Same As It Ever Was, Same As It Ever Was

I turned on MSNBC yesterday afternoon for a moment, before I headed out to go do yoga at the beach, and saw Steve Kornacki present the two graphics below:

These two survey poll results make it extremely clear, how American progressives are optimistic, improving, and growing, while 1950s focused American conservatives long to go back in time (member berries),
- before civil rights legislation passed and became enforceable in all 50 states
- before the EPA existed,
- before Germany and Japan rose up from the rubble of WWII to become economic rivals,
- back to the cold war & fear of Armageddon,
- back when LGBT citizens were treated as outcasts by 99% of Umerikuns,
- back when cigarette smoking in public was ubiquitous,
- back when drunk driving was a sport instead of a felony
- back to when you could fire a woman for becoming pregnant if she was not married
- back to when housing & finance discrimination against minorities was standard practice
- back to when Ike deported a million Latin Americans in "Operation Wet Back"
- back to when there were poll taxes and literacy tests to be able to vote

... yeah, a "simpler era" ... for simple minded people, who abhor change, and who are fiercely clinging to their guns & religion & 'majority white paradigm'.  Those who want all the benefits of living in a free Democracy, while having smooth roads to drive on, fast internet to access, reliable electric power, clean water to drink, a clean ocean to swim in, a bucolic landscape in which to hunt, free land on which to graze their cattle, and a strong army to defend them, without paying any taxes or having any convenience to their own personal preferences and desires.

Count me in the 70% of "it's getting better".  I'm still not a huge fan of any of the 4 candidates running for PUSA, but I will be voting for the woman most likely to defeat and contain the threat of a megalomaniacal narcissist who constantly lies & fabricates his own reality from taking over the Executive branch of our government.  The fossils of the 72% will eventually go extinct.

PUSA Lump Cover

This has been out for 10 months..  and I just heard it today.  Too damn funny!


This is really quite genius!  =)

DDF and I saw The Presidents of the United States back in Indianapolis in the mid 90s, at The Egyptian Room...  awesome show.

Complete Meltdown & Sedition

Last night, as I was grilling, and then eating my grass fed, hormone free rib eye with wild chanterelles (found at COSTCO for a reasonable price) I tried to watch the 3rd, and final US Presidential "debate".   I found myself growing increasingly upset by the lies and denials that the orange reality TV show host kept spewing, so I turned to baseball and enjoyed watching my favorite, the under-dog Cubs trounce the LA Dodgers in Los Angeles.

Then the DVR reminded me that South Park was about to record, and the channel needed to automatically change (I have a 2-at-a-time DVR, not one of the new fancy 8-at-a-time recorders).  Matt & Trey once again beautifully captured the essence of current events in America with their portrayal of Candidate Garrison doing his darnedest to lose and get out of the US Presidential race.  The "meltdown" that Garrison had, complete with orange toner running off him in the rain, was much funnier than the meltdown Drumpf (his real name... own it, don't try to hide it Donald) had on national television last night.

When Fox "News" anchor Chris Wallace tried to get Drumpf to back down on his statement that he would not accept a loss on November 8th and that he would continue to stoke the seditious flames of violent insurrection, with Chris's "But sir..." soft ball question reiterated in the most basic way possible that everyone in America could understand, Drumpf, Putin's puppet, doubled down on his "we'll see, I'll keep you in suspense."

While Drumpf kept talking about how he believes Hillary Clinton should go to federal prison "for 5 years", what he doesn't realize is that inciting Sedition is a violation of federal law, punishable by 20 years in prison; link here: 18 US Code Chapter 115, sections 2381 -  2385  (Thanks Cornell Law School!)   And the more he keeps encouraging the worst of Umerika to intimidate polling places in inner cities (also a federal crime), and reject the free and fair election results in all 50 states, the more he's paving a straight path towards federal prison for himself and his surrogates who repeat his dangerous and violent call to arms.

The Meltdown with Jonah and Kumail is often very funny.  Drumpf's meltdown is really sad and pathetic.  The United States needs a viable 2 party (or three...  someday...?) system to function correctly.  Drumpf's nilhilistic attempt at destroying everything shows just what a sad little boy he really is.

