Stranded in Civilization

To kind of cap off the previous abortion thread

2012-02-14T13:44:00.012-05:00

When you consider trans-fats, smoking, incandescent light bulbs, school vouchers, the 2nd Amendment, dirty jokes in the workplace, asking a woman out more than once, religious groups in NYC being able to use public-school buildings for after-hours prayer services...Oh God the list gets long!...cupcakes in school vending machines, the right of the average American to be as fat and lazy as he/she wants, making gay jokes, the right of the Church to provide their employees health coverage consistent with their moral and religious beliefs, giving more of their own money back to the American taxpayer to use as they see fit, the freedom of businesses to yes fail (gasp!), hydrofracking for natural gas and thereby creating thousands of new jobs in a bad economy etc. etc. etbloodycetera aren't conservatives for more freedom across-the-board than your average liberal? Can we sum it up best this way? -- Many conservatives are not pro-choice on abortion but are pro-choice about nearly everything else whereas many liberals are pro-choice on abortion but not much else?

Frustrations of a blogger

2012-02-13T15:24:00.011-05:00

What are yours? For me it's a quite long laundry list and cumulatively it makes for a far less enjoyable session at the old blog than it normally would be. The comment section doesn't usually go quite the way you expected, not that it should and therein lies the adventure but there are frequent misrepresentations and misreadings of what you just posted for the day. There's a steady diet of ad hominem and sometimes even a lack of respect for the host, the administrator, the moderator, that'd be me. People say the snarkiest things, it's the old social curare dart shot in the neck through a straw (phhhewt...) and happens at the least expected moments like when you sit down with your coffee and cruller and you're in a fairly good mood all things considered. There's the existential putdown, you're this you're that and then the Arguments from Intimidation which is heavily tied in with ad hominem. There are personal attacks on you at other blogs from time to time, there's the closing off of debates through their own definition of terms and sets of facts as used by some commenters, there's the endless hairsplitting and parsing of language which misses the larger points as usual and makes for dry reading like the warranty on your new toaster oven (you'd think this were an ABA or National Law Journal blog). There's posting without thinking, impetuous commenting, happens alot. Folks who can't understand your point or who choose not to and this doesn't mean you have to agree. So would a monologue be better, closing off the Comments Section entirely? not here but maybe more editorial control would. A blog is better than a forum as you have a far more creative and artistic say over things and you don't have to deal with an omnipresent mod all the time because you're in effect the mod. It's your own creative domain but as such if you delete what you don't like then you're a censor. What to do, what to do??? Well anyway if you want I'll throw out the usual topic:

Charlie Sheen are you paying attention?

Michael Jackson, Amy Winehouse, Whitney Houston (RIP 1963-2012)

So why is "pro-abortion" such an offensive term?

2012-02-11T16:20:00.005-05:00

The vast majority of folks who oppose abortion much prefer to go by the label "pro-life." However most people would also say that despite their preferred political and philosophical description they do in fact oppose the practice of abortion or are what you would call anti-abortion. The vast majority of folks who want abortion to be kept legal much prefer to go by the label "pro-choice" but despite their preferred moniker it would seem logical to me that many of them are underneath it all also pro-abortion. I much understand the standard practice of preferred labeling or packaging, it makes sense on alot of levels and not meaning to be contentious here but what's the difference?

Honesty (not so much)

2012-02-10T10:24:00.013-05:00

I'm gonna have to take my car in for an oil change perhaps next week. Now every mechanic you ask will tell you have your oil changed every 3,000 miles (don't believe me go do a survey) but when I was reading my Honda Civic manual a few weeks ago it said every 5,000 miles. Hmmmmmm. Your doctor tells you to drop the weight and we'll take you off the blood-pressure meds, it was ALOT of hard work with constantly reinforced social pressure at places like work to not lose that much weight and not only that but you shed 5-10 bonus pounds just for good measure and your doctor still keeps you on the pills and you politely remind him of this. Does he have stock in the pharmaceutical industry? perhaps the Vytorin tissue box in the waiting room is an indication. Older married woman at work with an autistic son, kinda uses her personal situation for leverage to get the hours she wants and to get out of jury duty. It's not like she's a single mom and he's at home alone and can hurt himself and autism is the thing these days anyway, they get by. Look I have a couple of autistic cats. Those high school girls in upstate NY you may have heard in a town you probably never heard of by the name of Le Roy, they mysteriously came down with Tourette's-like symptoms but the authorities and experts and resident psychologists are chalking it up to, you guessed it Anxiety. Look there's alot of free-floating anxiety in the air these days, God knows I've been dealing with it my whole life but I never twitched or cursed somebody out because of it. What a bunch of bullshit and I don't think even the paid shrinks believe one word of it. Turns out that according to one local newscast here there was once some sort of toxic train wreck once in Le Roy's history and Erin Brockovich has gotten involved not that anybody's not telling the Truth here. It's like at work with the weird psychedelics in the water, well if you're not feeling well one day they'll always chalk it up to you're known to partake of the adult beverages on a fairly regular basis, you may have made the mistake of letting this slip in loose conversation perhaps in a humorous vein and he has been dieting recently (read: starving himself). You see Truth these days is like the Constitution, it's elastic. It's not outright dishonesty or lying, it's a shading, a stretching, selecting the best elements of truth out there that most strike your fancy like those Le Roy girls probably do have some anxiety (who doesn't?) hence ~~~ or since most new cars do require a more frequent oil change well a car's a car or yeah you lost over 60 lbs. and we did say weight is a major factor but your blood pressure's still too close to 140 (actually maybe it was 132 over 84 that day and that was right after work) and well you can never be too careful (read: lawsuits), it's your health after all. Honesty, now don't be a glutton now:)

Would libertarians have gone to war against Hitler?

2012-02-07T12:34:00.007-05:00

I was pondering this thought today and I think not. The fact that 6 million Jews died in the Holocaust would have been deemed an internal affair by the libertarian/isolationist mind and in this thought experiment I have to kind of leave out Japan and Pearl Harbor since even Ron Paul I believe would go to war if our country were directly attacked. What's up with China and Russia these days, are they some sort of evil Axis or something? Maybe there's some truth to the various evangelical/ultra-traditional Catholic apocalyptic scenarios that they're gonna be two very heavy players in the End Times and not in a good way. Syria's Bashar al-Assad continues to kill innocent Syrian anti-government protesters practically on a daily basis now, the UN finally gets some gumption to at least condemn his tyranny and to call for regime change but China and Russia shoot it down by exercising their vetoes. In fact some Russian minister explained the decision by saying the proposed UN resolution amounts to a call for regime change, well DUH!!! The guy's a despot and mass murderer in the best mold and then President Obama who has finally gotten somewhat heated over the situation says a military option is off the table. That would be grudgingly respectable had he not gone after Col. Moammar Khadafy but consistency is the hobgoblin of small minds as they say. I do agree with Ron Paul on a number of things, turns out the Bunny Ranch in Nevada is enthusiastically supporting his candidacy because he's for states' rights and has said you can't legislate virtue. I'm not so sure if I'd want the 'hos and potheads behind me though but he's ultimately unelectable imo and I believe that is due to his extreme isolationism and the Hitler question proposed at the top there would be an excellent excellent question to pose to him in debate again leaving out the whole Hirohito angle and truthfully I don't think the Jewish issue was why we went to war in the first place. Hitler did in fact pose a grave threat to the entire world if you understand your History but the salient point here is even if a libertarian were to say it was right to go to war against Germany the Jews would not enter into the equation and that's what I'm getting at which brings up the whole other issue of anti-Semitism. Apartheid in South Africa and the government killing of anti-apartheid activist Stephen Biko and the imprisonment of Nelson Mandela, was that our concern too? Rwanda? Yes for me at least but a libertarian is apt to say no so that brings up that whole other can of worms regarding Race. I'll let soapie sort out the fine print, I'm only posing the Questions.

The Susan G. Komen policy reversal, if you can't stand the heat reverse yourself

2012-02-06T15:35:00.009-05:00

Well as it stands now the Susan G. Komen Foundation for the Cure has reversed itself after only one day and will now continue giving grant money to Planned Parenthood. You know listening to and reading the media coverage of the Susan G. Komen/Planned Parenthood controversy you'd think all the rage was on one side that of the pro-choice side. The polar universe of the msm where the Left-Wing is good and the Right-Wing evil, it's a political graphic novel, manga for ideologues. Now what I don't get or perhaps I do is if you're a breast cancer awareness organization why in blazes would you even want to get embroiled in the whole abortion controversy in the first place? Liberals don't act this way but pluralism cuts the other way too ya know and you'd think SGK wasn't aware of the fact that in society some folks, indeed many folks oppose abortion. Even some abortionists must find it existentially depressing work after awhile. My solution? personally I never gave to the Komen people and I sure as hell won't now.

The Susan G. Komen cure for the aborted baby

2012-02-03T10:02:00.019-05:00

I'm not really up to speed on all developments on the pro-life front lately, don't really get the lit in the mail anymore and there are other things on my mind so when I first heard that the Susan G. Komen Foundation for the Cure was cutting its financial ties to Planned Parenthood I was like but aren't the two separate anyway? I mean Susan G. Komen/Breast Cancer, Planned Parenthood/Killing Babies so what do the two even have to do with each other? Well anyway Komen pulled out of PP 'cause PP is under some type of criminal investigation in some parts but many folks are not happy with the sit'chation. Some top Komen officials have resigned in protest. Mr. 1%er himself NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg has just given 250G to PP as a grandstanding show to show how pro-choice and how pro-women's health he is. Isn't it nice to be able to sit down and write out a check for 250G? Bloomberg has always been hardcore pro-abortion, he takes it to the next level and strongly resembling some robot out of Westworld if he had to do the procedures himself he'd have no problem ("Oh just gimme the fuckin' forceps!" after sipping a cup of Dunkin' mint brew). PP is a kind of sacred cow in msmland and they reported the latest developments with the appropriate aghast. Anyone care to discuss the racist and eugenic background of their original founder one Ms. Maggie Sanger? Didn't think so. I never even liked the name Planned Parenthood as it strongly implies that Life should be perfect and it ain't, far from it and therein lies the poetry. I mean does your day even go according to plan? As my mother is always fond of saying it ain't a perfect world, that's Life and how many times have we heard parents say Jimmy or Mary wasn't exactly planned but they welcomed him or her into their loving arms anyway? It's just such a sterile, eugenic, unrealistic and futuristic concept that everything should just go according to plan, wanna hear about my life? Getting back to Bloomy he never should have gotten that third term, now he's just like that annoying retiree who comes back:)

Revisiting memories of your youth or a free-range blog

2012-01-31T13:49:00.016-05:00

Every once in a while you have to go back so my friend and I go up today to the village of Cortlandt in upper Westchester County NY to check out Sprout Brook Park. Back in the day they had a nice beach with a diving board and raft out in the middle, cricket frogs by the shore of the stream and snapping turtles further down who occasionally joined your swimming so today it's like the post-Apocalypse, barren, deserted and dredged, an empty lakebed with common reeds growing wildly everywhere where once there were happy kids and beer-bellied husbands. There's more than a touch of the Ozarks here with a bullet hole in a nature trail sign down the road so we walk around a bit and notice the big green sign of rules and regs posted on the side of the concession stand/lake manager building and one of them is maximum number of people on the beach at any one time is 525. Now bear in mind this was a rather small lake to begin with, more of a pond but when you're a kid everything seems so much more spacious and big back then so like how does 525 folks work? just stand in the water passing cups of coffee to each other? ("let's go Martha"). Now up aways in the Dutchess County area they have little porn emporiums called Giggles - why not?!? so I can think of a good name for some rival upstart company down the block, Chuckles - of course. They have some new hashish equipment hookah place here too, what kind of community values does this town have? Somebody recently spotted a mountain lion or cougar crossing the road somewhere in Putnam County but you know the old government line by now, must be somebody's pet or escaped from a zoo somewhere like do you know anyone who has a puma as a pet or where did he come from the Bronx? Rumor today that wolves have made a comeback up in Newburgh, can hear 'em howling at night up in the hills and they ain't coyotes which brings me to actor Liam Neeson. He made what many in Hollywood are calling an anti-wolf movie called The Grey and far be it from me to jibe with pc but it does seem to demonize the creature always a fave of mine and I just bought a nice wolf calendar at Walmart today for only four bucks damn their labor practices. Of course Andrea Peyser of the New York Post who seems to hate animals in general has no problem with old manly Neeson having a fine hot bowl of wolk stew with plenty of onions and carrots, kinda thought el lobo was semi-protected but whatever. Heh, 'member when I had some Scotch with the old man and he's going on about Al Sharpton and Roger Clemens and I'm just standing there in the kitchen looking at him like Dad I don't know what it is you're saying. Went boating with him once and so we go down Long Island Sound, through the Harlem River, this was in the day before kids started throwing shopping carts off of 4th level Target stores and then up the River past the TZ Bridge and he made the rather commonplace observation that you can see the same stuff by land and I'm like sorry I couldn't take you to see the Emperor Hirohito today. My brother once said when you first go out on some days into the bright sunshine you're like oh the light is hurting me, you feel like some vampire but your eyes adjust very well to tv pixels, what's up with that? I'm tired of hearing about health, obesity, this and that is bad for you like a slice of pizza or a hamburger is gonna kill you, gotta munch on a carrot stick or eat some wild berries like John Tesh. Are you tired of hearing about Newt Gingrich's sex life already? some folks think it's entirely relevant but I don't want to go spelunking with Shaw and Saty, into this stuff of the sex lives of family-values politicians. Gotta get your hip-waders on, your helmut light and your GPS, oh there's Newt hanging upside-down, slogging through some more, getting the willies, oh there's a minister getting a blowjob, no over there. The whole thing is skeevy, kinda creepy and I don't wanna know, I just wanna know about their Ideas, are they any good? Dammit I just wanna go swimming in Sprout Lake!!!

The secret to ending political partisanship

2012-01-26T15:31:00.006-05:00

"There's a Kool-Aid drinker born every minute" Z-man

When both sides finally realize that they're all full of shit. Gerald Ford probably was the only president who actually gave an honest State of the Union address: "The State of our Union...is not good." Politicians, they're shaking your hand with one hand and jerking you off with the other.

The Newt & Mitt Show

2012-01-24T10:04:00.009-05:00

Up until now I have for the most part avoided those endless GOP debates (are there supposed to be so many?) but I mainly tuned in last night at Rock Center on NBC to see if moderator Brian Williams would Go There, you know the Newt marital material which liberals are suddenly interested in but as I watched all I got was Cuba is 90 miles off the coast of Florida. I watched about the first hour off and on, it was fairly exciting to tell the truth with Romney and Gingrich attacking each other. Newt kept saying he wasn't a lobbyist for Freddie Mac, Romney put his tab at about $1M/yr. with Newt giving a much lower figure of course and truth be told I thought Romney's points were relevant and Newt gave off a stink cloud like an octopus obfuscating the issue, reminds me of some of the debates here. Meanwhile over at Bain Capital......Santorum and Paul looked like those Jeopardy contestants who just stand there and never ring the buzzer, Williams seemed to notice and got them in there too. Uncle Paulie thinks there are too many wars we can't afford but it was clear who the night was all about. Obama HHS Sec'y Kathleen Sebelius telling Catholic hospitals they have one year to figure out a way to provide birth control services to women, I would have thought it better for Mitt and Newt to go after Obama who seems to me likes to stoke the Culture Wars - "throw another log on the fire Corey" - but I guess they have to get rid of their respective threats first before they can go to the next level. Gosh man so how many more of these to go? it's becoming a weekly series like American Idol. Maybe Marky Mark can host the next one.

