But Paul’s equally but opposed ideas are pure Kookery. Comedy Central stuff.

Paul’s philosophy is not an election strategy nor a governing strategy, because he has no intention of being president. It’s a strategy to draw attention to black hole of critical thought around both the morality and practical outcome of series of vanity wars and the fiscal suicide time bombs the country has armed to great fanfare.

He’s the antidote to the damage done by kooks like Stewart, Colbert and Krugman.

It’s a fool’s errand to attempt to defend his positions, because the machinery of electoral power has a formula to destroy people who speak the truth about these hard choices and greatly reward those who Obama.

Take a look at what they did to Cain. Leave the race now or we’ll destroy your marriage. Of course nobody serious was ever afraid of Cain – he was never going to be the candidate. This was a warning shot to the principled top tier candidates that the personal cost for opposing the agenda of HopeyChange would be very very high.

Post Palin, Bachmann, Cain, Clarence Thomas, Powell, Rice and Obama at least we now understand the relative importance of race, gender and power in this country. First, take the oath of loyalty to the theology and long arm of liberal social democracy. Then get in your place in the victim line.

So we’re left with the Obama-Krugman ticket, a bunch of self-destructive and truly embarrassing candidates, and it’s my turn Romney.

And Ron Paul. Probably the most principled of lot.

If elected, of course, he would not abolish the fed. Because our system is not (yet) a monarchy. There’s a balance of power that slows change. In fact if a principled man like Paul were elected and actually tried to roll the state back we’d be treated to a sad display of the one way ratchet of growth of government. Once a program is put in place, it is basically impossible to roll it back because too many people are in on the Ponzi. If he trimmed by 5% the press would run endless stories of the ruthless 1% kicking the starving bullied children of gay interracial couples, one of whom died on the Sea Shepard fighting for the whales.

This is not on track to end well.

Mike.

And the weather was fine on voting day.

Why, by whom and how were they tricked? To what end?

A democratic vote is for compassion and kindness, legal restraints on the authoritarianism of the church and the exploitation of business, protection of the environment, world peace, economic security and the protection of the weak and unlucky. And a republican vote is for the opposite of these things. One would almost worry if youth didn’t vote democrat.

That’s how they were tricked by the boomers. But why? Blatant self-interest:

In 1975, the average boomer was 25 years old. The energy crisis and stagflation were early warning signs that the post WWII economic boom could not be taken for granted, but no one seriously doubted that the future belonged to America. What the boomers were thinking about in the late 60s and early 70s were the consequences of being drafted and sent to kill and die in Vietnam. After the war, an odd combination of guilt, cynicism, idealism, narcissism and LSD led the boomers to believe that every contemporary religious, social and economic system was flawed and must be destroyed and rebuilt. The 60s and 70s were a time of considerable attack on the status quo, but rebuilding not so much. Marriage, Christianity, families, children, patriotism, military, ambition, industry and science were all broken and had to be remade. And the working proposal was cocaine, disco, and sex without love or commitment.

In 1985, the boomers now in their mid-30s discovered that capitalism and business were not such bad things when the car loans and mortgage bills were mailed to them and not their parents. But Ford’s advertising folks were not successful with “This Is Not Your Father’s Oldsmobile” because the boomers were not interested in their father’s capitalism: 50 years of hard work, living within their means, paying the bills on time and with a little luck maybe a cottage in their old age. The investments and infrastructure that their parents and grandparents had left them were still generating real wealth in the economy. But a side effect of the investment decisions made simultaneously by this large demographic created a rolling boom/bust cycle that continues to this day. In the 80s the action was real estate and the stock market. The Japanese economic model (ironically) and the loss of manufacturing jobs to Asia were a bit of a concern, but for the most part the influential and lucky boomers were getting rich quick and liking it.

