Journal of Post-Ralphaelite Thought

 A friend of mine recently took exception when I mocked people (mostly conservative) who tossed around the term "Cancel Culture." It seems in the opinions of many some (mostly conservative), it's a freedom of speech issue. Not really. And it's not a First Amendment issue either, when Facebook or Twitter cancels your account for praising white supremacists, or neo-fascists, or other right-wing dickheads. " Cancel Culture ," which, according to Wikipedia, was originally an outgrowth of the "MeToo" movement, (so not so much about speech as calling out behavior - specifically against women) has morphed now into the latest right-wing NewSpeak  term for "I'm being punished for expressing my opinion."  Dig a little deeper though and you'll find the issue is not so much about "free speech," as "consequence-free speech." I mean...if you are going to be an opinionated ass, at least have enough self-respect not to be a w...

Just a quick reminder, since a number of right-thinking Americans have become concerned over disrespecting the US Flag (from http://www.usflag.org/uscode36.html) § 176 . Respect for flag No disrespect should be shown to the flag of the United States of America; the flag should not be dipped to any person or thing. Regimental colors, State flags, and organization or institutional flags are to be dipped as a mark of honor. (a) The flag should never be displayed with the union down, except as a signal of dire distress in instances of extreme danger to life or property. (b) The flag should never touch anything beneath it, such as the ground, the floor, water, or merchandise. (c) The flag should never be carried flat or horizontally, but always aloft and free. (d) The flag should never be used as wearing apparel, bedding, or drapery. It should never be festooned, drawn back, nor up, in folds, but always allowed to fall free. Bunting of blue, white, and red, always arranged ...

I have so far restrained myself from offering any opinions on this year's presidential race. It hardly seems necessary. I'll say this much: I had a choice of watching the debate or indulging in a martini on the porch with a good friend who doesn't share my political views. Guess which I took.

I confess, I'm ready to be done with the 2012 election. I'd feel this way regardless of the outcome. Unfortunately, conservatives can't quite let go. The recriminations and finger-pointing are in full swing - amusing but eventually tiresome. Latest members of the Sore Loser Club are restauranteurs John Schnatter, CEO of Papa John's Pizza, and Zane Tankel, who owns 40 or so Applebee's Restaurants in the metro New York City area. Both are incensed that Mitt Romney's loss means ObamaCare is no longer going to be dismantled. Tankel has announced he'll start firing employees and stop building restaurants. Of course, he's a franchisee, so it remains to be seen if parent company Applebee's will fill the gap with other franchise holders. Applebee's International president, Mike Archer, said Tankel's remarks, "were not the views or opinions of either Applebee's or other franchisees, although we respect his right to speak freely as an ...

What to do about Ron Paul? Sometimes he makes absolute sense, other times it's like listening to your crazy uncle rant - you know, the one who goes off after a few drinks at Thanksgiving about how the Holocaust never really happened.  With Hurricane Irene heading up the Eastern Seaboard, he chose to spout off about how FEMA was just a drain on the economy and not necessary. "We should be like 1900," he said, referring to the great Galveston hurricane of that year. For those of you unfamiliar with the 1900 Galveston hurricane , here's a little context which Dr. Paul conveniently failed to supply us with. The storm, estimated to be a Category 4 hurricane, hit Galveston on September 8, 1900, with a resulting loss of life estimated at between 8,000 and 12,000. Over 3,600 homes were destroyed. Survivors lived in tents and shelters constructed from debris, and were without water service for 4 days. The suggestion here is: why get the government involved? Let th...

The great circus sideshow that is our political process continues to be about the "debt ceiling." It's like the cliff-hanger ending at the end of a mediocre reality show. The self-aggrandizing and self-righteous Tea Party wing of the Republican party is hell-bent on driving the school bus off the cliff to make a point. Stephen Colbert sums it up nicely: Meanwhile, not a peep from much of anyone about such things as the tracking of American citizens via cell phones , warrantless wiretapping , or other Bush era shenanigans now taken over by the present administration ( Wired has more on this ).   I guess the Tea Party is okay with this sort of thing as long as it doesn't raise anyone's taxes. The Romans learned a long time ago the best way to distract the citizenry from the signs of their crumbling republic was with circuses. I'd say that lesson was not lost on our present elected officials.

It's hard to speak in absolute terms about the Libertarians, since they come in so many flavors -- mostly bitter. They all claim to stand for individual liberty (duh), a goal which, like mom, apple pie, and the flag, is hard to argue with. In the past they proudly pointed to their support of social rights -- as manifested by such hot-button issues as abortion rights and gay rights. Lately, as a result of in-breeding with Tea Partiers (why cousins shouldn't marry) they seem to have forgotten about all that. Rand Paul, scion of Ron Paul, and darling of the TeaLibertarians states, " I believe life begins at conception and it is the duty of our government to protect this life ," and came out against same-sex marriage during his 2011 Senate campaign. Hardly the stuff of individual liberty. So, what's left after social rights are gone? Property rights. Yes, the Libertarians are all about property rights. Property rights apparently trump civil rights. Said Paul , "...

