All Things Must Pass

Without intelligence in the electorate, the results have no meaning.  The appeal to the voters is almost on the most primal of emotions such as fear where the voters "default" as Norman Goldman puts it, to the Republicans.  Many have marveled at how all talk of the Ebola epidemic and ISIS and children crossing the border, came to an abrupt end a day or two before the elections were held last week.  The worst thing about the tea party is that it is completely dumb.  The thing was born out of an "astro turf" movement as Hartman described it.  There was nothing spontanious or truly "grass roots" about it.  It was all systematically organized.  What the voters of this past election don't realize is that they are like marionettes having their strings pulled and the thoughts they think THEY are having are not "theirs" at all but thoughts, falsehood after falsehood, that has been cleverly emplanted there just as surely as Christine's baby on DL is not her own.  The classic trait of a con artist of old is to get you to deny the obvious and make you think you are being really smart FOR denying the obvious.  We are told that you voters are saying 'America is on the wrong path now".  So are we to presume that come January after you voters have "fixed" that problem that now America IS on the right course?   A con artist will argue about anything and put nonsensical things up for debate, like these networks being able to have any Truth up for debate such as gravity or anything else which has been scientifically documented as true.   And if there is a division of opinion on a topic such as the existence of gravity - - or of Global Warming then the FOX or CNN will say “My this is certainly a divisive topic!”   Idiots are given at least parody with normal people.  Someone said that only thirteen percent of the population under thirty voted in the last election.  I find this a highly disturbing truth, with major implications about the fairness of the representation of “The Will of the American People” in politics generally.  “Ring of Fire” had their show up from November 9^th today.   First of all nothing is changed as far as both houses of congress going Republican is concerned.  This is because when both houses of congress were democratic we STILL were hamstrung by the Republicans with their filibusters- - so only doing highly watered down consumer protection bills or a completely dysfunctional health care bill.  Countless bills passed by the House back then were never ratified by the senate if they didn’t fall within that magic 74 day period between when Al Franken was elected and Ted Kennedy died back in the summer of 2009.  But the voters are just too stupid to be voting in many cases.  There is wide spread belief among voters that - - big foot exists, or that Saddam Hussein is responsible for 9 – 11.  42% of American voters don’t know who the current Supreme Court Chief justice is.  About thdiat same number believe that English is the officially mandated language of the constitution and that the constitution is an explicitly Christian document.   As such even I would not believe a figure like in Ukraine that 96% of the electorate turned out to vote on some secession issue or something.   I would say we should shoot for perhaps a 75% voter turn-out rate, but not a 95% one.  Some have suggested that since we make such a big thing out of Veterans day now, that we should have our national elections on veteran’s day.  Run it up the flag pole, and see - - .

In terms of the Banks- - keep in mind that a big reason I’d forgotten about that Banks don’t lend out money any more is because risky investments in derivitives or things that used to be patently illegal- - are more attractive than a six percent loan to a student for college.   Smaller local banks would like to lend money to the community but play by “a different set of rules” than the Wall Street banks”.   Don’t ask me what that means or why it’s that way.   Sean Hannity loves North Dakota and how their communities have thrived financially with small business opportunities, which may have less to do with the oil boom there and more because North Dakota has a whole different system from the rest of the country with banks that are state run and hence a whole lot fairer with their financial dealings with the public.   We move to the subject of medical malpractice.   Texas or “Tex-ass-istan’ as Norman Goldman says- - has the $250,000 cap in payments like California has.  At that price trial lawyers cannot stay in business because it costs them more than that to successfully research and prosecute the cases for their clients.  But I didn’t know was the whole idea of going after “The Trial Lawers” through “Tort Reform”  (two key buzz words the Republicans have drummed into us) is because Trial Lawyers used to be among the chief funders of the democratic party.  Of course they would use other catch phrases such as “frivolous lawsuits” and speak of “You need to pass tort reform to keep doctors from leaving your state, so you won’t be able to find a doctor when you need one”.   Or they will talk about “defensive medical practice” where unnecessary medical test procedures are run on patients.  Or they will talk about malpractice insurance rates for physicians going up, as if that should be any of our concern as patients.   They said that malpractice deaths are the third biggest single cause of death nationally behind cancer and heart disease.  They claim this death rate is $440,000 deaths per year sharply up from the 98,000 per year back before we had “tort reform”.  But tort reform has NOT lowered health care costs for us one bit!

