The Real Swine Flu: Why Capitalism Must be Eradicated From the Face of the Earth

Here's the state of the nation on May Day 2009: the financial terrorists that ruined the global economy still aren't in jail. In fact, not only are the immune from criminal prosecution, they have been rewarded. With our money. Billions of dollars of our money. The so-called socialists in our government gave it to them. It seems hard to believe, until you realize how things work here. While the less fortunate (lower class schmucks) die from lack of adequate health care, the power brokers in the world of finance own both political parties and all the branches and of our federal government and get to be bailed out on our trillions of dimes. It's a good thing most people aren't paying attention or there just might be a real revolution here. We can always blame the Mexicans for spreading some scary virus or whatever other diversion CNN is trumpeting. It helps to get our minds off our retirement/college funds being wiped out and our home foreclosed on.

April is National Shooting Spree Month: Have you hugged your Assault Weapon lately?

"I'm not afraid of Al Queda, I'm afraid of Al Cracka"

~ Chris Rock

Ahhh Springtime, the time of flower blossoms, birds singing...and violent, bloody, bullet-riddled rampages. Why is it that a time of year known for the renewal and promise of life is also the time most likely to result in mass murders? The sad litany of place names includes Waco, Columbine, Oklahoma City, Virginia Tech, and about a dozen more places have been added so far this month. The problem appears to be that we we have a lot of guns and a lot of crazy people, and we tend to allow that combination to occur more often than most places on earth. But it's more than just crazy people, it's a societal ill that is borne out especially harshly this year. With the economy tanking, the alienation and contradictions of a very cold system of competition is intensified. Not only has the safety net for the lowest 98 percent of the economic order been torn away in the last 30 years of bipartisan attacks on us native working schmucks, but the fallout from the loan scams have added to the ferment. Things get bleaker each Spring it seems as the greedfest of Wall Street is relied upon by our government to drive the economy. As long as that remains the case, and there is NO sign of it changing anytime soon, the Easter Bunny will need to wear kevlar.

Another scary development is the recent gun buying binge of right wing lunatics. These are the people that are genuinely afraid that Obama is a Muslim who will outlaw the Jesus-declared right to own a machine gun, and then ship them off to concentration camps where their women flowers will be pollinated by swarthy Muhammadians or some such outrage. So they stock up on ammo and semi-automatic weaponry. The good news is that statistically they are much more likely to accidentally kill themselves than purposefully kill anyone else, but the bad news is that they remain a danger to innocent family members and to you and I. If only the authors of the Second Amendment could have foreseen these nutjobs and edited the document to read:

A well regulated Militia*, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

* a well regulated Militia does NOT refer to some beer-swilling yahoo with his car up on blocks and an old washing machine on his front porch who wants an assault rifle because he thinks he saw a black "heldicopter" watching him!

Our Long National Nightmare Continues: Neocons Still in Control

"Now is the time...for Babylon to fall"
~Aswad, "Three Babylon"

The very cautiously tepid attempts of the Obama foreign policy team to give the appearance of being a sea change from the strident genocidal maniacs of their predecessors are a sure sign that U.S. foreign policy is still firmly plowing down the same disastrous path at nearly the same speed. The Neocon agenda is the de facto bipartisan agenda of our foreign policy, which is largely controlled by two main forces, transnational capital and Zionism. That much has not changed one bit and until it does, there will be nothing to celebrate for the long suffering of the world.

So it is safe to assume that all the worst aspects of our entanglements in Iraq and Afghanistan will not be brought to any real conclusion in the next decade, or longer. More blood and treasure will be lost in the drifting sands of time. New fronts will open up with new conflicts as regions are made safe for those who control the flow of international capital. Meanwhile, there are some positive developments in Africa and Latin America where democracy continues apace in providing change we can actually believe in.

The repressive policies of the IMF and World Bank that caused so many financial meltdowns in Africa and Latin America, the so called "emerging nations", are being soundly rejected and sent to the dustbin of history. These nations are now truly emerging as they throw out the representatives of corrupt oligarchy and the policies of their puppetmasters. For the first time since the Monroe Doctrine, we are actually letting the people decide how they shall be governed without invasions, coups and assassinations in our self-annointed sphere of influence. We have gone an entire 5 years without forcing a coup in this hemisphere! An incredibly long time for us. Perhaps we are finally reaching a new level of maturity and "leaving such childish things behind"?

If only we would be as wise and mature in our dealings with the problems in the Mid-East.

The Pressing Need for an American Nuremberg

To initiate a war of aggression, therefore, is not only an international crime; it is the supreme international crime differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole.

