Minimum Govt Protection of Civil Rights

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If there is one thing that the events of the last few years has proven, it is that our government is hopelessly either incompetent or corrupt when it comes to protecting our citizens from being oppressed by the government, or republican nuts, or tech bro stupidity.  What can we do to protect ourselves against the kind of overreach we have seen time and time again?  Not much actually, the government of the US was deliberately set up to be immune to the beliefs of the citizens.  But still it does not hurt to ask, well except that if you ask you will be put on various lists and have your life destroyed.  

 

But why not?  Unless you are wealthy, your life has been destroyed anyway.

 

Here is a short list of things we could demand and of course not receive.

1. In every movie, we always see that the US govt has complete access to all our private records, transactions, credit cards, driver licenses, etc.  We can see that they do not have such access and any violation of this law requires that the law enforcement officials be indicted and tried for a crime that requires jail time.

 

2. Time and time again, some internal security force, whether DHS or FBI or other, deliberately underestimates the threat of white, racist organizations but inflates the threat of innocent non-organizations such as Antifa.  When this becomes public knowledge, as it has in the case of the Portland demonstrations of a few years ago, the agents and management involved must be indicted and tried, and if found guilty, have minimum jail time.

 

3. The US can prohibit facial recognition systems used in this country and against American citizens.  Those organizations that violate that rule and their management and agents must be indicted, and if found guilty, be sentenced to some minimum jail time.

 

4. The Republicans have perverted the law by filing baseless lawsuits over and over again.  Fix this.

 

5. Any law enforcement official of the federal, state or local government who violates these laws must be prohibited from serving in any similar capacity in the government or in private industry.

 

6. Any tech company that violates the rights of its users or its employees should be nationalized without compensation and those who committed the crimes, if found guilty, serve jail time.  

 

7. The DOJ must be required to indict members of government who are obviously criminals such as Trump and his minions.  Failure to do so should result in dismissal and jail time.

 

This is minimum.  More will be added later.  Not all that interested in why you think morons like Trump should be exempt.

 

Yay! Global Wahrman is a "Hate Site" !

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The swine-like arbiters of all that is good and right, Boingo, an ISP for chrissake, has determined that this blog is a "hate site" and that their customers must be protected from me.  A greater compliment I can not imagine.  

 

I tried telling them that I am in reality a "contempt site" but it went over their heads.

 

Yes, global wahrman must be a "hate site" as I hate injustice and hypocrisy and, horrors, I am willing to write about it.

 

Happy Hanukkah

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Jill Fraser sent me these pictures of important new types of Hanukkah candle holders.  I think they speak for themselves.

Second Boingo Letter

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For some reason unknown, Blogger wont let me post the second letter to Boingo without turning my blog blue.  I am blue but I dont want my blog to be blue.

 

So what I have done is to make three jpegs from the letter and see if I can post that.  I thought it was a nice letter and I am being a nice guy.  You catch more flies with honey than with vinegar, and besides, what else am I going to do?  Sue them?  Write my congressman?  

I am starting to like the idea that I am considered a hate site.  Maybe my blog is actually better than I thought. But I think this is just the result of a dumb program at Boingo filtering at random and it found some words it disapproved of.  Thats my guess.

 

 

News of the Attempted Coup in Germany

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The attempt to restore the monarchy in Deutschland lead me to wonder if (1) Reichsburger could become a new fast food, (2) whether the US should attempt to rejoin the British Commonwealth and (3) failing that perhaps we could ask a Hapsburg or two to come over and run us since clearly we can not govern ourselves.

 

Kathleen Quaife Memorial Service December 5, 2022

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There was a memorial service for Kathleen Quaife (-Hodge) on December 5, 2022 at noon.  Stereotypically, I got a late start and other hilarity ensued combined with everyone leaving immediately afterwards.  But the upside is that an insider tipped me off to the correct location and I arrived to have several hours to myself in the fabulous exhibit dedicated to Kathleen's work as an artist.  This exhibit was created by her co-workers at the California State University Channel Islands where she had taught for several years.

 

Kathleen was one of my favorite people from my time in Los Angeles in the 1980s and 1990s and I was happy to reconnect with her for a day two years ago at the opening of a ceramics studio here in Santa Barbara.  

