Astra's Batshit Roundup

Political Batshit; Fundie Batshit; News of the Weird; ‘WTF’ moments; Cinematic Batshit, and More….

Dayum, but I loves me some batshit!

This week, there’s a bumper-crop of sociopolitical/religious batshit – from state governors who don’t know the Constitution to preachers writing bad movie scripts, we’ve got it all – but first, a thought or three.

Batshit is supposed to be funny – and while there’s a lot of funny stuff here every week or so, we really ought to pause to reflect on the fact that the world is a scary and unsafe place for a whole lot of people.  Some of the batshit you’re reading here this week will make your head numb, your eyes squint, and your mind say, ‘Whatthefuck?’ – but we really ought to consider the fact that every time one of our ‘leaders’ decides to do something bugfuck-crazy, someone else, either some guy on unemployment here in America or another guy working the night-shift pushing a broom in Iraq, Libya, Afghanistan, or some other Third World shit-hole is going to suffer.  Think about that the next time you vote.

Now; to the batshit.  There’s a lot of it.

General Batshit….

Seems people are reading this piece and actually looking forward to it.  Every week, I get stuff from readers.  Some of it is useful.

Take this site, for example, which features some of the more colorful political-protest signs.  (Yes, the one you see here is one of them).  Grandma is a Teabagger.  For Jesus, no less.  (Note:  There's a lot of ubercool signs on this site.  Most of them are misspelled to the point of making you cry.  Others are the product of such woeful education as to make you wonder if the person responsible came from another country - or another planet.  Regardless, it's one of those delightful wastes of time on par with People Of Wal-Mart). 

Gatorade.  Who would have known it was so popular?  This site (PassiveAggressiveNotes) is another one of those time-wasters like Failblog or PeopleOfWalMart – it can suck your brains in for hours at a time.  The lessons?  (1) People are nasty; (2) Toilets plug if you feed them things they don’t like; (3) Gatorade is probably full of some fucking controlled substance or another, because people go off the rails when theirs gets stolen. 

There are other lessons here.  Damned if I know what they are.

Lastly, there’s this site, which features some pretty fucked-up listings from Craigslist (you can file this under “these people collate all of this shit so you don’t have to.”)

This toy won Worst Toy of the Year from Parents' Magazine in 1981.  I can see why:

Political Batshit….

I like Chuck Norris.  He made it to 70, and still thinks like a punk-assed 18-year-old who wants to go kill Nazis Commies Progressives.  This week, he’s featured at World Nut Net Daily, where he’s going off again about All Things Anti-American - this time, by dissing on the public school system....

Meanwhile, on the economic front, there was an unusual conclusion to a jobs fair in Massachusetts….

Newt Gingrich screwed around on his wife so it would instruct him on how to impeach Clinton (I know; it’s hard to write this stuff without wincing.  You can’t make this shit up; you just can’t…)

How Tim Pawlenty got elected as a state governor without knowing the Constitution is truly amazing….

You can’t eat an orange in your bathtub in California (and fifty other bizarre state laws you never heard of)….

Sheriff Joe (“Tent City”) Arpaio enlisted the help of none other than Steven Seagal (washed-up action-film ‘star’) to help drive a tank (yes; a tank) into a residential neighborhood in Phoenix to perform a very unusual ‘raid’ (Hint: Chickens were involved)….

The American Enterprise Institute (one of those right-wing Astroturf groups the Koch Bros. don’t want you to know about) is hosting a lecture on the State of White America.  Seriously….

‘WTF’ Moments….

I love these sandals.   (Actually; I don’t.  The surgical-tubing they use for the thong-part irritates my feet.  But ya gotta love their logo.  And the 'extra bounce')….

While this isn’t quite ‘WTF’ material (as it’s rather well-thought-out) – if you’re tempted to make a lead-hat for yourself or spend the rest of your life indoors since the nuclear accident in Japan, go here and check out the chart.  It sort of puts things in perspective….

What does a guy with everything get for himself?  In this case, a whole houseful of friends….

This is not only fucked up, it's a bit embarrassing.  So just go read it....

The name of this restaurant just screams ‘WTF??’:

Fundie Batshit….

Mike Huckabee would be really, really comfortable with someone in the White House who shared his own views.  Just sayin’….

Bryan Fischer continues to channel ‘Napoleon’ (from Orwell’s ‘Animal Farm’) – turns out that everyone is created equal – it’s just that ultraRight Fundies are More Equal Than Others….

The life of a Culture Warrior is hard – especially if you’re bugfuck-nuts, like Sally Kern….

