I Really Got Nothin'

Barrel-Bottom Time At The End Of All Things

 Obligatory Demonstration Of Mongo Baking System

It's cold, in a relative way for America's Left Coast, and we tend to stay indoors. While shuffling through stuff with my nose, looking for something that will light up the Speak, Memory module in One Dog's Brain, I happened across the liveblogged Republican Response to Pestident Obama's January 2015 STFU speech.

It has a particular odor -- aged now, like a nice Vache (a raw-milk cheese wheel which, if improperly ripened, will fucking kill you), and seemed very apropos of Things, here at the Dawn of Trumplandia, the End of the Beginning, and the Beginning of The End.

One of the things I enjoy about liveblogging the STFU speech (boy; can't wait for the one we're gonna hear in January of 2018; can you?) is the opportunity to do some stream-of-consciousness that contains Teh Funny. Always the Funny, because otherwise we'd never stop screaming.

So Gobblez you, and Gobbelz 'th United States of 'Murrika; we're here for the rest of the year. Be like the Monkey Man and grope your waitress, or at least Tweet everyone about how it's your right to do so, and that everyone should prepare for a go-back to 1950 and just, you know, lighten up. Fascism's not so bad; there's just a lot of repetition.

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The Liveblogged Rethug Response

Joanie Ernst (R - Tea Parteish): On The Importance Of Being Ernst

Rather than respond to the President, I'm going to say in a Chamber Of Commerce way how great the Republican Congress is and the Republican Congress feels your pain in that little way it does, and let me tell you about that small town in Iowa, where I worked construction and was raised to be in the Republican Congress.

You see, when growing up, I wore bags on my shoes along with young Iowans who worked hard, and many families today feel they're working harder and getting less of those bags. We see the hurt, in the Republican Congress -- in cancelled health care plans and everyone more fearful. And less bags. America is hurting -- but when the Republican Congress demanded, there were failed plans like Obamacare.

The Republican Congress will make Congress function again. We want the Keystone "Jobs" bill -- the President, despite being wrong, hasn't done it. It will have minimal environmental damage. Will he sign a bill, or block good American jobs? Let's go over there to Eurp so the Republican Congress can boost simplified tax codes for the well-connected -- flat tax!  Flat tax! Tax the rich even less and all boats will rise, all bags will float!

Obligatory Cute Small Animal Photo In Middle Of Blog Whatever

We're calling on the President now in the Republican Congress. Some of it will occur where I stand tonight, in my Republican cloth coat, mispronouncing 'Al Qaeda', and our hearts can only imagine the two decades I spent in the Iowa National Garde. The innocent are not comprehensive in the Republican Congress.

Bonus Marchers must be prevented by the Republican Congress. The Republican Congress will address things and mail them to unknown places so no one will ever see them again. We will replace a healthcare law that has hurt so many HMOs. We'll do everything! We'll defend and protect because we in the Republican Congress measure our society with coffee-spoons.

America faces big challenges, but look at my parents, who had dirt to call their own. They sacrificed -- and now I am here, truly extraordinary. You just need the freedom to dream big and hard work -- the Republican Congress will do that dirt, with little help from the President. And I can't shut up, I must go on about this great nation and it's veterans and women and the Republican Congress. Thank you thank you thank you.

Republican Congress. You elected us (Smiles).

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MEHR, MIT ERBRECHEN:  

(Reuters; December 9, 2016, via TomClarkBlog) President-elect Donald Trump's Energy Department transition team sent the agency a memo this week asking for the names of people who have worked on climate change and the professional society memberships of lab workers, alarming employees and advisors.The memo sent to the Energy Department on Tuesday and seen by Reuters on Friday, contains 74 questions including a request for a list of all department employees and contractors who attended the annual global climate talks hosted by the United Nations within the last five years.
 
It asked for a list of all department employees or contractors who have attended any meetings on the social cost of carbon, a measurement that federal agencies use to weigh the costs and benefits of new energy and environment regulations. It also asked for all publications written by employees at the department's 17 national laboratories for the past three years.
 
"This feels like the first draft of an eventual political enemies list," said a Department of Energy employee, who asked not to be identified because he feared a reprisal by the Trump transition team.
 
"When Donald Trump said he wanted to drain the swamp it apparently was just to make room for witch hunts and it's starting here at the DOE and our 17 national labs," the employee said.
 
Trump transition team officials declined to comment on the memo...

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What's Goin' On

Oh, what's goin' on
(What's  goin' on)
Yeah, what's  goin' on;
Oh, what's  goin' on
-- Marvin Gaye / "What's  Goin' On" (1971)

My public service is jury duty.

Why -- is something special happening today ?

After You've Gone

America, Again: A Long Rant

Cleaning Up After Cleveland (Andreas Kudacki, July 22, 2016; nymag.com)

The Republicans have left Cleveland. There's little doubt that can-do Managers, the Owners and Choosers and Deciders, and the Belivers, were in control at the RNC, as they seem to be in control in so many places in our culture. Because Life is for The Strong, and the Tough, and the Competitive.  And those with The Faith.

You Worker Bees, you "individual contributors" will just have to pull yourselves up by your own bootstraps. We will be Great again, and have Law and Order -- here in Merica -- or, you know, not. Thank everyone for coming!

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Two Tales Of The City

Yesterday, I exited a subway car heading home from work at rush hour, turned right, and walked up a crowded concourse. There was a wall to my immediate left and knots of other exiting passengers to my right. Suddenly, I was face to face with a Caucasian male in his mid-20's, tall -- I'm well over six feet; this guy was at least three inches taller -- thin, hair cut close on the sides and in the middle puffed up in a modified Mohawk strip (as if he had, uh, a Weasel On His Head).

What followed was textbook; each movement was an escalation. First, we looked -- no, we stared --at each other. Neither of us gave way. Even though by then there was plenty of room around us, we each moved forward and slid past each other, equally determined not to make it simple and as if daring the other party to ratchet things up. Our arms inevitably brushed against each other, and we both pulled them away like yanking off a band-aid.

I had walked a step or two, and turned; he was already walking back. I stood where I was; he stopped inches from me. "You want some?" he said. I was surprised, but not that much; I was aware that ratcheting up the confrontation was my fault as well as his: They fought so fiercely because the stakes were so small. So, here we were and Quo Vadis?

Over the next second or so, I had two trains of thought. The first was something from another job life -- when an altercation turns into a confrontation, and the next step is physical violence, that's not optimal. Keeping public order means, even if you have a disregard for your own well-being, other people, innocent people, can get hurt. Your Macho takes a back seat.

