The next revolution . . .

It occurs to me -- it's become a fairly commonplace and untested belief that we, here in the United States of America, have become too rich, too well-educated, too civilized, and just beyond that sort of thing, for there ever to be another civil war or revolutionary war or serious armed rebellion.  Not now, in the 21st century.  And certainly not with guns.  There will be no fighting to the death over politics here.  Our polity has grown beyond all that icky conflict.  It's no longer a matter of whether there should be a social preference for the ballot over the bullet.  The question now is whether it will be the ballot or the bribe that decides our collective situation.

And it occurs to me that if it is true that it is flat impossible to present a serious armed challenge to the government, then it is only a matter of when, and not if, the constitutional guaranteed limits on government becomes a mere historical fun fact, having no contemporary meaning at all.

Government is all about regulation, control, power, and the dependency of the governed on the government for whatever security the governed may get out of the deal.   People being what they are and government agencies being what they are, government involvement in one's everyday life will necessarily increase right up to whatever limits on its growth might exist.  Without at least the possible chance that government could be overthrown by force, there is no effective limit to the growth of government.  The government busies will always find it necessary for yet another regulation, yet one more punishment, another license to be obtained and another agency to be consulted, all for the so called common good.  They can't help themselves and it isn't reasonable to expect that they could ever resist the temptation, once the notion occurs to them.  Most of them do their job sincerely intending to provide a benefit when passing a new law or making a new regulation.  It's just that consequences are frequently unintended and unanticipated.  There is no "too much" built into our system of government as things now stand, and mistakes can and do happen frequently.

So, am I advocating armed rebellion?  Oh, for heavens sake of course not.  That would be horrible.  It's just that when armed rebellion truly becomes unthinkable -- then we've all lost the liberty that this country reached for in 1776.   

I simply think it would be healthier if we decide that rebellion is far from  necessary, for now, for the time being, and not that rebellion is totally unthinkable.  

Oh, and once in a while tar and feathers should be applied, simply for purposes of improving the breed, so to speak.

Today's question . . .

What kind and how good an education do you think you are going to get when your college instructors can't -- not won't but can't -- distinguish between ideology and information?  It's all the same to them.

Illegal alien problem solved . . .

A whole bunch of Tunisians are skipping out of Tunisia and ending up in Italy. Italy feels overwhelmed and is asking for help from the European Union -- you know, their federal government. The E.U. says that Italy may not deal with the problem on its own, and also, that there isn't going to be any help from the E.U. These are refugees fleeing violence and civil turmoil.

Sound familiar? A whole bunch of Mexicans are skipping out of Mexico and ending up in Arizona, which is forbidden by the federal government from doing much -- the feds are suing the state-- and the federal government isn't going to do anything effective about it.

But these Mexicans aren't refugees like Tunisians. They are undocumented immigrants. They used to be legally described as illegal aliens, but that hurt the delicate sensibilities of the college educators, assorted wannabes, pseudos, dipshits and undocumented journalists who objected to the terminology. So now they're immigrants, simply yearning for freedom, a place in the sun, and a chance to cut grass and do jobs Americans won't do, and also to sell drugs.

Anyhow, since we are already going to mess with the language with no sense of shame, why don't we just call the Mexicans who have arrived here without due process something else? They can be refugees. That makes them sound even more desperate, needy, and pitiful and less likely to be deported. You'd have to inhumane to deport a poor, wretched refugee, right?

You'd have to repatriate them.

Things you probably should never say to people. . .

I'm curious. Are you a moron in real life, or is it that the demands of your job require you to behave like one at all times?

They like me, they really like me. . .

Well, I'll just be dipped. It turns out that my call is really important to them, and they would like me to please stay on the line a little longer so that my call can be answered by an operator in the order in which it was received. It is a real comfort to know that I'm cared about, and I'm especially reassured when I hear that same message repeatedly while I wait interminably, like about forty times.

Without receiving that message about forty times before talking to a live person, I might have thought they didn't give frozen gilded moose turd about their customers one way or the other.

My bad.

Somebody needs a life script . . .

Alicia Silverstone, a celebrity who I'm not sure I recognize, has named her baby "Bear Blu." Honestly, these people celebrated for their attractiveness and whose whole life is built around their appearance need to have a script written for them by somebody else, so as to avoid doing or saying anything stupid. Bear Blu! Good luck with middle school, kid.

She also said she was destined to be a mother. Yeah, that kinda comes with having ovaries and intimacy. But it's okay, Alicia, Sweetie. If you want your biological determination to be a destiny, you go right ahead. Just, maybe, check with your scriptwriter before saying things in public.

Oh, maybe I'm being a mite harsh. It's not as if she's doing a Lindsay Lohan or a Charlie Sheen, both of whom evidently could be much improved by having both scriptwriters and keepers.

Sunday reading confessional . . .

Just finished Richard Dawkins' The Greatest Show on Earth; Evidence for Evolution. Now half way through The Autobiography of Mark Twain, Part I, and just started Epstein's How Progressives Rewrote the Constitution. What are you reading?