Mr. Banana Man (Ray Comfort) and his actor buddy, Kirk Cameron, have rewritten the Bible:

Turns out we just didn’t know how good we had it under Bush the Second…

David Barton (Glenn Beck’s favorite ‘historian’), now wants us to believe that the Declaration of Independence is a collection of sermons, and that Jesus opposed the minimum wage.  (What’s next; David? Cow tipping?  Oh, yeah – Obama’s engaged in a sinister plot)….

Cinematic Batshit….

Hollywood hasn’t had a new idea in years.  The bottom of the barrel?  A remake of ‘Red Dawn’.  The producers changed the ‘enemy’ to the Chinese – problem is, they really, really have to sell this turkey, so they’ve done some pretty interesting things….

Just when I think I’ve seen a trailer for the Most Fucked Up Movie Ever, something else comes along. Like this piece of dementia:

Batshit of the Week Award….

John Hagee is an interesting fellow.  When he’s not busy bashing gays from his pulpit and beating the ‘take America back’ drum, he’s busied himself writing fiction (I thought Tim LaHaye had that angle sewn up, but I guess not.)  

He’s written a screenplay out of one of them (“Jerusalem Countdown”).   The producers managed to find two washed-up actors (Stacy Keach and Lee Majors), plus coerce Randy Travis into appearing in a film about bad Muslims, good Americans, and the Great Snatch (a.k.a. ‘The Rapture’).

Folks; I didn't know where to add this one - it defies classification.  Fundie Batshit?  Yeah.  Cinematic Batshit?  Oh, yeah.  Besides, words absolutely fucking fail me.  So, without further commentary, my Batshit of the Week Award goes to the new John Hagee film, “Jerusalem Countdown”:

(Until next time; folks.  Leave a comment below.  You know you want to)....

Joe Bageant - 1946-2011

After a fight with cancer, one of the best writers of the past two decades Went to Raise Hell on the Other Side this past Saturday, March 26th.

He leaves behind a wife and family, as well as several million dedicated readers.

An unapologetic champion of working people everywhere, as well as a perpetual gadfly of the current sociopolitical/economic system, it is the greatest understatement to say that Joe will be missed.

Now; go raise hell, Joe. You've earned the right.

Astra's Batshit Roundup....

General Batshit, ‘WTF’ Moments; Religious Batshit, Batshit Video, and The Usual Gang of Idiots….

Religious Batshit

Although I’ve promised you that this wouldn’t be exclusively a recurring ‘let’s-pick-on-the-Fundies’ piece, you’ll have to agree with me that some of the best batshit is religious. I mean, take this piece, from AlQaeda – their first women’s magazine. Epic - Friggin' - Fail. And don't get caught in Chechnya dressing 'immodestly' if you're a woman - you'll suffer an unusual form of corporal-punishment....

Then, from the Other Side, there’s this video – just think; this poor gal is gonna have to live this piece down for the rest of her life; she looks like she’s making use of one of those ‘discreet toys’ you read about:

Then, there’s this piece out of Texas – a local church sponsors an exercise-class called ‘Pole Dancing for Jesus’:

Not to be outdone, one of our favorite Fundie whackjobs, Victoria Jackson, has written this disjointed diatribe at World Nut Net Daily, telling us that the TV show “Glee” was ‘mocking Christians’ with its gay-kiss scene (word up; Vicky – they’re not mocking anyone. Maybe you. Maybe Robertson/Barber/LaHaye and company – but I’ll bet that Jim Wallis and William Rivers Pitt aren’t going to give it a second thought. Get over yourself.)

Remember Charles Colson?

Yeah, he’s still around – but he acknowledges that at age 79, he won’t be for long, because he’s founded a group called ‘Centurions’, which will carry the torch of extreme Christian Fundamentalism after he and the Exalted Leaders of Batshit Christianity are all gone. (Really. It’s true. Plus, ya gotta love Colson's statement that "...Christians are too busy worshiping at the altar of the Bitch Goddess of Tolerance.")

Speaking of the current leaders of Fundamentalism in America, Franklin Graham (the off-the-rails son of evangelist Billy Graham) says that the Japanese quake might be signaling the ‘end times’, and that president Obama is part of a Vast Muslim Conspiracy.

Evangelist Rick Joyner thinks that the quake was caused by ‘demonic principalities’, and Cindy Jacobs thinks the ‘Japanese are sun-worshippers.’ (You’ll recall that all of these morons came out of the woodwork a year ago after the quake in Haiti, saying that the ‘nation had sold itself to the devil’).

‘WTF’ Moments….

Police in Pennsylvania found 50 bags of heroin – and a lot of other stuff – being smuggled by a woman in her Hoo-Hoo…. Speaking of Hoo-Hoo’s, if you find that your Precious Lady Bits aren’t as pink as you like, you can buy a can of this crap from MyNewPinkButton.Com, and brighten things right up….

