Lost on the Lunatic Fringe

Another day, another argument. Of course, in the local forum someone is talking about how what we did at Guantanamo was not torture, and that we’re fucking humanitarians for the “not torture” we carry out there. One woman, a suitably retarded old biddy, says that torture is justifiable and an effective way to get information. She says, “if my grandchild was kidnapped and this guy knew where he was, I’d torture him to get the information.” Wrong. For one thing, we’re not talking about Mexican mafia kidnappings. We’re talking about detainees suspected of or known to belong to enemy organizations, among others. If we’re talking about torture to get information, how come her approach seems to be leaning toward torture as punishment?
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Forgive me for being full of rants lately, but it’s the way my head works.

I was thinking about the whole church/state separation and the argument about how money has “in god we trust” printed on it in violation of that principle…and I got to thinking about how most transactions these days are done in the form of credit cards or even cell phones in some countries, or online. It occurred to me that just about the only things people use cash for, the only money with the aforementioned “in god we trust” on it, are drugs or sex. I guess I could think of other things, like the stuff from coin machines or soda or a beer at the bar. You know, entertainment. Leisure. Nobody really uses cash for things like the groceries or bills. Nobody uses cash anymore for the responsible things. The money with god on it goes for all the irresponsible things, the incidental things.

I got a giggle out of that. The money they’re fighting so hard to keep god on is mostly going for drinking, drugs and sex. Why? Because cash doesn’t leave a paper trail. It’s for the stuff you don’t want a record of. You know what? Fuck it. Leave god on the money. I think it’s pretty appropriate to equate money and god anyway, in an ironic sort of way that would not appeal at all to a religious person.

I read the news every day, and lately it seems to be worrisome more so than in the past. I had someone ask me in the past couple of months whether I thought it was Obama’s fault. It was only a little while after he took office, and they said that the economy tanking was his fault, and that people saw that he was going to become the next president and panicked, or protested by shooting themselves in the foot, as near as I could follow the reasoning. I told this person that he’d only been in office a short time and that we’d noticed things going south a long time before he even considered running for president. We agreed to disagree.
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Hear hear! If only we had politicians who could articulate the idea as well as Mr. Hannon. I have no idea how well he gets things done, but I am in no doubt as to how well he says what needs to be said. What I must say is that it’s a shame that parliament has minds like that and their country still degenerated into a nanny state.

I was retracing my steps on the internet from years and years of wandering when I found this:

It’s a site called “End of Existence”. Basically it deals with the danger of nuclear war and seeks to make people understand what happens when the bomb is dropped. It’s not the people that die so much as the people who survive for any length of time after a nuclear strike. I was reading Myoko’s story and thinking to myself that The Day After didn’t even approach the reality. It tried hard, but when you read the words of someone who lived through it with the burns and the terror and surrounded by death, you start to understand that….you can’t understand. It would be like telling a holocaust survivor that you understand what they went through. You don’t. There’s no way you could, unless you’d been through it.
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The other day I had a conversation with a co-worker about the nature of patriotism in this country. I asked him to define patriotism, but it ended up sounding more like nationalism. I fear that most of the people I ask here are much the same in their mindset. When I have gone abroad, people in other countries have asked me why Americans are so over the top with their ostentatious display of “patriotism”. Basically, the only time you’ll see a British flag is when football (translation – “soccer”) is running. They fight out their rivalries through football. They prove their superiority that way. Since the only time America competes against other countries in a sport is during the Olympics, we’re closed out of that.
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In 1909 the international war on drugs began. Never mind that it was a problem caused by one country but felt in another. Some things never change.
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I’ve been laughing my ass off for a day or so. This challenge which has been issued to Obama to debate Rush on his show was absolutely laughable.

Basically, there’s no way it’s going to happen, and it’s already done the damage to both Rush and the Republican party that it was intended to do. I always find it funny to see a carny conned into being a patsy. That is exactly what happened to Mr. Limbaugh.
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Jon Stewart is a person I admire. I admire his brains. He’s one of those people that intimidate me a little. There’s a classification of person that some would call “professional”, and maybe that’s the best description for them. They’re the hoopy froods who always know where their towel is at. Few people function at their level. If you’re in their way or in some way opposing them, they will destroy you. It won’t be anything personal, just you were in the way. Not that I’m saying they’re ruthless, but they’re professionals, and you’re interfering with their work. They remove the obstacle, because they’re professional and the work is the only thing that matters to them. If you had the fool sense to walk through their work area, prepare to be eviscerated.
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“MOSCOW – If you’re inclined to believe Igor Panarin, and the Kremlin wouldn’t mind if you did, then President Barack Obama will order martial law this year, the United States will split into six rump-states before 2011, and Russia and China will become the backbones of a new world order.”

The man saying this looks like a dead ringer for Curly from the Three Stooges. Interestingly enough, he says ND will go to the Canadians. Let me grab my toque. I’m up for that. I mean, I hope for Obama to succeed, but if being part of Canada is the alternative, I can live with that. I won’t have to move to Canada, Canada will come to me. I was getting tired of the Canadians lording their socialized medicine and their higher standard of living and their poutain and their mounties over us. Thumbing their noses, making us jealous of their freedom and inclusive society. It just made me sick. I wanted to be part of it, but they made moving there so hard. It’s a far better scenario than that of Canada becoming part of the US. What can I say? I like what they’ve done with their place.
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