Breaking : A member of #YallQaeda leaks his photo out to the public #OregonUnderAttack pic.twitter.com/SwKJLCx596
— Packers (10-5) (@whovian15) January 4, 2016
BTW - "YallQaeda" is courtesy of Mock Paper Scissors
Jan 3, 2016
Today's Tweet
BTW - "YallQaeda" is courtesy of Mock Paper Scissors
The Bundy Redux
Civil Disobedience being in the eye of the beholder, I'm not at all sure what it is specifically, but there's a fair degree of certainty that what's going on in Oregon ain't it.
militarized law enforcement responses almost always bad idea, but we only raise this point when it's about criminal right wingers
— Atrios (@Atrios) January 3, 2016
Trying hard not to say, "It's time to regulate the fuck outa that militia."
https://t.co/n018rc9ENf
— Mike Roberts (@EvilleMike) January 3, 2016
There's so much happening, and so many flips and turns, and so much that's gone before that leads up to this, it's hard to find the room to step back far enough to get the whole picture.
One of the big things is that outfits like The Bundy Gang have been playing this "I'm not gonna be da gubmint's bitch" game for a very long time. Well sorry-not-sorry, guys, but you're not the government's bitch. You're Sheldon Adelson's bitch. You're Charlie Koch's bitch. You're Roger Ailes's bitch. You've been lied to and manipulated into being pissed off at all the wrong people. Which makes you a very useful bitch for anybody with a sizable media budget, who plays on your need for martyrdom and pity in order to hide his own power-grabbing agenda. In the old story, you're Guy of Gisborne to Rush Limbaugh's Prince John. Not to put too fine a point on it for ya, Sparky, but you're on the wrong fucking side. Again.
So anyway -
Nobody ever taught these moochers about The Tragedy Of The Commons. They see "open land" that belongs to all Americans; they need to expand their operation to make it pay for an expanding clan of (eg) Bundy kids; and so they believe in their hearts that they can just take what they need because all that land is right there and they feel entitled to it.
And none of that ever registers as ironic in their pea-pickin' little brain pans. And if you try to teach them a little sumpthin' about how they have to share - or at least they have to pay for what they get - they go into that cornered-animal crouch and start whining about being the victims of Oppressive Gubmint again.
These guys seem never to have matured past being hormone-poisoned teenagers. They're subsumed by that deadly combination of ignorance and adolescent bravado which makes it impossible for them to know their conclusion can't be true when they start from a false premise.
--BTW: that last bit is Ayn Rand. You remember Ayn Rand - the patron saint of your Radically Libertarian Douchenozzlery, right, Sparky? Yeah, no - it never sounds like you remember shit about it even if you ever fucking read any of it.
Don't worry
Even as we speak the media is sending their best thesauruses to Oregon to find other words than "terrorists."
#OregonUnderAttack
— Steve Marmel (@Marmel) January 3, 2016
I remember watching some Western on TV and the typical barroom brawl breaks out, and I asked my dad why everybody gets in on the fight when it was just a beef between two guys. He told me something like - some jokers got nuthin' better to do than hang around waitin' for an excuse to punch somebody.
So now we wait.
Jan 2, 2016
Today's Chart
From a few years ago, and still more than a little troubling.
We can't go on like this - and you know it's not any better now than it was in 2012 when the guy put this up. You can see it if you look.
Dots
Once is an anomaly:
Twice is a coincidence:
Just waiting for that third occurrence to confirm the trend.
We became allergic to the basics of paying for the things a healthy civilization needs - Education, Infrastructure, Healthcare, Science, Justice. We decided making rich people richer was more important than looking out for everybody as best we can. So it forced public servants to look for ways of stretching their budgets. Some of that is a good thing, but most of it turns out to be a very bad thing when the people looking for creative ways to augment their budgets are the ones who carry badges and guns and who have our tacit blessing to treat people extremely badly as long as it's "those other people" catching the shit and not us.
So - when somebody says "Police Department", think "Sheriff". And when they say [insert your town's name here], think "Nottingham".
And BTW - not to blow up the analogy or anything, but fuck Robin Hood; where's Frank Serpico when ya need him?
