Thursday, August 4, 2016

A Lesser Demon




Things have changed over the years in the good old Home of the Brave. It seems that sometime between the Progressive era (1890 to 1920) and the post war years our little Republic started to become an increasingly expensive, unresponsive, and out of touch behemoth running amok. This worrisome development has continued unabated to the present day. As the old maxim says, "Follow the money." I'd like to suggest we update these wise words to read, "Follow the money because the debt will stalk you and your children."


Source: Wikipedia

If you're not a numbers person, how about following your feelings? The most recent report card on how Americans feel about their Federal Legislature shows that approval ratings have ebbed to the current low tide level of 11%. In my estimation, that's on par with a dictatorial regime's approval ratings or maybe Coke II's consumer satisfaction, but not for our very own freely elected representatives!


Aim for the Porch Light! 
(I'll let you in on the joke shortly.)

What gives? We put these jamokes in office and then we despise them? Is it us? Are we really that fickle? Maybe as candidates they spent too much time lying to us while racing down the campaign trail. That would keep our hands clean as we discreetly assign blame and move on to topics which cultivate less gray hairs and facial wrinkles. 

But wait! There is that miniscule possibility that we spend too much time accepting, and even believing their lies. This not so tidey answer comes and roosts on our shoulders a bit too heavy. 

We could subtract at least half our burden by adding, "You have to admit, those front runners and their dark horses put on a hell of a good show before the election. I mean, they actually seemed... uh... honest."

But now, in the early days of December their promises engraved in granite just thirty short days ago are beginning to smell like some other solids dispersed among the kitty litter... again.  

The problem is that no matter how much their words resonated in your soul, no matter how much they knew what you've been going through, they don't give a "kitty litter solid" about you. 

Oh, they needed your vote to get elected, but then for the most part you have served your purpose like long overdue litter. So, the next election cycle you return the favor, "Out with the old and in with the new... poo." Back and forth, the turd tossing ballot by attrition is cast for a candidate whose promises were never meant to last into the new year. The distraught football fan has the next season, and we wounded voters have the election. Be of good cheer!

We, the People, will have our day again on eleven eleven. The liars get the intervening four agonizing years in which to fabricate more sweet fraudulence for our eager ears. 

Personally, I pass the time fantasizing about shooting out my representative's porch light at a minimum semi-annual basis. This pleasant thought shatters the repetitive motion, mental carpal tunnel of ballot box regret. 

Forgive me Founding Fathers for I have sinned. I voted for my last catbox solid candidate six months ago. What vexes me is Why? I haven't the foggiest, Fathers. I do not know. But I can tell you is his porch light is visible from six hundred yards or so. 

I remember proudly pushing the chad next to his or her name... because the other candidate was Beelzebub! Electing a demon would be insane. Give me absolution Fathers, that I may commit this lesser sin again. 

I must confess, this is the sad state to which our nation state has decayed: We vote against the person whom we know to be Satan We have proof. Ergo, we vote for the person with the slightly less pronounced cloven hoof. Ergo, error go.

Following this illogic, we're not really voting. The process of selecting the people of power is much akin to playing Russian roulette with a single shot, bolt-action rifle. That's not a pretty picture for the greatest and most rocking nation on the planet. But that's what we get evil Republicans or wicked Democrats. Beelzebub or the bullet. Trick or... trick. 

This "heads lose your heads, tails lose your tails" political reality might explain our increasing and enduring sense of despondence expressed numerically in our Congressional disapproval.  

The only holy way out of this inferno is to opt out of the political trauma center system all together. Thus avoiding both the Prince of Darkness and the lesser minion of the dark realm you'd support by default.


  • There's a couple parties that only care about white people. 
  • There's three that are only concerned with black people. 
  • A half-dozen are Socialist or have "Socialist" in their names. Every one of these insist that they are the only "real Socialists". The others are bourgeois. 
  • A growing slate have a "green" hue. The Mountain Party is opposed to coal mining in West Virginia. Talk about single issue politics!
  • My former political home, the Libertarian Party is still active and actively going nowhere. I guess freedom doesn't rally much interest in a nation dependent on the monthly ebb and flow of Treasury checks.
Not one of these parties, stand a snowball's chance in the hometown of the most unclean candidate you refuse to vote for. Why throw your vote away? Do the prudent thing and vote for the candidate who requires less blood offerings. That's a well used vote!

Praise God! You would NEVER vote for Beelzebub! That is why you have ALWAYS voted for a lesser Demon of the Dark Realm.
At least he will be after you shoot out his porch light.



