Thoughts on Living Dark in America

Tags

racism, right wing

I’m not a white man, I’m a white woman. A few Black men used to tell me that white women and Black men shared a common victimization. They claimed that Black women were freer than both of us.

I was never sure that I bought that argument, and I certainly don’t buy that I share an equality of victimization with Black men or women.

But it does give me a certain empathy that comes easier for me than perhaps to the white male.

In my professional working days, I dated a number of police officers. A few were regular beat cops, a couple were Sergeants. I  called a number of detectives and even one Deputy Chief good friends. Since this all occurred in one of the larger metropolitan forces in America, I think I know of what I speak.

Given that all this happened in Detroit, Michigan, once the “murder capital” wherein I worked with and under a list of rather well-known African-American police/ judges/politicians, I speak with some small knowledge of the realities of both crime and racism in America.

We are in the grips of a series of well-publicized incidents wherein Black folks have been killed by white police officers. This has happened in myriads of places, among forces that are more or less bigoted toward their policing communities. The evidence (1) or more properly, the allegations are all over the place. Some cases “seem” more clear-cut than others. People who are favorable to the police in one case are not necessarily favorable in other cases.

Whatever the truth may be in any case, there is a strong and clear perception that the system has failed the African-American community in large part. One example will suffice. Studies suggest that where marijuana is concerned, people use it pretty much in an equal amount racially. In fact, in some years, whites out use marijuana. Yet when you examine arrest rates, Blacks are arrested at stunningly higher rates. A look at the incarceration rates across the country speaks to the same conclusion.

Blacks are targeted. This has always been the case, and it continues to be the case. All the explanations and arguments cannot dissuade this conclusion no matter how hard people try. Deflections to “blacks commit more crimes against blacks than anybody else” are convenient diversions but nothing else. African-American parents teach their boys at an early age a whole series of behaviors in public that are required of them that are unthinkable to a white parent. Walking and driving while black is a real concept.

During my time practicing law, it was not unusual to be told by a client, “the police rolled up on us, stopped us, and said, ‘what are you doing in THIS neighborhood?'” No such thing is asked of a white kid.

The insensitivity to race in this country is stunning and shocking. The Right-wing continues to claim that we are a post racial country. And of course this is understandable when you are busily trying to dismantle government support systems, deny people the right to vote, and otherwise diluting the influence of dark skins in the decision-making process. Suddenly we don’t need to feed the hungry because they are poor and victimized by an unfair system that revolves around poor schools, lack of transportation choices, injustice in the courts, and so forth, but rather because they are “lazy” and have not learned the values of hard work and sacrifice that all good white children learn.

The point is there is a vested interest on the part of the Right to negate racism in America. Their champions become those handful of Negroes who crave the limelight and are willing to dance Bojangles tunes in return for being patted on the head and “considered” a real presidential candidate. African-Americans who stand up and declare the unfairness (as well as well-meaning liberals) are just “playing the race card”

Go to any right-wing blog, and read the comments. I regularly post “humor” pieces consisting of nothing but verbatim comments by people on topics of racial injustice. The same sick and ugly remarks pervade the hundreds that are posted.

Yet, I am daily told that I am the problem. I fail to understand the dangerous jobs our police people are doing, against criminals who are armed to the teeth. I fail to have any balance. I am always “playing the race card.”

Yes, I play it, because it fairly cries out to be played. This country is still ugly racist and you, Right wing, prove it every single day.

Here is a list of what is considered racist:

1. I’m not a racist. Well, you probably are if you made that statement. People who are sensitive to race and working to eliminate racism recognize that we are all racist or bigoted in ways we don’t even realize. We are always looking for the ways that we “assume” before thinking, “react” before thinking. We recognize our tendencies and work to eradicate them.  To say you are not a racist is to utterly fail to even grasp this concept. You are deeply racist, and haven’t even begun the process.
2. We have a black president, and a black attorney general. As Chris Rock said, this is not an example of “progress”. There have been Black people for decades and centuries that were more than capable of being all these things. To suggest that white American has finally reached such a point, has little to do with “progress” from a Black perspective.
3. Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson are black racists. There is no such thing as a black racist. It’s an oxymoron. Racism denotes the power to control a minority by a majority. A minority cannot be racist. Individuals of any race, creed, or gender can be bigots. Learn the difference.
4. Blacks need to raise their children to work hard and be law-abiding. They already do. What you are really saying, is that black people need to act white. You are not constrained as they are by crime-ridden neighborhoods, poor schools, lack of good transportation, poor government services, local merchants who take advantage of them though inferior products and high prices. When you have tried to fight though all that AND teach your child to be polite to slur-slinging authority figures and keep their hands out of their pockets and not play with toy guns, and not to walk down certain streets, and not to wear those tennis shoes, and not to wear your hat that way, and not to be out after 10 p.m., and not to ride in that sort of car, and, and, and, maybe you will get it.