 

Kathleen was like having a glowing ball of positive energy around. Again, why are the best people taken from us while the annoying and amoral swine continue to live among us?  Where is the justice in that?

The physical plant of CSUCI is astonishing and was the location of a notable hospital far, far away from anything else five miles outside Camarillo.  The buildings are classic and the place is huge.

The "Left" Used to Love Elon Musk

A Republican friend pointed out to me that "the left" used to idolize Elon Musk.  First this is more or less totally true.  Second I thought it was obviously stupid and I think it is stupid now.  Third, what he calls "the left" is objectively more like the moderate center.  There is very little "left" in this country.  There is some but they are tiny and have almost zero credibility.

Maybe I Understand What is Going on With Boingo and their "hate site" Designation

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In the process of sending my little letter to Boingo to try and unblock this blog, I may have (almost accidentally) come across what they are thinking here.  In the process of contacting customer service, the phone system asked if I was calling about service at a government facility.  Perhaps it is their policy not to provide access to websites that discuss politics, particularly websites that are very negative about the political situation, which I certainly am.  I would not say that is a hate site, however.  So we will see.  Maybe they can just call me a "political site" and perhaps convince me that they do this to everyone who is political, and then it might be understandable and maybe even reasonable.  However, if they do this to me and not to, for example, the Wall Street Journal, that would not be reasonable.

Or maybe what is going on is that they can't handle the truth and dont want to be accused of allowing free speech to happen if it does not reinforce the illusion that we live in a functional democracy with a justice system and equal opportunity for everyone.  Maybe their clients require them to censor reality.  Its perfectly possible and completely understandable.  Maybe the "hate" is all on their side, they hate certain blogs because they say things that they dont want to hear.

Oh Boingo! Please Free Me!

This is a letter that I wrote to Boingo customer service.  Boingo is apparently an ISP for WIFI airports and military bases.

Dear Boingo,

Many months ago, when a friend of mine was traveling through Phoenix airport, she reported that something called “Boingo” was blocking my blog and calling it a “hate site”. I looked up “Boingo” and found out who you were and after a few nice conversations with customer support, I am writing this letter.

Whatever my blog may be, it certainly isnt a “hate site” as that is generally defined. It is a site about several different things including the history of LA and visual effects, the role of the artist in the motion picture industry, contemporary America and its politics, a site for writing practice and other things. I think it would be fair to say that I have strong opinions and that I am very unhappy about the state of contemporary politics in America but that could be said about a majority of Americans these days.

I am also very sarcastic and cynical about many things, some would say bitter, and I have noticed that Americans in particular find sarcasm baffling and disagreeable. Also many AI programs seem to have a problem with sarcasm, or at least Facebook does. For that reason I stopped using Facebook to discuss many issues because I did not want to deal with their pathetic and incompetent filtering system.

I am sure there are many ways that we can solve this misunderstanding and release my site from its bondage. First, for all I know, you have already unblocked my site and we are done. That would be wonderful. If not, then perhaps you have a document you can send me that describes your policy, what defines a “hate site” and with this statement in hand we can determine if (a) the policy is itself reasonable and (b) whether my site is guilty of it.

In either case, I look forward to learning what the procedure is to unblock the site. Maybe all we need is a slight redefinition of terms. Maybe instead of calling it a hate site, you can put up a notice that warns that my sight espouses “strong opinions” and to “click here to enter site”. That would be fine with me.  But "hate site" is just not correct and is in fact quite demeaning.

I hope this will be quickly resolved.

Sincerely

 

 

Andor and the Explanation Triumphant

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As we have discussed, it is "the explanation" that is the better part of filmmaking.  Forget and leave behind the pathetic necessity to "show something" to "demonstrate something on the screen".  Some pointless visual effects.  Some ridiculous action sequence.  No, the most important part of the film, the play, the whatever, is when a character explains to another character what is going on, what they believe, what they are thinking, what they have been hiding.

I dont know where the series Andor is going and whether it can maintain its momentum to transcend, to rise above the pathetic Star Wars mythology with its emphasis on giant cosmic eggs / death stars and its Joseph Campbell-esque "hero's journey" so simple, so overused. 

No, what we need is two adults, desperate and alone, who reveal their plans, their hopes, their dreams, their failures, their secrets.  To reveal, at least in part, what is going on.  

