Afghanistan Bandstand

The Afghani War continues as Congress votes to provide more funding even after the WikiLeaks documents show what a fiasco this is. General Motors has killed more people than Al-Qaeda. Should we bomb the car companies mercilessly? Of course not.

We are killing large numbers of innocent civilians, including women and children, and also sowing untold misery, as well as flushing our future down the drain by massively wasting money. The whole thing is basically a gangland vendetta. Good idea? If anybody thinks so, I wish they would please provide a definition of "good idea" because this mess looks like monumental stupidity.

Tolls and Trolls

People have been whining a lot about toll roads lately. One of the latest whines involves a certain local road where ONLY ONE LANE would be tolled, and it has been pointed out that not only would this lane be added, but others would benefit from the decreased traffic due to those who choose to pay the toll. Some people have been suggesting that we start charging bicyclists also, especially since bicycles are a menace because they crash into pedestrians.

Yes, maybe we should charge a shoe tax also, and have all shoes inspected, for pedestrians? Or simply put toll booths on everybody's front doors to go outside? But then, shouldn't we all be charged to go from the living room to the kitchen also? Or to get up at night to pee?

Where are the news reports about all of these medical victims of bicycles? Where are the headlines about these rampant mobs of killer bicycles who are mowing down pedestrians so heavily that it is burdening our society? If this is such a big factor in our fiscal insolvency, we should take immediate action by all means. But, ummm...how many people did General Motors' cars kill last year (sorry...fill in Toyota, Hyundai, Mazda, Fiat or the death machine maker of your choosing...not trying to make it "evening in America")? And didn't they know when they made the cars that a certain number would die from using their product as intended?

All kidding aside, the fact is that cars heavily use fossil fuels, pollute, congest our traffic and do not anywhere near pay for their usage. They are heavily subsidized in our society to the exclusion of good public transportation. It is no wonder nobody wants to ride the train or a bicycle, when auto drivers can have the public paying for their automobile usage and pollution. Why pay for it if you can get someone else to?

In Poland, there are bus stops in every small town (imagine if you could take a bus from Austin to Dripping Springs or Elgin at any time), and they run almost all the time (though the night buses, from 11 pm to 5 am, only run every half hour). The city buses coordinate with the regional buses and the national buses. People who look like our parents and grandparents are routinely riding bicycles. There are bike lanes (usually made with bricks or tile) in many small towns. C'mon, if they can get this kind of public transportation going in a relatively poor European nation, surely we could do it here. We have poor people in our suburbs and exurbs who are virtually landlocked, and this can't be helping the employment situation (of course, there are no jobs for them to take right now, but that's a separate issue). The only excuse we have for not setting up good, usable public transportation, and setting up a regulatory structure to promote it over car use, is raw selfishness.

So if your blood pressure, cholesterol and weight go up because you rode your car instead of walking, taking the bus/train or riding a bike (keep in mind I'm talking about the able-bodied here, which probably comprise a majority of the drivers), or your lungs got congested from all the car pollution, don't expect medical care, because that's going down the tubes too in our lopsided, "too-rich-to-support-the-poor-and-middle-class" society. Maybe if there is a toll on some of our roads, ya might make a healthier choice, not only for the rest of us, but for yourself.

The Republican Economic Recovery Plan

The Republican economic plan seems to be the same as their health care plan, "Die Quickly." That surely must be what is behind their latest maneuver to kill any further extensions of unemployment in this era where so many cannot find employment.

But seriously, is it a good thing to have more calls to suicide hot lines?

Hostile Corporate Takeover

Has the Supreme Court dashed all hopes of public financing for elections? It looks like Arizona's gubernatorial race is unalterably messed with, but we'll have to see what happens in the Supremes' next term to see the full impact of this order.

We already pretty much have corporations holding public office. I mean, to win public office, you have to have a lot of ill-gained money from the exploitation of huge numbers of people, a large organization comprised of power-hungry drones advertising a product using deception, and an enormous amount of marketing based on manipulation of people's emotions. Bingo. Maybe as a first step toward acknowledging this, we should rename the Gulf of Mexico the Toilet of British Petroleum.

Housing Prices and Median Income

Housing prices still have room to fall, if you look at median price/median income ratios. Here is one case study of a very old house, showing that though there were ups and downs, bubbles and dips, the price only doubled from the 1600s to now.

The "Freegan" Movement

"Freegans" eschew the use of money and simply move into abandoned properties, refusing to pay for rent. And in some cases, the authorities and the neighbors are on their side. According to the Wikipedia article on "Freeganism," it is estimated that there are about one billion squatters worldwide. And, according to this article, the United Nations says our leftovers could satisfy every single empty stomach in Africa.

Collapsitarians

Maybe there's something to be said about planning your life around the collapse of our society.