Much has been made in recent months of mostly white men walking around in stores carrying their “I got a big dick” guns, in some male peacock display of misplaced masculinity. People forget that the Black Panthers did the same thing in California back in the 70’s and then Governor Ronnie Reagan called for new gun laws to stop this danger to the public. Black men with guns is dangerous. White men with guns is “protection to all”. Do you FUCKING SEE THE DIFFERENCE?

One day we will look back on all this (we being future generations no doubt) and see all the hypocrisy. A study just confirmed what has been known for a number of years. The bulk of the “tea party movement” was born, bred and financed by the Kochs. They personally don’t give a damn about all your religious issues, but they do find it a good thing to have your mind occupied by gays and affirmative action, by “socialist” boogie men behind every government program designed to help those less fortunate. They and those like them are behind the misdirection that you live with.

As long as you blame others for your shit-life ( or at least it would be a whole lot better if I didn’t have to support THEM), then you are not blaming them–the people with all the money and with all the power. They continue to reform this country into an oligarchy where the rich have everything and everyone works for them in some sick Ayn Randian dystopian nightmare. And you play your part by calling for free markets and free guns, and worrying about who is marrying who.

Get a clue. Markets have never been free, and the Kochs and their ilk don’t want free markets, they want them rigged as they now are to favor them. They want international markets to be open to their products and they will abuse and exploit workers worldwide and do so with impunity. They are intent on reducing you to no more than a Bangladeshi sweat-shop worker. They don’t care about your old age, or your health. As long as we continue to breed, there will always be enough. Platitudes are all you actually get from paid politicians who say we just have to get back to the good old days of hard work and sacrifice–you know, like you and your parents. Stop supporting these lazy no-accounts. That ain’t racism, just good old American pride.

Bullshit.

As they sit with their December tans in San Moritz and laugh over martinis at the gullibility of their “tea bagger” supporters,  while you continue to talk about “respecting our police” and calling young a young kid who may have snatched a few cigarillos a “thug”. Yeah, continue doing your “job”. The rich laugh all the way to the bank.

PS: all this shit applies to brown skins too.

 

(1) Given that almost none of these cases has resulted in a prosecution, we can only surmise what the evidence is. Grand jury testimony is not evidence nor proof of anything, having been untested by cross-examination or subject to objection by the other side. This is no “other side” in grand jury proceedings.

Hold Your Prayers, God is Busy in the Southwest These Days

Tags

immigration, religious right, right wing, teaparty

See, God is a little bit busy these days. If you hadn’t heard, a lot of children have been making their way to Merika these days, fleeing, you know, violence. Although nobody seems to talk much about that, the violence that is.

A vocal if hopefully small herd of mean people call them “illegals” and scream at the kids, telling them to “go back home”. Some have suggested that a well aimed firearm at the border might do the trick just fine, and no one of course should think they are meaning anything violent by that call to arms.

While not going quite this far, but *nudge nudge, wink wink* maybe they are, a couple of our pious types have ‘splained to us, the spiritually lacking, that this is all part of God’s plan. Brian Fischer, blasphemer-erradicator in charge of American values said thusly:

“Our southern border is there by God’s design. To disregard it, to treat it as if were not there, to regard it as something not worth respecting and defending, is an insult to the God who put it there for our benefit.”

Just forgettabout that “bring the little children unto me”. You missed the damn footnote: “unless they are from another country and *ick* brown or black, and are entering unto me illegally”.

 

Nodding in agreement is Texas *cough* Pastor Robert Jeffress who points out that God wants a fence between them and us, because, God was always clear about boundaries:

 

“Yes, Jesus loved children, but he also respected law. He said, render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s,” Jeffress clarified for the faithful on Fox News. “So, we need to do both. Show compassion, but secure the borders.”