 

Forget your battles between giant robots, that is for children.  

Episode 10 of Andor has a classic in the explanation genre.  It even has a little craft from the intelligence world.  It seems the rebellion has planted an agent in the empire security service.  This agent requests a meeting with his handler to warn him and to resign.  And the handler, in classic intelligence fashion, tells his agent that he can not resign, that he is trapped.  And then the handler explains his sacrifice, his motivations, his fears as a way of reminding the agent that he is not alone in regretting, in part, the price he has paid.

They did a really good job.

 

 

 

 

No Democrat Concedes

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I called my congressman today to request that (a) they send the long range missiles to Ukraine and (b) that no Democrat should concede today.  If the vote tally seems to suggest that they lost, that means that there was voter fraud and we need an investigation and a lawsuit.  No Republican should be seated without a battle.  Its time for the Democrats to wake up and start defending the American people.

Which they will not do because the Democrats are weak and stupid.  But we can try to stiffen their backbone.

A Report Card for the Democrats 2020-2022

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The Democrats had two years of unobstructed power in Washington.  They controlled the presidency and both houses of congress.  They have no excuses for not at least attempting to deal with these issues.  If we got progress on some of these, that would have been impressive.  But not trying is beyond frustrating.

Before you criticise me about what is involved to do many of the following (e.g. more than mere legislation in many cases), why not just assume that I already know what is involved and actually dont care all that much.  Yes, some of these are constitutional amendments, etc.  As I say, I dont care.  I have waited (we have waited ...) long enough.

1. Reform the federal and supreme courts.  The supreme court is clearly controlled by partisan hacks and some of the federal appeals judiciary as well.  As with item 11 below, incompetents or traitors or partisan hacks need to be removed.  Term limits would make sense.

2. End the electoral college. Al Gore and Hillary Clinton won their respective elections by any reasonable, modern standard.  Same thing for the House of Representatives and the Senate.  No longer is the domination of the majority of Americans by a minority in rural states acceptable.

3. Investigate and indict Republicans for their crimes.  Enforce the 14th amendment.

4. Put Trump in jail for trying to overthrow the US Government and for stealing classified documents.

5. Tax the rich and repeal the Republican tax giveaway.

6. See to it that we have a uniform voting code and end voter suppression.

7. End Citizens United and reduce the impact of big money on our elections.

8. Support abortion rights with federal legislation.

9. Support Ukraine against the Russians.

10. Support the creation of renewable energy.

11. Remove the other Trump and Republican swine from the mechanisms of government where they have been placed to destroy our republic.  People like DeJoy of the USPS.

12. Articulate a vision for addressing crime, addressing institutional racism at local police departments and addressing the homeless problem.

Of all of these, the Biden administration and the Democrats have failed except possibly for item #9 which they have done in a half hearted manner and item 10 which is somewhat addressed by the inflation reduction act.

The Democrats seem to think that by spending two years passing an infrastructure bill that they deserve to be reelected.  But why should we elect these people if all they do is fail the American people?

Policy Change for Comments on Global Wahrman

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For someone to comment on Global Wahrman they must have a Google account.  I tried allowing open comments but got too much spam and too many trolls.  There are a lot of sick people out there.

 

As America Declines into Self-Parody (10/26/2022)

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As the American Empire or Republic or Whatever-It-Is continues to self-destruct before entering its full-fascist period, we are required to watch one ridiculous self own after another.  Its sad to see a formerly great nation, perhaps, or at least one with some self-respect collapse into farce but here we are. Please forgive this brief narration as frankly I find the whole situation tiresome and there are others out there perfectly capable of writing about the situation, and a few of them do.  I write this post more as a form of diary.  These are the events that pollute my life and humiliate my country before the world.  

 

First, at a time when the Supreme Court is making itself illegitimate, we have our old buddy Clarence Thomas give Sen Lindsey Graham a pass.  Lindsey doesnt have to face a grand jury to testify and no doubt perjure himself because Clarence gives him a pass until after the midterms, at least.  This is the same Clarence Thomas who should recuse himself from anything related to the attempts to overthrow the US Government, an activity that his wife is well known to have participated in.  Now tell me the Supreme Court has any legitimacy, I dare you.  Their illegitimacy is so flagrant as to be insulting.

