Well…had a pretty good day yesterday and some fun with C coming into town and going out to have a couple….and today looks like a fun one, too with lunch at Mongolian BBQ with G and then out for a couple with her later in the day…I did see a really sad thing on the trail yesterday….there was a dead swan in the retention pond by M-6…now, if it was a goose I would have cheered to have one of those flying rats go down…but not a swan…oh, well…I guess that is nature at work. There was a very interesting idea on “Countdown” last night that made me laugh and that will be a topic of another one later this morning…I do have to get to 60 after all….not much else to say right now so I’ll stop here and go get a glass of ice water….more later…
All posts by James DeVol
Where are the guts, Obama?
Well…I am getting extremely frustrated with Obama and his continued inaction that is letting the repubs frame this whole debt limit argument….the big question I have to ask is “when do you start fighting for things that the people that voted for you want?” When the polls all show that a large majority of this country does not want any more tax cuts for the rich, they don’t want more cuts to social security or medicare, they don’t want more subsidies for business and the wealthy, why are you still willing to give all this stuff away to just play politics? Call the bluff of these idiots….let them torpedo the world economy…do you think that the wall streeters are going to let the lap-dog repubs crash the economy and hurt them? No more compromise…no more of the repubs getting everything they want and then asking for more, more, more….stand up to these idiots and you can be assured that the rational people in this country will reward you with 4 more years and a lasting dem majority…just get off your butt and stand for something..protect the middle class, protect the poor…it’s the right thing to do and trumps anything else…geez…
June 28th
Well….another night of fighting the boredom and I was somewhat successful with the free HBO that was on the dish over the weekend…I did get to watch a few movies….even watched “Inception” again and it was much more understandable the second time through. I did send a disc back to Netflix three days ago and have not gotten the notice they’ve received it….but I think the mail is screwy here since they didn’t pick up my electric bill yesterday either….I do have another pork loin to cook today in G’s recipe so that is something to look forward to since the last one came out the most tender thing I’ve eaten in a long time. I do have some things to do today…made a lot of headway cleaning this place up and want to continue that with all of the spiders that have returned…going to meet up with T for one later and then C is coming into town to hang out for a while….so I won’t be nearly as bored as I have been…need to start looking at plans for the 4th weekend but it will probably just be watching races again…but that’s okay…I will have topics for later since I haven’t gotten to 60 for the month and time is running out…
I predicted this one….
Well…there are a couple of things that I want to talk about today…the first is a neat little study that was done that compared the increase in productivity with the increase in wages since the 1980’s….where the projection of wage increases, if they had kept up with the increase in worker productivity, would have resulted in the median wage for the American worker being almost 100 percent higher than it is…what this says is that even though the American worker is working harder and longer, the fruits of this work increase has gone entirely to the top whose wages HAVE increased by 100% in that same time frame.
The second part of this nasty little secret is the sluggish performance of the American economy and my prediction that if the war on the American worker continued by slashing wages and benefits, and moving jobs overseas, there would be no one left to buy the 40 thousand dollar SUV’s and it would result in a feedback loop that would result in an economy that would never recover; but would remain stagnant over time since the majority of the economy is consumer spending. Exactly what is happening now; no one in the middle class is willing to spend anything since they don’t have any extra money anymore…it’s all in the hands of the rich and powerful who don’t purchase enough to keep the factories moving…and I am going to say this to the short sighted CEO’s out there who are lining their pockets at the expense of the entire American economy….I hope you feel good about yourselves…you’ve managed to destroy an economy that was the envy of the world…hope you can’t sleep at night…geez…
Michelle Bachmann is such a hypocite…
Well…just a short little tidbit that came out in the news a couple of days ago about the tea party, government bad, darling Michelle….I know you know her history…that government welfare in the form of the auto bailouts and extended unemployment benefits, etc. are creeping socialism that are going to ruin this country….and then it’s revealed that her husband’s clinic and family farm are the recipients of that very same government welfare in the form of government grants for the clinic and farm subsidies to the tune of over a quarter of a million dollars….I guess it’s okay to take away everyone elses safety net and get elected by the anti government folks and then belly up to the trough to take your “socialist” money. How much more of a hypocrite can anyone be? I’ll have more about this one later…or any one of the others that have cropped up lately…
