The Eye of a Needle

Fucking Social Security

2010-02-21T09:44:00.000-08:00

As I was filing my taxes this weekend, I took a look at my yearly Social Security statement. Throughout my career, I've paid about $61,000 in social security tax, with my employers contributing the same amount for a total of about $122,000. At my current earning rate, I will be able to retire when I'm 70 years old and receive $3,100 per month from social security. Mind you, this doesn't keep up with inflation, so in 33 years, when I retire, that three thousand per month will barely be able to pay for my medication, much less rent or property taxes.

When you consider how little we ultimately get back from it, how completely broken the system is, and how likely it is that the entire thing will be bankrupt by the time I retire anyway, I have to ask: Why the fuck am I contributing to it? Why can't I opt out? In fact, why the fuck am I paying taxes, any taxes, to begin with? The way I see it, the federal government of the United States has taken from me at least $61,000, promising that it's for my future, but knowing full-well that I'll likely never see that money again, possibly even hoping that I die before I reach retirement.

So what do you do? Stop paying taxes, instead investing that money in retirement plans that might actually yield fruit in the future, possibly even allowing you to retire sooner? God no, if you don't pay taxes, the federal government will arrest you, throw you in jail, and then use taxes collected from other poor slobs to keep you incarcerated while you 'pay your debt to society.' Does anyone see the infinite fucking irony in this?

When you think about it, the G8 countries promised $20 billion to starving countries and then delivered not a penny, even though we were all waiting to see immediate and decisive results. What makes you think our government is going to keep its promises thirty years from now when we're too senile to remember them having been made in the first place?

Being 'Not' American

2009-12-08T18:40:00.000-08:00

What does it mean to be an American? The first thing that it means is that you're so arrogant as to think that the United States is the only country in the world that comprises "America," and so when you say "I'm an American" you don't mean those damned "Mexicans," Mexicans here being a term used interchangeably to describe anyone with brown skin that speaks Spanish. To you, the term 'American' is one that you monopolize for yourself, one whose significance you either forget or ignore. To you, the term 'American' doesn't apply to immigrants, whether illegal or not, forgetting that only a few generations ago, your ancestors were themselves immigrants.

Those ancestors struggled, were paid nothing, and were despised just as much as you loathe those lazy Mexicans. Nevermind the fact that you epitomize the term 'lazy' and you wouldn't have the first clue what hard work truly is. Nevermind the fact that you haven't struggled a day in your life, unless you consider 'struggle' to be that time your power went out and you weren't able to watch UFC or Smackdown. You complain that they're taking your jobs and wasting your taxpayer money, but it's highly likely that you fall into an income bracket where taxation isn't one of your major concerns and the types of jobs that they're 'stealing' are ones you'd never consider lowering yourself to take. Nevermind the fact that you don't actually know a single 'Mexican.'

What else does it mean to be an American? It means you value your personal space above all else, that you live in a world of your very own, and that you care very little about the privacy or well-being of your neighbors. It means you think the other nations of the world should stay out of your business and that you should be able to play global warming tug-of-war with China to your heart's content. It means that you can complain about the environment, but continue to drive an SUV because you're paying "Carbon Credits" and that makes it okay. It means that you believe there is no problem a bunch of money can't fix. It means that you can police the world, but the world is out of line when it tries to resist you, so fuck those fascists!

What else does it mean to be an American? It means that you have more debt than you have assets, that you have no savings, that you'll never be able to pay off your credit cards, and you'll never be able to retire. It means that you are individually representative of the state of your nation, that your life is worse than your parents', your children will not have a better life than you, and their children will have a worse life than that. It means that you've sat on your ass and watched it happen, that your apathy has gotten the better of you, and that you wouldn't know how to fix things at this point even if you wanted to.

What else does it mean to be an American? It means that you are not particularly concerned about what I've just said because you're a greedy, ignorant, self-absorbed, racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, jingoistic, and megalomaniacal piece of shit. It means that the rest of the world laughs at you and your sense of entitlement, and it means that you need a serious attitude adjustment. It also means that in a few years, when the United States is part of the third world, your country is not going to elicit very much sympathy from its creditors. Maybe you should start playing nice with those creditors now?

One day, I will not be an 'American' and I won't regret that decision for a second. The false patriot's typical retort when one criticizes their government or country is to say "love it or leave it." In my case, I'll be overjoyed to oblige them. Others have said that it's not a good idea to give up dual citizenship, that it's convenient to have a US Passport. Well, I'd rather be inconvenienced than call myself an 'American.' Maybe if what it means to be an American should ever change, then so will my opinion, but I don't see that happening soon.

Sono un Cittadino Italiano!

2009-11-12T19:13:00.000-08:00

Well, today ended a year and a half long mission of gathering documents, being ripped off (by myitaliancitizenship.com), driving from Phoenix to Los Angeles, and crossing my fingers. In the mail today, only four months after applying, I received official confirmation from the Los Angeles Consulate that my citizenship has been recognized and that I can apply for my passport. I want to thank Raffaella Buiano at the LA consulate who was incredibly helpful and gladly expedited the process for me. I also want to thank the people at The Italian Citizenship Message Board, for their advice, and for providing the birth certificate request translations that worked incredibly well!

The Seven Deadly Sins

2009-11-03T08:20:00.000-08:00

The United States is a very Christian country, and so I'm sure that we good Americans know about the Seven Cardinal Sins that destroy grace in the eyes of God and condemn us to eternal damnation. Considering our knowledge of these sins, we obviously go out of our way to avoid them, don't we?

Lust: Easily our favorite sin, which is why hollywood continues to crank out talentless whores like this one. You'd rather see something that's easy on the eyes than be forced to think.

Gluttony: At least 23% of the world's obese population live right here! And since that number's growing daily, you'll eventually be one of them (if you're not already). Stop eating!

Greed: It's not just AIG that's greedy. There's a good chance you are, too! When's the last time you donated to a charity or purchased a sensibly sized television or automobile? Not ever!

Sloth: God gave you feet, lady, use them! Last month, Honda unveiled an electric unicycle that allows people to travel around their houses at 3mph without standing up. America will be its best customer.

Wrath: 3,000 of our people die, so we attack the wrong country. Our occupations are responsible for over 1 million deaths, and our 'peace loving' President is causing that number to rise daily.

Envy: If he can be president, so can I! So what if I have no experience? I want what he has: vast power with no idea how to wield it responsibly.

Pride: No words can express the joy I feel when I see bumper stickers proclaiming the pride one feels for simply having been born in a country to which they barely contribute. It brings a tear to the eye.

Saying Goodbye

2009-10-22T22:57:00.001-07:00

My grandmother just passed away. She left this world much as she lived her life, peacefully, and I'm happy for both of those things.

On CNN.com, there was a poll where 81% of those responding claimed that 'Love' is more important than 'Work.' Well, if that's the case, then why are most Americans miserable? Why do they work themselves to death with nearly no hope for advancement, and deriving almost no happiness from it?

I received a call from the Italian Consulate in Los Angeles yesterday. They told me that my Italian citizenship has been officially recognized and that I will receive papers (including a passport application) on or around November 11th. So one door closes while another opens, I suppose.

I will miss her and how she always confused me with my cousins. I honestly think she did it on purpose, perhaps a soft jab at my not visiting quite often enough. I probably deserved it.

Dignity

2009-10-21T21:50:00.000-07:00

Like most people, I have two grandmothers, and each couldn’t be more different from the other. Charlotte, my father’s mother, can only be described as an unstoppable force. Indeed, even after suffering an aneurism and having the doctor tell her that she must stop chain smoking and drinking two pots of coffee per day, she continues to do so, possibly fearing that to stop would result in her dying from boredom. She’s incredibly active, loud, outspoken, argumentative, and sharp as a tack, even if her hearing is starting to go.

Frances, my mother’s mother, is quite the opposite. She was born with a hearing impairment, and as a result, has to be very attentive to follow a conversation. She is soft spoken, and doesn’t like to argue, preferring instead to go with the flow, even if it means suffering fools. She’s fiercely independent, never asking for assistance, and hating to burden her family. Since the passing of my grandfather, her health has deteriorated, and now she is dying.

When I walked into the Cardiac Intensive Care Unit of Massachusetts General Hospital, I really had no idea what to expect. The waiting room was full of people, speaking as if they were at a cocktail mixer. How bad could it possibly be? As I walked down the hall, turning the corner to approach the bays where patients were being treated, I saw a woman in front of me, alone in a room, pale, sunken, lifeless. For a brief second, I thought to myself “I pity the family she belongs to because there’s no hope for her… Now, where’s my grandmother?”

