Being Yoda

" In this last of meeting places
We grope together
And avoid speech
gathered on this beach of the tumid river"-Eliot

"Don't spoil the party, but here's the truth:We have squandered our planet's resources, including air and water, as though there were no tomorrow, so now there isn't going to be one."-Vonnegut, from "man without a country"


What passes for the Majority Party in our country has Caved, once again. Democrats, as the saying goes, have once again "Snatched Defeat from the Jaws of Victory". "Tax Cuts", for the Super Rich, will not be repealed...because they're "scared of the GOP adslaught ".

Let me hear no more about the Liberal Agenda...how the Socialists are Taking Over... how the Right is a Persecuted Minority.
The Sith have Won.

"Into Exile I will go"...Yoda.

The Jedi have been slain.

I expect the Right to gain both houses of Congress, in around 39 days.
They will then launch a Crusade...investigating Obama's Whitehouse for all manner of stupid, nonexistant inannities..."Shutting Down" the Gooberment, so nothing gets done...Social Security, Medicare, Va Checks all cease flowing...let alone "Welfare"...Unemployment....all of that will stop...and the effects will be to destroy what's left of the Economy.Crashing the Economy will further the Sith's ends...
They will blame "Liberals"....and the Herd will swallow it.
I will be interested to see which Right Wing Crazy person gains the Whitehouse, in 2 years...likely, I'm afraid. Buzz Windrip, anyone?
Then, it's Over.

Not that it really matters...it's over, anyway...what was still questionable was How we were able to Face the Demise of Western Civilisation....with Courage and Compassion, or with Fear and Hatred.
It will be the Latter....the Democratic Party has failed.
I reckon there's something to the Conspiracy Theory that they (Dems) were on the side of the Sith, all along.
At least the Movers and Shakers.
The Real Liberals are Silent and Ignored...folks like Grayson, who should be out in front, are relegated to the rear.
Harry Ried is a Wimp...and that's likely why he's in his position.
We have been sold down the river...a simulacrum of "Opposition" to the Predations of the Right.

I sincerely Hope that I am wrong.
Even Crazy.
It would be preferable to what's ahead if I'm right.
I am in no position to Expatriate...Internal Exile will have to suffice...

The only Good I forsee is that ,at least...and finally...the Right will come out of their Closet, show themselves for what they really are...there is a possibility that regular folks will wake up....I will not hold my breath.
In talking with people, listening, I sense that the Race is Run...the Surreality has wholly replaced Reality.
The Rumors that Gardening will soon be illegal are rampant, as are many other Rumors about a Corporate Takeover of even our ability to Hunker Down.
I have dismissed such stuff, in the past, because of who was promoting it....and who was being blamed...(one worlders, Socialists,etc)...
While Gardeners are worried about this unenforcable "threat", Monsatan is busy consolidating it's Monopoly on Seed...Invisibly, even though it's being done in Broad Frakking Daylight.
that will be the Way the World Ends...Bechtel, a "small business", will gain rights to Rain Water...Monsatan will controll the Gene Sequence of Food.
Et Cetera. Among the Laws that will matter are the new 14th Amendment, which will strip regular folks of any remaining Power, and Cement Corporations into their Rightful Place as the only "Citizens" that matter.
Intellectual Property will become a big concern...Corporations with patents on Pigs will demand Tribute from Farmers.
At some point, if it all hangs together long enough, even Air will be Commodified...call me Hysterical...go on...
Expect some "Problem" with the Internet...something that will provide an excuse...a Need..to control it...

What passes for "Liberal Media" will quietly go away...GE will fear for it's ad money...and maybe even it's License.
Papers Please will spread to every corner...Internal Passports, just like East Germany and the USSR. The irony will go unnoticed.
I expect Camps for Leeches...the unemployed, the poor, the sick, the homeless...
And New Wars...some excuse will have to be found...perhaps a Scud in a bucket...only this time, there will be no smoking gun, no inconsitencies...it'll all be plausible, to a fault.
Then we'll have Loyalty Oaths...are you sufficiently American?

The seeds of this Dystopian Hell World are to be found, right now, in the rhetoric of the Right.
What the more unhinged among them accuse the liberals of doing is what, in their own Dark hearts, they want to do.


We have two years. Maybe less...

Lovecraftian Crawling Chaos...Mindless Entity.
The Machine that I'm always on about.
It's calling the shots, now.

The Right consists, wholly, of Minions.
Even those at the Top are Slaves to the Ideology....they do what they do because it Makes Sense, to them, from Inside the Machine.
Rove Believes....as does Darth Cheney...in the Logic and Veracity of their Actions....as well as the Surreality that supports them.
There may be a few, at the Very Top, in those Mythical Walnut Panelled Rooms, who know and understand what the Goal is...what sick individuals they must be...
Boner of Orange,and all the rest of the "Leadership", as near as I can tell, truly believe that their "policies" are the right things to do.
The farther down the Heirarchy one goes, the more sincere the Belief...
This is why Objective Reality, as presented by those on the "Left", doesn't penetrate...it does not compute.
This is the reason nothing, no evidence, no historical performance of said Ideology, can shake the True Believers.

I have been Smiting Trolls for a long while now...for my own amusement, mostly.
Since 911, I have endeavored to understand the Right...from Neocons to Tea People, "Libertarians" to Dominionist Xians...
The arguments against their Prescriptions for our Civilisational Ills are, on the face of it, quite simple...one needs only to look at History, and if that's not Operable, apply Logic.
An example is the Real World Effects of Reaganomics...Objectively Disastrous.
(except for the alreadt rich)
When confronted with such arguments, the Right will apply a number of Tactics.
We'll use a hypothetical "argument" regarding Economics, for Illustration....capitalism/socialism,etc.

Troll asserts that Obama and the Socialists are trying to Destroy the Economy...and that we must "return" to "sane" policies...like those of Bush,and Reagan.
I counter that those "policies" are most to blame for the current economic malaise...the wealth inequality, the stagnation of wages, the very real plight of average Americans.
Troll looks condescendingly down his nose at the poor,deluded Liberal...if only I could understand.
Reagan won the cold War, Saved the Economy, Shrunk the evil Fegov...Bush saved us from Terrists,etc etc.
I counter that none of that is the actual Truth...and look! here's all manner of Evidence...USSR collapsed under it's own weight, with no small "help" from Carter's Afghan Strategy...Fedgov, and it's "deficit", grew enormously...and the economy, for real folks, sank into a pit of Outsourcing, Wage Stagnation, Limited Mobility.
this will, usually, go on, back and forth, for a while....if it's a Good Troll.
If it's not, if the Troll in question is less experienced, for instance, Ad Hominem will be trotted out.
"All you Soft Headded Liberals want is to have everyone hanging from the teat of the Nanny State...you are all Big Government Socialists, who would have us all be Slaves...your Liberal Hippy-Dippy Utopia is Foolish and dangerous...only us Adults should make descisions"etc etc.
Usually this is the end of it...especially if I deign to pick apart, point by point, Troll Speak.
I have learned that one must define every word...counter every minor sentance...
There are Unexamined Assumptions in every statement....Liberal=Socialist, all Liberals want Big Government, all libs are Weak/stupid/evil...etc
Reagan was the Best.
Any facts, or even mere assertions to the contrary are met with derision...but without facts to back them up.
Belief is what matters, not Objective Reality.
I have found it near impossible to win any converts to Reality, so deep is the Indoctrination.
Surreality is Preferred...if a door in the Mind can be opened, by some happy chance...say, that USA has Not always been Good and Just and Rightious (see CIA,History)...their World Collapses.
Such new information is immediately Ignored...it must be a Liberal Plot(Projection, again)...it,"obviously", didn't happen.
It is much the same as trying to argue the finer points of Theology with a Born Again Xian.
No criticism can be tolerated, no opposing world view, no disagreement.
It shall be their way, or the highway.
No Compromise.
Erich Fromm had a lot to say about this..."Escape from Freedom" is one of my favorite books, and should be required reading for all who would oppose the Corpo-Feudalist Hell World that is fast approaching.
How discouraging that Objective Reality is such a Hard Sell...
Behind, or over, it all is that "Violent Parasitical Elite"....If there's any group of folks that really knows the score, it's Them.
In the Pond of our Civilisation, they are the Algal Mat, floating at the surface, sucking up all the Oxygen, hogging the Sunlight...
The scary part is that they have convinced all us fish...and copepods,diatoms,crawdads,etc...that they are not only a part of our Pond's Environment, but Essential to it's continued "Health".

There is, of late, some small Hope that Dems will keep the Senate...maybe even the house...but that last is stretching it...
Beck is on the Hot Seat, due to falling ad revenue...but his ratings are sky-high....
Dem Candidates seem to be mounting an actual Campaigne...calling out the Extremist\m of their Opponents.
Even Obama seems to have abandoned any idea of "Bipartisanship"...and is, at long last, using more forceful language to counter the Right's Crazy.
If the dems do keep the House, Senate and the White house...it will only be a Temporary Reprieve.
The End of our global Civilisation is still at hand...Resource Depletion cannot be Undone....which leads to a No-Growth Environment, Economically...in a System wholly reliant on Perpetual Growth...we have squandered the 30+ years we had to reengineer our Works...and even if the Right suffers a , much deserved, Political Defeat, the Corporate control of "Our" Gooberment is not likely to be meaningfully addressed.
There will still be Collapse...no matter who is in office....and whomever is in office, Money will still be the Real Power.
Money is concentrated at the Top....with the "Violent Parasitical Elite"....who hide behind their Hedge Funds, Think Tanks and Multinationals.

Barring some new Outrage from the Right, I'm through with this topic.
I feel like I've said my piece....and it's too damned depressing.
I've already begun limiting my "News" intake...I watch Rachel, Kieth if there's nothing on, and read Alternet.Liberal and Local.
I intend to Vote...for the first time Straight Ticket, Dem...for what it's worth.
Beyond that, I consider myself in Exile....
I need no more convincing.
If I write, at all, I'll attempt to provide solutions...as in What I'm Trying To Do.
(like the Cast Iron Hand Pump that arrived the other day.)
If anyone needs Clarification, Elucidation or Souces...e-mail me, or leave a comment.
(wishful, as it feels, mostly, like I'm shouting down a well...)

Applied Econ, Healthcare and the Long, Slow Rot of Civilisation.

