My first attempt at political cartooning

Government Please…

Just about everyone has a sad story about their having to deal with the government, either on the local, state, or federal levels, and few of these stories have a very  happy ending.  I too, have had my share of encounters with unmotivated and underwhelming buearocratic placeholders, incompetent cogs who’s only goal is to get through the day, week, next twenty years to collect a promised pension that probably will evaporate eleven minutes before the end of their last day.  You hear all of  these one sided stories, and you begin to believe that we are served by a race of evil, mindless stumbling blocks, placed in our collective way to prevent anything from getting accomplished.

My experience however, has been of a different nature entirely.  That is not to say that I have not suffered abuses, usually at the hands of local government (which is the most infuriating, by the way- seems the closer the bureaucracy the more idiotic it is).  Two instances come to mind.  The first was when I had a legal issue and needed to know exactly what the state laws said.  I called the state attorney generals  office and was at first disheartened, as I was forced to leave a message.  This will go  nowhere I immediately thought, and almost hung up without leaving a message.  To my pleasant surprise I not only received a call back within an hour, the intelligent young lady who called knew exactly what my issue were but which laws applied, and exactly where in the general statutes they were located so that i could reference them later.  this was enormously helpful, ridding me instantly of the problem and saving me countless amounts of money and time.  Your state government at work ladies and gentlemen.

My next challenge was at the federal level.  Absolutely no way I make it through this unscathed I thought.  So I gathered up my information and headed for my local social security offices, very early of course as I was sure this would be a multiple day event.  Patiently waiting for my turn, I watched as numerous individuals tried and failed to get satisfactory service from the federal employees behind the little glass windows.  Eventually, it was my turn, and with a sense of impending  doom I slowly approached the window, certain i would be sent packing in short order unhelped, deterred, and broken hearted.  When I told the nice lady why i was there, she immediately began pulling forms form her various stacks and compiling for her what surely would be a leisurely few hours of a question and answer fest.  I stopped her right away and told her that I had already obtained the forms, filled them out, and now only needed to file them.  Her expression of outright surprise was considerable, a mixture of cautious optimism and severe doubt, as she slowly accepted the forms, almost certain that this was some sort of trick.  She began to peruse the  forms I gave her, scanning them top to bottom as she turned each page her mood brightening with every correctly filled out line.  Now it was my turn to be surprised.  She started calling out to her coworkers “Look, this guy has all his forms, information sheets, and contact references all filled out and in the proper order!” as if such a thing had never happened before.

As I reflected back on my time awaiting my turn i realized that it hadn’t happened before, at least not that day when i was there.  While I was waiting, person after person was either turned away for being either completely unprepared, or settling in for a long day of watching a federal employee wasting dozens of government pay hours filling out forms that could have been more easily completed elsewhere.  A seemingly competent person would approach the window and state “I need to such and such”.  the clerk would not even ask if they had filled out the proper forms, as they walk across the room empty handed. The clerk would simply pull out a form and start asking the questions, “name?”, “ blah blah”. Good. they got one right. “Doctor’s name?” – “ I think it’s blah”.  “doctor’s phone #?” - “I don’t know.” “Doctor’s address?” - “I don’t know.” “name of your condition?” - “Ies hurt when I doos this.” they say while waving an arm about wildly. “That’s not an approved condition.”  “Did you bring your social security card?” - “I knows the number.”  “We have to SEE the card, (sigh) take these forms home and fill them out completely and we’ll file them then, any questions?”  “Yeah, whens do I gets my check?”   Everyone knows a form can be filled out much quicker and more efficiently by two people than by one who should know all the answers.  The money wasted having the federal government filling out just the name and address portions of all these forms could probably take care of the deficit all by itself.

I’m sure all those ill prepared and unhappy patrons who left disgruntled before me regaled all their friends and family with hilarious tales of their fruitless encounters with the incompetent federal workforce.  My only complaint would be the cattle-like way everyone is herded up to the windows one at a time.  But that too is a necessity I'm sure, if they did business by appointment only no doubt in my mind that all these people would show up just the same, sans appointment.

Revenge List

SteelCo Stool Co.

Carolina’s Medical Center

Mecklenburg County Government

Mitsubishi Motor Company

Time Warner Cable

God

Kidney Fund

The Republican Party

The Democratic Party

Boy Scouts of America

The Green Party

Girl Scouts of America

Wal Mart

Michael Moore

Bi-Lo

The Cast, Directors, and Producers of the films “AI” and "the thin red line"

MBNA

MySpace

Trust SunTrust

Normally I use this site for complaining only, but today i have nothing but good things to say and about a financial institution at that.  Today I had a somewhat serious problem that required me to actually visit a bank branch, something I do very rarely or never if possible.  I think we all know why.  However today things went extremely smoothly thanks in no small part to a gentleman named Gino Costa.  He was very professional but most of all helpful, I cannot say enough about the level of customer service I received especially in light of the paltry amount of profitable business I can give them.

So if you like being treated well and actually helped on occasion I strongly suggest you trust all your banking needs to SunTrust.  I was in no way compensated for this endorsement.  Thank you for your attention in this matter.

News You Can’t Use

News blurbs are in standard type my commentary is italicized.

A man was shot in the stomach in a robbery attempt while leaving a Pizza Hut restaurant.  He ate at Pizza Hut- he probably just felt like he was shot in the stomach.

A 460 pound con artist who claimed to be a preacher had thirteen complaints lodged against him. Nine of those complaints were for busted furniture.  “I think it’s terrible of him trying to hide behind God like that” one complainant said.  He’s asking an awful lot of God, don’t you think?

A relationship expert was commenting on the Obama's’ level of affection when she stated “they’re hugging and kissing, they’re fisting…” The horrified host quickly corrected her saying “I think it’s called a fist bump.”  Nothing I can add here.

Rand Paul supporter headstomps protester.  Later says “It wasn’t as bad as it looked”  I guess how bad it looks depends on which end of the tea-bagger thug’s jack-booted stomp you happen to be on.

