Monthly Archives: August 2011

Wisconsin election close, but no cigar, if there was a cigar

Posted on by
1

The recall defeat in Wisconsin brings to mind Emma Goldman’s famous adage: “If voting changed anything, they’d make it illegal.”
Now we’ll never know if a Democrat majority in Madison would have behaved any different than a herd of Republicans. I doubt it. Activists are patting themselves on the back for their partial success, saying the effort was worth it, which is the usual consolation for losers, and ignores the fact that many of Wisconsin’s present Democratic Party legislators already betray their constituents. Here’s another quote, by a Japanese engineering professor I had in college who used to say in broken English: “You build bridge. It fall down. No partial credit.” Imagine what he’d have thought of a bridge to nowhere.

US casualties: better sooner than later, it’s the only way they’re coming home

Posted on by
6

Chinook helicopter interior
Massive setback in Afghanistan, Special Forces Chinook shot down causing a record number of American deaths, thirty, two dozen of them Navy SEALs. Is this Obama’s plan to draw down our forces, by attrition? The night raid truncation is the biggest withdrawal over ten years. Plus side of course, it’s fewer Afghan civilians those soldiers would have killed.

A record number of US soldiers killed at once. Yeah, we don’t usually get confirmation so early, but Afghan President Karzai bypassed the usual censors and announced the catastrophe. So war-cheerleaders are scrambling for a silver-lining, and this is what they found. They assure war fans that the shoot-down of the Chinook didn’t kill any of the SEAL Team 6 patriots who bum-rushed Osama bin Laden.

Because, I don’t know, would that have made it worse? Because we don’t want it to look like Osama was avenged? Unfortunately the specificity would seem to imply that Navy SEALs are more valued than ordinary soldiers.

Actually, it’s curious, because we’re not told who was on that team, nor who died yesterday, so who’s to know? The military doesn’t even know if they were gay or not.

Karzai circumvented the usual casualty reporting protocol that’s succeeded for a decade now in obfuscating the US death toll in our wars. Deny early reports, pretend you need more time to confirm the deaths, wait until actual expiration of fatally injured casualties, and if they’re under the command structure of NATO, pretend they’re not American at all. Such a process draws out the impact of having to declare the death toll when it occurs. If Karzai hadn’t intervened, the Chinook casualties could have dribbled out over a week. Three or four a day would be no great shakes for Afghanistan these days.

Remember when a truckload of female MPs hit an EID the first year in Iraq? I didn’t think you would. It was the largest group loss of female soldiers in US history, but it wasn’t, because the DoD confirmed the deaths individually over days.

If journalist wanted to report US casualties in Afghanistan honestly, they need only check with the other nations participating in the occupation. The US is the only partner which has declared a policy of not acknowledging its dead. In the event of unclaimed NATO casualties, they’re American.

US AAA credit rating downgraded to AA as Tea Party downgraded to KK

Posted on by
Reply

Democrats are anxious to spin the tail on the asinine Tea Party, to label the credit rating adjustment made by Standard and Poor’s as the “Tea Party Downgrade.” Except a Twitterverse wiseacre already gave the Teabag idiot racists a downgrade, by cutting them down a K.

OMG the Colorado Springs Gazette Telegraph agrees Obama is a Tar-Baby

Posted on by
Reply

Disney rewrote its Uncle Remus Tale in printed version of the Brer Rabbit storyYES OF COURSE my surprised is feigned, but not my embarrassment. How in the world does a newspaper of not insignificant distribution (okay, readership perhaps) not restrain itself from supporting a bigoted remark like Congressman Lamborn’s? Whether the racism was inadvertent or idiotic, at best the comparison of America’s black president to a “Tar-Baby” could have been remarked upon, if one didn’t want to condemn it, but the Colorado Springs Gazette chose to support its Tea-Party libertarian by belittling criticism that the reference to the Uncle Remus stereotype was racist. In historic perspective it recalls the days when Colorado newspapers endorsed lynchings, and later the Klan. In essence that’s not ancient history. People no further away than Denver can dismiss Lamborn as typical of Pikes Peak mouth-breathers, and the Gazette editorial page confirms them. Indignation doesn’t begin to touch it.