More Insurance Blues and Hassles

It seems to be OK to hassle you to make you prove whether the dependents on your insurance are really eligible, even though it would only catch a small number of people who are ineligible.

BP's Crime Scene

“The government is letting BP clean up their own crime scene. On TV cop shows, they don’t do that.”--David Pettit, a senior lawyer with Natural Resources Defense Council.

But then again, what Texaco did to Ecuador or what Shell did to Nigeria is just as bad as what BP did to the Gulf of Mexico...

Call BP at home: Here are the home phone numbers of some of their executives, they worked yesterday. Douglas J. Suttles, BP Exec: 832 437-2273 and 832 437-2273. Per another BP exec, Randy Prescott: "Louisiana isn't the only place that has shrimp." Randy's office number: 713-323-4093.

Enemy Combatants?

Why are BP officials not considered "enemy combatants"? Why is Tony Hayward not in Guantanamo? Oh, yeah, because we closed it down. Umm...NOT.

Tony Hayward pulls in about 3 million British Pounds a year. What's that, about 5 million bucks? So about every minute that he is working, while his oil is fouling the Gulf of Mexico, about thirty bucks are fouling his pockets.

Let Someone Else Choose Your Senator

So the Tea Party is trying to repeal the seventeenth amendment now. You know, the one that allowed people to vote directly for their senators. Whud up? Does the Tea Party really want to be where the Reform Party is now? Or the Bull Moose Party? If so, go for it.

Pay-Free Mortgages?

Why pay your mortgage? The company that is asserting the right to collect on it probably sold it to somebody else who chopped it into bits and has no direct proof that they have any right to collect your payment. Who's to say that they really have the note?

I Definitely Don't Miss You

‎"Miss me yet?" Hell no. Can you go farther away? Say, Pitcairn? Or maybe Midway? Take your Dick with you. There would be no prosecution...we are forgiving, even for monumental fuck-ups.

Apologies in advance to the good citizens of Pitcairn Island for the suggestion. At least Midway is (technically) uninhabiited.

Or maybe they should live in a bubble at the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico.

Libertarianism = The Robber Baron Mentality of the Nineteenth Century

Libertarianism contains some of the most intellectually bankrupt and selfish ideology. Economic externalities just don't exist. If there's inequity, tough, as long as I've got mine. Most libertarians just whine about taxes, after taking advantage of many perks those taxes paid for.

Is Health Care Reform a Joke?

So we get these totally lukewarm, mind-bending, convoluted health care and financial reform laws. They don't move the cheese, they just swizzle around the bacteria growing on the cheese. And the Democrats talk about how they are the greatest thing ever, and the Republicans talk about how civilization will collapse. What is wrong with this picture?

If we could only spend as much time, energy and political will on feeding, housing, and providing medical care as we did on building big ugly concrete and steel monoliths filled with lawyers, bankers, insurance executives and accountants, this world would be a better place.

Expert Texpert, Choking Voters

So yesterday the stock market went down, and the "experts" said that one of the reasons was the House passing financial reform. And today the stock market went up, and the "experts" said it was due to the Senate passing financial reform. Do the "experts" really know their asses from their elbows?

I mean, weren't the "experts" in charge of the housing bubble, the derivatives debacle, the faulty engineering behind the BP oil spill, and every war we've ever been in? Methinks maybe your average transvestite junkie would do a better job running things.

Maybe we should be appointing welders from Peoria to high-level positions rather than eggheads from the Ivy Leagues. That having been said, there's nothing wrong with having people who actually have solutions run things. But the "solutions" all seem so corrupted by money, and the people in charge seem to be just well-connected prostitutes.

The Tea Party Fireworks Show

Rand Paul is going to self-destruct. Like sweaty dynamite. I don't think the Tea Party will really make a difference in too many elections. They are internally inconsistent (they mostly have no idea what they stand for other than anger), intellectually bankrupt, and not at all cohesive.

Razing Arizona

Now they are purging teachers with accents in Arizona? What the hell is going on there? Are they trying to take their state apart? First the Capitol and other government buildings get sold to corporations, then there's the whole insane illegal alien thing, and now this?

It used to be Mississippi that made Texas look bad, but it looks like we have a new contender.

Baby, You Can Drive My Car

So somebody has figured out how to hack into cars' computers. “We demonstrate the ability to adversarially control a wide range of automotive functions and completely ignore driver input — including disabling the brakes, selectively braking individual wheels on demand, stopping the engine, and so on.” How would you like to be driving down a winding road on the coast of California, and find that your brakes are being disabled by a hacker in Bulgaria?

Birth Management

Hawaii is getting so many requests for Obama's birth certificate that they set up an FAQ page for questions about Obama's birth.