Siegelman and Scrushy - Tip of the Iceburg?

Alternet: Going to Jail for Being a Democrat: How Alabama Gov. Don Siegelman Got Roved
By Paul Craig Roberts, CounterPunch.

The frame-up of Siegelman and businessman Richard Scrushy is so crystal clear and blatant that 52 former state attorney generals from across America, both Republicans and Democrats, have urged the US Congress to investigate the Bush administration's use of the US Department of Justice to rid themselves of a Democratic governor who "they could not beat fair and square," according to Grant Woods, former Republican Attorney General of Arizona and co-chair of the McCain for President leadership committee. Woods says that he has never seen a case with so "many red flags pointing to injustice."

The abuse of American justice by the Bush administration in order to ruin Siegelman is so crystal clear that even the corporate media organization CBS allowed "60 Minutes" to broadcast on February 24, 2008, a damning indictment of the railroading of Siegelman. Extremely coincidental "technical difficulties" caused WHNT, the CBS station covering the populous northern third of Alabama, to go black during the broadcast. The station initially offered a lame excuse of network difficulties that CBS in New York denied. The Republican-owned print media in Alabama seemed to have the inside track on every aspect of the prosecution's case against Siegelman. You just have to look at their editorials and articles following the 60 Minutes broadcast to get a taste of what counts for "objective journalism" in their mind.

The story itself bears so much similarity to so many other stories that it seems almost routine. It took a few of the comments to make me realize that suddenly "Dog bites Man" is genuine news.

The news is that "plausible deniablity" is off the table. We now know that when "Dog bites Man," it's almost always the same goddamn dog - just as we always suspected.

The Internet, the web and other emerging peer-to-peer connections are a staggering intelligence advantage to ordinary people, and a freakin' nightmare to those who would prefer to keep citizens "Mushroomed;" eg, "Kept in the dark and fed bullshit."

The Internet, the web, and now the various social media of "web 2.0" are a freaking godsend for people like me who justify their existence by making connections between apparently unrelated things. While the implications of it trouble civil libertarians when they contemplate how potentially troublesome data mining linkages could be, it's a fact that this particular phenomenon is at least as dangerous to those who would abuse their authority than to those they might find "dirt" on to abuse.

This case is fascinating evidence of that phenomenon. Not only do we have evidence of abuse, but clear and damning evidence pointing to a systematic cover-up.

It wasn't all that long ago that the assassinations of Robert and Bobby Kennedy, Martin Luther King and probably others were undertaken without any blow-back to those who set it up, or conclusive evidence pointing to who was responsible.

Back in the day, it only took a few judicious threats here and there, and the ominous, but truthful observation; "Who ya gonna tell?"

The answer today is "the whole goddamn world, and whatcha gonna do about it?" There are people alive today -Sibel Edmonds leaps to mind - who probably would have perished suddenly and quietly fifteen or twenty years ago.

The problem for those who start thinking in that way is this: There is no way to shut up a whistle-blower these days without significant and persuasive notice being taken. And if the implications of data-mining for connections between ordinary individuals may be troubling to ordinary individuals - imagine what the very idea does to the sphincters of people with connections to Karl Rove.

You see, this is one of those ideas that could have gotten me put in a quiet padded room somewhere very private, back in the day, just for pointing it out. But I hardly need to point it out, it's obvious, it's inevitable and it's already happening. The internet is a powerful and absolutely magnificent tool for individuals who need to evaluate the reliability of various information sources.

In "free and open societies" such as our own, a newspaper can be scrupulous about their journalistic standards and still be corrupt as all hell. There are probably three or four stories a year that are of critical importance - and if a paper sits on those stories, it's even better than publishing lies.

Well, that reality actually ended in the mid-eighties, when the Internet became a flood of information, and a way to reality-check information cheaply and reliably. What was first the tool of the hardwired geek intelligencia is now available to anyone with the cash to pick up a second-hand computer. If you are the slightest bit interested in data security, it's pretty darned easy to hide your tracks.

What this new reality amounts to is a means by which the average person can have access to the sort of information that William Casey would have sacrificed his left nut and his first-born to get his hands on - if he could have kept it to himself.

Indeed, that was J. Edgar Hoover's secret to power - files that contained dirt on everyone of significance in positions of power both public and private. Well, of course Rove has taken that tactic to heart - but the fact that he has done it is so clearly obvious to people in a position to "connect the dots" that it significantly erodes the effect.

For instance, ten years ago, even five years ago, Nancy Pelosi may well have gotten away with saying "impeachment is off the table." Anyone who disagreed and could object meaningfully would have no ability to do much of anything about it.

But by now there is some point to saying aloud that "taking impeachment off the table" made no goddamn sense politically or strategically when it's in the absolute best interest of honest Democrats to remove corrupt Republicans from power before they can fix the next election.

It makes sense to say that some combination of stupidity, incompetence and blackmail must account for the difference between implied promises in 2006 and delivered results in time for 2009 have significant and troubling implications.

The web hasn't eliminated smoke-filled back rooms where deals are made between politicians and "the people that matter." What it has done is put a live webcam in there, so we can see that the people in those smoke-filled rooms aren't any smarter, better informed or more high-minded than your average gas-station attendant or insurance agent.

We always had the right and the responsibility to oversee them. Now we have the practical capacity to do so; yes, that is bi-partisan urine trickling down their legs.

Oh - and by the by, what's true here in the US is true everywhere there is a robust Internet. So, pretty much, that means everywhere. The implications for the Taliban, for Norway, for China and Russia are all the same - there's no way of keeping "internal matters" internal, there's no way of ensuring that they don't end up on the front pages of their own media and blogs and there's no way of erasing every single trace of corrupt dealings.

Come to think of it, consider the implications of the internet in an honor society like Pakistan, where it becomes impossible to hide the private dealings of "men of the world."

It's a good way to get a private enterprise rocket grenade enema.

Nor is there any effective way of restricting access to that information without killing off their own economy. Now, some regimes don't give much of a crap about that - but that doesn't mean they can absolutely ensure that their citizenry will obey, when disobedience is so very profitable in so very many ways.

And it's also true of the United Nations, and stuffy old NGO's like the Red Cross. If it hadn't been for the web, I doubt they would have gotten so righteously hammered as they did in Canada, where the government took away their control over the blood supply after it turned out that they had willfully neglected to screen blood plasma for HIV - because it would have been "too expensive." That piece of data became widely known - along with another damning number - their overhead ate up 80 cents of every dollar donated. As I recall, - though it's only a vague recollections - it was a combination of hemophilia advocates who had been tracking this that brought it to national attention, but they did it by way of the internet, skipping the historical process of having to find someone to call who could do something and might be persuaded to do so.

