November 30, 2017

For the overly wealthy, it's not just about having more -- it's about making you have less.

This is classic hoarding-frenzy behavior, goes back all the way to when we split off from reptiles. It was always a significant attribute of royalty, historically very common in the upper merchant classes, and it goes like this: having more than you could ever need is not stimulating enough unless you know for a fact that others are suffering from having less than they need.

It is a clear fact of the hoarding disease -- and it is a disease -- that the hoarder's peak enjoyment comes from the vicarious thrill and guilty pleasure of watching other people starve. For the hoarder, too much becomes ever so much more enjoyable when the difference between themselves and the starving or stress-ridden lower classes grows wider. For them, it's like being a timid person watching a scary movie -- but it's all real.

Wealth is poison. Enough is as good as a feast, and too much in this case is a ticket to disturbingly psychopathic behavior. We all know this, and unfortunately our laws have been warped to satisfy the dark urges of addicts, weakening the nation and casting doubt on the survival of the human species.

Think of it in tribal terms. Say an ancient island culture of perhaps 100 individuals creates a monetary system based on shells. One hoarding-obsessed individual spends their entire life focusing not on work, or building -- but on gaming the economy to get hold of all the shells. Once they have most of the shells, they will still scheme to get the remainder, even though the rest of the tribe will be forced into starvation. How long do you think the other 99 members will allow this to go on? Awhile, perhaps. It's the nature of systems. But when the markers become more important than their meaning, the tribe is doomed unless it acts. They will either seize the shells and cast out the hoarder, or simply disregard the markers and make new ones. It's difficult for larger and more complex cultures to take these steps, but the principles are the same. Money is just an agreement. It is not a thing of value in and of itself, shells or dollars.

First chance we get, let's solve this problem. A 99% confiscatory tax on all incomes over a million dollars per year would certainly help to begin correcting this extremely damaging habit. Simple, fair, clean -- and the hoarding class would still get some pleasure out of maximizing their remaining one percent.

November 22, 2017

The Best Revenge.

Ryan Cooper

We now know there shall be no quarter from the ultra-rich in their quest to take as much of the national income and wealth for themselves as possible. So they should be given no quarter either.

At the earliest opportunity, a left-wing economic reform bill should deliberately destroy the power of the plutocrats: Break up their monopolist corporations, sharply increase taxation on their capital gains and dividends, levy a confiscatory tax rate on income over $1 million and a 100 percent inheritance tax on estates over $1 million, and kneecap finance with burdensome regulations. Then, strengthen the lower class: Ban "right-to-work" laws at a national level, increase the minimum wage and index it to inflation, beef up the welfare state, and spend to achieve full employment.

Some of the wealthiest and most privileged people who've ever existed are attempting to loot the pockets of penniless grad students so they can have even more money to spend on stuff like $450-million paintings. They've forfeited any right to deference or consideration.

Found this on Digby.


I think this is the best idea I've heard in a year. Let's end this class war forever.

November 20, 2017

Sea lions in the Sacramento River.

Hiking along the river near the I-80 bridge, my son and I saw a giant black head breach the water and snort in a deep bass whuff. Could not figure it out. Whales? Giant otters? We'd seen otters in a small wetlands area near the American River Parkway.

But these shapes -- massive. Broad backs, giant heads -- there were at least two near where we were sitting by the river's edge, and then we saw perhaps three more down near the railroad bridge on the way back.

My son googled 'seals in the Sacramento River', and came up with this --

http://sacramento.cbslocal.com/2016/12/10/sea-lion-making-its-way-through-sacramento-river/

She was taking pictures by the river Friday morning when she saw it.

“I couldn’t tell what it was,” said Grear.

Scott Buhl, a Wildlife Response Specialist at UC Davis, knew immediately

“Oh that’s definitely a California sea lion,” said Buhl looking at some cell phone video I shot Friday morning.

Not a dolphin, porpoise or seal, but a sea lion in the Sacramento river.

“He was just hanging out enjoying the day and didn’t seem to be in any distress,” said Buhl.

Buhl, says the the sea lion appears to be a healthy male, weighing roughly 400 to 500 pounds.

“It could definitely surprise you and startle you to see a sea lion staring back at you,” said Buhl.

It’s not uncommon to see a sea lion once every year or two in the River explained Buhl.

And of course a few idiots immediately suggest killing them. Just -- you know, because.

Humans. Ugh.

They were gorgeous. Beautiful. Heart-tugging. Awesome. Amazing experience on a Sunday afternoon.

November 18, 2017

herstory writes

in the end it was itinerant old pot farmers
green grocers and pot smoking clerks
T.A.'s with things in the closet
typecast kid stars and their momentous assistants
painfully awkward shyboys
sisters of no mercy
tripe mongers and vishnu programmers
secret keepers
pawn shop sweepers
ted behind the safeway
the critical mothers worried about the sun
superstitious wand waving sage burners
little short thinkers
super tall drinkers
the worst and the best
types and offtypes and notypes
persectured songsmiths
fancy little rich snobs who read
and every member of democraticunderground
who saved the human race
from the soviet ghost invasion of two thousand and sixteen
let us drink to them tonight
tell the stories of their mild and scattershot bravery
their hopeless losses
their impossible contraindications
their savaging and their comforting and their sweet wisdom
that lifted the species and sent it out
to the infinite
where it belongs.

November 18, 2017

One wonders, as an American --

If a foreign government secretly invaded and controlled the highest levels of our government, are we bound to policy enacted by the foreign agents while the invasion was active?

Asking for a friend. Name of Gorusch.

November 11, 2017

42.

Netflix is showing this film; I'm having trouble watching it.

Why? It's just too damn powerful.

Why?

Because Jackie Robinson is probably the finest American story there is.

Maybe Martin Luther King, just maybe -- but Jackie Robinson...

There you go, there's the test --

True Americans love Jackie Robinson.

It's the best story ever told in this nation.

Period.