Tuesday, October 6, 2015

A Time to Worry

The past sixty years has proven to be that 'long strange trip' immortalized by the band The Grateful Dead.

Allegory is one thing but our reality has indeed taken a turn for the dire and our corporate owned media is strangely mute on the subject.

Is there 'nothing to worry/be concerned about?' I certainly hope so because I don't trust the mawkish ghoul that passes for the fifth estate these days as far as I can throw it (even if I weren't old and feeble!)

Again, which narrative you subscribe to dictates how high the threat level has become. On the surface, using the 'official' paradigm the corporate media expounds, the 'unthinkable' is still pretty much precisely that. The former USSR commiting air support and ground troops into the (largely expendable) Middle East in apparent direct opposition to US/UN efforts to rein in ISIS is being interpreted as 'saber-rattling' by the two former nuclear superpowers.

Geez, am I off the reservation again? (You can bet your boots I am!)

Let us look at this from the Gegner perspective/narrative, one that posits global political tension is totally 'artificial'...a fabrication and most often a cloak for committing attrocities against enemies of the 'status quo'.

Which is to opine that those who hold power in what passes for our society are in league with one another. This is why two governments with a notoriously loose grip on their nuclear arsenals should not be lining up for an 'oops'.

Or would it be safer to say it would be the farthest thing from an 'accident' since the near spontaneous collapse of global monarchy.

Even the history books don't offer an explanation of that unseemly turn of events.

But the 'peace dividend' (necessary to develop an industrial society) had the unforseen side effect of producing an out of control population.

In the Seventies, scientists pointed to the 'population explosion'...a term that has fallen out of the public lexicon even though the problem itself hasn't diminished. (We were told by the corporate owned propagandists that 'technology' would solve the population problem. and that was the end if the subject.)

But that hasn't happened because they haven't cracked the energy nut.

Our entire modern social model collapses without cheap abundant energy. Dunno how many of you realize what the end of 'cheap energy' would look like but you're really not going to like it when 'they' pull the plug.

Okay, now I've done it! I've invoked the mysterious/omnipresent 'they'!

Who, precisely, are 'they?' [and like all good whack jobs I goggle in incomprehension and ask' aren't you paying attention?']

They are the less than one percent who have claimed ownership/dominion over this planet and everything on it.

Sort of disturbing to be called a lunatic when this entire situation indeed indicates major psychological problems, (starting with being a first-degree sociopath!)

But they have forced a fanatical belief in money down your throat so you're already primed to swallow just about anything they dream up.

But I (of necessity) digress.

Supposing I'm correct and there really are people who claim (divinely no less) that this planet and everything on it is THEIRS. How far would they go towards preserving what remains for them and theirs?

Would they nuke the lion's share of us out of existence? [In a heartbeat, considering the alternative.]

The clock is ticking and I'm sure I'm not the only that notices things are getting more than a little 'out of hand'.

The alternatives are few, there is a way out but that path is narrow and the window of opportunity is closing.

What should worry you to your core is why nothing is being done to entrench renewable energy, nothing.

Thanks for letting me inside your head,

Gegner







Tuesday, September 29, 2015

Mental Enema

I post sporadically because most of the time the silence is deafening…and it’s sort of counterproductive to have these conversations with yourself.

So, under the delusion that somebody is paying attention, I will cut to the chase and explain what motivated me to park it in front of the keyboard to give myself yet another thorough mental enema.

Bernie (not the billionaire) keeps reaching out for a campaign contribution and I can’t bring myself to do it because it would amount to pissing into the wind.

Let’s suppose Bernie succeeds in ‘winning’ the White House…what is the ‘veto pen’ going to do against mix bag of certifiable whack-jobs?

Naturally, little things lit this spark in my mind…starting with a conservative ‘ranting’ about how Team USA isn’t # 1 anymore.

By now I’m sure you’ve seen the internet video where this guy ‘pretends’ to be the adult and ‘correct’ a poor High Schooler regarding her ‘mis-conception’ that America is the ‘greatest country in the world’

To be fair, she asked a panel of self-appointed ‘experts’ why they thought brand USA was # 1 and knothead, the sole dissenter’s response was beyond disturbing, bordering on delusional.

This video originally made the rounds pointing a finger at the Boomers as the ‘Worst Generation’…when the truth is our grandparents (the alleged ‘greatest generation’) squandered the opportunity to make an example of people who put their self-interests ahead of those of our species.

I want you to stop for a minute and consider, if you will, ‘reality’.

Bean-blower starts his infantile tirade with kicking ‘liberals’, calling them losers…which is entirely correct. The problem is he doesn’t even touch on WHY Liberals lose.

Simple, because those who control ‘money’ make the rules.

And don’t interpret that literally because Gold has NOTHING to do with money.

It is a fiction the thieves feed.

This brings us full circle with the little known fact that 90% of crime is ‘cash & carry’ yet our moronic ‘leaders’ won’t ban cash!

Again I ask you to step back a little and look at ‘how’ the situation got this way.

Liberals we literally purged from politics by the political ‘sniff-test’. If you weren’t a rabid capitalist you were on your own finance wise.

Once Reagan broke the unions (the PATCO incident should have shut the nation down but no, the poisoning of the working classes mind was already well advanced. The Unions protected screw-ups while too many good people took a sharp stick in the eye and the [bought & paid for] union reps just shrugged, destroying their brand for personal greed.)

Especially with Japan being held up as a shining example of how corporate/worker relations ‘should be.’Of course, this was at the beginning of the ‘Global Race to the Bottom’ and Japan was just a gateway to China.

Now that the race has reached its conclusion, the world’s customer base has been pauperized and it’s workforce minimized, is it any wonder we have a surfeit of billionaires?

So on one ‘side’ of the political equation we have the rabid capitalists, willing to sell out jobs and safety for more tax cuts that will only make the world poorer.

The other side is worse…characterized as ‘tax and spend’ do-gooders…again, more interested in protecting screw-ups than regular people…

Where does this unlikely combination of bad and worse leave us?

With a totally dis-functional government.

I need not remind you that we do not have the tools to fix this, they simply don’t exist.

Are we done? Not by a long shot! Another distressing piece of fecal matter lodged in my mind is the latest liberal hobby horse of our nation leading the world in the number of people incarcerated.

Last night HBO ran a special on this topic and I couldn’t watch it.
WHY do YOU think we have so many people locked up?

Could it be because the whack-job capitalists knew there’d be trouble if they exported worker’s jobs and they needed a proactive solution?

What do you do with the ‘surplus population?’

Apparently our ‘betters’ believe prison is a reasonable answer.

And again I point to rabid self-interest being passed off as being in the public’s interest. (If you aren’t being mugged by all those workers the ‘more for me’ capitalist can’t use then, left handedly, they’re correct.)

There is a better way. It is insane in a world with so many willing hands sitting idle that we live in perpetual poverty directly because of ‘more for me’ capitalism!

Those of us on the ‘bottom end’ of capitalism know it doesn’t work and despite the isolated, delusional (and therefore none too bright) conservo-whacko we need to implement a more equitable social sharing mechanism…that capitalists have no hand in designing or implementing.

Have you seen the humorous commercial promoting a new online trading site called ‘Jet’?

Well, let me tell you here and now why we no longer ‘barter’

Because humans are ‘opportunists’ and we’d all be chasing the latest ‘trend’ (attempting to maximize return on effort/outlay) instead of focusing on doing what needed doing. The shortages would be staggering.

Just as unemployment (real unemployment as measured by the labor force participation rate) is worse than it was during the, er, ‘first’ global depression, commonly characterized as the ‘Great Depression’…an event never to be repeated but the more for me Capitalists couldn’t step aside…and they won’t.

So…if things hang together until next November (and there’s a damn good chance they won’t.) are you going to go to the polls with or without your torch and good length of sturdy rope?

Between now and then, prepare!

Thanks for letting me inside your head,

Gegner

Friday, September 4, 2015

Had to Happen

Well, I finally got 'Happy Birthday'd'. My 59th was Sunday and on Wednesday I got another visit from my old friend 'Lack of Work'.

My resume is largely phantom at this point in the game, even the McDonalds I worked at when I was a kid is a smokin' hole in the ground today.

If I held my (complete) resume to my chin, it would hit the floor (and I'm six feet tall)

Not a big surprise if you've been paying attentiion to our massively mis-managed economy (capitalism sucks, it only benefits the 'capitalist'!)

If my track record is anything to go by I (along with a few hundred million other, er, 'unsuccessful' individuals who haven't done a very good job of 'making themselves useful' in this bootstrap environment created for us by the capitalists.

Why me? Sort of figured I was in trouble when I figured out I was but one of a small handful of non-relatives. Almost everybody else in the company was related to the big guy (and good on him for taking care of his own! I don't blame him in the slightest! In fact, I don't blame anybody but the freebooting bucaneers that saddled us with this 'buyer beware' operating system (where even the judges have to look to their pocketbook before rendering...judgement.)

Decide the 'wrong way' and you won't be a judge much longer, fairness and impartiality be damned.

This is even more reprehensible when you consider how money is BS, a 'legal fiction' that you are forced to agree to.

I know I'm not the only one that did a doubletake when I read how today's 'experts' are recommending that you have a couple of million set aside so you don't run out of cash after you retire.

How the hell is anybody earning an 'average' wage supposed to lay aside that much cash when the average wage only affords a 'hand to mouth' existence?

