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This video originally made the rounds pointing a finger at the Boomers as the ‘Worst Generation’…when the truth is our grandparents (the alleged ‘greatest generation’) squandered the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

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.

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

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.

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

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!

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,