Social Isolation and Perfidy

αποξενωμένοι *
parmi les hances ambedeus **


In the Beginning, I was encouraged to embrace my Intelligence, and it’s corresponding Idiosyncrasies.
As a precocious child, I was told about how the world was my oyster…and about success and bootstraps, and College….
Later on, after I had taken the advice to heart, and had Embraced my Smarts and their corollaries…(Weirdo)…the Role Models and Wise Ones, had changed their minds.
Shot through my time at school, from kindergarten, on, was what I now can Identify as “Alienation”…
I embraced it, indeed. (imagine yourself as a literate kindergartner at a Lutheran school, who knows not only the names of all the Dinosaurs, but the Greek Roots of those names and has a rudimentary grasp of Evolution, Plate Tectonics, as well.)
The more my Folks backpeddled, the more I charged ahead…Individuation….Defining myself, with little input from the community I found myself in…except in the Negative(well, I’m Not a Redneck…or a Jock…and I make a rather poor Teacher’s Pet….)
This was hardwired, by the time of the Divorce…and ML’s dad burning their house down(almost a bigger deal than my own Folk’s divorce)
By the time I left Mom’s, under a cloud, I was already well on the way to Unusual.
Concurrently, at this period, was my difficulties with girls…I was already their Virtual Brother.(sigh)….providing a shoulder while they wailed about their Junior High Love Lives….then High School Love Lives…
When ML moved to T-Ball, Freshman Year…that was the biggest blow, yet.
My only True Friend.
I followed, a year and a half later…but it was too late.
Our Paths had irrevocably diverged.
(around the beginning of this period is when I met and fell in love with “Her”)
That summer when I moved to T-Ball, ML was gone somewhere…and I knew No One…I rode my Dad’s bike all over town…alone, and stared at.lol….which is, largely, the story of my life, since then.
I glommed onto the Stoner Set, as they were more open, and tolerant.
There was still the Girl Problem…I was still the Brother…and, admitting this to myself, reckoned I’d go whole Hog in that direction…perhaps one of my Sisters would take notice. Chivalry.
This was a minor reason for my career as Knight Errant…rescuing Damsels, and the like…the major reason was that I considered it the Moral, Right thing to do…
I was a Good Brother, I guess…
But, somewhere in my mind, I hoped for some recompense…the Lady’s Favour, as it were…which was not forthcoming.
I grew further apart.
I Rebelled….and was Cast Out.
At almost the same time, I attempted to Save the Wrong Girl…and due to her Powerful Relatives, was
Cast Out, even More.
So I learned to Drink.
…and found that there is an even more remote region of Outer Darkness!!
By the time I, finally, abandoned my Home Towns…I was Habitually On the Run.
Outside.
Le Passant.
In Huntsville, I began to think of all this mess in a Byronic sense…with a bit of Quixote(and Dean and Sal) thrown in, for leavening.
But H-Ville was still just a T-Ball with a University(and Prisons!)…the Brief Flowering of Miami Apartments, notwithstanding.
My Exodus, to Austin was with all of this, in mind…
Soon, I began to fear that there was no place, for me.
First Real Job in Austin(Olive Gdn doesn’t count.Ugh!), was a Frat Hangout…
I had had dealings with such creatures, in H-Ville, of course…usually by playing their parties.(the Help)…but this was different. I observed, with clinical detachment, their antics…from “the Line” through the little Kitchen window, through which I sent the food(Kitchen, as Blind. They appeared to not even notice my existence.). They all had gold and platinum cards…nice cars…and an almost guaranteed Leg Up…and they Knew this.
I’ve never been exactly envious of such folks…I have never wanted what they had…I hated them, because their Ease translated directly into My Hardship…they were just facile continuations of the Paradigm(I had yet to read Marx)…devoid of substance.
”Hollow Men”, made flesh.
They would fit nicely in whatever Niche had been prepared for them.
My time in Austin…at least at work…was spent like this; observing the Mundanes.
Then I’d go home to my then-wife’s Circus of Strays….
Little Intellectualism to be found, there…although I did have a few acquaintances who allowed me to indulge myself in philosophical rumination, from time to time.
But no where to Belong.
No Niche.
As the story goes, I ended up way out here; and still…no where to Be.
So I know a thing or two about high-fallutin concepts, like “Alienation”, and “Social Isolation”.
Aside from Wife and Mom, the only friends I have are “Online”…and thus exist mostly in my mind.(!)

I suppose that I should try to get used to my current state.


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Hot Cousin works at a giant insurance outfit…
Works all the time, and parties the rest…from what I can tell, most of the folks she interacts with are from Work…those that aren’t, are Old Friends,and the like…and seem to serve as Compartmentalised Rocky Islands…just offshore from the Big Island of Work…which is one of the things I’m pointing at.
I talk about “NeoFeudalism”, a lot….and there it is. The Giant Insurance Corporation has several Gyms, Cafeterias, Coffee Shops, Baseball Teams, Softball Teams, Squash and Tennis Courts, and a Swimming Pool.
There is ample “Greenspace” on “Campus”…numerous Hike and Bike Trails…it’s a “Community”…complete with it’s own Dialect(Jargon). The “Associates” are (tacitly) encouraged to “keep it in the Family”…to put a somewhat ugly point on it…
Manorialism, for the 21st Century.
Friends today are , largely, people one knows from Work….with the occasional call from the college roommate, or high school knockaround.
Our Social Lives are, increasingly, Defined by our Jobs…and the Systems that, along with ourselves, they are a part of. Add to this the Omnipresent Media Barrage…what to Do, what to Think…how to look…how to behave…what to Buy, in order to Be Happy…(because You Deserve It!)
(with the recent, exponential rise in Job “Displacement”…unemployment…and the like…I expect a concurrent Rise in PsychoSocial “Issues”…don’t know how to measure it: perhaps incidence of Mass Shootings, “Domestic Abuse”, or Prescriptions for Elavil…)
What I gleaned from Corporate Kitchens(like Olive Garden), was 1. it ain’t “Cooking”…rather, it is microwaving frozen food(compare to the lavish commercials!, of authentic food lovingly prepared, , by real chefs!!!)(Disentangle that Reality!)
2. It attempts to be a “Community”…Pep Rallies, Special Dialect, Emphasis on how all the “associates”, top to bottom, are on the Team….(again, tacitly) discouraged from interacting with one’s counterparts across the street, at Red Lobster. A Facsimile of a Tribe.
Anodyne. Soulless, but with the appearance of Soul.
%^%





One of the defining Features of “PostModernism”, is this Disintegral Disjointedness…Isolation, among an apparent overabundance of Choices. Orwell and Huxley (and Atwood, etc etc…and, don’t forget the Matrix!) are used as Metaphor to warn this or that Faction of the Doom to Come…if they vote the wrong way, buy the wrong product, get the wrong degree, or fail to do any of this, and more.(missing the various Points, completely!)
Meanwhile, We are already There. It’s 1984, the Year Zero…it’s Founder’s Day, and we should Celebrate, in our Pods.


The question that nags me…how much of this Isolation is Intentional.
As I’ve said, after 60+ years of increasing Credulity…of Gullibility… of our ever growing Inability to determine Objective Reality…it seems impossible to place Blame for this Condition.
Like Corporate Persons as AI….is it simply the Logic of the System…Automatic?
Is there some powerful Cabal of Social Scientists and Mass Psychologists, engineering these things?
As the last two “notes”(10&11), below, indicate…Our Isolation sure seems to have some benefit for the Top Tier…(by keeping us as fragmented and confused as possible)
But, this does not, of necessity, mean that there is overarching Intention.
Similarly, Sports…especially the Professional Variety…but it’s not limited to the large scale exhibitions.
Mason and Brady no longer get together for the Autumnal Gladiatorial Exercises(Football…they’re in different categories, now), but the rivalry lingers on, from the time when they did.
Fights routinely break out in “Sports Bars”, at sundry “Playoffs”…and other “Important” Games.(oxymoron!!)
Even Riots (!!) are not uncommon.
(see:kenstout.net)


Folks care so much about the fortunes and accomplishments of millionaire strangers, running with balls, that they will Riot!!!...but not Vote.
Again….how much of this is Intentional? Some, I’m sure…PTB like to pretend they’re in Charge, after all. Most is likely a simple function of Overchoice and Complexity, and the Dis-Integrating Trends operant in (Post)Modern Society(family splintering, suburban isolation, the end of the Career Track Jobs of the middle of last Century, with Pensions,Stability and adequate Wages.) PTB merely takes advantage of this Function.
From link #10;” To oversimplify, one might say that a new determinant
of alienation has emerged, in the course of the
twentieth century, which is not the result of an
insufferable lack of freedom but of an overdose of
`freedom,' or rather, unmanageable environmental
complexity.”

And:” According to Schacht, one cannot
possibly be involved with `society' as one can with
`community,' but only with some of the social formations
within it: i.e., specific processes and institutions,
that definitely cannot be considered to stand as parts
to a whole. Such involvement is necessarily selective
and limited, and depends on individual preferences,
character, and possibilities, sometimes even on a
random and unique series of accidents.”

And:’ The subjects themselves unfortunately have
very little say in the matter, whether lying on the
analyst's couch or standing on the barricades, and
may or may not be or become aware of their alienation,
and may even..rightly or wrongly..deny being afflicted
with it.
“
This is the biggest benefit, of all, to the Ruling Elite….whomever they are: We don’t Know…
Us serfs do not know that we’re serfs…Enamored by the Wall of the Cave, we lash out at the odd rabble rouser, the random Thinker, who intrudes on our enjoyment (as far as we can tell…) of the simulacrum.

From #11:” :” The message contained in THE MATRIX thus is a sustained attempt to get across the meaning of "Temet nosce" (in the Oracle's kitchen, above the door): "Know thyself." We are not capable of recognizing who we are, what we are truly capable of, if we allow the constraints and controls that delimit societal practices, to define "our selves." We cannot "free our minds," and our selves, on our own, independently of others – but, in fact, are dependent on the help of others, to lead, or "trick," us along the path of "self"-discovery. Following this path may be the most subversive activity to engage in, today”

AND:”“ Modern societies continue to hover in a state of suspended animation–allowing for economic and cultural changes, while protecting the social structure and political and organizational systems of power against the implications and consequences that ought to result from those economic and cultural changes.”
And:”Concepts like capitalism, democracy, freedom , and modernity, have become labels that highlight what is to be explained and understood, rather than involving explanatory value. Without determined efforts to maintain a process of reflection upon the historical origins of such concepts, their original meaning in relation to concrete socio-historical conditions and their subsequent, successive transmutations alongside concrete, nationally specific, social, political, economic and cultural changes until the mid-twentieth century, these concepts are barriers against, rather than tools for, explaining and understanding societal realities in their contingent specificity.”

This last is a somewhat dense explanation for the Texas 2012 GOP Platform’s inclusion of a Plank against “Critical Thinking”….meaning the pseudo-neomarxist Frankfurt School variety(13).( while stupidly omitting that distinction,(lol)thus setting themselves up for howls of ridicule) (perhaps they feared that if they were so explicit, some of their Herd would go and read up on the Frankfurt School, appreciate Sense, and leave the GOP.Ha!)

