Category: Cultural Obscenities

How our culture has allowed itself to become twisted

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Shutdown… Shutdown… SHUTDOWN… AHHH THE Sky is falling!

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I had another blog that I was working on.

It wasn’t going well, and may end up in the dustbin.

Hey, it happens sometimes so sue me… it’s not like you’re paying for my assault on your senses.

By now we’ve all heard about the government shutdown.

Sure the government is shutdown but it’s pretty obvious that the powers in Washington DC are playing games to make sure that the Shutdown is right in the faces of the citizens.I’m convinced that a lot of this is pure theater.

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Riddle me this? What kind of sense does it make to allocate resources like barricades and police to patrol monuments that normally have no such patrols of barricades?

It’s not like the Monuments in Washington DC have huge fences around them and single entrances. 

I’ve walked the length of the reflecting pond toward the Lincoln memorial from the Washington monument and never encountered a fence, park ranger, officer, or any other Government tendril.

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These places are open, they are designed to be open and accessible. These places are designed this way with purpose.

For me, these monuments are not only about venerating the great men that helped build this country, their openness is a comment on our freedom.

How times have changed!

These monuments are also a reminder that at one time we walked with our heads held high, fearless, and the concept of vandalizing any of these monuments was simply unthinkable. 

Getting to the Lincoln memorial at dusk and watching the lights come on was for me important and powerful. Entering the memorial itself was timeless and I took my time reading the great words inscribed inside. 

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By the time I left the memorial night had fallen. The lights of the Capital twinkled in the distance and the various monuments were awash in light.

I was in one of the oldest cities in our country and I felt a pride that was almost overwhelming. 

Now because of The Shutdown (Doom musical sound effect… please)

These free parks and open spaces are being closed at great expense and difficulty. WHY?

What does this prove, other than our leaders are far more interested in being vindictive and stupid. They’re making absolutely sure that vacation plans while already disrupted, are completely ruined.

Families in transit arrive in Washington DC, only to find that they can’t visit open air memorials? What’s the sense in that?

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What next, huge concrete domes over monuments, armed guards checking passports and a visitors right to be there? Metal detectors, body scanners, and then full body x-rays to make sure that you’re not carrying contraband in your anus?

How is this saving money?

In every instance it’s taking more man power to tell people the monuments are closed than it would to simply allow the monuments to be open and accessible.

The WWII memorial, the Vietnam Wall closed? Really?

This is exactly the kind of vindictive wasteful thinking that got us into the shutdown in the first place. But now instead of Congress kicking each other in the nuts, they’re kicking the average citizen.

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Another stupidity is that the Government put notices similar to this one, on Websites immediately.

We all know that the government IT departments haven’t shut down. This is another Fuck you to the people from our elected officials in Washington.

At the risk of sounding like one of the crazy right wing nutjobs.

It’s time for We The People to stand up and raise hell.

We need to kick all of our so called leaders to the curb and get some people that are actually willing to do their jobs.

The problems we’re facing aren’t going to magically go away. It’s going to take thinking, reasoning people who understand that cooperation is necessary for the good of the country.

Impeach ’em, Recall ’em whatever it takes. They are OUR Employees and they haven’t done the job(s) they were elected to do. Time to fire them and find someone who will do the job as we direct.

This vindictive bullshit has got to stop.

 

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You have got to be kidding me…

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I saw some video of the person trying to ram the gate at the White house.

It didn’t look to me like she tried to ram anything.

It looked a lot more like she’d made a wrong turn and was trying to figure out what to do next when the DC police and Secret Service responded with shouting and waving a whole lot of guns at her.

That video is not available on the web yet…  And it may never be because it makes the DC police and Secret Service look really bad.

I think she decided to just get the hell away from all these crazy people and their scary guns, who then started shooting.

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This led to a police chase where our “evildoer” hit a cop car practically destroying it, then sped on to her final destination.

Really? Crown Victoria vs. Lexus and the Lexus is drivable? While the Crown Vic is totaled. Really?

I think it’s far more likely that the cop driving the Crown Vic hit something else or was hit because you can see the front of the Lexus in some of the photos.

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This one for example.

The front of the Lexus doesn’t look nearly as screwed up as I’d expect after seeing the Cops car.

The initial news reports were that the Woman had started shooting at the cops.

As it turned out she was completely unarmed and had a 1 year old child in the back seat.

I can easily imagine a Mother getting freaked out because she was lost or made a wrong turn then was suddenly confronted with 20 or 30 men with guns all shouting at her and she decided…

THE HELL WITH THIS!

