Well…that’s four days in a row of being good a night here and the benefits are piling up…well…not really but I want to think that…I’m not sleeping much but I still feel better when I get up so that is a plus….have been up since 5 though, and I will need a nap later to make up for it….something to look forward to…I did watch “the Kings Speech” yesterday and while it was a good movie I still can’t understand why it won the oscar for best picture…must have been a pretty weak field….maybe that’s what I’ll do over the next week or so…get all of the oscar nominees from last year and see for myself…or, not, who knows? Not much to do today…have to get groceries and this one is going to hurt since I didn’t buy much last week…and there is no food here so the list is twice as long as normal…oh, well…might have HH with K but that might wait until we are up in MP Sat…oh, I’ll fill you in on that one tomorrow…more later…
Shenanigans, Shenanigans….
Well…after the huge giveaway to business paid for by the workers here in Michigan, guess what happened? The health of Michigan’s economy is no where near as bad as the repubs projections made it out to be. Doesn’t anyone else see shenanigans here? They come out in January with dire budget projections used to drive their anti-citizens agenda and raise taxes on us while giving the state away to business and the rich, an now, magically, they find that the projected 1.5 billion dollar shortfall is now only a billion dollars and dropping every day. And, Snyder and his cronies are still out there pitching that we need to bribe businesses to stay in Michigan…and that is just what it is, holding the people of Michigan up to bribes in the form of tax breaks to keep business from taking their ball and going home if we don’t give them what they paid for in this new repub controlled state. When do we, as citizens of Michigan, get the truth out of these repub liars?
One other thing that is happening in repub controlled states is another oldie but goodie where they are putting structural “reforms” in place that will suppress the votes that normally go to the dems….leaning on the old chestnut of “widespread voter fraud” that has never happened anywhere except in the heads of the repub strategists….shenanigans, shenanigans, shenanigans…geez…
Oh, one last thing, the repubs in the US Senate blocked the ending of 4 billion dollars a year in subsidies for the oil companies…yep, you heard it here, the repubs won’t give unemployed workers any help but they will give 4 billion dollars to the oil companies…I can’t even work up any outrage anymore since this is always the pattern…we can’t afford any safety nets for individuals but we can for oil companies….I fear for this country’s future…
I find this ironic…
Well…just a shorty before I go out and get some coffee and read the papers…just read an interesting study that looked at tax revenues in 2007 and the findings made me laugh like crazy…it turns out that the top ten “welfare queen” states; states that get more in federal money than they pay in, are the hot beds of the tea party and the right wing of the repub party…oh, the whole repub party is right wing now so I guess I’ll have to find a new descriptor….so, they hate the federal government and think it should be shrunk? I propose that we start with the easy way, cut off the welfare queen states and they will then have incentive to get off their butts and start working…that’s what the repubs say about the unemployed and that’s what should happen to these states. Geez…
May 18th
Well…an okay day yesterday…I lost at pool but was good when I got home so I feel okay other than not sleeping too well…so I am still a little tired this morning….and the rain falling doesn’t help make me smile….the weather looks better later in the week so that is something to look forward to since there is not much else that I can think of…..my back is getting better and it has improved a hundred percent over the last day or so…this was a weird one…normally, it hurts on one side or the other but this time it was all across it and not so much pain as just stiffness…but really bad stiffness that had me walking like an 80 year old and I hope I don’t look that old yet….not much to do today…G’s taking the week off since she has an interview tomorrow so it’s going to be just a take it easy day and night…and it looks that way for the rest of the week until C’s party on Sat…but that is not a bad thing….I don’t need the calories from the cocktails and I feel a lot better when I get up….I am still a few behind for the month but I’m not going to force it…there will be a least one more today…I think I may lay our in the sun today to start getting rid of the biker’s tan I’m getting….more later…
Welcome to the Soviet Union…courtesy of the Supreme Court..
Well…as I sit here today, I am saddened, outraged, and stunned by the latest nail in the coffin of individual freedom here delivered by the supreme court over the past few days. It hasn’t been enough that this court has muted the individuals voice in politics by the Citizens United decision allowing unlimited corporate money to buy elections, then they allow employers to take away any rights the individual has in the workplace by not allowing lawsuits against egregious violations of many laws that were written to protect workers rights, now, they gut the fourth amendment by allowing police to create “emergencies” that allow them to enter anyone’s house without a warrant. This latest case that this wrong headed court has ruled on allows the police to bang on any door without cause and then if they hear any noise that the police construe to be “destroying evidence” can enter the house without a warrant…even if no one int he house is suspected of any crime. Yep, you heard it again, it’s more of the “trust us” baloney that you always hear from the police…guess how this one is going to be used? Any critic of police tactics that has the guts to speak out better watch out….the knock will be coming to your door soon and not getting to the door fast enough can be construed to be resisting arrest…someone please save us from ourselves….geez….