~Robert Jackson, chief U.S. prosecutor at Nuremberg

Forget about the economy...for now. Forget about the environment...for now. Forget about every pressing issue that has resulted from 8 years of disastrous policies. The single most important item on the agenda of the incoming administration is the prosecution of members of the current administration for torture and other war crimes. This must be at the very top of the list. Nothing takes precedence over this country declaring it is a civilized nation that does not allow its leaders to initiate wars of aggression or to torture prisoners. The invasion and occupation of Iraq, based on "faulty intelligence" was a con game that had the explicit support of many Republicans and the implicit support of many Democrats. The international community and most people in this country are well aware that this is an international crime, perhaps the worst since the United States involvement in Southeast Asia. In additions to the thousands of deaths and injuries that have resulted from the invasion and occupation of Iraq, the United States has been torturing prisoners and subjecting others to rendition to other countries that have tortured them. If we let those guilty of these crimes go unpunished we not only set a dangerous and unnacceptable precedent for the future, but have also permanently decreased our international standing as a country interested in the most basic form of justice.

There is very important history to be made in the next few months. We must demand our leaders to be wise and brave enough to forge ahead in what is right and just. We must demand those guilty of torture and war cimes be prosecuted.

Go to this link and demand that the incoming administration prosecutes those responsible for the war of aggression against Iraq and for the torture of prisoners. We must restore some sense of morality as a nation before we can do anything else.

I'm Declaring War on Dumbfuckistan

My official declaration of war, made just moments ago:

From my base camp in America, before it's too late, I announce with solemn heart, weary mind and indomitable spirit, that I do hereby declare a state of war with the place in the human mind known as Dumbfuckistan. This decision is neither made lightly, nor in haste. Indeed, this state of affairs has been building for eight long years now, and that slow percolation only recently resulted in the pressure needed to set off an all out explosion, a desparate need for action. It is indeed a desparate state of affairs that the country is on the precipice of renouncing even it's lofty words of attempting to be interested in equality of opportunity. So we have come to this; religion used as a blunt instrument of force to secure a future for well to do Republicans. Identity politics used to divide and conquer a low income, low information lower class programmed to think in Balkanized terms of self-disenfranchisement. I am thus consumed with a righteous hatred. No, I don't hate the average Dumbfuckistani, who is for the most part a passive, grazing creature, sometimes even amiable, but nonetheless more dangerous in its ignorance than any other beast on the Plains or in the mountain forests. My hatred is reserved for the state of mind fog that the Dumbfuckistani remains in, even after being painfully raped and violently mugged for nearly a decade. It is this that must be eradicated, and given no quarter. For desparate times require desparate actions, and I must take up mental and moral arms against the virulent corruption, environmental destruction, torture, state terror, perverted Christianity, bald-faced lies, incompetence due to cronyism, war profiteering, etc., etc.,that the Dumbfuckistanis have allowed to fester for 8 years too long. This is war, a total war, an all-consuming war. It is war that has been fought before in this country. It is a war recognized by the Founders as altogether necessary when times require. Now is one of those times, and I am confident in the victory...of good over evil!

What Would YOU Do

What would you do if you
Knew all of the things we knew
Would you stand up for truth
Or would you turn away too
And then what if you saw
All of the things that's wrong
Would you stand tall and strong
Or would you turn and walk away

I see a message from the government, like every day
I watch it, and listen, and call 'em all suckas'
They warnin' me about Osama or whatever
Picture me buyin' this scam I said "never"

Now ask yourself who's the people with the most to gain (Bush)
'fore 911 motherfuckas couldn't stand his name (Bush)
Now even niggas wavin' flags like they lost they mind
Everybody got opinions but don't know the time
'Cause Amerikkka's been took - it's plain to see
The oldest trick in the book is make an enemy
A phony evil so the government can do its dirt
And take away ya freedom lock and load, beat and search
Ain't nothin' changed but more colored people locked in prison
These pigs still beat us, but it seem we forgettin'
But I remember 'fore September how these devils do it
Fuck Giuliani, ask Diallo how he doin'
We in the streets holla- 'jail to the thief' - follow
Fuck wavin' flags bring these dragons to they knees
Oil blood money makes these killers ride cold
Suspicious suicides people dyin' never told
It's all a part of playin' God so ya think we need 'em
While 'Bin Ashcroft' take away ya rights to freedom
Bear witness to the sickness of these dictators
Hope you understand the time brother cause it's major
So now you askin why my records always come the same
Keep it real, ain't no fillers, motherfucka blingin'
Mine eyes seen the gory of the coming of the beast
So every story every word I'm sayin' 'Fuck Peace'
See you could witness the Illuminati body count
Don't be surprised these is devils that I'm talkin' bout
You think a couple thousand lives mean shit to killers?
Nigga I swear to God we the ones - ain't no villains
Or any other word they think to demonize a country
Ain't no terror threat unless approval ratings slumpin'
So I'ma say it for the record we the ones that planned it
Ain't no other country took a part or had they hand in
It's all a way to keep ya scared so you think you need'em
Praisin' Bush while that killer take away ya freedom
How many of us got discovered but ignore the symptoms?
Niggaz talkin' loud but ain't nobody sayin' shit'
And with the 4th Amendment gone eyes are on the 1st
That's why I'm spittin' cyanide each and every verse
I see the Carlyle group and Harris Bank Accounts
I see 'em plead the 5th each and every session now
And while Reichstag burns I see the public buy it
I see the profilin see the media's compliance
War is good for business see the vicious make a savior
Hope you understand the time brother cause its major

Batshit Crazy

The elections of 2008 are rapidly approaching and bringing a looming sense of guarded optimism. Well they were until recently. Now they have the added bonus of comedy.

