No Hope

I tried to put together a list of things that need to be fixed and I could not continue.  It is too awful, it is too stupid. Its a nightmare.  I dont know what will happen but I am sure I hate this country and I have no faith in it.  I cant breathe.

Zoom Comsec

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Zoom announces that they would not encrypt communications because they want to support law enforcement and I said:

Michael Wahrman This is pretty weird. Only unsophisticated criminals or conspirators would use a communications channel that was not encrypted unless they really had to. And then they would use some sort of prearranged code that was seemingly innocent but rich in hidden meaning. "Did you ever get your car fixed ?" which really meant "Execute the informer and run for the border ...", etc. Which means to me, who typically has not read this article before commenting (yes, I know, I know) that it is more about spying on citizens than it is about traditional law enforcement. More about sniffing out those who would disagree with the government's always just and righteous policies so that dissidents who might disrupt new order can be removed before they disturb our harmony or our photo opportunities, etc. I refuse to believe that any of this is an innocent mistake at this point. A company of this size and importance who is in the business of enabling communication between individuals and small groups can not possibly have the excuse of being unaware of the implications of their policies in this matter.

What is Our Moral Imperative Here?

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The obvious question is whether we should be in Washington protesting? One might want to be there to protest the racism that led to the death of Floyd, or one might want to protest the failure of our system of government to protect its people from an obviously deranged madman. 

But in either case you can be sure that those who protest will be on lists, and that they will start killing people (you know, he committed suicide in jail, he tried to resist arrest by running away from drugs planted during a no-knock raid, or maybe he/she will just be asked to serve 10 years in prison in Alabama or whatever they come up with. Nevertheless, what is our moral position here? Should we be there even though we will be punished for protesting the actions of the leader?

The Events in Minneapolis and 50 Years

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I think that the protesters in Minneapolis should burn the damn city down.  Its been 50 years since 1968 and lots of promises were made.  Remember.  Its the ballot or the bullet.

The government failed us.

Time to change the government.

1185 Posts

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There have been 1185 posts on this blog.  15 away from 1200.  Yay! 

Purge of Trump Collaborators

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I am starting to read articles about how to treat the civil servants who cooperated with Trump and his criminal agenda when/if Biden comes to power. One article in particular pleaded for a smarmy forgiveness of those who betrayed their country and committed crimes, as clearly anyone who cooperated with Trump did. They must be investigated and a certain number of the worst offenders prosecuted. The rest of them should just be demoted or fired. Cooperating with Trump is like cooperating with Hitler, and war criminals should not be allowed in our government.

The New Interface to Blogger: Why?

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The new interface seems to add nothing new.  It just hides some functions and changes things around.  There is no point to it.  I plan to use the legacy blogger interface as long as they will let me.

Raising My Estimate of the Deaths from COVID-19

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I am raising my highly scientific estimate of American deaths from the coronavirus up from 200K to 288K. The world class logic (dry sarcasm, sorry) that I use for this estimate is as follows.

The WaPo death count for Americans as of this morning is 96,000. But we know the number is low because not all deaths from COVID-19 are officially marked as such for a number of different reasons, some benign, some less so. The estimates for an adjustment factor range from 1.25 to 2.0 although I have seen higher. Lets take a relatively conservative 1.5. That means that we are currently at 144,000 deaths. It seems likely to me, even optimistic, that we can expect an equal number of deaths going forward as we try to manage this thing although of course the future is uncertain. On the one hand we are getting better at testing, and know a lot more about how to treat the disease (although still not doing so great there, we are certainly getting better). On the other hand, it is likely that social distancing really did help (with regional variation) but different areas are opening up now and it would be a miracle if this did not cause local hot spots. A couple of good church meetings and political rallies can infect hundreds of people who will then spread the virus at the very least to their immediate family. The rallies in Michigan of the guys with guns and calling for people to resist the Mark of the Beast came from all over the country, I read, and we know some of them were infected. A vaccine in the next 12 months would be amazing, and I think has a low probability of happening, although it is certainly possible if we get lucky.

So it seems fair to me that if we had some N deaths getting to this point, and since we are nowhere near done, and at best we are at some sort of peak, then it is likely that we would have at least that many taking the curve down assuming that the curve is symmetric, which it may not be. Thus 2 * 144,000 = 288,000. At least.

I have been pretty good at predicting this so far, through my flakey back of the envelope estimates but hopefully I am wrong this time and it will just go away as the Great Leader who Knows All Things predicted.