Essentially, what has occurred is this: the web advantages people who deal honestly and who either have no skeletons in their closets, or who use them as festive decor while chuckling gleefully. It has made it clear that those who have invested a lot in appearing to have nothing to hide are less worrisome and more likely to screw you over than those who, say, like dressing up in rubber and don't much care about what "decent people" might think.

The average person is now capable of getting enough information to compete intellectually abd even strategically with "the people who matter," because we also have the ability to collaborate to mutual advantage at minimal cost.

Conservatives decry Wikipedia, for instance, because it's not "definitive," that it is "unreliable," and it's possible to insert innacurate information.

All of this is true - but what they don't comprehend is that the distinction between Wikipedia and, say, The World Book is that you can tell who's fingerprints are on which bit of information.

It's true that you can insert inaccuracies - but the act of doing so is information in it's own right; more compelling than the misinformation. Further, the process by which Wikipedia is self-policed tends to give extra validity to articles that have become stable and uncontested.

Compare that to the editorial policy of The Brittanica or Groliers.

Oh, wait. You can't.

So how do we know they have equal or higher standards, as is alleged by conservative sources?

They say so. Very authoritatively. And to the extent that you would have been able to check, that would be true, back in the day. The problem is, that makes you tend to rely on the accuracy of things you cannot check. And that is where the money is.

Go ahead, look up Armenian Genocide in three or four different encyclopedias.

Now go to Wikipedia. I don't actually know what it says - but I know that it will come from more perspectives than the "authoritative" sources, and the comments section will be more fun than "All My Children" and "Project Runway" put together.

History and culture is no longer defined by the victors, or by those who believe they are the "winners" in our society. Everybody gets their fifteen seconds - and it's archived by keyword on You-Tube forever.

A Standing O for LifeLock.

I just had a look at LifeLock, those "This is my real social security number" people. Frankly - and probably like you - I assumed that it was a stunt, and what was said in bold red at the top was completely negated with the small print at the bottom.

Come to think of it, it's damn depressing how complacent we have become in accepting as a given that any service we get from any corporation should be written as "Service*".

Now that I think of it, it's a little embarrassing to realize that it took the promise of $12.00 from a trusted third party to even get me to look, but I plead 40 years of disappointment in my fellow man as my reason.

Fortunately for them, their actual cost will be two dollars, for ten of those promised dollars will pay for my first month of their service.

Why? Well, you don't often read advertising copy like this:

If your Identity is stolen while you are a member of LifeLock, we're going to do whatever it takes to recover your good name. If you need lawyers, we're going to hire the best we can find. If you need investigators, accountants, case managers, whatever, they're yours. If you lose money as a result of the theft, we're going to give it back to you.

We will do whatever it takes to help you recover your good name and we will spend up to $1,000,000 to do it.

We don't think you will see a guarantee like this anywhere else from any other company. If you do, let us know because we'd like to do business with them. There isn't much fine print in our Guarantee. To see the details, click here.

Any half-decent lawyer will tell you the reason why you should never ever EVER write something as direct and unqualified as this. You WILL have to live up to those words in court, and they will bury you in frightening examples of the consequences of unwise and unguarded words costing businesses hundreds and thousands of words.

One of the examples I remember most clearly from my journalism and advertising courses is the case of a car dealer who promised that during his "Jungle Madness" sale, you could drive away in a new car for "just a thousand bananas."

Sure enough, someone showed up with a lawyer and one thousand fresh, golden, LITERAL Chiquitas.

They were very over-ripe bananas by the time his lawyer was sent from court by a laughing judge and a snickering jury, but that just added fruit flies to injury.

Speaking of contractual language, I'm in violation of the terms of the agreement by being clear about this being a paid post within the post and it would be technically possible for them to refuse to pay, or request a re-write. You see, they didn't want me to call attention to the fact they paid me to do this - no doubt because they are as cynical as I am for pretty much the same reasons.

It's tempting to gloss over the fact that it took the smell of money to get me to write this - but I'd prefer to be honest, and use the risk of not being paid to underline what is my real reason for going so far beyond the 200 words requested. This, you see, is no longer about that.

These are the sort of people you should absolutely do business with, even if you don't absolutely need to. And I'm not embarrassed at all to be seen doing business with people like this. Hell, if they write employment contracts and job descriptions like they do websites, they might actually be the sort of people I'd be willing to work for.

That advertising copy above is the reason. They have deliberately created conditions they will have to live up to.

That lack of weasel-wording, the complete absence of equivocation, the blunt promise of "Whatever it takes, up to a million bucks" is damn refreshing.

If you believe in the idea of the free market, as I do, and believe that it absolutely depends on people who are not just willing, but absolutely determined to play fair, then you need to sweeten the pot for them. You have to choose to deal with people who are willing to stand by their word, live up to their obligations and go the extra mile. You also have to start expecting that standard from everyone else, with no excuses.

Putting binding promises into one's advertising copy inspires in me ten thousand times the deep warm fuzzies that can be derived from a kiloton of adhesive imitation chrome fish.

The promise implied by a chrome fish over the door of a place of business is one that cannot be enforced in a temporal court of law, one not even as impressive as membership in the BBB.

Todd Davis - well I don't know what or who else he believes in - but he surely does believe in the sort of fish you could fry in front of the ninth circuit court and it's a big enough fish to feed a multitude.

I can count on the fingers of one thumb the number of times I've had the legitimate opportunity to say something as nice as this about anything regarding the economy or the practices of American business institutions. I've gotten so damn jaded and cynical, so bleak and depressed that frankly it's become difficult to blog.

What started out as a five minute, money-making chore turned out to take a couple hours of utterly blissful wordsmithing and the high point of my day. And that, Mr. 457-55-5462, is worth ten bucks to me. Hell, it's worth twelve.

I would love to be able to write a story like this every week, and have every word be true and as heartfelt as these. I'm rubbing your nose in the fact that AT THE MOST, I was paid $12.00, in response to the obvious rhetorical question.

My skills are for sale, my my good name is not. Even if it WAS, it would take a minimum of five more decimal places plus benefits, a golden parachute and a pension to compromise my virginity in that respect.

