Dedicated non-readers might recall that I ran afoul of one of Nicole Curtis's lackeys, some time ago, and he challenged me to show up on the job site and he'd give me what for. What for? I (and a few others) had taken exception to her tact of using volunteers to paint the projects on her TV show, "The Rehab Addict". (See: "Kicked Out Of Rehab" elsewhere in these pages) I didn't get e-tough with the kid, he started in on me. I got a kick out of it because it was just about the last thing I expected. Some people just can't take criticism.
Turns out Nicole Curtis is one of them. Over Xmas there was some mishap with T-shirts from her show that she was selling and a lot of people were angry that they hadn't received their shirts. I looked at her site and saw that she said she had to kick 100+ people out of Rehab, I guess because they had been mean or rude in their complaints. Well, OK. But, at the end of her mini-rant she stated that "(and anyone else) feel free to set an appt. and personally tell my dedicated crew off face to face rather than on this page". Yikes!
Personally, I'd like to take her over my knee and give her a moderate to severe spanking for her petulant behavior but, we all know that would just encourage more of such behavior. And, Minneapolis is too far a drive for spanking or fighting. Not to mention, this call to arms (the limb kind) wasn't directed at me, this time. I can look at the page but, I'm poster non grata as far as commenting. It's the finest page this Ferrerman has been kicked of to this minute.
Maybe it's the holidays but I saw that Brandon Marshall of the Bears challenged Carmen De Falco of ESPN radio to fight because Carmen had brought up a fight challenge Brandon had made to a fan on Twitter. I think it was a smartass Packer fan, but aren't they all? Marshall apologized by the end of the interview. He's a nice enough guy but seems to have anger issues.
The internet is full of such conflicts though. It's kind of a natural really given that people are relatively anonymous and may have thousands of miles between them. Or, be sitting at the same Starbucks sipping a halfacafadoublefoofylatte. I don't know what they serve there as I like my coffee "Halle Berry"- hot, strong and black. And, I make it myself. Faaaaar cheaper.
On Topix it's a fairly regular occurrence for posters to challenge each other. Most recently, an idiot who I'll call "Stringy Cheese" challenged someone who uses too many names to meet at a Portillos hotdog stand to fight. The interesting thing about that title fight was that Stringy Cheese was probably both the challenger and the challenged. The dude is definitely challenged. Quite likely too was that the other opponent was someone from his own troll gang, trolling him for sport. Regardless, there was never going to be fisticuffs between imaginary people.
I doubt anyone will answer the Rehab challenge either. T-shirts aren't really worth brawling for, now are they? This stuff is amusing because it's so silly and because of the impersonal venue that is the internet. People still act like it's a bar on Saturday night though, making dates and promises that they will never meet. Hopefully they don't act this way in real life. Something tells me most don't and I hope so because face to face often leads to fist to face. I like to think that cute, little blonde rehabbers are really as nice as they seem on TV, but have their bad days too.
Monday, December 29, 2014
The Boobs Tube
Last night I caught parts of the CBS show "Undercover Boss", a program I have long since passed on because if you've seen one episode, you've seen them all. I would have to believe that after the first season, the premise being known to the public, you couldn't fool too many employees with the "this guy/gal is participating in a reality show" scam that explains why a film crew is following "the new guy" around as he trains for a job. The episodes are predictable and derivative in that the undercover boss always seems to be placed with nice employees who tend to have money troubles and sick kids that make for feel good stories and feel really good stories when the generous, corporate boss rewards them with cash, vacations and life-saving cancer treatments for little Timmy. The takeaway might be that corporate rule truly rocks! Just pick out a few employees here and there, lavish them with gifts and keep the rest of them as you found them. It's like a game show where a chosen few walk out with fabulous prizes. The bosses, incidentally, may walk out with a better knowledge of how to improve their business but, if nothing else, they get some nationwide publicity.
One humorous aspect is that though they may be the boss, they rarely are any good at the jobs they pay people to do. That is where it gets real for me. Most bosses I've had couldn't do my job. The Ferrerman Principle is that some people achieve a level of incompetence that highlights their general uselessness and life has no choice put to make them the boss because they can't do anything else. I had a boss who bragged that he was a better bartender than anyone of us. We knew better but, one busy night he jumped behind the bar "to help us" and I put up with about 10-15 minutes of that told him to get out from my bar. He had no clue and was in our way, making a temporarily bad situation ridiculous. He was better suited to being the owner's son. It was the same in painting, even if the guy had actually worked his way through the company. Stories for another day but, those guys usually were back-stabbing rat bastards who weren't really good workers. They just kept an eye on people. It always amazed me that if you were the guy who snitched to get your position, why would you rely on snitches when you took over? These were scumbags who were after your job, if you were paying attention to your own history. Dumb.
On this episode of "Boss", the guy was the owner of a bar/restaurant chain called "Bikinis". The concept is cute chicks with bikini-clad spankable bottoms serving cocktails and wings. Where'd he get that idea? Well, business didn't seem to good at any of the Texas locations. I missed the opening so I don't know what the ploy was, but with it being a female wait and bar staff, all he could really pretend to be training for was kitchen or maybe manager. He worked the bar and followed a waitress around and did not wear a bikini. Evidently the bartender, knowing she would be on camera, opted to wear a t-shirt. Odd choice in a bikini bar but she wasn't comfortable on camera in beachwear.
That was a violation. She also displayed a laissez faire attitude towards a power-drinking customer who was downing double whiskey shots with a beer back. The "boss" was undercoverly concerned and wondered if he should break character and deal with the potentially fiscally responsible situation. The bartender wasn't as concerned. Eventually a manager stepped in to cut the guy off. He was ambulatory enough and not driving (well, according to him...) and he left without incident. As a ex-bartender who cut-off a few thousand drunks, her lack of concern concerned me. As a guy who watches reality TV though, I wondered about the editing.
At the awards portion of the show, the bartender was rewarded with a pink slip. I don't think this usually happens on such a feel good show. The boss cited her non-handling of the drunk, her t-shirt and a remark she had made about the job not being her life's work. She just wasn't Bikini material. She left the set in angry tears. Maybe she's on her way to see a lawyer but, Texas is a "right to work" state and the unadvertised side effect of that is "right to be fired"- for any reason. I'm betting she had to sign some sort of waiver for the show. Her dismissal on national TV sucked but, she likely move on to something better where she isn't expected to undress for the camera.
That wasn't the odd one though. It's kinda fun when they sit down with the now undisguised undercover boss and learned they had been duped by wigs and make up. Some look genuinely surprised. Maybe they don't watch much TV? The scheme is that they are supposed to meet with someone to give their evaluation of the "new guy" and that's when it's revealed that the "new guy" to be reviewed is the corporate boss guy before them. Yikes if you are going to get fired but, payday if not. The cook got a raise, back pay and money for a vacation with his family. The manager lady got a smaller raise, cash, and new teeth and a growth removed for her daughter. And, of course, the waitress got new tits.
I'm not kidding. The gal who 'trained' him as a server had confided in him that she dreamed of having bigger "boobies", a full C-cup to be exact. His beef with her was that she talked on the phone too much so, if she ditched the phone for six months, he would pay for breast augmentation. I'm still not kidding.
I wonder if he can write that off on his taxes as a business improvement?
One humorous aspect is that though they may be the boss, they rarely are any good at the jobs they pay people to do. That is where it gets real for me. Most bosses I've had couldn't do my job. The Ferrerman Principle is that some people achieve a level of incompetence that highlights their general uselessness and life has no choice put to make them the boss because they can't do anything else. I had a boss who bragged that he was a better bartender than anyone of us. We knew better but, one busy night he jumped behind the bar "to help us" and I put up with about 10-15 minutes of that told him to get out from my bar. He had no clue and was in our way, making a temporarily bad situation ridiculous. He was better suited to being the owner's son. It was the same in painting, even if the guy had actually worked his way through the company. Stories for another day but, those guys usually were back-stabbing rat bastards who weren't really good workers. They just kept an eye on people. It always amazed me that if you were the guy who snitched to get your position, why would you rely on snitches when you took over? These were scumbags who were after your job, if you were paying attention to your own history. Dumb.
On this episode of "Boss", the guy was the owner of a bar/restaurant chain called "Bikinis". The concept is cute chicks with bikini-clad spankable bottoms serving cocktails and wings. Where'd he get that idea? Well, business didn't seem to good at any of the Texas locations. I missed the opening so I don't know what the ploy was, but with it being a female wait and bar staff, all he could really pretend to be training for was kitchen or maybe manager. He worked the bar and followed a waitress around and did not wear a bikini. Evidently the bartender, knowing she would be on camera, opted to wear a t-shirt. Odd choice in a bikini bar but she wasn't comfortable on camera in beachwear.
That was a violation. She also displayed a laissez faire attitude towards a power-drinking customer who was downing double whiskey shots with a beer back. The "boss" was undercoverly concerned and wondered if he should break character and deal with the potentially fiscally responsible situation. The bartender wasn't as concerned. Eventually a manager stepped in to cut the guy off. He was ambulatory enough and not driving (well, according to him...) and he left without incident. As a ex-bartender who cut-off a few thousand drunks, her lack of concern concerned me. As a guy who watches reality TV though, I wondered about the editing.
At the awards portion of the show, the bartender was rewarded with a pink slip. I don't think this usually happens on such a feel good show. The boss cited her non-handling of the drunk, her t-shirt and a remark she had made about the job not being her life's work. She just wasn't Bikini material. She left the set in angry tears. Maybe she's on her way to see a lawyer but, Texas is a "right to work" state and the unadvertised side effect of that is "right to be fired"- for any reason. I'm betting she had to sign some sort of waiver for the show. Her dismissal on national TV sucked but, she likely move on to something better where she isn't expected to undress for the camera.
That wasn't the odd one though. It's kinda fun when they sit down with the now undisguised undercover boss and learned they had been duped by wigs and make up. Some look genuinely surprised. Maybe they don't watch much TV? The scheme is that they are supposed to meet with someone to give their evaluation of the "new guy" and that's when it's revealed that the "new guy" to be reviewed is the corporate boss guy before them. Yikes if you are going to get fired but, payday if not. The cook got a raise, back pay and money for a vacation with his family. The manager lady got a smaller raise, cash, and new teeth and a growth removed for her daughter. And, of course, the waitress got new tits.
I'm not kidding. The gal who 'trained' him as a server had confided in him that she dreamed of having bigger "boobies", a full C-cup to be exact. His beef with her was that she talked on the phone too much so, if she ditched the phone for six months, he would pay for breast augmentation. I'm still not kidding.
I wonder if he can write that off on his taxes as a business improvement?
Sunday, December 28, 2014
It's a thin, blurry line
I see where, at the funeral for one of the officers killed recently in New York, the police turned their backs on Bill DeBlasio, the mayor. They feel his rhetoric incited the gunman to murder the two cops. They seem to have solved this one pretty quickly. Did it even take an hour like the cop shows on TV?No word on whether the mayor's rhetoric incited Ismaaiyl Brinsley to first shoot his girlfriend, then the officers, and then himself. Nobody is really talking about that. I'm no cop but, I'm thinking the guy was more a mentally disturbed criminal than he was a revolutionary martyr.
Politics sure does make strange bedfellows. Republicans are up in arms about this because a black guy killed two cops, as we've learned, because NY's democrat mayor pretty much told him to. Interesting bed partner choice here is that, you may think you know that republicans dislike blacks but you know for sure that they don't like unions especially government ones. Under the right circumstances- like, if a white "patriot" had killed the cops- the dialogue might have been about two lazy, union thugs getting what they deserved for sloughing off in their taxpayer paid for patrol car. They really could look at it that way. They do hate unions with their expensive wages and benefits. It's a fine, very thin, blue line. On the one hand the police target minorities and keep the prisons full. But on the other, they have those pesky wages and benefits. Don't believe me? Look at the death of Eric Garner. According to Sean Hannity and Fox *news* Garner was killed by government tax collectors because of his selling of un-taxed cigarettes. They do have a way of looking at things, don't they? They can turn on a dime. And, give you change.
But ya know, that's politics. The whole idea is to separate you from your money and make it seem like it's your idea. People voting against their own interests is nothing knew. There surely are tens of thousands of cops who are staunch republicans, perhaps because of the party's mask of conservative ethics, and are willing to overlook the whole anti-union thing because they favor law and order in society. The best explanation of cops I ever heard came from a cop on the show "COPS". He said that people needed to understand that cops come out of the same general population we all do. They're not super beings. Just people. Like doctors and lawyers. Half of them graduated in the bottom half of their class so, half are better or worse than the other half. Just like some lawyers become patent or tax attorneys, some cops are better suited to safe suburban departments or blending into the background of a huge department like the NYPD. Think about people that you work with. Not everyone gets it. Not everyone is smart. A lot of people just show up.
Same with politics. Republicans are outraged that black people are being given all this money and special rights by the gubmint- just for being black- and now they are acting up and killing cops, because democrats told them to!
That's essentially what it boils down to. Never mind that by sheer volume of population, far more white people are "on welfare" than blacks, the perception is that of blacks in ghettos being supported by white taxpayers, not whites in Kentucky being supported by taxes. It doesn't take much Googling to discover that the republican base includes a lot red states that receive more gubmint assistance than blue states. This means that hillbillies may well vote against welfare that they are receiving, because they think it will stop blacks from getting it. Priorities.
The reality is that the middle class makes too much money. Their pensions and Social Security are a heavy burden too. Well, for someone. Wall Street maybe? They sure want their hands on everyone's pensions and SS and lot's of politicians are willing to help them get it. And poor people are a burden on the middle class because middle class taxpayers are the ones that pay for their welfare. It will all end when welfare handouts and demands for increases in the minimum wage ends. That's pretty much the way the media presents it to us. Everyone will be better off once democrats quit punishing the wealthy for being successful. You'll appreciate that too because, one day you will live the American dream of being rich and successful too and you won't want to be punished either. That's the way it works, the logic of the American mind. Unions are blamed for high prices. Your neighbor who is in a union "makes too much money." Who are you to say anyone makes too much money? Can't people all over the internet decide you make too much money?
If you are a struggling single mother of three who desperately needs a job, a conservative might tell you to get a job at McDonald's. But, conservatives also believe those McDonald's jobs are designed for teenagers not adults looking to support a family. So...go to college! Make something of yourself! It's still pretty much true that college is a path to higher earning potential but, how many single mom's can afford the $100k or so it takes to get that degree. Feeding and housing the kids takes precedent. Well, no one told you to have those kids...
The world does need ditch diggers and always will even though in our modern times that means the guy who operates the Ditch Witch- something you can't do, by the way. You can be trained, but do you want to? You can cook a hamburger, likely better than McDonald's but, don't you just love the convenience that Mickey D's offers? If you recognize that people need these jobs to better serve you, why can't you grasp that these people need to be compensated for their labors? We should all be ashamed that, in the "Greatest Country In The World" millions of our fellow citizens can work a 40 hour week and still barely scrape by. It's really obscene. Forty years ago that job at McDonalds actually would get a person through college. Now it barely affords a singe person a place to live unless he or she has roommates. It's kinda like college, I guess, without the classes and the parties.
Forty years. The price of everything goes up and wages go down. And politically minded conservatives believe that wages- for some- have not gone down enough! And instead of welcoming more fellow Americans into the middle class, let's shut the door! And nail it closed! Anyone know how to operate a hammer? The conservatives know they can get illegals to do it. Their fans out there in the general population tacitly approved that. Now that illegals have helped lower wages, it's time to rid the country of the foreign menace.
It makes a lot of sense if you don't think about it. Most Americans did not think about it. The politicians and the corporations did. Strange bedfellows indeed. Only the people got fucked though. Some are still fucking themselves and others in a desperate attempt to keep the residue of the American dream as portrayed on television in the 1960's, alive. That is the gift of hopelessness that politicians have left some of us, the hatred and contempt for the other Americans we are told are really the ones stealing our dreams. It couldn't be the powerful ones doing it! It's got to the poor, those greedy bastards! Who else could it be?
Politics sure does make strange bedfellows. Republicans are up in arms about this because a black guy killed two cops, as we've learned, because NY's democrat mayor pretty much told him to. Interesting bed partner choice here is that, you may think you know that republicans dislike blacks but you know for sure that they don't like unions especially government ones. Under the right circumstances- like, if a white "patriot" had killed the cops- the dialogue might have been about two lazy, union thugs getting what they deserved for sloughing off in their taxpayer paid for patrol car. They really could look at it that way. They do hate unions with their expensive wages and benefits. It's a fine, very thin, blue line. On the one hand the police target minorities and keep the prisons full. But on the other, they have those pesky wages and benefits. Don't believe me? Look at the death of Eric Garner. According to Sean Hannity and Fox *news* Garner was killed by government tax collectors because of his selling of un-taxed cigarettes. They do have a way of looking at things, don't they? They can turn on a dime. And, give you change.
But ya know, that's politics. The whole idea is to separate you from your money and make it seem like it's your idea. People voting against their own interests is nothing knew. There surely are tens of thousands of cops who are staunch republicans, perhaps because of the party's mask of conservative ethics, and are willing to overlook the whole anti-union thing because they favor law and order in society. The best explanation of cops I ever heard came from a cop on the show "COPS". He said that people needed to understand that cops come out of the same general population we all do. They're not super beings. Just people. Like doctors and lawyers. Half of them graduated in the bottom half of their class so, half are better or worse than the other half. Just like some lawyers become patent or tax attorneys, some cops are better suited to safe suburban departments or blending into the background of a huge department like the NYPD. Think about people that you work with. Not everyone gets it. Not everyone is smart. A lot of people just show up.