Church & Gov't - the Original Mistake

2012-01-23T12:04:00.012-05:00

Now this is convoluted and I haven't really followed everything on the Pro-Life front like I used to when I got pro-life stuff in the mail back in the day (PLEASE please don't tell Janet Napolitano!!) but my pastor was explaining this past Sunday that due to something in ObamaCare, the finer print now all Church institutions like hospitals and universities will have to provide contraceptives and sterilization to their employees. OK so by now you know my thoughts, if sex is a private affair then so is birth control and leave me and everyone else the hell out of it. I mean why not hit me up for some lube and anal beads too while we're at it and I totally agree with my pastor regarding religious freedom and conscience exemptions but there's a BUT here and you knew that. The root cause and what John Kennedy once warned about is the Church and the Gov't getting in bed together. Once you work with the government, once you as a religious institution or body agree to some federal funds and yes it's always altruistic at first be it helping the homeless, getting immigrants set up and assimilated, low-income housing projects, drug rehab, whatever, once you get in bed with the Government you then have to do its bidding maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, maybe in a year or two from now but THEY will be setting the Terms make no mistake. Take Catholic Charities which accepts some federal funds for their charitable work, laudable stuff to be sure but not that long ago they were told by you know who that they also have to place kids for adoptions with some gay couples because that's the law and so they stopped placing kids for adoptions altogether. The point is this, the Church should be the Church and the Government the Government so while I agree with my pastor I am somewhat agitated that the Church still doesn't get it, understand the root causes here. You wanna do something with Habitat for Humanity and work with Jimmy Carter and Bob Vila knock yourself out, have at it but your funds should be your funds and their funds their funds and may Obama stay out of it and just watch the Superbowl or go shopping with the missus or go on another Hawaiian vacation and crack open a coconut. Just be careful is all, you may have to pay for some poor worker's IUD down the road:)

Straights have destroyed the institution of marriage

2012-01-19T10:19:00.008-05:00

& over time gays will too. You want leaner and meaner government? that'll be when the gov't finally says we are no longer going to recognize failing institutions like marriage. I was thinking about this the other day, polygamy is technically illegal but that's a religious issue isn't it? Why not have the gov't simply say have at it, we're not gonna recognize it but you won't go to jail over it? Word now that ABC News is gonna give one of Newt's ex-wives two hours to dish and it's gonna air on the Monday after the SC primary. Apparently there was some big internal discussion over there about when to air it, personally I wouldn't air it at all but what's with the two full hours? American Idol season premieres get two hours but this is what journalism has turned into. Newt must pose some sort of threat or something. I once had a workable theory that gays have gay sex because straight sex often leads to feticide and well maybe it's some sort of protest act over the destructive power of women but there's holes if you'll pardon the expression in the theory as gays are often the most pro-choice. Ah my meandering mind! Funny though both gays and straights, even those who are for and against the gay marriage have one thing in common, they both seem to feel that marriage is still some type of viable institution or something. One final question though and it's been nagging at me of late: how come many of the same people who are for the so-called woman's 'right to choose' want to take away your right as a consumer to purchase an incandescent light bulb? Liberals are only libertarian on the social issues but not much else and listening to people like Shaw and Saty wax poetic about the golden right to abortion I'm, I'm just getting into a mood here and I might accidentally delete something:)

GOP Has-Beens

2012-01-18T10:03:00.018-05:00

The subject of has-beens interests me. One day Rocky and Blaine are one of the biggest things in the NYC radio market, the next day they're frying chicken at some Popeye's off the Interstate. These days the GOP has-beens are Sarah Palin, Michele Bachmann, that pizza godfather guy and maybe, make that probably Newt who can already feel the powerful vortex of the has-been hole sucking him in. IMO the architect of 1994's "Contract with America" deserves more respect than he's getting but that's just me. Michele Bachmann, too many brain farts and maybe the last straw was her mistaking Elvis' birthday for his deathday. I know it's not a big thing but taken as a whole you don't want her trying to reset Russian relations or pondering ending the embargo against Cuba. I want to devote the bulk of this blog though to Sarah Palin. Now when her star was early rising in the political sky (it didn't hurt that most men would've done her) early conservative commentary focused on such things as a family that hunts together stays together but the Gander Mountain voting bloc is only so big. Many many people have a mild distaste for the sport of hunting not through some elaborate theory of critter rights but Sarah and her family having a fine bowl of Moose Nose Stew on a snowy winter's night doesn't exactly impress them. Those be all-American values, heartland stuff to be sure but maybe not to a Manhattanite. So what makes a has-been or who has has-been potential? Could simply be just the inexorable Passage of Time, I mean Danny Bonaduce had to beat up a tranny to get back on the radar screen but in Palin's case and this is a biggie it was her overall Lack of Knowledge especially on the foreign affairs scene. You don't want this chick going up against Bashar al-Assad or negotatating some Arab/Israeli peace deal. I think the final nail in the coffin though, no it wasn't Tina Fey but Back in the Day some 8' giant black man who played the hoops plowed her. Sure it was back in the day but it's still a shock to the evangelical mind, yeah I know she's for the smaller gov't and pro-life and all so we can forgive her her youthful dalliances, her sex'chal 'perimentation but we kinda can't forget it either. Thanks Joe McGuiness! Oh yes Herman Cain and that's the really painful part of being a has-been nobody talks about you anymore. You know gimme someone who quietly has staying power through the years. Um I hate to say this but you can kinda say that about Romney. I hope to never become a blogging has-been btw, please lemme know:)

Romney

2012-01-14T11:20:00.012-05:00

I'm not gonna be spending a whole lot of time on this guy, hell I may not even vote. To all the Ron Paul critics out there and it's all good but tell me why I should vote for Romney. He probably has the nomination wrapped up by now but to me it's boring, hardly blogworthy on a daily basis anyway. It's been rather apparent for some time now that the conservative infrastructure in this country, pundits, commentators, talking heads, chuckleheads, opiners-at-large while not maybe passionately in love with Romney at first have tacitly nodded their assent and the question is why? I kind of pride myself on my astute political analysis but to me it's a mystery, all I can come up with is he's not scary. Saw him recently on The Charlie Rose Show and he's articulate and can talk and again maybe he makes mainstream conservatives comfortable in a coffee, cruller and blog sort of way, throw in a nice sweater and a cat on the couch. I honestly don't even think pro-choice Republicans are that threatened by him and even here I think his flipflopping may be the wrong term. He's gone from pro-life to pro-choice back to pro-life again and in physical terms, to put it in the jargon of science this is more like a vibrating strand of energy, a string (pro-life pro-choice pro-life pro-choice pro-life pro-choice pro-life pro-choice) and it's not to be taken seriously, it could be a mood. It's fluidity that's all like tipping that glass chemistry tube with the blue liquid inside, swishing it back and forth to study it and if he was pro-choice once he can be pro-choice again since he's able to see so many angles and sides. He ain't no static Santorum that wants to outlaw buggery or something and take away the coils and pills. Mormonism is an interesting subject and I've been meaning to google it, oh hell let's do it - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mormonism. It's just a touch Secret Circle-ish to me but that don't bother me none, hell if the guy's a Mormon the guy's a Mormon. I don't think though that ABO (Anybody But Obama) is the right way to look at it, the political calculus for modern conservatives to live by. On another note "I ain't no angry black woman." OK so go tell Oprah:)

You see this is the reason the people don't like celebrities

2012-01-13T10:02:00.005-05:00

The Most Important Birth Since Christ

There was no room at the inn but they had Lenox Hill Hospital in Manhattan. They took over a whole wing, some folks weren't happy, you know the 99%. Beyonce's mahogany suite with the bulletproof glass which one can expect some minimal anti-paparazzi measures but C'mon! and some guy couldn't even see his twin preemies in the ICU. The NYS Health Dept. investigation into the Matter went the way of the Natalie Wood reprobe, actually that one lasted longer. One hopes the Blessed Child develops some gender-identity issues later on in life and embarrasses the proud parents, a little Chaz Bono action (Sonny hit a tree skiing and couldn't live to share in the Joy) or else becomes a porn star like Laurence Fishburne's daughter but Jay-Z does seem to be really in love with her, it ain't no sham - a Kardashian marriage not. A nursing note: why so many C-Sections?

(lite agitating fare - about 230 calories)

Conservatives miss the point about Tim Tebow

2012-01-09T15:17:00.003-05:00

It seems that everything has to interconnect these days, Politics and Sports in this case and some conservative commentators are making it out like liberals making fun of NFL quarterback Tim Tebow's religiosity is a war on Christianity itself. He blesses himself and prays before the game or something and thanks God at press conferences. Not the first athlete to do this nor the last, you'd think it was never done before. Yeah liberals never miss a chance at a cheap shot but the Larger Point missed as usual is that

God doesn't care about a damn football game:)

Let me check what the Mainstream says first

2012-01-06T11:04:00.010-05:00

If I could boil most political discussions down these days it always comes back that Candidate X or Person Y is or is not in the mainstream. The way it's evolved moderation is a synonym for mainstreamism and if I could pluck a name at random here David Brooks conservative (moderate?) writer for the Old Gray Lady epitomizes it but why is it so important, why does it matter so much in the first place? Try to stay on track here, I'm known for my diverting threads (before you know it we'll be discussing the lead guitarist for the Butthole Surfers) but we can discuss recipes later. For me all the mainstream means is a herd mentality, a large large group of like-minded folk who hold pretty much the same opinions, cookie-cutter views and the question really is why is being in the mainstream considered such a good thing, indeed the supreme political virtue it seems? Let's not forget an American mainstream at least in the South was once in favor of the abominable practice of slavery and today some would question whether a majority even a slight one in favor of abortion is a good thing for society. Now some of my views might coincide with mainstream thought from time to time but that's merely a coincidence, to pride oneself that you're In The Mainstream shows a lack of thought, that independent streak imo. Watching tv the other night and some political analyst/commentator came on, forget the name as they're a dime-a-dozen but he said Ron Paul is too far right of the mainstream in the GOP to actually win anything. Now for me that doesn't tell me much, I want to know more and for me the mainstream is irrelevant anyway. This is vague info and strongly implies that Paul's ideas aren't even worth debating or discussing. It's funny, they say there's this Romney/Santorum divide in the party but both are pro-life, at least Romney is technically but he's perceived as somehow not being the pro-life guy here so that's a perception but I guess it's how much you push the issue. Ronald Reagan talked the talk but did he walk the walk? I just think there's too much talk of the mainstream, it's gotten a kind of preeminence it doesn't deserve. Now I just know soap is itching to say something:)

Put that in your blog and smoke it

2012-01-04T15:40:00.009-05:00

Latest Iowa Results:
Mitt Romney 25%
Rick Santorum 25%
Ron Paul 21% with Romney winning by a mere 8 votes!

Back in the day Ron Paul had his name on some newsletters that evidently had racist and anti-semitic threads, 80's 90's timeframe (what was on TV then?), whatever, don't really follow this stuff like some of the folks here. Guy at work few years back didn't help some bakery customer and got written up and it's still on his record and I said to someone just the other day why not just let bygones be bygones? Why

Back in the Day Should Have an Expiration Date

At some major supermarket chain many years ago so the story goes some chick was giving out free blowjobs behind trailers at night, frozen-food manager, night co-manager, salad bar worker, slightly autistic janitor guy, whoever, basically all and sundry. May have done the Train, dunno (many years ago I heard about some porno at work called simply The Train or something, thought it was some flick about random sex on a train with a sketchy plot, Ron Jeremy conductor? but some hipster explained it all to me and now I'm more up on Things). Anyways let's say she's a respectable married woman by now with the white picket fence, golden Lab and two kids, a little PTA action on the side and some applesauce cake on Sunday after services then one day that stuff comes up somehow (and it will come up sooner or later believe you me especially if she so much as runs for village dogcatcher) -- "But that was back in the day, everybody did stuff back in the day. It was Back in the Day." Well back in the day Mrs. Smith now 48 was a Freak. I'm leading up to a point here about the Ron Paul newsletters. Back in the Day is Back in the Day. MOVE ON PEOPLE!!!!!!

It's not so much the Republican candidates I hate...

2012-01-03T15:24:00.008-05:00

...it's the conservative political commentators. These movie critics of the political scene who have to overinterpret every daily up-to-the-minute pollette or subpoll and who dismiss various surges as the flavor of the week (as a group they heavily tend to lean towards Romney for some reason), these union commentators who tell you how to vote, who tell you Ron Paul is a system-hater when maybe all he wants to do is return to the Original System, these self-important chuckleheads who tweet and blog and pontificate and opine which leads me to a very important political maxim here you would do well to heed:

By all means know a candidate's political positions, study his or her belief system, judge their sincerity for yourself and how they'll impact on your life personally but you're perfectly capable of doing that already aren't you average American that you are. DO NOT however read the political commentary, do not allow it as a critical mass to influence the way you vote or think. If Newt tweaked another woman's nipple not his wife's, well you already knew that didn't you? You don't need me or some other pundicrat to tell you that's baggage, you don't need to read George Will's petulant commentary on Newt's view of the judges in this country just 'cause his wife is advising the Rick Perry campaign (look Will has a frenulum too). John Podhoretz, Michael Goodwin, David Brooks, Jonah Goldberg, Peggy Noonan, Carlmax Newsmax or whatever the hell it's called and so on down the list, just don't read 'em. I'd rather read soap's take on the ethanol subsidies situation anyway:)

Why we're not an intelligent country

2011-12-29T10:58:00.008-05:00

Trending right now at least when I first signed in around 10:30 this morning are:

(1) Gaga boyfriend
(2) Kim Kardashian
(3) Katy Perry and Rus......
---
(5) Rachel Uchitel

I never got this, you go to the library let's say or are at home and have a very valuable chunk of Time and you're looking this stuff up? So what was I trending just now? Old black news anchor Bill McCreary who once hosted a show in NYC called Black News in the '70s on Channel 5 and oh yes I found for Saty a fully employee-owned company at http://www.scottscornermarket.com/ and just the other day I was googling different detox teas and that whole subject and well I'm eclectic but not stupid. Did you know there's such a thing as Radio Frequency Hearing which often gets misdiagnosed as tinnitus? I mean I follow the Gaga stuff just a touch, tangentially like I know she's 25 and doesn't have a boyfriend (Patrick get in there!) but millions of Americans googling these same stupid subjects day in and day out across the fruited plain? amateur experts on pop ephemera and we VOTE!!! Kelly Clarkson just endorsed Ron Paul btw (http://www.gossipcop.com/kelly-clarkson-ron-paul-endorsement-support-president-2012-republican-twitter/). So I'm gonna be gone a little bit and go check out that food market again:)

New Year's Resolutions

2011-12-27T10:34:00.014-05:00

I've none, I already lost the weight. They say most folks gain a few pounds over the holidays. Well for me the way I combat this is I took a long walk the day before and on Christmas Day itself I ate very well of the main course offered and then some traditional desserts and no I didn't hold anything back but I didn't eat anything before this or after this for the rest of the day but it lasted me the whole day and into the night. Scotch, now there's a tricky potion. Got some Dalmore as a gift and later on that night with nothing on the TV I got bored, depressed and a tad irritable all at the same time thinking about work the next day. So I was all set on my day off this fine Tuesday to go to Balducci's the Food Lover's Market in the lovely and very Bronxville-esque town of Ridgefield CT and was doing some online research just now about getting there from the scenic Merritt Parkway when lo and behold they closed down! another victim of the bad economy and most of the stores and places I've become accustomed to shop over the years have likewise closed down. Rewatched Easy Rider few days back and the classic scene where the two bikers go to New Orleans and hitch up with two gals one played by Toni Basil and later drop acid and are wandering through some cemetery on some pretty bad trips. There's something weirdly hilarious about the scene and just heard on the news that moviegoing this year is down about $500 million from last year and all sorts of reasons were given but how 'bout most movies suck these days, they don't make 'em like they used to. I don't know what to do with myself today but might hit some Asian store later, the Ridgefield arc of my day is lost. Back to the regular sucky non-holiday music on the radio, don't remember a time in my life when music sucked so much and this is bad for long trips which I am wont to do. Happy Holidays vs. Merry Christmas, I've no problem just don't make me feel guilty if I go with Merry Christmas. So where are Jay-Z and Fitty's special holiday albums? (suggested song titles: Silent Night Deadly Night, Frosty the Blowman). This is what happens when you pigeonhole yourself in the bad, folks will laugh if you do something nice for a change and I read somewhere Fitty dropped a whole boatload of pounds going on some liquid diet so he could play some cancer survivor in a movie, might be interesting. Happy Whatever:)

Satanism in Yonkers

2011-12-20T10:13:00.006-05:00

This past Saturday night at around 10:00 there was a break-in at Sacred Heart Roman Catholic Church on Shonnard Place in North Yonkers. The damage was quite extensive with religious statues overturned, their heads broken off and then the trademark Satanic graffiti all over the walls. There was also alot of damage and defacement to the Virgin Mary statues of many homeowners within a 3 mile radius of the area with Palisade and Park Aves. particularly hardhit. One resident said it began back around Halloween, well that's a major Satanic holiday if anyone's interested. The other churches in Yonkers have been notified and Christ the King on North Broadway for example removed their creche from the front lawn.

So I'm watching my local Tri-State news last night and they seemed to downplay the whole thing as a rash of vandalism in the area although definitely categorized as a religious hate crime. Maybe the cops had them do this or withheld some vital information but law enforcement themselves have told at least one local pastor it was the work of a Satanic cult. My gut feeling is it's probably some type of offshoot of the Son of Sam Satanic cult as documented in Maury Terry's book The Ultimate Evil and if you visit Untermyer Park on North Broadway in Yonkers and head on into the old Croton Aqueduct from Odell Ave. just behind St. John's Hospital and walk a little until you start to see an old stone statue of a lion in the brush to your left and head in and go up some steps you soon enter a kind of stone room or "cave" in these parts with pillars and ledges and brick walls and on the outside of one side of the roof are the numbers "666" and in one corner of the room is a large pentagram drawn in a circle. There's other graffiti of course of a more mundane variety, KARMA POLICE for instance (I thought Saty would like that one). There's also been a kind of rash of missing pets in the area for the past several months and in the days of Son of Sam and beyond there were dogs and cats sacrificed in Satanic rituals, mostly German Shepherds or Alsatians whose bodies were found along the Aqueduct.

Of course if this happened to a bunch of synagogues the feds would get involved and you'd hear it on the news for days on end. All this happened on a Saturday night but Of Course Nobody Saw Anything:)

WORK

2011-12-17T10:02:00.011-05:00

Most people seem to accept IT and it's the reason why I've not been online that much of late. WORK - it's not that I'm for it or against it but as Beth once said a long time ago she doubts if when we're on our deathbeds and we look back we'll be happy with all those hours we put in. This social commentator handyman who used to come in, one day he says to me "ever wish you were fired?" and I go "yeah, maybe then you can finish that book you always wanted to read." Unless you're in business for yourself or doing your own entrepreneurial thing you're really not in control of your own life, the master of your own ship like today I have to go in late and some days you can't go for that long walk you planned or go up the line to Walmart. I'd like to hear libertarians who are all for Maximum Freedom explain this. Libertarianism is a pipe dream in so many ways and the fact that most folks have to get up at some ungodly hour and go in with their lunchpails means others are in control of us, we're working on their terms and again it's not a good or a bad thing, it is what it is but Maximum Freedom it ain't. WHO invented Work and why can't we change or shift the paradigm a little so as to have more leisure time to cultivate, oh I don't know Family Values which conservatives are so big on? My brother doesn't complain that much about work, his philosophy is work is supposed to suck that's why they call it work and if you want to get all theological about it you can blame Adam and Eve our first parents. I'm in a work frame of mind today, it's an old old topic around here so why not let it riff?

