Saturday, March 20, 2010
Friday, March 19, 2010
Hey! The Wall Street Journal AND Commentary Agree With Me!
So, I must be right!
It's indicative of how stupid and desperate an electorate can get that they will swallow almost anything uncritically, and with their eyes wide shut.
Now more than ever, not only should Barack Obama and his party be defeated, as soon as the fight is over we should all line up and kick John McCain square in the balls for being such a rotten candidate, and running such a cluster-fuck of a campaign. In retrospect, it not certain that McCain would have been any better as President (he certainly wouldn't), but he might have at least been polite enough to die in office and leave Sarah Palin in charge.
I'm not saying she would have been the best choice, either, but in replaying all the possible outcomes of the peculiar set of circumstances that came into play in November of 2008, I'm not so sure. Your choice was between the Old Man with the Woman Who at Least Had Held a Real Job Once Her Life, or the Bi-Racial Bullshit Artist with the REAL Retard in Tow. America took Plan B, and this is how we got here. But for the fact that John McCain had a senior moment in pulling that "suspending my campaign" stunt so as to look "statesmanlike" before bending over like a $10 whore for the bailouts he so vociferously opposed, he managed to get outmaneuvered in the process by the parvenu Obama (who managed to vote "Present" once again). It probably cost him the election, regardless of the rhetorical mastery of Obama's speechwriters and Teleprompters (we've since found out that Obama has no real speaking skills of his own).
And in the end, this is what we have: an Egomaniac-in-Chief, who believes that having perpetrated the Greatest Scam in the History of the World, he can not only get whatever liberty-destroying bill he wants passed, but that he's goddamned entitled to have it pass on his terms, and Fuck Us if we're not with the program.
This is why the right to vote should be taken away from at least 50% of the people in this country.
It's indicative of how stupid and desperate an electorate can get that they will swallow almost anything uncritically, and with their eyes wide shut.
Now more than ever, not only should Barack Obama and his party be defeated, as soon as the fight is over we should all line up and kick John McCain square in the balls for being such a rotten candidate, and running such a cluster-fuck of a campaign. In retrospect, it not certain that McCain would have been any better as President (he certainly wouldn't), but he might have at least been polite enough to die in office and leave Sarah Palin in charge.
I'm not saying she would have been the best choice, either, but in replaying all the possible outcomes of the peculiar set of circumstances that came into play in November of 2008, I'm not so sure. Your choice was between the Old Man with the Woman Who at Least Had Held a Real Job Once Her Life, or the Bi-Racial Bullshit Artist with the REAL Retard in Tow. America took Plan B, and this is how we got here. But for the fact that John McCain had a senior moment in pulling that "suspending my campaign" stunt so as to look "statesmanlike" before bending over like a $10 whore for the bailouts he so vociferously opposed, he managed to get outmaneuvered in the process by the parvenu Obama (who managed to vote "Present" once again). It probably cost him the election, regardless of the rhetorical mastery of Obama's speechwriters and Teleprompters (we've since found out that Obama has no real speaking skills of his own).
And in the end, this is what we have: an Egomaniac-in-Chief, who believes that having perpetrated the Greatest Scam in the History of the World, he can not only get whatever liberty-destroying bill he wants passed, but that he's goddamned entitled to have it pass on his terms, and Fuck Us if we're not with the program.
This is why the right to vote should be taken away from at least 50% of the people in this country.
A Sincere Note of Appreciation...
I want to thank everyone who has stopped by these past two days; they have been some my heaviest traffic days of the year-to-date considering that none of my posts this week have included the words "Anal Rash", "Homosexual Wrestling" or "Sexy Marsupials Slathered in Marmelade".
Some less-than-honest bloggers will use such tactics to generate hits to their site, but I rely solely on word-of-mouth.
Please, if you like what you're seeing here, drop me a line and let me know about it so I can do more of it, -- and as always, be sure to tell your friends! It's nice to have a public!
And if you'd please, click some of the Google Ads that might interest you. Ido get paid for them, not much, but every little bit helps during these trying economic times. Hey, I could be more of a beggar and put up a tip jar like some other bloggers, right? Do a brother a solid, will ya?
Once again, thanks to everyone who's dropped in. Your patronage is greatly appreciated!
Some less-than-honest bloggers will use such tactics to generate hits to their site, but I rely solely on word-of-mouth.
Please, if you like what you're seeing here, drop me a line and let me know about it so I can do more of it, -- and as always, be sure to tell your friends! It's nice to have a public!
And if you'd please, click some of the Google Ads that might interest you. Ido get paid for them, not much, but every little bit helps during these trying economic times. Hey, I could be more of a beggar and put up a tip jar like some other bloggers, right? Do a brother a solid, will ya?
Once again, thanks to everyone who's dropped in. Your patronage is greatly appreciated!
The Road to Hell...
..is paved with good intentions.
This is an old expression which found it's way back into my diseased head last night, with regards to the "Health" "Care" "Debate". I'm cynical by nature; life has taught me to be so, and it's probably at the root of much of my resistance to ObamaCare. Experience has indicated that whenever someone says "this is for your own good", it usually isn't, and it also teaches that when you lock a herd of politicians together in a room with a common goal, you usually get something other than a solution to the original problem. A camel, they say, is a horse designed by a committee.
Or at least the Senate.
I've been thinking that the democrat's relentless drive to pass a piece of shit healthcare bill that no one can afford must be part of some long-planned-sinister-Socialist Plot to Destroy America. I came to that conclusion because the visible signs indicate it; the dems seem ready to commit political suicide for this, acting contrary to public opinion, and they seem singularly devoted to the cause, almost to the point of monomania. Japanese Kamikazes weren't this committed. Compared to Nancy Pelosi in her quest to ruin the American Healthcare System, Mohammed Atta was a pussy.
But then, I had a moment of clarity (I was taking a dump), and another angle entered my thoughts. What if, let's say, the democrats actually were trying to accomplish something for the common good? What if they actually did have the best interests of the American people at heart?
Well, if you viewed the whole thing from that angle, then some of this controversy begins to make some sense.
There are, perhaps, some democrats who are so dedicated to the idea that they're actually doing some good, that they may be unable to realize what harm they might actually inflict as a consequence. Perhaps all that's needed, instead of all this acrimony, is a clearer explanation of what they intend to do, how they intend to do it, with a mind towards keeping the gap between good intentions and good results as narrow as possible.
I mean, it could be possible, right?
Then, as I was flushing, the idea faded. The Idea was forced from my head by the harsh sound of the water rushing, and in a perfect metaphor timed exquisitely to my actions, just as a turd circled the bowl, my idea also began it's epic journey into an unknown oblivion. Just as it had arrived, upon wings of gossamer as it were, The Idea suddenly flitted away out the bathroom window and into the cold, dark, Staten Island night.
Because reality came crashing back into my thoughts.
If this was really a "health" "care" "bill" it wouldn't contain provisions making the federal government (and one Bank in North Dakota) the only entities able to issue student loans in America.
If it were it truly intended to improve the nation's health, there wouldn't be provisions for allowing illegal immigrants to stay in the country illegally...and take advantage of ObamaCare.
Money for elective abortions doesn't seem to be promoting anyone's health, to me.
Any "Health" "Care" "Reform" wouldn't include provisions that the Federal Government could force you to buy insurance, nor would it tax those who already have insurance to pay for the medical care of the people who would still be breaking the law by refusing to buy the insurance they were commanded to buy.
It wouldn't remove half-a-trillion bucks from the current medical system (Medicare) and use it to start a brand-spankin' new bureaucracy that basically duplicates Medicare, only more expensively and with the ability to kill the elderly off with rationing.
The bill wouldn't add 30 million people to the insurance rolls, and then add no doctors,, nurses and other practitioners. It wouldn't punish doctors financially and legally just for being physicians. It would pay them fair market price for their services.
It wouldn't collect ten years of taxes, but then only provide six years of service. This one is the dead giveaway; even if the democrats lose power in future elections, they will still have created and funded the embryo bureaucracies which will have to be established, and which are necessary to an even more expansive program rearing it's ugly head in the future.
A "Health" "Care" "Reform" bill that raises taxes on Social Security and then extends additional taxes on everything from pacemakers to colostomy bags, can't be about anyone's health.
If the thing has to be passed in the dark of night by a clearly Unconstitutional Parliamentary maneuver, then it simply can't be any good. If the President of the United States can talk about it for 16 months and still not convince the majority of Americans of it's efficacy (and remember, a considerable number of these are people who consider Girls Next Door to be highbrow entertainment) , it can't be any good at all. If the Speaker of the House can play games wherein one day there's a bill to vote upon, the next day there isn't, and the following day she can get something signed into law without a vote ever being held, then it simply can't be beneficial or legal.
I have absolutely no doubt that there are a few - a few - democrats who believe with every fibre of their being that ObamaCare is the Best Thing Ever. They believe that decent society demands this kind of sweeping "reform", and that without it, we're sentencing millions of our brothers and sisters to unspeakable torment and deprivation. For those democrats, the one's too stupid to see beyond their own sanctimony and emotion, this is really all about Doing the Right Thing, and no measure of argument will ever convince them otherwise.
The True Believers can never be un-convinced by appeal to logic. Those people really are under the impression that they are bringing a positive boon to mankind. We should understand their motives are pure...and then shoot them before they breed further.
But, the rest can't be that blindly altruistic, nor even that smart. The addition of millions of lines of crap to the bill that have nothing at all to do with who gets an operation and how much it should cost, have attached their personal agendas to this bill, and are trying to achieve by graft what they could not achieve at the ballot box, or by law; they are out to control as many aspects of your life as they possibly can, for their own ends and enrichment. Even where the bill WAS changed because of the outright graft included in it (the infamous Louisana Purchase, the Cornhusker Kickback, Gator Aid, etc) the solution was not to admit to the sin and remove it from the package -- but to extend the same bribes to every Senator and State.
That's how libtards work; instead of decrying and abolishing bad behavior, they simply institutionalize and normalize it as that becomes necessary. What the hell does any of that have to do with anyone's health?
I've wavered between the ideas that Barack Obama is either stupid or arrogant, but I've changed my mind. The old Sean Hannity formulation that Obama is a unreformed Marxist Douchebag is closer to the truth, but is far too simple. It doesn't allow for the sublime absurdity of what's happening. Barack Obama is not motivated by the exercise of power, like most Marxists. Nor is he driven by an ideological perogative. Hell, he's not even motivated by concern for his fellow human beings. He is motivated by the force of Ego. This isn't about curing anyone's AIDS or making certain grandma gets that double-bypass; it's about the Annals of History, and Barack Obama's place within them. Barack Obama will never appear on Mount Rushmore; Mount Everest would still be too small to accommodate the proper commemoration he believes he'll be entitled to.
It's all about him, you see. And he has a sycophantic bunch of retards so infected by hypocrisy and political correctness (The United States Congress and the democratic party) that they'll give him those three pages in the Great History Book in the Sky, next to the other great men of the Leftist pantheon -- Mao, Stalin, Hitler, Pol Pot, Castro, Guevara, et. al -- even if it means destroying the greatest country ever created by men, and taxing the Middle Class right into penury. He is their God, and they are his Church. He's bigger than Buddah, Jesus, Mohammed and Zeus all rolled up into one, they think.
Because the ideal that Barack Obama is a "transformative figure" must be upheld over all other considerations. After all, he's black you know. In the world of libtards these things carry far more weight than any actual achievement or ability, because they still believe that America is a racist country, and so the elevation of a black man to the highest office is an event on par with the Second Coming. Therefore, whatever Obama desires, it cannot be denied.
This about allowing Obama to control your life; the system will affect what you eat, your activities, your treatment options, what medicines are available to you, and how much money you'll have left after the massive taxes required to pay for it. It's not about your health -- it's about limiting your choices until you are forced by law and process of elimination to accept the activities and mindsets that libtards consider to be the proper ones. They're out to control your behavior, against your will, and intrude upon every aspect of your life.
They want the Power of God, and Obama is the God they want. Obamacare is simply his Ten (Thousand) Commandments.
This is an old expression which found it's way back into my diseased head last night, with regards to the "Health" "Care" "Debate". I'm cynical by nature; life has taught me to be so, and it's probably at the root of much of my resistance to ObamaCare. Experience has indicated that whenever someone says "this is for your own good", it usually isn't, and it also teaches that when you lock a herd of politicians together in a room with a common goal, you usually get something other than a solution to the original problem. A camel, they say, is a horse designed by a committee.
Or at least the Senate.
I've been thinking that the democrat's relentless drive to pass a piece of shit healthcare bill that no one can afford must be part of some long-planned-sinister-Socialist Plot to Destroy America. I came to that conclusion because the visible signs indicate it; the dems seem ready to commit political suicide for this, acting contrary to public opinion, and they seem singularly devoted to the cause, almost to the point of monomania. Japanese Kamikazes weren't this committed. Compared to Nancy Pelosi in her quest to ruin the American Healthcare System, Mohammed Atta was a pussy.
But then, I had a moment of clarity (I was taking a dump), and another angle entered my thoughts. What if, let's say, the democrats actually were trying to accomplish something for the common good? What if they actually did have the best interests of the American people at heart?
Well, if you viewed the whole thing from that angle, then some of this controversy begins to make some sense.
There are, perhaps, some democrats who are so dedicated to the idea that they're actually doing some good, that they may be unable to realize what harm they might actually inflict as a consequence. Perhaps all that's needed, instead of all this acrimony, is a clearer explanation of what they intend to do, how they intend to do it, with a mind towards keeping the gap between good intentions and good results as narrow as possible.
I mean, it could be possible, right?
Then, as I was flushing, the idea faded. The Idea was forced from my head by the harsh sound of the water rushing, and in a perfect metaphor timed exquisitely to my actions, just as a turd circled the bowl, my idea also began it's epic journey into an unknown oblivion. Just as it had arrived, upon wings of gossamer as it were, The Idea suddenly flitted away out the bathroom window and into the cold, dark, Staten Island night.
Because reality came crashing back into my thoughts.
If this was really a "health" "care" "bill" it wouldn't contain provisions making the federal government (and one Bank in North Dakota) the only entities able to issue student loans in America.
If it were it truly intended to improve the nation's health, there wouldn't be provisions for allowing illegal immigrants to stay in the country illegally...and take advantage of ObamaCare.
Money for elective abortions doesn't seem to be promoting anyone's health, to me.
Any "Health" "Care" "Reform" wouldn't include provisions that the Federal Government could force you to buy insurance, nor would it tax those who already have insurance to pay for the medical care of the people who would still be breaking the law by refusing to buy the insurance they were commanded to buy.