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It took me a long time to figure out that the Ostraca (ὄστρακα) had been thrown…that I was unwelcome, back “home”. Not only were my Folks obviously tired of the game….Dad, off in his new life…Mom, with her Belligerent Eunich…but the Society, itself, had no use for me.
My Drunkenness was an excuse…and it was probably a good one. But Psychotic Inebriation was not the whole picture…I caught glimmers of it long before the Drink became a problem. The local Powers that Were didn’t want me around…”too much trouble”…meaning …what? Disruption? Certainly…But there was something more. A Fat Cop told me…as he was “booking” me for “PI” towards the end of my time there,…he said,” I hate people like you”…Not having much to lose, I asked why…”Because you threaten everything we stand for (meaning the town, if not the Civilisation)…you’re too smart…you read the wrong books…and get other kids to read the wrong books…and it just causes Problems…you’re not Moral, not Civilized”….
I’ve rarely spoken of this little interlude of candor…but it has nagged me. Back then, (and for the most part, since!) I never thought of myself as any kind of Threat…indeed, I considered myself a Paragon of Americanism! I was Fighting for Truth, Goddammit! For Freedom!
Looking back, now…we were both right…the Fat Cop, and I….and the two sides to the story were mutually incompatible. They, and the Principality of the School,etc., had been afraid that I’d start a Revolution…an Uprising. LOL.(VP Rick told me as much, while watching the Dogs search my Car, maybe 5 years before Fat Cop. I laughed it off, then.)
The Fat Cops, and the Cheerleading Suits in Corpworld, and the Hair Police, and all of the other Banal(Arendt) mechanics and gears and cogs in the Great Machine…have Won.
All of this will only get worse…because the vast Majority have lost the ability to Think…have lost the Need to Think…
And all of Us, the unhappy few who have, somehow, retained such a Need, and such an Ability…are Isolated…Fragmented…Leaderless…Community-less…save for the odd Arkansas Valley, or “Virtually”, which is Inadequate(if not Pathetic). We watch from the sidelines, from the woods, as our Civilisation Falls into Darkness…
Again, from #11:” We cannot "free our minds," and our selves, on our own, independently of others – but, in fact, are dependent on the help of others, to lead, or "trick," us along the path of "self"-discovery. Following this path may be the most subversive activity to engage in, today”

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NOTES,Etc.
*”alienated”.lol.
**”pierced through the ‘thigh’, with a Lance”.(see:Amfortas)
1(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gawain)
2(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betrayal)
3(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transference)
4(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shadow_%28psychology%29)
5(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hero_complex)
6(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Damsel_in_distress)
7(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knight_errant)
8(http://www.uiweb.uidaho.edu/student_orgs/arthurian_legend/grail/fisher/)
9http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_isolation
10(http://www.unizar.es/sociocybernetics/chen/felix/pfge15.pdf) !!!
11http://web.utk.edu/~hdahms/Emergence.pdf) !!!!!!!!!!

12 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_thinking)
13(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frankfurt_School)

The Morality of Serpents

“Come now, let Us Reason together…”

Yesterday’s announcement, that Mitt Romney had chosen Paul Ryan(Kill Medicare!) as his VP Candidate, is a veritable Bird’s Nest on the Ground for Democrats…indeed, for anyone who does not count themselves among the Super Rich, or their Fleas.
Mitt was bad enough…being the Poster Child for the 1%....hiding income to avoid paying his Fair Share, Exporting Jobs to Bangladesh, and China…being so far out of touch with Regular Folks that no one even knows, on a given day, just what it is he’s talking about.
Add Ryan(Kill Medicare!) to the mix, and it adds some clarification , as to where the GOP/Tea Party wants to take Us.
Ryan is a devotee of Ayn Rand. The Russian Émigré, and her PseudoPhilosophy of Selfishness, are to be found at the very heart of the Economic and Political System of the Reagan Revolution. It is the Ideology of a Pubescent Boy…”I’ll do as I want!...and Damn the Consequences!”…It can also be thought of as the Ideology of a Serial Killer, whom Rand, herself, is well known to have lionized as the quintessential practitioner of her “Philosophy”.
In it’s most simple form, it is the Ideology of the Lizard,or the Snake;
”I shall Devour”.
Pour boiling oil down the ladder you have just ascended, and set it alight….”I got Mine…”
This is likely a fine worldview, if you count yourself among the Very Rich.
If one is not so lucky, it is a recipe for Disaster.
A Snake is simply a “Mobile Alimentary Canal”…a Moving Stomach.(Campbell)
Is that the Model on which We wish to base Our Civilisation?
I submit to you, dear reader, that it is Not.
It is, instead, simply a “Coming Out” of the very same Ideology that We have been toiling under, for 35 years….”Greed is Good”.
One will likely hear much about “Fiscal Responsibility” in the coming months…Ryan seems to be somewhat fond of that Phrase….But let Us look at the Record…
The same bunch who now wants to “Cut Entitlements”(Kill Medicare! “Privatize” Social Security!), are the ones who have engineered the last 3 decades of decline…in Real Incomes, in Quality of Life, in Job Security, in Access to Health Care, in Civil Liberties(Patriot Act!) in Civility!…and on and on….
(Many will cry out,”Bill Clinton!”, as if this is a refutation …but, I assert that Clinton was the best Democratic Friend the GOP ever had:Nafta, Gramm-Leach-Bliley,”Workfare”,and a Womanizer, to boot!)

In this same period, the GOP has ruthlessly attacked Unions(perhaps the only non-governmental foil to unmitigated Corporate Power), and all things “Public”….including Democracy, itself. They Hate and Fear the “People”…hence, the sundry “Voter ID” Legislation, the “Right to Work”(for low wages) Policies, and the wanton Destruction of the Safety Net that, like it or not, We all rely on, and Pay For.(according to the 2010 Census, Mason has 16.3% below the “Poverty Line”, and 25.3% above 65 years of age,who are, therefore, beneficiaries of Medicare, and Social Security…as well as Government Protected(despite Republicans) Savings, Pensions and other Retirement.)( (http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/states/48/48319.html)
At some point, We the People, will have to take notice of the Reality of Our situation…and who it was who brought us to these unfortunate circumstances…Supply Side Economics has FAILED. Doubling down on the Failure will not Fix anything…it will, rather, make it much worse.
There will be a lot of fine rhetoric about how a Romney/Ryan Administration will be “Fiscally Responsible”…how it will “Get America back on track”…
I ask you…Back on Track, to What? What does the Phrase, “Fiscally Responsible” mean?
Is there any Evidence for it, from the GOP?
They, and their Self Serving, Fat Cat Coddling Habits, have brought us the Highest Deficits, the Highest “Personal Debt”, and the Worst Economy since the ‘30’s…(see: http://www.usgovernmentspending.com/downchart_gs.php?year=1900_2012&chart=H0-total and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:U.S._Household_Debt_Relative_to_Disposable_Income_and_GDP.png )


As for the Debt…who dunnit?
(http://www.whitehouse.gov/infographics/us-national-debt)
A review of Our History (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_history_of_the_United_States#Deregulation_and_Reaganomics:_1976.E2.80.931992) shows, quite clearly, in whom We should Trust…as far as Economics….if We have a care for the Majority of Americans, as opposed to the Tiny Minority who have received most of the Income Redistribution of the Great Republican Experiment.
Shouting, “Me,Me,Me!!!” does not a Patriot make…neither does a Lapel Pin.
”By their Fruits shall ye know them…”
It is far past time that We turned from Avarice as the Highest Good, to some regard for the Wellbeing of US. It is WE, after all, who must live with Ourselves, and Each Other. Civilisation is defined by Our Commonalities…by the Things that We Share. To dismiss this as “Socialism” is disingenuous and ahistorical….and will lead, inexorably, to more economic hardship and Poverty for the Rest of Us.
I ask that my Countrymen begin to Think…beyond the Bumpersticker…ask yourself, what sort of country do We want?
One of Greedy, Self-Serving Snakes, without any care for their Neighbors?
Or one where We…All of Us…have a chance…an opportunity…to attain some semblance of that increasingly elusive American Dream.
( just for fun: Paul Ryan’s Heroine, Ayn Rand, was an Atheist…and, in the hight of Hypocrisy, signed on to Social Security, and Medicare, when she got old and sick!)