AUTHOR'S NOTE: 

Should any reader extrapolate the insane idea that I am endorsing shooting any porch lights out, I will lose all respect for you as a human being and there will be no ice cream for you. It will be too hot where you're going. 


Sunday, July 24, 2016

Free the Definition of Free Trade?

For what must be decades now we have been told that "Free Trade" takes few thousand page document, negotiates in secret over years to put together. It takes language so complex that no average person could comprehend what we're agreeing to in the (much touted) agreement. More jobs, more money, more security, better access to all the stuff we can't live without, that's what we're told. We should be thankful that our elected officials managed to put such a wondrous trade deal together for us. 

We should be...

Evaluated!
Medicated!
Institutionalized!
Re-Educated!

Or mybe we already are.

Free Trade means,
"I give you this and you give me that, do you agree?"

If yes, the deal is done. If no, the deal goes dead. It is a very simple convenience of exchange transaction.

This concludes all you will ever need to know, and all there is to know, about Free Trade.  It's just that simple. eBay is free trade.


Even a cave man could understand Free Trade!

We do not have a single Free Trade Agreement. Not a single one. We have managed trade, very managed, very specific legally managed trade with wording so complicated that we don't understand it. 

Why do you think that is? Moreover, why would we actually believe that these very lengthy documents1 are what Free Trade looks like... 



  • US - Australia FTA
  • US - Bahrain FTA
  • US - Chile FTA
  • US - Colombia FTA
  • DR-CAFTA: Includes US - Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, & Nicaragua
  • US - Israel FTA
  • US - Jordan FTA
  • US - Korea FTA
  • US - Morocco FTA
  • NAFTA: Canada & Mexico
  • US - Oman FTA
  • US - Panama FTA
  • US - Peru FTA
  • US - Singapore FTA

Why would we be told that these are Free Trade when they are not? At the risk of sounding conspiratorial, because we are too dumb to know otherwise. It's a Repetition = Truth thing like suicide bombings. We hear something so often that we stop questioning the words. It's an established "fact", like...

  1. Witches causing crop failure
  2. Scurvy being caused by a virus
  3. Bats are blind
  4. Cutting to balance the humors
  5. AIDS being caused by people in Africa having sex with monkeys


OK, the last one was a stretch, but if we hadn't been told otherwise by so many healthcare professionals, we would be believed that too. In the absence of facts, any fiction will due.

For instance, if the managed trade deal ends in disaster for one or both signatory nations, well hell, Blame Free Trade! Then, the people will demand Managed Trade, which is exactly what we have.

Take your pick Coke or Pepsi. Cast your vote, and I will wish you the very best (of what you're given).

We know the truth when we hear it, but if it is never spoken and never heard...

Any fiction will due.


Footnote:

1. Links to the specific trade agreemens can be found at Department of Commerce Free TradeAgreements ( www.trade.gov/fta/ )

Don't Do a Duopoly

Pay no attention to those two guys behind the curtain.











Keep in mind that the two choice system comes right out of the corporate world. Coke or Pepsi, McDonald's or Burger King, and when you say, "I don't want a cola and burger", you're assumed to be unstable and potentially a threat.

We've tried every combination, Republican President/ Democratic House, Republican Senate/ Democratic House, Democratic President/ Republican Legislature, and every other permutamtion and still it's been a straight line from prosperity and peace to what we have today, which is neither.

We've heard the same tired rhetoric about campaign finance reform since I was a twelve year-old thumbing my way through the Chicago Sun-Times before school. Has anything really happened to return the power to the People?

Look, there is a solution, and it is simple enough for me to write in three sentences...


  1. Contributions from individual donors only
  2. A maximum of $500.00 per individual.
  3. All monies not spent on the current election campaign are turned over to Campaign Finance Enforcement for their funding.

Problem solved!

But this will never happen. We know the truth when we hear it, don't we?

Now, ask yourself, "Why won't it happen?"

 Is it not in the best interest of the People?

Think about it, those three sentences would return the power to the People because each person is only worth $500 of influence. The majority of people (the so called "99%") are a hell of a lot larger than the 1% which currently exercises much more influence on policy makers than the Welder from Ohio, the single mom from Albuquerque, or the Dentist from Seattle. One billionaire can quite nearly dictate his agenda to our Representatives, who in turn parrot it to us and the media, who in turn sing the tune we have come to know by heart.

It's a fictional little ditty, all (or most) of it lies. Some believe that the Coke part is true others are set like thousand year old concrete on Pepsi being legit. Meanwhile, whilst we shred each other to pieces over the cola we never wanted in the first place, guess who's vote is really being counted?

We know the truth when we hear (or read) it...

Don't we?