I’m getting my child and myself away from these crazy people who aren’t listening to what I’m saying.

I’ll grant you it probably wasn’t the smartest move.

Honestly if I was already stressed because I was lost and then turned into an area to consider my options, then looked up and saw a bunch of guys pointing guns at me and screaming at me… I’d be very much inclined to run.

OUT OF FEAR FOR MY LIFE!

These cops in the first video are obviously cranked beyond any reasonable notches. The gate in question is quite some distance from the White House.

That these folks were cranked tighter than a Meth addict coming down hard is something we as a people and a country should really take a good long look at.

A couple of weeks ago NYPD shot innocent bystanders because some nut job was running around in traffic.

The police missed the nut job they were shooting at.

Last year I believe NYPD shot 13 or 14 people in a similar incident where they only grazed the actual criminal but did a lot of harm to innocent bystanders.

Now it looks as if the DC police are just as amped up, stupid and irresponsible as NYPD. 

DC police killed this woman in front of her child. 

This lady was unarmed, obviously afraid, and we will never know what her intention was.

The one thing that we can be sure of and that we need to dial way down is living in fear.

The media, bloggers, Twitter, and god only knows what other media sources seem to thrive on filling us up with fear, of living.

It’s unnecessary and it leads to police over-reaction to common every day events.

What ever happened to an officer approaching the vehicle and saying something civil like “Ma’am you can’t park here you must move along.“

How about the civility of “Are you lost Ma’am and can I help you?“

Instead because DC is freaking out, the response was probably something like;

GET OUT OF THE CAR MAGGOT, FUCKING BITCH,  DOWN ON YOUR KNEES, NOW, NOW, NOW, I DON’T GIVE A SHIT WHAT YOUR EXCUSE IS, GET OUT OF THE CAR ON THE GROUND, NOW BITCH! 

Then there’s the very real possibility that if you don’t move fast enough or you move too fast you’re going to at minimum get beat to hell and at maximum you’re going to be shot.

Given that choice I’d probably opt to stay in the car and make a run for it. At least I’d have a cocoon of steel around me.

We need to take the fear mongering down several notches. 

Not everyone is planning to do congress or the president harm. If congress and / or the president are that fearful, maybe some introspection on how they are doing their job is in order.

Sometimes people make wrong turns. Sometimes people veer onto side streets trying to avoid an accident, then have to figure out how to get back on course. It happens every day in every city in the US.

They killed an unarmed woman… 

Will she be mourned and venerated like Trayvon Martin?

Surely her life was important and she was worthy of a police officer listening to her.

“It’s painful to live in fear“

The reports this morning are even more bizarre. This lady suffering from post partum depression loads up her child, drives from Connecticut to Washington DC and tried to ram a barricade at the White House? Was the child the Presidents?

None of it makes any sense and honestly given the spin that the DC police and the media are putting on this event. I am for the first time in my life fearful of the police and my government.

The behavior we saw yesterday and the police now trying to imply, if not outright say this woman was a threat to the security of the White House is ludicrous.

The internal investigation of this incident will be covered up. The police will be found completely blameless. The Secret Service will continue to claim they acted properly. 

Meanwhile the woman’s name will be slandered and her child will be without a parent.

The handling of this incident makes me want to vomit.

The truth of the matter will never come out. If we were able to keep track of the officers quitting the DC police department over the next year I wouldn’t be surprised to see a huge turnover.

I don’t think the officers leaving would be bad cops, rather I suspect they’d be the cops whose morals and ethics wouldn’t let them continue to work for a department that clearly has no moral boundaries.

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RACIST! (But who deserves that label?)

I’ve been mulling this one over for a long time. This is going to piss some people off.

I ask that you consider this as it was intended more as a thought experiment written from the perspective of a white person who wants to do the right thing but who’s painted into a corner by the over use of the word Racist.

 

 

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You can shut down any conversation in this country by calling one or more of the involved parties

Racist!

I’ve been thinking about it since the whole Travon Martin case.

But it’s deeper than just Travon, more widespread and much more ugly.

Travon was not the angelic child wearing the white hoodie. He was a 17 year old male.

Think about this, Travon was less than a year away from the age where he would be considered an adult by the courts, and could vote. 

Had George Zimmerman & Travon Martin gotten in a fight just a few months later, would we have seen the outcry we’ve seen?

Racist!

Why was George Zimmerman who identifies as Hispanic made out to be White in the media? Could it be that it was a better sell to have White on Black violence than Hispanic on Black violence? 

