A Last Look At the Year 2014

On the Hal Sparks show they are talking about Steve Sceliss – who will be the next Republican majority whip.  He’s come up in the world.  That speech he gave before David Duke’s “European Heritage” group really brought in the support for him.  And Hal Sparks says to watch people’s language.  He never said he was horrified by what these racist groups stand for.  He never affirmed his love and respect for all races.  All he said was “I have always been concerned about my people who vote for me and they know they can count on me”.  And saying you are “shocked at people’s reactions you might be a racism” is not to say you are shocked by racism itself.  Hal Sparks is a student of tricky language.  In 1999 Steve Sceliss made a statement that went ‘The novelty of David Duke has worn off.  And we need to find a way of getting the type of people who hold our beliefs into power.  The trouble with David Duke is that he was not electable”.  I don’t know how widespread this use of the word “Thug” for Nigger is.   You’d have to do a Word find and swap out on a document, and see if the document still made sense.  But of course hate speech sells.  That Wilson fellow who said “You Lie” in a Presidential State of the Union speech - - garnered a lot of popularity and support from that out outburst.  And of course Ronald Reagan began his 1980 in Philadelphia, Mississippi, where four Black little girls were murdered.  Today I hear that it’s the KKK more than any other group that insured that Ronald Reagan got solid support from southern states.

Sean Hannity had two women on who were victims of the Veterans Administration.  They had a high level of credibility listing places and people and times and the order of events.  But one of the women dragged in the fact that “We can’t trust Obama because of Bengazi and the IRS scandal”.  I guess I find it a little difficult to believe that the first person either woman thinks to blame is not the nursing staff or the hospital, or some administrative fowl up- - but right away they go to the top and blame President Obama personally, and say that he has to pay.  Then it was Days of our Lives.   Chad is having to admit his past with Melanie.  He signed a strange legal agreement where he agreed not to implicate Gabriel for what would in any other case be a felonius act, of- - pretty much hiring a thug and putting Melanie’s life in grave danger.  Jordan is mad because Chad kept a legally binding agreement not to tell anyone about it.  Meanwhile that hotel doorman failed to keep Nicole’s secret.  I guess there is no way to go to court and sue to get your - - - hundred dollar bill back

The number of “Ring of Fire” episodes is still frozen at 98 and the most recent one is December 7^th but I keep hearing references to new ones being made.  Of course they haven’t had “The Big Picture” in a couple months.  But I found “The Big Picture” at the RT web site and watched it there.   My biggest fear at this point is that the US Senate will adopt “The nuclear option” and make a rule that bills now don’t need three fifths majority to be voted out but a majority will suffice.  The democrats really should have done that in 2009 when they had the chance, especially with that “Block Obama by any means” strategy was announced by the Republicans.  “We’re going to be like the Taliban insurgence”.    That way the President politically will have to use his veto pen a lot more often than he otherwise would.  Of course the filibuster rule has been in the US Senate for over a hundred years, but that won’t stop the republicans from wiping at away in a single swoop, if they can gain political advantage in doing so.   I continue to hear reports that the Republicans have plans to launch a campaign of “we did it”, in the event this economy ever turns around robustly in a big way.  Grover Norquist is planning to say that “It’s because Republicans in congress shrunk government that’s responsible for the economic growth in 2014 and 2015”.    I hope for my own sake that the economy does grow in a major way in 2015 and that all of the funding cuts spawned by the recession of the past seven years become a thing of the past.  I don’t want to be among the ten percent who think things are getting worse.

Well it's a new year and we're all another year older and another year closer to death.  I don't like the idea that I'm getting older because I know death is out there somewhere in the future, just waiting for me.   There is polar air all over the country.  There was snow in Seattle and big trees downed from high winds all over California.  They are worried about the flowers freezing in the Rose Parade tomorrow.  They are expecting temperatures between thirty and thirty two degrees as it approaches parade time.  There is snow in Silverado Canyon here in Orange County, which is something you don't see every day.  Nancy Bell said there was also snow in the Anaheim Hills.   My new year's wish, as long as we're toasting it, would have to be that somehow the black cloud of the past six and a half years would just depart.  Because this economic depression has had numerous negative bi-products on me in terms of family tensions and shortage of funds, and my overall psychological outlook.  I would like to get rid of that and go back to a time - - any time- - when post 20008 worries did not exist for me.  Is that too much to ask?

Back To the Ol' Bad News Grindstone

This photograph is mislabeled

Let me lead off with this piece of utter garbage from Washington's Blog.  First they go into a Glen Beck exposee on how a little girl in kindergarten was allegedly "brainwashed and programmed" by her teacher not to listen to her parents.  The exact issue they never ONCE deemed to go into, they only wanted you to accept the fact that IT happened whatever "It" was.  We are then treated to this little paragraph.  The trouble with this paragraph is that if we are indeed NOT an "accident" (by the way the occurrance of the Holy Host in Catholic litergy is in fact referred to as an "accident" meaning "an occurance" if one will get out his dictionary.  What Glen Beck wants us to believe that "certain people" are "special" and have this "pipeline to God" and therefore the public school system isn't worthy of their Holiness, so these kids are taken out and home schooled.  I'd like to meet this "God" in who's eyes these right wingers are "Special".  This "specialness' obviously does not extend to the urban, the poor, or minorities.  I think parents who are constantly telling their kids they are "special" are setting them up for a collosal fall in life.

In this day and age, our public schools have essentially become government indoctrination centers that train our children to let “the matrix” do their thinking for them. They are taught that they are just highly evolved animals that are here only as the result of a giant cosmic accident, and that morality and values are all relative.
The computer crashed during Thom Hartman a little after ten.  Right wingers are so strange in their logic.  They say they want to drug test all welfare recipients.  And yet they are always saying the government “wastes money”.   But they aren’t concerned about the generous salaries or expense accounts of congressmen and their private junkets, or money for remodeling their offices every six months.  They aren’t concerned about ending research in the sex lives of mosquitos.  They aren’t concerned about funding all of this military hardware to keep contractors happy that often the military says they don’t even want.  No.  Where do they go when they say “Making a few cuts”.  Right to the vitals.  They go after the poor, the aged and the disabeled.  And when they say they want to lower taxes most often they aren’t talking about motor vehicles fees.  They mean taxes on the very rich.  They mean those accelerated depretiations and deductions that yield a credit balance.  Obviously drug testing every welfare recipient would be an undertaking frought with complications.   They had the stand-ins for Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity today on the radio.   Some of these people try and sound reasonable when talking about racial tensions and the police.  The charge is made that “These civil rights groups that come in always “default” to their being a racist cause”.  Not me.  I didn’t know for instance either that twelve year old kid, or the overweight cigarette vendor- - were Black.  It turned out of course that they were.  The statement has been made that “The facts indicate beyond any doubt that the Ferguson PD acted responsibly and didn’t make any mistakes”.    This is made as sort of an absolute statement.  Often the line is used “Well if you don’t want to get shot by a cop, don’t go after his gun”.   We don’t know for sure that’s even what happened.  But here is a simple comprehension test.  This guy in KEIB claims he got a Masters Degree as though they are so easy to get any ghetto black could get one.  OK if this guy is so smart tell me the proximate cause of why Michael Brown WAS shot.   Give up?   Going after the gun had NOTHING to do with it.  He got shot because he STOPPED RUNNING and turned around with his hands up and made an easier target to shoot at, since Wilson was such a lousy shot.  And he kept firing and firing and Browns body was riddled with bullet holes.  Of course Mayor Giuliani still likes to attack President Obama and Mayor De Blazio.  One Black caller made the point that “If this thing is not racially motivated- - how come white comentaters immediately turn it into a racial thing by attacking black civil rights groups and Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton?   Not that they actually listen to the words of these two, they just hear their names and go into some kind of a right wing trance- - and condemn any statement they make as bad.  I didn’t want to get into all of this today.  I went four days without writing or much hearing about all this stuff.  It felt good to be away from it, to tell you the truth.  Some would say looking on “News stories of 2014” that all these crises were in “the past” as part of the “year gone by” and we won’t have to think about any of these issues in the year 2015.  If only that were true.  The truth is that we have not even begun to see the ravages of this incoming Republican congress.   Some would say “We don’t have Institutional Racism and as proof we have a black President”.    Yeah, and one they are disrespecting and throwing disgraceful racial epithets at constantly.  I am more convinced than ever we still have entrenched racism even when it comes to red lining and bank loans, and which are “black cities’ and which are “white cities”.   I’m not buying for one moment Thom Hartman’s assertion that race relations are better today than thirty years ago.  America has been “fundamentally transformed’ all right.  Into a more racist place anytime in the last fifty years.