Nevada Senate Tea-bagger candidate Sharron Angle bans two media outlets from covering her campaign for daring to ask questions about the economy and foreign policy.  Now they start to show their true colors- what is their plan? rule in absolute secrecy?

Campaign finance reform failed so badly that corporations and foreign governments can secretly “donate to” (not buy I’m sure) candidates with unlimited amounts of undisclosed cash.  Don’t worry though, I’m sure the twenty bucks you gave to your favorite politician will get you just as much consideration and access as the hundreds of millions paid by China and Saudi Arabia.  

 

The Rant Is Overdue

If I see one more of these ignorant tea-baggers driving around in a forty thousand dollar gas guzzling behemoth with a “Don’t tread on me” sticker on the back I’m going to lose it, big time.  What a bunch of selfish, whining cry babies.  Lets have a little perspective here, shall we?  Never in the whole history of the world has there been a country of whom its citizenry has been asked so little, has been less put upon, or had more given to them than the American people.  Unless you happen to be Native or African American of course, then you’ve got tread marks to spare.

Just being born in this country puts you about a 1,000.% ahead of any one else living on this planet.  The indignation with which they decry the wrongs they imagine done to them rings as hollow as their leaders promises to- well, I was going to say what their leaders promise but I have no idea what that might be, other than to “take our country back!”  Take the country back from what?  The voters?  I think these tea-baggers really believe they have been wronged in some way.  The demographics of this country are changing fast and it scares the hell out of them that soon they will be a minority.  This  causes them a fear reaction bordering on panic.  Just what is needed- a bunch of old white panicky voters hopped up on fear and anger.

Right on time to be served by the tea-baggers the only thing they do have to offer other than a witches’ hat full empty slogans, more fear and anger.  You would think by their rhetoric that the current president has been in office for the last twelve years ruining the country.  It’s no wonder their jack-booted thugs stand on the necks of old ladies who oppose them, or is that just Rand Paul supporters?  That Alaskan teacher who hung the “worst governor ever” banner at the Sarah Palin event better watch out or she might be next.  Did you see empress Palin’s reaction when she found out the protester was a teacher?  “oh, one of THOSE” she said as she turned her head while rolling her eyes.  Not a surprising reaction considering the tea-baggers are so far right of the republican party that only the most fanatical bible bangers need apply,  They make no secret of the fact that the religioneers strongly oppose science, learning, and knowledge at every turn.

Cha-Cha-Cha-Cha-Cha-Changes….

These are just a few changes I would make to ease things along.  I’ll post more of them as time goes on.

The first thing that I would change is the name ‘football’.  The whole world calls what we call soccer football, and since many more people call it football than soccer we should be the ones to change.  Not to mention that since the rules of “soccer” ( soccer? I don’t even know her! )prevent picking up or touching the ball, football makes a lot more sense.  So American (and probably Canadian) football should become- are you ready for this?- “sportsball”.  And not just because it sounds like something Mr. Burns would say (“How about that local sportsball team?”)  It sounds cool too, we can have sportsball helmets and sportsball matches and Canadian sportsball teams.  Best of all we can all go back to ignoring soccer! Good ol' American spotrsball!

The next thing we should change is Christmas.  Every year it’s the same tired old controversies- Christmas is getting to commercial, they’re trying to take Christmas out of the holiday- they’re calling it a holiday tree/sale/season!  This one is easy.   Take all the non-religious crap away from Christmas and move it to New Year’s.  Gift giving, Santa, trees all the commercial crap becomes New Years presents, New Years trees, Santa comes on New Years eve.  This will leave Christmas a totally religious holiday for the Christians to do whatever it is they like to do(deny themselves, pray, go to church)  while the rest of us can enjoy our secular commercialized sales, gifts, trees, and New Year’s Day cookies in peace without offending or forcing religion down anyone’s throat.

We should also institute a ‘personal space’ zone. Each individual would be entitled to three feet of unoccupied space in all directions around him/herself when in public.  Too many times especially in grocery stores I have about eight seconds to chose a product from the shelve before there is a stampede of customers just dying to see what I find so fascinating. (“what’s he looking at?”) They also like to block the shelves like defending NBA guards as if their lives depended on me not getting a box of “Pop-Tarts”.  Once I was in an almost uninhabited bank when this lady came in and stood in line right behind me.  And when I say right behind me, I mean RIGHT BEHIND me!  She was so close I could not only hear her breathing but could occasionally feel her touching me.  If she hadn’t been so attractive I might have said something.  Please- can’t we all just give each other some space?

More to come.

Patrionomics

This one may require not a small amount of patience on behalf of the reader as I am about to make some observations and some suggestions that will most likely be considered not only un-American, but by some could even be called treasonous.  So I ask that you take a deep breath, read slowly, and keep an open mind while remembering that these are only ideas and cannot hurt you.

What amazes me the most about the good citizens of this great and fair nation is how few of them question the conventions that they have been taught (or had programmed into them) since they were very young.  As I recently said to a very good friend of mine, just because you have been told all your life that something is true, doesn’t necessarily mean that it is true.  I guess that I should understand this phenomenon as I was the same way in my younger years.  Early in my fragile education somewhere around first or second grade I can remember my teacher saying something along the lines of how this is the greatest country in the world and that no one anywhere does anything better than we do.  While this happens to be true in most cases the implications of her statements were that they are absolute truths and to question them is not only not permitted, but that doing so is somehow un-American.

The first of these dogmas is that God is the sole property of the United States.  That God created and protects the United States (and sometimes Israel) and no other nation may claim him or invoke his name.  For them to do so, especially against the U.S. would be sinful and possibly prove that the God they called on is most likely satanic.

The subject on which I would like to focus  (too late) for this article is our system of economics.  From the very beginning the wealthy elite who hold power in this country have created a new holy trinity inexorably linking capitalism with the principles of democracy and freedom and that questioning the validity of this linkage is unpatriotic or even treasonous.   All our lives we have been taught capitalism is the only good system and it is in some way righteous or that God himself is a capitalist.  That any other system is wrong and incompatible with the American way of life.  What the powers that be  fail to mention is that it is a good system for them.  Although history has shown that a capitalist system with the proper restraint and protections may be a great path to start and build a new nation,  its utter dependence upon constant growth, expansion, and unbridled consumption are clear indicators that such a system is unsustainable over the long term.

