Eating You're Dead

I don’t understand what all this fuss about Unions and tax cuts and the middle class is all about. After all, if we let the large corporations take all the tax cuts at the expense of the poor and unemployed then they can then reinvest the proceeds from those tax cuts into low paying jobs like McDonalds. After all, there is only so much money. We can't all be rich. Why even try really? At the end of the day you need money to make money right? And if you don't have money then clearly it's because you have not tried hard enough. Isn't that correct my right-wing friends? It can't because the cards are stacked against most of us from the very start of the game with college educations being out of reach of most people in terms of cost and all too many caught in the cycle of poverty to begin with.
And single mothers, clearly you are that way because you did something wrong and not because all TOO many fathers are deadbeats leaving you to rot in the confines of your own life. Let's not completely forget the single fathers though. They too are stuck in the same cycle. Oh you had a baby?!? Don't you understand that in America you are on your own if you do that? Yeah, see the right wing freaks that ran this country for most of the last 30 years don't believe in teaching you all about birth control and when you do learn about it you're taught that it's a filthy habit to have. See when you took that abstinence pledge you also failed to carry contraception because you had no intention of having sex. Anyway, long story short you're stuck with that kid. See those same right-wing people who don't want you to have an abortion of use contraception also don't care about you or your child. For them "life begins at conception and end at birth."
Tax cuts for corporations encourages them to invest in the economy and that is far more important than investing in the poor and in the schools and in the towns and cities. Don't worry. Eventually things will get bad enough that we will just privatize all of the above and the same care and thought that you get from Comcast or your credit card company can be all yours at City Hall.

It used to be the case that it was a war of poor people against rich people. Class War is the term the right-wing has used for years to make you think that they were being unfairly attacked. When they won that they decided to declare war on the Middle Class and they are doing quite well. Predatory lending, deregulation and the systematic dismantling of all life as we knew it has slowly chipped away at the spines of the average American to the point that life is just a slow grind into poverty.
I will say this much, we have been all to happy to oblige them, in some cases with the spoils of credit. Too much stuff and too much debt makes for bad times.
Then there are those people who have literally used their credit to survive. They use credit cards to buy groceries and pay utilities and take out loans to buy reliable vehicles to take them back and forth to work at jobs where their health insurance and benefits get slashed every year to the point that it often becomes more of a burden to keep them than to let them go.
Try to get meaningful health care reform and we get attacked viciously by right-wing maniacs who listen to every fear drenched word that is fed to them by other maniacs who are hired by giant companies to tear down the reform before it even happens and when all is said and done we end up with watered down reform that will probably be torn to shreds by a public doesn't know or care what it does.
Manufacturing has evaporated. Once a solid post in the house that middle class built, manufacturing is now just a haze over the pyre of the American dream after giant companies again decided that it would be cheaper and more impressive to the shareholders if we pocketed all that money we were paying those uppity union folk.
How about the teachers? Fuck them. Just a bunch of lazy know nothings that stand around with their hands in their pockets collecting fat paychecks and driving around in fancy cars. Hell they only work 8 months a year. What do they need all that money for? It's not like they are having to pay anything out of their own pockets for supplies and things the school districts can no longer afford because the people won't allow them to raise their taxes.
After all, why would the people want their taxes to go up. As it stands you have to have at least two jobs in the average house just to pay the bills. If you're lucky one of them is a good job and you can afford to have cable. Big government. It's obviously just a euphemism for socialism, the big, bad scary. It takes a lot of nerve to collect taxes to provide benefits to the poor. What do the poor do anyway? You know that all those benefits are going to people who just have kids for the hell of it just to get more money from the REAL taxpayers. It's not like the minimum wage is so low that a person will only bring home around $11-12 thousands dollars a year working full time. Why would someone in a job like that not try harder. Clearly they aren't making more because they don't work hard enough. It's not like companies are still paying people the same sort of wages they were paying ten years ago. I mean come on.

Any store clerk who sees the average consumer any day might try to convince you that it's not all welfare queens and bums taking in money from the rest of hardworking folks but don't be fooled. There's no way that someone who goes to work everyday and puts in 100% won't be rewarded with a living wage. It's not like companies out there are listing people as part-time while working them full time so they can't take advantage of a benefits package they couldn't afford even if it were offered. That's where I am so thrown off by the nerve of those union people thinking that their benefits are more important than tax breaks for companies that after 30 years of trickle down economics have yet to make a meaningful contribution to the rest of the working class and, for that matter, in many cases tax revenue.
They have clearly invested that money. After all, during the Clinton years alone there were 21,000,000 jobs created. Nevermind the fact that you need to have two or three of them, per person, to get by. After all, they created those jobs from their own loins and sweat. Have you ever gripped a pen for a long time? That kind of sweat.
The reason that the middle class needs to take the cut now is because their is no money. We're broke.
Nevermind that the wealth in this country is astonishing by even the standards of King Midas. It's not a problem that only a few people have it. This is America. If we can't make more money than we aren't trying hard enough.
I know a lot of you feel short-changed and want to direct you anger. That's why there are so many lobbying groups to take advantage of your rage and harness you with lies and enemies rather than meaningful solutions to your problems. They want you to be angry, not rational. If you were rational you would know that the same people trying to talk you into fighting for the dismantling of the unions and the rest of them middle class because they are too highly are the ones that have all the money that used to be in the hands of people like you and the middle class. They want you to tear down the last walls that stand between them and the last of gold this country has too offer. After all what do you have to lose? So go on and let them tear apart the last bastions of the middle class. Help them do it and when it's all done don't let anyone tell you that this was a war between the lower class and the middle class started by the upper class. That would be silly. Like eating your own dead!

How I Learned To Stop Worrying and Just Hope That No One Is Dancing

It’s been awhile since I shared anything but nonsense videos that were hastily put together in some sort of first time experiment.

There are those of you who may not have followed the changes in my life since I have done any updates of meaning. So here goes…and I promise this will be brief.

I moved from Michigan to the Great North Woods of Wisconsin. I transferred to a school here and have been putting little to work into failing the most basic of classes. With that having been said, Walmart will probably be my life for a good long time to come. I have accepted this fate and am working to get my brain wrapped around it.

That pretty much sums up the changes in my life as of the last six months that I am willing to broadcast in a manner such as this.

Now onto other dramatically less interesting things.

What I wouldn’t give for some interesting conversations. The most interesting conversations I have had recently have been with myself and believe me when I say that even I get tired of hearing me talk. The most interesting conversations I have had have, in large part, been online.

