The Celestial Navigator

CIT, the Government, and Why It Matters Now....

blue_jay001@yahoo.com (Astra Navigo) — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 09:52:00 PST

Yesterday, one of my worst fears came true - bailout money started disappearing, not through mismanagement, but through outright failure of the 'horse' on which government had bet our future tax dollars.

CIT, a large financial resource to the retail industry (it's involved in 'factoring' - the process of funding merchandise which sits on a sales-floor until it's sold) filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy the other day.

The fifth-largest corporate bankruptcy in American history, this one's notable because CIT had taken a staggering 2 billion dollars in direct government 'bailout' funds.

So, what happens to the money?

That depends on CIT's debtholders.

They'll have a 'creditors' meeting', which will involve a discussion of the company's assets relative to its debts.   As to the money you and I and your great-grandchildren have underwritten - it's likely gone.

While a rant is probably in order, I'll instead comment briefly on the job of government vs. the private-sector.

A Brief History Of American Economics

Around the turn of the century, America had gone through a similar unequal distribution of wealth - working-people were forced to work for months at a stretch with no fixed working-hours and no days off; there was no such thing as a 'safety-net', and the concept of the 'sweatshop' was an all too real part of life for people on the lowest rung of the ladder.

From the 1880's to the turn of the century, working people (who were striking for the right to form unions and bargain collectively) turned increasingly to rioting in order to make their cause known - and also from the sheer frustration of their position.

Presidents McKinley and Roosevelt saw the problem for what it was - and began the process of wealth-redistribution by the then-controversial acts of 'trust busting'.   Now almost-universally viewed as a good thing, the labor movement in America brought about two-day weekends, eight-hour workweeks, overtime laws, and other benefits which we accept today as a part of the social fabric.

Through this process (which was really completed during the Great Depression of the 1930's with the regulation of the banking and securities industries), America saw some of its greatest growth.   We'd learned, or so it seemed, the lesson which seems to have eluded us in this present generation - that the people who founded our country hadn't codified an economic system; it was up to subsequent generations to work out.

The system which developed - a hybrid of social capitalism - worked until the late 1970's when President Carter began the process of deregulating the financial markets.

President Reagan continued this process, and also overhauled the tax structure, which favored the wealthy - in sum, beginning a redistribution of wealth in America not seen since the turn of the century, and which began the long road to where we are today.

For our part, we cheered - taxes for some of us were lower, and if we cared that debt-paper was being sold to the Chinese to pay for the balance and fund this particular lunacy, we didn't show it.

When we gave the keys of the asylum to the inmates, we also forgot - if we ever knew - that unbridled capitalism is actually at fundamental odds with democracy.

Everyone Has A Job - Sort Of....

The free market doesn't do a good job of regulating itself.   This isn't any inherent failure in an economic system; it's simply human-nature.   Give a person the ability to make $50.00 from thin air, and he'll try to make $100.00.   Some people will be scrupulous about this process, and exercise a high degree of ethical restraint and moral responsibility.   Many others won't.

It falls to a governing body to do this for them, so people like you and I don't wind up snookered by the likes of a Bernie Madoff, freezing in our homes while 'energy traders' from Enron engineer rolling blackouts so they can reap the profits from suddenly and artificially scarce electricity, or waking up to find our investments worthless because the banking system had deluded itself into believing that taking bad loans and wrapping them up in bundles with bows on them constituted 'creating wealth'.

Put another way, it's the job of the free market to create jobs and wealth in a responsible fashion - it's the job of the government to create a stable medium-of-exchange (currency), to protect that currency by ensuring its ongoing stability, and to police the market via regulation in such fashion as permits everyone to make a decent living without fear of preventable loss.

That both have failed us is the fault of government.

Today....

The government - for at least thirty years - has failed in this. The results were evident in late 2008, when the banking system quite nearly self-destructed.   By this time, the only thing the government could do was to say 'Oh, shit!' - and start printing money to fill the gap and keep the whole thing from unraveling.

The effect is beginning to be felt - paradoxically, some are thriving due to this lunacy; most of us are going to suffer, because just as a dog working its way through a python will eventually come out the Other End in far worse shape, the nearly five trillion dollars the government has 'created' from thin air is working its way through the economic system as we speak.

It'll come out the Other End as more business failures and hyperinflation.

We're being told that money from thin air equals wealth - that the true job of government is to create jobs and buy businesses - that everything is getting better every day - and that all we have to do is 'believe'.

You'll pardon me if I don't share this enthusiasm.

My First Scary Story (Sort-Of)....

blue_jay001@yahoo.com (Astra Navigo) — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 19:17:00 PDT

It was a dark and stormy night - somewhere in the world; here in Oregon, it was a perfect summer evening - around seventy-five degrees and not a cloud in the sky; the sort of thing which made me ruminate about Life Beyond the Stars when I was a boy, and which invariably drew me outside with a glass of wine and a cigar in my later years.

I was on the deck outside my office near the reflecting pool when I heard the sound - a sort of grinding noise with an odd 'clank' thrown in every now-and-again; it grew louder from up-above the house, and seemed to terminate somewhere in the south-east corner of things.

I pushed myself out of my steamer-chair (never liked doing that; especially when Whatever Interrupted Me had also interrupted my 43rd reading of a Hemingway novel).

I walked around the corner; my feet making light crunchy-sounds on the gravel-path.   As the corner of the garage gave way to the vista beyond, I noticed it.

A saucer.   Damned if it wasn't a saucer -- steaming and kind of leaning to one side (must have hit a gopher-hole with one of its legs).   Trailing from one side was a wire, which I recognized as one of Comcast's.

"Shit," I said to myself.   "They probably took out my Internet."

I walked closer; glass of Temperanillo in one hand and a Hoyo De Monterey Double-Corona in the other.   I heard a whir, and a walkway gradually lowered.   Down the walkway waddled a little fellow who looked for all the world like that drunk asshole from "Little People; Big World."

I started laughing.   "Fucking Matt Roloff's takin' over Earth," I thought, laughing even harder.

"Ha-ha-ha-ha," imitated the Munchkin.

I took a big gulp of Abacela Temperanillo. "I'm either dead where I stand, or we're going to have a nice, long talk about the Wizard of Oz," I thought. "Might as well do this drunk."

"So, who the hell are you?"

"The - Hell - Are - You", It replied in a monotone.

"You're going to have to do better than that.   Don't you guys have a universal translator, or something?"

"Matt" (I'd already named him, absent knowing his real name) turned, looked up the ramp, and said something rapid-fire, like playing a tape-recorder backward. Another Munchkin waddled down the stairs.

They had a brief conversation, then the second Munchkin (who looked a lot like one of the members of the Lollipop Guild, come to think of it) turned to me and said, "I am the Studier.   He is the Leader.   I can speak your - talk - rather well."

"No shit? Well - we'll work on that.   He's the 'Leader', huh?" I pointed to "Matt".   "What's his name?"

"P'Taah"'

"Leave it to any organization, anywhere in the universe, to put an ignorant asshole in charge of things," I thought.   "Oh, well."

I took a small sip, pursed my lips, and made a noisy 'squirt' on the lawn.   "P-tooey," I said.   They looked at each other and nodded, vigorously.   Progress was being made.

"P-tooey, we wish to meet leaders of this place."

I laughed again -- they thought my name was 'P-Tooey'. Hell; might as well go with it....

"Wait a minute. What's your name?"

"K'Khan", said the Studier, pointing to himself with what looked like a four-fingered hand.

"I'll probably wake up in a minute. Might as well have fun with this one," I thought.

"You guys hungry?"

"Hung-gree?", said K'Khan.   He managed to look puzzled, even to me.

"Yes. Hungry."   I pantomimed eating; something I figured everyone - even from out-system - would understand.

"We bring our own-" he struggled for the word - "-food."

"Oh, well. I tried.   You'd like wine. I think." Then, I took a good look at the saucer, trailing my Comcast cable.   I realized that Comcast would be here, even in the middle of the night, to re-run the damn thing to the house.

"Look.   I'm sort of the unofficial Mayor of Hilltop, here - but I'm gathering that's not what you're looking for.   You want the folks who run the whole damn place, right?"

"Whole - damn - place -right...." K'Khan's 'voice' trailed off in that monotone, again.

"Tell you what. You have maps?   How'd you get here?"

"Matt" was rather upset by this time, and began berating my new buddy K'Khan.   I cut him off.

"Hey-hey-hey - uh; "Matt". You." I pointed at him - "...you're interrupting."

He turned and glowered at me.   "Where I come from, you'd be just another asshole on Reality TV," I thought.

"K'Khan. Uh - I don't mean to be rude - but you have to go."

"Go?"

"Yes. Go. As in 'vamoose.' Comcast is gonna be here in a few minutes; it's getting dark, my cigar's done, and my glass is empty. You know how to find major cities?"

"Cit-tees. Yes." K'Khan continued, "Ship - is not - well. Maybe two more parsecs before - repair."

"Explains the shiteatin' clank in your transmission." (I'd always wanted to use that line, ever since I'd heard my grandfather use it when I was five. But I digress.)

"Shit-eeetin-clank. Do not understand."

I started laughing. "Don't worry. Just tell "Matt" here he's not payin' you enough.   Now -- you'll need to find a city called 'Philadelphia'. It's east of here, not far from the eastern coast. You know from 'coast'?"

"Coast.   Land ends-water begin. Yes."

"Good.   Steer South/Southeast from there.   You'll find a town full of a lot of self important people and a shitload o' marble monuments. Plenty-plenty 'leaders' in that town."

"Matt" and his sidekick had another rapid-fire conversation. "You come with us," said "Matt".

"Like hell," I replied.   "I have to answer the door when Comcast gets here.   I'll have hell to pay getting the divots out o' my lawn tomorrow.   I hope you're gone before my neighbors get home."

"If you not come with us, we will-" - he turned to K'Khan for the word - "destroy - all your leaders. All your-" - again; he asked for help - "talk-people."

"Talk people?", I said, looking puzzled.

"Those who talk to you and give you news."

"All of 'em?", I said.

"All. Leaders too. None left.   You be - sorry."

I started laughing.

"No, I won't," I said, still laughing.   "Do names like 'Rush Limbaugh', 'Glenn Beck', and 'Sean Hannity' mean anything? 'Ann Coulter', 'Gary Gatehouse'? Start with them, all right?    What kind of weapons do you have in that thing?   Can you blow Washington, D.C. away? I mean, for real?"

"We can. We will. All gone."

I turned for the house, still laughing.   Over my shoulder, I said, "Have at it.   I'll hold you to it.   Do not disappoint me."

The ramp whined as it retracted.   The wheezing and clanking began, and the ship effortlessly climbed upward and disappeared into the eastern sky.

_________________________________________

Submitted for your approval, a bit of whimsy - a polemic against the concept of 'bad aliens' - regardless of their origin - and that the biggest disasters may well be blessings in disguise....

"The Skye, Black With Arrowes" -- Crispin's Day (The Battle of Agincourt)

blue_jay001@yahoo.com (Astra Navigo) — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 12:38:00 PDT

Today is the 594th anniversary of the Battle of Agincourt.

While most of us are well-aware of the conflict if we stayed awake in ninth-grade history, I thought I'd add a few comments of my own.

Agincourt was the result of Henry's decision to invade France and attempt to take the French crown - his claim as one of the descendants of the Normans who conquered England in 1066 being his casus belli.

Having raised an army of around 10,000 effectives, Henry sailed from England in early October to northern France.   He laid siege to the port-city of Harfleur, taking it in mid-October and leaving a small garrison there to keep the peace.   (It was during this siege that his army, having gathered mussles and crabs at the seashore which had been infected with the effluvia from the city's sewer-canals, took ill in droves with dysentery).

Henry resolved to march on Paris.   He took his army northeast along the French coast, crossing the Bethune and Breste rivers while the French advance-guard shadowed him to the south. In the meantime, the French king (Charles VI) attempted to organize a defense.

(Charles was widely considered at the time to be insane, but likely suffered from late-stage Alzheimer's dementia. As a result, the French were unable to raise more than 40,000 men to challenge Henry, with a more realistic number being nearer to 30,000).

By this time, Henry's attempted crossing of the Somme near the coast had been blocked by 6,000 troops of Charles' advance-guard.   Henry's ill and starving 'band of brothers' were reduced to around 7,000 effectives, the baggage-train '...carryinge more ille than baggage...."   They marched south along the Somme seeking a place to ford, and found a spot offering both cover and a fordable-spot at the town of Voyennes.

By this time, Henry knew that his only chance was to make the port-city of Calais, and make for home.   His army was combat-ineffective against the defenses of Paris; he was faced with over 150 miles of hard marching in mud and rain before reaching the coast.

They marched some 75 miles to the north before Henry's scouts encountered the main body of the French army just south of the village of Agincourt.   The French heralds (messengers) issued a formal challenge-of-battle.   Henry was in no position to do anything but agree.

The night before the battle, Henry's army consisted of around 6,000 yeomen (commoners, armed with longbows and light weapons), plus around 1,000 knights and 'men-of-name'.   The French army was around 30,000; 10,000 of these being knights and named-individuals, with the rest being conscripted commoners and other ranks.

The French took up position in a plowed field, with dense forest on either side.    Henry was at the opposite end, where the forest formed a 'v'.   He ordered each man to cut and shape long stakes, sharpened at both ends.

The next morning, Henry moved his army to within 200-250 yards (extreme bowshot) of the French lines.   He ordered the stakes driven into the earth at a 45-degree angle facing the French lines - this; to break any possible cavalry-charge by mounted knights.

Placing his knights in the center of the line along with dismounted men-at-arms and his archers on the flanks, Henry awaited the French.

In the late morning of the 25th, the French (under the command of Charles d'Albret) ordered a general advance.    The outcome, in retrospect, was predictable - French knights, capable of moving at no faster than around 12 miles per hour in order to keep their cavalry-lines intact, were the victim of English longbows (a competent longbowman could loose ten 'flights' per minute).   While the effect on armor at that range was minimal, the effect on horses was terrifying - wounded horses began to panic, and the charge was broken before they reached the impenetrable stake barrier.

The French advance was, for all intents, broken before they reached Henry's lines.

Those who were not thrown from their horses (or killed by the more-powerful longbow volleys as they grew closer) had to deal with having their mounts impaled by Henry's stakes.   Those who managed to reach the lines found that the longbowmen and other men-at-arms had two main weapons - a war-hammer (the head of which was a large hammer-head on one end, and a long spike on the other); plus a double-bladed knife (called 'tongs').   While what happened next defied the code of chivalry (men-of-name were supposed to be taken prisoner and ransomed), Henry's orders on this day reflected the necessity of defeating the French and getting his men on one piece to Calais.

Henry had ordered all but the senior nobility killed.

Accomplishing this was a swift-but-brutal affair; if standing; a swift crack to the helmet with the hammer took the man down; if lying in the mud, the spike-end of the hammer served to hook his armor and roll him over on his back.   At that point, the knife was thrust through the eye-slit of his helmet - at which point, the good English yeoman went on to his next victim.