With all this business in Wisconsin and their union-busting governor, it's become quite popular amongst some to bitch about "the unions." For all of their faults, there are strong and compelling historic reasons for why unions exist. The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire in New York City on March 25, 1911 caused the deaths of 146 garment workers , many who were trapped because the owners had locked the doors to the stairwells and exits. The fire is often cited as a catalyst in shifting the public's sympathies in favor of labor reform. PBS's American Experience series now has an excellent documentary entitled Triangle Fire that gives the background and events leading up to this tragedy. Watch it online and re-visit some of the rhetoric which is being bandied about these days by right-wing politicians (and I include Tea Partiers and self-styled libertarians in this group) and uber-rich business interests . They are making the same tired "private prope...

Okay, kids, today we are going to discuss the differences between being a shill and being a tool. Wikitionary has a couple of definitions for "shill" : A person paid to endorse a product favorably, while pretending to be impartial. An accomplice at a confidence trick during an auction or gambling game. I was in advertising for years -- I am (sad to say) well acquainted with the art and science of shilling. A classic example: back in the day, my then employer had as a client a very large brewery, which I shall call "A-B." When a proposal to require a 5 cent deposit on non-returnable bottles appeared as a referendum item on the Oregon ballot one election year, A-B took a very dim view, since they were a major producer of non-returnable bottles. Their response? They set up and bankrolled some phony grassroots committee ( "Citizens for Sensible Packaging" or some such bullshit) to oppose the measure. This is now referred to as "astro-turfing. A-...

News flash: the sun rose in the east.  And in other headlines, a  survey by the University of Washington Institute for the Study of Ethnicity, Race & Sexuality finds that Tea Partiers are "racially resentful." Is this a fancy way of saying black people piss them off? Which is another way of saying they are racists? Hmm...I wonder. Tie this with the recent poll which found this same group of grumpy white people thought "the Obama administration favors blacks over whites."  Newsweek has more information , if you are finding this hard to believe. Just to show they don't play favorites, the TP'ers also disliked Latinos. 

The latest CBS/New York Times poll reveals this shocking information:  people who identify themselves as members of the Tea Party movement are, for the most part, angry old white people who watch Fox News. In other news, scientists expect the sun to rise in the east tomorrow. Here's a snapshot of your basic Tea Party sympathizer/supporter: 75% are over 45 years old 95% identify themselves as Republicans  or "Independents" (ha!) 73% say they are conservatives 89% are white 63% say they get most of their political and current events news from the Fox News Channel More interesting takes on reality from the Tea Party: 92% think the country is on the wrong track 59% think President Obama was born in another country (30%) or say they don't know (29%) 52% say too much is made of the problems facing black people 25% think the Obama administration favors blacks over whites When pressed for why they objected to Obama, 19% said "they just didn't like ...

Wisconsin Republican District Attorney Scott Southworth sent a letter to 5 school districts opining that teaching children younger than 16 about contraceptives could be construed as contributing to the delinquency of minors ( PDF of his letter -- warning: big file ).  Rep. Kelda Helen Roys, author of the bill authorizing the sex-ed classes, said, "I think this is about trying to intimidate school administrators and teachers into staying silent." Interestingly enought, Southworth, a member of the Wisconsin National Guard who served in Iraq, s ued the University of Wisconsin, Madison back in his student days, saying he shouldn't be forced to pay student services fees ("segregated fees") because a percentage of them might end up supporting campus organizations with whom they disagreed ideologically or politically. The US Supreme Court said, sorry, it doesn't work like that. Refreshing to know that my home state of Texas has no monopoly on bone-head R...

Former George W. Bush speechwriter David Frum, a Canadian Libertarian and resident fellow of the American Enterprise Institute has this analysis on how Republicans (and other opponents of the recently passed Obama healthcare package) blew it. Could a deal have been reached? Who knows? But we do know that the gap between this plan and traditional Republican ideas is not very big. The Obama plan has a broad family resemblance to Mitt Romney's Massachusetts plan. It builds on ideas developed at the Heritage Foundation in the early 1990s that formed the basis for Republican counter-proposals to Clintoncare in 1993-1994. Barack Obama badly wanted Republican votes for his plan. Could we have leveraged his desire to align the plan more closely with conservative views? To finance it without redistributive taxes on productive enterprise – without weighing so heavily on small business – without expanding Medicaid? Too late now. They are all the law. Further on he observes: We followed the ...