The other consideration was -- this Guy. It was clear he was willing to make a physical threat to a complete stranger, standing on a public transport platform during rush hour and In These Times, when there are transit system police around -- I'd seen a K-9 patrol up ahead a few seconds before. I looked at the Guy, careful not to lean forward or move my hands, and made an Are you fucking kidding me? face. "Really?" I asked him.

"Really," he said -- and leaned forward. Without moving, I said, "Excuse Me."  Leaning forward a bit more, determined to count coup, he said, "Excuse me. Have a nice day." Even without hearing his tone of voice, you can decide whether or not he meant it.

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Fast forward to this afternoon: A bus in Kiddietown; another Caucasian guy in his twenties -- this one short and slight, casually dressed, otherwise unremarkable -- drops a few papers as he enters the bus, and begins cursing -- shouting, in fact; and it's quickly clear he's inordinately upset about something which does not involve the bus, or anyone on it.

He stomps toward the back of the bus, drops into a seat, and for the next block or so periodically shouts more curses, slapping the seat beside him. Almost everyone else on the bus goes into You Are A Nutter And We Will Now Ignore You mode -- but, The Guy gets into it verbally with two Black males sitting behind him. Predictably, it escalates quickly.

"Hey!" Says the first man to The Guy, "Leave me alone. Shutthefuck up, man!"  "Fuck you man!!" shouts The Guy. "I'll kick your fuckin' ass!!" The second man, who has a voice like James Earl Jones and is happy to project it, joins in: "Hey; I ain't takin' that fuckin' bullshit off you, so just shut - the - fuck - up!!"

The Guy braces himself in his seat and, with a real sense of timing, waits for a beat and then leans forward, staring at the two men, his face distorted with rage. "Fuck you!!" he shouts, then adds, "You, you -- N_____ !!"

A hush falls over the entire bus, more felt than heard -- because He said the N-word to two Black guys and we live in post Furgeson-Cleveland-Baltimore-Chicago-Mineapolis-et al. America -- and I'm thinking: man, wasn't I just here yesterday?

Meanwhile, the James Earl Jones Soundalike both increases the volume and lowers the pitch of his voice to a growl, another textbook stop on the road to This Is Really Fucked Up. The Guy keeps shouting, a slight hesitancy in his voice now, as if understanding he'd crossed The Fabled Line when using the n-word a block or so back. The two Black guys keep raising their voices in response.

Obligatory Mongo Photo In Middle Of Blog Terror

It's clear the confrontation has reached a binary decision point, and several other passengers call out to the driver, a Latino with a wrestler's build wearing Ray-Bans, to "do something".  He doesn't, right away; I understand -- 1.) Things can happen, all of them unpleasant by degrees; 2.) His Management supervisor and Union Foreman have advised there are liability issues; and  3.) "They don't pay me enough for this shit, dude".

The driver finally comes to an official bus stop, halts the vehicle, then stands up, leans on a nearby pole and looks toward the altercation (all non-threatening, casual). "Hey -- hey; take it outside," he says to no one in particular, then appeals to reason and some generally-accepted social propriety: "Not on the bus, man."

After a few seconds, when things could have gone in any direction, The Guy stands up and exits by the side door, shouting insults at the other men all the way. The men return them -- but it's all textbook now; The Guy has been the one to retreat.

Once he's off and the doors close, the bus begins to pull away. As it does, from the relative safety of Outside, The Guy performs another textbook maneuver: he begins screaming, ratcheting up his invective ("Fuck you! N_____!! You N_____!!") and slaps the side of the bus.  JEJ-2, looking through the bus windows, grins and flips him off; The Guy seems even more enraged and escalates again ("I'll kill you, N_____ motherfucker!!"), but it's all for show, now, and everyone knows it. JEJ-2 grins once more and shouts, "Yeah; talk on, fuckhead"-- counting coup, also textbook.

A woman in her twenties at the front of the bus, holding a Prada purse and wearing a print sun dress, a Rolex and her own Ray-Bans, looked around at the other passengers and said with a giggle, "Well, that was rully intense!" The remainder of the ride, by comparison, was uneventful.

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The Brand, As If Anyone Had Forgotten

(Carolyn Kaster / AP; The Atlantic online)

Jocks And Mean Girls Rule

So why mention these things? (Dogs like stories, and are good at the details.)  Because they exemplify a miserable trend in the broader culture; because I can't remember the last time I was in a confrontation (even one I helped create), as a civilian, which had real potential to become physically violent. And some of it mirrors what was on stage in Cleveland.

I'm part of an American demographic that doesn't encounter much real violence or intimidation, or police activity, on a regular basis. Mentioning my experiences to my friends prompted their own stories of confrontation and escalation. The general consensus:  these altercations seem to happen more frequently, now --- and, they've increased over at least the past decade.

Most often, they happen when driving, shopping, and (bingo) commuting on mass transit. However, the most disturbing aspect to my friends is how easily things escalate: people seem more willing to push situations, which could easily be walked away from, right to the brink where real violence is possible.

Official studies show the same trends, nationally, and in the same areas of social interaction. A quick check of the ubiquitous Gogglemachine will show the same observations, the same consensus by multiple observers. It doesn't have to involve complete strangers. My experiences, and those of friends, involving bullying by managers in the workplace has also increased in the past decade.

 Obligatory Cute Small Animal Photo In Middle Of Blog Rant

A few months ago, I'd called a manager of a national group about help in a project; he spent ten profanity-packed minutes accusing me of complaining about him to a vendor, crudely bullying me in any way he could.

This person has a reputation; I wasn't so surprised -- but I hadn't experienced him in that way, and I was knocked off balance. My responses -- interrupted constantly -- were factual; at some point, this person realized he was wrong in his accusations -- and like flipping a light switch, suddenly he sounded friendly, reasonable, behaving as if the previous ten minutes hadn't happened.

We both knew what he'd done -- and we both knew that even if I were to complain, because this person is labeled an "effective manager"; "he gets results"; there would be no repercussions.  I have a number of similar stories about other managers, and executives; so do my friends who work in corporate businesses, even 'cool' tech companies with "new" working cultures -- and they're all depressingly the same.

These sorts of person are narcissistic, possibly sociopaths. They're certainly bullies -- and know that they are.  They've found a niche in society which not only tolerates manipulation and mistreatment of other human beings, but rewards and promotes it. For them, it's a point of pride -- after all, they get results. And that's all that matters.

Weeks before he was assassinated, John F. Kennedy observed that one measure of a nation is through the individuals it upholds as heroes, worthy of emulation.  Over the past few decades in America, the people we are told to venerate, our Best, are the Business Leaders. They're supposed to be what we should want our children to grow up to become.