Corrupt Supreme Court and Separation of Power

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My friend, the Harvard trained attorney, tried to convince me that the Supreme Court denied the Democratic subpoena for the Mueller report because of "separation of powers". He didnt convince me of that, but he did convince me that the system was corrupt.

I said: "If, as you say, the subpoena is denied because of separation of powers, then the Democrats were stupid to expect anything from an independent investigation. The president could just order his corrupt attorney general to suppress whatever was discovered. So either the Supreme Court is suppressing the evidence (it is) or the Democrats and the American people were stupid to trust the process (they were) but in any case the legitimacy of the American system is diminished. "

There are many problems here but the one that amazes me the most is not the actions of the corrupt right wing nuts in Washington.  I think I understand them just fine.  What I find most unbelievable is the large number of people who are willing to accept any amount of corruption and treason as long as they dont have to face the fact that their system failed.

But it did fail.  It obviously failed many times.  Wake up.

How Do You Spell Stoodge?

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What fun it is to see the destruction of the American Republic in real time! A maniac injecting himself with fantasy drugs while Americans die right and left and the inspector generals are fired and Republicans with blood on their hands violate their oath of office in a way that would make a Roman senator turn away in shame. The tax returns are still not released, I guess the right wing supreme court is waiting as long as it can to protect their stoodge in the white house. I went to UCLA and we know all about running out the clock. Golly, they sure moved quickly enough when they blocked Al Gore's presidency and installed their boy! And of course I know, somehow I just know, that McConnell's right wing racist judges will enforce the law and not allow voter suppression, of course, of course. The oath! They will do their sworn duty like all true Republicans, like Rep Nunes and AG Barr if you know what I mean, wink wink. Hey too bad about Mueller, I guess he wasnt compromised enough and constrained by regulations for the True Americans in the White House. Let those Russians go, after all, we all know who guaranteed those loans at Deutsche Bank, now dont we? You DO know who guarnteed those loans this administration is being SO transparent about, right? They have old Trump-y, the quinine king, right where they want him. And lets not worry about arguing that "impeachment" is actually a process that will protect Americans! Never in the history of the American Republic, so-called, has there been a clearer case for removing a miscreant from the White House than the case that the Democrats prepared. It makes me wonder what this world is coming to. Surely, surely, surely someone must worry that all those decades about lying to the third world about how great our system is might affect our credibility. Oh yes, and now the Republicans are saying we must cut even the stupidly inadequate social services this country has because deficit! Oh yes, the deficit-y.

It amazes me that the Republicans would commit treason to keep power but they have. The system failed. It has failed every day of the last 3.5 years and a good case can be made that it failed in November 2000 and this is just the 800 lb chickens coming home to roost.

Implement the voting rights act. Put Merrick Garland on the Supreme Court. Tell McConnell, Nunes, Barr, Kavanaugh, Trump and Pence to go home and stay there until we decide what to do with them and for them not to travel without notifying the FBI.

Picture of my Patron

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This is a picture of my patron, who is on Facebook, but must remain nameless. It has been nearly two years since she picked me up out of the gutter and placed me here at the Monastery in Santa Barbara to study the Esoteric Knowledge.

No one knows where this is going, not really.

An Experiment

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So to my friends who think that everything is just peachy keen and there is nothing to worry about, I have the following suggested experiment. Go to one of these "stay open" protests, one with idiots with assault rifles and nooses, and stand in front and loudly say that you hate Donald Trump, that you think that he should be in jail, and that you are a Jew.

See what happens.

This is All You Have to Do to Fix Things

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1. Trump in jail, 2. Barr, McConnell, Nunes, Pruitt, etc in jail. 3. Remove the Electoral College, 4. Remove the right wing judges put in power by McConnell/Trump, 5. Make it impossible for the Supreme Court to throw an election like in 2000, 6. Remove Trump's executive orders, 7. Put the traitors in jail.  8. Reverse Citizens United.  9. Enforce the Voting Rights Act.  10. Put the Wall Street criminals from 2008 in jail.

Prepare to Go to the Mattresses

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Surely it is just prudence to build a fortress. Secret passages to the subway and the park. Back ways out. Overlapping fields of fire. Antitank and surface to air missiles. Internal passages. Traps for the unwary. Better to be safe than sorry. Offsite weapon caches. Maybe a backup in the country. Dormitories with kitchens, food to last 6 months or a year. Communications facilities. Backups of everything. Water, power, etc. It doesnt have to be that expensive if you dont wait to the last minute. Secrecy is important, only you should know where everything is.