It wouldn't remove half-a-trillion bucks from the current medical system (Medicare) and use it to start a brand-spankin' new bureaucracy that basically duplicates Medicare, only more expensively and with the ability to kill the elderly off with rationing.
The bill wouldn't add 30 million people to the insurance rolls, and then add no doctors,, nurses and other practitioners. It wouldn't punish doctors financially and legally just for being physicians. It would pay them fair market price for their services.
It wouldn't collect ten years of taxes, but then only provide six years of service. This one is the dead giveaway; even if the democrats lose power in future elections, they will still have created and funded the embryo bureaucracies which will have to be established, and which are necessary to an even more expansive program rearing it's ugly head in the future.
A "Health" "Care" "Reform" bill that raises taxes on Social Security and then extends additional taxes on everything from pacemakers to colostomy bags, can't be about anyone's health.
If the thing has to be passed in the dark of night by a clearly Unconstitutional Parliamentary maneuver, then it simply can't be any good. If the President of the United States can talk about it for 16 months and still not convince the majority of Americans of it's efficacy (and remember, a considerable number of these are people who consider Girls Next Door to be highbrow entertainment) , it can't be any good at all. If the Speaker of the House can play games wherein one day there's a bill to vote upon, the next day there isn't, and the following day she can get something signed into law without a vote ever being held, then it simply can't be beneficial or legal.
I have absolutely no doubt that there are a few - a few - democrats who believe with every fibre of their being that ObamaCare is the Best Thing Ever. They believe that decent society demands this kind of sweeping "reform", and that without it, we're sentencing millions of our brothers and sisters to unspeakable torment and deprivation. For those democrats, the one's too stupid to see beyond their own sanctimony and emotion, this is really all about Doing the Right Thing, and no measure of argument will ever convince them otherwise.
The True Believers can never be un-convinced by appeal to logic. Those people really are under the impression that they are bringing a positive boon to mankind. We should understand their motives are pure...and then shoot them before they breed further.
But, the rest can't be that blindly altruistic, nor even that smart. The addition of millions of lines of crap to the bill that have nothing at all to do with who gets an operation and how much it should cost, have attached their personal agendas to this bill, and are trying to achieve by graft what they could not achieve at the ballot box, or by law; they are out to control as many aspects of your life as they possibly can, for their own ends and enrichment. Even where the bill WAS changed because of the outright graft included in it (the infamous Louisana Purchase, the Cornhusker Kickback, Gator Aid, etc) the solution was not to admit to the sin and remove it from the package -- but to extend the same bribes to every Senator and State.
That's how libtards work; instead of decrying and abolishing bad behavior, they simply institutionalize and normalize it as that becomes necessary. What the hell does any of that have to do with anyone's health?
I've wavered between the ideas that Barack Obama is either stupid or arrogant, but I've changed my mind. The old Sean Hannity formulation that Obama is a unreformed Marxist Douchebag is closer to the truth, but is far too simple. It doesn't allow for the sublime absurdity of what's happening. Barack Obama is not motivated by the exercise of power, like most Marxists. Nor is he driven by an ideological perogative. Hell, he's not even motivated by concern for his fellow human beings. He is motivated by the force of Ego. This isn't about curing anyone's AIDS or making certain grandma gets that double-bypass; it's about the Annals of History, and Barack Obama's place within them. Barack Obama will never appear on Mount Rushmore; Mount Everest would still be too small to accommodate the proper commemoration he believes he'll be entitled to.
It's all about him, you see. And he has a sycophantic bunch of retards so infected by hypocrisy and political correctness (The United States Congress and the democratic party) that they'll give him those three pages in the Great History Book in the Sky, next to the other great men of the Leftist pantheon -- Mao, Stalin, Hitler, Pol Pot, Castro, Guevara, et. al -- even if it means destroying the greatest country ever created by men, and taxing the Middle Class right into penury. He is their God, and they are his Church. He's bigger than Buddah, Jesus, Mohammed and Zeus all rolled up into one, they think.
Because the ideal that Barack Obama is a "transformative figure" must be upheld over all other considerations. After all, he's black you know. In the world of libtards these things carry far more weight than any actual achievement or ability, because they still believe that America is a racist country, and so the elevation of a black man to the highest office is an event on par with the Second Coming. Therefore, whatever Obama desires, it cannot be denied.
This about allowing Obama to control your life; the system will affect what you eat, your activities, your treatment options, what medicines are available to you, and how much money you'll have left after the massive taxes required to pay for it. It's not about your health -- it's about limiting your choices until you are forced by law and process of elimination to accept the activities and mindsets that libtards consider to be the proper ones. They're out to control your behavior, against your will, and intrude upon every aspect of your life.
They want the Power of God, and Obama is the God they want. Obamacare is simply his Ten (Thousand) Commandments.
This is Why Rome Fell, You Know...
I saw perhaps the stupidest television ad last night for a Dating Club. I shan't identify the Club in question, because I have no desire to actually encourage anyone to join it. Suffice to say, this Club operates on the Internet, and caters to men. Personally, when I associate the words "Internet" and "Caters to Men", I usually think "porn".
So, naturally, I checked it out. I AM male, you know. I went to the homepage and looked around a bit.
What happens is that singles are, indeed, invited to join this exclusive club for very-important and exclusive people, and just so you guys have a chance, the membership is -- so they claim --80% female, making a for a 4-to-1 ratio of women (who probably don't look anything like the surgically-enhanced-airbrushed-sperm-burpers on both the commercial and the website). And of course, the 20% of male members, should you become a member -- the creme de la creme of masculinity -- belong to a carefully-selected, privileged caste, entitled to hunt in an exclusive domain, in a target-rich environment.
Think of it as being given permission to hunt in the King's forest.
I fucking laughed my ass off. It's great marketing, though, I'll give 'em that much.
Because think of it this way; if you truly were that sort of rare breed of man, why a) do you need help getting dates, b) why the hell are you looking for them on the Internet, of all places, and c) why are you hitting what is, for all intents and purposes, the dating Bunny Hill, where the level of difficulty is low and your odds of success have been artificially skewed in your favor?
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know someone will say "But some men just don't have any time to find a good date...". Yeah, right. There's not a man on earth that can't find the time to hunt vagina --particularly if he's one of the exclusive, very-important and select few this site makes their members out to be. If you really are that great; good-looking, sophisticated, smart, well-off, then you should have women tossing their knickers at you. The way most women regard casual sex these days (it practically grows on trees), this should be a no-sweat exercise for that exclusive-sort-of-man.
If I had to guess, there's probably four average-looking-but-seriously-mental chicks for every pork-rind-eating-lives-in-his-mother's-basement-loser online -- but they all have credit cards and self-esteem issues. So, why shouldn't someone make a buck off of it?
If you want a date, Gentlemen, go out and get one. It's almost becoming a lost art amongst men these days. You only have to talk to her. Start with "Hello...", and go from there. So long as you act like a gentlemen and give no indication that you're a serial killer or child molester, you're probably on your way. Mind your manners, be polite, and remember that "No" usually means "Not right now, but maybe after my girlfriend leaves....". Unless it's followed by a knee to the groin.
The worst that can happen is that she'll tell you to get lost. Suck it up and fix bayonet again, Lad!
I swear, every day that passes it seems that technology puts more and more space and obstacles between people.
So, naturally, I checked it out. I AM male, you know. I went to the homepage and looked around a bit.
What happens is that singles are, indeed, invited to join this exclusive club for very-important and exclusive people, and just so you guys have a chance, the membership is -- so they claim --80% female, making a for a 4-to-1 ratio of women (who probably don't look anything like the surgically-enhanced-airbrushed-sperm-burpers on both the commercial and the website). And of course, the 20% of male members, should you become a member -- the creme de la creme of masculinity -- belong to a carefully-selected, privileged caste, entitled to hunt in an exclusive domain, in a target-rich environment.
Think of it as being given permission to hunt in the King's forest.
I fucking laughed my ass off. It's great marketing, though, I'll give 'em that much.
Because think of it this way; if you truly were that sort of rare breed of man, why a) do you need help getting dates, b) why the hell are you looking for them on the Internet, of all places, and c) why are you hitting what is, for all intents and purposes, the dating Bunny Hill, where the level of difficulty is low and your odds of success have been artificially skewed in your favor?
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know someone will say "But some men just don't have any time to find a good date...". Yeah, right. There's not a man on earth that can't find the time to hunt vagina --particularly if he's one of the exclusive, very-important and select few this site makes their members out to be. If you really are that great; good-looking, sophisticated, smart, well-off, then you should have women tossing their knickers at you. The way most women regard casual sex these days (it practically grows on trees), this should be a no-sweat exercise for that exclusive-sort-of-man.
If I had to guess, there's probably four average-looking-but-seriously-mental chicks for every pork-rind-eating-lives-in-his-mother's-basement-loser online -- but they all have credit cards and self-esteem issues. So, why shouldn't someone make a buck off of it?
If you want a date, Gentlemen, go out and get one. It's almost becoming a lost art amongst men these days. You only have to talk to her. Start with "Hello...", and go from there. So long as you act like a gentlemen and give no indication that you're a serial killer or child molester, you're probably on your way. Mind your manners, be polite, and remember that "No" usually means "Not right now, but maybe after my girlfriend leaves....". Unless it's followed by a knee to the groin.
The worst that can happen is that she'll tell you to get lost. Suck it up and fix bayonet again, Lad!
I swear, every day that passes it seems that technology puts more and more space and obstacles between people.
One Pill Makes You Larger, and One Pill Makes you Small...
Literally, considering how many commercials there are devoted to the erection! Not to mention how many of us must be seriously depressed by life.
Yesterday, I decided to perform a little experiment and see just how many drug commercials I might be able to see in a reasonable time frame. So. I set my television to a station where I figured there'd be plenty of commercials, and then set aside three hours of my life to count how many drug commercials there were.
Total number of drug commercials? 12. Total number of drugs advertised? 9. The three extra viewings were for a brand-spanking-new anti-depressant, which I just HAD to do some research on, being something of an expert on the subject (more on this below).
I then took the opportunity to find out how much all of these drugs cost. What follows is a list of the drugs, what they're supposed to do, and how much they cost, with a little commentary from Your's Truly. Where possible, I have included a YouTube link to the commercial. If you have the time, please, please, please view the commercials and actually LISTEN to the warnings they give about the side effects of these drugs, and then, ask yourself a question; who in their right mind takes this shit, and if it were you, would you risk it?
You might be surprised that you're going to hear things you may have missed the 900 other times you saw these commercials.
For a few of these things, the commercial wasn't available on YouTube...except as part of a Consumer Reports expose series. I've linked 'em!
Here's the list, alphabetically:
1. Abilify - This is the new anti-depressant, so I had to do some research on this. In the "Community" (as we call it, "Community" refers to us Lunatics who keep in touch), Abilify has already become known as "Suicidium". Which is a pretty bad rep for a anti-depressant to have. The other bad thing about Abilify; it's usually given to people who are ALREADY taking other anti-depressants. I can tell you from personal experience, if you're taking multiple AD's, you're simply asking for trouble. Average price: $186.00 for 30-day supply. Please take note of the dire warnings about the SEVERE side effects.
2. Ambien - This is a sleep aid. The average cost is $260.00 for 50 pills. I don't know about you, but if I need to sleep that badly, I usually drink. Or watch MSNBC. One of the prime complaints about Ambien is that it's not uncommon for people who take it to suddenly get behind the wheel and start driving, completely unaware that they're doing so because...well, they're asleep! It's believed that Tiger Woods was taking Ambien the night he turned his driveway into the Biggest Soap Opera of 2009. I could not find a video worth posting on this one... Sorry.
3. Boniva - a treatment for Osteoporosis, flogged relentlessly by Sally Field. The advantage to Boniva, so we're told, is that you only need to take it once a month, a relief to busy Baby Boomer Broads for whom a daily pill and a glass of water might consume upwards of, oh... 18 seconds...of their busy, busy schedule. Average cost for Boniva was $348.50 for three treatments. By the way, you won't believe what sort of shit you have to go through in order to take it. Just watch.
4. Cialis - what man wouldn't like the confidence of knowing he can pop a boner on a schedule? Why, if you take Cialis you can rest assured that you can sport wood anytime within a 36-hour period. Just hope your intended doesn't have a 36-hour period of her own, or you're shit out of luck.
Please take note of the part where they say Cialis may affect your vision. I thought you only went blind if...oh, never mind. The average cost of Cialis was $161.00. Oh, and just because you can hold a woody for a real long time or produce one on command, it doesn't mean you won't have a problem with...ummm...early discharge. Which seems like an awful gyp.
5. Chantix - smoking cessation aid. This was another one for which the commercial wasn't available (not with good quality, anyway), but there's a Consumer's Report video of this one, too.
The average price for the Starter Kit was $131.00, and the Continuation kit (apparently, once you start Chantrix you have to continue to take it for several months) costs about the same. For that kind of money, you could hire someone to smoke for you.
6. Cymbalta - treats depression. But then again, I can tell you from personal experience that no drugs actually TREATS depression; they all just cover up the symptoms. Be that as it may, the worst aspect of Cymbalta is that you can't take a fucking aspirin with it because you might bleed to death. Average cost for this Absolute Godsend was $402.00 for a 90-day supply. Here's the commercial. I might want to bleed to death if I ever spent $402.00 on something and it didn't have a Hemi in it, or it didn't blow me with just a minimum of gentle persuasion.
7. Seroquel XR - another anti-depressant. Please note: it's also given to schizophrenics. I swear, we're all head cases in this country, aren't we? There was no commercial available for Seroquel, so I linked to the webpage. Seroquel costs about $100 for a month's supply (low dosage), but pay attention to the list of some of the most incredible side-effects: especially the part where it says that if you have some form of dementia and take this drug, you might just die. The involuntary facial tics, salivation, diabetes, possible sudden seizures and neurological disorders, and the possible liver damage, are just the bonus prizes you get for taking Seroquel.
8. Valtrex - for the treatment of genital herpes. Let's get something straight: despite all the young-ish, apparently straight actors in this commercial, I'm told by reliable sources that genital herpes is most often to be found amongst those over 55, and in Gay Men (Herpes was all the rage in the 1970's and 80's, you know. Then AIDS came along, and everyone forgot about it). This is another drug for Baby Boomers trying to disguise itself! Are you beginning to notice a pattern; how many commercials aimed at Baby Boomers have something to do with the crotch and screwing? I knew you would! The average cost of Valtrex was $151.00. And just like your herpes, you're probably stuck with Valtrex forever if you want to have any kind of sex life whatsoever.