I don't think we'd want to leave our children alone with them for thirty seconds. But the promise of wealth and success through a life spent in corporate business is what our children are being told is the highest expression of our culture, and the behaviors of these 'leaders' are what they need to adopt in order to reach that wealth, success and self-fulfillment.

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A long time ago, a cartoon posed the question, "What was the result of America's experience in Vietnam, and the attendant politics at home?" The correct answer was, "A deterioration of secular and spiritual priorities!" American culture is fraying badly under the weight of too many changes -- just the last ten include mass shootings, terrorism; The Crash; media outlets (Murdoch; Limbaugh, Wiener, Beck; O'Reilly) dumping human waste on our culture, 24-7.  Our 'entertainment' almost universally involves violence.

The real wonder is that people aren't more uncivil to each other, or that overtime parking doesn't invoke the death sentence.

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Trump: A Symptom 

This week we watched (some of) the antics at the Republican Convention, the Trump campaign's themes delivered by most of the speakers -- except Grand Turtlebear Greg Stillson, and Herr Doktor Carson, Exorcist and Fearless Vampire Killer, who seemed to have additional messages of hope and faith and eternal punishment in the fire the fire the fire for us all. And, of course, we heard The Donald.

 Additional Obligatory Animal Photo

There was nothing new in what he said Thursday night (though its delivery was less his trademark stream-of-consciousness) -- but I found myself asking How the hell did we come to this? That this stupid bully became their candidate??  It was as if someone had reanimated Fr. Charles Coughlin from the 1930's, George Wallace of the 1960's, or even George Lincoln Rockwell.  Trump appeared no different or better than any of the narcissistic bullies I've worked with or for in my lifetime. One difference between his campaign and Hillary's -- Trump says that he speaks for the angry Americans, the ones who want to "take it all back".

His campaign depends on tapping the kind of inchoate rage that we see or experience on the street, or at work. If Trump were to win, it would mean a period of social and political dislocation in America which no one in memory has experienced. I could make a joke about a similarity with H.P. Lovecraft's return of Chtulu and the Old Ones, but in fact nobody knows where it would all lead.

That said, I still believe Trump can't win. If how a person uses language is a good gauge of how they conceptualize and navigate the world, then Trump is too scattered and impulsive -- my Dog's nose tells me he can't run an effective team, and won't run a good ground game.  And, there aren't enough of his brand of conservative to go to the polls for him on November 8th. He can't win by sheer weight of numbers. He'll lose.

But, this contest will be played in the media as a close race. The assumption of office by President Hillary, The Inevitable One, will seem so very close (until the numbers come in) -- and Her victory will provide the consistency of a certain narrative about our history, a return to normal.

But Hillary is about the values of Business, too. When Hillary trotted out Tim Kane as her Veep, he spoke to a crowd and said, "America has never been about fear... it's been about bravery, and imagination, and doing whatever it takes to get the job done! [applause]." Hillary described him as "a Progressive who believes in getting the job done" (Emphasis in the original delivery).

Additional Obligatory Stimpy Face Photo

It's my expectation Hillary will assist in wiring America into a global system which will free business and banking from being responsible to the laws of individual nations -- environmental regulations; banking laws, trade laws. It will be an advantage capitalism has never had in history, making corporate business the single most important human activity. And it will continue the stratification of society, globally, into corporate Managers -- and everyone else, who will work for them, to earn money to buy products and services.

We'll still continue to be told a comforting narrative -- about America's uniqueness, independence and values, and it's place in the world. Frankly, Hillary's narrative is just a little softer than Trump's story of American greatness; only the wrapper is different. But to global Business, America is just one more place with resources and a population that can be bought, one more market where things can be sold.  We can play our pretend politics, so long as we don't get in the way of the grownups, managing large-scale operations for profit.

________________________________

Without belaboring the obvious, it isn't surprising that so many people (including myself) are acting like badly-wired rats. The post-WW2 world's politics, ideologies, technologies; its commerce and wealth, all made major shifts in just one generation. 

There had been a Cold War, and the possibility of a hot one, but also stability -- many regional players and ideologies (including those religious) were kept in check by the East-versus-West balance of power. No more. 

It's been decades of pressure; the cycles of change happen more quickly, and the world appears to be changing in unpredictable ways. The trends being presented by these changes appear to indicate that the world is a Box Full Of Bad Crazy, Looking For A Way Out. And that The Fix Is In.

People are frightened about the future, and fear can easily flip into anger. Most people have some unresolved conflicts; others have years of badly-wired resentments and painful memories; still more have PTSD  (thanks for the War, Lil' Boots!). This election season will be something to watch (I'd buy the Good Popcorn, but don't fire it up just yet) but the presidency of Hillary The Inevitable will not provide America what it needs to heal itself. I don't think even Ted Cruz and Benny Carson's jesus™ could do that.

Try not to piss anyone off in public.

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Cleveland: Where The Hot Wind Blows

Greg Stillson Unchained

Greg Stillson, Crazy Idiot Loser Unsuccessful Republican Candidate,

Shares His Private Aspirations At The RNC In Cleveland (Photo: CheeseStar)

Grand TurtleBear Greg Stillson of the Church Of I Kill You !! was unsuccessful against Il Duce in the 'Race To The Bottom' primary contests. Little Greg, accompanied by his wife, Irgrud, promised their supporters smaller government, that Lloyd Blankfein would be made secretary of the Treasury; a written guarantee signed by the lord and savior (well, somebody's lord 'n savior, anyway) that they would be transported to heaven "at a date and time of their own choosing";  and, that they "shall taste man-flesh!"
 

 Loser's Night: Greg And Dashboard Jesus Appeared
Before The Multi 'Tudes

None of it worked. Trumpo was too powerful. He had big hands. Greg had a big big sad, because the lord of Hostess© did not live in his pants. The night ended in terror and shame, and the Grand TurtleBear blubbered like a five-year-old, accompanied by his close campaign advisor, Dashboard Jesus -- who made meaningless Who's Awesome? You're Awesome gestures to the multitudes while firing random spitwads at them.

As a consolation prize, Greg was offered an opportunity to speak to the Republican convention, with an understanding that in the name of party unity, Greg would stay on his meds (400mg of Thorazine every 4 hours) and endorse the apotheosis of Trumpo, Clown-Emperor of Dealdom.

Greg was sly. He palmed his meds. He smiled, slyly. He walked to the podium, smiled again his trademark sly smile that says, Take it from me: the earth is 6,500 years old; and I am One Of Youuuuuu!! Then he delivered a speech.  In the process, he showed his pudgy, cheese-dimpled butt to all America and the world, the teevee broadcasting these images to as yet unknown alien races in galaxies not yet catalogued, for all time.  When these aliens see it, they will seek us out and eradicate all life on our planet. Because Freedom.