Same with politics. Republicans are outraged that black people are being given all this money and special rights by the gubmint- just for being black- and now they are acting up and killing cops, because democrats told them to!
That's essentially what it boils down to. Never mind that by sheer volume of population, far more white people are "on welfare" than blacks, the perception is that of blacks in ghettos being supported by white taxpayers, not whites in Kentucky being supported by taxes. It doesn't take much Googling to discover that the republican base includes a lot red states that receive more gubmint assistance than blue states. This means that hillbillies may well vote against welfare that they are receiving, because they think it will stop blacks from getting it. Priorities.
The reality is that the middle class makes too much money. Their pensions and Social Security are a heavy burden too. Well, for someone. Wall Street maybe? They sure want their hands on everyone's pensions and SS and lot's of politicians are willing to help them get it. And poor people are a burden on the middle class because middle class taxpayers are the ones that pay for their welfare. It will all end when welfare handouts and demands for increases in the minimum wage ends. That's pretty much the way the media presents it to us. Everyone will be better off once democrats quit punishing the wealthy for being successful. You'll appreciate that too because, one day you will live the American dream of being rich and successful too and you won't want to be punished either. That's the way it works, the logic of the American mind. Unions are blamed for high prices. Your neighbor who is in a union "makes too much money." Who are you to say anyone makes too much money? Can't people all over the internet decide you make too much money?
If you are a struggling single mother of three who desperately needs a job, a conservative might tell you to get a job at McDonald's. But, conservatives also believe those McDonald's jobs are designed for teenagers not adults looking to support a family. So...go to college! Make something of yourself! It's still pretty much true that college is a path to higher earning potential but, how many single mom's can afford the $100k or so it takes to get that degree. Feeding and housing the kids takes precedent. Well, no one told you to have those kids...
The world does need ditch diggers and always will even though in our modern times that means the guy who operates the Ditch Witch- something you can't do, by the way. You can be trained, but do you want to? You can cook a hamburger, likely better than McDonald's but, don't you just love the convenience that Mickey D's offers? If you recognize that people need these jobs to better serve you, why can't you grasp that these people need to be compensated for their labors? We should all be ashamed that, in the "Greatest Country In The World" millions of our fellow citizens can work a 40 hour week and still barely scrape by. It's really obscene. Forty years ago that job at McDonalds actually would get a person through college. Now it barely affords a singe person a place to live unless he or she has roommates. It's kinda like college, I guess, without the classes and the parties.
Forty years. The price of everything goes up and wages go down. And politically minded conservatives believe that wages- for some- have not gone down enough! And instead of welcoming more fellow Americans into the middle class, let's shut the door! And nail it closed! Anyone know how to operate a hammer? The conservatives know they can get illegals to do it. Their fans out there in the general population tacitly approved that. Now that illegals have helped lower wages, it's time to rid the country of the foreign menace.
It makes a lot of sense if you don't think about it. Most Americans did not think about it. The politicians and the corporations did. Strange bedfellows indeed. Only the people got fucked though. Some are still fucking themselves and others in a desperate attempt to keep the residue of the American dream as portrayed on television in the 1960's, alive. That is the gift of hopelessness that politicians have left some of us, the hatred and contempt for the other Americans we are told are really the ones stealing our dreams. It couldn't be the powerful ones doing it! It's got to the poor, those greedy bastards! Who else could it be?
Thursday, December 25, 2014
Happy Holidays To My Dedicated Non-readers!!!
Some, are more dedicated than others! A quick perusal of the Topix index showed someone calling themselves The Butthurt Blogger posted on 20+ threads in succession. They were mostly word threads, the usual suspect's favorite way of building post counts. I think we all know who that sad camper is and how it observes holidays. Stalking Ferrerman knows no holidays! Not even ones that, for all intense and porpoises are for families sharing love.
Elsewhere on the internet I found more hatred, this time of the Christian variety. I just know all the good places to go, I guess....
There's a conservative site I visit because, no matter the topic, it's chock full o' nuts, very angry, crazy nuts. Them's the best kind. They all hate Obama and liberals but, they have serious disagreements as to how much to hate and who to adore in place of him. For example, there is a bunches of them that don't think Ted Cruz is crazy enough to be their president. Some long for Putin. Really. They think Obama is a ruthless anti-American dictator but they think Putin would be a good president. Still others like Palin, Rand Paul or Ben Carson. None seem to like Jeb Bush but, not for his lineage as you might suspect. They think he "too liberal". In fact, that's a common criticism of all the conservative possibles except Putin. Any one of the suspects for '16 are viewed by many as too liberal. I think of that scene in the great film, "Slapshot" where Michael Onteaken's character comes upon a fan taking a sledgehammer to the team bus: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SfroUSUcbdc
I could see these folks taking a sledgehammer to whoever the regular republicans wind up choosing for the losing in '16. They still wouldn't be happy. Bush or Cruz might not be thrilled either.
Anyway, on this site, some of the hatriots were upset with the nerve of President Obama even mentioning the birth of Jesus in an address to the nation because, he's a Muslim, donchaknow. Yep, it's that kinda crowd. They know he's Kenyan too. And, he's coming for their guns. You know the teatard drill. They believe it all as gospel.
Sigh. The hatriots can't take even one day off from anti-Ferrerman or anti-Obama sentiment. Not one day. They had one thing to do today! They failed...
Oh well, that's their problem not ours!
HAPPY HOLIDAYS, DEDICATED NON-READERS!
Love,
Ferrerman
Elsewhere on the internet I found more hatred, this time of the Christian variety. I just know all the good places to go, I guess....
There's a conservative site I visit because, no matter the topic, it's chock full o' nuts, very angry, crazy nuts. Them's the best kind. They all hate Obama and liberals but, they have serious disagreements as to how much to hate and who to adore in place of him. For example, there is a bunches of them that don't think Ted Cruz is crazy enough to be their president. Some long for Putin. Really. They think Obama is a ruthless anti-American dictator but they think Putin would be a good president. Still others like Palin, Rand Paul or Ben Carson. None seem to like Jeb Bush but, not for his lineage as you might suspect. They think he "too liberal". In fact, that's a common criticism of all the conservative possibles except Putin. Any one of the suspects for '16 are viewed by many as too liberal. I think of that scene in the great film, "Slapshot" where Michael Onteaken's character comes upon a fan taking a sledgehammer to the team bus: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SfroUSUcbdc
I could see these folks taking a sledgehammer to whoever the regular republicans wind up choosing for the losing in '16. They still wouldn't be happy. Bush or Cruz might not be thrilled either.
Anyway, on this site, some of the hatriots were upset with the nerve of President Obama even mentioning the birth of Jesus in an address to the nation because, he's a Muslim, donchaknow. Yep, it's that kinda crowd. They know he's Kenyan too. And, he's coming for their guns. You know the teatard drill. They believe it all as gospel.
Sigh. The hatriots can't take even one day off from anti-Ferrerman or anti-Obama sentiment. Not one day. They had one thing to do today! They failed...
Oh well, that's their problem not ours!
HAPPY HOLIDAYS, DEDICATED NON-READERS!
Love,
Ferrerman
Monday, December 22, 2014
The Usual Suspects
It was an awful thing to murder two cops in cold blood, as happened in New York City. The cops are pissed but, as is fitting with the times, they are pissed at the wrong people.
Rudy Guiliani- you may know him from his 9/11 fame- blames current NYC mayor, Bill De Blasio, and Whipping Boy in Chief, Barack Obama, for the deaths of the two cops. He's joined in this assertion by NYPD Union chief, Patrick Lynch. Isn't it nice to see conservatives and public union rep's getting along so well? This never happened after school shootings where teachers were murdered along with children. Maybe the conservative teapublicans are warming to unions?
Not a chance. It's just the strange bed-mates of politics meeting any port in a storm.
Patrick Lynch is calling for a sort of work slow down, telling his cop members to only make arrests that are "absolutely necessary". Looks like the sale of loose cigarettes is not a capital offense for the time being.
But, isn't "only arrests that are absolutely necessary" kinda telling about what police work is really all about in the 21st century whether it's practiced in NYC or Reduced Speed, Arizona? Arresting folks is big business in NY as it is in other places and the cops are telling the liberal mayor that they despise that, they won't be filling city coffers for awhile. Presumably they will going after murderers and robbers instead. So, there!
I know that if I were a cop, I'd be very upset at the murder of my brothers. Kinda like, if I were black I'd be very upset at the murder of my brothers.
The cop-killer took his own life after the murders. There was no one left to blame but the president, De Blasio, Al Sharpton, maybe MSNBC, all of the people- black and white- who protested the Ferguson and Eric Garner killings...
Republicans tout themselves as the party of personal responsibility (at times) but, usually this just means holding someone else (like President Obama) personally responsible rather than actual transgressors. BENGHAZI!!!!!! and few hundred other incidents come to mind.
This wasn't De Blasio's or Obama's fault. NYPD has a right to be hurt. They ought to man and woman up and not misdirect their anger. All signs point towards the killer acting alone, using social media and protests about the killings to justify his cowardly actions. He shot his girlfriend. He didn't do that in vengeance for Eric Garner or Mike Brown, now did he? After murdering the cops he then took his own life. This was not a revolutionary martyr. This was nut job.
Like the husband and wife nut jobs who, inspired by the stand against law enforcement that Cliven Bundy took earlier this year, killed two Las Vegas cops, a "good guy with a gun" and then themselves. Or, in 2009, Richard Poplawski killed three Pittsburgh cops because he feared an "Obama gun ban was on the way".
Now, where'd he get that idea?
Conservatives! The same conservatives who blame Obama for (somehow) inciting protests against the police, have in the past incited action against the police. This doesn't give them credibility as much as it gives them portfolio.
In 2008, a guy walked in, guns-a-blazing into a Tennessee church and killed two people and wounded seven because he had felt liberals were bad for the country. At his home were several books by Fox "news" persons disparaging liberals. So, that's where he heard that.
Of course, neither Sean Hannity nor Bill O'Reilly or any of the other assholes at Fox news told any of these people to murder in so many words. Frankly, they're not that bold or committed. Actual revolution is not their thing. They are not leaders, they just carry the water. It would actually be bad for business. But, hey, shit happens. They'd probably claim it's unfair to blame them for the actions of others. Well, they would say that, now wouldn't they?
Rudy Guiliani- you may know him from his 9/11 fame- blames current NYC mayor, Bill De Blasio, and Whipping Boy in Chief, Barack Obama, for the deaths of the two cops. He's joined in this assertion by NYPD Union chief, Patrick Lynch. Isn't it nice to see conservatives and public union rep's getting along so well? This never happened after school shootings where teachers were murdered along with children. Maybe the conservative teapublicans are warming to unions?
Not a chance. It's just the strange bed-mates of politics meeting any port in a storm.
Patrick Lynch is calling for a sort of work slow down, telling his cop members to only make arrests that are "absolutely necessary". Looks like the sale of loose cigarettes is not a capital offense for the time being.
But, isn't "only arrests that are absolutely necessary" kinda telling about what police work is really all about in the 21st century whether it's practiced in NYC or Reduced Speed, Arizona? Arresting folks is big business in NY as it is in other places and the cops are telling the liberal mayor that they despise that, they won't be filling city coffers for awhile. Presumably they will going after murderers and robbers instead. So, there!
I know that if I were a cop, I'd be very upset at the murder of my brothers. Kinda like, if I were black I'd be very upset at the murder of my brothers.
The cop-killer took his own life after the murders. There was no one left to blame but the president, De Blasio, Al Sharpton, maybe MSNBC, all of the people- black and white- who protested the Ferguson and Eric Garner killings...
Republicans tout themselves as the party of personal responsibility (at times) but, usually this just means holding someone else (like President Obama) personally responsible rather than actual transgressors. BENGHAZI!!!!!! and few hundred other incidents come to mind.
This wasn't De Blasio's or Obama's fault. NYPD has a right to be hurt. They ought to man and woman up and not misdirect their anger. All signs point towards the killer acting alone, using social media and protests about the killings to justify his cowardly actions. He shot his girlfriend. He didn't do that in vengeance for Eric Garner or Mike Brown, now did he? After murdering the cops he then took his own life. This was not a revolutionary martyr. This was nut job.
Like the husband and wife nut jobs who, inspired by the stand against law enforcement that Cliven Bundy took earlier this year, killed two Las Vegas cops, a "good guy with a gun" and then themselves. Or, in 2009, Richard Poplawski killed three Pittsburgh cops because he feared an "Obama gun ban was on the way".
Now, where'd he get that idea?
Conservatives! The same conservatives who blame Obama for (somehow) inciting protests against the police, have in the past incited action against the police. This doesn't give them credibility as much as it gives them portfolio.
In 2008, a guy walked in, guns-a-blazing into a Tennessee church and killed two people and wounded seven because he had felt liberals were bad for the country. At his home were several books by Fox "news" persons disparaging liberals. So, that's where he heard that.
Of course, neither Sean Hannity nor Bill O'Reilly or any of the other assholes at Fox news told any of these people to murder in so many words. Frankly, they're not that bold or committed. Actual revolution is not their thing. They are not leaders, they just carry the water. It would actually be bad for business. But, hey, shit happens. They'd probably claim it's unfair to blame them for the actions of others. Well, they would say that, now wouldn't they?
Thursday, December 18, 2014
If you see only one movie this year...
...I hope it wasn't supposed to be "The Interview" with James Franco and Seth Rogen, because that's been pulled from the theaters due to terrorist threats.
Yep. Somewhere Kirk Cameron is thinking: "Why didn't I think of that??"
The Interview is a comedy about Franco and Rogen involved in a CIA plot to kill real-life North Korean dictator, Kim Jong-un. I saw an interview with Rogen where he was asked why they opted to portray a real dictator when they really could have portrayed a fake one from a made up country. His reply was kinda along the lines of "Who are we kidding anyway?" The audience would know they meant Kim Jong-un if they called him something like "Kim Bong-doin" so, why beat around the bush? Frankly, I think they figured North Korea was so socially slow that they wouldn't see the film until it was released on Betamax so, they figured they were good to go.
They might have had something there. There was a South Korean woman on The Daily Show last week that had taught in North Korea, and she noted that the best and brightest students in the north studying computers had no knowledge of the internet.
When I first heard about the Sony hacking and how North Korea was being blamed for it, I saw it as a cheap publicity stunt. That branch of Korea can't hack anybody if their best and brightest can't even Google. These people eat bark. They don't bite. They have all they can do to survive.
I don't know who hacked Sony and I don't know who made the threats concerning the movie but, I just don't think there's a young, chubby dictator behind this.
And, I don't think the movie is a dog that needed a publicity bone. They are actually not going to show it in any theaters, anywhere. That's not your usual straight-to-video avenue when terrorist threats are involved. I can't see a financial boon to Sony bypassing theaters for pay-per-view. They seem to be really concerned about the theaters being attacked for showing this film. Yikes.
I don't go to the movies anymore. Even when I did several years ago, we'd opt for the early Saturday or Sunday showings that were bargain priced but- more importantly- not patronized by loud, obnoxious, goofy people like on weekend date nights. With the advent of big screen, HD television, Netflix, etc. as well as the turnaround in getting "to video" being quicker than the olden days, there just isn't the impetus for folks like me to rush out to the theater anymore. You don't have to threaten me!
Frankly, I'm not big on Rogen or Franco. Seth Rogen has that nervous laughter thing going on, giggling after everything he says in case you don't like it you'll know he was kidding. I find that very annoying. I had a boss like that. Franco doesn't giggle but I'm not very familiar with his work beyond that. I'm sure he's good.
I'm also sure that neither of these guys are worth killing and that no movie they could make is worth dying for. I also think "Kim Bong-doin" would have been a better name for the dictator in a fictional comedy. It might have saved a lot of trouble too...
Yep. Somewhere Kirk Cameron is thinking: "Why didn't I think of that??"
The Interview is a comedy about Franco and Rogen involved in a CIA plot to kill real-life North Korean dictator, Kim Jong-un. I saw an interview with Rogen where he was asked why they opted to portray a real dictator when they really could have portrayed a fake one from a made up country. His reply was kinda along the lines of "Who are we kidding anyway?" The audience would know they meant Kim Jong-un if they called him something like "Kim Bong-doin" so, why beat around the bush? Frankly, I think they figured North Korea was so socially slow that they wouldn't see the film until it was released on Betamax so, they figured they were good to go.
They might have had something there. There was a South Korean woman on The Daily Show last week that had taught in North Korea, and she noted that the best and brightest students in the north studying computers had no knowledge of the internet.
When I first heard about the Sony hacking and how North Korea was being blamed for it, I saw it as a cheap publicity stunt. That branch of Korea can't hack anybody if their best and brightest can't even Google. These people eat bark. They don't bite. They have all they can do to survive.
I don't know who hacked Sony and I don't know who made the threats concerning the movie but, I just don't think there's a young, chubby dictator behind this.
And, I don't think the movie is a dog that needed a publicity bone. They are actually not going to show it in any theaters, anywhere. That's not your usual straight-to-video avenue when terrorist threats are involved. I can't see a financial boon to Sony bypassing theaters for pay-per-view. They seem to be really concerned about the theaters being attacked for showing this film. Yikes.