Another trend that started in the 80s was the split between the expressed ideological values of the richer boomers and their own person choices. They were still anti-marriage and family, but they were marrying, having children and sending them to private school. The environment was important, but they were building large homes and driving large cars. But they often voted their values, which over many years metastasized into the parody of Al Gore living in an $8 million dollar 9 bathroom house and burning jet fuel at a monster rate while simultaneously being the global father of an imaginary threat to the environment.

The 1990s: The movie The Big Chill, in 1983, was ahead of its time. In the 1990s the baby boomers discovered both their own mortality and economic uncertainty. Waves of economic and investment boom and busts created by the boomer demographic had produced many clear winners and losers with luck being a key attribute of success. The signs of social decay, the permanent loss of blue collar jobs due to globalization,  endless growth of the government / dependent class, regulatory overreach and unsustainable debt at the federal and state level were all there. But the rich boomers didn’t notice them, because none of them were directly affected. They were engaged in the latest get rich quicker game: technology.

Rich middle aged boomers, torn between living their values and not living their values brought us the 4 car garage housing a BMW M series, a Lexus LX series, a Prius and a Harley. And concern that gays couldn’t fight and die in wars.

In 2005, the average boomer was 55 years old. Their parents were struggling with the most difficult parts of old age. The boom/bust cycle was getting risky for folks with a shorter investment horizon, but one last trip to the casino of housing produced a massive windfall for some and many others holding the bag for the bill.

The result of the last 50 years of boomers booming is unsustainable debt at the personal, municipal, state and federal levels, massively underfunded forward looking liabilities, a slow or no growth outlook for blue collar workers, a black community with a large majority of children growing up without a father, exhaustion of many of the core social, industrial and economic assets we inherited, dependance on China to kick the can down the road for a few more years and dependance on the middle east for oil.

We did see a rise in the anti-war movement, which at least until the election and subsequent actions of Barak Obama seemed to rooted in principal. But we now know that the principal involved was the importance of borrowing trillions of dollars from their children, and their children’s children, and their children’s children’s children, to fund health care for themselves and their parents over the next 20 years.

Live and learn.

Mike.

I’m not doing it anymore.

Finding, unpacking and hanging the decorations, trying to negotiate for a parking space with a crowd of passive-aggressive strangers before shopping shoulder to shoulder with these same people, the drone of advertising featuring interchangeable Stepford families that starts in October and runs until January, the stress of wondering and worrying about who is expecting what perfunctory gifts, the monotonous music, that guy with the bell, wrapping, customs forms, mailing liquids, the card list, the forced frivolity and superficial piousness, the involuntary family gatherings.

Frankly, my previously joyous efforts to disparage these dreadful things has become tiresome. While I admit that Christmas is a uniquely rich target for distain and self-loathing, having a both a Christian religious heritage that excludes and offends people who choose to celebrate Yuul, Kwansaa, Lenaea, Saturnalia, Merlinpeen, Newtonmass and many other deeply held and practiced beliefs, while at the same time seducing people of many beliefs into the secular customs of the west that enslave humankind to the cold impersonal machinery of industry and commerce for the amusement and benefit of the modern slave owner class.

But the cognitive dissonance that results from contempt for a thing because it is both superficially secular and at the same time oppressively religious grows tiresome. As does having to carefully choose words and construct arguments such that I sound sincerely concerned and thoughtful about the exclusionary side effects of a Christian holiday but at the same time not committing myself to offer the same criticism of the belief and rituals of Hanukkah, Ramadan or any other religion except Christianity. And frankly I’ve been just pretending to really care about the wasted gasoline, landfills bulging from packaging, “living conscientiously”, “disconnecting” from consumerism, and all that other condescending intellectual self-help crap.

I’m just tired of it.

So I’m going to do something radical. I’m going to enjoy the holiday that celebrates both the birth of Jesus Christ, the Christian Son of God, and Santa Claus, that guy who lives in the North Pole and with the help of many elves, makes toys for the not naughty boys and girls and delivers them around the world by dropping down the chimney from a flying sled.