If we can't screw our customers, well, who can we screw?

I heard on the news this morning that a big-time national bank has scrapped its plans to raise its fee for using their ATMs by out of system customers from $3 to $5. They evidently did a test, and people stopped using their ATMs. For $5, people are willing to drive to an ATM in their own banking system -- the cost outweighs the convenience of using the nearer ATM for an out of system charge. Imagine that.

Of course, I remember when the banks were trying to encourage the use of ATMs. It was pretty obvious. If they only could get people to use ATMs, they could dispense with hiring tellers some of whom were actually paid more than minimum wage. Providing ATMs relieved the banks of the need to offer customer service.

Yeah, I can remember going into a bank and standing in a long line waiting for my turn at the teller's place, and while waiting having a bank employee come up and offer to show me how to use an ATM so I didn't have to stand in line so long. But I knew how to work the ATM; it was raining out there and the ATM was not sheltered. Thanks for your offer, lady, but this is Oregon and it rains, here. How about getting your sweet little banker butt behind the counter and serving customers instead of pushing them outdoors into the rain.

Now that the teller staffs have all been successfully reduced in favor of ATMs, the banks want to act as if the ATMs are extra special conveniences that the bank offers at great expense and difficulty. Accordingly, we should be grateful for ATMs and willing to pay extra to use an ATM services if we aren't one of their loyal customers.

Oh, bless you, bankers! If I couldn't do my bank business at a machine without human warmth or understanding, I just don't know what I would do.

Loyalty. Yeah, right. One of my banks reminds me from time to time about the great deal on a bank card they would like me to have. I would be charged 0% interest on charges for the first 6 months. Of course, if instead of borrowing, I loan the bank money by leaving it on deposit, what do they pay me? Maybe 1% annually. What do they do with my money? Lend it out to credit card holders for 0% interest for the first 6 months, and then 20+% on the unpaid balance thereafter. And they charge those credit card holders an ATM access fee on top of it, all using my money at 1%!

Yeah, I'm happy to accept their 1% on my deposits so that they can make 20%. That 1% they pay makes me feel like they really appreciate me and not like a sucker at all.

Sounds like a license for banks to print money, doesn't it? Laws have been passed to permit them to do business in this fashion. But then, even with this sort of advantage it's possible for banks to screw up. And when they do, what happens? The government bails them out, using guess-whose money.

I think they may be in cahoots.

Osama Bin Fishfood

They say his body was buried at sea with appropriate wrappings to be respectful of Islamic custom, and so as not to give offense. Of course, they, when they have a body of one of ours, drag the body triumphantly and with cries of jubilation all around the town square for a few hours, so as to avoid giving us offense.

The cult of the pirate . . .

Here's an interesting take on piracy, going back to the Barbary pirates, and European colonialism. Worth thinking about.

Inappropriate content . . .

Went to a store today and while there, my wife wanted to look in the book department to see if there were any interesting books. While looking around I saw that the store had posted a little note stuck on the bookshelf, titled "Inappropriate Content." It said something like the following:

Sometimes some publishers publish content that some people believe is inappropriate although others do not consider the content inappropriate. Our customers are always welcome to call to our attention content that they feel is inappropriate. We would never like for our customers to view content which they believed was inappropriate. We fully support the right of our customers to decline to purchase books that contain content they believe to be inappropriate.

I think that translates to if you don't want to see it, don't buy it, but if you think we are going to let perpetually offended dipsh*ts decide what others may or may not read, you can go pound sand and bark at the moon, for all we care.

So now we all know where we stand and I'm good with that.

This will work . . .

President Obama has said that shutting down the government for absence of a budget would be inexcusable. He has also said that if the House passes a bill to keep the government open for another week to continue negotiations, and if the Democratically controlled Senate passed it too, he would veto the bill thus causing the shut down. Why? Because all this talk about trying to get a little extra time to work out budget details was a "distraction."

Kicking the Imam's butt . . .

Take a look at this Pakistani actress kicking butt. The back story is that her accuser is a high member of the Taliban and had sent her a warning that she is going to be punished for making Pakistan look bad by going to India. You know what punishment that means. Remember, they made good on their threats to kill Indira within days after she returned to Pakistan, and she had already served as President of the country once and was an international figure. Of course, merely "punishing" this actress isn't enough. The purpose of her television "interview" was to scare the uppity out of any other women who saw the interview. She's in more danger than ever; she likely didn't change any minds who matter to her continued security.

Hope she makes it out.

Tsunami!

Horrifying amateur video of Japan's tsunami.

Those poor people!

Choosing sides . . .

What we saw in Wisconsin when the government wanted to cut back employee unions' influence over the budget looks a little bit like what we are now seeing in England, when the country is trying to bring some balance to the budget. Demonstrations, intimidation, and riots. In either case, the government has been handing out increasingly generous benefits which now appear to be unsustainable. Same thing all through the U.S. and Europe.