Obviously the 'experts' aren't referring to the 'average individual' when they are dispensing retirement advice. They are addressing their 'betters'.

There's a lot wrong in the world and none of it will change until they run what we currently suffer off a cliff. Then the Bucaneers will start all over again, telling what you do and don't deserve (while they expect YOU to do all the heavy lifting'...and the sad truth is you'll do it (happily, waving the flag and saluting the whole time) so long as it allows you to live indoors and eat regularly!

Look at how cheaply we sell justice (and with it what passes for 'freedom'.)

Not everyone is a moron...but the sad truth is too many are. It's not their fault, it's how they were built. Only a few had to be smart enough to figure out how to do the job safely, the rest just had to put their backs into it and do what they were told.

Yes, good citizen, there is shockingly little interest in justice or fairness, it's almost like the qualities have been bred out of our species (as much as they could be, we'd have gone extinct if they had succeeded in elimanating those qualities that make us human entirely.

Is the pendulum swinging back toward justice and equality?

If it is, the exploiters are working overtime to thwart those influences that challenge their power over the rest of us.

The majority of us are child-like, trusting and gullible (to a fault, just look at the state of our political system and shudder at how it got that way!)

If we don't put a stop to those who would cheat you of your basic rights for their own enrichment, we have nobody but ourselves to blame.

So get off your dead backsides and do it!

Thanks for leting me inside your head,

Gegner.



Sunday, August 2, 2015

Interesting

Hello there, good citizen! This blog exists to promote my works but the experts say 'selling your work' (on it's own merit) is the WRONG way to go about it. They suggest that you promote your work on the basis of its 'benefit' to you, the reader.

Um, great advice for 'self-help/how-to' books but how do you accomplish that when you write 'speculative fiction'? I write about things as they might be (often in a technology gone wrong vein.) So what does this do for the reader except to broaden their horizons?

I'll take it one step further because my 'customer base', the number of people capable of thinking 'outside the box' is small and getting smaller with the media's LCD and dumbing down projects long underway.

At a time when 90 percent of the population got their news from printed sources it was estimated that the average IQ was 100. This also occurred at a time when people discussed the issues of the day among one anohter, reaching a kind of 'consensus'. Now that the majority of population gets its information via visual (and not necessarily 'factual') media, that IQ has dropped considerably. Worse, discussion of the issues of the day has virtually disappeared, we have a consensus about nothing.

We complain our kids are poorly socialized when we adults are just as guilty. Either we nod along as the village blow-hard raves incoherently about the latest talking point the media spouts intended to outrage just such personality types (in the old days nobody would pay attention to such whackos because everybody knew they just liked to hear themselves talk...and that they didn't even make sense to themselves by the time their rant was through.)

Which is to opine that people today do a lot less thinking for themselves, something the media knows and takes maximum advantage of.

It is especially obvious in the presidential election cycle is in season, the whoppers get bigger and bigger and the non-issues are draged front and center while the tone deaf media wails in misery about the 'shrinking' middle class while totally ignoring the working class.

Worse, the punditry fails to point this out, making them just as ignorant as the poor fools who 'think' they are part of the much abused 'middle'.

You can fool yourself all you want but if you aren't a degreed professional using that degree to make your living then you're not 'middle class'. Chances are you're working class and, if you're like most of us, you're also part of the largest segment of the working class, the 'working poor'.

Where's my proof? The US census. It provides us with data on the true 'median wage'...which is why most 24/7 Wall Street lists use the far more nebulous 'household wage' in their surveys of all things best and brightest.

Did you know the labor participation rate is lower than it was during WWII (and our working aged population has doubled since then?) How about the fact that the median wage is still hovering in the $25,000 a year rage...and remember, that means half of all workers make more and half MAKE LESS...and $25k is barely enough to keep a roof over your head or wheels under your backside (never mind insuring either one!)

DO you find these facts 'interesting'? Then perhaps you would enjoy reading my works...

Just saying, ya know.

Thanks for letting me inside your head,

Gegner




Sunday, July 26, 2015

Hand Waving

Greetings good citizen, Hand waving refers to the misdirection manipulators use to distract you from what they're really doing. Most people don't appreciate having their attention being brought to the very obvious fact they are being deceived but hey, it's another one of those some of the people, some of the time, sort of things and if you don't like it, stick it!

Crawling back on my proverbial 'soapbox' (I've been away for quite a while...but nothing's changed.) I'd like to, er, challenge the reasoning behind the latest misbegotten 'band-aid' being proposed for those forced by our odious management system to a life of perpetual penury.

Succinctly, the 'echo' of the proposal to raise the Federal minimum wage to $15.00 an hour. (effectively doubling what it currently is in most states.)

I started working around 1970 and the minimum wage was $1.50 an hour.

Are you beginning to see the problem here?

Raise the wage and guess what will happen...yup, prices will go up! What a shocker!

Next thing you know we'll have homeless people starving to death at $15 an hour...and the cry will be to raise the minimum wage to $20!

Rinse and repeat.

Wanna get off the foolish treadmill? You gotta attack the problem at its root, with the handful of people who have robbed their way to billionaire status.

No irony should be lost on the fact that these are the same people who claim to be the 'job creators'...when nothing could be further from the truth. You do what you do because you have to, just like the laws governing money were meant to be (abused.)

Wanna live indoors and eat regularly? Need money to do that and why? Because 'the law' will take your land, your children and even your freedom if you refuse to 'play the game'...

So, are the people running this turkeyshoot starting to look like a bunch of criminals? Well, everybody knows the answer to that one.

The real question is how do we get off this crazy train before they run it off a cliff (which we can all see coming?)

We all saw how the 'Occupy' movement ended, big fat zero...in fact, so ineffective as to lead one to suspect the whole thing was staged, just like the film, 'Wag the Dog'...

But hope can be drawn from a little incident that occurred up here in the North East, when a cousin weaseled control of a beloved chain of grocery stores from it's longtime chairman/manager.

Workers walked off the job and customers boycotted the store until Arthur T was restored to the helm. The event is unprecidented in modern history and just a glimmer of what we all know to be true.

United We Stand.

Thanks for letting me inside your head,

Gegner, um, George, well, whatever.

Monday, June 8, 2015

Call to the post...

In a nearly eternal question that goes back into the mists of history, and you just know this question has been asked repeatedly so attribution is near impossible, we have to wonder, "if not us, who...and if not now, when?"

The last time an, er, 'public figure' invoked this historic question (I can't in good conscience use the term 'leader' when referring to this 'meat puppet') was just before the Berlin Wall fell during a time when, unbeknownst to the rest of us, the One Percent (and actually it's a much smaller number than that) seized the power of the media and declared war on democracy.

I know, crazy talk but they aren't even trying to cover up the fact that the 'justice system' is F.U.B.A.R. (and that's ignoring the uptick in police shooting, often unarmed, civilians and just walking away, free as a bird.)

Don't suppose this is related to our illegal invasion of foreign countries and 'conditioning' our troops to shoot unarmed civilians, is it?

Never mind how the government only seems interested in spying on YOU so they can, er, 'protect' the rest of us from, er, 'terrorists'.

Terrorists they breed with their tone deaf handling of foreign affairs.

It has often been said 'how fortunate is it for those that run the world's governments [The One Percent] that their constituents 'don't think'...(and if you doubt that then you haven't visited Facebook lately.)

Naturally, there is no direction to jump, nobody is holding up a banner to rally behind because nobody (besides my humble self) is offering an alternative to being enslaved and robbed by those who control 'money'.

Like Star Wars, the assumption is once we wrest control of our affairs our of the hands of the 'self-interested' that we'd toddle on with 'business as usual'...except that's not possible.

With the 'Easy Half' of our 'cheap and abundant' energy exhausted, those who hold the other end of the noose around your neck are aiming at a 'dial back'.

They intend to roll the social clock back to our 'previous model', the one were speaking out against the status quo would get you executed for 'heresy'.

Look at the media, the process of 'dumbing down has already begun! Last night I viewed an imaginary autopsy of a T-Rex!

(Why even go there?)

Imaginative, yes but thirty years from now they're going to claim it's real and you won't dare deny it!

But I digress. let us return to the shooting of civilians by those forced to perform multiple tours in the Middle East so they could earn money for college degrees so they'd qualify for jobs that no longer exist here in the USA.

Diabolical coincidence, right?

Better not say otherwise (think what you want) but you saw what happened to the Black Muslim in Boston that confided to friends that he...well, we don't know what was really said. We only have the 'official version' of his threats to 'behead' police officers.

How sad is it that we can only shuffle to the political right so far before our sons and daughters are goosestepping into the unfortunate lands that hold resources deemed vital to the One Percent's interests.

And nobody will dare speak against it, even as their own children return in bodybags...or worse, maimed for life and discarded by those who run the country they served with such valor.

Naturally, none of this ends well.

so we circle back to the beginning, if not us, who and if not now, when?

Wait just a little bit longer and it will be too late...and there are some who'd opine we've already left that goalpost in the rearview mirror twenty years ago.

Thanks for letting me inside your head,

Gegner



Saturday, May 30, 2015

Fantasyland

Greetings gentle reader, today's offering is eye candy for those of you that enjoy stories set in the fantasy realm. For us writers it is known as 'the heroes journey', where the central character embarks on a life changing journey of discovery. Written entirely tongue-in-cheek, the following is meant to tickle your funny-bone as much as instill a sense of wonder...so without further adeiu:

It’s all Joe can do to keep a straight face.