Cap'n Obama will get us through this

2011-12-15T15:27:00.004-05:00

The economic weather of which he has no control over, at least that's my gist of what he told Steve Kroft of 60 Minutes. It's a kind of interesting analysis this fatalistic version, wonder if the public will buy it. It'd be like if Jimmy Carter had said the same thing that despite long gas lines and inflation I'ma gonna be the guy to steer us into better waters and nicer climes. All Obama has to do is push the right policies that will make a difference in people's lives like make them buy health insurance, can't help it if Fate's a racist. Obama the Orator vs. Newt the Debater, should be a good one:)

The evolving thread

2011-12-09T11:28:00.010-05:00

Since my threads have a way of evolving, meandering, diverting in different and often interesting directions we'll take this pebble and throw it in the Pond. For me Alec Baldwin is an asshole not because of his politics, not because he's a liberal, he's just an asshole although I still say he was great in Glengarry Glen Ross so I'm able to put personalities aside for the sake of Art. So he got thrown off a plane for refusing to turn off his cell, 80-year old grandmas are being told to drop their pants so as TSA agents can check out their colostomy bags. Weight Loss Phase 2 - Maintenance. Now the societal reaction is are you still losing weight? Well no not according to my Homedics bathroom scale I bought at Bed Bath & Beyond so it's like why ain't he gaining some of that weight back? which so many are wont to do, must still be starving himself. There's something about shopping at BB&B that's soothing to the mind and I just love their new Gourmet Food Market, great for gift shopping. I can't wrap if my life depended on it, are women better at this than men? Unemployment rate now at 8.6% I think it is, I ain't gonna micropick the figure like some conservatives but it's still too high a number to win reelection on. So why hasn't the incandescent light bulb ban been rescinded yet? Guy told me if you wake up in the morning and it makes a clean break you're gonna have a good day, ain't had too many of those days lately. Job Stress, there should be something in the contract where you can send your laundry bill to the Company for skid marks in your drawers, gliding and sliding all day and that'll be on a rare blue moon day when you meet a hot chick. Evolve baby evolve:)

Dunno man, something seems to be missing from The X Factor

2011-12-07T14:43:00.008-05:00

Maybe it's the X Factor itself. Josh is too generic in a ballad sort of way for me, Astro should have been kicked off sooner when he almost refused to do his save me song but then again Stacy Francis was always too weepy so I can kinda see the judges' reasoning here. Perhaps Leroy Bell should still be there and that black Rick James dude from way back when but that's the trouble with these shows, the best don't always rise to the top. Rachel Crow is excellent for her age, Marcus Canty is ok but doesn't excite me and Paula should have caused a deadlock by taking Simon's advice and given Drew another chance but Drew and Astro do raise the interesting question of whether the very young should be allowed to compete in these type shows as their emotions so overflow. The groups are gone, I would have liked to see one group remain at least. Of course if you still want to discuss Politics and I'm betting you do what exactly is a non-intercourse affair with a member of the opposite sex of which I have to say I've been guilty many times over. Not even a handjob and you can't run for president anymore especially if you're a black conservative, doesn't make sense to me:)

The Thomas Sowell Experiment

2011-12-03T10:16:00.016-05:00

Clarence Thomas/Herman Cain, clearly there's Something at work here -- Now black conservatives are either hopeless horndogs, right-wing Afro-American sex addicts, hypocrites of the first magnitude or pose a threat to the Established Order. As I concoct this thread Herman Cain is discussing this right now with the Missus. There have been at least five females to date who have accused Mr. Cain of sexual harassment in one form or another when he was the head of the National Restaurant Association (please stop using the acronym NRA as it confuses me) but now a Woman has come forward to accuse the very married Cain of having a 13-year Affair with her although no intercourse apparently was involved. Back in the day that used to known as a friendship but if it serves the Larger Goals......Now I do believe in the VLWC or Vast Left-Wing Conspiracy but regarding the treatment of black conservatives how do you prove it exactly? It's tantalizing, it's elusive and is part of a kind of larger Super-String Theory of Politics. Whose house do they meet at? who is the leader? how do they network, do they send out coded tweets? etc. etc. Well as in any scientific theory you have to conduct experiments so what I propose is

The Thomas Sowell Experiment

the noted black conservative economist who's against things like Black Victimology and the Welfare State, you know those things that make for a good butt massage for the Left. So have Mr. Sowell run for some high political office and see if the Pattern continues. Oh and lo and behold what do we have here, some secret porno stash of Mr. Sowell's? maybe he exposed himself in an elevator once to some young and startled female staffer just starting out or maybe more mild stuff will do and build from there and so somewhere along the line like, oh I don't know maybe Mr. Sowell deftly made use of some double entendre involving the word lollipop or simply him eating a roasted baby portobella mushroom in her presence bothered her. I'm tired of the small stuff of Politics, I want to see the Big Picture, some unified field theory at work here. I think the power of the Newt Gingrich Surge is that most of his stuff is behind him now, old skeletons from an old horror movie and so it's like Okay but he has some good ideas let's hear them. The Gingrich Surge frustrates the conservative punditocracy who has declared unanimously that he should be a second or a lower-tier candidate by now and just to throw this in but if Saty ever had an erotic dream about Newt I think she'd have to kill herself......so after the Thomas Sowell Experiment we can have the Shelby Steele Experiment just to nail it down and present the paper to some prestigious political journal:)

Disorganized Religion

2011-11-26T15:48:00.013-05:00

If you're Catholic you've probably heard, starting tomorrow there'll be some changes in the service. I don't know about you but when I go to church I want to rest my weary head, I don't want to work, have to figure things out. Going to Mass should not be like going to school. I got a flavoring of some of the new church songs or singing parts I guess you could call them and I like the old music better. I don't really know what gave impetus to all this but my guess is that after all the clergy sex-abuse scandals they want to rejazz the Church and get folks interested again. Again for me it's an effort and I go by the old adage if it ain't broke don't fix it. For the past few weeks now our pastor who has a passing resemblance to Newt Gingrich btw has been explaining the new translation as they call it and I just tune out. The Church is more like a corporation than a religious institution these days and every so often they feel they have to rejigger it or reset it or something. Some of the ushers look like game show hosts in their suits, all that's missing is the big Gene Rayburn mike. When I went to grade school they made us go to Mass some mornings and before the service there was a rosary group and the woman leading the group did it so fast it sounded more like an auction or a horse race. 'Member they made us go to Confession too and once word got out the strict priest was in the right booth and the good one was in the left all of a sudden the line switched all the way over, I mean you could have killed someone and he'd just go say Three Hail Mary's, maybe an Our Father too. Oh God I got alot more of this stuff like abusive nuns straight out of some Gothic novel but I'll just save it for the Comments Section:)

Happy Black Friday!

2011-11-23T10:23:00.010-05:00

Let's face it, it's not so much Happy Thanksgiving as you can't wait to go out to Kohl's or Walmart. It's no longer even 4AM on Friday morning but in many cases 10PM after you've just made your turkey sandwich from the day's leftovers. Oh God I am so not a herd mentaliter, did the bulk of my Xmas shopping at a more leisurely and enjoyable pace starting in early November, just a couple more people on the list. Never got the atheists this time of year, even porn shops celebrate Christmas. Ah the joyless crowd. Never forgot the story my mother told and this was many a moon ago when she didn't even know what Black Friday was. My Dad and Mom decided to go to the Danbury Mall, a quite nice ride from the big YO and she figured it's the day after Thanksgiving, folks will be relaxing the day ater recovering from their meals and maybe even a hangover or two so her first reaction was who the hell are these people and the rest is history. SUCKERS!!! all I gotta do is my wrapping and it's done. I hope nobody gets stampeded to death this year but even then it'll probably wind up on some sick website like that poor guy who got pummeled by some teen thugs on the subway with nobody coming to help. Sat seems to feel I'm devoting too much time to Natalie Wood, it's distracting fluff from all the Real Problems and Issues our country and society faces but I say this. Even if we got rid of all the distractions, forgot about the Bieber and K-Dash, say suspended X Factor for a time so we could as a nation give these critical issues our undivided attention wanna know something? They ain't getting solved, there's too much corruption in high places. Just look at the Super Committee and speaking of X Factor Astro somehow feels he's obliged to win otherwise it's just some cosmic conspiracy against young black rappers from Brooklyn. Lakoda Rayne looked cute last night, oh I forgot that's a Distraction. Sorry, gotta go home now and do my recycling:)

Blog Rage

2011-11-21T10:30:00.004-05:00

I'm gonna have to start pulling some people over. Don't hate, participate:)

The worm of conscience

2011-11-19T15:31:00.008-05:00

So why is this Natalie Wood/Robert Wagner yacht captain guy speaking out after lo these 30 years? Dennis Davern, kind of a grubby-looking fellow from what I saw on the Today show now says something if I got it straight that Wagner was aware Natalie was missing but didn't take the necessary steps to locate her or something like that. Mr. Davern also says he basically lied to the police and others have said why would Natalie go out on a dinghy after fighting with Robert when she hated the water? Yes every book has to have a hook but there's also been a void for a good celebrity crime trial since the OJ heyday (Robert Blake and Phil Spector didn't get the water coolers buzzin' the next morning), get those tv's in TGIF rockin', get the talking bobbleheads on, get E.T. and Access Hollywood all revved up but from my own vantage point it doesn't look good when everyone on a yacht is heavily drinking and the spouses have a horrible argument and she goes missing only to wash up on the Coast a day later. When you're a celebrity you have power and well I just wanted to open it up for discussion and give the old blog that nostalgic swirl from time to time. I think Christopher Walken eventually went in his cabin to sleep the whole time (he could play himself in any upcoming movie imo) but you know something's definitely percolating here, they wouldn't open it up again for nuthin':)

Just leave the Gander Mountain stuff home ok?

2011-11-16T10:09:00.013-05:00

A judge has ruled that the OWS protesters in Zuccotti Park in Lower Manhattan can stay but they can't bring sleeping gear and tents into the park anymore, does this include Johnny Jugs? I think the topless gal did it, imagine if she were a Tea Partier oh the fun Shaw could have!! That 60's/70's Show shows no signs of abating but the core message of anti-corporate greed is a good one and I can't really quibble with it. Right-wingers are reflexively against OWS just as most left-wingers are against the Tea Party despite some overlapping goals and themes here. TP+OWS, why not? the perving of spacetime, that's gonna happen. The goal of all protest movements is to make people confront something they don't wanna confront, early on it was the lack of civil rights for blacks then a dead fetus, today it's corporate greed. Re my own blogging I've often said it's not so much my goal to win the debate but to have a discussion (S-Block might disagree). To take abortion as just one example, it's not so much my aim to bring you kicking and screaming 100% into my pro-life corner but a far more modest goal of mine is to make you less pro-abortion (and I can't even seem to do this) and so another problem with OWS is they have this All-or-Nothing principle. Obviously if OWS spent only one week in Lower Manhattan they'd barely be remembered and become merely a trivia question in the neverending and relentless 24/7 news cycle (Penn State today, tomorrow more of the Conga line of Herman Cain sexual accusers) so this explains their longevity and so their collective decision to brave the winter elements. Ah yes a chapped ass from all that fine OWS cuisine, snot icicles and freezing your little cherry balls off, frostbitten nipple tips and cold java and a heavily biased NY Post against you, now that's a Protest Movement!:)

Can you be a conservative and still believe in global warming?

2011-11-15T11:00:00.004-05:00

I say Yes, it's not agreement or disagreement with the Theory that determines whether or not you're a true conservative but what do you do about it? In a word Nothing:)

The Rise of Newt

2011-11-14T10:02:00.008-05:00

Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich had a very respectable showing at the last debate moderated by CBS News Scott Pelley and really shone on foreign policy and is even getting traction in the polls. By now it is conventional wisdom however that Newt is unelectable so why is that? It is because the Powers that be say so and this is reinforced by the echo chamber of the conservative punditocracy (e.g. the New York Post's John Podhoretz) and trickles down into the psyche of the voting public. I know soapie will disagree with my analysis here especially since Newt has gone all green on us but whenever I read that he is unelectable I never really hear the reasons why. Is it because he once dumped his breast-cancer stricken wife in the hospital? is it because he's so yesterday, some retro-90s fit? is it something else? We say so so it shall be so, he has no place in the Matrix of Politics. Then again he's not Ron Paul:)

Look, there's more important news out there than Ashton Kutcher's Tweet

2011-11-12T10:02:00.008-05:00

Why do I always feel we're missing The Bigger Picture? but anyway just my 2 cents on the Scandal - you know many times I look out the blinds at night to see what's going on and many times you'll see dubious sit'chations, gray areas but if you suddenly saw or your vision was accosted with the figure of an overaged hulking pervert of a man sexually abusing a 10-year old boy in the sports showers what's the problem? It's not just the Catholic Church anymore, nobody calls the cops. It's intimidation in the face of Evil or perhaps the mind doesn't register but

There's something oblique going on at Work

When you personally blog it usually doesn't draw that much interest the apolitical, how very solipsistic of me so for those of you who are interested what do you make of the following sit'chation? They recently hired a new girl, a woman of about 40 years old. We'll call her Lisa and she began ok, looked to be a promising worker. Anyways one night her other co-worker needed help upfront, busy and all and she was in the back the whole time. When the other woman requested help repeatedly Lisa was nonresponsive and on other nights she was slow to react to other workers as well but on this one night it seemed to reach a threshold. Now this other woman who works during the day, we'll call her Maria is going around telling everyone she's mental. In fact she insists on this diagnosis even though she's not a trained medical professional, has never evaluated Lisa, hardly ever sees her and has only gotten her information second-hand. I said to Maria there could be physical, organic reasons why Lisa was behaving like this and a blood analysis may get to the heart of the matter but the more I had an open mind on the matter the more Maria insisted she's nutz and is telling anyone who will listen. My take - Maria is a very suspicious character, at a minimum a troublemaker who roils the workplace. I reached a kind of conclusion in this case and will withhold it awhile to see if yours dovetails with mine which leads me back to Penn State,

Maybe I'm extrapolating from my own admittedly biased workplace experiences but in many places a high emphasis is placed on the most minor matters. Did you fill out the proper paperwork for today? are you wearing a white-collared shirt? a few more pizzas over here, there's a booger on the wall etc. etc. and the Things That Matter Most become like the proverbial elephant in the living room. Something can even reach criminal proportions but it's all about winning in the end, edging out your competitor, raking in the mullah but why look at the Bigger Picture when there's a spot on the canvas (a sports loss, an incompletely filled out worksheet, whatever). The country is imploding but Ashton Kutcher is stupid. Incredible!:)

Jaded Politics

2011-11-10T10:03:00.009-05:00

This past Tuesday (Election Day) I chose not to vote. People act like you have a duty to vote even if all the candidates suck, never got this. Anyway Democrat Mike Spano won the mayoralty of Yonkers, wasn't even that close so because she brought it up first this Italian woman at work asked if I voted and I said no so then I asked her who she voted for just to make lite conversation. She said Spano of course (I've been meaning to analyze this phrase "of course" but I've been busy) and so I then engaged her in a series of questions all the time being the epitome of Civility because HELP ME TO UNDERSTAND!!! I'm just curious I said why so many voted for the guy, what was the attraction? Did he say he'd lower taxes and she said he talked about Education (oh) and she added children are our future (I've never heard this before) and so I said but they all say that and she conceded the point. I said Obama talked about education among other things and she even helped me finish my sentence - "but look what we got." The Yonkers election was personal for me, all those red-light cams in the big YO were put up under the Republican and pro-life administration of Mayor Phil Amicone so my philosophy is what difference does it make, nobody really represents ME and my interests and values and me, my brother and my friend too always somehow vote for the losing candidate. The power of your vote is definitely overrated, it's a kind of Quantum Mechanics, chaos theory applied to Politics (see I have been watching The Fabric of the Cosmos over on PBS) but getting back to the woman at work it's as if pols have some sort of Svengali-like influence over people. We hate their guts and make fun during normal times but when it comes time to vote and they open up their mouth we buy into it. Help me to understand. So basically but I didn't put it in these terms exactly I said to my co-worker but we know they're basically full of Shit and we vote for them anyway. All it takes is a charming facade......Now I hate Hitler analogies as much as the next responsible blogger but around Yonkers someone painted in a Hitler mustache on Spano's face on a bunch of signs of his and the motto underneath put there by the Spano campaign themselves simply says A NEW APPROACH. Get it? you have to laugh at this stuff. Funny thing is the cops didn't even take the signs down yet, maybe it's the first crack in political correctness after all. It's all good:)