Saying some of these things to the average person usually sends them into a blind panic, they don’t know whether to argue, fight, or just run. Most of them argue then run.  Running seems to be the end result as if they must get as far away as possible from the idea of questioning such an established tenant.  Like they have never even thought once in their long lives “I wonder if what I’ve been told is true?” or “Things don’t seem to be working out all that well, I wonder why?”  Maybe the first amendment should have included freedom of thought as well as speech.  Questioning is not treachery.  Please for the love of God think for yourselves, it is not a crime despite what you’ve been told.  Trust me. 

note;

Campaign finance reform went the other way and now hundreds of millions of dollars are anonymously pouring into both parties coffers with absolutely no accountability.  I have no doubt that our election are being influenced by China and Saudi Arabia at the very least not to mention probably Russia, North Korea, and Iran as well.  Good luck to you United Statesians who contributed twenty dollars to your candidate, I’m sure your money bought you just as much concern. 

Tea For Two… <years> Three Tops.. I Promise.

Every few years the system turns over in its grave and brings us a new bounty of horrors on the political front.  The current cycle of childish nonsense has delivered to us the newest abomination known as the tea party.  These tea-baggers are so politically far-a-field they would be frightening  if they weren’t so funny.  I guess they could be funnily frightening.  Fortunately for the entire country United Statesians ( ‘Americans’ to me includes both American continents.  Only United States citizens are arrogant enough to think they are the only ‘Americans’ )  have very short attention spans and are easily discouraged or distracted.  Which means that even though these movements flame up quickly and take on all the rage of the latest “if you tickle me there you go to jail” Elmo, they tend to burn out to a smolder before they can do any serious damage to our fledgling society.  Remember something from a few years ago calling itself the Promise Keepers?  A bunch of overweight conservative white guys clogging up arenas raising their hands and bibles, singing and crying like a bunch of giant babies with pituitary gland problems and loaded diapers promising to lead, protect, and spend time with their families.  You know, the kind of stuff they should have been doing all along. This movement burst into a furor as middle-class America clamored to not be left out or to be the last to conform to the latest pointless craze. And for a while you could not go hardly a day without hearing about these bandwagon jumpers (“Hey, look what they’re doing! ).  But as it turns out, not only is doing the right thing a thankless and unappreciated job, it is also a lot of hard work.  Disillusionment led to boredom as dedication and resolve began to wane.  So all too soon they slowly drifted away and went back to playing golf, ignoring their children, cheating on their wives, and hanging out in titty bars.  The point is that a grass-roots movement like this has limited longevity as it loses cohesion due to internal power struggles and the inability to structure its efforts into a common organized goal.  Usually that life span is about two years.  Three tops.

I see this new tea-baggers (my name for them) movement as possibly being the last gasp of the extreme right of the republican party.  This group cannot see how increasingly isolated  they are making themselves with their exclusionary rhetoric that appeals primarily to  the angry and  the fearful.  Alienating just about every minority or ethnic group because they feel that they alone are right and are therefore unwilling to listen or empathize with any dissenting viewpoints.  What they don’t (or refuse) to understand is that in a very short time all of the groups they so easily dismiss will together outnumber themselves and that their unwillingness to compromise  will leave them a marginalized and powerless fringe of society.  Tea baggers see their country changing around them and it scares the hell out of them.  So badly in fact that out of a sense of desperation they espouse ideas and policies that most reasonable candidates would keep hidden in the darkest recesses of their own minds.  I really believe that this particular movement is actually dangerous.  It is intolerant, inflexible, divisive, and borderline militant.  Accusing anyone who disagrees with them of “hating or trying to destroy America” (there goes that word again) or of being a “unpatriotic traitor”.  If these people get any real power you can just say goodbye to any personal freedoms such as speech, religion, or privacy.  As well as any social programs that even slightly helps any of the under privileged citizens of this great country.  It is hard for me to believe that any of these hard line fanatics could be serious contenders in this election.  Their candidates are remarkably laughable possessing little to no practical experience and zero credibility . I guess it is simply a testament to how angry everyone has become, but if any of them somehow manage to get elected I’m sure they will be one-termers once the electorate sees how ineffective they will be.

If you think that that these Republicans or their Tea-bagger friends are going to cut taxes and/or spending, think again.  There is no way that they can at this point.  We need to spend seventeen trillion dollars on bridges, dams, levees, roads, and the electrical grid right now.  The government has neglected the critical infrastructure of this country for decades and now we have to pay the price or there will not be a bridge left that is safe to drive across.  If they do cut spending then the whole nation is likely to fall apart before our very eyes.  If spending is cut the first thing to go will be any help for the poor, sick, and old.  Followed closely by any protections for consumers, workers, or the environment.  However don’t completely despair, military spending should just about triple.

Now that Wall street is again making record profits and plans to hit new astronomical records in bonuses, why is there still no job creation in this country?  Could it be that corporations are delaying hiring to help their easily controlled candidates in the upcoming election?  If so it would be a despicable and unconscionable act to continue to allow people to suffer and take away a party’s fair chance to at lease try a new idea when they could have been helping to make things better instead of protecting their own selfish interests.  Unfortunately I believe you have to spend to create jobs, just like in WWII.  That worked doubly well as a lot of the unemployed were conveniently killed.  Maybe this time we could learn a lesson and just execute the jobless and save the expense of destroying and rebuilding half the world.  As for creating jobs I have no idea what kind of jobs they would be after corporate greed was allowed to send the entire manufacturing industries over seas.  “We can’t afford to make our expensive cheap products here” is the age old refrain.  Here is how you make it feasible to manufacture here- a five hundred dollar per product import tariff.  Where else could they sell their products?  Only United Statesian consistently overconsume on a scale large enough to keep them in their giant bonuses.

