Well….as you can see from the previous posts, I have been a little outraged today but I think the outrage is justified given the things I’ve seen. On a more pleasant note, I got past 1000 miles for the summer on the bike today…about 6 weeks earlier than last summer so the goal of over 2K for the summer appears to be within reach…yay! It is damn hot today…have been trying to not use the air for a couple of reasons….I don’t like air that much; I’d prefer to hear the sounds and smell the smells of summer but since they are working on the church behind my place, I have to keep this place closed up or the beeping from the heavy equipment will drive me nuts. I never run it in the car….there’s nothing better than the wind in your hair…well…part of it is the air doesn’t work to well anymore…after all, the car has almost 300K on it….maybe more later…
Bill Hardiman and the club for growth..
Well…when I was working out this morning, a political ad came on criticizing Bill Hardiman (a repub candidate for U.S. congress) for his support of raising some taxes to make sure Michigan could balance their budget as they are required to do by law. Now the people behind this smear is the Club For Growth; the same guys that gave us the Bush tax cuts and have never met a tax that they like…their motto being “starve the beast” since they do not believe that the federal government should have any power to regulate anything. Mr. Hardiman was being an adult when he looked at the hard realities in Michigan and went against the voodoo economics that are pushed by the repubs these days that tax and spending cuts will magically heal the economy. If you look at the economic analysis of the Bush years with the huge tax cut versus the Clinton years where taxes were actually raised to help end the budget deficit…growth was higher in the Clinton years as the deficits were lower…but you expect that from a fact-based administration; not the wishful thinking and repeating lies that pass for truth on the right. Keep at it Bill…you did a nice job as Mayor of Kentwood…I still can’t vote for you but you need to continue to hold out against the know-nothings of the party. Geez….
Manny Lopez is an idiot…still….
Well….have to go off on this idiot Manny Lopez from the Detroit News again….he’s back with more of the crap that he has been spouting that if we criticize the repubs for opposing the extension of unemployment benefits it’s just Democratic politics…there is no substance to it. He continues to make light of Keynesian economics and pushes the voodoo economics that growth can come only through tax cuts and cutting spending. I understand he wants to repeat the Repub talking points but to ridicule J.M. Keynes; one of the greatest minds in economics, to make silly political points would be the same as if I would go to Miguel Cabrera and tell him that he is hitting all wrong. Manny, reading and talking about economics is not the same as being an economist…and, while I support your right to spout off and be wrong, I am going to call you and your repub cronies on your hatred for the middle class. You rail on about paying for the 30 billion for unemployment benefits, where the hell were you when the top 1% of the country was getting a TRILLION dollars in tax cuts. Let me get this straight, you have a problem with 2.5 million middle class getting unemployment benefits so they can eat, but you just love the idea of 3 million of the wealthy getting 30 times more? Why didn’t you call for these tax cuts, or the war in Iraq, or the subsidies for big business be paid for? It’s just another instance of cloaking your hatred for the middle class; the working class, in pretend values….geez….
July 21st
Well…it’s another Wednesday and I feel okay today since I took the day off from booze last night and just relaxed. Looks like the normal things for Wed…going out to Ada later to shoot pool but I have some more farming to do today so I should get going on that…..nope, going to wait until after coffee to do anything…I don’t know why I feel so compelled to do everything so fast when I have all of the time in the world; even after being out of work so long I still have the built in need to get things done quickly and move on to the next task…I think I’ll change that today. I’m going to make a conscious effort to slow down and enjoy things today…even slow down my driving…as you know, I’m a professional speeder who lives at 20 over all the time…but I must be pretty good at it…no tickets since 74…yep, probably longer that most of you have been alive. So…going to take a leisurely shower and try not to speed read the papers when I get out to Kava…might even have two coffees today…breaking the routine…more later…
Haven’t talked about music in a while…
Well…this topic popped into my head when I was reading an article about Robert Plant and his new band on tour this morning. It wasn’t really the article which was pretty complimentary but then, like an idiot, I have to read the comments that were posted by other readers. Why do people hate so much? I know I’ve touched on this subject quite a few times but it still confuses me when there are these nuclear reactions to what was just a fluff piece. Some the respondents even went so far to think anyone his age should never be seen doing the music that has been their lives work. When are you too old to entertain? Doesn’t the marketplace determine when you should stay home? Should we stop reading books or enjoying paintings done by people that are in the later stages of life?