Kafka Charges Forth

Rollercoaster of emotions…
Friday, after my phone died in the middle of the call(all I got was “you’ve been approved…”)
after, then, dealing with kid’s phone, and the inability to dial direct to the Government Person who initially called me…
after all that, I determine:
I am “Medically Approved” for SSI…which will (Finally) get me onto Medicaid…
And…That I am, as yet, “Unapproved for Non-Medical”, for SSI…they need more Paper.
Wife’s Income(again)…and the value of my broken down shell of a trailerhouse…which sits in a pasture, out at Mom’s…
Uh-Oh…
The Tax People reckon it’s worth $11K…which is $8K over the SSI Limit for my “assets”…
I’m told to try and get it Appraised…
So I spend all morning on the phone to banks and Real Estate Agents, and Property Appraisers, who…to a man…say they can’t do it…
Because it’s not “Real Property”….it is, instead, “Personal Property”.
Ergo, I have a choice between the Tax Office Guy, who apparently thinks this shell of a “home” is lined with Platinum….or one of the “mobile home manufacturures’” Appraisal People….which, by all accounts, will cost me at least $500…and likely, $1000+…..
Which is, of course, probably MORE than the damned thing is worth!!!
So I elect to call the Tax Guy…I tell him it ain’t a “Homestead”…it ain’t “Real Property”(which I glean means,”attached to a parcel of land”)…that it doesn’t have plumbing, or a/c, heat, electricity, a kitchen, and that one can see daylight from both bathrooms, as well as the former Kitchen.
He drones on about the “New Bathroom”…$5K….which is missing a whole wall, as well as a door, and has raccoons living in it(!!!!!!!!)(really)
He then drones on about the “Deck”, which is totally gone….and the “Patio”, which was a porch, but which is now half gone…and what remains, is dangerous to set foot on… “valued”, respectively, at $700, and $2000(!!!!!!!!!!!)
Stepdad’s sudden insanity is not the only reason we left for Town, you see…
So I got the whole thing down to $6500…still $3500 0ver the Limit.
SIGH.
Tax Guy says, take some pictures….
Hopefully, it will then be “revalued”, again, down to the cost of hauling it off(which is what I had wanted to do, but have had no money)
The other option, is to sign on to something called “Conditional…”something-or-other…and put an add in the paper for the next 9 months, with that remnant of a trailer for sale, for the,Current, “Appraised Value”…$11,000.
If I do that, I can get Medicaid as soon as November….and, presumably, locate a willing Orthopaedic Surgeon….replace the Hip, and the Vertebra(maybe more than one)…”Fuse” the Ankle…and maybe even get a new Knee, too…as well as the necessary Physical Therapy….all of which is likely orders of magnitude more than $11,000…..
If a Rich Idiot wanders by , and shells out $11K for this Junker…wonder of wonders….I will hafta “pay back” whatever Medicaid I have received….
I have no Idea, at all, if this means that Medicaid will get the $11K, or whatever, or if I will be expected to “pay back” the whole amount….which, according to previous inquiries, could be north of a Quarter Million….
I harbor no Hope that such details will be forthcoming….I likely will never know, for sure, until Medicaid(or US Attourney, or whomever) tries to collect…which, as these things go….could be Years. (Social Security had us down as, not only Separated(no idea where they got that), but also still having 3 cars and trucks(so far) that are long gone…one, more than 8 years ago.
Another Issue…Cleared Up, for now…my “Rent”.
I don’t Own this House, in Town….Wife’s Uncle does…my “Rent” is paying his Taxes, and his Back Taxes…in order to pay the Back Taxes, my name is on the Tax Forms for this House…ergo, SSA, naturally, reckons that I am “Coowner”…and, thus, $20,000 richer than I said.(NOT)
It never ends.
Meanwhile, Joe Klein is on Morning Joe, saying that Disability is, essentially, the New Welfare…that “Regular Welfare” is down…but that folks who would be on that, are now “flocking” to Disability/SSI….and that “low level government functionaries” are simply letting everybody through.
I beg to Fucking Differ!
Mr Klein is regarded as a “Liberal”, by the Right.
I beg to differ with that, as well…
So, since Friday, the Bipolar(undiagnosed) is gone Haywire…
I go from Elation, which led to drunken psychosis, which led to Shame and Depression….and, now, since Monday, further Depths of Depression….and a sense of Sisyphean Despair
Add in the first “cold front” of Fall(down 6 degrees…it’s the Pressure Differential)…and I am in Hell…
Disability,proper, denied me for the Fourth Time…due to my lack of “Work Credits”, and my not being Disabled, under their, secret, definition of the word.
I had Credits, up until 2009…three years after I “Retired”.
Credits go away, after you stop working…so I have insufficient Credits, now, for Disability…because I quit working, because I was/am Disabled….
As for Not being Disabled(by whatever their Criteria is), I really, truly and honestly have no frigging Idea where that determination comes from.
Every Doctor including their own kept doctor, agrees…I’m all fucked up…which is the Medical Terminology for, ”Absolutely, without a Doubt, DISABLED”.
When the blonde one’s on Faux News(sic) blather on about the “Welfare State”, this election season…Remember Me.
When Willard, or Rick or Paul goes on and on about how easy it is to “game the system”, to defraud welfare…how the “welfare system” is rife with evil Welfare Queens, hanging from the Government Teat, living Large on HardWorking American’s Tax Dollars™…Remember Me.
When your Tea Party Uncle insists, over the Holidays, that the Kenyan Usurper is running us to ruin with his Welfare Handouts™….Remember Me.
It’s all Bullshit.
Shat by Kafka’s Ghost.

(my apologies, as well…to whomever I directed my directionless ire, bile and chagrin onto.I violate, to my Shame, most of my own Seven Things, whenever I fall into a beer bottle.Sorry.)

A Blanket of Apology

To all of You, whom I have made Angry…

I was Drunk.
All of the unconscious Demons came to the front,
Took me over.
I am the Embodiment of both Dean Moriarty,
And Sal Paradise….
Conflicting Spirits.
Please continue Loving me.
Know that I Love you, as well.
-Josef.

Six(+) Years….

….and the Gears of Government have finally found me.
Dude called, today…said I was “Approved” for SSI…
and, thereby, “Approved” for Medicaid.
I wept.
”Disability” was another matter…my “Credits” for that went away in 2009, because I hadn’t worked…because I had been waiting for Disability to notice me.(sigh)
I really do not know just how to feel…
Almost seven years ago, after I had finally quit working, due to the Pain(and this, after gradually limiting my work to fewer and fewer days, in a week)…and, even though I knew what was wrong, I went to my kid’s Doctor, who is used to my Idiosyncrasies….and had an XRay, and an actual Diagnosis…
Avascular Necrosis in my Right Hip, Gravel for a Left Ankle, Damaged Right Knee…Doc said, “You Need a Hip”. (Now, add “compression fracture, in T4”= “crushed vertebra”=”Broken Back”…(!!)…I suspect a couple more vertebrae have “issues”…now I can get X Rays, and MRI’s!)
Next step was figuring out how to pay for it.
I had no Insurance.
My last Insurance Company, had dropped me like a burning porcupine, after my Wreck, 20+ years ago…zero Insurance, since then.
(and I’ve certainly Tried!)
shit….

The story’s all right here.I can’t go through it all , again, right now…
I am overwhelmed.
Tears of Joy.
The Chance to Live like a Human Being, again…
(“chance”, because I do not know…if I can be fixed, or what all this actually Means…counting chickens, and all…)
“Chance” to contribute…at least SOMETHING… (besides dishes and laundry), to the Well Being of my Familia…(there’s a monthly check involved…which has never been my Focus(I just wanted Access to the “Best Healthcare in the World”.)…alleviating at least some of our Poverty)(I’ve even told the various Imperial Functionaries to “Keep the Damn Check, just give me the Health Care!”)
Chance to get the proverbial “Full Body Scan”, to find out how extensively FUBAR I really am…(numerous Known Breaks and Fractures that I “treated” myself, leaving no Record)
Best of all, the Chance to perhaps DO Something About It!!!!!
Sonata, in G…Eine Kleine Nachtmusik.
Light as a Feather.
Not quite able to trust that the Great Weight has finally been Lifted.
Almost a Quarter of my Life has been spent doing this…attempting to storm the walls of our pitiful “Public Health System”.
Add this to the more than half of my Life spent in Pain(much overlap, of course)….

Heat and Homogeny

The day fast approaches, when “School Shopping” must be undertaken.
I , as usual, want to go…to get out of the house/town…perhaps to go among the herd…
But mostly, because I dread when my Bunch is far away.
50 mile radius, is only various iterations of walmart, and beall’s…
However, Wife must go to San Angelo, for training…
They have a Target…lol…
At least it’s something different.
Wife sees “Shopping” as an Activity…like Golf.
I am unpopular on these trips, because I am an inveterate Utilitarian,
with regards to “Shopping”.
I have my List…and flow through the store(usually the grocery store), with speed and precision….
Which is, apparently, No Fun, at all.
I’m willing to compromise, of course. (within certain limits, set by Bones)
I have no problem sitting somewhere…like the truck…reading, while they finish the more tedious portions of the Activity of “Shopping”…
But everywhere there are acres of white concrete,
Baking in the Sun.
What trees there were, were shorn to make room for the concrete.
What passes for the Patios(America’s answer to Sidewalk Cafes), of the sundry eating establishments,
are adjacent to the Broiling Plains of Parking…
A large Umbrella on the table, cannot compete.
I like to smoke with my coffee, iced tea, and books…
There are no air conditioned spaces where this is allowed, any longer,
in the Land of the Free….
Perhaps, I will do some research…
There’s a river (the Concho) right through downtown…
Surely there’s a place to sit there…under a tree…

Amfortas Agonistes.

What’s the Point
of all my Investigation?
Of my Struggles?
Intellectual Pursuits, never ending, because All is One.
Related.
Integral.
Thank Goddess for Wife…
But, what about my Mind?
I long to be Understood.
And to be Corrected.
Engaged on my terms.
Folks only hear the bits they want to hear.
Especially Men…at least the specimens I encounter.
I prefer the Kitchen, and the company of Womyn.
Lust doesn’t negate the Intellectual,
that Feature is merely incidental…indeed,
the first flows from the last.
It is entirely Rational…
Unfortunate, that We still consider Womyn as Property
as Baby Factories.
And relegate to Impossible,
the possibility of Platonism.
Even(especially!!) the Lustful Sort.
Now that I am Broken,
Hopelessly Marred,
Now that I can no longer Fuck, save under the most extreme conditions,
am I , therefore, less Threatening?

I doubt it.
It’s still a Man’s World,
despite our Advances, and therefore based on Terror, in it’s former sense.
The (quite arbitrary) Rules, and Structures,
are based on Fear and Greed, and Possession.
A cloak, to elude the Uncertainty of Change, that is the most Salient Feature of Universe.
Unthinking, as Habit of Thought.
I am a Bonobo , among the more warlike Chimps.
Our unacknowledged Puritanism effectuates a Reverse Darwinism.
We descend…
Clinging to various fantasies of a less Threatening Past.
Clinging, fanatically, to God’s corpse…Unwilling to Boldly Create our own Meaning…
Our own Epistemology.
Unwilling to plant Roses, in God’s lifeless eyes.
All of our Politics reflects this…
this Unconscious Fear of Thought
and Lust.
The Little Hammer taps our knee,
and We hem ourselves in, to hide from the Universe…
Social Constructs,
Taboos,
Terrorised by the Vastyness…
We burrow in deep.
Struggle to Ignore the Heavens above,
now that we know, in our deepest level, that they are Empty…
and that We are Alone.

Tedious.
Boring.
To always be required to explain the explanations.
Sisyphean…rolling downhill to
Despair.
The sad fate of Philosophers and Poets…
Perhaps I’ll be Understood when I’m Dead.

Anachronism.
A thing without Time.
As punishment for some past-life infraction,likely Imagined,
I find myself swirling in an Eddy.
In our Rightward Swing…
My retrograde motion, contrary,
If inconsequential,
to the general direction of the Stream.
Waiting for the Exhaustion that will inevitably come…
I’ve been waiting for my entire life for the current to shift,
Watching the Leading Lights(sic)
whip the Sheep into frenzy,
piling stone after stone, believing sincerely that they are
Ensuring Permanence of Direction…Arresting Change.
Unconsciously, instead, making all but Certain the birth of an Oxbow…
Stag-Nation……A Civilisation, already dead,
But Unaware of it.
God’s grave becomes crowded…
What a conundrum!
I wait, less than Patiently, for someone to notice the Novelty of a new Course…
How Exciting!, I muse…
But there is only the FEAR.
There are many Eddies, I admit…but the one I’m turning in,
I find preferable…Less Violence, you see.
It is as yet Unknown which will entice the Stream…
This is the “Marketplace of Ideas”, I guess.
It is how Rivers change their course,
By Accident.

Jane Goodall, on the Beach

((….Of course, my Inner Drunken Lunatic had other ideas….apologies to 3 of my favorite Humans, for my Reptilian Outburst.)
Slowly, slowly, back on the Regimen…this year, I can’t handle being entirely Drug Free, for more than 24 hours, or so(32).)