I’m canceling my “ACLU Christian” Google Alert, removing the Huffington Post from my favorites and turning off MSNBC. I’m going to pass on the New York Times Lifestyles op-eds. I’m going to hang as many lights as I have time for. I’m going to stop to linger and enjoy the lights and decorations that others put out, in part for my enjoyment. I’m going to spend a bit of time thinking about what I can give that might be useful or fun, and I’m going to relax when I get it wrong, knowing that friends and family will appreciate the gesture. I’m going to load the iPod with Steamroller and Trans-Siberian, and even though I can’t hear the bell, maybe give the bell guy some change. I’m going to be a little less selfish and devote some time and attention to folks who I might normally not think about. I’m going to be a little less condescending toward people who choose to celebrate the event in a religious way. I’m going to wave to the middle aged guys dressed as Santa and wish them a Merry Christmas. I’m going to watch the Polar Express again.

I going to be thankful for life that the West, perhaps God, and perhaps good fortune, have blessed me with.

Merry Christmas.

Mike.

Not only is the quoted blog aimed at a narrow demographic, it is also likely incorrect. The premise of the blog is that there are “certain benefits”, enforced by the state under threat of imprisonment, available to married couples and not available to gays in long term committed relationships. That is unfair. The church is not involved. While the blog is light on the exact details of these benefits, it makes clear that this is the core issue at the heart of a complete redefinition of marriage: Legal equity with married couples for couples not eligible to marry.

Additionally the blog reinforces that this is a purely private matter between couples not eligible to marry and the state. Nothing else is being requested, and no cost will be paid by anyone outside of the couples not eligible to marry.

One would presume that civil unions would be an acceptable solution to this, as they would meet the letter and spirit of the problem as explained to idiots. Anyone who wanted to legally obtain “certain benefits” would simply draw up a contract and sign it. The church would not be involved. But thinking people who have been paying attention realize that this proposal has not been met with enthusiasm. One wonders why.

Not really.

A little common sense and life experience with marriage, divorce and death teaches us that the legal benefits of marriage are not a material reason why people choose to marry. Indeed they may be a deterrent to marriage. People choose to marry because they hope the combination of a personal and intimate group commitment ritual, combined with ongoing societal acceptance and reinforcement of their relationship and the threat of divorce pain will help them maintain a very long – with some luck lifelong – and happy committed relationship.

One presumes this is what gays want from marriage: ritual, acceptance, reinforcement leading to long term stable committed relationships. Perhaps the church is not involved, but society is.

A quick glance of polls surrounding this issue indicate that we are close to establishing exactly this. One wonders how much things like How To Explain Gay Rights To An Idiot set the cause back.

Of course the purpose of the blog is not to explain a complex thing in simple terms to a simple person, but to browbeat the thinking person into not thinking at all about the issue and certainly not speaking about it.

One of the least desirable parts of the gay marriage movement is the prevalence of personal attack as a tool to quiet opposition.

I have noticed, in my admittedly limited and causal experience here, that many of many of the  rhetorically militant and personally hostile when advancing the cause of gay marriage are not gay. They are in fact angry, condescending straight liberals.

It’s a little hard to make sense of the value system of angry, condescending liberals. They are not as a group especially pro-military, as the military is a place where young people are sent for brainwashing before being forced to to kill or die for no reason.

Yet it is critical that gays be allowed to serve.

They are not in fact all that enthusiastic about marriage.

Yet it is critical that gays be allowed to marry.

It’s confusing.

Mike.

Eugene Robinson’s Quiet Desperation

Whether or not he lets himself be persuaded to write more condecending and dishonest op-eds, Eugene Robinson needs to find some way to grow hair. Like everyone else, op-ed writers perform best when they look great. Eugene obviously does not.

You could argue that this is none of my business, but I disagree. Eugene’s problem with his shiny dome ceased being a private matter when he started publishing op-eds with his photo at the top — and it’s not  something you can fail to notice. Male pattern baldness affects 25% of men at  age 30, and 2/3rds by 60. Eugene’s hair loss is as legitimate an issue as the The Media’s Obsession with Obama’s Smoking that President Obama says he has finally kicked.