We may not have gotten it all down exactly, but we're pretty sure Greg said something like this.  Or he wanted to, really bad.

Thank you. Irgrud and I are honored by Lebron James tonight. And as I'm convinced America is going, I congratulate Donald, right over there (nods), on taking the nomination..

Conventions are excrement. But you'll listen to me before we burn you at the stake for your apostasy in not allowing me -- me -- to fulfill my destiny before god and my pants.

Just a while ago, a carefree Texas summer was destroyed by my loss of primaries to Mister Trump, over there (points). On that day I was martyred, Irgrud hugged me and said we still had friends at Goldman, wink, wink. But I had been murdered. I was in tears. How could anything ever be OK again? I feel things that happen to me deeply. To ME!

Then I had the chance to come here and force you ungrateful, spiteful, stupid agents of Satan to listen, to me. Me! ME!! And as I thought about what I wanted to say tonight, it's that we live in a world where lives are destroyed by evil, just as mine was. Not that you care.

Maybe it is because of a simple yet powerful idea: freedom from is greater than freedom to. And, were I the leader of this great Nation, all America would know that from Day One.

I want everything I've ever seen in the movies. I want to make you love me, and to love Jesus too when you have time, though I would keep you busy. Never has that message been  needed more than today. You owed me that. You all owed me so much.

Of course, Clinton, and Trump over there, will tell you I am crazy. Crazy! Me! Well, they don't know about my visions -- visions for the future. They don't know my dreams. They would run screaming in fear and pain and awe, if they could but see what I have in my pants. God is there. Let me show you.  [Exposes hind parts] Thank you.

Hillary Clinton deals heroin and has a house full of children to service her. It's true! And all dictated out of Washington. But something powerful is happening. Voters are rejecting cement lawn gnomes. They are symbols of Satan, of government, of a corrupt system that benefits the elites, instead of working girls and Feed Lot maintenance personnel.

I tried to tell you. I deserve so much. And you could have given it to me. America put a man on the moon. Surely you could have given me this, but no. No!

You deserve leaders who cast aside principle, and untie us behind a Principal. Who have anger for love. That is the standard you should expect -- punishment, and secret forbidden love, and television Jesus. No less.

And to those listening, please, don't go and do things in your kitchens where you think I can't see you. I know you stay home to do them, but you are wrong. And bad. And badly wrong. You must be punished, but you will learn to love the rope.

We must make the most of our moment. We must sieze and choke and drive and shave. To fight for me was to fight for freedom, to protect your god-given right to acknowledge me. Me! And I give those I love one final lingering deep kiss goodbye, with tongue. As I curse all those who were foul betrayers, I will say, "I am something beautiful".

Thanks. And bless me. You had your chance, but you fucked it up !!  Now you're going to get almost a decade of She Who Must Not Be Named, when you could have had ME !!!

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Time Of The Weasel

Get Out The Popcorn And The Amarlite

The Weasel Who Lives On Trump's Head 

Speaks At The Republican Convention, Cleveland (Photo: CheeseStar)

________________________

MEHR, MIT EIN ANDEREN (Actual Conversation):

MVOHC: Watching  any of the Republican  convention ?

DOG: Some.

MVOHC: So?

DOG: It's not Triumph Of The Will, is it?

MVOHC: What's that?

DOG: Uh.... I  gotta do stuff.

Actually, my favorite part of this quadrennial gathering of the Parteigenossen (so far) was Little Ben Carson's speech last night. It's really amazing how full of hate this person is, so much so that he's barely recognizable as a person.

...I’m not politically correct. And I hate political correctness because it’s antithetical to the founding principles of this country and the secular progressives use it to make people sit down and shut up while they change everything. It’s time for us to stand up and shout out about what we believe in.

...We must resist the temptation to take the easy way out and to passively accept what is fed to us by the political elite and the media because they don’t know what they’re talking about and they have an agenda.

...Interestingly enough... Hillary Clinton ...would continue with a system that denigrates the education of our young people, puts them in a place where they’re never going to be able to get a job, where they’re always going to be dependent and where they can therefore be cultivated for their votes...

One of the things that I have learned about Hillary Clinton is that one of her heroes, her mentors... is Saul Alinsky... He wrote a book called “Rules For Radicals”. On the dedication page, it acknowledges Lucifer, "the original radical who gained his own kingdom". Now think about that. This is a nation where ... our Pledge of Allegiance says we are “one nation, under God”. This is a nation where every coin in our pocket and every bill in our wallet says “In God We Trust”. So are we willing to elect someone as president who has as their role model somebody who acknowledges Lucifer? Think about that.

The secular progressive agenda is antithetical to the principles of the founding of this nation. If we continue to allow them to take god out of our lives, god will remove himself from us, we will not be blessed and our nation will go down the tubes and we will be responsible for that. We don’t want that to happen.

...It is not about me. It is about we, the people, and Thomas Jefferson said that we would reach this point, because we the people would not be paying attention, and it would allow the government to grow, to expand, and to metastasize and to try to rule us. But he said before we turn into something else, we the people would recognize what was going on, what we were about to lose, and we would rise up and we would take control of our nation and I say now is the time for us to rise up and take America back. 

 And that's Jenga.

_______________________________ 

Reprint Heaven: Welcome To Target

Because Freedom

(Because we think there's a problem.  From June 11, 2015.)

(Photo By Mongo + Android / Photoshop)

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Because This You Must Know

Wherein We Call Auntie Em Like We See Auntie Em

We Scare Share Because We Care

Courtesy of The Soul Of America, this Faux Campaign image appeared in a slightly different guise at EyeOfTheStorm blog, where cheese fills the void created by a sudden avoidance of law enforcement, in the service of all sentient beings. Tasty, too.

We here at Before Nine (all three of the people who read it, and the Superintelligent Parakeet) thought it "buried the needle" on the Droll-o-Meter, and summed up my own general feelings about one of the two major Democratic Party candydates for Pestident. Thought we'd pass it along.

I haven't said much about the Democratic campaign to become candydate, except to give a nod to Senator Sanders' effort. He says things that makes my Ancient Lefty's Heart™ rise, while at the same time I slump in Dog Abjectness because I know he's a foil and part of the Potemkin Village backdrop to the Kabuki theatre play that is national politics.

Hillary's campaign I acknowledge only because, distastefully, I have to -- summed up in my description of her as Hillary The Inevitable !

How inevitable?  If you watched Charlie Rose yesterday on CBS (he's got air time as occasional anchor of that network's 'Evening News', in addition to his regular gig on PBS with the syndicated Charlie Rose Show), then you saw Chukalicious go after Bernie with a meat cleaver on the national Tube. How far she'll go and how she'll enlist surrogates to do it for her was obvious. 