May 17th
Well…a fun lunch with T yesterday and that made the day a pretty good one….I did make some progress yesterday morning..got the tires rotated on the car but didn’t find where the noise is coming from in the rear of it…it has been there for almost a year so it can’t be too serious…I was good last night so I feel okay this morning other than getting up at 5 or so and not sleeping that well…I have been trying to eat a lot more and it has been working…I’ve lost some weight since I’ve started this plan so maybe there is hope for the summer…not much to do today…going out to Cascade for pool later and I do have to work out and ride so I’ll at least have the morning covered…going to be good when I get home tonight to get started on eliminating those calories and let the liver repair itself some…will try to get another one or two out today but, as you know, it depends on what grabs me in the news….more later…
Ole Newt and the food stamp president…
Well….I really don’t know if Newt is the most brilliant or the most stupid of the repub presidential candidates that have announced so far…if you saw any of the weekend news show where Newt’s line of attack against Obama is that he has presided over a great increase of Americans that are on food stamps and he makes the assertion that food stamps are welfare that people don’t deserve even if they are out of work because if they are out of work, it is only because they don’t want to work….conveniently ignoring the deepest recession on the last 80 years and the fact that employers are just not adding enough jobs to make the unemployment rate drop. Just what audience is Newt trying to reach? The millions of middle Americans who are out of work through no fault of their own but through the fault of the policies of the repubs? Does he think that even one of these folks who deserve this help will vote for him when he rails against even the smallest of safety nets? I think this is just another racist comment where ole Newt is trying to dupe the poor people that are still voting repub by equating people that need food stamps to feed their family with the abuses of the old welfare system. With over 12 million jobs lost in this recession that was caused by the excesses of the repubs, of course the amount of people on food stamps is going to rise…but there is still no plan on the right to help people get jobs that will help them get off the type of assistance that the repubs loathe…for individuals…but it’s okay to continue to give oil companies 10 billion dollars a year in corporate welfare…what did you expect from Newt and the repubs?
May 16th
Well…had a somewhat fun day yesterday out with K and V playing shuffleboard out in Cascade…K and I won both games so that puts us at 27-4 all time….I was good when I got home so I feel okay today…I did forget to put the heat on when I went to bed last night so it was about 50 in here when I got up this morning…the heat feels good now but the furnace is doing some weird two-step when it shuts off so I may have to have the service folks come…..not much to do today….I think I may have lunch with T but it hasn’t been confirmed yet and I haven’t heard from Tom so I don’t know if Tuesday is going to be Tuesday this week….so, I guess I’ll just have to let the day unfold at it’s own pace and take it as it comes….okay, mixing metaphors again but I’m sure you get the idea….I’ll have two topics later today since I do need to keep up….more later….
May 15th part two…
Haven’t done one of these in quite a while and no, I don’t think it’s cheating…I did watch the movie and it was no where near as good as the documentary on Jack Abramhoff that I watched the other day….there was way too much focus on the title character and not enough on the influence peddling and the “pay for play” aspect where he was selling access to repub senators and congressmen. The real story was just more interesting….it has been kind of interesting what is going on with the repub presidential candidates and all of the supposed front runners that have decided they can’t win in 2012 so they are staying in their cushy Fox jobs and will continue to rake in the money from their hate and attacks….now, all they have left is Paul, Romney, and ole Newt that have their hats in the ring…and not one of them can ignore their pasts of favoring healthcare before they were against it, for being serial cheaters, or for wanting to tear the federal government completely down….I know you can figure out which one is which without me telling you if you’ve been paying even a little attention…..
I do have a little hope that Obama is starting to think and act strategically by getting bin Laden, pushing for more oil drilling, and attacking the Ryan budget proposals…now he just needs to get out in front of them instead of counterpunching…I may even have another one today…
May 15th
Well..it’s Sunday so you know the pattern…waiting for the coffee to finish so I can put on Pandora and read the paper….man, it is so depressing to have it rain constantly for two days…okay, right now almost everything is depressing so I guess I shouldn’t blame it on the weather…I was pretty good last night do I feel better today than I have in a long time and I am looking forward to taking a lazy day and watching a movie I’ve had sitting in my mailbox for a couple of days…the problem is the movie is “Casino Jack” and I just watched the documentary of the same name so it’s going to be hard to believe Kevin Spacey as Jack Abramhoff…but I will give it a try later this morning….not much to do today…going to make ribs with G’s recipe today and I am looking forward to having something other than chicken….but I still do need to clean and get the garbage out…not walking out in the rain, though, so that will be much later from the way the radar looks…..I am behind on these for the month do maybe today will be a catch up day, who knows?