The fury of this action - the entire battle lasted less than an hour - gave rise to a saying which meant 'going-at something with a ferocity' - literally; 'going at it hammer-and-tongs'.

The French were not able to exact many casualties for their efforts.   The best accounts list around 100 English casualties, with the French losing between 7,000-15,000 (an accurate account was not possible - complete skeletons to this day are found in the field, dating from that time). Further, Henry's orders to take the senior nobility as prisoners had a devastating effect which even Henry could not have predicted - the 1,500 men taken back to England after Henry destroyed the French army at Agincourt literally represented half the French nobility - deprived of a support base, Charles VI could no longer raise taxes, let alone an army.   Most of these men could no longer ransom themselves, and never returned to France.

Henry reached Calais on the 29th, where he sailed for home.   The result of the campaign was of little effect; Henry achieved a port at Harfleur, but little real territory, and he died of natural causes before he could mount another campaign to achieve his real goal of taking Paris and claiming the French crown.

While the truth of the fight was far different, Agincourt also gave us the most memorable speech in the English language, penned by William Shakespeare less than two hundred years after the battle:

_______________________________

    What's he that wishes so?
    My cousin Westmoreland? No, my fair cousin;
    If we are mark'd to die, we are enough
    To do our country loss; and if to live,
    The fewer men, the greater share of honour.

    God's will! I pray thee, wish not one man more.
    Rather proclaim it, Westmoreland, through my host,
    That he which hath no stomach to this fight,
    Let him depart; his passport shall be made,
    And crowns for convoy put into his purse;
    We would not die in that man's company
    That fears his fellowship to die with us.

    This day is call'd the feast of Crispian.
    He that outlives this day, and comes safe home,
    Will stand a tip-toe when this day is nam'd,
    And rouse him at the name of Crispian.
    He that shall live this day, and see old age,
    Will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbours,
    And say 'To-morrow is Saint Crispian.'

    Then will he strip his sleeve and show his scars,
    And say 'These wounds I had on Crispian's day.'
    Old men forget; yet all shall be forgot,
    But he'll remember, with advantages,
    What feats he did that day. Then shall our names,
    Familiar in his mouth as household words-
    Harry the King, Bedford and Exeter,
    Warwick and Talbot, Salisbury and Gloucester-
    Be in their flowing cups freshly rememb'red!

    This story shall the good man teach his son;
    And Crispin Crispian shall ne'er go by,
    From this day to the ending of the world,
    But we in it shall be remembered-
    We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
    For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
    Shall be my brother; be he ne'er so vile,
    This day shall gentle his condition;

    And gentlemen in England now-a-bed
    Shall think themselves accurs'd they were not here,
    And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
    That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day!

"In The Legions Lie The Power" - Soldier Worship and Worshipping Soldiers - America's New Order

blue_jay001@yahoo.com (Astra Navigo) — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 11:38:00 PDT

Military Theocracy - Coming To An America Near You

An Insular Military...

"In legio recubo auctorita est" - an old Roman saying, and a bit of gallows-humor; toward the end of the empire, thinking Romans saw that the legions, far from being a loyal part of the governmental structure, had morphed into a power of their own - insular; bound to separate loyalties and increasingly separated from and disdainful of the civilians they were ostensibly sworn to protect.

The notion of 'empire' had decayed to the simple understanding that if a legion could be deployed to protect a piece of ground, that ground was Rome.   Everything else was 'barbarian'.   Often, the legions were feared more than the barbarians in remote provinces - in fact, large landowners simply employed barbarian levies to protect them - sometimes from the legions themselves.   These large estates on the frontier became so self-sufficient that they turned away Roman tax collectors - and became the foundation for feudal Europe in the dark and middle ages.

While I'm sure some of you already know where this is going, I'd be remiss if I didn't include some recent history, as well.

In the early '70's, the United States made the fundamental decision to turn from a conscript-army to a volunteer force.   What our leaders forgot - if they ever knew - was this:   Volunteer forces carry within them a sickness of sorts - they are almost always drawn from working class conservative society, and as such do not reflect society as a whole.   Nations which practice this process eliminate the stress of conscription (never popular), but they also run the risk of creating a military which lacks the values of the society as a whole.

This has never been so evident than it is today.

Evangelism and Fundamentalism - With An M-16 On Top...

Jeff Sharlet, a correspondent for Harper's Magazine, puts it very well: "When Barack Obama moved into the Oval Office in January, he inherited a military not just drained by a two-front war overseas but fighting a third battle on the home front, a subtle civil war over its own soul. On one side are the majority of military personnel, professionals who regardless of their faith or lack thereof simply want to get their jobs done; on the other is a small but powerful movement of Christian soldiers concentrated in the officer corps."

He tells a story of a group of soldiers in Iraq, who spray-painted "Jesus Killed Mohammad" on the side of their BFV (Bradley Fighting Vehicle); of a U.S.A.F. Major General (the commandant of the Air Force Academy), who made the National Day of Prayer services at the academy exclusively Christian, and who openly tells evangelical cadets to 'share the gospel'.

That all this flies in the face of both the UCMJ (that's the Uniform Code of Military Justice) and the U.S. Constitution should go without saying - that the military is not only left alone with these actions, but encouraged to do anything which 'improves morale' should be appalling to anyone with any degree of sense.

The military, up to this point, has operated outside of politics and religion, and with good reason - every nation which has allowed its military to engage in either has invariably wound up with people wearing uniforms running the country.   Even the Romans had a law against it; their failure to uphold that law or live to that standard cost them their Republic.

Today, however, we've seen the military undergo a transformation - the past twenty years have drawn a generation, home-schooled by Fundamentalist parents - into its ranks; devoid of any real contact with 'the world' (defined as 'anyone outside the Fundamentalist Christian community') ; these children of the postmodern Christian era have donned their country's uniform for very different reasons.

They Serve Themselves Who Take The Oath...

To them, it is not an obligation to national service - it's a chance to prove to their friends, parents and older siblings that they are willing to 'defend' the America they were brought up to believe could exist again, under the right circumstances - an America devoid of the corrupting influences which have brought about its decay; an America where 'God' was first.

Drawing volunteers from regions which are predominantly rural and with extreme-Conservative Red State values, the current demographics are shocking when examined in the light of day.

While over 80% are self-identified as 'Christian', over 30% of America's military self-identifies as 'Fundamentalist Evangelical'.   Muslims are one in four hundred.   Jews are scarcer still, and at the bottom are the list are atheist/agnostic, at less than one half of one percent.

This was recently brought home to me in a conversation with someone online.   He served in the U.S. Marine Corps, with two tours in Iraq.   I was asking him what he thought of the war.   He was in favor of it - and thought that destroying Islam would be a good idea 'while we were at it'.

I expressed horror at that idea - and he replied, "I didn't put on the uniform for you. I put it on for me, and mine."

It was very evident to me who 'his' people were - fellow Fundamentalist Evangelicals.

The U.S. Constitution - An Inconvenient Truth...

This attitude is reflected in the highest levels of the American military.    The Officer's Christian Fellowship (founded during WWII and concerned primarily with the spiritual well-being of military officers for several decades), recently stated that "...if Satan cannot succeed with threats from the outside, he will seek to destroy from within."    Today, the OCF views its mission as a twofold-objective:   Bringing America 'back to God' - beginning with ensuring that the military is first converted, and converted to a Fundamentalist form of Christianity.

Most believe that the notion of 'separation of church and state' doesn't exist - and the senior officers are using America's military academies as a means of spreading that gospel-of-a-revisionist-Constitution.   Little mention of the First Amendment is made there - in fact, many senior officers either plead ignorance or confusion when the twin-concepts of the Establishment Clause and the Free Exercise Clause are mentioned in conversation.

For the "God Soldiers", a constitutional republic isn't enough.   They want a theocracy.

Aryans; Nazis; Fundies - All One Big, Happy Family...

There's a malevolent side to this - far beyond the idea of an insular military which increasingly views Civilian America as The Enemy.

With the advent of the War on Terror, a segment of society which embraces Christianity and which dislikes Islam has found a new home - wearing the uniform of one of the four branches of the U.S. armed forces.

Recruiters have found that Aryans, neo-Nazis and other extremists are fertile ground for recruiting, even though the official stance is that these people are not suitable candidates.   The military doesn't escalate many investigations beyond the unit commander's level - oftentimes a late-twentysomething captain whose biggest concern is maintaining a full complement of personnel, not worrying about the content of the individual's character.

The increase in extremists in the military has shown up in places like Baghdad and Kabul, where Aryan Nations and anti-Arab/anti-Muslim graffiti have sprouted like mushrooms after a spring rain.   Dealing with the problem is nearly impossible, with troop-strength the main concern.   Militia movements are gaining ground in America for the first time since the '90's; steeped in the 'God/guts/guns' philosophy of the extreme right, they've drawn most of their new members from former American military personnel.

Connecting the Dots...

America is now in a dangerous position.   Our military is now more aligned with extremist elements than with the majority of the country.   Half the nation engages in outright-worship of the American Soldier; in fact, stating that you have reservations about the current conflicts in which we are engaged will garner you names - like 'Obama-lover', 'libtard', 'socialist', or worse.   In my own case, I've been 'asked' - albeit politely - if I wouldn't be happier living in another country, where the 'belief-system more closely reflected my own.'

This sort of exclusionary-thinking is common to extremists of all stripes - it's the sort of thing which sent people to camps and gas-chambers by the millions in Europe about seventy years ago, and that sort of thinking has taken root here in America - because, as they're quick to point out - it's not bad when we do it, and when 'God' tells us it's all right.

The economy is circling the drain, and shows no real signs of stopping.   The next 15 months are going to tell the tale; we'll either fix it or we'll have civil unrest like we haven't seen since the American Civil War.

The military will then be in a position to take center-stage.   They're convinced that America has 'strayed' - and that it needs to be 'taken back', ostensibly to a time when everyone was a Christian, and where 'Christian values' were the standard by which America operated.

Their handmaidens, the half of America's civilians which offer them adulation and worship, are all too willing to allow troops in the streets, if they'll 'restore America to greatness.'   That this has massive implications for the future of America and the rest of the world also goes without saying.

"A soldier without discipline is but a brigand," said Marcus Aurelius.   In the legions, lie the power.

_______________________________________

Reading:

"The Crusade for a Christian Military" (Jeff Sharlet; Harper's Magazine - May; 2009)

"Religion in the Military" ('Fault Lines' - June; 2009 [YouTube video]

"Return of the Militias" (Southern Poverty Law Center - August; 2009)

"A Few Bad Men" (David Holthouse; Southern Poverty Law Center - July; 2006)

"Dozens of Active-Duty Troops Found On Neo-Nazi Sites" (Kevin Baron; Stars and Stripes - July; 2009)

"Top Ten Ways To Convince Muslims We're On A Religious Crusade" (Chris Rodda; The Public Record - September; 2009)

A Potpourri of Lunacy....

blue_jay001@yahoo.com (Astra Navigo) — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 18:33:00 PDT

As yesterday's piece was a bit dismal for Friday consumption, I'm offering today's round-up of the weird - stuff which is Just Too Good To Pass Up.

Yes - I'll be throwing some folks under the bus here.   Be warned.

India - It's Sure Changed A Lot Since Gandhi....

First, there's this piece from IndiaDaily - turns out that 'sources' (damn; I love that word!) state that extraterrestrials are monitoring our activities and will blow up any nukes that India and Pakistan start to use on each other.   From the article:

"Indian scientists are slowly understanding that the Extraterrestrials have very unique power of jamming the operational characteristics of any device made by human beings. If they wish they can disable any equipment instantaneously."

Hey - that's a swift trick.   I could use that technology - say, to bugger-up the next car that's driving too slow in the fast lane.

(Note:   People believe this crap. Really.)

I Guess Jesus Would Have Joined The NRA....

Next, there's this missive, from The Reverend Paul T. Hipple of Dominionists for Tancredo 2012:    "Rather than defend himself with his weapons, Jesus chose to be renditioned and tortured under conditions so horrific they would be unsuitable for extracting intelligence from terrorist muslims. Jesus died upon the Holy Cross for one reason: so that we could enjoy our 2nd Amendment Rights to Hold, Bear and, if necessary, shoot our Arms at muslims and other immigrants who are here in America to destroy our Christian Way of Life."

This was the first paragraph of "Obamacare Is A Ruse Entirely Designed To Steal Your Guns", the lead-article in the Reverend Hipple's ongoing paean in praise of former Representative Tom Tancredo of Colorado (a fellow who makes most of the Religious Right look tame).   Tancredo, you might recall, made the famous statement that he ran for President in 2008 in order that "...the movie Red Dawn wouldn't become a documentary."

(Dominionists, if you're wondering, are people who believe they have a cultural mandate of sorts to 'return America to its roots as a Christian nation.'   I'm fairly well-stated regarding this lunacy - so I'll let it slide here.)

Beam Me Up; Scotty....

Then, we have these folks, who believe that 'Planet "X"' (also called "Nibiru") will be coming to collide soon with an earth near you (oops - that's us!) in 2012.   They've even started a countdown (you can follow it on the webpage - currently it's 1,160 days from today (that's October 17th, 2009, on the planet where I'm from).    There are plenty of websites purporting to follow this 'event' -- a Google search will leave you wondering - again; if you live on the same planet I occupy - how so very many people got sucked up into this thing in the first place.

The movie looks to be cool, though.

(I should point out here that while I'm likely to be pretty busy shovelling batshit by the truckload [between the Presidential election and the legions of whackjobs who believe that the World Is Coming To An End], the Mayans themselves have made it pretty clear that their calendar doesn't end in 2012.)

Sorry, and stuff, to Those Who Believe.

Speaking of Movies....

I couldn't let this go without mentioning this, as it ties in to an earlier comment: My favorite all-time-cheesy '80's film (the one which the American Film Institute credits with being the Worst Film of the '80's), and possibly the best C. Thomas Howell film ever made - is getting a face lift.

Yes, folks -- Red Dawn is being remade.

This time, it's starring a whole bunch of twentysomethings I've never heard of - and it'll be set in Michigan, not Colorado, with the Iranians being the 'bad guys' (aided by Bad-Guy Muslim Cells, no doubt the result of our bad, bad immigration policies which didn't preserve the purity of our nation and keep America for white-Christian-straights).

(Trivia: Red Dawn is in the Guinness Book of World Records - not for anything good, mind you - it's officially the Most Violent Film Ever Made, with over 2.5 violent acts per minute.)

__________________________________

I suppose this is a tame week - no one got killed; the biggest news was the Kid In The Balloon (although I'm sure that story eclipsed some real stuff we should have seen) - life goes on, folks.   Enjoy the ride!

Critical Depth II (An Economic Update)

blue_jay001@yahoo.com (Astra Navigo) — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 14:50:00 PDT

With the stock market closing over 10,000 yesterday, I thought it was a good time to review my prior article on the economy, and to outline where we're likely to be in a year.   Again, the facts are a remorseless beast, and my conclusions do not share the enthusiasm of several market pundits who are calling for a recovery next year.

The two months since my last post on this topic have, if anything, solidified my position.

