December 21, 2009 archive

Docudharma Times Monday December 21




Monday’s Headlines:

Obama’s Guantanamo policy rings a bell

Spanish quest to identify black soldier who fought against fascism in civil war

Labor Data Show Surge in Hiring of Temp Workers

Fed’s approach to regulation left banks exposed to crisis

 China’s quiet satisfaction at tough tactics and goalless draw

Asia’s Las Vegas celebrates 10 high-rolling years

Anger as Pius moves closer to sainthood

Stolen Auschwitz sign is recovered

Iran’s masses mourn the loss of Grand Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri

Hamas helping British lawyers target Israel

Late Night Karaoke

Open Thread

Banned again, thank God!

I’ll admit, I had a nasty cold a couple of weeks ago, was unemployed, was bored out of my mind, so …… I rejoined Dailykos.   Other than just to kill time while I was barely able to move, I did it mainly to rec up a few things here and there, and to just see what kind of responses certain ideas would get.   Wow.  

My name was MightyMole.    It’s a type of light we use in Hollywood made by Mole Richardson.

That place has gone so downhill since I was banned last time that it was almost completely unbearable to be over there.   Yet it sucks you in, there’s “action”, instant responses, you can’t even keep up half the time, and I type over 100 words a minute.   The energy is bad, but it’s hard to break away from once you’re in it.  

But holy shit that place is populated by a bunch of idiots.   Some of the people are smart and informed, but seriously it’s only maybe in the 5% range.  

And what’s so annoying about the rest of them is how they THINK they have a clue.  When they don’t.    People who are completely ignorant —  who think they know everything — are absolutely no different from the dumbest fucking Republican ever.

One of the smarest things a person can ever do is realize how informed they AREN’T.   In fact, that’s what I tell people now what a college education is for.   A college education is not to really teach you that much stuff, it’s to let you know how much stuff you DON’T know.  

What has happened to the average American “Democrat?”   It’s scary.  

I don’t put up with rudeness very well.   I’m done with rude people.   And that place seems to have turned into nothing but a big toilet-hole of rudeness, a place where people can go to get their rocks off abusing each other verbally.  

Weird.

I once dated a girl who admitted to me that she would drive to distant shopping malls, where she planned on never going back, just so she could be really nasty and rude to the woman workers in the stores.   It’s kind of like that.   What is it with these peoples’ need to be nasty to other human beings?

My rule is that if someone is rude or nasty to me, I come back at them ten fold, or more.   I just don’t have any patience for that shit any more.   People in this country will put up with anything, including really abominable behavior on the part of each other.  

Anyway, here’s the best comment I saw, by one of the rare needles in the haystacks of ignorance:


Yeah, the GOP failed alright (8+ / 0-)

They worked it so that everyone on the individual market is required to pay exorbitant premiums to private companies for crappy insurance that doesn’t actually cover anything, with no regulations or oversight; essentially the largest middle-class tax increase in history; the insurance companies get 30 million new customers that they don’t have to service because everyone is going to be required by law to buy their horrible product.

And the Republicans won’t bear any of the blame for it despite the outcome essentially being better for them and their benefactors in the health insurance industry than anything Bush could possibly have dreamed of passing.

Let’s all laugh at those failures in the GOP.

by eg4190 on Sun Dec 20, 2009 at 11:25:33 PM PST

These people are cheering on their own party’s suicide.  

No wonder this country’s in such a sewer.  

These people couldn’t give a crap that Obama’s blowing up civilians willy nilly in, say, Yemen right now.    Murdering completely innocent people.   Doesn’t matter.

Obama can literally do anything Bush did, but because he’s got a (D) after his name, it’s just A-OK and he’s “My” President.  

Blows my mind.  Just completely blows it.

Oh, and don’t even think about primarying him in 2012, apparently Democratic Presidents are entitled to a single eight year term.   That was news to me.  

No IDEA about political power.   No IDEA about how to use it.  

Maybe I’ll just delete this whole thing in a while.   I know I have told people here over and over to just avoid that place.    I meant it, I really did.   I was bored.   Sure, I knew how I might react over there, but my perusals of that place in the past few months have been superficial, in fact I have avoided it for months at a time, so I didn’t really have a feel at ALL as to how that place has gone downhill.  

Wretched.  

Hair-splitting purity tests, my ass.

There’s a coalition of “progressive” unity-schtickers lamenting the sudden loss of support for the President and his policies.  United we stand, divided we fall, they say, and all that crap we have been hearing since well before Democrats took Congress.  These Democratic appeasers are united behind a person and party, not the issues, and therefore take issue with those who prefer the “principle” to the “man” or “tribe.”  To them, people like myself are purity trolls, like Republican Tea-baggers, regardless of what the tribe stands for.  Thus, they will tolerate any and every thing, as long as it’s served up on a plate.