As I got closer to the bays, looking at the areas that had just entered my field of vision, I scanned them for my grandmother. There were family members in both of those bays, none of whom belonged to my family. My attention was drawn again to the woman laying in the center bay, and I could suddenly feel my lungs empty, as if every last drop off air was being forcefully suctioned from them. It was her. She was nearly unrecognizable.

She is suffering from Septic Shock, probably the result of a Urinary Tract Infection. Septic Shock, like its little brother Sepsis, is no fun at all. An infection in the patient’s blood stream causes systemic organ disfunction. In her case, her kidneys failed first, requiring a constant connection to a dialysis machine. Then, her blood pressure began to plummet and her breathing became impaired, requiring intubation and a constant drip of dobutamine, fentanyl, and midazolam to keep her in stable, but critical, condition.

It went on like this for nearly two weeks, during which they feared she may have suffered a stroke. Only two days ago did they take her off of her sedative. When she awoke, she was able to open her eyes in response to auditory and physical stimuli, but she’d look through you, neither recognizing you nor able to discern what she was looking at. The woman I knew as my grandmother never woke from that slumber. She was in pain, both physical and emotional, fearing the unknown, hating the cruel joke that life had played on her.

Yesterday, after acknowledging that her sepsis had yet to be quelled, the doctor finally proposed what we had been dreading to hear. He told us that it may be time to slowly remove my grandmother’s life support and allow her to pass peacefully rather than suffer in misery for the rest of her life. My grandmother, a woman who refused to be helped while crossing the street, did not want to burden her children, and if she could, would never agree to nursing home care. Instead, she’d insist on returning to her apartment, and would hope to quickly return to her walks around the neighborhood. This is not to be.

Tomorrow, the doctors at Mass General will begin to remove the drugs and machines that are keeping my grandmother alive. She will pass in her sleep, without pain, and without ever having to see her children torn apart, watching her wither away in a nursing home. She is Frances Madeline LaCava-Barter, and she will be missed more than she can possibly imagine.

My Album is now on iTunes Music Store

2009-10-05T12:24:00.000-07:00

And now for a bit of blatant self-promotion...

My album ('The Magician') is now available worldwide on iTunes Music Store. It is my first album, and does a good job of representing where my head has been (musically) over the past couple of years. I'd like to break even on the project, so if you like late 1970s/early 1980s post-punk music, please consider purchasing a copy.

You can find the album here. iTunes Music Store should redirect you to a version of the album for sale in your country, but if not, just search for "Thom Bradford" and you'll find it.

You can listen to some of the songs at my page on MySpace.

Customer Rape - It's the Bank of America Way!

2009-09-22T12:00:00.000-07:00

Let's say that on Monday morning, you have twenty dollars in your bank account. You use your debit card to buy a coffee in the morning for two dollars and then a sandwich in the afternoon for three dollars. And by the way, those prices are unrealistic, as everyone knows a cup of coffee costs around five dollars these days.

Anyway, you do the same thing on Tuesday and Wednesday, buying a cup of coffee and a sandwich. How much will you have left in your bank account come Thursday? Five dollars or negative two-hundred sixty-one dollars?

The answer is negative two-hundred sixty-one dollars. Why? Well, you forgot about a check that you wrote for twenty-one dollars, and that check appeared on your account just after midnight on Thursday morning. "But wait," you point out "that should only bring your balance to negative sixteen dollars plus a single overdraft fee," and in a logical world, you would be absolutely correct. Unfortunately, you're dealing with Bank of America in the real world.

Here's how it would work in a logical world

(overdraft in red)

How is this possible? Well, Bank of America, like most banks, registers pending transactions, and posts them in a batch every few days. Unlike many banks, Bank of America doesn't post those pending transactions in chronological order, they post them in order of monetary value from highest to lowest dollar amount, making it far more likely that an overdraft will occur sooner in the batch.

So on Thursday morning, instead of the check triggering a single overdraft, as you would expect, that check is the first item processed, immediately sending your account into overdraft and triggering an overdraft fee for every subsequent item.

Here's how it works in the world owned by Bank of America

(overdrafts in red)

So what should have been an ending balance of negative fifty-one dollars (negative sixteen minus a thirty-five dollar overdraft fee) instead becomes negative two-hundred sixty-one dollars because you're charged seven overdraft fees instead of one.

What's worse is that even if your paycheck goes through at exactly the same time on Thursday and you have sufficient funds to cover all pending items, you'll still be charged these overdraft fees because Bank of America will back-date posting of the twenty-one dollar check to Wednesday, even though it didn't appear on your account until Thursday at midnight.

Is this how banks should treat their customers?

Bank of America seems to think so because they've been doing this for years. They're almost proud of it, claiming in their automated response to my inquiries that their customers actually like their transactions to be processed in this way because it makes it easier for them to read their statements.

I'm a software engineer, and I know a little something about how software is written. The way that something is displayed to the user and how it is stored and processed behind the scenes are two entirely different things. So when Bank of America tries to use the excuse that people like being raped, I immediately have to call 'bullshit!'

This year, a class action lawsuit was filed and won against Bank of America for this very practice. BofA settled, unwilling to admit any wrongdoing, and will be giving everyone who responded a check for seventy-eight dollars. (Didn't you get the memo? I certainly didn't) Yet they continue the practice to this day. Why? The answer is quite simple, because they make far more money raping people with artificial overdraft fees than they could ever lose in court settlements.

The economy is bad right now, and people are hurting, including me. Banks got bailout money from the government whereas the American public did not. For Bank of America to now turn around after taking forty-five billion in TARP funds (taxpayer dollars) and gouge us for even more money with these practices is completely unacceptable.

As the victim of this practice, I threatened to leave Bank of America as a customer as well as take legal action predicated on knowledge of their class action settlement and got yet another automated response that they wouldn't be reversing the charges. I'll be leaving Bank of America at the end of the month, and I suggest you do the same.

(NOTE: I'm told that several other banks do this as well, including Wells Fargo and Chase, but I can't confirm that information)

A Letter To My Unborn Child

2009-06-26T07:22:00.001-07:00

Dear Son or Daughter,

I know you're not here yet, but today, June 25th, 2009, Michael Jackson died. You may be wondering "Dad, who is Michael Jackson, and why should I care?" Well, I'll tell you why you should care, and that is because Michael Jackson symbolized the American dream.

Yes, it's true... He was born poor, but with a talent, and so he was exploited into making considerable amounts of money for people with absolutely no talent other than that of being societal parasites. Granted, his talents weren't anything amazing... he could dance and sing, but so can a lot of young folks. The difference is that, much like JonBenét Ramsey, Michael Jackson had a parent that was a manipulative opportunist who, instead of letting his children grow up like normal children, decided that they'd be his own personal cash-cows.

So fame at such a young age was hard on Michael Jackson. He was reclusive, odd, and misunderstood. Later in life, he was accused several times of molesting children in his multi-million dollar compound slash theme park called Neverland Ranch. Of course, money can buy many wonderful things, and so Jackson was able to buy off the families of his accusers. Yay!

When he died, everyone seemed to forget about the alleged child molestation. They instead focused on the things he had accomplished thirty years earlier, accomplishments that made him rich beyond your imagination. They got angry when people cited the fact that Jackson was a pedophile, possibly because their adult lives are miserable, and they are desperately trying to cling to memories of their innocent youth, a youth that Jackson was almost certainly a part of. Too bad they haven't thought about the youths whose innocence Jackson robbed.

If Jackson's death has taught us anything, my future child, it's that you'll probably never be as lucky, particularly since I don't beat you into performing. You've also learned that fame turns you into a horrible person, but also that people are willing to forgive any kind of horrible deed, so long as you have entertained away part of their miserable lives. In particular, though, you've learned that if you have boatloads of money, you can make all the bad stuff magically 'disappear.'

That is the American Dream! Good luck achieving it, my progeny!

Your dad,
Thom

Monsters of our own Making

2009-06-03T13:16:00.000-07:00

At about 7am on the morning of December 30th, 1994, I sat on an MBTA Green Line car traveling from the Cleveland Circle area of Brookline to North Station in Boston (the ‘C’ train). I recall that I was happy on that morning, if for no other reason than that it was a Friday and my workweek would soon be over. As is often the case so early in the morning, Beacon Street was calm and sleepily coming to life.

