2008/09/26

Bail-out WHO?

So let me get this straight: The banks wrongly loaned money to people who purchased houses and could just barely make their house payment... When the economy sagged a bit (due to high fuel prices?) they suddenly couldn't make those mortgage payments and defaulted on their loans. 

Now the banks are in trouble because so many people stoped paying their mortgage payments. 

So... Gee Whiz... the solution is to forgive the bankers the bad debt and forget about the home owners.

Why not pay off part of the mortgage of those home owners so that they can continue to make their (now lower) payments and move back into those abandoned houses?

What I asked my representatives is this: "Why is welfare for people wrong, while welfare for the banking industry is right?"

2008/09/25

Bilbray voted AGAINST the war on terror

Here is the voting records for H.R. 1 Implementing "Recommendations of the 9/11 Commission Act of 2007".


Brian Bilbray voted AGAINST the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission.

2008/09/23

Imagine Sheeple without loans.

Imagine a country; a fine country with more than enough land for all it's people to have a place to live, more than enough sun for everyone to have electricity and more than enough water for everyone to grow all the food they would need to eat, if only they would work a few hours a day in their gardens.

But, imagine the people of this country are addicted to power. Cheap power. Lots of power.

The people work for those few who have the power, instead of working for themselves.

Imagine a very intelligent young woman who attended university and became very educated as well as very intelligent. Imagine that she found a way to make power for everyone, or rather that she invented a machine that would allow each person to make their own power.

She built a prototype, and wanted to start a company to build these machines, so that all the people could buy one, then stop working for the people who had the power and go back to their gardens for exercise and food, instead of health clubs and fast food restaurants.

To build so many machines, she would need money to build a factory; so she applied for a loan from a bank. But the banks in this country were all owned or regulated by the government. And the president of the government was working for the people who had the power. They had paid for him to come to power though something called an "election" in which the people pick who ever they see on TV the most. And he picked up his phone, and made a call, and set a policy, and the bank would not loan money for anyone working on alternative power.

It wasn't always like that. Once, the banks could decide for themselves to whom they would loan. But the bankers were also addicted to power, and they made foolish loans to people who could not really pay them back. Instead of letting the bankers pay the price for their mistake, the government took over the banks. They told the people that if the bankers were allowed to suffer, it would create a "financial crisis" and the people would suffer. Even though the vast majority of the people had next to no money in the bank, and only the richest people would really have lost anything, and even though all they would have lost was money, not food or land; still the people believed in the terrible "crisis". So the people, or the sheeple, allowed the government to take over the banks.

Before that, the sheeple had allowed the government to shut down a country that was a source of power, which had lowered the price of power^, because the government lied to the people, telling them that source was planning to make war on them with something called "weapons of mass destruction" which, it turned out, didn't really exist in that country. And even though some of the people realized the government was lying, when the "financial crisis" was announced, they didn't remember that their government was a government of liars, they just didn't want to face the crisis. They ran and hid and let the government take over the banks.

Stupid, stupid, sheeple.

Every year they worked harder for the power, which cost more and more every year, and the people with the power got richer and richer while the sheeple got poorer and poorer. The sheeple lost their homes, because even though the government told them it was O.K. to help the bankers, the government would not help the people keep their homes.

The sheeple could never see that they were surrounded by empty land, with water and sun and seeds and tools and enough power to work the land to make food and trees to make homes and knowledge and talent to learn and be entertained because they were blinded by power, too stupid to question thier government, and too frightened to make a stand.

2008/09/20

I sing, you just suffer.

My dear uncle Glen sent me a song list he had reciently played as a DJ at a company funciton and asked if I and his daughter had performed any of them: I thought my answer was amusing enough to share. Professional music, or rather the reaction people have to those who are not professionals, has been a sore point with me for years. I long for the days of the entire pub singing along with the one guy who can play the piano. Everyone "sings"; thats the way it should be.

The only songs on that list that I’ve “performed” are “Dancing Queen” (the ABBA version, ‘cause I’m in touch with my feminine side) and “Rock around the clock” ‘cause I’m a big enough dork to think I can pull that off. And by “performed” I mean sang along with the radio or CD. And by “sang” I mean croaked.

What I’ve performed in front of people, other than with the church choir (which the entire family is now in: S.A.T.B. Allie, Maria, Remy, Me) includes “Brother Can You Spare a Dime” and “Power to the People” (aka “Bomb the World to Peaces”) both of which were recorded and both recordings will remain mercifully hidden.

There was also “Country Roads” with two other guys and ukes; another guy playing one he made and me on the one I inherited from dad, We lost our place about ¾ of the way through. I mean, how do you loose your place in “Country Roads”?

And I sang “Morning has Broken” with a nice older lady from the church and I’m fairly sure I didn’t break it, but there was no recording so I can keep fooling myself.