Thanks to Medicaid, we were able to, finally, determine just what invisible substances in our local environment caused our Youngest Son to be sick all Fall and Winter. We had already suspised "Allergies"...but it's good to have several specific culprits...Mountain Cedar Pollen being the main one.We had to go to Kerrville, 70 miles, one way, to determine this.
"Allergy Shots", (Immunotherapy) was Indicated...and commenced.
After 5-6 trips, we finally finagled our way into our regular Doctor, in Fredericksberg, giving the weekly shots.
Now, it will be done at the Hospital in Fredericksberg.(45 miles, one way) Our Doc's Nurse was very worried about doing this to a 4 year old, due to Risk of Anaphalaxis...I completely understand her Fears..
That's not the point.
The point is, here, in mason, we have the Remains of a Hospital (my wife was actually Born there)...that has shrunk into a Clinic, with attached ER...and, now , shrunk even further to just a Clinic...with a Physician's Assistant attending...a "Real" Doctor comes around once a week.
They won't do the shots..."Liability" is suspected, but they say they don't have the resources.
The ER has been shut down.
So I get to drive an extra 80+- Miles, each week, in order to see if this treatment will alleve my Son's suffering.
I am ready and willing do do this, of course...but it equals an extra $70 spent on Gas, every month.
For all the Green Shoots rumored to be in evidence in the larger economy, and despite Good Hair Rick's insitance that Texas is, somehow, immune to the economic woes of the rest of the world...Mason has been in a de facto Depression for 10 years.
This translates into a lack of employment and opportunity....on top of my own Disability.
I can see nothing ,down the road, that will alleviate these problems.
Yet, all around me, are folks who, on the one hand, insist that "Liberals" are somehow to blame, exclusively, for these problems...and, on the other, that everything is just fine.
That these problems are our own, individual Fault...due to Sin and Laziness, I suppose.
I disagree.
These things are a result of Choices made, by individuals, and collectively...as well as by our "Leaders"...to make things this way, whether inadvertantly, or no.
On these many trips south, and back...I have noticed a lot of Road Repair.
Since I frequent this highway, I can attest that there is no Obvious reason to be tearing up the road and then reinstalling it.
In fact, the "repairs" have the immediate effect of making that portion of the road thus "repaired" much worse than it was.
This is what Job Creation looks like.
It's the kind of stimulous that was settled for, since the "Conservatives" stood up and hollered about everything else...like Real Health Reform.
The county owns, to my best knowledge, what remains of our little Clinic.They contract the operation of it out to a company, which I can't remember the name of.They are tied, somehow, to the Hospital in Llano, as well.
The operating company has changed a coupla times since I've been paying attention to such things.
I rarely go to the doctor, at all...and it is even rarer to see me in Mason's Clinic. A PA is simply not worth the $60+...I'd rather go to Fredericksberg on the rare occasion when I am sick.
Our Regular Doc has all our records, and we have a good relationship...he understands, and accepts, my quirks...a valuable quality, in itself.
Another thing that is operative in Mason...since we no longer have a functioning ER (the equipment and whatnot is still there), when one has a serious enough problem to call an ambulance, one must go to Fredericksberg or Llano.
My own trip to Fredericksberg ER, wherein I was given a ride and O2, cost more than $1000,plus XRay, Plus ER,Plus,plus,plus.
For Really Serious Cases, the default is to call a Helicopter....which will run you $30,000, and up.
The helicopter Company was Privatised several years ago, and costs have skyrocketed. They sell their own "Insurance"...and those who can afford such get preference.(hospital of choice, as well as a lower overall bill).
In Mason County, about a Third of the population is on Medicare...lots of Old Folks.
So there's not a lot of Public Agitation for fixing all this.
Those who have Power and Money and Healthcare, see no reason to give a shit about the rest of us.
To make this last bit worse, we are a very Red County...Obama's a Socialist,etc...
The Poor are Poor, due to their own lack of Initiative.
Po Folks are almost totally unrepresented in Mason.
Fully 18% of the population was below the federal Poverty Line...at least in 2000, when the last such data wre collected.
it is likely Higher, now.
23% were over 65, 24% under 18...and the rest scattered in the middle.
Eleven, out of the 900 or so, households make above $75K...most are clustered around the high 20's...Median is $26K in Town.
For the County, as a whole, the numbers are skewed higher...lotsa Ranchers,etc..Old Money...out in the country.
My point is that Mason has been in decline, economically, for 10+ years...and the Ideology of the Majority does nothing but make things worse.
It's bad enough that I can't get a hip, knee, etc...I'm likely gonna hafta get rid of our phones to continue to take my kid for his shot.
There is ,simply, nothing left to cut.

Machine, and the Anomalous Warrior-Monk

On Entertaining the Possibility of the End of the Enlightenment


At root, I am a Perennialist...I adhere to the Perennial Philosophy.
While this Philosophy was the main Engine of what we call the Enlightenment, it preceded it by thousands of years.
During that long Twighlight period, the Perennialists were, largely Underground...keeping to the Fringes of the Mundane Culture.
They realised that the Great Mass of Humanity were simply Not Ready for Thought, Freedom and Wisdom....this realisation was no cause for celebration,rather for sorrow...and patience.
The Rivals, the Authoritarians, were Ascendant...having enjoyed a substantial Head Start of some thousands of years.The fact of Mankind's Not-Ready-ness was, for them, a cause to celebrate.
In Authoritarian Culture, Thought is to be Feared and Discouraged...Wisdom is thought of as the purview of a select few, an Elite, who alone are capable of Thought.
The World is so Complex, you see.


There have been a few periods when the Perennialist Tradition has gained traction in the larger Society...these periods are known, to students of History, as "Golden Ages"....referred to by adjectives such as "Flowering" and "Elnlightened".
Of these Flowerings, we will consider three that have had Influence on Contemporary Western Culture.
Ancient Greece(750-550BCE), the European Enlightenment(1600-1850), and The Sixties(1962-1972)...all of.which were wholly subverted by the Machine, the Authoritarians.

Perhaps we should more clearly define what I'm referring to with words like "Perennialist" and, especially, "Liberal".

My favorite quote:
" Men fear thought as they fear nothing else on earth - more than ruin - more even than death... Thought is subversive and revolutionary, destructive and terrible, thought is merciless to privilege, established institutions, and comfortable habit. Thought looks into the pit of hell and is not afraid. Thought is great and swift and free, the light of the world, and the chief glory of man."

Bertrand Russell

And another:
" Fortunately for us, there have been traitors and there have been heretics, blasphemers, thinkers, investigators, lovers of liberty, men of genius who have given their lives to better the condition of their fellow-men. It may be well enough here to ask the question: What is greatness? A great man adds to the sum of knowledge, extends the horizon of thought, releases souls from the Bastille of fear, crosses unknown and mysterious seas, gives new islands and new continents to the domain of thought, new constellations to the firmament of mind. A great man does not seek applause or place; he seeks for truth; he seeks the road to happiness, and what he ascertains he gives to others. A great man throws pearls before swine, and the swine are sometimes changed to men. If the great had always kept their pearls, vast multitudes would be barbarians now. A great man is a torch in the darkness, a beacon: in superstition's night, an inspiration and a prophecy. Greatness is not the gift of majorities; it cannot be thrust upon any man; men cannot give it to another; they can give place and power, but not greatness. The place does not make the man, nor the scepter the king. Greatness is from within."

Robert Ingersoll

and:"Vincit Omnia Veritas"..."Truth Conquers All"...(I don't know who said this.)

There's "Liberal", in a nutshell.
The Idea that Man is Perfectable, is capable of Improving Himself, through the Application of Reason.
The Idea that Mankind is not a Slave...to Biology, Tradition,Original Sin,Superstition, or any of the other Tropes we hear about from the Right.
The Perennialist Philosophy has been promoting this Idea, or keeping it's Flame alive, for Milennia.
It is what is behind the words and philosophy of myriad Giants...from Socrates, to Aristotle to Jesus, to Lao Tsu, Marx, Neitzche, Jefferson.....
There is, through all of History, a Continuum of Liberal Thought....
This Continuum is, like everything else, Obfuscated, Muddied, by the Right...the Authoritarians, the Machine.
The Right have endeavored to keep the Pearls for themselves.
Another quote:
""The Party seeks power entirely for its own sake. We are not interested in the good of others; we are interested solely in power. Not wealth or luxury or long life or happiness: only power, pure power. What pure power means you will understand presently. We are different from all the oligarchies of the past, in that we know what we are doing. All the others, even those who resembled ourselves, were cowards and hypocrites.

"The German Nazis and the Russian Communists came very close to us in their methods, but they never had the courage to recognize their own motives. They pretended, perhaps they even believed, that they had seized power unwillingly and for a limited time, and that just round the corner there lay a paradise where human beings would be free and equal. We are not like that. We know that no one ever seizes power with the intention of relinquishing it.

Power is not a means; it is an end. One does not establish a dictatorship in order to safeguard a revolution; one makes the revolution in order to establish the dictatorship. The object of persecution is persecution. The object of torture is torture. The object of power is power."

George Orwell - 1984
This is AntiEnlightenment...AntiLiberal...the AntiPhilosophy of the Machine.

The Authoritarians Fear the Masses.
Fromm has said that this Fear has at it's root, a Fear of Inadequacy....a sense of Powerlessness and Isolation ...of being set loose in the world with no support, nor any set idea of one's Place in that world.
Leibzweski(spelling?) says that these folks are, actually, a whole different subspecies...the Psychopath.
That they are incapable of emotion or sympathy or remorse.Indeed, the Systems that these folks have engineered, spread now over the face of the earth, Select for Psychopathy.

I reckon the Truth to be some hybrid of these....making them all the more Dangerous.
Turn on the News, and their presence in the world is readily apparent.
Willingly or no, consciously or no, these Creatures have been busy remaking the world in their own image for all of recorded History.
Homo Sapiens Avaricious.
Their activities have been cloaked in the vestments of Liberty, of Truth, of Divine Right and the Will of God, Himself.
Anything to convince a critical mass of folks to go along, to allow their rapacious gluttony.
In Myth, Hades, Loki, Zeus, and the Old Testament Jehovah all are modelled on this type.
Avarice, Caprice and Subterfuge...the Con Men and Grifters of History....yet so many were Kings, Priests and even Emporers...
In fact, the very Idea of a Heirarchical System, flowed out of this Ideology.
Pharaonic Model.
Moloch.
Our own, 20th Century Mythos characterises them as Sith, Palpatine and Vader, as the various and sundry Forces of Darkness, Morgoth, Sauron,Ungoliant, Harkonnens and Omnius....The Matrix.
Lovecraft's Crawling Chaos,
Always Dark, and Dishonest.
"Tricksy and False".
...for they are Anti Reason....of necessity.
A Truly Reasonable,Truly Well Informed Person could not go along with the Predations and Dishonesty inherent in such a System.
Regular Folks must be Fooled, Tricked, Bribed and Threatened...for the Principals of Authoritarianism go so against the Principals that Reason dictates. Perennialists, Liberals, figure that Man,though certainly Flawed, is capable of Improvement...and that he can guide this Improvement through Reason....That Reason points the way, if one would only Open one's Eyes, Mind and Heart.

Another quote:"...You have much to learn about Jesus and about the most Vital Struggle which has plagued Mankind since the Dawn of History; Mankind's contiuous Struggle between Freedom and Slavery, between Value Producers, and the Violent, Parasitical Elite, between Peace and War, between Truth and Deception." -James Redford.