 

This on top of the Trump loose-Cannon and her "special master" makes the whole justice system seem a joke.  [As some wit put it, if you want to use the term "special master" it should be at a BDSM party.]  If you want us, or some of us, to respect the judiciary and its decisions then you have to do something to mitigate the damage that Cannon and Thomas and Alito and Gorsuch and Barret and Kavanaugh do in plain sight.  Tell us your plan.  Oh, you dont have one.  I see, thats clear. 

 

As we blunder into the midterms where is the DOJ in the effort to make the midterms a legitimate exercise in democracy, the free exercise of the franchise?  Nowhere to be found.  Vigilantes in Arizona and Republicans in state after state are working to restrict the vote and intimidate voters.  Many of those to-be-elected are so insane as to believe that their leader, the traitor who stole classified documents and got caught at it, was elected in 2020.  Guess what, he wasnt.  

 

Where are we in getting rid of the Electoral College, that fatal compromise from 250 years ago?  Our leaders are nowhere to be found. Nowhere.  Nothing.  Here we have an unstable situation where a minority can seize the presidency against the will of the people again, and force someone, maybe even Trump, on a defeated former Democracy, if that is what we were, and there is no serious effort to fix it.

 

And while the DOJ fiddles, they manage to arrest some Chinese spies, which is nice, I guess, but how about putting Trump and his minions in jail.  Nope, nothing.  

 

Totally impotent.  A complete failure.

 

This country is pathetic.

 

[And so, Boingo, if this is what you call hate speech and therefore censor me because I express my opinion, then so be it.  I dont think it is hate speech.  I think it is the honest expression of an informed citizen about the most important events in my lifetime, the collapse of the American Republic.  Golly, I guess you dont approve. ]

The State of the Midterms and War

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All sorts of things are going on and most of you who read my blog know this as well as I do.  You dont need me to tell you this stuff, and I am really averse to repeating myself which I tend to do.  But its also the case that most of us forget what happened when so there is some utility in writing some of these things down.  So a few notes for the future about the state of politics and about war.

The 2022 midterms are weeks away and you can read many analysis and predictions.  The Senate is up for grabs and could go either way.  The Republicans are expected to win the House of Representatives but it could be by a very small margin.  But whoever wins, everyone will be looking closely to see how the Supreme Court decision on Roe v Wade affected things, if at all. Will people vote who might not have voted before?   Furthermore, the pollsters have covered their ass by pointing out that they have consistently underestimated the right wing Republican vote and they have every reason to think that is the case this time.

This disturbs and disappoints me a lot.  The stakes of the midterms are very high.  If the Republicans win then all progress of legislation must stop and they will make life hell for America.  At this point, there can be no lukewarm feelings about politics in this country.  Whatever the long term prognosis for the Republican party, and for the conservative forces in this country, as they are currently represented they seem to want to destroy the country.  I know I can never forgive them.

And then of course the Supreme Court is about to let loose.  Anyone who thinks this court has any legitimacy and is not completely partisan and reactionary will find out shortly how deluded their beliefs are.

 

We have Trump, the theft of classified material, and slave judges and special masters.  Its alternately horrifying and disgusting.  Do we have a functional legal system left?  Prove it.

We have war in Europe.  We have Russia threatening to use nukes if they dont get to do whatever they want.  We have war crimes to make the SS proud.  We have the vindication of initiative and morale and precision weapons.  We have anonymous destruction of energy infrastructure to punish those who would not obey Putin. We have drones galore.  Oh brave new world to have such munitions in it.

RAND Alumni Event and Dr. Donald B Rice

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The RAND Alumni event had only a few people I knew present, but I was happy to see and be able to talk to those who were there.  Among them was Michael O'Brien, Cara McCormick and Herb Shukiar.  But most of all, I was amazed to run into Dr. Rice who was president of RAND when I was there.  I thanked him for hiring me back in those days when I was a college drop out.