4 of us did a arrangement by a 5th of the barbershop classic “On the Banks of the Wabash”; we worked on it so hard we almost quit, we got to the point that we hated it. But we sang it _perfectly_ several times. Then when we performed it, our bass got off on the wrong note and it sucked all the way through. We haven’t been able to find a new bass. We were nice; he doesn’t want to do it anymore.

In the near future, I hope to again embarrass myself, by singing something well beyond my technical ability; and enjoy the heck out of it. Because that is my terrible secret: No matter how totally incompetent I am, I truly love singing. I just love it.

Y’all can just suffer. 

2008/09/18

Are the conservatives really wrong? Or just different?

As the end of my prior post says, I'm not so sure I know all the answers. The following video really does a great job of pointing that out. It also includes heard a brilliant quote, which I'm not sure it true; it is brilliant in the sense that it really makes one think.


"Sports is to war, as pornography is to sex"


In light of prior readings about porn making ones expectations of sex unrealistic, it sort of makes sense...


...I've always had a distaste for sports, and perhaps now I can understand why.


Perhaps this also explains why so few women enjoy sports.


Anyway, the video is about the difference between liberals and conservatives. You may not agree with everything that is said, and it goes by very quickly. But I think it is worth the time to watch it.



2008/09/16

"Why not vote for McCain and just drill the coast and in ANWR for oil?"

Drilling is a great idea. Just like giving the crack-addict another rock to tie him over until he has a chance to get down to the rehab center.

I’ve got no problem with more drilling, even in ANWR (Alaskan Native Wildlife Refuge) because honestly the liberals have very much overstated the value of that area to wildlife.

But the oil is going to run out sometime. You can argue that it will run out next year or in 200 years, but it’s going to run out. For the USA, it ran out a long time ago, except for ANWR.

It’s a question of crushed ice in your drink or block ice.

With a crushed ice drink (slurpie, shake, etc…) you never really notice any difference until you are totally out. You can just suck on it and it tastes just the same until suddenly you get that first rattle of an empty hole. And then there is very little left… the end is near. With a block ice drink (lemonade, ice tea, iced coffee, etc…) as you sip, the ice melts and the drink is diluted until you are drinking basically water. It’s a gradual change and you know about where you are in the drink by how strong it is.

Sweet light crude is a crushed ice drink. When a country is pumping up the last bit of oil, it doesn’t cost them any more than it did when they drilled the first well. And then it runs out. Ask the UAE. They are in transition from oil exporter to oil importer. They have been converting their economy to investment, real estate, and entertainment for years now.

http://www.ameinfo.com/71519.html Wow... good thing Kuwait has that oil from Iraq to process now that the Iraqi system is blown all to hell.

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/HF07Ak01.html (really worth reading)

Mexico is on the edge of running out and has no plan to offset the hit their economy is going to take. As usual, in Mexico, the people will bear the brunt of that failure. Talk about sheeple.

http://www.energybulletin.net/node/46360

Saudi Arabia is going to run out in the next 10 or 15 years. They desperately need to keep their prices up in order to make the profit necessary to transition their economy.

http://techref.massmind.org/techref/other/USAenforcesOPECprices.htm

The USA, of course, ran out years ago… except for our reserves… Like ANWR… I wonder why our government decided to “protect the wildlife” that doesn’t need protecting up there, instead of just letting the oil companies drill till we sucked up the last drop? Could it be that they were thinking ahead to the possibility of the Middle East being so screwed up that we would no longer be able to buy oil from them?

The long story short is that if the costs of crack… err… I mean oil… doesn’t go up, if the crack… oil… isn’t hard to get, the American capitalist economy will never transition to anything else until the very last second. This would make that transition painful; horrible in fact. Rent the documentary “Oil Storm” if you want a “best case” idea of what that would mean for us.

The Pickens plan is great… It will keep American dollars in American so we can afford to buy CCC (cheap Chinese crap). It puts in place PART of what we need in the long term for alternative energy (the wind farms in the central USA) although that does not really work all that well for the coasts where most of the power is consumed since power transmission lines are very costly and inefficient. I would go with floating nukes on the coasts, and wind inland but that’s just ‘cause I’m a mad scientist. Heck, no one is bothered by that H bomb they lost off the coast of Georgia, why worry about an air craft carrier with a few high tension lines?
http://www.cnn.com/2004/US/09/13/lost.bomb/index.html
<http://books.google.com/books?id=svfKD4-MMT8C&pg=PA153&lpg=PA153&dq=aircraft+carrier+"generates+enough+electricity"&source=web&ots=mxnLS9n9jD&sig=kpgyMEGTzLGS_Jr6vsXcYAFtV9k&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=2&ct=result>

Anyway, NG for the cars, wind (or nuke) for trons and keep working on that Hydrogen infrastructure. Oh, and something to make the hydrogen with… The worst part of the Pickens plan is that we will just move from smoking oil to mainlining NG until the NG starts to run out; thereby solving the problem once and for all. But wont… ONCE AND FOR ALL!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iqPjxsAuUxk 

There is nothing wrong with a corporation making a profit. But when that profit is at the cost of an unquestioning public, it just encourages further exploitation… *cough* I mean, “profit taking” which must eventually lead to a separation of the rich and the poor, which eventually leads to a revolution. A population of sheep must beget a leadership of wolves. And yet the American Sheeple buy Hummers, and fail to take a pay cut so they can telecommute, or pay extra for organic food (avoiding the use of oil based fertilizers and pesticides). They don’t see that the weak front of wolves on the left and right are herding them into the narrow valley where it will be easy for the pack to pick off as many juicy little lambs as they like. As the price of oil goes up, and the profit is taken, a few Sheeple are jumping about, trying to find an exit; buying the Prius or electric car (which, due to its higher cost of production, uses just as much oil to make as they will recover over the life of the car).