The Violent, Parasitical Elite...They have taken over the Whole Frakking World, through the vehicle of their Artificial Persons...given even more Power from a captive Supreme Court, in the recent Citizens United Case.
In anticipation of a Popular Uprising, as a result of the Rapine and Plunder, they have had the Audacity, the Hubris! to form their own Faux Grassroots Organisations...siphoning off Public Rage, and channelling it towards somebody, anybody who is not Them.
Especially "liberals"...who have been so characitured as to serve as a Boogy Man, an Existential Threat to All that is Good and Holy.
And We, as a People, Swallowed it Whole!

A Quote:"What Luck for the Rulers that Men do not Think"-A. Hitler.

Silent Weapons for Quiet Wars, C.Wright Mills'"the Power Elite",Gross'"Friendly Fascism"....are all pointing to the same thing I've been holllering about.
The creation of the Machine.



During WW2, the "Intelligence Agencies" found that they could work with the Industrialists, and Government, to ensure "Stability", and an unprecedented Control of Humanity by the Elite.
The ideas of Bernays(http://www.theburningplatform.com/?tag=edward-bernays), a student of Freud, were applied, as well.
We are, all of us, members of the Herd....and we don't even realise it.
Fast foreward to the 60's....the Youth began to realise that "Civilisation" was a murderous slavery machine, and decided to try a different ways of life.
This presented a problem for the Machine....a shortage of cannon-fodder....and not just in the conventional sense.
The Machine requires Consent from the slaves.
The Youth of the 60's were witholding their Consent...and their Belief in the System.
This is the Machine's Achilles Heel.
Machine learned to coopt, rather than directly oppose, this Counterculture...this opposition.
The 60's Youth Movement was absorbed....and the Machine grew Omnipresent, if not Omnipotent(that would come later).
Personal Computing, the Web, and the 24/7, everywhere-you-look "Consumer Culture", served to further enslave us.
We have, all of us, been decieved.
It is my personal belief that the only effective counter to the Dominance of the Machine is Disbelief...which leads one to Disengage...to Drop Out.....untill such time as the Machine "runs it's course".
The latter is ,in my opinion, inevitable....we inhabit a Finite World, and there are signs everywhere that we are reaching the Limits to Growth...Machine requires Growth.
The last 30 years of encirclement by the Machine is proof of this, in an indirect way.
Machine sees the end of Growth, and is preparing the way for it's continued Dominance in a No Growth Environment.(probably a Pseudo-Feudalism)
"They" will, at some point, need to reduce the population.There are, simply, too many to feed and maintain without abundant oil, and other resources.
We are , merely,Superfluous Livestock.
I suspect that War, especially the Civil Variety, will be the preferred mechanism.
Thus, it is no accident that We the People are divided in every way, except the way that matters, and reflects Reality...by Class.
We are tacitly forbidden from thinking in terms of Class.
Marx is verboten.
Otherwise, We might unite against our real enemy;the Parasitical Elite.
It is instructive, I think, that the Neocons appeared to break away from the Program that had been operative, and effective, for so long.
Suddenly, the long trajectory of the machine was accelerated, the rhetoric became extreme, the Fear was everywhere.
What did they see, the Neocons, that scared them into such reckless action?
In a word...the End....end of the Paradigm.
The 3 Enders:Peak Resources, Peak Economics...and Climate Instability that is a result of the Paradigm.
These are coalescing...building into a tsunami that threatens the viability of the Machine and it;s Operative Paradigm of Infinite Growth...on a Finite Planet.
The Radical Hard Right Turn of 2001,cynically known as "Compassionate Conservatism",and overlaid by the "Global War on Terror", can't really be explained, with satisfaction, in any other way.
What the 60's couldn't acheive, the 3 Enders can.
Entropy.
So the Neocons....the Reactionary "Wing" of the machine....Freaked Out...LIHOP-ed 9-11, and rapidly constructed the rest of the surveillance state. (it had been constructed, up to this point, incrementally...)
This Radical departure from Systematic Incrementalism presents an opportunity...and a Warning....
The Machine percieves it's own Demise...and it will Rage against the "Dying of the Light", as it were....
We, as Individuals...have an opportunity to Organise,Locally, for the eventual End of the machine.
But, to do so, we must, on the one hand, keep such activity (and even awareness) out of the Machine's sight....and we must, also, Disengage.
The Systems in place, from food production, to energy, to transportation....just about everything....are unsustainable.They are,frankly, Impossible...without Cheap, Transportable Energy.
We are Psychologically Manipulated, at every turn, into being Required to Believe....in the Perfection, Omnipresence, Omnipotence, and Immortality of the Machine.
This is why I am a "Conspiracy Theorist".LOL.
We must Unplug, whithout appearing to Unplug...and encourage others to do the same, again, without appearing to do so....or even appearing to be aware of the necessity.

Instead of; Work:Paper:Buy....we must endeavor to; Study:Do:Harvest.(Ure)
"Dropping Out is a Revolutionary Act."(W. Zendik)

The self-imposed Rules of the Machine prevent it from Powering Down in a sane, humane manner.
The Rules were designed to further enrich the Elite...to consolidate their Power.....but they, too, rely on Abundant, Cheap Energy.
It is up to us, as Individuals and as Community, to do the necessary work.

Sadly, Critical Thinking is lower than at any point since 1300AD.
Few have the desire, let alone the ability, to Think for themselves.
Even Ideas come prepackaged, with shiny, attractive wrappings...
The long term program of Diseducation has bourne fruit.
"Public" Education has kind of a sordid history...at least in it's current form.
Hypercapitalists in the early 20th Century saw a need for docile workers, to populate and operate their Factories.
At the time, and for most of America's history, the majority of the People were on the Farm...and Great Value was placed on Education, however derived.
Thinking Farmers (Jefferson's Ideal) were found to make poor Cogs in the machinery of the Factory.(Zinn)
Mass Production, the Assembly Line...these were inimical to Free Operators, with Minds, who were used to Open Air and being (of necessity) Generalists...Jacks of all trades.
So, the Hypercapitalists concieved the Public Education System that we have ,today.
This was designed, according to the very words of it's designers, to make "Good Workers"...
To train Sheep to be on time, to be happy at their particular wheel of the Machinery, to take orders, and to not stir up shit.
Those who saw the banality and essential Evil of this Organised.
They read Marx, and found him to be Right.
Unions!
The Labor Movement.
Strikes!

What was a Hypercapitalist to do?!
The Living Gears of his Machinery were so uppity!
The answer, at first, was direct oppression.
They called the cops.
Then they employed their own cops.
These were deployed to the Strikes and other Uprisings,where heads were smashed, noses broken, "Rioters" killed.
And it was learned that these tactics served to make things worse.
The Cogs Rebelled even more!
Another tactic, or tactics, was needed.
Enter Psychology.
...and Propaganda....and Marketing.
The new Media, Radio, was employed..."Credit" was re-invented from the carcass of "Debt".
"Products" were marketed to "Consumers"...
But it wasn't enough.
Folks were still too damned Educated.
Enter "Public Education."
...and Indoctrination....and Conformism.
This whole story, done quite in the open, at the time...has been all but forgotten.
Those who know about it are relegated to "Conspiracy Theorist"-status....part of the Programming.This was done during the Great Depression, when a considerable portion of Americans were Desparate.
then came the War (the Second World War)...the Populace was rallied to the defense of the Free World, against (for the last time, for real) an Existential Threat, an Enemy that all Free Men could oppose.
The most massive Military Mobilisation of all time was begun.
Idle factories were retooled to produce materiel for the War Machine.
At the same time, Boot Camp was retooled to Mass Produce Soldiers.
Farm Boys and Store Owners willingly submitted to systematic depersonalisation...willingly became Cogs in a different, at the time more acceptable and necessary, Machine.
The Lesson was well learned.
When the War was over (in Truth, it never really ended.), the Habits of Conformity were well ensconced.
Just as important, during the War...the Industrialists, Hypercapitalists, found that they could work with Government to achieve a common goal.
The newly Organised Intelligence Apparatus, beginning with the OSI, was quick to get in on the new game, as well.
This Triune, the "Military-Industrial-Intelligence Complex", was just what was needed by the Would Be Controllers to whip an unruly mob into shape.
They could subvert Democracy, while appearing to Defend Democracy.
They could Enslave the People, while appearing to Free them.(Kangas)
At War's End, a new Enemy was found....a former Ally.
Russia, which was (Nominally) Communist, would serve nicely.
Socialism/Communism, in Theory, was an effective remedy to the predations of Hypercapitalism...a Check...Marx's Capital was like Volume Two of Smith's Wealth of Nations...
In Practice, it was just another means of Control.
Those who would Rule Over There,in the East, used the Idea to implement Control...in the same way that "Capitalism" was used in the West.
The MIIC, the Machine, used this Threat to subvert Unionising and Labor Solidarity.
Those who would demand better wages and working conditions were branded as Commies....as Enemies.
This Red Baiting had been tried before...but the "Specter of Communism" always arose again to threaten the Hypercapitalists' preferred Utopia of Power, supported by Docile Servitude.
Now, however, the tools for finally "winning" this battle were in place.
The FBI...with Crossdressing Fag J. Edgar Hoover at the helm, launched a Crusade against Communism.Senator McCarthy smeared everyone who disagreed with the Conventional Wisdom.
They were helped by the Machinations of the CIA in the Media and Education...
At the same time, the newly minted Breton Woods Agreement...concieved, ostensibly to prevent another Depression... was in fact implimented to ensure Control of the World's Resources.
The Troops coming home found an "Education" provided for them.
And a "Job", which provided the "Belonging" they had come to love in the Military.
"Housing" was made available..."Subdivisions" were sprawled out across the former Farmland encircling the cities...now You, Too, can Own a "Home"! Every Man, a King!
"Credit" was extended to the Masses...Invisible Chains that they willingly accepted...American Dream.

Not everyone partook of this Capitalist version of a Worker's Paradise.
There were Malcontents....some called themselves "Beats"...which the Machine labeled as "Beatniks", adding the subtle, Soviet-sounding appendage....thus lumping them in with the Commies under every bed.
These were writers and Feral Philosophers...Free Thinkers, who abjured the Conformity and Docility of the Mainstream American way of doing business.
The Beats made common cause with black Jazz Musicians, with Professors, and, yes, with "Commies" and other assorted Rabble Rousers.
They wrote tracts and treatises and books...all in fresh, new ways.
They, inadvertantly, helped to birth the Counterculture.