Three hours later, that calm was shattered when John C. Salvi III walked into Planned Parenthood’s Brookline office with a rifle and began to open fire. Within twenty minutes, he had made his way down Beacon Street and arrived at Preterm Health Services where he again began to shoot at anyone in sight. In the end, two women had been shot dead and five others had been wounded.

The people of Massachusetts, who had generally remained blissfully apathetic where the abortion issue was concerned, were now in shock. Yes, we had seen the protesters outside of Planned Parenthood with their repulsively blown up photos depicting aborted fetuses, but we mostly ignored them. Now, though, a debate that had been raging in other parts of the country was suddenly dumped squarely on our doorstep, and its participants could no longer be ignored.

Massachusetts Governor William Weld and Archbishop Bernard Law, in an effort to defuse escalating tension, suggested that a bilateral group convene to represent both sides of the state’s abortion debate, a task then organized by The Public Conversations Project in Watertown. One voice chosen for that group was Madeline McComish. A Senior Chemist, McComish was also well read, a devout Catholic, and President of Massachusetts Citizens for Life, one of the state’s largest pro-life organizations.

About a year after the murders, the head of Pro-Life Virginia, a controversial man by the name of Reverend Donald Spitz announced his intent to rally in Boston, so that he might demonstrate his support for what he called John Salvi’s “righteous deed.” This prompted McComish to write a letter that both condemned Spitz and made it known that he was not welcome in Massachusetts. Despite accusations that McComish was betraying the cause, Spitz relented, never appearing in Boston.

And what became of John Salvi? Though expert witnesses testified that he was schizophrenic, Salvi was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. Nearly two years after the events of 1994, he was found dead in his jail cell, having allegedly committed what could only be described as the most elaborately impossible suicide ever undertaken. It is reported that, after thoroughly beating himself, he shoved cotton into his mouth, tied a bag over his head, and bound both his hands and feet.

I see you shaking your head. The state says it was suicide. Why would they lie?

The Debate Shall Begin Anew
On May 31st, 2009, nearly fifteen years after the Salvi rampage, Dr. George Tiller was shot to death as he entered his church in Wichita, Kansas. Ironically, Tiller was a devout Lutheran while at the same time being infamous among members of the pro-life movement for performing late-term abortions.

Surprisingly, Tiller’s assassin thought it appropriate to commit the act at a place of peace and worship. Not surprising, at least to people of the pro-choice movement, is that the person charged with his murder was a white male with a possible history of mental illness.

Catalyzed by the murder of George Tiller and the Obama Administration’s recent decision to resume funding of stem-cell research and abortion options, those on either side of the abortion debate will no doubt be reinvigorated, and we can expect to hear or read quite a bit about the subject over the next weeks.

That said, before the gloves come off, it would be unfortunate if we didn’t at least try to understand one very important thing.

We Are All Hypocrites
One of the problems arising as a result of the politicizing of abortion is that our black and white world demands that people take sides. I personally feel that I can’t take sides, and refuse to do so. While I am against the idea of abortion, I am at the same time adamantly opposed to government coercion. This is a difficult stance to take, as you are immediately labeled a hypocrite by the extreme sides of the debate.

That said, the abortion debate is in no way lacking hypocrisy from all directions.

People will say that those of the pro-life movement are hypocrites. They will question the pro-life claim that all life is sacred, especially when you consider the fact that a majority of the people in the movement are among those who voted for George W. Bush both times. As such, they advocated his administration’s invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan and were indirectly responsible for the subsequent murder of well over a million people.

Opponents will say that the pro-choice people are hypocrites because they were predominantly among those who have protested Bush’s wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. They spout antiwar slogans like “no blood for oil,” while at the same time having no problem with what the pro-life movement believes to be the systematic murder of over 62 million human beings since abortion was federally legalized in 1973. They also haven’t been particularly vocal about Obama’s escalation in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Both arguments are justifiable, but there is another dimension to the hypocrisy.

There remains our common hypocrisy. A quote (mistakenly) attributed to Oprah Winfrey reads, “I've killed more people than the Unabomber has because I've paid more taxes.” When it comes to accusations of hypocrisy in the abortion debate, it must be said that our complicity in a society that engages in such brutality makes us all direct or indirect contributors to mass murder. Pro-life activists fund abortions, while pro-choice people fund wars wherein women are raped and killed, so who are any of us to complain about the other?

Faith, Science, and Certainty
At one point or another, the abortion debate inevitably degenerates to the religion versus science argument. Pro-choice people will argue that it is scientifically proven that a fetus cannot survive out of the womb after the second trimester. Pro-life people will insist that life is a gift from God. Each will scoff at the other when they start spouting these arguments. They believe that it is a war of faith versus fact, when nothing could be farther from the truth.

Religion is not perfect, far from it. It is not entirely based on fact, and quite often founded on supposition and theory, where deities and allegories are leveraged for the sake of unifying believers. In most religions, the theories will never be proven, and most will eventually be disproved. This requires practitioners to have faith such that they may proceed with work that they believe to be for the betterment of the world.

Science is also far from perfect. It is also not entirely grounded in fact, but instead on supposition and theory. There are entire branches of science wherein the theories may never be proven, where most will eventually be disproved, and for which the goals are questionable. Yet scientists have to practice faith, convincing themselves that these theories are true insomuch as they may be leveraged to proceed with work that is believed to be for the betterment of the world.

Are you seeing a similarity here? Both scientists and religious practitioners have to believe in their theories even if the ability to observe evidence of such hypotheses has yet to occur, otherwise their work is for not. It is this belief that eventually mutates into certainty, and it is certainty despite evidence that causes all hell to break loose. Our certainty makes us inflexible and dangerous, liable to invade countries or bomb abortion clinics, all for the sake of ‘saving lives.’

Both religion and science are an attempt to codify laws, whether they are societal or ones observed in the natural world. Neither has perfect vision when it comes the big picture and neither can see into the future. So what both must do is accept that situations change over time. Eventually, technology will be such that a fetus will be immediately viable outside of the womb, and eventually the idea of what constitutes ‘life’ will be very much blurred. Nobody is right or wrong in this debate; they are just subject to the conditions of the moment.

Ultimately the problem with the abortion debate is that many on both sides deny the mutability of the world around them. They are overly certain of their positions on the matter, while at the same time being incapable of complete possession of all relevant facts. They are thoroughly inflexible, and neither one is willing to listen to the other, leaving us at an impasse.

The Role of Government in the Divide
But is this impasse completely our own fault? Politicians have a terrible habit of latching onto complex social issues both for the sake of pandering to voters, and to politicize problems that they neither have the power nor intent to solve. It’s a lot easier to win votes by talking endlessly about what ‘should be’ rather than formulating plans to solve the real problems of government.

Abortion is one of those issues. It is a societal problem, not a political one, and so it is best left to society. Unfortunately, even though it never ceases to disappoint, our country has become so practiced in looking to government for a solution to our problems that we have forgotten we are completely capable of addressing these issues ourselves.

The anarchist in me tells me that all laws are inherently damaging to a society, including Roe v. Wade, while at the same time knowing that many states would trample on the rights of women were it not for that decision. It’s my belief that were there not incessant legislation to enforce what once might have been considered common sense, then common sense, as it has evolved, if indeed it has evolved, would prevail. Society would be significantly more capable and likely of solving its own problems without a government in the way that attempts to eternally etch in stone the social mores of any particular generation.

To pursue the political solution of stripping away more of the very few rights that women enjoy relative to men, in my opinion, is not one that should be on the table. If history has proven anything, it’s that if you voluntarily allow the government to take away one right, they’re far more likely to trample on them all. Ask Dick Cheney, he’ll agree.

The problem of abortion is a symptom of a sick society, and any doctor will tell you that you treat the illness rather than the symptoms. The ultimate goal of both sides, from a fundamental level, should be to reduce the rate of unwanted pregnancy in an attempt to avoid abortion altogether. Thus, the pro-life movement needs to adopt the pro-choice solution of providing birth control options, while the pro-choice movement needs to adopt the pro-life approach of encouraging personal responsibility when a pregnancy occurs.

In the end, a solution hinges on Americans getting back to the practice of good parenting. We need to take the time to properly raise our children, instilling in them a respect for human life. Not only will those values translate to fewer abortions, but they may also allow us to avoid a war or two in the future.

Oh, who am I kidding? War is inevitable.

Pro-Life Response to the Tiller Murder
In writing this article, I decided to contact Madeline McComish to elicit her response to this most recent act of violence. “Why?” you ask. It’s easy for one who’s pro-choice to immediately dismiss someone like McComish as a religious kook, but then, you don’t know Madeline McComish.