Unbelievably, some of these morons are still calling for the privatization of the social security system.  What were these people doing during the last three years while Wall street was flushing the entire U.S. economy down the toilet?  Watching SpongeBob Squarepants reruns?  Social security is far from a perfect system but it is vital to the very survival of most of the elderly and disabled in this country.  You cannot risk putting that much temptation  into the greedy hands of the unscrupulous dirtbags that seem to ruin our economy every decade or so.  Wall street has been salivating over the s.s. fund since it was first created, to them it is nothing but a free source of wealth that they can plunder at will.  Losing a large portion of the fund to the fees of a private managing company would be bad enough but it wouldn’t stop there.  It would all be “lost” in risky investments or traded back and forth between companies until it is completely swallowed up by fees or just embezzled at which time the bankers would simply throw up their hands and say “oh well” and walk away scot free and that much richer for their trouble.  Either way you will end up paying twice as much to refill the fund because I do not believe that even a group as heartless as the tea baggers will stand for millions of geriatric homeless dying in the streets.

The Republican party has dusted off some of their oldest and worst ideas in the not so new ‘pledge to America’.  Sounds just like their old ‘contract with America’ that for some reason most everyone thought was a good idea.  Which it was not.  Basically it consisted of forcing all the new Republican Congressmen to vote only how the party told them to, if they did not they would not be endorsed in the next election.  Why in the hell would anyone want a Senator who would vote against the best interests of his district and its citizens because of the aims of the party.  This sounds like lunacy to me, but both parties believe that the power and well being of their party is their primary responsibility and infinitely more important than the people they represent. 

After seeing the most recent sound bite from Tea-bagger empress Sarah Palin (“we can see 2012 from our house!”) I nearly became physically ill. The snide condescending hatred in her voice permeated her words and sickly sweet smile. Fine, you don’t agree with the current president, then how about coming up with some useful ideas instead of a bunch of pointless slogans.  You had your chance and you lost- so if you are not willing to help, shut up.  As far as  the rest of the tea bagger candidates go, all I can do is quote Derek Jacobi from ‘I Claudius’ who said in reference about the progeny of his family tree “ We’ve certainly had a terrifying crop this season”.

101 Damnations

You’ll never see it coming how this title ties in.  I have a standing  morning appointment three times every week.  This obligation requires me to drive past a small and little known family services clinic.  The two trips during the business week are uneventful, however the Saturday morning journey offers a bit of a distraction.  Every Saturday morning, rain or shine, high humidity or freezing ass cold there is a small band of abortion protesters on the public easement in front of the clinic and across the street waving signs and bibles at everyone unfortunate enough to have to walk or drive by.

The fun part of this sideshow besides laying on my horn as i slowly drive by (and watching these religioneers[not a real word] try to puzzle out whether it is a honk of support or one of derision ) is watching the escalation of the conflict.  First an off duty police officer was added to the mix, paid for by the clinic to keep the peace and make sure they stay off private property no doubt.  Then in an attempt to protect their clients’ privacy and to possibly help to dampen the effects of the protesters bullhorn they added an eight foot privacy fence.  Undeterred after two weeks of yelling at a planked wall the pro-lifers started bringing ladders and actually began erecting a small scaffolding each and every week so that they could now look over and yell at people on the other side of the fence!

To these protesters I have this to say;  don’t you have anything better to do with your time?  If  you really think that screaming slogans at people from a court ordered distance is going to encourage anyone to reexamine their decision that late in the game, you’re nuts.  Yes, I said nuts.  I don’t care how you feel about abortion, for it or again’ it, if you are standing on top of a scaffold in the freezing cold so that you can whinny at people over an eight foot fence like some kind of judgmental screech owl, you’re a nut.  The decision to terminate a pregnancy is a very personal, painful and agonizing choice, one which I do not believe anyone would make without all due consideration.  All your angry name calling chants, and catchphrases only serve to push more reasonable minds further away.  Sometimes even wanted pregnancies have to be terminated due to medical complications, try to imagine how much more pain your heckles and taunts inflict on an already hurting and conflicted person in this instance.  You have no idea why those people are visiting these clinics or what their circumstances are or how much they may be suffering already so how about trying to practice a little  of that Christian charity and compassion I hear so much about. 

Instead of wasting time and money building scaffolds and renting bullhorns (although any right-to-lifer worth their salt should have their own bullhorn) try doing something sensible or maybe even something helpful.  Like stop opposing sex education and birth control.  Education is not permission and the head in the sand belief that if you don’t tell your children about reproduction they will never figure it out own their own is simply quite ignorant.  They’re going to figure out how their equipment works whether they know anything about reproduction or not and regardless of any kind of abstinence pledge they may have signed to make you happy, they are going to put their limited knowledge into practice.  The most responsible thing that you can do is to teach them how to protect themselves and not ruin their entire futures unless you want sick or dead children or to be grandparents at the ripe old age of thirty-seven.  Or both.  Your choice.

I feel that the clinic is missing an opportunity to fight fire with fire as well.  If it were me I would schedule the landscaping contractor to perform their services at the same time the protesters show up each week.  Let them scream themselves silly and hoarse ruining  their voices trying to compete with the mowers, blowers, and weed whackers!