The Republican Party has finally gone totallly insane. Mind you, they are still evil and capable of scaring enough low information voters to make the 2008 elections a lot closer than they should be. But they have reached a level of desparation that is actually heartening to see. The choice of "Mooselini" to the ticket was bizarre. Until you realize that Creationists/Rapturists make up a large part of their vote. I'm not sure whether that's funny or scary. It was very scary that in 2004 this group gave us four more disastrous years. But Americans are not that stupid anymore! They won't fall for the same bullshit as they did four years ago.

I hope.

Dick Cheney is the One True Antichrist

I got a chain email a while ago from a Hillary supporter that claims Obama is the Antichrist. Recently, as expected, the wingnuts have been reviving the meme since Obama hasn't assuaged their fears that he is not a true warmongering, torture-endorsing, tax-protesting, electric chair switch-pulling nutcase disciple of Jesus Christ, Our (Their perverted) Lord and Savior.

What's truly amazing is that wingnuts are so into projection and have been so out of touch with reality for so effing long is that they can call Obama, someone who actually is not out to destroy the world, the antichrist, whilst they ignore the mass murders and economic catastrophes foisted on the world and nation of our own Dick Darth Duck! Mutherfukkin' Cheney. A guy who has so much clout he can shoot someone in the face and make THEM apologize TO HIM for it. Think about it. That's right, think. Something the wingnuts and the corporate media have conditioned us not to do. As the classic blues song goes: That's EVIL, evil is going on wrong!

So wingnuts, please spare us the pathetic projection and STFU for the next several months...no make that decades. Thanks.

On Olympic Coverage and My Grand Plan for the Future of Telecommunications

NBC's Olympic coverage so far has been less than impressive. In fact, it's been a steaming pile of bullshit. I wanna see real Olympic sports like boxing, sprints, long jumping, etc. Not water polo or horse riding or fucking volleyball. Especially not volleyball, which has been on wall to wall coverage today. They spent 6 hours on indoor volleyball then another 6 on beach volleyball. Who gives a fuck!? The entire premise there is to set up a spike. That's it. That's the entire strategy. Jesus hopping Christ on a pogo stick, they broadcast 12 hours of that today! Setting up a spike!

Why are there so many lame ass sports that have been added to the Olympics in recent years? Badminton!? This is a gold medal sport? WTF is next, lawn jarts and bocce ball? Who wants to see this shit? Do soccer moms really wanna see this? Is that who NBC is pandering to? There's GOTTA be a way to see the sports I wanna see, w/o having this shit dictated to me. Here's my idea:

INTERACTIVE TELEVISION.

Imagine combining your PC and TV and picking ANY sporting event (or movie, or music video) that you want to see ANY time you want to see it. It would be like Youtube, except better. You can get anything that exists in all the archives of all the entertainment outlets, anything that was ever recorded. There would be a kickass search function, better than google, that would identify that long ago song or movie whose name you can't quite remember, but all you had to do was type in (your TV would come with a keyboard/text message/remote type thing that I haven't fully thought out yet) and voila! There's that movie you saw when you were a kid that you vaguely recall, but always wanted to see again. And of course, it would also allow you to bypass the crappy excuses for Olympic sports that saturate NBC's current Olympic coverage and let you get right to the stuff you want to see. Freedom of choice! Where is it? Is this not the land of the free!? Interactive TV now!!

Thank you internet for letting me vent.

On Presidential Role Models

“It’s impossible for a chicken to produce a duck egg. It can only produce according to what that particular system was constructed to produce. The system in this country cannot produce freedom for the Afro-American. It is impossible for this system, this economic system, this political system, this social system, this system period. ...And if ever a chicken did produce a duck egg, you would say it was certainly a revolutionary chicken.”
~Malcolm X

“What can a cloth suit tell me about the wealth of a soul?”
~ Randell Robinson

This presidential election of 2008, still being decided, has often been spoken of in terms of history. Even more so, it has been constantly spoken of, by virtually all the candidates as a watershed for "change". In actuality, barring a miracle, the only historical change that there may be...maybe... someone other than a white male elected President of the United States this year. This change, important yet ultimately superficial, in these days of greatly diminished expectations, is cause for rapturous awe, and a strange mix of delirious optimism and great anxiety. We have given up on a fair system. We have long given up on even a slightly less bloodthirsty imperialism (which we are actually supposed to be proud of!) All we have to hope for is a symbolic victory, one that gaurantees no substantive change in policy in terms of what really matters.