So now we have another Asian airliner that disappeared under mysterious circumstances.  I hope we don’t spend months talking about this one in the media.  It was across the Island Nation of Indonesia, a two hour flight- - - and suddenly a storm comes up and you can cue up the Gilligan’s Island theme.  The thing disappears.  They wanted to get above the weather climbing to 38,000 feet and then nothing - - no communication, no nothing.  Just the speculation.

A majority of the population believes the year 2015 will be better than 2014 with only a minority of ten percent believe it will be a worse year.  I have trouble being really confident myself.  Just when you think things are going to improve, something comes along to bring you back to reality.  If my own lagging behind the indlation rate routine continues- - costs of one nature or another will outstrip that paultry 1.4% increase I got in my Social Security payment.  They told us it would be 1.7% but California isn't pulling its weight.  If you use the analogy of a wave- - a top heavy wave eventually breaks.   Perhaps it isn't a big stretch to suppose this same imigry can be used with the economy.  Just like with real estate, those who speculate either in oil futures or in common stock prices, rely to a large extent on the "greater fool theory".  It's a ponsie scheme where someone will eventually be left holding the bag.  Joseph Kennedy got out of the stock market just prior to the crash of 1929.  I read that in a Kennedy biography.   But it just could be that some prominent rich people will "take a bath" this time.  President Obama according to sources, is always the one in the room saying "Don't prosecute" and "Give Wall Street everything it wants".  It was President Obama who argued now to prosecute the Bush - Chaney - Rumsfeld CIA war crimes.  I don't know how you can "move forward" when you are constantly shoving anything and everything under the rug.  It seems to me in the end you have a mighty lumpy rug and an even greater need to "clean house" properly.

This is Monday December 29, 2014 approaching two thirty or “tooth herty”.   You know, the one thing I wanted for this holiday season is not to be in the middle of some dental incident where I would be restricted as to what I ate, in terms of nuts and candy.  All in vain.  I just called the male dental receptionist about my “chipped tooth” as he refers to it.  It’s more like a “chunked” tooth.   The lower part of my tongue is all red and I’m getting canker sores, plural, on it.  I still have not unwrapped the fruit cake, or the baggie of walnuts.  I’m working my way through those chocolate sandwich cookie things- - two flavors remain now, ginger, and double chocolate, not good for my canker sore.  The bad news is that Dr Bowie is off all this week, which maybe explains why next week’s appointment originally was so late to begin with.  I told him the crown had already been paid for and to just switch off teeth, and the guy said that would not be a problem.  Now of course I’m guilt ridden eating anything sweet.

Two things in today’s Days of our Lives episode ticked me off.  The first of course was that baseball player was told and rather indelicate terms that his carrier as a baseball player was finished.  He was all washed up.    Dr Daniel Jonas was certain of that even before the guy’s routine of physical therapy was through.  But the other whammy is of course now he has to admit this to Will.  Suddenly in the middle of his article he goes from this big success story to the on the spot coverage of his impending ruin.  It completely sucks.  And now even if Sonny needs an influx of cash, this is yet another financial source that has dried up.  He's already drained his personal bank account with Will, without telling Will what he was doing.  And Chad tricked him into signing that contract that say "If financial troubles develop, you and not me are exclusively responsible".  Thanks a lot. This can't be Sonny's best week. But the other is this love affair between Melanie and Gabriel in prison.  They both have this element of commonality of saying Gabriel did the right thing in killing Nick Fallon.  The logic is completely stupid because the whole point was Nick was “disrupting her family life”.   Well, her whole life is a lot more “disrupted” now that she’s in prison for life.  For Melanie to now say “You did the right thing” is to question her sanity.  Maybe Gabriel was under stress and not thinking straight.  What would be Melanie’s excuse.  Meanwhile Melanie is giving Gabriel a pass for basically trying to get HER killed.  Suddenly that is OK.   Gabriel is alive and Nick is dead- - but it seems as if Nick is the one that both girls are maddest at.   If Roman knew the full truth about this crime, he’d be a hell of a lot matter than he got at Raphael today.   Then I went out for coffee break.  Nancy asked me for a cigarette loan.   She gets ten cigarettes at eight and if she smokes ten by two, and then wants another- - she’s smoking too much.   Rico is back serving.  I had two cups of coffee.

This morning didn’t get off to the greatest start.  The liquor store wasn’t open so I ended up spending a dollar fifty for coffee at the bakery, and then had to break a ten to buy cigarettes to pay Paul after breakfast.  I had Stephanie on and looked at my watch and it was twelve after seven so I hurried down and now suddenly was a minute and a half late.   Usually at seven fifteen we wait forever for drinks and cereal and things for them to finish serving.  Today every drink and every bowl of cereal was on the table.  But strangely there were no spoons to eat our cereal with.   Joe Drisco was holding down the fort for a whole table saying “Don’t take anything off of this table” and JW wouldn’t let me have empty place settings either.  So I’m a minute and a half late and don’t get served and yet I have to look at milk and orange just staring at me that I’m not allowed to touch.  Eventually I was served- - except for the spoon.  It’s the first time I’ve eaten Raison Bran with a fork.  Tom found me a spoon for the last three bites finally.

Black Holes - The Womb Of the Big Bang

I wasn't anticipating having the origens of the Big Bang explained in a plausable manner when this day began. So - - did "God" do it? Did God set the whole thing off - - this so called "most unique that's ever happened in cosmological history? I read the rest of the article on Black Holes I had missed. This author revived a variation of my previously discarded ‘perpetual falling machine” theory where we ourselves came from what used to be a “singular event” Black Hole and it answers the riddle of how we “got the matter in a singular place” to begin with. We were just waiting for a critical mass, I suppose before some thermonuclear reaction on steroids occurred. In the past I have tended not to buy the “singularity” theory since NO time or space theory can explain a Black Hole since- - once again “They have left the Universe”. Hence it’s also silly to say that Black Holes contain either a finite amount of space or a limited amount of matter, since we have no way of knowing how long matter has been “falling into them” and that trash receptacle could be about three billion years overdo for emptying. It also goes against my pet theory of how multiple universes have the commonality of all being created at once at the same time and the “same space” as far as we dare even employ such a confining term. And as that TV show from whenever stated “dimensions did not EXIST then so that every event was a NEW event not connected or related to any other event. And since it was an event not relatable to any other event, it had to be it's own, new dimension. It would thus follow that if TODAY there could be some event not relatable IN ANY WAY to ANY OTHER event - - the axiom would be true that at that point you would have moved into another, new dimension. It's like George Washington as President. Everything he did set a precedent. There was no formated space as we know it. You may remember from previous posts that at its inception the Universe was so HOT that many bozons such as the Higgs bozon - - hadn't had an oppertunity to form yet. And it took “Time” (another misnomer) for various events to “accumulate” a commonality to them where you could say for sure that one event followed another, much as I mentioned in a recent blog posting. Another theory which mankind instinctively applies to Black Holes is that they are like a window blown out on a high flying jet airliner and are thus “gigantic sucking machines”. The Magazine makes clear this is a false analogy and that if our Sun for instance, were to be transformed into a Black Hole, nothing would change about the orbits of the earth and all the other planets. Of course again this assumes two things I’m not accepting. First that there is a limited, measurable amount of matter in a Black Hole, almost as if we could weigh it, and the second is that - - Black Hole gravity is just the same of ordinary gravity. But as I stressed in the previous posting- - I don’t believe this is the case at all. But the message here is “Even the mysterious - - has physical limits.” Some people I'm sure would love to have some convenient Black Hole to put all of their "expired sins" in. A place that's not too far away but hides quickly out of sight so that even You can no longer see it. (Selah) Chuck Swendoll once said "We reap in a different form than expected, and in a different season". So the Black Holes are "planted" with or without the vacuum cleaner quality of sucking out everything in their paths - - and then the "harvest" comes in another season and in another form. You have all of this "singularity" of matter - - - there for periods that defy Time measurement - - and then one day there is the trigger point - - and the whole thing just explodes.