We learn from the Stephanie Miller show this morning that fresh Russian tanks are again rolling into Ukraine, and NATO doesn’t like it.  This is an area where me and Washington’s Blog will never see eye to eye.  The rest of the world knows that Putin is one of the world’s leading agressors.  In terms of the leaders of China being offended when Putin put a shawl on that guy’s wife, I think perhaps we should learn the proper protocol of other countries prior to visiting there.  And President Obama’s chewing gum at an official function is definitely out of line.  Did Obama never get in trouble for chewing gum in class?  Nickerette was apparently what it was, which reminds us that President Obama used to be a smoker, and tomorrow it could be me.  Meanwhile Chris Matthews has come under fire by our side for advocating that the Trans-Canadian pipeline be voted on through.  I had C-Span on yesterday and it was a House hearing and all of the speakers were pro pipeline, and we are informed there that Harry Reid is the latest Judas, and now has opened the door to approval of the pipeline in the Senate.

And now out of sequence here’s Jackie.  The Supreme Court is going to hear a case on whether anything other than State Exchanges are valid with the Affordable Care act.  Basically it’s millions of Americans could lose their health care over what is basically a semantic glitch that should have been fixed before the bill was passed.  “The states wanted the autonomy to set up their own exchanges” but then given that “autonomy” these same states opted NOT to open their own state exchange.  Hence the way things look now with the Koch brothers in firm control of the Supreme Court, the leading five justices will rule that any benefits coming through anything other than the state exchanges is null in voice, which is most of the red states.  Due to the whole “reconciliation” glitch- - congress was powerless to change the wording of this bill at any time after Ted Kennedy died.  Now of course Mitch Mc Connell wants to dismember the affordable care act piece by piece, and asking the President to oversee the destruction of his own bill.  It’s like ordering a hostage to blow his own brains out.

In terms of evolution Stephanie and company are saying “We all came from one common ancestor”.    If you’re into the math - - and understand the problems in methodology - - and design and coordinated “working together”, you like me will have major problems with evolution.  But the people who espouse “Creationism” are NOT just saying that there are proceses we don’t understand and are currently unexplained.   As I have said (last July) these people on the religious right lack the mental capacity to even understand the logic NECESSARY to support creationism, as I now view it.  No the ONLY reason why these psuco-scientists even CARE at all about this academic subject is to get religion’s “foot in the door” and establish the United States as a “Christian nation” along the same lines of History where “Instilling patriotism and respect for authority and good citizenship” are the hallmarks of a good history curriculum.  In other words, the goals of creationism is not science but propaganda.  As such the proponets of creationism should be fought at every term.   I highly doubt that people memorizing the answers to one of these state “diagnostic” tests- - have any logical grasp of certain math problems.

I did not type in Word yesterday and I haven’t done a blog entry since Monday, not that there has been anything I’ve had to say but I’ve generally been preoccupied with other things.  Last night I slept better than I have the past several nights and it was actually 6:08 when I first woke up and got up.  The computer has been problematic because it stalled while installing the Microsoft updates, which they are still putting out.  Pulling the plug, so to speak, is dangerous when a computer is downloading but in this case the thing was already not functioning so I was less concerned about damaging the hard drive.  “Don’t shove a fish up your ass”.  I wish I had thought of those lyrics as a parody of “Don’t you go breaking my heart”.   If you shove a Christian fish up your ass your heart will be broken.   Stephanie lost the DVR, which vanishes occasionally.  I went out and got a large coffee at the liquor store for $1.25.  This morning we had oatmeal followed by a well done fried egg and toast and butter and jelly.   I’m wearing the heavy red jacket for the first time this season.   The night chill is more pronounced now.  Last night it was drowsing during the ABC news and early Jeopardy.  Then I roused.  I was attentive during “Wheel of Fortune” and then it was “Arrow”.    Again I drowsed during “The 100”.  It’s a good show and several weeks I’ve been too drowsy to enjoy it.

We cheated one place alphabetically to get the songs to come out in a better order on the disks.  But here it is - - 42 songs by George Harrison and friends.  OK as of nightfall we added a track on Disk two, which means we also had to eliminate one.

BEST OF GEORGE HARRISON (updated)

All Those Years Ago

Any Road Will Take You There

Apple Scruffs  (demo recording)

Beware of Darkness

Blow Away

Bongla Desh

Brainwashed

Cheer Down
Cloud Nine

Cocamame Business

Cracker Box Palace

Dark Horse

Ding Dong Ding Dong (Ring in the New)

Deep Blue

- - - disk two - - -

Devil’s Radio

Far East Man

Give Me Peace on Earth - -

Hear Me, Lord

Here Comes the Moon

I Dig Love

If Not For You
It Don't Come Easy (demo version)

Isn’t It a Pity

It’s Johnny’s Birthday
Let It Down
Living in the Material World

Mama, You've Been On My Mind
Not Guilty

- - - disk three- - -

Run of the Mill
Simply Shady

Soft Hearted Hanna

Sue Me, Sue You Blues

The Art of Dying

The Light that has Lighted the World

The Lord Loves those that Love the Lord

This Guitar Can’t Keep from Crying

This is Love

This Song

Try Some, Buy Some

Wah Wah (Bongla Desh Concert)

When We Was Fab

You Can Lead A Horse to Water