Sean Hannity has an unusual solution to all of America's problems....

You can buy a designer pair of kneepads; especially designed for – well; you know – from Italian designer Diesel (but they’re only available in India)….

General Batshit….

Back to Pennsylvania, here’s a guy who found an inventive way to stop unwanted sexual advances…. Proof that you can get a custom license plate, but the state can always revoke it (I love this one. It’s inventive….) This one gives an entirely new meaning to the term, ‘dickhead’…. Then there’s this piece, from Bill O’Reilly of the No Brain Zone No Spin Zone – it turns out radiation is good for you:

More Batshit Video….

Words just fail me on this one. Forget “I Like Killing Flies”; this film is quite probably the Most F*cked-Up Movie Of All Time (at least, until one of my readers brings another one to my attention):

And, before we get to the Main Event this week, here’s something to leave you laughing – if you’re a David Lynch fan (and I am), here’s his first film, “Eraserhead”, condensed to 60 seconds:

Batshit of the Week Award….

Sometimes, there’s just so damn much batshit out there it’s hard to shovel. Regardless, it’s a tie this week; in a world where nearly everything is off the rails, I found two guys who take the cake.

First, there’s Randy Forbes of Virginia – who couldn’t get two other religiously-themed bills passed – and who still (obviously) hasn’t read the First Amendment....

Second, there’s Bobby Franklin of Georgia (whose multiplicity of proposed batshit-legislation boggles the mind), but who’s finally outdone even himself by saying that “America is like Khaddafi because abortion is legal.” (It’s true. Of course, he might as well have said, “Zombies run Belgium!”, because it makes just about as much sense. My question? Who elects these people?)

So – proof that not just one jackass, but several, can get elected, and because they’ve got the brains of a pet rock, the Batshit of the Week Award goes to Randy Forbes and Bobby Franklin. I hope they enjoy it.

(By the way, thanks to everyone who reads this small corner of the 'net, and who keep sending me things to feature. This is a fun diversion from writing about the reality of the world. You know who you are - keep it coming!)

Until next time, folks….

Che Guevara Was Right....

Flashback to 1967.

Commandante Ernesto “Che” Guevara, late of the Cuban Revolution and a man who, at age 39, could have held a cush-job in Havana with a ’59 Impala of his very own was instead lying in a one-room schoolhouse in East BFE Bolivia, suffering from a leg-wound and talking to the schoolteacher.

He took the time to correct her Spanish grammar on the chalkboard, and asked her if this building was the best the government could do.  He informed her that in Cuba, the building wouldn’t be considered fit for housing pigs, and that he was there to help bring proper schools and medicine to Bolivia. 

When asked how, he stated flatly that only a handful in Bolivia owned all the wealth, and that the only way that would change was by revolution.

Shortly after that, at the urging of the CIA, several soldiers drew straws in the courtyard.  One went into the school building after the teacher was removed, and shot Guevara, four times.

Guevara’s last words:   “Go ahead and shoot; coward!  You only kill a man.”

_____________________________

Today.

One percent of the American population owns 95%+ of everything. Our education system is a joke. The average American can't get medical care.  Warren Buffet himself said recently, “There’s class warfare, all right, but it’s my class, the rich class, that’s making war, and we’re winning.”  He went on to say that ‘we shouldn’t be.’

Do you have a dollar in your wallet or purse?   Congratulations.  You should frame it.  Reason?  It’s more money than the top six American corporations paid in taxes last year.  It’s probably more than most wealthy Americans paid. 

Here’s a wake-up call, if you needed it:  The middle-class is dead in America.   The fact that you might have a mortgage, a bank-loan on an above-average car, several credit cards, a student-loan debt which would have been unthinkable twenty years ago and spend what’s left of your paycheck each week at Whole Foods on Saturday morning does not mean you are middle-class.  It means you’re a serf – one of the faceless millions who are beholden to the banking system.  

The evidence now is overwhelming – we are in the final stages of a class-war which began (more or less) thirty years ago.  It will end soon, with the remainder of the nation’s wealth firmly in the hands of a group of oligarchs who’ll make the kings of the Middle Ages look like benign dictators.

Chicago-school economics – which ruined nations like Chile and Argentina, and allowed their dictators to rise – has held sway here since Reagan.  The essential public element of democracy – critical thinking, logic, and reason – are now considered ‘effete’, and only used by elitist intellectuals who are somehow better than the rest.

Some of us are saying, “Look!  We don’t have a democracy – we have a plutonomy.  We’re ruled by corporations which use the courts as a front!”

The majority shouts us down -- because they're more concerned with Kim Kardashian’s ass.