 

 

Dr. Donald B Rice 

 

Simple Tasks for my Representative

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One advantage of the right wing attacks on democracy in America over the last 20+ years is the fabulous opportunity it presents to learn how the US Government and its Constitution is intended to work.  Forget what you learned in civics class, that is just the beginning of the story.  While we theoretically have some sort of representative democracy, by no means is it intended that an individual should have much influence on the government and its policies.  In fact, it is exactly the opposite: the individual is intended to NOT have much influence except in very specific and limited ways.  The process is intended to give a superficial legitimacy to whatever the elite, in their magnificence, decide to do for us, the little people.  Although one may vote for two US Senators directly and the POTUS indirectly, at least you can, depending on your skin color and whether you can afford to take time off from work, have a tiny, itsy bitsy impact.  But you dont elect judges, certainly not at the federal level.  That the POTUS and the Senate do and to the extent the process of voting is perceived as legitimate, then perhaps the judges are legitimate.

 

The only election you have even a prayer of influencing (unless you have a lot of money or are for some reason famous or inherited your elite status) is your congressman.  Therefore, if you dont like how things are going and want some changes then feel free to write anyone or contact anyone you like, but probably the only one who *might* listen to you is your congressman and even that is marginal.  The more one understands how and why the Constitution was written, the more it becomes clear that it is intended that you contact your congressman.  It might not work, in fact it probably wont, and they have very limited power, but that is how things are designed and you may as well give it a try.  Besides its entertaining to annoy them and talk to their pleasant interns who answer the phone.  Its fun! you should try it.

But for this whole shaggy mess to hold together it requires that people not get really pissed off about how things are going.  If, say, your elected representatives fail to deal with a baker's dozen of critical life and death decisions, and choose to kick the can down the road to avoid doing anything hard, then bad times may be on the horizon.  Then "the people" may get ornery and decide to hold their elected representatives responsible for solving some problems.  And if our elected swine, I mean representatives, have waited to solve those problems until they are much more difficult, well isnt that too bad?  "The people" may not take no for an answer and then things may get nasty.  Isnt that one part of the story about the so-called Tea Party.  Sure, it was funded by the right wing nuts the Koch brothers, but they would not have been able to do it unless there were a lot of pissed off people.

 

And that, I propose, is one part of where we are today.  In order to help move things along I have graciously donated my time here, on this blog, to suggest some things that need to get fixed sometime in the future.  Ha ha just kidding.  No they need to be fixed right forking now.  God bless those sweeties in the House, or the Senate or the DOJ or the Supreme Court, but they may have to take some direction now.  Right now.  Obviously they wont and in some cases they are too late.  They fucked it up and we fucked it up by not screaming louder, earlier.

 

America used to be about process and compromise.  Not any more.

 

So here are some issues that need to be addressed. 

1. Trump and his co-conspirators in the attempt to overthrow the government need to be barred from government office and go to jail.  The DOJ is only now looking into this and it is likely that Trump will declare for the presidency right after the midterms which in normal times would mean he is untouchable.  Too bad, he gets indicted and goes to jail anyway.  

2. Trump stole US government property and endangered national security.  The Trump judge moron decided without good reason to impose a delay in an attempt to get Trump off the hook.  Too bad.  Proceed with the investigation, bring the indictments, and put Trump in jail.  Right now.

3. Having the electoral college select the president is like having a spinning gun in the middle of a room of people.  It is going to get off and people are going to get hurt.  Al Gore and Hilary Clinton won their respective elections.

4. The Republicans in various states are restricting the vote.  Fix it now, you have less than 60 days.

5. Get the Trump morons off the judiciary.  

Its too bad they let the situation get out of hand, but that is what happens when you have cowardly representatives like we do.  They knew what was happening.

How to Understand Republican Arguments

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I have an approach to help understand and interpret something a Republican says in favor or against some proposition.  For example, a Republican might say that abortion should be decided by the states.  Or a Republican might in a few months say that abortion should be decided by the federal government and not by the states.  And these are the same Republicans so it can be confusing.  I have a technique that helps me understand such things and I want to share it with you.

 

Remember in the following that "all models are wrong but some are useful".  In other words, I am not suggesting that Republicans are lying pieces of garbage.  I am saying that they appear to be lying pieces of garbage for the purposes of predicting future behavior.

 

The technique is as follows.  When a Republican makes an argument such as "abortion should be decide by the states", what they are really saying is "We want to outlaw abortion and we will say any damn thing we want to attain that goal. Then when it is convenient to say something else to attain that goal, that is what we will, without hesitation, do.  We are shameless and powermad and there is no point in arguing with us because you are just wasting your time.  We dont believe our arguments either".