I'd heard this and scratched my head... Ron Paul, long-time Libertarian hero and current U.S. Representative from Houston (Republican) is facing a trio of  Tea Party infused challengers in Tuesday's Republican primary . They say he's "gone Washington." I thought only the Democrats ate their own kind. It's a funny old world...

Sarah Palin has reportedly signed a multi-year contract with Fox News as a "contributor," according to Politico and other sources. Her wacky high-jinks, malaprops and (dog-gone it) weird takes on reality ought to provide hours of entertainment to viewers. The self-proclaimed hockey mom displayed her tongue-in-cheek sense of humor by quipping, "It's wonderful to be part of a place that so values fair and balanced news." Fox went on to say the Divine Sarah will offer up her plan-speakin' commentary and analysis for Fox News Channel, Fox Business Network, FoxNews.com and other Fox owned outlets. This ought be funny as hell. Read more at: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0110/31364.html

Not to beat a dead horse or anything but... 22 million missing emails from the Bush administration have finally been found. In case you've forgotten your ancient history, the Bush White House developed quite a case of  "Gosh, we can't find that," during the stink over the attorney general firings and the brouhaha surrounding the outing of CIA agent Valerie Plame . It will be interesting to see if the inquiring minds who are all a-twitter over the so-called "Climategate" emails will find this bit of news worthy of their pronouncements. The newly discovered emails cover 94 calendar days of email backups that include the periods where the above events took place. These are, by the way, mandated by federal law to be preserved. The reason given for their missing status was they were "mislabeled." Uh huh. While I'm sure there may be a fair amount of potentially explosive material to be discovered (well, not before 2014 at the earliest), th...

Okay -- if you accused me of link-whoring I'd be hard-pressed to deny it. Ron Paul, anointed as one of the few worthies amongst my erstwhile Libertarian drinking buddies, was on Jon Stewart last night to promote his new book. Despite his rock star status within the ranks of the Libertarians, Representative Paul is technically a House Republican. I'll say I can tolerate his brand of Republicanism a little more than some of the other flavors. Jon Stewart did a pretty good interview,although it seemed (to me anyway) there were times the Representative from Houston was clearly thinking, "What the fuck?" I'll let you decide for yourself why. As Stewart would say, "Here's your moment of Zen..." The Daily Show With Jon Stewart Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c Ron Paul www.thedailyshow.com Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Ron Paul Interview

I've grown weary of posting and arguing various political screeds here, as well as engaging in debate with friends and acquaintances. Across the political spectrum, the current level of rhetoric has entered a particularly shrill and nasty phase. Consider the recent health care discussions. I don't think any of this ranting solves problems.  However we've gone through other periods of bad civic manners, so I have no doubt this one will pass as well. No side is immune from this nastiness and unfortunately it's easy to get sucked into this bullshit. When I do, I find myself quickly turning into a nasty, mean-spirited person I don't much like. So at least for the time being, I've decided I'm going to resist the urge to butt heads. I'd rather find points of agreement than disagreement. Just to get it out of my system once and for all, here are my thoughts on various hot button topics of the day. While I think I'm right, I'm not going to insist ...

Much has been made in wingnut circles about the supposed "beating" of Kenneth Gladney at a St. Louis town hall meeting. Mobs of union thugs beat him! He was hospitalized! Yeah, right. MediaMatters has a clip of the incident as well as a pretty damning analysis which puts the lie to the hordes of rightwing media and blogosphere all foaming at the mouth. To quote from MediaMatters : Go watch the YouTube video. (Or, the "shocking video," as Power Line hypes it.) The first thing you notice when the camera starts rolling is a union member already sprawled out on the ground with somebody standing over him. No explanation of how he got there (pushed, shoved, punched?) and Ham couldn't care less. Then yes, Gladney is pulled to the ground by somebody wearing a union shirt. (At the :06 mark.) But instead of Gladney being beaten and punched, as his attorney describes, and instead of union "thugs" standing over him and threatening him, Gladney bounce...

Republican pinup Sarah Palin has decided to hang it up and has announced she'll be resigning as Alaska governor. Time will tell what fueled this latest bit of Wasilla wackiness. Given her competitive nature, perhaps she felt overshadowed by fellow Republican governor Mark Sanford's hi-jinks. "We've seen a lot of nutty behavior from governors and Republican leaders in the last three months, but this one is at the top of that," said John Weaver, friend and confidant of John McCain. Even now McCain must be kicking himself again for choosing her as running mate in 2008. Given the suddeness of her decision and the fact she's leaving without serving even a full term, inquiring minds will be wondering if she's trying to outrun some soon-to-be breaking scandal. God willing, this will be the last time I write about this woman. But I doubt it.