I just don’t understand the psyche of people that can’t enjoy entertainers just because they have aged. Would you have Neil Young stay home and never tour again because he over 60? I know you may feel that I have these feelings because I’m getting up there and I have started to think about my age and how I relate to the world, but good music is good music and great writers are great no matter what their age. Music has given me so much enjoyment and extra understanding of life through that shared experience and I want to keep the ones I love around until they can’t do it anymore…and maybe longer than that. What do you think?
July 20th
Well…it was kind of a busy day yesterday after starting off quite slow….did go out with G last night and lost 15 bucks playing Keno. Today I have to get this place cleaned up…yeah, I know I’ve been saying that for about a week now but I will get the spiders cleaned out of the bathroom and clean my shower. Have to go out and get some supplies, too, since I have to do some farming later. Whew…my brain is not really working right now…so I’m going to end here….more later…
A new low for these hypocrites….
Well…I’m sure by now, you’ve heard the new repub spin on the failure to pass extensions of the unemployment insurance that has expired for millions of Americans…that it is the Democrats fault since the repubs will vote for it if they cut the money from somewhere else in the budget…which, on it’s face, doesn’t seem like a bad idea. But, the question I have to ask is, “why didn’t they have to cut other spending to finance the Iraq war?” Why didn’t they have to cut spending to pay for the trillion dollars of the Bush tax cuts? It is the sorriest sense of hypocrisy that deficits are so important to them now when they had no problem giving oil companies billions in subsidies when they were making record profits but they can’t allow any increase in the deficit to help American families continue to eat. And the Obama haters go on and on and on with their lies and distortions….I hope these idiots get laid off and then there will be no money to help them….
July 19th part two…
Well…had a pleasant surprise today when T called and wanted to have lunch after coming back from her vacation..it’s always nice to talk to her and we do a lot of laughing…thought today was going to be kind of a bore but I had the inside mirror fall off the car again so I had to fix that along with taking care of some more duct tape that has peeled off the A-pillar on the way over to Greydon’s yesterday….at least it gave something to do. and, I think I have G later for a couple of beers if she feels like it so I need to take a short nap since I’ve been up since 5 again…and the perfect movie to do that to is on…2001, I love everything that Kubrick did but this one has a slow pace to say the least and is perfect for lying on the couch and drifting off to….so, that is what I’m going to do…not much happening in the world for me to comment on so I guess it’s going to be time tomorrow to start laying out my philosophy about politics and life in general….have been thinking about that for a while but who knows if I’ll get to it…I guess I should, huh?
July 19th
Well…had a sunday funday for the first time in a quite a while that was fun….but it is really hard on me to start at 3:30 in the aft and continue all night…just getting too old for that I guess….so I’ll spend another day feeling kind of crappy…it was weird to come home after the storm and find my patio chairs scattered around the lawn and branches down everywhere…over on the north end, it barely rained. Not much to do today….have to go over and get some supplies but that is about it…and clean this place up…I think it will be bathroom day later since I have a new crop of spiders that are everywhere…hmmmm….that’s about it for now..I should have a good post for later…
July 18th
Well…it’s 9:07 and I have everything that I wanted to do done….this is going to make for a boring day but there are some races on later so that will be okay. I think this post is going to be kind of stream of consciousness since there are just so many disjointed thoughts in my head right now. The first one is just weird….you know how I think “Dark Side of the Moon” is perfectly suited to riding early Sunday morning? Well…when the phrase “run, rabbit, run” came on, one did come out of the bushes and ran….I laughed out loud at the sheer absurdity of the moment.
Damn…all of the thoughts that I had on the bike have abandoned me….so I’m going to stop here for now and read a few newspapers online…more later….