And while we are on the subject of foolish behavior, please leave those poor homosexuals alone.  Don’t they have enough problems already without you relentlessly hounding their every move for no good reason?  Doesn’t the constitution give every one the right to the pursuit of happiness (with them though i believe the emphases is less on the hap and more on the piness) ?  The most confounding of these policies is the decades long boycott of the Disney corporation of all things. All just for doing something nice in offering health benefits to same sex spouses of its’ employees for God’s sake!  The religioneers are not going to tolerate this outrage no siree, how dare they do something to help someone.  Just wait until God hears about this! They have no protests against companies that poison the environment and their workers while ripping off consumers.  No protests against corporations using child slave labor.  Not a word against the alcohol, tobacco, or firearms industries which kill millions every year but they fly into a blinding rabid fury because someone they don’t know is getting healthcare coverage.  Un  be  lievable.  Having been raised a reluctant Baptist, it should come as no surprise to me that these religioneers would consider that the absolute worse thing you could do, the greatest crime you could commit on this Earth is to love someone.  I told you you wouldn’t see it tie in.  God bless Disney.

funny footnote:

All this sex education stuff was easy for me.  I knew all the anatomy and processes including their medical names, how they worked, and what caused pregnancy and std’s by the middle of second grade.  Well ahead of most of my classmates but not all.  Just a benefit of growing up in the seventies I guess.  Some of my contemporaries were already trying to fool around with each other to varying degrees of success early in the fourth grade, so by the time the school board thought it was appropriate to teach reproductive science- eighth grade health class- all they succeeded in doing was embarrassing themselves.  I did not know until much later that that is when sex ed was taught.  the health/gym teacher kept sending me to the library during class and I was too happy to be free to ever wonder why.  Only later did i find out that in yet another example of my mothers complete insanity, she had listened to the religioneers hysterical cries of “ don’t let you children take sex ed, they’ll teach them how to have SEX!”   knowing full well that she was banning me from a subject that I already knew everything about.  Un be lievable.

Kratz Enough!

I see that the Wisconsin district attorney Kenneth  Kratz finally agreed to step down.  Why he was spared the humiliation of being fired I will never understand, but then again there is a lot I do not understand.  Like how does a douche like this putz get to be so arrogant and self important anyway?  Whatever cachet Kratz may have thought he had to control his own destiny after being caught sending sexually explicit texts and emails to the wives of men he was prosecuting for domestic violence was a self-delusion of the highest order.  At first this idiot thought he was just going to continue in his position with no repercussions as if nothing at all had happened.  Even as complaints and calls for his firing mounted, he refused to budge, he would not give up his office.

This is the point where I would have publicly and shamingly(not a real word) fired him, but still he was allowed to stay.  As the pressure grew he decided to magnanimous and offered to “get some counseling” however leaving his job was still out of the question.  Someone thinks an awful lot of themselves don’t they?  How could anyone be so delusional as to think they are so important that not only can they violate every code of ethics but to also decide how or if he should be punished.  Or think that the public outrage would be sated with the idea of him “getting some counseling”.  This idiot presumably went to college.

I’ve always wondered, what do you do after you’ve utterly destroyed your career, obliterated your credibility, and flushed your integrity down the toilet?  What do you say to the next employer when they ask why you left your last position?  Windup, “Well, that’s actually a very funny story.  It seems that I predatorily sexually harassed a lot of women who were already victims of male chauvinist assholes such as myself, violating their trust one more time and possibly killing their faith in men forever.”  Boom.  Out of the park.

Pop Torts

A lot of things sound like a good idea when you hear them for the first time, but it is only when you dig deeper and really think things through or barring that, rush ahead and put them into practice that you see the folly of ill-considered plans.  A case locally that comes to mind was the idea to raise additional funds for the school system by confiscating the vehicles of drivers convicted of DUI’s.  Sounds good on the surface, punish drunk drivers and help educate the children- great!  What kind of vehicles these planners thought they would be getting i have no idea, probably BMW’s, Jag’s, and Benz’s no doubt.  The plan begins to fall apart when the the cars start rolling in.  Worthless beaters every one.  Cars that no one in their right minds would buy or even take for free.  No one stopped to think that anyone with a car worth taking would be able to afford a slick lawyer to get it back.   The school system not only didn’t get any new money they had to pay to store or have hauled off a bunch of old junkers.

the same thing goes for mandatory sentences for drug dealers.  Seemed like a good way to fight the drug war until you realize now you have to release a bunch of violent rapists and murderers to make room for the endless parade of pot sellers.  Which makes no difference in the drug war anyway.  The “drug war” has been waged for decades yet there is not one person I know who cannot get any kind of drug they want with a few phone calls within 24 hours.  Huge waste of time and money.  On a related topic, this too could be fixed by instituting my policy of there being no such thing as prison overcrowding, if you can close the door there is room for one more.  I also want to start an organization dedicated to abolishing the parole system in this country.  I am so tired of seeing these slags released from jail and going out to commit more crimes and create more victims almost immediately.  Maybe some prisoners are rehabilitated, but it is not worth the risk.  I would call this group Die in prison. org.

The new slew of proposals are just as frightening.  Limited government is the newest battle cry, however I wonder how many people follow through their thinking to the logical conclusions.  Nature abhors a vacuum and if you take power away from one group another quickly fills the void.  Limited government is code for corporate control of America with unelected robber-barons calling all the shots.  You’ll get no vote with their policies or for their leaders.  Bad idea. 

Tort reform is another somewhat older cry with the same trick ending.  Using highly publicized reports or runaway jury awards to undeserving plaintiffs to call for reforms, it is a thinly veiled attempt to institute monetary caps or take away your right to sue entirely.  First of all these abuses are exaggerated in the press, and are usually overturned on appeal or simply never paid.  Second, caps will only hurt the people who truly deserve these awards to pay for a lifetime of medical care.  What other type of reform could they implement if not caps?  Who will be deciding which suits are justified and which ones aren’t?  A second set of jurors?  It is the juries job to decide if a case is justified not a lawyer, politician, or insurance company’s.  Some would say that the system is unfair to the insurance industry, but they are the ones that can afford the best lawyers, I’ve seen this first hand.  No one forced these companies to be in the insurance business,  they chose to be in the risk business and their investors chose to buy their stocks.  Risk is their business, and sometimes you lose.

This one is so ludicrous I could hardly believe what I was hearing.  Idiotic town councilmen trying to pass pants ordinances to make people pull up their shorts.  You have got to be kidding right?  In my town the police are so busy with more serious crimes that they will not come out to your house for vandalism of even car break-ins.  So this moron wants to tie up valuable police time and money following around baggy pantsed idiots and handing out fashion tickets.  Probably having to show up in court as well to waste even more time and resources.  I just hope they implement mandatory sentences for these scumbags. 