By example, more people are concerned with the NFL walkout than they are with the state of working people in Wisconsin.  In the end, it’s not going to matter a hang if a handful of big boys with double-digit IQ’s get $1M or $1.2M for playing a game.  It will matter if their kids don’t get an education – but losing his Monday Night Football is going to affect Cletus McSixpack far more than his kids losing an opportunity to get ahead in life – or, so he thinks.

He thinks this because the media, owned (again) by those same corporations, has told him so. 

Another example - after 9/11, the government passed repressive measures which would have caused spontaneous demonstrations in the 1950’s – but which didn’t raise a peep in 2001.

Do you realize that the government can seize your person as well as your property, make you go away for years at a time without trial, and can prevent anyone from so much as determining your general welfare?

Do you know that, if finally tried and convicted, you can be put to work on a labor gang in a military prison?  (Think Bradley Manning, here.)

Once you filter out the conspiracy theories about rail-cars and camps, the truth is scary enough.

Soon, the wealthy will be able to live in America tax-free – and you will be forced to pay their bill.  (In 1916, the Federal income tax was aimed squarely at wealthy people – none of the working people of America had to worry about it.  Thanks to the ‘miracle’ of inflation, plus the equal ‘miracle’ of tax legislation, they’ve shifted the entire burden to us.)

Soon, they’ll come for your Social Security in the name of a ‘balanced budget’ – putting nearly 40% or more of the nation’s population in severe financial jeopardy, if not out in the street entirely.   (Our former president- the same guy who was the architect of those repressive acts mentioned earlier – considers it his ‘greatest disappointment’ that he wasn’t able to demolish Social Security during his tenure.)

Soon enough, they’ll come for what’s left.

Our current president, elected on the backs of people who demanded an end to this lunacy, has rubber stamped it all.   Why?  He was bought-and-paid-for by these people.

Anyone who is not convinced of the basic mathematics of the thing only needs to do a little modest digging to learn the truth – Federal tax rates have dropped precipitously for the top 1% over the past forty years, while real wages for the bottom 90% of Americans have actually decreased in the same amount of time. 

Inflation has put working people into tax brackets formerly reserved for the wealthy – and revisions to the tax law have virtually eliminated taxes for the top 1%.

Social Security.  Collective bargaining.  Civil rights.   All of these are now in the gunsights of the corporately-owned U.S. government.

All but one area – the military.

Without it, the population can’t be controlled.  Recently, a U.S. Army Major made the statement that the Posse Comitatus Act (that’s the law which forbids the Army from being used internally against our own population) is an anachronism, and should be ignored.  (Not repealed, or dealt with legally, mind you – ignored.)

Obama’s deficit-commission has deliberately kept the military off the table regarding budget-cuts.   I can only wonder why.   Militarism runs rampant in America today.  Criticize our two current wars, and see how long it takes for the Right to come back, both-barrels, and put you in your place.

(I don’t need to tell you – or I shouldn’t – that the nation is being bled-white, financially, by the conduct of these conflicts and the maintenance of nearly 1,000 military bases all over the world.  America’s military is the strongest in the world, and now has little or no restrictions on its use, foreign or domestic.)

Militarism; the destruction of the labor movement; confiscatory taxation and ownership of government – these are all elements of fascism.

The Declaration of Independence uses the words ‘alter or abolish’ to refer to any government which has spun out of the control of the people.  The fact that we’re still allowed to vote does not mean that we have a democracy in America, folks.

“America is a whorehouse where the revolutionary ideals of your forefathers have been bartered and sold on the altar of capitalism,”  said Che Guevara, when he was in New York in 1960.

It turns out he was right, all along.

Astra's Batshit Roundup

General Batshit, Butt Pirates, ‘WTF’ Moments, and the Batshit of the Week Award

Holy Crap!

Proof that our military is more and more off-the-rails, a group of Army chaplains has decided the best way to reach our young soldiers with the message of God’s Throne is to do so in the ‘throne room’ – or, if you prefer – the latrine.  No shit.  You can’t even take a dump in the Army any more without having the Bible shoved up your arse.

People are Nasty, and Sh*t

BART, the venerated and sometimes-maligned transportation system of San Francisco, was the recent subject of an independent study by San Francisco State’s biology lab – where they found that those plush fabric seats on BART’s new trains now contain more than polyester and blue dye after a bit o’ use – it turns out that many of  BART’s riders have questionable hygiene.

General Batshit

Michele Bachmann not only doesn’t know anything about government – she doesn’t know anything about American history, either.

Brannon Howse, a little-known Fundie whackjob who used to support Glenn Beck (a better-known Fundie whackjob) has now come out and called Beck a ‘New-Age Antichrist’.   My favorite whackjob-website, World Nut Net Daily, has the whole story (it’s not going to matter who wins the argument – but it’ll be fun in its own way to watch.)