CSPD Junior Police Explorers learn early to swagger and menace like pros

Posted on by
22

2011 DIVERSITY FAIR, NOTES, PART 1- What is our police department doing with high school age “explorers?” They’re uniformed and have their own shoulder patch. Exploring what? The limits to which they impose their weight against peoples’ rights? I’m at a civic festival in Confluence Park, across from a canopy whose shade does not conceal a mass of blue uniforms, adult officers bulky with bullet-proof vests and leather, holstering all manner of law enforcement weaponry, and CSPD apprentices, skinnier for lack of the armor and accouterments, but otherwise dressed exactly like police officers, and adopting the swagger which comes of trooping the colors, emboldened by the anonymity of the requisite Ray-Bans.

I don’t know what the CSPD think they’re doing. Community outreach would be far better accomplished in t-shirt and shorts. I can’t help but think that the authority communicated by the uniforms is being abused in this setting. I’m reminded immediately of the menace which fascist youth groups projected over even their parents. These kids are strolling around the event like appointed hall monitors. Patrolling, some of them would you believe, with their thumbs looped on their leather belts. If they had clubs they’d be twirling them.

Of course, they stroll pretending it means assimilation, as if submission to authority is a normal ingredient of any balanced community. I suspect that’s what the early indoctrination “explores.”

Actually, the Explorers get their name because they’re “exploring law enforcement as a career.” Yes any profession would be something an apprentice might want to explore, but police craft is one which requires alerting the public that this uniformed person does not have full-on authority/responsibility over you. Well, responsibility is probably what they’re most concerned about.

No one should doubt the craft of policemanship bears complexities worthy of journeymen, but I’d rather recruits came into law enforcement in the more common manner, after a college education.

Well, this IS the EVERYBODY WELCOME Diversity Fair, so we can’t exclude the Fascists. But do the city’s traditionally marginalized populations really feel welcomed by such an asserted police presence? I’m thinking of the immigration-challenged circles. But in general, how welcome do you suppose Hispanic, African, or Native Americans feel with white kids semi-officially playing cop?

Presumably the Klan was excluded from invitation, like any hate-group, because it offends the hatees. Probably law enforcement should take a backseat too, and not pretend that policing be considered a cultural component of a community.

It’s given me an idea however. Maybe the point could be brought home if we injected the event with worse than these crew-cutted crackers. How about a para-militarized presence?

I’m thinking cops in riot gear, patrolling like it was no big deal. In protest situations it’s become the norm, imagine if the average non-protester were to see the face of the US police state. Would citizens be so comfortable if instead of officer friendly, or junior uniformed friendlies, the event was patrolled by storm troopers. The CSPD knows better than to expose itself like that, but imagine a riotous development to draw them out.

Or, why not assert a pseudo-authoritarian presence for them?

If not riot gear, maybe a paramilitary uniform, American dark blue, with plenty of USA insignia, the American eagle made to look a little Germanic, let’s say. Jack boots, riding pants, leather straps, and black gloves a must.

Technically, the force could pretend to be a secret service, community outreach for the NSA or the plethora of intelligence agencies. The idea would be to present a dark, ominous authority. Handing out small fliers that read “Please take no notice of us, if you’ve done no wrong, you’ve nothing to be afraid of.”

White American lunch

Posted on by
Reply

I had a white American lunch today. It sounds like stereotyping to say that, but it’s true, I had the Friday special at a local luncheonette. Roasted white meat of turkey, on white bread, with mashed potatoes and whitish-yellow gravy. Nothing of color, or shading, except a one ounce plastic cup of cranberry sauce to make it red blooded. Now who else is going to eat that?
 
Of course I want to joke that green would have been unpatriotic, but sadly it’s more likely a price issue at poverty wages.