Quote time

   I don't like ass kissers, flag wavers, or team players.  I like people who buck
the system.  Individualists.  I often warn kids: “Somewhere along the way, someone is
going to tell you `there is no “I” in team.'  What you should tell them is, `Maybe
not, but there is an “I” in independence, individuality, and integrity.'”

    Avoid teams at all cost.  Keep your circle small.  Never join a group that has a
name.  If they say “We're the So-and-Sos” take a walk.  And if, somehow you must join,
if it's unavoidable, such as a union or trade association, go ahead and join.  But
don't participate; it will be your death.  And if they tell you you're not a team
player, just congratulate them on being so observant.

                -George Carlin
                -from
                “When will Jesus bring the pork chops?”

The American Scream

The friend i was speaking of in my earlier post (minimum rage) had said something else to depressed me that I had almost forgotten about.  That she was thinking about giving up one or both of her jobs and trying to get on at Wal-Mart.  The dream is still alive I guess.  Is this the best the American people can hope for in today’s world, a slim chance to get a low-paying no room for advancement 38 hour a week position at Wal-Mart?  What a time to be alive. 

A few years ago when the automobile industry imploded, a lot of the blame was heaped on the auto workers union.  Although some of their benefits were a bit outrageous, i doubt that they were as big a part of the problem as the exorbitant executive salaries that permeate American corporations.  Even if some of their demands were over the top, they are almost justified in light of all the abuses carried out against workers for so many years.  Union auto workers were among the highest paid of the working class and blaming them for the meltdown sent a loud and clear message to America, that it is too much to hope for to expect to earn a higher standard of living if you are a simple working class person.  That the idea of being able to comfortably buy a home or send your children to college is out of reach.  Why should it be so unfathomable that a lowly worker could make a better than average living for themselves  even in the richest country on earth.  That the best they can hope for is a lifetime of hard work for low pay and endless struggle and debt.

The problem is that management seems to only see the labor force as a huge financial burden rather than an asset.  As if the products construct themselves so they have no idea why they have to pay all these workers so much money.  I saw the same attitudes while working construction a few years ago.  there was never a contractor who ever made even a single dime on any job.  They just could not understand why they had to pay their employees so much.  Meanwhile the company owners tried to outdo each other in seeing who could buy the most expensive truck.  They also had new motorcycles, boats, their kids and wives had new vehicles, the wives were also on the company payroll (even though they never came in or did any work).  But they never made a dime because they had to pay their employees so much!  These same so highly paid employees wore rags to work and drove old rusted out beater 72 ford pick-ups that only black magic could keep running.  most of these poor saps never even saw their paychecks as their wives would start arriving at the office Thursday afternoon to sit and gossip in their cars while waiting for their husbands checks to come in.  Work hard all week and go home on Friday and be given an allowance by your own non-working wife.  What a time to be alive.

The majority of the taxation of America seems to be the sole burden of the middle class as well.  You can’t tax the poor, at least not much- they don’t have any money.  The wealthy can pay sleazy lawyers and accountants to shelter and hide most of their assets so no luck there.  Companies are given huge tax breaks by local and state governments in exchange for moving  to or staying in a particular area to provide jobs for workers which they can then tax.  (free land is also usually provided)  So now the working people of this country not only pay their own fair share of taxes, they get to make up the difference for corporate welfare that is doled out while the wealthy and their companies skate home free. 

Like I also said in that earlier post, the highest paid employees in a company produce no goods or any services that a consumer  would pay for.  Yet their salaries are drawn off profits from the goods and services provided by the working class.  Sounds like welfare to me.

Freedom Mosque

The whole mosque at ground zero controversy has brought up two major points to me.  It started out “cultural center” in the media then went to “victory mosque” then finally “terror mosque”.  Personally I don’t have a problem with the proposed cultural center or its location.  It’s not like it is on the actual site ( like the multi-religious center at the Pentagon, which has operated since reconstruction was completed).  So if a mosque, all be part-time one is at one ground zero why not both?  The one at new the New York site is around a corner and down the block, how far away is far enough? 

All this is just a precursor  to what I think will be the real fight once the New York memorial is completed.  You know there will a Christian cross at the site and a Star of  David  for the Christians and Jews who died there, but what about a Islamic Crescent  for the Muslim victims of the attack.  If people don’t want a mosque two blocks away are they going to tolerate Islamic symbols on the site itself.  Muslims died in the buildings as well and they are just as dead as the people of other religions and I’m sure they will want their family members memorialized as well.  Did other religious groups who had victims in the Oklahoma City bombing want to tare down churches near the site because it was a southern Baptist who blew up the building?  I do not recall that happening.

On the other side the whacked-out Florida preacher that had planned to burn Korans on September eleventh may have made a point without even knowing it.  In the America I live in, as ridiculous as this idea was, most reasonable people would consider this a form of free speech.  But trying to burn a Koran or criticize a Muslim or Islam is likely to get you killed.  The founder of the New York mosque is unwilling to move his project because he’s afraid it will incite violence from the radicals.  this raises the question is Islam and freedom really compatible?  If you have to tiptoe around and be careful about what you say or do for fear of upsetting a bunch of radicals, that is no way to live in any society.  All fanatics must learn that nothing anyone says or tries to burn gives them the right to kill people or blow things up just because you disagree with them.  Compromising and putting up with ridiculous people, acts, and statements is the price of living in this country.

Despicable PG&E

Headline news reported the other day that TRN an industry watchdog group is accusing energy giant PG&E of serious misconduct in relation to the disastrous pipeline explosion two weeks ago.   Four people were killed and three more are “still missing” (let’s just call it seven, from the video i saw I do not think they will find the last three) dozens of houses were burned to the ground, and some of the evacuees who were lucky enough not to lose every thing in the fire were later victims of looters while being kept away from there homes by police.  Then I saw a news crawl that governor Schwarzenegger wants to declare the site a federal disaster area to pay for the cleanup.