I have been watching politics more in the last six months or so and am stunned at the basic degeneration of rationality. Shocker! I shouldn’t be surprised, but I am. There are a lot of pissed off people, though I must say that I have run into a lot of people who are pissed off about things that just aren’t a reality. A lot of them are just projecting their anger at the circumstances around them into percieved or imagined slights and injustices. It throws me for a loop to argue with many of them about the inaccuracies they rage about because the few that have read up on what they’re pissed about have gotten a lot of their information from people or sources who are just trying to drum up rage toward one group or another. Many are just irrational. How do you fight that with common sense? You don’t. I have in many cases given up trying to inform people of the reality because many of them are pissed and just don’t want to hear it. Oh well. I guess I will just wait for the revolution and hope that I own guns by then.

I finally called the local utility co-op about a line on our bill that was confusing me. It’s just called “Purchased Cost Adjustment” and tends to increase the electricity portion of the bill by nearly 50%! I called the local office about this to try to find out what it was. The woman on the phone essentially told me that the electricity use on the bill for the electricity used and the PCA was an adjustment to the bill for the cost of the fuel burned to make the electricity based on the fluctuating cost of the fuel used to create the electricity. “So, I am essentially paying for the electricity twice?” She responded to that with “well, not really….” and then continued by telling me that she pays more in the county that she lives in as the explanation of the why it was not double billing. If the PCA is for the cost of the fuel burned to make the electricity then what is the regular amount? Delivery? I thought getting pizza was expensive. Fuck! As of right now the overall bill is epic. Good luck with that.

On a side note, if you think Hillsdale County, Michigan is rural you haven’t seen anything yet. This place we live in now is more country than I think I have ever seen. Wow!

I happened to catch a glimpse of Dancing With The Stars recently. What the Hell? Are you guys serious with this? Apparently the premise of the show is that a bunch of pseudo-celebrities get together each week and practice dance moves with professional dancers then compete on the show to see who the public likes the most and votes for or against or some shit like that. I’m not sure exactly, but what I saw was hideous. What the hell are we watching these days. Every time I turn on the television I see all new “reality” shows or someone’s internal organs or some shit like that. Are we really serious about this? This is not a rant against reality television. This is a rant against the people who are keeping these shows alive. “Arrested Development” can’t even run three full seasons, but “16 And Pregnant” can run ad nauseum? I understand trying to turn on the television to distract us from the real world for a minute and to entertain us, but at what point do we decide to use it to get a little informed? I’m not saying turn on CNN and know what’s happening every second of every day. What if we just demanded a little bit more intellectual enrichment from television? No, not learning every second of every day, but just something to jog our slowly rotting brains a little bit? Any chance of that happening? Am I saying that we should all just rot in a glut of information and serious fair or that I am any better than the people who watch those shows? No. Just try to get a little more brain work in your life. That’s it.

So, it was recently revealed that someone at the RNC was taking donors out to some sort of Bondage Lesbian Strip club or something like that. Not sure of the details. It’s all too sordid for me…okay, maybe not, but I just don’t care all that much. Anyway, my point here is that I am kind of confused about the uproar. Apparently, there are people, not the least of which being the Christian Right Voter Assholes or whatever Jimmy D is calling that band of misfits and delusional fucktards, who are pissed to discover that the Republican National Committee is trying to seduce donations out of the mega rich by getting them liquored up and dragging them out to watch young women make out and spank each other. Did I miss something? I thought this sort of thing went on in the well of the House and Senate. I’m just glad we don’t have to pay to get the carpets cleaned. Seriously folks, do you think they are meeting in nicely lit west side offices to discuss the issues and beg for money. No, they show them a good time. That’s the way you do business. Grow up. If you don’t like it, change the fucking culture.

In light of recent news stories about people threatening the life of Democrats who voted for the health care bill, I can’t help but wonder is maybe some conservatives out there have decided that since there’s a chance the health care will save some lives they are obligated to kill enough people to even it out.

The Hutaree. There are two things Michigan makes. Wine and crazy people. It used to be cars and crazy people, but that’s changed. Ugh.

Anyway, I will finish this up for now. I just thought I would share some things with you.

An Open Letter To President Obama

I supported President Obama in the campaign. I was, like many others, a volunteer leader in a very rural and conservative part of Michigan. Believe me it was not easy to defend the candidate because I dealt with many people who refused to embrace his philosophy and politics. I firmly believed in what I was telling them and spent a lot of time debunking lies and talking about the real Obama. Now I find myself at an impasse. First, Senator and candidate Obama sought to provide help to the telecommunications companies that invaded my privacy (I am an At & T customer) when they were in a spot because of it.
Then he tells us that he has no plans to intervene in the discharge of gay soldiers from the military, a repugnant, antiquated and government sanctioned policy that is nothing more than back-door bigotry.
Now he is trying to fight the release of "interrogation" photos that would shine an unmistakable and much needed light on one of the most heinous criminal acts of modern American history.
I understand the need to look forward to repair America in our eyes and the eyes of the world, but, in my opinion, the only way to do that would be to hold those responsible for these crimes up to the judgement of the world. We need to air our dirty laundry and prosecute those who did this. That's the only way to get the stink out of the house. When the toilet overflows and there is human waste in the bathroom you don't move into a shiny new house you fix the bathroom and throw away the parts you can't repair.
We have stopped the sewer from flooding the house, but there is still a lot of clean-up left to do.
President Obama, in order to repair America and bring us back from the brink of the destruction of our the values we all strive to have as a nation you cannot simply overlook the immoral and disgusting behavior of our past.
Gay people are not just sideline jokes to be poked and prodded when votes are needed. I understand that the climate in America is one that does not make providing gay people the same rights as other Americans an easy subject to embrace, but to not do so is disheartening to me. I pay my taxes and I try my hardest to support what I think are the best ways to move forward and help all Americans despite my being boxed into being a second class citizen by the laws and people of the country I was born and raised in. While not politically advantageous, it is the right thing to do. Fight for me to be able to take part in the American dream just as wholeheartedly as any one else in America can. In a time when gay people are confined to the corners of the rooms of American life to pointed at and laughed at by our fellow Americans yours could be a truly influential and powerful voice in the fight to put us on equal footing. To pass this opportunity by without so much as a real foot on the floor stomp to wake this sleeping and weary country that has become complacent to it's civic duties would be the real tragedy of your Presidency. Torture and government sanctioned bigotry should not pushed to the back burner of your time in office to appease a public that is not ready to deal with the mistakes of our past. We all hold responsibility for what has been done in our name, but you have an opportunity, with the bully pulpit, to do more about these heinous issues than most of us could do in a lifetime. Please do not let the legacy of your Presidency read that your fixed our wallets, but wouldn't help us fix our souls.

Shanfroman

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Shit Eyes Is On The Loose or How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Embrace The Doom!!!