One should should set one's price high enough that it discourages temptation. And I'm afraid that many "persons of significance" have lowered the bar to a point where even minimal standards make a decent assessment of self worth seem positively inflationary.

But it's nice to be recognized for a job done well and honestly. One of the few ways I'm sure something I've said has been read and appreciated is the sound of virtual coin clinking into my PayPal account. Money, as Robert Heinlein said, is the sincerest form of applause.

And by that means and in the same spirit I am suggesting to you that you give Lifelock a standing ovation. "Pour le encouragur le autres"

Bush can't keep his lies straight

Keith Olbermann lists all the various reasons and excuses Bush has used to justify the Iraq war.

I had a roommate once who was a total sociopath, and it took me less than a month to realize that all his "reasons" were really excuses. In fact, he did what he did because he wanted to do it and gave whatever excuse he thought would work that moment. He really had no clue that sane people keep track of these things.


It's been clear for a long, long time that whatever reason exists in George Bush's mind for the war - if any mind or reason exists in any commonly understood sense - it probably isn't one of his utterly disposable excuses.

I stopped keeping score long ago, so I hadn't realized how very damming the sum of his lies had become. But it is truly damning, and indicative of someone utterly incapable of being responsible for the consequences of his decisions. Whether he's a sociopath, a dry drunk, or simply too stupid and isolated to comprehend the issues on his desk does not matter to me, any more than his statements about his political philosophy or his "deep, Christian faith."

He's as inconsistent in those areas as he is in the context of the war, so I conclude that these positions are just as momentarily convenient as any other.

Some of his statements are particularly revealing of an incapacity to deal with the reality of other people, and the idea that his actions give legitimate cause for offense. The latest example is his dismissive reaction to Matthiew Dowd in particular and all parents of service members in harm's way as being "too emotional" to have a valid opinion.

It's pretty easy to demonstrate a widespread skepticism about our misleader.



Then, of course, there was his amazingly insensitive and inept handling of Cindy Sheehan. Whatever you think of her,she's a nightmare of his own making, a visible symbol illustrating his contempt for and impatience with an increasingly critical citizenry.

It has long since become impossible for me to have any respect for the man - and if I am to maintain respect for the office of the President of these United States, I must continue to loudly call for his immediate resignation. If he will not do that, he must be impeached.

Meanwhile, whatever he wants of Congress, and whatever he says to justify his demands must be presumed to be as disingenuous as all his previous interactions with that body, and, I must add, with people representing all parties. I would strongly suggest that various members get together and compare notes on what he has said to them to justify particular votes. I'd bet money that these stories will neither add up nor bear any great resemblance. And I'd be stunned if he's delivered on promises made to secure votes, even with solid supporters such as our own Sen. Ensign.

Congress - and particularly the Republican members - had best realized that the supporters of a liar and a fool are likely to be associated with the lies and foolishness in the public mind. People cannot help but wonder, in the face of overwhelming evidence of his willful, callus and incompetent leadership and contempt for the citizenry, whether that support is the result of blackmail, gullibility or corruption.

More to the point, they probably don't care. They just know that loyalty to a miserable failure is placed above loyalty to their constituents, and there can be no good reason for that.

tag: Impeach the President, George W. Bush, Miserable Failure, ITMFA, Congress, Veto Threat, Matthiew Dowd, Cindy Sheehan, accountability, surge, sociopath, integrety, Iraq, Iran, Too Emotional, Parents of Soldiers, War Critics, Sen. Ensign

Having lain down with his Master, Dowd scratches an itch

An Administration's Epic Collapse | TIME

The three big Bush stories of 2007--the decision to "surge" in Iraq, the scandalous treatment of wounded veterans at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center and the firing of eight U.S. Attorneys for tawdry political reasons--precisely illuminate the three qualities that make this Administration one of the worst in American history: arrogance (the surge), incompetence (Walter Reed) and cynicism (the U.S. Attorneys).

That's brutally unqualified language; criticism that is as accurate as it is surprising, considering the source and given what effect it may have on the access of Time reporters to the Administration. Perhaps they have realized that source is only useful in a geothermal sense.

Time Magazine has always been center - right with an reflex toward conservatism, dispute rumors to the contrary - though of course it IS to the left of places such as Newsbusters, which seems to have fallen of the edge of the spectrum, a reality that is underlined by increased defections by former "hard core" supporters such as Matthew Dowd and the reaction of the echo chamber.

And despite what the echo chambers reverberate, I don't think coming out against the administration is evidence of a "shift to the left," save in the Colbertian sense, that "reality has a well-known Liberal bias." In a truly Conservative, classically Republican world-view, results count more than words. And the Administration's record on delivering any promised reality has been dismal.

Traditionally, Conservatives are fonder of facts on the ground than pie in the sky, of established and proven procedure to grand and glorious socio-economic theory. The caveat is that you must not confuse "Conservatism" with "Social Conservatism," a mindset which is much more accurately described as "reactionary" or "radical," depending upon the issue.

Read the comments - and indeed, the article itself. It's revealing of the very mindset that did in fact lead to the administration's collapse. First, a complete inability to recognize reality, a callus disregard for the feelings and indeed, the well-being of people who disagree, and of course, a stunning arrogance based upon willful ignorance.

As many actual Conservatives have come to belatedly realize, there is a huge amount of karma waiting around the corner with brazen knuckles, intending to extract a long-term payback for short term strategies. While those strategies were effective, far too many were making good livings furthering them, and too many winning elections and contracts based upon the polices of fear and loathing (as set forth in this Salon article.)

[Matthew] Dowd had been central in formulating the 2002 midterm campaign that zeroed in on the Democrats' patriotism. In 2004, he and Rove crafted the negative attack on Kerry as a "flip-flopper." Asked about the TV ads ripping Kerry, Dowd said on Sept. 22, 2004, on CNN, "I think it's totally tasteful. And the American public is going to be fine with it." He also blithely defended the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth defamation of Kerry's sterling Vietnam War record. "I think the Swift boat ads were part of that dialogue," he said in a 2005 PBS "Frontline" documentary, "but it was more important in that they pointed out something about John Kerry, which is, all this guy's talking about is his Vietnam record. What does that have to do with the war on terror?"

Dowd believed he was designing a permanent Republican majority, but, working alongside Rove, his short-term winning tactics built enormous pressure that produced an implosion. During the 2006 midterm campaign that lost the Republicans control of Congress, Dowd worked as a consultant for California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, a Republican running as a virtual liberal Democrat. "I think we should design campaigns that appeal not to 51 percent of the people," Dowd told the Times, "but bring the country together as a whole."