Is there an energy drink that’s safe or nutritious or worth drinking? A look at Lost, Bawls, Bing, Reed’s and Pimpjuice

Posted on by
2

 
Lost Energy, not found in Bawls, Petey's Bing, Reed's Elixir, or Pimp Juice
Short answer, not really. But we’re feeling left out of the excitement, even if it’s addled. Reed’s Natural Energy Elixir is probably the most interesting (sparkling filtered water, cane sugar, pineapple juice, honey, fresh ginger root, lemon juice, lime juice, green tea leaf, ginseng, goji, acai, camu camu, jiaogulan & L-theanine) but won’t deliver the jitters to suit energy drink junkies. It’s sort of like Herbal-X was to Ecstasy. Colorado local Petey’s Bing is a “natural” concoction with bing cherries, ginkgo biloba, ginseng, acai & flax seed extract (plus caffeine, taurine & guarana for the obligatory heart palpitations), but cuts its cane sugar with Sucralose to reduce the calories, so until they consider natural stevia, shelve Bing with Tab/Fresca. Pimpjuice has acai juice, grape extract, green tea extract, pomegranate juice, pear juice & yerba mate to supplement the usual suspect stimulants. The legendary Bawls ties with …Lost for best taste in popular polls. But doesn’t “Lost Energy” say it all? Our serotonin-leaking masses are being pitched caffeinated supplements to make up for what’s gone missing from their dead processed food.

Republican Congressman Doug Lamborn is how much worse than Democrat Senator Michael Bennet?

Posted on by
1

My Dem friends are protesting the Debt Ceiling Heist outside of 5th District Congressman Doug Lamborn’s office, even though today the relevant vote is in the Senate, and Senator Michael Bennet has an office downtown. Except he’s a Democrat. AS IF my colleagues think only the Republicans are screwing them on the debt crisis “deal!” Much as I object to being represented by the squeaky voiced pea-brain bigoted Lamborn, this Move-On crowd pretends their corporate party offers a veritable alternative. Senator Bennet is a pro-banking, pro-privatization, pro-military, frack-the-environment, blue dog centrist, who quite righty takes progressive liberals for schmucks.

Doug Lamborn won’t touch President Obama because he says he’s a Tar Baby

Posted on by
3

Yes Congressman Doug Lamborn, this is technically not a Tar Baby but an English GolliwogThat line probably gets lots of laughs at Tea Parties, but over Denver airwaves, Congressman Doug Lamborn’s likening President Obama to a “Tar Baby” got, I’ll say it, sticky. Yeah, the expression meant “intractable quagmire” when Mitt Romney used it to describe an cost-prohibitive subway project, but Tar Baby’s primary allusion to a negative African-American stereotype got Romney in trouble. Now like a banana peel gag irresistible to Republicans, “Tar Baby” is how Doug Lamborn chose to describe, not a hole in the ground into which you pour money, not a trap set by a clever fox to lure the Uncle Remus progenitor of Bugs Bunny, but to describe his Teabag constituents’ poster child usurper, risen from America’s untouchable class, our first black president.
 
You dopey Tea Party Klan jester, you won’t shake Barack Obama’s hand because it’s black. You’re a racist sneak, unfortunately egged on by the bigots endemic to your backwater district. I hope you find that the rest of Colorado will make your “Tar Baby” remark a real tar baby for you.

Lamborn says he meant “quagmire” and a supportive media is referencing the dictionary to assert his usage was correct. But the instances for which Romney and John McCain apologized were quagmires, not personifications, least of all OF Obama. A physicist can say he’s got a problem that’s real bitch, but not if he’s talking about his wife.

I think it’s fairly disingenuous to say the primary definition of Tar Baby is a quagmire. That’s like concluding Fag is a cigarette. Yes, but that’s when neither are used to describe a person.

Curiously the local media helpfully mention that “Tar Baby” was a plot device in Uncle Remus, popularized by Disney in Song of the South. No mention that it’s the only animation that has not been reissued, because it’s widely regarded as offensive on racist grounds.

Lamborn has apologized to President Obama and assures interviewers that he’s confident his apology will be accepted. Isn’t it ironic that he won’t touch Obama with a ten foot pole, yet can count on the man’s magnanimity? Of course he’s right, the president opposes nothing, why take issue with racism?

But I believe Lamborn will have lost his value to even his Tea Party Klan associates. Having his apology accepted, it’s going to be impossible for Lamborn to belittle Obama with even a pea-brain pretense of credibility.