Hello again. Sorry for the prolonged absence. School, life, work. Things get in the way. Life is a busy thing but I can deal. By the way, a note here. Yesterday I heard some sort of confessional from some chick named Leona Lewis on the radio. Apparently she is involved in some sort of bad relationship or something like that. She is involved with someone who cuts her open all the time and someone, be it friends or family keeps trying to yank her away from it. I have to say I agree with her friends or whoever. If she is with someone who cuts her open and makes her bleed she should leave. Although I also wonder is maybe she is some sort of masochist because even though they pull her away she apparently pulls away and if she has been cut open and is bleeding in love and still has the strength to pull away then I admire her strength. When a person loses too much blood they get weaker and apparently she is still strong enough to pull away from those pulling her away to go back. I would say I admire her tenacity, but I suspect she is a filthy pervert. We'll see. The other day I was on my way to work and realized I was following a Green Lexus. When we pulled up to a light I saw that there were two teenagers inside driving and riding. What the fucks is this? "We fucks with each other?" How the hell do two teenagers get behind the wheel of a Lexus? I know it was probably property of parents, but who lets their kid tool around in a fucking Lexus? Then again who buys a Lexus? Nevermind. I can see as I write the futility of even bothering to be horrified by this sort of thing. Look at the economic bullshit going on and all the people bitching about how they have had to cut back. Hillsdale County Michigan is suffering from one of it's worst economies, perhaps ever, and they still drive cars that burn more gasoline than most people can afford. Nevermind. It's all pretty brain damaged. U2 has written a musical version of Spiderman?!? Are you serious with this? "Dizz Nee Land" by Dada. There is a decent chance this is one of the most awesome songs ever. I just heard it today for the first time and I think I love it. Never heard of Dada. I also like "Last of the English Roses" by Pete Doherty. Where the hells is American radio at these days?!? Why do I not hear these kinds of things unless I find obscure radio stations? Funny thing is most of this stuff is available on a Clear Channel station that plays alternative music here in GR. I think I hate the idea of Clear Channel, but there is nowhere else I can find the music I am finding on this station. 96.1 in Grand Rapids is awesome. Check it out. It's called The X. I'm guessing that means Generation X and I am also guessing that I am officially cloned. Oh well. One more brick in the wall, right? One complaint...what is with the Offspring? I can never tell if what I am hearing from them is from 10 years ago or last week. I could take or leave them so it doesn't make sense to me. Then again, apparently a lot of people like them because they never seem to go away. "Pretty Fly (For A White Guy)" sucks though. I can't stand that song. I love waffles. Bob Dylan thinks Barack Obama is going to get ruined, to some degree, by Washington D.C. I think he's right. Let's hope the best though. A liquor store in Massachusetts is offering home delivery for $5.00. Michigan, this is an idea to stimulate the economy. Think about it. I'm almost 30 years old. Oddly enough that doesn't bother me in the least. Sure there are pangs from time to time that last about a minute or so, then I think about a time recently when I saw a couple young guys in Denny's. They were probably about 15 or so. They were so awkward. I remembered that age. I realized immediately that I would never want to be that age unless I could have all the same knowledge that I have now. There is no trade off. All or nothing. I've never understood what that was all about anyway. I guess I would have to have some sort of incredible lust for all things young and hip for the fear of aging to make any sense. Then again, I guess people are probably more worried about death. That is what aging is right? One day closer to death? Fear not. Death is no swaggering wonder to be feared and reviled. From what I understand everyone will get the chance. On the other hand I might look at youth differently if someone were going to give a Lexus to cruise around with my friends in. No. I wouldn't. "Morality is temporary, wisdom is permanent." HST There's a wookie on my bookcase. I wonder is he reads to the bird when I'm not here. I wonder if he also calls the bird a "tiny, tiny chicken"? I wonder if the bird cares. I know the bird that flew into the window and took off back to where ever it is that it lives probably cares that I'm here. The body nazis are trying to make smoking an activity that only the super rich can do. What the hell is wrong with these people? I don't blow smoke at people and I have my own insurance. Leave me alone. It's already taxed at over 100 %......Fuck off! Refer to the section above on aging and leave us alone. Just wait until it becomes cool to tax the shit out of the things that fat people love. Imagine a bag of chips selling for $7.00. Doesn't sound right does it? The chips are bad for you. They will come up with some sort of tax based on fat content or something like that per serving. Wait and see. Then you'll wish that you had said something when they started taxing smoker's into oblivion. How about $3 20 oz. sodas. How about $25 pizzas? Think about it people. You know this isn't fair. How about we start adding extra tax to cars because they cause air pollution that chokes people? How about we start taxing people who don't excercise? I know it sound unreal, but if we are going to tax smokers for the health care costs they add to the system then who are we going to tax for the rest. Maybe old people and those with chronic illnesses? Living a long life is a choice but we pay to keep them alive with the cost of health care being passed off. Where does it stop? Daredevils will pay dearly! Oh and can you just imagine how expensive tanning is going to be? How about fast food? How about liquor? How about driving in general? How about guns? Can you imagine a $300 rifle then going for $450? I know what you're thinking. In moderation most of the fatty foods aren't as bad for you as smoking. First of all how many people really moderate there and who would say that someone who smokes in moderation is going to die as quickly as those who smoke like me? Under the same standards virtually anything you can buy in the gas station would cost you a fortune. Imagine your next stop at the gas station going from $10 to between $15 and $20! The cigarette tax may sound like good news now, but wait until they have taxed smokers into oblivion. Who's next? That's it for now.

The Year Of The Jackass

Times are curious and so are the voters. Some of them at least. Today as I was sitting in T.G.I.F. it occurred to me that a lot of those places are all the same. Some weird smorgasbord of inoffensive Top 40 music that is comfortable for the young set or the family types. Bring your grandmother too. She will be amazed at your hipness. She will revel in the walls that are all to covered in shit. It looks like a hurricane of magazine advertisements wandered into the place and shit all over the walls. I will be glad when that trend is over and those places redecorate. I have an idea for the redesign already. They can just cover the walls in neon painted mounds of randomly places horse shit. The whole place can be done up to look like the corner of a horse's stall just as they're cleaning the place out. The food can be brought by men and woman dressed as jockeys and include real horse meat. It will be the only thing we can afford in a minute if things keep turning the way they are. The restrooms can have real stock shares of the Big Three Auto companies to wipe your asses with.
Oh it's getting ugly out there isn't it. Just today I saw a family walking along the road in the tsunami we are experiencing here. The children were being dragged along the road by their parents who were fleeing bill collectors shooting after them in big tow trucks. The family was running because the tow trucks had taken their fleet of Sport Utility Vehicles, but the truck drivers had not become enraged until the family publicly denounced them as swine and then gone for dinner at the Olive Garden with money they saved in their shoes. It was scene too ugly to watch so I turned away and back to my bacon cheeseburger. My waiter who was watching the whole scene asked me what I thought of it.
"They had it coming," I said and tried to turn back to my book, but the man persisted.
"How can you say that, they have children?"
"The children can be sold. There is a great deal of money to be made in the African mining industry," I said and turned back to my book again.
The waiter snarled and grabbed the overstuffed burger off my plate and squeezed it to bits in his hand and threw the pieces back down onto the table. "Enjoy your meal sir."
After he stormed off I thought about what he said and decided that he was right. The children were the ones who really suffered when homelessness and despair gripped the whole family. Now they couldn't even live in the SUV they had invested so much time and money into. Hopefully the Olive Garden kept them warm long enough to keep the chill of a rainy Sunday night from seeping into their bones before the sun came back up in the morning. Hell, maybe the father and mother had found jobs singing birthday songs to customers and washing dishes crusted with garlic salt and tomato bits.