"Uh, either way is good."

"Fine. Have you been told what needs to be done?"

"Sort of."

"Either you have or you haven’t. Which one is it?"

"Given the circumstances, I think I’d like to hear it again."

"Very well but remember, you’ve already agreed to go and it’s too late to turn back now."

"Yeah, whatever." Joe replies.

"The Heart of Magic is missing. Your job is to recover The Heart and return it here, where it belongs, got it?"

"I got that part but no one’s told me who took it and what this ‘heart’ looks like."

"The Heart of Magic is not a thing but a living being and you’ll know it when you see it. As far as we know no one took it, we only know where it went."

Joe purses his lips and shoots a frosty glance at Erin.

"All will be made clear huh?"

"What part of ‘you’ll know it when you see it’ didn’t you get?" Erin shoots back.

Joe rubs his furrowed brow and shakes his head.

"I didn’t expect this to be easy but I was expecting a little more help. Where’s this ‘guide’ they’re sending along with me?"

"Right here" replies a tiny voice that jingles like a talking wind chime. Joe stares at Ulieo in disbelief.

"This is just beautiful, you didn’t tell me that you were sending me to hell with Tinkerbell!"

Ulieo jangles with fury at the mention of the famous fairy’s name.

"Ix-nay on the inkerbell-tay if you don’t want to wear your gonads for earmuffs." Erin cautions.

"Her and what ar…Ooof!" Joe hits the ground with a thud, clutching his groin.

When Joe finally recovers it is light again and he finds himself alone in the now deserted circle of stones. He looks about for Erin and her wizard friend but they are nowhere in sight.

"What happened?" Joe croaks hoarsely.

"I think you were about to apologize to me." Ulieo tinkles coolly.

"Oh, right! Uh, I’m wicked sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you." He mumbles sincerely. And you better hope that we don’t happen upon a bugzapper somewhere in our travels or you’re toast! He thinks to himself.

"Are you ready?" Ulieo asks. Joe gingerly pulls himself erect and nods in the affirmative.

"Which way?" he grunts.

"Think you can walk to Nevermore?" Ulieo tinkles, amused.

Joe gives Ulieo an astonished look; he has an idea what the fairy is hinting at.

"No way!"

"Think happy thoughts!" Ulieo chimes as she sprinkles him with pixie dust. At first nothing happens. Then Joe recalls the Christmas when his parents gave him a pony…and he levitates off the ground.

It suddenly occurs to Joe that his parents were dirt poor and he’s lived in an apartment all his life; there never was a pony…

And he plummets towards the earth!

"Nice pony, thanks Mom and Dad!" He holds this thought until he catches up with the tiny fairy.

"Uh, I never got a pony as a kid." Joe explains.

"It doesn’t matter. The thought of getting one made you sufficiently happy." Ulieo replies.

"Well, I’ve never had a date with Barbie either. If I imagined that I had, would I go supersonic?" Ulieo does not answer but instead shoots away into the distance, leaving a sparkling trail of pixie dust for Joe to follow. Joe does his best to keep up, flying as fast as he dares.

He doesn’t want the fairy to get too big a lead or he may lose her…and he has no idea how to get out of here on his own.

The trail of pixie dust leads Joe toward what appears to be the flickering lights of a large city. The closer he gets, the larger the metropolis becomes.

"I ain’t never seen nothin’ like this in no fairy tale" Joe mutters. Ulieo’s dust trail vanishes in a rundown part of the sprawling city. Joe is startled to find himself standing at the corner of a deserted intersection, no longer aloft.

He tries to will himself back into to flight but he is unsuccessful. Either he’s all happied out or it’s more than a coincidence that he became earthbound the same place Ulieo’s trail of pixie dust gave out.

Joe reaches into his leather jacket and palms his mother of pearl handled straight razor. Joe is no stranger to the city and he knows the mean streets when he sees them.

On his own again, Joe sets off in search of the nearest bar figuring it will be the likeliest place he’ll get a handle on his quarry. He walks towards what appears to be downtown and he spots a ‘bag lady’ digging in a dumpster.

The ancient, toothless bearded hag farts and a lightening bolt shoots from her backside, instantly frying a nearby rat. The hag cackles with glee at her handiwork. She picks up the flash fried rodent by it’s thick tail and swallows it whole, followed moments later by a burp that shoots flames twenty feet into the air!

Joe gets a sinking feeling in his gut as the words ‘You’ll know it when you see it’ ring in his mind. He eyes the old girl suspiciously but decides to stick with his first impulse rather than spend any more time checking out this dangerous, albeit weird phenomenon.

His instincts serve him well and before long he sees a rowdy group exiting an alleyway, obviously drunk. Joe waits until they clear the area and cautiously enters. The alley is pitch black but a few yards ahead a single lantern illuminates a sign over a doorway. Joe smiles when he reads the sign, The Magic Harp.

In this tale I insert an average, er, self-styled tough guy into an extremely unfamilair set of circumstances...with the obvious results.

Anyway, you can read all about Joe's magical adventure in Big Question, my collection of short stories that in this instance asks, why would magical creatures require non-magical assistance?

Thanks for reading!



Tuesday, May 26, 2015

You are what you believe

Mary Kay (the cosmetics tycoon) is credited with the euphemism, "if you think you can, you can and if you think you can't, you're right."

Disturbingly, I find that my blog over on Goodreads has zero readers, which I find hard to fathom because the variables are unknown. Of all my Facebook freinds only my pastor is a member at goodreads (meaning the bulk of the people I grew up with classify themselves as 'non-readers'.

Not necessarily a bad thing but not something I find particularly helpful, especially when the purpose of my blog is to raise awareness of various disturbing developments in the underpinnings of our society.

Left to our, er, 'imagination' is where the 'fourth estates' loyalties lie, to the public or to their shareholders?

Worse, nor overlay the concept of you are what you think you are and reflect on how chilling a lying media can have on the public well-being.

For example follow this link then ponder why no US news outlet reported the hack never mind any of the released information...don't suppose it might be damaging for the public to learn what's going on between US financial concerns and Saudi rulers?

But equally as disturbing to me is how the same people charged with 'keeping the public informed' also happen to be some of the most highly compensated individuals in our badly broken society? [raising the question of how instrumental were they in creating today's massive social imbalances? I'd opine 'crucial'!]

Which is to ask, how 'free' is the press we are currently saddled with? Can the minders of the one percent be relied upon when they share the interests of our collective oppressors?

More disturbing is if these individuals want to retain their lofty perches, the must tow the line drawn by none other than their shareholders, a majority of whom are members of our freshly minted billionaire class.

How sad is it good citizen that I'm old enough to remember when the world was gifted with it's first 'billionaire' (how queer is it that since our first reported 'for real' billionaire, the media has gone back into the historic record to make many more of them by 'modernizing' the fortunes of old.

While this report indicates the flunkies of the billionaire class are paid in annual multi-million dollar salaries, justified by the salaries other 'entertainers' make, how much of what passes for 'news' is actually 'info-tainment?

I know I belabor the obvious but stories like this make me edgy.

Thanks for letting me inside your head,



Friday, May 22, 2015

Who will lead?

Greetings gentle reader,

Today's offering looks at the grim circumstances spelled out by my first novel, 'Unplugged' which tracks the tribulations of one survivor of a global blackout during the first month post-collapse. Considering there isn't a plague involved or a thermo-nuclear crisis to deal with, you'd think 'a few days' without electricity or telephones would leave society fairly intact...assuming the delivery trucks kept running and the police could be summoned whenever trouble broke out.

But wait! Almost nobody can 'work' without electricity and then we'd have the whole 'who's in charge?' issue to contend with.

Are the guys you elected to 'town government' up to the task of providing emergency services to the community with zero resources of their own? (Most towns have 'privatized' their emergency services as a 'cost cutting' measure, but that's because the morons were educated by the same school system that YOU attended and neither of you have a clue what money is or what its for!)

So we begin:
“People, I have buses on there way here to take any injured or ill among you to our infirmary. Anyone who is hungry or lacks clean water please line up on the left side of the auditorium, sick to the right… Okay sick and hungry need only get in the sick line, we’ll feed you there.” I add, noting some folks can’t decide which they are, sick or hungry.

A few dozen people including all the town leaders remain seated.

“I want all of you who are neither sick or hungry to come to the stage area please.”

I motion the ‘Leader’ group over to me.

“You’ve got a little help here, go to your store room and get supplies for your people.” I tell them.

“We don’t have any.” Ted says.

“You don’t look like you’ve missed any meals Ted, why is that?” I ask.

“I own the store.” He replies smugly.

“Quiz me this Ted. Are you making people pay for food even though they aren’t getting paid?”

“Of course! It’s not my fault they can’t get at their money! Business is Business! I’ve been letting the ‘credit worthy’ charge their stuff but I can’t take a chance on everybody!” Ted exclaims like I have just asked him a stupid question.

“Big mistake Ted.” I reply flatly as I draw the Beretta. “What are you going to do with that?” Ted blubbers. I kill him where he stands.

There is a stunned silence at the sound of gunshots inside the auditorium, followed by a low murmur and then a cry. “Three Cheers for Greg Andrews!” And they do.

“The rest of you miserable bums better RUN to the store and get supplies back here pronto!” I bark. Bob and his cronies take off double time. Some of the others just stand there.

“I take it you folks are fellow business owners who have been allowed to charge food at the store?” I snarl. They all nodded their heads slowly, not wanting to admit to being the privileged few but more afraid of pissing me of, like Ted had.