But Dowd neither detailed nor did the Times mention his consulting work in the campaign last year of Richard DeVos, billionaire heir of the Amway fortune, for governor of Michigan. DeVos is a zealous follower of and major donor to the most extreme organizations of the religious right. His campaign against incumbent Democratic Gov. Jennifer Granholm was marked by nasty ads falsely stating: "Under Governor Granholm's administration, you can stay on welfare as long as you want." These weren't a new paradigm but old racial code words.

Despite having won - so to speak - two elections and having near absolute control of the nation and it's policies for six years, there are no fruits of victory - no achievements to commemorate the triumph. And all that "Republican Revolutionary Spirit," all the fruits of the Gipper; all have resolved with seeming inevitability, into one massive, miserable and undeniable failure.

To the surprise of no-one at all, mercenary opportunists such as Dowd will be the first "dedicated supporters" to discover that - to their astonishment - George Bush has committed impeachable offenses, not so much due to a crisis of conscience - though that may indeed play a role, but due to the fact that calling for the blood of the leader may have the effect of shielding the followers from accountability as well as possibly preserving a shred or two of self-respect.

With the sheer number of Nixon and Regan retreads in this administration, the strategy is probably obvious to everyone.

So once again, the usual suspects will be "shocked, shocked to find that there is gambling in this establishment!" And once again, the real lesson of the price of stupid, precipitous and unethical conduct will be lost. We teach our kids in T-Ball and Pop Warner that winners never cheat because cheaters cannot win. Maybe the Mommy and Daddy Parties should remember that simple, kindergarten lesson in practical ethics.

Illustration: Bush Puzzled as to what went wrong by webcarve

tag: Miserable Failure, George W. Bush, Impeach the President, Iraq War, economy, ethics, lies, Matthew Dowd

Of Duty and Honor - the responsiblities of Citizens and Soldiers.

The Unapologetic Mexican:

"IT IS REMARKABLE, this spirit we inherit, this blood we inherit, these dreams and these roads that we wake to find wound around our wrists and across our cheeks like war paint, like sleeplines, like shooting stars tattooed as gentle but indelible reminders. We are children for so long. Our desaturated comic strips blow into pulpy confetti clouds of memory and the palms open to reveal magenta astral charts...alien and familiar all at once. Nameless glyphs that reappear. Faultlines and gold-laden veins that bleed through old tests and texts and packaging slips. Emerald grit upon the fingertips. The voice that sings the moon to sleep reprises her reminders in the secrets that we speak. Drafts of warm air, cool lilac exhalations, and sunset's shadow. Desert sun and greyhound buses and memories of a home you've never touched with your hands."

Daayaam, that's fine writing; goes down like a stubby of Bohemian after a hot day riding a stuker and tossing bales of wet alfalfa - which is what blogging feels like some days, and no Bohemian pilsner to be found here in Reno.

This blog is a challenge and a joy - for I have to say that while it is beautiful, it's template needs a little tweaking for those of us who cannot read six point gold type on a parchment background.

But unlike most pretty blogs - it's worth highlighting or even fuzting with your browser text settings. That was a pretty post. But this is Graphictruth, where pretty is valued only to the extent that it helps the blade of truth slip between the ribs of ignorance.

So check this out.

You forge of your self a dull weapon.

PERHAPS A READER cannot readily agree with the stance of holding soldiers personally accountable for aiding such massive crimes as the invasion of Iraq. Perhaps even though it is made clear to us in everything from time-worn fables to Self-Help books to music lyrics to television shows to age old films to mama's words to our own inner urging—that each person in life is born alone, dies alone, and in the meantime, must stand up and be counted for what they have lent their hand to while here—we still imagine somehow that culpability for anything from kidnapping to assault and battery to murder is mitigated and even nullified, nay—justified, by immersing the self into a collective such as the military. Those who argue as much enable the State to carry out unmentionable crimes and and will do so for the end of time, justifying such dangerous and indiscriminate allegiance by arguing that the cohesion of their nation-state justifies all. These are the people who hand over their will and thought with but a slight gesture, and so they are that oppressive State. They forfeit the discernment and skepticism and autonomy necessary to mark one as a reasonable individual and they do it for a song, for a mediocre fee, for a fable, for a fluffed-up casus belli. For these people, even questioning the codified if unspoken set of rules that make these wars possible is taboo, after a point. And yet those who hold this ideology see fit, somehow, to bemoan the wars waged by the greedy elite when it is only their own ideology of Human as Mindless Tool that makes these wars a reality.

CHI-CHING!

Please tell me why should I not form a militia, or my own government? My own group of people who decide upon a book of laws? Why are they, then, not justified in killing where killing would otherwise be thought a crime? Because they are not your gang? Yes. And that is all. So at least we can be clear on that. There is no great morality that can be defended by any nation, and especially one that operates on the dictums the US does and engages in the hypocrisies that she historically has.

BLAMMO!

There is no such thing as Liberty and Democracy, nor Freedom when you seek dispensation of same from a Government. Because in the end, those glorious ideals and speeches and laws will be communicated with steel and blood and agony and murder, and based on reasons you may or may not agree with. Just as we see now. Just as we have seen in the past. Just as we will see again. For there is no law of society but force. Everything else is a conditional addendum. And to loan your body and will and force to the State—and unconditionally—is to forego your humanity and forge of your self a dull weapon.

KABOOM!

A dramatic - and damnably accurate assessment of the current situation. Nonetheless, I do support the troops. Not because I support the war, or even the supposed intent behind the war. I support their survival, so that they may internalize the experience of being cynically used as if they were Janissaries instead of free citizen-soldiers. I also remind all US Soldiers of their nearly unique oath of service - to "uphold and defend the Constitution of the United States from all enemies, foreign and domestic."

I remind everyone that in supporting the troops, we are supporting fellow citizens in dire straits that are not of their choosing, and if many do not have the courage to take a principled stand such as First Lieutenant Ehren Watada it's due to having families to support - or due to what their friends and families would say. Sadly, many are willing to do wrong in order to be seen as "doing the right thing" by those who do not know better.

If they are unaware - as many are - as to their rights and duties as Citizen-Soldiers under the Uniform Code of Military Justice, and the Constitution of the United States, it's our duty to find out and tell them. They are kinda, well, busy.