I will not downplay the power of the symbolism. The United States, with something other than a white male as president, will look a lot different. It will even feel a lot different. Alas, I fear it won't actually be much different. We will have a duck as president. Perhaps a female duck, or a black duck, but a duck just the same. This system can only produce one species. Only if we change the internal workings of the system or the interaction with the environment can we force a mutation. We are told to hope...to wish for...to dream of...this significant change. For in 2008, the greatest expectation is a role model that will inspire the next generation to actually accomplish the substantive change that is needed now and has been needed for many past generations. This is what diminished expecations give you...dreams deferred. No thank you. I won't believe in presidential role models until there is some substantive reason for believing.

Handicapping the 2008 Presidential Election

Hey, it's presidential primary season again. Has it already been four years since the American electorate, in their infinite wisdom, handed the Boy Monkey Ass four more years of raping and plundering the known universe? I had been blissfully semi-unaware of this mess until I was watching football the other night and went to switch to the NFL channel and landed on C-SPAN by mistake. There they were talking about momentum and likeability and blowing the usual smoke and nonsense that makes about 60 percent of the people not bother to vote. There they were once again ignoring the two most important things about any election in this country...who is giving each candidate their money to run, and which candidate has the best hair. As every pundit knows, but none will admit, these are the two things that will determine the next president.

Unfortunately, I have no idea who is getting what percentage of their bribe money from what grossly misanthropic segment of the American capitalist rogue's gallery. They never print this stuff anywhere in the McPapers or on the McNews Channels. But I have seen the candidate's hair. Oh yeah, they do show you the hair and make-up. So without further ado, here's how I see it panning out.

Republican:

Rudy Guiliani: Bald. NEXT!

Fred Thompson: Bald with huge bags under his eyes. Who the fuck begged him to join the race? Nobody, that's who. Keep it moving, Uncle Fester.

McCain: Silver hair, thinning. Very Old...not as bad as Thompson, but you just can't picture him getting an intern to drop to her knees, except maybe under duress.

Huckabee: Dyes his hair, slightly thinning. Looks like Dick Nixon around the time of the Checkers Speech. Same nose, jowels, shifty eyes and 5 o'clock shadow. At the first sign of sweat on his upper lip this mofo is DONE.

Romney: Pure televangelist hair. Dyed.


So Romney has the best hair. He's a very slick dude that tries too hard to be sincere sounding. He's totally transparent, though and totally full of shit with no moral compass whatsoever. He's also the big money candidate. In any other year he would be a lock for the presidency. But a large percentage of the electorate who would normally be easy pickings have sore rectums from the last 8 years of getting the 50-inch GOP elephant dick in that azzzz. Some of them still might fall for it, though. In the words of Bugs Bunny "don't these ducks ever learn?" The Republicans also have a protest candidate this year, Ron Paul. He is against the Iraq War so of course he is insane. Anyone against the Iraq War is insane and believes in UFOs. Just ask the corporate media, they'll tell ya. But I digress...

Democrats:

Obama: Closely-cropped natural. I thought for sure he would go for the waves at some point in the last 4 years, but he's keeping it very basic and unassuming. I think he would still do well if he grew it out a little, but how much is too much for the mainstream voter??

Clinton: Her hubby rocked the undyed "poof" look all the way to the top back in the day and she is staying with what got them there, with the perfect business-like corporate cut.

Edwards: Best in show, his hair got all the press so far and gave him a huge boost in Iowa. Hard to hold back the Little Lord Fauntelroy factor and I see him being a force at the convention, with his well-groomed mane good for at least a couple hundred delegates.

So taking in all of the above, look for the impeccably coifed Democrats to easily take the Presidency over the follically (and morally) challenged Republicans this fall.

Message to the Black Athlete in America

I live in Grand Rapids, Michigan, which is a staunch Republican outpost located about halfway between Chicago and Detroit. Perhaps our most famous living native son is the champion boxer Floyd Mayweather, Jr. I bring this up because recently Floyd beat up some Brit to win some kind of middle weight boxing title. You see I don't follow the sport closely. In fact, I truly wonder why if it's illegal for chickens and dogs to fight then it's perfectly acceptable for people to scramble eachother's brains for sport. I have my theories as to why, but I will save that for another day. Anyway, the point is that you would think our local newspaper and TeeVee stations would be closely following this story. But I watched the local news last night and they did not mention anything about the fight (which was going on at the time) until the sports section. Yet, last year when the Tigers (which play in a city 180 miles away) were in the World Series, they led off the news with coverage and reporters covering the story in front of wide screen TVs at local sports bars.

Now let's go back in time a few years to 1998. At that time Mark McGwire hit 70 home runs and was a modern day folk hero. Three years later Barry Bonds broke that record and was subpoenaed. He then went on to break the all time home run record in 2007 and was subsequently indicted.

Ok disclosure time. Barry Bonds and Floyd Mayweather Jr. are black men. So, to borrow a sports anaolgy, they have two strikes against them starting out. They are also considered arrogant by many sports writers who happen to be caucasion. STRIKE THREE!

They are outta there. No front page headlines and you better watch your step. That's the price you must pay if you insist on being the UBA, or Uppity Black Athlete. This is the CLS, or Carl Lewis Syndrome at play here. Named after a famous UBA from the '80s, who didn't play by the rules of the caucasian media and was even suspected of being gay. That killed his megastar and even star status in America (though not elsewhere in the sissy world of Europe and Japan).