CHARLIE ROSE: We also asked Senator Sanders why he said Secretary Clinton should apologize to the families of Americans killed in the Iraq War. And he addressed why negative attacks between the two of them have intensified. [To Sanders.] The tenor of this campaign has changed when you're questioning the qualification of a person to be president. Whether their questioning your qualifications, which they say they haven't.
BERNIE SANDERS: All I'm saying—
ROSE: — or you’re questioning their qualifications?
SANDERS: You're right. You’re right. Okay? But what I want to say is when I see the headlines, “Clinton questions whether Sanders is qualified to be president,” you know what? We are going to respond.
ROSE: But don't you owe it to yourself and those people who may vote for you to know more than simply look at a headline? You looked at a headline and then responded questioning her qualifications.
SANDERS: Oh, Charlie, it's not a question of a headline. Here, something else. I mean, after we won in Wisconsin, I think the Clinton campaign —  that was our sixth victory in seven states. I think what they have said publicly is the tenor is going to change. They are going to go much more negative on us and they have. That's the fact.
ROSE: Take a listen to this. This is what you said. You said that Clinton should apologize for Iraq war deaths. Do you really —
SANDERS: For what?
ROSE: For Iraqi war deaths.
SANDERS: This is after I was asked to apologize for the tragedy in Sandy Hook. You know, put these things in the context.
ROSE: But, again, it's tit for tat.
SANDERS: It is tit for tat but I, you know, responding to attacks being made against me.
ROSE: I'm asking where the tenor of this campaign is going and is that going too far to say she bears responsibility for Iraqi war deaths?
SANDERS: Do I bear responsibility for the tragedy for the horrors of Sandy Hook? So, you know, let's get off that. Of course, she didn't bear responsibility. She voted for the war in Iraq. That was a very bad vote in my view. Do I hold her accountable? No.

American media seems to describe Sanders' campaign in dismissive terms, like a Gene McCarthy Children's Crusade (if that name confuses you, ask your parents or grandparents if they Got Clean For Gene). He's cast as the scrappy old man, tilting at windmills, offering Pie-In-The-Sky Socialist boilerplate -- and he's facing Hillary Rodham Clinton.  

However, please note -- the media is doing the same thing to Herr Trumpo. Not that the press savages Bernie in the same way they've gone after the Donald, but the similarities are enough to ponder. Not that we should weep big Crocodile tears for Trumpo; but a pattern of dismissive, Old-Man-Sanders-Got-No-Chance articles and 'Opinion' pieces, and talking head commentary on teevee is remarkable. 

But, of course; Hillary; beyond doubt:  She Is The Inevitable One, her time Come Round At Last, after being so cruelly shut out by Herr Obama eight years ago.  Eventually, Bernie will give up. Won't he? She is The Inevitable; can't he see that? Stupid Old Man.

Apparently, no. And he seems to be garnering votes from people who find Hillary ! distasteful (and, gosh -- even if this weren't an electoral process led, and paid for, by the interests of The Few, why would people do that?).  

She Who Comes At Last doesn't like this. So now, after Wisconsin, she went after the Old Man --  only, she's careful not to do it personally.  Charlie (who fluffs a lot of Very Bad People by softballing interviews with them) volunteered to be the hired dildo for that job.

Over at Soul Of America, the Knez of Egoslavia has mentioned his encounters with a Hillaryite Colleague (HC) in their workplace -- which I reproduce here, more or less in order and more or less in unfettered glory because I agree, and because the Superintelligent Parakeet told me to:

... my anti-Clinton is not pro-Sanders - I will not be crossing the street to vote for Sanders on April 26, nor do I advocate his candidacy. My interest in Sanders is based on my anti-Clintonism, anti-Democratic Partyism, the fuckers, and how Sanders makes Hillaryite Colleagues angry.

HC said, when did you become a Sanders' advocate? ... I'm not, I said, Sanders is a tool too, just answer the question. HC said, it depends on whether Biden entered the race. Me: >> Affectless stare <<  Fuck you, said HC. 

>> Affectless stare <<, nice, said my Hillaryite Colleague over a pint earlier in the evening. Sorry about my tone, I said. Fuck you, said HC. Look, I said, I am making an effort to not let things Clinton does that every politician does piss me off more with Clinton than it does with the others. You yourself said you didn't think Clinton should be held to a higher standard than anyone else. Fuck you, said HC.

My only real commentary about Bernie and Hillary ! on the Intertubes has been posted elsewhere -- in particular, dialogue from a running commentary with my own HC at my own workingplace. Reproducing it here (at least) satisfies the Parakeet, whom I do not want to make angry:

... I like Bernie's rhetoric, but he won't become the candidate of the DNC. It will be Hillary, the Business-As-Usual, stiff as a waterboard in public, the Faux Friend of the People. I'd be all right with a Bernie Presidency -- but the idea of Hillary and Oily Billy back in Der Weissen Haus frightens me, because **she claims to be a thing when she is in fact some other Thing**, and deep in our guts we all of us know it.

I don't want Trumpo; his election to Leader is not impossible, just not likely. To rapturously want Hillary as the Inevitable Fate of Murrika is to engage in Cognitive Dissonance on a scale so huge as to be incomprehensible. So I... agree -- not crossing the street to vote for Bernie = 'anti-Clintonism, anti-Democratic Partyism, the fuckers, and how Sanders makes Hillaryite Colleagues angry'.

Here at The Place Of Witless Labor™, my own conversation with my very own Hillaryite.

HILLCOL:- Hey; lookit this (brandishes copy of USA TODAY)
DOG: Oh; this is the part where Mrs. Clinton asks Senator Sanders how he would break up large financial institutions?
HILLCOL: What'dya mean, 'The part where'?
DOG: What Mrs. Clinton implies in her question is, Senator Sanders' intentions are nonsensical -- that JPMorgan-Chase, BofA, Wells-Fargo, Citigroup, Goldman-Sachs and Morgan-Stanley CAN'T be broken up, because they're too powerful. Or they shouldn't be broken up. Because Freedom.
HILLCOL: She's not sayin' that.
DOG: By inference, she's declaring the Senator's position on American investment banks to be illogical, specious, and too radical.
HILLCOL: (Pause) What?
DOG: [Affectless Stare]
HILLCOL: Sanders is just stupid.
DOG: [More Of Same]
HILLCOL: Fuck you. You think you're so smart. It's people like you who'll get Trump elected.
DOG: (Pauses; licks self)

Re: Bernie and Progressivism, "Oooo, That's A Bingo!" Making a similar point with my very own Hillcol this morning (that The Fix Is In and the Game Is Rigged), they were confused. They thought I was some kind of diehard Bernie person.