I think every LEO needs a complete BG check by FBI, just as a person working in top secrete field, eliminate threats https://t.co/EY9h6HCex7
— Mickey Cox (@TheRightImageLV) January 2, 2016
Twice is a coincidence:
Entiire Florida police department busted for laundering millions for international drug cartels https://t.co/I1zGsr1r9d
— margaret stuart md (@marstu67) January 2, 2016
Just waiting for that third occurrence to confirm the trend.
We became allergic to the basics of paying for the things a healthy civilization needs - Education, Infrastructure, Healthcare, Science, Justice. We decided making rich people richer was more important than looking out for everybody as best we can. So it forced public servants to look for ways of stretching their budgets. Some of that is a good thing, but most of it turns out to be a very bad thing when the people looking for creative ways to augment their budgets are the ones who carry badges and guns and who have our tacit blessing to treat people extremely badly as long as it's "those other people" catching the shit and not us.
So - when somebody says "Police Department", think "Sheriff". And when they say [insert your town's name here], think "Nottingham".
And BTW - not to blow up the analogy or anything, but fuck Robin Hood; where's Frank Serpico when ya need him?
Dec 31, 2015
Be It Hereby Resolved
I resolve to revert to all my old bad habits
a coupla days later than I did last year.
A Year Of Eternal Sadness
Here’s my 2015 year in review.
— Chris Murphy (@ChrisMurphyCT) December 31, 2015
2015 started in the early hours of January 1st when 5 people were shot on a New Year’s Eve party bus in Memphis.
— Chris Murphy (@ChrisMurphyCT) December 31, 2015
The next day, another mass shooting (defined as at least 4 people shot, including the shooter) in Savannah Georgia.
— Chris Murphy (@ChrisMurphyCT) December 31, 2015
Two days later, 2 dead, 1 injured in Dallas, and 2 dead, 4 injured in Roanoke, VA.
— Chris Murphy (@ChrisMurphyCT) December 31, 2015
2 days later, 1 dead, 3 injured in Miami. Next day, 1 dead, 3 injured in Chattanooga.
— Chris Murphy (@ChrisMurphyCT) December 31, 2015
--and--
All this data is compiled by https://t.co/KEvaS5kOvN and the redditors at @rGunsAreCool, which tracked 372 shootings & counting in 2015
— Chris Murphy (@ChrisMurphyCT) December 31, 2015
and on and on and on
Dec 30, 2015
Required Viewing
It's locked up pretty tight behind pay walls, but John Frankenheimer's Seven Days in May is a mighty good thing to see now and again.
Lotta weird shit goes on most of the time, but now it seems the weird shit meter is about to peg in the red again.
"...this threat from the far right is never very far from us."
$3.99 on Amazon Video
Say No To Shitty Ad Practices
I've recently bailed on 2 of my favorite sites - Addicting Info and Little Green Footballs - because their ads got way too pushy and intrusive.
Don't get me wrong, ya gotta pay for things, and these websites don't stay in the Content Business for very long unless somebody ponies up.
So I'm good with just about everything, but not when (eg) MacKeeper pops up and freezes my browser so I can't do anything if I don't click on their OK button. Go fuck yourself with a pine cone, MacKeeper.
I'll go back to those sites eventually - I suppose - but for now, this is just one more of my little protests.
Don't get me wrong, ya gotta pay for things, and these websites don't stay in the Content Business for very long unless somebody ponies up.
So I'm good with just about everything, but not when (eg) MacKeeper pops up and freezes my browser so I can't do anything if I don't click on their OK button. Go fuck yourself with a pine cone, MacKeeper.
I'll go back to those sites eventually - I suppose - but for now, this is just one more of my little protests.
Dec 29, 2015
About That Christmas Story
So everybody's holiday favorite is the story of how a kid is growing up in Ohio, and he has a toy gun, and how everybody warns him about not getting hurt because of it and his dad buys a weird lamp and some kid gets his tongue froze to the flag pole and it all turns out OK because Ralphie's a white kid and the local cops don't murder him for no fucking reason.
A Tweet And A Quote
Racism doesn't usually look like someone shouting slurs, it's looks like people eagerly looking for a reason why a black kid deserved to die
— Lou Schumaker (@LouSchu) December 24, 2014
Today's Tweet
Ohio is an open carry state, and the cops say they thought Rice was an adult, so what law, exactly, was he breaking?