First, a recap - back in August, I provided you all with a brief history on how we got here in the first place, and some of the dynamics of the credit-crunch, plus the reactions of the government first under Bush, then Obama - and why those reactions were akin to fighting a fire with gasoline.

Summer is over.   Fourth quarter is upon us; it should be the most-robust of the four, with both consumer spending due to America's holiday-season and the tax-incentive-based end-of-year-purchasing done by corporations.   We're seeing some mixed signals - by all predictions, end of year purchasing in both sectors is going to be lackluster - but the stock markets and certain commodities are actually increasing.

While there are stated reasons for these increases, the real reasons are actually chilling to me.   I'll review both the stated and the real, below.

Stocks

Not long ago, I was in a gun-shop. The owner is in his 70's; he's a bit of a Renaissance-man who, while he never went to college, reads voraciously. He and I have discussed the finer points of a Charleville musket vs. the British Brown-Bess; his is a shop where the smell of pipe-tobacco, coffee, and Hoppes #2 Gun-Lube all mix to form an aroma as heady as the conversation.

There was a fellow in his shop looking at an 1870 Colt revolver - the genuine article; not a reproduction.   Price?   $2,950.00; firm.

While he was looking, the proprietor and I were ruminating over the fact that in 1870, the general-store which originally sold the pistol probably asked $25.00 for it, and threw in some supplies, as well.

The potential buyer looked over at me and said, "Yeah - real ripoff today, huh?"

The store-owner and I both grinned at each other.   I looked back and said, "Nope. In fact, if anything, that pistol is money in the bank.   It's not the pistol that's worth more nowadays - it's the dollar, that's worth less."

This anecdote should serve us well as we review things.

Stocks are a reflection of two things - optimism in the future of the company which issues the security, and the relative value of the dollar.   Stock will increase (or decrease) in price based on these two.

Confidence in the American economy is at an all-time low.   The fundamentals of every American corporation are in the toilet by any yardstick.   So, what is driving the price of stock up?

Two words: Monetary inflation.   Again; as with the pistol - it's not that the stock is worth so much more - it's that the dollar is worth less.

Gold (and other commodities)

You know you've got a bad case of inflation when websites pop up every day via late-night infomercials offering to buy your 'unused gold jewelery', and when the fellow who runs your dry-cleaner has a sign in his store-window saying "Buying or trading your unused gold!"

Gold reached a high of $1,065.00/oz yesterday.   It shows no sign of going lower.

What's not being reported as widely is the increase in other commodities - silver and copper.   Silver began a steady increase in 2005, interrupted only by the increase in oil prices in 2008. When oil bottomed late last year, silver resumed its climb (it's now around $15.00/oz).

Copper tends to follow economic trends.   From a 60-year low in 1999, copper has almost quintupled in price, the world's economic problems notwithstanding.

Again -- we should look to the value of the dollar for an answer here - it's not that these commodities are more valuable -the dollar is losing value.

Dollar

If you've wondered why the house you bought in 1990 on a 15-year mortgage with a payment of $1,000/mo. is unobtainable today under similar terms by your kids, then it's worth taking a look at what's happened to the dollar.

Example:   If you bought an item for $1,000.00 in 1990 - that same item would cost you $1,650.00 and change in 2009 - an increase of 65%.

This one issue - the continued devaluation of the dollar - should be considered a crisis by our government, but it isn't.   We've continued to print money to pay bills and sell the debt-paper to the Chinese - a process started under Reagan, and continued by every president since.

Now - consider these facts:

1.    The government has printed $5,000,000,000,000 (trillion) in new money since Obama took office.

2.     The stimulus and buyout programs have exceeded our GDP this year - to the point where collecting taxes at all is a futile effort, as the government simply cannot - and never will - be able to pay the bills associated with these programs.

3.      Because of the first two statements here, the government is bankrupt by any measure. There's simply no way to repay the loans - the interest alone will 'drown' the government (they can't collect enough in revenues to keep up.)

There's something we should count on seeing, increasingly - signs offering to trade for gold.   Your dry-cleaner isn't the only one who's wise to what's going on.

(In Zimbabwe, people now routinely go into the hills and pan for gold to pay the bills - an ounce will still buy what it did before the government started printing one-trillion-dollar banknotes.    Of course, no one uses them.   One gram of gold buys ten loaves of bread. An ounce pays for a month's rent. Zimbabwe's economy has gone almost entirely underground, thanks to the government's insane economic policy of printing money to pay for things, rather than increasing productivity.)

We've learned the lesson well, that a printing-press is easier to implement than sound fiscal policy.   Count on the same outcome.

With the dollar's fall also comes its lack of desirability worldwide. If the dollar continues its slide, we can count on it losing its reserve-currency status (more on that below, in the 'reading' section).

Employment

This is probably the biggest single indicator of true economic strength, and the biggest reason why we're nowhere near a real recovery - we are still hemmoraging jobs, and will continue to do so well into next year.

We'd do well at this point to consider the economics of the thing, as well as the numbers.

According to the government, 15.1 million people are out of work in America (source: BLS; Sept. 2009).   This does not take into account the number of people who have been unemployed for longer than six months and/or have ceased looking for work.

If these people are factored in, the true number is around 25 million - or nearly twenty-five percent of the workforce.

Even using the government's official figures, the rate is nearly 17% - not the 9.8% they're trying to feed us.

This number will continue to rise through the bulk of 2010.

Foreclosures

The foreclosure-problem has gone well beyond questionable loans and house-flippers - in fact, it's no longer possible to blame speculators and real-estate agents for the collapse of the housing market.   Real-estate is still in free-fall in most parts of America - the number of mortgages 'underwater' (more owed than the home is worth) is the best proof of this.

In late 2008, one in every 54 homeowners received a foreclosure filing.   In September, that number had climbed to one in every 20 - and with one in every eight mortgages 'underwater' in 2009, and with that number set to increase to one in every two in 2010, we're faced with the unlovely but inevitable prospect of becoming a nation of renters as people abandon their homes in droves, send the keys back to the lender, and go rent an apartment, live with relatives - or hit the street.

One bright spot: Rental housing will be a growth-industry.

Summation:

If we add this up, we have the following:

1.    The dollar is worth 65% less than it was in 1990.   It will continue its slide due to a combination of abysmal internal economic policy and a foreign policy which is very destructive of wealth.

2.    Actual unemployment by government measure is around 17%; real-life unemployment is probably around 25%.   This number will rise through 2010.

3.    Foreclosures will probably peak around one in three homes by the end of 2010, with the number of mortgages showing negative-worth around 50% (one in two) by the end of next year.

4.     Inflation will begin a dramatic increase, starting with oil, as the demand for that commodity increases.   Commodities which are tradeable and portable (gold; silver; copper) are already seeing significant price increases.

5.     Paradoxically, the stock-market will continue to rise until the confidence in America's recovery begins to falter.   This seeming contrary increase is due to inflation; not confidence in the future.

As before, red lights lead to green lights, and green lights lead to an uncertain future. Remember, the ship will go all the way to the bottom if something isn't done. Unfortunately, I fear we're past that point.

The current administration has seen fit to sell us - literally - to foreign countries by virtue of Federally-guaranteed debt-paper, and the repayment-math doesn't work (we cannot repay the notes, by any yardstick or measure). The only thing we can do is to watch the future play out - a future none of us wanted.

One out of two current homeowners living either in forced-downsizing (apartments or the equivalent) or out on the street, with an unemployment rate of 25% while most of the wealth continues to be concentrated in the hands of a very few are the sort of statistics which cause revolutions.

With our government either blissfully unaware of all this, or incapable of solving it, I fear the worst will raise its head, and soon.

___________________________________________

Additional Reading:

'The Demise of the Dollar' - The Independent (October, 2009)

'Is the Dollar Doomed?' - Market Ticker; (October; 2009)

'On The Margin - Total Unemployment for August, 2009' - Seeking Alpha Newsletter (October; 2009)

'Gold Pushes To Record High; Dollar Weak' - CNN (October; 2009)

'A Financial Revolution' - Robert Fisk; The Independent (October; 2009)

'The Forbes 400 Show Why The Nation Is Falling Apart' - Les Leopold; Huffington Post (October; 2009)

'A New Normal For The World Economy' - The Economist (October; 2009)

'The Tax Drought of 2009' - CNN Money (October; 2009)

'Middle Class Squeeze - The Deep Roots of Social Transformation' - Charles Hughes Smith; Daily Finance (October; 2009)

'The Real News About Jobs and Wages' - Robert Reich; Huffington Post (September; 2009)

'Inflation Calculator' - (Coin News)

'Gold at $5,400' - National Inflation Association (October; 2009)

'Life After the Bubble - From American Dream to American Nightmare' - Portland Oregonian (October; 2009)

'America is Facing a Weimar Moment' - Robert Freeman; Common Dreams (March; 2009)

The REAL Dalai Lama (Or, "Peeing in the Cheerios")

blue_jay001@yahoo.com (Astra Navigo) — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 18:11:00 PDT

The Dalai Lama is a Fraud (among other things)

Recently, the online acquaintance of someone in my Multiply 'circle' had been singing the praises of the 14th Dalai Lama, Tenzin Gyatso.

Now, I'm not a 'phant (syco, or otherwise), and my aversion - and sometimes, outright loathing - of things-religious is well published, here and elsewhere.

In this case, I took it upon myself to point out some of His Lamatude's more-egregious shortcomings - and found my comment deleted, with the terse statement, "No bashing of H.H. The Dalai Lama will be tolerated here."

So much for Cheerios.

I can see keeping one's mouth shut about the Emperor's predeliction for going on-parade sans culotte, especially if he's subsidizing the whole damn empire - I mean, if he's paying my bills, he can walk around claiming invisible clothing all he wants - I promise not to snicker at his shortcomings, as long as I can continue to cash the check.

But when the only thing a person's done is to meditate on the sound of one-hand-clapping while everyone waits on him hand-and-foot, I've a hard time keeping silent about the obvious discrepancies.

Take his early life, for example.

Tibet is full of what I'm fond of calling 'voodoo'.   When the last Lama died, monks gathered and went searching for a place with blue-tiled roofs - that was the 'vision' of the last Lama regarding the location of his successor.

(See, Lama-ness isn't hereditary.   You can't inherit being His Lama-tude.   To be the Head Lama Guy, you have to be 'envisioned'; then found.   It can take years.   In this case, they tracked down a small house with blue tile roofs and picked a small boy from his family -- evidently, having your children kidnapped by monks is a great honor in Tibet -- took him to the capital in Lhasa, and began his 'education'.)

'Education', in Lama-ese, means being cut off from the rest of the world - no radio; no outside news; no influence of any kind - you get to read old textbooks written by other Lamas, and learn about the Manifold Path.

(My Thunderbird had a cracked manifold once -- it was the right one, which made it a bitch to replace, because the 292CID-V8 came standard with one - two were only installed on Thunderbirds, which meant that the second one was hideously expensive - but I digress).

Tibet - and especially the capital, Lhasa - is a study in economic contrast - on one hand, you have an uberelite of monks and Lamas, who run the show and get waited on, while the faceless masses live in grinding poverty and support the monks.   It works just fine - for those who are privileged enough to wear robes and give orders.

This sort of seclusion might make good Lamas - but it doesn't make for good judgment.   The current Dalai Lama proved this in the late 1930's when, still a boy, the Dalai Lama was visited by representatives from the National Socialist government of Germany.

The Nazis wasted no time importing about a dozen Tibetan monks to Berlin, convinced there was an Aryan 'connection' - a missing-link of sorts between Tibet and Nazi Germany. The first expedition to Tibet in 1938 by Ernst Schaefer cemented relations with both the Lama and the greater government of Tibet which lasted on a personal level until well after the war.

Heinrich Harrer was a member of the Waffen-SS and a death-squad leader.   In spite of the warm-fuzzies connected with the film "Seven Years in Tibet", Harrer's efforts through the war years in Tibet were aimed at encouraging the Tibetan government to support Nazi efforts against India.

Yet another SS officer who spent time as a politico-military envoy to Tibet was Bruno Beger. Beger split his time between Lhasa and Auschwitz, where he assisted Josef Mengele with medical experiments.

(Dalai Lama and Bruno Beger, in later years)

This sort of thing goes splendidly unreported, including the Head Lama's affinity for dressing up in Nazi uniforms in his early years.

Since the Chinese drove him out in 1959, he's spent his time traveling the world with his retinue - a pale shadow of what once served him - telling the world that it suffers from too much greed - and, by the way, please-please-please let me go back home so I can live like a Lama should....

He's never repudiated his coziness with the Nazis - in fact, he remained fast friends with Beger and Harrer until Harrer's death in 1992 (Beger now lives near Frankfurt, age 92, with his collection of Tibetan masks still on his wall.   He's expressed no regrets for what he did, having received a three-year suspended sentence in the '70's for his 'work' at Auschwitz).

The Chinese have abolished servitude to the Lamas, also introducing modern medical care, running water and electricity to Tibet.

__________________________

Folks, I'd be happy to listen to someone who at least claims to be older and wiser than I - especially if he'd lived a long and productive life and had some form of accomplishment to show for it.   Being waited on hand and foot; living on donations; wagging a finger and saying "Too much greed!", before being driven to the next photo-op doesn't constitute a productive life.   If he'd held a job and balanced a checkbook, I'd be willing to listen. As it is, he's just a case of arrested mental development and naivete.

Obama and the Peace Prize....

blue_jay001@yahoo.com (Astra Navigo) — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 10:34:00 PDT

Real Hope, or Chocolate Bars?

How to Win a Nobel Prize In 12 Days....

Unless you've been under a rock this morning, you're aware that president Obama was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize today - only the fourth American president to be so-honored.

While I'm happy as an American that one of our own was given this prize, there's a vague sense of unease in the back of my mind about this.

Just as Willy Wonka, from a troubled childhood-made-good, busied himself making children all over the world happy, my fear is that the world is now still expecting president Obama to retain the mantle of Saviour-in-Chief, when it's become apparent he's just a human being.

The official statement recognizes Obama for "...extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples." The committee's statement continued, "Only very rarely has a person to the same extent as Obama captured the world's attention and given its people hope for a better future."

As with Wonka, the story is just a bit surreal.

Nominations were due on February 1st - which was only a few days after Obama had taken office.   While everyone had great expectations, we had no idea what the man would actually do.   In a great many ways, we still don't - many of his actions have actually imitated those of his predecessor; his failure to roll back the MCA and the Patriot Act, along with the raft of 'presidential directives' and executive orders which have, among other things, circumvented the Constitution, have left many of his most-ardent supporters confused and disappointed.

We can throw in his failure to close the detention-camp at Guantanamo, his failure to demand an audit of other facilities known to house prisoners of America's 'War on Terrorism', and his abysmal handling of the economy.

On the other hand, we have a trip to Cairo to tell the Muslim world that no matter what, they should ignore the bombs, bullets, and occupation - we Really Do Care.

Meanwhile, a member of the Committee who agreed to an interview on the basis of anonymity said, "It’s like putting a gold star on a student’s paper, or giving him the ‘most improved’ trophy when he makes a good effort." Thorbjorn Jagland, chairman of the committee, said he "hoped the prize would help Obama resolve the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan."