 

Just forgettabout that stuff in the early part of the bible, about welcoming the stranger and hospitality and so forth. All that, we know, is made irrelevant by Jesus, oh except for that little part about not suffering men who lay with men to live. And maybe that part about witches too. That might stay in too.

 

What the religious right who pushes this vile push back against children, is that it was one of their own, George W., that “compassionate conservative” who signed into law the requirement that these kids can’t be returned to their country of origin without proper legal proceedings.

 

Just before leaving office, on Dec. 23, 2008, George W. Bush signed into law the William Wilberforce Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act. This bipartisan measure, named for a 19^th century British abolitionist, was aimed at extending and beefing up efforts to prevent and prosecute human trafficking and protect the victims of trafficking.  More importantly, it described exactly how unaccompanied children crossing the border must be treated.

 

The crazies on the Right have of course ignored their own complicity in this legislation, and find it more profitable to insinuate that the President has in fact invited these kids from their violence-wracked homelands to America for some nefarious purpose:

 

I have to believe that when you don’t respond in any way that you are either inept or you have some ulterior motive of which you are functioning from,” Perry said during an interview on ABC’s “This Week.”

 

Ricky (I can’t believe these glasses haven’t made me smart yet) Perry actually said that, although what the conspiracy is for or about, is beyond his meager brain power to discern.

 

Meanwhile, the Right continues to live in cognitive dissonance which prompted one comedienne to suggest that the children should paste the name “fetus” on their forehead. That sounds harsh, but these are the same people who are willing to go to extreme lengths, i.e., Hobby Lobby, to protect the rights of a “fertilized egg”. To turn children away who are fleeing violence and possible death in their own country, seems a interesting juxtaposition to say the least. 

 

To say nothing of our sanctimonious lip service paid to all those poor Syrian children who are living in makeshift tent cities all over the Middle East, having fled the murderous bombardments of Bashar Al-Assad. No finer example is John S. McCain and his wringing of hands at the “humanitarian tragedy” that is going on. Yet we hear nothing from the old fart when it comes to protecting these poor children arriving frightened and alone because their families believe that the trek to Merika is far safer than allowing them to remain at home.

 

No, in fact McCain says no to authorizing money to the President to deal with the crisis, finding it:

 

“It would cost us very little to fly them back, as compared with the cost of taking care of them while they were here,” he said.

 

Mostly McCain has whined about not being allowed to take his cell phone with him in viewing the detainment camps in Arizona. His Senatorial rights, he claims trump these kids right to privacy. Change the policy, he bellowed.

 

We in America are again caught in that position we so often find ourselves in–telling the rest of the world how to behave, all the while doing the in-opposite at home. Another shaming moment in the US of A.

 

The South Has Fallen Way Off the Edge of Stupid

Tags

GOP, How stupid are you?, Merika, right wing, teabaggers

Gather round children, it’s time to hear a story.

It’s a story about a land called Merika.

It was once a jolly place living in the delusion of self-congratulatory goodness.

Yes, these Merikans believed themselves not only special, but specially good.

They stood for apple pie, Mom, and freedoms which were countless in number, as many as stars in the sky.

People from all over Gaia did whatever necessary to get to the land of Merika and we welcomed the poor, and tired, although why they were tired from sitting on a boat is a question seldom asked.

Course, the People who lived in Merika (who never named it just calling it home) were not nearly so impressed with these new Merikans and their ways. Their “ways” including pretty much telling the People to go jump in the Pacific, for they needed the Merika for a thing called “capitalism”, which sounded capital but turned out to be just another scam for the rich to inherit the earth.

They stole some folks and made them work for no wages, which gave a pretty unusual cast to capitalism and gave new meaning to the concept of “good people”.

They then got nosy in other people’s business in other places not Merika by explaining with bombs and such that they too should be like Merika (as best they could, given they were not special).

Anyways, Merikans prospered (at least most and as long as most is more than other countries, it was accounted perfect), but the thing about this capitalism is that some very few Merikans got filthy filthy wealthy, and they didn’t share with nobody. They bought houses and visited them a couple of weeks a year, and maybe not even every year. They traveled to other lands, always remarking that these other lands were not as nice as Merika, but they bought stuff that reminded them of these inferior places anyway. They boat boats too, and sailed the oceans blue.