Li’l Abner on the debt ceiling panic

Posted on by
1

Patterned after GM president Charlie Wilson, who said: what's good for General Motors is good for AmericaWhen the satiric cartoon Li’l Abner was made a musical on Broadway, robber baron General Bullmoose sang Bring back the good old days, lamenting the regulation of capitalism, pondering:
“How can you break the market?
            How?
The SEC will not allow
            …one little panic.”
Today with graft unregulated and un-policed, the American public is made to panic for every swindle, to extort from them bank bailouts, tax breaks for the rich, and now cuts to “entitlements” such as poverty class pensions and medical care.

The Li’l Abner strip may not have had the legacy of Pogo, or longevity of Gasoline Alley, but it was the Doonesbury of the 30s and up to the 70s. In the introduction to From Dogpatch to Slobbovia, a little compendium of Abner scenarios, cartoonist Al Capp said this about his artistic intentions:

“to create suspicion of, and disrespect for, the perfection of all established institutions. That’s what I think education is. Anybody who gets out of college having had his confidence in the perfection of existing institutions affirmed has not been educated. Just suffocated.”

Avid fans included Queen Elizabeth, Charlie Chaplin and John Steinbeck who wrote:

Capp is probably the greatest contemporary writer and my suggestion is that if the Nobel Prize committee is at all alert, they should seriously consider him.”

As a side note, the Broadway cast of Li’l Abner included the character Stupefyin’ Jones, played by Julie Newmar aka Catwoman, and Appassionata Von Climax, played by Tina Louise, Ginger of Gilligan’s Island –if you always wondered how the character Ginger could not have failed to be a real “movie star.” Tina Louise began her career on Broadway in the 50s and was age thirty-something when the TV series aired. Imagine green-lighting an actress of that age today to play a sex symbol, yet Louise became as yet TV’s most enduring sex symbol.

Colorado Springs councilwoman pulls her Lisa Czelatdko card, thinks being a dumb blonde joke deflects accusations

Posted on by
Reply

Which is worse on a city council? A council member who’s disabled mentally or morally? At least in combination, stupidity gives away dishonesty. Colorado Springs city council real estate proxy Lisa Czelatdko tried to use her position to get preferential treatment at the Pikes Peak Center box office, then wrote about it on Facebook: “I pulled the city Councilmember card.” When criticized, Czelatdko fabricated an alternate tale contradicting her own words, then belittled accusations of wrongdoing, based on the logic that her ploy had been unsuccessful. When she finally apologized, she was sorry that… everyone had gotten the wrong impression! So let’s see: influence peddling, stupidly describing it, lying, being too stupid to recognize the transgression, stupidly thinking no harm done, & making a dishonest apology. In sum: Czelatdko’s integrity ties 3/3 with her intellect. Getting her off the city council might be as easy as removing her chair before the next meeting, unless she steals someone else’s.

Lying may be par for political office, acknowledging right from wrong too much to ask as well, but failing to understand why her constituents take offense is a disaster. I know some find this quality disarming in a politician, for example George Bush the Last. Like Dubya, Czelatdko’s mental shortcomings appear to concentrate in the moral.

In her own words, here’s what happened: LCz on FB:

“Boo hoo. Tried to get (tickets) … with no luck. Finally getting desperate I pulled the city Councilmember card and that (Pikes Peak Center) is in my district, nope, nada, nothing! I guess I just have to listen to them on my iPod,”

When the fans hit the shit, Czelatdko pretended that the story had been misinterpreted, that she was name dropping in effort for the clerk to get the spelling of her name correctly. Except, she’d already explained she’d tried to use the influence card. Not just being a council member, but the member responsible for their area.

Do we know if Czelatdko got to see the show? Maybe her Facebook plea reached somebody who wanted the opportunity to do her a favor. A box office clerk would be an unlikely person to need to bribe a councilwoman, even one responsible for their employer’s district, but no doubt there were businesses out there who could scramble something for the pandering politico.

It’s not that a city council person boohooing is unbecoming, the fundamental expectation of privilege is unseemly, and then especially to pretend it means nothing.