“Well folks, you know the value of hard work, I suggest you make tracks behind your ‘buddies’ and DO SOME.” I bark. They didn’t need to be told twice. I have Bucky radio his people to ensure there isn’t any loading up and getting out of town with the goods going on.

After the well to do scurry off it happens again.

“Three Cheers for Greg Andrews!” And they do, more heartily than the first time. Nick and his people arrive with four buses. I help triage the really sick from those not so bad off. We fill every seat on all four buses but that is all of them so we only need to make one trip. I sent some folks over to the food line after hearing their main complaint is stomach pains without the fever and nausea. About a half hour later the former leaders and their helpers come back wheeling overloaded shopping carts into the auditorium. I like to think they are doing the right thing rather than being cowed at the sight of a dozen heavily armed men in full combat armor.

I learn from one of the school custodians that the stoves in the school kitchen are on bottled gas and still work. Apparently this was a ‘sweetheart deal’ with the local LNG supplier when the school had been renovated a year ago. A bit of beneficial graft for once.

I get a team together and we cook pasta for the first hot meal many of these people have eaten in a week. I make the sauce myself.

“Three cheers for Greg Andrews!” And they do, nearly shaking the rafters in the auditorium this time. Who the fuck keeps doing that I wonder? The auditorium has translucent skylights and the room brightens considerably as the sun begins to shine. I should have noticed my newfound flunkies were dry when they returned. Bucky’s people need to get out of the sun! This black combat armor is hot enough without adding steamy afternoon sunshine.


After everyone has eaten their fill I make a few announcements. I tell them of the orphans we rescued from Newburyport and how the need for foster parents is critical. I also tell them to assemble here in the morning to sign up for the team of their choice. Representatives of all our teams will be here in the morning to explain what each team does.

I put out a call for anyone with professional baking experience. Now that we have working ovens we can start bread production first thing in the morning. Fred will still have to build the hearth as planned since the gas won’t hold out forever. We urgently need bread and demand just got kicked up another notch.

“You’re all free to go home now.” I finish.

“Three Cheers for Greg Andrews!” Someone cries and they do. This time the roar is deafening. I’m a big hit with the general population. The former well to do just stand there frowning. They wear expressions of disdain with how the ‘rabble’ is carrying on. I am curious how many of them will be still be here in the morning as I’m not the only one paying attention to who isn’t cheering. I figure the privileged few are thinking I’ll get mine when the ‘proper authorities’ take control again. Their smug expressions say, ‘We saw you murder a man in cold blood, right here in front of us and we won’t let you get away with that!’ Yeah, they’d cheer when I got mine.

Funny how the boss seldom has the patience to be a good worker. It will be most interesting to see how many of them I’ll have to exile for slouching. They believe in their future. I believe in mine.

While this is a 'fictional' account of how things may play out, one thing is for certain. The 'Hamiltonian' ethic of 'let those who own the community, run the community' [Let those who own the land, rule the land] will be the rule rather than the exception...and unlikely scenes like the 'liberation' of a neighboring town will be unlikely because the 'usual suspects' will protect 'their interests' at the expense of everybody else.

Although it is this same 'paranoia' the will doom these fearful 'owners' to being preyed upon by gangs of mauraders, worse, they will eventually be overrun, enslaved and stripped of their possessions by the same kind of opportunists they are!

Yet they still won't appreciate the 'irony'.

To be an effective leader, you must be able to see beyond the end of your own nose and put the interests of the many ahead of those of the few...and in this respect, with precious few exceptions, there are no 'effective leaders' in our current corrupt government today.

My novel was a little ahead of it's time but it isn't 'out-dated' by any stretch of the imagination.

So the next time the lights go out, ponder if it's an 'accident' or a grab for what remains of your so-called 'rights'.

Thanks for letting me inside your head...

Wednesday, May 20, 2015

The Eye

Greeting good citizen!

Today we do a 180 and I'm going to write about one of the offerings in my latest work, Big Questions.

Let's start with an excerpt (to see if I can whet some appetites around here:)
Colonizing space is an expensive proposition and the Baron had no intention of footing the entire tab alone. The building of the ship and stocking it for a long mission would create millions of jobs, jobs that were desperately needed by the governments of the world.

Like every great endeavor intended to benefit all mankind, the world’s governments competed for contracts with The Eye of Orion Corporation, often building facilities and training workers at the public’s expense.

In exchange for the use of public funds, the Baron and the UN made a compromise where the Baron would submit a Constitution and a Bill of Rights for the eventual inhabitants of The Eye of Orion, once the colony became ‘viable’. Until then, the colony would be run as a corporation with the colonists being considered ‘employees’.

The contents of these two important documents and at what point the colony would be considered ‘viable’ were left entirely up to the Baron with the UN being named as the nominal ‘overseer’ of this process.

This little factoid about the colony eventually becoming a full fledged republic could be found in extremely fine print on the back of page thirty-one of the colonist agreement. The front of these contracts spelled out vague land grants and, depending on who it was, bestowed nominal titles upon the signatory that were granted by the nominal Emperor, who was none other than the Baron himself.

Once word got out that the Baron was setting up a monarchy in space, the media had a field day. Despite the negative publicity (or perhaps aided by it) those who liked the idea of getting in on the ground floor of the next big thing plunked down buckets of cash to secure for themselves a Duchy or Barony on ‘The Eye’.

Um, this is just the tip of one of the icebergs floated by this cautionary tale. It also highlights the need for our species to alter how we go about bestowing decision-making ability upon people that often have zero qualifications to make those decisions...(remember yesterday's college educated idiots...which is not to say that everybody with a degree is a moron, (even if it seems that way sometimes.)

The Framus enjoyed twice it's normal compliment of visitors and, as usual I am baffled as to why some days this is metropolis and why most days it's a desert (although yesterday's post was somewhat left of the ol' 'reservation'.)

But I digress. If you want a position of responsibility what is the first thing you're required to do? You have to prove you're qualified!

Why does this requirement vanish once money enters the equation? Money definitly isn't brains but our old pal 'Stupid' apparently can't figure that out.

So why do we stand there twiddling our thumbs while the rich rip the rest of us off? Is it because the average member of law enforcement isn't smart enough to recognize when a crime is being commited...or worse, it's not a crime if a rich person does it? (Which is to opine that our ENTIRE (in)-Justice System' needs to be thrown out and rebuilt.)

Worse, the rich dude golfs with the Judge so he can get away just about anything because the Country club hasn't had an opening on it's membership roster since WWII.

Let me put a finer point on this...Justice, of the people and by the people means there isn't a 'judge' to override the jury, the jury IS the judge! (that kind of power shouldn't rest in any individual's hands, just ask one, they'll tell you...or slap you with contempt and have you jailed...just because they can.

We have to put an end to this kind of, er, BS.

as always, thank you for letting me inside your head...

Tuesday, May 19, 2015

One thing leads to another...

Greetings good citizen,

Today I, er, 'stepped in it' so to speak. A friend posted a blurb that basically said Bernie Sanders, (Democratic candidate for president...despite not being a democrat, which is fine by me.) supports the idea of free college for all who choose that route.

Well, the feed is getting a tepid at best response, and while life offers us countless opportunities to keep our mouths shut, I 'opined' that what makes a college degree 'valuable' is their (relative) scarcity. While society would 'theoretically' benefit from an over-all 'smarter' populous, would we really? Which is to point out that almost everybody in a position of power these days possesses a college degree and look at the mess our socio-economic climate is (nevermind the climate itself!)

You won't find an educator out there willing to admit that our (or anybody else's for that matter) school system teaches critical reasoning skills because it's something either you were born with or you weren't.

Thus the axiom, 'stupid is permanent, ignorance can be fixed'

Worse, the not so bright will argue that it isn't true, that they are indeed intelligent while spouting all manners of nonsense!

Sadly, this proves the axiom...how unfortunate is it that those who are bold enough to share this observation run the risk of being labeled likewise...and whose to say the claim isn't true as well?

Yet another conundrum!

Thanks for letting me inside your head,

Monday, May 18, 2015

Desperation


Greetings good citizen;

Once again I have decided to bless you with a dose of what passes for wisdom (in a world apparently devoid of it.) Worse, when you're the one dispensing it, you also get to define what is or isn't (not that you have to agree.)

Perhaps that will be the first pearl we can agree to disagree about, wisdom is where you find it.

Like the parent that visits his critically injured child in the hospital and dryly shares the observation "bet you don't do that again!"

Is this wisdom or simply belaboring the obvious? You choose.

But I digress. (Something I do frequently and aging isn't helping...even a little.)

The topic dujuor is Desperation...that relentless desire for things/situations to turn out other than the way they are currently going.

And try as we may, no life is free from the base root of desperation, which is to say none of us are completly free of despair. (If I don't sound like the adult in my earlier example I certainly feel like him.)

To a degree, there is much to fret over, no denying it. What troubles me more often than not is how the media is always waving red flags that only a few people care about.

Is this due to their 'journalistic responsibility' to not agitate the public or are they really that clueless?

Just as 'the Working Class' has disappeared from the media's lexicon (replaced with the more nebulous 'Middle Class'...which is indeed a different animal altogether from that newly minted animal that ocassionally pops up in the media dubbed 'The working poor')

Time to repeat one of my classic memes, If you can't live on what your boss pays you, it's not your bosses problem, it's YOURS!