Obama is backed by “BIG COAL” and so he will push laws that remove environmental air quality protections from around coal fired plants. But at least it will be American coal instead of Saudi Oil. McCain will win points with the greenies by pushing laws that increase air quality requirements and cause more power plants to switch to NG (a byproduct of oil drilling which we still have volumes of in the USA). The bulk of the money for oil goes to the Saudis. A people who hate the USA to a man. A vote for McCain, is a vote for Oil, is a vote for the Saudi royal family, is a vote for Saudi peoples, is a vote for…

POP QUIZ: What nationality were the 9/11 hijackers? A) Iraqi? B) Afghan? C) French? D) None of the above. See below for the answer which is printed upside down.

Summery: We need a slow transition from Saudi oil to American NG + wind/nuke then to fusion? Solar? Something? Keeping the price low, in a free market economy, makes that transition happen very suddenly about the time the oil runs out. Bad. Forcing the price high by artificially restricting demand (keep ANWR closed, bomb Iran, invade Iraq) allows for the “free” market to adjust. Adjusting to a resource we have lots of in the USA (NG, coal, nuke) keeps our dollars here and out of the hands of the devils playthings. Adjusting away from oil makes oil companies very, very sad. Oil companies will ask McCain (and to a lesser degree Obama) to help them maintain a cheap supply of crack… err… oil. Vote for the lying pig bastard politician who isn’t supported by big oil.

Or maybe big oil is taking the long view and helping us to ease the transition to new fuels? Naw... couldn't be.

 

 

ıpnɐS ǝɹǝʍ sɹǝʞɐɥ tt\6 ǝɥ+ `ǝʌoqɐ ǝɥʇ ɟo ǝuoU (| :ɹǝʍsuV

More NeoCon lies about Obama...

Email from the neocons:

Do you know how I can find the following Obama stuff?

1. Occidental College records -- Not released
2.
Columbia College records -- Not released
3. Columbia Thesis paper -- 'not available'
4.
Harvard College records -- Not released
5. Selective Service Registration -- Not released
6. Medical records -- Not released
7. Illinois State Senate schedule -- 'not available'
8. Law practice client list -- Not released
9. Certified Copy of original Birth certificate -- Not released
10. Embossed, signed paper Certification of Live Birth -- Not released
11. Harvard Law Review articles published -- None
12.
University of Chicago scholarly articles -- None

13. Your Record of baptism-- Not released or 'not available'

14. Your Illinois State Senate records--'not available'

15. And why did you place your hand on the Koran when you were sworn in as senator if you are a Christian?


My response.

This is so completely stupid that it would be funny if people weren’t actually dumb (and hate filled) enough to believe it.

http://www.snopes.com/politics/obama/obama.asp in general... This is a list of the LIES and distortions the NeoCons have propagated against Obama. Even the ones that show as true are not as damaging as they seem. E.g. the flag was removed from the /tail/ of the aircraft but not from the side, and the tail still shows red white and blue in a flag like pattern.

http://www.snopes.com/politics/obama/50lies.asp college records, law practice, etc…

http://www.snopes.com/politics/obama/citizen.asp Birth cert is public. You don’t think the DNC checks these things?

http://www.snopes.com/politics/religion/ellison.asp It wasn’t Obama with the Quran and bibles are not used anyway.

 

Some of the items in this list have not (yet) been refuted by snopes, but they don’t mater. 

- Why do we care what his medical records say? The neocons are just trying to cover for McCain being the oldest candidate ever.

- Has McCain released his schedule? Why do we need to see Obamas?

http://deepbackground.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2008/07/24/1219454.aspx Columbia didn’t require a thesis at the time… He never wrote one. 

 

McCain is buying the election. 
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121988099541678063.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

And who is loaning him the cash?
http://www.opensecrets.org/pres08/sectors.php?sector=E “Energy/Natural Resources” which consists of Coal, Utilities, Waste, and…

 

…BIG OIL!

 

I wonder why he supports drilling off the coast of California? (even though it is true the inflating your tires properly will make as much of a difference in the price of gas as will screwing up our coat line) 

I wonder how he feels about Exxon never having paid for the Valdese incident and turning the greatest profit EVER for a single quarter? (they made $1,500 each and every SECOND the first quarter of the year, while we paid $4/gallon at the pump).