This was a Movement of Disaffected Youth....suspicious of Power...unwilling to close down their Minds, or to be Happy Little Cogs...Company Men and Housewives.
They percieved Great Injustice...for Minorities such as Black People, Women, Queers, and even "Youth", itself.
They Rebelled, Mightily.
For a decade, they hollered and marched and "Sat In" and did drugs, experimented with sex and music and Ideas....
Refused to help the Establishment in it's Project of Thralldom, as they saw it.
They refused to fight in the War.
En Masse, they ceased to Believe and Participate in the Machine World.
This, the machine could not abide.
The effects of Breton Woods were being felt, despite all the Book Cooking...the Debt owed to the World was getting too big for the Paradigm to convincingly defend.
Ironically, the Machine had almost broken it's own System.
The Nixon Administration had an answer...rather several...
An arbitrary end to bretton Woods, effectively renegging on the Machine's Debts..."Floating Currencies", backed, not with Gold, but with Faith...with Nothing At All.
in it's place, a Coercive sytem of Petrodollar Recycling was instituted.
The Oil Kingdoms in the Middle East were "Encouraged" to sell Oil only in Dollars, which could be had by "Purchasing Debt", in the form of US Treasury Bills.
The Domestic side of Nixon's Remedy was Austerity, cloaked as "Inflation", as some uncontrollable function of the Independant Entity known as the "Market".Applied Mythology.
In addition, the War on Drugs was spun up, and a popular, "Conservative" backlash was fomented among the fearful people who were scared of the Hippies.
The Demonisation of the Left began,again, in earnest.
Hippies were Dangerous Rebels, in league with "Our Enemies", eating out our substance, causing the readily perceptible decline in everyone's fortunes.
And they were all Potheads, Sexual Deviants and Communists!
The Music which had helped rally Young People to the Cause of Liberation was easily Absorbed.
Machine Allied Corporations wrested control of Mass Media and the Production, Distribution of Music and Words.
The "Market" was invoked to Censor unwelcome Ideas.
Several high profile (and suspicious) deaths of Youth-Cultural Icons, as well as the strange phenomenon of Manson, were all the food the Propaganda Arm of the Machine needed to undo such giant leaps as Woodstock and Acid Tests.
Systematic Demonisation of all things Left...Liberal.
The destruction of the Economy helped, too, to stoke the Fear.
By the late 70's, the Middle East Oil Kingdoms had begun having second thoughts about their "Agreement" with the machine.
their own Machine...OPEC....found it's spine.
The "Oil Crisis" ensued...and further damaged the economy.(how much of this was engineered by the Machine, itself,I don't know)
Around this time, in the Churches and Living Rooms of Subdivision America, a Counter-Counter Movement was forming.
Large sums of cash were made available...Fear of Everything was stoked.
And it worked!
St. Ronald Reagan was swept into Power, and along with him, a new Ideology...a repackaged Right Wing, Antienlightenment Ideology.
The lessons of the past 70 years were consulted, and a New Improved, Friendly Fascism (Gross) was brought to bear.
Wrapped in the flag, and Carrying a Cross.(Lewis)

St. Ronald came in on rhetoric regarding an End to the Collective Nightmare of the 60's.
"Morning in America" spoke to the folks for whom the spectacle of their children naked, stoned and Free was just too much to bear.
Suspiciously, in my opinion at least, there had been a sudden shift in popular drug use...from Mind Expanders...Pot, LSD,Shrooms, Peyote...to Mind closers....Heroin, Coke,Speed...
Many of the Wounded Warriors, returning from Viet Nam, were already hooked on such stuff...and harboured a certain Nihilism, as well.(How utterly convenient)
This Nihilism was infectious...as was the incidence of Violence...
A few, isolated, incidents were spun up to represent the whole.
Similarly, fictitious happenings were spun up to paint the entire Counterculture as "Bad". The spitting on returning soldiers....which I can find no actual evidence of...
A few Heroin Addicts ruining the operation of some Commune, somewhere...
Etc etc.
Isolated, or even Made Up, events were spotlighted...the Machine pointed, and said, "See!?".
The last half of the 70's were like a bad hangover...
Disco came out of nowhere...the Machine's first effective foray into using Music as a Mind Weapon...
Coke was the drug of choice....as well as Booze....Lizard Brain Drugs.
Carter was ineffective.(I wonder how much of the problems of Carter were manufactured by the Machine.)
The predictable happened.
By the 80's, and Reagan, it was all over.
Collective Shame, on the part of the Youth...now adults...
Instead of Tune in, Turn on, Drop Out...it was Finish school, Cut Yer Hair and get a Job.
One of the effects of St Ron's Ideology was the eviscerating of 50 years of Democratic Common Cause/Common Man regulation of Corporate America.
Immortal Fictions were People, too!...and "deserved" Civil Rights as much as Black Folks and Women.

S&L, Miliken, Iran Contra, panama, Grenada...Just Say No!...
8 years of BS,+4 years of a smidgen more palatable BS...
All the while "Conservatives" demonised the Left...who were, apparently, still Hung Over...and wallowing in a sort of Post Orgy Shamefest- Zietgeist.The Actual Left,"Real Liberals", disappeared during this time...the entire political spectrum moved far to the Right, so that Democrats were, in reality, merely less Rightward than Republicans...leading to much confusion(which could be exploited).
Reagan's many Failures were Ignored, or blamed on Carter...
These were my Formative Years...and i remember the Oppressive Quality of that Time, very well.
The Right succeeded in making the Left ashamed of the "excesses" of the 60's...regardless of what really happened.
meanwhile the Right exhibited Monstrous Shamelessness...they didn't seem to care when they were caught out doing dastardly things.
Lies, Obfuscations, Red Herrings...thrown around everywhere.
St Ron crashed the economy, and was ballyhood for saving it.
His policies ramped up the largest debts in history, yet he...to this day...is remembered as the Icon of Fiscal Responsibility.
The Left went into hiding....they didn't know how to counter such deliberate Surreality.
Right Wing Mythology, Ideology, Trumped Reality...
and for the next 30 years, the Right dragged the country, the Mind of America, so far to the Right,that we can likely never get back.
Russia collapsed under it's own weight...St Ron claimed Responsibility.
Add another plank to the Surreality, the Mythology.
Enter Clinton.
New Democrat....which means that the "Left" had accepted their place on the Right of the spectrum...whithout anyone really noticing.
Clinton made noises that sounded like classic Liberal Rhetoric, but governed from the Center Right.
He continued the Deregulation Frenzy...launched ill concieved "Wars" on 3rd World Countries that Multinational Corporations figgered they "needed" access to....dismantled "Welfare"...
His failure to Inhale...and his questionable judgment, as far as Mistresses...he was Perfect!
He handed the Right just about everything they wanted...and set the stage for the arrival of lil George and the Neoconservatives....and the End Game.

++++++++++++++++++

This Narrative flies right into the face of "Conventional Wisdom"...the system of Mythological Constructs that we are expected to use to view the world.
CW says that this is all "Conspiracy Theory", and, thus, Crazy Talk.
I'll clarify.
Consider the Corporation.
An artificial Entity, Created on Paper...it has no body, no mind...yet it exerts Influence in the Real, Objective World.
It is made up of, on the one hand, potentially Millions of Individual Human Beings...from Janitors to CEO...
On the other, it consists of nothing more than a collection of Ideas.
Being Bodiless,Incorporeal...it cannot die (at least as long as there are Humans left to Believe in it).
Let us assume that this Corporation is a Chemical Company, created for the business of producing Poisons.
The Bottom Line, the Logic of this Corporation, doesn't consider any Environmental or Human Costs...
It makes Sense, whithin this System of Logic, to Pollute...to Socialise Risk, Pollution and Public Infrastructure.
Say, for the sake of Argument, the CEO, and the board of Directors, have an Epiphany....they accidentally become aware of the Damage their Corp. is doing....and Repent. Resolve to clean it all up, and Sin No More.
The Entity that is the Corporation, while having no Mind, will replace them.
The Shareholders, or whatever...the most Psychopathic of It's Human Constituents..will get rid of the "Problem."
The Epiphany is Inimical to the Logic of the Corporation.The System of Ideas, itself, will prevail.
The Artificial Creation, the Corp., has become Sentient...Independant of it's Creators.
(This scenario has actually happened, btw..with a carpet company, among other instances.)
Take this concept, and apply it to the Government, to the Institutions that Run the World, to the Global Civilisation, itself.
That, is the Machine.


It is made up of Millions, Billions of Individual Humans...and Goups of Humans...all making Individual Decisions.
But those Decisions are made within the Logic System of the Machine, itself.
A Trillion Individual Decisions, made by Millions of Individual Humans, have, over 100 years or more, led us to a point where "We" are no longer in control of the World.
Our Creations are in Control.
The Individuals, and disparate Groups of Individuals, didn't see this coming...their myriad Decisions were made because they fit the Logic System.
It was Logical to do these things!
It made sense, at the time.

Now, in the Hypersurreality that is Post-9-11 America, we have difficulty even conceiving a different Paradigm, or even perceiving the Nature of the Current Paradigm.
As a Fish cannot see the Water, we swim in a Dream Reality..our narrow Worldview reenforced by Mundane Worries and Cares...the Complexity is beyond our Understanding, and serves to bolster our perceived Helplessness to DO anything about the myriad problems.
These Problems are seen as Discreet Phenomena...disconnected, alone, unrelated to anything else or to each other....much like Us.
A Comprehensive Look at the World, as Interconnected...Big Picture...is labelled "Conspiracy Theory"...one is lumped together with the John Birch Society and various Alien Grey Enthusiasts...
In addition, all Opinions, all "Points of View" carry Equal Value.
Both "Sides" of a given dispute are considered Equally Valid, and given (presumedly) Equal Time.For all the bemoaning of "Moral Reletavism", the Machine's own Champions can't see their own.
With the aforementioned disembowlment of Critical Thinking, and of Generalist Thinking,let alone the Focus on Short Term, we are trapped in an Ideological/Mythological Cage of Unecessary Complexity.
Complexity!
Everywhere, there is Complexity...often for Complexity's Sake...even if this Complexity is Counterproductive...even if it actually does Violence to whatever it was instituted to accomplish.
The Machine has taken all the disparate Dystopian Warnings...from 1984 to A Handmaid's Tale,... and used them, seemingly, as a Manual, to Fashion our World.