If you want to be well liked and black in the world of sports you have to be at least humble if not downright deferential. Caucasian athletes can do as they damn well please, they get a pass. These are the rules. Michael Jordan was a possible exception. He would not suck up, but he still became the megastar because he bit his lip and let the Nike money do the talking. Be like Mike. And they will at least tolerate you.

Joe Lieberman in the Garden of Gethsemane

And he went forward a little, and fell on the ground, and prayed that, if it were possible, the hour might pass from him.

Mark 14:35

Of the many rouses that politicians use to cow people, religion is perhaps the most effective. The sight of a senator or president appearing as a moral standardbearer while backing wars of agression is as common as suicide bombers in Baghdad these days. Case in point: "Holy" Joe Lieberman, the orthodox Jew that so pompously chastised Bill Clinton for sticking his penis in unauthorized areas, has since devoutly endorsed the decidedly not-so-moral Bush/Cheney cabal and its spreading of torture and death hither and yon.

Now he is in the unenviable position of having to vote yay or no for the next advocate of torture and genocide that Bush has nominated for Attorney General. Our Mr. Morality can take a righteous stand against these evils just as he did against the philandering Clenis. Or he can give the green light to torture and death. Or he could use the sleazy, torture-enabling Mr. Schumer and Mrs. Feinstein as cover and give a purely symbolic vote against the nominee. It will be interesting, in a disgusting kind of way, to see how it pans out.

Must Be Halloween Again

Collective fear stimulates herd instinct, and tends to produce ferocity toward those who are not regarded as members of the herd.

~ Bertrand Russell


In WingnutLand, it is always Halloween, that dark, spooky place where danger lurks in every shadow and evil ghouls are ready pounce without warning. Of course the only real ghoulish characters involved here are those who have so tragically appointed themselves as the guardians of our safety. The latter day Pearl Harbor aka 9/11 allows them to wield fear as the most powerful weapon in their arsenal since it allows them to unleash all the others. The sad fact is that the public has wised up to them before many cowardly people in congress have.

So now they want to attack Iran. Why? I guess it's because the Iraq thing went so wonderfully smooth. Yep, mission accomplished. Err...or not. Never mind, let's move on. These Iranians are terrrorists ya know and they umm...have these nookular things that they plan on using to ehh...kill us all with. Yep, that's what they wanna do...kill us all. With their bombs. Yeah. Their bombs. Nookular ones.

Well that's good enough for me. I am convinced. Wait a minute...my attention span being longer than three seconds, it just occurred to me that I heard this bullshit before. But where? Oh yeah, from these same assholes. About Iraq. OK...can someone arrest these motherfuckers now? Oh wait, congress is going along with them again. Way to go Democrats. Take AIPAC money much?

So let's listen for that little satanic hobgoblin Dick Cheney, here he comes now with his Halloween ditty:

Trick or Treat
Smell my Feat
Gimme sum more Blood to Drink

But there's hope...the media will expose them this time. Certainly after the last disaster they won't be made to look like criminally negligent accomplices to genocide AGAIN will they? No effing way...they are gonna totally expose these shysters this time I can feel it. You believe me don't you?

If you do then I have some Revolutionary Guard nooks to sell you.

Slavery...Again

I will begin my comments this very, very serious topic with a somewhat light-hearted aside. I am that rare type of person that actually enjoys certain uncomfortably awkward social situations. Don't get me wrong...I don't try bringing them about. It's just that some other damn fool invariably does and when it happens I actually welcome it, for a couple reasons. First, there's the very funny aspect of watching ignorant people stutter and spit while other less brash, but no less ignorant people, shift from foot to foot uncomfortably and stare off into space yearning for immediate deliverance from the here and now. And there's the emotional catharsis of "educating" on some fool that is just mindlessly regurgitating the talking points meant to reinforce their own lack of historical perspective.

Speaking of which, one of the most insidious and downright amusing-in-a-perverse-sort-of way talking points are those that deal with the topic of Slavery in America. These, I believe, are being cooked up by the modern day equivalent of plantation owners and their enormous PR machine that consists of an army of intellectual charlatans to do their bidding on the propaganda circuit. Well recently one of these charlatans, a movie critic turned culture warrior (only in America!!), decided to join the long list of right-wing nutcases that have expounded on the "Slavery Wasn't so Bad, Actually" meme that resonates so strongly with most white people benefitting from a socio-economic lansdcape descended directly from the plantation Big House. I will not even name the author because he deserves no special recognition, being one of the more unremarkable of the wingnut hired mouthpieces (maybe making a name on the freak show parade was one of the motives here). It's highly doubtful that he, as a supposedly educated person, even believes what he writes. So let's go down the list of the author's six "inconvenient truths" of slavery and see just how truthful they are. Why bother? Because this is the internet and we (still) have the opportunity.