According to McComish “This is a truly tragic event that goes against everything that the pro-life movement represents. I mourn not only for this man and his family but also for the pro-life movement. The murderer of Dr. Tiller has done great harm to the pro-life cause.”

Is this your typical empty rhetoric from a pro-life zealot? Was it said to avoid appearing hypocritical and to mask the subconscious glee that she must probably feel after her cause has won another victory? The answer to both questions is ‘No.‘ How do I know this? Because Madeline McComish is my Great Aunt, and I know her to be sincere. When she says that she mourns, she truly means it.

Surprisingly enough, until the Salvi murders had occurred, I had absolutely no idea that Madeline was the President of MCFL and had only a passing knowledge of her opinion on abortion. I knew her primarily as an incredibly articulate and kind person who, like my Grandfather, would do anything for anyone, going out of her way if necessary. And though my opinions on the abortion question differ significantly from her own, I admire and respect her, not only because I know her, but also because she’s willing to listen.

Are you?

Lambasting Technology :: Introduction

2009-05-26T10:58:00.000-07:00

I've been a technologist for the past twenty-five years. When I began, I was completely sold on the idea that technology could, one day, free us from the drudgeries of work and that our labor would no longer be so completely intolerable. Because I believed that it could grant us more time to enjoy our families and hobbies, I was dedicated to contributing to that revolution.

Unfortunately, as technology has advanced, the opposite has happened. Throughout its development, while one of technology's primary purposes has been to allow us to become more productive workers, the workplace demands have become such that we are expected to produce as much as our facilitative technology will allow, if not more.

Technology should have afforded us a twenty-hour workweek, and yet most of us are lucky if we put in less than fifty. Contrast this with our grandparents' generation, where they put in their thirty-five or forty hours per week, and nothing more was expected of them. That generation spent far more time with their families. In fact, during that generation, conditions were such that only one spouse had to work, and so children were raised properly and family bonds were significantly stronger than they are today.

In our modern capitalist society, technology has taken the place of the slave master's whip. It is among the tools of economic enslavement and we are worse off for it. Think about the technologies you generally employ and ask yourself what their particular purpose is. You'll probably find that a good portion of that technology is meant to make you an efficient worker, while most of the rest of it comes in the form of entertainment devices such as televisions and video game consoles. The fact that worker productivity and entertainment are the predominant uses of technology is no coincidence.

Due to its rapid rate of evolution and obsolescence, technology has engendered a new consumer culture of waste and elitism, where either people don't seem to mind that they're having to replace products constantly for little technological advantage, or they revel in doing so because having 'the latest and greatest' is a statement of social status. Meanwhile, discarded technology piles up on the African continent where young children scrounge through fields of toxic refuse in the name of what we believe to be 'recycling.'

As a people, we must begin to ask the question of whether technology is serving its intended purposes or if it is simply just another tool in the enslavement and stratification of our society. If we answer the latter, we must begin to reassess technology, its uses, and its ubiquity, and move to curb or repurpose it to our advantage rather than our detriment. It must be made to align with its promise.

A Change You Can Still Hope For

2009-05-11T13:43:00.000-07:00

Many Republicans decry the idea of social programs like single-payer healthcare as yet another form of welfare, claiming that they don’t want to ‘foot the bill for somebody sucking off of the government teet.’ They profess that they’re for small government and argue that government spending is out of control, while at the same time not being terribly troubled by the fact that more than half of this country’s discretionary budget is siphoned directly into the war machine.

Many Democrats decry the jingoistic dogma exhibited by many Republicans, acting as if they were appalled by the incredible ease with which our country embarks on its imperialistic endeavors. They scream that we should stop invading nations and killing innocent people, while at the same time not being terribly troubled that the United States is the single largest supporter of the Israeli government’s lopsided aggression toward Palestinians.

All of them have completely bought into the economic and xenophobic propaganda that our government wields so cleverly, keeping us in constant fear of one another and convincing us that we have no choice but to place all of our future hopes in the wisdom of our federal government and its ability to successfully navigate the storm that it seeded on our behalf.

Americans, from top to bottom, have lost their identity. The elite forget that their fortunes were made through the toil of the working class, while the working class forget that the best way for one person to be successful is for everyone to contribute toward each other’s success.

Instead, we have become an ocean of isolated individualists who care little about the ongoing health and well-being of our culture. We cling to our possessions and stations, as if they are the only things of value that we can claim. We no longer protest when our leaders, landlords, and employers exploit us to increasing degrees. Instead, we prefer to avoid rocking the boat such that we might retain our titles as wage slaves.

We’d rather lock ourselves into our homes, watching mindless television with its fraudulent news and debilitating content that masquerades as entertainment. We spend countless hours on ‘social networks’ peering into the fiction that people create for themselves, while never actually ‘socializing.’ We barrage ourselves with pornography and violence that desensitize us to the world and devolve us as a species.

In the recent election, we heard a great many promises and a lot of assertions that change was somehow inevitable. To the degree that a Democratic President is outspending his Republican predecessor on things such as military aggression and corporate welfare, then yes, change has indeed occurred.

The change is that the two corporate dog and pony shows known as the Republican and Democratic parties have finally arrived at their point of convergence. They no longer retain any of the attributes that might have, at one point, made people believe they were two separate parties. Instead, they are a single corporate duopoly who are no longer accountable to their constituents, much less the American people as a whole.

If our new President truly wanted to help the American people, he could do so in a heartbeat… Among other things, he could pass a single payer health care bill, and he could do so for a fraction of the money that was spent in our multiple failed attempts at bailing out the banking and auto industries. So the question to ask is ‘why hasn’t he?’

Is it because he doesn’t know what he’s doing? Unlikely. Any person with the savvy to campaign for two years and win the White House on a platform as amorphous as Barack Obama’s is certainly capable of avoiding mistakes in policy and doing what’s best for the American people with little to no resistance from either side of the Congressional aisle.

No, if our President really wanted to change our country for the better, there would be very little standing in his way. The fact is that he has no intention of ‘change’ and never did. The powers that be, both government and corporate, don’t want change because change means that their reign over the political and economic interests of the American people may become weakened, and such a disruption threatens the foundations of their power.

Change is a risk they’re not willing to take on your behalf, and through targeted psychological warfare, they’ve made damn sure that you will fear and reject true change. True change is to dissolve the political bonds which have connected you to a system that no longer acts in your collective interest. It is saying ‘to hell’ with seemingly innocuous but increasing restrictions on your ability to protest and speak out against your government. It is revolution, and it is time.

I'm a Cop, I'll Shoot Low!

2009-04-14T19:38:00.000-07:00

So earlier today, I got this email from Phoenix District 6 Councilman Sal DiCiccio. Mind you, this is the first communication I've ever received from him. Instead of what I might have expected, a weekly notice about what kind of voting he's doing on our behalf, he thought it better to inform us that our Police Lieutenant may win a contest to 'play golf' with celebrities.

Even better, the Lieutenant won this honor by scribing the brilliant slogan "I'm a cop, I'll shoot low!" Ok, so we understand that it's a reference to golf, but are you fucking serious?! No, I don't want to send in votes for a guy who thinks that loosely throwing around the concept of shooting someone is acceptable, especially to win a round of golf with retired basketball players.

Oh, also, when you're drafting an email that you plan on sending out to thousands of people, you may want to check the spelling on the subject line. What does the word 'Conteset' mean? Most Mail clients will do you the favor of underlining something like that in red.

In a way, I'm almost glad that DiCiccio was appointed this position as a result of a vacated seat. I can't imagine how thoroughly embarrassed people might be knowing that they actually voted for this guy.

From: Phoenix Council District 6
Subject: USGA & GolfDigest U.S. Open Challenge Conteset
Date: April 14, 2009 11:39:43 AM GMT-07:00
To: Tom Bradford

Dear District 6 Residents and Friends,

I would like to let you know about an opportunity to support Phoenix's very own Police Lieutenant Larry Giebelhausen. He has made it from a pool of over 73,000 contestants to the final four in a contest put on by the United States Golf Association in conjunction with Golf Digest. Lt. Giebelhausen did this by writing a six word slogan associating his career with his love of golf.

The winner will get the chance to play with three well-known celebrities, including basketball legend Michael Jordan, during the US Open Celebrity Pro-Am that will be held at Bethpage State Park in New York this May. The goal for Lt. Giebelhausen is to break 100 for the round.