Thoughts on the Michael Jackson verdict

2011-11-08T12:12:00.008-05:00

An LA jury finally gets one right, certainly there was no other choice on the technical merits than guilty of involuntary manslaughter and Dr. Conrad Murray will serve his four years in a county jail rather than the state prison or word on the legal street is he'll probably even get some form of house arrest and YET,

in another sense MICHAEL JACKSON is really the guilty party here and all his enablers down through the years, friends and family, everyone. People who suck you into their madness......Michael Jackson became a whining, cloying and needy creature ("give me my milk") and on balance Dr. Murray probably would not have gone with the powerful anesthetic propofol had not Michael Jackson insisted and become a baby about it Here's what I don 't get, MJ by then had already gone down as a legend in music history, he made his billions and yet these celebs have to stay in the limelight it seems, it's an obsession of theirs and so if he was just content with his monumental and phenomenal success up 'til that point so what if he couldn't sleep? What of it? he didn't have a 9-5 job or even a 7-3 like the average slob so in his life his chronic insomnia was really quite irrelevant to making ends meet so if need be screw the need to tour or whatever, your health's more important anyway. In a way Michael Jackson ruined Dr. Conrad Murray's whole life and career and as someone said to me yesterday maybe he's in his own type of hell right now. The perpetual Michael Jackson fan club is missing the Bigger Picture but they always do. I say this, if you wanna be weird be weird on your own time, don't involve the medical profession:)

The Roving Travelblogger

2011-11-04T11:16:00.010-05:00

(Still waiting for the Jacko verdict) -- The new and much-anticipated/touted Ridge Hill Shopping Center in Yonkers or simply Ridge Hill is now fully open and so my friend and I checked it out the other day. It's not just a shopping mecca, it's a veritable community of the affluent who live there and have concierges, a kind of tony hamlet of Yonkers and is like having a borrowed section of White Plains right down here in lower Westchester. My friend said of the experience he likes it and all but it's a little weird, even a touch gay. Went to the new REI which is a kind of recreational equipment/camping outfit and with not that many folks in there yet it definitely has that desolate vibe going. Think End Times, roving zombies in the lower valley looking for something to eat and you break into the place for vital supplies and provisions, definitely the single eyescope and some of that tasty freeze-dried beef stroganoff. Raymour & Flanigan, that's not here (not yet anyway) but as I said to my friend doesn't that sound like a gay couple? ("did you go to Raymour & Flanigan's wedding?") Capped the day off with a leisurely hike through scenic Untermyer Park on N. Bdwy. in Yonkers. With its Greco/Roman statuary and fountains and Gothic undertones this place rocks but in a weird way. We walked down the Thousand Steps towards the glimmering Hudson, saw a few deer but the old abandoned vineyards of a long-ago age were too muddy and tangled to go in search of the Devil's Cave. This was around the time of Son of Sam when literal Satanic worship happened here and author Maury Terry interrelates it all somehow to the Son of Sam slayings in New York City at the time. The Ultimate Evil, convoluted as ever and now updated and well worth a read but I had this thought. I get the Borrelli letter but who's to say that famous letter to Jimmy Breslin which was mailed somewhere in Englewood NJ at the time wasn't just the work of some creative and literary kook with maybe some tangential knowledge of the case? Anyway this book is definitely dated as so much time has elapsed and Berkowitz is the only one in prison but for me the whole pivot of the book revolves around the theory that there was an actual snuff film made of the Moskowitz shooting. This would validate the conspiratorial angle of the entire book and it's hard to believe authorities can't get ahold of it somehow if indeed it exists. Quite recently in fact there was a chalice full of unconsecrated hosts stolen from a local church here just before the Mass started so this is something the authorities should definitely be looking into to see if Weirdos Inc. is still in business. So after a day of shopping at Ridge Hill and strolling through Untermyer's I went home to some fine Numi (new company) African Rooibos Red Tea and some other goodies I bought at Whole Foods which is totally organic btw or so they say but how can that be? nothing is totally natural these days. I would've posted sooner but was pleasantly surprised at all the comments left at recent threads of mine that I've only gotten to now due to my rather erratic work schedule. I get a real kick out of soapster's and Lista's discussions and his youthful boyish libertarian idealism brooks no dissent. OK man so let's check out the Cindy Crawford Home Collection:)

A Herman Cain/Kim Kardashian blog

2011-11-02T14:17:00.010-05:00

Herman Cain, shades of Clarence Thomas/Anita Hill. Look this is what happens when you're a conservative uppity nigger who thinks for yourself.

Things went downhill ever since Kris Humphries had to sit on that plane next to Ray J, he of the original Kardashian sex tape. Kim comes across as nominally more intelligent than Paris Hilton and somewhat less annoying than J-Lo who loves herself and she even has a line of something at Sears or Macy's. Andrea Peyser of the New York Post calls her a fame whore. I don't get all that worked up about it, for me it's just to pass the time while reading the morning paper. Word on the street is Justin Bieber may have gotten a girl pregnant. He's dipping and Kardashian is back on the market, hey ya never know. You know what gets me about Montel Williams who tokes the medical cannibus on a daily basis is he doesn't look or act like he has MS, bopping around on that infomercial with the juicer and he did do that talk show all those years, didn't look the worse for wear. Despite years and decades of steady medical and scientific advancements you mean to tell me the only thing that can manage your pain is pot? c'mon! I think he's fronting or as they say in England fron-Ting. A word to the Madoffs, next time try jumping:)

What is the role of government?

2011-10-28T09:55:00.013-05:00

This is the essence of ALL of our blogging when you get right down to it, a distillation of our political POVs. Soapie likes local states but not the federal government, Dave sees a clear role for the feds. Beth is a charitable person but wants this to be her own decision. Saty says time and again we don't understand what socialism is, we need to do our homework but I beg to differ, we have enough of an idea. Throw this out there, would YOU eat at Soapie's Libertarian Meat Market and Deli? (this is of course a utopian place, a figment of our imaginations where the USDA rules don't apply to him). I was struck my Mal's rather agnostic position on abortion as stated in the previous blog, basically take abortion as an issue off the political table, scrape that dried crap off the plate and into the garbage bin which is interesting since pro-choicers then would no longer have any say in party platforms either. While we're at it get RACE off the table too, don't wanna offend the guests. Herman Cain, the current GOP frontrunner is pro-life among other great things. I say this, his 9-9-9 is at least better than the 666 Plan but should we not vote for him because he doesn't subscribe to Mal's wisdom which also happens to be Pam's? OK so you go into soapie's place and ask for a roast beef wedge with all the trimmings and a big pickle and a side of potato salad only his deli clerk ain't wearing any gloves, maybe you just caught him scratching his nuts as you walked in but as my instructor in a food-safety course once said latex or vinyl gloves are overrated, people somehow get a false sense of security with gloves since they get dirty too especially if you're not constantly changing 'em and then you gotta order extra gloves which runs you into some money. If I may put words into soapie's mouth since I kinda got the gist by now and I know he's on a coffee break at his law firm and is reading this and will respond shortly -- better that one person get diarrhea so his staff can learn than have the feds come in and say how it's gotta be. So the free-market has some dribbles, that's the beauty of it. I would hazard a guess Dave ain't eating there either:)

The libertarian conundrum

2011-10-26T14:23:00.004-05:00

If a child cannot be born (because of abortion) how can it enjoy Liberty? WE have a great libertarian package for you IF you manage to be born.

The death of Khadafy which begs the question......

2011-10-21T11:31:00.007-05:00

why all the instantaneous graphic imagery but not with bin Laden? We were even treated to a bullet hole in the head shot but we STILL have nothing on any bin Laden death photos, in a vault somewhere. Shaw has recently taken some of us to task because we conservatives don't want to give Obama credit for taking out bin Laden. Speaking for myself it's not that I don't want to honey it's just that OBL's death was never independently verified by objective sources other than the government. Oh yeah another difference, the Libyans still have Khadafy's body whereas bin Laden if it was him was thrown overboard practically 12 hours later. Yeah we're all happy about the latest developments but on the flipside Bibi has just released about 1,000 Palestinian terrorists in exchange for one young Israeli soldier held by Hamas for five years. A word about NATO, ostensibly when the Libyan rebels began to gather steam in the latest chapter of the Arab Spring NATO was simply supposed to enforce something called a No Fly Zone, that's it, now they're kinda in the assassination racket sort of. Osama bin Laden, Anwar al-Awlaki, Khadafy all on Obama's watch and I heard the faintest stirrings in the msm this morning that he's somehow being credited with the death of the mad Colonel as well. Ah well Happy You Tubing!!!

McDonaldizing the gangster

2011-10-19T13:47:00.010-05:00

It's soon to be in production but John Travolta is gonna star in a new biopic about the late John Gotti. I'm kind of past this stage in my life, for me the genre of the mobster peaked with The Godfather trilogy. I'm so into other stuff and on a really slow Friday nite (showing my age since I'm not clubbing) I'll dig Sam and Dean on Supernatural even though I have no idea what the hell is going on. Heh, Simon showing his human side on The X Factor last night by apologizing to a contestant he just booted and bringing her back into the fold. He's losing his edge, he's been McDonaldized too. Flicks glamorize a life of crime, Burger King could have soda cups with Gotti et al on 'em and Moms would buy 'em for their kids. We've lost our moral compass. Few months back there was a major and I mean major federal roundup of some major mobsters and folks were writing letters to the New York Post all angry at the feds, leave the guys alone! I really don't do gangster blogs since, who knows a gangster might be reading this right now but it's how I feel. Been rereading parts of Maury Terry's Ultimate Evil since updated and some weird shit went down in Yonkers in the '70s and '80s. Seems some Satanic cult had regular meetings in Untermyer Park on North Broadway and killed some German Sheperds and left 'em on the Aqueduct, Berkowitz may have been involved. Personally know of stories of hospital workers at St. John's seeing the torches and hearing the chanting on some evenings, 'magine you're a patient who just had some major work done and you're recuperating and you lurch towards the window by the River and see some stuff. Been kinda sporadically blogging of late more like a hobby, the old work schedule again. Went to the biggest bookstore I've ever been in my life yesterday, the two-decker job with escalators Barnes & Noble in Poughkeepsie on Rte. 9, didn't buy anything but it was an experience. Is it just my imagination but are stores getting bigger? maybe I can do my walk there. Going home now to enjoy some fine African Rooibos Red Tea, good for the allergies:)

Well hell it's a job but still

2011-10-15T09:32:00.007-05:00

Pureeing the topics here but let's get back to retail for a minute. One of my friends who works at the supermarket end of things is a kind of source for scuttlebutt that's happening in that sector of the economy. You remember KRONOS don't you? (and btw don't tell me that's just a phonetic version of "chronology" or something), now add to this the growing field of mystery shoppers. Now I don't know what the going rate for them is but basically they pretend to be your average casual shopper, they come in and then after they leave the store or place of business they grade how well each department did in terms of whatever the Company deems important (e.g. suggestive selling, "how are you today?" etc.). Now I realize the economy is bad but would you do this for even a temporary living? get other workers in trouble really who are just trying to get by? Word on the street is some major supermarket chains will even go to the lengths of finding out which employee was lacking and maybe even write him/her up. This kind of gangsterism is not good for morale imo and stuff like this tends to happen when a company is not doing well, they're looking for answers and don't know what to do so they come up with crap like this. Truthfully I'd rather be unemployed than rat people out to pay my rent and once they make use of mystery shoppers the company seems to become practically obsessed with the topic like nothing else matters (e.g. low prices, a safe work environment). BTW checked out the new Gordon Ramsay culinary collection yesterday at K-Mart, not bad especially the digital 12-Cup coffeemaker:)

Loose movements and solid movements

2011-10-14T09:09:00.010-05:00

Say what you will the Tea Party Movement is a solid movement, a sign of political health which leads me to the drift of the thread title here. The Occupy Wall Street crowd have made Zuccotti Park in lower Manhattan their home with the blessing of Mayor Bloomberg who originally said they want to take jobs away from the City. There have been reports of public urination and defecation and public sex too. Now if I were a protester and wanted people to respect me and my message or at least be open-minded would I engage in such behavior? What a bunch of dirtbags, arrogant brats! The NYPD have held off removing them from Zuccotti Park at least for today no doubt due in large part to the msm's bias here in favor of the hippies. It's spreading to other major cities, has metastasized and labor unions and assorted NYC pols support them and even President Obama seems in support. In short Tea Party - Bad, Occupy Wall Street - Good. Now there is such a thing as Corporate Greed but why these people? have they never grown up? These trust-fund babies without jobs, go flip a burger or something. I deliberately held off awhile on this topic in contrast to some other conservative bloggers because I wanted to see how I feel first, let it sift through, brew for a time and see how it smells but it don't smell good. Hey Mayor Bloomberg isn't there hygiene laws to enforce and give people their park back. On a totally unrelated sidenote my friend and I were in Rockland County some time back and I stopped in a liquor store on a shopping strip on 57 and said to him later the young guy helping me sounded gay, had the accent going not that there's anything wrong with it so my friend educated me - "he has that metro-Jew voice like Bloomberg", you know with the high tonal quality. Just a cultural note:)

The priest shortage

2011-10-12T14:45:00.008-05:00

While we're on the subject of faith this topic came up recently in our parish because our parochial vicar was just reassigned upstate and now our pastor is running the parish all by himself basically and saying most of the Masses with only an occasional helping hand and btw the priest who was just sent upstate will be running that parish by himself too which seems to be the trend these days. In the latest bulletin our lone priest/pastor now gave statistics on the priest shortage, only one new priest ordained in the whole Archdiocese of New York in the month of May and he further gave the numbers on how many parishes in Westchester and surrounding counties are now being run by one priest. Suffice to say quite a few in fact but this begs the question as unfair as it may seem to him and others and make no mistake saying that many Masses is hard work but isn't this the marketplace in operation? The vast majority of men do not opt for the celibate lifestyle which is still a requirement for the Catholic priesthood so you can pray for vocations all you want and petition God on a weekly basis but that still won't change the marketplace or the reality. Of course for too many men these days who aren't even priests there is the depressing matter of involuntary celibacy, those existential drought periods of poor gas station porn and carpel-tunnel syndrome but even for these poor souls caught in the orbit of Outer Darkness sex or meeting someone or eventually falling in love is still a goal if not reached in this life then the next. Deliberate celibacy has always struck me as somehow going against Nature but be that as it may my pastor acts like a bunch of us men are supposed to just stop what we're doing after maybe a lengthy period of reflection and spiritual introspection and sign up to be priests. Ain't gonna work that way, there's too strong a pull in the opposite direction. Change the rules and you'll get more priests:)

A thought on God

2011-10-11T11:41:00.002-05:00

Everyone in Heaven is happy but God is troubled. This doesn't make sense.

Steve Jobs and a philosophical question that pops up

2011-10-07T14:36:00.006-05:00

Would you rather be astoundingly wealthy, a gazillion or have your health? You can live in a mansion and die fairly young or you can sit on your patio in all your middle-class stature on a fine autumn afternoon and enjoy feeding your cats or your dogs or if you don't have them just reading a book. Though I'm a strong capitalist by nature I don't envy the superrich, that societal trend has always irritated me. While I don't want to punish them like Obama I am philosophically balanced, they don't bother me but I don't want to be one of them. Personally I'd rather have my health.

Steve Jobs, Apple Founder and Tech Genius -- 1955-2011, RIP

Watson is my boss

2011-10-06T14:32:00.008-05:00

Have a friend who works in a supermarket and he told me the other day that when the workers punch in now there's a handy device on the wall with a lens that scans their thumbprint. Fred Flintstone with his punchcard is so yesterday. You'd think a deli clerk or a part-time butcher were working for the CIA or the FBI or Interpol and I'm not even sure they do this (side issue -- why do so many women who work in supermarkets have man hands?). What's next, retinal-scans like in Minority Report? So the name of the company the supermarket contracted with is, get this, KRONOS. Why that? sounds too sci-fi to me, a little off I said and my friend gave me the deep background on Kronos. Seems in mythology Kronos was the father of Zeus and there was a prophecy that one of Kronos' sons was gonna do Dad in, kill him and take over so when they were born Kronos ate Poseiden and Hades. Who says ancient Greek/Roman mythology is boring? it's chockful of Sex and Violence. Anyways Zeus' mother knew what was coming so when she was pregnant with Zeus and gave birth she wrapped a big old rock in some swaddling clothes and Kronos ate it. Zeus later cut off Kronos' testicles and penis and threw it in the ocean where it gave rise to Aphrodite. You remember Venus in a pink shell don't ya? Now all that's fine for a college lit class but why would a major technical company choose such a name with such a negative bio behind it and why would a major food chain even do business with them? and how come the Union never got involved and issue a statement or even inform its members? It's because the New World Order'ers are Weird that's why, everyday is a Renaissance Festival inside their heads. BTW the term for scanning your thumbprint to start work and punch in and out for Lunch and go home later is biometric, remember that word and the whole stated rationale is that some workers are using other workers to clock themselves in using their punchcards. Old story new solution. Well that's the cover story anyway but my gut tells me there's more, much more to the story like that cat Willow that wandered all the way from Colorado to New York City and was lost for five years until some shelter ID'ed him 'cause the family had a microchip put in him, that's gonna be YOU in the not too distant future ("Don't worry m'am, Hank's just having an affair"). Now who's behind all this? I'd say our friends the Masons, those who like to worship statues of owls in the Bohemian Grove and stuff like that, a little Osiris action. Basically they're Nutz and now we hear that Watson is gonna look over some folks' medical records and make instant diagnoses, save time and money. The times they're'a gettin' weird:)

Stalking the customer

2011-10-01T09:32:00.010-05:00

Personally I don't like it when I walk into a place and get accosted by some sales clerk asking me what I need, there's a touch of the used-car lot. Well I don't know man, I might be in a blue-funk mood working on some issues and just need to browse for awhile, clear my head like my friend does and I'll know it when I see it (geez that's a nice travel mug). Can't just fart around anymore. Some places, supermarkets for instance, have what is called the 10 Foot Rule whereby every worker is supposed to engage every customer within a 10' radius which is fine in theory but in reality you'd get no work done. I actually came across a phrase once called customer intimacy - dunno what it means, having sex with the customer? Maybe this is tied in with suggestive selling, dunno. I was in a department store in the Poughkeepsie Galleria while on vacation this past week and just wanted to pay for my item but the older woman at the register who's from Yonkers btw asked me a couple times if I have a Rewards Card, I said no and she pursued but would I like to have one and no I don't want to give to the March of Dimes so I said I don't shop here that much so I'd just like to pay for this and be on my way and btw your weird fluorescent lighting is killing me (that was in my head but didn't say it, some folks know what I mean, others don't as their zombified brains have been killed by the stuff already). I like the smaller shops in town, you don't get this corporate-imposed mentality of stalking the customer, just good old-fashioned service. Got my kinkeliba tea from the Amazing Grace Variety African Market on Main St. in downtown Poughkeepsie the other day, that's a great medicinal tea from some bushy shrub in West Africa called the healing tree and so my friend and I chatted with them for awhile. They know what they have to do, don't need some head honcho corporate strategist with a Cracker Jax degree issuing endless edicts through e-mails while the company slowly goes bankrupt. If kinkeliba is really the cure for Cancer you'll never know about it, there's no money in it. Christmas is right around the corner, my God how time flies and if I see some bargains I may shop early. When I don't know what to get people it's mainly money and booze, the good stuff and a couple fine cigars if they smoke. As the late George Carlin so eloquently said when he pays for something and the clerk goes have a nice day - "have a nice day? just give me my fucking change."