********************

2:30 am looked like 4:30 am to my half conscious mind.
So I made coffee, and am on my 3rd cup....at the real 4;30 am.
I am, of course, thinking about politics.
Today is Beck's Big Show..."Restoring Honor"...and "Reclaiming the Civil Rights Movement"....reclaiming it from "Liberals", he says.
Liberals who have hijacked it, presumably.
MLK as Right Wing Hero...what a world.
Like Voltaire didn't say, "I'll defend, to the death, their right to say it"...but this is bordering on the proverbial yelling of "Fire!"
This is but the latest iteration of the program of Mind Fuck from the Right.
It is a melding of Anti Gov, Libertarian sentiments...with "Conservative Christians"...so called "Values Voters"...
DoubleThink, Cognitive Dissonance, Astroturf.
With ample funding from the richest folks in America, and the World,this "Movement" has gathered a real head of steam.
It is Psy-Op at it's finest....I am amazed, sometimes, at the sheer audacity of it all.
The Fascists have taken the playbook of 1960's Lefty Radicals, and used it to form a Counter-Movement...convincing fearful people to wholeheartedly support an agenda of Corporate Rapine and Plunder, and a Worldview that is so Surreal as to be rediculous.
Indeed, real Liberals, like me, have a hard time taking it all seriously.
But I believe we must.
The Unhinged, the Reality-Challenged, among us are Uniting...growing in Power and Influence...ready to Rise up.
These are Dangerous Times.
Their Mythological Reality has become just as Real as the Objective Kind...no small feat.
What a Masterful Stroke!
There are Powerful Magicians on the right...deep in their Thinktanks...They have managed, in a mere 30 years, to so distort Reality, and the Language and Ideas we use to apprehend it, that a goodly portion of the country actually believes this nonsense.
Indeed, even Liberals have fallen prey to their Crazy...we use their Definitions without even thinking...the Defaults in our Meme-Space are theirs...
Take 'Values Voter": it is Implied that Liberals have no Values, or Value. Hell, "Liberal" has been a perjorative for my whole life!
They own "Christian"...and "Conservative"...neither of which have any relation to their former meanings.
"Patriot", "Liberty" , even "Democracy" have this kind of Dog Whistle Quality to them, wherein they mean something to the Right...that is much different than what we, on the left, think they mean.
Our own Liberal Predilictions are used against us....we are hardwired for Fairness...for Honesty...
We give them Equal Time, and assume that they are being forthright...assume that they have a desire, like us, to come to an aggreement...a middle ground....that the apprehension of Truth, of Understanding, is a Common Goal.
but this is not the case.
The right is interested in Victory, not Compromise.
Compromise = Weakness.
Thought leads to the possibilty of Compromise (might learn something to change your opinion)...ergo, Thought is Bad.
Action is better.
Belief is what matters...Certainty.
This is something Liberals have difficulty understanding....I know I did.
We habitually weigh positions, test hypotheses, study and fret and Think...it is easy to assume that everyone would do the same.
This is Not the case.
There are 3 types of Right Wing folks.
1. The ones who actually benefir from the Undoing of Enlightenment; the Elite, atop the Economic Pie.
2. Their Enablers, who must hope to get something out of being so False, and working for the undoing of the Enlightenment.
and 3. The Great Fearful and Ignorant Masses...those who have been convinced that "Liberals" are the Evil Ones, that "Liberals", and their assorted Proxies (Brown folks, Terrists, Commies, Queers and Atheists) are the ones out to End America, Take our Freedom and Kill Us All!(see Fromm,"Escape from Freedom")
They have been so Traumatised by the Policies of the Right that they would be pathetic, if they weren't o dangerous.
The Defunding and Demonisation and Purposeful Counterproductivity of Public Education has left these folks, and everyone else, too Ignorant and Befuddled to see their Folly.
The Deregulation of, and Socialism for, Corporate America has left them Vulnerable and Destitute.
The Human Gains made up into the late 60's were sold to them as "Too Radical", as Dangerous...as something to be Feared and Dispised.( a good portion of Americans, according to polls, think Free Speech should be regulated, in an obscene irony)
More recently, Great Tragidies were allowed to get out of hand, to become Existential Threats,so as to make the World even more Fearsome.
911, the willfully stupid "response" to Katrina, the Criminal Evisceration of the economy...the last Republican President and his "Administration", had the opportunity to stop, or at least mitigate, all of these, and more.
Instead, they not only Let Them Happen, they made things worse....then successfully turned the blame onto the nonexistant Left, and the New Guy...the Black Guy.
An Honest, Objective look at recent History reveals this to be the Unvarnished Truth.
But the Captive Corporate Media, and the Mind Poison administered these past 30-40 years, have had their predictable effect.
Sigh.
This is the way the world ends...




^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

I just watched, on Live TV, the last American Combat Troops cross the Kuwaiti Border...out of Iraq.
8-17-2010
The Seven Year Folly is " over."
There are still 50,000 "Support and Training" Troops remaining...and there's that Monolithic Imperial Embassy....and all manner of Airfields and Bases...and a Ruined Country...and (my personal peeve) an unknown number of missing, stolen or destroyed Priceless Artifacts, dating from the very Beginning of Civilisation, that we left unguarded.
There is also,presumably, the Largest Light Sweet Crude Deposit left on the Planet.
The Last Mega-Field.
Ergo, we ain't gone...
We'll be back.
In any case, we're still in the Neighborhood...Kuwait,Bahrain,Qatar, Turkey,Kyrgestan,Khazakstan,Turkmenestan,Diego Garcia,and...of course,...Afghanistan...where we are building another Imperial Stronghold (Embassy).(in Pakistan, as well)
We have a Presence in Somalia, too....the better to keep an Imperial Eye on the Gulf of Aden, and the approaches to the Red Sea, and Suez.(Tanker trail to Europe)There are indications that we will "have to" enter Yemen, as well.
This is NOT the equivalent of the Legions leaving Britannia.
And it doesn't have anything to do with Decline of Empire...it is not the case that we don't have the Money.
It has everything to do with the Decline of Easy Oil.
The American Empire will see it's Millions of Po' Folks die in Camps, before it will abandon Iraqi Oilfields.
5,10,15,20 years from now..whenever the effects of Peak Oil are being felt the hardest, we will return.
By then the Depleted Uranium Dust we have strewn will have done it's work...the Iraqi People will be a shadow of what they were...in no shape to fight.
We'll come in, with Medicine, with Food...it will be sold as a Humanitarian Mission...
But the Oil Companies will tag along, much like the Missionaries went with the Conquistadores.
The Empire will have it's virtual hand on the Spigot.
Iraq, while appearing to be a vast Wasteland, is some of the most valuable real estate on the Planet.
This whole Media Frenzy has more to do with the upcoming Elections.
It's for the consumption of potential Swing Voters, and the Dissilusioned Democratic Base.
Cynical?
Absolutely.


##########################

5am August 2,2010....
It was 103 degrees, yesterday.
Yet it feels cool, this morning.
We might have an actual Autumn, this year.
I smell woodsmoke...and I can tell ,by the smell, that it is from an "old" fire....the last log was added around Midnight, and it was allowed to burn down to coals.
Long experience with campfires and early mornings...
The stars, and a half-moon, are bright...the crickets, mighty gears of Night, are loud, but at the same time, subdued....like they're tired.
I am Tired.
I have accomplished much, this Summer...but there is much more yet to do.
I do not look forward to this last trip to Magnolia...then to Kingwood, for my Neice's Birthday...
I hate going back there.
Too many people, too many Memories, many of which I have only begun to remember in the last six months...
Facebook, and hooking up with Mel, has opened doors in my Mind...
I cannot tell if the Hole in my Memory is due to the wreck (20 years, this December), or to repression.
I had a hard time, back then.
As I've said, I was always the Outsider...the smart kid, the strange kid.
I never felt like I "Fit"...anywhere.
I have long suspected that there is something about me...some "Vibe" I give off...that others can,unconsciously, percieve...
At first, I chalked it up to my appearance...but I have cut my hair, many times...(usually ,in a failed attempt to get a job).
I think it's something else.
I realise that I am somewhat Hyperaware....and "Sensitive", in that I notice small things...like looks, and facial expressions.
This is how , without any actual Training, that I can Track...I'm uncanny, in the Woods.
I have Dog Ears...an unnerving ability to hear things that others can't. This contributes to my Innate Musicality, I reckon.
Despite years of smoking, I also retain an almost scary sense of smell and taste. Hence my almost accidental skill at Cooking/Chef-Hood.
I "Know Things"...I don't know how I do it, but I retain Knowledge...I can't consciously call up this Knowledge, but when I need it, it is there...Bubbling up from a deep Well in my Mind.
I pick up, say, a National Geographic...I figger I haven't read this particular issue since right after it came out...30 years ago (I have them, going back to 1964)...but when I read it, it's not new. It's like I read it 10 minutes ago.
Where is this material stored?
How much "Room" is there?
I retain Copious Knowledge....accidentally.
Yet, until recently, I have been unable to remember a large-ish portion of my Life...and what I have remembered has been chronologically jumbled...chaotic.
I have no "sense" of Chronology...I am Timeless.
What preceded what, and when did such-and-such happen?
I cannot say.
I have determined, due to employment records needed for my failed attempt at Disability, that I was only in Austin for 2, perhaps 3, years...it seems like so much longer.
How did I fit so much Experience into my Life?
My Wild Years? How long did they last?
I seem to have, again inadvertantly, crammed several Lifetimes into one.
Perhaps it was because I started, really, at 16.
When I left Mom's, and moved in with Dad, I thought of myself as an Adult.
Dad was aloof, distracted by his own sense of Helplessness and Failure.The Divorce really hit him hard.
So I was pretty much on my own.
The downside was a lack of instruction.
(which I didn't realise,or mind, at the time.)
I got (I thought) assimilated, acculturated, by watching my peers, reading books and applying my considerable intellect.
In retrospect, this was a gigantic failure!
One, the friends that I liked the most were, all of them, in "Trouble" all the time.
Some of them were, when ya get right down to it, not the sharpest tools in the shed.
Two, the books I lived in were, most of them, written by Mad Geniuses....continually bucking Authority, and sometimes paying the Ultimate Price for it.
They had Integrity, but not what one could reasonably call an easy life.(turns out that our Civilisation places little value on Integrity, or Intellect...despite the Rhetoric and Sloganeering to the contrary.)
This leads to Three..my Intellect.
As I said, our Civilisation gives much Lip-Flapping Time to the Value of Intellect.
One learns, even in our poor excuses for schools, about the Great Writers, Scientists, Statesmen, etc.
But in the Real World, Heaven Forbid that a Young Genius shows a Glimmer of Thought!
That is much too risky!

And when that Young Person starts to notice the Lies and Contradictions that our Civilisation is built on,...well.
Can't allow that...

The unspoken Assumption is that our current Paradigm, our current Modus Opperandi...the Way We Do Things Now...is it! The Pinnacle, The End of History.(Fukyama)
Everything that has gone before has led up to this Ultimate Point.
There can be no more Innovation, save that which furthers and maintains the Current Paradigm...the Machine.
There can be no Alternative to the Way We Do Things...not even small enclaves of Experimentation....
Word of the success of these Alternatives might get out, and threaten the Machine.(see: Cuba)
Thinking "Outside the Box", while praised, is to be Discouraged, if not Outlawed, entirely.
The Machine can Brook No Competitors...much the same way that Fundamentalists insist that their God is some kind of Tough Guy, yet need to stamp out the adherants of anything else....lest their Version lose the Battle.