Lt. Giebelhausen made it to the final four with his slogan "I'm a cop, I'll shoot low!" Now all he needs are your votes of support. To vote for Lt. Giebelhausen you can go to GDOPENCONTEST.com. You can vote daily between now and May 1st, 2009. Details are also in the attached fliers.

As always, if you have any questions, please call my office at (602) 262-XXXX

The below two links are flyers about the contest.
phoenix.gov/d6images/d6golfdigestvote.jpg
phoenix.gov/d6images/d6golfcontest.jpg

Sincerely,
Sal DiCiccio
Councilman
Council District 6
City of Phoenix

My Political Philosophy As It Has Evolved

2009-04-02T15:16:00.000-07:00

I'm a Libertarian Socialist, which essentially means that I believe in Anarchism. For the uneducated who believe whatever propaganda our government and media put out, Anarchism isn't 'Oi Punk Neo Naziism,’ and Socialism doesn't automatically imply 'Communism.' It doesn't mean that I'm part of a rebel group that plans to revolt against the government, murdering all of its leaders, and it doesn't mean that I want Hugo Chavez to take over the United States.

Anarchism is a word derived from Greek that means 'without rulers,' and one of the overwhelming things that Anarchists have in common as that we don't believe that placing power in the hands of government or a hierarchical leadership structure is desirable. Instead, we adhere to the belief that direct democracy is preferable, and that individuals are perfectly capable of deciding policy and law amongst themselves.

And yes, there is an aspect of Socialism in my beliefs. Global Capitalism is a largely failed experiment. It was 'marketed' by its proponents that opening markets and removing barriers to free trade would somehow better the world in its entirety. In fact, this has had the opposite effect, and much as the gap widens between the rich and impoverished in this country, we are also seeing major economic disparity among many of the nations participating in the world economy, regardless of if they were dragged in voluntarily.

The capitalist world economy isn't about bettering the lives of everyone, it's about placing unlimited resources and power in the hands of a minuscule percentage of the world's population, none of whom truly live among 'us.' It is about exploitation, subjugation, and ultimately the enslavement of the world's people, whether they be producers or consumers.

You certainly don't better the lives of others by economically exploiting them, and you will eventually find that your life is also lessened as a result of consuming goods produced by our third world slaves. A healthy economy requires equilibrium, and the farther that balance is thrown off, whether through rampant consumption of sweat shop products or by forcing subsidized products down the throats of our 'trading partners,' the more unlikely it is we will be capable of recovering.

That said, a healthy economy can never be obtained through the practice of capitalism because capitalism, by its very nature, doesn't seek equilibrium. Profit implies that one person paid more for goods or services than they should have, and as a result, a subtle form of theft has occurred. Aggregate these profits from their lowest levels to the top of the class pyramid, and you'll see that there are a very small number of people who truly benefit from capitalism, while the rest of us serve only to perpetuate it, emboldening those in power to commit unspeakable acts against us.

This is no way for us to live. It forces us to become miserly, recluse, and self-consumed, wary of one another's intentions for the sake of protecting the useless property and what little money we've amassed. It flies against everything that it means to be human. After all, we are social animals, never meant to rely only on our self for protection and sustenance, nor should we.

The meaning of life can't be found in your flat-screen TV. You won't find anything but mind numbing idiocy on television, meant to sedate and distract you from the real things going on around you. Your favorite wrestler or NASCAR driver couldn't care less that you struggle every month just to pay the rent, nor should they, because they are several rungs above you on the capitalist class ladder.

So what are you going to do about it?

You Killed My Baby! You Bastard!

2009-02-25T08:56:00.000-08:00

Last year, a woman named Helga was rushed into a hospital emergency room. She had been in a terrible accident and was losing blood rapidly. To complicate matters, she was eight months pregnant and the life of her unborn child was seriously jeopardized.

Unfortunately for Helga, she had been brought to a hospital run by absolute morons, and staffed just as poorly. As she was transfered to the operating table, the doctors argued about how best to save her life. She was hemorrhaging badly and would probably die if she didn't receive a transfusion. So the doctors decided to prioritize. They'd perform a transfusion, and if that was successful, they'd try to stop her bleeding.

In order to perform a transfusion, the doctors would need a source of blood. There were no bags readily available, so they instead decided to tap Helga's femoral artery and feed it into her forearm. As the blood flowed, the doctors were surprised to find that the woman's condition was not improving. Time was of the essence and they knew that if the woman bled out, her baby wouldn't survive. What to do?

One of the less idiotic doctors had a great idea: "I know! Let's tap the unborn baby for its blood, that way the mother can survive to carry the baby to term!" The other doctors, being stupid as they were, thought this was a brilliant idea, and so they called in a gynecologist to perform the tapping.

The tube was removed from her femoral artery, which proceeded to bleed profusely, but because the doctors were desperate to save the woman's life as soon as possible, they decided to wait until after the transfusion to stop the additional bleeding.

The tapping of the baby was performed, and as the blood flowed from the unborn to its mother, the doctors watched in shock as the baby's vital signs began to wither away. Even more disappointing was the fact that the mother's condition was worsening.

Five minutes later, both the mother and her child were dead, and the doctors stood around scratching their heads wondering what the moral to this story was.

The way of life that Americans have created for ourselves is excessive and thoroughly idiotic. In order for our children to survive, we must sacrifice this generation. Our economy is telling us something: that we are not meant to sustain this way of life, and that if we don't make the necessary adjustments voluntarily, then the market conditions will do it for us. We must evolve or die, and we must stop putting our faith in the idiots in Washington, because their incompetence only makes our situation worse.

And Nero played the lyre as Rome burned

You've Been Obamad!

2009-01-29T15:51:00.001-08:00

So, remember a couple of weeks ago when your President got on TV and told the people of this country that his would be a government of transparency, and that he would not be appointing former lobbyists to posts unless those posts were unrelated to their lobbying activity?

Remember when he said that if someone leaves their post to become a lobbyist, they would be forbidden entirely from lobbying the administration? You do, don't you? This guy that you voted for, placed all your hopes in... The guy who promised you the world on a silver platter and to 'change' things in Washington, he said these things. You've been paying attention right?

Two days after making this announcement that caused you to 'ooh' and 'ahh', your President opted to appoint William Lynn as Deputy Secretary of Defense. William Lynn is a former lobbyist for Raytheon, one of the biggest defense contractors out there. Sounds like a conflict of interests, right?

Now, Obama is appointing Tim Geithner to the role of Treasury Security. Don't know who Tim is? Oh, well he's a former lobbyist for Goldman Sachs. You know, one of the biggest contributors to the Obama campaign and one of the biggest single beneficiaries from these economic stimulus packages that we seem to be giving out like free condoms. Wait, isn't that a conflict of interests, too?

But if you're trying to change cronyism and this corporate government that has all but destroyed our economy and our country as a result, then why would you appoint corporate used car salesmen into some of the most important posts in the country? The Treasury... that seems important. Call me crazy, but the Department of Defense does, too. Why are we hiring people whose former jobs entailed syphoning massive amounts of money from taxpayers into corporate coffers?

Oh, I know! Because you're retarded! You morons elected a guy who duped you. He said all the right things, and because you were desperate to wash the taste of George Bush out of your collective mouths, you bought it hook, line, and sinker. Turns out he's the same old corporate lackey you've come to know and loath, and he's at the helm of a country you have no choice but to sink and die in.

In case you missed this in the news, he has also publicly sided with the Bush administration where it concerns wire tapping of U.S. citizens without a warrant. So watch what you say, because fascism ain't just a word we conveniently throw around to vilify other nations anymore. Oh, and he'll be wasting another 800 billion of your children's futures soon under the guise of 'economic stimulus', and no doubt three to four trillion in the years to come.

So let's recap: he doesn't care about campaign promises, transparent government, your freedom as an American, or your children's futures, and all this within two weeks of taking office. I'll tell you I told you so now, to save me the trouble of having to do it later.

Because 11 is Just as Good as Any Other Number?

2008-12-12T09:24:00.001-08:00

Question: Why are photo enforcement cameras calibrated to flash at 11 miles per hour over the speed limit?

Answer: If you're speeding less than ten miles per hour over the speed limit, it's only a civil traffic violation and results in a less severe punishment than other driving offenses.

Comment: If the purpose of these cameras is to ensure the public safety, then they should be calibrated to flash when you're driving even one mile per hour over the speed limit. The fact is that eleven miles per hour has been chosen specifically to maximize profits for both the photo enforcement contractors and the local and state governments who benefit from the penalties.