Racist!

Why didn’t someone stop the media? I remember seeing one of the guests on a talking head program ask that question and he was shouted down.

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Racist!

Why is it that asking a question like “What incentive do people waiting to come into this country have to stay in line,  if we offer amnesty to those people already here and others who bypass the rule of law?

Racist!

Why do we need an ID to write a check but not to vote? When laws are enacted to prevent voter fraud by requiring an ID at the polls, it’s… You guessed it

Racist!

The tragedy of Travon Martin is that his was a young life wasted.

Worse is that his name may be inexorably tied to a divisive racist philosophy that has been sold to the American people by certain individuals who profit from divisive rhetoric.

Racist!

The full facts of the Travon Martin case may never be known. What is known is that a jury of women acquitted George Zimmerman of all charges as they were called upon to do by the law.

Racist!

It’s not racist to follow the law.

If the law is wrong then change it.

It is by definition racist to call for harm to another group based on ethnicity. 

Oddly, we’ve seen folks who, (due to their history) had the most reason to prevent such calls for violence, instigating exactly the kind of mob violence they themselves have suffered.

Instead of being a light and an example certain leaders have chosen vengeance.

Racism knows no color or ethnicity. It’s as simple as being able to define anyone as “Not US“. 

Anyone can engage in racism and no skin color is more or less prone to racist behavior. Yeah, no one gets a pass in my book.

But because racist is tossed around so loosely and used as a means to shut down opposing viewpoints it’s losing it’s meaning and it’s impact.

Racist!

Now days it seems that just because I’m white, I must be a racist.

That’s just as bad as seeing a black man and assuming he’s going to rob you.

Racist!

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Well, Virginia… 

I was raised in the South in the 60s and had a good deal of racism around me.

The first word I learned for a black person was the “N” word.

By the way, it was said as casually as “go get the broom”. It was often synonymous with “go get the broom” because the cleaning people were exclusively black.

For example: “Awww crap theres dirt all over the floor. Son, got get the N-word to clean it up.”

My Mother however saw the inherent wrongness of racism,  she taught me there was a better way, a way of equality and that we could live side by side being decent to each other.

Her belief in a better world that we could make real in a generation was very strong albeit perhaps idealistic.

Nonetheless she gifted me with a desire to see a world where color was irrelevant and people were measured and acknowledged for their deeds.

That philosophy allowed me to approach the smartest kid in my chemistry class for tutoring because I was having trouble getting it.

Albert was a black guy and he helped me pass that class. I wouldn’t have asked him for help if I didn’t believe that color was a poor measure of intelligence. Alberts deeds, his test scores and participation in class demonstrated he knew his stuff and I needed a lot of help. Thankfully, he was a kind and generous person otherwise, I’d have flunked that class. 

Albert… Where ever you are, Thank you for proving that humans are much more than skin color and intelligence knows no bounds.

I have recognized racism in the workplace and stood against it. Meeting commitments is not something that changes because an HR person finds out an employee is black.  Promotions should be based on merit not quotas or fallacious racist beliefs.

For the large majority of my life I’ve worked very hard not to allow racism in my life, thoughts, or in fact to interact with racists. 

In the past decade, I’ve been called a racist more often than not, simply for asking a question.

I’ve been treated badly at the hands of people of color, and time & again told I was evil, unfair, privileged, and the source of all the problems of the world.

There was a saying once… Racists are made, not born.

Well folks… If no matter what I do, I’m going to be labeled a racist… 

I MIGHT AS WELL OWN IT!

With “Owning” it comes freedom.

I no longer labor under the burden of white guilt, I honestly don’t care what you think anymore.

You’ve decided based on the color of my skin that I’m a racist, so be it. You’ve added another person to the ranks of people you claim are your enemies. Congratulations!

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Where do we go from here?

Burning neighborhoods?

Gunfights?

Drive By shootings?

Molotov Cocktails?

Do we let the hate fully blossom and start killing each like the Hatfields & McCoys, or like the Calvary and Lakota until one of our groups is dead and the other so decimated that they may never recover?

It’s been done…

We can read about it in history books.

You can ask permission to speak with an elder of a Native American tribe, They can tell you a story of blood, tears, and hatred…

Where do we go from here?

Choose!

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Yet more obscenity… (Sorry, not the “Good” Kind)

A reader of my blog directed me to this little jewel of insanity.

T shirtA 14 year old in West Virginia was wearing a t-shirt at school like the one at the right. (I pulled this image from the NRA website. The shirt is for sale there.)

Short version.