Hank Williams Jr. in on my television singing about how the woman do it in Dixie with a bunch of women I have never seen in the south or the north. These are the kind of women you rarely find outside of L.A. or some other depraved hollow like that. The kind of women you will only find in plastic surgeons offices or on the set of movies with title like "Deep Diving:Virgin Assholes 11" or "Dicksie Tricks 12:The Deep South". We leave the country music channel on for the bird because it seems to respond best to country music and parakeets need sound on at all times, even when sleeping, or they start to fear immediate attacks from predators of all stripes who would devour them whole.
It's not so different from how humans would be if we had any predators to worry about but ourselves and our pet monkeys and tigers. Recently a woman had her whole face and hands torn off by a rampaging monkey that belonged to her neighbor. One wonders if there was any music playing when that happened. I doubt it though. I don't think music would have helped. The monkey had been the star of Old Navy commercials. The whole scene makes more sense to me after having spent some time in Old Navy once. The whole place is done up to look like the caverns of an industrial warehouse that just happens to be filled with Quasi-trendy over priced yuppy clothes. The help is bored and angry because they hate their jobs and most of the customers are people who believe they are upscale, but can't really afford it. I would probably want to tear someone's extremeties off too.
Times are tough. Even Miley Cyrus has to sing country music, in addition to her pop music, to hedge her bets against the coming shitstorm. That's why the idea to decorate restaurants like a shitty horse stall is a good idea. In a minute the feeling of home on the town will be all the rage. It's the comfort of home with the escapism of trendy night spots. Leave the shit stained misery of your life for the shit stained misery of night life. It will have the kids foaming at the mouth to stuff their pockets with dogshit to add to the fun. Bring glitter. The night life needs shine!
The art world has known for years the value of feces and in these economic times it will be the only certain currency. Hell, who knows? Wiping your ass with GM shares might make them more valuable. Even the Chinese are getting into the act. The Chinese manufacturing industry is in a tailspin right now because Americans find themselves with less money to buy their lead-based, melamine tainted plastic trinkets. As a result 20,000,000 chinese immigrants find themselves without jobs and the goverment is shitting itself stupid trying to stimulate the economy now that those people can no longer afford to distract themselves from authoritarian control with flashy cars and large homes. We have that much in common with the Chinese right now. One major difference is that China holds $1 trillion in IOU's from America. Worthless IOU's as of right now. That is one thing working in our favor. By the time China needs to collect on those IOUs they will be worthless. Our economies are intertwined. When we stop buying their garbage they need to collect, but they cannot because we only stop buying their garbage when we are broke. Hee hee. Suck on it. That is until they forage far enough into other markets that they no longer need us. How's that for pain? 2009 is the year of the ox on the Chinese calendar and they are prepared to run that ox right up our asses if the times serve them right. 2010 is the year of the tiger. Will they tear us apart or will they wait until 2016, the year of the monkey? Only time will tell. Many people are nervous right now about the amount of our debt the Chinese are buying up. Clearly, if the Chinese are buying it, our debt isn't nearly as worthless as it looks like it might be in a few years. If it is then we will be that family on the curb and the Chinese will be mowing us down with our own cars and trucks. Until then, they need us as much as we need them. At least I hope so. Then again, maybe 2009 is really the year of the jackass and I am just another braying buffoon.

How Does Shawn Speak So Much Without Saying A Thing? "You Just Have To Listen Carefully."

In the middle of a massively snowy night I am. It has been snowing here for like the last day and a half or something like that. I don't know how much has actually accumulated, but I know that according to the weather there are places west of here along the coast that have picked up 14 inches of snow. Holy shit Batman!!

Things are going good here so far, other than that. We have now gotten everything unpacked and where it's going to be. We have a lot more space in this apartment than we thought we would. In fact, it's really roomy, compared to the last place.
I have recently picked back up on Poe's album Haunted. It's pretty good and I would recommend it highly to anyone. It's kind of weird compared to a lot of music out there, but it is also chocked full of hooks and melodies and some awesome lyrics. Maybe if everyone ran out and bought a copy of it then she would release a new one. She has been working on a new album for years and for all intents and purposes she has dropped off the face of the planet. I cannot find out any new info abour her or any new music. If anyone out there knows anything I would really appreciate knowing it. I searched all over the internet today and there was nothing to speak of and none of the fansites had anything that I could find. Anyway....
I start work on Monday at the new store. Well, it's not really the new store. For those of you out there that see me regularly, or did before I moved, this will be redundant. I have worked at this store before. I worked in this store a couple of years ago on my first failed attempt to get out of the county. As a matter of fact, I was even doing the same thing I will be doing this time. Long story short, things went south in a bad way last time for reasons that I will not get into, but I will say this much. We are not going to let that happen again. We are on it this time.
I have the most awful heartburn right now. We just had spaghetti and garlic bread and it's always gives me the most wretched heartburn. The kind that sets fire to my throat. It's awful, but I love it so before it gets to that point. Mmm, spaghetti and garlic bread. Shit.
I got an idea for a new story today, that I will undoubtedly never finish. I suppose if I set a goal to finish it before I start school in January then I will at least have the time to write something from start to finish even if I think it's awful because I wrote it in such a hurry. Now is as good a time as any. I have the whole weekend off and no money to do anything and with all the snow I wouldn't want to anyway. We'll see. I will make sure to keep you updated. Maybe someone out there to keep up on me and try to shame me into doing enough with it that when I go back to work on Monday I don't have to be embarassed that I went out on a limb like this and told everyone about something I am excited about that I never got back into after I talked about it. Did that make sense? Was that run-on sentence really as long as it looks on this screen? Is that indicative of how I write in general? Let's hope not.
I think the fucking reindeer in my profile picture is mocking me. Bastard.
Tell me again why Jack Black won't go away.
My penguin calendar is about to go out of date and I haven't found another one to replace it. "What a terrible thought."
Anyway, I think I am done with this for now.