These are the things that have occupied my Mind, from an early age.
I resisted the Borg-Like Assimilation into Corporate America...and became Feral.
The most Dngerous Enemies of the Machine are those who do not Believe in it...those who Resist, and can present well-reasoned arguments Why they Resist...
I am Outside the Box, Personified.
A Dangerous Anomaly.
This is, admittedly, a very hard row to hoe, but what am I to do?
Integrity of Thought led me here.
Refute!
All of my Crusading is against mere facets of One Thing....the Machine, and the Lies and Inconsistancies and Obfuscations by which it is Maintained.

Whether it is the DrugWar, Corporate America or the High School Hair Police...it is all of a piece.
Unwarranted Control over the Mind of Man...based on Logical Fallacy and "Say So".
I must fight it...because it is Wrong!
And now that I am old and cripple, now that it seems that my race is almost run, I must hand my Baton to my Sons...
That they may continue the Fight.
For there is something in Mankind that wants to be Ruled, wants "someone" to "do something"...
and as long as that is the case, there will be a Machine to exploit it...for Fun and Profit.
Because there are also Men whose Avarice, whose Lust, drives them...they are Exploited by the Machine, as well....
This is Ironic, since they(or folks like them) Created the damned thing to begin with.
When the first Priest convinced the first Farmers to give him a parcel of Grain, in return for intercession with the Divine....the Machine began.
The fight has been a low flame for 10,000 years, and grew to a great blaze with the advent of Technology and the Science of Mind...the early 20th Century.
The Machine lost ground for nearly 500 years...what we call the Enlightenment...but it has adapted since around 1914...and become enormously Powerful since 1945.
Since1980 when St Ronnie Raygun ascended, the Machine has all but undone the Enlightenment...
The 60's were a scary time for Machine, it was about to lose the fight, once and for all.
The Kids didn't believe, any more.
The Conservative Revolution was the reaction to this.
Fear and Loathing!
The Mythology of "Capitalism" and Christian America...
The Nazis that the CIA imported must have been enormously helpful....
(snark!)
Fascism, Perfected!
Cloaked in the Mythology, wearing the Garment of Freedom and Democracy, the Machine fooled us.
We went willingly.
We asked for our Chains.
We handed over our Minds...and those of our Children.
Except for Oddballs like me....
It is in Oddballs that we must place our Hope.
Strange Birds, who are Immune from the Machinations...from the Mythology.
It is difficult to realise that the Race will never be won...that there is no Happy Ending.
This Fight is Eternal.
And, rather than be depressed and discouraged by this fact, we must stand firm, and continue.
Even when it is Darkest....and I suspect that these are much Darker Times than even Nazi Germany(for the simple reason that they appear so very Bright on the surface)...we must continue.
This is the Great Purpose of Anomaly.
To Continue.

American Religion

As much as the Fundies would like us to forget, we have in this country a long history of Separation of Church and State.
There is, however, a Government Enforced Religion, in America...that is so pervasive as to be almost invisible: What we call "Capitalism".
One is hard pressed, indeed, to escape the trappings and belief structures of this Faith...it's Crusaders are one's neighbors;it's Inquisitors, almost everyone you will ever meet.
Everywhere are it;s Temples...called "Banks".
Everywhere, it's Sacraments...the taking out of Loans, the Cashing of Checks, Commerce, and Trade.
Omnipresent, it's Holy Cracker..."Money".
Money is the tangible Symbol of all that is Holy...a fancy piece of Paper, inscribed with Signs, imbued with Value...by our Collective Belief.
Increasingly, even this Tangible Fetish is no longer necessary...Money exists only in Databases...as ones and zeroes...so strong is our Faith.
The People live and die for this Fetish...this Host.
They sell their Souls for the getting of it...Sacrifice their Integrity, their Family, their Self-Worth.
They endure all manner of Hardship, and blame themselves when there is not enough.
Money is generated, Created, in the Temple...by the Priests, called "Bankers", or "Loan Officers".
The Supplicant presents the Priest what is called a "Business Plan", in some cases, establishing their Worthiness to partake in the Sacrament. If the Priest deems this Sufficient, he or she goes into the Sanctuary...performs the necessary Rituals and Incantations, and Money is thereby Created....with an agreement, all but signed in blood, that the Supplicant will pay Tithes for a considerable period...and that failure to do so will be considered Apostasy, which will be Punished.
There is a Heirarchy, among the Faithful....some Persons are deemed more Valuable than others.
The Most Valuable Persons are known as Corporations....so Valuable that the enjoy, it is thought, Immortality...
The Most Valuable Corporations are the Big Banks. They are so close to God, so Perfect in their Faith, that they have been given the Power to Create Money...not only in the aforementioned Loan Making Process...but out of Thin Air.
The High Priests of the Most Valuable of the Most Valuable Corporations, who are Privileged to sit at the Very Feet of God,are known as the Federal Reserve.
They determine the Faithfulness, the Worth, of everyone else.
All Money flows to Them.
God is known by various names...the one used the most is "The Market".
The Market is everywhere...and nowhere.
It lays waste to Apostates, and sets on Thrones the Faithful.
Powerful is our God.
Surely none can Compete with Him, lest they Lose their Soul.

There is, however, a Rival.
Marx.
Cursed, Faithless.
Many are the disguises of this Rival, this Deciever.
Socialism, Communism...and Democracy.
Liberal, Labor, the Working Man.
The Rival decieves Men into thinking that they "Deserve" a better life than the Market affords them...that there is more to Life than Money....That not everything is a Commodity, to be Bought and Sold.
Heresy!
Surely the Market is Powerful enough to Destroy this Rival....
But the Market Moves in mysterious Ways!
Some believe that He is Testing Us...and allowing the Rival's continued Existence.
For surely, our God could, with a Word, send the Rival into Perdition.
Many are Decieved....for the Rival is Cunning.
The Priests forever strive against the Rival, employing Warriors and Knights...these are known as Advertising and Think Tanks.
They counter the rival, with Propaganda, to ensure that the Faithful remain True.
The Market can brook no Competition, for He is a Jealous God...Greedy for our Love and Supplication.

Counterinsurgency/421offensive

Three years ago, the Texas Legislature passed, and Governor Good-Hair signed into law, a measure that allowed cops to treat Marajuana Possession as a Class C Misdemeanor....on par with running a red light. No longer did getting caught with a quarter bag mean, of necessity, Jail.
This was mentioned, in passing, below the fold, in the major Texas Papers, and ignored by local TV News.
There was, as well, a caveat....it was left up to individual Jurisdictions,... Counties, and the like...to decide if they would apply this new, more sane, way of dealing with the Noble Weed.
To date, only Travis County (Austin) has applied it.
...With zero Fanfare.
Republican Politicians can, with some regularity, and in all seriousness, advocate the End of Social Security, Medicare and the First and Fourteenth Amendments (among others)....but Politicians, of any stripe, can't touch the real Third Rail in America; The Failed and Unamerican War on Drugs....which translates into the War on Weed.
The Fear and Misinformation, the Blatant Lies and Stereotypes, have made it impossible to even discuss the problem, and everyone has a dog in the fight...
Cops make too much money from Asset Forfeiture, and Federal Grants...the former, from among the Poorest among us.With this cash, they can purchase Cop Toys, the better to spy on you with.
Not mentioned.
Big Pharma lobbies, with millions of dollars, to keep things just as they are...they don't wanna compete with something that folks can grow in their garden, and administer themselves..much better to force people to buy overexpensive, side-effect-ridden Pharmaceuticals...
This goes unmentioned, too.
Liquor Lobby, the same.A Government sanctioned Monopoly on Intoxication....the effects of which are violence and death, as opposed to Peace and Chillin'.
The Drug "Treatment" Industry doesn't want the Status Quo to end, either. All those State and Federal Dollars...
And let's not forget the Private Prison Industry.
The Drug War is a boon to them...in fact without the Drug War, and the immortal Immigration Fiasco, there wouldn't be that much need for Private Prisons...
Science is abused to foment this nonsense.
When Science determines that some plank in the Dogma is false, even if our own NIH conducts the study, it is buried, ignored...in favour of Hyperbole and Innuendo and Hysteria.
Aspirin, indeed meteors, are more dangerous than Pot.
But you'd never know it from the rhetoric.
A majority of Americans know all this, or at least suspect it...
But nothing can, it seems, be done.
We must remain stuck on the Insane Hamster Wheel of Stupidity.
We must continue to spend millions of dollars a year eradicating Ditch Weed....wild Hemp, left over from WW2 when the FedGov encouraged farmers to grow it (!)...and which has zero THC. (smoking a long ton of it won't get ya high).
We must continue to enforce our insane drug laws...thus driving up the price of Pot, and other drugs...so that Mexican and Columbian Drug Cartels can continue to reap Profits....and turn the Southern Border into a War Zone.(Much like Al Capone, et alia, were created by Prohibition.)
We must continue, and accelerate, the Militarisation of Cops...like little po-dunk towns "Need" a Swat Team.
The Militarised Cops must continue to bust down doors...on anonymous "tips"...shoot people, often at the wrong address, and force folks to Rat out their friends.
The East German Stasi were rank amateurs!
Leave it to America to show the world how to build and maintain a Police State.
We are forced to submit to drug tests, none of which are immune from failure, false positives...in order to keep a job at Wal Mart and Wendy's.(I can understand for Bus drivers, and the like...)
Our First Amendment Rights to Free Speech are routinely abridged, proactively by ourselves....if I were to get this little diatribe published in the Mason County News, I would become even more of a Person of Interest...subject to increased scrutiny by Law Enforcement....wear a T-shirt advocating an end to Prohibition, get extra attention.
Our Fourth Amendment has been gutted...so many exceptions have been attached, without an Amendment to the Amendment...that it is, essentially, meaningless.
Fifth Amendment? Forget it. Ya get caught with Weed, you are encouraged to "Inform" on your buddies, with the possibility of a "lighter sentance"....you are Forced, thereby, to work for the Police State....become a Traitor to your friends and family, an unpaid servant of an Immoral Machine.
All the remainder of the Bill of Rights, with the possible exception of the Gun Amendment(2nd), have been eviscerated and made irrelevant.
Jury Nullification, one of Jefferson's favorite Ideas, whereby a Jury can Judge the Law, itself...has been scuttled. Jurors are told, in effect, to be docile lackeys of the Judge...that Nullification is a Myth.
Indeed, the easiest way to get excused from Jury Duty is to say the word "Nullification."
The saddest, most maddening, part of this, to me...is the persistance of the Mythology of Weed, despite all evidence to the contrary.
Cops, and even EMT's and ER Doctors (who should know better), continue to insist that Weed = Heroin=PCP. That they are equally dangerous, and Always Bad.
It doesn't matter that Weed is, arguably, the safest drug known to man...that no one has ever died directly from it's use...that the Gateway Theory has been repeatedly Disproven...That D.A.R.E. is counterproductive...That the movie "Reefer Madness" is high comedy,rather than an accurate depiction of reality....that Pot has many medical uses.
The cry is heard, whenever Medical Pot comes up, "There are no studies that show medical benefit, or essential benignity"....
One, there are Numerous studies giving the lie to all of this...conveniently Ignored by the government and Corporate Media...
Two, in order to study Pot, a researcher must get approval from the DEA...which is rarely given....and who looks over the shoulder of said researcher, and vetoes any findings contrary to the Dogma. Then one must procure Pot. This can only be done, legally, by purchasing it(at a considerable markup) from one, single, Government-Run Farm in Georgia.
It is unknown how closely this Government Weed resembles the stuff out in the World...