Furthermore, if speeding is truly a danger to the public at large, then its enforcement should be one that is actively pursued by police officers such that the threat can be immediately quelled. To send a ticket several weeks later by mail does not eliminate the immediate danger to the public, and in fact, the existence of the camera presents more of a danger to the public than does any speeder caught in its lens. Photo enforcement cameras result in nothing but erratic driving before and after a group of drivers pass through the enforcement zone, increasing the risk of vehicular collisions far more so than the single speeder weaving his way through traffic.

The practice of photo enforcement is simply an extension of the prison industrial complex, an institution that has a firm hold on the governments of most southern states, including Arizona's. Much like the military industrial complex, corporations are colluding with our elected officials for purposes of extracting money out of your tax paying pockets under the guise of 'protecting your safety.'

What should enrage you even more is the fact that RedFlex, an Australian company, is the corporation that takes your photo and sends you the bill. So not only are we handing Arizona's tax dollars over to a foreign company, but we're also allowing that foreign entity to police our citizens. Does that seem constitutional to you?

It should come as no surprise that the vast majority of the tax dollars you pay to maintain our state's prison system go toward incarcerating non-violent offenders for inordinate amounts of time. Over 70% of our prison population are there for minor offenses such as marijuana, alcohol, or methamphetamine, when they could just as easily be compelled to enter a rehab program for significantly less cost to the state (and by proxy, you). Instead, they stay in prison, continue to 'miraculously' get their drugs while there, and are doomed to repeat their offenses. But it's not in the corporate interest to keep people out of prison, so continue to say goodbye to your money.

Isn't it a strange coincidence that as our economy has started to fail, the housing market has plummeted, and as Arizona finds itself with a major budgetary deficit, that we are now all of a sudden incredibly interested in photo enforcement? During the housing boom, most of the cities barely bothered to enforce traffic violations because most of their revenue was derived from property taxes. Now that a huge number of houses are in foreclosure and the banks don't bother to pay taxes on them, how are the cities to generate revenue?

Oh, I know! Photo Enforcement!

If you believe this is for your safety, then sir, you are utterly fooling yourself. There is no such thing as true security, nor should there be. Policing is an ineffective placebo, much like our Department of Homeland Security or one's faith in God. Our problem is that we are all sheep, fumbling through our lives and doing as we're told. We allow ourselves to be confused into actually believing that we should fear an amorphous foreign enemy who 'hates us for our freedom' rather than directing our attention at the body of elected officials, democrat or republican, of whom we truly should be suspicious.

Every time we become complacent in our safety, our government announces some new 'terror threat' so we don't forget that they're here 'to protect us'. I can't wait for 2013, when we will apparently be attacked with biological weapons. Is it a coincidence that 2013 is the year after the first Obama term in office? Perhaps that year was chosen so that we'd be keen to vote Republican if Obama doesn't completely crush terrorism in the next four years? After all, the Republicans have done a damn good job in the last eight years, haven't they?

Think about it, if photo enforcement were actually an effective way of keeping people from speeding, then companies like RedFlex will have voluntarily engaged in one of the worst business models possible, one that has a relatively low up-front cost, and absolutely no recurring revenue. The point of photo enforcement is to maintain a steady stream of continuous income for both the corporation and government, and to that end, companies like RedFlex are making a considerable amount of money. Meanwhile, you don't notice your freedoms slowly eroding away from beneath you.

What is wrong with you people?

How I'm Voting on Arizona's Ballot Propositions

2008-11-03T21:15:00.001-08:00

I'm voting NO across the board.

Why? Do some research and you'll find that, with the exception of 102 which is sponsored by bigots, all our state's ballot propositions are sponsored solely by the industries and corporations that they will ultimately benefit. None of them are actually grassroots efforts proposed by and for the benefit of the people of the state of Arizona. In fact, the three proposals that were grassroots efforts, the ones that could have actually benefited the state, couldn't collect enough signatures to make it onto the ballot.

Of course, corporations have plenty of money to hire people to go door to door, and so you can rest assured that most of the propositions on any of the ballots across the United States will benefit corporations directly or indirectly and not the people of their respective states.

Want my advice? Vote NO on every Arizona ballot proposition. You'll be doing the people of our state a favor.

Are You Proud of Yourselves?

2008-11-03T20:59:00.001-08:00

So tomorrow, you idiots are going to take one of the banking and credit card industries' best friends in the senate and vote him into an office that's a heartbeat away from the presidency, and you're going to do it because you were too lazy to bother looking into his voting record or the people with whom he rubs elbows. And you thought that all of the Republicans and Democrats voting for the bailout package was a bad idea? Wait until you see what they do when they're in office. What is wrong with you people?

Arguing Arizona Proposition 102

2008-10-31T10:14:00.001-07:00

One of the propositions on Arizona's ballot is probably not too dissimilar from propositions on many other states' ballots... It's one we seem to keep seeing every couple of years, and that is an attempt to enact laws or change a state's constitution to forbid gay marriage or to define marriage as between a man and a woman.

I'm not going to go into a speech as to why I think gay marriage should be legal. My reasoning for it is pretty straight-forward: If you're of age, and you love someone, you should be able to marry them. What I am going to do is shoot down some of the ridiculous arguments I hear from people defending the idea of gay marriage bans.

God created Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve
I hear this one every so often. Morons cling to this argument as tightly as Libertarians cling to their guns. If there were a God, then technically that God would have also created Steve, as Steve didn't just blink into existence spontaneously. Also, if God created you to be the mindless sheep that you are, completely fated to live your miserable existence, then why is it such a stretch of the imagination to believe that maybe God also created gay people?

You say that gay people choose to be that way... Who would choose to be the target of what appears to be the only remaining socially acceptable form of bigotry?

That said, if you're going to make this a religious argument, then you immediately lose. The First Amendment states "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." So if your arguments are predicated on the idea that marriage is somehow a religious mandate, then technically our government shouldn't even recognize your marriage.

My taxes will be raised if they're allowed to marry
Yes, if gay people are allowed to marry, then upwards of 10% of the population will be taking a standard deduction from their tax withholdings that they wouldn't have otherwise been capable. So maybe the deduction for marriage will be reduced by 10%? Are you saying that you don't want them to be capable of marrying because you're greedy? Are you fucking serious?

A traditional definition of marriage protects our future generation
So what you're saying is that marriage between a man and a woman results in children, and that insures that there are progeny to carry the torch of our ignorance? Let me clue you in on something. These facts should be obvious, but some of you need to have this shit pointed out:

Men and women are demonstrably capable of having lots of babies without being married. There are a LOT of single and teenage moms out there. Are you suggesting that marriage should be a precondition of childbirth? That somehow the body should KNOW that it's not allowed to become pregnant unless there's a ring on a woman's finger? Maybe there should be an IQ test to be a parent.

Homosexuals aren't going to enter into heterosexual marriages because gay marriage is illegal. If you want to force them to live a miserable existence in a marriage where they're not allowed to be who they are meant to be, then perhaps you're just wanting to project your own misery on them?

Heterosexuals aren't going to spontaneously become gay if the marriage ban is lifted. I know, this is a homophobe's greatest fear. Somehow if gay people are allowed to be gay, then they're going to hit on you, or maybe even rape your children. Or perhaps their gay pheromones will turn you gay if you get too close. Sorry, doesn't work that way. Pry your head out of your own ass.

Our world is overpopulated as it is... perhaps we don't need any more babies. In fact, we should probably start getting rid of some of the ones we already have. I see far too many idiot kids these days being led around on a leash by their idiots parents as if they were fucking dogs. There's even a kid-lojack for those parents who are too self-absorbed to be capable of watching their own child. So if the kid roams off, you can use a tracking device to find them. I shit you not.

You say that gay marriage would make a mockery of the institution itself. How are the vast majority of American marriages not mockeries of the institution of marriage? Heterosexual people change spouses more frequently than they change their automobiles. We as Americans have the third highest divorce rate in the world, and you're worried that homosexuals are going to blemish the institution any more than heterosexuals do already? You're living in a dream land.

Regarding Proposition 102
So for those of you who don't bother to read your state's laws, let me inform you of something: The state of Arizona already has a gay marriage ban. Yes, it's true. Gay marriage is banned by the state of Arizona's Revised Statutes. So in effect, all that Proposition 102 does is takes the language that's in the statutes and promotes it to be part of the Arizona Constitution.