WE MAY WELL HAVE JUST CELEBRATED OUR LAST AFFLUENT CHRISTMAS IN AMERICA

If this headline scares you, remember in mid summer of 2007 when I headed a blog posting "These are the good old days" as though we'd look back on the summer of 2007 as some mystic panacia we'd be longing to get back to? Well, as the material below explains- - sometimes EVENTS make the President more than the Man makes the President. Ronald Reagan owes our era of wealth in the 'eighties (which wasn't all that impressive if you look at the cold statistics anyhow) we don't owe that to conservative triumph, but more to the Federal Reserve, and to explode the federal deficets, but most importantly of all - - to the fact that oil was discovered in places like the North Sea and Alaska, which made abondont energy at a reasonable price - - doable. And as such the economy as a whole benefited.

As unemployment topped 10%, the January 1975 cover of Ramparts magazine blared:The End of Affluence: The Last Christmas in America. (TLCIA)

The government responded to the high unemployment, rampant inflation and rising budget deficits by manipulating data to mask the politically inconvenient realities of inflation, unemployment and deficits by playing with Social Security Trust Funds, inflation data, etc.–games it continues to play to cloak reality from the media-numbed public. The economic stagnation, despite various stock market rallies and false starts, essentially lasted 10 years, from 1973 to 1982.


The malaise had a happy ending: huge new oil fields were discovered in Alaska, the North Sea, West Africa and elsewhere, ushering in a renewed era of cheap, abundant petroleum. President Reagan re-set Social Security for a generation and introduced a lower taxes, higher permanent deficits ideology that is now accepted as the only possible way to sustain the Status Quo: deficits don’t matter, even when they reach the trillions, because our good friends the Gulf Oil Exporters and Asian exporters will buy all our debt forever and ever, keeping interest low forever and ever.


(And if they drop the ball, then the Federal Reserve prints money and buys trillions of dollars of Treasury bonds. Sweet! We don’t need any external buyers, just the Federal Reserve creating money out of thin air.) Then the U.S. created and launched two revolutionary technologies which both created new wealth around the globe: the personal computer (microprocessor and cheap RAM) and the Internet (TCP/IP, Ethernet, and the commercialization of Tim Berners-Lee’s World Wide Web with free browsers) spawning the generation-long boom of the 1980s and 90s.


Those “saves from stagnation” were one-offs; there will be no more supergiant energy finds, nor any equivalents of the Internet expansion cycle. When the wheels inevitably fell off the Internet/tech boom in 2000, the U.S. did not create a new engine of wealth: it opted instead for a devilishly insidious simulacrum of wealth: debt which rose at an exponential rate throughout the economy.

The United States Is Quickly Moving Twords Fascism

It would seem it’s shades of 2002 all over again as far as working up hype for another War in the Mideast.  You sure got the impression people on Meet the Press last week were gung ho for war.  But the government doesn’t play fair.  Apparently people in the Obama administration threatened to prosecute the family of James Foley for daring to offer ransom to the enemy, which is apparently against Federal law.  And of course James Foley was at an anti NATO demonstration and was the subject of a movie documentary “Four Days in Chicago”.  The government really is paranoid of protestors.  All aspects of the media seem to suppress and distort the views of anyone who is anti war.  It’s not even considered proper to broach the idea that we should not go to war again in the Mideast.   Foley’s certainly resents the idea of the Obama administration using James Foley as a poster boy for the war effort.  One magazine greatly distorted the results of one poll, where 65% of the people seemed to be against “Doing more in military involvement” and said the survey said “America has really come around to a more pro war stance in the past year”.   We know that Pat Tilman before he was killed by “friendly fire” was voicing doubts about the War we were in then- - and the Army burned his notebooks he had compiled.  And we also know that 9 – 11 families who speak out against further war in the Mideast aren’t treated very well by the media.  In fact we seem to be moving tword some sort of a Fascist state.   George Washington blog- - gave all sorts of links quoting various Americans including former Supreme Court justices- - as saying the United States was moving in a dangerous, Orwellian direction with all our drones and domestic spying.  Of course a rescue mission gone bad, like Jimmy Carter before him, is the last thing any President wants.  This blogger also reminds us that the United States is neither a democracy nor a republic, but an oligarchy  (I better look up that word) an elite few powerful people, running the country.  Of course Tim suggested in a phone call with me years ago that President Obama was “selling out liberal interests”  (my words) and he said “Perhaps the President is being forced to do this.  Perhaps certain people have made it clear the President’s life is in jeopardy if he doesn’t play ball”.    I have stated many times Michael Benner has had those same dark thoughts.

I watched that C-Span video on “What the next recession will be like” in this country but it was mostly looking back at the last recession.  Clearly that recession was caused not by anything Greenspan did, or even Bush’s deficit spending, but rather out of control private debt.  That’s the kind of debt no Republican wants to talk about that’s way larger than our total federal public debt.  But another lie was roundly refuted.  Actually before a major depression such as the 1920’s government revenue is actually UP and the government debt goes DOWN.  In fact a sign of an impending recession NOW could be is our federal deficit keeps going DOWN.  (Selah)  It’s no big surprise how a recession comes about.  There is an over-supply of too many unused buildings or goods and the people aren’t buying them and production is cut back, and people are laid off and don’t have money and can’t pay their debts.  But the kicker is that this author states that the banks are lending out lots of money still.   The Republicans in 2012 made a really BIG THING of the non-fact that “The banks aren’t lending to business because of the uncertainty caused by fear of Obama raising taxes again”.    That was the bogus lie of the year because lending- according to this author was only ever cut back by - - - wait for it - - two percent - - as opposed to over 25% in the Great Depression from 1929 to 1930.   And the other lie is that recovery is easy.  NOBODY I read back in 2009 EVER said this recovery would be EASY, in fact just the opposite was true.  I was told that real estate prices would STAY down for a long time and that unemployment would NOT improve for years and years.  If these Republicans imply public knowledge was anything other than this they were lying to you.  In Japan they had a financial crisis like ours in 1991 and may STILL have not recovered from it.  I’ve heard the economy has been “flat” (or flat lining) in Japan for over twenty years.

 I also watched a little “History of Intel” where Packard was from Silicon Valley.  Needless to say HP computers are almost universally regarded as the crappiest computers on the market.   There was praise heaped on Steve Jobs as well as some mentor who was “worthy of him”  (such modesty!) yeah- - Steve Jobs finally came across a guy who was good enough to teach him something named Noyse - - or something like that.  This guy died at a young age and it was traumatic for Steve Jobs.  There was a lot of talk about all of the greatest computer minds flying helicopters and airplanes together and otherwise taking physical risks and  “If anything had happened to us, it would have been like a cyber Buddy Holly type situation”.   (not the most modest person in the world)

This bit about Scotland having a referendum on Independence this Thursday is pretty silly.  Other than pure sentimentality- - it makes completely no sense economically, or in any other way.  But the crew of the Mc Laughlin group was slow to recognize this fact.  One need only look at our own Civil War to see the complete folly of this sort of secession.  After all the South was economically weaker than the North before the war began, and after the war they were nothing- - and could only help to survive by charity from the North.  In fact Quebec had a better cause for independence because they were ethinically and linguistically and culturally very different- - and yet the people back thirty or more years ago regarded that move as a bad joke.  This one is an even bigger joke, which is probably why I haven’t mentioned this news story before.  But I see it heads up “The Week” magazine I received at the dinner table.

Neil Savedra can talk about counterfeits all he wants.  Of course he is absurd to do so since if I were to rank Evangelists from totally sincere to totally bogus, of all the people I’ve ever heard preach in the past fifty years, Neil would be as close to pure bogusness as you could get.  Besides nobody in their right mind would CLAIM to be a fundamentalist Christian, if they were not in fact that- - since Evangelists of this sort have such a notoriously bad reputation.   By way of proof - - if Neil of KFI were at all serious about “sharing the Gospel” as the Bible mandates, he would do it for free.  But instead over half the time I’ve checked in-  - during the period when the Jesus Christ show is on- - it has NOT been Neil speaking but a commercial.  And maybe the notion of “Jesus wine” would make an entertaining Saturday Night spoof- - but in reality - - people who wrap themselves in commercialism just aren’t considered credible by the public.