Tennessee state senator Mae Beavers (no; I didn’t make that up) recently introduced a bill which would make it mandatory to submit a long-form birth-certificate to file as a presidential candidate in Tennessee.  When asked if she knew what a long-form birth-cert actually was, she had an interesting reply….

Here’s a guy from Minnesota who believes that satellite-launched laser-beams can cure disease.  Really.  I didn’t make it up….

‘WTF’ Moments

This gal flew all the way across the country - to take ‘revenge’ on her husband.   Meanwhile, on the other side of the world, some rabbis have a clever, peaceful and non-violent (if not too-well-thought-out) means of eliminating homosexuality….

Butt Pirates

This guy wins a prize from Guinness for the inventive use of his - well - uh - 'nether regions'….

Batshit of the Week Award

And, finally – my Batshit of the Week award goes to the 91 year old Congressman from New Hampshire, the Right Honorable Marty Harty (no; I didn’t make that one up, either) – who said that we need to send all of our ‘defective people’ to Siberia (yes; he said that.  Really).

But hey – anyone who lived first-person through WWII and who still channels Adolf Hitler for commentary in Congress deserves an award – even if it is just my Batshit of the Week….

Until later; folks….

We've Seen This All Before

(Sack of a rich man's house - English Civil War)

Elitism, Corruption, Oligarchy – and Revolution

Late last night (or, early this morning, depending up on your time zone), Governor Walker of Wisconsin got his way – by moving the metaphorical goalposts by way of eliminating budget-language from his union-busting bill, he managed to get his GOP henchmen to roll back over eighty years of Federally-guaranteed collective-bargaining rights in a dead-of-night vote.

Predictably, the people of Wisconsin went mad.

They mobbed the capitol building, and announced that they weren’t going to leave.  The police opened the doors for them – small wonder; the police (up to now) have been making at least a living wage (although less than they deserve) by way of belonging to a union.

Of course, it’s not over – this will go to court, and might well wind up a Supreme Court case based on Federal guarantees – but with the Supreme Court also owned by corporate oligarchs, that outcome is uncertain in the extreme; the Citizens United case is fresh in everyone’s mind, and the deck is increasingly stacked against anyone who works for wages in America.

Robert Reich said recently, “…know that we are a nation of laws, and those laws will prevail.”

My response?   Bullshit.

We’ve seen this behavior before – not here, but in England.  The law didn’t work there, either, until people made the decision to put an end to the nonsense which passed for domestic policy.

When  Henry VII defeated Richard III at Bosworth (having the late king’s body hanged on display as a warning), he set about building a stable nation.  The seeds of later problems were sown by way of his appointment of ‘justices’ throughout the country – unpaid nobility who more often than not served their own interests.  While the nation’s economic fortunes rose, most of that money wound up in the hands of a moneyed elite.  Henry’s establishment of his own rule over the rule of Parliament set the stage for further corruption.

His successor, the infamous Henry VIII, ruled as he saw fit – and, if a law didn’t quite suit his needs, he’d go  to Parliament and insist on one that did, which happened frequently.

Succeeding monarchs did no better – they changed laws to suit their needs.   By the time Charles I came along in 1625, decades of Crown largesse had resulted in Parliament being a rubber-stamp for royal whim. 

Several unsuccessful and costly wars (sound familiar?) had nearly bankrupted the treasury; Charles fought this with higher taxes and confiscatory policies.  By 1640, both the Irish and the Scots had quite enough; they rose in open rebellion, which spread to the rest of England proper.

What followed is now called the English Civil War; it began in 1642 with a series of Royalist victories, where it appeared that Charles and the entrenched moneyed-interests would win – they had more of everything, and the army raised by Parliament – comprised mainly of peasants – was consistently no match for the Royalists – until, with persistent leadership and training, the peasant-army won at the Battle of Naseby.

Naseby was the tipping point for the entire conflict.  Parliamentarians won a string of victories which culminated in Charles being made a head shorter in 1649.

The subsequent republic didn’t survive long – the leader of the uprising, Oliver Cromwell, dissolved Parliament and declared himself Lord Protector (‘Dictator’, by another term); he lived until 1658, ruling with as iron a fist as he was allowed.

When the monarchy was restored a few years after Cromwell’s death, it was clear that no king (or queen) would rule again with such authority – but the country was still a long way from granting a fair shake to working people.

My point?

There are a couple of them, as it turns out.

First, what’s going on in America today isn’t exactly new.  It’s happened before (the story above is just one such example); to that end, we’re not covering new ground or even making history.

Second, we should understand that if we don’t begin as a nation to recognize some basic truths and begin some genuine compromise, we’re setting ourselves up for something far worse than any potential peaceful outcome.