Western governments, state, federal, European, whatever, are powerfully committed to the status quo, troubled only by the need to raise ever-increasing amounts of cash to meet the ever-increasing commitments to government entitlements/handouts. For example, I read somewhere where our current administration is considering a tax based on how many miles you travel in addition to the already high taxes, state and federal, on fuel.

If you are on the "gimme" side of the government/citizen relationship, you are in favor of government as it now stands. If not, your opposition to government by handout could likely lead to threatened mass street action, intimidation and property destruction to accompany the massive disturbance of the peace such demonstrations require. Somebody had a line I read, I wish I could remember who so I could attribute it, where the left has given up on trying to convince based on the force of their logic, and is now working on developing conviction through the logic of their force.

So, here's the question. Are you in favor of increased government taxes to support government checks? Are you a member of a public employee union, getting government assistance, going to school and living on government student loan money, getting aid for your dependent children, sucking up Social Security? If it comes down to fighting in the streets, will you be in favor of increased taxation to support continuing your government checks? If so, I figure you are what is classically called. . . a loyalist. But if you think about the difference between what our constitution says, and what's going on presently, and figure we should return to the old, pre-Wilson notions of federal constitutional limits you are . . . guess what. . . a rebel.

Choose.

Internet Exploder 9 . . .

This is just great. I updated Internet Exploder. So what's changed? Well, when I compose a post for the blog in blogger/blogspot, I can't post it. Either nothing happens, or up comes the print options. Everything else works just fine, except for the part where I put the post out on the web.

But blogger still works in Firefox. So I know what I must do, now.

Way to go, Microsoft. Did somebody say, "This isn't a bug; it's a feature?"

Virginity tests. . . .

Yeah. Virginity tests. Because everybody knows that if you are a protester and not a virgin, the conclusion that you are a prostitute is inavoidable. And everybody knows that if you are a prostitute, you are in need of torture and humiliation.

What a fine people. Let's invite them to join the country club.

The Koran in flames . . .

Yeah, I can see why Iran would want to have the United Nations condemn a U.S. church for burning a Koran.

Wonder how many Christian Bibles there are, left, in Iran. For that matter, I wonder how many Christians or Jews are left in Iran. Not that long ago, within my lifetime, Iran was actually fairly multi-cultural. Not any more.

I figure that the United Nations ought to condemn all ceremonial book burning. Also execution of homosexuals, female genital mutilation, stoning rape victims to death, honor killings, child brides, slavery, violent jihad, the jiz-yah, and public employee unions.

I threw the union thing at the last minute, Kinda adds a final completion to the rhythm of the sentence, doesn't it?

We need something to attract people to our attractive attraction, which isn't all that attractive enough, evidently, all by itself . . .

I read in a recent Portland Mercury that some of our city rulers are considering, once again, building a hotel in or near the Rose Quarter. I don't know how believable or serious this is or if the local politicians thinking about this are officials of the city, or the county, or metro. Or all of them; they're pretty much in cahoots anyhow.

The idea is to attract more action to the Convention Center. Of course, the politicos who like this idea plan to be using our money, whether or not we think it's a dumb idea. Used to be, if a bunch of people agreed that constructing a building would be a good idea, they themselves would invest in it, to earn the benefits of their investment. Or not. Just as they pleased.

If they asked me, I'd say if you guys have extra money of ours to build a hotel I'd just as soon you use it to repair local roads. We are about at the point where many of the roads are more suited to ox carts and burros, than to cars. Even if the cars are hybrids. Roads deteriorate with use, and you can't patch up deteriorating roads by simply painting bicycle lane stripes and green boxes on the roads, or erecting signs announcing that Oregon is being put back to work.

When government wants to do a project, it isn't as if we citizens have much say in it. If they decide to go ahead, there's no way for the "non-interested" investers to pass on that particular investment so as to save their capital for the next idea that percolates up. Oh, we can vote for somebody else next time, but meanwhile we are still invested in whatever it was. Like light rail. Whose bright idea was it, anyhow, to use a 19th century response to transportation problems, applying 20th century technology, to meet the needs of the 21st. century? Doesn't matter; we've got us some light rail and are going to get more.

And as for the proposed Rose Quarter hotel, it doesn't matter what independent investors might decide. To politicans, a hotel in this area would be -- an Attraction. An Attraction can be named after a local dignitary and can provide income opportunities for cronies. And since the Attraction would bring outsiders into the city and they would leave some of their money behind, benefitting us all, it should be okay with us. Right?

Hey, waitaminit. Wasn't the Convention Center, itself, supposed to be an Attraction to bring action to the city? What does it say about our civic investments when you have to build another Attraction to attract people to your Attraction? Oh, and notice that the first Attraction is nicely located next to a light rail stop so that people can easily come to the Attraction from wherever they might be, without being required to seek out lodging close by.

Gah!

Just another oppressed Palestinian . . . . . .

When they learned that a Palestinian person had snuck around in the dark of night, crept into a Jewish home, and stabbed the sleeping father, mother, children, and an infant to death, five in all, people in Gaza celebrated and passed out sweets.

What a fine culture.

Let's give them a country all their very own, and support it with lots of aid from American taxpayers.