Trying Not to Make It So Darned Complicated

The contrast between conservatives and liberals isn’t terribly complicated;  but the reality of it can indeed be unsetteling.   For instance in 1968 there was a book out called “The Population Bomb” that stated that world overpopulation was a serious problem.  You know the drill if you grew up in the sixties fifty years ago.  They said “If we don’t do anything about the birth rates around the world- - the world’s population we know it today- - will double by the year two thousand.  Now it’s fifty years later and the world’s population has doubled.  And we don’t care.  Yet Thom Hartman tells us a simple way to cut birth rates in women is to educate them and liberate them from the sexual tyranny of men keeping them “barefoot and pregnant” all the time out of some sort of tribal loyalty.  We are told we waste untold amounts of soil and energy resources on growing food for - - animals, for humans to then eat.  It’s a highly wasteful and inefficient use of energy- - both the physical and the nutritional kind.  Yet we do it.  This guy on KNX just now stated “Rather than wage a war on coal, the coal industry ought to be protected – and all the jobs and energy that come with it”.   Yet experts tell us coal cannot be made cancer free – as the “clean coal” advocates suggest.   When it comes to government spending- - we do not have a government spending problem; we have a revenue problem.   We have taken deliberate steps over the past few decades to deliberately create a revenue crisis.   Now some like Pete Richards would say “No- - I know of examples of extreme government waste.  They have all sorts of money if they will use it right”.    Let me torpedo this logic with a simple example.  Suppose you have a leak in your radiator hose and your engine isn’t getting enough water and is in danger of overheating.  Is the answer to say “Well then I’m just going to make sure my radiator is never completely filled up- - and that way I’ll waste less water”.   No.  Not unless you want your engine to fry.  Since when does cutting revenue cut waste?  Hummm?  Because if you still have the same political crooks in power such as Chris Christie, Scott Walker, Rick Scott, and Rick Perry (though he is not in the same league as the other three).   These right wing republicans are the biggest crooks and nest featherors on the planet!   I’ll use a personal example that may drive the point home.  Since about 2008 I have been running a “food deficit”.   If I were in the same room with Dr Phil Mc Graw talking to prospective dieters - - I would tell them “Be prepared to say good-bye to any personal happiness you’ve known with food all these years, because from personal experience I will assure you will never get enough food on these diets and years later- you’ll still be looking for every opportunity to get more.   Some people- - maybe even me have toyed with ideas like “Getting used to the new normal”.   OK unions and pension funds are a thing of the past.  The California renters tax rebate is a thing of the past.   Living in a world without continual war (like under Clinton or Reagan) is a thing of the past.  Constant fear of terrorists and terrorism is “The new normal” for us.  Disfunctional government is “The new normal”.   We hear it announced as if an edit from On High- - months ago - - that “The democrats will lose big this November in congress” and we all blindly accept it.  When Chris Matthews said a few weeks before the Iraq War started in 2003 “Well, we’re all pro Iraq war now” we all blindly accept it.  I have doubts as to whether God Himself regards a democratic victory of any sort as even theoretically possible.   The average bub-bah in the red states is also sold the ego-feeding line of ‘You have rights as an American.  You have the right to be ignorant and proud and never question your own inadequacy or think for one moment some more educated person might know more than you.  You have the Right to expect the sort of first class elite medical care that Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity can get- - you know- - if you you’re your nose to the grind stone and keep voting conservative.  Dr Levy sees nothing wrong with an elite class of the very rich getting new transplant organs all the time and to live to be a hundred and fifty years old, so that not only does your Wealth live forever with virtually no fear of inheritance taxes these days – but you yourself can go on living in your permanent privileged elevated status consuming way more than your share of the world’s resources.  You have the Right to believe that all of these economists and their forecasts- - and energy experts- and their forecase- - and all of the sociological surveys done in society and gun violence- - you have the Right, by God- - to regard ALL these things as some gigantic left wing socialist conspiracy of the ‘College elite” or whoever.”  I would only comment to these same rednecks- - that “You ALSO seemingly have the right to be insulted and LIED TO by these posers and hypocrites who don’t even believe themselves half the things they are telling you.  They may have family members like with Eric Cantor or Rob Portman- - that are as queer as a three dollar bill- - and they love and accept these people- - but they know it’s in their own interests to fan YOUR hatred to get YOUR votes!   Like I say this problem may be unsolvable- even for God Himself.

We’ve heard about this strange younger generation, Generation Y, whose collective life experiences are so different from my own growing up in so many different ways - - such as heightened dependence on parents- - how they view their own job prospects - - or even things such as human values in general or character and discipline.  In a Little Rascals thing- - this one guy Tubby was always talking about his father taking a razor strap to him to keep him in line.  And we’ve all heard Granny Clampet talk about “cutting a switch” to take after Jethro when he gets out of line.  I don’t know how they discipline in Texas, but this one Minnisota Viking, Adrian Peterson- - - used a “switch”  (traditionally a hickory stick, I guess) to discipline his son, and now the  NFL is accusing the player of child abuse.  Just how far reaching is the domain of the NFL anyhow?   We hear that the term “Redskins” is offensive.  The new mayor of New York wants to eliminate horse drawn carriage rides through Central Park- - no doubt a hallowed tradition people come to the city for- - since the nineteenth century.  We hear that this younger generation is more altruistic and want to save the world- -- seemingly much more in substance than my own Hippy generation ever was.   We hear that in technology not only is the CD on its way out, but that even E mail is considered old fashioned.  We hear that “flex time” and working at home- - is becoming the norm- -but I’m not sure- - maybe in that mythical land Lisa Simpson wrote about called “Equalia”.   Certainly not in any sort of real life I’m familiar with.

I feel like doing the Joan Rivers thing with my readers, “Can We Talk?”  By the way as we all suspected- - there was medical mal-practice involved with Joan’s death, just as there was with my Dad.  If human life is worth little to you- go and vote YES on 46.   The logic of that ad is about as crazy as “There is a conspiracy of the uniform manufactures - - to have a bill calling for more police officers on the street.  Don’t Make The Uniform Manufactures Rich!”   But it is a reminder that death can come at any time when we don’t expect it.  You could go into a hospital for the most minor and routine of procedures and end up dead.  In my writings you may have noticed I have an tendency to complicate things.  Perhaps this obsession for “detail” is part of my mental illness - - like I have a little “Rain Man” in me.   Some people say that the reason why Autistic people can’t hold conversations- - is because their visual cortex doesn’t link up properly with their auditory cortex- - and they view everything out of synch.  So autistic kids will often cover their eyes or cover their ears- - because they can’t process the mental input they are getting.  That’s a new theory anyhow.  Dr Levy doesn’t have that problem.  He simplifies things down WAY too far for my taste - - - so that the average viewer of FOX news can understand it, but when you’ve simplified it THAT far you’ve lost the essence of whatever you are trying to convey.  So how would Dr Levy handle a topic like “The Rapture” or a sudden snatching away from this world to another- - -and not look back.  He might discuss the shock of “Everything in your complete existence being stripped away from you - - even your own body.  Perhaps even what we come to know as material objects and special relations and language.  This would be quite an adjustment for anybody.  You might have to get used to a whole set of alien moral values (and I use that word in its generic sense).   As I myself have pointed out- - don’t assume even your Memories will still be a part of you.  You may have a whole other identity- - and if someone were to tell you what this present life was like for you- - you’d think they were telling you some fantastic story.  The possibility of different Afterlives is endless- - and I confess it might be something even me with my fertile imagination- - have never thought of.  And I would not insult either you or God Himself – by claiming I know what’s “out there beyond the veil”.