Meanwhile, lots of Merikans got dirt poor. So the rich grew a bit scared. “What if they blame us for taking all the money?”

So the rich invented stuff like “Protestant work ethic, and pulling oneself up by one’s own bootstraps” and explained that rich people work really hard.

So poor people worked really hard.

But it didn’t help. And they were getting really riled.

So rich people told them that it was because of all those freed people, and all those other-than-white people who were the cause of their misery. They were “takers” and the gov’mint was givin’ away all their hard-earned money to “those others.”

And Merkia got more and more split apart between the few haves and the enormous have-nots.

The haves decided that the best thing to do was to make it hard for the have-nots to vote.

And this reached the height of heights in a silly state called Florida which looks a lot like a flaccid penis, and when you stop to think about it, it’s a bunch of flaccid penises that promoted the new law they have. And when you add in that most of the people in Florida are really really old, then that picture of very very old wrinkly flaccid penises will sear your brain for all eternity.

Anyway, this law, says that if you go get in line to vote, you can’t have someone save your place while you go pee. They figure that given the relative age of voters in Florida, this will reduce the lines a lot.

It may of course just encourage a lot of very very old and wrinkly flaccid penises to be publicly exposed. Not to say about what it might mean to that phrase “trickle down economics.”

I don’t know how this will give the rich a boost at the polls however. Unless it means that rich people think that only they can afford Depends. I guess it depends on what you call poor.

Close by in the land of Louisiana, a land that like most in the South, spends a lot of time talking about the honored sacredness of the “Constitution”–a document that once upon a time, they sought to distance themselves from in the quest for cotton-pickers at no cost, has found time to reason together in an unreasonable way.

Seems they have decided that like having a state flower and a state bird, a state really oughta have a “state book”.  And although the CONSTITUTION suggests that the state should “make no law” that has the effect of favoring any religion, the crawdaddys there decided that that doesn’t mean what it says or say what it means, and the bible would be a fittin’ state book, because as we all know, it says what it means and means what it says.

No doubt it will be one and one only version of that book although there are hundreds, because as everyone knows, God spoke to King James and said, “go forth and translate my words and call it your version of my words” which is not exactly God’s version, but thinking any deeper than that makes my head ache.

 

And so my child, this is the story of a special land, a special people, and a special time.

And they all lived happily ever after in the land that everyone else called Stupid.

Amen, and good night.

 

A Certain Amount of Attention is Required

Tags

abortion rights, code words, critical thinking, Election 2012, GOP, Mitt Romney, right wing, Romney and morality, taxes, Tennessee

 

 

A certain amount of attention is required to prevent being duped. And of course, if you don’t realize the deception soon enough, it may be too late to avoid the unpleasant consequences.

Perhaps the greatest gift of learning is the ability to think critically. We are all subject to lapses, and we all have varying abilities here. Most of us are woefully inadequate as any political or company ad will attest. We are overly subject to our past, our emotions and frankly our personal desires as to how we wish things were.

We would all do well to spend a bit more time checking under the bed rather than simply admiring the pretty quilt that lies upon it.

Cases in point:

The Right (does anybody find it as funny as I do that the Right is named right when they are wrong which is surely the oxymoron of the century) mains as often as it can, that the Left is guilty of blatant race-baiting. Now I find that usually silly. Recently Joe Biden claimed that the R & R would return people “to chains” a reference that really was a play off Willard’s stated desire to “unshackle” the banks from regulation. The Right was aghast with shock and outrage at Joe’s incendiary remark.

But of course we all know that the Right has been using code for-EVER in its attempt to remind its white audiences that THEY are not the same as THOSE OTHERS. If you want a clue about how to read between the lines, then scoot over to the Grio and read a good piece on the “new normal.”

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There are more ways than one to skin a cat. Whether that is true or not, there are certainly many ways to effectively stop abortions other than a blatant and at this time, illegal move to ban them outright.

Tennessee has managed to force the closing of a long-operating clinic in its state by passing a “seemingly” innocuous law that requires that every clinic must have one doctor on staff with “admitting privileges” to a local hospital. When their only clinician with such privileges died, the clinic was unable to secure another.

Why? Because now such privileges are denied to such clinics. So even though they have board-certified OB-GYN’s on staff, and fully capable Ambulatory Surgical Treatment Center, they cannot meet the new state requirement.