So you need to ask yourself, do you hate the idea of gay marriage so much that you want to take a law that is already in force and promote it to our state's constitution just for the sake of making a huge bigoted statement to homosexuals? Are you that much of a self-serving homophobic piece of shit that you need to change a document that's not meant to change on a whim?

Did you know that Arizona allows you to marry your first cousin if you're over 65? So you can engage in incest, but you can't marry someone who's in no way related if they happen to be of the same gender. As an Arizona voter, are you telling people that you're okay with cousin-fucking, but only if the cousins are male and female?

What is wrong with you people?

Choosing the Method of your own Execution

2008-10-23T13:31:00.001-07:00

Your executioner stands before you. In front of him is a table, and on that table are three options. The first option is a fully loaded gun, the second is a baseball bat, and the third a six-sided die. You are given the opportunity to choose one from among the three options.

If you choose the gun, the executioner will shoot you in the head until you expire, possibly sparing you prolonged suffering. If you choose the baseball bat, the executioner will begin to beat you over the head, not stopping until you've either died or four years have elapsed. If you choose the die, you are allowed to roll it once, and if 'one' is the resulting side, then you will be free to go. Any other number rolled will result in the executioner choosing one of the other options for you.

Which option will you choose?

In a game of life or death, most reasonable people will conclude that, while the chances of walking away without harm are remote, one must choose to roll the die, as the other two options ultimately result in death, one more horrible than the other. Only a miracle could spare you death after having been shot in the head several times or bludgeoned over a period of four years, and everyone knows that miracles don't exist. On the other hand, chance, a one out of six probability in this case, could save your life.

You've chosen to roll the die, haven't you?

Then why are are you voting for either of the two major parties?

To all of those people who tell me that you're going to vote for McCain because Obama will be worse for this country, or vice versa, you're essentially telling me that you prescribe to the concept of choosing the lesser of two evils, and I can only ask you why? Why will you choose the swift death over the torturous one, completely ignoring the chance to survive the whole ordeal?

You're also telling me, in effect, that the concept of democracy means absolutely nothing to you. Democracy, where every person's vote counts equally and all options and ideas are presented for your consideration. Democracy, where your ideas actually mean something and you can generally be assured that at least one other person shares those thoughts. Democracy, where you elect someone to represent you, and they ACTUALLY represent you. When did this concept stop being valuable to you?

You're saying that you're satisfied with corporate control over your options, ideas, politicians, and by proxy, your entire life, and that all you want to do is get through your day without having to take a chance on your own destiny. Why are you choosing the gun? Why are you choosing the baseball bat? What happened to you? When did you stop being the greatest example of darwinian progress and instead become one of the ideologically conforming sheep? When will you take back your dignity? When will you take back your country?

You can't do it when you're dead.

I refuse to choose the method of my own execution. If must die by my enemy's hand, then my enemy will decide how to dispatch me. I won't give him the pleasure of watching me beg for mercy, and I certainly won't go out without trying to take him with me. How will you face death?

Toward a Viable Third Party

2008-10-21T14:33:00.000-07:00

If the American voter has learned anything over the history of two-party politics, it should be that if you belong to a particular party and you prove that you're incapable of not voting for your party, then that party has absolutely no incentive to listen to you. This concept of blindly voting for your registered party regardless of the candidate that they put forward is tearing away at the fundamentals of our democracy.

Here's a little tidbit. Last year I decided that I'd like to run for the Arizona State Legislature... I went to my party's "Election School" which is basically a large gathering where party officials present speakers who will instruct you on the finer details of running a campaign. Later in the event, it was time for me to talk to one of the party committee members to discuss my potential nomination and how to go about it.

I introduced myself, and he asked me which district I planned to run in. Upon answering, the first words out of this guy's mouth, I shit you not, were that I looked too young to be a viable candidate, and that the older voters in the district, comprising the bulk of the electorate, would prefer to vote for an older candidate. Mind you, I hadn't said more than ten words to this guy, and I certainly hadn't shared with him any of my platform, yet he summarily decided that I would be an ineffective candidate. The fact is... this is all too common among two-party politics in this country.

I walked away, sickened by the event that had just occurred and completely disillusioned by my party. I thought these were the people who 'cared' and it just turns out that they're the people who are more concerned with winning elections based on demographics than they are about ideas and principles.

Do you think the parties choose candidates based on their platforms and ideas? Do you honestly believe that Barack Obama's platform is any better than that of Hilary Clinton or Mike Gravel? Isn't it obvious that Ron Paul and Mike Huckabee's politics were far better than John McCain's?

So then, why are these two people running for president? Why, indeed. Well, the simple answer is that it was pre-ordained. The choice was made long before you voted in the primary, and the theater that is party politics served as great entertainment on the path to a decision that was essentially not yours to make. These men won the primaries, not because you wanted them to, but because their parties decided long ago that they would win.

I don't know if anyone has already done this, I'm too busy to check, but I'd like to propose a new third party. This party espouses absolutely no political ideologies, but instead has a very specific platform with a simple set of rules:

You are a free and independent thinker; your thoughts are your own
You must be willing to admit when you're wrong and change your mind accordingly
You are driven by pragmatism and the greater good rather than the wants of the few
You represent the American people as a whole and your constituents as a subset
You vow that you will work with members of any and all parties equitably and without prejudice
You will campaign on your own platform and represent your own beliefs with candor
You will remain in an office for no more than two terms, regardless of its term limits

So there it is... It's more of an oath than it is a political platform, but these are the things that Americans are sorely missing from their politicians. Even if your ideals lean toward libertarian, democratic, republican, or socialist, you can become a member of this third party and 'know' that you're entering politics for the right reasons.

No more career politicians, no more flip-floppers, no more party hard-liners, no more mindless automatons who are incapable of crossing the aisle for fear of not being reelected. And most importantly, no more running a campaign that is predicated on little more than the bullshit that your party expects of you. That all must end.

Throwing Away Your Vote

2008-10-21T12:04:00.001-07:00

So, upon reading this blog, a few of my friends have commented about my suggestion that we just vote for random candidates in the upcoming election. They asked me the typical question that Democrats or Republicans ask of people who vote for 3rd party candidates, that question being "But don't you feel like you're throwing away your vote?" Here is my response... No, I don't. In fact I believe that you're throwing away your vote when you cast your ballot for one of the two major parties.

Let's face it, for the past century, a Republican or Democrat winning the presidency has been a foregone conclusion, and at this point neither party represents its original ideals, nor do they give a shit about the American people. They are effectively a single party, brought to you by the corporations and lobbyists with the deepest pockets and fanciest private jets. Nevermind John McCain, we already know who he sleeps with, let's talk about your golden-boy Democratic candidate.

Barack Obama is a great guy, right? He cares about you, doesn't he? He's about fairness and doing what's right, isn't he? No, sorry, those are all incorrect assumptions. Don't believe me? Ask Alice Palmer. Wait, you don't know who Alice Palmer is? Well, let me tell you.

Alice Palmer was an Illinois state senator who, for years, had been a beloved activist for Chicago's black community. In 1995, Barack Obama was a nobody on the Chicago political scene, and Alice was a very important somebody whose incumbency consistently remained unopposed within her party. That year, she was afforded the opportunity to run for a vacated higher office in a special election. Barack Obama assisted her in doing so, and would run for her vacated spot if she should win the office, promising to withdraw his name should she not win the special election.

All well and good, but unfortunately Alice didn't win the special election, so she went about gathering signatures to be reelected to her existing seat. She asked Obama to honor his promise of withdrawing, and Barack Obama refused to do so. Worse, rather than run against Alice Palmer in a fair election, Barack Obama decided to use the same voter registration laws that he had leveraged to benefit Alice's special election campaign in order to completely invalidate her reelection bid. He also had the campaigns of two others invalidated on similar grounds, allowing himself to run unopposed in that election.

Sound like a great guy to you? But wait, there's more!

Oh, hey, gay people, do you think Barack Obama will fight for you any more than McCain will? He's a Democrat, so he's obviously in your corner, isn't he? Wrong again. In a recent interview with Jake Tapper, Obama was asked about the subject of gay marriage, and this was his response:

You know, I believe that marriage is between a man and a woman, but I also think that same-sex partners should be able to visit each other in hospitals, they should be able to transfer property, they should be able to get the same federal rights and benefits that are conferred onto married couples.

And so, you know, as president, my job is to make sure that the federal government is not discriminating and that we maintain the federal government's historic role in not meddling with what states are doing when it comes to marriage law. That's what I'll do as president.

So he believes that marriage is between a man and a woman, but he doesn't believe that the federal government should be discriminating? It seems to me that to state unequivocally that you believe marriage is between a man and a woman is pretty fucking discriminating.