I don't go to the movies anymore. Even when I did several years ago, we'd opt for the early Saturday or Sunday showings that were bargain priced but- more importantly- not patronized by loud, obnoxious, goofy people like on weekend date nights. With the advent of big screen, HD television, Netflix, etc. as well as the turnaround in getting "to video" being quicker than the olden days, there just isn't the impetus for folks like me to rush out to the theater anymore. You don't have to threaten me!
Frankly, I'm not big on Rogen or Franco. Seth Rogen has that nervous laughter thing going on, giggling after everything he says in case you don't like it you'll know he was kidding. I find that very annoying. I had a boss like that. Franco doesn't giggle but I'm not very familiar with his work beyond that. I'm sure he's good.
I'm also sure that neither of these guys are worth killing and that no movie they could make is worth dying for. I also think "Kim Bong-doin" would have been a better name for the dictator in a fictional comedy. It might have saved a lot of trouble too...
Wednesday, December 17, 2014
Bush Trimming Tips From Ferrerman
Good Gawd Amighty, Jeb Bush is thinking about running for president. Sheesh. In 2000, Dick Cheney sat down the Bush brothers, George and Jeb, and asked them if either one of them would invade Iraq, no questions asked. George answered "yup" and, the rest is history.
Now, maybe Jeb is willing to answer in the affirmative about a country to be named later? Hopefully it doesn't get that far.
Dick Cheney and his pals at Haliburton had plans before the election for war with Iraq. They seemed to know they would get in the White House. As you might recall, it was very close. The US Supreme Court had to make the call. Then, they had to have a reason for war. The best they could come up with was blaming Saddam Hussein for some Saudis flying planes in the Twin Towers in New York City. Pretty thin thread there so they added the weapons of mass destruction they knew he had, because the US had given them to him. Add in the fact that Saddamn was the egotistical dictator of a sovereign nation and that he didn't like anyone telling him what to do, and you had the recipe for war because- you know- 9/11.... and the rest was the shock and awe of history.
All that alone should be enough to discount any Bush from from contention, even running back Reggie Bush, who is no relation. The brand recognition should be such that consumers hear "bush" and immediately shave and/or wax their genitalia which, if you've seen porn lately, they have done.
But, even without all that, a third Bush as president? What is this, a monarchy? Even if the first two had been good (they weren't) it's the thought that counts. And it's a thought that goes against the grain of America, Because Daddy Bush was Reagan's Vice President, you'd have to go back to 1972 to find a winning republican ticket without a Bush on it. Maybe that's why Jeb's running? He's their good luck charm?
Mind you- full disclosure- I'm not thrilled about Hillary Clinton's possible run either even though her husband was a pretty good president. I like her. She'd probably be a pretty good president too. It's just that matching her against a Bush kinda highlights the royalty aspect of it all that this country is not supposed to have. If it were to come down to those two being the nominees of their party, then we are assured of either having a third Bush or a second Clinton as POTUS. That would mean that, aside from two Obama terms, we've either had a Bush or a Clinton as president since 1988. Is that the best this country can do?
There are 310 million people in this country. There are more than two families capable of fielding presidential teams. I'm not looking at you, Romney's. Don't get any ideas.
And to be Ferrer, I don't know that Cheney and company sat Jeb down with George. I may have taken dramatic license there. They might not have asked Jeb at all, probably knowing he wouldn't be party to a scheme like that. Well, I don't think he would but, I don't know. Jeb was a governor of Florida who could give press conferences in English and Spanish. George could give then in fractured English and gibberish. Dick Cheney put himself in charge of star-searching for a VP contender and, after an exhaustive search, decided he himself should be a heartbeat away from the presidency. How the fuck does any of this happen in the greatest country in the world?
If it does come down to those two against each other, America as we used to pretend it was, is gone, the final screw in the coffin.
Wednesday, December 10, 2014
Too Rolling Stoned
A couple of weeks ago a friend posted the Rolling Stone article about the alleged gang rape of a University of Virginia freshman student by members of the Phi Kappa Psi fraternity. It's a long-ass read that could have been a lot longer but Rolling Stone opted to leave out interviews with the perpetrators at the request of the victim.
What the fuck kinda *journalism* is that?
Here's my story. I only ask that you take my word as gospel and not interview any suspects....
Rolling Stone now sees that putting so much trust in her was "misplaced". Not a good idea. Duh.
I'm not a regular RS reader but I have enjoyed them over the years and, most recently, with various reports by actual journalist, Matt Taibbi, whose work actually does get fact checked.
Was there a rape at the campus? Probably. Poor reporting doesn't change that. The Rolling Stone article was no grand jury whitewash. It was close but, holds no legal standing.
This past week Fox *news* called out Jon Stewart of The Daily Show for erroneously including a black youth in California who had died (in police custody) of a drug overdose, in a segment about young black men who had been murdered by police. Stewart's team dropped the ball on that one and in Fox's blurry vision, that fumble of his wiped the Fox slate clean. Stewart pointed out that he has to be right 100% of the time. Fox only has to be right once. They probably agreed with him on that.
Jon Stewart's people are very good at what they do. It may be "fake news" but they use real facts and figures to entertain us with their fake news. Jon and Steven Colbert are regarded as the most trusted men in news. That's no joke. Our two funniest men have more integrity than network anchors.
Rolling Stone is very highly regarded too. The aforementioned Matt Taibbi was aghast at RS's actions and inaction's. In fact, the editor responsible was one that Taibbi found to be thorough to an aggravating (to him) degree.
So, why did this happen? Well, people make mistakes. They have bad days. They misplace trust.
But, like Rolling Stone and Jon Stewart, they own up to it and they move on, striving to do better. They have to- they are journalists and they are not perfect. We don't need them to be perfect but we do need them to try.
You see, without them we are at the mercy of the lawyers, politicians, and those that look for the loopholes everywhere in life. It's nice to believe that the truth will set you free but, more often than that, doesn't it usually seem to be technicalities?
What the fuck kinda *journalism* is that?
Here's my story. I only ask that you take my word as gospel and not interview any suspects....
Rolling Stone now sees that putting so much trust in her was "misplaced". Not a good idea. Duh.
I'm not a regular RS reader but I have enjoyed them over the years and, most recently, with various reports by actual journalist, Matt Taibbi, whose work actually does get fact checked.
Was there a rape at the campus? Probably. Poor reporting doesn't change that. The Rolling Stone article was no grand jury whitewash. It was close but, holds no legal standing.
This past week Fox *news* called out Jon Stewart of The Daily Show for erroneously including a black youth in California who had died (in police custody) of a drug overdose, in a segment about young black men who had been murdered by police. Stewart's team dropped the ball on that one and in Fox's blurry vision, that fumble of his wiped the Fox slate clean. Stewart pointed out that he has to be right 100% of the time. Fox only has to be right once. They probably agreed with him on that.
Jon Stewart's people are very good at what they do. It may be "fake news" but they use real facts and figures to entertain us with their fake news. Jon and Steven Colbert are regarded as the most trusted men in news. That's no joke. Our two funniest men have more integrity than network anchors.
Rolling Stone is very highly regarded too. The aforementioned Matt Taibbi was aghast at RS's actions and inaction's. In fact, the editor responsible was one that Taibbi found to be thorough to an aggravating (to him) degree.
So, why did this happen? Well, people make mistakes. They have bad days. They misplace trust.
But, like Rolling Stone and Jon Stewart, they own up to it and they move on, striving to do better. They have to- they are journalists and they are not perfect. We don't need them to be perfect but we do need them to try.
You see, without them we are at the mercy of the lawyers, politicians, and those that look for the loopholes everywhere in life. It's nice to believe that the truth will set you free but, more often than that, doesn't it usually seem to be technicalities?
Saturday, December 6, 2014
Revenge, party of one...
Hopefully Snopes gets a hold of this and debunks it before it becomes a major motion picture, but this has been making the internet rounds:
http://www.addictinginfo.org/2014/12/05/louisa-manning-finally-gets-chance-to-smack-down-bully-from-middle-school-and-does-it-brilliantly/
I'm happy to see that the majority of commentators in the Facebook realm have been in concert with my take on it, and not like those fat losers that think the ugly fucking bitch is some kind of heroine.
Well, I wouldn't quite put it that way, not at this age, but I was pleased to see that most people's take on the whole thing was that the guy in the story had grown up and out of his childhood self and the girl had not.
It's great that she turned out to be attractive eight/ten years later but she's clearly still stuck in the emotional past. The boy, as man, is not. We don't know what he looks like but we can assume he's quite attractive because she did not happy dance at his weight gain, hair loss or disfiguring scars from a well-deserved tragedy. I think she very well would have delighted in those happenstances, had they happened. Her revenge was looking good and standing the guy up so that he would feel rejection. Ouch. That's "brilliant"?
Come now, is it fair to judge the guy by his 12 year old self, ten years after? If she is no longer a "hairy man-beast" maybe he is no longer a bully? Would you like to be judged by your 12 year old self?
I recall a former love of mine who was blonde, 5'7", 118 pounds- quite spankable, when this Ferrerman knew her. By almost all accounts she was all that and a bag of chips. Yet I spoke with a few women who insisted she was a "fat pig", not just back in school but fat pig emeritus, in their minds. Clearly these were young women who had bullied her at the time and reserved the right to bully her for the rest of her life, regardless of how she looked. Some people never grow up. Some people were assholes at 12 and would still be assholes ten, twenty- sixty years later. There's a word for people like that. The word is assholes. These girls were thisclose to that.
But, a lot of kids who were 12 years old at one point, are years and decades older now. They grew up, evolved, matured. Louisa Manning makes a deal of him asking her out instead of immediately apologizing to her. She presumes that dinner was to be a prelude to him fucking her now beautiful self. That may have crossed his mind but we don't get that story because she cut him off before dinner. That was her victory, her revenge.
I'm of the opinion that he most likely intended to make amends for his youthful indiscretions over a nice dinner while they caught up on the past ten years. Of course, he never got the chance. However, we did. He seemed to have turned out well. She's 12 years old with the body of a 22 year old. I won't diminish anyone's childhood torment here because I know full well how real that is for so many hundreds of millions of people. But at some point people have to get over it and realize that maybe they aren't 12 anymore and that maybe their tormentor grew up, while they did not.
http://www.addictinginfo.org/2014/12/05/louisa-manning-finally-gets-chance-to-smack-down-bully-from-middle-school-and-does-it-brilliantly/
I'm happy to see that the majority of commentators in the Facebook realm have been in concert with my take on it, and not like those fat losers that think the ugly fucking bitch is some kind of heroine.
Well, I wouldn't quite put it that way, not at this age, but I was pleased to see that most people's take on the whole thing was that the guy in the story had grown up and out of his childhood self and the girl had not.
It's great that she turned out to be attractive eight/ten years later but she's clearly still stuck in the emotional past. The boy, as man, is not. We don't know what he looks like but we can assume he's quite attractive because she did not happy dance at his weight gain, hair loss or disfiguring scars from a well-deserved tragedy. I think she very well would have delighted in those happenstances, had they happened. Her revenge was looking good and standing the guy up so that he would feel rejection. Ouch. That's "brilliant"?
Come now, is it fair to judge the guy by his 12 year old self, ten years after? If she is no longer a "hairy man-beast" maybe he is no longer a bully? Would you like to be judged by your 12 year old self?
I recall a former love of mine who was blonde, 5'7", 118 pounds- quite spankable, when this Ferrerman knew her. By almost all accounts she was all that and a bag of chips. Yet I spoke with a few women who insisted she was a "fat pig", not just back in school but fat pig emeritus, in their minds. Clearly these were young women who had bullied her at the time and reserved the right to bully her for the rest of her life, regardless of how she looked. Some people never grow up. Some people were assholes at 12 and would still be assholes ten, twenty- sixty years later. There's a word for people like that. The word is assholes. These girls were thisclose to that.
But, a lot of kids who were 12 years old at one point, are years and decades older now. They grew up, evolved, matured. Louisa Manning makes a deal of him asking her out instead of immediately apologizing to her. She presumes that dinner was to be a prelude to him fucking her now beautiful self. That may have crossed his mind but we don't get that story because she cut him off before dinner. That was her victory, her revenge.
I'm of the opinion that he most likely intended to make amends for his youthful indiscretions over a nice dinner while they caught up on the past ten years. Of course, he never got the chance. However, we did. He seemed to have turned out well. She's 12 years old with the body of a 22 year old. I won't diminish anyone's childhood torment here because I know full well how real that is for so many hundreds of millions of people. But at some point people have to get over it and realize that maybe they aren't 12 anymore and that maybe their tormentor grew up, while they did not.
Friday, December 5, 2014
Conservative is in italics for a purpose
I wonder if, with the reactions of the last two grand jury *verdicts*, we're not getting a hard glimpse into the cowardly new world of a republican controlled United States?
Our conservative citizens are quite matter-a-fact about the penalty for theft and/or resisting arrest being death. I think I'd have Koch money if I had a dollar for every time I heard words to that effect coming out of conservative mouths. Eric Garner would be alive today if he hadn't resisted arrest. So would Mike Brown. Had he had better parents, Tamir Rice would have know better than to wave a fake gun around. All these blacks are dead because they flaunted the law. To conservatives that is the new, world order of things.
We saw this with- pick any of the school or theater shootings. The conservative reaction to everyone of those tragedies was "more guns". Now it's "do what you're told and you won't get killed".
You know who says that? The bad guys in the movies! That what you tell hostages in the bank!
The conservatives are telling us that, if we do what we're told, when we are told, we just might get outa this alive!
No, that's what the hero says. The conservatives are probably more apt to tell us to get in the boxcars in an orderly fashion. You know, 'cause if you don't, you get killed, right? Everybody knows that!
What country is it that these assholes want to take back, anyway?
Chris Rock says that the white people his children are meeting today are the best white people this country has ever produced. It didn't take me long to think about that and understand what he meant. It is true. But- fuck me a running- we've still got a long way to go. These conservative assholes still stand in the way, trying to slow everybody down. They must think there's money in it because it makes no other kind of sense. And let's face it- it's all about money with these fuckers. The only thing conservative about them is conserving their few brain cells for reasons they have yet to told why. I don't think we'll be expected to think much in their world.
Conservatives...it's just a family friendly way of saying Asshole-Americans, our oldest minority seeking their special rights....
Our conservative citizens are quite matter-a-fact about the penalty for theft and/or resisting arrest being death. I think I'd have Koch money if I had a dollar for every time I heard words to that effect coming out of conservative mouths. Eric Garner would be alive today if he hadn't resisted arrest. So would Mike Brown. Had he had better parents, Tamir Rice would have know better than to wave a fake gun around. All these blacks are dead because they flaunted the law. To conservatives that is the new, world order of things.
We saw this with- pick any of the school or theater shootings. The conservative reaction to everyone of those tragedies was "more guns". Now it's "do what you're told and you won't get killed".
You know who says that? The bad guys in the movies! That what you tell hostages in the bank!
The conservatives are telling us that, if we do what we're told, when we are told, we just might get outa this alive!
No, that's what the hero says. The conservatives are probably more apt to tell us to get in the boxcars in an orderly fashion. You know, 'cause if you don't, you get killed, right? Everybody knows that!
What country is it that these assholes want to take back, anyway?
Chris Rock says that the white people his children are meeting today are the best white people this country has ever produced. It didn't take me long to think about that and understand what he meant. It is true. But- fuck me a running- we've still got a long way to go. These conservative assholes still stand in the way, trying to slow everybody down. They must think there's money in it because it makes no other kind of sense. And let's face it- it's all about money with these fuckers. The only thing conservative about them is conserving their few brain cells for reasons they have yet to told why. I don't think we'll be expected to think much in their world.
Conservatives...it's just a family friendly way of saying Asshole-Americans, our oldest minority seeking their special rights....
Tuesday, November 25, 2014
Not Ready For Prime Time
Who releases an incendiary grand jury verdict at 8:15pm (CST) on a Monday night? They practically had the decision in hand when they convened the grand jury, so why the prime time revelation? A smart prosecutor releases the verdict in the light of day, away from the metaphors of darkness.
This guy was not smart. He waited for prime time, I think, for his own self aggrandizement. "Fuck the night, common sense, and protesters- for I have a story to tell!"
Really it wasn't much of a story. The whole case seemed to befuddle him what with different people having different accounts of what happened and all. He's like a Legal Ken Doll declaring: "The law is HARD!" As someone on The Last Word with Laurence O'Donnell noted, with his approach as well as the grand jury's, we wouldn't be leading the world in incarcerated citizens. We would have empty prisons. He seemed to accept the "he said/she said" perspective of conflict. "Who's right? I have no fucking clue. But, we can't put a guy on trial if there's conflicting stories. How would we find out what happened?"