1. SLAVERY WAS AN ANCIENT AND UNIVERSAL INSTITUTION, NOT A DISTINCTIVELY AMERICAN INNOVATION.

OOOOhhhhh. Good call. "But Mom, everyone else was doing it!". How far did that justification get you, when you were a 5 YEAR OLD? I could see how this argument would play well with the spoiled ass young Republicans that it was meant for, though.


2. SLAVERY EXISTED ONLY BRIEFLY, AND IN LIMITED LOCALES, IN THE HISTORY OF THE REPUBLIC – INVOLVING ONLY A TINY PERCENTAGE OF THE ANCESTORS OF TODAY’S AMERICANS.

It existed almost 200 years before The Republic was even declared, after which African slaves were denoted as 3/5ths of a person for another 89 years. The tiny percentage is misleading on a number of counts. Number one slave owners were rather small segment of the population to begin with. Number two, it involved a large percentage of the ancestors of Black people and one of the reasons for this is that, number three, the slave owning men sired quite a few black children. In fact, this can be traced through modern methods, and the thought of a lot of lilly-white trust funds being called into question on those grounds is a very scary thought indeed for some folks!

3. THOUGH BRUTAL, SLAVERY WASN’T GENOCIDAL: LIVE SLAVES WERE VALUABLE BUT DEAD CAPTIVES BROUGHT NO PROFIT.

Oh my favorite one, the old "My Holocaust was Bigger Than Yours" argument. He even does the Auschwitz comparison. Just because slaves were murdered for being sick, just because slaves were murdered for wanting to be free, just because slaves were murdered just because, this doesn't mean that all of them were MEANT to be murdered. They were really just meant to be WORKED TO DEATH. But the underlying theme is more along the lines of "the profit motive is your friend, even if you are a lowly slave". Meanwhile, people are still dying in this country because of profit-driven health care. Not to mention those in Africa consigned to death by the Big Pharma patent obsession. But I digress...

4. IT’S NOT TRUE THAT THE U.S. BECAME A WEALTHY NATION THROUGH THE ABUSE OF SLAVE LABOR: THE MOST PROSPEROUS STATES IN THE COUNTRY WERE THOSE THAT FIRST FREED THEIR SLAVES.

All this says is that Northern manufacturing was more profitable than the Southern agriculture. That's not to say that temendous wealth was not built on the backs of slaves working the plantations. The author also neglects to mention that Northern wealth was built on the backs of immigrants and children in factory sweatshops. Even so, if given the choice, I'd take the sweatshop over the plantation experience any day, tyvm. I bet the author would, too.

5. AMERICA DESERVES NO UNIQUE BLAME FOR THE EXISTENCE OF SLAVERY, THE UNITED STATES MERITS SPECIAL CREDIT FOR ITS RAPID ABOLITION.

It took 89 years and about the bloodiest civil war any country has ever fought to get rid of it. It was then replaced with a system almost as brutal that lasted another 100 years. And all the while there were people justifying slavery by saying it was God's will as expressed in the Bible. Of course there is little doubt that if slavery were still around the author would be listing the six "inconvenient truths" about "why slavery ISN'T that bad" instead of why it WASN'T that bad.

6. THERE IS NO REASON TO BELIEVE THAT TODAY’S AFRICAN-AMERICANS WOULD BE BETTER OFF IF THEIR ANCESTORS HAD REMAINED BEHIND IN AFRICA.

There's also no reason to believe that if Europeans had not continued to exploit the people and resources of Africa to this very day that large segments of Africa would not have the turmoil and misery they have had. But getting beyond that often overlooked truth, this statement is like saying that "hey, at least the Jews that were murdered by the Nazis in Europe didn't have to go to Israel and worry about being attacked by Palestinians".


OK I'm done. Now after having gone through all that trouble...I am beginning to think that the whole point of the drivel cascading from the right-wing parade of assclowns is to have forward thinking people waste their time and energy debating and debunking obvious bullshit. They are no more than internet trolls. Unfortunately, they are too well funded to be ignored.

Spreading What?

The Iraq Fiasco, againt all odds, continues to smell even worse lately. Two stories to follow (that the Money Media certainly won't) are the plans by our beloved U.S. oil companies to privatize the entire national oil sector, and the continued subjugation of the Iraqi government by crazed terrorrists aka Blackwater mercs. Both of these things can be traced right back to that caricature of evil incarnate, Darth Cheney. This reptilian mafioso creep was part of the Poppy Bush junta in the early 90s at which time he came up with the concept of privatizing large segments of the military, and contracting that business out to Republican-owned companies. He had to wait about 10 years before he could fully exploit the system he created, but now it's ON, thanks to 9/11 and the all too predictable scenario of the U.S. public not paying attention. So our tax bucks go to a few of his favorite violent charities, and some of that gets funneled back into the Republican campaign slush fund. Hundreds of billions of dollars have been redistributed that way in the past 4 years. It's a remarkable achievement for someone who lacks a heart, and soul. And with this killing machine we are in the process of spreading democracy in the Middle East.