This sounds to me like the 'everyone's a winner' philosophy of team-sports in American schools nowadays - no one loses; everyone gets to 'win' something.

Only this time, it's not a gold star - it's a Nobel Peace Prize, which ought to mean something.

Instead, during Obama's first 11 days in office, his most visible accomplishments were the inagural ball (Michelle's dress was, by any stretch, awesome), and his Super Bowl party.

I'll add that he also reaffirmed the Army Field Manual for interrogations. Not much 'peace' in that act.

So, like Willie Wonka, America's new president is now expected to spread sunshine and peace throughout the world.

That vague uneasiness?

It's the realization that the world isn't a peaceful place - and that a lot of those problems were caused by America.   It's the realization that 'Yes, We Can' is a good thought - but it has to be backed with some serious effort - effort that requires more than chocolate bars and hope.

Religion and Spirituality - An Atheists' Perspective

blue_jay001@yahoo.com (Astra Navigo) — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 10:08:00 PDT

“The fact that a believer is happier than a skeptic is no more to the point than the fact that a drunken man is happier than a sober one. The happiness of credulity is a cheap and dangerous quality.”
– George Bernard Shaw

“The meme for blind faith secures its own perpetuation by the simple unconscious expedient of discouraging rational inquiry. Faith is the great cop-out, the great excuse to evade the need to think and evaluate evidence. Faith is belief in spite of, even perhaps because of, the lack of evidence. ”– Richard Dawkins

“We must respect the other fellow’s religion, but only in the sense and to the extent that we respect his theory that his wife is beautiful and his children smart.”
– H.L. Mencken

It took me a while to write this, because I was too busy dealing with the reality of the third quote, above. As much as I’ve tried to write this in the spirit of ‘respecting others beliefs’, I can’t do it.

Y’see, in case you hadn’t figured this out by now – I’m an atheist.

That’s right. I don’t believe in imaginary friends, faeries, unicorns, the Loch Ness Monster, a Living Elvis, or anything else that I can’t prove as fact.

When the publishers of this ‘zine asked me to drop my two-cents in the pickle-barrel on the subject of spirituality, I was given a few general parameters – but I found that my own philosophy operates far outside of them.

I can say, “In the spirit of ________,” – and mean it only in the theoretical sense; such as when I’m negotiating something with a customer (”….in the spirit of cooperation….”) The idea that there really is a disembodied phantom running about named “cooperation” is ludicrous to me.

Neighbors told me my house was haunted. I later found that most of what they were discussing dealt with odd noises – perfectly explainable in a home that’s sixty years old. I’ve never felt a ‘presence’ in the bedroom – just a draft; explainable by midcentury-modern transom-windows.

My first exposure to religion began when I was five; my Mother took my sister and I back to Virginia, the state of her own birth, to visit my maternal grandparents. While Grandpa was what modern-day kids would call ‘cool’ (he gave me and my sis rides in the tractor-bucket; smoked unfiltered Camels and smelled vaguely like the stuff in my Dad’s liquor-cabinet, courtesy of a flask he kept in his jacket), my Grandmother was the antithesis of such things, and treated my Grandfather like he was one step above Old Scratch, himself.

(Read the rest here, on Subversify.Com!)

What Is Past Is Prologue - American Migration And The Current Political Climate

blue_jay001@yahoo.com (Astra Navigo) — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 12:36:00 PDT

Recently, an article reminded me of a book I'd read almost twenty years ago - in it, historian David Fischer pointed out that there were four distinct migrations to the shores of America, and that each one laid the groundwork for the social structure which led to the Civil War and the cultural divide we have between the northern and southern states today.

Revisiting that book was an interesting experience this week, as I was compelled to view the material in a new light - a far darker and less-romantic vision of America, as the fundamentals of our makeup have led us to this pass - the reaction to 9/11; the ascendancy of the Right, and especially the all too real possibility of another civil conflict.

Fischer identifies these waves of migration as follows:

1.   Puritans, who settled mainly in New England.
2.   Cavaliers, who settled in Virginia.
3.   Quakers, who settled mainly in the Delaware Valley and surrounding regions.
4.   Borderers, who settled in the backcountry of the rural South.

While these weren't the only migrants - there were French Canadians and French who settled Louisiana, for example - these were minor migrations which did not materially affect the fabric of American society, save for their local influence. It was the four major migratory 'waves' which literally created America.

In the 1770's-'80's, the Revolution was fought primarily due to a union between the Puritans of New England and surrounding northeastern states and their Cavalier counterparts in Virginia. The American Civil War of the 1860's was more of a continuation of that conflict than a 'new' war - the Puritans, wanting an end to slavery, could not force the hand of the Cavalier culture in the South at the time the Constitution was written. This happened when the two cultures turned on each other in the 1860's, settling with a Constitutional amendment the issue of human slavery, and settling (for the time being) the ideas of states rights and secession - more on that later.

Approaching the whole as a socio-anthropological study gives us the ability to detach much of the emotion from the thing, and look at our past from a very human standpoint, devoid of the twin concepts of politics and religion. It's the aftermath of the Civil War period which gives credence to the concept, and gives us pause as we ponder our future as a nation - it also gives us the framework by which to answer a perplexing question - why is nearly half of the nation - made up almost exclusively of working-class people who are (or should be) at fundamental odds with the core tenets of, yet are supportive of, the political party of the 'ruling class'.

The startling thing about this map is that it almost exactly reflects the Borderer migrations pre and post Civil War.   While the Republican party has maintained some of the classic Cavalier philosophies of money and privilege, paradoxically the Republicans have also, in order to gain a broader base, adopted a Borderer culture with Borderer values.

Who are the Borderers?

The Borderers are those peoples who resided on or near the borders between Scotland and England.   In a state of near-constant conflict since the 1100's, the border regions were finally 'pacified' (read: Militarily defeated) in the 1700's.   Many of them - in fact, entire regions along the borders were stripped of indigenous populations, these people suffering wholesale-deportation to America.

Capitalists from England came to the border regions to create estates from the newly-vacated land. Not content with what they had, mass evictions of Scots and border-English families became common - the evicted took ship for America in droves.

These people were not like the Puritans, who aspired to education and who had loftier reasons for leaving England - religious and political freedom; the ability to speak one's mind without sufferance.   The Borderers came to America with one goal in mind - material improvement in their lives.

The lands to which they were relegated were in the backcountry of America at the time - the southern regions of the colonies and westward to what is now Kentucky and Tennessee.   These areas were already populated by First Nations peoples, and the Borderers wasted no time inflicting on them the same treatment they had suffered themselves.

Borderer politics were rough-and-tumble; Andrew Jackson is probably the best example of this, along with John C. Calhoun.   Their religion was also far less structured, taking the form of field meetings and prayer-groups, with semiliterate preachers giving broad-ranging interpretations of the Bible and its meaning.   Living a hardscrabble life, these people were easy converts to the teachings of people like John Darby and the Dispensationalists; pre-millenial 'rapture' was prominent in their church culture, and the desire to hasten Christ's return (when, ostensibly, life would be better) was also a prominent feature.

Coming from a culture of definite superiors and inferiors based on material possessions (mainly land and cattle), which gave rise to an order based on social rank, the Borderers who came to America mimicked this structure in their New World lives. Conservative to an extreme, they routinely ostracized people who didn't conform to the 'rules'. Whereas they had well-defined notions of 'freedom', the freedom to dissent wasn't one of them.

Indeed, violence in Borderer culture was ingrained for a thousand years before any of them came to America. The concepts of shooting trespassers; the beginnings of America's 'gun culture'; favoring property over civil or human rights - all are hallmarks of Borderer culture.

Fighting ability was valued highly - to the extent that favoring anything military (if you'll pardon the almost-pun here) bordered on worship.

On the other hand, there were things which were not valued in Borderer culture - top of that list is education.   In England, education was only reserved for the most-promising or the most-wealthy; while schools were built in backcountry America, most adhered to the 'blab-school' concept, offering very little in the way of genuine education, save the little a child could learn by rote or repetition.

Again paradoxically, early American backcountry sexuality was dominated by the twin concepts of promiscuity and Calvinism - the 'shotgun wedding' literally got its start in America's backcountry.   Girls became pregnant as teenagers; illegitimacy was rampant, and due to the low population both in English-Scottish Borderer country and America's backcountry-South, the population didn't draw such a fine-line regarding sexual congress between close relatives.

Always an insular culture brought on by the differences they brought and the remoteness of their location, Borderers were always quick to join-ranks against any outsiders - or outside ideas. Their own peculiar brand of conservative activism prevented the dissolution of slavery during the Constitutional convention, and led to the Civil War in the 1860's.   American Backcountry xenophobia, wrapped up in a culture which predates the founding of the nation, exists to this day.

_________________________________

So, what of today?

Some of the dots are easy to connect - the Republican Party is the party of the conservative South and America's backcountry; it espouses much of what Borderer culture has become, and while it represents a fixed-point cultural anachronism in American society, it also has the benefit of great financial support from America's ruling class, and a ready-and-willing set of culturally-ingrained servants - a form of political servitude not much distanced from its 16th and 17th-century roots in the border-ridings of England and Scotland.

In fact, much of traditional Borderer values are present in recent headlines and conservative gatherings. A quick look:

-- Fear of religious persecution
-- Promotion of a 'thugocracy' - beating-down the 'liberals'
-- Shooting abortion providers
-- Actively calling for a 'Christian revolution'
-- Conservative activism, carried to extremes (assault-rifles at speeches; etc.)
-- Defense of 'traditional marriage' at the expense of the civil-rights of others
-- "Taking their country back" (through force of arms and a gun-culture, if necessary)

This 'culture-within-a-culture', while not unnoticed, has caused many a journalist, politician, and other pundit no small amount of alarm and confusion.    Until we examine its sociopolitical and anthropological roots, however, we can't begin to understand its meaning.

The polarizing effect of this culture is evident both religiously and politically.   With pastors calling for 'a new Christian revolutionary war', and with Congressmen like Joe Wilson shouting 'You lie!' from the floor of the House, it's not hard to see that there are highly-charged emotions running rampant over common sense.

This sort of thing, regrettably, isn't new to the American political scene. Let's connect a few dots:

Borderer culture gave rise to John C. Calhoun, the firebrand of the senate during the years prior to the Civil War; it was Calhoun who advocated (as early as 1832) outright secession from the United States, and who later stated that slavery was a 'positive good' in America.

We cannot forget another Borderer, Preston Brooks (who, like Calhoun, was also from South Carolina); Brooks beat fellow senator Charles Sumner almost to death with his cane, having disagreed with Sumner's recent speech vilifying the recent pro-slavery violence in Kansas.

It appears that Calhoun-style politics has raised its head again in America, thanks to the persistent Borderer culture.

We only have to look at the rhetoric of Michele Bachmann, who has called for a 'revolution in America' so that 'can't achieve their ends.', or the recent calls from Governor Rick Perry of Texas for outright secession.

Ignoring the media at this juncture is a mistake.   We only have to look at the likes of Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, and Bill O'Reilly to see the true nature of Borderer-culture-made-manifest in modern American politics.

Economic marginalization has always been part and parcel with Borderer culture. It shouldn't be a surprise to see right-wing extremism - seated in 'red' states with heavy Borderer ancestries - on the increase.

The ranks of disaffected Americans are growing.   The recession has disrupted the plans of 1 in 3 Americans - a level not seen since the Great Depression.   Extreme philosophies; honed for decades by 'red' state residents, have greater appeal with the advent of a bad economy.

On one side, we have a philosophy which espouses property rights over human and civil; xenophobia over openness, and a culture of violence over a culture of peace.    On the other side, we have a philosophy of enlightened, educated reason.

If I'm right, we have the rest of this year and the next to straighten things out.   If we don't, our own history and cultural differences suggest serious civil conflict - this time, as before, a cultural divide, but the stakes are actually far higher:   We'll be deciding whether we remain a republic which values property over people, or whether we become a true social democracy.

The choice, I fear, will be made by those with the loudest voices.

In A World Without Religion....

blue_jay001@yahoo.com (Astra Navigo) — Sun, 20 Sep 2009 16:05:00 PDT

Today, I had someone go off at me about my lack of belief in his imaginary-friend.

So, I thought I'd remind everyone about the core-problem with the world, and one of the recent events of the past ten years which would be vastly different if religion weren't poisoning our thinking.

Without religion:

1.     Yes - the Twin Towers would still be standing.

2.     National Socialism would never have existed.

3.     There would have never been an Inquisition.

4.     Joan-of-Arc wouldn't have been turned into barbecue.

5.     Most of humanity's wars would have never happened.

6.     Africa would be free of the results of colonialism.

7.     North and South America's indigenous populations would have remained free of the White Man's Burden.

8.     The Middle East would be a geography question for 12 year olds - not a constant source of worry and pain.

9.     The Crusades would have never occurred.

10.    The Dark Ages would never have happened.

Think about it....

A Conversation; on the Train....

blue_jay001@yahoo.com (Astra Navigo) — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 14:55:00 PDT

I just returned from a couple of very uneventful weeks in Hawai'i (spent mostly face-down in the water, looking at fish and doing a lot of swimming).

Part of my return itinerary was a trip on the Amtrack Cascades (it was cheaper to fly out of Seattle than it was to fly from Portland, so I took the train both 'to' and 'from').

I like trains.

They're a peaceful means of transport; far more civilized and less jarring than the idea of taking off half my clothes for the metal detector while some ~~thief~~ employee from TSA paws through my luggage.

Trains move at a slower pace - but a business-class ticket allows me to sleep (something I can't do on a plane), and they let me see a lot of things which can't be seen from the 20,000 foot level (the altitude at which the commuter-flight between SEA and PDX operates).

It also, on occasion, gives me time to chat with some rather interesting people.

I noticed the fellow the moment he got on.

A bit overfed and overdressed, he was also very confident. "Old-school salesman or preacher", I thought to myself.   I didn't have long to wait for the answer.

Settling himself in next to a younger fellow in front of me, he said, "I notice the cross on your lapel!   What church do you attend?"   His seatmate answered, and asked what his new companion did.

"I'm the youth and activities minister at X Fellowship in Seattle," he replied.   Asked how he got to be a minister, he replied "My father was a minister before me. I went to XYZ Seminary, where I obtained a double-masters' in Divinity and Church Management.   I also have several certificates in Youth Ministry."

I was amazed, really.   They continued some pretty self-reinforcing conversation; discussing numbers of 'souls saved'; numbers of new converts and 'baptisms'; numbers of new members and other signs of church 'growth', such as building projects and the like.

"I make it a point to take the kids fishing every weekend when fishing season's on. We have an intramural soccer-team and --"   I began to tune the guy out.

Later, after a nap, I went to the dining car. It'd been since yesterday late afternoon that I'd had anything to eat, and I knew there was a turkey and ham with a cup o' chowder back there with my name on it.   I found a place to sit after collecting my comestibles, and was musing over my sandwich when guess-who walked up and said, "Mind if I sit here? There's noplace else open."

