Well…have been reading all morning trying to find topics to get caught up on these and ran across a story that is the true distillation of republicanism playing out in Florida…with the tax cuts for the rich decimating the budget there, the gov, Rick Scott, has indiscriminately slashed the budgets of all departments of the government…with huge cuts to child and family services that Scott said is necessary to “grow jobs” in Florida. But the unintended consequence, or maybe it is intended, is that over the past few months, 40 children have died because there are just no longer enough case workers to go around and highly at risk children were returned to dangerous home situations. I’m not sure what else to say about it…but, it point outs the callousness and disdain that the poor get from republicans since they are “takers” in their eyes…geez…
The right still doesn’t understand the Constitution…
Well…the right is all up in arms today about the reaction to the homophobic, racist comments that one of the stars of “Duck Dynasty” made in an interview with GQ magazine, going on and on about how his first amendment rights have been violated since he has been suspended from A&E for the comments. Man, these folks just don’t understand the document that they wave around their heads, do they? The first amendment protects your freedom of speech…and this idiot is still free to say whatever he wants…there is no one trying to silence him…but, due to the repubs continual deference to corporations and the right of these corporations to do whatever they want to their employees, A&E has every right to suspend him…the first amendment has nothing to say about the fallout from your free speech. This is something the left has been clamoring for for decades, to try to limit the power of corporations over the constitutional rights of employees but the right just thinks that there need to be no laws, that corporations will do what’s right just because they are “nice”…something we all know is not and never has been the case. I still support the right of this homophobic, racist ass to say whatever comes into his tiny mind, but the right has to remember that words have consequences…geez…
December 19th
Well…it was another day yesterday but I did find the new battery for my Walkman buried over at the post office…it had been here for almost a month, came by registered mail so I had to sign for it…and, they were supposed to leave a notice if I wasn’t here but that never happened either…I am also here all the time so there was no reason for them to not knock on my door for the signature…just lazy I guess…but the guy at the battery company was really helpful in finding where it was so that was cool…and now, I have been playing it all day yesterday and today and it hasn’t used any juice…looks like the beat up, old thing will go on for another couple of years…not bad for 14 bucks…I did sleep okay and I may have found the reason for the constant stuffed up head…in cleaning the other day, I found some black mold that was growing on my bedroom window…so, I cleaned that up with a bleach solution and I’ve noticed that I am breathing better in bed…we’ll see…not much to do today…I did buy some ground chuck at the store this morning since I am craving burgers after not having any beef for the past couple of months and that will be lunch for the day…then, I need to clean to at least do something….more later….
Need to pick on Walker again…
Well…I am feeling considerably better now that I have my Walkman working again and I have played 5 songs without the battery going dead..so, I thought I pick on one of my favorite targets again and his dismal record of job creation that has been mirrored in every other state that is run by the repubs…the latest data from the BLS shows that Wisconsin’s job creation rate under Walker is less than half the national average and trails dem run states by as much as 50%…yep, Walker, the poster boy for the repub agenda of right to work for less, less taxes for corporations, and union busting has basically trashed Wisconsin’s economy by that nonsense…just as Snyder has done here in Michigan…where the only job growth has been in the auto industry and whose assistance by the federal government was opposed by every repub here in this state. I can’t stress this enough…the states are laboratories for repub ideas and by the objective numbers in every measure, they fall far short of progressive policies that serve to protect the middle class and reign in the egregious income inequality that the repub policies are designed to make worse while they enrich the 1%. I will be really interested to see how this idiot spins these numbers…oh, that’s right, they go by gut feel, not no stinkin numbers…geez…
December 18th
Well…it was another day yesterday and I only slept about three hours last night so I am tired and grumpy this morning…had some weird dreams that centered on the 4th amendment and police abuses of it that were troubling to say the least..and, I got an e-mail from the battery company that the battery was delivered here on the 23rd of November but it never showed up in my mailbox…so, I have to go up to the office in a few minutes to see if it was left there…and then, over to the post office if it isn’t…the last entry on the tracking said there was a notice left but that never happened so I am a little pissed about that…and the battery is so small that you could put 5 of them in a standard envelope so I’m not sure why they would put it in something that won’t fit in my mailbox…other than that, it was just another boring day in the apt with not a lot to do…I did find some mold that was growing on my bedroom window and cleaned that all up with bleach…wonder if that was why I am so stuffed up all the time? Not much to do today…battery searching and resumes but that is about it…more later…