Bring Me A Drink And Some More Of Those Delicious Peanuts.

Ah, the colors. Shit I don't know. Anyway....

I miss the 10,000 Maniacs. I know dirty hippie, left-wing, bleeding heart liberal, pansy bullshit, but I loved them. I still remember the first time I heard them.

It was in 1992 actually, if I am remembering the timeline. I was in Mrs. Castleberry's art class and she was playing Our Time In Eden. I was living in the woods for the time with my mother because my father had to send us children off so the state wouldn't take us. Of course that was short lived and it was really a horrible thing altogether, but that's not what this was about. I don't remember what we were doing that day, but she put on some music and it was the 10,000 Maniacs. I was immediately in love with the sound of the jaunty tunes and the beautiful voice of Natalie Merchant. After that it became a total fascination with me that I could not indulge often because I was very young and could not afford to get their records. The first time I owned an album of theirs was when my mother got me a cassette tape of their unplugged album when I was in high school. LOVE! Heh heh. I just wanted to share that.

Does anyone out there ever think about the fairy tales and shorts from years ago? Things like Rumpelstiltskin and The Three Bears? How about the Billy Goats Gruff? Little Boy Blue? I loved those things and now I don't even remember most of them, although I am going to start looking around on the internet for them to see if I can refresh my memory.

"Ring around the rosies, pocketful of posies, ashes, ashes, we all fall down." I heard once that Ring Around The Rosies was about the black plague. I should look into that. It makes sense. Shit.

Politics is heavy business. Seems like we always have to wait. (weight...do you get it? That would be much better I think if I could say it instead of write it. Not good at all, but better.)

On the song "Candy Everybody Wants" and one other song I can't remember from "Our Time In Eden" the brass is done by the JB Horns. That was James Brown's back up band. I just thought I would mention that. When the 10,000 Maniacs were introduced on MTV Unplugged (from back when I could stand MTV) they were introduced as Natalie and 10,000 Maniacs because after roughly ten years in the band Natalie Merchant had told them that she would tour and then she was leaving the band to do her own solo stuff. Good stuff too.

Have you ever noticed that when music magazines talk about bands they do it wrongly. "U2 are in the studio." Isn't that wrong? I am not sure. U2 is one band. Are in that case is plural. I think it would be correct if they said "The members of U2 are in the studio". U2 is only one band. Right?

How many of you out there think about animals like the rhinocerous and the hippopotamus without hearing them mentioned. There are so many animals that I was just mesmermized by as a child that I rarely if ever think about or for that matter hear about anymore. Huge freakish creatures that are all but ignored by everyone but animals planet, zoos and five-year-olds.

Speaking of zoos. Aren't they just a drag sometimes. You see animals all the time on television and in videos and they leap and jump and chase and play. You see them in the zoo and it seems like they are always resting. What the fuck is up with that? I still like the penguins though. If I remember correctly they were the only ones moving when I went to the zoo. Then again it was the summer and they did have "air conditioning". The whole place did smell funny though. Kind of like a pet store that really needed to be cleaned. Dirty fuckers.

Tonight, I was visiting Jonathan and in the hour and a half to two hours I was in his house the blowing wind and the snow covered all but one side of my car. How the hell does that happen anyway? In the three hours that my car was parked at home it got a little bit of snow, but not like at his apartment. How the hell does that happen? I think it was the terrorists. They must have tried to bury my car in snow so that I would be stuck and could not get out to find out the details of their master plan. They were probably planning to repaint all of the lines in Hillsdale County so that no one would know where to park. Trust me when I say that the lines just confuse people. I never took driver's training, so I have to ask. Is there a rule about your car driving and parking on the the lines rather than inside them?

Hey kids, don't buy those clothes that come looking used. That's just retarded.

I have to give a shout out to That One Guy. I totally stole this blog style from him. Short bursts of thought. I am going through one hell of a writer's block and trying to figure it out. Then again there are those people who are saying "he thought he could write before?", but they would be wrong. I could never write. I just throw up words.

Good night you rotten fuckers. Hope all is well with you.

The Tyrannical Good Guy...MIA?

Just thought I would let you know, both of you, I believe that the reason I haven't published on here is I have a new blog. Here's the kick in the crotch....it's on myspace. I know, I know. My SPACE?!? Deal with it. It's really not the Devil Incarnate, or Internet or what ever you would call the Devil for computers. It's just trendy. I like it though. I actually have readers on there. I may still post here from time to time, but more often than not, if my recent posting are any indication, I will be posting on there. It's Myspace.com/shanfroman. It's a good thing.

Shanfroman

Independence Day Entry...MIA?