History tells us that this is a good idea.

I have read a lot and it is always useful to have a place like this.

What The World Needs Now

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What we need now is something to drag us down from the precipice and into the gutter where we belong.  Another plague, a real economic collapse, a global war or two, and a new aggressive religion ought to do it.

Will the USA Drag Down the Western Alliance?

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The USA has proven beyond doubt that it is an unreliable ally, capable at any time of devolving into a  racist and self-destruction quasi nationalism, a nationalism as conceived by the most literal and ignorant of people. And as its economy craters due to the hard work of the bipartisan globalist morons, most Americans will find themselves on the short end of the stick. Impoverished and unemployed or working at stupid menial jobs while the elite jetsets around the world.  I doubt that Americans will enjoy living in this world they so diligently created. As their self-impoverishment becomes more apparent, I think they will be shocked. And that they will lash out, I predict, with some truly insane late-imperial militarism. 

And yes, any country that is affiliated or allied with us will no doubt be drawn into stupid military adventures, expensive as well as ill-conceived, demonstrating the most crass and shallow understanding of the situation even as it uses some clever but expensive new munition.

Historians will write for centuries about the stupiity of the USA and perhaps also of the west, of their (or at least the USA's) self destructive behavior but they wont have any answers. It is not much more complicated than it appears. People are not pretending to be shallow. They are shallow. The USA self-destructed out of greed and dumbness.

But we may not have to worry about the judgment of history as everyone may be dead due to global climate change. Go methyl hydrate! Go polar ice caps! Yay!

Pride and the Endless Pit!

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It is pride, false pride, that lead the righteous to their inevitable doom, destined by the Gods to rot for all eternity for their failure of character. No amount of experience can prevent those who are predestined for eternal torment will prevent them from making that fateful mistake on that fateful day. And so it is with me, two days before a self-generated intermediate deadline, I say "Now is a good time to use a modern HTML / CSS layout technology, I had read about how CSS Grid works and it looked straightforward. And with that single decision, all forward progress halts, and his soul is thrown into the endless pit! If anyone out there happens to have used this technology and can answer some simple questions, please let me know.

[ So I nearly have this fixed.  It turns out that there are too many ways to do everything and anything in CSS and I pity those who must implement this in a browser.  So, I am taking the time to learn CSS more or less from first principles.  I have the problem about half solved and I am sure I can get where I want to go.  ]

Authentic Southern Vegetarian Sweet Potato Pie

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This recipe is completely authentic except that it isnt.

1. We use the Trader Joe's frozen to-be-baked crust and a glass pyrex pie baking dish.  2. Bake about 2.5 - 3 lbs of sweet potatoes at about 450 F for over an hour or until the sweet potatoes are squeezable.  Use a baking dish.  Insert a knife or fork into each sweet potato so it doesnt explode.   3. In a dish combine the (cooled) sweet potatoes with 1 cup sugar, vanilla, some corn starch, the peel of one orange, the juice of 1.5 - 2 oranges, salt, nutmeg and cinnamon.   Mix well.  Add cornstarch until you get the consistancy you are willing to live with for the rest of your life.  Is it sweet enough?  Too sweet? 4. Cook bottom of pie crust in oven for 10-12 minues at about 400 F. 5. Let pie crust cool a little bit and then add filling. 6. Make the executive decision about whether you want a crust top to your pie and add it if so.  7. Bake for about 30 minutes but do not let the crust burn. 8. Be careful not to burn the sh*t out of yourself.

Vocabulary in the Age of Trump

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Words to know in the time of plague and the collapse of our government and our society:

-- supine, n. failing to act or protest as a result of moral weakness or indolence

-- boogaloo, n. right-wing term for a coming civil war

 

On Civil Disobedience in a Dictatorship

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A friend who will remain nameless asks a reasonable question: is it fair or right for us to use civil disobedience to protest the right wing dictatorship in Washington. Well, if you have faith in the system or in our elites, then possibly the answer is no. But I have no faith in our depraved elites or in our system. I think that ICE/Gestapo is going to keep murdering children, that Devoes is going to keep destroying people's lives and ignoring court orders, that the right wing DOJ will exonerate russian spies and that our Republican representatives will do anything to defend an obvious criminal and traitor in the white house. In other words, I think the question is nonsensical and could only be asked by someone who is in total denial of the situation they are in. Your government is probably murdering children right now and you dont know about it but your lack of knowledge does not make you innocent in these circumstances. You are complicit in their crimes unless you take every possible action to stop and defeat them.