The thing is, better than 90% of criminal cases are plea bargained. A prosecutor decides- pretty much like Law And Order- if he can win a case in a trial. Most of the time he probably can but, whether he can or can't, a plea bargain is offered. "Plead guilty to this charge and do a year or we'll pursue this and you'll do life". No prosecutor is charged by the people with finding out "who did it". That's the job of the police. The prosecutor's job is to prove that the guy the cops picked up "did it". And that's whether he did it or not. The saying regarding grand juries is: "A prosecutor can get a grand jury to indict a ham sandwich." In fact, in over 160,000 federal grand juries, only ELEVEN failed to return an indictment. Mind you, those, like the Ferguson case, were not trials as we think we know them. This was a question of "probable cause"- should they put Darren Wilson on trial? The no-brainer that probable cause is 160,000 other times....was suddenly a trial instead. And though there was conflicting testimony that should have prompted a trial in nearly 160,000 other cases, that conflicting information was somehow damning evidence in this one.
Well, another victory for persecuted white folks, I guess. How fitting that it happened during the 2014th installment of White History Year.
This guy was not smart. He waited for prime time, I think, for his own self aggrandizement. "Fuck the night, common sense, and protesters- for I have a story to tell!"
Really it wasn't much of a story. The whole case seemed to befuddle him what with different people having different accounts of what happened and all. He's like a Legal Ken Doll declaring: "The law is HARD!" As someone on The Last Word with Laurence O'Donnell noted, with his approach as well as the grand jury's, we wouldn't be leading the world in incarcerated citizens. We would have empty prisons. He seemed to accept the "he said/she said" perspective of conflict. "Who's right? I have no fucking clue. But, we can't put a guy on trial if there's conflicting stories. How would we find out what happened?"
The thing is, better than 90% of criminal cases are plea bargained. A prosecutor decides- pretty much like Law And Order- if he can win a case in a trial. Most of the time he probably can but, whether he can or can't, a plea bargain is offered. "Plead guilty to this charge and do a year or we'll pursue this and you'll do life". No prosecutor is charged by the people with finding out "who did it". That's the job of the police. The prosecutor's job is to prove that the guy the cops picked up "did it". And that's whether he did it or not. The saying regarding grand juries is: "A prosecutor can get a grand jury to indict a ham sandwich." In fact, in over 160,000 federal grand juries, only ELEVEN failed to return an indictment. Mind you, those, like the Ferguson case, were not trials as we think we know them. This was a question of "probable cause"- should they put Darren Wilson on trial? The no-brainer that probable cause is 160,000 other times....was suddenly a trial instead. And though there was conflicting testimony that should have prompted a trial in nearly 160,000 other cases, that conflicting information was somehow damning evidence in this one.
Well, another victory for persecuted white folks, I guess. How fitting that it happened during the 2014th installment of White History Year.
Sunday, November 23, 2014
Petulant people look back and lament
The current republican party seems to be a cross between a terrorist organization and a mafia family. It seems they have an attitude of elements of both with their activities suggesting that, if you the people only go along with what they do, they won't do it anymore. Maybe I could add petulant child to terrorist and mafia-like. Read the following in Jon Stewart's 'wiseguy voice:
"Hey, America, We've been noticing that you're having a little trouble with your government these day. Capiche? Things aren't getting done like they're supposed to. A lot of lawsuits, tears and angry talk. And that's just from us! Bet you'd like to make that, uh, disappear, wouldn't you? Well, if something were to happen to your president, like an impeachment or a fire at the Capitol- an accident, mind you, probably set by communists- we could take over and make things run, you know, "kinda smooth". Capiche? I'm saying we can make all this go away. Union troubles? We've been working on that. Tired of whiny, do-nothing congressmen? We can put those mooks to work...if they've got the right guy to answer too, that is. We get one of our guys in The White House (I'm sayin' maybe a Bush again...) and you the pigeons- and by that I mean "people"- will see some serious shit get done. All this "obstruction" goes away if you people come in line. You put that Clinton broad in and- well, you think we were hard on the moolie, wait until the old bitch gets in. We will curb-stomp the political process like it's Billy Batts. Not that I know anything about his unfortunate disappearance, that is. What are you lookin' at? So, I'm just sayin' that, it's up to you, America. Things can go a lot easier if you play ball with us. By the way...we know where you live and where you work. Capiche?"
Ayyyyup. It sure seems that way, doesn't it? These assholes were seriously talking of impeaching him the moment he won in '08, months before he took the oath of the presidency. The actual process of impeachment is lost on them, most thinking that it means taking him outside for eyeballing a white woman and replacing him with Sarah Palin. It's actually not that at all. An actual impeachment would be quite boring and (so far) not even include any talk about blow jobs.
Now, after fifty-plus votes in the House against healthcare, congress is actually suing the president. Who does that? Assholes, that's who. Terrorists and gangsters maybe. Certainly petulant children with lawyers.
I remember one of the many times Sublime1 wanted to sue me and Hegel. Or is it, "Hegel and I"? Anyway, he consulted a real lawyer who looked at him like my German Shepard used to when I spoke Japanese to him, and probably said something like: "You want your imaginary persona to sue imaginary people? Are you some kind of fucking idiot?"
Sub probably mulled that over for a few days before deciding that, though he couldn't win, he could force Ferrerman and Hegel to fly to North Carolina- at our own expense! And, we'd have to pay for his lawyer to sue us, win or lose. Because that's the way that works? I don't have a law license but then, neither does he.
It's similar with the GOP plan of governing by litigation. Except instead of forcing Obama to fly to the senate at his own expense (airline travel was affected, BTW and, he could actually catch a ride with the Secret Service), thus causing him extreme financial hardship, the repubs plan is to wear out the American people instead. That causes US extreme financial hardship.The last time they shut down the government, for example, it cost US @ $28 billion dollars. We the people paid for that. Within seconds of closing the government, Ted Cruz and others were on camera asking people how they felt about "Obama forcing a government shutdown". Huh what? That's like your big sister grabbing your arm, smacking your face with your hand and asking "Why are you hitting yourself???" Congress is that petulant child.
Maybe the GOP isn't consciously trying to wear the US down but, they are wearing US down, out and sideways. The perception might be that turning complete control over to them is the 'obvious' recourse to making things smoother in Washington. The reality is that having control of both houses just means they can double-down on obstruction, and get nothing done, soullessly in the hopes of ruining the legacy of the first black president of the United States of America. History will not be kind. There is no reason to be kind in the moment either as these litigious bastards don't deserve it.
"Hey, America, We've been noticing that you're having a little trouble with your government these day. Capiche? Things aren't getting done like they're supposed to. A lot of lawsuits, tears and angry talk. And that's just from us! Bet you'd like to make that, uh, disappear, wouldn't you? Well, if something were to happen to your president, like an impeachment or a fire at the Capitol- an accident, mind you, probably set by communists- we could take over and make things run, you know, "kinda smooth". Capiche? I'm saying we can make all this go away. Union troubles? We've been working on that. Tired of whiny, do-nothing congressmen? We can put those mooks to work...if they've got the right guy to answer too, that is. We get one of our guys in The White House (I'm sayin' maybe a Bush again...) and you the pigeons- and by that I mean "people"- will see some serious shit get done. All this "obstruction" goes away if you people come in line. You put that Clinton broad in and- well, you think we were hard on the moolie, wait until the old bitch gets in. We will curb-stomp the political process like it's Billy Batts. Not that I know anything about his unfortunate disappearance, that is. What are you lookin' at? So, I'm just sayin' that, it's up to you, America. Things can go a lot easier if you play ball with us. By the way...we know where you live and where you work. Capiche?"
Ayyyyup. It sure seems that way, doesn't it? These assholes were seriously talking of impeaching him the moment he won in '08, months before he took the oath of the presidency. The actual process of impeachment is lost on them, most thinking that it means taking him outside for eyeballing a white woman and replacing him with Sarah Palin. It's actually not that at all. An actual impeachment would be quite boring and (so far) not even include any talk about blow jobs.
Now, after fifty-plus votes in the House against healthcare, congress is actually suing the president. Who does that? Assholes, that's who. Terrorists and gangsters maybe. Certainly petulant children with lawyers.
I remember one of the many times Sublime1 wanted to sue me and Hegel. Or is it, "Hegel and I"? Anyway, he consulted a real lawyer who looked at him like my German Shepard used to when I spoke Japanese to him, and probably said something like: "You want your imaginary persona to sue imaginary people? Are you some kind of fucking idiot?"
Sub probably mulled that over for a few days before deciding that, though he couldn't win, he could force Ferrerman and Hegel to fly to North Carolina- at our own expense! And, we'd have to pay for his lawyer to sue us, win or lose. Because that's the way that works? I don't have a law license but then, neither does he.
It's similar with the GOP plan of governing by litigation. Except instead of forcing Obama to fly to the senate at his own expense (airline travel was affected, BTW and, he could actually catch a ride with the Secret Service), thus causing him extreme financial hardship, the repubs plan is to wear out the American people instead. That causes US extreme financial hardship.The last time they shut down the government, for example, it cost US @ $28 billion dollars. We the people paid for that. Within seconds of closing the government, Ted Cruz and others were on camera asking people how they felt about "Obama forcing a government shutdown". Huh what? That's like your big sister grabbing your arm, smacking your face with your hand and asking "Why are you hitting yourself???" Congress is that petulant child.
Maybe the GOP isn't consciously trying to wear the US down but, they are wearing US down, out and sideways. The perception might be that turning complete control over to them is the 'obvious' recourse to making things smoother in Washington. The reality is that having control of both houses just means they can double-down on obstruction, and get nothing done, soullessly in the hopes of ruining the legacy of the first black president of the United States of America. History will not be kind. There is no reason to be kind in the moment either as these litigious bastards don't deserve it.
Saturday, November 22, 2014
The Audacity Of Dopes
Jesus Christ! Wait- can I say that? Do I have the right, from the right? Evidently the President Of The United States doesn't, at least according to these fuckwads. Golly- quoting the Bible? Is he not aware that, for the purposes of this *news* segment, at least, that there is a thing called THE SEPARATION OF CHURCH AND STATE in that Constitution he uses after taking his morning constitutional? Or is he a newbie to church? He claims he has gone to church "for years" and he maybe just found out about that one? My goodness, there is much gnashing of teeth from these people. You'd think they'd have gnashed their teeth down to the gums by now.
Friday, November 21, 2014
Driving all The Old Trolls Crazier
Let's review. This Ferrerman has been on the internet for a bit over six years now. In this time I have won Topix, been inducted into the Hall Of Fame, and brought joy to millions of dedicated non-readers with this blog. Pretty neat, eh? I could rest on my laurels, but that's not me. And I didn't do this by myself. I co-won Topix with the help of my wonderful friend, Hegel- who is also in the Hall Of Fame and extremely talented in her own right.
Long time dedicated non-readers of this blog know that the initial impetus for writing was to address bogus charges by the then-named troll, Angelique770, whose actual fake name at the time was Angelique De Sauissn. Now that's a stripper or drag queen name if you've ever heard one. *She* was trying to be French at the time and I suppose that sounded French enough. For the record and by the by, I'll refer to this troll with feminine pronouns just for clarity rather than any gynecological assessment I would never care to make..
I've learned since then that the best way to handle false, ridiculous and malevolent charges from imaginary people on the internet is to ignore them. It literally drives them crazier! It's like how Sublime1 and Crunchy Bacon habitchually harp on me to confirm their positions on past visitation problems I might have had. They desperately need my help there. I don't give it to them. They get angry. They are left with no choice but to continue to fluff their own nuts by aggressively pursuing homely women who are not their wives on Topix, thus somehow honoring their own children. Go and figure that! The fluffer nutters....
Anyway, I was informed long ago that A770 initially was angered by my decision to not join her little band of misfit 'writers' in their insipid stories about the sexual hijinx at a mental hospital. Aside from being a grade school attempt at sophomoric writing, it seemed like the whole point was to delineate which of the then-Chicago Regulars were in favor and which were not. If you were a doctor or a nurse and having virtual sex in the bushes with someone, you were at the right lunch table. If you were a patient, you were in the hall. So, all that aside, the writing just sucked. I did not participate. It was the beginning of the end.
I know I write well. I get better all the time. I could not have helped those stories at all. They couldn't help themselves. Sure, I busted her on her bullshit about being a "therapist studying Topix" and for the way she treated others who were supposedly her friends and was indeed a factor as well. As a Ferrerman who grew up with younger siblings and raised on cowboy movies, it was my destiny to stand against the bullies. It's part of my charm. Here's Steinbeck's take on Ferrerman:
Damn. That's pretty heavy responsibility. I'm just glad it wasn't the thing with the rabbits.
Anyway, unfortunately, I can't be there. This bitch is either a mod or exchanging panties and dresses with one. I got banned whenever and so did Hegel. So, Ferrerman and Hegel have long since been unable to post on Topix due to an IP ban. If you can't beat 'em, cheat 'em must be the Topix motto. Mine is: "Fuck 'em if they can't take a joke and joke 'em if they can't take a fuck." But then, I'm a writer. It's a gift.
In the time we were able to post there, we whupped the dogshit out of her and her minions. She's actually quite the Manson770 in that she manipulates others- not just the voices in her head- to do her dirty work. This is why she can get a college-educated LAWYER like Sublime1 to do her dirty work. He believes in her and every word of her ever-changing story and profile incarnations. Why? Because she would not lie to him. I bet she told him so...
I often look back (as I am now) and marvel at the fact that I am dealing with an actual guy that talks about his own wife as a piece of meat, openly fantasizing a fairly obvious lie about the two of them being swinging spouse swappers. And another guy who calls himself "Crunchy Bacon", who plays video games, has a wonderful, beautiful wife and chases chubby women on a message board. Then, of course, there is the all too ubiquitous "Sam" who would seem to have his own personal vendetta against Ferrerman but is really just a voice in A770's head, one that specializes in posting about sucking dicks, men's cum and bad things to do with gerbils. Early on I suspected that A770 was a gay dude impersonating a woman. Her Sam persona proved that. Think about the women you know in life. Unless they are street whores or porn stars, they just don't talk like that.
So, it's not that I am fighting with imaginary people. They are still fighting with me and anyone they suspect is me, even if they made the posts themselves! Who does that? These people and their multiple personalities, that's who. And who took a troll from the relative heights of convincing people she was a well to do, French born, professional therapist with 6th grade schoolgirl writing skills, all the way down to a cum-obsessed scumbag who stalks an old man in Florida by showing his home address- because he supports Ferrerman? Well, me, of course. And Hegel, too. You know who helped the most? Angelique De Saussin. That dude just had to fall apart on her own. The rest was just me and Hegel being ourselves. Now that drives the trolls crazier....
Long time dedicated non-readers of this blog know that the initial impetus for writing was to address bogus charges by the then-named troll, Angelique770, whose actual fake name at the time was Angelique De Sauissn. Now that's a stripper or drag queen name if you've ever heard one. *She* was trying to be French at the time and I suppose that sounded French enough. For the record and by the by, I'll refer to this troll with feminine pronouns just for clarity rather than any gynecological assessment I would never care to make..
I've learned since then that the best way to handle false, ridiculous and malevolent charges from imaginary people on the internet is to ignore them. It literally drives them crazier! It's like how Sublime1 and Crunchy Bacon habitchually harp on me to confirm their positions on past visitation problems I might have had. They desperately need my help there. I don't give it to them. They get angry. They are left with no choice but to continue to fluff their own nuts by aggressively pursuing homely women who are not their wives on Topix, thus somehow honoring their own children. Go and figure that! The fluffer nutters....
Anyway, I was informed long ago that A770 initially was angered by my decision to not join her little band of misfit 'writers' in their insipid stories about the sexual hijinx at a mental hospital. Aside from being a grade school attempt at sophomoric writing, it seemed like the whole point was to delineate which of the then-Chicago Regulars were in favor and which were not. If you were a doctor or a nurse and having virtual sex in the bushes with someone, you were at the right lunch table. If you were a patient, you were in the hall. So, all that aside, the writing just sucked. I did not participate. It was the beginning of the end.
I know I write well. I get better all the time. I could not have helped those stories at all. They couldn't help themselves. Sure, I busted her on her bullshit about being a "therapist studying Topix" and for the way she treated others who were supposedly her friends and was indeed a factor as well. As a Ferrerman who grew up with younger siblings and raised on cowboy movies, it was my destiny to stand against the bullies. It's part of my charm. Here's Steinbeck's take on Ferrerman:
Then I'll be all around in the dark - I'll be ever'where—wherever you look. Wherever they's a fight so good people can post, I'll be there. Wherever they's a mod beatin' up a guy, I'll be there... I'll be in the way guys yell when they're mad an'—I'll be in the way kids laugh when they're hungry and they know supper's ready. An' when our folk post the stuff they believe an' live in the threads they build—why, I'll be there
Damn. That's pretty heavy responsibility. I'm just glad it wasn't the thing with the rabbits.
Anyway, unfortunately, I can't be there. This bitch is either a mod or exchanging panties and dresses with one. I got banned whenever and so did Hegel. So, Ferrerman and Hegel have long since been unable to post on Topix due to an IP ban. If you can't beat 'em, cheat 'em must be the Topix motto. Mine is: "Fuck 'em if they can't take a joke and joke 'em if they can't take a fuck." But then, I'm a writer. It's a gift.
In the time we were able to post there, we whupped the dogshit out of her and her minions. She's actually quite the Manson770 in that she manipulates others- not just the voices in her head- to do her dirty work. This is why she can get a college-educated LAWYER like Sublime1 to do her dirty work. He believes in her and every word of her ever-changing story and profile incarnations. Why? Because she would not lie to him. I bet she told him so...