But what exactly are we spreading? It seems that democracy in Iraq is the kind of democracy that we have in the United States. One where the vast majority of people have important decisions made for them by people who are corrupt in the most basic sense: they put cash money ahead of everything else, most notably the lives of their fellow people. What kind of democracy prevents a sovereign government from kicking out psychotic death squads like the Blackwater mercs? What kind of democracy sees politicians bribed in order to sell off the vast wealth of the nation to foreign oil companies, allowing billions of dollars to be swiped out of the national treasury?

Answer: The kind that we want to spread to Iran, Cuba, and North Korea.

What's in a name: Katrina

You know I rowed a little boat, five miles 'cross the pond

You know I rowed a little boat, 'bout five miles 'cross the pond

I throwed my things in the little boat, it rolled me right along
It was thunderin' and lightnin', but it rolled me right along

It was thunderin', it was lightnin', Oh yeah, it rolled me right along

There were thousands of people, they didn't have no place to go, mmm
Little children they were screamin'and cryin', Oh yeah

The wind was howlin', they didn't have no place to go, mmm

There were thousands o' people, they's goin' from door to door, mmm

- I Rowed a Little Boat

Traditional, from the 1927 Mississippi River Flood

On August 29, 2005, almost 80 years after the terrible Mississippi flood of 1927, the levees broke and flooded the poorest, lowest-lying sections of New Orleans, Louisiana, drowning over one thousand people. Two years later, many of those sections are still deserted, their inhabitants scattered across the country, many with no plans or desire to return. For several weeks the sight of the survivors, stranded by the floods and by the harsh economic realities of a country that consistently puts money ahead of life, was out there for all the world to see. And the world did see it, more clearly and objectively than most people in this country were willing to. I remember going to the BBC and other foriegn news outlets to get the most in-depth look at why the richest country on earth could doom its own citizens to a watery grave. How that country that could spend a trillion dollars on invading and occupying countries halfway around the world was not willing to spend less than one hundredth of that cost to shore up the levees that protected one of its own cities.

Coming almost exactly four years after the 2001 attacks, with a similarly horrific death toll, this disaster in many ways stood in stark contrast to that event. This time, the lie was put to the term "Homeland Security" the reactionary name and department that was born of 9/11. It was exposed as a grand farce as floating corpses were eaten by dogs and people died of dehydration, waiting for help that never came. This government was obviously not capable to secure this country, much less Iraq.

And then there the were people stranded and dying even after they were rescued, or waded out of the flood waters. As Wolf Blitzer observed in a moment of live-TV stream of consciousness "These people are so poor, so Black". And they were. They were not the wavy-haired, light complected Louisiana ruling class Moriels et al., but their darker brethren, lowest on the economic and social totem pole that is the living legacy of the plantations. They were "left behind" even as the pets were flown out of harm's way while the monstrous swirl of clouds and wind approached.

Perhaps the sickest tendency in the wake of the event was to blame the victims, which is elevated to something of an art form by our media giants. So we have LOOTERS and SHOOTERS and all kinds of hysteria that turned out to be 99 percent bullshit, all in the name of making people think "yep those niggers are animals and they brought this on themselves. Nope, there's no helping those people". What they didn't report that most of the poor people in New Orleans and all across our land of bounty, have jobs, often more than one. And they still can't afford a car to get the hell out of town. No they never spoke of poverty wages, but the first thing Bush and Cheney did was foist an executive order making it legal to pay slave wages to workers reconstructing the city!

Oh and one more thing the media never told you. The lower 9th ward, the lowest of the low lands, was created when the New Orleans Superdome was built, destroying a more prosperous (and elevated) working class community and relegating its inhabitants to the place that is now a wasteland. It is sadly ironic that the Superdome became their terrordome again during Katrina and their middle passage out of New Orleans.

The Great (Non) Debate

Listen to me! A two-legged animal will believe anything, and the more preposterous the better. Whales speak French at the bottom of the sea. The horses of Arabia have silver wings. Pygmies mate with elephants in darkest Africa. I have sold all those propositions...and more.

~Allardyce Meriweather, snake oil salesman in the movie "Little Big Man"

Americans like to be fooled. It's in our blood. We are suckers for hucksters with good sales pitches. Nowhere is this more evident than in the field of politics. How else can you explain so many people voting against their own economic self interests? Karl Rove was no genius, despite what some frustrated non-wingnuts may think. It's not hard to fool people who are raised up as consumers, the human equivalent of a grazing bovine herd animal. It's been done before, many times. Just play to the fear and ignorance. Genius means inventing something new...and ole fat Rover just took the ancient turgid playbook of American politics and ran through the mud one more time with it. The genius part of politics exists elsewhere, however...to wit: the entire "left/right" debate on Fox News and CNNBCBS. How is this desultory bit of theatrics genius you ask? First of all, the true left is nowhere to be found in the mainstream media. Rather we have center-right debating with the rabid wingnuts. It's a sham, designed to make people believe that the likes of Bill Clinton is actually a "leftist" rather than the big chubby, amiable friend of carnivorous capitalism that he is. It's also designed to make people believe that there is an opposition to a system that puts profit ahead of life on earth when there isn't. Not one that can get elected president anyway.