So my support to them is specific and limited to doing what is needful to survive. I discourage adventurous heroism. Dead heroes can't vote. I suggest that every non-citizen in US service who wishes to do so, pursue the citizenship they have - in my humble opinion - earned in the most honorable possible way.

But I'd also suggest requesting written orders for any actions that could be considered a war crime. Hell. in this clusterfuck, get written orders for everything, and make multiple copies, especially if related to combat injuries. Funny how hard it is for the VA to find such things.

Most of all, come back alive, in as close to original condition of issue as possible, and rejoin civilian life as an armed, dangerous and motivated citizen voter. We will help, and that, too, is Supporting the Troops.

And hey, we may need you, should it become clear that it's time for a Constitutional Convention.

tag: Supporting the Troops, Military, Constitution, Laws of War, Uniform Code of Military Justice, Citizen-Soldiers, Iraq war, Oath of Service

Speaking Wonklish

Mike the Mad Biologist snorts at the rightward idea that there is insufficient wonkishness in Left Blogastan. (And really, he should know.) He quotes Matt Stoller, as do I, because Matt goes to the heart of the issue.

To put it in context, Kevin Drum's column was written prior to the 2006 election, and was something of an "if we win, then what" sort of piece.

Matt Stoller writes about Kevin Drum's plea for more wonkiness in the lefty blogosphere (italics mine):

I'm not going to go into details, but wonkery is at this point counterproductive because the essence of wonkery is an assumption of good faith. If you write a policy in wonk-land, it's assumed it will be carried out, the law will be respected, the money will be appropriated, etc. The Bush administration has broken that basic compact. They lie. All the time. They approach arguments in utter bad faith from the get-go. They abuse the process, everything from budget battles to conference committees. If you approach people like this in good faith, you lose...

Now, I do want things from Congress. And there are great discussions about the policies that we want, from Effect Measure to Boingboing to The Washington Note. But I'm not going to pretend like any of these are feasible without working out the systemic rot that has infected our discourse and political system. I want to see the law be reestablished as law, policy battles return to good faith terrain, and facts established as the basis for policy-making - and then we can discuss policy. [Emphasis Mine - and I wish I could use the blink tag-BK]

So, that is my suggestion for a policy. A general housecleaning. A return to good faith discourse and good faith politics. THEN we can discuss and argue about things that are not immediately obvious necessities to those unblinded by the delusions of the radical Right.

I say "a return," because much of this situation evolved (heh) from the Dominionist Christian efforts to infiltrate the political process, and they are quite expressly trained, advised and counseled to conceal their intentions, which are frankly to turn this nation into a theocracy not unlike that of the Taliban.

How George W. Bush became the head of the new
American Dominionist Church/State
by Katherine Yurica

Most Americans have been aware that religious right
Republicans have become extremely active politically
in the last twenty years. But because we're Americans
and we're mostly tolerant of other people's religious
beliefs, their rise to power hasn't really troubled us.
We should be troubled. There is now overwhelming
evidence that conservative Christians set out to
takeover the government of the United States and impose
their culture and values upon all Americans. This
article is not a theory--it is factual and historic.
The proof is in this essay. Dont miss this one.

Whatever dominionists say for public consumption, the real goal is what drives them. It's a policy that has brought them some success over the last 20 years, though it's unraveling as their actual agendas become obvious. But meanwhile, their tactics have obviously spread throughout the Right Wing, because in some senses, they have become the spiritual advisers to the Right - and because their tactics work.

For a while.

But as P.T. Barnum so famously observed, you can't fool all of the people, all of the time. The problem for the Right is just that - in order to continue all their overt and covert policies, they DO have to fool all of the people, all of the time. Worse yet, they have to start with themselves. This sort of willful suspension of a skeptical review of policy and ideological faith - and the loud derision of facts in evidence is bound to lead to a bruising collision with reality at some point.

In our case, we have Iraq, a president apparently willing to nuke Iran for reasons we can only speculate upon as his justifications are hardly worthy of the name, a looming energy crisis AND global warming, two linked issues that we should have started seriously addressing in the late seventies.

The right-wing "skepticism" about global warming is presented on the same intellectual level and possesses the same degree of intellectual honesty as it's "skepticism" about evolution and the human and environmental impact of - well, pretty much what any large corporate donor wishes to do.

The leaders of the various right wing factions - and there are many, with growing fissures between them - much prefer blind faith to measured and judicious support of their agendas based on skeptical discussion and review. It's a rather seductive proposition, it makes the job of wielding power ever so much easier and it creates a temporary illusion of juggernaut-like effectiveness.

But the problem of faith is that sooner or later that faith must be expressed in works. Faith - in God, in economic theory, in the merits of a military-industrial oligarchy - must bring a pudding to be proven.

And all we have gotten is repeated, rude figgings.

The cure for this starts with impeachment. Then it goes to a general cleansing of the government of "bushies," those who's success has depended more on loyalty and ideological purity than an honest day's work doing something related to their job description.

For instance, Homeland Security should have some relationship to actually securing our homes and our lands. And isn't that OUR job, Constitutionally speaking? Second Amendment? Well-Regulated Militia? (Volenteer fire departments are good examples of "well-regulated militias;" well-equipped and well-trained community members who are the "first responders" to many emergencies.

FEMA should manage emergencies that are too overwhelming for local responders. The Coast Guard should be guarding our coasts. Immigration and Naturalization should be doing things related to managing a coherent, fair and managable immigration policy. The FBI should investigate federal interstate crimes - which include both terrorism and treason. The CIA should centralize foreign intelligence. And we should have a foreign policy that does not make success in these efforts difficult to impossible to achieve.

This is common sense, of course - and since it is common sense, there's still a general reluctance to admit what a very, very poor job these agencies do when they do anything.

The only sane human reaction these days is to hide when a government agent approaches, for there can be no assumption of either good faith or the ability to do anything to make any human situation more bearable.

So let us start at the top, with impeachment. Then let us be rid of both those who are ideological incompetents and those who decided to play politics in preference to doing the right thing. In this I include many elected representatives of all parties who were in a position to know better, and either chose not to or were too focused on politics to remember that politics is a means, not an end in itself.

Let us restock our government with seasoned, apolitical professionals at the senior levels and task them with clearing out the underbrush.