As for the less positive observations…
I could definitely live in Galveston…Freaks, Hippies,Weirdos…the Island has a long History of accommodation for the Socially Unacceptable.
Then there’s the Tourists(in Pre911 Restaurant Parlance;”Terrorists” )
I suspect that one can pick out the more Liberal Minded of the Beach Goers, from the likely unconscious choice of color scheme, as well as clichés regarding automobiles….invariably, the Kia’s and Prius’ were accompanied by Rainbow Flags and Giant Umbrellas….I guess it could be similar to “Gaydar”…lol.
These were in the Minority…and kept to themselves, music, only loud enough for them to hear….quick glances, looking out for Danger..
The Beach, come Friday, was Knee-Deep in Tea…Black, Red and White, Angular….and the obligatory,and omnipresent, Red White and Blue. You could smell the Testosterone….and Feel the Belligerence….Loud Music, Ostentatious…Prideful…
At the Edges, were the International Brotherhood of Serious Fishermen. I am a Member, as shown by the Surf Rods sticking out of my truck…and I kept running into the same 4 guys, talking about Fish, and their Presence or Absence .IBSF rises above mere Politics(2 of these fellows were likely Pseudo Nazis,lol)….a glimpse of a Better World, where our Commonalities matter more than our differences.
If these field observations of Demographics is scalable to Texas, in General…then we are, indeed, Lost.
By Thursday, mid-day, when the Throngs began streaming in, the Vibe was unmistakably Hostile.
A strange feature of Tea…of the Right, in General…is that they seem to be unaware of their own Hatred and Fear and Hostility….it is Normal, unremarkable…Part and Parcel of Who They Are.
This is the most depressing Observation….and is born out in the literature…in my long study of the Mind of the Right.
It is what Dooms the remnant left to obscurity. Reason cannot Penetrate the numerous Falsehoods, Dichotomies, the Inconsistencies. If the Beach is, indeed, a Representative Sample of Texas, then we are Doomed.
Despite the Collapse of the Republican Party…we are Ripe for Fascism…..the Mindlessness, the Burning…the Essential Nihilism….
So much for Progress.

It Was Fun, But…

I coasted through..
As in an Ordeal…
I took the Maximum Allowed, of all my Pills…all Legally Prescribed…
And I just Skated through….
Plus Judicious Use of Magic Brownies.
Could not have done it,
at all,
but for the Drugs.
I Floated Along, and it was Good.
Fished with my Boys, and my Brother and Dad.
The boys, and Wife(!) , learned about Crabbing(weights, string, chicken necks, net)….
How fun it is.
Beach.
Hours.
I am Lobster, come for your Dead.
Boys, crestfallen, that they must stay close to shore, so that Momma can rest…Dada being too Broken to take them out any more.(“To the Deep End”, as Ben puts it….)
2 Hour waits, sans A/C, for the Ferry…surliest folks I’ve ever encountered….
Bought myself a Green, Batik, Sarong.
Ankle Length.
(for the Kilt Girls)
350 Miles!
& I’m “Detoxing”, tonight…from the Max Dose I’ve been on for the week.
Just Brownies, and Beer.
(Fear Not, I ain’t gonna get on FB, or call any body….
Let the Mountain come to Me.)

Why Politics Matters

I Screwed up.
I keep the week’s Pills in one of those things that have the days, and am/pm, on little compartments.
I’ve always had problems with Time…and, in this case, it matters…so I embrace the usual fact…that by 10 am, I don’t remember if I’ve taken my meds…often at 4am. Was that today? Yesterday? Last week?
I guess, on the one hand, this is indicative of the –non-effectiveness of the meds.lol.
…which is what I’m on about…
on the other hand,it is indicative of what all I do to try and feel better.
My Green Box goes from Sunday to Saturday.
Ergo, Saturday is when I fill it.
I screwed up, this week, by forgetting that the Vicodin would run out on Friday.
Every other month, I must call in to my Doctor for a refill.(the Influence of DEA Hysteria, and the resultant inhumane way we do Pain Management)
One cannot call the Doc, or his Nurse, directly…one must press 2, and leave a message.
So , Monday morning, I did so…and she got back to me that afternoon…
They deal with this class of chore at the end of the day(I’m not the only one)…so, it’s Tuesday Morning…and I must wait till around lunchtime for the Pharmacy to get their end accomplished.
Almost 4 days without Vicodin.
Objectvely good for me…I used to go without voluntarily…to guard against the Addiction that one hears so much about…despite the actual Clinical Evidence(folks who take this crap for Pain, are unlikely to become Addicted)
I have noted No, Zero, signs of Withdrawal/
What I have noticed, is PAIN.
The Meloxicam,Mthyl Salycate(sp-2), and even Magic Brownies can’t touch this, it seems.
The Brownies make me want to get up , and move around…nothing unusual, there.
But I find that this is more difficult than usual.
To break up the Monotony of Bed, I hobble down here…to the Library, and sit Painfully in the Massage Chair, at my desk, for a time.
Bed isn’t really any less Painful.
It is a distinctly different Quality of Pain, than the usual…
It’s not the Crushing kind, that comes with Hurricanes, and Cold Fronts…Thankfully, even with the recent rain, we’ve had little in the way of Pressure Differentials.(less that 5 points, between the Highs and Lows).
It’s not the Dull Full Body Ache…the feeling of being Stacked Wrong…of what I term “a Good Day”.
It’s not the Acute, Stabbing Pain in various Joints….like I’m being pulled apart, as on a Medieval Rack… like when I “Overdo” it.
This is Different.
This is both Sharp and Dull…Crushing and Pulling…Acute and Diffuse…all blurred together…Undifferentiated.
Any semblance of Comfort is even more elusive than normal.
The “Restless Leg Syndrome” is back…in every joint.
I cannot Sleep.
The Crazy thing is, I can remember what Vicodin was like….I thought it was bad enough, with it…
Going without is…Untenable.

When I’ve gone without, before…Voluntarily…for 5 days at a time…I have found that the expected effect of “Resetting” has been beneficial. Your body Resets, and the Hydrocodone is more Effective, for a time….until Tolerance sets in, again.
I sure hope that this will be the case, (Hopefully) this afternoon.

I am the Poster Child for our Byzantine, Compassionless System.
Medicaid Expansion is the portion of “Obamacare” that will affect me…I had hoped, in 2014.
The “Christian” Rick Perry has all but shot that down…I guess to appeal to his “Base”…all the Rabid Tea People, and PseudoChristians in Texas, who continue to vote for him…..many of whom enjoy their own Socialised Medicine…in the form of Medicare, or Veteran’s Benefits.

As it stands, the “Income Cutoff” for Adult Medicaid, in Texas, is $231 per Month…for a Family of Four.
Think about that.
The Disability System is set to default on "Deny"....and they are up front,that it is NOT Doctors who make the "Determination"...but "Experts"(!?!)
Even to get Foodstamps, there are myriad Hoops to jump through…the Default Assumption on all state run “Welfare”, in Texas…is the Assumption of Fraud.(of which, I have determined to my satisfaction, there is No objective Proof)
Even the hated IRS operates on the Assumption of Good Faith…with a corresponding Threat of Audit.
The way it’s set up. in Texas…well…they’d be more Honest and Forthright, to just abandon all Pretense, and have No Welfare, at all.
Obamacare is not a Perfect Fix, by any standard….Universal, Single Payer, like in all the Civilised Countries, is as close as we can come to that.
That will never happen, as long as Hatred of the Poor, Distrust of the Injured, Meanness to the Lame, is countenanced in this country.
I am in this unhappy state, today, due to an unhappy Accident, more than 20 years ago….compounded, exponentially, by my inability to gain access to Reasonable Healthcare, when I needed it, 6 or so years ago.(it could happen to You)
When you have the Opportunity to Vote, this November(assuming proper Identification…sigh.)…Remember me.
It should not be the Business of Government, at any level, to Punish the Poor, the Lame.
That is, currently, the Effect of these sundry Policies.

Idiosyncrasy. Adventures in Geekdom.

Soon after my first son was born, I moved to the couch.
I couldn’t sleep, with his every gurgle and coo…he couldn’t sleep with my tossing and turning and weird hours.
I often wonder how much that couch contributed to my current predicament(Pain).
So , I ended up with my own bed, then my own room, as the Pain became more of the reason for all this consideration.
I always remembered that my Grandparents slept in different rooms for the same reason.
So , I had my own tv…and would be up, earlier or later than everyone else…
Sound was a problem.
I began using subtitles, to enable a lower volume.
It dawned on me one day, watching some Natgeo thing with my boy, that this could be a possible, if subtle, tool…to encourage reading.
I began putting subtitles on everything.
Both boys, and even the wife, do this as a matter of course, now. It’s Natural and Normal.
It may have had an effect(both are several grade levels above , in reading), but I have zero scientific Data. Alas.
I watch a lot of foreign films.
Especially since the birth of Netflix.
Subtitles are necessary.
It occurred to me, a few years ago, that I could turn the subtitle as tool thing on myself.
So, I’ll have French or german subtitles on American shows, where available.
The Simpsons(at least season 2) has Hungarian Subtitles.
The stuff I consider “Light Reading”, has always been somewhat…. Esoteric. References in Greek, or Latin….whole stanzas in Italian or French.
I have found that this Cosmopolitan Sprinkling has become markedly easier, more Natural…since I started doing this.
”When we’re all Half-breeds, there will be Peace”- Beya, in (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1646974/)

On the Republican Intransigence, regarding Foodstamps, and other Help for the Victims of their 30 year Economic Experiment.

(http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/10/steve-king-unemployed_n_1662858.html?utm_hp_ref=politics)

(http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/07/05/1106550/-House-Republicans-pushing-16-billion-in-food-stamp-cuts)


I am amazed, as usual, at the audacious assholery of these folks.
When did it become Moral to so Hate the Poor and Downtrodden?!
Is there some secret Gospel that I have overlooked?
Mr. King’s Ass-Umptions are widespread belief, in Republican circles.
The Poor are Weak and Lazy, and don’t Want to Work…thereby deserving their Plight….no Pity is required.
These Ass-Umptions excuse their adherents from Compassion…and from shouldering their own Fair Share.(Taxes)
What has become of “There, but for the Grace of God, go I”?
”Walk a Mile in My Shoes”?
Are we to have a Wealthy Elite….an Aristocracy….but without the good old fashioned Noblisse Oblige?
The Facts, as usual, are arrayed against Mr King, and his Ilk.
According to the Numbers, Food Stamps are the second best Stimulus the Government can undertake….second only to Unemployment Insurance(which the Republicans also despise).
The Stimulatory Effects of Tax Cuts are somewhere much further down that list.
But these Facts do not matter to Mr King….they can be safely ignored in the service of his Hatred.
….and he is not alone.
Everywhere, this Hatred of Poor Folks is in evidence….Rick Perry’s decision to eschew Billions in Federal Dollars for Medicaid Expansion…so that the Millions of Po’ Folks in Texas can (Finally) Obtain access to Health Care….this Refusal, according to the Economists…will cost Texas much more Money than the paltry sums needed to implement such a program.
Economics is not on their side…so what is the Excuse?
They make a Moral Argument! To Justify their Irrational Hatred of the Poor!
They use the Trappings of Christianity to shore up this Hatred!
The Christian Community, so loud and vocal, when it comes to denying Contraception, Abortion…so Raucous in bemoaning the decline in Morality in our Nation…where are they on this issue….an issue so close to the Heart of Christianity, as evidenced by the very Words of Jesus?!
After 32 years of Republican Hegemonyin the Economic Sphere(Clinton was no Liberal;”Workfare”,”Deregulation”.etc), 35 years of Wage Stagnation relative to Inflation…after the Economic Disaster of the Bush Darkness….the Ranks of the Impoverished have not been so high, since the Great Depression….a Direct Result of the Policies and Shenanigans of the “Conservative Revolution”….
And their “Answer” to the Pain and Suffering that they have Caused is….More Pain and Suffering….and casting the Blame onto their Victims!
To a Man, they call themselves Christian….they, like Lil George, profess an undying Love for the Person of Jesus….
When they stand before Him, and He says,” ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. 42 For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, 43 I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.’”….
When confronted by their Record…what will they say?
”But they Deserved It…..”? “ They were Lazy”?
What will be their Excuse?
Does it really take an Agnostic(me) to ask these questions!?! To point out this Theft of the Mantle of Christ!?!
All you Good Christians out there…who, it seems, invariably Vote Republican…what is your Excuse?
I’d really like to know.