I often look back (as I am now) and marvel at the fact that I am dealing with an actual guy that talks about his own wife as a piece of meat, openly fantasizing a fairly obvious lie about the two of them being swinging spouse swappers. And another guy who calls himself "Crunchy Bacon", who plays video games, has a wonderful, beautiful wife and chases chubby women on a message board. Then, of course, there is the all too ubiquitous "Sam" who would seem to have his own personal vendetta against Ferrerman but is really just a voice in A770's head, one that specializes in posting about sucking dicks, men's cum and bad things to do with gerbils. Early on I suspected that A770 was a gay dude impersonating a woman. Her Sam persona proved that. Think about the women you know in life. Unless they are street whores or porn stars, they just don't talk like that.
So, it's not that I am fighting with imaginary people. They are still fighting with me and anyone they suspect is me, even if they made the posts themselves! Who does that? These people and their multiple personalities, that's who. And who took a troll from the relative heights of convincing people she was a well to do, French born, professional therapist with 6th grade schoolgirl writing skills, all the way down to a cum-obsessed scumbag who stalks an old man in Florida by showing his home address- because he supports Ferrerman? Well, me, of course. And Hegel, too. You know who helped the most? Angelique De Saussin. That dude just had to fall apart on her own. The rest was just me and Hegel being ourselves. Now that drives the trolls crazier....
Still carrying a torch for President Obama?
Woo boy, the villagers are angry! They've had torches and pitchforks at the ready since November 5, 2008 but this time they are really pissed! This time, they believe, the man they call "Obummer" and "Odumya" (among others) the man who is at once a brutal dictator and one who does NOTHING, has really pissed them off. Now he's done given citizenship to millions of illegal Mexicans! All they have to do is cross the Rio Grande, collect their free stuff (lap tops, Playstations, etc.) and they are now hyphenated-Americans like the rest of us...as long as they vote democrat...
Not quite. A leisurely stroll around the internet would give you that impression though. Mitt Romney's 47% are living up to Jonathon Gruber's assessment of their mental faculties.
Dedicated non-readers, I'm no expert. But, I can open up Facebook and Google and I can seek out those who are experts and learn what is going down. I can figure shit out. When Ferrerman accidentally clicks the wrong channel on the remote and hears "The A Team" en Espanol, Ferrerman does not immediately presume Mexicans have hijacked our television and, of course, the country. You see folks, Spanish-speaking people are already here and have been for a few hundred years. That's why they get their own channels!
What President Obama did was acknowledge that and address, via executive action, something that the House of Representatives had refused to vote on for the last 18 months. If congress refuses to do their job, someone has to act. That someone is President Obama. Sue me if I'm right about that. They want to sue him for this and, well, everything else. The whole Sue Nation has risen!
President Obama didn't create millions of new citizens overnight as if they were Keystone Pipeline jobs that actually existed. If you came here 5 or more years ago and can prove it, you no longer have to fear deportation. Your children who were born here and are citizens no longer have to tearfully wave addios to mom and dad as they get deported. If you have made a life here, you are safe from deportation and can go to the back of the line for the long and arduous process of attaining citizenship. And, by the way, if you are a gang member or criminal, you will be arrested and deported. That's not ever going to change. Same with if you got here last week or intend to join us next week or next year. If you can't prove you've been here at least five years, you'll be deported. No president has deported more illegals than President Obama. You can look it up.
I would respect the fear and outrage from the right a bit more if they didn't express the same vitriolic, violent outrage over his playing golf. Did republicans really believe it was feasible to deport what might be 11 million people? That was their plan? Who pays for that, fiscal conservatives? My own plan- The Ferrerman Plan- for years has been to enforce the laws on the books that are against businesses hiring illegals. No job opportunities means no waves of illegals seeking jobs. Guess who is against that. Congress and the corporations who employ them. They like the cheap, unorganized labor. They don't like paying fines either. I haven't heard anybody else say this but, legalizing these people might enhance wages a bit more as these people become more assimilated and less fearful of the authorities. We'll see about that.
As far as border enforcement goes, it looks like it will get better. ICE and the Border Patrol can now concentrate more on protecting the border itself, rather than separating families. There are still people being exploited and literally dying to get here and that's got to stop. We're a nation of immigrants and there should be a legal way to become a citizen. No one got a five year head start last night. They got to breathe a little easier was all. They can breathe the hot air of our teapublican politicians and their minions but, it's still American freedom.
Not quite. A leisurely stroll around the internet would give you that impression though. Mitt Romney's 47% are living up to Jonathon Gruber's assessment of their mental faculties.
Dedicated non-readers, I'm no expert. But, I can open up Facebook and Google and I can seek out those who are experts and learn what is going down. I can figure shit out. When Ferrerman accidentally clicks the wrong channel on the remote and hears "The A Team" en Espanol, Ferrerman does not immediately presume Mexicans have hijacked our television and, of course, the country. You see folks, Spanish-speaking people are already here and have been for a few hundred years. That's why they get their own channels!
What President Obama did was acknowledge that and address, via executive action, something that the House of Representatives had refused to vote on for the last 18 months. If congress refuses to do their job, someone has to act. That someone is President Obama. Sue me if I'm right about that. They want to sue him for this and, well, everything else. The whole Sue Nation has risen!
President Obama didn't create millions of new citizens overnight as if they were Keystone Pipeline jobs that actually existed. If you came here 5 or more years ago and can prove it, you no longer have to fear deportation. Your children who were born here and are citizens no longer have to tearfully wave addios to mom and dad as they get deported. If you have made a life here, you are safe from deportation and can go to the back of the line for the long and arduous process of attaining citizenship. And, by the way, if you are a gang member or criminal, you will be arrested and deported. That's not ever going to change. Same with if you got here last week or intend to join us next week or next year. If you can't prove you've been here at least five years, you'll be deported. No president has deported more illegals than President Obama. You can look it up.
I would respect the fear and outrage from the right a bit more if they didn't express the same vitriolic, violent outrage over his playing golf. Did republicans really believe it was feasible to deport what might be 11 million people? That was their plan? Who pays for that, fiscal conservatives? My own plan- The Ferrerman Plan- for years has been to enforce the laws on the books that are against businesses hiring illegals. No job opportunities means no waves of illegals seeking jobs. Guess who is against that. Congress and the corporations who employ them. They like the cheap, unorganized labor. They don't like paying fines either. I haven't heard anybody else say this but, legalizing these people might enhance wages a bit more as these people become more assimilated and less fearful of the authorities. We'll see about that.
As far as border enforcement goes, it looks like it will get better. ICE and the Border Patrol can now concentrate more on protecting the border itself, rather than separating families. There are still people being exploited and literally dying to get here and that's got to stop. We're a nation of immigrants and there should be a legal way to become a citizen. No one got a five year head start last night. They got to breathe a little easier was all. They can breathe the hot air of our teapublican politicians and their minions but, it's still American freedom.
Thursday, November 20, 2014
An exercise in stupidity
I'm following "Grubergate" as closely as I follow any non-story that come out of The Teapublican House of Non-Issues. Evidently he was one of the guys who put together parts of the Affordable Care Act that republicans were complicit in passing but have had some remorse about, of late. A year ago it seems, the Jonathon Gruber guy called Americans "stupid". A year ago.... He should have added "slow". I have to admire the man's honesty.
If you have read the comments on ANY internet site, watched "Jay-walking" when Leno was on "The Tonight Show", been on Topix or vote republican, you know that Americans are stupid. Duh!
Ted Cruz knows people are stupid, at least his constituents are. He recently declared that "net neutrality is Obamacare for the internet". Millions of stupid people who don't understand "Obamacare" then went on the internet to not understand net neutrality. He pulled his pants down in public, got spanked for it by Sen. Al Franken and a host of others, and doubled down on his assessment. Know why? Because people are stupid, that's why. Cruz knows this and counts on it. He's an asshole, but he's not stupid.
Though some of the wisest people on earth pass through the doors of the Ferrerman blog- my most dedicated non-readers- there are also several idiots who stumble through these doors- the trolls from Topix. So, I'll explain net neutrality for their misunderstanding.
Do you want the internet to remain as free and open as it is now, or do you want what Obama wants? He wants- LOOK!!! A BENGHAZI SQUIRREL!!!!- and, in conclusion, free laptops and internet for illegal ISIS immigrants and FEMA camps for patriots.
Fuck. Who let Rick Perry in?
Net neutrality is just keeping the internet as it is at this very moment in time. Defeating it means tiered access with varying speeds, based on not only how much you pay, but how much every site you visit pays. I think it was Stewart (or Colbert?) that called it "the fast lane for assholes". The thing is, you could be a very rich asshole with all the premium speed that money can buy, but if sites you like do not pay ransom to Comcast, you get slooooooooooooooooooooooed down access whether you like it or not. That's stupid, but Ted won't tell you that because, that would be stupid.
Sometimes I wonder if I am stupid...because if I'm in the dark on an issue, I can pretty much make up my mind by checking to see if republicans are for or against it. You could put Obama's prints on anything and millions of republicans would be against it based solely on that. So, it's very tempting to just base my own views on an issue simply by going 180 degrees from the republican stance. That would be stupid though, no matter how accurate it truly is. And it is. It makes me feel like Nate Silver. Taller though. AND, not stupid.
Aside from willful, politically inspired stupidity, some people are just not smart. Making the internet rounds of late is a clip about college students on a campus in Texas who don't know much about history. These kids didn't know who won the Civil War. Not even the black students whose ancestors benefited from it or the white, Texas kids whose great great grandaddies mighta fought in it . They also didn't know the name of our current VP, Joe Biden. These kids are going into debt for the rest of their lives and they aren't as smart as a fifth grader? That's stupid.
The other day I wrote about lawyers. You buy them books and send them to school and they can be stupid too. Maybe they are in the bracket of willfully stupid- stupid for pay, like politicians. Like a Ted Cruz or a Rick Perry, Sublime in the threads is stupid with a purpose. He's led around by the nose by an imaginary person he's never met but defends with all his might. She is beautiful, he says. She is good to him, he says. She is honest, he says. Do you know how he knows this? She (or HE) told him...
Now that's stupid for free. I know it's imaginary people on the internet, but calling yourself a lawyer and blindly defending a made up person based on what some of their characters post to you is pretty fucking stupid. I hope he doesn't put that on his resume'. He's a good example of stupid is as stupid does.
When asked about the offensiveness of Jonathon Gruber's remarks about Americans, Congressman Trey Gowdy said: "I'll tell you how stupid the American people are- look at the mid-term results! Look at who the people elected!"
And he meant that in a good way! 37% of eligible voters showed up for the mid-terms. Not even republicans really cared as they showed poorly as well. Nothing to brag about. They couldn't even get a mandate from their own people. Now, that is stupid.
I won't argue because doing so would just be stupid.
If you have read the comments on ANY internet site, watched "Jay-walking" when Leno was on "The Tonight Show", been on Topix or vote republican, you know that Americans are stupid. Duh!
Ted Cruz knows people are stupid, at least his constituents are. He recently declared that "net neutrality is Obamacare for the internet". Millions of stupid people who don't understand "Obamacare" then went on the internet to not understand net neutrality. He pulled his pants down in public, got spanked for it by Sen. Al Franken and a host of others, and doubled down on his assessment. Know why? Because people are stupid, that's why. Cruz knows this and counts on it. He's an asshole, but he's not stupid.
Though some of the wisest people on earth pass through the doors of the Ferrerman blog- my most dedicated non-readers- there are also several idiots who stumble through these doors- the trolls from Topix. So, I'll explain net neutrality for their misunderstanding.
Do you want the internet to remain as free and open as it is now, or do you want what Obama wants? He wants- LOOK!!! A BENGHAZI SQUIRREL!!!!- and, in conclusion, free laptops and internet for illegal ISIS immigrants and FEMA camps for patriots.
Fuck. Who let Rick Perry in?
Net neutrality is just keeping the internet as it is at this very moment in time. Defeating it means tiered access with varying speeds, based on not only how much you pay, but how much every site you visit pays. I think it was Stewart (or Colbert?) that called it "the fast lane for assholes". The thing is, you could be a very rich asshole with all the premium speed that money can buy, but if sites you like do not pay ransom to Comcast, you get slooooooooooooooooooooooed down access whether you like it or not. That's stupid, but Ted won't tell you that because, that would be stupid.
Sometimes I wonder if I am stupid...because if I'm in the dark on an issue, I can pretty much make up my mind by checking to see if republicans are for or against it. You could put Obama's prints on anything and millions of republicans would be against it based solely on that. So, it's very tempting to just base my own views on an issue simply by going 180 degrees from the republican stance. That would be stupid though, no matter how accurate it truly is. And it is. It makes me feel like Nate Silver. Taller though. AND, not stupid.
Aside from willful, politically inspired stupidity, some people are just not smart. Making the internet rounds of late is a clip about college students on a campus in Texas who don't know much about history. These kids didn't know who won the Civil War. Not even the black students whose ancestors benefited from it or the white, Texas kids whose great great grandaddies mighta fought in it . They also didn't know the name of our current VP, Joe Biden. These kids are going into debt for the rest of their lives and they aren't as smart as a fifth grader? That's stupid.
The other day I wrote about lawyers. You buy them books and send them to school and they can be stupid too. Maybe they are in the bracket of willfully stupid- stupid for pay, like politicians. Like a Ted Cruz or a Rick Perry, Sublime in the threads is stupid with a purpose. He's led around by the nose by an imaginary person he's never met but defends with all his might. She is beautiful, he says. She is good to him, he says. She is honest, he says. Do you know how he knows this? She (or HE) told him...
Now that's stupid for free. I know it's imaginary people on the internet, but calling yourself a lawyer and blindly defending a made up person based on what some of their characters post to you is pretty fucking stupid. I hope he doesn't put that on his resume'. He's a good example of stupid is as stupid does.
When asked about the offensiveness of Jonathon Gruber's remarks about Americans, Congressman Trey Gowdy said: "I'll tell you how stupid the American people are- look at the mid-term results! Look at who the people elected!"
And he meant that in a good way! 37% of eligible voters showed up for the mid-terms. Not even republicans really cared as they showed poorly as well. Nothing to brag about. They couldn't even get a mandate from their own people. Now, that is stupid.
I won't argue because doing so would just be stupid.
Monday, November 17, 2014
Kill all the lawyers!
Well now, that's bit harsh, isn't it? That was the opinion of William Shakespeare, back in the day.
On NPR I was reading about a case in California where a 28 year old male teacher was convicted of lewd behavior with a minor for having sex with a 14 year old, female student. He's in prison for the crime and that's not the issue. A civil suit against the school though is in appeal because a lawyer has positioned that the girl was at fault, that she knew what she was doing when she lied to her parents and willingly met the man at a motel to have sex with him. The school didn't know what was going on and surely didn't approve. In California the law puts the age of consent at 18. It varies from state to state.
I guess the big deal is that the school, not knowing about the incident when it happened, is not financially liable for it having happened. I can see that. Unless you actively hire help from Pedophiles R Us, how do you know what all your personnel are up at anytime?
What irks me about this is the lawyer putting the blame on the kid. If you have kids or were ever one yourself, you know that they say and do the darnedest things and that they make a lot of mistakes. They are kids. You should see them skateboarding! What are they thinking.
What are lawyers thinking? Whoever this one is, is it his mission to lower the age of consent? How low can it go? If 18 is arbitrary, does he think lower is better? Kids that young have been tried for murder. They kill. They have sex. They may rape but, not adults. They are kids. In some civil courts kids have been found liable for their actions in similar cases to the California one. These kids are not being arrested for rape, mind you, they are just being found complicit in their own rapes by civil courts.
Tort reform is always an issue with conservatives. Our governor-elect here has said he would agree to a modest hike in the minimum wage if the courts agree to deny legal action against businesses by employees, including workman's comp claims. Just don't get sexually harassed or hurt at work and some people will get a small raise and everything will be fine... And isn't everyone just sick of people making millions off of frivolous lawsuits in stead of earning their reward by playing the lottery like everyone else?
People forget that there are people behind these cases- actual living, breathing people who have been wronged- and that it is lawyers who bring these cases to the light of a court room. Why do lawyers do this? Well, it's their job. Why do they blame victims? Well, that's their job too. Very few of them think logically. Their whole being is to think monetarily. They constantly are on the prowl for loopholes in the law and will use practically anything to get an advantage. People get upset when a criminal gets away due to a technicality in the law and I understand that part of a lawyers job is to keep the law itself honest. So yeah, if the cops beat a confession out of a guy, they did not uphold the law and that is wrong. We can't have our police disrespecting the law as the criminals do. I surely get that. They are supposed to be better than that. Lawyers, oddly enough, do not have to be better than that.
The infamous "Hot Coffee" case was successfully argued by a lawyer. The interesting thing is that the same lawyer could easily have argued against the elderly woman who brought the case. It makes no nevermind to them. Many don't take a stand until they see the dollar signs. This is why I respect so few lawyers. They are very chaotic in what they actually believe in because rather than logic or personal beliefs, they argue all too often for what pays better. It's like the high school debate team. Defend a position even though you don't believe in it. Then, WIN!
The good guys don't always win. The best, most expensive lawyers, often do. The law itself seems to respect that and pay homage to it. It's hard to pick a side. Prosecutors make mistakes and sometimes those mistakes get buried via executions. This is why I am against the death penalty. Innocent men have been executed and often saved from execution by DNA and prosecutors faced with that, rarely admit their mistakes. An "Well, I'll be damned...i was wrong..." is too much to ask for, it seems. They just keep arguing no matter how wrong they are, Therein lies the rub.
