With so many teachers out there on social media, it was impossible to do this hearing quietly. Alexander played by old-school media rules, which worked to an extent. But, I saw clips of the confirmation hearing all over my Facebook wall. It was on The Daily Show. It’s out there for everyone to see whenever they want to see it. Alexander’s part in this is glossed over in all of those things, so he’ll suffer only from lack of credibility among his peers. But, DeVos will never be taken seriously … if that matters at all these days.

Happy New Year, Billy!

I don’t have a New Year’s Resolution this year. But, I am compelled to follow the mainstream media news for the first time in my life. I’m reading it daily to see how they treat the President-elect and his party in power. That will give me clues as to how far down the road to fascism we will venture.

bnw wrote:

SPLC is a hate group that focuses on other groups hatred but not their own. The veracity of their reports defines Fake News since so many high profile instances are later proven to be BS. The report is a sad pitch for money but the previously gullible have awakened to the reality that the MSM and the SPLC have been lying to them for many years and the donations are drying up from mom and pop. But relax, Soros will still pick up the slack.

Provide some proof of your claims that the SPLC is a hate group. That sounds like something a good old-fashioned Aryan racist would say because the SPLC is the only organization willing to take on bigots these days. The federal government stopped after 911.

I exercise regularly. Didn’t always. But, I had to lose weight. I’ve lost more than a quarter of my body weight (60 pounds). I did it because of my cholesterol. And, I just kept at it. I’ve done lots of different stuff, but mostly I’m doing yoga and resistance training … a lot of pushups, mostly. Strength training is great. I don’t do a lot of squats, tough, because my knees are creaky, too. I’m 46 years old, btw. But, I’m in way better shape than I’ve been since my 20s.

I had to build my way up, but I do lots of pushups. I can do 54 at one time. But, mostly I do different kinds of pushups, and several series of them. This morning, I figure that I did between 300 and 400 pushups plus other exercises with a resistance band. Then, I put on some ankle weights, laid down and did some leg exercises. That was over an hour’s worth of work.

But, I can only do that type of workout about twice a week. I do a lot of yoga because it’s great for flexibility and adds strength. Check out this one lady, Yoga with Adrienne, on Youtube. I follow her yoga workouts, and some of them can be really challenging. A 21-minute core workout will tear you up. Or, you can go with a lighter workout that helps mostly with flexibility. Or, anywhere in between.

The great thing about these workouts is that I don’t have to go anywhere to do them, so there’s no excuse not to do them.

They cut the trees into segments that I just need to split for firewood. The guy we hired suggested waiting a year to split them so that the wood is dry.

Imagine an alternative universe where Stan Kroenke worked with St. Louis civic leaders to keep the Rams in St. Louis. Do you think the Rams would have moved to Los Angeles?

One thing I will never accept is that SK decided to move because St. Louis couldn’t support the Rams. If this team wasn’t historically bad, I doubt there would have ever been an issue with attendance or a perceived lack of support.

If I had to choose to be someone else, I think it would be Taibbi.

I need to read him religiously.

This was a memorable scene. Tyrion rambles on with his brother as he awaits his fate via Trial by Combat, philosophizing about the absurdity of life. He goes on about the moron relative who crushes beetles. Tyrion needed to find out why he did it.

“Turns out too much has been written about great men, and not nearly enough about morons.”

Is Tyrion a beetle? He’s certainly seen many “beetles” crushed by the unthinking soldiers of the powerful.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HpYxta98c5w&feature=youtu.be

• This reply was modified 7 years, 8 months ago by Dak.

The Bush years are a reminder that a small cabal of nut jobs can gain support for all kinds of fucked-up stuff if people are scared. And, these same nut jobs are scared of what Trump might do?

I really think now it’s just right-wing elites are afraid that they can’t trust Trump to do their bidding for the richest 0.1%. It’s a philosophical disagreement on just how to control the world. And, they just can’t predict how Trump will act. If Trump met with these elites and gained their trust, they wouldn’t care what kind of hellfire his presidency would rain down on the rest of the world, just as long as he can convince the overlords that they’ll be shielded from the fallout.

I saw The Big Short, Billy. Watched it with my wife. It was good. My wife will watch mainstream entertainment about an aspect of the corporatist system — a symptom, if you will. Can’t get her interested in more in-depth views about the whole system from people like Chomsky, the late Howard Zinn, Naomi Klein, etc. If I had, she might have voted for Sanders instead of Hillary.