This is how rights are taken from people without their even being aware of it.

Of course Tennessee apparently misses the point that you can reduce abortions by: making sure that poor families have adequate food and health care, providing good employment training to the unemployed, providing services to new mothers, day care facilities to working mothers, better sex education that emphasizes something more than “not doing it”, i.e., CONTRACEPTION, and making contraception freely available.

Oh, wait, that would be helping people to be dependent wouldn’t it? We certainly can’t have that!

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Of course he’s hiding something. The Obama campaign sent an offer to Romney: release five more years of tax returns and we promise to never ask for any more. The offer was declined, with Romney telling us all that we can trust that he has reviewed them, and he never paid “less than 13%”. Since when is thirteen percent a good figure? Is that what you pay?

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This man ——->

Said this:

How can you go out there and tell people things that just aren’t true?” he asked rhetorically. He added, “This is a time for truths.”

Remember the old Star Trek show when they captured an old satellite that had gotten its commands scrambled and was trying to sterilize all life? The intrepid Captain Kirk sent it into a mental melt down by saying, “Everything I say is a lie. I’m lying.”

It appears that Willard has no more sense of truth than he has of the price of a loaf of bread these days.

Sigh….don’t we have a right to expect more from those who make decisions in our name?

∫

Much is made of the fact that Willard tithes something like 10 % of his income each year to his Church. He is wont to tell you that when you add his tax returns to this tithing, he gives “well over 20%” of his money to help others.

The assumption is that the tithe goes to charities to help others. Well. . . .not quite.

If you are interested in where all the Mormon church’s money goes, then link up to Crooks and Liars and read all about it. They have the charts and the figures.

It is a serious eye-opener.

Related articles

• Tennessee Abortion Clinic Closes, Citing Restrictive State Law (huffingtonpost.com)
• Mormon Church Rakes in Billions in Tithes (webpronews.com)

 

Chuck Norris Said. . .

Tags

Chuck Norris, GOP, Islamophobia, Neo-cons, right wing, Sharia law

If you are like me, you probably have little or no interest in how that sentence ends. I mean, Chuck Norris? A martial arts practitioner whom Hollywood places in rock ’em sock ’em movies where the “acting” is tangential to the violence.

Oh, I had heard or at least on one occasion seen that he had attached himself to the McCain/Palin campaign which I guess served to bring out 5-13 extra people at a rally or something.

Turns out old Chuckie is a busy dude in the right-wing insanosphere. He jumped on the birther bus early on, and, well, it’s a downward spiral after that. He is by all accounts a “devout” Christian, which means essential he’s a wackadoodle fundamentalist.

Well, the reason he came across my radar is that he now writes a column  for WorldNetDaily, one of the most awful rags dedicated to “Christian” beliefs I’ve ever seen. Alan Keyes is a featured writer for them as well, and they regularly (daily) pontificate about Obama being the right hand man of Satan.

Although a poor student in his school career (high school), it seems Mr. Norris has become an expert on Sharia law (it’s coming to a town near you, he warns) and he has single-handedly destroyed the theory of evolution.

He also ain’t a fan of global warming, being as it’s just a facade to introduce a “new world order” of which the Christianist movement is deathly afraid.

A bastion of conservatism no less august than Forbes, pokes fun at Chuck’s cry that the progressive indoctrination educational system is driving students out of the system at an alarming rate. Except it’s not alarming at all.

All this adds up to nothing of any importance. Norris joins a long list of GOPer’s who have left their brains in the crapper and now view the world through kaleidoscope eyes.

But it is telling when even your own side starts to shake their head in disgust. All this craziness of course plays well to the base which is not noted for its command of english, spelling, or critical thinking (and they have the lack of diplomas to prove it). Yet buffoonery of this nature serves to alienate the real people who the GOP needs to both impress and embrace–the independent voter. The neo-cons seemed to have grasped this. Unable to control these freaks, they are now abandoning them much as Peter did after Jesus’ arrest–“me? I never knew the man” they shout.

Sarah and Michele and Newt, Donald, Mikey, all are starting to be shunned by an evil, but still frighteningly sane group that has much bigger fish to fry than birtherism and creationistic claptrap. They truly do want to dominate the world via American exceptionalism, and when the teabagger movement and it’s cartoon character “leaders” are no longer of use, you can be sure it will be “cut bait” and the yachts will move elsewhere.