Rob not the poor, because he is poor: neither oppress the afflicted in the gate. ~ Proverbs 22:22

Midnight in Paris.

You either love Woody Allen, or despise Woody Allen…with perhaps a third, option, like Wife: likes Woody Allen, but can’t get past the whole deal with his love affair with his adopted daughter….pretty creepy, if not technically so.
This film, as I’m a Francophile, has me wishing I would have gotten on that boat.
1990, or so, had the opportunity to work in the galley of a freighter, bound for Spain(close enough…it is rumored that they have rail.). I chickened out.
Since HGW had turned me on to “A Movable Feast”, I had been hooked. I’d read all those guys, of course…starting at just a bit older than my oldest son is , now….but I had, somehow, overlooked, “Feast”. Me and P were apart, at the time…and my first foray to Sam had been less than stellar.(GPA=!.7 ! Something of a feat, in itself…)
I had determined, in my extremity, that the Military didn’t want me(recruiter didn’t show for the “meeting”…it was a brush-off. could it have been the hair? Not That long, compared to now.) I was at loose ends…waiting for classes to end, to slink back home, with my Technicolor Motorhome. I expected to be disowned. And there was an ad, in the Houston Post(now defunct…there can be only one…) for a Galley Slave on a Europe-bound container ship.
I was itching to leave Texas…going anywhere…but Europe would do just fine.
All my Heroes spent time there…the Beats, all of Hemingway's Bunch…and on back. I thought of London, and Italy and Greece…perhaps Egypt and the Levant, as well…But Paris was the Place.
The Language has always been foreign to me…even in my later erudition…but the Place Names flew in a jumble in my mind.
Monmartre,Place du la Concorde, Jardin des Tuillieries, Boulevard St. Germaine….(forgive my lack of French Spelling Skills.)
I’d been to Montreal and Quebec(and Toronto)…but I was too young (16, then) to go running off. I certainly wanted to…but I was with my Brother and Grandparents…The architecture, the lights…the whole Feel…Papaw remarked…a lot…about how it reminded him of France.
So I remembered all of this, and plotted and planned.(read: dreamed.)
At the same time, I feared being so far away from help….and wanted(despite appearances) to please my Folks….go back to College, etc.
So I chickened out…and didn't please anybody....and went gallivanting all over Texas and the Deep South…mostly the southern half of Louisiana, instead. P was gone, after an all too brief 2 more years(?unclear.lol)…MIP was long gone…MRL, CH, I had drifted too far off the reservation for them…they had their Lives…
I really had nothing to lose.
Not getting on that boat….
I count it as one of my few…but large, nevertheless…Regrets.



((Picture taken from :( http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/fd/Caf%C3%A9_de_Flore.jpg)

(Further Evidence of Surreality)(Assertion=Fact)

(http://www.alternet.org/world/156180/how_the_american_military_machine_endangers_the_whole_world_/?page=entire)
I usually hear that, since it’s Alternet, we can pretty much ignore what they say…as they are a “Liberal Rag”,after all…. This is part of the False Equivalency, so prevalent, today.
Whatever.
It doesn’t excuse those on the Right from at least attempting to provide substantial Evidence, in support of their arguments.
These Links are just a smattering of actual science, and/or Analysis, that counter a few planks of the Conservative Earth.(That Parallel Version, right beside the Real One).
Isn’t the Military “Big Government”?
“Homeland Security”?
Domestic Surveillance?
Extrajudicial Killings and Incarceration?
Torture?!
Looks like “Big Government”, to me….
One of the much Lionised Founders, Madison(wrote the Constitution), said something about how the US shouldn’t go around “Looking for Monsters to Slay”….
Hypocrisy is so evident in the War Mongering Sector, I don’t really see a way to argue yerself out of it…
…so, they don’t even try.
(http://www.alternet.org/drugs/156144/government-sponsored_study_destroys_dea%27s_classification_of_marijuana_as_%27medically_useless%27/?page=entire)
One of my long-term favorites of Obtuse,Overbearing Government…if the whole “War on Drugs” isn’t “Big Government”, then what is???
Especially the War on Marijuana…where’s the Rational, Emperical!! Scientific Support for the Continuation…and Doubling Down…of these Policies?
Analytical Support?
Negative….under it’s own definitions and assumptions, the War is an abject Failure.
Yet we must continue to put all these otherwise law abiding American Citizens in Jail, abrogate our Constitutional Rights….and the Rights of States!!!(10th Amendment, Righties, surely you remember that one…).

(http://www.alternet.org/sex/156162/5_states_where_%22living_in_sin%22_is_illegal_america%27s_irrational_love_affair_with_the_institution_of_marriage_/?page=entire)

It’s almost too easy.
Define, “Nanny State”, please.
(http://www.alternet.org/story/156191/50_of_americans_want_marijuana_legal_70_want_medicinal_pot__are_international_treaties_standing_in_the_way_of_legalization?page=entire)
So…we can ignore such treaties,etc as the Geneva Conventions, with legalese gymnastics(“enemy combatant”)…we can withdraw from others when it suits us(see: Bush “Administration”)…but when abrogating on our obligations would help People…end a Great Injustice…it’s No Can Do…Our hands are tied, you see.
The Right can get all worried about “Sovereignty” …Agenda 21, Chinese Ports,UN Troops coming to get us, UN as Antichrist, on and on and on….but they can countenance this.
Sigh.




(http://www.alternet.org/rights/155942/mass_arrests_likely_at_political_conventions%3A_6_historical_precedents/?page=entire)

2 words, “Tea Party”.
Where was all the AntiProtest Fervor during all those Rallies, where folks in Tricorns packed actual Heat…does this mean that Occupy, against it’s Principals,should start Arming itself?
It would be interesting to see how that went over.

(http://www.alternet.org/sex/156162/5_states_where_%22living_in_sin%22_is_illegal_america%27s_irrational_love_affair_with_the_institution_of_marriage_/?page=entire)
Ummm… Nanny State….State’s Rights…imposing Religious Morals on American Citizens….

Supporting “Evidence” for continuation? “Christian Nation”, Pseudohistory. Hysteria. Hyperbole.
Same with the whole Gay Marriage “Issue”…Where’s the evidence?
Where’s the Reasoned Argument? The Rational Refutation of all the (Evidence Based) Claims for just getting out of the way?
Need we mention Divorce?

>>>>>>>>>>>>
”It’s on Alternet”, is not an Argument.
All of these articles make specific arguments, backed up by Research.
They demand reciprocal consideration from their respective Opponents.
One more, about the Mendacious Idiot, who is likely to be “my” US Senator…(http://www.mediaite.com/online/tea-party-senate-candidate-ted-cruz-fear-mongers-sharia-law-is-an-enormous-problem/)
This particular Thought Virus is in operation, right here, in Mason….despite the lack of even One(1) Muslim…and, as noted (and Linked) in the article, despite any empirical Fact to back it up.
I find that I must take a little break from all of this….lol…for the time being, I’m with Ten Bears…”I have said all I have to say.”

A Tentative Outline of where I’m Headed

Baudrillard was on to something.

In our Modern(postpostmodern?!) World we have no Meaning, save that Imposed on us.
We attempt to hold on to the Meaning-Systems of our forebears…the various Religions, and Political Divisions…mostly in Vain.
The Conflict, as I see it, Today, is between Certainty and Perplexity. Those who Fear Perplexity adhere to Certainty, however derived…and to feel as Certain as Possible in whatever Meaning they Cling to, they attempt to Impose their System on Everyone.
This is a misapplication of the Categorical Imperative. They Stop Thinking at some point on their Road.
Postmodernism, as it is called, seems to be an Exhaustion…a Giving Up…on the Search for Meaning. Our Collective Sphere of Knowledge increasingly Negates the Logic Systems, the Moral/Ethical Systems that came before…and we Fear Life Without Them.
So, we cling…savagely…to those Old Systems.

We also, necessarily, Stop Thinking.
This is the great Crisis of our time.
I’m with Nietzsche and Camus, in that I reckon it’s Possible…and Necessary…to Create Meaning.
In fact, that’s the only way I see out of our Mess…
For instance, it seems to me, that Hyperindividualism is Dead….
It no longer works in Modern Society. To keep on acting as if it does, is to damn Us to a Hellworld of Pollution, Extreme Inequality,War and Savagery.

There’s very little Trust, in our current Systems, including Government…so we feel the need to “Look Out for Number One”….whole Philosophies have been erected on this…essential Selfishness. Every one of them neglects the Obvious Facts; 1 that we are too many, 2. that the world is Finite. If Unmitigated Selfishness (Greed is Good) is the de facto Meaning of Life…apply the Categorical Imperative… then we are Doomed…we’ll continue on our current track, until there is nothing left to support Life.
The recent re-emergence of Fundamentalisms…both religious and secular, is a symptom of this Fear of Meaninglessness…

I’ve long hollered about the Universalism(Catholic) that the Enlightenment inherited from what came before…Understandable in Physics, and even Biology(RNA and DNA sure seem universal to Life…as we know it(!!!)). But we have a tendency to apply Universalism to areas where it, arguably, doesn’t fit…like Politics and Economics, and even Morality/Ethics….there can be Only One…
TINA(there is no alternative)…if we labour under a common philosophy, that’s it….every school of thought seems bent on imposing itself on the whole world.
This is most evident in Religious Fundamentalism…Islam’s Ummah…Christianity’s “Christian Nation”, extended to the whole world…the “One True God”, manifesting in so many different incarnations, all of them true.lol.

We see it in Political Economy…Capitalism,vs Communism….My Way, Or the Highway….With us, or Against us…Criticism(even constructive) = Apostasy.

Morality/Ethics….in the US, it’s a Christian thing(despite their myriad subfaiths) ; Nudity=Sex, which is always bad….nonxians are suspect, if not hated…women(and black folks) should get back into their Place, and be happy there…(but , we’re not Misogynist/Racist.(wink))

There’s much wiggling in these, of course…we are ashamed of “End Justifies Means”…but we accept it.(GWOT). Part of Us is ashamed of lots of things that we , nevertheless, allow and encourage.