Little things like this, the growing ranks of the working poor coupled with rising prices the so-called 'economists' among us consistently ignore are indeed fueling a larger shared sense of 'desperation'.

That and a majority of the current population sprinting for the nursing home...well, pardon me because in my humble opinion, things are looking mighty desperate for the vast majority of us.

So I leave you to ponder if this is wisdom, belaboring the obvious or nonsense.

You (as always) get to decide for yourself.

Thanks for letting me inside your head!

Friday, May 8, 2015

An undeniable trend

Around the globalized world we have seen 'surprising' and 'upset' victories pulled off by one decidedly unpopular political party and they just did it again in England.

Coincidence? Hardly. Only one other, er, medium, is predominantly OWNED by the minority that profess conservative leanings. ANd what does this medium do? it informs us.

And for decades we have been protesting the stilted manner it performs this task which is the primary reason for it's existence. (Don't be mislead good citizen, the politics nor the beliefs held in the hearts of those who delivering the message are not necessarily in agreement with their employer but if they wish to keep their situations they do what they're told and don't rock the boat.)

It is a strong accusation to make but the results repeatedly defy logic and simple mathematics. Just as 1 percent is less that 99, 25% conservative bias isn't enough to win a single election.

Yet they do...and the 'excuse' given for this unlikelyhood is 'dissatisfaction'.

Now, more than ever, the electorate is dissatisfied with conservative governance (or, more succinctly the decided lack thereof!) yet our conservative owned media continues to announce ever more unlikely conservative victories around the globe.

That uncomfortable feeling in the pit of your stomach is the knowledge something is very wrong and we don't possess the tools to fix it.

That said, we don't have a lot of options.

I know it's boorish to belabor the obvious but you won't hear this from our of the bought and paid for conservo-whacko media.

Thanks for letting me inside your head...



Thursday, May 7, 2015

Privacy vs security, whose 'privacy' are they really concerned about?

Greetings good citizen, Today 'Democracies' around the world are teetering on the edge of totalitarianism as the elected portion of the government is subjegated by the 'appointed' portion, a long ignored danger that sprang into existence in a misplaced desire for 'continuity'. A legacy of the 'cold war' era.

This is the elephant in the room, we elect a, er, figurehead (who then proceeds to adopt the mantle of 'the leader of the free world') yet it is this man/individual's 'appointed' department heads who weild the real power in government.

Bad enough the only thing we, the citizens who must live under the decrees issued by this, 'meatpuppet', are permitted to do is vote for which meatpuppet will nominally be responsible for appointing a suite of autocrats s/he has no control over.

At the heart of this article is the issue of privacy vs. security but as we know the deeper issue is the public's right to know what the government is doing to them in their name, under the banner of 'safety', a goal which becomes ever more elusive as the heavy-handed and unaccountable appointees use robots to cleanse 'undesirables' without the benefit of a trial.

Bad enough our government is leading the way in this usurpation of the will of the people (in the name of our safety, of course!) but today's headlines tell us other nations are following suit:

PARIS — For two years after the revelations by Edward J. Snowden, Europe was awash in talk about American excesses in mass surveillance, objecting to how the National Security Agency swept up emails and phone conversations — even of political leaders like Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany — in an American electronic net that seemed to envelop the Continent.

But the past few months have helped clarify what much of Europe really objected to: the American involvement in that surveillance, not the net itself. Worried about Islamic extremists in its midst, Britain passed even more sweeping surveillance laws last summer. And in the wake of terrorist attacks in Paris in January, the French have begun what has become almost a rite of passage for Western nations since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in the United States, voting through the lower house of Parliament on Tuesday vastly expanded government powers to protect, and spy on, its own citizens.


The lower house of the French parliament held a vote on Tuesday to adopt new surveillance rules.

Even Ms. Merkel, who lectured President Obama in 2013 about her family’s life under the East German Stasi, found herself reminding reporters the other day that Germany often has to spy to protect its citizens — while dancing around the question of how much it may have cooperated with the N.S.A. in looking at Airbus Industries.

While government spying 'for the public good' has yet to yeild positive results, the ever growing threat of being labeled an 'aggitator' is tearing our society to shreds.

People are mimicing conservative talking points to avoid the appearance of being 'unpatriotic.'

Sadly, we need to clean our political house and put the honest citizenry back in charge of our affairs or the self-interested will continue to pillage whatever they want and cry 'public safety' if anyone questions them.

The question you have to ask yourself good citizen is why you're reding this here and not in the corporate owned media, the one who are supposed to be watching out for the public's interest?

Thanks for letting me inside your head

Tuesday, May 5, 2015

The Cure

Writing about writing gets old quick. Worse, back in the day, writing was used as 'punishment' which may partially be responsible for our current quandry. The ignorance overload brought on by a media bent on providing entertainment more so than 'information'. The cure for ignorance is knowledge but it needs to be ingested and processed to become useful.

Now we arrive at a disturbing distinction encountered by most writer/authors...none of our friends 'read'...(and the average person is convinced of this because they literally haven't picked up a book since they left school.) Mind you, walk into the break room and you'll find the same devout 'non-reader' in thrall to their smartphone as they surf the net.

Now, Forest Gump's most famous, line 'stupid is as stupid does' (and no, 'life is like a box of chocolates' isn't more memorable or nearly as widely repeated) which brings us full circle to the 'I don't read' claim...and that ever shrinking line between stupidity and ignorance.

As we enter the 2016 presidential election cycle we find ourselves faced with a growing field of unqualified wannabes. Worse, all but one of these candidates is 'undesirable' as they subscribe to the conservo-whacko meme of government can't govern (while passing laws via lynch mob that butter their benefactor's bread)

The single notable exception to this pack of meat puppets is Bernie Sanders...but this candidacy poses another insurmountable hurdle, the 'chief executive' isn't 'all powerful' (and if he doesn't toe the line drawn by the one tenth of one percent he'll be assassinated like every other president that has attempted to do the right thing.

I like Bernie and I don't want to see him dead. I'm happy he's running but I understand he is powerless to alter the existing vipers nest that inflicts relentless injustice upon the citizens of this once powerful land.

Here's a quote from Bernie Sanders.com

“The American people must make a fundamental decision. Do we continue the 40-year decline of our middle class and the growing gap between the very rich and everyone else, or do we fight for a progressive economic agenda that creates jobs, raises wages, protects the environment and provides health care for all? Are we prepared to take on the enormous economic and political power of the billionaire class, or do we continue to slide into economic and political oligarchy?” Bernie Sanders.

Do you find it disturbing that everyone continues to point to 'Morning in America' as the time frame where the USA lost it's way?

If this is true and less that 25 % of the voting public self-identifies as Republican does it disturb you that 100% of the corporate owned media is Republican (and, against all odds, we have a 'mathematically impossible' conservative dominated legislature?)

Again, it should come as no surprise that the ones who pay get what they want...and if you're funding the campaign, who cares what the voters want?

See a little 'consistency problem' here? For all of the flag waving the self-professed 'patriots' among us we don't live under a government where the people are represented, we live under a government where a human construct is worshiped, money.

More poignant: money is, in reality, worthless. (And those who control it, know it.) It is the LAWS surrounding money that impoverish vast portions of the globe.

But I digress,

I intend to vote for Bernie (if he gets that far and I doubt he will.) I suspect/'predict' he'll drop out near the end of the race.

And like all the other elections over the past 40 years, we'll be left with a choice between 'bad' and 'worse'...and this time 'worse' will win and no one will be able to figure out why.

Which brings us to the 'title' of this entry The Cure , which is to opine that it is not possible to make correct decisions without accurate information.

Not that 'stupid' will understand this, 'stupid' thinks everything he needs to know comes from the eye that never blinks...'no reading involved' (naturally this implies no thinking either but our pal doesn't see this.)

Thank you for letting me inside your head (even if I did make you 'read'!)







Friday, May 1, 2015

May Day!

Once a celebration of the advent of summer (not around here but you take my point) May Day also did double duty as a distress call (probably be interesting to research the origins of that bit of linguistic history but I'm content knowing warmer weather is just around the corner (even if we do keep the flannel sheet on 'til June!)

As I heard it, the celebration of May Day goes back to pagan times and is akin to Thanksgiving which celebrates the harvest, May Day celebrates putting in the new crop...a bookend sort of thing although it has been adapted in various nations to, er, 'motivate' and build patriotic fervor within the populous.

Which sort of belies the fact that left to their own devices people will get together for a party with no particular reason needed. Sort of a once a quarter thing whether they needed it or not.

Interestingly enough we still preserve these 'traditions' but what's missing is their basic purpose of building social cohesion.

Back in the day it took a village, today we all pretend to be islands, independent of one another.

But wait, it gets worse.

Back in the day we'd get together and talk with one another during break-time, not anymore. Today's youth grew up with their toys for company, so when they moved into the workplace, they sit down with their electronic companions and surf the web, occasionally discussing what they find there but not often...in fact, when something like the Baltimore riots is occurring they seem to treat it as though it were happening on another planet and not in their own backyard.

Again, I have to temper this disturbing news with the fact that it's not just the kids anymore, the 'grown-ups' have adopted this behavior too!

Understand, if we don't discuss what's going on around us we won't address their underlying causes and solutions WON'T be found...or worse, a 'for profit' solution will be pursued and it will cost more than just money to the families of the victims.

I marvel at the prevalence of 'escapism' taking place within our society and it feeds on itself. People that spend all day gabbing on the phone for business walk out of their offices and strap their cellphone to their ear was they walk out of work!