Last night the realization hit like a ton of bricks that in my writings I still have ways of presenting things in a way that overly complicates things and makes them too detailed.  And worse yet I play this “hop scotch” game of leaving clues referring to other clues on different posts you have to hunt down.  This is demanding way too much patience from my blog readers.  Last night I made it my mission to hunt down the original truck load of “Beatle Federation releases”.   And I found them.   There are eight single disk things – at least the first seven are based on the number Seventeen, and I call it “The seventeen club”.    There is an eighth disk in this “Boxed Set” – titled “The Best of the Rest of the Beatles’ or something – and I specify the use of the picture from Beatles Anthology II for that one  - which draws mainly from the Anthology series- - which is a real entity and can be found in any record store, assuming they have those any more.   This was done in early February of 2013 in case anybody wants to go looking for it- in Psychic Balance, which should be renamed ‘Psychic Imbalance”.  Now- - if you go down a few posts - - to late January of 2013 you will find that illusive “Red Album”.  It’s shorter than I imagined it.  There are only thirty songs in two disks.  And it too relies amazingly heavily on Beatles Anthology.   And there ARE post Beatle tracks on that album, but not as many as I had imagined.  "Cold Turkey" is on it.  Most all the tracks on side two are in alphabetical order.  It’s pretty easy to remember which tracks they are.  You have the Ringo single from 1971.  That’s it for Ringo.  You have the George single from July of 1971.   There ARE no Mc Cartney singles from 1971.  Instead we use the last three songs off of the Mc Cartney album of 1970.   That leaves John, and there aren’t most of those Lennon singles I talked about either.  “Shaved Fish” has been in the stores since 1975 and anybody can find most of them there.   I pick my two favorite tracks off the Imagine album and use those “Give Me Some Truth” and ‘I Don’t Want to be a Soldier, Mama”.   "Sour Milk Sea" and "Come and Get It" were demo tracks done by the Beatles for other groups.  This RED album - - is the one with the ‘Hey Jude” picture cover.  The thing with that vinyl thing of “The Beatles” this is all in black décor, no doubt for the sarcasm of it.   So that’s back - - early February of 2013.   You have to go back to mid January of 2013 (a few weeks earlier) for our “Expanded White Album” CD - - which is the WHITE in the whole RED and WHITE and BLUE thing.  

Tomorrow Never Knows

Have you ever observed or analyzed a situation, or perhaps come upon some soap opera scenario where you concluded "There is only two possible outcomes for this situation" but the trouble is, Either scenario seems completely impossible and you can't imagine Either thing happening if you think about it a second or two.  Months ago I told you that if the Lord or whatever other Force out there was to intervene in human affairs it would be months and not years because 'We just can't keep on going on the way we are going".  Are you people really expecting that we are prepared for two more years in congress of even Worse gridlock than we have had the previous four years, and some would argue the previous six?  Things are so bad the right wingers aren't even agreeing with each other.  These is this regular Black guy that appears on a Thom Hartman program who says "The Republicans are ready to approve this renewal, or some would say, the resurrection of the Mideast war.  It's just a matter of Obama giving the thumbs up signal and congress will storm the gates in eagerness to heartily vote their approval.   If this scenario were to be true- - then the President's choice would be easy.  All he needs to do is to become the new "Bush" and it will be like the Republicans again have a kindred spirit in the White House.  Personally I can't conceive of this happening.  I think that Black guy is full of it because he lies about everything else, and was just trying to make points.  But nobody believed him that Congress was champing at the bit to support a new war.  Hartman didn't believe it, we the audience don't believe it, and I doubt if the guy himself even believes it.  On the flip side of the coin we have Rush Limbaugh working himself up into a froth going on and on about how if President Obama prosecutes this war- - bombing campaign- - whatever - - that the President is violating the Constitution in a more blatant way than even President Bush dared to do.  Only in his dreams could President Bush violate the constitution without once consulting congress or getting approval for another war.  So which is it?  If President Obama this power mad violator of the Constitution - - or still the same snivveling, timid coward he's always been?  Hummm?   A complicating factor enters because often Rush Limbaugh is so sarcastic at some point even his most ardent supporters have to be confused as to what Rush really believes.  It was several months ago- - maybe even a year ago - - I was wondering what the heck this President would do once he got out of office.  He could become a Wall Street banker or an insurance company attorney and make lots of money.  If Obama did this he would be another Steve Jobs, starting off life on the left side of the fence and going completely to the other side.  Then is when I heard the words - - was it my fevered over-imagination or for real- - - the words came to me "What President Obama chooses to do once he leaves office as President won't even be an issue".  The words were spoken with a strident, almost cocky confidence.  This gets one's mind to imagining then - - the only logical alternative would be if the President didn't survive this remaining term in office.  These words have haunted me.  I don't know how long we can just keep going on in gridlock and disfunctionality in government- - which you will scan the history books in vain to find a parrellel period in American History.  The other alternative is that someone yells "Cut - - - that's a rap" and this whole sorry thing we call human history comes to an end.  I am sticking to the date two weeks and one day from now.  That's it.  Two weeks.  That may be all we've got left.  We've heard a lot about star allignments and I've gone into that in the past.  Some would have you believe that we can prove Jesus of Nazareth was the Messiah using Astrology alone.  Does anyone believe in the stars any more?

Minimum wage is a continuing hot topic today.  You've seen the productivity verses wages chart haven't you?  For years and years productivity pretty much kept up with wages- - but at some point- - almost as if someone ran a bell- - the wage curve began to fall off- - and the gap between wages and worker productivity has only grown larger and larger into a gaping gulf.  People will say "These fast food workers just aren't WORTH ten dollars an hour", with the distinct implication that they're just lazy, who "don't want to earn what they get paid".  This Black guy, as become common now- - cries crocadile tears for all those poor Blacks and Latinos who won't be able to afford their burger and fries because prices have risen so much, pointing out "You know it's mainly the poor who buy these products to begin with".  He further makes the argument that "Well, young teenagers trying to get their first job just won't get hired".   Let's look at both of these claims.  Fast food is not like gasoline.  Everybody doesn't raise their prices on the exact same day.  And the competetion among fast food outlets is much more fierce than for petrol products.  You can go to another outlet or try an entirely different kind of food, or decide to eat healthy and discover the virtues of the all lettuce diet or something.  I mean- - what's particularly insulting to the intelligence- - is that this Black guy knows - - if what he said were actually true - - about affordability - - the poor people themselves would be the first to enlist in the ranks of His side.  These republicans - particularly the few Black ones- are just posers and hypocrites, saying what they don't believe themselves.  In terms of the employment market- - right NOW teenagers have to compete with twenty and thirty year olds for their jobs - - i e against more experianced workers.  The corporations know that if the minimum wage is increased- - they will only have one choice but to trim their gigantic profits just a little.   For a franchise owner the only question he asks is "Is this neighborhood a great market for my product" and if it is- - he knows he's got it made.

“Law and Order” criminal intent - was on.  The first episode was about this fervent Mideast woman who is a sociopathic liar.  Sometimes the adage is true “The louder they protest – the bigger of a liar they are”.   My tooth is getting gradually looser and I doubt it will last the six days necessary.  But as I told Judy, I too am concerned about gum infection and that has to be cleaned out in its own right.  So far this year I have been spared long ceremonies of bell ringing and roster name calling.  But I don’t see how if it’s the case “All the signs were there for the previous eight years in the Clinton administration and yet nothing was done” how can you then see “George Bush was innocent in not taking action to prevent it because it came as a surprise to all”.   Sometimes the logical content of the rhetoric of the right shifts literally from one minute to another.

Norman Goldman announced new evidence in the Ferguson police shooting case Thursday at four.  I set the DVR on Media Player - - to listen later.  Two new witnesses have come forth to confirm the dreadlocks friend of Michael Brown - - concerning how Brown was being hit with shots - - and was grabbing his belly and then throwing his hands up in the air.  He said he was in a position to see Brown's brains being blown out with the fatal shot.  Even without this there are three or four strong witness that tell us what happened.  And also it is the FBI themselves that "found the guy with the audio tape".  I say this- because some on the right would have you to believe it was just some fraudulant oppertunist.  So far the Ferguson police department has shown about zero reason to trust or believe anything they say.  It doesn't take a rocket scientists to conclude the whole situation is racial and racist- - because obviously Cliven Bundy engaged in a combative duel with the Federal Officers- - and the Feds backed down once they saw Bundy's guns, or something.  Clearly we have a complete disconnect in how law enforcement chooses to deal with protesters depending on what their race is.  We can agree that this is beyond dispute now, can't we?

Oscar Pestorius, the “Yes, M’lady” guy- - was cleared by the judge of pre meditated murder but could still receive fifteen years for involuntary manslaughter.  If you just had a violent argument with your wife and she’s in the bathroom cowering and you are so angry you fire four shots through a locket - - bathroom door, I just don’t think you can chalk it up to “some sort of negligent oversight”.  But the judge says she personally believed the defendant’s testimony and personally didn’t think the many witnesses of the prosecution were credible.

Meanwhile Ray Rice that Baltimore Ravens guy made it clear that last May or whatever when he apologized for striking his wife that- - oh- - he did strike his wife.  How could a thing like that slip the NFL’s mind?   But at the time in February he told bystanders as he dragged his wife’s unconscious body from the elevator that “she’s just drunk”.  And a police officer states now that he personally gave the NFL a copy of the key video from inside the elevator.  So the NFL right now is just lying through their teeth saying they didn’t know.