I’ve held out the counterenlightenment Ideal of Pluralism, as a partial Solution.
Fact; we must learn to live together.
Fact; we believe differently.(each of us)

ergo: we must accept this difference, and focus on our Commonality.

My Worldview doesn’t Depend on You….it is mine. I am Happy with it.
You should be Happy for me….and leave me to it.
I am Happy for you, if you’ve located, or invented some Meaning…and I’ll leave you to it.(with caveats, a la JS Mill)

In our(necessary) Interaction, these differences are immaterial…they don’t matter.
What does matter is the things we have in Common…the Proverbial Life, Liberty and Pursuit of Happiness.
I genuinely desire Your Happiness, up until it interferes with My Happiness. I expect the Same, in return.(Reciprocosity)
All the Opaque Philosophical Terms, and Economic, Psychological and Religious, end up Hiding this really simple concept.
This surprises me, because Reciprocosity is there, in every world religion…and in every politic-economic system(except, perhaps “Capitalism”, as practiced, today)(go on, argue that point)

Problems ensue, admittedly, when we try to Educate the Young…what are the Common Foundations of Knowledge? Education is Necessary, I think….and I think no one would argue otherwise. The problem is our individual definitions of Truth.
Reading, Writing and Arithmatic seem to be conducive to Universalisation. Even the most backwards Fundies seem to be ok with these. What about Science?
Here we enter into Psychological Territory. Does Evolution/Natural Selection Undemine someone’s Religious Worldview?

Yes, it likely does….Cosmology, and Physics, too… The Bible is a Bronze Age set of Ideas…Prescientific…Signs and Wonders, and a Worldview in Conflict with what We have Learned.

As much as it pains me, there may be no reconciliation. Perhaps Education should be required in the “Three R’s”, and optional for the rest…leave it for them that want it.
Fundies should be Free to Be Ignorant. Let them, with the Absolute Requirement, that they keep it to themselves…stop the attempts at Universalising their Ignorance.
((Similarly,Another hot button current issue…Frikking Abortion…restrict it to Rape Incest and the Health of the Mother(I’d add ancephalic, or otherwise unviable zygotes, for Compassion’s sake)….Fine. But there must be a Correllary; Free, Universal Sex Education(an anodyne exposition of what happens when a penis ejaculates into a vagina, c’mon, people), and universal availability of Contraception…and we can have an end to all the hubbub….Just an aside.lol…and I realize I’m contradictory, with the Universalisation-speak.lol)

The Point I’m trying to make…is that Tolerance, and Reciprocosity, and Compassion are likely the Only Things that can be Universalised, without world-ending Strife.
Fundamentalism must be overcome…and our Commonalities must be Emphasized.
I ask the Fundamentalists, religious amd secular….Why does Your Belief depend on what I believe?

To the Corporate Capitalist; why can I not have a communistic community, out here in the wilderness? Is the existence of an alternative destructive to your success?Tell me how.

Similarly, to the fundamentalist Christian: is my Agnosticism somehow threatening to your Faith? Is who I (with mutual consent) Fuck, in any way, your business? Explain.
If I desire to Give away all my stuff(Jesus,lol), does that lessen your belief in Capitalism? If I decide that God lives in that Tree, over there,does it, in any way Undermine your Christian Beliefs?
If it doesn’t Harm You, it’s none of your business….and it’s up to you to make the case, that it does harm you….
and asserting that yours is the One True Faith/Economic System, is not a valid Proof of Harm.
Conversely, I can make a pretty good case that Crusading Xianity does, indeed, do Harm….and that Hypercapitalism, of the Corporate Kind, does, indeed, Do Harm…I can do these things, not with an appeal to my own Faith/Political/Economic Philosophy, but with Pictures, and Stats, and Verifiable Evidence.
That’s the difference.
Those asserting their Right to Hegemony offer only Assertions and Hyperbole, in support of their Right to Hegemony. This is not what the Founders Intended.
This is what Freedom of(and from) Religion, and the Separation of Church and State is all about.
Find reference to God, or Capitalism, in the Constitution….Ha!

Instead of reacting to the lack of Consensus in Ontology, Epistemology, Teleology, etc…with attempts to Impose One Worldview, Universally…
We should, instead Embrace our Diversity, and endeavor to Identify our Commonalities…the rest is up to the Individual(with the J.S. Mill Caveats, above, of course)

I’m not naïve enough to think that any of this is forthcoming…we’re poised on the edge of internecine Religio-Political Civil War, after all…

Perhaps after….lol.
Perhaps these ideas will be helpful After, as we’re picking through the Ruins.

I have (thin raft) Hope…even taking into consideration Camus’ and the Greeks’(!), insistence that Hope is likely the most dangerous thing in the world.

See:( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integrity)

(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absurdism)

(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Categorical_imperative)

(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simulacra_and_Simulation)

((http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zarathustra_%28fictional_philosopher%29)

(http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/political-animal-a/2012_07/doesnt_religion_mean_conservat038385.php) LOL!

Anomie and the Ontological Crisis.

I’ve been throwing the phrase,” Existential Crisis”, at the wall, over there, for a while.

Thinking about Postmodernism, and Post-post modernism…all sorts of things, flowing from these….questions.
I treat Wiki just like I treated my Encyclopaedia Brittanica, Deluxe, back home…wandering in C.F.F.’s and E.G.’s..(in this case, Virtual…) Books all over the bed, the floor.
I’ve been in the Frankfurt School, and what flowed out of their Thinking…and that led to Immanent Critique, and Ironism….down a short set of rapids, to Neopragmatism, Neo Gramsci, Reflective Disclosure, and Richard Rorty. The History of Liberalism, of course, like the bottom of the river.

Keep running into Marx…although not in the way we think of him in America(snort)…more in the sociologicaly revolution he inadvertently launched. Perhaps the Gravel on the river bottom.

Culture Jamming…and , finally, to Capitalism. Dig and Dig, and read all about Milton Friedman, Hayak, and the whole gang. (I like Hayak, btw)

And, as always, I think about this Thing We Do, Now….and identifying it.
Corporate Capitalism? neoFeudalism?
Not adequate.
Machine?

Better, but still a cast into the bushes.

With all of this in my head, and more…I lie awake(pain, and mind)…and arise for coffee, and Rachel Maddow…watched a show, “Outfoxed”, an expose, of sorts, about the inner workings of Faux News(sic)…
this makes me think of (likely Rove) telling Suskind the difference between History’s Actors, and those who study their Actions, the “Reality Based Community”…of how they the ,”Actors”, Create Reality….by Fiat!. for the rest of us to study and admire.
I ain’t going into the Thicket of Neoconservatism, again…I reckon I’ve learned enough about them. They’ve been replaced, anyway.
The new bunch is the same as all of the old bunches…the Laconophilia of Neocons, the Old Right, and their focus on Economics,however crazily derived, the Fundies.
Even Tea is there, sloshing around…but I don’t think any of this is adequate in Defining just what we’re dealing with , in this Country.
The Right is enduring a Crisis of who they are…Existential Crisis, Anomie….just like the Left did, in the 60’s and 70’s. The Left Fractured into Absurdity, and withered away before the new onslaught of “Conservative Revolution”. The Left was exhausted by their own Purges and Strife…and had no defense against the antiLiberal Propaganda.
Since they are the Dominant Political Outlook of our times…(go on, argue with me on this point)…it turns out that we all are enduring an Existential Crisis…and worse, and Ontological Crisis.

We have a network…with “News” in it’s name…that spews the worst propaganda imaginable. But we can’t do anything about it, because They have the Right to Freedom of Speech and Thought, too.
We have a large segment of the Population who believes that the Earth is 6000 years old, and that Scientists are evil, and that they’re plotting with the Queers, and likely Jews and Black Folks…to turn us into the Soviet Union. That Climate Change, and “Critical Thinking” are Liberal Plots.

Sharia.
Cornucopian Thinking. Magical Thinking. Clinging ever more fervently to Bronze Age Ideas…and making Reality fit their Delusions.
We still tell ourselves stories…about American Dream….about the Shining City on a Hill…and how Things Will Improve.
Cognative Disconnect.
We eat it for Breakfast.

This is why we’re having, not only an Existential…but also an Ontological Crisis.
We can’t determine Truth.
The Nonphilosophy of “Postmodernism” has played a large role, it seems…but, in the irony of the century, it affected the Right more….and made them go mad.
The Fundamentalist Bent, when merged with Economic Philosophy, is a dangerous thing.
Take Fundamentalist Christianity…Literalism,leading to a break with Reality…and marry it to Uber Rational Corporate Capitalism(which, in another Irony, flows from the Enlightenment)….stir.
In the 90’s(I’m remembering this figure), something like 80% of the economists were Friedmanites…

Or at least, cozy with Chicago School.
Politics have Fundamentalised, too…and in much the same way.
In fact, it’s getting hard to distinguish between the disparate realms, here.
Congressmen are Preachers are Economic Pundits are News(sic) Reporters are Congressmen…
We have so many different Narratives in Play, that there’s bound to be contradictions…the inclusion of Literalism into the Mix, fixes this. The Literalist Fundies have had long practice believing in Contradictory Things, at once. As the Merger between them and the others has Gelled, it should have been expected…
Faux has pioneered and developed this into High Art…We Create Reality…and the only Liberals we’ll have on to try and counter the Narrative Mix, are the weak and unheard of types.(Sorry, Alan).

Define Socialism…Capitalism…even Conservatism…there is a whole other Language in play, here…it sounds like American English…except that it says Nothing. It imparts Emotions.

Ontology is the study of Reality…of Being.
The reason that folks like me can’t talk to “Conservatives”, is that they speak a different language.
They’ve built an alternate Reality…and insist that we not disturb their Illusion.
It’s most evident, I think, in the Economics.
Tax Cuts!...analogous to “God Wills It!” (see Kingdom of Heaven, for a somewhat ahistorical romp through Crusader Delusions)

The Enronisation of Capital…just making shit up, and calling it Real…and, somehow, turning that into Billions of Dollars…
Until the Faith of the “Investors” wanes…turns out that Reality has a habit of intruding.lol.
But we persist!
More Deregulation! More Tax Cuts!
Extrapolate this,(which shouldn’t seem all far fetched, as it just happened to all of us)…Extrapolate it into the Memespace….into the Zeitgeist of that side of the Collective Mind…
Where do we begin to counter such problems?
Half of the country believes at least some of this Other Narrative Mix….and a largish portion of the relatively Sane Half pays heed to it…uses it’s language and Framing.