The charges are that PG&E received a five million dollar rate hike to pay for repairing the gas main that failed, then turned around and gave the repair money out as executive bonuses.  PG&E then asked the state for more time and another five million dollars to make the repairs they should have already made.  I can only guess that they must have rum out of money before they ran out of executives.  The explosion and resulting fire were so huge that at first it was reported that an airliner had gone down in the neighborhood on approach to LAX.  It took emergency responders two days to put out the fire, and police kept even people who lost nothing to the fire out of the area.  Police kept out the residents but apparently  allowed in all the looters who felt like wondering through the neighborhood.  One couple not only had their jewelry stolen, but their passports and social security cards as well.  My advice to that couple is to go ahead and change your names now, it will only get tougher the more your identity is stolen. avoid the rush.

What I would do.  This is a new feature for this blog where I not only write about a travesty of justice, I will also write about what I would do to bring about a just resolution to the matter if it were up to me.  And they better pray it is never up to me.  First PG&E would pay for the whole cleanup and rebuild, no federal money!  Next, every executive that took a bonus from the rate hike meant for repairs would be charged with arson and murder.  Over and over again companies rip off consumers, poison their employees and customers all while getting huge tax breaks and free land from local governments just to do business in their states.  Nothing is ever done to correct these travesties or to prevent them from happening again.  There is a lot wrong with the Chinese government, but they know how to deal with corruption and restore the confidence of the public.  Remember when tainted baby formula turned up?  The Chinese took their head of the Chinese equivalent of the FDA out of his office and shot him within a month.  If we created a few examples like these some of these abuses would clear up pretty quickly

Minimum Rage

An unusual thing happened to me a few days ago. I was waiting
on a friend just inside one of the “big box store” chains that quickly
choke their way across America, When a young lady, walked over to me
and asked me if I needed any help. This was not unusual. I explained
to her that I was only waiting for someone and trying to make a call.
She continued to speak to me, (this was unusual) first about what
phone service I used then about her family, the high cost of living,
and her job at this location and another one. Both of course part-
time and wholly inadequate to provide a reasonable living.

Work soon interrupted and I was sorry that I did not get to
say goodbye. It has been awhile since an attractive young woman has
taken the time to speak with me when she did not have to (sad- I know).
As I left I tried to determine her motives for such an act, and contrary
to my normal paranoia the only sensible conclusion I could arrive at is
that she simply wanted someone to talk to, or more to the point, listen
to her.

This has stuck with me for several days as I knew how she or
anyone else who struggles this way on a daily basis would feel. Having
money alone will not make you happy, but it can make life so much easier.
Not having to worry constantly about how you will make it day to day can
lift the despair that can make the burdens of life seem so endless and
so tiring, as if nothing will ever change or get better and all you want
is to see some way out. But things do get better, at least on some level
and you push through even if they do not because you have no choice.

Here is a young women who is only trying to support herself and her
family, most likely working over forty hours per week but because it is
for two different companies she will never see a dime of overtime or
benefits that any full time employee would expect and by law be entitled
too. I know people will say “it's just business, it's just capitalism,
they have to make a profit.” I know all the arguments, but it just feels
wrong. And in most of my experience if it feels wrong it is wrong. Do
the profits and the executive salaries have to be so high.

Meanwhile the the nearly all millionaire Congress proposes that
“We should get rid of the minimum wage, it will help business.” I don't
know if it will help business but it will surely help business owners
and most likely stock holders, though I'm almost certain the woman I
spoke with owned no stocks. I am sure that this policy would hurt the
poor, who could expect huge pay cuts or to be fired so that they could
hire cheaper employees. The best case scenario I could foresee is that
all future hires would make $2.78 per hour. This would hurt business
in the long run as you try to imagine how much an employee earning this
rate would care about good customer service. They could make as much
selling lemonade on a street corner so what is it to them if they get fired.

Maybe all these companies that give only 32 to 38 hours a week
to get the maximum amount of work from employees without having to pay
for overtime or benefits, should pay into a general fund that could
provide some overtime and/or benefits to those workers who work over
forty hours a week and would normally be entitled to if it were for a
single company. Most people would see this as welfare (which it is not)
and Hating welfare is easy because they think of it as people who live
off the hard work of others. The same could be said about most corporate
managers. They preform no valuable services for the customer nor do
they produce any usable products that consumers would buy yet they take
generous salaries from the profits of the hard work done by others who
earn much less. By this definition alone, corporate executives are on
public assistance.

Graham, Crackers?

Occasionally I will read the newspaper column written by the Reverend
Billy Graham. I know what you are thinking, Yeeelch! Newspaper!, but I can't
help myself as it is a holdover from my youth when my dear grandmother used
to force me to sit absolutely still while she read his articles to me against
my will. A few times I actually agreed with him, but normally I was merely
indifferent.

However, as in the case of his column of Wednesday, August 11th 2010
the only conclusion I could reach is that Rev. Graham had lost his mind.
Someone had written in to say that the kindest, most thoughtful person they
knew said she was an atheist They went on to say that they had thought that
one would have to know God in order to behave like this but now no longer
thought that this was necessarily true.

I was fine up to this point, then he offered his answer and immediately
offended me like no other time before

“If your friend comes to Christ someday, she will be an even better
person than she is now.”

Alright, hold the presses. (literally) I have a slight problem with
this. To say that someone you do not know would automatically be a better
person just for accepting a religion, in my opinion is unreasonable and wholly
inaccurate. I've known way to many Christians to fall for that one. Now some
would say that those weren't REAL Christians. If this is the case then I
surmise that only about ten to twenty percent of Christians are REAL Christians.
His statement amounts to the opinion that the worst Christian is a better person
than the best Atheist. The fact is most of the worst people I've ever known
couldn't stop talking about their religion or God as if doing so excused the
most abhorrent of behaviors. To be fair I'm sure there are plenty of truly rotten
atheists as well. He then surprisingly ads

“Perhaps she simply has a sunny personality, as some people do.”