DOG: No. I think the political and financial system is bent and irredeemably corrupt. Bernie gets up and criticizes it because he's allowed to. He's allowed on stage because he makes Hillary look reasonable and centrist.
HILLCOL: (Pause) So you don't like Sanders either?
DOG: It's not about 'liking'. National elections are orchestrated to celebrate and perpetuate myths about society. It's really about how certain people are allowed to be candidates -- and the winner has a limited amount of power. Ask yourself: what are the myths? Who does the allowing? Who benefits, and how?
HILCOLL: But Clinton is a progressive. She's a *woman*, for god's sake. Is that why you don't like her?
DOG: You're missing my point.
HILCOLL: No I'm not. You're gonna throw your vote away. You're gonna get Trump elected.
DOG: I'd tell you that, on one level, it doesn't matter whether Trump or Clinton, or Sanders or Cruz, or Kasich or Elmer Fudd gets elected -- but I think that would blow your circuitry.
HILLCOL: What the fuck are you talking about?
DOG: Bingo.

And that's Jenga.

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MEHR: ES KOMMT AUS 2008:

As "Tough Hillary" emerges, this -- true now, as it was in The Olden Days.

 (Mr Fish, 2008)

Stranger Danger

UK View:  Can't Look; Can't Look Away

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MEHR, MIT SALZ:  Courtesy of the blog on the other side of the mirror, there is no better proof of the state of the Republican party and right-wing politics in America than that offered by the cultural sinkhole mutant zone devolving state of consciousness Texas (where --and this, a local joke -- the Cockroach is the state bird): 

"When you drive away all the reasonable people from your party," we are told, "you end up with Trump and the head of the Republican party in Travis County, Texas... [a state where] The lowest common denominator is very, very low."

The newly elected chair of the Republican Party in the county that includes the Texas Capitol spent most of election night tweeting about former Gov. Rick Perry’s sexual orientation and former President Bill Clinton’s penis, and insisting that members of the Bush family should be in jail.

He also found time to call Hillary Clinton an “angry bull dyke” and accuse his county vice chair of betraying the values of the Republican Party ...

... Morrow’s main complaint is with “establishment” Republicans, who he does not believe should hold elected office, he said. Last week, he tweeted that the Republican National Committee was just a “gay foam party.”

 

Morrow has a long history of critiquing prominent state Republicans in vulgar, and often sexually explicit, terms...

... Travis County GOP...vice chair Matt Mackowiak [is] apoplectic. Mackowiak, a Republican strategist, immediately announced over social media that he would do everything in his power to remove Morrow from office... “I’m treating this as a coup and as a hostile takeover.”

“Tell them they can go fuck themselves,” Morrow told the Tribune.

The post concludes with a straight shot at what the emergence of Trump means, politically and culturally -- that in many places, America is much like Yeats' poem; A Box Full Of Bad Crazy That's Looking For A Way Out:

There will be many more mini-Trumps and Trump rallies just as there were many tea party rallies. The gun nuts and militia movement will join with them; the white nationalists already have.

Even if the right manages to take down Trump it is too late to take down his followers. The right has been stoking the fears and resentments of their base for decades and now they are seeing the result of their labors. They thought they could milk the followers forever without consequence. They were wrong.

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UND JETZT:  Gilding the Lily, or proving the point Susan from Texas made (via Reuters):

One of Donald Trump’s sons appeared along with a white supremacist while giving an interview on a conservative radio show, adding to concerns that the front-runner in the battle to be the Republican candidate in November’s presidential election is willing to accept support from extremist supporters.

Donald Trump Jr., who is actively campaigning for his father, gave an interview on Tuesday on "Liberty Roundtable," a conservative Utah-based radio show...

During the show he was questioned by ... another radio host whose show "The Political Cesspool" is described by the Southern Poverty Law Center, a leading U.S. civil rights group, as "racist and anti-Semitic."

During the interview, conducted over the telephone, Trump Jr. talked about what a good father Donald Trump was and how his campaign is changing the Republican Party.

“It’s not a campaign anymore, it’s a movement,” he told his interviewers.

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At Night They Dream Of Robot Nixon

Reepub Leakin'

Forget Donnyboy. Ignore Crazy Moose Lady and Greg Stillson. Put Randy Paul, Carly Cruella, Big Chris, Little Marky, Jebby !  and the rest of the Thug Boat Rat Pack on the Back Burner.

Real Americans™ respond to two -- and only two -- true candidates for the Republican Presidential nomination: The Zombified Ronald Rayguns, and Robot Nixon.

Real Americans™ want a leader who will Restore America without resorting to laborious steam-cleaning methods, use of smelly chemicals, or compromises with cheese-eating Surrender Monkeys abroad and Fifth Columnists here at home. Or as Crazy Moose Lady said on Monday, “How about the rest of us? Right-winging, bitter-clinging, proud clingers of our guns, our God, and our religion, and our Constitution.”

Yes; Murragh In Cans want a leader who is undead -- or, bound to a robot body so as to stomp our many, many enemies flat.  As the poet says, Well, and then /  funny, ha ha, not funny / but now what they’re doing is wailing / Trump and his Trumpeters / not conservative enough. Zombie Rayguns and Robot Nixon will give Merrycow back its Gravitas and its full-service gas stations, where the Beefalo roam.

 They just know it to be true; so they will be coming, to a Primary state near you:  Vote early, and often.  Any questions, call Fat Karl.  He has The math.  A-roo.

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MEHR, MIT OBLIGATORISCH FOTO, VON NETTISCH KLEINE TIER:

Hoo Hoo Hoo; Es ist Natürlichkeit! Click Here To See More About This Little Guy. 

Don't Forget To Bring Your Personal Injury Attorney. 

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Greg Stillson Neglects To Report Campaign 'Loan'

Doing God's Will (Well, Somebody's God, Anyway)

The New York Times reports that Greg Stillson (R - Canada), candydate for the Republican nomination as Empty Suit Front Man For The Owner Class™, has hidden failed to report as much as a $500K 'loan' arranged by the investment firm, Goldman-Sachs, which may have found its way into the coffers of his previous campaign for the U.S. Senate, raising questions about Stillson's ethics in seeking higher office.

Mr. Stillson's wife, Ilse, is employed by Goldman-Sachs as a Squid Wrangler, but is currently on leave to act as a helpmeet for her husband. 

A giant, speaking toad spokesperson for the Stillson For Leader campaign admitted that the loan from Goldman Sachs (drawn against the value of an investment account the Stillsons have with that firm), was a source of money for Stillson's race for the Senate in his current breeding ground in the Mutant Zone state of Texas.  "We had some media issues that had to be addressed," the spokesperson said.

