Category Archives: Misc

Misc

More thoughts….

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Well..this one came to mind with just a tiny little article in one of the newspapers I read every morning that passed on the fact that taxes, for both individuals and business, are at their lowest level in more than 60 years. If you’ve been here before, you heard me talk about this topic, but not in this context….the context of Obama going to the Chamber of Commerce and promising them lower taxes and less regulation if they will just start to hire more people with the over 2 trillion dollars in retained profits that they now hold; a figure that is higher than any time in recorded history. How did they make so much profit if their taxes are too high? My question is, “who pays for the infrastructure, education of the workforce, and other things necessary for business to thrive if they don’t pay their fair share of the tax burden? Guess who? You and me….

I understand that this trip to the Chamber was a political calculation to look like there was no stone unturned in creating jobs, but to go to these thieves with his hat in his hand and say “pretty please” to get them do do the right thing for the country that made them successful is just wrong…business owes it to the people of America who bought the roads they use to transport their goods, who bought the education that gives them good workers, who bought the military that protects them every day, and who gave them the profits they so jealously hoard….to dismiss this debt while passing responsibility on to individual Americans is morally reprehensible…geez…

Misc

A few more things…

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Well…it has been such a huge pain that there is nothing really going on in the world, or at least politically here….haven’t had any topics that have really grabbed me and gotten the old outrage machine in my head going…but, of course, you see that and I have been looking really hard for work and that does take some time. There is one thing that did kind of materialize over the past couple of days..or I remembered it…I think I thought about this a couple of weeks ago but all of my ram is being used for other things and I have to forget something for something new to come in. I think the divide that is becoming permanent in this country is partially the fault of the segmented media and the fact that with the explosion of choice in the media and the blatant disregard for the truth in some of them, we can select media that only reinforces the ideas we already have…avoiding anything that can challenge those beliefs and give us the other side of the story. When I was growing up, news outlets prided themselves in their objectivity and tackling issues that were important to all of us…with a more eclectic mix of stories from both the US and around the world. I have even stopped watching the news since it is so superficial these days, being dumbed down since the people running the shows have been led to believe that it is more entertainment than informative. I fear that this is leading us to a permanent state of divide where our differences are the story; not the things that we Americans have in common….don’t know what to do about it….

Misc

Sister Sarah….

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Well….I know I promised one last one about sister Sarah but I am really bored with her and don’t think I should waste any more time writing anything about someone who is only famous for being famous….no accomplishments other than to lead the other far right crazies out from under the rocks where they live…as I’ve said before, in this media saturated environment where we live, folks who were left to howl at the moon and shout their craziness on street corners now have an outlet in fox news who have done their best to make it appear that these people are speaking for the majority if us when it is just not true. But, I detect a falloff of the novelty of their views and with that falloff comes the movement to the next crazy thing…so Sarah…your 15 minutes are up…go back to Alaska….no, that’s not what I wanted to say….I will never want to silence anyone for any thing they say or any views they may have that differ from my own….so, I won’t talk about her anymore but I hope she keeps up her comedy act…we all need to laugh more and I’m sure her self-important parody of a national figure will give us a few more good ones….

Misc

I just don’t know…

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Well…I have been railing on against the idiocy of the right all week and it has taken a lot out of me…and has taken me dangerously close to the feeling that events in the US have gotten out of hand…that we are sliding back to the bad old days where we citizens don’t mean much when compared to the clout that business and the moneyed interests have. But, I’m not going to turn this one into another screed against this rising tide…we all need to take a break sometimes and this is going to be mine…and talk about some other things that may be uplifting or might not….maybe getting away from the charged rhetoric will help me cleanse my head today, I’ve had the feeling that this might be necessary for a while now; that my heart was just not in it and I was lacking in lucidity…just going through the motions. So, today, I’m just going to ramble a bit and just talk…hoping that something will make me feel better about the world and myself. Who knows?

Hmmm…it is kind of heartening to see the people in some of the Arab countries get to the point where they have said enough, enough of the cronyism and theft by the elites that leave the people with no voice and no institutions that can help them express their desire for freedom…but I do have the fear that the well organized religious zealots will co-opt the popular uprisings and make it worse for them in the short term. We can hope that that won’t happen but unfortunately history is not on the side of the people…I just hope the US comes down on the side of freedom no matter what pain it causes us….

Oh, Sarah Palin…..nope, not going to write anything here….just a reminder that the ban on Sarah takes effect in three days…

Sports….I don’t really think that sports matters in the overall scheme of things…but I do want to say I am so happy that Nick Lidstrom was chosen for one of the captains in the NHL all star game this weekend…a better sports figure has never been seen here in Michigan….well…maybe Al Kaline or Alan Trammel…I feel good that we had these men to watch over the years….and it is so nice to see the unassuming kids we have coming up through the system for the Red Wings….probably one of the reasons I like hockey so much…very few self absorbed idiots…I forgot to talk about the new racing season that is starting tomorrow with the 24 Hours of Daytona…always the kick off of the year and I am looking forward to it..I think…not so much the Nascar season…I am tired of Jimmie Johnson and the lack of innovation that the series shows….way too many rules that make the racing bland and repetitive and it is only getting worse…guys, this is the reason people have stopped coming to the tracks and watching, not the points system…and, while we’re at it…lets get rid of the “Chase” and go back to talking about everyone that is on the track not just the top 12…

Okay…that’s enough isn’t it? I’ll try to get another one out later but I’m not sure if it will be a good idea or not…I’m sitting here listening to Pandora and just want to get out the last book from the bag o books I got from T and escape for a while….