What did these people do before cellphones? Must have been awful lonely but at least in the old days they thought about things. Having been on the receiving end of these telephonic handholding sessions, I know just how mindless these conversation can be.

What I'm saying is many of these people who can't hang up are calling (pretty much anyone) to avoid being 'alone with their thoughts'.

Worse, when they're alone with their thoughts, media outlets take it upon themselves to 'spin' the news stories they encountered online into whatever the talking points of the day dictate.

Unlike my humble self, the corporate owned media has no problem telling you what to think, in fact they insist on it!

Somewhat ironic to see so few people self-identifying as 'conservatives' yet they echo conservative talking points precisely because they don't take the trouble to think for themselves!

Sort of gives new meaning to the term 'empty headed'!

In this respect we are a lot closer to flushing ourselves down the drain than most would think...

Please reconsider what the eye that never blinks tells you and remember that it looks different when you're standing in the other guy's shoes.

Thursday, April 30, 2015

Curious loop

Picking up where I left off nearly two years ago on the much misunderstood topic of 'money' (that commodity, sanctified by god, that you are kept A.) purposefully ignorant of and B.) in perpetual thrall to

What 'new' thing on this nightmarish topic can I share with you? Let's shift our focus for a moment to the 'stated purpose' of 'government' and how things really work.

Given 'A' is 'money' is a 'legal construct', originally intended to 'simplify' barter...but it grew beyond that. The thing to keep in mind is money has evolved with the times. Money didn't start off being what it has evolved into, it didn't start off as an 'instrument of debt.'

But we find ourselves in a world where everything has a price (even if that price is ridiculous) and if you need to survive in the current economic desert (along with 7 billion others) you are, unquestionably, a 'debtor'. Often a debtor living in abject poverty.

Which begs the question 'when does a system stop serving the greater good?'

And I, for one, would opine we passed that point a long time ago...but the self-interested, (the few the system benefits) actively support the 'status quo'.

How unfortunate for the vast majority of us those 'well-off few' have a stranglehold on political power in this nation?

Follow my reasoning, even if you disagree with it (and many, inexplicably, do)

Money is a legal construct that gains it's 'validity' from...government. Controlling 'legal tender' makes debts denominated in money prosecutable in government courts.

Sounds like a no-brainer but it seems the general public fails to consider the causality of this chain of circumstances. It is the backbone of our current debt-driven society.

Now back to my original assertion (which happen to be the facts) All money is 'funny'. Gold isn't money any more than seashells are.

Money serves the purpose of facilitating the 'division of labor' concept, making it possible for us to live in a world where we don't have to do EVERYTHING ourselves.

(Note to self-professed 'job creators', you don't do jack, Mother nature is the one and only job creator! Some don't differentiate between 'spirit in the sky' and Mother Nature and it works out to be the same difference.)

Like Time Travel, it appears we have a bigger problem on our hands than what strikes the eye.

Which is to express another 'unpopular' truth, we live in the perpetual NOW, time (like money) is a human construct. Just because we are aware of the passage of time doesn't make it 'navigable'.

The multiple inconsistencies inherent in the management of our global currency system has caused mammoth mismanagement of our ever more slender resources.

Which is to say, global warming be damned, if we fail to get a handle on population growth we won't be around to worry about environmental degradation!

Once again it is not my purpose/intent to tell you WHAT TO THINK, it is my intention to provide you with something to think about.

Whether you do or not is the difference between ignorance and stupidity...stupid is permanent and ignorance can be fixed.

Thanks for dropping by!

Tuesday, April 28, 2015

Today's headlines

The blogosphere as well as the corporate owned media is alive with the controversy over the new global trade agreements.

The blogosphere speculates that the latest round of 'secret' trans-oceanic 'trade negotiations' will result in a further erosion of workers leverage against the one tenth of one percent's stranglehold on the global economy.

The misstatement here is the fact that you are already held hostage to their money, what the criminals do after that you have zero control over.

What we're witnessing is the, er, gradual lifting of the longest held 'open secret' out there. They're going to do what they want and there isn't anything (short of revolution) that you can do about it.

Doesn't matter if you like, approve or condone, it's going to happen and if you want to fight about it, well, let's take a look at how it's going to go down.

First, we have the mechanism in place to, er, 're-institute' the Draft. When they start assembling a 'global peacekeeping force' they are going to draft YOUR sons and daughters and ship them halfway across the planet. In the meantime, if you get to 'uppity' over here, soldiers/peacekeepers from some third world hell hole will be deployed in your neighborhood to 'keep the peace'...puts the 'disturbance' in Baltimore yesterday in a whole different light, doesn't it?

Bad enough when the local PD drops civilians for no reason...these UN peacekeepers will be exempt from local laws (just as we exempt our soldiers/mercenaries from the laws of the lands we invade!)

Now imagine your kids stationed in foreign lands where they aren't familiar with local customs (like our soldiers in the Middle East...) When the body bags start coming home you'll be told you child died protecting our 'freedoms' (even if you have no idea what they're talking about because freedom is/has become an 'abstract concept'.)

Let me once again back up to the part where there isn't a single thing you can do about this, it's coming whether you think it's a wonderful idea or not.

Remember, the negotiations are 'secret' (because of the rioting centered on previous illegal trade agreements which usurped local autonomy and had law enforcement shrugging their shoulders and saying 'there's nothing I can do about it' when they could (and should have) arrested the judges who told them they were powerless!

Just a little something to ponder as sit back you wonder what all the hubbub is about.

Monday, April 27, 2015

Humility?

Greetings gentle reader, Kindle countdown deal starts tomorrow for, er, one of my two novels, get your exciting/action packed full length novel for .99 while they last! (One starts on the 28th and the other starts May 2nd so visit early and often, buy more than one, they make great gifts!

But on a more somber note it seems W. has finally (really, well fox news thinks he's been biting his tongue until now) taken the current administration to task for it's handling of the conflict HE created! (Tell me again what Iraq had to do with 9/11?)

This is the thanks the current (lapdog) administration gets for not prosecuting W and his accomplices for war crimes.

Not that many of us labor under the illusion that our vote does anything but give the majority of us the clear conscious of saying 'I didn't vote for him'...just like most of us didn't vote for W...either time. (Problem with a money driven media, it prints whatever it's customers want to hear, the truth be damned... and if you point that out well, you must be some sort of paranoid deviant!

This is Mureca, where the press exists to safeguard your freedom (not that they can name any.)

But I preach to the choir, Like Lenny Cohen says (sings) 'everybody knows'

Saturday, April 25, 2015

Kindle countdown set to commence this week

Yes, gentle reader, I put both of my novels on the Kindle countdown plan, Edge of Eternity starting the 28th of April and Unplugged starts on May 2nd, 99 cents get 'em while they're hot!


Now for the piece I was contemplating but didn't get to yesterday, the topic near and dear to all of our hearts, Freedom.

Interesting word as the dictionary defines it as 'the state of being free'...and it stops...free from what? It doesn't say so we stupid humans 'imply' and make up our own (often quite fanciful) definitions, many of them overburdened with the shortest word in every language, 'I'.

Which brings us to the burning question; is 'personal freedom' even possible, considering human beings do extremely poorly when left to their own devices?

TV is filled with 'rugged individuals' taming the wilderness on their lonesome...or so the none too bright would think.

Which is to point out that we all want the 'freedom' to go about our affairs unmolested and in exchange for that 'freedom' we allow others to do likewise.

The problem begins when you live under a system that puts your well-being in direct conflict with your desire not to be molested. First we, since it was here when you/we got here and nobody had a choice in the matter, we have the work for pay, a swap that allows (other) individuals to profit from your labor...often making more off of your efforts than you do (and I don't mean that collectively, in extreme cases this happens individually...and these corporations are quite large! [where did you think billionaires come from?) The common thread here is, believe it or not, is the government.]}

Not to say this is a bad thing, it just means our/everybody's government is corrupt to the core, which extends to our/their justice system, which is also in the pockets of those who would let our civilization crash itself to pieces on the rocks of injustice...

Um naturally this is all tied together, making it difficult to address singular aspects, the cause and effect chains cascade throughout society, which is why the fabric of our civilization is being torn asunder with frightening regularity.

Not to poke the stick into the cage (too hard) but most of us would agree that total freedom is a bad thing, just as total truth is something our species is incapable of handling at this time.

Thursday, April 23, 2015

Death to America!

On MSN's homepage they ran another of their famous 'top ten' lists and this time the topic was 'Five countries that hate America most.'

Naturally there are (many) more than five nations that don't share our exceptionalist point of view so they ran with 'Hates us most' followed by the 'stats'; which we have no way to verify.

In last place was our Drone training ground, Pakistan. Sort of a no-brainer but they like us more than the other four 'also rans' at a surprising 65% disapproval rate...guess you had to see the questions to better understand this comparatively lukewarm response.

Hating us more than our bombing buddies is Lebanon; now inundated with refugees from Syria and Iraq after US precipitated events in both countries. Now even there hatred isn't 'crazy bad' as it's only a percentage point higher than it is in Pakistan at 66%

Now we take a major leap in an unexpected direction, guess who hates us more than the Lebanese? Belarus!

What have we ever done to them you might ask? Back when I was researching currency values I found that Belarus had the lowest value of any currency on the entire planet! Wanna make an enemy, devaluing their money is a great way to start!

