaddafy by his enraged and incited populace. A matter of public record, she paraphrases Julius Caesar in her attempts to sound statesman-like.

     “We came, we saw, he died.”...

      ...[“Reporter—Did you have anything to do with it?”

      “Mrs. Clinton—I’ll never tell”. ]*

     You can watch a portion* of this informative exchange here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xXkl0Zn4_CA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FmIRYvJQeHM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pnPw6y4HuA4

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6RR9LiCFs9E\

     On this matter, this is what Mr. Cockburn had to say:

     “Did the terminal command, Finish Him off, come via cell phone from the US State Department, whose Secretary, Hillary Clinton, had earlier called for his death, or by dint of local initiative? At all events, since Gaddafi was a prisoner at the time of his execution, it was a war crime, and I trust that in the years of her retirement Mrs. Clinton will be detained amid some foreign vacation and handed a subpoena.”

     In my opinion, a head of state who laughs— laughs! over the death by lynch mob of another head of state, is unworthy of the dignity of elected office. Is this really the kind of person we want representing our nation, serving our interests? Or is Mrs. Clinton just yet another version of our tendency to elect those we feel “familiar” with, minus the critical reasoning which it takes, on the part of a scrutinizing public, to ensure that the leaders we elect actually represent our stated and claimed ideals and values? Our nation is in a lot of trouble, folks. There are people now holding high office who not only find the violent death of others cute and appropriate, but are willing to find a joke in it, if they can manage to milk one.

     (*Apparently the full exchange with reporters from which I draw that quote, as I originally viewed it a year ago, is no longer up at YouTube, although I shall continue to research the possibility it might Somewhere be available, and update these links for my readers, if I can.

At present, unfortunately, all that are available are half-minute clips at the most. Given the high,  mighty, and protected status of Mrs. Clinton, it’s quite possible that such graphic exposures of the Secretary’s inner soul have been removed from YouTube by her political operatives.)

http://antiwar.com/blog/2014/04/29/hillary-clinton-the-democratic-partys-pro-war-anti-civil-liberties-front-runner/
http://original.antiwar.com/JP-Sottile/2014/06/05/hillary-clinton-and-the-weaponization-of-the-state-department/