One Year Ago Today

oh the rich people want what the poor people's got

saying that our political culture is broken is not exactly an original statement.  it's obvious that our republic has degraded into a cirlce jerk.  we are a one party state.  in theory there are differences between republicans and democrats, but two years of obama have shown that the results are mostly the same.  health care.  bradley manning.  war.  taxes.  economic policy.  energy.  no matter the style, the outcomes are equivalent.  the actual left wing of american politics is totally without representation.  the democrats are a center-right party; the repubs are an ever more extreme and ignorant right wing party.  the politicians described as far lefties by dickheads like bill o'reilly are pretty tame centerists.  yet, there are people in the streets in wisconsin and ohio.  they have no real representation. 

third parties won't work in this country.  without a parlimentary system, it's too easy for the two major parties, who represent exactly the same interests in every way, to keep them out.  and most americans buy into the status quo, egged on by opinion manufacturers of whichever jersey they've chosen to cheer for, so they resist even those who might actually represent them.  watch what happens on the blogs when anyone dares to acknowledge the actual conduct of the obama administration and compare it bush, raygun, whoever.  mass hysterics.  the folks who are honest are quickly surrounded by the circle jerk, and, well, nobody gets out of that alive.

in our system, political parties die and are replaced.  how might that happen to one of our two right-wing parties?  the folks in wisconsin and ohio probably point the way: by witholding support.  obama and walker are in the same party.  there are opponents of that party mobilizing in various states.  if those people had the will to withhold their support long enough to kill the democratic party, then perhaps a true center-left or left-wing party could form.

will that happen?  no.  there'll always be a funny anthony weiner soundbite, or bernie sanders rant, or something to keep enough of the serfs on the land.  americans don't have the balls for politics.  our only hope is that the ruling party might actually get so inbred that it will forget to breath and die.  santorum, baby. 

just a thought

i guess i understand that many of the large, leftyish blogmeisters get stiffy's imagining themselves becoming the next david broder or even ross doo-hat.  if they ingratiate themselves to the village just right, then some friend-of-obama-or-pelosi will pluck them from their seat on the lawrence o'donnell show and lead them to sententious tenure.  it's human nature, and few can resist the paycheck when they get that close.  after all, you're on cable, and obama says nuclear power is our future, so you puke up some misinformed banalities and just maybe you can skip the viagra tonight.  fine.  but where do all the other idiots come from?  this is not freerepublic, for christ's sake.  from the back bench left-wing bloggers to the legion of idiots and their comments that parrot the company line from their trenches in the realtiy based community, it is just a tiny bit disheartening to see all the stupidity on shameless display.  you don't work for the company you fool, so why do they carry their water for free?  of course, i dismiss the industry types and university shills.  they are hopeless and to be ignored.  i'm not talking about them.  it's the garden-variety igorant fuck that you find under every rock littered all over this new, left-wing media. 

again, it makes sense to be a toady if you're already getting paid and really really believe you could get a huge fucking paycheck some day.  and some of the folks out there have been properly sceptical from the start, but not as many as you would think!  are the rest just morons, misinformed or perhaps lickspittles by nature?  i'm not sure.  perhaps rather than hope for better from stars and up-and-comers, we should look for intellectual leadership and information from the old hands.  they've done their work, have found their voices, and are not interested in being careerist ass clowns anymore, if they ever were.

the nuclear issues in japan have highlighted a lot of the ignorance and useful idiocy of plenty of folks who should--and claim to everyday--know better.

magic, fear and superstition

surfing around the perportedly reality-based blogs in the wake of the earthquake in japan and subsequent nuclear catastrophy, i've been struck by the ignorance and misunderstanding polluting those sites.  i really do think it's a weakness of many 'liberals' or 'progressives' to embody the nerdgasm view of technology and believe that there's an easy answer right around the corner.  the issues with nuclear power have been hidden in plain sight for three generations, and these folks should know better.  perhaps they're being blinded by all the time they spent playing star trek role playing games before they discovered the internet.

for the record, the greenhouse emisisons for nuclear power are high.  the uranium has to be mined, after all.  then it has to be turned into fuel.  spent fuel will always be a problem, unless you happen to be in the business of building nuclear weapons. 

how much of our 20% dependence on nuclear power today could we eliminate with conservation and efficiency?  as soon as we can turn energy-star appliances and triple pane windows into atomic bombs, there will be a cabinet post demanding them.