Doesn't help that this was expressed as one belarus dollar being worth one two thousandth of a US dollar...so you know who exactly is responsible for turning your currency to trash (even if it was just to take advantage of the 'carry trade', that bizarre thing bankers do with the differences between currencies...which logic tells us doesn't exist;but who are we to tell the bankers they're wrong?)

Anyway 69% of Belarusians hate America or more precisely the US government! And the article fails to mention the example I cite but does point at currency trouble being a 'contributing factor' to Belarus's lack of love for the ol' USA.

Who hates us more than the Belarusians? Who do you think, the friend of my enemy is my enemy; so it should surprise no one that Palestine comes in SECOND at a whopping 72 % (and one has to wonder about the accuracy of that figure, are they really claiming 28% of Palestinians LIKE the US? Is it logical to believe that even ten percent of Palestinians are cool with what the US has done (Every UN vote to censure Israel is blocked by the US.))

While you have to give it to them regarding the 'most hated' list the implication that the list is much longer than five is present for the reader to observe or ignore.

We could make the same list using our so-called 'allies' and it wouldn't be wrong.

But who is 'leader of the pack'? Who in the world hates the USA the most? It's like taking a trip in the wayback machine, it isn't an Arab nation (the corporate owned media promises they all LOVE us...despite their involvement in 9/11) it's the republic that Old Ronnie Reagan slayed, the USSR!

Nixon gave us detente and now W's fourth term has turned the average Ivan on the street (a colossal 82%) into 'America Haters'.

This list might better be viewed as who is currently in the sights of the tail-gunning US media, an 'enemies list' if you would.

A simpler way of asking the same question is how many nations disapprove of the USA and the simple answer is how many nations are there?

If we were to ask how many nations approve of the USA, in all honesty, leaving 'compared to' out of the equation, the answer would be crickets chirping.

Even we don't approve of how things are done or where they're headed so it's self delusion to think any sane individual does...much less 'spirit in the sky'.

Wednesday, April 22, 2015

Malcontent

No one is particularly keen on politics these days, it seems nobody (in politics) is looking out for the 'working class' and we're sick & tired of hearing about the 'plight' of the middle class while the working poor are ignored.

Yes, we know we are supposed to 'assume' the middle class includes the 'working class' while the media pretends the only ones that matter are the ten percent that keep an eye on the one-tenth of a percent's 'interests'.

Again, the (corporate owned) media 'advertises' that we live in a 'classless' society but we all know the dirty admission that comes out when the sleazeballs start stumping for your vote: the only ones who matter are the 'Haves' and the 'Have mores.'

Um, there is a movement out there (among those who have to live on the minimum a 'willing buyer' will pay them) to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour...

Growing up the minimum wage was less than a dollar an hour but I was much better off then than now because my dollar bought more...which is to opine the problem isn't in how many dollars you earn but in how much your dollar buys! Having more dollars won't put a dent in poverty, it will only slow the drowning of the impoverished.

Yes, adding dollars to the economy only increases 'debt'...because all of those extra dollars will end up where the other have, in the pockets of those who already have more than they can spend. (Funny how 'purchasing power' isn't a problem when you control pricing power...)

What the average person has zero control over is how much they get paid.

Worse, if you can't live on what your employer pays you, it's not your employer's problem, it's YOURS!

Broken record, I know. I keep saying it but it seems nobody is paying attention. Worse, you all keep repeating the same actions hoping against hope that this time it will be different.

Which brings us to the next 'truism'...stupid is permanent, ignorance can be fixed. If you truly want a different outcome, logic dictates you MUST do 'something different'.

Just chew on that as the next presidential contest revs up with all the usual suspects.


Tuesday, April 21, 2015

R&R

Pardon my absence, I was busy over the long holiday weekend with spring related chores ['Patriot's Day'(originally called Bunker Hill Day) is a local holiday that few get off, even the trashman comes (but he's a little eccentric when it comes to holidays.)]

Anyway, the Boston Marathon keeps historic Bunker Hill Day on the calendar and I was, er, coerced into planting grass. Being a longtime homeowner one tires of mowing grass...so when the local scourges (japanese beetle grubs and ants) wipe out portions of the lawn it is considered (by those who have to cut it) a 'win'. Sadly, the Mrs. doesn't agree and we all know who is going to win THAT argument, don't we?

Which is to opine that we are the victims of what 'The Eye that Never Blinks' says is expected of us. Most of us (especially golfers) thank our lucky stars when the town declares a water ban! Lawns are thirsty (and this is a major contributing factor to the current sorry state of my carpet of dirt) but when there isn't sufficient water/rainfall, the theory is your lawn will go 'dormant' until mother nature revives it later on in the year with rain.

Either way, the only way to combat the pests that make their home under your lawn is by watering in pest control products and fertilizer to keep your lawn 'healthy'.

Yet, if we take but a short trip in the 'Wayback machine' we'd find that lawns were rare outside the estates of the, er, 'Well-to--do'. Truth be told, acreage in general was rare back in the day for folks not living on a farm and then all that grass had a different name, it was called 'pasture' and it was highly 'functional'.

You didn't grow grass because it was 'pretty', you grew it to feed your livestock...but that's not what the eye that never blinks tells us.

In fact this is only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to, er, 'marketing' (read manufactured need) the huckster in your living room/den 'shows' you in the idealized world of the Hollywood (soon to be Bollywood) sit-com.

Filling your head with unrealistic ideas is what the corporate owned media does best.

Telling how you should live your life is also a task willingly borne by the corporate 'nanny state', which is also behind the corporate police state popularized by the eye that never blinks.

300 channels and there's still nothing on...but that's mostly due to the corporate blinders the media is shackled with...can't be sending mixed messages, the 'customers' (read the one percent) will complain!

The 'gilded lily' held up as an example of 'how things should be' is the product of the few who can afford it and blame YOU for not achieving it!

Time to take a long, hard look at how our society is (mis)managed and to start discussing how to put a stop to it.

Time to end the paradigm of 'he who cuts the paychecks is A.) a job creator...that's nonsense! and B.) gets to have their 'fantasy' projected onto all of us because they're paying for it, they aren't YOU ARE!

Once again, thanks for letting me inside your head...

Sun's out, time to go water the grass...

Thursday, April 16, 2015

Say Something

Platitudes echo in our minds, my Mom used to be fond of saying, " you can only kill a brave man once, a coward dies a thousand deaths." (Which, for some reason, unbidden, would come the reminder "better to be a live chicken than a dead hero"...)

It is indeed the old 'fish or cut bait' debate. If the brave die defending their convictions then who will remain to fight tyranny?

If not us, who and if not now, when?

Worse, there has never been a real 'consensus' on how human affairs should be managed. Our civilization is circling the drain yet few think there is a reason to panic let alone complain.

Which is to point out that there are always those who don't want the apple cart upset, which resurrects another platitude, "better the Devil you know" (which may be okay for Murphy but it's killing the rest of us!) My own kids are curious examples of this last attitude...seems like Peter Pan is everywhere!

Yet denial won't save what currently passes for a functioning society. How sad is it trigger happy policing isn't a 'new' problem?

Again belaboring the obvious is all discussion of 'rights' and 'freedoms' take place after the old regime is vanquished and the new regime moves into it's rotting corpse...bringing us to the deeply disturbing reality that most 'revolutions' are 'hijacked' almost immediately after they 'succeed'...leading us to that inevitable conundrum of the names have changed but nothing else has.

Meet the new boss, same as the old boss!

Um, writing is a solitary occupation and while one is composing, Silence is indeed 'golden', but this is a public forum and YOU are invited to share what you think.

The path forward is one we must share...let's try to flourish together rather than perish fighting over what is 'ours' in the first place...

Thanks for letting me inside your head,





Wednesday, April 15, 2015

Thrilling news!

Amazon sent me a advertisement this morning and my title, 'Unplugged' was first on the list of works I might find interesting...

Now I know their marketing department tracks what you do on the Amazon site but I didn't go in via the retail side to look at my own products so I'm somewhat excited by the prospects that more than just myself received this e-mail!

We'll see if I receive a sales bump.

In more disturbing news, the hats are assembling in the 2016 presidential race and it's looking even more desperate than in previous years.

The only one running as a Democrat (and that's not saying she is one) is Hillary and if that's the best they can do they deserve to lose.

That said, it's no mystery that a majority of the voting public self-identifies as 'Independent'...not that this is true either.

As long as the process is dominated by R or D, it doesn't matter what you call yourself. Worse, there hasn't been a real Republican in politics since Eisenhower.

So who are these pretenders and how did they win political power?

They are the 'meat-puppets' of the one tenth of one percent and they want to re-establish monarchy! We all heard W when he declared (publicly no less) that this all would be 'easier' if he were 'dictator'...well good citizen, what's 'synonym' for dictator...starts with a K, come on, you can get this.

What I'd like to 'remind' you of is failure to obey the dictates of your 'king' results in 'death:personal'.

So, as I asked in this morning's comment on 'Some Assembly Required', there doesn't seem to be a nickels worth of difference between our so-called 'world leaders' and the criminally insane.

For today's rhetorical question, 'Choice, I wish we had one...'

Thanks for letting me inside your head,

Gegner



Tuesday, April 14, 2015

Fumbling & Bumbling is humbling....

Three weeks in now and I still haven't found an effective approach to this blogging thing (at least as far as promoting my books is concerned, I had quite a following under my alter ego when I blogged about politics.)