I see one of two scenarios here.

One is our very own nasty, brutish and short Second Civil War, with the likely outcome of a militarily-backed dictatorship ‘for the good of America’ – given the state of polarization in this country, the military is the only power strong enough to ‘unite’ the place and keep a lid on things.

The other likelihood is some form of Balkanization.   This will depend largely on the Federal government’s ability to exercise internal control after years of fighting two demoralizing wars.

(For the record, I’ve heard both arguments –one, which is very persuasive, is that the military would never fire on civilians; the other, just as persuasive, holds that if the conflict is perceived as ‘red vs. blue’, the military – which is mainly ‘red’, ultra-conservative and increasingly insular from America as a whole – wouldn’t hesitate to use whatever means was necessary to put down a rebellion if asked.)

Simon Johnson, in his masterful article for Atlantic Magazine entitled “The Quiet Coup”, points  to the confiscation of America’s wealth by a pack of oligarchs on Wall Street, essentially capturing our government.  While he writes from a decidedly economic point of view (he’s one of the senior economists at the IMF), he points out that America, regardless of the outcome of this situation, can’t continue as things are – the whole thing will collapse, or we’ll have a revolution.

Michael Moore stated recently that “America is not broke”; we still have the money – it’s just not in the right hands to effect genuine change.  Increasingly, we’re told by the oligarchs that we’re not smart enough to manage our own monetary affairs; that the people on Wall Street are there because they’ve established some magic mental-alchemy unknown to the Rest of Us, and that our money – and our futures – are somehow safer in their hands.

They’ve backed up this position by creating organizations like “Americans For Prosperity” to promote this view, and to reinforce the fact that it’s working-class people who are the real culprits here; they had the temerity to form unions and demand a better deal – and for this reason, America is hamstrung by the millions of greedy union members and others who want more than they deserve.

Up to now, this tactic has worked.  It’s been successful because Americans are a cheerful lot with short memories – we have the unerring habit of forgetting what happened, economically and politically, five minutes ago – and we also believe with an optimism bordering on suspension-of-reality that we, too, will someday beat the billion-to-one odds and become members of The Club.

No matter that basic math shoots that theory all to hell – with four hundred families in America owning over 60% of its wealth, and with one-percent of all Americans owning nearly 95%, the odds literally are over a billion-to-one that anyone with a college education and a dream will achieve much more than paying off the college loans before they die.  With one mortgage in three essentially ‘underwater’, the chances that any working American will have anything to leave to their children past unpaid debts is increasingly slim.

Meanwhile, most of the wealth is at the top.

These people weren’t stupid.  They began the process through constant revisions in the tax system over thirty years ago, to the point where the Quiet Coup is now a reality.

The real question is this:   How long will it be before Joe and Josephine Sixpack – along with the struggling doctor up the road – turn off the tube long enough to realize that there’s no hope absent change?

And, when they do – what form will that change take?

The oligarchs are betting you won’t see the truth.   They’re betting that their semiliterate Tea Party multitudes will continue to swallow the hogswill of ‘big government/unions/greedy liberals’ being the source of all of our problems.  They’re betting that their Astroturf groups, like “Americans For Prosperity” (a wholly-funded part of the Koch Brothers empire) will carry the day, and continue to convince America to vote against itself and for the few who’ve come to run this country as the Cavaliers of old England did, by virtue of owning the nation’s wealth and the magic of legislative fiat.

They’re counting on you continuing to believe that you’ll be a member of the Club one day, if you just work hard.

Work hard, and give in.

Astra's Batshit Roundup

The Most F*cked-Up Movie Of All Time; Performance Art; Batshit Politicians, And More….

Finding truly funny batshit is getting harder and harder to do, friends.

Some of the stuff being done by our ‘leaders’ is truly crazy – but it’s not funny.  Take this incident, posted elsewhere, which occurred during a fundraiser.  Or, this guy, who believes it’s ‘God’s will’ that a woman is raped – but only if she gets pregnant.

Yep – there’s a lot of un-funny batshit in America and the world of late – but sit back, dear readers, and enjoy a few minutes of head-shaking, OMG-inducing, 'WTF' moments….

Performance Art

You’re all familiar with the ice-cream shop in Great Britain which featured human breast-milk ice-cream (until  the local government shut ‘em down).  That might qualify – but it’s really bush-league batshit.  Now, this gal, on the other hand….

“Look; Ma!  Someone Threw Away a Perfectly Good Moron!”

In (where else) North Carolina, a guy goes to the hospital in colorful fashion….

Film Review

This has got to be the most f*cked-up movie of all time….

But, What Does She Do If They Smell Like Crumpets?

Speaking of Great Britain, there’s a teacher who sprays her kids with air freshener if they smell like curry….