Okay…here’s an update on the battery situation…finally found it buried in the distribution center over in Kentwood…had to sign for it since it came from Singapore and they think it might be terrorist related….have installed it and it is charging so, so far so good…and it has been charging for a half hour when the old battery showed full charge after 5 minutes…can’t wait to get it back in the car…
Obamacare polls…
Well…after the bottom was reached in the polling on Obamacare a few weeks back, and after the website was fixed to where most users are now able to use it, the numbers have come back to where it has an almost even favorable/unfavorable rating…but that doesn’t stop the right from continuing to lie about the program and say that a great majority of the people in the US don’t like the law…one thing that I have to keep stressing to people is to go deeper into the numbers…while it is true that the numbers are even right now, there has always been 15-20 points of those in the disapproval column that disapprove because the law is not single payer and does not cut the insurance companies out completely. So, if you add even the low side of 15% back to the approval side of 46%, you get a good majority of people who approve of the law, although some of them hold their noses while doing it since it is better than the previous system. It is clear that the majority of people in the US, other than the tea party idiots, want the system changed and want it to be given a chance while improving the law as flaws surface…as things have been done since this country started…at least until the right wing infection of the repub party…geez…
December 17th
Well…it was a kind of nice day yesterday with lunch with T and lots of laughs…and more trips down memory lane….we did have fun….slept like crap and up way too early today but there is nothing I can do about that so I won’t think about it…I did scrape together 5 bucks to get in on the Mega for tonight…586 million dollars would be okay and it is fun to have some hope for one day anyway…still feel like I have allergies or something since my head is still plugged up and I am sneezing..don’t feel too bad other than that so I guess I’ll stop complaining….I do have to get some stuff done around here today…need to get the summer wheels cleaned and put away to remove some of the clutter….not much to do today…resumes but that’s about it…only have a buck in my pocket so that keeps me in all day but that’s normal anyway…more later…
A win for us and the 4th amendment..
Well…have been trying to figure out what to write today..there are plenty of topics but none of them have been grabbing me…but, this one just came across my Twitter feed and it is a cheerable moment for me and should be for everyone in the US…and across the world…just this aft, a federal judge has ruled that the gross capturing of all of our phone records by the NSA is unconstitutional…saying that it violates the 4th amendment and that “James Madison would be spinning in his grave…”.
Finally, a judge that has said enough to all this nonsense…anyone who has ever read the constitution knows that the 4th is very simple…you can’t search peoples lives without probable cause that a crime has been committed….and just using the phone is not illegal so the leap to collecting every phone record has to be against the law. Period. The only bad thing is that he stayed his decision until the appeal is completed…but, with how the decision was worded, this judge feels that the plaintiffs will prevail in any appeal…he should have made it immediate…would have saved billions of dollars…a good piece of deficit reduction….geez…
December 16th
Well…I was right…it was another boring day yesterday and the only thing I did was binge watch “Lillyhammer” to get through the 8 new ones…pretty good show and the last one had lots of tongue in cheek “Sopranos” references including the theme song…slept like normal and feel okay today but it’s only 3 degrees outside and that just adds to the layers of things to be depressed about…the car did start so that was a good thing and it appears that the heat works fine…we’ll see….might have lunch with T today but it looks a little iffy and, as much as I’d like to see her, I just don’t have the cash to be spending going out…not much to do today…I do need to work out since I can’t ride anymore and that is making me even more depressed…gaining weight already and that will be a nice set up for further depression…just full of laughs today…more later…
December 15th
Well…another day gone by and not really anything to show for it…and, I’m running really late today since I had to make two runs out to get the paper…wasn’t there at the normal time and that threw me off for the morning…didn’t sleep okay last night and I think part of it is that I fell asleep on the couch and I am sore from doing that…oh, well…didn’t get much accomplished yesterday other than cooking…didn’t even clean at all so I do need to do the bathroom today….and there are no Lions on today so this day is shaping up to be a bore…maybe a Netflix marathon is in order? Made some of the crappiest coffee in a long time yesterday that I am finishing today…trying to save money and make the coffee last is just not working…it is more like brown water…I can’t afford to buy coffee so I guess I’ll just have to live with it…I do have tea in the cupboard but that gives me terrible heartburn and I’m not fond of the taste…more later…