However, failure to report the Goldman Sachs loan (for as much as $500,000) was “just one of those things,” the spokesperson said, adding that corrected reports would be filed, "and no one cares about this anyway. You should be getting right with god before you besmirch the beatific nature of the representative of Our Savior On Earth."  

There were, the spokesperson added, no attempts to hide anything. "But we will remember you who asked these trivial questions --  and on that great day when the Senator becomes Leader, those who are not pleasing in his sight shall be made to tremble."

Photo Of Stillson As A Child Preacher In His Native Canada

Mr. Stillson, a conservative former lay preacher and Amway distributor, campaigned for his Senate seat (the Times noted) "as a populist firebrand who criticized Wall Street bailouts and the influence of big banks in Washington. It is a theme he has carried into his bid for the Republican nomination for president."

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Welcome To Target

Because Freedom

(Photo By Mongo + Android / Photoshop)

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Taliban

Someone Else Today. You Tomorrow.

This bill is not about discrimination... [the purpose of the legislation] is very simply to empower individuals when they believe that actions of government impinge on their constitutional First Amendment freedom of religion... 
-- Indiana Governor Mark Pence, to ABC's George Stephanopolis

SB 101: Religious freedom restoration. Prohibits a governmental entity from substantially burdening a person's exercise of religion, even if the burden results from a rule of general applicability, unless the governmental entity can demonstrate that the burden: (1) is in furtherance of a compelling governmental interest; and (2) is the least restrictive means of furthering the compelling governmental interest... Specifies that the religious freedom law applies to the implementation or application of a law regardless of whether the state or any other governmental entity or official is a party to a proceeding ... Prohibits a governmental entity from substantially burdening a person's exercise of religion, even if the burden results from a rule of general applicability... Specifies that the religious freedom law applies to the implementation or application of a law regardless of whether the state or any other governmental entity or official is a party to a proceeding implementing or applying the law. Prohibits an applicant, employee, or former employee from pursuing certain causes of action against a private employer... (The RFRA, per the Indiana General Assembly)

I had intended to post a long rant on the perfidy and outright evil which characterize right-wing evangelism in America, but we'll just take those items as a given.

SB 101 isn't the first law passed in even recent memory allowing a minority in political control to enshrine their intolerance with the force of legislation -- in this case, evangelical christians (with a small "c") and their god-given (well, somebody's god, anyway) right to condemn -- in this case, LGBT Americans. And evangelicals love to condemn; being a True Believer seems to gives them the authority to do that, filled with Grace™ and love (and something else) as they are.



And our right-wing evangelicals want to be the dominant authority -- over women, over children, over education and art and sexuality. Our evangelicals, like the Taliban, would like to enact their own version of religious law in America -- and religious law is not about uplifting and empowering the human spirit; it's based on Thou Shalt Not.

Religious law of whatever flavor is based on the fundamental precept that Humans are bad, stained from birth with evil, who must be carefully watched by the Elders and restricted from committing more acts which The Elders believe are affronts against (somebody's) god.

And (as is always true in less democratic forms of governing), the force of religious law always rests on ultimate punishment. Those who break these laws are whipped and disfigured, have parts of their bodies crudely amputated; are tortured until they confess their crimes; are stoned to death, beheaded, or burned at the stake. And the entire community will be made to watch, or may be required to participate in a ritualized killing... as a religious requirement. As an object lesson.

And nations ruled by True Believers and their edicts -- religious, or political -- always become bankrupt cultures; shabby, frightening, and ultimately murderous places.  Ask the Muslims of Serbia and Croatia. Ask the Tutsis of Rawanda. Ask the people of Cambodia. Ask the people of Afghanistan. Ask the Jews of Europe.

(A Dog has a long memory:  The last member of my family had been a born-again evangelical; for a time, they were associated with a tiny sect, organized around a self-proclaimed 'pastor'. After a long illness, my family member died; at the funeral, I watched the 'pastor' turn what was a moment of grief and remembrance into his opportunity to tell a captive audience, at length, that their time on earth was short and everyone in earshot and beyond was hellbound and they'd better get right with the lord.

(He shouted and strutted; he preened -- a True Believer in full, in love with the power that act of condemnation gave him. Of passing judgement, and settling scores. I've found some of him in every individual I've seen or experienced since who claims to be 'moved' by an allegedly higher power. And the so-called "laws" associated with whatever freakshow delusion they're pushing which allow them to do pretty much whatever they want. Yes, they'll make fine leaders of America, or whatever they'll call their New Kingdom.

(Ask the members of the People's Temple at Jonestown. Ask the Branch Davidians at Waco. You might even ask the members of 'christian' congregations across America, listening to speeches made by their 'pastors' condemning other people as less than human and feeling such putrescent drivel is not only just fine but righteous.) 

SB101 is not the last legislation of its kind that we'll see passed in America. And if an evangelical christian ever becomes President of the United States, we will see many more. The United States is, in the eyes of many, the country where political apathy is king; perhaps that's so.

If it is, then God help us all. In our torpor, ultimately we may find ourselves ruled by the same kind of strutting, egotistical monsters that a real pastor, Martin Niemöller, had in mind when he made the oft-quoted observation:

First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out, because I was not a Socialist. Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out, because I was not a Trade Unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out, because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak out. --  Pastor Martin Niemöller (1892–1984)

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MEHR, MIT "ES GENUG IST !":

(Reuters) - Indiana's Republican Governor Mike Pence, responding to national outrage over the state's new Religious Freedom Restoration Act, said on Tuesday he will "fix" it to make clear businesses cannot use it to deny services to same-sex couples.

Pence, in a news conference, said the law he signed last week had been widely mischaracterized and "smeared" but he called on the state's Republican-controlled General Assembly to send a new law to his desk this week to fix it...

But Pence found support from conservatives including Republican presidential hopeful Ted Cruz and possible presidential contenders Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio...

Critics say Indiana's law went too far in potentially allowing businesses to deny services to gay couples, because they could argue that doing so went against their deeply held beliefs.

Same-sex marriage became legal in Indiana under an appeals court ruling last year.

Religious Freedom Acts in Georgia and North Carolina appeared to stall this week after Indiana came under fire. But the Arkansas House of Representatives is expected to approve this week an RFRA that has already passed the state's Senate.