On rare occasions, Eugene thinks about his hair loss. “I’m really struggling, been struggling for a long time with it,” unnamed sources say he thought briefly while writing an op-ed making the case that Christie’s appearance disqualifies him from public office.

After he wrote the article, Eugene was seen as acknowledging the contradiction between judging individuals on the merit of their values,  words and actions as opposed to how they look. Unnamed researchers attribute this to the psychological stress and loss of self-esteem due to changes in appearance that occur with male pattern baldness.

My intention is not to blame Eugene for his ad hominem attacks on a person he disagrees with. I’m sure Eugene is kind, caring liberal who is simply a victim of a genetic disease entirely out of his control.

But Eugene chose to put his photo at the top of an op-ed in the Washington Post. Well Eugene, heal thyself. Many hair loss sufferers have success with clinically proven treatments such as finasteride, dutasteride and topically applied minoxidil solution.

Politically, I disagree with Eugene on almost everything.  Today, I’d just like to offer him a bit of  unsolicited, heartfeld and at its core motivated by nothing save basic human kindness: get a hat.

Mike Zintel

But what do they really want?

Respect.

It is interesting and instructive, during times when Condescending Angry Liberal Intellectuals like George Lakoff (or Jane Smiley) feel that the momentum is against them, to see the thin veneer of selfless tolerance and compassion come off and to get a peek below the surface.

Intellectuals, from a young age experience a sense of isolation. They notice that they see patterns that most people miss. They notice that a great deal of the messaging from adult authority sources is either riddled with ignorant bias or is intentional deception. And they discover that when they share their insights, they are often ignored, jilted or mocked.

Experience that will later come in handy.

As intellectuals enter their teens and early 20s, they discover that in the competition for friends, lovers, jobs, power and influence, non-intellectuals “win” more often than they should. Beauty, charm, self-confidence, physical strength, effort, luck and even the ability to persuade are in practice at least as important in the competition of life as the ability to pontificate about the reasons behind the reasons behind the reasons. Whatever.

It’s at this time that some intellectuals become Condescending Angry Liberal Intellectuals like George Lakoff (and Jane Smiley). Anger is the trigger. At the core, anger about the fact that the world doesn’t work the way it would if it were designed by a carefully structured benign committee of intellectuals. Anger about the fact that they alone have the insight and the answers but are denied the power. This anger creates confusion because one of the first things that committees of intellectuals would design out of the world, in addition to any competition for their own power, is anger. They are seething mad that they don’t have the power to eliminate anger for the good of the children. Or something.

If an intellectual at this fragile time encounters Condescending Angry Liberal Intellectuals like George Lakoff (or Jane Smiley) and they discover a belief system, not unlike a religion, that explains the anger.  The belief system teaches that the only reason that committees of good intellectuals have not been able to engineer a good and perfect world is because of the evil – western conservatives, the patriarchy, Christians, people who work for living, and the military. Of course this is all wrapped in layers of complex self-contradictory theories and expressed in Lakoffisms that attempt to paint it as far more benign, noble and objective than it really is.

The cognitive dissonance that results when one thinks and acts in a hurtful and intolerant way in pursuit of kindness and tolerance, the self-contradictory nature of the soup of competing  intellectual liberal beliefs, and the fact that intellectual liberalism in practice almost never works as planned takes no small amount of intellect and effort to ignore. It is usually necessary to surround yourself with like-minded true believers who think in lock step and talk smack about those who do not, and to constantly reinforce to the Condescending Angry Liberal echosphere the necessity of this in the pursuit of diversity which can’t exist when people disagree.

And so we get garbage like this this.

Mike.

Inglemoor High School
15500 Simonds Rd. NE
Kenmore, WA 98028-4430

November 4, 2010

Re: ATTENDANCE CONFIRMATION letter, Rev. 08/2010

Dear Inglemoor High School

Thank you for your letter making us aware of my child’s year to date excused absence from school due to illness.