The Democrats, being endlessly naive and weak, fall for this trick over and over again.  Dear Democrats: please grow up.  Stop falling for this trick, it makes you look stupid and it does us (remember us? the little people?) no good.

The Heavyweight Fight of the Century!

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Ladies and Gentlemen!  Your attention please!  The fight you have all been waiting for!  In this corner we have the world champion bully, traitor and narcissist, Donald Trump!  And in this corner we have the plucky idealist, Merrick Garland!  Who will win?  

 

At last, yes you thought that this day would never come.  The Donald is such a nutty boy and his followers so incredibly loyal and stupid that they seemed to be able to overrun any of that vaunted "constitutional protection" we have all heard about all our lives.  But maybe not so much, especially with the completely opportunistic and shameless Republican party running interface for this piece of garbage.

What will happen?

Image "borrowed" from MSNBC

 

 

Legitmacy and the Supreme Court

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We started our discussion on the legitimacy of the US government here.

The basic argument is that a country or system can survive all sorts of attacks, mistakes, compromises and failures and still exist and move on.  But the elites of this or any country should not assume that they can just fail endlessly and cynically ignore the values on which that country was based. They should not think they are above the "judgment of heaven".  History is filled with examples where such a decadent system hollows out and experiences just one more shock and, to everyone's surprise, collapses into a puddle.  See the Ancien Regime of France in 1799 and Imperial Russia in 1917 for example but there are many others.

It is pride that comes before the fall.

 

The Republicans have accused the Democrats of legislating through the judiciary but of course what that really means is that it is the Republicans that plan to legislate through the judiciary.  Once their partisan justice drones were put on the bench then the Republicans knew that they didnt have to care about majority rule or democracy anymore.  They could count on their "originalists" to wildly violate jurisprudence and legislate away.

But if you are going to do this kind of stuff, then you had better be sure that your court is above reproach, and has been put in place with impeccable process. Its not just who is on the court, it is how they got there that matters, not to mention their arguments. The American People, had better believe in your integrity, boys and girls, because if they dont you are asking for trouble.  What is a justice system whose Supreme Court is seen as corrupt and partisan?  

So lets see what we have here and in no particular order.  First we have the court overthrowing the rightful winner of the 2000 election to put their right wing stooge in power even though we all know that had we kept counting the votes in Florida that Al Gore would have won the electoral vote as well as the popular vote.  Now, with George W in power, we get none other than Roberts and Alito on the court.  Then we get McConnell to refuse to evaluate and confirm Merrick Garland.  Then we have Trump, a known criminal, nominate not one, not two, but three right wing nuts to the Supreme Court.

Sorry guys, but you screwed it up.  The court is far from legitimate and now you have a failed justice system.  Well good luck with that, but it doesnt work for me.

Only Nuclear Weapons Will Save Taiwan

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Its pretty clear that the only thing that will save Taiwan is having nuclear weapons and a way to deliver them when the mainland attacks which is inevitable.  

 

What have we learned from Ukraine?  They gave up their nuclear weapons and now Russia feels they can walk all over them. Would Libya have rolled over so quickly if they had nuclear weapons.  When Iran gets nuclear weapons, wont they be all the more aggressive about expressing their regional hegemony?  Would they attempt to destroy Israel with those weapons?

Good bye nuclear disarmament.  Countries need nuclear weapons to defend their sovereignty.

Prepare to launch! 

 

Storage Area Done

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When we cleaned out the old house, there were 130+ boxes of my life that needed to be stored.  They got moved to a local storage area and I started working through the boxes.  It took 8 weeks of obsessive work to get this down to 45 or so boxes I am going to keep. The jewish books go to the local Chabad Lubavitch, the astronomy and astrophysics books go to the Joshua Tree astronomy league and the books I am not keeping go to the Little Library in Van Nuys, curated by Jill Fraser.  Some photographic gear will go to Tom Barron.  The rest, those 45 boxes, stay with me in my little apartment.  God only knows what will happen if I have to move.

 

Voter Fraud, Florida, Gross Hypocrisy

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The US is entering another round of legitimacy challenges and crisis.  As a Southerner I can tell you flat out that issues of who can vote, both legally and practically, are huge.  The history here is as ugly as you care to look.  Therefore when deSantis and Florida selectively choose felons to accuse of vast voter fraud (excuse me, 20 people?) but dont look at all the ways black people have been disenfranchised over the years, both historically and currently, then excuse me but I feel the need to say this is self-serving, right wing crap.  The next set of elections will be illegitimate because of acts like this one.  