As more, somewhat accidentally found, implication that the roots of our Secular Anomie lay in Fundamentalist Xianity…Presuppositional Apologetics.
Here is the denial of any Truth, any understanding, outside of a Literalist Biblical Framework…..asserting(!) that even arguments against are Proof.
Faux ‘News’(sic) is the Political(pseudosecular) Expression of this…and Neoliberal Economics, is the(again, pseudosecular) Economic Expression.
Tea doesn’t hear the evidence presented by those pesky Liberals…because theirs is the One True Faith.
The Certainty I’ve been hollering about….(Van Til:” "(T)he only proof for the existence of God is that without God you couldn't prove anything."”…Circular Logic, at it’s best)

Like Uncle Friedrich, I worry about Nihilism.
I worry that it will lead to other than Neitszche’s preferred embrasure of Man Creating His Own Meaning(!), in an essentially Meaningless Universe.
All of my wrangling, and pestering…is not(usually,lol) mere Partisanship…I think that there’s something afoot. I have searched for an Exegeisis…some inkling that someone else…perhaps better qualified…had noticed this, too.( I am Feral, after all…I do this because I can’t help it…and if I don’t ‘let it out’, I shall surely go mad)
Philosophy is at a Nadir, in America.
Post Modernism Killed It.
Zizek, so far, appears to be the only one worth reading.(I want Links!) The Rest….again, so far…seem to say a lot of nonsense, and call it “philosophy”…Gray is Nihilist, in the worst sense…and I can’t think of any others, off the top of my head….which should say plenty(!).(That Greek-sounding guy, Nick-something….dense, bordering on nonsensical…but with a few good ideas, in spite of himself)
I survey the Media, and a wide range of things online. There’s much Contradiction…much Incoherence.
Reason is on the Run. How can we hope to have what resembles Civilisation if we cannot agree on anything, at all? Rove’s two arbitrary Divisions of Mankind seem to actually Exist…and that’s a Terifying Thought.
See: Antinomy, as in Kant.

to my Dem County Chair.(a Ramble on Liberalism)

‎(http://www.alternet.org/election2012/154123/9_kick-ass_things_obama_should_do_in_a_second_term/?page=entire)

I’ve been thinking about this a lot...wouldnt it be cool to have an actual opposition party? meaning actual Liberal? I think it's safe to assume that most republicans would assert that we already have a "Liberal Party"...then again, they believe all manner of crazy things....and I haven't been able to locate one, aside from the greens, in America, today. Believe me, I've looked…. just a continuum of right wing sensibilities, with no left, at all.

I’ve been mulling, for some time, the prospect that we need a definition for Liberal…the old one having been raped and mangled these past 40 years.

For instance, I can’t count the number of times this has played out…me-“I’m a Liberal”…them-“ why do you idolize Joseph Stalin?”

What do you even say to such things?

The Mythos that the Dark Magicians of the Right have been peddling all these years is so pernicious, so soaked into our every day, mundane lives, and how we think about them, that it’s almost impossible to discuss anything that might help get us out of their mess.

I say “their mess” advisedly…it is their Mythology and the Policies that flow from it that has led directly to our current predicament.

I assume that anyone reading this understands that when I say 40 years, I really mean about 4000, but the “Conservative Revolution” of the 1970’s is the latest and greatest iteration of the Long Struggle against Night.

http://www.tnr.com/article/politics/robespierre-the-right

http://www.eurekaencyclopedia.com/index.php/Category:American_New_Right

Why in hell can’t what remains of the Left do that? Build a Movement?

Like the Greens…what holds such an effort back?

If it’s lack of money (likely), what sort of work-around is possible?

I’ve studied the Right for almost a decade, now, starting in 02…to answer the question, pressing then and now:” Who the Hell are these people?!”

Neocons,Religious Right, Dominionists, Club for growth, Fox News…the whole sordid snakepit. Turns out they are all related, along with many more. I have found, surprisingly, that the grunts of the Movement often are unaware of these connections, or of the broader Policies encouraged by such a wide ranging and influential bunch.(much recent research into the “low info” voter’s tendency towards Conservatism/the Right…I’ll get to that later)( http://pss.sagepub.com/content/23/2/187.full)

The more I’ve learned about the individuals, the myriad groups and sub-movements, and the Philosophy(-ies) that constitute the American Right, the more I must sit in awe of their achievement, however much I chafe beneath it.
Dark Magicians, indeed…it is Masterful, the Mindfuck visited on the American People, since the 70’s.

Again, why can’t the Left learn from this? Are the remnants burrowed in too deep? Do we, on the Left, simply not comprehend the “opposition”(as Vikings “opposed” the Monks, or the Inquisition “opposed’ Witches)?

….and we’re back again to the need to Fundamentally define what , exactly, a Liberal is…

Wiki says:” Liberalism (from the Latin liberalis)^[1] is the belief in the importance of liberty and equal rights.^[2] Liberals espouse a wide array of views depending on their understanding of these principles, but generally liberals support ideas such as constitutionalism, liberal democracy, free and fair elections, human rights, capitalism, and freedom of religion.^[“

⁽

(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberalism)

First of all, why is there a yellow flag? I have never seen yellow as representative, somehow, of Liberal Values. From whence does this derive?(gut says ‘yellow=cowardice’)

Second, th3e above sounds good, to me….but is inadequate. The article quickly chaoticises, bursting like a seed pod with all the varieties and sub-species of “Liberal”.

Wiki does much the same with “Conservative”….yet Conservatism has managed to become remarkably Monolithic, even now, during their Great Fractious Freakout(Tea vs Establishment, and others).

Third, of course the very Foundational Principles of “Liberalism”(the above will do, for me as a starting block) sort of lend themselves to Fractiousness…This may be due to the attention to Nuance and Detail inherent,imo, in the “Liberal Mind”. Whales! Amnesty! Gay Rights! Organic Ag! Screw like Bonobos!

Not a naturally cohesive bunch, I’d expect.

Fourth, “Disobedient”, to me, is a Liberal Trait…one of those Foundational Principals. (Thinking of TJefferson, Uncle Walt and Henry David) With this in mind, I reckon that the old adage regarding the herding of cats, may apply.

On the other hand, we must remember how unlikely, at the time, was the Union of “Conservative” and ‘UberChristian Fundies”…or White Closet-Racists, in the South. That said, Conservatives seem to naturally get in line, and goose step right along behind whatever Leader manages to capture their minds…Liberalism does not lend itself to this behaviour, despite the frequent accusations of “Worshipping” Obama.

As a sort of “first draft”…an exercise in Brainstorming…I’ll likely just ramble all over the place…bear with me.

Since the 70’s the Right has been ascendant. This is no accident, but the implementation of a carefully laid out Plan, by 3-5 dudes in a hotel lobby. Paul Weyrich was the brains and whip-bearer; Howard Phillips was a soldier, and Richard Vigurrie was the nuts and bolts guy…the latter, who was key, revolutionized communication with one’s potential “Base”…with direct, targeted mailings of pamphlets, and surveys etc that specifically targeted those all over America who were likely to support the Key Points set to napkin at those early meetings. Mothers, PTA members, etc.This was well before the “Information Age”.

There is no analog for Viggurie, on the Left. I get an emailbox full, every day, from various Liberal Groups…including several arms of the Democratic Party…I fear I’m not alone in saying that I simply delete most of them….Why?

These guys, and their Movement have hijacked the whole country….and I think most importantly, taken over the Language we use to talk about the most important things We, as a Nation, have in common. Grass Roots in the service of Big Business, Big Government, Big Religion, Big Military, and on and on…all the while, insisting that they are a small, beleaguered minority(which they were, in 1975, but at no time since).

The Occupation of the Language has been the most serious blow. As I’ve toyed with many times, even Liberals use the Phrasing, Definitions and Meme-Space of the Right….we conceded this field, for some reason….and that reason will hafta be identified, if there is to be any Hope.

From this core group, grew up the vast apparatus of the Great Wurlitzer, the proverbial Echo Chamber of the Right. They, each of them, were serial Group Founders…Christian Coalition, Heritage Foundation, Club for growth, and hundreds, thousands more…something for everyone…and all connected…by money, and by a rather nebulous, slogan-fired common cause and ideology.

Again, there is No analog on the Left.

The spectacle of the 60’s and early 70’s…the momentum, inertia, of the Liberalism of the time, was turned against us. Shame at the various excesses, sexual, or otherwise, was fomented, cooked and stirred.The parents of the Hippies were goaded to action using this lot of Memes. Remember, that the loudest most visible bunch who made the sixties the “Sixties” were really a rather small minority, themselves….with millions of less enthusiastic and less committed hangers-on. Those Hangers On were courted…the Jesus Freak faction of Hippie-dom,and others, were courted, and steered….the Myths, like Hippies spitting on returning soldiers, the Myth of Mansonism as representative of the Whole Movement,the selective publication of Woodstock pictures, focusing on trash strewn field, and the like( totally disregarding the Peace,Love,Understanding aspects of that event)…it was a subtle Framing Exercise…changing the Meaning of the whole endeavor. The Left was caught unawares by the backlash…at first likely because none of the Movers could quite believe some of the outrageous lies…surely everyone will see right through them….

The Left did, indeed, suffer from excess….from disillusionment, and a sort of Cultural Exhaustion…and, importantly, the introduction of what I’ll call Lizard Brain Drugs into the Drug Culture,(which was largely a CIA Op), that fed the Exhaustion and Disillusionment and encouraged the Excess.

I think the whole Sixties Meme needs to be Reclaimed, by the Left.

We must “rewrite” the Histories, from the perspective of the Revolutionaries…instead of from the perspective of the Old Regime, which is what we labor under, today. There’s another side to that story.

(as an aside, and for instance…when we advocate for Marijuana Reform…we dance all around the Getting High aspect, and approach it from an angle we hope will be “Respectable”…that of Medicine(which is legitimate)…we are dishonest, often even with ourselves(at least in Public) about the Fact that many of us just want to Get High…we act as if we are ashamed of this…and we should stop, and instead embrace it.Is it not our Right to choose our own Relaxant, or must we continue to lie, and, in Public, stick to the approved mind altering drug(alcohol)?This is important. Another example…Sex. The Left left the field, and used wishy washy and ineffective means on the whole Free Love/Sex for Sex’s Sake aspect…we, instead, used the Shame Based language of the Right. How about a little Honesty? Many(most?) women take the Pill in order to have Sex, without fear of Pregnancy. To this day, we fight the fight while ignoring this central Philosophical aspect of the Pill…the Freedom of Women to engage in Sexual Activity, because they like having Sex….and because they reject the whole repression and domination of the Right Wing’s sexual outlook. We must have the courage to be unashamed of these sorts of things…Occupy Puritanism!)

War is Shameful. Inequality is Shameful. Lying is Shameful.

Shame is a powerful tool, and the Right has used it to full advantage…and we sat quietly, in tacit agreement…ashamed of ourselves…why?

The Right, obviously, has used FEAR, in the HS Thompson usage…Fear of just about everything; Hippies, potheads, colorful and unusual clothing, Sex, being Different, Smart Folks,Peace(!), and on and on and on….the core of Right Wingdom is FEAR, of the existential sort, of everything that is “Not Like Us”…
Liberals should endeavor to embrace, and Own, COURAGE!

Be not afraid!

It takes Balls to stand up to often violent reactionaries…We must grow stones and spines. The Right has neither, when ya get right down to it.(witness the knee jerk reliance on ad hominem, when confronted with opposing views that they find unassailable).