I the Parent/Guardian, appreciate the reminder and share your concern about the situation, as I live with the student, monitor her academic progress and attendance, try to help her when she struggles with homework, and care for her when she is ill. As noted in your letter, I the Parent/Guardian was the one who called you each day she was too ill to go to school.

I share your stated concern for my daughter’s academic success.

I must confess to some confusion about your requests to me, “encouraging your student’s regular attendance to school”, and “my support in promoting regular attendance”, and your references to district health policies.

What is the correct action to take when my child is too ill to attend school?

Not being a trained educator, I am unfamiliar with the phrase “attendance intervention”, and also unclear how your offer to disallow my daughter from attending all future classes would further the goal of having her attend all classes.

Sincerely,

Parent/Guardian

NOVEMBER 3^rd, 2010 

TO:        Congress and the Extended Progressive Community
FROM: Barack Obama
RE:        Mid Terms

It’s been a busy time. A time of change. An important time. An important time, of busy change.

I want to pause and reflect on the good news coming out of this election. Most importantly, I want to reassure you that I am doing fine. Michelle, the family and I are doing just fine.

I also want to reinforce the message that this election in no way represents a rejection of our progressive agenda in America, nor does it change my resolve. The hole that I inherited from the Republicans was far deeper than I imagined. The quick action that I took saved the economy from collapse. In time, away from the noise and confusion that Karl Rove, Glenn Beck, FOX and Wall Street create, people will see that without my bold actions things would be much worse.

I understand that the legislative dynamic has changed. I knew this was a risk, but I was elected to fundamentally transform America. It’s easy to become frustrated with the progress of this historic task, especially during these times of change. But as Joe said, this is a big fucking deal.

I view this cycle as a warm-up for 2012. To their credit, the Republicans learned from us how to use the same new media that we used in 2008 to spread a message of hope to spread their message of fear. I want to reinforce that our message is still one of hope. I too am frustrated by the rate that the country can be fundamentally transformed. But the red states are teachable, and history will be on my side.

I understand that some of you will be working on the fundamental transformation of America in new ways. I want to reassume you that the work that is done daily in schools, universities, in the media and in the arts is of great importance. Sometimes the road to progressive change is long, but the youth turnout during my historic election teaches us that a policy of continuous education can pay off.

I will do my part, blocking the agenda of the Republicans and FOX with the power of veto and court appointments. I don’t forget that the bureaucracy tends naturally toward an enlightened progressive agenda, and the positive steps I’ve taken to reinforce this will continue to work in my favor.

In the near term, Michelle and I will recharge a bit after this busy time. Michelle loves to travel,  and golf clears my head.

Barack.

How dumb do they think we are?

Elections are swung by the most ill-informed voters. People who fail to appreciate the difference between TARP, that probably saved us from banking collapse, and was surprisingly affordable, and Stimulus, which was Nancy Pelosi just going through her entire Rolodex and sending them your childrens’ money. But right now they do have a vague but correct sense that something significant is wrong here – just as they had the correct sense that something was wrong with the Iraq war.

The statists played their hand in a way that was obvious to everyone after the Scott Brown Operation Ram It Down Their Throats Anyway Because We’re Just Smarter debacle.

We dummies didn’t forget that one.

I have no illusions that the GOP have discipline, or that we don’t have big problems in America. Or that the GOP isn’t running some bad candidates.

But once you’ve killed your economy and replaced freedom with a culture of dependence, you’re on your way to irreversible decline.  The self-organization of the Tea Party, who are somewhat represented by the GOP, gives me hope that freedom loving soul of the country is far from dead. Hope that replaces the fear I experienced during the historic election of 2008 surreal Obama True Believer thing 2 years ago. I rather doubt we’ll be selling plates in the cafeteria, and having our children sing songs in school  after the next president is elected. That was some weirdo shit to a Ted Nugent extremist like myself. And I’d seen it before, with Pierre Elliott Trudeau in the old country.