9. Viagra - the Granddaddy of them all! The ultimate tribute to the Erect Phallus. Please take note of the very artistry of this commercial (as well as the list of side effects); well-preserved Woodstock-rejects, in a scene vaguely reminiscent of their "garage-band" days, sitting around, a-strummin' and a-singin' about Doin' the Nasty with Betty Sue, and then they sing the paean to the little blue bugger that makes it all possible! VEEEEE-VAAAAAAAH VIAGRA! You can't mistake just who this commercial is aimed at. Viagra has probably been responsible for more heart attacks in the last five years than red meat, a tanking NASDAQ, unexpected paternity test results and the erection...errr...ELECTION... of Barack Obama combined. Average cost of Viarga; $153.00.
Now, why did I do all this? What possible reason could I have for devoting this much time and effort to nonsense?
Because these are the drugs the Baby Boomers are taking, and they'll soon be retiring in huge numbers....and they'll want whatever version of ObamaCare that might pass to, eventually, pay for their prescriptions. You think it can't happen? If ObamaCare becomes the law of the land, within a decade there will be a voting bloc so monumentally huge that they will be denied nothing; 70 million Baby Boomers who'll want strong bones...and even stronger boners. And they'll have absolutely nothing to do (besides fuck, apparently) except vote, and what they'll vote for is what previous monolithic voting blocs have always voted for: someone pay for my shit!
Just as Social Security became the "third-rail" of American politics, so will ObamaCare for a generation that will depend upon it as recent economic loses will have destroyed much of their retirement assets.
This is what they'll expect to have others pay for. Magic pills that cure everything, expensively, but often cause far more problems then they solve...only more expensively. Which leads to a much more expensive Medical System.
You have been warned.
Update: The response to this post has been so positive, I'm thinking of making it a regular feature. So, every so often, I'll be posting more obnoxious crap about the silly prescription drug commercials we're deluged with ona daily basis.
Yesterday, I decided to perform a little experiment and see just how many drug commercials I might be able to see in a reasonable time frame. So. I set my television to a station where I figured there'd be plenty of commercials, and then set aside three hours of my life to count how many drug commercials there were.
Total number of drug commercials? 12. Total number of drugs advertised? 9. The three extra viewings were for a brand-spanking-new anti-depressant, which I just HAD to do some research on, being something of an expert on the subject (more on this below).
I then took the opportunity to find out how much all of these drugs cost. What follows is a list of the drugs, what they're supposed to do, and how much they cost, with a little commentary from Your's Truly. Where possible, I have included a YouTube link to the commercial. If you have the time, please, please, please view the commercials and actually LISTEN to the warnings they give about the side effects of these drugs, and then, ask yourself a question; who in their right mind takes this shit, and if it were you, would you risk it?
You might be surprised that you're going to hear things you may have missed the 900 other times you saw these commercials.
For a few of these things, the commercial wasn't available on YouTube...except as part of a Consumer Reports expose series. I've linked 'em!
Here's the list, alphabetically:
1. Abilify - This is the new anti-depressant, so I had to do some research on this. In the "Community" (as we call it, "Community" refers to us Lunatics who keep in touch), Abilify has already become known as "Suicidium". Which is a pretty bad rep for a anti-depressant to have. The other bad thing about Abilify; it's usually given to people who are ALREADY taking other anti-depressants. I can tell you from personal experience, if you're taking multiple AD's, you're simply asking for trouble. Average price: $186.00 for 30-day supply. Please take note of the dire warnings about the SEVERE side effects.
2. Ambien - This is a sleep aid. The average cost is $260.00 for 50 pills. I don't know about you, but if I need to sleep that badly, I usually drink. Or watch MSNBC. One of the prime complaints about Ambien is that it's not uncommon for people who take it to suddenly get behind the wheel and start driving, completely unaware that they're doing so because...well, they're asleep! It's believed that Tiger Woods was taking Ambien the night he turned his driveway into the Biggest Soap Opera of 2009. I could not find a video worth posting on this one... Sorry.
3. Boniva - a treatment for Osteoporosis, flogged relentlessly by Sally Field. The advantage to Boniva, so we're told, is that you only need to take it once a month, a relief to busy Baby Boomer Broads for whom a daily pill and a glass of water might consume upwards of, oh... 18 seconds...of their busy, busy schedule. Average cost for Boniva was $348.50 for three treatments. By the way, you won't believe what sort of shit you have to go through in order to take it. Just watch.
4. Cialis - what man wouldn't like the confidence of knowing he can pop a boner on a schedule? Why, if you take Cialis you can rest assured that you can sport wood anytime within a 36-hour period. Just hope your intended doesn't have a 36-hour period of her own, or you're shit out of luck.
Please take note of the part where they say Cialis may affect your vision. I thought you only went blind if...oh, never mind. The average cost of Cialis was $161.00. Oh, and just because you can hold a woody for a real long time or produce one on command, it doesn't mean you won't have a problem with...ummm...early discharge. Which seems like an awful gyp.
5. Chantix - smoking cessation aid. This was another one for which the commercial wasn't available (not with good quality, anyway), but there's a Consumer's Report video of this one, too.
The average price for the Starter Kit was $131.00, and the Continuation kit (apparently, once you start Chantrix you have to continue to take it for several months) costs about the same. For that kind of money, you could hire someone to smoke for you.
6. Cymbalta - treats depression. But then again, I can tell you from personal experience that no drugs actually TREATS depression; they all just cover up the symptoms. Be that as it may, the worst aspect of Cymbalta is that you can't take a fucking aspirin with it because you might bleed to death. Average cost for this Absolute Godsend was $402.00 for a 90-day supply. Here's the commercial. I might want to bleed to death if I ever spent $402.00 on something and it didn't have a Hemi in it, or it didn't blow me with just a minimum of gentle persuasion.
7. Seroquel XR - another anti-depressant. Please note: it's also given to schizophrenics. I swear, we're all head cases in this country, aren't we? There was no commercial available for Seroquel, so I linked to the webpage. Seroquel costs about $100 for a month's supply (low dosage), but pay attention to the list of some of the most incredible side-effects: especially the part where it says that if you have some form of dementia and take this drug, you might just die. The involuntary facial tics, salivation, diabetes, possible sudden seizures and neurological disorders, and the possible liver damage, are just the bonus prizes you get for taking Seroquel.
8. Valtrex - for the treatment of genital herpes. Let's get something straight: despite all the young-ish, apparently straight actors in this commercial, I'm told by reliable sources that genital herpes is most often to be found amongst those over 55, and in Gay Men (Herpes was all the rage in the 1970's and 80's, you know. Then AIDS came along, and everyone forgot about it). This is another drug for Baby Boomers trying to disguise itself! Are you beginning to notice a pattern; how many commercials aimed at Baby Boomers have something to do with the crotch and screwing? I knew you would! The average cost of Valtrex was $151.00. And just like your herpes, you're probably stuck with Valtrex forever if you want to have any kind of sex life whatsoever.
9. Viagra - the Granddaddy of them all! The ultimate tribute to the Erect Phallus. Please take note of the very artistry of this commercial (as well as the list of side effects); well-preserved Woodstock-rejects, in a scene vaguely reminiscent of their "garage-band" days, sitting around, a-strummin' and a-singin' about Doin' the Nasty with Betty Sue, and then they sing the paean to the little blue bugger that makes it all possible! VEEEEE-VAAAAAAAH VIAGRA! You can't mistake just who this commercial is aimed at. Viagra has probably been responsible for more heart attacks in the last five years than red meat, a tanking NASDAQ, unexpected paternity test results and the erection...errr...ELECTION... of Barack Obama combined. Average cost of Viarga; $153.00.
Now, why did I do all this? What possible reason could I have for devoting this much time and effort to nonsense?
Because these are the drugs the Baby Boomers are taking, and they'll soon be retiring in huge numbers....and they'll want whatever version of ObamaCare that might pass to, eventually, pay for their prescriptions. You think it can't happen? If ObamaCare becomes the law of the land, within a decade there will be a voting bloc so monumentally huge that they will be denied nothing; 70 million Baby Boomers who'll want strong bones...and even stronger boners. And they'll have absolutely nothing to do (besides fuck, apparently) except vote, and what they'll vote for is what previous monolithic voting blocs have always voted for: someone pay for my shit!
Just as Social Security became the "third-rail" of American politics, so will ObamaCare for a generation that will depend upon it as recent economic loses will have destroyed much of their retirement assets.
This is what they'll expect to have others pay for. Magic pills that cure everything, expensively, but often cause far more problems then they solve...only more expensively. Which leads to a much more expensive Medical System.
You have been warned.
Update: The response to this post has been so positive, I'm thinking of making it a regular feature. So, every so often, I'll be posting more obnoxious crap about the silly prescription drug commercials we're deluged with ona daily basis.
Thursday, March 18, 2010
Hospitals and Insurance...
One of the blogs I frequent is Stilettos in the Sand, where the author, Sabra, sometimes cross-links my blog posts (like I have anything important to say?). You should take awalk over there sometimes, and see just what she's up to over there in Muslim Sand Flea Heaven. Anyways, there was a discussion begun on one of her threads that was prompted by a post of mine. You can read it here.
One of Sabra's respondents, posted the following:
"I live in a nation with univeral health care but guess what if you need an operation you have to wait, if you need some medical exams you have to wait but if you have an insurance and pay for your exams, operation and so on you don't have to wait...I had to have a small operation but if I had to have it through the national health care I should have to wait 2 or 3 months but i have a private insurance and I had to wait one week...Some time ago an american told me that part of the 30 millions without insurance are people that even if they have the $ to pay for it they opt to go without an insurance because they are healty/young and prefer to spend the money in other stuff. Please tell me if I wrong but if someone without insurance is sick isn't left outside the hospitals..."
This is a common misconception about the American healthcare system overseas. I have heard similar stuff from my English friends, and also from Italians and Spaniards on my travels.
I'll be happy to tell you that, No, if you're ill or injured, you cannot be turned away from a hospital regardless of ability to pay. In the United States of America, everyone is entitled to treatment in the Emergency Room. Free of Charge, unless they have insurance to defray or cover the costs.
And therein lies some of the problem, because Emergency Room treatment is the most expensive kind available, and what's supposed to be a last resort for the general public has become the means of first resort for far too many.
Many of these who use the Emergency Room as the first line of defense simply can't afford insurance. They don't earn enough, or rather, often can't earn enough. They belong to the economic lower class, mostly because they are unskilled, uneducated or have never worked before in their lives. The American social welfare system is quite generous; According to various sources, the official Federal Poverty level in the United States is something like $26,000 a year for a family of four, and that's before you include housing subsidies, tax credits -- only in America can people who don't pay taxes, get tax credits -- food assistance, and eligibility for Medicare on both the state and federal levels, which many never bother to sign up for, because that means effort. When you add in the fact that American Public schools are taxpayer funded, and that many colleges and organizations provide competitive scholarships, you begin to wonder just how anyone in America can ever be considered "poor".
It's just more like "lazy".
Ask someone in Calcutta, Sudan or Cambodia if $26k a year, plus a subsidized apartment, food, public schools and healthcare sounds like a good deal? Why do you think the world beats a path to our door, and not, say, Belize or Zimbabwe?
Anywhoo, the number of these people on the lower end of the economic spectrum is growing, mostly because of unchecked out-of-wedlock births in many minority communities, and because of illegal immigration. In fact, many illegal immigrants travel to the United States specifically to give birth, because we confer birthright citizenship upon their children if they're born in a U.S. Hospital, which make the entire family eligible for all sorts of welfare.
So, the Emergency Rooms are being flooded by by people who haven't the means to pay for their treatment, which means the taxpayer and those who do have private insurance subsidize the Emergency Room system for everyone else. And their numbers are growing; It is estimated that 12-15 million illegal immigrants are in the United States right now, and they're all using Emergency Rooms and Community Clinics, and not paying a red cent for it. That's about half the number of "uninsured" that ObamaCare assumes.
The second problem we face is that there are about to be 70 million more useless mouths added to the welfare rolls in the next decade; The Baby Boomers are about to retire. And never in the history of the world has there been a generation of people so obsessed with their health. They will expect to have every ache and pain catered to -- and paid for by someone else -- because, well, they'll be retired, you see.
And with the recent destruction of wealth caused by the shenanigans in world markets, and the loss of value in solid assets like real estate over the last few years, they'll be begging for more largess than even their parents received -- the typical "Greatest Generation" (i.e. born before/during the Great Depression) retiree lives(d) to an average age of 83, and 90-yr olds are not uncommon, meaning they are a net drain on the resources of Medicare and Social Security, which were both designed with the assumption that not many of them would live past 70. Now a great many of them (Baby Boomers) will have no or greatly-reduced assets to carry them comfortably through retirement.
The Medicare/Social Security system is already on the order of (depending on who's figures you believe) $40-170 trillion in the red, and we're about to run another 70 million souls onto the rolls, who medical science is now keeping alive even longer. Do the math. That's 100 million (the current 30, plus the Baby Boomer 70) people in a country of 300 million who will require "free" healthcare on a shrinking employment and tax base.
And not only are these folks obsessed with their health (after all, they've brought us jogging, aerobics, the healing power of minerals, yoga and Pilate's, the Nautilus machine, the macrobiotic and organic diets and so forth), they expect to be catered to -- because in addition to being the most health-conscious generation, they happen to be the most spoiled generation in history.
These two traits have combined to produce the modern pharmaceutical industry, which now caters to individual maladies (which used to be just associated with "old age" and borne gallantly and silently by those afflicted) with Silver Bullet pills. There are now designer drugs for Erectile Dysfunction, Depression, Osteoporosis, Liver Disorders, Lung Disorders, Incontinence, Swollen Prostates, Un-swollen Prostates, the list goes on and on. That's when they aren't developed to treat "made up" diseases (mostly caused by an increase in 'vanity' diseases, like Chronic Dry Eye , or sedentary lifestyles, like Restless Leg Syndrome). Each is incredibly expensive -- mostly because they are heavily marketed on American television. It is NOT unusual to see the same medication being advertised six to ten times a day.
If that isn't bad enough, most of these medications have side-effects which require other medications to counteract. This gets extremely expensive. The typical story is of someone who takes a medicine for an otherwise controllable-by-a-change-in-lifestyle problem, but then develops a variety of "syndromes" brought on by the side effects of these designer meds, and before you know it, your simple toenail fungus problem soon requires you to take four medications and spend $300 a month on them all.
A great number of these medications are NOT covered by medical insurance, mostly because the insurance companies consider them to be of dubious value, or because the side-effects are often worse than the disease they were meant to treat.