MotherJones (the inspiration for this post)

Chuck Norris Facts (do visit this one,it’s a parody site, with really funny jokes)

Wikipedia on Chuckie

 

♦

What’s on the stove? Chicken Scallopini Parmesan, salad and bread

 

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• The Official Chuck Norris Fact Book (justaftersunrise.wordpress.com)
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Can Spring Be Far?

Tags

abortion rights, Ayn Rand, Egypt, GOP, Humor, libertarianism, Middle East, right wing, Sarah Palin, world politics

Spring? Is anyone talking about spring yet?

Things have been decent here for some days. We are getting more snow next week and colder temperatures again, but frankly, we aren’t sure how bad.

It’s nothing, compared to the East. I sure do feel sorry for those poor folks. Well, sorry, but glad too. Glad it’s them and not us. Them and us. Comparisons are inevitable.

I haven’t been off the property for nearly a month now. It will be by next Thursday, which I am hoping will be a shopping day. The Contrarian has gotten out a couple of times and is out now, buying a few things to tide us over. We got blown out yesterday, since he didn’t quite make it out the driveway at the road. So we were officially stuck  for the first time this year. Not bad all told, usually we have had at least 3 or 4 by now.

***

One begins to wonder if we are on the cusp of something really big happening in the Middle East. Tunisia fell, and now Egypt is tottering. Not sure how that will play out, but it seems it’s either going to be a new government or a very ugly crackdown. Yemen is rumbling. No word yet if the Iranians have become emboldened again to try to break that regime.

Time will tell as they say. That’s a waste of words heh? Time doesn’t tell anything, and “they say” is just a cheap way of not researching to who actually said that. Anyway, the obvious is true. We will know more in the future. Like we would know less?

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Political Irony has your late night humor. Given that there is NO football, humor is a necessity here. Grumpy husband alert.

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Elizabeth Kaeton has a very important post on the proposed Rethug bill about non-funding of abortions. It re-writes what “rape” means, and thus seeks to limit abortions. It’s Machiavellian in its intent certainly. It hopefully will be opposed by all intelligent and compassionate persons.

***

David Frum has a short piece on why the GOP, and its apologists need to let go of Palin. The new ERW (extreme right-wing) claims she would be a nobody without the Left. Frum disagrees and the comments are rather good on this one.

***

Under the theory that everybody has a talent. Andrew Sullivan found a map of the US with notes on what each state excels at. Iowa is first in “sick days taken”. Go see what your state does best at.

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If I got this straight: We are sort of for people throwing off the chains of dictatorship and deciding their own fate. Some would argue that this is what is happening in Egypt. John Bolton was always a point man for Dubya’s “nation” building theories, always decrying “human rights violations”. But now Bolton backs Mubarak because he fears the Muslim Brotherhood may gain control in a democratic process. Sooo. What is this Muslim Brotherhood, and should we ignore our principles for expedience sake? The Brookings Institute explains the history of the Brotherhood and says the danger is not that great. One can see the predictable lines of debate on this one. Neo-cons versus rational people.

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Gosh, what would the world be without hypocrisy? I mean, irony is one thing, but hypocrisy, it fairly makes life worth living. To be able to point someone out and know with deep satisfaction, that the person at the end of your finger is someone who fails to live by any standard they themselves set. It’s purely delicious, enough to make you happy for the rest of an entire day.

Ayn Rand, beloved of the cockadoodle-do right-wing teabaggers, is one such person.  Now, first let me say, that no teabagger probably ever heard of Ayn Rand before Beck or a colledge ejucated right-winger happened to remember reading her utterly forgettable tomb, Atlas Shrugged.

Rand, as you may remember ranted against the poor and most of the middle class as undeserving rabble, sucking the well-earned funds from the real people, the rich, who got to be rich because they were, well, just better in every way. Well, it turns out Rand, sank to the level of the much maligned masses: she drew both social security and medicare under another name, “Ann O’Conner”.

Paul Ryan, the GOP budget czar, credits her with being his guru. Rand, with two other women started American libertarianism. The other two women refused social security on principle.