Mitt Romney - I can't get all that jazzed up about the guy

2011-09-30T11:47:00.004-05:00

First off his health care program in Massachusetts was the model for Obamacare. Judging from his latest debate performance with Rick Perry (oh, are there others?) he doesn't seem to want to touch the third rail of Social Security so that's second. Third off he seems rather bland, very bland in fact like a safe conservative choice in a polyester suit (read: moderate). I believe that as we speak he's pro-life but I don't think he's firmly rooted in any one direction except the zeitgeist or the base or whatever, four. Mormonism, you can take it or leave it but for me it has just the touch of the cult but that's not a five. I'm just not that into him. The GOP Establishment (Nancy Reagan, Henry Kissinger, Bush, the New York Post) pushing Chris Christie on us has the feel of someone trying to fix you up and I always hated that. It's the pushing that I find suspect (what, nobody else out there?) and Ron Paul is McCain's age. It'd take the edge away if Hillary ran against Obama which usually when there's no primary to speak of it means the guy's a champion but c'mon. A champion to whom, Shaw? Personally I prefer to watch X Factor, it takes my mind off things:)

Bobby Farrell is a slut

2011-09-29T10:17:00.004-05:00

More and more I'm reading in the papers these days about cyberbullying, cyberharassment and that sort of thing and sometimes it goes like this. Happens in school alot apparently but in the adult world some anonymous blogger out there posts defamatory and mean crap about somebody who they may have crossed paths with at some time or other or maybe they had some ill-fated lover affair with the other person, the victim I guess we can call him or her finds out about it, calls them out on it and eventually takes it to court. Case the other day I read about where a guy's ex is warning other women via the Web to have nothing to do with the creep and he's fighting it in the courts. Well in order to win how do we empirically prove he's a creep or not without following him around all day documenting his every move? A woman model is said to be a real slut so how do we go about proving that one too and yet sometimes these people win in court. Is she a 'ho, is she chaste or is she something in between? We've no way of really knowing and I don't want to know. As ugly as free speech can be and I'm not endorsing this by any stretch but by my libertarian calculations it should be allowed which is not the same thing as saying you should do it. Young college student jumps off the GW Bridge 'cause his roommate webcammed or something his gay sexual liaison and they wanna bring him up on a hate crime. New term - cybercide, causing somebody else to take their own life by what you post on the Web. Again very poor moral judgement used but as well-intentioned as the law is I can't go along with this. As I've said elsewhere the Law should never ever be based on our very subjective interpretations but that's more and more the case these days. BTW I apologize to any Bobby Farrells out there, it's just some kind of fictitious composite:)

Unconventional thoughts on conventional wisdom

2011-09-28T09:55:00.008-05:00

As any regular reader of this blog well knows I am no fan of Conventional Wisdom. It's too pat for starters, I hate it 'cause it's a herd mentality fossilized over time and it nudges at you because you know it's bullshit. Just to get the ball rolling here these are five plucked merely at random:

Rejection is not personal - The hell it is. If the woman is perfectly available and you are too and she says no then there's just something about YOU buddy. Could be your bank account, might be your one eyebrow but it's Something. Chances are she'll never tell you but keep digging.

You need 3 square meals a day - Not unless you're digging ditches. In fact it's that third meal that's packing on the pounds, I believe we've covered this at length at this blog but we like to err on the side of eating a little too much because of all the media coverage of anorexia which statisticwise is rather rare. A subset of this is that Breakfast is the most important meal of the day, since when? I suspect it's just to sell product. Usually I grab a doughnut or a buttered roll with my coffee and get going, don't have time.

Time heals all wounds - Partial wisdom at best, open to debate. Many times the wound is a dull ache after all these years but it can come back, that's why we have Scotch. All the survivors of 9/11, they'd beg to differ. I don't get my wisdom from a Hallmark card anyway.

Paranoia is a bad thing - Couple times I suspected they were talking about me at work, turns out I was right. A little paranoia keeps you safe but use it sparingly. Overtrusting is not a virtue believe you me especially when you consider that 1 out of X number of people in the general population is keeping it psycho. BTW stop talking about me.

Watch your health - This is a philosophical thing. Nothing wrong with watching your health up to a point but at what point do we cease enjoying the things Life has to offer? Sure sometimes I'll opt for the apple, another staple of conventional wisdom but many times I'll go for the Suzy Q because it's there. BTW they're making them smaller.

Just a partial list, the merest tip of the iceberg. What's your thing or have you too drunk deep of the Propaganda?

Mr. Port Authority Toll Hikes as the savior of the GOP?

2011-09-26T10:04:00.006-05:00

They won't give him up and I'm not getting it. Some influential GOPers, some real Republican movers and shakers, didn't quite get their names but a large swath of them are former Bush donors which should tell you something right there and they're practically stalking NJ Governor Chris Christie to enter the rather disappointing field. Calling his office at all hours of the day, sending love letters, behind his shower curtain, in his closet, behind him in the diner. Saw a few recent pictures of the Governor and is it just me or has he gotten Bigger? He seems positively gargantuan these days and practically dwarfs out everyone else in the picture. Now when I was having a weight problem myself not that long ago I got out of the shower one evening and looked at myself in the mirror and said OK this and no more so at what point do you even stop noticing these things? PUT DOWN THE FUCKING KRISPY KREMES!!!!!! Not exactly a role model for our yoot so what does it cost to cross the GW Bridge these days 12 bucks for cash-paying commuters? going up to 15 I believe in a couple of years and this is the Savior of the GOP party just 'cause Rick Perry had a couple dismal debates??? You know I was never that great at the whole job interview thing but I think I'm a real kickass worker just the same. God help us and already those red-light cams are sprouting up all over Jersey like some vast police state. BTW did you catch NYC Police Commissioner Ray Kelly on 60 Minutes last night? I'd be afraid to scratch my nuts. Oh yeah I knew this was coming but apparently technology is in the works for those traffic cams to be rejiggered somehow to see how fast you're going too, that's being discussed in Albany right now believe it or not. You know when you consider that most towns, villages and city speed limits are artificially low I'd go bankrupt. The topic of Chris Christie causes me to ramble but just 'cause he has a penchant for the blunt talk ("get the hell off the beach!") and can somehow control a budget but not his own food intake doesn't mean you have to get all hot and sweaty, have a man crush on the guy. It's like they want to take him in the woods and Ned Beatty him or something. Palin/Bachmann, now that's your ticket. We can at least see who can out-brainfart each other:)

The Obama Platform is what exactly?

2011-09-23T09:05:00.011-05:00

That I'm trying to do the right thing but am constantly prevented? that my heart is in the right place...It's not so much a list of accomplishments to run on so I'm not really getting why he wants us to vote for him again. He reminds me of a whiny contestant on X Factor, someone who wasn't that great to begin with but who won't get off the stage and feels the judges' decision is some kind of cosmic injustice speaking of which I think the best contestant so far was that Diana Ross lookalike on the first night forget the name. Absolutely phenomenal but she needs to reduce the waterworks. Simon seems somehow nicer this time 'round with L.A. Reid kinda towing the line here. New Girl, mildly funny but felt it didn't live up to its advance hype all through the summer although I really really like the name Zooey Deschanel. The new 5-0, my brother feels it's bad writing. On the Season Premiere a secret cam hidden in an old clock in the late Governor's residence that could exonerate McGarrett of her murder and Danno busts it with his foot 'cause he doesn't have a screwdriver handy and there he is on the tape Wo Fat killing the guv and framing Steve but his head is somehow cut off, well he is the Archvillain after all who gets away all the time. I'll give it a chance and at least they cover other ground besides serial killers but if they're to be really faithful to the original Chin Ho has to get shot and thrown from a car. Somebody at work has the Irritable Bowel Syndrome and one of the stalls is for all practical purposes unuseable. How can we turn a profit if people don't even know basic potty training? I feel I'm right about all things but do I expect people to agree with me all the time? No, it's ain't realistic and that's the trouble with alot of blogging these days. My God so you don't agree with Ron Paul you're not a true conservative, when did this happen? This is supposed to be fun, kind of coffee klatchy and I see our friend Tony Bennett has made some controversial comments about 9/11. Doesn't he look like some friendly uncle you had when you were a kid and you just got ripped a new one by Mom and Dad and he talks to you in the alley and asks you what's wrong and says but they really love you and gives you a 5-dollar bill to go get an ice cream cone? Looks real good for his age. OK what'cha got?

Social insecurity

2011-09-21T14:50:00.002-05:00

Is Rick Perry right, is Social Security a Ponzi scheme?

Once you go black sometimes you go back - Sarah Palin's jungle fever

2011-09-16T09:07:00.006-05:00

Joe McGuiness has written a new one, The Rogue, a kind of unauthorized bio of Sarah Palin. Now every book has to have what they call a hook these days to sell, in Barbara Walters' case it was her affair not that I care and so in this case we learn of Sarah Palin's past coke use (presumably we're not talking about the classic American carbonated beverage here) but even bigger is (brace yourself all you racist teabaggers out there, got a chair? sit down)......seems when she was a junior in her college days she had a one-night stand with some 6'10" black basketball player by the name of Glen Rice (he's trending right now as we speak). Now as a husband you don't want to hear this stuff, your spouse's past episodes of high sluttery when they do come out are bad enough but Sarah back then was 5'4" or 5'5" or something and the African-American gentlemen was 6'10" so you know some really freaky stuff went down. Sure that was back in the day but that toxic crap really gets in your psyche I don't care what you say, it's lurking in your mental attic somewhere in some cobwebbed corner with the baseball mitts and the Flexible Flyer (permanently emblazoned images of your beloved churchgoing wife guzzling it down like a milk shake, getting bopped in the head with IT). The other thing is some of today's biggest conservative women moralizers have been yesterday's biggest cat-bitches in heat (e.g. Dr. Laura) so maybe they should be the first to get this stuff out, just sayin' but what I think Mr. McGuiness is doing here and he's known to not like Republicans but he's masturbating the Tea Partier's mind which he sees as most liberals do as lurking in the racist fever swamps, some gap-toothed old red-headed farmer who sneaks into his daughter's room at night telling his wife hey get a load of this, Sarah Palin once fucked some big black buck. He's niggerizing the debate, agitating the political discourse never that high to begin with and maybe somebody should start writing unauthorized biographies of all the unauthorized biographers out there. Start with him, Kitty Kelley......but damn I just thought of something, what if there's a Sex Tape out there? Michele Bachmann dear, I hoped you lived a fairly clean life:)

9/11 - the most historic event in recent history

2011-09-13T09:04:00.010-05:00

I had thought when I went to work Monday morning some folks would have a different perspective in light of the preceding day's solemn and extremely moving events, don't worry about stupid stuff......uhm, no. We don't discuss current events much, I'm always the one to bring up the topic but then again I never married my job. It's been years since I read the late Claire Sterling's seminal work The Terror Network published in 1981 and what's changed is that then terrorism was mainly political whereas today's it's largely inspired by a warped vision of God. Sure Hamas and Hezbollah are still political but it's a weird development, after the Cold War never dreamed we'd be at war with radical Islam. You don't believe in Allah and we'll kill you, when did that happen? Saw Frontline's "Faith and Doubt at Ground Zero" the other night which while superbly produced and asked legitimate questions somehow left me uninspired and empty. Doesn't anyone ponder this puzzle that God chose to give us the gift of free will and that means the freedom to choose evil in many cases, to make bad decisions and that all too often those bad choices negatively, even tragically impact and impose themselves on others, the good, the innocent, the virtuous? Put another way if God forced you to be faithful to your spouse it wouldn't mean anything so I'm a little more on God's side here and also if you never had Evil could you really appreciate the Good? If the world was always and forever a perpetual Eden with no tears and sorrow, no suffering and no death would we even know what the Good is? How horrible those people died on that day and your immediate thought is there but for the grace of God. To make that terrible terrible decision to die in overwhelming fire or to jump 80 or even 100 stories hand in hand with a complete stranger in some cases. My own mother many months before this even happened was sitting on the couch one day and said she had a very bad feeling. She felt cold she said and then said she felt something very terrible was gonna happen to the World Trade Center and it's always struck me to this day. I've heard others say similar things so I do believe in a kind of psychic reality. 9/11 unified us as never before and how could it not? I'm sure those people who chose to jump sometimes again with that complete stranger were not contemplating their political differences or the stupid stuff that went on at work last week and that's one of the great lessons here. The other is this tragic event so mind-boggling in the magnitude of its sheer evil, this existentially surreal Happening brought out the worst but more importantly the best in Humanity. We also went from the sublime to Rachel Uchitel becoming one of Tiger Woods' bevy of mistresses so the poetic always somehow becomes mixed with the tabloid culture but that's to be expected. Then there was my lady boss who yesterday was doing her work as usual and asked me what date it is and I'm thinking but didn't say it just how uninformed are you? I mean I'm not a nerd or anything but when you go home what do you do? Do you at least pop on the News for 10 or 15 minutes before going to bed? Again an extremely moving and poignant day and make no mistake, we live in a post 9/11-centric world. It imbues all our thoughts, our very psyche and it did affect my sleep that night. Though it was an adequate sleep it was a kind of somber and fitful slumber and my dreams and thoughts drifted back to this tragic framework brought on by the day's events. What are your thoughts?

The Post Office

2011-09-09T09:07:00.002-05:00

I say let 'em go broke.

Advertising you'll never see

2011-09-06T09:19:00.004-05:00

Everybody has to be the best and they resent it when somebody questions their #1 status, challenges the orthodoxy. Take the new Weight Watchers commercial with Jennifer Hudson which says rated best by US News and World Report. Now that's mainly a geopolitical mag so WW may as well have been endorsed by Popular Mechanics and you know it just got under their skin that Consumer Reports recently rated Jenny Craig the best weight-loss program out there. So why can't WW simply say we're a good approach among many, it's an option and the same thing goes for Boar's Head. They just have to be the world's #1 cold cut, can't say look we're a damn good slice but hey if you like the Black Bear or Thumann's that's up to you. Advertising is all bullshit, it's childish but it is what it is. Now everyone can't be #1, why can't you just say you have a good product and leave it at that? Trojans......