Then there are the predatory lawyers -- like former Presidential Candidate John Edwards -- who make a living suing doctors and hospitals. More like extorting settlements from them through the use of the legal system -- which causes doctors to practice defensive medicine; the ordering of unnecessary tests, the performing of unnecessary procedures -- just to keep the shysters of their backs. These lawyers treat the medical malpractice system like their own personal trough. If I'm not mistaken, John Edwards managed to milk it for somewhere in the neighborhood of $50 million by filing questionable "Cerebral Palsy and Birth Defect" suits, in which doctors are somehow to blame if your child is born with a genetic disorder, and must somehow be made to pay.
Now, the lawyers will argue they do noble work keeping bad doctors out of the system -- and many do -- but far too many run scams that they know they can earn good cash from, and not get called on it. Ever. The ABA and their democratic party protectors defend them. It's why Tort Reform hasn't even been discussed in ObamaCare. I'm of Sicilian lineage; if I did something similar to this the Federal Authorities would be at my doorstep with a RICO warrant and asking me if I knew anything about the Kennedy Assassination.
To sum up:
1. No one is denied medical care in the United States, regardless of ability to pay.
2. We're flooded by lazy, stupid people and illegal aliens who can't afford to pay for their care, and who use the Emergency Room for everything from the sniffles to childbirth-for-the-purposes-of -stealing-welfare-benefits.
3. 70-million useless mouths who feel they should be able to live forever at someone else's expense with the ability to sport pharmaceutally-enhanced erections will soon join the system without paying anything further into it, and they will live for far longer than even their free-loading parents did.
4. The legal profession is out of control in this country, and no longer exists to protect people's rights, but to enrich lawyers at the expense of the rest of us, and has done a great deal towards creating many of the problems we now face.
We won't even get into the stupidity of unionizing hospitals (anything run by unions usually produces terrible results, see: General Motors, the Public School System Homeland Security, FEMA, et. al.) , and don't get me started on government mandates upon States and employers with respect to healthcare. Take all of this into consideration and it's no wonder we have the most expensive healthcare system in the world.
What's amazing is that we still manage to have THE BEST Healthcare system in the world. America is that sort of country; it always has been. If the government would get out of the way, we'd not only have the best system, but the least expensive and the most responsive.
ObamaCare, in whatever form it takes, will achieve none of this. It will simply extend an unpaid-for entitlement to people who will never have to bear any responsibility for paying for it. In two US States where "Universal" healthcare was tried (Massachusetts and Tennessee), it has failed abominably, producing lower standards of general health, rationing, rising taxes and public debt.
UPDATE: I was in a hurry this afternoon when I originally wrote this; it has been edited for spelling/grammar, and some of my basic points expanded upon.
One of Sabra's respondents, posted the following:
"I live in a nation with univeral health care but guess what if you need an operation you have to wait, if you need some medical exams you have to wait but if you have an insurance and pay for your exams, operation and so on you don't have to wait...I had to have a small operation but if I had to have it through the national health care I should have to wait 2 or 3 months but i have a private insurance and I had to wait one week...Some time ago an american told me that part of the 30 millions without insurance are people that even if they have the $ to pay for it they opt to go without an insurance because they are healty/young and prefer to spend the money in other stuff. Please tell me if I wrong but if someone without insurance is sick isn't left outside the hospitals..."
This is a common misconception about the American healthcare system overseas. I have heard similar stuff from my English friends, and also from Italians and Spaniards on my travels.
I'll be happy to tell you that, No, if you're ill or injured, you cannot be turned away from a hospital regardless of ability to pay. In the United States of America, everyone is entitled to treatment in the Emergency Room. Free of Charge, unless they have insurance to defray or cover the costs.
And therein lies some of the problem, because Emergency Room treatment is the most expensive kind available, and what's supposed to be a last resort for the general public has become the means of first resort for far too many.
Many of these who use the Emergency Room as the first line of defense simply can't afford insurance. They don't earn enough, or rather, often can't earn enough. They belong to the economic lower class, mostly because they are unskilled, uneducated or have never worked before in their lives. The American social welfare system is quite generous; According to various sources, the official Federal Poverty level in the United States is something like $26,000 a year for a family of four, and that's before you include housing subsidies, tax credits -- only in America can people who don't pay taxes, get tax credits -- food assistance, and eligibility for Medicare on both the state and federal levels, which many never bother to sign up for, because that means effort. When you add in the fact that American Public schools are taxpayer funded, and that many colleges and organizations provide competitive scholarships, you begin to wonder just how anyone in America can ever be considered "poor".
It's just more like "lazy".
Ask someone in Calcutta, Sudan or Cambodia if $26k a year, plus a subsidized apartment, food, public schools and healthcare sounds like a good deal? Why do you think the world beats a path to our door, and not, say, Belize or Zimbabwe?
Anywhoo, the number of these people on the lower end of the economic spectrum is growing, mostly because of unchecked out-of-wedlock births in many minority communities, and because of illegal immigration. In fact, many illegal immigrants travel to the United States specifically to give birth, because we confer birthright citizenship upon their children if they're born in a U.S. Hospital, which make the entire family eligible for all sorts of welfare.
So, the Emergency Rooms are being flooded by by people who haven't the means to pay for their treatment, which means the taxpayer and those who do have private insurance subsidize the Emergency Room system for everyone else. And their numbers are growing; It is estimated that 12-15 million illegal immigrants are in the United States right now, and they're all using Emergency Rooms and Community Clinics, and not paying a red cent for it. That's about half the number of "uninsured" that ObamaCare assumes.
The second problem we face is that there are about to be 70 million more useless mouths added to the welfare rolls in the next decade; The Baby Boomers are about to retire. And never in the history of the world has there been a generation of people so obsessed with their health. They will expect to have every ache and pain catered to -- and paid for by someone else -- because, well, they'll be retired, you see.
And with the recent destruction of wealth caused by the shenanigans in world markets, and the loss of value in solid assets like real estate over the last few years, they'll be begging for more largess than even their parents received -- the typical "Greatest Generation" (i.e. born before/during the Great Depression) retiree lives(d) to an average age of 83, and 90-yr olds are not uncommon, meaning they are a net drain on the resources of Medicare and Social Security, which were both designed with the assumption that not many of them would live past 70. Now a great many of them (Baby Boomers) will have no or greatly-reduced assets to carry them comfortably through retirement.
The Medicare/Social Security system is already on the order of (depending on who's figures you believe) $40-170 trillion in the red, and we're about to run another 70 million souls onto the rolls, who medical science is now keeping alive even longer. Do the math. That's 100 million (the current 30, plus the Baby Boomer 70) people in a country of 300 million who will require "free" healthcare on a shrinking employment and tax base.
And not only are these folks obsessed with their health (after all, they've brought us jogging, aerobics, the healing power of minerals, yoga and Pilate's, the Nautilus machine, the macrobiotic and organic diets and so forth), they expect to be catered to -- because in addition to being the most health-conscious generation, they happen to be the most spoiled generation in history.
These two traits have combined to produce the modern pharmaceutical industry, which now caters to individual maladies (which used to be just associated with "old age" and borne gallantly and silently by those afflicted) with Silver Bullet pills. There are now designer drugs for Erectile Dysfunction, Depression, Osteoporosis, Liver Disorders, Lung Disorders, Incontinence, Swollen Prostates, Un-swollen Prostates, the list goes on and on. That's when they aren't developed to treat "made up" diseases (mostly caused by an increase in 'vanity' diseases, like Chronic Dry Eye , or sedentary lifestyles, like Restless Leg Syndrome). Each is incredibly expensive -- mostly because they are heavily marketed on American television. It is NOT unusual to see the same medication being advertised six to ten times a day.
If that isn't bad enough, most of these medications have side-effects which require other medications to counteract. This gets extremely expensive. The typical story is of someone who takes a medicine for an otherwise controllable-by-a-change-in-lifestyle problem, but then develops a variety of "syndromes" brought on by the side effects of these designer meds, and before you know it, your simple toenail fungus problem soon requires you to take four medications and spend $300 a month on them all.
A great number of these medications are NOT covered by medical insurance, mostly because the insurance companies consider them to be of dubious value, or because the side-effects are often worse than the disease they were meant to treat.
Then there are the predatory lawyers -- like former Presidential Candidate John Edwards -- who make a living suing doctors and hospitals. More like extorting settlements from them through the use of the legal system -- which causes doctors to practice defensive medicine; the ordering of unnecessary tests, the performing of unnecessary procedures -- just to keep the shysters of their backs. These lawyers treat the medical malpractice system like their own personal trough. If I'm not mistaken, John Edwards managed to milk it for somewhere in the neighborhood of $50 million by filing questionable "Cerebral Palsy and Birth Defect" suits, in which doctors are somehow to blame if your child is born with a genetic disorder, and must somehow be made to pay.
Now, the lawyers will argue they do noble work keeping bad doctors out of the system -- and many do -- but far too many run scams that they know they can earn good cash from, and not get called on it. Ever. The ABA and their democratic party protectors defend them. It's why Tort Reform hasn't even been discussed in ObamaCare. I'm of Sicilian lineage; if I did something similar to this the Federal Authorities would be at my doorstep with a RICO warrant and asking me if I knew anything about the Kennedy Assassination.
To sum up:
1. No one is denied medical care in the United States, regardless of ability to pay.
2. We're flooded by lazy, stupid people and illegal aliens who can't afford to pay for their care, and who use the Emergency Room for everything from the sniffles to childbirth-for-the-purposes-of -stealing-welfare-benefits.
3. 70-million useless mouths who feel they should be able to live forever at someone else's expense with the ability to sport pharmaceutally-enhanced erections will soon join the system without paying anything further into it, and they will live for far longer than even their free-loading parents did.
4. The legal profession is out of control in this country, and no longer exists to protect people's rights, but to enrich lawyers at the expense of the rest of us, and has done a great deal towards creating many of the problems we now face.
We won't even get into the stupidity of unionizing hospitals (anything run by unions usually produces terrible results, see: General Motors, the Public School System Homeland Security, FEMA, et. al.) , and don't get me started on government mandates upon States and employers with respect to healthcare. Take all of this into consideration and it's no wonder we have the most expensive healthcare system in the world.
What's amazing is that we still manage to have THE BEST Healthcare system in the world. America is that sort of country; it always has been. If the government would get out of the way, we'd not only have the best system, but the least expensive and the most responsive.
ObamaCare, in whatever form it takes, will achieve none of this. It will simply extend an unpaid-for entitlement to people who will never have to bear any responsibility for paying for it. In two US States where "Universal" healthcare was tried (Massachusetts and Tennessee), it has failed abominably, producing lower standards of general health, rationing, rising taxes and public debt.
UPDATE: I was in a hurry this afternoon when I originally wrote this; it has been edited for spelling/grammar, and some of my basic points expanded upon.
Wednesday, March 17, 2010
Some People Shouldn't Be Allowed to Breed..
Via JammieWearingFool, we get the story of Baby Hitler.
There are some people who aren't cut out to be parents. They either don't have the proper morality, or the correct sense of responsibility. Or, maybe like this mother, they're just dingbats who happened to get pregnant and had nothing better to do.
One gets the idea from reading the article that this woman, a) takes herself way too seriously; she's an artiste, you know, and b) has absolutely no scruples about exploiting her child in order to advance her "art". For that reason alone, her child(ren) should be taken from her, and she should be horsewhipped in the public square. That's before we even get to the photographs she took (see the original article), all in obnoxiously bad taste.
Children should never be used as props for their parents' politics, idealism, stupidity or mental illness.
There are some people who aren't cut out to be parents. They either don't have the proper morality, or the correct sense of responsibility. Or, maybe like this mother, they're just dingbats who happened to get pregnant and had nothing better to do.
One gets the idea from reading the article that this woman, a) takes herself way too seriously; she's an artiste, you know, and b) has absolutely no scruples about exploiting her child in order to advance her "art". For that reason alone, her child(ren) should be taken from her, and she should be horsewhipped in the public square. That's before we even get to the photographs she took (see the original article), all in obnoxiously bad taste.
Children should never be used as props for their parents' politics, idealism, stupidity or mental illness.
Go Figure...
It seems to me that some of the people who are screaming for "Free" and "Universal" Health care in the United States are usually the same people who preach that mankind is destroying the planet with his pollution and his carbon footprints, dooming us all to a painful and destructive future of skin cancers, rising sea levels, buried up to our waists in dead polar bears.
It's really hard to square their motivations, at first. I mean, they actually want something that will keep evil people alive (we're all evil by virtue of the fact that we exhale carbon dioxide, after all)? If human beings are destroying the world, then who-oh-why would you want to advocate for something that ensures that they'll be around longer to do ever-more environMENTAL damage, with their wanton mass consumption and thoughtless litter, and did we mention evil, disgusting breathing?
And I'm talking about YOU Al Gore, specifically, and the rest of your brain-dead minions in general.
I think the reason they're in favor of something so obviously in opposition to their main concern is that the idea of central control appeals to them more than the idea of a cleaner, greener world. I think they secretly believe that if ObamaCare were to be made the law of the land in the United States, that the higher-than-a-kite tax rates needed to support it are, in effect, environMENTAL-ly beneficial; if people are having their money confiscated to pay for breast implants for pre-op, undocumented Nicaraguan transexuals, then they don't have any money to buy meat. Or gasoline. Or pay their electric bills. Or engage in any economic activity at all.
And then we'll all be back, by necessity, in the circumstances which Mother Nature so-obviously intended for us; living in a "sustainable" partnership with the land, at which point, the smug enviironMENTAList will find some other panty-bunched nonsense to annoy us with, if we haven't killed and eaten them all first.
All you need to realize that ObamaCare is all about control of your income, your choices and your activities is to take a good look at the people that democrats drag out as examples of people who would be helped by their policies (and to be fair, they do this with every policy initiative, not just the squishy, touchy-feely ones).
For Al Gore back in 1999, it was the 200-year old woman with high blood pressure, diabetes, scabies, Athlete's tongue, leprosy, consumption and probably an ingrown pubic hair, who was "forced" to "decide between buying food and paying for her medications".
The other day, it was Barack Obama's leukemia victim who had to decide between paying the mortgage on the ancestral home, or getting medical treatment. My, a decade certainly makes a difference; the economic factor back then ('99) was a matter of simple survival -- medicine or starvation -- now the formulation is medicine or real estate. But perhaps that woman was just a convenient combination of themes: Obama will not only give her free medical insurance, he'll also get her out from under her mortgage. She's a victim of both the "Predatory" Insurance Companies AND the "Predatory" Mortgage Lenders!
In both cases, it later turns out that both "victims" were already eligible for some form of existing federal or state subsidy, including Medicare.
If this was REALLY about reform, then Obambi would be out to generally change the way the system delivers care, and the manner in which it tabulates rates of compensation. Instead, what he's aiming at is taking the free market element out of the equation altogether, while leaving the worst abuses in place -- so that now they can be committed by highly-paid, unionized, government employees, who will vote and contribute money to the democrats until the crack of Doomsday.