Like all Bullies, there comes a point where one must, however reluctantly, Punch them in the Face. Reason has no effect. I don’t like this any more than you do…dear Liberal Reader.

A key feature of Liberalism is Tolerance for differing views. This has been used against us. We naturally seek common ground, abhor unnecessary confrontation and practice, almost automatically, Nonviolence…which is to our Credit.

But what if there is No Common Ground…what if our opponents actually Like Confrontation, for it’s own sake…what if they glory in Violence…and , most importantly, what if the other side is not in the least interested in Compromise?

The Right is Manichean, Black and White…there ain’t no gray. How can we expect them to Compromise with what they regard as Evil, itself?

I am not calling for Violent Revolution…yet…as I think it would be counterproductive and soul-killing. But one has a right to defend oneself, as well as the defenseless, on an individual basis.

We are too nice….and it has gotten us nowhere.

We are accused, as an article of Faith on the Right, of being the instigators of War and Violence…as silly as that sounds, it’s true.(Beck, et alia)

The Right, and their Cops and Troops, engage in Violence all the time…but this is seen as acceptable, and is whitewashed as necessary, against the Left. The Right sees all of this as a War to end all wars…as a holy War…and they feel justified in their own excesses, as a result of this. It is an Existential War…and we should, perhaps, begin to see it that way, as well. After all, they will not be satisfied until they have “Won” the whole world. If that’s not an Existential Threat( a real one) to all those who do not want to live under repression, I don’t know what is. They literally Declared War on Us….and we must stand up for ourselves, short of massacre.

Another Front is the cooption of a significant portion of the Democratic Party. Blue Dogs, and the like. Meanwhile, the other side has purged all dissent from their ranks…as Bill Maher said,”the Dems moved to the Right, and the republicans moved to the Insane Asylum”…Lesser Evilism is unacceptable. I am sick of having, essentially, No Choice. We have lost our party…and must either Take it Back, or rally around a new one…even if, in the short term, it means that we lose power and votes. Those considerations have, again, gotten us nowhere. Ben Nelson, the Odious Lieberman, and a thousand others, have no business being in the Democratic Party. They are Liberal Republicans, and should be run off, post haste.

Bipartisanship is Dead, as the past 3 years under Obama should have taught us.

We must cease compromising with the Right…cease kow towing to the Corporate World…and to that part(hardly monolithic, despite appearances) of Christianity who would sooner have us in chains, than compromise.

We must define ourselves, and stick to our Principals. Enough of the retreat!

If the Democratic Party won’t go along, we must leave it…stop giving it our support(and money!). Go over to the Greens, and insist that those votes be counted.

(I understand the necessity of OWS being headless, hydra-like…but we must get organized, nevertheless. CIA/FBI be damned)

Which brings us to another plank in the gallows that the Right has constructed, and convinced us that it is a mere Porch….”Conspiracy Theory” as a slur, shutting down righteous obstinance.

There really is a Giant, Multitentacled Conspiracy arrayed against All Things Liberal. This is not Fantasy…it is Not Hyperbole…it is Fact…and there is ample evidence for it(Church Committee, numerous others).

We must stop allowing this “slur” to shut us up. The Right believes in all manner of kooky conspiracy theories, that really are unsubstantiated, and Hyperbole and Fantasy…yet they are adhered to, without question, as another Article of Faith.(Liberal Media? Climate Hoax?Founders as Fundamentalist Evangelicals? Etc etc)

We, on the other hand, have at our fingertips, actual evidence of an actual Giant Conspiracy, rather a network of Conspiracies, set up to smear and discredit us, and Science, and Economics, and History,,,and…on and on…..Is this really so hard?

Reason must be able to triumph over Orwellian Doublethink and Right Wing Hysterical Fantasy.. Why is this so difficult?

We must acknowledge the existence of elements in Our Government who are dead set against a Liberal Counter-Counter-Revolution…FBI infiltration of Peace Groups, like the Quakers(!)…and, now, the application(and potential application) of the word “Terrorist” to anything the Gov doesn’t like…again, a very real threat.

Our Government doesn’t belong to us…save for widely dispersed and disparate elements within it…it belongs to the Right Wing; Corporations, Wall St, the God Squad, etc etc…and all those so very Fearful people who, at least tacitly, encourage and enable them.

Head, Meet Wall.

From the Right, it’s Nonsense: I support our Democratic Republican Form of Government, and have Issues with the Libertarian/Pseudoanarchists, and the Tea People.

Is equated to: I Worship the State…Desire the State Communist Takeover of all Private Property…and want all Tea herded into Extermination Camps.
Sigh.

From what passes for the Left: I have Issues with the Over-Regulation of the Little Guy, Eschew the Label, “Big Government Liberal”, Despise Beaurocracy run amok, and reckon the Democratic Party to be only a Lesser Evil.
Is Equated to: I side with the Fascists, am not Pure Enough(?), and “just don’t understand”.

Sigh.

Is there no room, for me?

All of these positions/opinions, were arrived at Honestly, and with as much Rigorous Objectivity as I can muster.

The Flame Wars that have erupted , since Justice Roberts did his little Dance, have resulted in folks who I know are Dems, sounding exactly like those who I know are Reps …The Right’s Mindfuck seems insurmountable.
I went looking for Think Tanks, with a liberal Bent…and what there are, are Economic Policy Shops…well and good…such things are needed…
But how’s that working out?
Where’s the results…when even the staunchest, self-described Liberals, are parroting the Heritage Talking Points? Death Panels? 60,ooo new IRS Agents?

Po’ Folks are Lazy?
For all their acumen in disentangling policy and tax code, these Shops are terrible at Messaging.
I am sick, unto death, of Lesser Evilism…I’ll vote for Obama, again….but not because of his Policies. He’ll get my vote, because the Alternative is so much worse.
Health Care Reform….awesome. Coulda been much better…perhaps without the “Bipartisanship”…
But what about the reversals on Marijuana Decriminalisation? What about the Failure to close Gitmo? The damned Drone Strikes? The Capitulation, if not down-right Cozyness, with Hedge Fund Lizards?
My God! Is this a Choice?!
I talk about the Corporate Takeover of Public Schools…happening, if somewhat stealthily, right here….and no one knows what the hell I’m talking about.
And, remember, Obama has continued the “No Child Left” business of Lil George…
Where’d Occupy Go?
Did we win?
I realize that I’m in Texas…and surrounded by Tea…still…

Chris Hayes talks about how the Left has no Moral Philosophers…to counter the Post Reagan Onslaught…all the Think Tanks and Media Megaphones…the Great Wicked Wurlitzer of Ditto.
We are left with bland centrists,(Brookings), Ivory Tower-ists(Demos), and various repetitions on that theme.
Where’s my PNAC?
Are there no more Philosophers?

The Right has constructed a Narrative that works. It’s self-contradictory, silly, and mostly pretty Dangerous…but it resonates with regular folks…speaking to their Emotions, in Bumper Stickers.
Surely, there is some enclave of Left Leaning Philosophers…toiling away at a Narrative of our own…surely.
Is the American Mind so poisoned, so polluted with nonsense, that there is no effective Counternarrative?
Have we passed the point of no return, where the Surreality of the Right Wing will just have to play itself out?

I’ve a great many Ideas…and I possess the Courage to articulate them into the Face of Power, and it’s hangers-on…
Is there a Forum?
A Community of Thought?
It feels as though we are already well into a new Dark Age…Kafka-esque, Dystopian, Dark, as in Ignorance…Back into the Cave.

Please convince me otherwise.

>>>>>

It’s the same Feeling I had in High School…then in College…and in my very rare experiences in Corporate Environments.
The Feeling one gets navigating some Government Department… or 800 Number, ostensibly provided to ease one’s Imperial Entanglements.(211, in Texas…round and round and round and…)
Like watching some Mindless Thing squirm and ooze it’s way, attempting to navigate the simplest of mazes(a straight line), at the exit of which is a fiery death….
Everywhere is either/or…till it’s all so Meaningless….

Ya think to yourself,”let’s get it over with, already”….

Bring on the Storm Troopers, and the Stake, and the Wasteland.
At least then a line would be apparent.
>>>>>>>>>

If Willard wins…I’ll likely count it as Over.
A quick descent, just like under Lil George….
If Obama? Will it be more of the same?
More high minded rhetoric, while the stealth wars continue?

Even the Tex GOP is having misgivings about the “Patriot Act”!
Why is it still there?
Toynbee shines a little light…Corporate Machine is Internal Proletariat…
Took Power from the Dominant Minority, little by little…then 911, and Wham!
Pull out all the Stops!
All the while Funding(!) the External Proletariat…if not Creating it, from whole cloth.
Niccolo says ya can’t put anything past these guys…they’re in it to Win.
I’m afraid that they have….

Climate Change…even Natural Selection!...still blithely relegated to the Conspiracy Theory drawer.
Peak Oil, for which there is abundant evidence…the same. It’s Liberal Plot, to turn everybody Gay.

Nothing substantial can be done, because there’s three(at least) Realities…all running parallel.
Yours, Mine, and the Truth…Machine believes in one, while advocating with deluge tactics, another.
The People…scared, confused, exhausted…seem willing to believe the most heinous insanity…
After Lil George, for a “Conservative” to rail against Executive Orders…against Dictatorial White House Policy…is Insane.
Even more so, because there is little Proof.
When there was ample Proof, they were waving flags, and bristling with belligerence, at anyone who dared to Question.

>>

“I have trod the winepress, alone.”

Or that’s what it feels like.

That’s what I’m tired of…
No One wants to talk Philosophically…
And Philosophy is what we need most.
That , and a Narrative.
What is a “Liberal”?
That’s the Discussion I long to have…hopefully, without it degenerating into nonsense,and backstabbing…and, especially, Unexamined Assumptions.

There are a few who are Thinking along these lines…Lakoff comes to mind, Chip Berlet, and others in the fields of Neuroscience and Psychology…much research into the Cognitive Differences that lead to a Right or Left Outlook.
Chris Hayes, is there, too…with probably the Smartest Show on TV.

What is required, is Thinking that includes all of this Thought and Research…and Economic Evidence…That Unifies it into a Narrative that Liberals(who often don’t know that they are Liberals!) can rally behind.
My God! We should have even Jesus on Our Side!

How’d it happen, that the Screw You Party so successfully laid claim to Him? Who will undertake this task, if not Us?

Currently, in Mason, the Democratic Party is all that’s available to us, as a starting point.
Where are the Democrats?
More importantly, Who are the Mason Dems?
I’ve heard, after the fact, about various small gatherings…on somebody’s ranch.
Where is the Visible Manifestation of Democratic/Liberal Values?
The “News Paper”?
Ha!
The “Barrio”, where I live(North Side) is ripe for the pickings…25+ years of a Belligerent Sheriff have left my neighbors Silent, and Uninvolved. Apolitical.
The Monumental Task is Education of the Folks…but, in order to accomplish this, there is required an even more Monumental Task…one of Definition, one of Language, and , above all, one of Philosophy.
We have Work to Do.
Let’s Talk.