Misc

The gun thing again…

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Well…with the tragedy in Arizona, I would have thought that we would step back and think about our gun laws; keeping the right to own them, but with some common-sense restrictions that would minimize the danger to the general public. But, what do we see here in Michigan? We have the repubs pushing now to remove all restrictions on where you can carry guns along with making it easier to get a concealed carry permit. Right now here, you can’t carry a gun into a school, bar, or government building…but these guys want these slight restrictions to go away…I for one don’t want to be in a bar with anyone carrying a weapon and when my children were small, I would not have wanted anyone carrying a firearm around them. As you know, I am a firm supporter of the second amendment, but as our society has changed, I feel that gun laws should do the same…why should the rest of us be uncomfortable when a small minority want to show off how tough they are by carrying weapons? Okay, that’s not quite fair….I would trust most of the people that I know that own guns to be responsible in public, but what about mistakes? What about the statistics that say that most people who are harmed by guns in home robberies are hurt by their own guns? I can’t grasp how this group can be so adamant about their 2nd amendment rights, and then think it’s just fine for the government to take away our 4th amendment ones.

I don’t know what the solution is, but I do know that common sense says that the more people you expose to dangerous things, the more injuries there will be. Geez…

Misc

January 26th

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Well…probably the worst night’s sleep in a while….have been up and down since about 1:30 and it’s not a good start to the day…so…my energy level is quite low and I guess I’ll have to take it easy for another day..no flu chronicles today but I think I still have some of it…weird, weird dreams last night that had Helen Mirren and John Malkovich in them…they centered on Walmart selling tiny, real bunnies in happy meal containers that they had on racks throughout the store…and no one thought that was a bad thing…I told you that it was weird inside my head…I did win at pool yesterday and that was fun…made a few shots at the right time….not much to do today…have a few errands and some work to do here but I think I’m going to take it easy….I will have a comment on the SOTU and the repub response that has been predictable to say the least…

Misc

Aren’t you tired of being held hostage?

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Well…I have been thinking about this one ever since a new governor was elected here in Michigan and one of his first acts was to propose changing the business tax structure to give corporations a huge tax cut carried on the backs of the workers who will be forced to take pay and benefit cuts to pay for them….these cuts for business would worsen our deficit here by 100% and be another huge transfer of wealth from you and I to the rich…again. The reason for these changes, along with the repub bowing to business interests, are the threats by corporations to move out of the state if they don’t get what they paid for when they gave the money to elect repubs to take control of all of Michigan’s government. The same thing is happening in Illinois, when the legislature there voted to raise taxes (from 4.8 to 6 percent) to deal with one of the most severe budget crises that any state faces and businesses have started those same old tired threats….never mind that most corporations have many ways to avoid taxes that you and I don’t…these ungrateful thieves have started to pout and want to take their ball and go home. I say, good riddance….these guys want all of the rights of citizens (that they were granted in the Citizens United decision) but they want nothing to do with the responsibilities. When was the last time you were given free land to build a house or had your taxes eliminated to keep you living where you do? I’ve had enough of the competition to make our workers into third world laborers who can never make enough money to live a middle class life while corporations and their political lapdogs rake in all of the benefits of those labors.

We need to start a new movement where there is a price to pay for selfish corporate behavior…let’s find out who these creeps are and just stop buying from them…it’s been too long that corporations have been able to do whatever they want and hold the rest of us hostage to their whims….it will never stop unless we do….geez….

Misc

A few thoughts on Keith….

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Well…lots of analysis on why Keith Olbermann left MSNBC and I want to throw in my two cents….first, let’s get this out of the way…from what I’ve read of his tenure at many of the shows he was on point to a person much like myself..one who chafes at being told what to do, combined with a huge ego…hmmm…but what I think was the deciding factor was the takeover of NBC by Comcast…I think he saw the writing on the wall, that the ownership of the company was going to become much more conservative…I’ve never been one to go along with the conspiracy theories that sprout out here on the web like weeds but this time I think there may be some substance to it…that the new owners first act was going to be to change his show to make it more amenable to the right’s interests….who else was out there that was telling the truth about the conspiracy between big money, business interests, and the right? I could be completely wrong but I’d put 5 bucks on it that this is one of the reasons Keith is gone….MSNBC no longer exists for me…I think they’ve cut off their nose to spite their face…

Well….that may be a little harsh….I’ll have to think about it for a while….after all, I am TRYING to be more reasonable….

Misc

Goodbye Keith and thanks….

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Well…just learned reading the news this morning that Countdown with Keith Olbermann was canceled Friday and I sit here with some sadness that our progressive counterpoint to the swamp of propaganda from Fox is gone. There were times that Keith made me cringe with some of the over-the-top hyperbole that was a part of the show, but, for the most part, he was the only one that was calling out the right and its lies….who was shining a light into the dark corners of politics that the mainstream media was ignoring. There were many times that I wanted to stand up and cheer for the things he said….and to applaud the passion and humanity that was clear from the beginning of Countdown….I regret that I skipped last night’s show but am thankful for the eight years it was on….

So, thank you, Keith…..

Misc

I’m on board Dana….

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Well…just read an op-ed piece by Dana Milbank from the Washington Post where he proposes that all of the media declare February a “Sarah Palin free month” and I think it is such a good idea that I will pledge to do the same. So, after Jan 31…this will be a Palin free zone….even though she is such an easy target that on the days that I’m somewhat less than lucid I can still get a post out on her latest craziness….it is kind of a sacrifice for me since…as Dana said, when she is in the tags for an article, the article goes much higher in the search results…but that is a crutch I’m willing to do without if it will help to make her go away….