On NPR I was reading about a case in California where a 28 year old male teacher was convicted of lewd behavior with a minor for having sex with a 14 year old, female student. He's in prison for the crime and that's not the issue. A civil suit against the school though is in appeal because a lawyer has positioned that the girl was at fault, that she knew what she was doing when she lied to her parents and willingly met the man at a motel to have sex with him. The school didn't know what was going on and surely didn't approve. In California the law puts the age of consent at 18. It varies from state to state.
I guess the big deal is that the school, not knowing about the incident when it happened, is not financially liable for it having happened. I can see that. Unless you actively hire help from Pedophiles R Us, how do you know what all your personnel are up at anytime?
What irks me about this is the lawyer putting the blame on the kid. If you have kids or were ever one yourself, you know that they say and do the darnedest things and that they make a lot of mistakes. They are kids. You should see them skateboarding! What are they thinking.
What are lawyers thinking? Whoever this one is, is it his mission to lower the age of consent? How low can it go? If 18 is arbitrary, does he think lower is better? Kids that young have been tried for murder. They kill. They have sex. They may rape but, not adults. They are kids. In some civil courts kids have been found liable for their actions in similar cases to the California one. These kids are not being arrested for rape, mind you, they are just being found complicit in their own rapes by civil courts.
Tort reform is always an issue with conservatives. Our governor-elect here has said he would agree to a modest hike in the minimum wage if the courts agree to deny legal action against businesses by employees, including workman's comp claims. Just don't get sexually harassed or hurt at work and some people will get a small raise and everything will be fine... And isn't everyone just sick of people making millions off of frivolous lawsuits in stead of earning their reward by playing the lottery like everyone else?
People forget that there are people behind these cases- actual living, breathing people who have been wronged- and that it is lawyers who bring these cases to the light of a court room. Why do lawyers do this? Well, it's their job. Why do they blame victims? Well, that's their job too. Very few of them think logically. Their whole being is to think monetarily. They constantly are on the prowl for loopholes in the law and will use practically anything to get an advantage. People get upset when a criminal gets away due to a technicality in the law and I understand that part of a lawyers job is to keep the law itself honest. So yeah, if the cops beat a confession out of a guy, they did not uphold the law and that is wrong. We can't have our police disrespecting the law as the criminals do. I surely get that. They are supposed to be better than that. Lawyers, oddly enough, do not have to be better than that.
The infamous "Hot Coffee" case was successfully argued by a lawyer. The interesting thing is that the same lawyer could easily have argued against the elderly woman who brought the case. It makes no nevermind to them. Many don't take a stand until they see the dollar signs. This is why I respect so few lawyers. They are very chaotic in what they actually believe in because rather than logic or personal beliefs, they argue all too often for what pays better. It's like the high school debate team. Defend a position even though you don't believe in it. Then, WIN!
The good guys don't always win. The best, most expensive lawyers, often do. The law itself seems to respect that and pay homage to it. It's hard to pick a side. Prosecutors make mistakes and sometimes those mistakes get buried via executions. This is why I am against the death penalty. Innocent men have been executed and often saved from execution by DNA and prosecutors faced with that, rarely admit their mistakes. An "Well, I'll be damned...i was wrong..." is too much to ask for, it seems. They just keep arguing no matter how wrong they are, Therein lies the rub.
Sunday, November 16, 2014
We the people...those people
Why can't we have two Americas, one for them and one for us?
I don't necessarily mean north and south like The Civil War and a hundred some years after that (though it could break down as such) but instead, a "we the people" and "those others" that just don't get it.
We the people could, for example, retain the Affordable Care Act and have affordable care and the others could go back to sky-high premiums and getting stripped of coverage when they get sick. That seems to be what they want.
We the people could have our net neutrality and those people could pay waaaaaay more for less and for sloooooower connections. They seem to want that too.
We the people could marry whoever we want. Those others could continue to limit marriage to one man/one woman. Sisters would still be women.
We the people could enjoy a strong but slimmed down military and those others could have open carry and militias.
We the people could continue a separation of church and state, as well as welcoming all religions. Those others could battle to see which branch of Christianity would rule.
We the people could enjoy competitive wages with safety nets for the less-advantaged. Those people could fill prisons with debtors and put children to work. Target practice? Hunger games?
These and other discrepancies don't really make for coexistence among neighbors though so it might be best if those people move. They'd probably go south, the natural direction of thoughts and morals when people are so easily filled with hate and violence. I say go ahead. Seek your corporate, republican, Xtian paradise. Let us know how it works out for you. We should probably build a wall though and not bother to leave a light on for them. Those people are already gone in spirit and in thought.
I don't necessarily mean north and south like The Civil War and a hundred some years after that (though it could break down as such) but instead, a "we the people" and "those others" that just don't get it.
We the people could, for example, retain the Affordable Care Act and have affordable care and the others could go back to sky-high premiums and getting stripped of coverage when they get sick. That seems to be what they want.
We the people could have our net neutrality and those people could pay waaaaaay more for less and for sloooooower connections. They seem to want that too.
We the people could marry whoever we want. Those others could continue to limit marriage to one man/one woman. Sisters would still be women.
We the people could enjoy a strong but slimmed down military and those others could have open carry and militias.
We the people could continue a separation of church and state, as well as welcoming all religions. Those others could battle to see which branch of Christianity would rule.
We the people could enjoy competitive wages with safety nets for the less-advantaged. Those people could fill prisons with debtors and put children to work. Target practice? Hunger games?
These and other discrepancies don't really make for coexistence among neighbors though so it might be best if those people move. They'd probably go south, the natural direction of thoughts and morals when people are so easily filled with hate and violence. I say go ahead. Seek your corporate, republican, Xtian paradise. Let us know how it works out for you. We should probably build a wall though and not bother to leave a light on for them. Those people are already gone in spirit and in thought.
Thursday, November 13, 2014
Raping Posters- Is That A Thing Now?
I was perusing Topix last night and saw where Sublime was posting about going to Chicago to beat someone up. He seemed to figure that it would take awhile to beat that person up so, while he rested up for the next round of violent beating, he would force the guy to blow a yet to be determined guy.
"I guess I could alternate between beating you up and making you blow some dude (not crunchy) in between the beatings, but this isn't supposed to be an enjoyable experience for you. If I did that, you'd be asking me to fly to Chicago every weekend and beat you up."
He posted that to a poster calling them self, "Kevin" and of course, his dumbass probably doesn't know that the real object of his violent lust is one of his friends trolling him. His folks bought him books and sent him to law school and this is how his mind works? A married, father of three boys, a law school graduate and a republican who wants to beat people up and force them to perform sex acts? This is how some people fill their time at work.
Frankly, a lot of people think this way. Many believe- regardless of the crime, that criminals should be beaten and sodomized in prison. Not just child rapists either. Way too much of the population thinks prisoners should ultimately be society's avengers. This is why we can't have nice things- like a functioning congress, for example. People don't always think things through. I think Sublime did though. Yikes. What kind of freak would want to be any degree of party to that? Well...
Want proof that rape is a crime of violence and not passion? Prison rape is that proof. The men who commit it don't consider themselves gay. In fact, if you were to suggest they were gay, they'd likely beat you, fuck you in the ass and make you blow them. Sheesh- nothing gay about that!
And, of course, there isn't. It's about power. It's about imposing your will and your body onto and into someone without their consent. Old women get raped. So do nuns, children, animals and men. It's got nothing to do with what they were wearing, saying or doing at the time. It's all about horrible people seeking out victims to abuse. There is no rationale to it. There is no justice either.
I've always wary of men who go there, in conversation. These are not people you want to drink with or go camping in the woods. Even if it's someone you might figure is talking tough, it's an avenue of thinking that I cannot relate to. I know it seems like just desserts for child rapists but, so does execution for murderers until we get the rest of the story and learn that the prisoner executed wasn't actually at all guilty. If we can't depend on our justice system to always get it right, why should we rely on our armed robbers and murderers to delegate justice? Or, our unlicensed lawyers?
"I guess I could alternate between beating you up and making you blow some dude (not crunchy) in between the beatings, but this isn't supposed to be an enjoyable experience for you. If I did that, you'd be asking me to fly to Chicago every weekend and beat you up."
He posted that to a poster calling them self, "Kevin" and of course, his dumbass probably doesn't know that the real object of his violent lust is one of his friends trolling him. His folks bought him books and sent him to law school and this is how his mind works? A married, father of three boys, a law school graduate and a republican who wants to beat people up and force them to perform sex acts? This is how some people fill their time at work.
Frankly, a lot of people think this way. Many believe- regardless of the crime, that criminals should be beaten and sodomized in prison. Not just child rapists either. Way too much of the population thinks prisoners should ultimately be society's avengers. This is why we can't have nice things- like a functioning congress, for example. People don't always think things through. I think Sublime did though. Yikes. What kind of freak would want to be any degree of party to that? Well...
Want proof that rape is a crime of violence and not passion? Prison rape is that proof. The men who commit it don't consider themselves gay. In fact, if you were to suggest they were gay, they'd likely beat you, fuck you in the ass and make you blow them. Sheesh- nothing gay about that!
And, of course, there isn't. It's about power. It's about imposing your will and your body onto and into someone without their consent. Old women get raped. So do nuns, children, animals and men. It's got nothing to do with what they were wearing, saying or doing at the time. It's all about horrible people seeking out victims to abuse. There is no rationale to it. There is no justice either.
I've always wary of men who go there, in conversation. These are not people you want to drink with or go camping in the woods. Even if it's someone you might figure is talking tough, it's an avenue of thinking that I cannot relate to. I know it seems like just desserts for child rapists but, so does execution for murderers until we get the rest of the story and learn that the prisoner executed wasn't actually at all guilty. If we can't depend on our justice system to always get it right, why should we rely on our armed robbers and murderers to delegate justice? Or, our unlicensed lawyers?
Saturday, November 8, 2014
All About The Base and All that Jazz
It's always kinda disingenuous to compare anyone to Hitler. The teapublicans comparing Obama to him, for example, has so absurdly watered that down that analogy that it's become ridiculous. How can a man at once be both a "dictator" and "the worst president since Carter"- one of our all-time nicest presidents? As usual, the republicans are all over the map with mudslinging, but largely just preaching to the choir.
Are their any Hitler-wannabes on the teapublican horizon? Probably several hundred but none that really stand out and grab you by the throat and scream: "SEIG HEIL!" You have to remember though that Hitler wasn't elected to power. The guy just wasn't that popular at first. Germany gave him a position as chancellor pretty much to appease him. He seized power with the Reichstag fire, blaming it on communists and then went about his murderous plans for world domination. While he did campaign on "the Jewish question", he didn't provide his answers until after he seized power. Frankly, running on a platform of murder and working people to death wouldn't get a guy a lot of votes. Germany went along with it, but after the fact. There had been no polls pondering: Should Jews, Gypsies, homosexuals, communists and various in sundry other undesirables be wiped from the face of the earth? He tipped his hand but not that much.
Politics is a lot like what they say about jazz.- it's the notes you don't play that make the difference.
When the Tea Party came to be very early in 2009 when Barack Obama took the oath of office and taxes were suddenly discovered to be "too high" and "un=American", people were intrigued by this new party. What did they really have in mind? Taxes aren't pretty but they do pay for the roads, schools and military that we need here in the 21st century, but they tended to be more upset with taxes on rich than with the tax burden on the middle class. They wore tri-cornered hats, misquoted the founding fathers and pretty much preached against taxing the rich and proposed taxing the poor instead. Not so much a founding father's idea as it was the old Monty Python, Dennis Moore sketch. It made a lot of folks wonder whose idea it really was.
Turned out that the teaparty was more astroturf than grass roots as it was funded by the Koch brothers, a couple of billionaires. They took the usual republican notion of being fiscal conservative and injected it with the steroids of huge sums of cash. Suddenly, old people in revolutionary war attire wielding misspelled signs wasn't so humorous. Some of these assholes got elected to the House of Representatives. Yikes!
While I don't see the various tea parties as being Nazi party-like, there are a lot of parallels. They are crazy. They'll accept anyone into their parties that is any degree of crazy, but the crazier the better. It's a mix of extreme Christians, gun nuts, people who hate gubmint, more gun nuts, racists, Ted Nugent, even more gun nuts and (D) all of the above. Probably a few Nazi's too. The original Nazi's were not that exclusive either. Numbers. You got to have numbers.
And you've got to have people to hate. These Kochsuckers hate everybody. But, mostly they hate their fellow Americans who are not white or are white and liberal. That's a lot of Americans to hate! They diversify though. They also hate poor people. They hate them so much they want to make more of them! In the spirit of fiscal conservatism and tax savings, they think it's a brilliant idea to stop paying out welfare and also to end the minimum wage. The thinking is, get off welfare and go to college to learn to get a better job, lazy bastard! Sans wages and welfare, forage for berries in the woods while attending college classes. Oh- and pay more in taxes. I told you they were crazy. I'll add that they are idiots too.
The question is, how dangerous are they? We don't know yet. But, nothing good comes of hate combined with government. They hate "big government" but they desperately want to become part of it. They say they want to make it smaller but, who does that in a nation of 310 million people? You can't run the USofA as mom and pop candy store. They want to cut everything that smacks of socialism (which they almost exclusively confuse with communism) but they want to add to an already bloated military budget. Makes you wonder why. Goodness, think of all the wars we'd have going right now with a McCain or a Romney in the White House. Germany didn't really want war in Europe so soon after the First World War but, they went along with prepping for it and then Poland inexplicably attacked them.... Well, that's the way Germany made it look.
I've said all along that the GOP was smart to concentrate on getting into the senate and governor's mansions and state legislatures across the nation. With all that in your pocket, who needs 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue? Look at the obstruction we just saw with them controlling the House. Now they have the Senate too. Yes, I know that they have had this before and we survived. It wasn't these Kochsuckers though. That's like comparing today's republicans to the Party Of Lincoln, formed to end slavery. Different times, different people. Just because they have Ben Carson doesn't mean they love Chris Rock. There were Jews, Swedes and other's in Hitler's SS. JEWS! Humans are a very unpredictable race.
Indeed. That's why it's hard not to wonder how this all will play out. How much hand-tipping have they done already? They still speak of FEMA work camps and death panels that aren't going to happen, six years into Obama's presidency. They have a penchant for saying things like "Well, you people were going to do that to US, so..." On a somewhat less foreboding note, a common refrain on the internet (regarding Congressional control) is: "You people had your chance- you blew it!" I take that to mean that democrats could have seized totalitarian control of the country but they were too busy feeding poor people.
Loose talk from a bunch of mentally ill posters on the internet, maybe. But, they get all this prodding from people they are putting into power. This can't end well. It will get worse before it gets worser.
Are their any Hitler-wannabes on the teapublican horizon? Probably several hundred but none that really stand out and grab you by the throat and scream: "SEIG HEIL!" You have to remember though that Hitler wasn't elected to power. The guy just wasn't that popular at first. Germany gave him a position as chancellor pretty much to appease him. He seized power with the Reichstag fire, blaming it on communists and then went about his murderous plans for world domination. While he did campaign on "the Jewish question", he didn't provide his answers until after he seized power. Frankly, running on a platform of murder and working people to death wouldn't get a guy a lot of votes. Germany went along with it, but after the fact. There had been no polls pondering: Should Jews, Gypsies, homosexuals, communists and various in sundry other undesirables be wiped from the face of the earth? He tipped his hand but not that much.
Politics is a lot like what they say about jazz.- it's the notes you don't play that make the difference.
When the Tea Party came to be very early in 2009 when Barack Obama took the oath of office and taxes were suddenly discovered to be "too high" and "un=American", people were intrigued by this new party. What did they really have in mind? Taxes aren't pretty but they do pay for the roads, schools and military that we need here in the 21st century, but they tended to be more upset with taxes on rich than with the tax burden on the middle class. They wore tri-cornered hats, misquoted the founding fathers and pretty much preached against taxing the rich and proposed taxing the poor instead. Not so much a founding father's idea as it was the old Monty Python, Dennis Moore sketch. It made a lot of folks wonder whose idea it really was.
Turned out that the teaparty was more astroturf than grass roots as it was funded by the Koch brothers, a couple of billionaires. They took the usual republican notion of being fiscal conservative and injected it with the steroids of huge sums of cash. Suddenly, old people in revolutionary war attire wielding misspelled signs wasn't so humorous. Some of these assholes got elected to the House of Representatives. Yikes!
While I don't see the various tea parties as being Nazi party-like, there are a lot of parallels. They are crazy. They'll accept anyone into their parties that is any degree of crazy, but the crazier the better. It's a mix of extreme Christians, gun nuts, people who hate gubmint, more gun nuts, racists, Ted Nugent, even more gun nuts and (D) all of the above. Probably a few Nazi's too. The original Nazi's were not that exclusive either. Numbers. You got to have numbers.
And you've got to have people to hate. These Kochsuckers hate everybody. But, mostly they hate their fellow Americans who are not white or are white and liberal. That's a lot of Americans to hate! They diversify though. They also hate poor people. They hate them so much they want to make more of them! In the spirit of fiscal conservatism and tax savings, they think it's a brilliant idea to stop paying out welfare and also to end the minimum wage. The thinking is, get off welfare and go to college to learn to get a better job, lazy bastard! Sans wages and welfare, forage for berries in the woods while attending college classes. Oh- and pay more in taxes. I told you they were crazy. I'll add that they are idiots too.