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What’s on the stove: burgers and fries and coleslaw. It’s Saturday! Drat, the spellchecker isn’t working so hope I spelt awflea gooder than useyul. 🙂

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Sometimes Things Just, Well Work Out

Tags

Christine O'Donnell, corporate America, election 2010, GOP, Harry Reid, Nevada, political ideology, Politics, right wing, Sharron Angle, teabaggers

I woke up hearing that the Contrarian was on the phone. No big deal, except that it was around 3:30 in the AM. A moment or two and I knew why.

“I switched to you guys because I was having trouble getting on with ATT. This is the second time in as many months that I haven’t been able to access the Internet. I’m getting frustrated.”

Oh boy, I thought. Not good. Sigh. . . .

I awoke at around 7:20, and got up. The Contrarian mumbled,”babe we can’t get on the Internet. They are going to call, we’ve at level two.”

I scratched my head. “They are going to call?”

“It’s them, not us. I don’t know.”

Well, that set a tone. I could avoid certain thing no longer.

I started my coffee, then slipped in and gathered a basket of dirty clothes. Once that was running, I poked into the fridge and took out the four granny smith apples I’d purchased on Sunday. Then the sugar, then the flour, some shortening. None of this looked the least bit fun.

I did morning prayer, my rosary, and then got my bagel and cream cheese, some more coffee, and my EFM material and sat down to study a while.

Then I got up and made a half recipe of pie crust, and put it in the fridge. Then peeled, cored, and cut up my apples, added the usual cinnamon, allspice, and nutmeg, sugar, salt, cornstarch. Rolled out my dough into a rectangle and put it on top of my deep dish pan. Into the oven. We have “Apple Pandowty” for dessert tonight. Turned out quite nice. Good with a scoop of ice cream.

Then I folded clothes, tore down and remade a fresh bed, swept all the uncovered floors. Taking a break, the phone rang.

“That better be them!”

You have no idea how much I hoped THAT were true.

It was, and they figured it out. “Sometimes when our guys shake hands they sort of miss each other. They don’t line up.” That’s what the Contrarian said.

I figure that the truck backed up to the trailer and was off-center. That happens in the Intertubes sometimes I guess. Anyway, they just have to switch out our password, and try a fake one, and then re-enter our password. Then magically, it all untangles and lines up right again.

Don’t ask me the why this works. It does. I’ve learned when computers are concerned, well let’s make that any machine, it’s best just to accept success and not question the hows and whys of it.

And hey, I got a lot of housework done. I vacuumed after our return to Internet access. So that proves that I am a reliable good person surely.

***

For reasons I have no clue about, (we somehow miss-taped it) we missed the Angle-Reid debate. I don’t understand that it was very good for Reid. He was, well as he is. . .not exactly a dynamic speaker. So Angle by merely being “as good” probably helped her cause. I think it’s looking dim for Reid. Guess Nevada will get a nitwit. Who knows, perhaps they richly deserve it. Or maybe he will win. It’s too close to call.

***

Joe Klein has been my friend since he threw in the towel with John McCain in the 2008 election, calling him simply a dishonorable scumbag. Okay, my interpretation, not his. He looks at the likes of Christine O’Donnell, who like her model, Palin, is authentically ignorant, seemingly by choice. They are revered by some, who think they are like themselves. Sadly the “average” guy and gal, used to be informed and willing to learn. That is the difference here. Klein calls them our ignoramuses. In other words, Klein asserts that the ignorant now pass as “authentic” and thus “one of us” to the teabaggery folk. This comes, he asserts from the best and brightest in a sense betraying the public trust with their utter greed. Interesting take .

***

Frank Rich has an astoundingly cogent article in the NYTimes on how Christine O’Donnell and those of her ilk are making a great camouflage to what is really going on behind the scenes. Big corporate billionaires support these candidates, because in the end their redound to the benefit of the GOP, which IS going to do their bidding if they come to power. Rich lays it out well how all the “shadow” organizations are behind the teabagger movement funded by big business interests. These billionaires share zero of the agenda of the teabaggers, as is also true of the routine GOP professionals. They both find the teabagger candidates and their silly voter/followers useful in putting them back in power.

***

Related Articles

• Worst. Debate. Ever. But, Advantage Angle (outsidethebeltway.com)
• FIGHT FREE: Verdict: Reid, Angle debate a snooze (politico.com)
• Watch: Christine O’Donnell Compares Serving Openly Gay in the Military to Committing Adultery (pinkbananaworld.com)