The average reader isn't much interested in the writing process so writing about the nuts and bolts of writing isn't gaining me much of a following, but I tend to doubt I can turn the politically disenfranchised into readers of my prose (despite it being laced with alternatives to the current fiasco we're saddled with.)

Which is to address the elephant in the room, if we don't actively discuss alternatives we won't be able to effect the changes we all desperately need.

Our civilization is colossally mismanaged and we, the victims of this mismanagement, are powerless to change it.

While those with the wherewithal to run for political office feign ignorance of what their constituents want (justifying their unpopular support for the agenda of their campaign's major donors...) The rest of us wonder aloud about how we can repair an obviously broken system, while ignoring that the first step towards addressing our problems is being denied to us by the profit driven wingnut (emphasis on the 'nut'!)

How we fix this without a rallying point is obvious...we don't. Those who bar rational discussion ferment revolt!

Which is to ask just how much of our current ride on the 'crazy train' is intentional?

The inability to organize leads to our collective doom at the hands of those who would take it all for themselves.

The premise of my first novel is what would happen if our government was seized by criminals and they decided to push us into our own sewer to cement their rule?

Understand, good citizen. You have already had your right to peacefully assemble revoked. Long ago your ability to petition your government was 'delegated' to 'aides' (whose job it is to placate you.)

More interestingly, YOU (nor your forebearers) asked for a 'representative' government...they thought they would have a 'voice' and it was only after the fact that they learned they had voted to let someone else speak for them without ever consulting them.

Problem is good citizen, we have no way to 'fix' this little 'unexpected' bit of treachery.

Will we sit helplessly as we watch the last vestiges of what used to be our freedoms snatched away from us in the name of 'national security?'

Remember good citizen, only rogues and scoundrels require the cloak of secrecy. Small wonder that conservatives are zealous defenders not of freedom but of 'privacy'...there's mostly...you can't be trusted.

Thanks for letting me inside your head,

(Gegner)



Monday, April 13, 2015

Setting

Greetings gentle reader, this installment takes on the topic of settings, which, like your characters, calls for differing levels of specificity.

Setting, in most cases, is driven by the main premise. Some stories unfold entirely inside the main character's head and can be as fantastical as the writer's ability to express such fanciful places.

Otherwise we arrive at the question that devil's most writers and that is 'how much is too much?' If you have taken pains to establish the story takes place in the fall do you need to tell the reader that the leaves rustled (fill-in-the-blank) every time there is a whisper of wind?

Exposition is the art of timing when you tell a reader something pertinent to the storyline. Often what you share descriptively pertains to where the character is in the story.

Which brings us to the other side of it...is it necessary to tell the reader about the howling wind and the creaks and groans the shelter makes once you have established there is a storm?

You definitely go there if the character is being stalked by something (often being chased by personal demons can be more terrifying than a real life threat!) but choosing when and where to use the landscape as a vehicle to move the story forward is a tough call.

I'm sure I'm not the only one driven to distraction by Tolkien's endless description of the trek through the forbidden forest but it achieved the desired effect, by the time the spiders captured the company you were glad he stopped describing the ceaselessly falling and rustling leaves!

(I don't have a copy of 'The Hobbit' handy or I'd look up it's proper name and since Tolkien employed a lot of similar sounding place/character names, I don't dare guess.)

Which is to opine that Tolkien took a chance when he purposefully stretched the trek through trackless forest letting the reader become as nauseated as his characters were, trapped in an endless, unchanging landscape.

I'd advise against using a similar device (unless, like Tolkien, you're writing fantasy...just saying.)

But I digress, when setting up a scene you want to be sure the reader has enough information so they aren't left wondering 'how'd they manage that' because you forgot to include a specific item your character had access to.

But this is part of the 'loose threads' factor authors also combat routinely. (You can't include anything in a story that you don't 'pay-off'!)

When writing, one must be careful not to 'lose' the reader and you definitely don't want to raise more questions than you answer! (A very good indication something is tragically wrong...like your memory is shot!)

All of that said, I preach to the choir...

Thanks for stopping by!





Friday, April 10, 2015

The Embodiment of Evil....

As writers, we are all tasked to create 'believable' characters...even when they allegedly have ice-water in their veins. Your dialog is based on the characters inner compass. From there we encounter the first obstacle and that is how well do YOU read people? Can you channel your inner wimp or are your characters all over the map? (Let's not to lose sight of the fact that many stories 'track' a character's development but this is another factor entirely! I'm pointing at question 'are your characters multi-dimensional or are they monochrome reflections of one another?')

With that in mind, have you noticed the trend in 'unbelievable' characters populating screens both large and small? Or have you? (I once again allude to the tendency to simply absorb what the screen feeds us rather than thinking about what we're witnessing.)

This isn't so much a critique of an industry that has minimal time to develop and effectively transmit plot devices, we all laugh at sitcoms precisely because we don't personally know anybody who behaves like that! Perhaps it's funny because we all know someone we suspect would act like, that given a similar situation.

In writing your 'customer' only has a mental picture of the characters you create, their personality comes across through their words and deeds.

How effectively you flesh out the character is demonstrated in how 'memorable' they are in the reader's mind.

Some would opine that keeping your characters 'real' minimizes their memorability but to that I leave you with something to chew upon (al-la Kaiser Sozay) "The Devils greatest achievement is convincing everyone it is he and not they, themselves who are the embodiment of all evil!"

Thanks for letting me inside your head!









Wednesday, April 8, 2015

The power of Marketing

One day I came upon a plastic figurine of an Native American among my son's playthings and I immediately marveled over the fact that it had never once occurred to my son to murder that redskin!

I spent my youth playing cowboys/settlers and Indians and the poor natives NEVER won. To be fair, I also spent countless hours hunting Nazis and Japs but I was (not that I was consciously aware of it, especially at the time) a victim of my environment. We'd play all day and watch Rawhide, Gunsmoke, McHales Navy and Twelve O'clock High/Rat Patrol/Hogan's Heroes at night.

Ironically, when Star Trek/Lost in Space came along, didn't we channel our energy into killing aliens just as zealously.

So when I see how this phenomenon has been 'adapted' to our current cultural soup, I am alarmed to note the 're-imagining' of the past, where the facts are being 'massaged' to protect the guilty. (Perhaps the most glaring example of this is 'Morning in America', also known as the Reagan years (the worst presidency ever!) The only ones saying otherwise are those too young to remember what it was really like!

But I digress, the topic is how easily your perceptions are altered. Now what does this have to do with writing?

Everything, it all begins with ideas on paper!

One of my 'alter ego's' favorite questions is 'How can you be expected to make correct decisions without accurate information?'

Well, good citizen, this applies to you as well. How will we save ourselves/our children from those who control the eye that never blinks?

Maybe you should have a word with your congressman next time you bump into him/her...oh, that's right, they live in Washington, you NEVER bump into them! (and they've been re-elected how many times?)

Here's an idea, maybe you can write to them (not that they'll read what you communicate, they have 'people' for that...)

But once again I digress, let us return to that plastic figurine and how it never occurred to my son to kill it? (A decidedly good thing.)

Now reflect for a moment on how the 'eye that never blinks' is molding our children's tomorrow.

Can you say (anything but) "reality TV' But those young, impressionable minds don't know that, what, you kids watch Anime?

Now be afraid, be very afraid (because they're raising a bunch of 'Pollyannas' and we can only wonder why?)



Tuesday, April 7, 2015

Drop the pencil and nobody gets hurt...

I've been on a tear these last few posts about 'responsibility in writing.' What the author writes and what the editor publishes. The beauty of the net is it's the wild, wild west all over again. No rules (should say few rules, spew enough vile content and somebody, somewhere will take it upon themselves to land on you with both feet so writers beware!)

While it has calmed somewhat since the early days, there is still a 'divide' between the 'brick & mortar' world of publishing and the, er, 'independents' who are largely self-sufficient.

That said, let us direct our attention to that bought and paid for guardian of 'free speech', the Editor. He decides which projects get the green light and which ones get sent back for re-write until they meet his/her 'journalistic standards.'

Which is to shine a light on one of the many elephants on the room, the severe and persistent lack of attention being given to 'executive privilege'. This is not a shot at the President because he has no control over those who use their office to 'shield' their activities from scrutiny.

Our current 'can't get out of their own way' government is the result of this appalling 'lack of transparency'.

So how do we fix this? As long as we allow 'private ownership' of the media (with the one cutting the paychecks determining what you can and can't see) we can't. These are the same people who have 'muzzled' our representatives by making the revelation of their treachery...treason.

Since sanity is defined as what 'the majority of the public' regards as 'normal', you can see the Chinese handcuffs but you can't get them off!

I read in an online news source today that said the 'average citizen' should be, er, 'deeply concerned' about the billion dollar price tag attached to running for the Oval Office.

Logic dictates that ONLY people [read: sock puppets] owned by the One Percent (actually the one hundredth of one percent) can run for the nation's highest office (largely because of the artificially high cost of media coverage...go figure? Isn't the media considered a public utility?)

But we are once again faced with the question of 'what are YOU gonna do about it?'...(if you don't like it?)

Naturally, much more disturbing is the fact that ALL money is 'funny' (as well as being terribly mis-managed.)

Which is to point out that it's 'all on paper' for those pulling the strings and call the shots...shots YOU have to live with.

To paraphrase a famous quote, If not now, when and if not us, who? Yeah, Reagan said it but he didn't say it first, I believe it was most famously cited by Churchill.

Thanks for letting me inside your head,