In the 40, or so, years since Tricky Dick declared the WOD, We the People have spent Trillions of Dollars...
How many teachers could have been hired? How much Healthcare, provided?
Nixon, in his own words, knew that Weed wan't a Danger...he Demonised it in order to have something to use against his opposition on the Left...at the Time, the Hippies protesting the War...
The War on Drugs was, and is, a Political Weapon....and this is it's most essential use...never spoken of.
It is a continuation of the Cold War, the Red Scare, and, now...the Global War on Terror...in which Terrists are hiding under the bed, ready to eat up all the apple pie, or something.
Another tool in the box of repression.
Weed is a Mind Expander...potheads tend to think outside the box.
Can't have that! Someone,perhaps even a Critical Mass, might realise how the Machine is fucking us!
...and that Door can never be opened, lest the Machine loose Power.

The beginnings of the War on Weed were blatantly Racist...in the 20's and 30's, in the South, to facilitate running Mexicans out of town....
Then Black Jazz Musicians were added to the list of Undesirables who smoked Pot...then Commies.
The first Marijuana Tax Act (they had to do it this way to get around that pesky Constitution...remember, they had to Amend it to outlaw Booze...)...was implemented in 1936. It was set up as a catch-22;One had to have a Tax Stamp on one's Weed, which could only be gotten if one was already in violation.
Weed went underground, till the 60's...when Anti-Commie Hysteria started to lose it's effectiveness on America's Youth.
They were out in the streets, protesting the War, demanding Civil Rights for Coloreds,for Women...an end to the Establishment.
And many of these Malcontents were Potheads!
Now, 40 years and Trillions of dollars later, Weed is still associated in the "Conventional Wisdom" with Scary Hippies, Scary Commies, Scary Black People...all of whom Hate America, and want to see it become a Soviet Communist Worker's Paradise complete with Jack Boots and Death Squads...(!?!?)
Kind of silly, when one thinks about it...considering that America has become a Police State as a result of all this anti-Pot, anti Union, anti Democratic Hysterical Hyperbole....a Right Wing, Fascist Paradise.
Curious.
I am weary of being compelled to hide my Pot Use.
How can something so Stupid and Unamerican continue for so long?
All, every one, of the "Reasons" for prohibiting Marijuana have been knocked down, disproven....and still we continue to allow otherwise innocent folks, Americans, to be imprisoned, branded as Criminals, forced to hide in the shadows, and be suspicious of their friends.
The Machine has the War on Terror, now...with which to scare us, to justify it's criminal behaviour...
While we're in Fear of Terrists behind every tree,with Loose Nukes, can we not, at least, smoke a Joint?
If they Hate Us for Our Freedom,by all means,let us give them a little more Freedom to Hate.
Legalise It!

Hair Crusade!

I am forty years old, an American Citizen and a Father to two boys.
I am also a Man who prefers his hair to be long....contrary to the Norms of the Society I find myself in.
This Manifesto is a sort of "heads up" to you, that this Will be an issue in the future...as my Boys are already making noises about wanting longer hair, "Like Daddy".
I Will Not Cut my Hair to support your Policy, as it would do injury to my Self Esteem, as well as my Integrity.
Non Serviam.
I have endured hardship for most of my life because of this, and would like to appeal to you that this injustice not be continued for another generation.
Schools, in past court cases, rely on certain assertions to justify their intolerance of longer hair on boys.(These are taken, verbatim, from the Amicus Curie provided to the Court by TASB, in the Needville Case)
1. To teach hygiene.
2.To instill discipline.
3. To prevent Disruption.
4. To avoid safety hazards.
and 5. To assert authority.

I will now stick an Arrow in each.


1. "To teach hygiene".
Logically, this falls flat...are not most girls encouraged,by societal Norms, to maintain long hair?
Are they, thereby, Dirty?
There is nothing inherently "dirty" about long hair.
There's this product one can purchase, called "Shampoo"....it cleans one's hair.
Morally, this smacks of Discrimination.
Women fought for, and won, the right to wear pants...which were, historically, the attire of men.
How,exactly, is this different?

2."To instill discipline."
I think that this has more to do with #5, than with any wish to "instill discipline,"..depending on the definition of "Discipline".
If we mean, "Punishment", then, yes...perhaps...although I can't think of any crime that could have been comitted.
Original Sin?

On the other hand, it takes discipline to maintain long hair.
One must spend a lot more time brushing, and detangling with long, than with short.
One must also learn how to keep it out of the way, for instance, when preparing food, or working with machinery.
"Discipline" must here be read as "Submission".


3.. "Prevent disruption".
In my own experience, quantifiably more disruption is caused by the enforcement of such policies, than they prevent.
It's not 1950, anymore. The court case referred to as Ferrel, 1968, had to do with some male students being barred from class due to their "Beatles-style haircuts".. The time when such things could reasonably be considered "disruptive" is long past.Hairstyles accepted, in the broader Society, have changed...many times. Indeed, the "High and Tight" that so many School Policies seem to be aiming towards, could be seen as more anomalous.

4."To avoid safety hazards".
I presume that this is referring to the above mentioned machinery problem.
Again, there is a simple solution, in the form of a readily available product, called a "Hair Tie".
I use these all the time, when working with things that might entangle my hair...or when preparing food.
And, again, if a girl were to enroll in shop-class, would she be required to cut her hair?
If not, then this is Discriminatory.

5."To Assert Authority."
Here we get to the Meat of the matter.
I assert that this is the real reason behind the rules regarding boys and long hair.
In loco Parentis, gone too far.
In my experience, the Administration is interested in maintaining it's own authority...no matter the facts, and no matter the real-world consequences.At it's root, I suspect that there is a longing for "Simpler Times"...a Fear of all the "disruptions" of the 60's , and onward.
My own experience involved being forcibly carried, and held down, my senior year, so that a "Cosmetology Student" could shear me.
All manner of Logical Fallacies were employed to justify this behaviour.
What it ended up doing, however, was reinforcing my distrust, and dislike, of Authority....and causing much more of a Scene, than I had ever courted.
They could give me no reason for this rule that didn't rely on, essentially,"Because we say so".
The heart of my argument against such rules, is that this is Unamerican.
Arbitrary Authority is to be Challenged.
I can hear the refutations bubbling..."but they're children!".
To that I say BS.
What are we really teaching with this policy?
To Submit to Arbitrary Authority?
Authority that can be asserted without any Reason or Logical Support?
To single out a child because of his failure to conform to an arbitrary "Norm" , when that child has done nothing to harm anyone, is simply wrong.
It cannot be justified.
Raj Singh, of Valparaiso University (re:below) said, "
1. A man's reasons for abstemtion from haircutting practices all relate to his assertion, intended consciously or subconsciously, that he is not the servant of other men.
2.When people in positions of (non-religious) authority demand that a man cut his hair or shave his face, their purpose is to require the clipped man to openly demonstrate his obedience and subservience to them."
The many court cases over the last 50 years regarding this matter have all relied on the above enumerated "reasoning".
They have consitently held that the school's interest is served by discipline and authority.
I assert that thge policy has the opposite effect than that which was intended.
I am the evidence for this assertion.
"Styles" of the wearing of hair have changed, over millennia.
Are we to remain stuck in time, on this one issue?
I assert that is not the business of Government to dictate the style or appearance of the People, whether they be 4 or 40.






I was born with Large Ears...the kind that stick out from one's head, like Wings.
Children are Cruel...Dumbo...Fly Away....
I was tormented, as a child, due to my ears...they were pulled and tugged till they were red and painful...
I started wearing a baseball cap in around 3rd grade...specifically to cover my ears.
Of course, hats of any sort are forbidden in school...and are looked down the nose at indoors, even as an adult...(like in Court.)
So, early on, I started resisting haircuts.
Joe the Barber, in Tomball, would always trim me so that my ears got maximum spread and visibility.
This "need" for longer hair was an unconscious response to the treatment my ears engendered.
Rather than deal with the treatment, the PTB (teachers, parents, etc) focussed on my hair.
At the same time, my Genius was asserting itself...(likely the Real Reason that my "peers" tormented me...).
With Genius comes realisation of Anomalousness....and Rebellion follows.
As I got older, my hair would get longer...no longer would I walk, as to the Gallows, to the barber Chair....I had to be forced.
Freshman year is when I really asserted myself.
I was continually forced to get bad haircuts in the school's "Cosmetology Lab"...and when I started growing whiskers, I was also forced to shave...usually in the Vice Principal's (Roy) Office, with a rusty, dry razor...( there's bad hygiene, for you!)
All of this was , supposedly, to prevent my "Appearance" from causing a "Disruption"...
I protested that the enforcement of such edicts was causing the disruption....a reasonable assertion...to no avail.
It was, in realty, about Their Controll over Me.
After High School, my first job still wouldn't allow a beard, but didn't care about long hair...so long as it was clean and tied up....thus proving wrong yet another "reason" for the Rules; that the Schools are "preparing" Students for the realities of Life.
Now, I'm 40 years old....
I have had very long hair for 20 years...and worn a beard and mustache for most of that time.
I "remember" to shave when it itches...and cut my hair when it gets a knot...
During this time, I have been persecuted by the Law.
Repeatedly.
I get singled out for searches, and questioning, when the Redneck standing next to me has a pocket full of dope.
Profiling!
Seems that 30+ years ago, a lot of folks with long hair were dope smokers.
ie Anti Establishment Types, who disdained the track of the present "Civilisation" and Rebelled against it.
The excuse for the continued targetting of Long Hair for "special treatment" by Law Enforcement is the failed War on Drugs.
The Operative Mythology states that if a Man has Long Hair, he must, necessarily, be a Dope Smoker...which means, always, that he is also shooting Heroin, and on PCP...and is , thus, a Violent Danger to Society.
This is Stupid on many, many levels...and is furthered by most Schools' insistance on the continuance of these stereotypes.
I feel most comfortable when my hair is long....it is no longer merely a stick in the eye of Authority.(That's just Lagniappe)
In High School, Roy (the VP) would try to explain things to me.
I'd say something about Equality, under the Law....after all , women were encouraged to maintain long,flowing locks...
He'd counter that Men shouldn't have long hair.(Hardly a refutation!)
I'd point to the picture of Jesus on his wall....
Are we not supposed to Immitate Christ?
(this was, admittedly, merely rhetorical, on my part...and he knew it...but the premise was/is valid...)
Or, I'd say, take Thomas Jefferson, et alia....
These arguments were never refuted....save by some mealy mouthed assertion of "the way things are..."
Not good enough.
Senior year, in Tomball, I told VP Pit Viper that I was Rastafarian, and that, therefore, was forbidden by my religion from cutting my hair.
This worked, for a time, till she (I guess) did a little research....
Turns out that one must be Black to be Rasta....
I assert that it shouldn't have mattered in the first damn place!
That my hairstyle is a function of my Freedom of Expression...and is, thus, Protected, under the First Amendment.
I have heard the silly retorts my whole life...."But it is a Choice...You can conform, and stop the Persecution...therefor it is Not a Civil Rights Issue".
i say Bullshit.
That's a half baked Excuse...just like the "Disruption" argument.
It has no more merit than the appeal to Authority or Tradition.
I am either Free, to be who I am, whom I choose, while harming none.....or I ain't!