"Sure", I said, motioning to the seat in front of me. There really wasn't any place else, and the conversation was sure to be interesting. I wasn't disappointed.

"So, what brings you to Portland?", he said.

"I live there," says I

"Lived there long?"

"All my life, so far."

"Well, it's a good town. I'm going there for a conference."

"Here it comes," I said to myself. "I'm supposed to ask, 'What sort of conference?', so he can start talking religion. Oh, well - I don't have anything else to do. Besides, this can be interesting....."

"What sort of conference?"

"It's a youth conference for my church."

"Really? What do you do?" (Now, I was asking for it.)

"I'm the youth and activities pastor for -- " He launched into the same explanation as earlier, maybe changing one or two words.   Clearly practiced.   I was noticing his professionally-laundered shirt; his tan; his tightly-woven wool jacket (complete with lapel pin) - in a land of backpacks and t-shirts, this guy liked to live large.

I decided to let him tell the whole story. "What got you into being a minister?"

Again, the same tale as before - maybe two words changed.

Now, it was my turn.

"But what do you do?", I said.

He looked confused; then repeated part of his 'resume'.

"Yes; I heard that - but what do you do?"

Asked what I meant, I defined my question further.   "You told me your resume - and you've 'grown' your church, but what has that accomplished, actually?"

"Well, we're saving souls!"

"I understand the concept - but what does that do for the new member - besides provide a membership?"

He launched into the whole 'salvation story' - I cut him off.

"I understand that whole concept.   What I'd like to know is what you do - what have you done for these people? What do you do for the community?   How do you justify keeping the building open and the lights on with other people's money?   Have you fed anyone? Clothed anyone?   Brought them a cup of cold water?   'For if you do this for the least of them, you do this unto me', remember?"

He paused.   I continued.

"The problem with American Christianity is that it's devolved into a country-club mentality.   I look at you, I see a game-show host; not a minister.   Do you know what 'minister' means? 'Servant of others'.   I've heard a lot about 'growth', and 'numbers' and the like - but unless you take those kids to the homeless shelter to do some work, rather than wasting your time fishing, you're not going to teach them anything of real value.   The way it sounds, you folks are 'Revelation-lukewarm'."

I'd clearly made him mad.   I could see it in his eyes.

"I will pray for you, brother," he said.

"Don't bother.   And, I'm not your brother. We're not related."

He got up to leave. Italian wool slacks; wing tips.   He'd get off in Portland, having shaken off the conversation, and bullshit with his other preacher-buddies like nothing had ever happened - like nothing was even wrong.

Wrong.

The monstrous wrongness of what I'd just seen hit me.   Here I was - the guy who does go to the homeless-shelter and volunteer on occasion, because I think it's the Right Thing To Do.   I'm the guy who donates his old clothing not to a profit-making venture, but directly to two shelters in town.   I feed random strangers in Old Town.

Here he was - the Guy In The Wool Jacket - who should be doing these things, and encouraging others to do so.

"Life is funny," I thought to myself, as I finished my sandwich.

____________________________________

"So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of my mouth." -- Revelation 3:16

A Pause; For Some Levity....

blue_jay001@yahoo.com (Astra Navigo) — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 14:51:00 PDT

While I'm working on a far more-serious post, I thought I'd throw in some levity.

I have a confession.

I like redneck girls. Not for anything up-close-and-personal, you understand.   I like admiring their particular joie de vivre.

Outdoor concerts are usually rotten, for example, because of all the usual reasons - they're usually held on the hottest friggin' day of the year; there's never anything truly thirst quenching like water for sale (although you can get plenty of alcohol).

And, there's always a gal or two like the Babe in the Confederate Bikini.

She's just lost her Daisy Dukes, but she'll never lose her Marlboro.   She's also just one or two generic beers away from taking some random assclown behind the Porta Potties and givin' him a Reason to Live; the smell notwithstanding. Personally, I'd never touch her without a latex body-suit - but I have to admire her style.   Just something completely honest about her 'advertising'.

Redneck weddings are also a blast.   I've been to several, being as I grew up in rural Oregon.   My whole family were like fish-out-of-water, but I learned that while most of the kids with whom I went to school weren't exactly Mensa material, they were decent people.

I went to a wedding when I was almost out of college - the people there were talking about how much they made an hour; what cars they'd just bought; the people they were with - there was no lofty ambition about changing the world.    Twenty minutes into the 'reception', there was action like this.

In deference, it wasn't the bride - it was her sister, who was doubling as a maid of something-or-another.

Her boyfriend held her up, and made comments about her underwear.   That's Redneck Etiquette.

They bought a trailer on the south end of town and lived there a couple of years.   I went to visit them shortly after college, and found the husband, living there alone.   She'd long since moved out and ran off with someone else; reasons unknown.

He got to keep his fishing boat.

Speaking of fishing, redneck-girls are usually fond of the same things redneck boys are fond of - fishing; hunting; camping; etc.   They'll hold their own when changing a tire, and most of them might outswear your uncle who did-time in the Navy, but they'll put up a tent in a downpour without much complaint.

Take this girl, for example.

She'll probably catch dinner.   And, while she's at it, she'll keep the beer cool by tying the clear-plastic retainer rings to a length of tent-cord, staking one end to the shore and dropping the six-pack in the water.

She's also learned that her swimsuit can do double duty as a beer-koozy, too.

Yep - you can say I'm a bit of an aficionado (that's 'fan' to the redneck-girls who might happen on this piece) of girls from the Other Side of Town. They'll never play golf with you; they'll never, ever be caught saying 'checkmate!' (let alone play chess with you); they won't know one end of a tennis-racquet from the other, and they'll end every sentence with a preposition if they get the chance - but they sure are a lot of fun to watch.

Especially when they've been drinking....

(Regular programming resumes tomorrow or Saturday.   Until then, enjoy....)

Subversives from Within - the Christian Right in America....

blue_jay001@yahoo.com (Astra Navigo) — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 20:28:00 PDT

As you know by now, I'm not terribly fond of 'sandwich pieces' (posts where someone introduces, then comments on, another post - they're also called 'reposts').

Occasionally, however, I make exceptions.

Frank Schaeffer, one of a handful of 'thinking Christian' authors, describes in detail the problems we're facing here in America with Fundamentalist Christianity, and the dangers they represent - from their organization through their education system, Fundamentalists have created, as Dr. Schaeffer points out so well here, an alternate-America, right under the noses of everyone else.

I can't say this enough: These people are dangerous. If you don't believe me - read on....

Subversives From Within (Francis Schaeffer; 2009)

Who are these people?! Where do they come from?! Ordinary Americans might wonder why anyone would stoop so low as to follow Glenn Beck, Fox News and Dick Armey (and their corporate sponsors masquerading as "FreedomWorks") as they organize their "9/12 March On Washington" to cynically exploit the 9/11 attack.

Patriotic Americans might question the organizer's aim to provide a media forum for dimwitted right wingers to scream "Liar!" "Socialist!" "Antichrist!" "Muslim!" "Death Panels!" "He's not an American!" and so on and on and on about the commander in chief charged with defending us from further attacks. And some people might even cry "shame on you!" to the more mainstream Republicans participating that include Dick Armey of FreedomWorks, as well as GOP Reps. Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee, Mike Pence of Indiana, Tom Price of Georgia, and South Carolina GOP Sen. Jim DeMint.

Ordinary folks from Planet Earth may ask why the Republican Party, right-wing activists and members of the Religious Right seem so unreachable with mere facts let alone decency and decorum. (As the proud father of a US Marine who fought in Afghanistan, I'm particularly outraged that these people would exploit the 9/11 attacks after my son and others were prepared to give their lives in response to our enemies.)

As a former Religious Right leader, who was raised (and home-schooled by my Evangelical-leader parents, Francis and Edith Schaeffer) in the movement, let me explain just why the ordinary rules of decency don't apply to the right these days.

Let me also answer this question: Who are these people?

Protecting Your Children From Satan

A big part of the answer to understanding the heightened climate of outright hate and fear of the "other" is the home school and Christian school movement. It is a modern incarnation of the anti-federal government ideology of earlier firebrands such as John Calhoun who was the 7th Vice President and a Southern politician in the 19th century. Calhoun embraced slavery, states' rights, limited government, and said that Americans should secede from the union if it went against their wishes. (See: "Calhoun Conservatism Raises Its Ugly Head" by Mike Lux in the Huffington Post Sept 11/09.)

In the early 1970s the evangelicals like my late father and James Dobson decided that the our society had fallen so far "away from God" and so far from "America's Christian history" that it was time to metaphorically decamp to not just another country but to another planet:. In other words virtually unnoticed by the media and mainstream political operatives, a big chunk of American society seceded from the union in all but name.

What they did is turn the white race-based in "Christian school" movement of the 1950s into a countercultural phenomena. As tens of thousands of new Christian schools opened, it was no longer just about "protecting" white kids from minorities and African-Americans. It was about protecting your children from Satan in other words the United States government's long reach through the public school system.

To protect your children from Satan -- in other words mainstream, open patriotic and pluralistic America -- you either kept them at home where mom and dad could teach the children right from wrong or sent them to a cloistered private evangelical/fundamentalist school. At home or in school you used curriculum prepared by the likes of James--beat-your-child-and-dare-to-discipline-Dobson, RJ-slavery-was-a-good-thing-Rushdoony, or many and other right-wing anti-American activists. That curriculum presented "secular America" as downright evil. Hating the USA became next to godliness.

The Anti-American Home Schoolers Come Of Age

We are now several generations into this experiment of holier-than-thou withdrawal from our American mainstream culture. If you wonder who it is that's both running and underwriting organizations such as the Family Research Council, Focus On The Family, Freedom Works and other organizers of the 9/12 March and who are the most faithful followers the likes of Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh or viewers of Fox News your answer is: it's the home school/Christian school generation of men and women now hitting their thirties and even forties who might as well have been raised on a different planet.

What are these home school and Christian school children taught? Here's a quote from one of the far right's leading home school curricula creators:

"The political question is this: By what biblical standard is the pagan to be granted the right to bring political sanctions against God's people? We recognize that unbelievers are not to vote in Church elections. Why should they be allowed to vote in civil elections in a covenanted Christian nation? Which judicial standards will they impose? By what other standard than the Bible?"

(Gary North of Institute For Christian Economics)

The generation raised on the belief that the US government is illegitimate because it is trying to "impose" non-biblical laws on people has hit the streets. These are the people who grew up indoctrinated into an alternative reality. Today they are out there waving signs of Obama dressed as Hitler. They are buying weapons and ammunition. Some are in the growing and revived militia movement. They are Dick Armey's foot soldiers. People like Armey and Beck can count on the ignorance of their dupes. It's against their religion to read a real newspaper, watch anything but Fox or go to a real school.

Evangelical Red Guards

Over the last 30 years Evangelical fundamentalists have managed to do what Chairman Mao failed to do with his Red Guards: indoctrinate a whole generation of evangelical people to see their own society as the enemy and act like subversives from within the culture. These people are as anti-American as Al-Qaeda. The "Christian Reconstruction" movement is working for theocracy. Reconstructionism (of which Gary North is one leader) says that the law given for the political and legal ordering of ancient Israel is intended for all people at all times.

Reconstructionist leader David Barton gives a definition:

"The Christian goal for the world is the universal development of Biblical theocratic republics, in which every area of life is redeemed and placed under the Lordship of Jesus Christ and the rule of God's law."

Who are Glenn Beck's foot soldiers? In effect what we have is a group of indoctrinated people who have never actually lived in America because they were brought up deliberately cloistered from it by their parents and churches. Because they are legally "Americans" they can move freely around our democracy trying to destroy it working within the United States. Today they are acting like a fifth column, no, they are a fifth column. Some of them have not just seceded metaphorically, there is even a growing movement for states to secede literally.

Today the right wing America haters actually are doing to America what no "illegal" immigrants ever do: work to overthrow our democracy and replace it with a theocracy. The home-schooled, privately educated brainwashed horde are an antidemocratic, fundamentally anti-American political movement. For a start they do not accept the results of the last election.

Liberal/Progressive Wishful Thinking and Blindness

Meanwhile those ordinary Americans including many Democrats, progressives and liberals who work within the system can hardly imagine that there are people so far outside the lines of what they regard as ordinary decent behavior that the progressives seem psychologically unequipped to deal with this reality.

President Obama is one such person. His talk of bipartisanship is a pipe dream. Why?

Bipartisan Pipe Dream

Because you can't be bipartisan with people who don't play by the same rules -- say accepting the will of the people -- as you do. Obama is not alone in his gentlemanly wishful thinking. For instance consider New York Times book review editor Sam Tanenhaus saying in his book (The Death of Conservatism) that the the conservative movement is over.

Tanenhaus rightly points out that the extremism of the right has driven away traditional Republicans. I ought to know! I, as a life-long Republican and former Religious Right activist helped create this situation. But Tanenhaus and others like him just don't get the fact that the far right is resurgent, in fact more dangerous than ever as a wounded animal is dangerous. They don't get it because kindly liberals also live in a bubble.

The kindly liberal reasonable bubble of an open free culture in which reason, argument in fact prevails is far removed from the other America, one of militia training camps, fundamentalist churches, parents who follow Dobson's "parenting" advice by "breaking" their children and whipping them (as Dobson tells them to do in his books) and thus raising the damaged and dangerous automatons of biblical vengeance and sadism.

The Last Chess Game You'll Ever Play

What reasonable people don't understand is this: if one person is playing chess abiding by the rules and their opponent is losing at the chess game it may appear that they have lost the match. But what if one person is willing to change the rules? For instance, if you're playing chess against someone who -- if they start losing -- takes a lead pipe out of their back pocket and smashes you over the head with it the "rules" change.

Serial Killers

The real story of the Religious Right and their power to destroy is told by Max Blumenthal in Republican Gomorrah, and Jeff Sharlet in The Family and by me in Crazy For God. What our books have in common is the understanding that you can lose in the political system but still "win" -- according to your destructive agenda -- if your agenda is non-political but rather religious and apocalyptic in nature.

To understand the Religious Right today and how dangerous they are don't think politics -- think serial killers who "win" by "getting even" with the society they perceive as having disrespected them. It isn't about facts. It isn't about election results. It isn't about truth. It's about victimhood and revenge on the "elite" in other words on everyone not like you. It is about the weird combination of sadism and masochism Blumenthal describes in his book.

Think Republicans who have no plan of their own for health care reform other than stopping Obama. Think "Deathers" and "Birthers" who are all about de-legitimizing our system as "evil" because it includes rights for gays.

New Rules: Anarchy and Scorched Earth

What those who think that the power of the Religious Right and/or the Republicans is ended don't understand is that it's only ended if you believe in the rules. When I say the rules I mean, for instance, that if you lose an election the other side gets to legislate. However if your opponent is not interested in the rules and is, A) waiting for Jesus to return and consume all the "infidels" or, B) you are just waiting to take that "lead pipe" out of your back pocket -- say go to public meetings and intimidate people by carrying loaded weapons to those meetings -- or worse, maybe even use them to shoot down someone -- all polite bets are off!