Picture from Benton Jew

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Many years ago, Benton Jew and Josh Pines came to town and I guess we all went to Griffith Park Observatory.  

Purchase Stamps from the USPS

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Since the Trump weirdo is trying to destroy the USPS, now is a good time to purchase stamps from USPS.com or from your local post office.  The more the merrier.

HI Trump Weirdos! Hey!

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One of my few comments from a Trump weirdo.... deleted. Yay!  Totally fucking bugnuts. I hate these people and I want them to die.

More on Operation Paperclip

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[Excerpted from a letter to a friend regarding Operation Paperclip]

I think you might benefit as I have from reading this book. The CIA made public a book review on it:

https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/csi-studies/studies/vol-58-no-3/operation-paperclip-the-secret-intelligence-program-to-bring-nazi-scientists-to-america.html

It wasnt just rocket scientists, it was much more than that, and complicit is not the word. In many cases these are the leaders of the projects that killed 10s of thousands of slave laborers (100s of thousands?). I am not aware of the Manhattan project being even close to what happened in Nazi Germany. We are talking about some of the worst people of the Nazi regime when it came to such things as medical experiments with a 99% death rate on non consensual subjects. And it was after the fact and we hired these people because we did not believe that we could compete with the Russians with their German scientists any other way. I say, bullshit.

I dont think that the Manhattan project makes us equivalent to the Nazis even a little bit, in any way, whatsoever. I could argue this persuasively for 100,000 years and some people could not hear me, so I suggest we dodge it. They dont want to hear what went into the decision to drop those bombs, what went into the decision to stop dropping those bombs, and so forth. It is way beyond their capability to put themselves into the mindset of those who were there. Even the simplest historical issues are beyond their capability to hear. If it were me, I would not have dropped the bombs directly on those cities, I would have deliberately dropped it offshore, for example. The city would have been wrecked, many people would have died although not as many who did, and the point would have been made. But would the Japanese leadership have heard the message if they had done that? I dont know, but I know that the people who were there and whose job it was to save American lives did not think that it would. Hiroshima was not a civilian target, not even a little itsy bitsy bit. Some scholars wrote a nasty letter a few years ago (10?) comparing Hiroshima to the beautiful and innocent city of San Francisco not realizing how insanely stupid and ignorant their argument was (and these were people who studied the subject), because even a stupid moron who studied the war in the pacific would realize that San Francisco was one of the eseential cities in our war in the Pacific. Perhaps people in academia in this subject are by definition stupid, I dont know, but they sure did not enhance their credibility in this discussion.  The Manhattan project is one of the great achievements of our civiilization and really is not comparable in any way with the use of Nazi scientists who deliberately killed people in their charge.

There is an important issue here: we can not trust our government to uphold our morals. We must realize that we must take action and at the very least punish those who, for example, by government policy use torture to achieve policy goals. We have used torture in our nations past, but never by policy to the best of my knowledge. Is this an important point, yes I think it is.
We are all complicit today in the destruction of our government and the murder of innocent people, whose number we will never know because unlike the Nazis we deliberately do not keep and destroy the records (see EPA and Gestapo/ICE). Every day that Trump is in power, every day that McConnell puts right wing nuts in the court system means our system failed. The courts need to be sanitized at once, failure to do so means that we live in an oppressive right wing dictatorship. There is nothing those people wont do to achieve their bizarre right wing goals over the wishes of the majority of the people in this country (which is obvious to everyone in the world except maybe Americans in denial).

The game is over. Its time for a new government.

This is Why We Can't Wait

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However, this is why I do advocate as of now a general strike and civil disobedience, which might indeed get people killed.

Because doing anything else, is immoral. Waiting is immoral. And I cite for you the following evidence: Did Trump remove the rules protecting the elderly at nursing homes? Would you agree that if he did such a thing that it would be an act of incredible cruelty, removing necessary protections (we know they are necessary because of things that have happened) to protect those who can not protect themselves?

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/trump-rolls-back-rules-protecting-elderly/

This is just sick.

If we had a government that functioned, this would not have happened because the Orange Moron would have been in jail one or two years ago.