Last night we had beef Strogenoff and corn and a green salad and corn.  We had tapioca pudding for desert.  The Ravens and Steelers game started just before five thirty with a superior rendition of the national anthem.  I could have watched the game for nearly an hour but expended a lot of time getting in and out of the medication line.  I had about given up when I came down to leave upon Paul’s phone call and the line was short with just Glen and Steve ahead of me.  Steve seemed like he was not in line.  Those are the worst people who end up taking five minutes at the counter.  Fortunately Yadera was forthcoming and I was able to get my meds.  Paul was about to enter the building when I came out and we went to the car.  I didn’t know that Paul and Judy even had air conditioning, till I came out of the house at nine fifteen and the air was so much warmer outside the house than inside.  I said I was hungry or something and was given two thin slices of cantaloupe- - and Paul placed a bowl of corn chips out there and apparently I was responsible for emptying the entire bowl.  I got into kind of a Jethro Bodeine “crunch frenzy” and just kept eating as long as there was food.  But the movie was very late in getting started.   We were talking with Judy’s mother who was there.  And no she doesn’t look anywhere near 94.  I told Paul I thought she was at his wedding but I drew a complete mental blank when he asked “How do you remember what she was like?” but when I saw her I knew I had seen her from somewhere.  She is living at the house now.  Judy herself said she was tired and wanted to take tomorrow to chill down because she’s been overworking herself.  We talked a little about current events.  Paul said to Judy’s mother “Go ahead and ask him any question; he’s really smart”.  I tried to defuse that invitation- - and also said I was plum out of ideas when it came how to best handle this ISIS crisis, but shared what knowledge I had.  That dance partner of Paul’s with the far right political views- - said initially she’d be delayed, and then that she wasn’t coming at all.  We started the movie at twenty five to eight.  About ten minutes later that Mexican lady friend of Judy’s arrived from Santa Ana.  She acted like she’d met me before but I don’t remember.  Judy had previous said “Oh you know Anita- - she was the one sitting on the end of the sofa”.  I don’t remember.   Apparently Mom is having increasing bouts of stretches of time people say she did- - that my Mom plain doesn’t remember.  As for some checkbook reappearing mysteriously under her nose- - as I said about Joe Drisco’s remark about “some kind of voodoo” that- - I wouldn’t put it past “The Powers that Be” to disappear an object and then make it magically reappear again.  It’s more reasonable than Mom not seeing it- - despite the fact it was found almost exactly where she left it.  The movie itself had the usual booming base- - and Paul said “all those horse hoofbeats got to be a little much”.   Every time a crisis in the movie would arise- - like the Roman Cencus- - he would be heralded by horses.  In another scene- - Herod demanded a half sheckle tax on the temple- - and planned to raise more taxes for when he built Massada - - and if you couldn’t pay- - the troops had the legal right to take one of your virgin daughters- - and also one third of your farm land, which you don’t have to spare.  Paul is right about the business with the three stars- - the mommy star, the daddy star, and the King’s throne- - coming together for the first time in “three thousand years”.  OK folks, this movie will never be popular in the Romulan Empire.  I remembered the scene where Mary came back now pregnant- - and she was going on and on about Elizabeth having a baby and one of the elder priests says “Elizabeth has a Husband”.  I saw that portion of the movie in the back TV room.  They had all three Wise men with their names and personalities.  They featured their desert journey and Joseph and Mary’s desert journey.  But one time Joseph prayed for a sign- - and then he saw a mountain stream or something and the caravan – and animals went into the water and then a poisonous snake appeared- - “Shake- - get out!”.   At the conclusion of the movie I developed pink eye- - and asked Paul how bad it looked.  In the bathroom Bones greeted me there and said “Of course too bad all those innocent children had to die.  You know an excellent ZAC slogan would be “Nobody died when Zachery was born”.  Good point.   Anita or whatever her name was- - had to leave just as quickly as I did.  The front door was unlocked so maybe Yadera had remembered what I said.  I went straight through the building to the back for a smoke before going up to the room.  Bill was watching “House”.  I get a little weary of watching “House” because the guy is such an impulsive screwball, kind of like Clay Doyle.   But I will say that I have more of a feeling of peace today and assurance- - with a bolstered belief that “If God could get all those peole through that major crisis- - then he can get me through my problems”.

The Economics of Revolution

Senator Bernie Sanders is on right now.  People say he’s a “Socialist” but I have always found Sanders to be perfectly level headed and reasonable in his economic ideas.  But Sanders hit on a key fact that CANNOT be overstated.  And that is that people don’t KNOW who their congressman is, and probably never thought of writing him on any issues.  Many do not even know which political party runs the house, and therefore when nothing gets passed, well these people DO know who the President of the United States is and so blame him for EVERYTHING and not caring whether it’s other people’s doing.  Sanders reminds us that this is the most unproductive congress in the History of America!  Why isn’t this fact trumped by every democratic house candidate running this year?  But some staggering economic reality comes from Mike Papentonio.  First of all- - when Rush Limbaugh opens his mouth on anything economic- - even when I was a fan of his- -I knew THEN he had NO credibility when it came to economics.  But Rush Limbaugh had stated the meme of Judy and others of “There isn’t enough MONEY in the country where even if the Rich were taxed at a hundred percent- - it would only provide a drop in the bucket to help the poor or cover the national debt but the ONLY effect of getting at this wealth would be to - - - wait for it - - Impoverish the Rich.  But what are the facts.  My motto is “When all else fails look at the facts”.   Mike Papentonio interviewed this book author of “The economics of Revolution”.   I hinted at this in my latest blog posting before I had even seen last Sunday’s “Ring of Fire” this morning.  Dig these statics.  The real inflation rate is not “below two percent’ as the government states, nor is it seven percent- - as I had come to believe-- - but this guy says it’s more like Ten Percent.  He said that the average household income has gone down 8.3% since 2007 when the recession began nearly seven years ago.  But then he says that the average Capital Wealth of the average American has dropped 43%.  That should be doomsday print sized newspaper headlines all over the land!  But it isn’t.  And as to the ability of JFK’s remark about “For now man holds in his hands to eliminate all human poverty”  - - remember that?   FDR in 1944 stated we needed some economic plan because of the great advancements in industry and technology the time is fast coming upon us where commercial wealth will skyrocket and the time is foreseeable when we will be able to completely eliminate poverty in America.   I won’t mention his suggested tax rates for the rich.  But now the author this morning of “The Economics of Revolution” claims the top one percent had thirteen Trillion dollars in known wealth.  That is wealth on the books.  But when you figure in the estimated illegal wealth in off shore accounts- - the figure comes to over Twenty Trillion with a T - - dollars.  That’s MORE than enough to completely eliminate the national debt and have trillions to spare!  This author suggests that if wealth were distributed equally in this country it would mean a $700,000 check in everyone’s bank account.  Doing the math myself I reach the figure of $83,000 for each American.  That's still a nest egg.  That’s a seven with five zeros.  So the next time some conservative tells you that welfare programs like food stamps or energy bill assistance for people freezing their tooshes off in Michigan - - just let them know that these government programs are a drop in the bucket.   There is a move afoot to pay fast food workers fifteen dollars an hour.  Why don’t we start with $10.10 first like the President suggests, and then see what happens.  I have told you that in principle I’m against tinkering around with the wage market because I’m kind of a free market idealist.  However the whole employment market- - has become so skewed due to rigged laws and economic policies favoring employers now- - that the free market itself is NOT what it would be under any kind of fair conditions.  I think more and more fast food and Wall Mart employers will hear cries of “We’re as mad as hell and we’re not going to take it any more”.   As I have said before- sometimes the thing you fear the most has a way of coming upon you.  This is an almost Biblical principle, and it applies most aptly to stubborn people with their heads in the sands.  The Glen Beck types talk constantly of crashing economies and Revolutions - - caused by the Federal Reserve I guess - - yet these same people will by their own attitudes now almost guarantee that these things will in fact occur.

