Love Yourself

Hoping she can stick it out and become the "next Sara Bareilles" (as she mentions in one interview I heard)

All About That Bass (Accoustic) --Meghan Trainor

Today's Question

It seems we have a problem in this country with radicalized cops.  

So I'm wondering - where are the moderate cops, and why aren't they standing up in protest against the extremists in their midst?

Connecting Dots

When we stop caring for each other, it's not long before we stop caring about each other.

From truthout:

There is more at stake here than manufactured ignorance and an unconscionable flight from the truth. There is also a dangerous escape from justice, morality and the most basic principles central to a democratic society. The celebration of brutality, spectacles of violence and the affirmation of torture suggests that in a market-driven society with its unchecked individualism, sheer Darwinism and refusal to think about social costs or, for that matter, any notion of the public good, the addiction to cruelty, violence and torture becomes less difficult and almost too easy. In the age of disposability and despicable gaps in wealth, income and power, modern terror becomes normalized and points to the onslaught of a mode of totalitarianism that is more than an ephemeral moment in history. Violence is no longer marginal to American life; it is the foundation that now drives it.

Winter Song

Winter Song / White Winter Hymnal --Sil'Hooettes and The Virginia Gentlemen (UVa)

Today's Tune

My Traveling Star --James Taylor

Today's Pix

Part And Parcel

You're a woman who did a coupla shots with me at the bar, and you flirted with me and you  were dressed in a sexy-time way - which forced me to rape you.

You're a random brown person who committed a minor civil offense and then you disrespected my authority as a police officer - which forced me to kill you.

You're a herdsman living in Afghanistan; you're a Muslim, and you got sold to the CIA in 2002 for about $1000 because your goats got into your neighbor's garden one day in 1995 and you never really fessed up, and he'd held a grudge against you that whole time; but we'll disregard everything after the part about you being an Afghani Muslim - which forced me to torture you.

You're just a regular somebody who can't see his way clear to buy into a religion that requires blind unreasoning obedience to a lord - which forces that lord to condemn you to torment and suffering for a thousand eternities.

You've got nobody to blame but yourself.  You had it comin'.  You shouldn't have been in the wrong place at the wrong time.  You sent yourself to hell.

It's more than a little weird that the people who're constantly demanding that everybody take personal responsibility for everything that goes on in own their lives are the same people who can't quite think their way thru to the point where they have to own their responsibility for having raped or murdered or tortured somebody.

If I can get you to believe absurdities, I can get you to commit atrocities.

The Lites (fixed)

Where's The Plan, Stan?

The More Things Change

I was all for NAFTA back in the day because I was all for Bill Clinton, because Clinton was my kinda Republican, and he was doin' it right for the right reasons, and blah bah blah.

I was a fuckin' idiot for it.



(hat tip = Democratic Underground)

Ya think Crime-nibus was bad?  Ya think Defense Authorization was bad?  Ya think any of it was good?  Hold on to your hats.

Now maybe I'm just being paranoid (I hope so, actually), but because we've heard for the last few years about how the number of American manufacturing jobs has been going up (aka: Happy Talk; aka: Smoke Up Yer Skirt; aka: Bullshit), plus the fact that we're gearing up for this Trans-Pacific Partnership thingie; I think there's room to speculate on some possible connections.

Obama can strong-arm Wall Street a little by telling them he'll stop defending them against the obvious fact popular sentiment that they're all crooks, ie: "you guys have to make a good show of it by putting up some jobs in key places and key sectors; then we can invite the inference that NAFTA wasn't all that bad, and we can link the not-so-bad canard to TPP; we can leave certain sections of the tax codes unenforced; and then once TPP is approved, you can hit the tax-goodies-buffet again by writing off all the costs of those USA jobs, and get another break when you outsource those jobs to Vietnam.  It's a pretty good deal, and all you need to do is funnel enough Campaign 'Donations' in to the right races so we can make it look close and interesting so the Press Poodles can keep talking about it in breathless tones of anticipation and drama, which makes for some very good Advertising Revenue, which makes for a nice kickback scheme for more nice fat campaign contributions; all of which we must perpetuate so we can go on pretending we live in a democracy".  And that ain't all - not by half.

BTW - the Bureau of Labor Statistics (beginning Feb 2015) will start parsing out Jobs-For-Asians numbers and Jobs-For-Latinos numbers in its monthly report.  I wonder if there's any potential for shenanigans in that(?)

I really do hope I'm wrong here, but I'll be adding a goodly amount of Olestra to my diet just so I'm greased up and ready for the reaming we're about to get.

Like the man said - Pessimism is the best default position because you're always either proved right or pleasantly surprised.