Wow. This one really caught me off guard. I don't think he is even trying on this one. This is an prime example of over simplification on a grand scale, and completely unworthy of the reverend's intellect. Maybe Stalin had a sunny personality as well, jovially sending his enemies off to the gulag, but it would not have made him a better person or even to seem like one.

And then the finale; “She's not this way because she's an atheist-”
Agreed. "In fact she's this way in spite of her atheism.” Disagreed. Completely.


And then; “because a true atheist has no real reason to believe in
right and wrong, or to behave sacrificially toward others.”

Hmmm. How about behaving that way simply because it is the right thing
to do. I would sooner question the character of someone who behaves this way
out of the fear of punishment only, than someone who has nothing to lose either
way. I have often wondered about this, is it really kindness if it is done
simply for self-preservation. Are you a better person if you do right and
sacrifice only because you are afraid of the alternative, rather than the
belief that it is the right thing to do? Can you sincerely love a God out of
the fear of the consequences without it breeding even a hint of resentment? Why
would an intelligent God want your worship or love under such duress in the
first place? Having questions about organized religion is nothing new, and it
has rarely made much sense to me. Why want to be worshiped at all? Why punish
when you could teach? If the goal is to become better people, wouldn't learning
be better than torment. (I feel the same way about prison, I do not see it as
rehabilitation or punishment, but simply prevention) Maybe separating yourself
from the rest of humanity through negative behavior is its own punishment.
Maybe I'm not smart enough to understand all this but I assume we all have a
conscience for a reason. More on this subject later.

Queso addendum

Guess what happened again. Go ahead. Guess. I dare you. I suppose
it is really my fault for going back there and/or trusting them to get it
right. You would think that the process of having to give your order two or
three times would ensure that you got what you wanted, but it seems to not be
enough.

My favorite insult to injury is the sign at the drive through that
states “Please have your money ready.” Oh yeah, thats the bug in the system.
It's never that they do not have any food ready (lets run a special on this
item and then not order or make any extra!”) The food is screwed up regularly,
but when was the last time you screwed up paying? When was the last time you
accidentally paid in Rupees. Or half-shillings. Maybe you had a pocket full
of left over Confederate dollars from your last trip backwards in time.

Normally I would just toss the garbage rather than waste the time and
fuel to take it back. This time I was determined to make them eat it,
figuratively if not literally. The exchange took no less than three employees.
And what did I get for my time and trouble you did not ask? A coupon for my
next visit? A couple of their famous hot apple pies for my inconvenience?
Nope. All I got was their sincerest heartfelt apology.

No queso (or 'an overreaction')

Fast food has never been the pinnacle of fine dining, (only now it just costs as much) but the current crop of low waged and even lower I.q.'ed grill jockeys is letting down those of us who hold the lowest of expectations. Getting away with anything even close to the correct order is tantamount to winning the million dollar lottery. The employee's ability to symmetrically stack two burger patties is apparently immediate grounds for dismissal. Company policies such as cheating every fourth customer out of their french fries go a long way toward increasing profit margins, but not nearly as much as the eight-and-a- half dollar sack lunch. Making sure the employee operating the register speaks only a modicum of English not only multiplies confusion and errors( seeing to it that in all fairness no one leaves happy) but keeps time consuming complaints to a minimum.
Order a breakfast sandwich of sausage, egg, and no cheese and you get wild
variations of sausage and cheese; egg and cheese; or just sausage but with entirely
different bread types, usually the most sweetly disgusting choice available- the pancake like cakes soaked with baked in syrup. Yum! It is though they are part of some kind of government subsidy plan and must give away a certain quota of extra salty non-dairy cheese-like squares or face an extremely high monetary penalty. At least that is what I was beginning to believe after being wronged yet again. In a flagrant disregard for customer service that made the manager of the restaurant shake her head in disbelief, the special ticket indicating “no cheese” was actually stuck INTO the unwanted cheese-like product. However all my fears were allayed when the manager turned to the kitchen staff and yelled out “NO QUESO!”.

Oily Sheen

         How will we ever recover from such a disgusting blight that has been
 forced on the American people for so long now.  This oily Sheen causes nothing
 but pain and suffering and no good could ever come from such an abomination. 
It is ugly, it stinks, and it continues to befoul and poison everything it touches,
yet there seems to be no way of stopping or ridding ourselves of it.

 Its latest victim? 
The Colorado system of justice.
The oily Sheen I refer to here of course is not the BP gulf spill, but the
sleazy, oily actor known to us all as Charlie Sheen. How many chances does one
person get?  How much justice can seven hundred thousand an episode buy?  All
you want in this country apparently if you are rich and/or famous.  How many
times has he been arrested for DUI?  For domestic violence?  For cavorting with
prostitutes?  Frankly, I do not know nor care, and I'm not going to waste my
time researching it, but it seems like a lot to me.


     Oily Sheen was set to plead guilty to a felony and receive a 30-day(suggested)
jail sentence, but refused the deal when he learned he would not be allowed to
smoke in jail. So the great state of Colorado backed down to the power of the
oily Sheen and offered him a misdemeanor charge with no jail time, anger
management classes(ha!), and 30 days rehab.  With the 90 days oily Sheen has
already spent in rehab awaiting his day in court, it will probably be time served.
Even if it isn't, 30 days in a five star resort for beating up your wife hardly
seems like the kind of justice you or I could expect, but if it was, I think I
could finally start to see the benefits to being married.  Oh, to have such choices
in life! 

    Some justice has been delivered though in the form of a couple of luxury automobiles
belonging to oily Sheen being driven to the nearest cliff side and then pushed off. 
the police seem to think it was an “inside job” but oily Sheen claims to have know
idea how it keeps happening.  To which everyone else screams “It's your wife stupid!”
Don't worry about it though, a half hour or so on the set will pay for both cars lost
so he will be okay.  The whole incident will no doubt leave shame and dishonor the
Colorado system of justice with the taint of a black cancerous blotch that no amount
of Dawn can disperse.