Governmental Batshit

Karl Rove is up to his old tricks – and they’re going even farther off the rails; Newt Gingrich’s presidential campaign will rely for ‘counsel’ on Glenn Beck’s favorite historian; turns out we tried to trade F-16’s for frozen chickens; Mike Huckabee proves, yet again, that he’s not only crazy, but stupid….

Miscellaneous Batshit

If you work for L.A. County, just don't die at your desk - they'll never find you; we’re running out of Tequila – and a lot of other things, too - "Mom!  Why are there rats in my pizza?"….

Astra’s Batshit of the Week Award

Sometimes, words just fail you. 

Recently, the big blue spruce on the White House lawn blew over in a windstorm.  It was an old tree; probably past its time, but it was considered the ‘national Christmas tree’, and for 42 years, it was decorated in a big ceremony.  The readers of the Free Republic (“America’s Exclusive Site for God, Family, Country, Life and Liberty constitutional conservative activists!”) had some interesting things to say about its demise – things like, “God is not happy with Obama”.

The comments get even crazier – but click on the link – you’ll see why I’ve awarded my Batshit of the Week Award to the readers and supporters of the Free Republic website – which may be more people than you think.

Until next time….

This Is The Way The World Ends

A Nation; Gone Insane; Loses Its Grip on Power

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world….

“The Second Coming”  - W.B. Yeats

Yesterday, the Supreme Court, in the latest of its follies, decided in favor of the Phelps clan of Topeka, Kansas.  By a vote of 8-1, the Supremes decided that yes, Phelps’ ‘church’ has First Amendment protection to picket the funerals of dead American military servicemembers with hatespeech.

This gave me an opportunity to ruminate over the last of several Supreme Court decisions – among them, that of granting American corporations the same rights as individuals (the Citizens United ruling) – which, in turn, allows the likes of the Koch Brothers and their financial empire to literally purchase the American government anonymously.

It also gave me pause as to our government’s foreign and domestic policies of the last sixty years.

When the final history is written, it’ll be a long litany of late-twentieth-century failures which will add up to this:  We were more concerned with triviality than with the business of governing ourselves. 

Some of us were awake.  Some of us pointed to the excesses of Reagan while the Neocons were busy chasing Clinton’s blowjobs.  Others pointed to the concentration of monetary power at the top as it was happening; to the increasing power of radical Fundamentalists and equally-and-increasingly-radical Neocons; to the increasing deficits under Bush.

Yet others pointed out the increasingly insane commentary coming from the Right – “You’re either with us, or against us;” "God told me to go to war with Iraq," said President Bush – while some of us asked the real question, “Why did the Arab peoples attack us?”

Questions, you see, weren’t popular.  ‘Popular’ involved cowboy-singers writing ‘patriotic’ songs, and ascribing to a ‘God; guts, and guns’ mentality.  Introspection wasn’t a valued trait.  Blind aggression was.

It still is.

It would have been a perfect moment for a little humility, in retrospect – to actually listen to our opponent in the matter – who told us, with clear alacrity, that we were attacked because of our presence in Muslim countries, and for over sixty years of support for a racist regime in Israel, made manifest by their dreadful treatment of the Palestinians.

Instead, we started dropping bombs on Afghanistan, and declared a ‘war on terror’.

This struck people such as myself – perhaps a bit more educated than most, with an advanced degree in history and more than a bit of knowledge of things-military – as more than odd.  War, as an instrument of policy, is declared on nations (or, in rare cases – take Napoleon, after his return, as an example – against individuals) – not on tactics.  Might as well declare ‘war’ on ‘the pivot maneuver’.

The echo-chamber in Washington reflected the emptiness in Bush’s head – while we chased ghosts and rainbows in Afghanistan, the nation slipped into recession.   Bush’s orders to the Federal Reserve were to lower interest rates and kill the recession, No Matter What. 

The cheap money went, like water, to the easiest place it could find – which at that point was right into the real-estate market.  Anyone with an ounce of sense and an eighth-grade education in mathematics could see the outcome – but we were told that the value of American homes couldn’t drop. 

Some of us didn’t share their enthusiasm. Some years later, with the economy circling the toilet-hole for the last time, we still don't.

We’re told that ‘the war is winding down’, and ‘the economy is getting better’; we’re told that the real enemies of economic growth are working-class people, and that our economic ‘betters’ (the one-percent who own most of everything) will make things right again – if we only leave them alone.

"Despise Not Your Enemy" - 
A Lesson to John Bull in 1879 from a Zulu

The dreadful lessons of history, however, are catching up with us now.