Of course the election of a black president was historic. And overdue. I celebrate that. But did he have to be the most statist president ever?

Despite what Newsweek and condescending academics believe, and cynical democratic strategists pretend to believe, the Tea Party has nothing to do with hostility toward the first black president. Many of us voted for him.  And to our credit, we didn’t take the bait in the face of months of an unwarranted and manipulative harangue. Because the county is proud of fairness and inclusion. We just don’t want to live in a European Social Democracy. If we did, we’d move (back) to Canada.

The racist meme didn’t work. The violent meme didn’t work.

Now we’re at witch.

With any luck, the actions of a leadership predisposed to the creation of liberal social democracy will soon be discredited as ineffective for a long time. And the current leadership as being dangerously idealistic, dishonest and heavy handed in the pursuit of their utopia.  I will take some probably unfair satisfaction watching condescending academics drive their Prii back to their reserved parking spots in condescending academia, and get back to their core competency of convincing young people that they experience with their eyes, ears and brain is all wrong and that America and Somalia are really the same.

For 40 years the most activist and outspoken liberal women have silenced conservative women. And we’ve watched as they championed freedom from dependency on men and replaced it with dependency on the state. But while all this was happening, many women achieved genuine independence. And many freely chose dependency partnership over isolation. But we didn’t hear much about this, because when what you’re selling is too sketchy to withstand an honest discussion, constant browbeating is needed.

The real irony is that Obama’s success systemically transforming the nation toward a European model where everyone is dependent on the state was the trigger that is causing conservative women to break rank and expose the fundamental hypocrisy that modern institutional feminism is about women’s freedom. And this could turn the election.

Of course liberals will retain the moral high ground, because a critical mass of people want more strongly for the religion of statist liberalism to work than they care that it hasn’t. Frankly everyone longs for something that can elevate humanity from the brutishness that is nature. But history should have taught us than giving absolute power to a handful of doesn’t work.

And Barack will have two more years to lose the war in Afghanistan and get us out of there. Fine by me. I haven’t a clue why we’re there and I think we need to (sadly) keep our powder dry for the inevitable Operation Got You Last So If You Don’t Start Nothing There Won’t Be Nothing against a nuclear Iran.

Mike.

About 35% of the US population strongly supports the health care bill. And they tell me that once us dumb rubes really understand that liberal elites know what’s best for the rest of us, we’ll be on fully in board. We just need some book learnin’ an some teachin’ and we be smart like Europeans.

So, in interest of advancing the cause of gun clinging bible thumpers everywhere, lets think like elite liberal progressives and see what we can learn.

“More care will be available because money that could be delivered as services is wasted on health insurance company overhead and profits.”

Seems reasonable. They’re greedy bureaucracies, that’s for sure. Everyone hates insurance companies. But a quick read of the financial statements of the companies shows their profits to be insignificant, and total overhead around 20%. It’s hard to imagine a giant federal bureaucracy being less inefficient than 50 medium size private bureaucracies. So we’re going to go backwards on this one.

“Care will not be denied to anyone because government bureaucrats are kind and private sector bureaucrats are greedy.”

Probably true, but not for the reasons stated. Government bureaucracies can’t go out of business. Ever. So there’s no real reason to stop spending other people’s money.

“Care will be cheaper because governments will wring the profit of the rest of the system (i.e. doctors, hospitals, drug companies, research)”

 Eventually true, but this requires significant rationing. Conflicts with Care will not be denied… Can’t have both.

“It is better in the aggregate for everyone to have poorer quality care than for some to have good care and others to have poor, or no care.”

One of the most honest, and possibly correct arguments. But curiously, you don’t hear about it much.

“I’ll benefit because the someone else will be giving me their money”

As honest as the previous, and equally unheard. Works fine as long as the demand for other people’s money doesn’t exceed the supply.

Mike.