Zooey, that’s a good point about the only Wall Street criminal going to prison was the guy who went after the people with money. Makes sense. Who cares about the unwashed herd? Do you know that a St. Louis Cardinals front office exec got nearly 4 years in prison for “hacking” into the Houston Astros’ scouting information? (I think he just guessed the password used by the guy who used to work for the Cardinals.) He was busted on the same laws that target corporations from stealing information from other corporations. He probably got off easy.

One other thing that I hadn’t thought much about until watching Requiem. The term “anti-American” referring to someone who opposes state power. Chomsky says that’s a unique term here, because no other free nation uses that type of phrasing to insult someone. He said that Italians would laugh at you if you called them “anti-Italian” for standing up to the state. And, elsewhere, the same thing, that it would be considered a joke. But, in totalitarian states, using that term, such as “anti-Soviet” is a big deal and brands you as a traitor to the state. Thought that was interesting.

Watched “Requiem for the American Dream” on Netflix last night, which is basically a little more of an hour of Chomsky breaking down how the American corporate elites work to control the political system and how it’s bad for democracy and society in general. My son was watching it with me when my wife told him he could go back on his phone if he wanted to. you know, to screw around with apps. He did just that. He missed the part about Manufacturing Consent and how the advertising agency has done a really good job at turning us into consumers more interested in striving for the next purchase than doing things like fighting for democracy.

At the end of the show, both of my kids came in and watched a little bit. My daughter asked me what it was about. And, I spent the next 15 minutes explaining some of Chomsky’s views and answering their questions. At ages 12 and 15, they’re fully aware that their generation may face most of their life dealing with environmental disasters. I explained how global warming is something we’ve known about since I was a kid, and did nothing about it because the people with money were busy thinking about making more money. It’s their generation that will have to change things, and at the same time, it may be too late for their generation.

At one point, I pointed out how it’s kind of ridiculous that we are a very wealthy nation, but have so many poor people suffering, and we do very little to help the poor, and instead blame them for their plight while the mega-wealthy get richer. My son was surprised that we are that wealthy, because we’re in debt as a nation. I told him, no, our rich people are very wealthy. And, pointed out how fucked up it is that our wealthiest sectors get a government bailout when they screw things up. As Chomsky says, this isn’t a capitalist state. In a capitalist state, big business doesn’t get government handouts.

It’s interesting how much kids can understand about this stuff if you explain it to them.

TSRF wrote:

Yeah.

It’s one thing to refute the science, like they do for global warming for instance, it is totally another thing to deny the data to the scientists trying to study an issue.

IMHO: NRA = Evil

The NRA’s choke-hold is a byproduct of a system that allows this type of special interest influence. Of course the gun lobby is going to promote its own goals. But, they wouldn’t be so successful if they weren’t allowed so much ability to influence elections. The elected officials who accept their support should look at what their constituents believe, and most Second Amendment supporters also support common sense gun control regulations. This is the type of thing that leads to historically low opinions of our Congress. No healthy political system should yield such low approval rates for our representatives. There’s such a disconnect from politics and everyday people that it leads to disillusionment in government. And, the worst part: Those same people who are causing that problem then say, well, you can’t trust government. You might as well get government out of the way and forget about all of those pesky regulations.

Citizens United has to change, first thing, and then we need a sweeping change in campaign finance rules. Reforming this system will take time. The Supreme Court has to change to overturn Citizens United. And, progressives need to win Democratic primaries and beat Republicans in order to get enough votes for wide-ranging campaign finance reform.

• This reply was modified 7 years, 8 months ago by Dak.

I feel the same, Zooey. Until there are more truly progressive Dems, this party doesn’t even think in these terms. You mentioned LBJ. With this Democratic party, would they have even passed the Civil Rights Act, knowing it would have cost them the South even if it was the morally right thing to do?

Cool story. i’m more and more interested in bacteria. I’m right now attempting my first home brewed beer. The interaction of yeast with sugars is what creates the alcohol (fermentation), but different yeasts also create different outcomes in how the beer will taste. And, the key is to avoid other bacteria from getting into the brew, because it will compete with the yeast and create something other than the beer you were trying to create.Interesting stuff.

Until Trump’s supporters take Trump to task for not releasing his tax returns, I don’t want to hear their thoughts on other candidate’s private purchases. Sanders was right to throw his support behind Hillary, simply because Donald Trump is not fit to rule this country. You can’t bankrupt yourself out of trouble when you’re President.