In the meantime, the huge transfer of wealth and services that all of this entails, from the exorbitant taxation, to the creation of multiple, intrusive and often-contradictory bureaucracies, will do something which Socialists have long dreamed of doing; it will, if not bring true economic equality to all mankind, it will at least make certain they're all suffering in the same horrible way, without the need for violent revolution and bad PR for the Socialist cause.
And so now you can see just where environMENTALists and ObamaCare supporters come to an agreement. They don't necessarily care about saving the planet or saving anyone's life, they simply wish to be able to exert control over others and generally feel themselves superior. If they manage to make a good living off it, so much the better.
If you truly wanted to reform the American health care system, you do the following four things:
1. Bust the unions.
2. Kill the lawyers.
3. Change the laws to allow real competition amongst insurance carriers, hospitals and doctors.
4. Dismantle the Medicare system and give everyone a voucher to purchase their own insurance, instead.
but, there I go applying logic. If the government actually did any of these things, there wouldn't be multiple layers of federal bureaucracy to fund, and no opportunity for graft.
The advocates are not so noble as they appear.
UPDATE: You know that old expression about how when one finds one's self in a deep hole, it behooves The Won to stop digging? Apparently BHO has never heard that one before. Brett Baier of FoxNews kicked his ass in a special interview on the subject of "Healthcare" this evening. It's long, but worth the view, and thanks to JammieWearingFool for posting it. It wasn't that long ago that BHO and his cronies considered FoxNews as the enemy, and simply a republican/conservative mouthpiece, but now Fox is their last resort when it comes to getting the Mengele Plan passed. Go figure.
What's plain to see in this interview is that after 15 months of drama, this asshole still doesn't get it, is still convinced that he's entitled to it, and doesn;t like answering direct questions. Without a teleprompter, this guy can't speak coherently at all.
It's really hard to square their motivations, at first. I mean, they actually want something that will keep evil people alive (we're all evil by virtue of the fact that we exhale carbon dioxide, after all)? If human beings are destroying the world, then who-oh-why would you want to advocate for something that ensures that they'll be around longer to do ever-more environMENTAL damage, with their wanton mass consumption and thoughtless litter, and did we mention evil, disgusting breathing?
And I'm talking about YOU Al Gore, specifically, and the rest of your brain-dead minions in general.
I think the reason they're in favor of something so obviously in opposition to their main concern is that the idea of central control appeals to them more than the idea of a cleaner, greener world. I think they secretly believe that if ObamaCare were to be made the law of the land in the United States, that the higher-than-a-kite tax rates needed to support it are, in effect, environMENTAL-ly beneficial; if people are having their money confiscated to pay for breast implants for pre-op, undocumented Nicaraguan transexuals, then they don't have any money to buy meat. Or gasoline. Or pay their electric bills. Or engage in any economic activity at all.
And then we'll all be back, by necessity, in the circumstances which Mother Nature so-obviously intended for us; living in a "sustainable" partnership with the land, at which point, the smug enviironMENTAList will find some other panty-bunched nonsense to annoy us with, if we haven't killed and eaten them all first.
All you need to realize that ObamaCare is all about control of your income, your choices and your activities is to take a good look at the people that democrats drag out as examples of people who would be helped by their policies (and to be fair, they do this with every policy initiative, not just the squishy, touchy-feely ones).
For Al Gore back in 1999, it was the 200-year old woman with high blood pressure, diabetes, scabies, Athlete's tongue, leprosy, consumption and probably an ingrown pubic hair, who was "forced" to "decide between buying food and paying for her medications".
The other day, it was Barack Obama's leukemia victim who had to decide between paying the mortgage on the ancestral home, or getting medical treatment. My, a decade certainly makes a difference; the economic factor back then ('99) was a matter of simple survival -- medicine or starvation -- now the formulation is medicine or real estate. But perhaps that woman was just a convenient combination of themes: Obama will not only give her free medical insurance, he'll also get her out from under her mortgage. She's a victim of both the "Predatory" Insurance Companies AND the "Predatory" Mortgage Lenders!
In both cases, it later turns out that both "victims" were already eligible for some form of existing federal or state subsidy, including Medicare.
If this was REALLY about reform, then Obambi would be out to generally change the way the system delivers care, and the manner in which it tabulates rates of compensation. Instead, what he's aiming at is taking the free market element out of the equation altogether, while leaving the worst abuses in place -- so that now they can be committed by highly-paid, unionized, government employees, who will vote and contribute money to the democrats until the crack of Doomsday.
In the meantime, the huge transfer of wealth and services that all of this entails, from the exorbitant taxation, to the creation of multiple, intrusive and often-contradictory bureaucracies, will do something which Socialists have long dreamed of doing; it will, if not bring true economic equality to all mankind, it will at least make certain they're all suffering in the same horrible way, without the need for violent revolution and bad PR for the Socialist cause.
And so now you can see just where environMENTALists and ObamaCare supporters come to an agreement. They don't necessarily care about saving the planet or saving anyone's life, they simply wish to be able to exert control over others and generally feel themselves superior. If they manage to make a good living off it, so much the better.
If you truly wanted to reform the American health care system, you do the following four things:
1. Bust the unions.
2. Kill the lawyers.
3. Change the laws to allow real competition amongst insurance carriers, hospitals and doctors.
4. Dismantle the Medicare system and give everyone a voucher to purchase their own insurance, instead.
but, there I go applying logic. If the government actually did any of these things, there wouldn't be multiple layers of federal bureaucracy to fund, and no opportunity for graft.
The advocates are not so noble as they appear.
UPDATE: You know that old expression about how when one finds one's self in a deep hole, it behooves The Won to stop digging? Apparently BHO has never heard that one before. Brett Baier of FoxNews kicked his ass in a special interview on the subject of "Healthcare" this evening. It's long, but worth the view, and thanks to JammieWearingFool for posting it. It wasn't that long ago that BHO and his cronies considered FoxNews as the enemy, and simply a republican/conservative mouthpiece, but now Fox is their last resort when it comes to getting the Mengele Plan passed. Go figure.
What's plain to see in this interview is that after 15 months of drama, this asshole still doesn't get it, is still convinced that he's entitled to it, and doesn;t like answering direct questions. Without a teleprompter, this guy can't speak coherently at all.
Happy St. Patrick's Day...
Yep, nothing like having a holiday who's mascot is a drunken midget with a horrendous accent, is there?As an Italian Boy, I've always been of the mind that I'd rather be Dead than Irish, but I have to admit that the Irish can certainly parrrrr-taaaay with the best of 'em! After the Brazilians and Spanish, the Irish are perhaps the greatest partiers on Planet Earth, in terms of purest debauchery. Why, the streets of New York this evening will be full of belligerent drunkards, leaving huge puddles of green vomit all over the place -- that's when they aren't leaving puddles of green urine in every convenient alleyway and upon every vertical surface.
Lions marking their territory are, by comparison, exceedingly clean.
For one day, everyone becomes Irish...or at least pants-shitting drunk.
Of course, the usual St. Patrick's Day controversy in New York -- whether or not Gays should be allowed to march in the Parade -- will be debated...again. Considering this is a holiday symbolized by a fat pixie with bad fashion sense, I don't see the problem. What's gayer than a leprechaun, after all? But there are Irish who still hold to the last vestiges of Roman Catholicism, if only for show, and so the same fight happens annually. I think, not that I care, that gays have been allowed to march in the parade for a few years now, but I'm too lazy to actually find out.
And what any of this has to do with either St. Patrick or Ireland is beyond my understanding. If it's supposed to be a religious holiday I never hear of anyone attending mass for it, and the only kneeling in prayer-like solemnity that seems to get done is the sort that usually precedes the technicolor yawn into the good, Ol' American Standard. If it's a cultural holiday,then what culture, exactly, are we celebrating? The True Irish culture which is gentle, learned, civilized, calling upon a long and wealthy lineage back to the days of Celtic Europe -- or the culture of the drunken retard, Guinness Stout, Identity Politics and Potato Famines?
Most of the hub-bub about St. Patrick's Day, at least in how we celebrate it today, is a relic of the 17th and 18th century, not the 4th-5th Century, which is when St. Patrick was supposed to have lived.
I usually avoid going out on St. Patrick's Day, if I can avoid it, if only because people seem to believe they've been given license to behave like absolute Huns because of the calendar. The drinking always leads to the same laundry list of problems; public brawling, sexual assaults, streets full of piss and puke, at least a dozen seriously-injured cops and at least 50 bias crimes.
I used to partake of those time-honored traditions, too ... but that was when I was an alcoholic. None of that stuff makes any sense or seems very fun unless one is inebriated. I've grown out of that, I should like to think.
I'm certain St. Patrick would approve not (if he were still alive), and that somehow all of this debauchery fulfills some deep-seated need. The only thing I truly miss about being part of the "festivities" is listening to the one overly-devoted inebriate who actually knows the history of the Irish struggle against...well...everything, going all the way back to the Romans. And he's determined to tell you the entire story, pausing only long enough to order another shot of Jamieson's, and scratch his balls in public.
He can make the tale, which is sort of like the Irish version of "Roots", almost seem like the romantic epic of an entire nation. But then you remember that the other 364 days a year this guy is supposed to be giving communion, and you secretly wish you could be a fly on the wall for his confession tomorrow. There's got to be at least one altar boy in there somewhere.
By the way, tomorrow is the Feast of St. Joseph, the patron Saint of Italy, which passes every year with very little fanfare -- primarily because Italians don't take every excuse they can find to get rip-roarin' drunk and violent. We have a Mafia to do that for us. I don't actually believe in Saints and Feast Days, and I certainly find the concept of an Irish Holiday which commemorates a Briton, to be highly amusing and somewhat ironic. Point that out to an Irishman in his cups and just watch his head explode.
And everything tastes better without green food coloring in it. It certainly doesn't make anything look more appetizing, that's for sure.
So, Happy St. Patrick's Day to anyone sober enough to read this!
Oh, and I'm kidding.
Update: A short dissertation on Irish slang.
Manufactured Grief...
There's nothing worse, I think, than the manufactured grief that often accompanies the passing of a celebrity. Especially a D-List-washed-up-I-don't-even-remember-you-celebrity who's impact on your life, assuming they have one, is so fleeting and insubstantial that you can't even be bothered to remember their name.
I feel that way about the passing of Corey Haim, whom I was informed -- after the fact -- was a Big Star in Movies (exactly two of 'em!) in the 1980's (Hey, he's My Generation! I should care!), and was somehow such a huge and tremendous talent of such incredible import that...I forgot all about him.
In fact, I'm certain a lot of people forgot just who Corey Haim was. And that's probably the root of many his problems.
I'm not here to crap all over the dead, and certainly not all over this guy; I can understand what drove his addictions and I have some sympathy for the mental anguish it must have caused him and his family. What I don't understand is what his partner-in-crime, Corey Feldman (who I also forgot about, until someone reminded me that he was in "The Goonies") was talking about, thus:
"...In a posting on his Web site today, Feldman wrote: "I miss you so much already. When I think of something funny I don’t know who to tell it to. I find myself trying to call you but then remember your (sic) not there. I think about the new movies we will soon be doing together and then suddenly realize that the dream is over. I always feared this day would come, and often rehearsed how to face it. But once confronted with the reality of it, it’s so much more painful than I could have ever imagined. Nobody will ever understand the brotherhood we shared."
Feldman also wrote that he "never knew" that Haim's death would "have such a huge impact on the world."
"I learned something Corey, there are a lot of people out there who really love you, and appreciate the joy you have brought to their hearts," he added. "I only wish you could see the way the world is mourning over your absence...."
Okay, a few comments:
Firstly, Corey and Corey were living in some sort of fantasy world (probably drug-induced) in which they were going to become "famous" again. Sorry, but child stars usually only gain fame the second time around when they manage kill someone, most often themselves. No one was ringing your doorbell, and no one was dying to get either one of you back on the silver screen. I should have thought that after two decades in the "Where are they now?" bin, you might have noticed. Even when someone did want you to work for them, it was to exploit you in one of those new-fangled reality shows which are little better than kiddie porn for all the redeeming virtues they possess.
If that's what you had to look forward to then no wonder you took drugs. For your own good, Mr. Feldman, the sooner you begin to realize that high of fame and notoriety is gone and will never return, the sooner you can begin to heal yourself and perhaps save your own life. Your acting days are probably over; the only reason you had a few in the first place was because you were a semi-cute kid. You grew out of that, and then no one had a use for you afterwards. Get used to it, and adapt accordingly.
Finally, it's this line which really gets my goat:
"I only wish you could see the way the world is mourning over your absence."
I can promise you this: by next week, Corey Haim will be forgotten again by the greater mass of humanity. And so will Corey Feldman.That's the saddest truth about life.
The only reason anyone (other than Haim's family and friends) "mourns" Corey Haim today is because we live in the age of relentless 24/7/365 media outlets that have time to fill and bills to pay, and if they have to jam square pegs into round holes, or spend an inordinate amount of time shouting the virtues of people who have even the slightest amount of notoriety and impact in order to fill, --then damn straight Corey Haim somehow becomes relevant again! Suddenly, because he managed to kill himself, he becomes My Generation's John Barrymore, Errol Flynn and Orson Welles all rolled up into one, and I'm supposed to mourn the loss of such a spectacular talent.
Alright, that's business, and I can understand that. But what I object to is that someone retroactively decides to beatify the guy when he overdoses, and then expects me to join in a orgy of forced and manufactured grief. I really and truly resent being told what I should invest my emotions in, especially by people who really don't give a shit.The second thing that I object to is that someone had to die in order to get a little attention, which might have saved a tortured mind -- and in this case, he gets all the wrong sorts of attention way after the time when any of it might have mattered.
Where were you people when this man needed your help?
I feel that way about the passing of Corey Haim, whom I was informed -- after the fact -- was a Big Star in Movies (exactly two of 'em!) in the 1980's (Hey, he's My Generation! I should care!), and was somehow such a huge and tremendous talent of such incredible import that...I forgot all about him.
In fact, I'm certain a lot of people forgot just who Corey Haim was. And that's probably the root of many his problems.
I'm not here to crap all over the dead, and certainly not all over this guy; I can understand what drove his addictions and I have some sympathy for the mental anguish it must have caused him and his family. What I don't understand is what his partner-in-crime, Corey Feldman (who I also forgot about, until someone reminded me that he was in "The Goonies") was talking about, thus:
"...In a posting on his Web site today, Feldman wrote: "I miss you so much already. When I think of something funny I don’t know who to tell it to. I find myself trying to call you but then remember your (sic) not there. I think about the new movies we will soon be doing together and then suddenly realize that the dream is over. I always feared this day would come, and often rehearsed how to face it. But once confronted with the reality of it, it’s so much more painful than I could have ever imagined. Nobody will ever understand the brotherhood we shared."