For the longest time, there were people in our federal government that thought they shouldn't meddle in the affairs of the southern states' discrimination of blacks, nor were they interested in enforcing the right of women to vote or have access to safe abortions, and so a statement like this strikes me as both incredibly hypocritical and thoroughly suspect.

In fact, this has been Obama's opinion for quite some time. You've just been so blinded by the fact that he's not John McCain or Sarah Palin that you assumed that he wasn't opposed to your freedom. So let's face it, if you think he's going to do anything for you as president, and that he's NOT in the pockets of religious lobbies, then you're out of your fucking mind.

Do his actions and stances sound like a nice guy who genuinely cares about people regardless of their race, gender, economic background or sexual orientation? Or does he sound like a back-stabbing cocksucker who desires power more than he honors loyalty, promises, and peoples' god-given rights? The fact is that Barack Obama isn't running for President because he cares about you, it's because he cares about power and his own position in the world... To simplify things, he's a typical politician, no better than John McCain.

Oh, and by the way, if you think that Democrats hands are clean of corporate and lobbyist dollars, and that Barack Obama is adamantly opposed to such practices, then you're fooling yourselves even more. Over 141 corporations contributed a total of $50 million to pay the costs of hosting the Democratic National Convention. ALL of these corporations have some sort of agendas to push on lawmakers, and the parties don't even have to disclose the source of such contributions for months after the convention, well after the elections have taken place.

So when Obama promised that his campaign would be free of such influences, he lied. When he told you that his message is change, he lied. How is being in the pockets of corporations a change from what we've experienced in the past eight years? He's lied directly to every American who was thinking about putting their faith in the words of a man who pretends to be your shining savior, but isn't anything but a corrupt opportunist.

The Republican and Democratic parties are bought and paid for by corporations and special interests. To vote for them and perpetuate their corruption of the American way of life IS throwing away your vote. The only way to save our country is to vote these two parties completely out of power.

I think I'll vote for Ralph Nader. Nader has a fifty year track record of both caring about people and being thoroughly incorruptible. Obama, on the other hand, has only a twelve year history of backstabbing, double-talking, flip-flopping and abstaining from having any sort of opinion whatsoever. The last two of those years have been spent campaigning for the presidency rather than actually tending to the affairs of the American people. That is not leadership, people.

But What Are We To Do!?

2008-10-14T18:15:00.001-07:00

Before the American revolution, regional politics were mostly controlled by the rich, or 'gentlemen' as they would call themselves. In their eyes, commoners (that would be you and me) were neither intelligent nor interested enough to participate in politics. In fact, this was evidenced by many a town meeting where mob rule instead of rational thought became the norm rather than the exception. At that time, there was definitely a distinction between the classes in this country, and this distinction was generally (albeit reluctantly) accepted as the way things were.

It was from among 'some' of the founding fathers that the concept of self government was proposed. I say some because a fair number of them would have preferred that we continued to be ruled by kings or presidents for life. This idea that a man, be he a baker, a tailor, or part of some Virginia aristocracy, had an equal voice in government, was a very unique proposition among the world's governments at the time. Of course, when I say equal, I obviously mean with the exception of women, indentured servants, and slaves.

Benjamin Franklin, in his statement approving of the Constitution said:

In these sentiments, Sir, I agree to this Constitution with all its faults, if they are such; because I think a general Government necessary for us, and there is no form of Government but what may be a blessing to the people if well administered, and believe farther that this is likely to be well administered for a course of years, and can only end in Despotism, as other forms have done before it, when the people shall become so corrupted as to need despotic Government, being incapable of any other.

So basically one of the most intelligent men in the world at the time was predicting that the American people were ultimately incapable of governing themselves with such lax restrictions, lending credence to the notion that democracy, even representative democracy, is eventually doomed to fail because the mob accepts no personal responsibility for the decisions that they make as a people. Considering what's happened to our country over the past century or so, I'd say he was absolutely correct.

Who's at fault for our current woes as a country? Is it George Bush's fault that we're in a never-ending war in Iraq? Is it his fiscal policies that have caused our economic problems? Many have pointed out that the loosening of lending restrictions were actually signed into law by Bill Clinton. Of course, the Democratic party will never admit to having a hand in our current economic problems, but the simple fact is that they don't have to admit to it because it's not their fault.

The fault, for every single problem in our country, is directly or indirectly attributable to both the American voter and the American non-voter. It is you who exercise the power to destroy yourselves. You had the power to reject the 16th Amendment, yet you didn't. You had the power to repeal the Federal Reserve Act, yet you didn't. You could have pressured congress into voting down the War Powers Resolution Act, but neglected to. Quite simply, every long-term policy that remains non-repealed despite the fact that the majority of Americans find it unacceptable is a testament to our idiocy as a collective people.

I have absolutely no sympathy for us.

What's Wrong with America? You!

2008-10-08T12:46:00.000-07:00

Are you offended? Well, fuck you. You're what's wrong with America. The fact that you were offended by the title of this post without even reading its content is the fundamental reason why our country is irretrievably broken. Americans are reactive creatures who respond only to negativity because they're too lazy to be proactive about maintaining an environment that inhibits the potential for such negative stimuli.

I'm sorry, was that confusing for you? Let me put it a different way. You're more than happy to take a free ride when things are great, but as soon as things get fucked up, you go insane because the free ride is over. We see it every eight to twelve years when you decide that, because you weren't getting free healthcare AND tax breaks, the party that was previously running the country wasn't doing a good enough job and they now need to be replaced. Did you ever stop to think that maybe the problem isn't in the parties themselves, but in you and your complacent apathy, you selfish fuck?

Here's the thing, there's nothing wrong with the fundamental policies of either the Democratic or Republican parties. Yes, they are almost diametrically opposed as far as their approaches to governing, but that doesn't mean that either group is wrong. In fact, if either one of the parties ceased to exist and there was only one party running the show, our government would probably run rather smoothly.

The problem occurs when you have two opposite philosophies constantly in a state of push-back against each other, resulting in a stalemate that benefits absolutely nobody. Perpetuating the problem is you the voter who constantly flip-flops on choosing a side in your typically American reactive manner, not even bothering to find out if you have any other options because you're too lazy to do the research.

Do you know if the candidate you're voting for actually agrees with your general opinions about how government should be operated? DO YOU EVEN HAVE OPINIONS ABOUT SUCH THINGS? Or do you only care about whether or not a candidate is pro-life, as if that's going to cure our nation's ills, you myopic retard.

Are Barack Obama and John McCain the guys you're voting for because you agree with their politics, or is because one's not the other guy? Did you even know there are third party candidates who are every bit as qualified to run the country as these guys? Hell, some of them are far MORE qualified, and yet they're not in the spotlight because Americans are too fucking lazy to think for themselves and find out who else is on the playing field.

Do you want to fix your country? Do you REALLY want to fix your country? Here's how you do it: This upcoming presidential election, don't vote for Republicans OR Democrats. Instead, randomly choose any third party candidate who is on your ballot. It doesn't matter if they're libertarians, socialists, green party, or that guy in France who was running with his dog, just pick one and don't be concerned with whether or not the candidate is insane or corrupt, because chances are they're no more insane or corrupt than the two major party candidates.

Does that seem crazy to you? To me, crazy is letting a guy who's about to die or a guy who is still only driving with a learner's permit to take the wheel of a semi, which is exactly what you're doing if you vote for McCain or Obama. It's no more crazy than contributing to the fact that your government is in a constant state of gridlock as a result of you being far more concerned that you're going to miss "Smackdown" than you are with the goings-on of your country.

Honestly, will choosing a third party candidate, even randomly, find us worse off than we are at this moment? Impossible! Furthermore, what you accomplish by voting in such a way is to loosen the stranglehold that these two parties have over our country. They're divisive, they've been tearing us apart as a people for over seven generations, and the madness has to stop if we ever want to return to any semblance of a democracy.

So seriously, randomly choose third party candidates this upcoming election. By creating a heterogenous mix of representatives and political philosophies in government, you actually force people to start listening to and working with one another because they no longer have the full weight of their party pushing down on them. In the end, even if a socialist became our president and the congress were filled with a bunch of green party, libertarian, and independent representatives, we'd be far better off than we are now.

Understand though, that once you've weeded out the lock that the two major parties have on us, we'll actually have to start voting based on our own ideas and morals rather than being a sheepish conformist. Do you think you're capable of actually thinking for yourself?