House of Tea

2011-09-02T14:38:00.005-05:00

I'm more a coffee person than a tea guy but this Muslim guy at work turned me on to a new tea I never heard of before and it comes from his home country of Senegal in West Africa. Basically you get some kinkeliba leaves (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Combretum_micranthum), soak 'em first to clean 'em and then steep the leaves in a small pot of boiling water. He uses a medium flame and covers the top with foil, takes several minutes and says when the leaves turn from green or olive to all brown it's done. Another way of telling it's starting to be done he said is if you pass the corner with it on the stove and get a good whiff of it it's definitely brewing. Now it's been studied by Science for a long time and I really couldn't google that much info on it as the articles tend to be short or stubs as wiki calls them but it's a therapeutic or medicinal tea and as near as I could gather it has uses in treating malaria, aids in weight loss, helps with your digestion and is an important detoxifying agent. I was discussing this with my Muslim co-worker and he says it's almost as if they want to keep it a secret, no money in it. He also said Senegal or West Africa has other teas with uses in medicine, one that cures asthma he said and I'm like but why didn't I know about this? Just the other day I went into a Mrs. Green's Natural Market in Mt. Kisco and while they have quite an impressive array of all the global teas on the back wall the woman in charge never heard of the tonic so I briefly explained to her. She thought maybe I was looking for gingko biloba but basically I just left at that point because their power was off due to Irene and it's kinda hard browsing in the shadows. I really really like this tea, it's made me feel 10X better and he likes to add mint leaves to the brew but I like to take it plain and get that pure flavor. It makes me work better too I think, I'll be zipping along and the others are just dragging all day. Not an easy tea to find, he gets his in Harlem but that ain't my neck of the woods. So get a good tea party rockin' and get all that crap out of your system:)

I'm gonna buy me a house down by the river

2011-09-01T14:57:00.008-05:00

Since this blog has been woefully mistranslated (as usual) let's go through it again and add some fresh thought, get some lemon zest rocking, open the window and stink out the pillows. When Hurricane Irene hit the Northeast it was technically a tropical storm at that point even though many in the sensationalistic media were still referring to it as a hurricane and still do but God bless the Ole Gray Lady they got it right. Always ask yourself WHY the media does something and in this case the something had to do with the sheer amount of all the pre-coverage, the pre-game show. OK it wasn't a 'cane when it hit the Tri-State area so the major devastation in the regions that saw the most devastation had to do with the rain and not hurricane-force winds. You can't have a 'cane without the winds. The folks who saw the most flooding, some curse God, county, the utility company but never their own real estate judgement. Was Irene the most devastating storm in modern times? To hear many tell it yes but imo only in terms of poor real estate decisions and a corrupt real estate industry. Pray tell why would you call a potential floodplain home or open your business in the vicinity of a major river system? I've some swampland to sell you. Ideas have consequences, decisions have ramifications and while it's not true I don't feel for these people it's not the first time it's happened and Basic Conservatism 101 says take responsibility for your actions. If you're gonna live or work by the Passaic River in Jersey for example at least go to Dick's for a canoe is all I'm saying. So basically yes the New York media jazzed it up in all its 24/7 pre-coverage glory and folks in Westchester County wiped out all the bottled water for a region that saw a peak wind gust of 48MPH in White Plains so to say there was no media influence on people's economic behavior here begs credulity, that's pretty much a given and the only thing I'm talking about is motive here. My God it's a blog! Now as has been pointed out damage from Tropical Storm Irene is estimated at over $1 billion in New York State alone so that's used to kind of counter my thesis here that Irene in some ways was good for the economy but as I'm sure you've heard small businesses, those Mom and Pop stores are being driven out by the large chains and fair to say Home Depot and Wal-Mart did quite well from the preparations for Irene. So why was what was basically a tropical storm such a biblical event in the end? In a word Real Estate:)

I honestly think everyone is mental

2011-08-29T09:13:00.009-05:00

Now bear in mind that here in the Tri-State area the media were talking about Irene a good part of the day Thursday, most of Friday, practically ALL of Saturday and then all through the night and well into Sunday afternoon. Much of regular programming was preeempted of course (sorry Judge Judy and COPS fans) while the vast majority of folks were hitting the food stores like crazed zombies hoarding up on all the canned goods and water that'll last you at least five days as conventional hurricane wisdom goes. Now I watched alot of this coverage myself and not to downplay storms or anything but the New York media should have gone with most of you are gonna get a good old tropical storm with strong winds but less than 100MPH and your typical flooding with Jersey getting hit particularly hard. That would have been responsible and sane coverage and not the oversaturation we got, one of the most overhyped storms in Modern History. I really do think the msm wants to pump up the Economy especially under Obama and that meant crowds scrambling into Home Depot and Wal-mart and other home-improvement stores for $599 generators and batteries and flashlights and lanterns and of course destroying the supermarkets and few weeks from now you'll hear Oh Lo and Behold there's been some kind of a financial uptick, folks have been spending more. Strongest wind gust in the NYC area was 67MPH at LaGuardia Airport clocked at 4:04AM. Of course Long Island always gets hit the hardest but I'm talking about the folks who don't live in the particulary dangerous Zones, Get a Grip! Rather shocked when I went to work yesterday and saw that most people didn't come in. Had no trouble coming over myself and I think people used the excuse that highways and parkways were flooded instead of taking the time to use alternate routes which you should know in advance anyway, that and they were obviously influenced by all the apocalyptic news coverage. Saw Mill Parkway in Westchester County always gets flooded especially around the Elmsford and Pleasantville areas but that happens during many normal storms too and the Bronx River is always problematic at such times. Anyway if you live around these parts go food shopping today, there's nobody in the stores.

I really don't think we're ready for the Apocalypse

2011-08-27T09:05:00.020-05:00

First the baby 'quake up the East Coast last week with all the Manhattan office people standing around outside with the cell phones and then the tweetathons and now Hurricane Irene. Now I don't downplay this stuff but I finally know what a sheeple is. A group of sheeple go to the supermarket and wipe out the entire Poland Spring aisle even though they live in an area that is not going to get the brunt of the storm, maybe some tropical unpleasantness and meanwhile the poor supermarket stockclerk is down in the basement getting ready to put a new U-boat of the H2O on the lift. Gotta get some OT in so that's cutting into his circle-jerking time at home and by then he won't be in the Mood. On the flip side you have your retail/food businesses who never want to close, gotta get in that last sale and trade and having a resume peppered with such jobs it's always amazed me that even a day or two prior to some much predicted weather cataclysm it's not even a topic on the table for discussion. Sure you have to see what it's gonna be first but these places never want to close and if you get hit by a falling tree or electrocuted on the way over you can always be replaced by a handy ad in the PennySaver and maybe your boss will say a few words to your Mom at the wake. OK so you went to Home Depot for your generator and your batteries and lanterns but the media coverage OMG! Now bear in mind this was this past Thursday at least three days prior to the Main Event here in the Tri-State area and all day long in their pre-Irene coverage they weren't really saying anything new, just repeating the same old stuff like your repetitive uncle who comes to visit...spaghetti models, new term which basically means we don't know nuthin' fer sure yet. NJ Gov Chris Christie: "Get the hell off the beach!" Oh why don't you talk like a professional once in a while you overtouted GOP doughboy who along with NY Governor Andrew Cuomo just approved a set of massive Port Authority toll hikes. Mayor Bloomberg lives for these moments. Finally heard the ad for Romantic Depot on the John Tesh radio show the other night coming home from work, some nice socially-respectable sounding lady voiceover talking about lotions and gels and DVDs for him and her so make sure you have enough of that on hand and the batteries too. Now I'm all for the free speech, don't get me wrong but the commercial made it sound like they're gonna work real hard to make your marriage or relationship stronger when the more mundane reality is just some browser box with some scared Asian girl on the cover handling three dicks along with the fetish clown video. Saw in the paper liquor lines in NYC overly long which reminds me. Wish me luck, I'm gonna go to K-mart later for some T-shirts. I hope I can get around. WORKING THEORY: the media wants to bump up the Economy, Irene can do that. Maybe they have stock:)

With a little help from NATO

2011-08-23T09:09:00.004-05:00

Maybe he can be a judge on American Idol.

So what's the karmic deal yo?

2011-08-20T09:03:00.003-05:00

Just how does a particular religious system influence people's behavior? Are Christians better than others? more moral, more ethical, somehow more virtuous? Are they the salt of the earth? You'd think so but to give a perfectly honest answer in my long experience......NO, uh-uh. For example to put it in the work context again I've had my share of Christian bosses, some Catholic bosses. Many were underhanded, screwed the worker, weren't fair and as for other Christians they gossip, backstab, throw others under the bus with the best of them. Not an indictment of Christianity btw since I'm a Christian myself but why this contradiction? I'm going to heavily paraphrase from a point made over at Lista's, gonna do some major-league spinning myself here but the idea of you can keep on sinning and just keep going to Christ who will forgive you over and over and over again...I think the average Christian feeling liberated from the whole karmic cycle feels he or she can do what they want and get forgiven later. OK maybe that's an oversimplication but to paraphrase from St. Augustine "make me not gossip Lord or throw other people under the bus but not yet." Many Christians behave like the rest of the lot and then take their Souls to the cleaners on Sunday as my brother likes to say. The Christian/Catholic running the department now, doesn't strike me as being overly ethical, maybe the Church is more a social watering-hole......Perhaps the karmic believers are better people, live better lives because karma is so much more demanding and unforgiving and yes fear-inspiring. Pope Benedict would do well to address the issue again as he's addressed karma in the past and is well familiar with the topic. I believe it was when he was Cardinal he made the point that the beauty of Christianity is that Christ enables you to break free from the harsh and never-ending cycle of karma, that's the positive aspect but on the downside imo is the general character of today's Christian. The Pope would do well to talk up the issue again this time in the context of you people are misapplying Christ's Message and the Gospel if you think you can just go on sinning and......but is karma real? does it actually operate in this life in the here and now and not just in lives to come? A stronger variation of the biblical you reap what you sow I've seen some evidence. I'd love to hear examples here from the resident bloggers who are big on karma. As a rule I generally don't blog about presidential vacations, God knows they all take them so I just wanted to go with a karmic thrust today:)

Are most people selfish?

2011-08-19T09:09:00.005-05:00

There are some very interesting discussions going on at Lista's about karma and I will be expanding on some of the points like, oh I don't know tomorrow or beginning of next week but the topic of selfishness is too broad here. Are most people selfish? Since we spend so much time at work I'll put it in my usual context of the workplace (after 1,000 posts it's still a tick on my ass). Dunno if my place is a microcosm, God I hope not! but I've come to the conclusion that most folks are selfish. Now they're not viciously selfish, they come across as quite nice. They don't have fangs and will buy you a cup of coffee but when push comes to shove their interests come first. Take vacation time. We have a problem going on right now where everybody wants to take their vacations at the same time and we're not talking a week off here and there but like a month devoted to European travel alone. Now back in the day I still remember a system, a kind of unwritten code that you took turns, you went and then he went and then she went when Bob got back and if you had to sacrifice for the good of the Company by pushing up your much-looked-forward-to vacation by a week or two well that just showed what kind of a sterling guy or gal you were. Now it's like this isn't even an afterthought and I've spotted another trendoid and it has to do with new hires. Now many of these monstrous jaunts, random globetrekking are being taken by the fairly new employee, the recently hired and it's not that they're getting paid for all this free time but that's not the point. It's still leisure time and the department runs less effectively due to their prolonged absences, the burden then being shifted onto the few who remain like moi. I asked a co-worker about this, new workers pushing for and getting massive time off when they haven't even put in a year yet. I queried him well is it a part of some contract, some kind of secret handshake, an overly generous boss, some spit the love juice out from under the table kind of a deal but he said no, that they just have their minds set on going is all, doesn't matter if they started a new job. Of course back in the day when you were lucky enough to get hired for a spanking new job you would happily wait and chug along until you qualified for at least one full week of paid vacation time and then it would properly accrue over time but this selfishness thing is cutting across all age and ethnic groups, spilling over all kinds of boundaries and it's not just the young, an easy enough group to pick on although I don't like working with them either. Calling Out Sick, that's another one. Now I don't do it anymore but the few times I did in the past I at least chose a day when it would have the least impact, made sure there were enough people on staff. Not anymore, I've seen people simply call out sick even if the whole day depended on their presence and not a twinge of guilt upon their return. The selfishness thing is kind of disturbing, the blitheness with which it's practiced and goes straight to our character deficit in this country. Since this ultimately ties into the whole karma thing I'll be working on that one next. As I said to my friend once I think we were born in the wrong era:)

My 1,000th blogpost

2011-08-17T09:03:00.003-05:00

So what d'ya think?

If Obama were Bush......

2011-08-16T09:11:00.007-05:00

You see this is why I REALLY hate politics, folks can't admit the obvious. Let's say everything that's happening under Obama's term now happened to Bush, the 9-9.2% jobless rate, the historic downgrading of our credit, entering into yet another recession (actually in my view the old recession never really ended just that the "experts" pronounced that we were out of it, remember that one?), the failure of our mission in Libya however you define it, our Syria non-policy, troop surges in Afghanistan and the two wars never really ending...well I daresay liberals would most assuredly hold Bush responsible, the buck stops with him and that's right and proper (disagree with me if you like but I'm consistent). OK let's just focus on the unemployment rate and that historic because it never happened before S&P downgrading of our credit rating since those are the two biggies here the fact remains that this happened on Obama's watch just like if they happened on Bush's watch it would be fair to say there was a lack of leadership. You see it's like this, let's say you have a store manager or a branch manager or even a company president. Charles is a swell guy, quite popular, chats with the workers around the coffee machine every morning, is good for morale, honors their birthdays when the time comes and all the other positive stuff but some of the workers aren't doing the right thing, some of the department heads ain't doing the right thing either. The place isn't functioning quite right, profits are down, maybe you can't put your finger on it but would it be fair to hold Charlie personally responsible? YES, a 1,000X yes because when anything bad happens in a business or government entity or a religious institution (e.g. the Church sex abuse scandals) the buck has to stop with someone and that someone is the head, it happened on his or her watch, he or she didn't lead, didn't have oversight. Democrats like John Kerry can call it the Tea Party downgrade if they like but that doesn't change the fact that the S&P action happened on Obama's watch and no other president's watch. What I see in President Obama is a lack of leadership, a failure to take personal responsibility and they're not the qualities and virtues I look for in a leader. What I also see is an incestuous relationship with Hollywood. Now Sony Studios which has been the biggest booster of Obama in Hollywood has a movie in the works about the raid that killed bin Laden (of course the events of that day are highly questionable but that's another blog for another day so for now just to make a point). Rep. Peter King is rightly indignant about all the leaking of classified information that's going into the making of the movie but here's the kicker, it's due to be released to the general public about a month before the 2012 elections. I've rambled on long enough but the death of bin Laden doesn't somehow magically delete the S&P downgrade or create millions of new jobs. I think race is a factor too. We all want the nation's first black president to be a success, to be more than a footnote in History or a piece of trivia in an almanac but it ain't working out that way. It's just way past time for liberals to man up and admit the obvious:)

Our Syria non-policy

2011-08-15T09:02:00.007-05:00

What if we had gone after Syrian president/dictator Bashar al-Assad instead of Libyan leader Moammar Khadafy? well about 2,000 Syrian protesters might still be alive today. What if we didn't have wars going on in Iraq and Afghanistan at the moment maybe we could have gone after BOTH. Maybe if we didn't get involved in any of this mishegas we could devote full-time to the escalating crisis in Somalia, a country without a functioning government where 30,000 children have died from cholera there in just the last 3 months alone in this the land of Famine and Drought. The Arab Spring has turned into the long hot summer. We preferred to do business with Assad instead, Hillary even referred to him as a "reformer" not that long ago but here's a great way to cut federal spending and put a dent in the debt and deficit at the same time -- STOP ALL WARS! Just sayin'. BTW has "just sayin'" become an annoying catch phrase yet? just sayin':)

Life's little miseries (from the "You're Killing Me" series)

2011-08-12T09:07:00.008-05:00

(TMI Disclaimer: If you don't like scatological commentary please turn the page. If u post thanx 4 sharing why did you just read the whole thing?) You see the thing about Port-o-Sans -- there are two on the South County Trail, one at Great Hunger Memorial Park in Ardsley which I still refer to as Woodlands and the other at the Farragut Ave. parking lot at the Hastings-on-the-Hudson end. Now for me to use a Port-o-San for the other thing it has to be Absolutely Necessary, some kind of an apocalyptic emergency, Omega Man with the trots and so yesterday sparing the reader the more graphic details a critical decision was rendered that at the end of my walk I would bite the bullet. There exists a Murphy's Law of Port-o-Sans, it's a cosmic mechanism that doesn't vary and that is that somebody always took a dump before you got there. Doesn't matter if the tank guy just came by a half hour before to clean the place out and hose it down and in this case that same tank guy ain't coming 'til next Tuesday and yesterday was Thursday. At this point due to the condition of the facility ANOTHER critical decision was rendered to wait for the public library to open at 10:00, geez only about 40 minutes away so this is where your meditative powers and use of nice pleasant imagery like babbling brooks comes into heavy play. Now I've used enough public facilities in my lifetime to come to the conclusion that this nation ain't digesting its food right, it's a public health concern and just this morning I checked out the other Port-o-San at Farragut out of a kind of perverse curiosity and same deal. Someone shellshocked by Life, the same jogger working off a bad divorce? Ah what job stress hath wrought, what it's done to our once fine country and they can't pay this tank guy enough imo (Spanish guy, go figure). Basic potty training is the foundation of Civilization and we're obviously a country in decline. When my friend worked at Pathmark in dairy I'd meet him there every once in a while towards the end of his shift to go out and had to go once, nothing serious mind you so he showed me through the breakroom and on to the Men's Room. Let's just say all three stalls were a federal disaster area and I asked him wha'happened? and he said one of the workers wasn't feeling good. OK I get it, I understand but how'd the stuff get on the walls? I honestly don't know how the gays do it, God bless 'em. The rest stop at the train depot at White Plains, pretty gangster. Ever have a bird crap on your head? Is that supposed to bring good luck?

Personality pools

2011-08-11T09:08:00.011-05:00

You really do work with a garden-variety of people but I think the reason I've never fit into any of the cliques at work is I operate under a kind of inverse principle from everyone else: sometimes I'll dislike other people whom others like and conversely I'll like others who are disliked. Sets me at odds right off the bat. The majority of people I've worked with over the years seem OK but when I didn't like someone sometimes it was on a visceral, even existential level (Saty chalks this up to karmic crap in past lifetimes and it's an interesting theory). More likely of the ones I didn't like despite their popularity I saw them as somehow being phony and conniving or some other group of strong negatives. I judge character with other criteria besides popularity and it's like sometimes they know it, they can sense it and there's a vibe in the air and they know that you know you're on to them and whatever bullshit game they're playing. On the other hand back in the day we once had this district manager who was strongly and I mean strongly disliked and there was practically a consensus about him. Prick was one of the nicer terms used and yet I liked him and said to a co-worker once that you may disagree with him at times but what I like about him is he shows passion for his job, his position, takes it seriously and has a good knowledge of his district and what needs to be done. Most DM's I've encountered over the years come across as simply bland titleholders who are more interested in teeing off on a nice day than learning the ropes but this DM was different and had a kind of youthful enthusiasm for the job. Now my lady boss at the time when everyone learned he was being reassigned to our region was clearly perturbed, said he's a pain in the ass and other choice words and yet I felt like saying to her some of us feel about you the way you feel about him. The best workers I"ve worked with tend to fall into the ethnic categories of Latinos and Asians. I don't even care if the Latinos aren't full citizens as they say but they work their asses off and the phrase work like a Mexican came into widespread use for a reason. Asians are quiet and take orders without bitching and churn out the work product too and this goes back to their strict upbringings and the installation of values like appreciating being here in America, working and studying hard and it shows and they're moral too btw, don't go throwing other people under the bus. Getting back to the DM I think the reason why he grated so much is he just wanted people to do a little work is all and do the right thing and yet I had a manager once, an inveterate asshole who gave me a hard time but clearly won in the popularity sweepstakes. Tomorrow I have to say something about Port-o-Sans:)

Bad teachers or just bad kids?