Feldman also wrote that he "never knew" that Haim's death would "have such a huge impact on the world."
"I learned something Corey, there are a lot of people out there who really love you, and appreciate the joy you have brought to their hearts," he added. "I only wish you could see the way the world is mourning over your absence...."
Okay, a few comments:
Firstly, Corey and Corey were living in some sort of fantasy world (probably drug-induced) in which they were going to become "famous" again. Sorry, but child stars usually only gain fame the second time around when they manage kill someone, most often themselves. No one was ringing your doorbell, and no one was dying to get either one of you back on the silver screen. I should have thought that after two decades in the "Where are they now?" bin, you might have noticed. Even when someone did want you to work for them, it was to exploit you in one of those new-fangled reality shows which are little better than kiddie porn for all the redeeming virtues they possess.
If that's what you had to look forward to then no wonder you took drugs. For your own good, Mr. Feldman, the sooner you begin to realize that high of fame and notoriety is gone and will never return, the sooner you can begin to heal yourself and perhaps save your own life. Your acting days are probably over; the only reason you had a few in the first place was because you were a semi-cute kid. You grew out of that, and then no one had a use for you afterwards. Get used to it, and adapt accordingly.
Finally, it's this line which really gets my goat:
"I only wish you could see the way the world is mourning over your absence."
I can promise you this: by next week, Corey Haim will be forgotten again by the greater mass of humanity. And so will Corey Feldman.That's the saddest truth about life.
The only reason anyone (other than Haim's family and friends) "mourns" Corey Haim today is because we live in the age of relentless 24/7/365 media outlets that have time to fill and bills to pay, and if they have to jam square pegs into round holes, or spend an inordinate amount of time shouting the virtues of people who have even the slightest amount of notoriety and impact in order to fill, --then damn straight Corey Haim somehow becomes relevant again! Suddenly, because he managed to kill himself, he becomes My Generation's John Barrymore, Errol Flynn and Orson Welles all rolled up into one, and I'm supposed to mourn the loss of such a spectacular talent.
Alright, that's business, and I can understand that. But what I object to is that someone retroactively decides to beatify the guy when he overdoses, and then expects me to join in a orgy of forced and manufactured grief. I really and truly resent being told what I should invest my emotions in, especially by people who really don't give a shit.The second thing that I object to is that someone had to die in order to get a little attention, which might have saved a tortured mind -- and in this case, he gets all the wrong sorts of attention way after the time when any of it might have mattered.
Where were you people when this man needed your help?
Please, God, MAKE IT GO AWAY!!!!
Would you toss your career away for this woman?You might if your name is John Edwards.
Now, I know I've said it a million times on this blog; I won't talk about John Edwards anymore...except this one, last time. Truthfully, I think I just enjoy the schadenfreude, and I'm getting a good belly laugh just imagining how Edwards must be feeling right about now that his paramour and baby-mama has spilled her guts to GQ, complete with photos (via The New York Post).
I guess she might as well make some cash while she can, right? Because considering Johnny-boy's actions to date, if he could get out of paying child support by killing himself, he just might do it. More likely, he'll get another douchebag political hack to kill himself and then claim the body is John Edwards....really.
Anyways, I think I'm just enjoying the thought of Edwards squirming. He's been exposed for the cad and liar that he always was, and you'd think that after some reasonable amount of time, his public embarrassment would end and we could be well-and-truly done with this piece of shit.
But no...The Baby Mama has to have her fifteen minutes, too.
On some level, I think this woman is laboring under the misapprehension that "Johnny" (as she calls him) is actually in love with her. That once that old battleaxe, Elizabeth Edwards, finally kicks the bucket (who gets no sympathy from me; she's just as bad as her husband), that she and Johnny will live Happily Ever After. Perhaps that might even happen, in some Bizarro Universe, but what's more likely to happen is that he'll find some way to weasel out on her.
I mean, look at that picture; He actually fucked that. And more than once, obviously. That woman has a look in her eyes that fairly screams "Glenn-Close-Full-Menstrual-Fury-Batshit-INSANE". I mean, I've even looked at the GQ pics that accompanied the article, and quite frankly, she's not that hot. I rather doubt the attraction was physical.
It was more like she was convenient. Busy men -- especially those trying to lie their way into the White House with fake Andy-Griffith-Like-Aw-Shucks-Populism and tales of Two Americas which apparently don't apply to the man in the 32-room mansion who somehow believes he still feels the working stiff's pain -- will stick their willies in anything that hold still long enough. And if you continue to make yourself available n this fashion, they'll continue to take advantage of the convenience. There's no emotion in it for these guys, no attachment. It's a purely physical act.
And then, as always, it becomes inconvenient for them to continue the routine. Then they do stuff like try to hide you from public view, deny anything about affairs, claim they're the victim of some slanderous campaign, get their flunkies to lie for them, pay bribes to keep you silent, shut you up in someone else's mansion, and ultimately, try to steal dirty diapers so as to game the DNA test for the coming paternity suit.
I mean, really, Gentlemen; would you do the horizontal mambo with THAT? Without a drink or seven? Personally, I wouldn't hit that with a stolen dick. Not only do I get the distinct impression that the sex would suck, I KNOW this broad would probably be so incredibly grateful that I even talked to her that she'd suddenly be everywhere -- in my hallway banging on my door in the small hours, outside my place of business laying in wait for me, begging my landlord to give her a set of keys, and then eventually, committing a very messy and dramatic suicide on my doorstep -- but that's only because I wasn't home in time to make it a proper murder-suicide.
(Note: I've been through a similar little drama before....Except for the messy suicide part!).
Trust me: I know crazy...that woman looks Manson-family crazy.
Now, I know I'm not being completely fair to Ms. Homewrecker...errr...Hunter. But as much as John Edwards disgusts me, she disgusts me just as much, if not more. She knew he was a married man with a family and sick wife at home, and she's not exactly a sainted figure because of it, either. But anything which continues to expose both of these losers for the petty, narcissistic little assholes that they are is welcome, even if it is annoying, because every time both show their faces somewhere, it reminds us just what a turd John Edwards always was and that some misguided douchebags thought that turd would have made a great President of the United States.
Now THAT truly would have been crazy!
Tuesday, March 16, 2010
Detroit, New York, What's the Diff?
J. Robert Smith at Pajamas Media muses upon the Post Office and a Green Detroit, and it's a cautionary tale for the rest of us.
Mr. Smith shouldn't fool himself into thinking it's only democrats that think this way. Our so-called republican (probably because it was the cheapest label to buy) Mayor of Noo Yawk, Michael Bloomberg -- Patron Saint of Virgin Spinsters and the Perpetually-Pantybunched -- was so convinced that only his divine beneficence could "save" this city from it's looming Wall-Street-induced fiscal crisis that he went out and had the goddamned election laws changed so that he could serve a third term.
And once he'd accomplished re-election -- spending $100 million bucks of his own hard earned coin. At least he had that much decency -- and then winning by a mere 4% over a democratic candidate that ran such a lackluster, torturous, tedious campaign of inanity, inertia and hot air that you would have thought he was the National Spokesperson for Constipation, did Saint Bloomberg turn his considerable talents towards helping New York navigate the current financial crisis?
No.
Did he, perhaps, set about enacting the vital reforms that are needed in this city, which is slowly having it's lifeblood sucked out of it by voracious public unions, a rising crime rate, fleeing businesses, rising unemployment rates, shrinking tax base, unchecked illegal immigration and higher levels of government spending?
Of course not.
Then what, exactly, is he doing?
Trying to pass a law restricting how much salt finds it's way into my food...
That's after, of course, he's already passed laws outlawing transfats, making certain I have all the nutritional information available on my Whopper with Cheese posted at the cash register, and eliminated the serving of sugary drinks in public schools (where they still somehow manage to serve corndogs, pizza and processed chicken nuggets, according to my nephews).
This is the Mayor who's also cordoned off sections of the city that used to be open to vehicular traffic so that now you can walk all the way up Broadway, from Times Square to Central Park on the weekends, assuming you'd want to considering there's a subway available to save you the trouble and shoe leather. It's not as if there's much scenery to enjoy between 42nd and Columbus Circle -- unless you like office towers.
It's the same Mayor who once suggested "congestion pricing" plans by which tolls charged on river crossings to enter the city from the Outer Boroughs would be adjusted by time of day and general level of traffic. The idea was a) to restrict vehicle traffic into the City and thus, clean the air and make traffic flow more smoothly, and b) raise a shitload of money while simultaneously denying the benefits and niceties of the City to those who live in the Outer Boroughs for the benefit of the transplanted Upper East Side libtards.
It's both class and economic warfare, veiled by the pledge of "it's all for the Common Good..".
The City of New York is always on the lookout for a buck; so much so that it inspects your garbage, which had better be thrown in out in clear, see-through plastic bags, and placed in the proper trash receptacle if you wish to avoid a fine greater than that given to speeders, drunk drivers or public urinators (don't ask me how I know that!).
You can no longer smoke in public, assuming you can afford cigarettes; which now average nearly $10 a pack. Michael Bloomberg has succeeded in making crack a cheaper and more attractive alternative to tobacco. In the meantime, the city's poor continue to get fatter and sicker (a steady diet of welfare-funded Twinkies and Fatback will do that to you), and the hospitals ever-more crowded with pregnant illegals with tuberculosis and AIDS, and the Union workers who run them get richer and do less work, and this is why the taxes on cigarettes had to be raised in the first place; to save the hospitals.
At least that's what they said...
The rot started under democrats (I remember the days of Abe Beam, Hugh Carey, Ed Koch and David Dinkins with something less than nostalgia, more like nausea), but then something mysterious happened: some republicans came along -- like Rudy Giuliani and Mike Bloomberg -- and they not only did their republican schtick and cut crime and spending (although Bloomberg loves raising taxes), they also carried on some of the stupidity and freedom-choking policies of their predecessors. For Rudy it was mostly about guns, but for St. Mikey it's all about his Upper East Sider friends and their "enlightened" sensibilities.
Blooomberg's fiercely-mextrosexual, self-appointed-Manhattan-elite are the new Lords of the Manor, and we're the serfs.
Now Micheal Bloomberg spends all his time, and his vast fortune, to ensure you're eating arugula and lemon grass and his friends get to walk their fancy, teacup lapdogs in Central Park, or to enjoy the boisterous Open-Air flea markets selling counterfeit goods and authentic West African food poisoning that now dominate Midtown on the weekends, all without having to encounter a taxi, an SUV, or a tourist (unless they have really neat European accents), or worse -- one of the proles from Queens or Staten Island -- while every potential employer flees the city because of crushing tax burdens, regulatory expenses and overpaid Union labor, and the State floats upon a sea of red ink.
The only thing missing from Micheal Bloomberg's New York City is a Bastille for us scum to storm.
And people wonder why nearly a decade after 9/11 there's still a great, big, gaping 19-acre hole in the ground?
In many respects, New York and Detroit are already sister cities.
Mr. Smith shouldn't fool himself into thinking it's only democrats that think this way. Our so-called republican (probably because it was the cheapest label to buy) Mayor of Noo Yawk, Michael Bloomberg -- Patron Saint of Virgin Spinsters and the Perpetually-Pantybunched -- was so convinced that only his divine beneficence could "save" this city from it's looming Wall-Street-induced fiscal crisis that he went out and had the goddamned election laws changed so that he could serve a third term.
And once he'd accomplished re-election -- spending $100 million bucks of his own hard earned coin. At least he had that much decency -- and then winning by a mere 4% over a democratic candidate that ran such a lackluster, torturous, tedious campaign of inanity, inertia and hot air that you would have thought he was the National Spokesperson for Constipation, did Saint Bloomberg turn his considerable talents towards helping New York navigate the current financial crisis?
No.
Did he, perhaps, set about enacting the vital reforms that are needed in this city, which is slowly having it's lifeblood sucked out of it by voracious public unions, a rising crime rate, fleeing businesses, rising unemployment rates, shrinking tax base, unchecked illegal immigration and higher levels of government spending?
Of course not.
Then what, exactly, is he doing?
Trying to pass a law restricting how much salt finds it's way into my food...
That's after, of course, he's already passed laws outlawing transfats, making certain I have all the nutritional information available on my Whopper with Cheese posted at the cash register, and eliminated the serving of sugary drinks in public schools (where they still somehow manage to serve corndogs, pizza and processed chicken nuggets, according to my nephews).
This is the Mayor who's also cordoned off sections of the city that used to be open to vehicular traffic so that now you can walk all the way up Broadway, from Times Square to Central Park on the weekends, assuming you'd want to considering there's a subway available to save you the trouble and shoe leather. It's not as if there's much scenery to enjoy between 42nd and Columbus Circle -- unless you like office towers.
It's the same Mayor who once suggested "congestion pricing" plans by which tolls charged on river crossings to enter the city from the Outer Boroughs would be adjusted by time of day and general level of traffic. The idea was a) to restrict vehicle traffic into the City and thus, clean the air and make traffic flow more smoothly, and b) raise a shitload of money while simultaneously denying the benefits and niceties of the City to those who live in the Outer Boroughs for the benefit of the transplanted Upper East Side libtards.
It's both class and economic warfare, veiled by the pledge of "it's all for the Common Good..".
The City of New York is always on the lookout for a buck; so much so that it inspects your garbage, which had better be thrown in out in clear, see-through plastic bags, and placed in the proper trash receptacle if you wish to avoid a fine greater than that given to speeders, drunk drivers or public urinators (don't ask me how I know that!).
You can no longer smoke in public, assuming you can afford cigarettes; which now average nearly $10 a pack. Michael Bloomberg has succeeded in making crack a cheaper and more attractive alternative to tobacco. In the meantime, the city's poor continue to get fatter and sicker (a steady diet of welfare-funded Twinkies and Fatback will do that to you), and the hospitals ever-more crowded with pregnant illegals with tuberculosis and AIDS, and the Union workers who run them get richer and do less work, and this is why the taxes on cigarettes had to be raised in the first place; to save the hospitals.
At least that's what they said...
The rot started under democrats (I remember the days of Abe Beam, Hugh Carey, Ed Koch and David Dinkins with something less than nostalgia, more like nausea), but then something mysterious happened: some republicans came along -- like Rudy Giuliani and Mike Bloomberg -- and they not only did their republican schtick and cut crime and spending (although Bloomberg loves raising taxes), they also carried on some of the stupidity and freedom-choking policies of their predecessors. For Rudy it was mostly about guns, but for St. Mikey it's all about his Upper East Sider friends and their "enlightened" sensibilities.