Greg Stillson For President

I Saw The News Today Oh Boy

   Sen. Ted Cruz; June 6, 2014  (Photo: Texas Tribune / Bob Daemmrich)

Martin Sheen As Greg Stillson In The Film Adaptation Of King's The Dead Zone (1983)

We've all seen the news.  Yesterday, Senator Ted Cruz of Canada the Soverign Nation Republic State of Texas announced that he was running for the Republican party's nomination as its candidate for President in the 2016 election. He said many things, and repeated the word "imagine" many times.

As I watched him speaking in a number of film clips on mainstream news, I was suddenly reminded of a character in contemporary writing and film -- Greg Stillson, in Stephen King's The Dead Zone.  If you've seen the 1983 film (possibly the best screen adaptation of any of King's books), then you've seen Martin Sheen playing the role of a local politician in Maine, a Huey Long-style populist who runs for Senator -- very much what would pass for a Tea Partei candidate today.

Stillson says he believes in America, and Values -- oh, and the truth, so long as he agreed with it. And, outwardly a confident and canny politician, King's character was written as an evangelical, too -- and very much convinced that it was his destiny to become President and Do God's Will (well; the will of somebody's god, anyway).

But the truth was that inwardly, Stillson was altogether not all he seemed -- and whatever it was people were voting for when they looked at him, what they got was very different.

Stillson is introduced in the novel at the beginning of the book as a struggling traveling salesman for a Bible-printing company ... During a stop at a house in rural Iowa, Stillson is attacked by the absent homeowners' dog and, enraged, sprays ammonia in the animal's eyes before beating it to death. As he drives away, Stillson comes to the realization that he is destined for greatness. (Stephen King Wiki)  

It is possible the truth is, in the long, oily wake of the Scalia Court's decision in Citizens United, that America's elections are now the property of people like the Koch brothers, Addled Sheldon, and Little Rupert? Just another thing to be purchased. Because they can. Because Freedom.

But, maybe not. Maybe that's not the truth. Maybe elections might be the last place where, when casting a vote, we are in fact all equal and anything is possible. The truth? We have a moral obligation to work against ignorance and malevolence, or we will get the leaders we deserve.

The truth, too, is that King's novel and the film it's based on are just that -- fiction. In the real world, people like the Senator from Canada Texas are all too present a reality, and using the political process (such as it is) we should work pretty damn hard to ensure he or anyone like him, if they receive the nomination of any party, will be defeated at the polls.

 I'd suggest going here and adding your name, and even spending a few dollars. And yes, this will be on the final.

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Sandy Hook

Observations By Others

 (Photo: AP, via The New York Times)

There are no real words for what happened in Connecticut, yesterday. There is plenty to say about how it happened.

I overheard someone at work (a classic gun nut owner who believes Negros persons of color will overrun his part of the planet) observing that "this [presumably, massacres committed by unstable individuals with firearms] is the new normal".

On PBS' The News Hour, a professional psychologist asked to comment said (and I'm paraphrasing) that "It's important to say... this kind of tragedy doesn't happen every day... that schools really are safe places."

I reject the first comment. The second remark made me think: This fellow doesn't go to many Inner City schools, then -- massacres with 27 dead don't happen every day, that's true; but there are shooting incidents, and kids packing, and metal detectors, and education occurring against a solid backdrop of poverty and violence, every day. 

The psychologist on News Hour was, I thought, trying to suggest themes parents might pass on to reassure their children (Don't worry, Timmy; It Can't Happen Here) -- that planes can crash, but the odds of going down in one, or having one crash on top of you, are hugely in your favor. And largely, that is true.

But planes do crash. Ships sink. Trains collide and buses plunge. Whenever that does happen, there are NTSB investigations, reconstructions and root-cause analyses. There are discussions with engineers and manufacturers about what to do to lessen the chances such a tragedy doesn't happen again.

Only in cases like Sandy Hook does our national debate begin and end with, "Guns don't kill people; the people using them do". And that's it -- Pilot Error, essentially, is the public finding; and any other meme is just filler in the media. That, and people repeating, "It doesn't happen every day." 

I'm sure that fact is a comfort to the extended families of twenty children, who died because they were shot with high-powered handguns. Twenty children.

I grew up around guns. I've owned firearms; at various times because I was required to carry them, but afterwards had no sane reason to keep them. I don't want them in my home.

We live in a world of high anxiety, and there are persons who want to exploit those feelings of danger, threat, and imminent disaster:  Gun manufacturers, and their lobby, the NRA, are at the top of the list.  Mike Huckabee and the rest of his fellow Xtian evangelical ilk; there are 2012 World-Enders, predicting massive earthquakes and crustal displacement and 'coastal events', and ultimately few survivors.

There are White Power fascists, and Survivalists, and the people who manufacture and sell them freeze-dried food and plans for bunkers to shield against the EMP bursts from North Korean-launched warheads, detonating high above the USA.

What happened in Sandy Hook yesterday has happened before -- in Columbine, in Denver; In Virginia; in a mall in Seattle last week; at a Dairy Queen in the Northwest. There may not be massacres, but annually there are many multiple-victim, firearm homicides in America.

And they will keep happening, until something changes about how firearm ownership and possession is discussed, and regulated, in this country. 

The debate is not about Operator Error.  It's not about something that happened "over there" in another city or state. It's about twenty dead children.

Along those lines are two, other very pertinent observations -- one, a part of the discussion at TPM Prime (Subscription Required):

Memekiller:  ...for me, it's all about the NRA. I'm anti-NRA, not guns, and am offended by the strangle-hold they have over our politics. And I'm angry that Democrats have ceded the issue, only to have the NRA, if anything, put twice as much effort into unseating Democrats and Obama who, if anything, loosened rules on guns ...

... And the gun culture the NRA fosters... Would the prevalence of guns be as frightening without the culture of paranoia and conspiracies they perpetuate? It's not just about freedom to own a gun. The NRA culture is a cult of xenophobia and insanity. They don't seem to be aiming their message at responsible gun owners so much as the disgruntled and those prone to paranoia. They are less about developing an advocacy group than they are about assembling a well-armed militia of the mentally unstable.  

And the other, at The Great Curmudgeon :

Broken

Our discourse, that is. Fortunately, we have DDay trying to repair it.

Just to pick at random, here are a couple headlines at the Hartford Courant site just from the past 24 hours: Woman Shot, Man Dead After Standoff In Rocky Hill. Armed Robbery At Hartford Bank, Two In Custody.It’s not that school shootings like this are abnormal. They are depressingly normal. The fact that there were no shootings in one day in New York City recently was seen as a major achievement, which shows you how desensitized we have become to gun violence as a normal occurrence of daily life.Just a reminder. The NRA is an industry lobby for the gun industry. The industry that makes consumer products largely designed to kill people.  Not deer. Not rabbits.

People.   

by Jay Ackroyd (@jayackroyd)

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