The job of the government - first, last, always - is the regulation of the commons. Our common markets and our common access to them, our common resources, such as air, water, watersheds and green spaces that we all have an individual and equal survival-level interest in, regardless of wealth or position. Our common systems of transportation that make freedom of movement and access to markets more than just a fine-sounding pronouncement. This concept extends to some rather abstract-seeming things - like the broadcast spectrum, access to information, education and space exploration - but these are all things that we, as citizens of this nation, benefit or suffer from as individuals regardless of wealth, power or position.

Besides, even if you can buy access to power, bribe your way into markets denied the common man, it doesn't follow that you should have to, or that these "protected" markets are therefore superior in any way. Indeed, you've likely bought access to the shark pond, chum.

I have seen this situation coming since 1980. I've seen the promises, and I've seen the reality. This is a poorer nation than it was then, poorer intellectually, poorer financially, poorer spiritually and poorer in every other way relating to the graces and benefits of a civil and civilized society.

This nation has become greedy, mean-spirited, intolerant and - not to put too fine a point on it - stupefied.

The only policy that can be discussed is to rid ourselves of those who created those conditions and replace their policies with those that have been demonstrated to work in civilized nations, in accordance with our Constitution and with regard to it's enlightened intent of maximizing individual liberty.

I believe that a faith in things that work is the essence of Conservatism, and so I appeal to Congress; impeach. Impeach the President now. You are either with those of us who wish to live again in a decent, civilized nation that is well regarded by the world - or you are on the losing side, and the rest of us will be well-rid of you.

tag: Impeach the President, Impeach, Domestic Policy, Foreign Policy, Economic Policy, Wonks,

What sort of people rely on Open Democracy.net?

I got this in my email today.

You may recall that you generously gave your time to fill in our openDemocracy users' survey this summer.

Nearly 3,500 of you did so, a terrific sample. You can click here for a visual tour of the results. We really appreciate your help, it taught us a lot about what you are looking for from openDemocracy.

Survey Says (pdf)...

Overwhelmingly, well educated, well-paid white SMART people, even given a 4% 3d World readership.

In other words, folks like me that the Republican Party has taken for granted for decades upon decades. While the politics of the readership seem weighted heavily to left of center, it's because readership spikes in two places; Center Left (classical liberal, I'd assume) and No Category - where I live, as a Libertarian. "No Category" is arbitrarily placed to the right of Center - which has a lower readership.

From that strong Independant spike (were I bet they did not expect it) it slopes down to bottom out at 3% at Center Right and Conservative. That means a heck of a lot of old-fashioned Center-Right folks are relying on Open Democracy as a reality check - and of course, us generally Anti-authoritarian folks what likes at least three sources before we decide who's al is being gored.

So, my fellow Libs, and fiscal conservatives, dig down and donate. I don't about you, but I always figured the smart money was on freedom. This seems like confirmation to me.

To quote their email to me:

To make the process quick, efficient and secure we are using both a UK and a US service for charitable giving. Anyone in the world can donate, just click here and you can see how it is done.

Do that thing, willya?

tag: Open Democracy, individual liberty, libertarian, 1st Amendment, antiauthoritarian

From the Japanese Interest Desk of the Department of the State of Confusion

And the mystery ingredient is:

BURI!

Words: Japan Probe
Uncensored Pictures: Banana Hole
Censored Pictures and commentary from Lost in Ube

Interesting factoids: NHK is government owned. The occasion was a widely popular New Years Live TV event, the performance the doing of some person called DJ something-or-another (Doesn't seem to be lacking for free traffic already), who reminds me irresistibly of The Chairman from Iron Chef. Clearly the mystery ingredient is BURI!

Turns out that the fully-dressed performers were wearing body suits airbrushed to appear as if they were naked. (Note, a stunt that would not work with Vegas dancers).

It turns out that a large cross-section of the audience (pro and con on the issue, I might add) who saw these images in lower resolutions were convinced the girls were actually mostly nekkid, but a casual examination of a section of the still from the performance (featured above) clearly reveals how fake the nudity was.



Now here's a question for ya; which is actually more offensive: a pretty and fully naked Japanese girl, or a Japanese girl who is covered in an airbrushed body suit with a fully erect mushroom as a sop to "modesty?"

You know, I've been known to create erotic and even consciously pornographic works. Not only do I like playing with social taboos, I enjoy sucker-punching them, kicking them in the groin when they are down and then symbolically peeing on the whimpering metaphorical remains of my wrath. I am definitely down with consciously messing with misplaced and objectionable social taboos.

But, much to my surprise and vast amusement at my own expense, I personally found it objectionable. I was actually offended! Why the hell should it be offensive to ME, of all people- instead of just compellingly silly? Dear Lord, there is little in the world that could be sillier looking than a cheerleader apparently dressed in nothing but gold lame' gloves and a turgid "Hello Kitty" mushroom!

Where's Mario when you need him?

Anyway, I came to the conclusion that the concept I was searching for was "Tawdry." It includes the idea that nudity is so inherently dirty that the only way to depict it is to fake it - and then fake it as much, as broadly and as compulsively as possible in order to profit from those who want to participate in something that is dirty because it IS dirty.

It's seeing nudity and sexuality as being sinful - and deliberately rolling in the dirt to the wildly masturbating throngs. It's an appeal to the lowest expressions of the worst manifestations of the most basic of urges. It's taking advantage, in other words, of the moral and ethical failures of other folks.

In that, it's no different than equally offensive appeals to racism with the the goal of getting elected. A lot of folks see this as being comparable to the Janet Jackson nipple "slip," but in fact it's much closer to being DJ whatsisname's Macaca Moment.

Ok, now that was a pretty damn rude observation, so I'll soften it with a more general observation of human nature.

In my vastly cynical opinion, it boils down to this; prohibitions against nudity are not to protect us from the attractive naked flesh of pretty Asian cheerleaders. It's to preserve the male illusion (and indeed, a variety of female self delusion) that we would all be so attractive, if only we were permitted to shed the coverings that protect you, the viewer from an Occasion of Sin.

I've seen enough nekked people to know that the un-enhanced and unsorted human body when scratching it's butt and otherwise going about it's affairs is about as inspirational to lust as, well, your average damp and slightly smelly bath sponge.

This leads us to a genuine backstage truth. There ain't nobody LESS naked than a nude woman lookin' for to be An Occasion of Sin. And there's another, too. The fact that a significant array of males were perfectly happy with being deluded by a crudely airbrushed body-stocking clearly shows that most women are spending way too much on their hunting camouflage.

tag: ethics, sexual taboos, DJ Ozma, NHK, Japanese Culture, Japan TV, pornography, prudery, prudes, foreign press, moralism, ethical realism, morality

Give a Clue this Christmas!