 

This may have been acceptable in the 1930s but it is not acceptable today.

 

https://www.politico.com/news/2022/08/18/ron-desantis-voter-fraud-arrests-florida-00052753

Notable Items Rescued From the Storage Area

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After decades of procrastination, I dedicated myself to cleaning out the 150 boxes of books, papers, esoteric computer equipment and reducing them to a lean and mean 40-50 boxes.  This task, similar to the cleaning out of the stables of King Augeas by Hercules, reclaimed some notable mementos of my former and wasted life.  

 

 

1. An uncashed check from Robert Abel & Associates.

 

 

2. Ticket stubs from my train trip to Washington DC to protest the right wing coup d'etat by the Supreme Court to install their stooge Bush over the rightful winner, Al Gore.

 

 

 

3. Apple Mac Powerbook Duo

 

4. Carter/Mondale 1976 

 

5. deGraf/Wahrman card from my cabin on Lookout Mountain

 

6. Ken Kahn's PhD thesis from the MIT AI Lab.

 

"White Innocence" is a New Term of Art

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I learned a new term the other day: white innocence.  It refers to those white people who are so dumb as to be constantly surprised in the right wing dictatorship their naivete has helped to bring about.  Roe v Wade gone, oh!  No more voting rights?  Oh!  Citizens United?  Oh!  Maybe Kavanaugh wont vote to destroy abortion rights!  

 

White people, dumb as a rock.

 

 Mitch laughs at you, you know.

Legitimacy Sequence Start

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Start of a series of blog  posts on legitimacy of government and government authority.  

The issues of what makes a government "legitimate" are controversial or at least strongly contested.  Governments can sometime sustain huge controversies, disasters and failures but still keep going for years, decades or centuries.  Citizens generally understand that there are problems, maybe even huge problems, but for many reasons decide to shrug them off.  Some people will protest, some people will work for change, some people may plot or try revolution but generally the ship of state moves forward.  This being so, some parties and factions believe that they can commit any crime and abuse any principle of government and get away with it.  In spite of these abuses, the legitimacy of the government, though lessened perhaps, is still sufficient and everyone moves on.

But this is a dangerous game, this flouting of principles and the law, because sometimes a formerly stable yet imperfect government, after years of abuse, does one more thing or has one more disaster that is self-inflicted and then, suddenly and unexpectedly, the whole thing unravels.   In at least three well-documented cases (the monarchy of France before the 1789 revolution, Imperial Russia under the Romanovs and the February Revolution, and the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1988-1991), none of the participants particularly expected the fall of the existing regime.  It was a surprise and in each case for many people a catastrophe.

Therefore, do not be so proud, America.  Things have been stewing beneath the surface for decades, and the trainwreck of the recent 5 years was not an accident and what happens next should not be a surprise.   Lets review some recent case studies.

Books Reduction in Force

draft

There were maybe 100 boxes of books in storage that have been reduced to perhaps 30 or 40 boxes.  The rest are being given away as follows: about 5 boxes to Chabad in Goleta, about 3 boxes to the astronomy club in Joshua Tree and the rest to the Little Library in Van Nuys hosted by Jill Fraser.

 

Thank you Jill.  The little library seems to be working out better than I would have guessed.

 

10th Anniversary 4th of July Celebration

Its our 10 year anniversary! 

I didnt even know that it was and I discovered it by accident.

I am not sure who  reads my blog but I feel very encouraged that a major ISP sees the need to block my site.  That must mean that I have annoyed someone or some thing important enough to get me blocked.  Hate speech?  Nah!  Someone is just being an asshole.

The blog has accomplished many things for me in my life and it has been worth the time I have put into it.  Obviously it has changed over the last decade but certain goals are being achieved.  I am much more confident and accomplished at expressing myself in writing.  Even the best natural born writer needs to practice and I am hardly the best.  Certain stories in my life have been written down and that makes me happy.  And of course the whole melodrama of the right-wing takeover of america that plausibly started in November 2000 has been endlessly interesting and we are just getting to the good parts!  

Thank you, again, for bearing with me.