If you don't think last night's "debate" was a meltdown, read the 'extremely liberal' links here:
National Catholic Reporter:  https://www.ncronline.org/blogs/distinctly-catholic/trumps-meltdown-third-debate
WSJ: http://www.wsj.com/articles/presidential-debate-after-a-sedate-start-donald-trump-takes-the-bait-1476932103
National Review:  http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/441240/trump-owns-his-trumpiness

Angels' Landing

In the middle of September, Dr Desert Flower and I drove our FWD station wagon up to Zion National Park in the SW corner of Utah.  The last time we were there in 2011, we did not have the time or the right foot wear to climb up to Angels' Landing, which is a severely difficult climb that able bodied hikers need to be in good shape to successfully assault.

We were well hydrated, wore layers, and headed up at 8am.  We've learned we should have gone much earlier - there was a full moon and we could have gone before dawn - and avoided the crowds and traffic jams once we reached the chain climbs, where single file in one direction only was required.

Here are a few of the pictures I took on the way up and back down.  They don't do justice to the sheer magnificence of looking down upon the verdant valley below with the stark, sheer vertical drops and steep canyon walls.

I'm delighted that we're in good enough shape to make it up and back down, 1800 feet elevation change, and not be too sore to enjoy the rest of our vacation to Grand Teton and Yellowstone the following week.

Don't Eat People Food!

At Zion National Park last month, Dr Desert Flower pointed out this sign on the shuttle bus that takes people up and down the canyon.  Very funny, and remarkably accurate!

When I see common squirrels at the Carlsbad beach here in California, they're also chubby, puffy, not-lean mammals, addicted to hand-outs from humans.  Fed by tourists, they live high on the junk-food-chain.

Doug Applegate Over Slimey Issa Anyday

I came home from donating blood today, to find this smear campaign against Colonel Doug Applegate from the California Republican Party in my mail box.  The former Colonel is running against THIS CAR PROTECTED BY VIPER Darryl Issa, king of meaningless subpoenas as the chair of the United States House of Representatives Judiciary Committee.  I unfortunately moved from the reddest of red counties in California (Orange) to North San Diego County where Issa is the entrenched Congressman.

If I was an ignorant, apathetic, or uninformed voter, I Would Have been ALARMED by this inflammatory mailer... look at all the horrible things Applegate wants to do to the booming California economy and tax paying citizens!?!?! How terrible!!  (an uninformed Independent voter might say) Then, I read the fine print:  "Sources: US Energy Information Administration (EIA); Progressive Democrats of American candidate questionnaire"

OK, so the California Republican Party is scared that Issa might lose, they're cranking up ads and mailers to try and smear Applegate, and they're using "Progressive Democrats of America" (PDA) to try and facilitate this?  It sparked my curiosity, so I started google searching it... turns out, PDA is outraged that their words are being twisted, and they're punching back.  I found a link (here)
http://pda.nationbuilder.com/applegate_vs_issa  that explains how the CA Republicans are using EIA future projections and PDA Democratic endorsements to double down on stupid, clinging tightly to fossil fuels, the Republican status quo, and ignoring climate change the inexorable progression of time.  No, Douglas Applegate is not "WRONG for our Economy"... unless the "our" there denotes Republican dinosaurs who deny facts of peer reviewed science, and who want to go back to the 1950s America that they loved so much (except for those 90% taxes on the upper income brackets that were in place during Ike's administration).

Applegates ubiquitous TV ads are factual, and damning of Issa.  The entrenched Congressman Did increase his personal wealth to multi-millionaire status while in Congress, and is cozy with Donald Drumpf.  I hope Drumpf's millstone sinks Issa into the depths of the Pacific Ocean off the continental shelf, 3 miles off-shore of Carlsbad.

Play fair Republicans.  Own your personae, don't try to denigrate your opponent.  You're the party of rich & selfish guys who want to keep the status quo, or go backwards in time, without a T.A.R.D.I.S.  In California, which added 300,000 people, and which has lower unemployment than the rest of the country, where there are 75 craft breweries within a 30 mile radius of my home, where well regulated business are prospering, and where one can find more electric vehicles on the roads than in any other state in the U.S., I really don't want to go back in time.  I prefer to progress forward.  Thanks.