My Latest Autism Designs and what they mean.

People who are neurotypical tend to think in boxes. One problem with being on the Autistic Spectrum is that you tend to not think in boxes. As far as I can tell, our thought process is highly relational. We tend to not even SEE the boxes and we don't think in a binary way at all.

A great number of problems come from the inability to understand that different people can have starkly different ways of understanding the world around them.

We tend to assume that people who came up with a functional solution for a problem came to it in the same way; indeed, by way of the same initial perceptions. Autistics and Aspies are as guilty of this as anyone; indeed, it's been studied within the AS population. The reason it's not been studied within the NT population is simple; in the case of NT's, the assumption that another person has a thought process that works like yours does is statistically likely to be correct.

So, when an autistic person makes this unwarranted assumption, it's called "mind blindness" and the autistic is gently handed a clue in the form of "social stories." When an NT does it, it's in the form of an organization called "Cure Autism Now."

If "autistic thought" were not valuable, there would not be such a roster of famous thinkers, such as Einstein and Newton now thought to have been probably autistic to some degree. By the same token, it should be a profound clue that there are courses to teach neurotypicals to "think outside of the box," and almost all higher education is aimed at rooting out simplistic, either-or thinking and to over-ride fear and submission responses when you have to communicate about or defend your work.

The ability to think and function outside of the box is an asset of significant value; recognising that is especially important if you are planning to "do something for autistics." Their ability to function in 'in an appropriate way' is limited, but that does not imply their ability to function, given an appropriate context is as limited as it appears. The trick is to find that context; and in that context they will not have so much difficulty "being appropriate."

There's no area where this insight is more critical than in regards to the parents of autistics themselves.

Make no mistake; autism can be a crippling condition, and it's made worse by being a condition where you absolutely must depend upon others to accommodate your needs and accept limitations that those without the condition cannot easily see or understand. But even the most obviously disabled "autist" is as severely affected by presumptions of how their disability affects them and even more by refusal of others to accept our word for the accommodations we need.

This following paragraph is emblematic of the crippling parental fears that the 800-lb gorilla of the pro-cure movement exploits for funding and validation:

You are never prepared for a child with autism. You will gradually come to believe it, but never fully accept it, get used to it, or get over it. You put away the hopes and dreams you had for that child - the high school graduation, the June wedding. Small victories are cause for celebration - a word mastered, a dry bed, a hug given freely. - FAQs about Autism: Cure Autism Now

Those of us who object to such fear, panic and the pervasive bigotry that exists with in the pro-cure movement - as well as it's seemingly obvious ethical deficits are pretty soundly attacked, with all kinds of terrible motives assigned us. (Theory of Mind, eh?)

A great deal of the work on the support groups that accept AS persons as contributors - something of a rarity - is to get non-AS people to accept that our "inability to cultivate friendships" is not a crippling condition to us. Once we have our one or two friends - friends as geeky and weird as us, generally speaking, we are done. My personal limit is two, and what NT's call "friendships," I now interpret as "Acquaintances." Yes, of course that has profound effects in terms of my ability to sustain a social network, and that has cost me many opportunities; indeed even jobs. I try and work things so that one of my two has the social skills I lack and the willingness to use them on my behalf.


Unfortunately, there is a lot of very bad advice out there and some very bizarre ideas as to what will be helpful to people such as I, who are on the spectrum and who are nonetheless potentially articulate and intelligent beings. Mostly this revolves around the idea that a bad job of conforming to the expectations of others is superior to a good job of being me. Here's Lennie Schafer on the topic of "fake autistics" like me.

(What about "high functioning autism" and how does that fit in? Simply put, it doesn't fit in anywhere. High functioning autism is not clinically defined and is not in the DSM-IV, and for good reason. High functioning autism is an oxymoron. If one meets the criteria for a diagnosis of autism, by definition one cannot be high-functioning. It would be as silly as the term sharp-eyed blindness.) (1)

So why would a handful of people, amongst a few others, who apparently are for the most part Aspergers, if anything, want to identify themselves autistic? Perhaps because autism is a profound disability and Aspergers is a disorder that is mostly not. Autism thus carries more moral weight than Aspergers and therefore has more moral clout for self-esteem building political and social agendas. "We autistics don't want to be cured" carries much more punch than "We Aspergers don't want to be cured", especially given the reality that there is no movement anywhere that seeks to "cure" those with Aspergers into being anything else.(2)

Aspergers-labeled alone, they would be ignored by the press and would be denied the juicy sense of empowerment that would come with a high-profile "oppressed minority" movement article like the one in the liberal New York Times. (3) (4)

The New York Times reporter failed to do a journalist's most basic homework. She failed to check the credentials of those doing the complaining, despite my urging. Anyone can call themselves autistic and write cranky letters to the editor. So how does someone determine if a person is truly autistic,or is an autism imposter with Aspergers? Ask to see their diagnosis. If someone claims to have autism for purposes of making some political statement, ask them to prove it. In any of the correspondence I have had with the autism "imposters", not one has ever supplied such documentation. (5) Of course, it is highly unlikely to ever see it. The irony here is that if someone has enough language skills to effectively complain about the treatment of autistics, then they themselves cannot be autistic.(6) Apparently more than one big city newspaper has failed to see through this deception, so eager are they to get an unusual victim story into print. Can we afford to allow the interests of our autistic children and everyone else "on the spectrum" to be pushed out of the public eye and displaced by a handful of imposters crying a contrived victimhood? Who speaks for autism? Not this bunch.

Note that he, and those like him don't like being quoted, even under "fair use" constraints.

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Of course, if I committed so many foolish rhetorical errors in public, I'd prefer not to be used as a hideous example either.

1. Argument from Authority. Of course, the process of determining what goes into the DSM-IV is pure and objective science .
2. Aspergers is, in fact an autistic spectrum disorder and has quite a range of effects. As a step-parent of a diagnosed Aspie, I'm very aware of the fact that there are very significant issues involved. They are not so inconvenient to US, as parents. They are going to affect HIM quite significantly unless we find some adaptive strategies that work for him.
3. As opposed to the entirely legitimate empowerment that comes from suffering the hideous, horrendous burden that is Autism.
4. Of course, it's a liberal thing to be concerned about the civil rights of children being abused and neglected for the sake of the convenience and social comfort of their conservative parents. This is the root host for "Autism, A Debilitating Disease, not a Culture," a page that links to both Free Republic and Free Dominion, while telling Canadians they a vaccilating, unpatriotic fools for not joining the "Coalition of the Willing." Snark aside, the fact that this site, is associated with Authoritarian Right Wingers explains a lot about the entire, very authoritarian "curebie" movement.
5. For myself, I want to see Lennie's MENSA results, his HIV status and full financials proving he's not unduly profiting from his activism before I deign to speak with him. I suspect he's unworthy of my attention, but if he proves otherwise, I will of course listen.
   