The question is, how dangerous are they? We don't know yet. But, nothing good comes of hate combined with government. They hate "big government" but they desperately want to become part of it. They say they want to make it smaller but, who does that in a nation of 310 million people? You can't run the USofA as mom and pop candy store. They want to cut everything that smacks of socialism (which they almost exclusively confuse with communism) but they want to add to an already bloated military budget. Makes you wonder why. Goodness, think of all the wars we'd have going right now with a McCain or a Romney in the White House. Germany didn't really want war in Europe so soon after the First World War but, they went along with prepping for it and then Poland inexplicably attacked them.... Well, that's the way Germany made it look.
I've said all along that the GOP was smart to concentrate on getting into the senate and governor's mansions and state legislatures across the nation. With all that in your pocket, who needs 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue? Look at the obstruction we just saw with them controlling the House. Now they have the Senate too. Yes, I know that they have had this before and we survived. It wasn't these Kochsuckers though. That's like comparing today's republicans to the Party Of Lincoln, formed to end slavery. Different times, different people. Just because they have Ben Carson doesn't mean they love Chris Rock. There were Jews, Swedes and other's in Hitler's SS. JEWS! Humans are a very unpredictable race.
Indeed. That's why it's hard not to wonder how this all will play out. How much hand-tipping have they done already? They still speak of FEMA work camps and death panels that aren't going to happen, six years into Obama's presidency. They have a penchant for saying things like "Well, you people were going to do that to US, so..." On a somewhat less foreboding note, a common refrain on the internet (regarding Congressional control) is: "You people had your chance- you blew it!" I take that to mean that democrats could have seized totalitarian control of the country but they were too busy feeding poor people.
Loose talk from a bunch of mentally ill posters on the internet, maybe. But, they get all this prodding from people they are putting into power. This can't end well. It will get worse before it gets worser.
Friday, November 7, 2014
A Super-sized Economy Where Hope Doesn't Float
I was looking at a republican site on Facebook where hundreds of people were angry about a proposed hike to $15 in the minimum wage that wasn't on any ballot anywhere in America this past Tuesday. I think five states did vote for an increased minimum, as Illinois did, but I'm not sure all were binding. Illinois' wasn't. The employees- I mean, citizens- may want it (and they do) but it still has to be run by corporate for final approval. Governor-elect Rauner has warned outgoing gov, Pat Quinn, that he doesn't want any surprises in the lame-duck period between now and January when he takes over. He knows where Quinn (and others) live....
The approved hike in Illinois is $10. This is a figure that Rauner feels will kill business. Every business in Illinois, when they put their business plan together, evidently didn't figure payroll. Oops! Hey- you make mistakes too! It happens. Ten bucks an hour!? Why did billionaire Bruce Rauner even ever go into business when he could get a $10 handout for an easy job at McDonalds? It's bad enough that business has to pay people, which cuts deeply into profits, now they have to pay them more! Ex-governor Quinn may well compound things by pushing the minimum hike thing through a democrat- controlled state legislature. Well, it is what the people voted for. Say all you want about this recent republican tidal wave of a tsunami mandate but, the people in those five states did vote for it. That's supposed to count for something, right?
Well, this Ferrerman has written quite a bit about the minimum and dedicated non-readers know where I stand. Let's make this about the dipshits that are against the minimum.
A lot of the people on the aforementioned site said in so many words that they would quit their current job and seek a minimum wage position if that $15 wage transpired. Evidently, it would be a step up from their current rate. Yikes. Yet they are still against the raise, even though a rising tide tends to lift all boats. Are they afraid of success? Getting into a higher tax bracket? Fearful that they'd just blow it all buying new appliances or putting the kids through school? People on welfare, as we know from the Foxy Party news, get lobster for dinner, and free phones and computers from the government. They could go that route but, they have pride. Maybe they are happy where they are? Why mess with the status quo?
Some of the most brilliant minds on the threads and on Facebook have pointed out the folly of paying fast food workers what liberals call "a living wage". Why, because we'd be paying $20 for a Big Mac, they exclaim. Well, no. Australia has a minimum of @ $16 an hour and they pay 40 cents more for a Big Mac than we do. Now maybe that in "wallabies" or whatever they call their money and the 40 cents there is like $30 dollars here. I mean, a buck's a buck, right? Maybe their cents are different?
These same brilliant minds think that there should be no minimum wage at all. That the free market should set wages- not the gubmint. They also believe that, though you might less, you could make more. It's up to the free market- not the gubmint. Of course they want to pay you more! They just want it to be their idea, not the gubmint.
Well, what if there was no minimum? How would it effect the price of a Big Mac, in a Big Mac economy if there were were no minimum and the loser behind the counter was paid $2 an hour as the free market dictated? They would cut the price of that burger to reflect the HUGE savings in payroll, right? Maybe make it 49 cents like in 1973 like when the Mac was introduced? Naw, that's extreme. Costs have gone up since then...but just for business... Maybe they'd halve it though, considering they'd be saving millions on labor? I'm sure they would. They would still be making huge profits and surely they'd pass the payroll savings along to the rest of us. It's good business!
Alright, dedicated non-readers, stop laughing. Stupid kochsuckers really believe that shit! The price of a Big Mac would go up because up is profit. Duh. When illegals started to flood the construction business, no builder or developer advertised that he could sell you a home for tens of thousands less because, unlike his competitor, he used far cheaper immigrant labor- and passed the savings onto you! Business doesn't work that way. He charged the same for the house with cheap labor learning on the job and bought a bigger boat with the windfall profits. I don't want to make homeowners cry but, the motherfucker probably charged you more for his lowered payroll. Don't bitch. It's capitalism. You have to admire it or you're a Muslim socialist. That's the worst kind, by the way.
A rising tide and "the smart ones" are in leaky boats trying to sink the little boats still afloat. That's your free market. Well, that's the one you get.
The approved hike in Illinois is $10. This is a figure that Rauner feels will kill business. Every business in Illinois, when they put their business plan together, evidently didn't figure payroll. Oops! Hey- you make mistakes too! It happens. Ten bucks an hour!? Why did billionaire Bruce Rauner even ever go into business when he could get a $10 handout for an easy job at McDonalds? It's bad enough that business has to pay people, which cuts deeply into profits, now they have to pay them more! Ex-governor Quinn may well compound things by pushing the minimum hike thing through a democrat- controlled state legislature. Well, it is what the people voted for. Say all you want about this recent republican tidal wave of a tsunami mandate but, the people in those five states did vote for it. That's supposed to count for something, right?
Well, this Ferrerman has written quite a bit about the minimum and dedicated non-readers know where I stand. Let's make this about the dipshits that are against the minimum.
A lot of the people on the aforementioned site said in so many words that they would quit their current job and seek a minimum wage position if that $15 wage transpired. Evidently, it would be a step up from their current rate. Yikes. Yet they are still against the raise, even though a rising tide tends to lift all boats. Are they afraid of success? Getting into a higher tax bracket? Fearful that they'd just blow it all buying new appliances or putting the kids through school? People on welfare, as we know from the Foxy Party news, get lobster for dinner, and free phones and computers from the government. They could go that route but, they have pride. Maybe they are happy where they are? Why mess with the status quo?
Some of the most brilliant minds on the threads and on Facebook have pointed out the folly of paying fast food workers what liberals call "a living wage". Why, because we'd be paying $20 for a Big Mac, they exclaim. Well, no. Australia has a minimum of @ $16 an hour and they pay 40 cents more for a Big Mac than we do. Now maybe that in "wallabies" or whatever they call their money and the 40 cents there is like $30 dollars here. I mean, a buck's a buck, right? Maybe their cents are different?
These same brilliant minds think that there should be no minimum wage at all. That the free market should set wages- not the gubmint. They also believe that, though you might less, you could make more. It's up to the free market- not the gubmint. Of course they want to pay you more! They just want it to be their idea, not the gubmint.
Well, what if there was no minimum? How would it effect the price of a Big Mac, in a Big Mac economy if there were were no minimum and the loser behind the counter was paid $2 an hour as the free market dictated? They would cut the price of that burger to reflect the HUGE savings in payroll, right? Maybe make it 49 cents like in 1973 like when the Mac was introduced? Naw, that's extreme. Costs have gone up since then...but just for business... Maybe they'd halve it though, considering they'd be saving millions on labor? I'm sure they would. They would still be making huge profits and surely they'd pass the payroll savings along to the rest of us. It's good business!
Alright, dedicated non-readers, stop laughing. Stupid kochsuckers really believe that shit! The price of a Big Mac would go up because up is profit. Duh. When illegals started to flood the construction business, no builder or developer advertised that he could sell you a home for tens of thousands less because, unlike his competitor, he used far cheaper immigrant labor- and passed the savings onto you! Business doesn't work that way. He charged the same for the house with cheap labor learning on the job and bought a bigger boat with the windfall profits. I don't want to make homeowners cry but, the motherfucker probably charged you more for his lowered payroll. Don't bitch. It's capitalism. You have to admire it or you're a Muslim socialist. That's the worst kind, by the way.
A rising tide and "the smart ones" are in leaky boats trying to sink the little boats still afloat. That's your free market. Well, that's the one you get.
Thursday, November 6, 2014
Chuck and Buck
First you cry...
Well, no, not really. I was a little pissed at my fellow Americans this morning. What were these people thinking, making Chuck Todd look smart?
Chuck is a pretty smart guy and he knows more about the ins and outs of politics than I do so, I'll give him that. He looks like a woodchuck though. Maybe that's why I don't like him much. It can't be that he's always talking bad about the democrats because I have been around this game long enough to know that, as a talking head, he has to keep people interested and watching. It's no different than sports analysis. You've got to keep people watching. It's good for your ratings and for the companies ratings. It's like Joe Buck doing football or baseball. When the game is over, win or lose, fans of both teams will tell you that Buck favored the other team. When one team is down by 3 touchdowns in the fourth quarter with ten minutes left, but breaks out a long run, it's his job to get excited to get you excited. Sports is all about what could happen as much as what is happening. So is politics. Chuck and Buck have to keep you from changing the channel. It's that simple.
The rest of the population is a bit more complex. These people do have agendas. Thousands of them. Millions of them are idiots. You might already know this if you have been anywhere on the internet or out in public. Lot's of jerks on the roads, offices, TV, radio- everywhere. Many of them vote. And as Chuck Todd (and others) repeatedly reminded us, republicans tend to vote in mid-terms because their people push them to vote. Historically many democrats vote only in presidential races. Doesn't it seem like, well, those are the one's that count?
The mid term elections are important though because these are the clowns that actually make the laws. They also have the ability to obstruct law-making which is what they do best, of late. This congress had an 8% approval rating yet 96% of those in this race were reelected. Now, how the fuck does that happen? Well, people are stupid.
We are looking at two more years of gridlock. When the tea part swept in with all their anti-hope and anti-change, start the insanity in 2010, a lot of those weirdos were gone by '12- a presidential election cycle. Now they come back in in this off year and you can begin to see the pattern. They haven't gotten anything really done in the past six years because their goal was making Obama but a one term president. This, of course, goes on in his second term. Now they hope to ruin his legacy. That's not going to happen either. Many of these people were deeming him "the worst president since Carter!" and wanting to impeach him...moments after his first election, before he had taken the oath of office. History is not kind to assholes who *think* like that. When you make a statement like that about someone, they can't help but live up to your expectations in the little world inside your head, no matter what they do in the real world.
So, crazy people *won*. What does it mean? Not much. Tea party republicans will not carry this alleged tsunami into the White House in '16. There will be no FEMA concentration camps for democrats- "'cause that's what they were gonna do to US...." no end to taxes or open season on immigrants. Barack Obama holds the power of veto and over-riding that takes 2/3 of both houses so, probably nothing too crazy is going to get that far. Crazy people won like fans think they won when their team beat the other team. You're still not invited into the locker room to shower with the team. You just get to buy the over-priced jerseys. Buck and Chuck know that. More people should.
Well, no, not really. I was a little pissed at my fellow Americans this morning. What were these people thinking, making Chuck Todd look smart?
Chuck is a pretty smart guy and he knows more about the ins and outs of politics than I do so, I'll give him that. He looks like a woodchuck though. Maybe that's why I don't like him much. It can't be that he's always talking bad about the democrats because I have been around this game long enough to know that, as a talking head, he has to keep people interested and watching. It's no different than sports analysis. You've got to keep people watching. It's good for your ratings and for the companies ratings. It's like Joe Buck doing football or baseball. When the game is over, win or lose, fans of both teams will tell you that Buck favored the other team. When one team is down by 3 touchdowns in the fourth quarter with ten minutes left, but breaks out a long run, it's his job to get excited to get you excited. Sports is all about what could happen as much as what is happening. So is politics. Chuck and Buck have to keep you from changing the channel. It's that simple.
The rest of the population is a bit more complex. These people do have agendas. Thousands of them. Millions of them are idiots. You might already know this if you have been anywhere on the internet or out in public. Lot's of jerks on the roads, offices, TV, radio- everywhere. Many of them vote. And as Chuck Todd (and others) repeatedly reminded us, republicans tend to vote in mid-terms because their people push them to vote. Historically many democrats vote only in presidential races. Doesn't it seem like, well, those are the one's that count?
The mid term elections are important though because these are the clowns that actually make the laws. They also have the ability to obstruct law-making which is what they do best, of late. This congress had an 8% approval rating yet 96% of those in this race were reelected. Now, how the fuck does that happen? Well, people are stupid.
We are looking at two more years of gridlock. When the tea part swept in with all their anti-hope and anti-change, start the insanity in 2010, a lot of those weirdos were gone by '12- a presidential election cycle. Now they come back in in this off year and you can begin to see the pattern. They haven't gotten anything really done in the past six years because their goal was making Obama but a one term president. This, of course, goes on in his second term. Now they hope to ruin his legacy. That's not going to happen either. Many of these people were deeming him "the worst president since Carter!" and wanting to impeach him...moments after his first election, before he had taken the oath of office. History is not kind to assholes who *think* like that. When you make a statement like that about someone, they can't help but live up to your expectations in the little world inside your head, no matter what they do in the real world.
So, crazy people *won*. What does it mean? Not much. Tea party republicans will not carry this alleged tsunami into the White House in '16. There will be no FEMA concentration camps for democrats- "'cause that's what they were gonna do to US...." no end to taxes or open season on immigrants. Barack Obama holds the power of veto and over-riding that takes 2/3 of both houses so, probably nothing too crazy is going to get that far. Crazy people won like fans think they won when their team beat the other team. You're still not invited into the locker room to shower with the team. You just get to buy the over-priced jerseys. Buck and Chuck know that. More people should.
Saturday, November 1, 2014
How YOU doin'?
There is a video making the internet rounds where an attractive woman walks around NYC while a camera surreptitiously records the visual and oral responses of the men she encounters.The video is called: "Ten Hours Of Walking in NYC As A Woman." It does a great job of illustrating what it can be like for a woman in the big city and gives a pretty good indication of what hopeless jerks most men are and why it's so hard to get laid when you are an idiot. The woman in the video is silent throughout so it's just her walking and all the fellas doing the talking.
I don't think that for most men that catcalling is a means to the seductive end. I see it as a backlash to the lifetime of cumulative rejection that most men experience. Most guys know that the attractive woman passing by likely has zero interest in them. No chatting. No quickie in the alley. No church and children, 'til death do we part. So, with all that off the table, why not compliment a woman on dat booty?
I worked with a guy named Earl who was like that. He was a waiter and I was a bartender at the PCNO club in New Orleans and we were between shifts and asked the boss if we could go around the corner and catch a couple beers. In New Orleans this is perfectly acceptable behavior. We had the bosses blessing and his admonition to not get drunk.
Earl wasn't a catcaller but, I learned quickly that he had a very annoying, stupid habit of stopping every reasonably attractive woman on the street to chat her up. He'd compliment them on their blouse or their eyes and yada-yada and I quickly determined that it could take the rest of the fucking day to get around the corner if I waited on Earl so, I abandoned him. He knew where to find me. And when he did, I asked him if his technique had ever worked.
No, it had not. However, he added, if it were to work one time in a thousand, it would be worth it!
Sheesh, them's some odds.... And yes, he said, even if that one success was a rather unattractive woman it would still be victory.
Earl was about my young age and also had a full beard as I did at the time. I remember a few times chatting up new waitresses at the Club and having them stop me and ask if I were Earl or Ferrerman. I'd introduce my Ferrerman self and they would smile. There was a big difference between myself and Earl and after that, I shaved off the beard to make that difference even more noticeable.
It wasn't that I was more successful with the ladies than Earl (of course, I was) than it was about our different approaches to women, regardless of the circumstances. Guys like Earl- guys on the streets of NYC- have a volume-Volume-VOLUME approach to women and it shows. In a sense, they really let themselves be picked by the woman in that they throw themselves out there like buckshot, hoping one pellet hits the target. When it does- BULLS EYE! It's really the lottery approach in that you understand you can't win if you don't play so, you buy lots and lots of tickets. And maybe you match three numbers and *win* $3. I've known Greeks and other eastern Europeans who feel that they are just not doing their jobs as men unless they proposition every woman they meet. They think they are being charming and, if it works...OOPA!