The fact of the matter is we now know what the experiment in raising children outside of the American mainstream means. It means that there's a whole subculture within American culture that mistrusts facts precisely because they are facts. They glory an alternative view of not just politics but of reality.

They frequent the creationist museum and look at dioramas of dinosaurs cavorting with humans. They believe that gay people choose to be gay just stick it to the rest of us and could change if they invite Jesus into their hearts. They believe that before you run for governor of Alaska, for instance, you should get a preacher specializing in "casting out the spirit of witchcraft" to anoint you so you can win against the demonic forces of secularism -- as was the case with Sarah Palin when she first ran for governor. They believe that the NRA was telling the truth when they claimed that Obama would "take away your guns" and so have loaded up with more guns and ammunition. They think the time has come to rise up and overthrow the government. And yes, most of them also believe that black people are inferior to whites, so to have a black man in the White House is itself "proof" of American's fall from grace.

There's no arguing with such people and no winning against them using mere elections. They are not playing by American rules. Their idea of winning is not fair elections but Armageddon.

Religious Right Growing Again

Those who say that the Religious Right and the far right have lost their power are looking through the lens of rule-obeying democratic liberalism. They don't understand that their opponents will always carry the proverbial lead pipe in his or her back pocket. To the progressives who think that the Religious Right and the right wing has lost its power I say this: You're correct when it comes to political facts (for the moment) of the last election, but you're dead wrong when it comes to the way revolutions work.

Second American "Tea Party" Revolution

Revolutionaries never have played by the rules. They don't have to win by the rules. They hate the rules. They don't live in a rule based or fact based universe.

They believe they are serving a "higher cause" so it makes the "mere human" rules unimportant. They're ready to shout down opponents, call out "liar" about someone telling the truth, undermine public meetings and/or commit physical violence. They are also willing to become the tools of cynical corporate lobbyists using them for ulterior purposes, say stalling health care reform.

In order to "win" -- in other words destroy our country as we know it -- the far right merely needs to be true to its own rule which is, to put it very mildly, that coloring outside the lines is not only perfectly okay but required.

Conclusion

Not only do the Religious Right distrust facts to them facts are evil. You are "satanic" if you believe in evolution. You're also satanic if you believe health-care reform is about anything but death panels and abortions. You're satanic if you don't believe that gay people are evil or if you think sex education is sensible. You're satanic if you don't believe in Satan!

The tactics that progressives develop for actually winning against the right have to involve far more than politics. They have to also involve ceaseless vigilance against an enemy that has now -- literally -- raised up an armed, paranoid and deluded alternative nation within our borders and created a fifth column to undermine the United States and our democracy. They need to be called out by the rest of us in no uncertain terms.

Long term the Religious Right subculture has to be understood, then exposed for what it is: an anti-democracy movement built on willful lies with potentially violent underpinnings in the thrall of an apocalyptic cult of revenge on everyone not like "us." It is also the useful tool of corporate lobbyists. Who use these shock troops of the proudly ignorant for non-ideological reasons.

The Religious Right may have lost a round politically but they've still got a "lead pipe" in their back pocket. They can still "win" by making the rest of us lose our democracy by increments.

______________________________________

Folks, again - please don't say I didn't warn you.

Lies; Damned Lies, and Statistics....

blue_jay001@yahoo.com (Astra Navigo) — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 23:33:00 PDT

"Sec 246 — NO FEDERAL PAYMENT FOR UNDOCUMENTED ALIENS

Nothing in this subtitle shall allow Federal payments for affordability credits on behalf of individuals who are not lawfully present in the United States."

____________________

As one of my professors once said in my freshman year, there are three kinds of lies -- lies; damned lies; and statistics.

While some statistics are little more than pull-quotes, prepared for an author who wants to grind an axe, some are well-nigh-incontrovertible.

The statistics on health-care are damning to America - 46 million people have no health care at all and nearly a million bankruptcies per year based solely on unfunded health care costs - but this is somehow of no consequence to half of our lawmakers, who have been bought-and-paid-for by the pharmaceutical and hospital companies in America.

Some lies are just lies -- "I went to the store", when you really went to see your boyfriend/girlfriend in 11th grade is a lie.   It's of no particular consequence; you did it so you wouldn't have to have an argument with your parents.   These are things which you laugh about over Thanksgiving dinner with the extended family ten years later when that person is now married to you and you're minding a two-year-old in a high-chair.

Damned lies are different.

They're hurtful things - and sometimes the accusation of a lie, especially in politics, can be a lie itself.

Take Obama's speech the other day.

As the speech wound down, he recapped his health-care plan.   It's not perfect - in fact, there are some things which need serious work in order to be functional.   However, when Representative Wilson decided to half-jump out of his chair and yell "You lie!" to the President in the middle of a speech to Congress, he chose to do something which was not just poorly-reasoned and wrong - he chose to deliberately lie to the American people about the contents of the House bill on healthcare.

As you can see from Section 246, above, there will be no payments to people in-country without documents -- 'illegal aliens', if you will.   While this is counter to the programs in several other countries (even third-world nations), this section is important to many Americans, who don't want to see lettuce-pickers and dishwashers treated for life-threatening diseases on the national dime.

Why Mr. Wilson didn't see fit to do his own research (I'm assuming that's what the people of South Carolina elected him to do, among other things) is quite beyond me.   Instead, he decided to reach down beyond his considerable experience to dark areas more-visceral, and pull out a spontaneous rebuke.

By failing to do so, he perpetuated in turn the lies being disseminated by Corporate Medicine, which has the most to lose from this.   Perhaps it's the money he's taken from the pharmaceutical industry; perhaps it's his state-of-origin, which is one of the most-red of red states - but I'm willing to bet that the main culprit is his narrow-mindedness and his complete unwillingness to read anything coming from the White House.

As a result, he made a king-sized ass of himself.   Now, what's more amazing is that no one on his side of the fence called him on it - and several Republican apologists have actually applauded him for his abysmal ignorance.

Perhaps I haven't made this as starkly clear as I should -- he called the President a liar, and he was wrong.

Not just wrong, but he crossed a line which should never be crossed; not in the halls of Congress.   In so doing, he lied, himself.

Where was Mr. Wilson when President Bush lied?    Where were the constituents of ~~Cletusville~~ Beaufort, South Carolina when President Bush lied?

Thousands of Americans are dead because Bush lied.

We have spent over a trillion dollars in the twin sandboxes of Iraq and Afghanistan, because Bush lied.

The Justice Department ran roughshod over the Constitution because Bush lied.

Where was Mr. Wilson?   Where were all of the members of the git-r-dun constituency he represents?

I'll say it here, as equally-plain as I can:    Right now, I'm not concerned with a country which is safe for my savings.    Frankly, it's too late for that.   I'm not concerned with having a country which is safe for my retirement -- thanks to the actions of all eight presidents from 1968-onward, it's too late for that, either.

I just want a country which is safe for those of us who stayed awake in class.

I want a country where such egregious comments are called-out by both sides of the aisle, and harshly, for what they really are.

I know -- that's too much to ask, also.

_____________________________________

Folks, as another friend of mine said today, if we screw up the next year, we will be responsible for destroying this country.

It's time to get real -- starting with telling the truth.

Oops, She Did It Again (Orly Taitz and the New Kenyan Birth Certificate)

blue_jay001@yahoo.com (Astra Navigo) — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 18:35:00 PDT

Orly Taitz, the Queen of Birthistan, has done it again.

She's produced another "Kenyan Birth Certificate" (the first one having been a fraud, and having been punked by some people who created a 'Kenyan Birth Certificate Generator' so you could punk all of your friends, too.)

What on earth did the woman expect?   As it turns out, one of the 'officials' on the first cert was a certain "E.F. Lavender" (they'd taken the name from a popular soap brand).

Not to be deterred, she's filed another lawsuit, this time presenting a cert from a mysterious emailer named "Mr Lucas".    This Lucas-fellow (apart from bearing the name of the electronics-company which made the fuel-pump in my MG which went bad so many years ago) has come up with the real deal - at least, according to Taitz and her followers, who are living for the day that someone proves Obama is Not Fit To Lead because his Momma decided to fly to Kenya when she was eight and half months pregnant (?) in order to give birth in a colonial hospital in Mombasa, ~~Zanzibar~~ Kenya.

Oops. That's right.   Mombasa was part of Zanzibar in 1961.

Orly's latest birth-cert. Click on image to zoom.

Some other problems with the cert are just as glaring - the date-formats are wrong (they're in U.S. format - MM/DD/YY, rather than the European convention of DD/MM/YY).

Also, most of the 'data' is typed using a space-justified font which was not available until around 1968, courtesy of the IBM Selectrics typewriter.

Dunno whose baby they got to donate the footprint - but that's a cool touch, I'll admit.

______________________________________

When are these people just going to give it a rest, and admit that they're wrong? Not just misinformed, or not possessed of the right documents - but wrong?

Obama is a citizen. If you don't want him in office, you've two routes to go that are legal: Wait for something called an 'election' (that's how we select presidents in this country) in 2012, or ask your Congresscritter to initiate impeachment proceedings.

As to the Justice Department, there's no vast conspiracy - in fact, in refusing to hear these cases, they're doing everyone a favor - because filing a lawsuit isn't the proper venue for this sort of thing, as an individual cannot prove that he or she has been specifically damaged by this process.

Of course, it's a lot more fun for Ms. Taitz, and it certainly is entertaining in a Jerry Springer sort of way - but as I've pointed out in a prior post, it's starting to give the rest of the world the opinion that America is full-to-the-brim with batshit-crazy whackjobs who've nothing better to do with their time than read up on conspiracy theories and mutter incoherently to each other.

Give it a rest. It's not doing anyone any good, and it's not funny any more.

Labor Day; 2009 (The Story of Bend, Oregon)

blue_jay001@yahoo.com (Astra Navigo) — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 18:18:00 PDT

When BBC/America correspondent Adam Brookes decided to do a piece on America's economy from an 'everyman' perspective, he chose the town of Bend, from my home state of Oregon.

Most of us who live in Oregon have known Bend as a thriving community which had modest beginnings in the cattle and timber trade.   No less a publishing luminary as G.P. Putnam chose Bend, Oregon as the place to hone his journalistic skills before taking the reins of the family publishing empire; the combination of dry climate (over 300 days of sunshine per year); four definable seasons (great summers and some of the best skiing in the world) and the clearest air in the West (the Bend area is home to a world-class astronomical observatory) consistently ranked the place as one the Best Places to Live in America, by almost any yardstick.

This all came crashing down during the recession.

Some statistics:

When I first started going to the Bend area for recreation in the early '80's, the population was a sleepy 20,000, more or less. In 2005, it has jumped to 80,000.

The price of homes in Bend doubled during that time - something that was unsustainable - and with it came the construction of housing to accommodate the growing population.

As Brookes puts it, "In what had once been an isolated lumber and mill-town, high-end restaurants and brewhouses opened. Shops selling expensive bric-a-brac bloomed. Massage therapists and hairdressers proliferated.

Downtown Bend looks like a shrine to post-millenial bijou: pricey shoes, scented candles, fancy coffee."

Construction; Credit; Collapse --

When the credit markets collapsed, so did Bend.    Home prices dropped by 40%, and the 'official' unemployment rate jumped to a staggering 17% - depression-level rates by most measures. (Note:   The real rate is quite likely around 30%, if we consider not just those currently receiving benefits, but those for which benefits have run out, and those who simply quit looking.)

The story of Dan Hardt, a building-contractor in Bend, is typical.   He owned a thriving business, hanging drywall in new homes - he had a crew of twenty, and the usual 'toys' (multiple homes, cars, a boat, etc.) which accompanied this success.

Now, he lives in a homeless shelter - his business ruined; his accomplishments gone.

That those who lived in this manner simply cannot cope is an understatement.   An average of four suicides per week in Bend is mute testimony to the failure of the American economy; a bankruptcy-write-large of the 'American dream'.    It's possible to build a life when things are stable - but today, all bets are off.

In Bend, at least, the 'American dream', is a failure; an abject nightmare leading to ruin, and death.

As Mr. Brookes points out, things are very different here.   Lacking the culture of looking after each other, our social-services are limited in the extreme.    In his article, he states, "When you lose your job in America, you will receive financial aid from the government. But it is limited. Typically, an unemployed worker in Bend will get state benefits for a period of six months to a year. After that, as many in Bend are discovering, you are on your own.

In addition, the loss of a job frequently means the loss of health insurance and payments into retirement funds. This limited social safety net means unemployment in America can be devastating."

Or, as Dan Hardt puts it so well, "It's not just the job that stops. Everything else stops with it."

Labor Day in America.

While it ought to be a time of backyard-grills and end-of-summer 'activities', in Bend this year Labor Day is going to be Poverty with a View; a return to Depression-era frugality and the certain knowledge that whatever comes after, things will never be as they were.

Bend, it would appear, is a microcosm of America, here on this Labor Day of 2009 - and we don't look good to the rest of the world.

You Might NOT Be A Libertarian, If....

blue_jay001@yahoo.com (Astra Navigo) — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 13:35:00 PDT

I've gotten some pretty incisive hate-mail recently due to my stand on health-care.

One person pointed out that as I'm an atheist, I 'wasn't capable of understanding the "real America." '

Another was polite in her suggestion that I would be 'better suited in another country where my beliefs were more in keeping with the majority.'

Yet another told me that the First Amendment didn't apply; that America was a "Christian nation", and that if I didn't like it, I should 'get the hell out and leave the place to real Americans.'

However, the one that really got me was from a gal who'd been a longtime reader (until she fell in-company with the Birthers and other Fundiewhacks) who told me that because I supported national health-care, I couldn't possibly be a Libertarian.

Y'see - I registered as a member of the Libertarian Party in 1988.   I was a delegate to their convention here in Portland a few years back.   I've been a Libertarian since before it was cool - and I can tell you that a lot of people who are calling themselves Libertarians are one step removed from being National Socialists (that's "Nazi", for those of you who might not know.)

I know - I've explained this before - but I'll do it again, just so everyone here knows:   A Libertarian supports freedom and liberty; the responsible kind, which exists up to the point where those freedoms encroach on the freedoms of others.

I'm what's called a 'consequential Libertarian', if you're looking to split-hairs; I break with the 'classic' Libertarians who believe we could do without things like a national government, taxes, compulsory education, national defense, and things like that there.

Those of us who are 'consequential' Libertarians believe that there are consequences for actions, both positive and negative - and that due to human nature being what it is, it's necessary to impose things like speed limits, ownership restrictions for firearms, and preventing twelve-year-olds from being able to go to the grocery-store and buy codeine.

We don't, however, believe that it's necessary to tell responsible adults that they can't smoke marijuana.    We believe that the war on drugs is a joke, and has done nothing but increase the prison population (something, by the way, for which you and I pay, and pay dearly).

We believe it's far cheaper to build an adequate education system at $12,000/student than to imprison the same person eighteen years later at $120,000/year.

We believe that it was a good idea, overall, to ban private ownership of machine-guns in the 1930's, what with organized crime using them to settle their differences.

We believe that prohibition was the worst idea to come out of the depression-era (and that it contributed to a lot of that organized crime in the first place).