Some people of the conservative persuasion would say “You liberals are only thinking of I, me, mine and not seeing the big picture”.   So let’s look at the macro picture a bit.  I believe in human responsibility.  This extends to things like computers and the internet where I don’t think people should get into computers or the internet without being properly educated with at least a rudimentary computer background.  Some would say that the way to help the “many who are poor” in the world is to give them $70,000 starting job salaries on an oil rig or something and that “energy equals prosperity”.   Some rich might even quote me the verse that is nowhere to be found in scripture that “The Lord helps those who help themselves”.  Or else they would quote Jesus and the parable of the talents, where Jesus ordered the man with the one talent have it taken away from him and given to the guy with ten, because the guy with the one talent did not develop it.  I have a somewhat different take on this passage.  Because it’s the rich who refuse to invest in this economy.  Indeed the Fed gave free money to the rich bankers with the “suggestion” that they lend it out to those who needed it and get a fair profit for it.  But the rich bankers for the most part haven’t done this.  People with money in bank accounts in the Camen Islands or in Switzerland- - aren’t helping the US economy one bit.  So in truth it’s the poor who “give back” and contribute MORE to this economy than they receive due to the multiplier affect, that Jesus also talked about.  Jesus spoke of giving away your Blessings so that others also might be blessed.  Indeed it’s the RICH who fit the profile of the man with the One talent who stuffed the money away in his mattress.  Then Jesus asks him to account for that money and the guy admits that he did not “trade” or - - lend to others- - using the wealth he had.  So by this logic it’s the rich rather than the poor that deserve to have “what they have- - taken from them”.  (Selah)

On The Nasty Neo-Republican Art of the "Pre-buttal"

This is the next morning.  "The morning after" and the President's all too fleeting speech last night stunk.  Sean Hannity was right.  Neither the words "War" nor "Islamic" nor "Victory" were ever used in that speech, almost s though he'd been tipped off.   I was almost dumber for having listened to it.  I certainly learned nothing.  I don't know just exactly who all this "coalition" consists of or what specific agreements were reached or how much bombing we were doing before of how much we'll be doing now.  I am puzzled as to whether the President was even asking the Republicans to vote any money for this opperation, which apparently could last weeks, or months - maybe years, just like before.  I am completely unclear as to Why this new Iraqi government is so much better and what agreements we've made with them.  Turkey is NATO and they are at war with the Kurds, but we are backing the Kurds.  Isn't there a problem here?  Right now it's a quarter to six AM and completely dark still outside.  "Yeah, it's always darkest before the dawn - and all that".  In my personal life there are some definite encouraging signs.  Be sure and catch all that "album release" folderall plus a lot of personal input from John Lennon, and also three songs I just remembered that were on that "mystery compilation" I haven't found yet but know I posted about a year ago.

This whole thing with the Republican pre-buttal or rebuttal before the fact, is getting way out of hand.  As you Mitt Romney took the platform and began lambasting the whole Bengazi thing litterally while the thing was still Happened- - and we had no idea WHAT the facts were.  John Boehner is famous for his "Pre-buttals of a major speech the President gives- - - hours before he's even made it.  On this Sean Hannity and I agree that John Boehner has got to go - - as House Speaker- because he's horrible!  But now Sean Hannity has taken this Presidential bashing to new heights.  Of course George Bush got criticism from time to time from leftward democrats- - either saying "I don't think his war strategy is wise" or else poking fun at his former cocaine use- - or skipping out on military service.  But now Sean Hannity just makes it blunt.  He lists all the conceivable problems in the world today and says "They are all President Obama's fault".  Even though there are things like leaving US equipment behind for ISIS to use- - the President could not possible have control over- - just as the withdrawal timetable was already set by George Bush.  If anything you could make the charge that President Obama was trying his darndest to drag out the Iraq war for as long as possible.  But Hannity quotes from a Bush speech - - - played - - where Bush is saying "We need a strong presence in Iraq to detur Islamic extremist terrorism" but I darkly suspect this was in connection with the alleged link between Hussein and Bin Laden, which is proven to be bogus.  But the sound byte makes President Bush look prophetic.   But then Sean says "Military service is the highest calling a man could aspire to- - why, it's almost a spiritual calling".  Well if it's such a high calling- - how come Sean Hannity did not join the military Service?  But then he drags Jesus into it quoting scripture "Greater love hath no man that he lay down his life for his brothers" and then says "I believe Jesus was referring to going to war when he uttered these words".  Blasphamus.  That's what Sean is.  And the standard Pre-buttal rhetoric was also opperative, meaning that Sean Forearmed himself in case the President SHOULD deliver an inspiring speech.  So Sean said "Well- - it doesn't matter what the President says, because we know the President's word is no good".  You can't please these republicans.  If the president says "I can't take that action because I believe in following the law" like with an immigrant's right to a hearing.  On the other hand if the president so much as threatens to take executive action, like on Immigration then people like Sean will say "The President has exceded his constitutional authority and because of that everybody conceivable south of the border is storming the gates to get to America.  You can't win for losing!

As to what I would say if I were the President (I'm typing this a few minutes before five) I would shock everybody by saying "I confess; it's Bush's 43's fault".  Keep in mind all of the President's detractors will be listening so "you might as well give them something to complain about".   I would say that past US activity is largely responsable for the funding of Islamic extremist terrorist groups such as Al Qaeda.  I would also show photographs of John Mc Cain with ISIS leaders a year ago, and Ronald Reagan being corgial with Saddam Hussein.  I would talk about where the funding for the 9 -11 attacks came from, from Saudi Arabia and that the United States has had a dangerous, indeed lethal connection with Saudi Arabia for decades and it has to be dealt with now, since it wasn't after the 9 - 11 attacks.  I would mention how President Bush '43 pulled the troops out of Saudi Arabia.  I would mention that even now there are economic interests the United States is too friendly with that are involved in the funding of ISIS.  I would also remind Americans that "This President made an error in judgement by getting caught up in the Arab Spring hysteria.  And also "These revelations may be shocking to many Americans even now, but these times are too serious NOT to address them now and allow them to go on and fester.  I would also mention that we need to get off of dependence of Mideast, and particularly Saudi oil imports, and that the United States would have been much more energy independent now had we implemented President Carter's far sighted measures in 1979.  I would conclude that people who PLAN to go to war- - - usually end up GOING to war because they can't let all of their well laid plans just "go to waste" as they say, but if we planned more for a lasting and just peace we might be able to prevent future wars like this and spare any further ultimate sacrifices of our brave young men. - - And of course for that all important religions touch I'd say "With God's help and looking to Him for guidance, I am confident that all of this is possible.  Good night and God bless you.

Thom Hartman states that in early 2004 the tide of American oppinion was turning against the Iraq War with people like Howard Dean speaking out.  But then in the spring of 2004 there were some vicious murders done by Al Qaeda in the province of Felugia, which may have made that area now a bone of contention for our troops to conquer.  It newly fueled the public paranoid over Al Qaeda.  Many of the objective expects (not to mention Bones, whose oppinion I have given short shrift to lately) state that ISIS is not any kind of an overt threat to the United States itself.  It's all a localized affair.  But Thom Hartman claims there is a speech of Bin Laden, where he does almost this "Bush campaign strategy mia copa" admitting that these "incidents" of people being violently and publicly butchered are "just to get us mad so that we will continue the war".  OK the thinking is more than a little nutty.  It's like my parents used to tell me when I was a teenager "Your brother is only doing those things to you just to get you mad.  If you ignore then he won't succeed".  Well, guess what?  He succeeded!  Big surprise, huh?  It sounds nutty that Bin Laden would actively WANT America to step up its war effort.  But Hartman claims "Bin Laden used to brag that he would bleed America dry and bankrupt us- - - and every dollar Al Qaeda spends brings about a hundred fold by way of return.

I am rethinking my stance on the whole "Crash of 2016" scenario, but NOT because I have some left wing (or worse - socialist) personal axe to grind.  No.  Rather I have observed that these great gains of Wall Street and bank and corporate profits- - - CAN indeed do this in the short term.  But historically to expect that it's a never ending kind of thing is like whistling past a graveyard.  Because we have the glairing example of the 1920's where after a while there was just no Base- - no consumer demand for product, and at some point all of the short term guimicks won't work any more.  You can only CUT corporate taxes so many times and you can't cut them any more.  In like manner airlines can only "economize" and cut back service and leg room on plans so far before the public just Balks!  They won't take it any more.  And ditto for job cuts.  You can only prune back the employees so far- - and the remaining ones working fifty and sixty hours per week at no overtime pay will just balk and not do it any more.  Keep in mind- -  every thirteen year old boy knows that masturbation pays diminishing returns after a while.  So this 'self stimulating" activity of buying back your own stock and being paid in stock options- - can be done for a while but there comes a point where there is no new guimic- - no new stunt you can pull or new supply of sheep ready to fleece.  At that point the bottom will fall out of the market and the thing will just crash like a house of cards.