This rapid loss in support for Obama has occurred for several reasons.  First, this was a very important election after eight years of neoliberalism on acid.  Second, due to a certain psychological pre-eminence of various crises at this particular time in history, we have been keenly aware of the importance of all this promise for hope and change, including the specific issues and policies that would indicate change.  Third Barack Obama has signaled in all major areas of crisis, from warfare (Iraq, Afghanistan, Somalia, and now, Yemen), the political crisis off giving welfare to deranged profit-takers ($12 trillion dollars and counting to casino gamblers), social welfare (this fucked health care bill), the Unitary Executive and civil rights (blocking judicial activity surrounding Bush era war crimes, torture, human rights, etc.), to environmental degradation (Copenhagen), and boy howdy that’s a lot of signals, that his promises of hope and change are full-on bullshit.  If you want to call questions of war & peace, basic human rights, clear-cut questions of law, rampant and encroaching crony capitalism and fascism,  and environmental crises “purity tests,” be my  guest, you retarded fucking gink, but it shows zero intellectual honesty.

An Open Letter to Myself

I’ve seen all these open letters lately, to the President, Michael Moore, you name it, and I wondered what it be like to get an open letter.  It must be something to read a newspaper or a blog and see an open letter addressed to you for all to see.  Since it’s highly unlikely someone will post an open letter to me in any media outlet, I thought I’d do it myself.  Can’t really stop me now can ya, cuz if you’re reading this, I already did.

Dude,

I know you’ve been depressed lately.  It’s not hard to see for chrissakes.  Moping around all day like you have forever to live.  Well, you don’t.  You’re getting old brother and you better stop and smell the roses before there are no more to smell.

I know it’s hard to go on with all this shit going on.  Wars, homelessness and poverty, unemployment, the world going crazy.  You’ve seen clearly how the two major parties differ only in approach, with the same overall agenda to maintain the plutarchy.  Remember when you learned about a plutarchy?  Shit, you had to look that up didn’t ya?  When you found that term, first you looked up oligarchy:

“An oligarchy is a form of government in which power effectively rests with a small elite segment of society distinguished by royal, wealth, intellectual, family, military, or religious hegemony.”

Whoa! That was an eye opener.  It certainly seemed to fit with exactly what this country has become, even though you now know it has always been that way.  

Then you looked up plutocracy:

“Plutocracy is rule by the wealthy, or power provided by wealth.”

Well ya, that’s true, but maybe oligarchy is better.  Then you came upon the combo term:  plutarchy.

“The combination of both plutocracy and oligarchy is called plutarchy.”

Plutarcy!  That was it and you knew it.  Money controls shit, but so does religion and the military industrial complex.  And that New World Order thing with the stuff about thirteen families and the Illuminati.  The family part!  It’s out there bro, but you know you can’t push it away.  You aint built that way man.  Truth is truth and that’s what you’re all about aint it?

So you decided on plutarcy and then became depressed.  Like it was all too much to overcome.  Fuck that.  Just because the lemmings are flowing over the cliff, doesn’t mean there aren’t many more like you.  Non lemmings.  You know there are and you just need to keep focused on them.  Fuck the lemmings.  And just because of your realization that the plutarchocrats just may be too powerful to overcome, fuck that too.  You’re better than that.  Lemmings are lemmings for a reason.  Because they have no power.  They follow.  You aren’t a follower.  You’re a big, mean motherfucker.  They’re useless and no factor in the overall battle.  They aren’t your battle, the plutarchocrats are the target.    

So I encourage you to stay in the game my brother.  You have much to contribute and you know the truth.  That’s the key.  You know the truth.  It doesn’t matter if you get your facts fucked up now and then, or if you have doubts because of what others may say.  Trust your instincts!  Keep learning and fighting the good fight.  I’m here if you need me.

Keep on truckin man.

Pique the Geek 20091220. Reader Defined Topics

The Geek took hiatus last week to attend, and be part of, the marriage between Eldest Son and his very wonderful bride.  It was a very traditional Methodist service, and it went off perfectly insofar as no one fainted, no one objected (there was not a “If anyone objects…” clause in this particular service, so no one did.

The Geek also took today off and did not write a scientific column for several reasons.  First, I stayed up too late last night reading the news and weather.  Second, I could never come up with a good topic for tonight.  I will do better for next week, I promise.  Third, The Geek has just been feeling a tiny bit under the weather, but not horribly ill or anything.

Sunday Train: Doctor Dan prescribes High Speed Rail for Kentucky

Burning the Midnight Oil for Living Energy Independence

Doctor Dan Mongiardo, Kentucky’s Lieutenant Governor, has announced that he is running for the Democratic nomination for the Kentucky Senate race, to take on whoever wins the Republican nomination to challenge for the seat that Senator Bunning (R-Big$$$) has announced he is giving up.

Lots of politics to unwrap in that paragraph, which I’ll leave to the political wise-guys. The Sunday Train today is about Dr. Dan’s Rail Plan.

As far as I can tell, Dr. Dan’s Rail Plan has four main parts, and regular readers of the Sunday Train will recognize much from each of the four parts:

  • Support for expanding Kentucky’s existing and potential Amtrak routes into 110mph Emerging Higher Speed Rail corridors
  • Support for regional rail services to complete the above state rail map
  • “Hybrid Light Rail” to provide cross-metropolitan local rail services, principally to Louisville
  • Heavy investment in complementary local transit, including bus rapid transit and a high frequency driverless monotrain system for Kentucky.

Act Blue Page

For those looking to send some snake oil Doctor Dan’s way: Daniel Mongiardo’s Act Blue Page.

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