Blooomberg's fiercely-mextrosexual, self-appointed-Manhattan-elite are the new Lords of the Manor, and we're the serfs.
Now Micheal Bloomberg spends all his time, and his vast fortune, to ensure you're eating arugula and lemon grass and his friends get to walk their fancy, teacup lapdogs in Central Park, or to enjoy the boisterous Open-Air flea markets selling counterfeit goods and authentic West African food poisoning that now dominate Midtown on the weekends, all without having to encounter a taxi, an SUV, or a tourist (unless they have really neat European accents), or worse -- one of the proles from Queens or Staten Island -- while every potential employer flees the city because of crushing tax burdens, regulatory expenses and overpaid Union labor, and the State floats upon a sea of red ink.
The only thing missing from Micheal Bloomberg's New York City is a Bastille for us scum to storm.
And people wonder why nearly a decade after 9/11 there's still a great, big, gaping 19-acre hole in the ground?
In many respects, New York and Detroit are already sister cities.
Monday, March 15, 2010
Reason # 11,206 Why Your President is an Asshole...
Okay, I've just turned the television on, and once again The Savior of the Universe is on television complaining about Insurance companies, beating the bushes for his ObamaCare monstrosity. He's using the same old strawman arguments about "the old lady who gets screwed by her insurance company" and "paid the highest deductible, but got rotten service" and was ultimately "dropped for a pre-existing condition" and all that tommyrot.
Listen, I have first-hand knowledge of what it is to be fucked royally by an insurance company, but I can console myself with this thought: when they were picking up my bills, 90% of my medical expenses were paid for, and I still got 60% of my yearly salary -- tax free -- for almost two years afterwards.
And I paid a lot for that level of coverage, Mr. President. I was recently looking at an old paycheck, and I was paying just a hair over $2,400 a year for that policy, and Lord knows how much of that tab my employer picked up. The lesson: if you can afford to pay for it, you can get awesome coverage.
The problem is that there are people who can't afford that level of coverage, and the reason they can't is not because the insurance companies are out to screw them; it's because they can't earn enough to pay for it themselves. The reasons they can't earn enough to pay for it are varied, but I can promise you that at the top of the list are: uneducated (because the Union-run public schools do such a good job!), lazy (why work when you can claim aggrieved minority status, or just engage in serial pregnancy and get free money?), receiving welfare for the second or third generation, criminal, in the country illegally, have never held a job in their lives.
What Pelosi and Reid have wrought, America wants not. I don't know how much clearer that can be made without an angry mob gathering outside the White House with torches and pitchforks. We can't afford it as a country, and the economy at present is shrinking, not growing, and so it's not likely to be a winner at anytime in the foreseeable future. Drop this subject, Mr. President. You should be paying attention to more important things.
Yet, they can't seem to help themselves, these Obamatards. They keep pushing and pressing and trying to sell it to us. They think if they send The Won out into set-piece little dramas where he is surrounded by vocal supporters (the lazy, halt and stupid, the Union slobs who can afford their own insurance but want it for nothing, anyway), and keep putting them lofty speeches into the Ol' Teleprompter for him to vocalize -- that if he just manages to seem somewhat "Presidential" -- then this pig will manage to fly.
Someone's been watching too much "West Wing", methinks...when he hasn't been following strange men into the shower, allegedly?
None of this makes Barack Obama look "Presidential". Today will be, I think, like his 50th Potemkin Village speech on "health" "care". I still don't know what the heck he's talking about, except that a long-standing American libtard tradition of giving shit to people who haven't earned, and certainly won't ever pay, for it, is to be continued on an even grander scale. FDR and LBJ were disgustingly parsimonious with other people's money compared to BHO. Yeah, that'll make it increasingly popular.
Get this through your heads, democrats: poor people are not terribly motivated to do anything for very long (except maybe breed, smoke crack, and commit violent crimes). You may manage to harness their numbers every so often to achieve some limited result, but you will never be able to harness them for the sort of "transformative" change you're talking about because your own actions have turned them into little more than mental slaves of the government plantation -- with rice pudding for brains, no ambition, no pride and no work ethic. You can round them all up and pump 'em full of adrenaline, but their enthusiasm will quickly fade because their attention spans are geared for "right this second" rather than "tomorrow"; this is why the class-warfare card always fails. It's why this bill will never become law. It's why you're failing now.
It's now gone beyond mere failure, and it begins more and more to resemble desperate begging. It's high-pressure, full-court press sales time; you might as well hang a sign on Obi Won that says "Everything must Go!". You can smell the fear through the television set; this man, who promised so much, has delivered on nothing. If anything, he's already on track to become the Worst President in U.S. History, and yet he's holding out the slim hope that there will be something, something, that he can "achieve" of lasting value that will set him above James Earl Carter on that list. It's beginning to look more like ego than a policy goal. But He's wrong about it all.
Primarily, he's wrong because his vision was too broad, and in the end, he left it to others with their own agendas to fashion it and put their stamps upon it. The other reason he's wrong is because none of this crap over "health" "care" is what a President needs to be doing, nor a government. Do you realize that while the American economy tanks, we've spent fifteen months talking about nothing but this stupid bill?
On the one hand, we should be thankful the assholes in Congress have been preoccupied by this monstrosity, because who knows what other nonsense they may have cooked up if they had had more free time. On the other, BHO has frittered away one third of his presidency tilting at windmills. And if you'll allow me a third hand for rhetorical purposes, The Obama/Pelosi/Reid Frankenstein Bill has probably done more to damage the democratic (small 'd' intentional) party for the future than any tax-cheating, boy-fondling, bribe-taking Congresscirtter ever could.
This bill is the Titanic, and when it finally goes down, it's taking everyone with it. You know it, I know it, anyone capable of breathing without mechanical assistance (would that be covered?) knows it; why doesn't Barack Obama? Either he's stupid, or he doesn't care. I don't know which is worse.
Listen, I have first-hand knowledge of what it is to be fucked royally by an insurance company, but I can console myself with this thought: when they were picking up my bills, 90% of my medical expenses were paid for, and I still got 60% of my yearly salary -- tax free -- for almost two years afterwards.
And I paid a lot for that level of coverage, Mr. President. I was recently looking at an old paycheck, and I was paying just a hair over $2,400 a year for that policy, and Lord knows how much of that tab my employer picked up. The lesson: if you can afford to pay for it, you can get awesome coverage.
The problem is that there are people who can't afford that level of coverage, and the reason they can't is not because the insurance companies are out to screw them; it's because they can't earn enough to pay for it themselves. The reasons they can't earn enough to pay for it are varied, but I can promise you that at the top of the list are: uneducated (because the Union-run public schools do such a good job!), lazy (why work when you can claim aggrieved minority status, or just engage in serial pregnancy and get free money?), receiving welfare for the second or third generation, criminal, in the country illegally, have never held a job in their lives.
What Pelosi and Reid have wrought, America wants not. I don't know how much clearer that can be made without an angry mob gathering outside the White House with torches and pitchforks. We can't afford it as a country, and the economy at present is shrinking, not growing, and so it's not likely to be a winner at anytime in the foreseeable future. Drop this subject, Mr. President. You should be paying attention to more important things.
Yet, they can't seem to help themselves, these Obamatards. They keep pushing and pressing and trying to sell it to us. They think if they send The Won out into set-piece little dramas where he is surrounded by vocal supporters (the lazy, halt and stupid, the Union slobs who can afford their own insurance but want it for nothing, anyway), and keep putting them lofty speeches into the Ol' Teleprompter for him to vocalize -- that if he just manages to seem somewhat "Presidential" -- then this pig will manage to fly.
Someone's been watching too much "West Wing", methinks...when he hasn't been following strange men into the shower, allegedly?
None of this makes Barack Obama look "Presidential". Today will be, I think, like his 50th Potemkin Village speech on "health" "care". I still don't know what the heck he's talking about, except that a long-standing American libtard tradition of giving shit to people who haven't earned, and certainly won't ever pay, for it, is to be continued on an even grander scale. FDR and LBJ were disgustingly parsimonious with other people's money compared to BHO. Yeah, that'll make it increasingly popular.
Get this through your heads, democrats: poor people are not terribly motivated to do anything for very long (except maybe breed, smoke crack, and commit violent crimes). You may manage to harness their numbers every so often to achieve some limited result, but you will never be able to harness them for the sort of "transformative" change you're talking about because your own actions have turned them into little more than mental slaves of the government plantation -- with rice pudding for brains, no ambition, no pride and no work ethic. You can round them all up and pump 'em full of adrenaline, but their enthusiasm will quickly fade because their attention spans are geared for "right this second" rather than "tomorrow"; this is why the class-warfare card always fails. It's why this bill will never become law. It's why you're failing now.
It's now gone beyond mere failure, and it begins more and more to resemble desperate begging. It's high-pressure, full-court press sales time; you might as well hang a sign on Obi Won that says "Everything must Go!". You can smell the fear through the television set; this man, who promised so much, has delivered on nothing. If anything, he's already on track to become the Worst President in U.S. History, and yet he's holding out the slim hope that there will be something, something, that he can "achieve" of lasting value that will set him above James Earl Carter on that list. It's beginning to look more like ego than a policy goal. But He's wrong about it all.
Primarily, he's wrong because his vision was too broad, and in the end, he left it to others with their own agendas to fashion it and put their stamps upon it. The other reason he's wrong is because none of this crap over "health" "care" is what a President needs to be doing, nor a government. Do you realize that while the American economy tanks, we've spent fifteen months talking about nothing but this stupid bill?
On the one hand, we should be thankful the assholes in Congress have been preoccupied by this monstrosity, because who knows what other nonsense they may have cooked up if they had had more free time. On the other, BHO has frittered away one third of his presidency tilting at windmills. And if you'll allow me a third hand for rhetorical purposes, The Obama/Pelosi/Reid Frankenstein Bill has probably done more to damage the democratic (small 'd' intentional) party for the future than any tax-cheating, boy-fondling, bribe-taking Congresscirtter ever could.
This bill is the Titanic, and when it finally goes down, it's taking everyone with it. You know it, I know it, anyone capable of breathing without mechanical assistance (would that be covered?) knows it; why doesn't Barack Obama? Either he's stupid, or he doesn't care. I don't know which is worse.
Sorry, I've Been Busy!
I haven't been writing much of late! And what I have written looks, in retrospect, like poop because I haven't devoted enough time to detail. But, I have an excuse, you see; I've been sorta-kinda busy trying to find work...again.
It gets increasingly difficult every time the search begins/renews. I'm getting old; I have bad knees and a bad back, so physical labor is out of the question. The skills I do possess are totally out-of-date because I haven't been able to put the to productive use for quite a while. I've been reading an awful lot about older men like me taking advantage of all sorts of grants for "re-training" but I never seem able to find any of this stuff. It leads me to believe that most of it is bullshit -- propaganda of the sort that's common these day, like "the Stimulus is Working!", or "Another job saved or created!".
What few leads I have followed in this "re-training" scheme seem to end as soon as I get to the part of the application that says "Check race"...and there's no "White" box. Or "Check Primary Language" and "English" is like seventh of eighth down the list. The sea of minority faces in the room is usually the giveaway, and all the people speaking Spanish are usually a dead giveaway.
I'm certain if I was Black, Hispanic -- or had tits -- the government would be more than happy to "help" me by making me a ward of the state. However, last time I looked, white men get to pick up the tab for that sort of thing; not take advantage of it. Besides, I really want to work, and to work at something that really counts or matters.
I'm thinking of starting some sort of volunteer work, just to get out of my own head and have something to do, and from what I hear, many people are somehow spinning that sort of thing into "careers" (by which I guess they mean "non-profit" jobs, which ultimately depend either upon charity or government funding. Screw that; I just need to be occupied).
Anyways, I'll keep plugging away, if only because I still have some shreds of self-respect, and I've always been too dumb to walk away from fights. Hey, I hear there's a Congressional set available in New York...you just have to keep your hands off you male co-workers. I think I can hack that.
It gets increasingly difficult every time the search begins/renews. I'm getting old; I have bad knees and a bad back, so physical labor is out of the question. The skills I do possess are totally out-of-date because I haven't been able to put the to productive use for quite a while. I've been reading an awful lot about older men like me taking advantage of all sorts of grants for "re-training" but I never seem able to find any of this stuff. It leads me to believe that most of it is bullshit -- propaganda of the sort that's common these day, like "the Stimulus is Working!", or "Another job saved or created!".
What few leads I have followed in this "re-training" scheme seem to end as soon as I get to the part of the application that says "Check race"...and there's no "White" box. Or "Check Primary Language" and "English" is like seventh of eighth down the list. The sea of minority faces in the room is usually the giveaway, and all the people speaking Spanish are usually a dead giveaway.
I'm certain if I was Black, Hispanic -- or had tits -- the government would be more than happy to "help" me by making me a ward of the state. However, last time I looked, white men get to pick up the tab for that sort of thing; not take advantage of it. Besides, I really want to work, and to work at something that really counts or matters.
I'm thinking of starting some sort of volunteer work, just to get out of my own head and have something to do, and from what I hear, many people are somehow spinning that sort of thing into "careers" (by which I guess they mean "non-profit" jobs, which ultimately depend either upon charity or government funding. Screw that; I just need to be occupied).
Anyways, I'll keep plugging away, if only because I still have some shreds of self-respect, and I've always been too dumb to walk away from fights. Hey, I hear there's a Congressional set available in New York...you just have to keep your hands off you male co-workers. I think I can hack that.
Sunday, March 14, 2010
If I Hear the Word "Draft" One More Time...
Okay, I was just watching Geraldo At Large on FoxNews, and one of the guests was Jesse Ventura, former pro-wrestler, former-governor of the State of Minnesota. Normally, anything Ventura has to say goes in one ear and out the other, mostly because the words he utters have so little substance that they manage to pass between the spaces between atoms without slowing down. Now, Jesse Ventura is an intelligent man; he just also happens to be a political poseur; his maverick governor routine was just one more variation on that old WWF-heel character of his, and the new-and-improved-Jesse-the-Conspiracy-theorist-being-spied-upon-by-the-US-government is, too.
It's just another persona that Jesse has put on in order to make a better-than-average living without having to actually work.
I saw Mel Gibson play that character in a very bad movie, once...Anyways...
The subject was Afghanistan, vis-a-vis Patrick Kennedy's rant on the Press ignoring the War. Ventura made a comment about bringing back the Draft (conscription), which is something he thought would either:
a) Have ended this war (and the one in Iraq) already, or
b) Made our political leadership more reticent about getting involved in foreign adventures in the first place.