Now, I am a Father.
My oldest Son has a Dad who is a Long Haired Hippie.
Naturally, he wants to emulate this.
The school, however, is operating under the same, intolerant principals, as always.
8 years old, and he is Forced to keep his hair short, and in line with the style deemed "acceptable" by the Administration.
No reasons are given , beyond the same, tired Logical Fallacies that I dealt with.
(Appeal to Authority/Tradition)
Whether the Society, at large, likes it or not...I am an Adult...finally Free to wear my hair the way I see fit.
I vote. I pay the Taxes that pay the salaries of ,ostensibly, "my" employees.
Must we continue this charade for another Generation?
Are we really going to Alienate another kid?
To what end?
I'll make, here, my own Appeal to Tradition....
the American Tradition of Standing Up to Authority...of Demanding that Stupid, and Unjust Laws and Rules be Amended!
That's the kind of Tradition I endeavor to Teach my Sons.
What are the schools teaching, with this blind acceptance of Authority?
It is NOT 1950.
Those among us with an Authoritarian bent are Free to Pine for that Golden Age....that is their Right.
But to Force such nonsense on those who do not share their Pining is Wrong.
The World has moved on.
My kid sees his heroes, Albert Einstein among them, with long hair.
His Dad has long hair.
Yet the school will insist, beyond all Logic...that it's their way, or the highway.


I can almost hear the retort, as I'm writing this..."But, Joe, this is hardly a Big Enough Deal to raise such Hell over..."
I have been dealing with this issue for most of my life.
It Is a Big Deal.
This is America...it is rumored that we won the Cold War...which was, supposedly, fought against a repressive , conformist and authoritarian ideology.
Yet, the only refutation I get to my complaint is based, when you get right down to it, on an Appeal to Authority.(which is a Logical Fallacy)
My Sophmore year, last day of classes...the Ag boys chased me around campus with sheep shears.Roy looked the other way.
Is that the kind of intolerance and Violence we want to encourage?
If you look different, if you are outside of the "Norm", you are Fair Game?

My kids, 4 and 8, currently, want to grow their hair...just like Dear Old Dad.
This harms no one.
Am I to tell them that they must Submit, when every fiber of my being says Stand Up!?
Submission to Authority is for Slaves...for lesser men.
To suspend students for the length of their hair smacks of Authoritarianism...and my boys, young as they are, are already learning that Authority must be Earned.
That it cannot be granted, or arrogated, on "Say so".
That Submission is Anathema to Free Men.
Would you have me amend these teachings?
On what grounds?
I am interested to hear your thoughts.

Prowler

An Example of a Known Unknown

Prowler.
In 2004, my Mom went to Magnolia. Don, the Belligerant Eunich, was in the VA for an extended stay.I was left in charge....and noticed nothing amiss...
untill Mom got home and called me.
The sliding door, which noone ever used, was unlocked and open about 4 inches.
I employed my inherent Indian Tracking Skills, and determined that someone had been there....crushed plants,etc.
Backtrack 5 years:Neighbor, "Tiger", before he actually moved next door, had goats, but no well.
We, being kind, strung a hose from our well to his fenceline.
Fine and dandy.
We were building a pumphouse around the well, for the approaching winter....
Tiger left the water running on several occassions...damaging the pump...
So I cut him off.
Hard winter....lights and a heater on the pump apparatus, as the house wasn't finished....hard freeze, and the lights/heater get turned off.
Smallish bootprint in the dirt around the pump.(Tiger is a smallish dude...with the attitude that goes with being a Small Man.)
We lay in wait many nights....nothing.
Finished pumphouse, and locked it up.
2 years later, Tiger moves in.Next door.
One night, Mom hears her dogs going crazy....like they have something trapped.
She goes out, 3 am , to find them w/ something cornered under a trailer.
As she calls them off, Tiger's little dog is there...then Tiger, himself, in a bathrobe, calls her name from the shadows...says he's after his dog...collects it and leaves.
Over the years, various tools disappear, and we went through 200# of hamburger awfully quick....but never made the connection.
Fast foreward to the sliding door.
Obvious that "someone" has been in the house.
We start noticing things....even footprints.
The friendly cats (out of 50 wild ones) are found dead....eviscerated.
Coke cans appear in stramge places.
We deploy baby monitors outside, to listen....all manner of strange noises.
We deploy little infra red cameras...again, anomalies...
Sherrif is not interested.
Don is still gone, so we move in with mom...she's freaking out.
I have guns, begin patrolling at odd hours (I was working nights ata cafe, got home around 11pm).
One night, I'm sitting there with mom, drinking beer after work, litening to the monitors.
Gunshot! Sounds like a shotgun.
I run out, trail of footprints in the grass...leading to the gulley.
I'm there, with the barking dogs, the Q-Beam, and the .357.
no way they had time to get past the tall grass in the gulley...So I empty the gun into the likely patches of brush.
Reload, and empty it again.
Nothing.
Next day, I'm out there....and find where a person was laying.
Footprints, even.Missed the fucker by 2 feet! The Stones on that guy!
Sherriff is not interested.(?)
Out feeding one afternoon, boys playing in Mom's yard, I see Tiger....observing us from his fence....in the bushes...with a rifle.
Only saw him 2 more times...
We escalated...put up motionlights and cameras...(cops said that was a deer with a flashlight in the goatbarn...)
I knew he had nightvision scope on his 22....so we got a night vision monacle.
I, the cripple, am laying in wait, under a tractor, w/ a 4-10, when I see what I interpret to be a cigarette cherry, thru the NV.
In the woods.
Then I see the IR beam, sweeping.
I fire....and realise that I am outmatched...he has the Tactical Advantage.
We suspect that he is watching us during the day, from his brush.
Traps we set are defeated.
We begin surveillance...see when he leaves, set traps then.
Don's drunken, crazy war buddy comes to stay, after hearing of all this.
We're in the house, listeing...when there is a shot.We rush out, guns at hand, and find more dew trails....cops see them too...but do nothing.
Next day, we find a shotgun shell,12ga, in the area where the shot came from.
Don gets home a coupla days later, and while briefing him, I produce the spent shell.
He says that he had let Tiger "borrow" a 12 ga, years before.
He calls his house, his son is home from college, and brings the gun back....same type of shells.

This went on for years.
Fucker always had the jump...Tactical Advantage.
He could watch us, but we couldn't see into his place to watch him.
This was escalating at the same time that I was beginning to be cripple....my legs were going.
I quit my job...for both of these reasons.
Dead goats, strange wire, strange little knives and screwdrivers....doorknobs attacked, like someone was trying to get in....cameras sabotaged...trails threough the bushes along the common fence line....cigarette butts (Tiger's brand) in all manner of places.
He apparently had a baby monitor...mom and I both had phone calls with recordings from inside our houses.
Then, one November, Mom and Don were in Magnolia, again.
I got up at 5 to go let the animals out....
The new chicken house was no more.
Burnt to the ground, along with 8 guinneas, and 75 chickens...
The sherriff poo-poohed the cut extension cord.

One day, patrolling the fenceline, I smelled Ammonia....near a little building not 100' from the fence, on Tiger's place.
Meth.
Turns out that the sherriff was implicated in the local Meth Trade, as well....
At this time, however, Mom was losing her mind...due to all this.
She's seeing him everywhere...esp. on the tapes from the camera.
She says he's employing "holograms" and ropes and pulleys...that he's on her roof...in the trees...
I can see no evidence, nothing on the tapes, being rigorously objective.
Don turns against her.
It's "all in her head", etc.
I knew that I had seen enough...I was convinced that Tiger was sneaking around doing strange things....
But even footprints, and jimmied doors were not enough for the cops....or for Don.
Mom's psychosis, understandable as it was, didn't help.
At one point, I smelled something behind my house.
Upon investigation, there appeared to be a small bucket of dog shit. (I had no dogs).
Mom stopped sleeping.
I stopped sleeping.
Hyperawareness.
Me and Wife actually saw the little fucker, crossing the front field in broad daylight, one day.
I got the gun, and went up there.
Ground too hard for prints....but there he was, on his side of the fence, watching me.
I suspected that our houses, and phones, were bugged.(easier to do than I had thought)
It was like he Knew when we were gonna try something surprising.
So...I couldn't sleep. any way.
I'd give mom the code word (which we ca\hanged often) so she wouldn't shoot me...and I'd slip out a window, and go on random walkabouts.
On a few occasions, there was a shot....and not from Tiger's direction.
So I'd hop in the truck, open all our gates and cruise all the fencelines, shooting up the brush with a 12 ga.
>00Buck.
Fucker called the cops on me!
(We lived way out in the middle of nowhere...he was our closest neighbor...next closest was a mile away)
I was reading Casteneda's Don Juan....and decided to try Magic.
I mean, why the hell not?!
So I go sit on the fencerow...and focus till m head hurt.
Visualised entering Tiger's house,finding his bed, and him.
I mentally went inside him, visualising the tinyest detail of anatomy...I squeezed his heart....poke holes in his brain....
I did this many times...
I couldn't sleep, anyway...and I could never actually catch him.

A year ago, Mom's in Magnolia....and Don loses his head.
I am the root of all his problems(!).
(related elsewhere).
We end up moving out.
Now mom has 2 enemies, Tiger and her Husband.
I hear through the grapevine recently, that Tiger has "aggressive Altzheimer's" and can no longer be left alone.
I am shocked by this news.
Did I do that?!
Is it an explanation for all the surreality?!
For almost 5 years, I have been hyperaware, and thought of as crazy...
I mean, why would anyone do the things we were accusing Tiger of doing?
Cops figgured it was me, or Mom, herself....I am a long haired Hippie (ergo a Dope Fiend), and me and Mom are strange ducks...Liberals, artists, etc....
Don hasn't helped...befriending the Sherriff, slandering me, telling them Mom is crazy as a latrine rat....

My Reason, my Rigorous Skepticism, says: either it was Tiger, or it was something Paranormal.
There are no other explanations....I have been over it a million times.