2011-08-10T09:05:00.009-05:00

I was never that caught up in the whole education debate in this country, not that I don't care but in the conservative worldview if I understand it correctly and I think I do there are an awful lot of bad teachers in the public schools and so if we just got rid of teacher tenure everything would be hunky-dory. In fact this is one issue they really get their dander up about, endless columns to the point where I just cruise them and turn the page but dunno man, maybe the problem is with the Kids. In our discussion of utterly boring and meaningless jobs Saty had this to say: "Quite a lot of jobs could be made more interesting by the motivation and willingness of the person doing it to make it more interesting." Just substitute the word class for jobs and student instead of person and the same point applies to education. What's a teacher to do with a class full of asshole kids, fidgety brats who won't sit still and aren't willing to learn? I started out very early in the public school system but then my folks switched me over to private but out of all those years I don't really recall too many truly bad teachers. Maybe a few were too boring and dry for my tastes and could have been better but to hear conservatives tell the tale......Mayor Bloomberg's multimillion dollar Black and Latino Initiative in NYC has as a key component teaching the young'ens all about Sex, rubber instructions, things like that but if I may borrow from the soapster here it is not even the primary obligation of the State to educate your kid. It certainly isn't to teach them something Mom and Dad should be teaching them anyway and I say teach 'em a trade, how to make money, how to get a job. How is learning about Mike and Fred adopting a kid gonna pay the bills down the road? Now Mayor Bloomberg somehow got the law changed in the City so he could run for a third term and we get this stuff for his finale and pedestrian plazas where cars used to be and bike lanes nobody really uses and he even wants to have food grade inspections for New York's trademark fast food vendors because in his words if he's buying a hot dog he wants to know whether the guy washed his hands first. Maybe you want one of those giant salted pretzels and Moussa just took a dump. I just shut my mind off to it:)

The paranormal thread

2011-08-09T10:12:00.006-05:00

I usually don't blog that much about the paranormal so pressing is the political beat these days but thought I'd share a very interesting experience that happened just a few weeks ago (many things I intend to blog about but not quite yet, gotta form it and see how it'll play). First time this happened was very early in the morning when I just got up and went in the kitchen to fix the coffee, the next time later on in the afternoon around Judge Judy time. As a rule I don't watch the old battleaxe just to set the timeframe here and it even happened a third time to the point where I just unplug the TV set when I'm done at night. You see the set would go on and off on its own and go through all the channels repeatedly. Now I have a converter box since I don't have cable, I know I'm behind the times and I'm not a big fan of the new digital transition so dunno if there's a technical reason, I'm sure some will be profferred by the more secular-minded among us (ahem ahem) but I was glad I had other people in the room on these occasions as witnesses. As any reader of this blog well knows I and some others have had problems with the funkadelic water at work over the years so when this incident with the boob tube first happened I didn't bring it up right away but waited for the others in the room to say hey look what's happening. Could be one of those pesky illusions ya know? soap would know what I mean and then you look like kinda maybe you were doing a doobie or sniffing some airplane glue while putting together your Godzilla kit. Anyway this began happening right around the time this 50-something woman at work passed on suddenly. She as far as anyone knew was in good health, didn't smoke or drink and just dropped dead one afternoon from a heart attack. Mysterious for some of us on the workfront but you know these things, they just brush them aside to concentrate on the bottom line. I think Jesus could come in with Elvis for a roast beef wedge and they wouldn't bat an eyelash. The whole thing was an experience that would test an atheist and it didn't inspire fear in the least so much as fascination and curiosity. How 'bout you, got any good ghost stories?

Obama's flirtation and the downgrading of U.S. credit

2011-08-08T14:20:00.010-05:00

Standard & Poor's has downgraded America's credit rating from AAA to AA+, first time in History that's happened which is actually surprising considering our history. Apparently S&P has a more dismal view of our long-term economic prospects than the other two major credit-rating agencies, Moody's and Fitch. Now 'tis true that S&P in its report called for enhanced revenues aka tax increases as Rachel Maddow happily points out but also threatened to downgrade U.S. credit if Congress didn't cut spending by at least $4 trillion. The $2 trillion cuts didn't impress the eggheads what can I say? Obama Administration says the math is fuzzy, whatever. Now the New York Times has editorialized that from now on there should be no raise or not raise the debt ceiling debates as there should be no debt ceiling period (Times editorials are beyond liberal and are really Bermuda Triangle stuff) and I really don't read Times editorials anymore but get wind of them when other conservatives complain about them which is often. S&P has threatened a second downgrade but the point is this, if your spouse or significant other constantly talks about cheating and goes about flirting but doesn't actually go through with the deed would you still trust them? Seems to me most presidents just go about quietly raising the debt ceiling not that I agree with this but Obama actually flirting with default here is what really led to the downgrade IMO, I mean can he be trusted with paying our bills in the future? It was a game of high-stakes poker and I don't think the folks over at S&P much care for poker-playing with our national debt and deficit:)

Friends don't let friends blog stoned

2011-08-05T09:04:00.005-05:00

Are drugs good for you? Time to put the issue to bed once and for all. To all the pro-drug types out there I propose a simple experiment: post some type of acidblog, a potpost, a meth musing, a coke commentary, whatever and the rest of us will post our usual stuff and both groups will be judged on creativity, artistic edge, deeper knowledge of the issues and Life in general, the rare and unusual insight, that sort of thing. I mean drugs are supposed to enhance these things right? so hop to it. The drugged posts should be positively exploding with all of the above and then some, Starbursts for the mind and the straight blogs will be positively dull and uninspired by comparison. OK so when you're done gimme the keys to your computer.

Wasted time

2011-08-04T15:18:00.003-05:00

A co-worker and I were having this discussion last night. Take the most boring, unsatisfying and mundane job you can think of, fill in blank but we can start with armpit sniffer if you like and I said in a way it's tragic, those are lost hours of your life you can never get back to read a book, to watch a documentary on cheetahs, to go for a walk, to cultivate a friendship or any of a hundred other activities that give enjoyment and meaning to you personally. He thought for a moment and considered but then said "but you're getting paid for it." A strong logical point and I had to think for a minute. His is a common attitude, perhaps the prevailing one but dunno I said, I disagree. Since work is such a large part of our lives, such a huge chunk of Time really it should at least be satisfying and fulfilling on some level, have some overall Meaning. Now we all feel being stuck in a traffic jam is a perfect waste of time but let's say we got paid a little for it to take the edge off, to compensate us for the pain of our boredom and delay would it still be wasted time? My friend would obviously say no but I say yes it would still be since a traffic jam is not even remotely related to the meaning and purpose of Life. In Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged the motive power of Life is simply the joy of existence, that's good enough for me and by this standard being in a coma for ten years even if you're lucky enough to come out of it accounts for Time Lost and the Good Lord doesn't give those back unless there's some kind of holdover system into your next life. You'll often hear conservatives say that prisoners these days have the life. This is rather asinine and I have to say something about this. The prisoner's real sentence here is wasted time and I don't care if there's a gym involved and three square meals a day and cable tv, it's still prison. I would rather be at home at night watching that good cheetah documentary or reading a stimulating book or doing a challenging crossword puzzle and this is the short list because I'm somehow broadening my horizons, massaging my imagination, increasing my knowledge if only by increments whereas the totally nonfulfilling job takes important time away from doing this and far more besides and even taking into account the monetary consideration involved it's a total waste of my time although apparently not of my friend's and that's cool, to each his own as they say. If I could call this blog anything it's a kind of ongoing Manifesto of Life. They say you learn something new everyday. By my reckoning if you live to be 5oo you'll be a Genius:)

Joe Biden and the Tea Party Terrorists

2011-08-03T09:06:00.007-05:00

Originally this blog was taking shape as all the various ways critics, usually liberal ones invalidate those with whom they disagee by the use of the political pejorative "extremist." SHAW does this and neocon David Brooks of the New York Times does it as well and it's an argument from intimidation, a deliberate polemical device to curb free-flowing and robust intellectual, philosophical and political debate and its purpose is to circumscribe already shrinking respectable parameters of civic discourse and yes it's an attempt at thought control although I can't obviously impugn motives to everyone here. On my walk today the way this was shaping up in my mind though is why we worship moderation so much (seems kinda boring and bland to have this as your overall guiding life philosophy), why it's now considered the supreme political virtue and basically I want to know do we worship moderation in and of itself as a goal and an end or is it simply a technique, an important at times and pragmatic step towards the Larger Goals (the Reagan approach)? If it's the former what's the point? if it's the latter I can understand and there may be times that it makes eminent practical sense although I can imagine my idealist colleague soapie disagreeing. Used to be if the word extremist was bandied about everyone pretty much knew who everyone was talking about, those who oppose abortion and gay marriage for instance, narrow folks who were seen as being overly cramped on the social issues. NOW it means especially for liberals anyone whom the wielder of the term disagrees with. If you're for fiscal responsibility and government living within its means you're an extremist. If you're against higher taxes on the wealthy (and don't kid yourself on everyone else) as a way of dealing with the debt and deficit then you're an extremist and I can imagine the list expanding. It means whatever SHAW and Brooks and others want it to mean. For liberals and conservatives some things are just not for sale whereas moderates want to sell the whole house. Oh isn't Joe Biden charming btw, just had another brain fart:)

A kind of closet environmentalist

2011-08-02T09:05:00.012-05:00

Yesterday I took my long customary walk from Woodlands Lake in Ardsley, Westchester County NY all the way up to Rte. 119 in Elmsford figuring maybe the beavers moved downstream after all these years. When we were kids my Dad took us to Warehouse Lane in Elmsford off 9A where UPS is and where the Saw Mill River meanders its way through on its eventual destination in the Hudson River and we observed the local beaver population busy at work building their lodges and dams (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beaver). Now there's much more industry here, there's a Sam's Club where the drive-in theater used to be and Masters Department Store has been replaced by a huge multiplex showcasing the latest in Hollywood dreck. Warehouse Lane, home to a huge Coca-Cola plant, FedEx, Conway Freight, Nestle Foods (Poland Spring and Deer Park trucks parked outside), a tire and auto place and San-Mar Laboratories, the Elmsford Animal Shelter and other assorted places of business. Over down 9A a bit by where you get on 287 is a Romantic Depot, an overpriced porn hut. Browser packs, a clown fucking some fat woman or maybe that's Giggles. It kind of melds together in your mind after awhile in one big existential landfill but I mean at least strive for Art. Wendy's, KFC, Grainger's, Rosedale Nurseries more in Hawthorne where the Saw Mill is very picturesque here and quaint like something out of a jigsaw puzzle. If Rush lived here he'd probably think it's all good, a hustling and bustling area, good population and jobs galore but you'd think a beaver population would be special, a kind of nurtured and protected area. Do we have ANY sense of the environment anymore? Does that make me an environmental wacko? maybe in his book but I'm just someone who would like the Dads of today to be able to take their kids there and learn something about Nature, about this special rodent that had been so heavily and tragically decimated back in the day, to see something they don't teach in school anymore because they're too busy learning about the Gay Lifestyle instead. Been meaning to ask btw, Powerwalkers with their weird arm movements, what's that supposed to do for you?

I don't want to bore you with this stuff

2011-08-01T11:26:00.007-05:00

The New Debt Deal for Dummies

Nearly $3 trillion in spending cuts. The debt limit would be raised in two stages, a $900 billion increase now and a $1.5 trillion increase next year. Obama has a temporary authority to hike the debt limit without Congressional approval. The plan calls for at least $2.7 trillion in spending cuts over 10 years and also takes place in two steps: $1.2 trillion in cuts now and at least another $1.5 trillion in cuts to be named by a special bipartisan committee by Thanksgiving. If the Congress doesn't act on the suggested spending cuts by 12/23 automatic triggers go into effect to the tune of $1.5 trillion and we're talking sacred cows like the Pentagon and Medicare here. Reforming entitlements like Social Security, Medicaid and Medicare are on the table as well as the tax code. My thoughts: reminds me of Astronomy which I was interested in as a kid. A light-year is the distance light travels in one year moving along at about the rate of 186,000 miles/sec. and this galaxy and that star are so many light-years away from Us and then you get into the whole area of black holes and event horizons and when you seriously begin to ponder the whole thing boggles the Mind and so these #'s from the Guv'ment are hard to wrap around so how does the average yokel know if they're good or they're bad? All I knows is keep raising the debt ceiling as it will be again in 2013 and you begin to escape the field of gravity (i.e. fiscal responsibility and good governance), actually we've been in Orbit for some time now. I'm not gonna be like the other erudite bloggers out there and pretend I understand this stuff. The whole thing imo is just an intergalactic clusterfuck:)

contributions to the culture

2011-08-01T10:07:00.004-05:00

Hustler publisher Larry Flynt has offered Casey Anthony 500G on the barrelhead to pose nude plus 10% of all ensuing profits. Her lawyers of course have denied any negotiations have taken place. Apparently there be groups of men out there who want to see this stuff and said to Flynt go for it. Says Flynt: "so there may be some sick individuals...but that's what life's all about." Maybe she can make a sex tape with O.J.

And on the aggressive atheism front

2011-07-30T09:07:00.007-05:00

A group calling themselves American Atheists has filed a lawsuit trying to prevent the return of the steel beam cross that was found standing in the rubble of 9/11 to the new World Trade Center Memorial. They argue that the government is partially funding the project and the Cross is a religious symbol. The new memorial is set to open on the 10th anniversary of 9/11 (sans banos btw but that's a whole side issue). Mayor Bloomberg who always can be counted on to say the safe and nondisputable thing said on his weekly radio show on WOR that they have the right to sue. My take, by its very nature mourning is for so many people such an intensely spiritual and religious experience and this country has such strong religious underpinnings that goes all the way back to its Founding that only a bunch of Grinches with too much time on their hands and nothing better to do could do such a thing.

The Taconic Parkway Crash 2 years later

2011-07-29T09:46:00.006-05:00

The quickest recap: On 7/26/09 about 1:30PM on a Sunday afternoon 36-year old Diane Schuler was coming back from an upstate NY campground in Parksville and was driving a Ford minivan and wrongly entered an exit ramp on the Taconic State Parkway near Briarcliff Manor in Westchester County NY and then proceeded to drive south in the northbound lane at around 85MPH and hit head on three Yonkers residents in a Chevy Trailblazer killing them instantly. Diane died along with her 2-year old daughter as well as her three very young nieces who were all in the minivan at the time bringing the tragic death total to 7. Miraculously her 5-year old son Bryan survived the crash. A subsequent autopsy purportedly showed Diane Schuler was drunk and stoned at the time of the accident. There was recently a documentary about the crash on HBO called There's Something Wrong with Aunt Diane and the surviving husband, Daniel Schuler, has recently filed suit against New York State for poor signage on the Taconic and is also suing Warren Hance the brother-in-law and owner of the minivan Diane was driving. In turn the family of Michael and Guy Bastardi, two of the men killed in the other vehicle plan to sue the film company for upwards of $100,000 because they paid the husband. So that's pretty much the developments on the 2-year anniversary of the crash and here are my original thoughts at the time: http://not-the-left.blogspot.com/2009/08/contradictions-in-taconic-parkway.html and http://not-the-left.blogspot.com/2009/08/contradictions-in-taconic-parkway_20.html Question Everything:)

Rush, the Old Gray Lady and political masochism

2011-07-29T09:06:00.006-05:00

As a very occasional reader of Shaw's blog "Progressive Eruptions" the topic of Rush Limbaugh comes up ALOT. To be fair she mentions Rush's name about as much as conservatives talk about New York Times editorials. I get the sense liberals form a core listenership of Rush's radio show just like conservatives probably form a core readership of the Old Gray Lady, in fact they probably subscribe. The New York Post has an occasional feature called TimesWatch but does the NYT have a counter-section called PostWatch? (I'm watching you buddy) I don't get caught up in this stuff. I say this, both should be allowed to peacefully co-exist. A nonopining newspaper, oh how I yearn! Rush is like the Mick Jagger of our national political discussion, I may occasionally tune in but there's newer stuff out there:)

The gutting of the 9/11 Zadroga Act

2011-07-28T09:14:00.006-05:00

First responders who may have gotten cancer on that fateful day are not covered under the $2.7 billion compensation fund. Federal doc John Howard, director of the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health says in a new study he can't seem to come up with a cancer/9-11 toxins in the air kind of link. Well that's one way to cut spending. Ya gotta do what ya gotta do in these financially apocalyptic times but makes you wonder why they wanna raise the debt ceiling and yet they won't cover these brave men and women. C'mon, not even a trickle of a trillion? By the time they finally get the bill right most of the ailing 9/11 heroes will be dead or maybe that's the whole point. Maybe this is one of the rationing aspects of Obamacare we're seeing but I wouldn't want to be accused of making another hate statement.