[name withheld] knocked on the door before nine while Stephanie was on talking about fifteen dollar minimum wages.  I’m sure he felt funny about that knowing what his co workers around here probably get paid.  [name withheld] got me an apparently new lamp just taken out of the plastic, but then had to transplant the knob from the old lamp. (?)  The bulb worked and the lamp worked, and it’ll be a lot easier to dust than the old one.  Thom Hartman talked about the Irriquois tribe- and how Benjamin Franklin said of them “If ignorant savages can come up with a Constitution, than certainly we educated Englishmen can”.   He invited a deligation of them to the Constitutional Convention in 1787.  John Hancock greeted them and Abigail Adams sent her husband a letter speaking well of them, and saying “Don’t forget about the women”.  Up to that time the word “male” by way of any restrictive clause, had not been used in the Constitution.

This is Tuesday September 9, 2014 and Apple will be making their big announcement today at ten AM.  Of course on Sirius A they have their “new releases” at ten AM New York time, even if retail outlets normally open at nine, they make the customers wait an extra hour on new release days.   Stephanie Miller was a new episode today.  I didn’t think I had seen that exact color of blue shirt before Stephanie was wearing.   She’s back with Maximum Mookage because Jim Ward is back.  Apparently a “Mook” is someone from New England.  Everybody is still talking about the President’s ten suit.  I had one cigarette left in the pack.  Later before seven I got another cigarette from Bill.  Joe was happy just to see light in the clouds this morning.  I went to the old patio to get a good look at the slightly super full moon.  I waited till meal time to take my medication after what happened yesterday with that nausea panic attack thing where I felt like I might just barf at the table.  I had KNBC on TV.  I didn’t get coffee at the store but didn’t need it because Paul Evans gave me an extra cup, as well as an extra patty and a half of hashed browns.  We had scrambled eggs and toast and butter and jelly.  We had thick oatmeal I used milk on.  I know- I’m getting absurdly detailed.  One of these days I’m just going to chuck it all and not say anything.  Sometimes I do for a while but then I think “is there anything that’s happened important that I should write down?”   In terms of that beating up of the fiancé in the elevator, I agree that a logical deduction is if they show a guy dragging an unconscious woman from an elevator, it’s not because she fainted.  I already mentioned the “Double Jeopardy” thing.

We told you last month about Sirius A record releases.  But we said the Federation would release something at the beginning of September.  So here is that story.  Let's give you an update as to Federation and other recording releasing history.  The Federation on September 2nd released that first two disc "Classic Dementoids" I believe was the name of it, in the identical line-up.  But the "Get Punked" free bonus album was delayed till the ninth because there was an contention about the Dead Kennedy selection - - because they didn't like "Let's Lynch the Landlord" but had another suggestion, but in the end, that album too was released with the identical song line-up.  However for the other "Demented Again" album- - the song line up was still another contingency.  They wanted to include most of that anti Israeli speech- - but they edited it down further to 25:25 (as in you know what song) but John Lennon thought the editing sounded choppy.  The three tracks AFTER "End of the World" consist of "Refrigerator Heaven" by AC, and "Nazi Punks Fuck Off!" but the next track is "Something Happened to me Yesterday" by the Rolling Stones.  Those three last tracks would cut into the playing time of the lecture track so it had to be reduced.

We now have our tribute to Vinyl.  Also released yesterday by the Federation was by almost way of a joke was "The White Album" in clear blue vinyl.  It has the traditional green apple label with the outside of the apple on sides one and four of the product, and the inside sliced apple sides two and three.  BUT - - we took a few bizzare liberties with the song listings.  We wanted to make it both a little shorter and include one more George Harrison track for more "Beatle parody".

THE BEATLES

Back in the USSR
Dear Prudence
Glass Onion
Good-bye, My Love (Mc Cartney demo)
Wild Honey Pie
While My Guitar Gently Weeps (with studio count down)
Happiness is a Warm Gun
-----side two-----
Martha, My Dear
I'm So Tired
Why Don't We Do It In The Road?
Piggies
Don't Pass Me By
Not Guilty
Rocky Racoon
-----side three-----
Birthday
Yer Blues
Can You Take Me Back Where I Came From (long unedited version)
Me and My Monkey
Sexy Sadie (longer mono version)
Helter Skelter (shorter mono version)
Long, Long , Long Time
- - - - -side four- - - - -
Revolution no 1  (alt mix - - Longer edit- - slow fade out to 6:20)
Honey Pie
Cry Baby Cry
Savory Truffle
What's the New Mary Jame (identical to "Anthology")
Good Night

As you can see a number of songs just got eliminated.  But also we DID eliminate ONE George Harrison song if you count "Sour Milk Sea".   It's vinyl and the "Hey Jude" front cover.  The back is black backdrop and white lettering.  It just says THE BEATLES and a few production credits - - and then the four sides are listed in white print sides one and two to the left and three and four to the right.  Below this is a rather tasteless plug for three more Federation CD's.   The Blue album is identical to the commercial release.  Our version of the White Album (see previous) is longer with more tracks - - and our own custom "Red Album" that is completely different.  This album features most of the "Let It Be" sessions - - with the exception of "Two Of Us" and the tradition here is "there has never be a Let It Be compilation without at least one key song missing.  For instance the KMET bootleg tapes were most obviously missing 'One After 909" and "I Me Mine", whereas "Naked" was missing "Teddy Boy" and "Anthology" is missing "Don't Let Me Down" and of course the Phil Specter original LP was missing both "Teddy Boy" and "Don't Let Me Down".  But all of the Red, White, and Blue are double disk compilations- - and to fill the roster out we have various Beatle 45's that are NOT on the official "Blue album" because the criteria is that there would be no duplicates on the "Blue" album - but certain ones like "The Inner Light" and "You Know My Name" would be included, and the "Come And Get It" demo, and also post Beatle single 45's through 1971,  and at least four John Lennon A sides,  the first two (I believe) Paul Mc Cartney solo singles, and the first Ringo single - A and B sides, and the Bangle-desh single both A and B sides selected other songs (and I wish I could just "search" for the listing right now but various early songs such as "Maybe I'm Amazed" "Working Class Hero" "Isn't It A Pity" and perhaps "The Art of Dying" and "Give Me Some Truth" - or songs written before the Beatles actually broke up-  and here's three more that were on it "One of Nature's Children", "Junk" and strangely enough "Yesterday" for bizzare reasons I won't go into - and - - to clarify about "Accross The Universe" it's the Let It Be Naked version because Paul and notibly John Lennon prefer that version, even though that ism't my favorite version.  However we used the Anthology version of "Long And Winding Road" because I preferred the order us the use of the words "Standing" and "Waiting" better- - and of course the "bridge" features Paul just talking the lyrics- - and all Phil Specter had to do was put heavy strings over that part.

Now at the time the "Red Album" came out and also the "Cleasic vinyl" versions "The way they should have come out" of both "Pepper" and "Mystery Tour" - - the song "Hey Bulldog got burried - - .  John Lennon was given assurance that the song would be "picked up" on the re-release of Abbey Road, and that's what happened today Wednesday September 10th.  The spirit of the KLOS crew is alive and well.  We used the unfaded version of 'Hey Bulldog", which we slip in between "Oh Darling" and "Octipusses Garden".  John Lennon says that "Come Together" is the only song on Abbey Road with a normal "fade" and all the rest of the tracks are endies or else they segway into another song.  This takes us to another KLOS bit- - because "Her Magesty" (with the final last note restored) is stuck in between "Mean Mr Mustard' (with the final last note restored) and "Polyteme Pam".   By John's specification, the space before "Magesty" is only about a third as long as the pause after "Magesty".   We now come to "The End" and since Burt Lombard (alias Mick Ronson) was mixing this- - he used the splice from the Anthology version- - with the extra guitar overdubs.  And it was carefully matched for EQ and volume, and compression to make it as undetectable as possible.  And finally ten seconds after the conclusion of "The End" there is that Mc Cartney blurb heard at the end of "Penny Lane" on Anthology where Paul is saying "People ask us- - just what are you up to".   By the way way too many White Albums were printed up for the Federation to sell- - about fifteen times more than we'd ever expect- - so Reigel said they wanted them because Reigel VI  (as a planet) has more people that still use vinyl than any other part of the Federation.