So in campaign 2008 we have the Republican side already proudly advertising themselves as the worst in human nature. Shameless boorish hypocrites willing to squander whatever resources (both human and natural) they can to maximize the profits of the top 1 percent of the population. On the other side we have the Democrats, divided into the so-called "top tier" candidates who are undercover Wall Street stealth operatives ready to sign more disastrous trade agreements and the more true representatives of the long battered working class who are already being termed the "also-rans" by the money pundits before a single vote is cast. These are our choices. We are told the only people that are willing to make any meaningful change cannot be elected to make that change.

This is the democracy we want to export to the rest of the world? No wonder no one wants us occupying their country.

Perversions of Christianity

"Again I say to you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God."

-Matthew 19:24

I don't recognize anything remotely Christ-like in the biggest purveyors of Christianity in the United States these days. Backers of religious wars, vilifiers of the poor, supporters of the continued acceleration of maldistribution of wealth and resources among the economic classes; on virtually every important issue, they are more akin to Roman rulers rather than the humble servants of God they pass themselves off as. The great paradox here is that those who most closely preach the true word of Jesus are more often than not agnostics or non-Christians. Jesus set an example for not judging others, lest ye be judged. But all these people are good for is passing judgement, and a harsh judgement at that. I'm telling you, if the current crop of right wing religious hucksters were around back then, they would have hurled stones in response to the statement "let he who is without sin...", because they truly believe they are without sin. That is the level of their hubris and hypocrisy. You have to be seriously blind to any faith in order to take a message and change it to suit your own prejudices and class perspectives. This is the modus operandi of the faith hustlers, southern white conservatives that were never in touch with the true teachings of Jesus Christ having grown up in segregated churches and in a culture where black people as subservient, almost invisible members of the world was the norm. And they preferred to keep it that way, and they still do. Listen to them speak about the past in nostalgic terms, and you know what I mean. Once having any concern for others ceases, then religion loses any purpose it had. This ain't coming from me, either. Read your good book, whatever that good book may be...ALL religions have the Golden Rule as their central message. Realizing that, we see how many people in the world today are TRULY LOST. Those that preach the message along with those that follow them into the hell they inevitably create.

So Much for Living in a Free Country

This is classic hypocrisy from the ruling elite...in fact it doesn't get any more in-your-muhfukkin-face obvious than this:

"Academy Award-winning filmmaker Michael Moore is under investigation by the U.S. Treasury Department for taking ailing Sept. 11 rescue workers to Cuba for a segment in his upcoming health-care documentary 'Sicko'."

Now this story requires some background info so let me set the stage for you. About 50 years ago the people of Cuba overthrew centuries of autocratic despotic rule, promulgated by Spain and the United States. They installed a socialist regime, and that resulted in a large number of rich and/or corrupt Cubans fleeing to Miami, where they proceeded to rent out a bunch of whores that we commonly refer to as U.S. politicians. These whores took the old casino/brothel money from the Cuban exiles and, among other dirty things, made laws preventing U.S. citizens from travelling to Cuba. Let me repeat that part with emphasis: THEY MADE IT ILLEGAL FOR US TO TRAVEL TO CUBA.

Now ask yourself, what kind of country makes it illegal for its own people to go where ever the hell they want to? A despotic regime? A banana republic? Yes, that's what we are living in. So the next time you hear some right wing clown talking about how repressive things are in Cuba (or any other country currently out of favor with the State Dept.) ask in a loud and clear voice: WHY IS IT ILLEGAL FOR AN AMERICAN CITIZEN TO TRAVEL WHERE THEY WANT TO?

Now back to the story. Among the most corrupt element of United States society is the propensity for politicians to take money from big corporations and then make laws benefitting them. And about the worst offenders in this practice are big pharmaceutical companies, a special breed of people that ALWAYS put profits ahead of people's lives. A case in point, these are the people that condemned millions of sub-Saharan Africans TO DEATH because they were worried about losing a few dollars to generic drugs that fight AIDS. They are the lowest of the low. Well maybe with the exception of the U.S. State Department.

So Michael Moore is making a movie about how our health care system is basically, criminal. But you can't call very huge and powerful corporations what they are. Nope, not in the United States. Because where there is a lot of money, there are a lot of people being paid to lie. So in those rare instances when someone attempts to bring up the unpleasant and obvious truth, such as our health care system is an embarrassment and criminally neglectful, these people will spring into action. They will write stories, they will go on talk shows and yes, they will run for political office:

"Moore's opponents have accused him of distorting the facts, and his Cuba trip provoked criticism from conservatives including former Republican Sen. Fred Thompson, who assailed the filmmaker in a blog at National Review Online."

Remember when I mentioned how U.S. politicians are whores? Fred Thompson is a big whore. Now he may play a tough guy on TV, but he is really a soft pussycat when it comes to standing up to deadly corporate behavior. He rolls over and arches his back for those who are going to sponsor his potential presidential run. And that's where we are in this free country right now, being ruled by people like that.