The young man apparently tried to exercise his FIRST Amendment right to freedom of expression and refused to change shirts. Then the school calls the cops, the young man is arrested for “Disrupting the education process” REALLY? What ever happened to calling your Mom or your Dad and having them pick you up from school and giving you a talking to you wouldn’t soon forget.

Why the fuck were the cops called at all?

At worst, the kid may have been in violation of some dumb assed dress code. Hell you see more controversial shirts at the mall.

So what’s the problem?

The problem is yet another over-reaction from people about guns. Honestly I’d never thought you’d see this kind of crap from West Virginia. After all that is one of the “Flyover” states isn’t it?

I haven’t been able to confirm it, but I wouldn’t be surprised if this was another example of stupid “Zero Tolerance Policies”

In expressing his support for the Second Amendment… This 8th grader had his First Amendment right trampled and left in the Mud.

The police know they’re wrong in this. The District Attorney knows this trifling thing should have been nothing more than the school, the police (since they were called), the young man, and his father sitting down and having a discussion about why this shirt shouldn’t have been worn and as was already done, a day of suspension for the young man. Ideally it should have been the Principal, the young man and his dad.

That’s where it should have ended.

The people of Logan West Virginia should be outraged that their tax dollars are being wasted this way. They should be asking serious questions about the schools administration too.

As I’ve written before, what kind of lesson are we teaching? “Don’t handle your own problems foist it off on someone else? Make sure that you complicate things so much that only a jury can sort it out?” Come on!

This is not how civilized people in a polite society deal with simple problems.

There was a time in this country when we didn’t need Lawyers, Judges, and Police to be involved in every single aspect of our lives.

We shouldn’t need to take anything to court except in cases of the most serious breaches of law or in simply unresolvable cases.

Worse is that this young man is going to have a juvenile record for doing absolutely nothing wrong.

Why do we repeatedly teach our young people about their Rights, about doing the Right Thing and then turn around and punish them for exercising their rights or doing the right thing?

I’ve written about this before,

The young man who disarmed a gun wielding moron on a bus in Florida because the person with the gun was holding it to the head of another student and threatening to pull the trigger.

The young life guard who saved someone life, but that “save” was outside the area he was paid to patrol and so as a result of doing the right thing, he was fired.

Then there’s the young man in Oregon who saved someone else from drowning and because of procedure his family was hit with a bill for an ambulance ride and examination in the local emergency room.

The Elementary school child who was suspended for chewing his poptart into the shape of a gun.

The child who took his cap gun to school and ended up being grilled for hours and his family’s home being searched for weapons.

The adult Army Sargent in TX who was arrested, had his guns confiscated, lost out on a Career promotion, and had his Son terrorized by a police officer because The Sargent was “rudely” displaying a rifle… By the way it’s  legal to carry rifles openly in TX.

There are so many more of these cases it’s unreal.

Folks, this kind of stuff goes on all the time, each day there’s another incident added to the list.

For every incident that makes the national news, how many are being swept under the carpet?

I’ve been told I’m wrong. I’ve been told that the government isn’t coming to take guns out of the hands of the people. I can only say OH, Really???

If that’s true, then why are police so quick to search homes, specifically looking for weapons? How do we justify the repeated violations of the First and Fourth amendments nationwide? How do we justify the denial of the Second amendment when legally owned guns are confiscated during searches conducted in violation of the Fourth amendment?

WE CAN’T!

If you entertain for one moment that the Constitution of the United States of America isn’t under siege you really need to think again.

To my conservative and liberal readers. Regardless of your stance on guns… (put that aside for just a moment). We need to reach out to each other to protect all of our constitutional rights.

The loss of the First amendment will affect all of us.

Do you want to live in a nation where you can’t speak your mind? How about a nation where you fear having your home searched randomly for contraband, not because you were accused but just because someone felt like it? This is perhaps not fiction anymore.

We already have seen the erosion of privacy that is tantamount to an illegal search by the NSA.

It will take a united America to protect The Constitution. There are no party lines in this, no color, no religion, no conservatives, no liberals, only Americans who believe in Freedom.

I’m no longer a member of the NRA, but I’ve got the hat… I think I’m going to be wearing it a lot more. A) to let folks know I’m pro 2nd amendment, and B) because I’m sure that I’ll be able to find liberals to have discussions with.

I was thinking we should have a “Jared day” where everyone wears the same t-shirt he was wearing when he got into all this trouble. I hope that the NRA is watching and provides funding for Jareds defense, I’m betting he’s going to need it.