We don't see the logic in making multibillionaires out of people who turn around and thumb their noses at the rest of us - because with wealth comes responsibility for the common good; otherwise you don't have a country; you have a perverted sort of feudal-meritocracy where blind luck and cojones the size of basketballs rule over common sense and logic.

(What I just described, by the way, is where we're headed - in fact, we're well down the road toward that sort of thing; it's the sort of place that gave rise to armies which goose-step - but that's another topic, entirely).

True liberty involves responsibility for each other - but that seems to have failed the logic of the rightists in this country.

So, now that you know what we are - here's what we aren't:

1.    If you believe that the First Amendment guarantees that you can put the Ten Commandments on every courthouse in America, try every case by the Bible, and the phrase "Congress shall make no law regarding the establishment of religion" applies to Buddhists, Atheists, Muslims, Wiccans, Native-Americans, Zoroastrians, and anyone else who isn't a Right-Wing Fundamentalist/Evangelical Christian - you're probably not a Libertarian.

2.     If you think Fox News really is 'fair and balanced' - you're probably not a Libertarian.

3.     If you believe that you should be entitled to keep everything you make without taxes or some other contribution to the common good, you'll make a great anarcho-capitalist - but you're not a Libertarian.

4.     If you believe you have an unalienable right to attend a Presidential town-hall meeting toting a loaded assault-rifle, there's a damn good chance you're a right-wing whackjob - but you're not a Libertarian.

5.     If you believe it's all right to pick a fight with someone outside a mosque and then cry 'freedom of speech!' when they call the police - there's a better-than-even chance you're a thug - but you're not a Libertarian.

6.     If you're a pastor, and call openly for the death of the President because he's "not an American", and "not a Christian" - then there are several classifications for you, some which ought to land you in the nuthatch or prison - but it's safe to say that you aren't now, nor have ever been, a Libertarian.

7.      If you think Chief Justice Roberts is a great man, you're probably a died-in-the-wool Bush Fundie - but you're definitely not a Libertarian.

8.     If you actually value a political leader who goes to war because "god told him to" - you're batshit-crazy, but you are definitely not a Libertarian.

9.     If you think Roe vs. Wade was a bad idea -- I might agree with you; the Supremes should likely never have even taken the case (it's not a Federal issue) -- but if you believe that a woman's body isn't her own, and that medical procedures should be banned because 'god doesn't like them', and 'Jesus isn't happy with it' - -then you've got a solid grip on your relationship with your imaginary-friends - but you're not a Libertarian.

10.     If you think that taxes are for huge armies and police forces to 'deal' with everyone who Doesn't Think Like You - then you're not a Libertarian.

11.     If you're in favor of bailouts, as long as they reinforce the status quo (and help your Uncle Cletus replace his 1989 Ford F-150) - you definitely have no grasp of economics, and you're definitely not a Libertarian.

12.     If you think printing up $5,000,000,000,000 in brand new $1 bills is a great way to get the economy working again, there's a damn good chance you failed eighth-grade math - and you're not a Libertarian.

13.     If you think taking citizens of other countries to government-run torture camps and waterboarding them is a great way to 'preserve our way of life' - it's a lead-pipe-cinch you haven't a clue what America is about - and you're definitely not a Libertarian.

14.     If you're in love with the idea of the death-penalty - regardless of the fact that it's unevenly applied to persons-of-color, the mentally-disadvantaged and the poor -- then you're no doubt a heartless and cruel moron - but you're not a Libertarian.

15.     If you think going to war with nations which have or had no beef with us is a great idea - then you have no sense of justice in the world - and you're not a Libertarian.

Lastly -- if you think that allowing the likes of Bush, Cheney, and their minions to run about free, spouting their lies and apologetics without answering for their crimes is a great idea - then here's some good news:   You probably take company with about half the country.   You have a lot of friends.   You're probably aching for the day that someone kills that black-assed son-of-a-bitch Leninist/usurper in the White House -

- but you're no American.   And you're definitely not a Libertarian.

(A shout-out is due to Swaggie, who suggested the link and the idea.)

Varmint-Cong and the River....

blue_jay001@yahoo.com (Astra Navigo) — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 12:39:00 PDT

"...in this case my enemy is a varmint. And a varmint will never quit - ever. They're like the Viet Cong - Varmint Cong." -- Carl Spackler; (Caddyshack)

"It's fu**in' pagan idolatry. Look around you...I ain't afraid of all them fu**in' skulls and altars and shit. I used to think if I died in an evil place, then my soul wouldn't be able to make it to Heaven. But now? F**k! I mean, I don't care where it goes, as long as it ain't here! -- "Chef" (Apocalypse Now)

I'm Back.

I've got a trip starting tomorrow which will take me to California for a day, then to Hawai'i, (a little pleasure, a little business).   There will be things like air-conditioning, clean sheets, hotels, and sterility.

I'm happy for getting away.   I've relearned that while Getting Away is a good thing - perhaps the best of things - coming back is a good thing, too.

Even with The Varmints.

Camping in Oregon is an experience, especially in the late summertime, when the berries are still in season and the heat is off; it's dry; you can find yourself enough food without breaking into the dried crap you bring with you, and as long as there's water, you'll make out just fine, barring the sunburn - and we humans have developed a sophisticated clothing-industry to deal with such.

The first night was understandably tiring - I used muscles I hadn't used for a while, getting everything set up and working; there was a lot of digging involved, and I'd set up camp not far from a river in the Coast Range.   The next day, I was going to find a bottle of champagne a friend of mine and I had buried about fifteen years earlier (had it been that long?)

As night fell, I heard some crunching -- branches; in the distance, across the river.

I made sure the tent-flap was secure and settled in for some sleep.   I was awakened by more of the same.   Dreams were weird that night.   Smoke on the water; fire in the sky.   You know the drill.

Morning, I decided to go fishing.

Fishing is a serene experience, usually - it gets you in a place where the only things which exist are you; the river; and the fish.   Be the fish.   Think like a fish - catch a fish.   If it's big enough and you know the water's clean, you can eat the fish.   All the fish you can catch.   Smoked fish.   Fried fish.   Baked fish; if you've got the equipment.

More crunching; across the river.

I had my 9MM. Good enough for most things; laughable for anything larger - but thankfully; those things didn't live here. It's well past breeding season for bears; if you find a momma bear, she's likely just looking for berries. Bear usually will keep their distance from people if there's enough food around.   I've seen the backsides of more bear than I care to tell. I was more worried about two-legged creatures, guarding cash-crops.

I went back to fishing.

Late morning-early afternoon; past the time that any fish would be biting. No fish.   Damn.   Dry chow tonight.   Looked for crawdads; didn't find any.   Might, if I tried baiting a hook with bacon.   Settled down to that.

Bait is a lazy way to fish.   Dry-flies are best; I wouldn't respect - let alone eat - any fish I could catch with a goddamn coffee-can full of worms. Crawdads aren't respectable, though.   I cut up a slice of bacon, put a bit on the end of a hook, and was rewarded in a few minutes with a nice fat crawdad fetched out of a still shallow.

Crawdad, shrimp, lobster, and cockroach are only a gene or two apart. Doesn't matter to me.   I'm happy with 'em.   Caught several more.   Lunch, and dinner besides.

Cleaning crawdads is no more difficult than cleaning shrimp. You can boil them, but I'm more fond of skewering the little buggers and grilling them.   They taste just like shrimp if you do 'em right.

Crawdad and salad for dinner.   Life was pretty good - until I heard more activity across the river...

__________________________

Was awakened from a dream where several commandos were splashing across the river, headed toward my camp.   Awake; I realized that there was real splashing in the river, and I needed to find out what it was, pronto.

Out of the tent, I saw It.

A raccoon.

He was making a go of getting across the creek, as he'd been reconnoitering the place for a couple of days, trying to figure out how to get to my chow. They can smell food a long way away.

Worst thing you can do is to feed the buggers - they'll show up the next day with an army of their buddies, and clean you out.    Best to keep your supplies out of reach - I'd gone the time-honored route of slinging everything from a tree-branch, after bundling it up, cooler and all.

No varmint-cong here.   Just a 'coon.

He showed up several times after that - dug into my garbage-pit once, looking for cucumber peelings, crawdad-shells and fish leavings.    He wasn't so interested once he learned there wasn't much to eat there - although it was a pain reburying it all.

The time passed quicker than I would have liked - my raccoon buddy was more animated than a volleyball, but was more fun to talk with.   He was just as interested in me; the two-legged creature who Didn't Belong as I was of him, the four legged creature who Did.

I'll actually miss sleeping on the ground tonight.   I'll miss the sound of the river, and the taste of grilled crawdad.

Mission accomplished, I suppose.

In Case of Rapture....

blue_jay001@yahoo.com (Astra Navigo) — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 09:07:00 PDT

I am just going to have to get off the dime here, folks.

After being told the other day that, as an atheist, I was 'precluded from seeing the light and the truth', I figure I really should put this to work.

There's millions in atheism, folks. Millions.

Take these guys, who came up with Eternal Earth Bound Pets, Inc.

For a fee, they'll look after Fluffy, Poochie, Snuggles (or whatever inane name you've given your Chosen Varmint).

They've even got a guarantee - you see, because they're atheists, they'll Be Here when the Great Snatch happens and all those Good Christians wind up in Heaven.

In their own words, "...For $110.00 we will guarantee that should the Rapture occur within ten (10) years of receipt of payment, one pet per residence will be saved.  Each additional pet at your residence will be saved for an additional $15.00 fee. A small price to pay for your peace of mind and the health and safety of your four legged friends.

Unfortunately at this time we are not equipped to accommodate all species and must limit our services to dogs, cats, birds, rabbits, and small caged mammals."

Now, had I thought of this, I'd've put a more-comprehensive business-plan together, offering a smorgasbord of services including finding a few atheist veterinarians who'd offer to keep Little Snookie up on his-her shots.

I'd also be a little more specific about the range-of-care. After the Great Snatch, food, doggie-sweaters (like the one above) and basic shelter ain't gonna cut it. There'll be locusts, sores (although if I'm correct in my translation, those are only going to affect people), bloody water, hailstones, heat waves - stuff that would kill Poochie in his tracks.   Me?   I'd see to it that Itchy and Scratchy and Poochie got bottled water and air-conditioning, at a minimum.

While All Dogs Go To Heaven (Disney told me so), there are bound to be a lot of animal-lovers out there who are genuinely worried about What Comes After the Great Snatch.

I mean, they'll be worried sick about their Uncle Cletus, who scoffed at religion.   Here they'll be, at the Right Hand of the Man Himself, wearing a white robe with no reason to even take a bath again -- and Clete'll be down there in his trailer, drinking beer, scratching and farting.

It's enough to cause a newly-raptured saint some non-existent medical problems, with or without the worry that Poochie is running about, dodging rocks-from-the-sky and looking for water while all the two-legged creatures on the planet say, "Lookit! The Jesus-Freaks are gone!   Hey!   Let's all engage in depraved activities of a Biblical sort!"

Unless, of course, Jesus decides to take the dog....

A Pause; In The Fabric.....

blue_jay001@yahoo.com (Astra Navigo) — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 21:00:00 PDT

"He was going back to camp. He looked back. The river just showed through the trees. There were plenty of days coming when he could fish...."

-- Ernest Hemingway; "The Big Two-Hearted River" (1925)

On occasion, I miss the peace of the wilderness.

This is one of those times. While I can't promise you the Great American Short Story upon my return, I'll have a fish-tale - or none. Maybe a camping story. Certainly one of those.

Some sunburn. If I'm lucky, the mountain blackberries will still be in season, and there might be crawdads in the lowland creeks. The foraging will be good, this time of year, and I might even see a deer or more; when I do this sort of thing, I tend to get out a little farther than most.

____________________________________________

"Three rifles; supplies for a month; and Mozart...."

-Isak Dinesen; "Out of Africa" (1938)

_____________________________________________

Done right, camping is the best experience; one tends to forget the small things (mosquitoes and dirt) in favor of the large (the grand vistas; the solitude; the fact that everything really does taste better over a campfire); time passes in a fugue state, and when one returns to 'civilization', the question is more apt to be "Why am I here?", rather than "Where's the shower?"

I'm a bit tired of civilization right now. It's in the process of tearing itself apart, and that saddens me. I want the certainty of routine - and the best place to reconnect with that is in nature.

"Luna crescit et descrescit", said the old Roman - the moon waxes and it wanes; the sun rises and sets; the rain falls; the stars are in their courses, and nothing changes that.

I leave on Wednesday. Where I'll be, you can look up and see the Milky Way (or that part of one arm in which our own poor system is located).

I'll say 'hello' to a star for you all.

Don't burn the place down.

Mortgages, Banks, the Economy, and Why You Should Be Concerned Now....

blue_jay001@yahoo.com (Astra Navigo) — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 10:54:00 PDT

"All the way to the bottom, son, if we don't do something to stop her."

This was the response I received at age twelve when, in the 'tow' of my father during a tour of a submarine, I asked the question, "How far down will she go?"

(As submarine operational statistics are considered classified, this is the stock-response to that question.   It's also a piece of gallows-humor - because every submariner knows that a submerged submarine is, in essence, a sunken ship - it may be operating in a form of balance and harmony with its environment, but it's also underwater - and because humans can't breathe underwater, the time the ship can spend in that environment is limited -- which means that when the plug is pulled, sufficient resources have to be in place to bring it to the surface again - or the crew dies.)

It's that simple.

Likewise, economies are fragile things - a deep moral discussion of just-when bankers decided to become the New Age version of Dark Age bandits is well beyond the purview of this post, however.   Frankly, the ship has taken on too much water; it's going to sink, and it's up to me to tell you why, and why you should pay attention to the next few months.

Here's the good news: There's going to be a recovery.

Here's the bad news:   It's not going to last.

While the trigger to all of this is likely hyperinflation (as I've mentioned earlier, you'll first start to notice this when gasoline goes from $2.50 to $8.00/gal in the next twelve months), you'll also see it in a rapid increase in credit card rates (Tip #1 for you - if you haven't already, get rid of your credit-cards. Pay them off, cut them up, and send them back. Now.)

The underlying causes are more insidious - inflation was the government's means of answering the question, "What do we do now?" after the credit-markets dried up.

A Brief History....

When Greenspan lowered interest rates to near-zero in the early part of this decade to ameliorate the recession, what he put in place was a chain-of-events which led to too much money, too soon, spun up from nothing and put in the most-convenient place - real-estate.

This drove the price of real-estate to unsupportable levels. People were talking about retiring on their real-estate portfolios, and in '06, the new head-of-the-Fed, Ben Bernacke, said that there wasn't a 'housing bubble'; things were fine.

I didn't share his enthusiasm then, and I see no reason to support his sunshine-and-puppies predictions now.

In late 2007, due to the large banks having taken on far too much debt, the credit markets dried up.   Banks simply could no longer capitalize loans - they were underwater by any standard - and there was no way to bring the 'ship' to the surface again.

With no credit, American business simply ground to a halt.

Enter Obama....