Pro-Choice = Pro-Abortion

2011-07-28T09:10:00.007-05:00

Is this another Hate Statement? Why is it when you get close to the Truth of the Matter you're accused of making a hate statement? So nobody in the abortion clinic, not the doctor or the woman or the boyfriend or any member of the nursing staff or a counselor or the janitor is really for what is taking place? Everybody is morally sleepwalking through the entire procedure? It's a surreal conclusion.

Don't bother hiring the jobless

2011-07-27T09:02:00.003-05:00

In the interest of political fairness this has to be talked about although I don't know how much weight to give it as a factor in our current unemployment rate of 9.2%. I've been reading of late and hearing in the news that many companies make a very conscious decision to not hire the unemployed. There is truth to this as I remember many many years ago being out of work for 3 or 5 months, I don't remember the gap exactly and at the very outset of my job interview for an industrial supply company the interviewer practically zeroed in on solely that it seemed and it rather offended me and I didn't get the job even though I was obviously looking for work. The demand that your Life be perfect, well guess what in most cases it's not. In my case I think it was simply the gaps to be embellished later (freelance photography anyone?) as in my youthful idealism once the bs on a job became too much to bear I simply moved on. Don't do that anymore in order to stabilize my life which doesn't seem healthy either 'cause then you just put up with crap on a daily basis. I would imagine even in some cases there could be depressive issues in a person's life and that could explain some gaps but then you have the mental stigma thing ("hey Clifford's nuts")......Never liked it that on practically all job applications these days after each job you list and describe there is a box exclusively reserved for Reason for Leaving. Well I would hazard a guess that in many cases the person leaves for reasons of being pissed off (fill in your own reason(s) here) and imo it's none of their G-d business. They're trying to build some kind of psychological profile on you and if you're honest you'll probably remain jobless ("geez I see here he's some kind of a malcontent, didn't like some of his co-workers") and the way things are going in the news these days if you don't come across as the overly happy and cheesy type they might figure someday you might shoot up the place, just on the off-chance ya know? Now your beefs may be perfectly legitimate but that's not the point. Bottom line is there is a definite and strong form of corporate judgementalism at work here, the perfection-mongers (let's go over their lives with a fine toothcomb shall we). Bottom line is we won't hire you, take a chance. Better that you live in a cardboard box underneath the overpass. BTW here's a few bucks for booze, cigars and porn:)

Obama's State of the Apocalypse

2011-07-26T09:01:00.008-05:00

Though it was a rather brief speech Obamawise I was furiously scribbling down notes in my little pad. The Debt Crisis - A Special Address. The speech and the president were utterly predictable, I could've written it. He hates capitalism but through a polemical sleight-of-mind cast himself as a compromiser and a moderate. Basically he is holding a resolution to the debt crisis hostage so he can punish the Rich so unwavering is that principle for him. If no deal is reached he said America will lose its AAA credit rating. Another point - two wars (that he continued btw) and a prescription drug plan added greatly to our national debt. SS checks and Veteran's Bennies are now in jeopardy, interest rates will rise on car loans and mortgages and credit cards (what, they're not high already on the credit cards?) and we won't be able to pay for Medicaid and Medicare. The whole address was peppered with the classic key words and phrases of Class Warfare. 98& of Americans who make under 250G as a household would see no tax increases (250G being the threshold I guess for being considered a millionaire these days) and he had to get in about corporate jet owners and oil companies his favorite mantra of late. Boehner's approach to extend the debt ceiling for 6 more months won't solve the problem and basically there are two approaches he said. First drastically cut spending without any revenue (read: tax increases), the Republican plan and two Our Way which is to close all those tax breaks and loopholes for the rich (one of David Brooks' favorite talking points). It's not fair he said that the wealthiest Americans and Corporations not contribute anything at all here (what, they haven't paid Taxes up until now?) and what we need is a balanced approach to reducing the debt and deficit (i.e. those tax increases again which Republicans are deadset against). He invoked Ronald Reagan 2X saying Reagan himself raised the debt ceiling 18X (he likes the Gipper when it suits him and Abe Lincoln too). Kicking the can down the road, he likes that one. Congress has one week left to act and it's a dangerous game we're playing. Yeah we have the challenges of entitlements and tax reform to consider. "Compromise has become a dirty word." If only he practiced it. Let's put Politics aside for God's sake!!! Then House Speaker John Boehner spoke. He's all for cutting and capping government spending which will eventually lead to a balanced budget amendment. We got a health care bill nobody wanted and Obama wants the largest increase ever in the debt ceiling after the largest spending binge in History. The Boehner Plan would cut spending by $1 trilion. So stimulate my stimulus. We now return you to Masterchef already in progress:)

The DSK maid's media blitz

2011-07-25T11:17:00.007-05:00

She is finally speaking out and now we know the identity of the 32-year old West African immigrant and hotel maid who has accused former IMF Chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn of sexually attacking her in Room 2806 at the Sofitel Hotel in Manhattan on a Saturday May the 14th. Her name is Nafissatou Diallo and she has given exclusive interviews to ABC News and Newsweek magazine. She told Robin Roberts of ABC News "I want justice. I want to see him go to jail." BTW folks misuse this term jail an awful lot these days and back in the day when my Korean friend was going to law school I was browsing through one of his textbooks and the place jail is generally for holding people no longer than a year for those convicted of misdemeanors or as a temporary holding place. The more accurate term to use here is prison and is reserved for those convicted of a felony or felonies, anything over a year but it's a common enough mistake. OK so Ms. Diallo has acknowledged she made some mistakes in what she told prosecutors early on and dramatically reenacted aspects of the alleged attack by kneeling on the floor at one point when DSK allegedly forced her to perform oral sex. The other interview, the Newsweek exclusive scoop was conducted by Editor-in-Chief Tina Brown (name rings a bell), Paris Bureau Chief Christopher Dickey and News Director John Solomon. Both the ABC interview and the Newsweek interview were conducted at the 5th Avenue offices of her attorneys Kenneth Thompson and Douglas Wigdor. She has come clean about lying about an earlier rape in Guinea on her asylum application (not good) so her young daughter would not be genitally mutilated the way she had been, misled on an application for low-income housing (eh) and filed an inaccurate tax return (neither here nor there imo). DSK lawyers William Taylor and Benjamin Brafman said in a statement about her media blitz "its obvious purpose is to inflame public opinion against a defendant in a pending criminal case." Some thoughts: it is unusual for a victim of an alleged crime of this nature to engage in a media campaign, granted and the other aspect is was international political pressure brought to bear on Manhattan DA Cy Vance Jr.? "I want him to know there are some places you cannot use your power, you cannot use your money." Oh yes did I mention there's a civil suit coming up.

Thoughts on Amy Winehouse

2011-07-25T09:35:00.007-05:00

She joins a rather growing list known as the Club of 27, young and talented musicians who tragically died at that age: Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Jim Morrison and Kurt Cobain. When I first came across the news the other day it was sad of course but not in the least bit surprising. When I first heard the iconic hit "Rehab" on the air I thought she was a black singer, soulful and bluesy and full of those R&B vibes 'til somebody at work told me who she was. Crack cocaine, you're a millionaire, you're white and living in London and this is your drug of choice? I threw out my "Back to Black" CD yesterday, just a waste. Word on the street is Charlie Sheen's a methhead, pretty soon I'll be blogging about him. Amy Winehouse (1983-2011), RIP.

The tragedy in Oslo

2011-07-25T09:12:00.008-05:00

It is now just coming to light that the 32-year old man Anders Behring Breivik wanted to target ex-PM of Norway Gro Harlem Brundtland who led 3 Labor Party governments in the 80's and 90's and is known as the "mother of the nation." All told 76 people tragically lost their lives last Friday and after bombing Oslo, Norway's capital Breivik gunned down scores of Labor Party youths on the island of Utoya. Apparently he left alot and I mean alot of online rants, manifestos on the Web filled with hateful and violent and extremist rhetoric which begs the question with such a lengthy cybertrail were authorities asleep at the switch? I mean how could he do what he did, was nobody keeping tabs on the guy? Well now we know Breivik is some kind of right-wing fanatic motivated by anti-immigrant and anti-Muslim sentiment and according to Liberal Theory there exists some kind of mysterious, mystical connection between all right-wing groups. In other words we are all guilty, somehow implicated, Palin/Bachmann so please Curb your Free Speech. Breivik wanted to spark some kind of Crusade and transformation over there, prevent "cultural Marxism" and Islamism from taking over Europe. Expect liberals to make hay and politicize Tragedy here:)

The Good Ole Summertime

2011-07-23T14:27:00.006-05:00

Yesterday it was 104 degrees in Central Park a record for July the 22nd. There was no major power outages to my knowledge but you dread them just the same this time of year Crank up the temps and folks naturally crank up the AC units then naturally blame Con Ed when the power grid can't handle it and they don't fix it in a timely enough fashion as in NOW. People today don't want any discomfort, no more that shared sense of sacrifice for the greater good and gone is the day of the Fan you used to see in those old black & white film noir detective movies with the gumshoe's feet on the cluttered desk and the old and tired dog in the corner. Now I'm not against the AC, I'm not against Progress by any stretch and schools, stores and most especially hospitals need it this time of year. The elderly and the sick are most at risk during a heatwave but what about the Rest of Us? Ceiling fans, there ya go! What if most of us opted to use a fan in order to reduce the chances of the next major blackout? just a thought. Think of how much you can save on your next electric bill. Anyway there's a definite difference between 90 and 100 and yesterday even just going to your car or sitting on your porch reading the paper was like being on Venus. It's hard on the pets but they know what to do, take it easy. We haven't even gotten to the dog days of August yet, oy vey!

The GOP field is giving me a migraine

2011-07-22T09:04:00.003-05:00

I've decided to hold off on doing the usual, blogging about the ever-growing GOP field for president and so we get ten different conservative bloggers going with ten different conservative candidates but something tells me we'll be talking alot about Michele Bachmann in the near future. BTW how are President Obama's bowel movements?

You don't have to have Sex

2011-07-21T09:25:00.008-05:00

Kinda doing a 2-a-day blog now 'cause there's alot of Crap in the news lately but ran across this, one of those irritating blurbs you read in the morning paper with your coffee and cruller. Some liberal task force wants birth control for women covered in the new federal health care law. Now the title of this thread is simply a logical point as to why this should not be the case. It is not anti-sex, I don't care if you're hanging from the chandelier but it should not be covered. It's not gonna make or break you, it's not like your blood pressure meds or your Nuvigil. Here's what gets me though, this at a time when the federal government is seriously supposed to be looking at ways to cut spending, to get the debt and deficit under control. Look, if I wanna go to CVS or Rite-Aid and buy a pack of Trojans (are men covered here btw?) that's my business, I don't expect for you to pick up the tab. What if a woman is into alot of men, I mean a real Holland Tunnel or are only the married covered? Having an erect penis inside your vagina is not medically necessary as far as health care is concerned IMHO:)

The dietary clueless

2011-07-21T09:06:00.004-05:00

The unrelenting weirdness that is Society. If a Woman has the right over her own Body don't I have the same right over mine to lose weight? If a woman can kill her fetus I say she can take the garbage up at work and get the truck too. Folks continue to ask me how I shed the pounds. Even the more positive ones bother me, I'm tired of these people. Look if you don't already know a protein shake is supposed to replace a meal, that you're not supposed to dip Chips Ahoy in them I can't help you. If you can't figure out on your own that if you exercise first and then have your meal later you'll burn more fat then don't talk to me (if you're absolutely starving before your hardcore workout then have something lite). If you and your family went out to Gianni's as part of some new cultural trendoid of funereal protocol and you all had your bowls of pasta and your bread dipped in olive oil and your tiramisu and your wine and your ales all because your beloved aunt got eaten by a mountain lion then don't act mystified and bewildered because I'm the thinner one. If you're all proud of yourself because once in a blue moon you went on a 6-8 mile walk but you don't do this everyday and then you hit Barnes & Noble because IT still ain't coming off you've made a mystery out of something that is not the least bit mysterious. Am I bothering anyone?

The thought occured

2011-07-20T10:33:00.007-05:00

I made an OJ joke the other day and the black guy made a good point, "if Casey is innocent then OJ is innocent too." Now we are taught that no matter how a jury decides in controversial and high-profile cases we should respect their decisions. The system worked and other nostrums. Fine but if we accept juries' decisions then how come nobody is out actively searching for the real killers? in fact nobody seems to care. You can't have it both ways, if jury verdicts represent some kind of philosophical truth, legal realities then everybody needs to start these now open cases over again and ferret out the true perps and bring 'em to justice. Imagine that, the killers of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman and of little Caylee are still walking the streets!!! On the other hand if you concede as I do that juries are frequently just plain stupid and don't follow instructions then there really is no problem, no intellectual inconsistency to speak of. Do ya know what I'm sayin'? Just another exhibit in why Conventional Wisdom is so often wrong:)

I need a pill for the pill for the pill for the pill......

2011-07-20T09:16:00.002-05:00

Shift Work (Sleep) Disorder or SWSD, from Wiki: "SWSD is a circadian rhythm sleep disorder characterized by insomnia and excessive sleepiness affecting people whose work hours are scheduled during the typical sleep period. There are numerous shift work schedules and they may be permanent, intermittent or rotating; consequently the manifestations of SWSD are quite variable." BUT there's good news, there's NUVIGIL!!! Nuvigil may cause side effects like, oh I don't know a serious rash or a serious allergic reaction that may affect parts of your body such as your liver or blood cells which may result in hospitalization and be life-threatening. A skin rash, hives, sores in the mouth, blisters, swelling, peeling or yellowing of the skin or eyes, trouble swallowing or breathing, dark urine or fever. Then there are the serious sides: mental (psychiatric) symptoms such as depression, anxiety, sensing things that are not really there, mania, suicidal thoughts, aggression or other mental problems. Symptoms of a heart problem including chest pain, abnormal heartbeat and trouble breathing. Some of the more common sides include headache, nausea, dizziness and trouble sleeping, you know the usual. Why not deal with the Original Problem instead of twenty myriad other ones?

Will liberals continue to use the race card?

2011-07-19T09:04:00.004-05:00

Proba-blee. Now by any objective standard Obama's first term has been more than a bit of a dud, even the alleged bin Laden slay doesn't seem to have any staying power. The nub of the matter, Obama is not a good president. Conventional political wisdom says people vote mainly on the economy, economy still ain't doing so good and the jobless rate is up to 9.2% with only 18,000 new jobs added for the whole month of June. I don't care if the guy is black, white or polka-dot you can't vote for the guy. The Obamanauts will though and they'll make a whole racial thing about it but how can I in good conscience vote for a black Jimmy Carter? Obama doesn't suck because he's a black guy, he's a black guy who happens to suck. He made History though, duly noted for the Almanac:)

The lack of a life perspective

2011-07-18T14:42:00.009-05:00

This never ceases to amaze me that so many people don't know what's ultimately important and what's not. The Jamaican chef told me once that on the day of 9/11 a woman was going to buy one of those rotisserie chickens and went on and on about how greasy the bird was and this after the planes went into the buildings (on ANY other day ok ya know?). Many years ago went to work at a deli job in the evening and was training a new girl so I decided to forego my lunch 1/2 and the next day the woman who was kind of in charge (there's always one of them, everybody's a manager) said to me Wally wants to know why you didn't take a lunch last night, actually that'd be a dinner. I became rather uncivil at that point and explained to her that I just came back from the hospital where my Dad just underwent rather major surgery, not on the level of open bypass but certainly a life distraction for me and I said to her to be perfectly forward about it I really don't care about this niggling work rule so write me up and it kind of shut her up. You wanna know why this country's so fat? It's because we never miss an opportunity for a meal. I've witnessed this with my own eyes once, actually on more than one occasion, this indissoluble connection between Death and Food. Woman at work gets a call on her cell for example with some rather tragic and unexpected news. Someone near and dear to her died suddenly, well before his time and in his prime and after the initial shock phase wears off, say three or four hours or so it's "ok give me two lbs. of roast beef and a lb. of Genoa and a 1/2 of..." for making the obligatory cold cut platter. Truth be told when a loved one passes I'd rather go for a long walk by myself to kinda sort things out, nobody's starving. Watched bits and pieces of Ordinary People last night and the Donald Sutherland character I could most closely relate to. The tragic death of their young son Buck tears the family apart and in one scene the father goes to the wife who are increasingly estranged at this point and goes why was it so important to you what I wore to our son's funeral? I chose the blue shirt instead of the white one but IT WAS BUCK'S FUNERAL! This everyday obsession with the mundane and the trivial and the utterly unimportant especially in the workplace, I'm not getting this one. Perhaps it anchors us, objectifies things for us, keeps us on the regular plane away from the scary and the unpleasant and the messy to keep us from going crazy. I say it is crazy:)

8/2/11 is the new Y2K

2011-07-18T14:35:00.003-05:00

To hear Obama and the Democrats (and Shaw) talk. Peggy Noonan is right, why can't the issue of taxes be separated from the issue of spending and be hashed out at a later date? Can't screw the rich be dealt with another day? Government needs to go on a diet and yet raising the debt ceiling yet again will be like putting off your diet for the umpteenth time. The case could be made the other way around that constantly raising the debt ceiling will lead to a worldwide financial crisis and as my friend once said maybe we need a Chinese boot up our ass.