June 27th
Well…another day, another night, and I did defeat the boredom somewhat with going out with K and K for a couple yesterday aft and then races to watch. I did get the new computer for the bike…oh, told you about that yesterday….have been being pretty good lately and feel okay this morning and that’s good since I need to get this place cleaned up and start getting rid of stuff in case I need to move to find work…and it’s necessary anyway to get some discipline in my life. I did get rid of the leaning tower of newspapers yesterday and that was a major accomplishment and a good base to build on. Not much to do today…don’t have to cook since there are many leftovers from the pot roast and I am going out for coffee to watch for rain…thanks Pink Floyd….I don’t think they meant that as a good thing, though….more later..or right now since I’m behind for the month…
June 26th
Well…yeah, I’m running late this morning but I have an excuse for this one….the computer died on the bike yesterday and I had to buy a new one and install it before I got to the newspaper….and here’s a weird thing…the identical computer that I bought 6 years or so ago cost almost 25 bucks and this one was only 12 bucks…so I felt pretty good about that. I didn’t do anything yesterday, really…I watched as Mexico beat up on the US in soccer yesterday and won the gold Cup and then Verlander pitched another great game for the Tigers so I was able to keep myself amused….and I made a pot roast with T’s recipe that is always good…not much to do today..haven’t heard from K in quite a while and that is kind of weird but I guess it’s the path that things are on….I do have some musings for later on why the recovery is faltering and maybe on politics but who knows? Want to get out on the bike right now since there is plentiful sunshine and no wind…going to get 25 miles in and grin a lot…
June 25th
Well…another very, very low key night last night and I think I’m losing some of my social skills being here all of the time….but I have been getting some huge amounts of introspection time and I’m not sure that’s a bad thing. It looks like a glorious morning and I am really excited about getting out on the bike after the F1 qualifying that is on right now….and I am going to get a pot roast in the oven before I go out so it will be ready when I get back…I think I’m going to ignore the bad news on eating potatoes and make some mashed ones and gravy…how can you have pot roast without them? I do have a question that has been rattling around in my head about the hand wringing that has been going on here in west Michigan about attracting and retaining young talent to keep this place vibrant….what about the older talent like me? It’s just another piece of evidence that us older, qualified workers have been discarded and are never going to find work again…and that is the only thing that depresses me these days…what am I? Chopped liver?
Oh, well….going to get out on the bike and smile at the sky today along with watching races and cleaning today…so, I can amuse myself as always….more later….
Some funny stuff…
Well…I don’t know if you’ve heard or not, but Georgia has recently passed on of the toughest anti-immigrant laws in the country that basically allows them to stop and arrest anyone that looks hispanic…that may be a little bit of hyperbole…I do that sometimes, as you know, and the wonderful rule of unintended consequences kicked in to bite them in the ass. What has happened is that all of the illegals that the farmers exploited to get their harvests in have fled the state, leaving them with no one to do the low paid, backbreaking work that Americans won’t do, leaving this years harvest rotting in the fields and costing the farming business there millions. I am just laughing my ass off since this completely dispels the tired old repub notion that the illegals are taking the jobs of American citizens….and shows these neanderthals what pandering the the fringe of their party without thinking about the consequences will do….now…I don’t support the idea of people being rewarded for breaking the law and coming here illegally, but couldn’t we do something like a documented guest worker program that would allow people to come and do those jobs? Just a thought….
June 24th
Well…a semi-interesting day yesterday with the new season of “Burn Notice” starting and that helped to relieve the boredom somewhat but not as much as I need. I guess I’ll have to find more things to do that don’t cost anything…don’t know if I can ride the bike more…oh, I did have a weird dream this morning that had the bike in it….I had it parked on a hillside next to a road and an old woman in her Mercedes decided she wanted to park on the lawn and ran it over….don’t know what that has to do with anything but it was entertaining…especially when her husband said that it was my fault for even being on the earth when I’m not rich enough to afford to not ride a bike….yep, that one was a little convoluted but you get the idea. Not much to do today…I do have a little cash so I’m going to go for groceries so I can at least eat….and now with potatoes being the worst food for people wanting to lose weight, I have to figure out what else to eat with my meals….I will have some more comments today since things are heating up in politics and the weirdness level in increasing….getting right into my sweet spot….