Bush, having all but given the order to 'dive' by pressuring Greenspan to prevent a recession on his watch, did nothing while the crisis materialized.   The nation had taken on debt well beyond its ability to pay, and this debt had pushed the banking system underwater.   A crisis of international proportions loomed.

After election day in 2008, the new president announced his 'stimulus' packages.   In essence, he was going to crank up the press and monetize the debt of the Wall Street banks, favoring them over the regional and local banks which are responsible for the loans which create most of the jobs in America.

Doing this was like fighting a fire with gasoline.

When done, Obama had 'monetized' (that's a roundabout way of saying 'printed') nearly five trillion dollars.   The total of the stimulus packages actually exceeded America's GDP.

I'll say this plainly: There's no way our economy - or any economy - can support this.

What They've Done With It......

For their part, the Wall Street banks favored by Obama have sat on this money - you see, they know something we don't:   Serious inflation - probably hyperinflation - is right around the corner.

Most small and intermediate banks are still in trouble.   The mortgage-mess is still there.   The prior decade saw the dismantling of the regulations put in place after the era of J.P. Morgan and the banking crises of the late 19th/early 20th centuries.   In fact, during Bush's watch, there have been an astonishing number of regulations abolished - banking leverage has been increased; money can flow between commercial and investment banks, and the prior controls on the SEC have all but disappeared.

Putting the fox in charge of the nation's financial henhouse wasn't enough - the Bush administration, having created the perfect petri-dish to breed this mess, turned the economy over to the next group - who administered the coup-de-grace in the form of printed money.

Where We Are Today.....

Banking:    The banking system is underwater.   (1) Banks simply aren't doing enough business to keep going; an annual growth rate of 2% isn't enough to keep them alive; (2) If you watch CNN and read any financial news at all, you're seeing that banks are failing at a rate unprecedented in the nation's history (annualized bank-failures have almost gone vertical); (3) The FDIC is bankrupt - holding only $41B in reserves as of March of this year, with four regional banks having failed this month; (4) Defaults are projected to increase through 2011, further impacting bank balance-sheets; (5) We are at or near historic lows in bank credit at 2% growth.

Real-Estate:    In March of this year, one in four American mortgages were underwater (more was owed on the home than it was worth).   With the economy still shedding jobs as an outgrowth of the credit crisis, fully 50% (one in two mortgages) will be underwater by the middle of 2010.

The Political Implications:

Big banks in America now have a power they didn't have before - they've been favored with more money than the nation can support via GDP.   In spite of the support they're getting from the Right, they're not opening those purse-strings and creating jobs.

That's because the large banks no longer believe in America.   They believe in more profits - and they've monetized their own debt, improved their own balance-sheets, and invested in other currencies to hedge their bets.

What Obama has created is a form of nascent National Socialism; a modern-day feudal system not unlike what was created in Germany in the late 1930's.

Summary:

The good news is that the leaks have stopped; there's pressure in the hull, metaphorically speaking - likely, the recession has hit bottom.

However, as with a submarine, once you've repaired the damage and you're not losing your air-supply, you still have to take stock of things and get the water out of the boat - or she'll still keep going down - all the way to the bottom.

Ending the recession is well and good -but it's not what's needed here.   What's needed is a recovery of near-heroic proportions.   I'm doubting it'll happen - the forces at play here are going to push us back down into recession, and probably depression.

Over 40% of America's wealth has been erased - thus far.   If the government were to add up everyone not just on unemployment, but those for whom benefits have ended and those who have simply given up looking, the unemployment rate is nowhere near 10% - it's more like 20%.

The Obama Administration has seen fit to behave in banana-republic fashion, purchasing key industries, printing money and shoveling it into the economy via the large Wall Street banks, who now enjoy an oligarchy-of-sorts not seen since the 1870's.

I'd hate to think that, having sufficiently turned things over to the large banks by default, we're going to see a repeat of the banking crises near the turn of the last century - but there's little in today's news or the stats (go click on the links) which tell me otherwise.

Remember that the pumps buy you time - but minutes only.   Everyone; get to a lifeboat.   Red lights lead to green lights; green lights lead to exits, and exits lead to an uncertain future - let's all hope it's better than the alternative.

Crazy in America - It's Been With Us For A Long, Long Time....

blue_jay001@yahoo.com (Astra Navigo) — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 09:05:00 PDT

Most of us - at least, those of us who aren't infected with the desire to run out and gibber uncontrollably at the world - have a sort of 'governor' on our behavior.

We don't yell at people randomly on the street.

We conform to social norms about nose-picking.

We bathe before going to the grocery-store - most of the time, anyway.

We also don't get in people's faces and start spouting nonsense about the New World Order, the Illuminati, the Bilderbergers, ad nauseum - and we don't seek out senators at town-hall meetings and yell, "Someday, you're gonna stand before Gawd - and he's gonna give you what you deserve!"

Legal or not, we don't carry AR-15's to public gatherings where the President is going to speak.

(Yes; I've picked two events which Really Happened this week - so you could get an idea where I'm coming from).

However, just as Jesus said, "The poor you will always have," America has always been populated with a certain Crazy Element.

The media now has taken a different tack with the Crazies - instead of leaving them to gibber uncontrollably to each other, media pundits have found that it's better for ratings to take morons like these and actually give them a camera and a microphone.

This sets a dangerous precedent.

Rick Perlstein, a correspondent for the Washington Post, gives us a thumbnail-history of such events - and it turns out that while the latest turn of events is disturbing, this crowd has been with us for a long, long time:

In America, Crazy Is a Preexisting Condition

Birthers, Town Hall Hecklers and the Return of Right-Wing Rage

Rick Perlstein
August; 2009 - The Washington Post

In Pennsylvania last week, a citizen, burly, crew-cut and trembling with rage, went nose to nose with his baffled senator: "One day God's going to stand before you, and he's going to judge you and the rest of your damned cronies up on the Hill. And then you will get your just deserts." He was accusing Arlen Specter of being too kind to President Obama's proposals to make it easier for people to get health insurance.

In Michigan, meanwhile, the indelible image was of the father who wheeled his handicapped adult son up to Rep. John Dingell and bellowed that "under the Obama health-care plan, which you support, this man would be given no care whatsoever." He pressed his case further on Fox News.

In New Hampshire, outside a building where Obama spoke, cameras trained on the pistol strapped to the leg of libertarian William Kostric. He then explained on CNN why the "tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time by the blood of tyrants and patriots."

It was interesting to hear a BBC reporter on the radio trying to make sense of it all. He quoted a spokesman for the conservative Americans for Tax Reform: "Either this is a genuine grass-roots response, or there's some secret evil conspirator living in a mountain somewhere orchestrating all this that I've never met." The spokesman was arguing, of course, that it was spontaneous, yet he also proudly owned up to how his group has helped the orchestration, through sample letters to the editor and "a little bit of an ability to put one-pagers together."

The BBC also quoted liberal Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin's explanation: "They want to get a little clip on YouTube of an effort to disrupt a town meeting and to send the congressman running for his car. This is an organized effort . . . you can trace it back to the health insurance industry."

So the birthers, the anti-tax tea-partiers, the town hall hecklers -- these are "either" the genuine grass roots or evil conspirators staging scenes for YouTube? The quiver on the lips of the man pushing the wheelchair, the crazed risk of carrying a pistol around a president -- too heartfelt to be an act. The lockstep strangeness of the mad lies on the protesters' signs -- too uniform to be spontaneous. They are both. If you don't understand that any moment of genuine political change always produces both, you can't understand America, where the crazy tree blooms in every moment of liberal ascendancy, and where elites exploit the crazy for their own narrow interests.

In the early 1950s, Republicans referred to the presidencies of Franklin Roosevelt and Harry Truman as "20 years of treason" and accused the men who led the fight against fascism of deliberately surrendering the free world to communism. Mainline Protestants published a new translation of the Bible in the 1950s that properly rendered the Greek as connoting a more ambiguous theological status for the Virgin Mary; right-wingers attributed that to, yes, the hand of Soviet agents. And Vice President Richard Nixon claimed that the new Republicans arriving in the White House "found in the files a blueprint for socializing America."

When John F. Kennedy entered the White House, his proposals to anchor America's nuclear defense in intercontinental ballistic missiles -- instead of long-range bombers -- and form closer ties with Eastern Bloc outliers such as Yugoslavia were taken as evidence that the young president was secretly disarming the United States. Thousands of delegates from 90 cities packed a National Indignation Convention in Dallas, a 1961 version of today's tea parties; a keynote speaker turned to the master of ceremonies after his introduction and remarked as the audience roared: "Tom Anderson here has turned moderate! All he wants to do is impeach [Supreme Court Chief Justice Earl] Warren. I'm for hanging him!"

Before the "black helicopters" of the 1990s, there were right-wingers claiming access to secret documents from the 1920s proving that the entire concept of a "civil rights movement" had been hatched in the Soviet Union; when the landmark 1964 Civil Rights Act was introduced, one frequently read in the South that it would "enslave" whites. And back before there were Bolsheviks to blame, paranoids didn't lack for subversives -- anti-Catholic conspiracy theorists even had their own powerful political party in the 1840s and '50s.

The instigation is always the familiar litany: expansion of the commonweal to empower new communities, accommodation to internationalism, the heightened influence of cosmopolitans and the persecution complex of conservatives who can't stand losing an argument. My personal favorite? The federal government expanded mental health services in the Kennedy era, and one bill provided for a new facility in Alaska. One of the most widely listened-to right-wing radio programs in the country, hosted by a former FBI agent, had millions of Americans believing it was being built to intern political dissidents, just like in the Soviet Union.

So, crazier then, or crazier now? Actually, the similarities across decades are uncanny. When Adlai Stevenson spoke at a 1963 United Nations Day observance in Dallas, the Indignation forces thronged the hall, sweating and furious, shrieking down the speaker for the television cameras. Then, when Stevenson was walked to his limousine, a grimacing and wild-eyed lady thwacked him with a picket sign. Stevenson was baffled. "What's the matter, madam?" he asked. "What can I do for you?" The woman responded with self-righteous fury: "Well, if you don't know I can't help you."

The various elements -- the liberal earnestly confused when rational dialogue won't hold sway; the anti-liberal rage at a world self-evidently out of joint; and, most of all, their mutual incomprehension -- sound as fresh as yesterday's news. (Internment camps for conservatives? That's the latest theory of tea party favorite Michael Savage.)

The orchestration of incivility happens, too, and it is evil. Liberal power of all sorts induces an organic and crazy-making panic in a considerable number of Americans, while people with no particular susceptibility to existential terror -- powerful elites -- find reason to stoke and exploit that fear. And even the most ideologically fair-minded national media will always be agents of cosmopolitanism: something provincials fear as an outside elite intent on forcing different values down their throats.

That provides an opening for vultures such as Richard Nixon, who, the Watergate investigation discovered, had his aides make sure that seed blossomed for his own purposes. "To the Editor . . . Who in the hell elected these people to stand up and read off their insults to the President of the United States?" read one proposed "grass-roots" letter manufactured by the White House. "When will you people realize that he was elected President and he is entitled to the respect of that office no matter what you people think of him?" went another.

Liberals are right to be vigilant about manufactured outrage, and particularly about how the mainstream media can too easily become that outrage's entry into the political debate. For the tactic represented by those fake Nixon letters was a long-term success. Conservatives have become adept at playing the media for suckers, getting inside the heads of editors and reporters, haunting them with the thought that maybe they are out-of-touch cosmopolitans and that their duty as tribunes of the people's voices means they should treat Obama's creation of "death panels" as just another justiciable political claim. If 1963 were 2009, the woman who assaulted Adlai Stevenson would be getting time on cable news to explain herself. That, not the paranoia itself, makes our present moment uniquely disturbing.

It used to be different. You never heard the late Walter Cronkite taking time on the evening news to "debunk" claims that a proposed mental health clinic in Alaska is actually a dumping ground for right-wing critics of the president's program, or giving the people who made those claims time to explain themselves on the air. The media didn't adjudicate the ever-present underbrush of American paranoia as a set of "conservative claims" to weigh, horse-race-style, against liberal claims. Back then, a more confident media unequivocally labeled the civic outrage represented by such discourse as "extremist" -- out of bounds.

The tree of crazy is an ever-present aspect of America's flora. Only now, it's being watered by misguided he-said-she-said reporting and taking over the forest. Latest word is that the enlightened and mild provision in the draft legislation to help elderly people who want living wills -- the one hysterics turned into the "death panel" canard -- is losing favor, according to the Wall Street Journal, because of "complaints over the provision."

Good thing our leaders weren't so cowardly in 1964, or we would never have passed a civil rights bill -- because of complaints over the provisions in it that would enslave whites.

(Rick Perlstein is a regular correspondent for the Washington Post. His bio and other goodies may be found here).

Recipe for a Revolution....

blue_jay001@yahoo.com (Astra Navigo) — Sun, 16 Aug 2009 20:34:00 PDT

Today, the Obama administration announced that it will likely abandon a government-paid option for public health care in favor of privately-funded 'health co-ops'.

Congratulations to everyone who fought so hard on behalf of the large insurance companies, corporate hospital interests, and big pharmaceuticals -- you won!

America will remain in a Class All By Itself -- the only industrialized nation with no national health-care system.

Half the nation's workforce will have to go to a foreign country to purchase pharmaceuticals at a price they can afford - some which cost pennies to make, and are sold for hundreds of dollars here in the U.S.

An unemployed person in Cuba will still have better medical care than an unemployed person in the U.S.

Now - I'd like one of the aforementioned supporters of big business to answer me a very, very simple question:

When 40,000,000 Americans have no health care because they cannot pay for any form of insurance, and when twice that number are underinsured, how is it going to help them to establish 'health co-ops'? What part of 'they cannot pay' do you not understand?

In the light of that announcement today, herewith find my Recipe for a Revolution:

1.      Start with 60,000,000 people with no health care or marginal healthcare.

2.      Add nearly 20,000,000 mortgages which are 'underwater'.

3.     Fold in 28,000,000 unemployed people.

4.     Add $5,000,000,000,000 in printed money.

5.     Increase the inflation rate to 150% in four years.

6.     Place all ingredients in a pot labeled 'Polarized Nation'. Tie the lid down tight.

7.     Turn the heat up to 'medium', so everyone will have a chance to get used to it.

8.      Now, pick a side (either side of the pot will do nicely; the outcome will be the same.)

9.     Wait. It won't be long.

______________________________________

Folks, we all have a ticket to the upcoming show. Me? I'll take the cheap seats; they're farther from the action, and frankly, I've got less chance of being hurt.

I'll bring the bulletproof vests and the Kevlar helmets.

You bring the popcorn.

A Word From Your Sponsor....

blue_jay001@yahoo.com (Astra Navigo) — Sun, 16 Aug 2009 09:39:00 PDT

You've no doubt noticed a change to the comments-section.

I was forced to go to moderated-comments after receiving spam from a porn-site; I don't approve of such things, and don't permit people to hijack what I've written to promote anything, porn-site or no.

Unfortunately, you'll have to enter a 'captcha' code and wait for your comments to be approved. I suppose this is part of having a growing readership - but I still detest the process.

Thanks for your understanding!

--"Astra"