The Afghans – armed with ‘70’s-era Soviet weapons and handmade clothing - have put-paid to our armies.  The terrorists remain at large.  Our policies in the Middle East have caught up with us – their peoples are throwing off the Western-aligned dictatorships which kept the chess-game at a stalemate for so long.  The Israelis, for the first time in a generation, are fearful that this time, the worst is true – a ring of united Arab nations, absent Western influence, will square accounts with them for what they’ve done.

The original income tax, intended to affect only the wealthy, was eventually shifted from them to those who could least afford it.  The resulting income inequality has hamstrung the economy and turned America into a net-debtor nation, as successive administrations, mostly Republican, have continued spending and borrowed the rest.

This bill is now due. 

We’re in debt to the world for Afghanistan and its bastard-brother, Iraq, which was born of the same insanity and morally bankrupt leadership.  We’ve killed over two million Iraqis.  We’ve destroyed their country for two generations. We are creating enemies faster than we can kill them. 

It’s time to wake up to the fact that regardless of all of the Teabagger rhetoric, Fundamentalist preaching and Neocon bluster, we are no longer the good guys in the world.  We haven’t been, for over sixty years now.

Worse than that, we’re lying to ourselves, too.

Unemployment?  We’ve jimmied the figures – it hovers around 10%; just ask the government.  What they’ve not told us, of course, is that there are nearly three times the ‘official’ number – they’re just not counted, is all.   The Newspeak of economic reporting is simple:  You don’t have to call it a ‘Depression’ if you move the economic-goalposts so the figures tell a different story.

The real cost of the military?  The Feds own up to around $700 billion.  In truth, when you count the hidden costs, is around $1.3 trillion. 

The Federal Reserve is directly purchasing corporate and municipal bonds now – in what boils down to simple money-creation and a back-door extended bailout.  Quantitative Easing?  It’s the purchase of U.S. government bonds – yet more money creation; the economic ‘nuclear option’ discussed briefly in the media.

What about the media?

The protests in Wisconsin are barely covered in the mainstream media – if you want the unvarnished truth, you have to use the alternative media to get at it.  Federally-guaranteed collective bargaining is out the window for teachers, firemen, policemen and other state-funded workers.  The NFL, NBA, or MLB  threatens to go out on strike, and the nation is made aware of it in excruciating detail.

Seems the average American is more concerned with football-players who make seven-figure salaries than they are the teacher who educates their children on $45,000 a year – and who has to purchase, in many cases, classroom supplies from their own paychecks.

What have we got left?

As a nation, not much, as it turns out.

We have a huge military – the last bastion of an Empire being its ability to wage war.  We can do that, on a massive scale.  History teaches us that empires have the habit of dragging everyone in their orbits into war as they gasp their last. 

We’re saddled with a massive debt, the size of which will likely never be paid – and the perpetrators, in childish fashion, are pointing fingers at everyone but themselves. 

Our choices of ‘leaders’ – pandering sorts who’ve promised an endless vista of panem et circenses while the whole damn thing circles the toilet-hole of history – are reflective of our increased polarization.  While our populace are pistol-whipped with the butt-end of Empire, the ‘American Exceptionalism’ crowd continues to believe that It Can’t Happen Here.

Here’s news. ‘It’ already is.

On the positive side of the cosmic-ledger, we have the vote – although I’m not holding out much hope there.  More Americans voted in “American Idol” than in the last presidential election, and our lack of knowledge of world politics, history and geography is legendary.

We also have, along with the worst education system of any industrialized nation, the unerring ability to forget what happened fifteen minutes ago – the election of batshit-crazy Teabaggers to the House of Representatives in the last election is mute testimony to this.

The slick messages of the corporate-owned media are intended to sway voters to cast their ballots against their own self-interests, and to preserve the new order – where the one-percenters retain their monetary and political power, and the rest Eat Shit and Die.

This particularly-egregious form of fuckery is already being felt in Wisconsin, where the Koch Brothers-funded “Americans For Prosperity” have paid for a series of slick ads, asking Wisconsin’s voters to ‘Stand With Walker’ against the evils of unions, collective bargaining, and other ‘liberal philosophies’.

Not content with taking our money and shipping our jobs overseas, they’re looking for the last nickels and dimes in the couch-cushions, by way of destroying the ability of the remaining working Americans to make a living wage. 

Absent a general awakening by millions of heretofore ignorant, docile, supine and moronic American voters, there are two alternatives, and they’re catching up with us in the collective rearview mirror of the National Bus, damn fast:  Either Balkanization, which would more-or-less satisfy the varying factions – or a military dictatorship of some sort, which is the only thing which will unify and hold together a nation as polarized as this one.

I’ve said it before. 

It’s time to pick a side.   Because, folks – what you’re seeing, right now, is what happens When a Country Goes Insane.

This, indeed, is the Way The World Ends.