If any part of this has struck a chord – stand up, take action.

Write your Congressman & Representatives. Their addresses are easy to find on various Government websites. Please take a second and look ’em up.

Try to wake up your family, friends, and neighbors. You do that not by browbeating them, but by presenting them with your concerns and facts.

Freedom is hard work. We’re up to it, but we all have to be engaged and pulling together.

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Is it Just ME????

I ran across several articles recently talking about the DOJ telling us that saying bad things about muslims was a violation of civil rights.

Granted some of the first articles were from very conservative sources. I managed to track back to what appears to be the original source article.This piece is far less sensational.

This article was the first one I found, Then I ran across this one. Here’s another piece from Breitbart

The first two are designed to inflame passions and put their own spin on the material. The Breitbart piece is less spin and more Wait a minute, yep this is happening.

Even so the original piece is still worrisome.  

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You can just imagine my confusion at seeing a story that an US Attorney from Eastern Tennessee is warning people that speaking ill of muslims could violate the Muslims civil rights.

I found my self asking, “What happened to the First Amendment?”

You know that little Amendment that guarantees all Americans the right to free speech?

Technically, I’m protected in what I say on this blog by that amendment right now.

I can put a crucifix in a bottle of urine and it’s protected under the 1st amendment.

I could call the Pope a pedophile and condemn all practitioners of Catholicism as pedophiles too. And that would be protected speech. (I actually like the current Pope and Don’t think he’s a pedophile. Apologies your Eminence but I’m making a point here, Please bear with me.)

I can say that all Baptists are snake handling Red State Morons and that’s protected under the First Amendment.

It’s perfectly OK for me to climb to the tallest building with a bullhorn and call the United States of America and evil imperialist regime headed by a group of lying corporate stooges, who are selling this country out from under us faster than Judas sold Christ out to the Romans. And that too is protected speech.

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But along comes the US Attorney from Eastern Tennessee and suddenly Muslims a specially protected class of people!

What The Fuck

I know that most Muslims are decent hard working people. I would never in a million years seek to restrict their ability to build places of worship or prevent them from practicing their religion. In fact It’s far more likely that I’d be trying to quiet then disperse an angry mob outside a Mosque.

Gods, house no matter the name of the religion is Gods house.

One of the oldest rules among civilizations world wide is that All Houses of worship are sanctuaries.

In times of war, the young, the old, and the women could reasonably expect to be safe within the walls of their Church / Temple / Mosque… They were clearly non-combatants if they’re inside praying. Only absolute Barbarian Animals would violate the sanctity of a house of worship.

(I’ve always found it fascinating that Muslims will cry foul if American bullets strike the walls of a Mosque accidentally, but Sunni will blow up a Shiite Mosque and not say a damn word.)

You just don’t mess around with the spiritual center of a people.

Not only is it bad JuJu…

When you create martyrs you’ve given your enemies something to rally around. That often ends badly for the aggressor.

I’m a believer in the constitutional concept of freedom of religion so much so that I’ll protect a religion even if the religion isn’t something I agree with.

I’m also a believer in constitutionally protected freedom of speech.

Which leads me back to WTF?

If I choose to point out that Islam is responsible for the Cultural & Scientific retardation of what was a jewel of civilization, that’s in violation of Muslims civil rights?

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I can equally and defensibly say that the Catholic Church was in part responsible for the destruction of cultures worldwide. Inca, Easter Island, Several Native American Tribes, and the remnants of the Aztecs just to name a few. Saying that isn’t a violation of Catholic civil rights?

We can arguably say that it’s far more likely for a follower of Islam to blow themselves up in a crowded marketplace, or to set off bombs at the end of Marathons, or to lob shoulder fired missiles or rocket propelled grenades randomly into Israeli neighborhoods.

This is not a violation of civil rights, this is not so called hate speech!

These are observations of fact. These events are irrefutable and we’ve got the video to prove at least one case of each. Yet the US Attorney from Eastern Tennessee is going to look at these statements as a civil rights violation?

Where the fuck are my civil rights?

I’m not calling for violence against Muslims.

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However all it would take for Muslims to put a price on my head would be for me to insult Muhammed or draw an image, flattering or not of Muhammed.

The US Attorney from Eastern Tennessee better step the hell back, and carefully consider what he’s saying. My badmouthing Muslims, Catholics, Baptists, Buddhists, Wiccans, Agnostics, or Atheists had damn well be treated exactly the same.

Either we’re all free and equal or none of us is. 

You’d think that a US Attorney from any district in the country would know that.