New Constitution Project

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Every day that Trump remains in office just proves that the government has failed and that we need a new constitution.  Voting for Biden will remove one of the symptoms, which is nice, but it wont fix the corrupt politicians or judiciary and it wont fix an obviously failed constitution.  Since our elites have failed to fix or even discuss a new constitution we may as well start discussing one ourselves.  It wont really help and any good ideas (or bad ideas if they are useful to someone who wants to steal money) will just be taken without attribution, but thats OK.  As peons with no political power, what else do we have to do with our time?

How To Get the Bernie Supporters to Vote for Biden

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I have heard a lot of people command and threaten Bernie supporters that they had better enthusiastically support Joe Biden or they are traitors, etc. I dont think that is the best approach. Here is what I suggest you do to get people's enthusiasm. The following is intended for example only, obviously the details might vary.

Joe Biden would announce a major policy speech. For that speech, Bernie Sanders would introduce him and say something like "I would like to introduce my good friend and long time colleague in the struggle for justice in this country, please welcome, Joe Biden!" and then Biden would go up there and, in JFK or RFK style, in ringing tones, say something like "We will end racial discrimination in this country! We will guarantee an elite education to anyone who qualifies! We will see that the rich pay their fair share of taxes and undo the stupid so-called Republican tax reform! We will put the criminals of the previous administration in jail! We will punish those countries that have interfered in our elections and attacked our society! We will get the right wing nutty boys like Roberts, Gorsuch and Kavanaugh off the bench because America will not be a slave to the right wing minority! We will make our elections free and fair for all Americans! We will take a leading role in addressing global climate change! We will do all this and more. Join me!"

And then I think you would no longer have to threaten Bernie supporters to get their vote.

Facebook List of Celebrities You Have Met

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But what is a celebrity?  

Here is a possible list, all real.

Jimmy Carter
Forrest J. Ackerman (and Wendy Wahrman Ackerman)
William Shatner
Ivan Sutherland
Ed Catmull and John Lassiter
Lynda Weinman
Neil deGrasse Tyson
Jim Clark
Bill Joy
Tim Leary
Terrence McKenna
Grace Hopper
Willis Ware
John Dykstra, Richard Edlund, Joel Hynek, Dennis Muren, Douglas Trumbull, Richard Yuricich
Jerry Brown, Jr.
Graham Nash
Matt Groening
A host of West Coast SF writers, Larry Niven, Poul Anderson, Bob Silverberg, etc.
Sumner Redstone
Mark Hammill
Bill Mumy
Jim Cameron and Gale Anne Hurd
Bill Hanna and Joe Barbera
Harry Marks and Saul Wurman
Steven Spielberg
Jeffrey Katzenberg
Bob Kurtz
Greg MacGillivrey
Joni Mitchell (sortof, its a long story)

Look! My Lyft Driver Gave Me a Mask!

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My Lyft driver, a nice Hispanic lady, had a very limited supply of masks and she offered me one.  At first I refused but she wanted me to have it.  I gave her a big tip but that isnt what matters.  What matters is that people help each other in a time of crisis.  

Unlike my friend David in LA who goes out of his way to infect people.

Me at Pharmacy in Montecito

Returning the Gift of Nastiness in the Pandemic

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Its not everyday that you get to return the favor of nastiness to someone who has attacked you in the past and for no good reason.  I am sentimental about my old friends, yes even my old lovers. Friends on Facebook for several years she suddently attacked me for no reason.  So here we go, dear, love you!  Text follows.

Since you went out of my way to be as nasty as you could be to me for no good reason, and when I was just being cordial and pleasant, I wanted to return the favor. I hope that you or someone you love is damaged permanently in this pandemic. With luck it can be someone who dies because you infected them so you can live with the guilt, assuming you are capable of experiencing guilt.  Please dont ever talk to me again.

End of text.  That was fun!

Getting A Message to Richard Edlund, Somehow

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I just want to get a message to Richard Edlund, ASC, somehow.  I know he is on the Board of Governors of the Academy.  Anyway I want to make sure and hope that he is taking care of himself in these challenging times.  And to thank him for all the times he has been very kind to me.  He probably doesnt even notice, he is probably kind to everyone.  But it really has meant a lot to me over the years.

The Whole World is My Garden

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For those who use Voltaire's garden as a way of excusing their failure to stand up for what is right, my response is that my garden is the whole world.  If you fail to stand up for what is right you will not be forgiven by history.