So this year I have every intention of doing an entry for Independence Day or, for those of you who think it's all about barbecues and pyrotechnics, the Fourth Of July. I spent the days leading up to it and the day of and a few days after trying to figure out what I wanted to say. There were a lot of things that I wanted to say, but I just couldn't figure out which ones I wanted to put down. No luck. Nothing stuck out in my mind. The prevailing thought was anger. It was what I felt and still feel. Then like a ton of bricks it hit me. There was something else beyond anger that I was feeling. A couple somethings and I think I will talk about them both here. It's been a few days too long to really count this as my Independence day entry, but what the fuck, I make the rules write? (P.S.-Pun intended.)
When I think about America, my heart swells with a great pride. I wish I could say that I am just giving that lip service. Then it would be easier to decry what I think is the horrible state of affairs in this country. See, I am one of those freaks of nature that are apparently part of a dying breed. I carry a copy of the constitution with me a lot of the time and on occasion I still yank it out and read it. Each time I am still amazed at the thought and care that went into each page of it. I know it’s not perfect. I know that those men left out many things, but that’s where I see the beauty in it. They also left it open so that anything they missed could be added. Anything could be taken away. They set it up so that America could change with the times and still have a solid foundation. It is not a perfect document, but they made it so that we could always make it more perfect with passing time and effort.
America has long been regarded as “The Great Experiment”. Indeed. One of the greatest if you ask me, although most people don’t. They don’t really need to. I tend to go on about it. I’m not always right, but I also encourage others to show me when I am not.
See, to me, America is a country that can always fix itself. Those men set it up that way. America is perpetually evolving. It is always moving and growing and changing and I will be the first to admit that sometimes, oftentimes, it changes to fast for some of us. Some things never change though. America will always be “The Great Experiment”.
There is a darker side to that though, in my opinion. America has an undercurrent of respect and structure that many people do not question and I think many more don’t care to.
America has moved, slowly at first, in a rapid new direction. The people of this country don’t spend enough time with their government and their government, for the most part, doesn’t spend any time with America.
We have moved into a new age. American are now willing to sacrifice their civil liberties to be free from the specter of terrorism. Terrorism has become the new form of government in my opinion. There are those that argue that the government has slowly been subverting us for years. That we have slowly been falling under the rule of a police state. That may be true and it may not. I just don’t know.
I’ll tell you what I do know. Right now our government is committing crimes against us. They are watching us ALL in new and unprecedented ways. Phone calls, banking, library cards. They are watching us on levels never seen in such a scope and in new ways. They are doing it WITH the approval of a large part of the population. I don’t know if that large part really believes that it’s the right thing to do or if they are just following the President or if they just don’t know what else to do. I just don’t know. All I know is that it should deeply offend every American. It should offend every person who ever took pride in the people who defend us. It should offend every person who ever defended us. It should offend every person who ever voted or thought about voting. It should offend every person who considers themselves American. There are some motherfuckers in this country who will say that anyone who doesn’t have anything to hide doesn’t need to worry about. What a sorry fucking excuse. There are a lot of people in the world who aren’t ashamed of their bodies, but you don’t see them out walking naked. There are a lot of people who aren’t criminals who don’t want strangers traipsing through their house.
It is pretty goddamned twisted when someone who really wants to live a private life is come down on because they do not want the government going through their privacy at will. I don’t like it, but I also don’t like that when I express that sometimes I am made to feel ashamed. There are people who believe that someone who wants to protect their privacy may really have something to hide. This new mentality casts a shadow on anyone who feels this way.
Anger was one of the emotions I felt. Pride was another, but today I realized which one it was that I couldn’t put my finger on.
The other night when I was watching the fireworks I couldn’t help but think of the troops. Jonathan said that there are troops in Iraq who probably fear the sounds, the booms, that we were basking in. When he said that I started thinking about the war and America and the new mentality and the great pride I felt in this country that was coupled with a new kind of shame and suddenly as I watched those fireworks I had tears in my eyes, but there was some other emotion that I couldn’t put my fingers on until I had a few days to think about it.
Fear. Not your typical fear of terrorists or the economy, but fear of that new mentality and the ramifications of it. Fear of the apathy sweeping the nation and the helplessness that stems it. Fear of the politicians who are too busy trying to RUN the government that they apparently don’t realize they are destroying it. Fear of the belief that there are people who want to stop this but don’t know how. Fear of the belief that there are people out there who want to stop, but think it’s too big. Worse yet, fear of the people out there who think it’s okay. People who don’t mind sacrificing what they think is a luxury. People who don’t mind giving up their rights to combat the terrorists. People who just don’t understand the rights they have and don’t really care.
Fear of “The Great Experiment” being a failure because the mad scientists took over and the good ones just went home.

The Bill of Rights
Amendment I
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

Amendment II
A well-regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.

Amendment III
No soldier shall, in time of peace, be quartered in any house without the consent of the owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law.

Amendment IV
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

Amendment V
No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a grand jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the militia, when in actual service in time of war or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use without just compensation.

Amendment VI
In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the assistance of counsel for his defense.

Amendment VII
In suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury shall be otherwise re-examined in any court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law.

Amendment VIII
Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.

Amendment IX
The enumeration in the Constitution of certain rights shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.

Amendment X
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

Jellied Mush, Or How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Eat My Cigarette Butts!

Okay, so tonight for the very first time in my life I saw Sex And The City. Well, I can’t really say that I saw it. I watched a few minutes of it on Fox. I cannot believe what I saw though. It was, without a doubt, a few of the worst minutes of television that I have ever seen. I can’t believe that it was watched by so many people and was a hit. The writing was just horrible. The characters were these washed out, watered down humanoid creatures. It was awful. I would even go as a far as to say excruciating. I just stared at it, unable to pull my eyes away from the TV. It was like watching a baby get eaten alive by wolves. Too horrible to watch and yet just freakishly awful enough that I couldn’t turn away. In just a few minutes I saw punch lines that I should have seen coming from a mile away, but didn’t because they were so bad that I couldn’t imagine any television show that any more than two or three people would watch using them. It was horrendous. It somehow managed to be worse than Friends, and that’s saying something in my book. I was finally able to turn away when my survival instincts made me put my cigarette out in my eye. Although, to my credit, I barely noticed the cigarette. It only hurt slightly more than Sex And The City did.

Something else hit me in the face this week. For the first time I saw the beer commercial with the “Don’t wish your girlfriend was hot like me” song. What the fuck?!? I just don’t understand. What is with that song? I just don’t get why everyone likes it so much. Could there possibly be more trite, ridiculous lyrics. Well, I suppose there could be but, Britney Spears is busy birthing babies and Justin Timberlake is off somewhere trying desperately to find a suitable replacement for Michael Jackson to rip off. (Here’s a suggestion...let’s get the whole lot of you to try impersonating Jim Morrison. At least he had the decency to die before we could all catch on to his schtick. Sorry, baby boomers but being drunk and stoned is not art. Neither is warbling and yelling. Throw the two together and what do you have...a dead guy.) Anyway, I don’t even know where to start with all of this. What can I possibly say about a bunch of hoed out bitches strutting along singing about being trashy and whorish and then having the whole fucking world snap up their albums and run wild with it? Gotta love the kids these days. No, scratch that.. gotta love marketing. We have somehow figured out how to sell shit to people who wouldn’t be caught dead cleaning up after their own dogs. I bet you the people who buy this crap are the same ones who are responsible for the return of capri pants (buy some fucking shorts...you look ridiculous) and the enduring popularity MTV. Give me a fucking break. I just recently got digital cable and found out there are like thirty six MTVs and Vh1s. Guess what. Some of them play videos. Not the originals, but hey, we can at least give them credit for pandering. Oh, how many goddamned soul and jams channels do we need and why don’t just call it what it is. Hydrogenated substitute crap that years and years ago passed for music before it was bastardized and raped and turned in what they now call R and B and rap. Call me cynical, but I almost long for the days of Gangsta rap and Boyz II Men and that’s saying something again. What the hell ever happened to folks like Stevie Wonder and Marvin Gaye and rap before it was all about shooting people and bling and jewelry? Keep in mind that I gave up all most all forms of new music a while ago. It’s all just turned into some kind of jellied mush. Hell, most of the older bands and old bands that I loved have turned into jellied mush. For Christ’s sake, or for my sake rather, just give it up. In the meantime, quit trying so fucking hard to market music and just make it. See if that does anything for you. While I’m at it, is there any chance that anyone out there could get MTV and VH1 cancelled. I won’t even get into CMT and GAC. As long as someone is watching those two channels I know that there is one less dingbat on the streets. On the flip side I do have to give the country stations credit for something. I did recently see a Dolly Parton video. Kudos. Maybe country radio followed your lead icons like Johnny Cash and Willie Nelson wouldn’t be shoved off into the dustbins of the past. Remember new does not necessarily mean fresh.