6. Factually untrue.

Unpuzzled is my most militant anti-curebie design, with the slogan, "help find a clue."

I know, it's rude and confrontational, but I've found that sometimes you need to swat people with a clue-by-four in order to startle them enough so they actually listen.

Those "seeking a cure" tend to ignore everything from those of us who ARE on the spectrum because it doesn't fit into to their mindsets, just as they reject "inappropriate" responses to communications from their autie and aspie children.

This is especially true of issues about communication style, reasonable accommodation and most importantly, the concept that a difference need not be AS disabling as it seems from an "NT" perspective. And, speaking as someone who's gone round and round on this at various times and under various circumstances, those who most boldly wave the "puzzle ribbon" seem at times to be making a point of their puzzlement, and their inability to understand to be the issue of auties and aspies.

See point above about how many friends and relationships an autie or aspie needs in an emotional sense. We do not absolutely require a relationship with the biological parental units. It's a nice thing to have, but we cannot and some quantity of will not be as easily coerced by family emotional ties as neurotypicals can be. This is not just because we have a "faulty" connection between emotions and reasoning. Our reasoning is not emotional, and our emotional responses seem to be quite different - across the board. Put two aspies in the same room and they will communicate quite well indeed - but their body language, topic choices and intuitive negotiations of "status" will be starkly different - and one of the greatest differences is the relative lack of huge tooth-bearing grins with full eye-contact.

To an aspie, to most sensible primates and all cats I've ever met, bare teeth and a full-on gaze is, at the very least, a statement of territorial or situational dominance, inviting a ritual contest of wills to determine who will be in charge and who will submit. Your typical aspie doesn't wish to play that game, having no need or real desire to join your pack, so if you do see them bare their teeth - it's probably in the context of a genuine, non-ritualized warning that Bad Things Will Suddenly Occur If You Do Not Go Away NOW.

What part of "Agggh! [flap flap flap] [throw object] LEAVE ME ALONE" is unclear to you people?

The "Unsmily" design honors the "aspie smile," a neutral expression that essentially means "hailing frequencies open." That look of slightly blank attention is a sign that an aspie or autistic is willing to let you talk at them for a while. Indeed, oft-times we are listening so hard that we are not thinking about what we will say next.

No pointless social noises please! Talk about something that is both objectively important and something within the realm of my interest and ability to have an opinion on. Make a full statement, then shut up and let me talk at YOU for a while. Then it's your turn.

Appalling, isn't it?

Well, that is the way aspies and auties communicate best - asynchronously. The full give and take of an NT conversation is difficult for us, and those of us that can manage it are doing it because we realize that style of communication is important to our NT friends all out of proportion to anything actually communicated. Mostly we grunt and make what experience has taught us to be socially appropriate noises at the expected times.

We are quite unlikely to put up with attempts to get us to conform to your expectations of what people like you should be. We are not 'like you,' and while we do very clearly appreciate that you have social advantages we do not, and we all understand that any parent would wish their child to have every possible advantage - we also know that many of those "advantages" come with a price. Some of those prices are ones we cannot pay - and for many of us, compromising who we are or being less than honest about what we know to be true is a price we will not pay - no matter how politically incorrect it may be to point out that the emperor has no clue.

In case you'd forgotten, the President is a lying' bastard.

Bush admits it right to their faces because he's been rankly lying about anything and everything ever since he ran for president and never, not once, paid a penalty for it. Think about it carefully--for anyone else a public admission of lying would be absolutely devastating on a professional and personal level.

Sorry, dear, I lied about sleeping with that perky admin half your age. No big, right? Yeah, boss, I said I delivered all those parts when I actually drank beer for two hours. So?

But for George Bush implacable rules of life just vanish, so he doesn't care, admit it right out loud on the record, why not? This horrifying national psychosis--words chosen with great attention--was very carefully and deliberately enabled by The Washington Post as they scrubbed their stories to hide the lying.

(more}

Now, it's a Bad Thing to lie to the American People and to Congress. Particularly to members of Congress who's campaigns were damaged with all the "stay the course" rhetoric and public defense of Rummy right up to the "Heave Ho" moment.

But, hey, such trivial considerations of consequence are beneath our "decider." I can't complain about the outcome, of course. I merely point out that trusting a known and famous liar ain't the path of prudence, as many Republicans found to their cost this past election.

And meanwhile, the WaPo is trying to revise history - unaware of the Google Cache and The Memory Hole, apparently. These days, revising web history is merely an amusing spectacle of futility, rather like a cat covering up on linoleum.

I blogged you so!

"The profile of corruption in the exit polls was bigger than I'd expected," Rove tells TIME. "Abramoff, lobbying, Foley and Haggard [the disgraced evangelical leader] added to the general distaste that people have for all things Washington, and it just reached critical mass."

Compare and contrast

I forgive the folks of Elko and thousands of other deeply conservative towns across the nation for being in a state of shock and denial, for they cannot imagine how anyone who lives by their own virtues could screw up so badly. It is literally inconceivable; it should be a matter of practical impossibility due to bone-deep, value driven integrity that is the soul of small-town conservatism

Well, I'm sad to say this, but folks like George Bush and a thousand others took advantage of your preconceptions of how things ought to be. They said all the right words in public, and you figured that since you have integrity, they did too.

Sorry about that. I feel your pain. You see, I grew up in an area like that, where people had to rely upon one another, expected to be able to, and could. The closet volunteer fire department was a solid 15 miles away, the closet hospital was 45 minutes on dry roads in a fast car - and they were never dry. If you heard three shots in rapid succession, you grabbed a rifle and a first aid kid and ran toward the sound, because there was a broken leg or worse.

And when you grow up in such a place, it's really crushing to find out that people from the big city don't share those essential values. Well, not the rich ones, anyhow.

I'm going to be charging 15% more per post now. Just thought I'd let you know.