So, there is an element of nothing ventured, nothing gained but I think it's more of a lack of respect for women in general and their own manhood in particular. There's a lot of fear at work there and it's being passed on to random women on the street. These are fellas who have given up. They just don't know it yet.
The last time I saw Earl, girlfriend and I were on the streetcar and Earl and his buddy were with their dates. Earl acknowledged us but looked as if he wished he were anywhere else in the world. His friend was with a lovely, age-appropriate young lady and Earl seemed to be with her mom. I guessed his approach had finally worked.
I don't think that for most men that catcalling is a means to the seductive end. I see it as a backlash to the lifetime of cumulative rejection that most men experience. Most guys know that the attractive woman passing by likely has zero interest in them. No chatting. No quickie in the alley. No church and children, 'til death do we part. So, with all that off the table, why not compliment a woman on dat booty?
I worked with a guy named Earl who was like that. He was a waiter and I was a bartender at the PCNO club in New Orleans and we were between shifts and asked the boss if we could go around the corner and catch a couple beers. In New Orleans this is perfectly acceptable behavior. We had the bosses blessing and his admonition to not get drunk.
Earl wasn't a catcaller but, I learned quickly that he had a very annoying, stupid habit of stopping every reasonably attractive woman on the street to chat her up. He'd compliment them on their blouse or their eyes and yada-yada and I quickly determined that it could take the rest of the fucking day to get around the corner if I waited on Earl so, I abandoned him. He knew where to find me. And when he did, I asked him if his technique had ever worked.
No, it had not. However, he added, if it were to work one time in a thousand, it would be worth it!
Sheesh, them's some odds.... And yes, he said, even if that one success was a rather unattractive woman it would still be victory.
Earl was about my young age and also had a full beard as I did at the time. I remember a few times chatting up new waitresses at the Club and having them stop me and ask if I were Earl or Ferrerman. I'd introduce my Ferrerman self and they would smile. There was a big difference between myself and Earl and after that, I shaved off the beard to make that difference even more noticeable.
It wasn't that I was more successful with the ladies than Earl (of course, I was) than it was about our different approaches to women, regardless of the circumstances. Guys like Earl- guys on the streets of NYC- have a volume-Volume-VOLUME approach to women and it shows. In a sense, they really let themselves be picked by the woman in that they throw themselves out there like buckshot, hoping one pellet hits the target. When it does- BULLS EYE! It's really the lottery approach in that you understand you can't win if you don't play so, you buy lots and lots of tickets. And maybe you match three numbers and *win* $3. I've known Greeks and other eastern Europeans who feel that they are just not doing their jobs as men unless they proposition every woman they meet. They think they are being charming and, if it works...OOPA!
So, there is an element of nothing ventured, nothing gained but I think it's more of a lack of respect for women in general and their own manhood in particular. There's a lot of fear at work there and it's being passed on to random women on the street. These are fellas who have given up. They just don't know it yet.
The last time I saw Earl, girlfriend and I were on the streetcar and Earl and his buddy were with their dates. Earl acknowledged us but looked as if he wished he were anywhere else in the world. His friend was with a lovely, age-appropriate young lady and Earl seemed to be with her mom. I guessed his approach had finally worked.
Thursday, October 30, 2014
Ferrerman's Business Advice
Any idiot knows, business doesn't hire people unless they have extra money laying about because of tax credits! People, this is Fiscal Conservatism 101! Ever watch "Bar Rescue" on Spike TV? Each week, Jon Taffer, 'rescues' a bar/restaurant that is failing because of taxes and government regulation- the only reasons that businesses fail in a democrat controlled America. Jon steps in, removes tax and regulate democrats from office and the people with the pirate-themed restaurant become the self-made millionaires that our founders intended. It's a lovely, familiar story!
Some 30 years after Reagan created trickle-down, voodoo economics, republicans still believe it works. Some slow folks might be waiting for it to work but republicans do believe it does.
It doesn't. I don't get how anyone with even the most basic of business sense can't see how fucking stupid trickle down is. The state of Kansas recently went through this when republican governor, Sam Brownback, cut taxes on the wealthy and eliminated small business taxes. And he cut spending. Try this at home. Quit your good job and get a lower paying one so you bring in less revenue. Offset this by spending less on the kids. You might not see immediate results but, don't despair....
Kansas is in big trouble. As you might expect, taking in some $685 million less in revenue can hurt the budget. Well, republicans always figure that you simply offset that by cutting spending. Take in less, spend less. Of course, you cut spending on things like welfare rather than on the bloated military budget. A country like ours makes money on wars and fighting. Feeding poor people just squaders money. That's the thinking.
Stupid people from Topix threads all the way to the House of Representatives also firmly believe that a raise in the minimum wage would destroy America. They fear $20 Big Macs so, they fight any attempts to raise the minimum whether it's the $10.10 the White House proposes or the $15 per hour that many labor groups tout. Most economists figure that, if the federal minimum had kept pace with the cost of living, it would be $15 per hour. I've also heard $21 but, regardless, the minimum itself is too much for many teapublicans. They'd like it eradicated. Let the free market dictate the minimum, they say. If the free market says $2 an hour, so be it! It could say $20, or $200! In fact, under their thumb- I mean- system, you would be free to ASK for $200 an hour. You might not get it but, if the free market were so inclined, you maybe could....
Well, you can ask for any wage you want now. You just can't be paid less than $7.25 an hour. The minimum wage is a safeguard that was established by FDR because he knew how evil and greedy rich people were, having grown up with them. In 1938 the minimum (thanks to him) was 25 cents. Seventy six years later it's only $7 more and millionaire congressmen who work for billionaires think that is "too much". They think people would do better with less.
Well, OK- they don't actually think that. They want you to think that. They are not that stupid but they sure do believe that you are. And they want you to regurgitate their fiscal policies on the internet and support them in the voting booth. Stupidity unites non-attorney spokespersons with disabled muffler monkeys, at least on the internet.
Raising the minimum $3 can mean more people getting off of welfare. Not as many as $15 would but it's a step in the right direction. As it stands now, people can work at Walmart- the nation's largest employer, and still need welfare from the government to survive. Our tax dollars shore up the Walton family's payroll department. That's very fucked up. True conservatives (I think you and I qualify) should be literally up in arms over this alone. But, *actual* conservatives aren't. They figure that you get rid of the minimum and also get rid of welfare- you quit coddling people- and then they are forced to pull themselves up by their bootstraps, go to college and ($100,000 later) take advantage of the tax exempt status of small business and open up a Scotchtape store. Or a pirate bar. Why not? Right away, your labor costs will be whatever you feel like paying. No taxes and no payroll equals you equaling Exxon or General Electric inside of a year! You'll easily afford Big Mac's when they go up in price- not because of rising labor costs but because of the old business saw: "If you charge more, you fucking make more!" That, is Business 101. That's a major reason why prices go up. We learned that as kids when the candy bar got smaller AND the price went up.
It isn't just the minimum. It's the convoluted, *thinking* associated with trickle down. Common sense says that if you give $100 to a poor man, he spends it. It goes to rent, food, toys for the kids- it gets spent. Give $100 to a rich guy and he pockets it or maybe lights a Cuban cigar with it. He doesn't spend it. He doesn't have to. A raise in the minimum isn't welfare though the idiots in the threads equate it with that. I don't think these people refuse raises at work and many of them post on Topix all fucking day so, who is zooming whom when they say the guy behind the counter at McDonald's isn't *worth* his pay?
1.6 million people currently work at the rate of the Federal minimum. Do the math on a $3 an hour raise for all of them and base it on a 40 week instead of the 60 these people probably work- if they're 'lucky'. Whatever hours you choose, every fucking penny of that goes back into the economy. Not one cent would go to a bank in the Caymans. It would all go back into America. Why can't stupid people see this? Save money on taxes (welfare) by employers paying their employees rather than we the people picking up part of the tab. I don't know-maybe that's not capitalism? Maybe my Muslim-socialist-commie liberal self doesn't understand capitalism?
Let's look at it with a perspective that republicans can relate to- their own: If you can't afford to pay your employees a living wage, go to college and learn a better business model. Business success was not intended to only be successful at one level of pay throughout a businesses career. If you have been in business for several years and are still paying the low, minimum wage, you have failed. Get out of the business world basement and start a real business! It's not society's job to coddle you!
Some 30 years after Reagan created trickle-down, voodoo economics, republicans still believe it works. Some slow folks might be waiting for it to work but republicans do believe it does.
It doesn't. I don't get how anyone with even the most basic of business sense can't see how fucking stupid trickle down is. The state of Kansas recently went through this when republican governor, Sam Brownback, cut taxes on the wealthy and eliminated small business taxes. And he cut spending. Try this at home. Quit your good job and get a lower paying one so you bring in less revenue. Offset this by spending less on the kids. You might not see immediate results but, don't despair....
Kansas is in big trouble. As you might expect, taking in some $685 million less in revenue can hurt the budget. Well, republicans always figure that you simply offset that by cutting spending. Take in less, spend less. Of course, you cut spending on things like welfare rather than on the bloated military budget. A country like ours makes money on wars and fighting. Feeding poor people just squaders money. That's the thinking.
Stupid people from Topix threads all the way to the House of Representatives also firmly believe that a raise in the minimum wage would destroy America. They fear $20 Big Macs so, they fight any attempts to raise the minimum whether it's the $10.10 the White House proposes or the $15 per hour that many labor groups tout. Most economists figure that, if the federal minimum had kept pace with the cost of living, it would be $15 per hour. I've also heard $21 but, regardless, the minimum itself is too much for many teapublicans. They'd like it eradicated. Let the free market dictate the minimum, they say. If the free market says $2 an hour, so be it! It could say $20, or $200! In fact, under their thumb- I mean- system, you would be free to ASK for $200 an hour. You might not get it but, if the free market were so inclined, you maybe could....
Well, you can ask for any wage you want now. You just can't be paid less than $7.25 an hour. The minimum wage is a safeguard that was established by FDR because he knew how evil and greedy rich people were, having grown up with them. In 1938 the minimum (thanks to him) was 25 cents. Seventy six years later it's only $7 more and millionaire congressmen who work for billionaires think that is "too much". They think people would do better with less.
Well, OK- they don't actually think that. They want you to think that. They are not that stupid but they sure do believe that you are. And they want you to regurgitate their fiscal policies on the internet and support them in the voting booth. Stupidity unites non-attorney spokespersons with disabled muffler monkeys, at least on the internet.
Raising the minimum $3 can mean more people getting off of welfare. Not as many as $15 would but it's a step in the right direction. As it stands now, people can work at Walmart- the nation's largest employer, and still need welfare from the government to survive. Our tax dollars shore up the Walton family's payroll department. That's very fucked up. True conservatives (I think you and I qualify) should be literally up in arms over this alone. But, *actual* conservatives aren't. They figure that you get rid of the minimum and also get rid of welfare- you quit coddling people- and then they are forced to pull themselves up by their bootstraps, go to college and ($100,000 later) take advantage of the tax exempt status of small business and open up a Scotchtape store. Or a pirate bar. Why not? Right away, your labor costs will be whatever you feel like paying. No taxes and no payroll equals you equaling Exxon or General Electric inside of a year! You'll easily afford Big Mac's when they go up in price- not because of rising labor costs but because of the old business saw: "If you charge more, you fucking make more!" That, is Business 101. That's a major reason why prices go up. We learned that as kids when the candy bar got smaller AND the price went up.
It isn't just the minimum. It's the convoluted, *thinking* associated with trickle down. Common sense says that if you give $100 to a poor man, he spends it. It goes to rent, food, toys for the kids- it gets spent. Give $100 to a rich guy and he pockets it or maybe lights a Cuban cigar with it. He doesn't spend it. He doesn't have to. A raise in the minimum isn't welfare though the idiots in the threads equate it with that. I don't think these people refuse raises at work and many of them post on Topix all fucking day so, who is zooming whom when they say the guy behind the counter at McDonald's isn't *worth* his pay?
1.6 million people currently work at the rate of the Federal minimum. Do the math on a $3 an hour raise for all of them and base it on a 40 week instead of the 60 these people probably work- if they're 'lucky'. Whatever hours you choose, every fucking penny of that goes back into the economy. Not one cent would go to a bank in the Caymans. It would all go back into America. Why can't stupid people see this? Save money on taxes (welfare) by employers paying their employees rather than we the people picking up part of the tab. I don't know-maybe that's not capitalism? Maybe my Muslim-socialist-commie liberal self doesn't understand capitalism?
Let's look at it with a perspective that republicans can relate to- their own: If you can't afford to pay your employees a living wage, go to college and learn a better business model. Business success was not intended to only be successful at one level of pay throughout a businesses career. If you have been in business for several years and are still paying the low, minimum wage, you have failed. Get out of the business world basement and start a real business! It's not society's job to coddle you!
Tuesday, October 28, 2014
By Definition...
Once upon a time I did work for a very disagreeable woman who had a retarded stepson. I mention he was retarded because she rarely failed to mention it herself.
"I'm taking my retarded stepson to the store. My retarded stepson needs a new pair of pants"
Anytime she referred to him, it was as her "retarded stepson"and she spoke of him a lot. She was an awful woman on many levels. I heard her talking to her friend on the phone about how she couldn't wait until (her husband) died so she could move. I didn't think I was hearing a murder plot, just the musings of a tragically blunt- what's the word? Her husband probably did not fear death either.
She actually introduced her retarded step son to me in this way: "Ferrerman, this is my retarded stepson." I had to ask him his name. Turned out it was Jimmy. That mystery was solved. As you might guess, he was a sweet, happy kid, about 18 years old. I think he had no idea how awful his stepmonster was. I hope not.
She defined that boy every time she spoke about him. Why do people do that? I worked with a guy who always referred to his "black son" which was the only son he had and, being as how Timmy was a redheaded, redneck, crackhead and the kid was clearly not sprung from his loins, it seemed unnecessarily descriptive. Frankly, given Tim's redneck-ness, I was rather proud of him for accepting the boy as his son. Well, as proud as I could be of an asshole we all referred to as "Crackhead Tim". He began dating the boys mother right before she gave birth and he specifically asked her if there was any chance the baby daddy might be black. She said no. She was wrong about that. Last I knew they were all still together and, I imagine he's still referring to the kid as "my black son".
Sublime, the imaginary Lifestyles and Entertainment editor of Topix, frequently talks about his "autistic son" to differentiate from his two non-autistic boys. Why? Why share with strangers that you have an autistic child when you are the sort of creep that criticizes other people's children, as Sublime does? It's not clear whether Sublime is as horrible in real life as he portrays himself on the threads and there is no way of knowing if one of his kids is actually autistic or if he is just portrayed as one in the threads. It might all be a bait like the trashy tales he tells of his having sex with his wife. That nonsense might be real, I don't know. It's hard to say if he's bragging or simply laying this all out there to be mocked for being such a douchebag.You re supposed to have sex with your spouse. You are under no obligation to discuss it with strangers though. People embellish on the threads to create controversy because...because...why not? I don't know why it is important for people like that to come out with tid bits like that or things involving their children.
I think when we define our loved ones like this, we say more about ourselves than we do them.
"I'm taking my retarded stepson to the store. My retarded stepson needs a new pair of pants"
Anytime she referred to him, it was as her "retarded stepson"and she spoke of him a lot. She was an awful woman on many levels. I heard her talking to her friend on the phone about how she couldn't wait until (her husband) died so she could move. I didn't think I was hearing a murder plot, just the musings of a tragically blunt- what's the word? Her husband probably did not fear death either.
She actually introduced her retarded step son to me in this way: "Ferrerman, this is my retarded stepson." I had to ask him his name. Turned out it was Jimmy. That mystery was solved. As you might guess, he was a sweet, happy kid, about 18 years old. I think he had no idea how awful his stepmonster was. I hope not.
She defined that boy every time she spoke about him. Why do people do that? I worked with a guy who always referred to his "black son" which was the only son he had and, being as how Timmy was a redheaded, redneck, crackhead and the kid was clearly not sprung from his loins, it seemed unnecessarily descriptive. Frankly, given Tim's redneck-ness, I was rather proud of him for accepting the boy as his son. Well, as proud as I could be of an asshole we all referred to as "Crackhead Tim". He began dating the boys mother right before she gave birth and he specifically asked her if there was any chance the baby daddy might be black. She said no. She was wrong about that. Last I knew they were all still together and, I imagine he's still referring to the kid as "my black son".
Sublime, the imaginary Lifestyles and Entertainment editor of Topix, frequently talks about his "autistic son" to differentiate from his two non-autistic boys. Why? Why share with strangers that you have an autistic child when you are the sort of creep that criticizes other people's children, as Sublime does? It's not clear whether Sublime is as horrible in real life as he portrays himself on the threads and there is no way of knowing if one of his kids is actually autistic or if he is just portrayed as one in the threads. It might all be a bait like the trashy tales he tells of his having sex with his wife. That nonsense might be real, I don't know. It's hard to say if he's bragging or simply laying this all out there to be mocked for being such a douchebag.You re supposed to have sex with your spouse. You are under no obligation to discuss it with strangers though. People embellish on the threads to create controversy because...because...why not? I don't know why it is important for people like that to come out with tid bits like that or things involving their children.
I think when we define our loved ones like this, we say more about ourselves than we do them.
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