Strange Ramblings From Someone Who Shouldn't!

Here's my thing. Back in 2004 when George Bush was seeking a second term as President I noticed that out of nowhere John McCain seemed to pony up his soul and go out of his way to butter the Bush's buscuits. At the time I theorized that it could be because the Vice President was going to step off the ticket and that McCain would be in....I was wrong. Now with rumors flying that the VP may step down in 2007 after the mid-term elections I cannot help but wonder if it's not because they already have someone else in mind for his job. Maybe a senator who is currently courting the conservatives in the country for what looks like a bid for the presidency in 2008? Dumping Cheney would help Bush and while working with Bush would hurt McCain a bit, what better way to campaign for the Presidency than to do it from the Bully Pulpit of the White House. With Bush on the way out McCain could distance himself from the Bush legacy and bring some conservatives back into the fold and some liberals too. Hmm. I know how crazy this sounds, but Hell you just don't know with these bastards anymore.

Shanfroman

The Panicked Sheep Have All Obtained Weapons

The sky is grey these days. The rain will not stop. The goddamned weather channels all say that the rain is going to continue for at least another six days. It might as well go on for another sixty. Things have gone crazy. Even Bill Cosby is on CNN cursing the world and giving network news employees shivers.
The President of the United States has run amok with power and the impotent congress is loath to stop him. The Band once told us they took respite on Cripple Creek and I can only hope that they have room for the rest of us. Today, I was reading a book I have read at more times than I am comfortable admitting just yet and in it the author, Hunter Thompson, referred to "panicked sheep" as one of the alternatives to the vicious years of the Nixon presidency. I am beginning to wonder if maybe that panicked sheep syndrome hasn't developed into something far more ominous.
Since the attacks of September 11th, 2001 I think the American people have lost what was left of their minds. It has become perfectly acceptable for perverts to hold positions in high offices and to watch over us like the good neighbors they want us to think they are. The American people are perfectly content to let the government trample our civil rights all in the name of keeping phantoms terrorists from attacking by the dark of night. I cannot help but wonder if most people even know what terrorism is. They think, I think, that terrorism is bearded men with turbins trying to kill Americans. When one actually looks at the definition of terrorism they realize that there are far more ominous implications to it than we even imagine.
Many Americans apparently have no concept of the right to privacy granted by the Bill of Rights. Most Americans apparently are perfectly content to let the federal government track their phone calls and library checkouts without cause or reason. I am so tired of hearing people say that if I have nothing to hide than I should not be worried about it. If this were happening at work than most people would look at it much more differently. I would like for you to imagine what it would look like if you worked for a company for 26 years (my age and length of citizenship) and then one day one of your coworkers steals money from the company and destroys his computer on the way out, destroying senstive company documents with it. Well, take it to the next step. The next day your bosses tell you that they will be listening to all phone calls from all employees. Reading all email, memos and what not in an attempt to catch the next person who may try to do it again because they know that the guy had help in the office. They inform you that they will not be monitoring just your business, but also all of your personal time at work, all of your personal emails, all of your calls from home...everything. I think that most people would have issues with that. See, there are people that want to have that privacy who don't have anything to hide. Have things really slipped that far into the abyss that we really believe that people who don't want this monitoring to take place have something to hide? I would be willing to bet that there are more people who don't agree with it than we would all like to think and believe it or not they aren't all holed in shacks in the mountains with piles of ammunition and explosives. They are not all Michael Moore liberals and they are not all unpatriotic and or hoping that the terrorists win.
The people of the United States have been whipped up into some absurd frenzy of fear and paranoia that it almost stunts my growth to think about it. There entirely willing to surrender their personal freedoms in the form of a bank issued cashier's check to protect us all from terrorism that we have created a new brand of terrorism. We have created our own prison that will come back to bite us in the ass. Are we really so busy in our everyday lives that we cannot take the time to really consider the fact that we are okay with people being detained indefinately without charges or lawyers just because someone in the government told us that they were terrorists or knew the terrorists? Or are we just that selfish? I say selfish because there are very few Americans who would just stand idly by if this happened to them. We would go apeshit if it were us. What do you think the reaction would be if a troop of soldiers just dropped down into some suburbian heaven and started snatching people up all in the name of security. Are things really far enough gone that we would just say that they must have done something wrong or else they wouldn't have to worry gotten snatched up? Or is just the American people sitting off to the side and seeing the headlines and saying "oh, that government, but what can you do? Thet are all crooks and liars,"? Fuck that. Write a goddamned letter. Turn off American Idol long enough to read a fucking newspaper and then respond. You have a government representative who works for you. Tell whoever it is that they need to get off of their ass and fix it. Believe it or not, if enough people told them what they really thought the congress would listen. How in the hell do you think that all of these activist groups can get anywhere? It's not all money. I know that most people think that you can win any election if you have enough money, but that is simply not the case. A goddamned lobbyist cannot control what a politician knows will cost him his job.
Look, I have clearly lost my original point here, I think. See, in the last few years we have all gone crazy with fear and rage. We are willing to let our government run amok blowing up whatever suits it in the rest of the world. We actually let them put that goddamned color coded terror system in place for those challenged by words and ideas. We let them pass off the fucking duct tape on the windows all while we let Musty Sea TV and Brangelina take over the world. We have dropped the ball and we should be castrated and sterlized for it. We have trusted individuals who I will not name to drop us into a bottomless pit with the promise of a jet propelled rope at some point all in the name of some fear that we should have had years before it slammed us and then we decided to make up for lost time, right now and the future all in one fell swoop. We have chosen, through our own negligence, to run around like panicked savages trying to pull our own heads off at the first site of fire in our house, spinning dumbly, with pistold, at anything that moves in the dark of our yard, in the post office, in the streets, in the airports and wherever else we may be that doesn't include name tags. To make a long story short we have just jumped our good senses and left them on the airplane so that we can feel safer. To me it is no different from getting arrested so that we can stay in a cell that no one from the street can get into to keep from being mugged. It's okay though. They are looking out for us so that the other they can't attack us again. Right?

Shanfroman

"It's not dark yet, but it's gettin' there."
Bob Dylan

Flag Suckers Beware! " Your time is gonna come..."