Unfortunately, Geraldo was brain dead this evening and didn't get much of a clarification on just what Ventura was aiming at specifically. Ventura added that some (most) troops have been deployed multiple times to either theatre, already, and the hint was left hanging was that more troops and fewer deployments would have worked out much better for all involved.
I half-way agree with him, but in this regard only: it's not enough to send MORE troops, you have to send the RIGHT KINDS. And then once you have the right sorts, you have let them do what soldiers are supposed to do: kill the enemy.
What both wars have required is your basic infantry soldier, trained up to be as lethal as possible, and available in numbers great enough to occupy larger swathes of territory and ensure that whatever Uncle Sam has taken, Uncle Sam can keep and instill his system upon. One of the problems the U.S. military has had since the Second World War is a lack of infantry units, and the advance of technology has only made that worse; our ground forces, prior to these two wars, were built around the tank, and designed to fight the Soviet Union attacking with masses of armored vehicles upon the German plains. After Desert Storm, the only lesson learned was that the modern, technologically-advanced, tank-heavy force (which is impossible to transport without months of preparation and requires supply convoys miles long which are vulnerable to guerrillas) is invincible, and any other nations would be stupid to try and fight us. And we would not need to change. Ever.
Then came Sepetember 11. And the US Army had to go into Afghanistan -- that's not tank country -- and it's not even a state with a national army, and it's bascially a bunch of guys in raggedy pajamas who are born snipers and masters of exploiting terrain to their advantage, adept at using 50-year old weapons very effectively. It's an infantry war, an extremely-low-tech, old-fashioned trench warfare sort of infantry war, and we don't have those sorts of infantrymen (or is it infantrypersons?) anymore. What few we DO have expect to be driven to battle in a fully-armored, air-conditioned steel limousine, following behind tanks and air support, and then to basically just mop up the four or five stunned-and-scared-shitless-but-eager-to-surrender survivors they might find. What light infantry forces we have (Airborne, Marines, Mountain Infantry, which are perfect for these circumstances) are already on the job, but they're stretched to their limits -- hence the repeated deployments -- because there aren't enough of them, and the military will not raise new regiments and divisions; that's expensive, and we're supposed to be fighting cheap, on the Rumsfeld model.
Conversely, Iraq after the very weak "Shock and Awe" (which everyone could watch sitting in sandstorms on TV for three weeks before they reached Baghdad) very quickly turned into a house-to-house and counter-insurgency fight, like that in Fallujah and the Sunni Triangle. You need an awful lot of infantry to fight battles like that, and ours wasn't trained in that sort of close-quarter's battle. They were then expected to keep order -- in a country where everyone was so confident that we'd be welcomed as 'liberators' -- simply by walking around with a rifle visible. And because Iraq was a more 'sophisticated' place than Afghanistan, we didn't even send a whole bunch of those combat troops; the majority of the troops there are support troops (truck drivers, Public-relations and Civil relations types, and engineers. It was judged more important to rebuild Iraqi schools and golf courses than to kill Iraqi soldiers and Ba'athist sympathizers, apparently).
We saw how that worked out: seven times into Fallujah, only to have the Iraqi "provisional" government pull us out on the verge of victory each time, and then elevating their "leader" to Parliament, losing men a few at a time to IED's, or having supply convoys attacked by "insurgents" in "pacified" areas because there weren't enough troops to keep them"pacified for long". No, instead, we were concerned about the museums being looted...
In both wars we've fought with one hand tied behind our backs. The rules of engagement are ridiculous, and are more easily understood if they are intended to ensure that American forces don't cause legal and political problems in front of a CNN camera crew, rather than to kill the enemy and protect themselves. This is something that Ventura seems to have missed; These wars would have been over a long time ago (without the need for multiple deployments and a decade of casualties and treasure) if we had just remembered what soldiers are supposed to do, and how they're supposed to do it;
War is about killing people and breaking things. This isn't war; it's a public relations campaign with guns directed at people who'll hate us and our culture regardless of how many schools and hospitals we build.
What, exactly, have we been fighting for and what have we gained? To "bring democracy to the Middle East"? What the hell for? It's not as if the Iraqis or Afghans know what that is, or what it's good for, and if we were serious about showing them we'd have to commit to being there for the next 100 years and replace the culture -- as well as probably kill millions --in the process. I don't see much cultural destruction/transformation going on, and I don't see piles of corpses. Iraqis may be glad that Saddam Hussein is gone, but they know that sooner or later another moron who is just as brutal will one day rise to take his place, and while they might be voting now, they know how fragile that franchise will be once the Americans leave, as leave we must.
The Afghans? They're fighting to maintain a way of life which is centered around bestiality, banditry and buggery. Those guys are are the modern-day Huns. They don't have much use for a college education. They're not battling one another to see who can get the first plasma television in the neighborhood. They don't want to become dentists, computer programmers or CPA's. They'd rather be drug dealers and thieves. They're not fighting amongst themselves, and against us, because they're dying for the GAP, KFC and The Dukes of Hazard; They're fighting to remain ignorant savages, to retain a way of life which is as natural to them as breathing, even if it strikes us as barbaric, brutal, and repressive.
Hamid Karzai's life can be measured in minutes as soon as the last American chopper leaves Kabul.
The strategy of bringing both countries, such as they are, into the modern world with freer political systems and market-based economies with which we can do a mutually-beneficial commerce, are probably going to fail. Mostly because Arabs and Afghans are apparently genetically unable to make the choice between blindly following the insane words of a dead pedophile, and making decisions which might be beneficial to themselves. The phrase "inside every ________ is an American dying to get out" does not apply here . They don't want to be like us, in fact they often feel themselves to be our moral superiors, and if given the chance they'd kill or enslave us in a heartbeat. Allah gives them that right and that command, you know. Therefore, any plan which envisions a (more) lengthy American presence in either place is a waste of lives and fortunes.
If the ultimate goal is to "defeat terrorism" and "Keep Al'Qaeda from reforming and using Afghanistan as a base", well then you've missed your chance. You missed it because you wanted to be liked so much more than feared that you failed to make a terrible, great, bloody slaughter of every man, woman, child and stray dog you came across. Not only would you have killed terrorists and potential terrorists, you would have set a fearsome example of what happens when you cross the United States (I would personally have left both countries self-lighting, glass-topped parking lots, washed my hands of it all afterwards, dared the rest of the Muslim World to try that shit again, and screw what world opinion has to say -- they do little but posture and lecture us while they grovel before the Muslim World, and support it with welfare.
Now, ten years have passed and the chance to engage in that sort of destruction, the sort that brought Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan to their knees, has come and gone and will never be considered as anything but an admission of defeat by this generation of ass-wipe leaders, if and when they ever need to take that tool out of the box. They'd be afraid to unleash American power, because it would be embarrassing to them and their precious reputations.
As for ex-Governor Ventura, instead of asking "why don't we have a Draft?", why not ask how it was that the military got talked into the ridiculous idea that it could change an entire culture without making anyone bleed and without bouncing some rubble? How is that the Military that Learned the Lessons of Vietnam, seems to have truly learned so very little?
Update: Lumpy, Grumpy and Frumpy posts this little tidbit about raging heroin addiction and Afghan police recruits. The New Huns, I tell you.
It's just another persona that Jesse has put on in order to make a better-than-average living without having to actually work.
I saw Mel Gibson play that character in a very bad movie, once...Anyways...
The subject was Afghanistan, vis-a-vis Patrick Kennedy's rant on the Press ignoring the War. Ventura made a comment about bringing back the Draft (conscription), which is something he thought would either:
a) Have ended this war (and the one in Iraq) already, or
b) Made our political leadership more reticent about getting involved in foreign adventures in the first place.
Unfortunately, Geraldo was brain dead this evening and didn't get much of a clarification on just what Ventura was aiming at specifically. Ventura added that some (most) troops have been deployed multiple times to either theatre, already, and the hint was left hanging was that more troops and fewer deployments would have worked out much better for all involved.
I half-way agree with him, but in this regard only: it's not enough to send MORE troops, you have to send the RIGHT KINDS. And then once you have the right sorts, you have let them do what soldiers are supposed to do: kill the enemy.
What both wars have required is your basic infantry soldier, trained up to be as lethal as possible, and available in numbers great enough to occupy larger swathes of territory and ensure that whatever Uncle Sam has taken, Uncle Sam can keep and instill his system upon. One of the problems the U.S. military has had since the Second World War is a lack of infantry units, and the advance of technology has only made that worse; our ground forces, prior to these two wars, were built around the tank, and designed to fight the Soviet Union attacking with masses of armored vehicles upon the German plains. After Desert Storm, the only lesson learned was that the modern, technologically-advanced, tank-heavy force (which is impossible to transport without months of preparation and requires supply convoys miles long which are vulnerable to guerrillas) is invincible, and any other nations would be stupid to try and fight us. And we would not need to change. Ever.
Then came Sepetember 11. And the US Army had to go into Afghanistan -- that's not tank country -- and it's not even a state with a national army, and it's bascially a bunch of guys in raggedy pajamas who are born snipers and masters of exploiting terrain to their advantage, adept at using 50-year old weapons very effectively. It's an infantry war, an extremely-low-tech, old-fashioned trench warfare sort of infantry war, and we don't have those sorts of infantrymen (or is it infantrypersons?) anymore. What few we DO have expect to be driven to battle in a fully-armored, air-conditioned steel limousine, following behind tanks and air support, and then to basically just mop up the four or five stunned-and-scared-shitless-but-eager-to-surrender survivors they might find. What light infantry forces we have (Airborne, Marines, Mountain Infantry, which are perfect for these circumstances) are already on the job, but they're stretched to their limits -- hence the repeated deployments -- because there aren't enough of them, and the military will not raise new regiments and divisions; that's expensive, and we're supposed to be fighting cheap, on the Rumsfeld model.
Conversely, Iraq after the very weak "Shock and Awe" (which everyone could watch sitting in sandstorms on TV for three weeks before they reached Baghdad) very quickly turned into a house-to-house and counter-insurgency fight, like that in Fallujah and the Sunni Triangle. You need an awful lot of infantry to fight battles like that, and ours wasn't trained in that sort of close-quarter's battle. They were then expected to keep order -- in a country where everyone was so confident that we'd be welcomed as 'liberators' -- simply by walking around with a rifle visible. And because Iraq was a more 'sophisticated' place than Afghanistan, we didn't even send a whole bunch of those combat troops; the majority of the troops there are support troops (truck drivers, Public-relations and Civil relations types, and engineers. It was judged more important to rebuild Iraqi schools and golf courses than to kill Iraqi soldiers and Ba'athist sympathizers, apparently).
We saw how that worked out: seven times into Fallujah, only to have the Iraqi "provisional" government pull us out on the verge of victory each time, and then elevating their "leader" to Parliament, losing men a few at a time to IED's, or having supply convoys attacked by "insurgents" in "pacified" areas because there weren't enough troops to keep them"pacified for long". No, instead, we were concerned about the museums being looted...
In both wars we've fought with one hand tied behind our backs. The rules of engagement are ridiculous, and are more easily understood if they are intended to ensure that American forces don't cause legal and political problems in front of a CNN camera crew, rather than to kill the enemy and protect themselves. This is something that Ventura seems to have missed; These wars would have been over a long time ago (without the need for multiple deployments and a decade of casualties and treasure) if we had just remembered what soldiers are supposed to do, and how they're supposed to do it;
War is about killing people and breaking things. This isn't war; it's a public relations campaign with guns directed at people who'll hate us and our culture regardless of how many schools and hospitals we build.
What, exactly, have we been fighting for and what have we gained? To "bring democracy to the Middle East"? What the hell for? It's not as if the Iraqis or Afghans know what that is, or what it's good for, and if we were serious about showing them we'd have to commit to being there for the next 100 years and replace the culture -- as well as probably kill millions --in the process. I don't see much cultural destruction/transformation going on, and I don't see piles of corpses. Iraqis may be glad that Saddam Hussein is gone, but they know that sooner or later another moron who is just as brutal will one day rise to take his place, and while they might be voting now, they know how fragile that franchise will be once the Americans leave, as leave we must.
The Afghans? They're fighting to maintain a way of life which is centered around bestiality, banditry and buggery. Those guys are are the modern-day Huns. They don't have much use for a college education. They're not battling one another to see who can get the first plasma television in the neighborhood. They don't want to become dentists, computer programmers or CPA's. They'd rather be drug dealers and thieves. They're not fighting amongst themselves, and against us, because they're dying for the GAP, KFC and The Dukes of Hazard; They're fighting to remain ignorant savages, to retain a way of life which is as natural to them as breathing, even if it strikes us as barbaric, brutal, and repressive.
Hamid Karzai's life can be measured in minutes as soon as the last American chopper leaves Kabul.
The strategy of bringing both countries, such as they are, into the modern world with freer political systems and market-based economies with which we can do a mutually-beneficial commerce, are probably going to fail. Mostly because Arabs and Afghans are apparently genetically unable to make the choice between blindly following the insane words of a dead pedophile, and making decisions which might be beneficial to themselves. The phrase "inside every ________ is an American dying to get out" does not apply here . They don't want to be like us, in fact they often feel themselves to be our moral superiors, and if given the chance they'd kill or enslave us in a heartbeat. Allah gives them that right and that command, you know. Therefore, any plan which envisions a (more) lengthy American presence in either place is a waste of lives and fortunes.
If the ultimate goal is to "defeat terrorism" and "Keep Al'Qaeda from reforming and using Afghanistan as a base", well then you've missed your chance. You missed it because you wanted to be liked so much more than feared that you failed to make a terrible, great, bloody slaughter of every man, woman, child and stray dog you came across. Not only would you have killed terrorists and potential terrorists, you would have set a fearsome example of what happens when you cross the United States (I would personally have left both countries self-lighting, glass-topped parking lots, washed my hands of it all afterwards, dared the rest of the Muslim World to try that shit again, and screw what world opinion has to say -- they do little but posture and lecture us while they grovel before the Muslim World, and support it with welfare.
Now, ten years have passed and the chance to engage in that sort of destruction, the sort that brought Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan to their knees, has come and gone and will never be considered as anything but an admission of defeat by this generation of ass-wipe leaders, if and when they ever need to take that tool out of the box. They'd be afraid to unleash American power, because it would be embarrassing to them and their precious reputations.
As for ex-Governor Ventura, instead of asking "why don't we have a Draft?", why not ask how it was that the military got talked into the ridiculous idea that it could change an entire culture without making anyone bleed and without bouncing some rubble? How is that the Military that Learned the Lessons of Vietnam, seems to have truly learned so very little?
Update: Lumpy, Grumpy and Frumpy posts this little tidbit about raging heroin addiction and Afghan police recruits. The New Huns, I tell you.
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