— Christopher Hayes (@chrislhayes) December 28, 2015
Chris Hayes has fallen way off - along with practically all of MSNBC - but hey, even a blind hog roots up an acorn once in a while.
Dec 28, 2015
Show A Little Love
A nice profile from Daily KOS
The only podcast combining politics, humor, outrage, kittens, science fiction and marital bliss is The Professional Left with the husband-wife team of Driftgass and Blue Gal. A new edition comes out every Friday (including Christmas and New Year’s!) and I never miss it, usually listening on bike rides around the park.
They just won a coveted Swifty for Episode 295 (July 31, 2015): "Is Cecil the Lion a Proxy War?"The Professional Left Podcast
Teach The World To Sing
The Message Manipulators seem to be bent on stripping away the soul from all of us by reducing everything to a transaction and creating a world of de-humanizing commercialism.
I've been part of that. I was with them for a long time. No more. And never again.
But there are times when my eternally insistent skepticism (which always teeters on the brink of The Cynical Abyss) is tested.
Wouldn't it be nice if this was more than just another attempt to co-opt something that should be a lot more meaningful than making us smell less like humans. (not that there's anything wrong with smelling better - just sayin')
hat tip = Facebook friend MH
I've been part of that. I was with them for a long time. No more. And never again.
But there are times when my eternally insistent skepticism (which always teeters on the brink of The Cynical Abyss) is tested.
Wouldn't it be nice if this was more than just another attempt to co-opt something that should be a lot more meaningful than making us smell less like humans. (not that there's anything wrong with smelling better - just sayin')
hat tip = Facebook friend MH
Dec 27, 2015
Today's Tweets
Actually, this is a screen cap of the tweet that showed up on Facebook (hat tip = DR), but hey - social media is social media, and it's only there to serve us up to the advertisers and propagandeers anyway. But, I digress.
If something good happens because of it, that's just a lucky coincidence.
And if something bad happens because of it, well - shit happens; whaddaya gonna do?
My favorite thing - when you post a pic, you can 'tag' the faces in the pictures, and somebody tagged this guy "Asshole'.
Poe's Law states that sometimes, it's not possible to differentiate between an actual statement of an extreme and a parody of the extreme. So the guy could easily be a 'Poe'. But seeing how weird USAmerica Inc has gotten over the last few decades, and looking thru the guy's Twitter feed, I'll go with the obvious and say he really is the jackwad freak he's trying so hard to convince us he is.
Late Breaking: Online scuttlebutt is that the guy lost his job because that tweet just went a little too far (hard to believe that's the one that did it, considering practically everything on his feed is "White Genocide" and "Hitler-Was-Right" etc). His feed has nothing posted after Dec 24th, so I guess he took everything else down or his account was frozen or whatever.
The winning response so far:
— conan the librarian (@jamesdupuis2) December 27, 2015
Torching
Moonbeam --Sinne Eeg
Fragile --Nils Landgran
My One And Only Love --Sinne Eeg
With Every Breath I Take --Janis Mann
Kissing A Fool - George Michael
Dec 26, 2015
Dec 25, 2015
A Podcast For Christmas
It's just what I asked Santa to bring me!
And be sure to listen for the part where driftglass explains the new positioning effort that puts the Teabillies way out to the right, and The Democrats way out to the left, and "The Newly-Moderate GOP" smack in the middle. Now, what was it I've been saying about Jeb this whole time?
Say whatever ya wanna say, but ya can't say these guys haven't been trying to warn us about all this shit for a good long time.
And be sure to listen for the part where driftglass explains the new positioning effort that puts the Teabillies way out to the right, and The Democrats way out to the left, and "The Newly-Moderate GOP" smack in the middle. Now, what was it I've been saying about Jeb this whole time?
Say whatever ya wanna say, but ya can't say these guys haven't been trying to warn us about all this shit for a good long time.
Click here for the website where you can shop Amazon, or subscribe directly:
--or--
(make checks payable to):
The Professional Left Podcast
PO Box 9133
Springfield, IL 62791
The Professional Left Podcast
PO Box 9133
Springfield, IL 62791
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