It has come to my attention in the last few months that there are certain groups and individuals who are once again celebrating their annual Mission to Undermine the Constitution and limit the rights of free speech for the rest of us proposing, once again, an amendment to the Constitution Of The United States of America to ban the desecration of the U.S. Flag. Some of these people are random crazies who saw Saving Private Ryan and thought they saw Nazis everywhere they turned. They’re the same ones who think that Osama Bin Laden is lurking in the corner of their favorite bars in all places at all times waiting to blow them to smithereens for loving freedom. I’m not endorsing Osama Bin Laden by the way, I’m just saying that him wanting to kill us because of our freedom is a very simplified and deceptive sound bite that is more for newsreels than intellectual debate. It’s cheap and the men and women in our government and media who peddle it should be slapped in the head until they promise to be more honest in the future.
Anyway, before I get much further into that I need to get back to my original point. Senators Orrin Hatch and Rick Santorum, both up are reelection in 2006, have endorsed an amendment to the constitution to that effect and in the House an amendment proposal was sponsored by Rep. Duke Cunningham, who recently announced that he would not run again in 2006 after he was immersed in scandal(his immersion, by the way took place after the proposal). Do you see a pattern here? I know not all of the people favoring this thing are up fpr reelection next year, but at least a pile of them is. Silly me I just don’t know where I get off questioning the integrity of politicians.
The point of the whole thing is to amend the constitution so that the Congress can pass a law banning the desecration of the flag. Desecration for those of you that don’t know is like violating the sanctity of something or treating it disrespectfully. The whole point of the thing is to be able to finally get a ban on flag burning passed. There have been people trying to do it for years. Flag burning has been a major issue since 1969. One side claims that the flag should be safe-guarded as a symbol of our democracy and America and our troops and the noble efforts of all the above to protect and defend the freedoms we have here in America. The other side claims, and I believe rightly so, that flag burning is protected under the first amendment and that an amendment banning it would be a violation of our right to free speech.
Maybe I am looking at this all backwards. They want to ban flag burning, a powerful statement of disillusionment with our government, and an even more powerful form of expression, because it violates the sanctity of all that which we hold beautiful and dear and near to our hearts as red-blooded Americans, but they don’t want to anything about shorts designed with a pattern cut from material with the flag printed on it. Let me get this straight. They don’t want to do anything about people running around with their ass stuck to the stars and stripes, dirtying it up on park benches and public bus seats and the floors of public toilets. I supposed that Free enterprise, consumerism and Tommy Freaking Hilfiger are more patriotic than the first amendment. Go figure. For that matter what about all the napkins and paper plates and table cloths and God knows what else out there with the flag printed on it that comes out every year on the Fourth Of July? What about all that sh*t? Is it not desecration of the flag for someone to slap a half pound of potato salad on Old Glory and then use a napkin with the Stars and Stripes on it to wipe their mouth off? Is it not desecration to drop a piece of chicken slathered in barbecue sauce on the flag which has been printed on a plastic table cloth? What the hell? Is it still not desecration when all of those things covered in the leavings of a picnic are then thrown into a trash can in a public park paid for by the government instead of them being burned, which is the honorable way to dispose of old and weathered flags? Which is more disrespectful? Burning the flag to protest the government, which is constitutionally obligated to protect your right to do just that, or to wipe your mouth with the flag and then throw it away? Don’t forget covering your ass with the flag just because it is fashionable! I am not saying that we should ban these other things, though I am against them. I am particularly against those tacky ass ribbon shaped magnets with the flag and the American Eagle on them. Damn those things are stupid.
My point is that burning the flag and wiping your mouth on it and sitting on it or making a fashion statement with it is protected under the first amendment and it should stay that way. Popular moral order should not be the law of the day, the law should. In addition to that the law should not be the moral order of the day. The law should never be used as a tool to get reelected and the constitution should not ever be used to stifle the expression of free speech. It’s there for just the opposite.
Call your Senators and Representatives and make sure they know that. You can find contact information for all of them at thomas.loc.gov under their appropriate menus.

You can also get a better perspective than mine from this site.
www.veteransdefending.org

President Jefferson And Britney Spears Caught In Legal Debacle!!!

Well, it's time for another minute with me, if you are so inclined. Though I suppose if you weren't then it wouldn't make a difference because you wouldn't be here.
I thought it would be prudent to talk for a bit about something that has been on my mind a lot for quite awhile now.
Just today a coworker of mine asked what it would take to get young people involved in politics. I told him, with good faith mind you, that he should show them how it could affect them. Show them how everyday life for them is governed by politics. Tonight I find myself wondering if it would really be that easy. Government is not sexy. IF I GET ONE COMMENT ABOUT INTERNS I MIGHT BLOW MY STACK. THOSE JOKES ARE OLD. Black Ram Whiskey tastes like really ripe raisins, by the way. I just thought that I would add that in. I like it. I don't remember where it's from. I got it from a friend. It's good. It's good. PS-FLLV is on the way. I need to get some more stuff. Anyway, what the hell happened in the last 50 years or so? Is there some reason that Civics in general has all the popularity of Melissa Etheridge in a baptist church? When did government become some sort of drag? What the hell is wrong with all the parents and teachers in the world? At what point did you all decide that your kids would be better off not worrying about their own government? You may be thinking "who the hell is he to tell me what I should and should not be teaching my kid" and I suppose that would be your right. What the hell is the deal though? You taught them to eat and talk and walk and throw their sympathy at the handicapped. Why didn't you teach them to throw their sympathy at their National Government? Handicapped people get along better than most politicians now. At least handicapped people can work jobs with the general public. Politicians spend all day every day surrounded by drunken sots with no point or purpose other than the daily grind of listening to people like Tom DeLay prattle on and on about things like babysitting the children of oil barons and preserving the amniotic sac of stillborn sheep for ritual burial.
Seriously though, what the crap? Doesn't it make a difference to anybody that our children know more about the clothing that Jessica Simpson wears, or barely wears lately, than they do about how a bill is passed or who proposes them or how those bills affect us all? How can anyone be okay with that?
Entertainment:
1 : the act of entertaining
2 a archaic : MAINTENANCE, PROVISION
b obsolete : EMPLOYMENT
3 : something diverting or engaging: as
a : a public performance
b : a usually light comic or adventure novel

Okay, I can see that.

Entertainer:
1 one who provides entertainment

Okay, I can see that too.

Government:
1 : the act or process of governing; specifically : authoritative direction or control

Alright, I can see that too. Authoratative direction or control. So, let me get this straight. Our children are taught everyday that it is important to learn and soak in everything they can about the one who engages in the act of diverting us from everyday life and to ignore the ones who have authoratative direction or control over all of us on local and national and world level. Wow, I have to tell you if that is the case then "The Great Experiment" is in for one fucked up future. Until next time...have a wonderful day and remember that sometimes even I say "Oops, I Did It Again".

"My hope [is] that we have not labored in vain, and that our experiment will still prove that men can be governed by reason." --Thomas Jefferson to George Mason, 1791