Walkabout Thoughts #14

My thoughts, while walking off long Covid and listening to podcasts...a blog designed and meant to be freely associating, on the run, and not perfectly edited:

 
Weather for the day… 41° and overcast.

Podcast for the day is Rachel Maddow‘s excellent, "Ultra" podcast, episode five

Instagram post for the day

A woman on the "Ultra" podcast asked a question I've wondered about myself. What’s the difference between hatred and detesting? For myself without realizing it, I’ve seen it as hatred being an emotional, loss of control. While detesting is more cerebral. My grandmother told me when I was a child never to hate. Period. She was an amazing person, and an old country, Slovak Catholic. Such as I was raised, until about ninth grade. My point in bringing this up is, I’ve seen too many on the far right hate Nancy Pelosi. Hate Democrats. Hate "Libtards". I find the far right in their attempt to destroy our democracy and replace our country with authoritarianism to be, if not hateful, detestable. But I’m not out of control in my dislike. It’s an objective dislike of bad ideologies and attempts to inject theocracy into our democracy. So my point is… If you hate the other side, you’ve already lost, if not the war, reality. When I was in martial arts, beginning in fifth grade, I was told day after day, "There is no room for anger or hate in a fight, because then you’ve lost, even if you win. Be professional, be a martial artist. Fight tactically, objectively. Think! Because hate and anger cloud the mind." So how do I know I’ve been on the right track, politically speaking, for years now? Because years ago I started running into those on the right who, hated. It was irrational. frequently based on fantasy, conjecture, thought that should be based on fact, but was nowhere near it. Don’t hate. Act. Act based on facts and evidence. Because we are adults. I have never reacted well to authoritarianism. I’ve never reacted well to fear being pushed on me. Since childhood, I have faced my fears, because I had plenty to face. I was bullied as a kid. At a new school every year or two. Small for my age until I shot up in 10th grade to over 6'. So I don’t like bullies. Which is why I disliked Trump from his first day of campaigning to become POTUS. Anyone who tries to inject fear into you or the equation, could be your enemy. Never be fearful. Be aware and reactive. Better however, to be proactive. But that takes too much for to much of America. Trust but verify. Conquer yourself first and you’ll never need to conquer others. Then if you ever find a need to conquer others, then you know, you're “the Other“. You have become, the Enemy.

So where DOES all that hate come from on the right? It comes from popular beliefs in myths, and disinformation. It comes from Republican leadership, who saw that... just as Russia saw it...easily weaponized, easily expanded upon what already existed, in order to divide, with the eventual hope to conquer. Or very least, as Putin sees it, inject chaos. As Trump sought and still does. To inject chaos and reap the benefits as too many are distracted. So they make America chaotic, distracted, vulnerable.

How do people get into authoritarianism? How did they get into Nazism? Or neo-Nazism? Or want to be a Nazi? Or denied-Nazism, which is typically, actually Nazism? It’s because of their unrelieved anger and frustration. Anger and frustration that is given a controlled release valve. Controlled consciously and carefully, by others. First they get involved for fun, for the exhilaration, the catharsis, the release. Which is then quickly controlled by others. It is manipulated. Exploited. Subverted. At that point you have in, as in our case today in America, Trump control MAGA. Ladies and gentlemen, because these are binary people by implication in decree, through protestations (against the "Other" and ever more so for this behavior...) and for ignorant beliefs supporting authoritarian, fascism, until finally at very least "wannabe", Nazis.

About congressional “franking“ (check out either Rachel's "Ultra" podcast, you'll thank yourself... or perhaps this pdf free book published in 1944, "Black Mail"). That really needs to be monitored. Anything sent out by someone in Congress about things like Trump's stupidly ridiculous "big lie", that are anti-democracy, that are antigovernmental, while this one is difficult because some antigovernmental stuff is what Congress is there for. Self examination and correction.  Those things should be monitored and disallowed to be sent out, IF deemed incorrect and judged anti-American. The public should be notified. The free ride needs to be over. Free speech when Weaponized, not necessarily monetized, needs to be monitored. This is not to say, censorship, or to the break the Constitution‘s First Amendment. But it needs to be, if not controlled, made publicly aware with great clarity based in fact, evidence, and reality. Because if no one else is doing it, someone has to protect the US Constitution against unhealthy, ultra right (or destructive ultra left) wing types who weaponize free speech against America and against our US Constitution. At this time, considering what the ultra and even moderate (in their silence) right wing are doing, there ARE no corresponding left wing type actions.

I always wondered why one of my favorite directors names is, "George Roy Hill". Why the "Roy"? Apparently, there was someone in Congress named George Hill. One time secretary to Representative Hamilton Fish of New York. That alone might explain it. For some of this you’ll have to listen to Rachel Maddow‘s, “Ultra“, episode five. Ultra apparently stands for "ultra right wing". A term more ubiquitous in Europe. But saying today, "extremist are far right wing", is simply no longer descriptive of them. But "ultra" sure as hell is.

It’s past time right now, to review what "Frank" disseminated information is being sent out and which members of Congress, most especially the ultra right wing, Trump Republicans, MAGA congressionals, to see what they’ve been doing these past six years and correct, or at very least, blast that information out to America, and the entire planet, if it has been being abused. IF those in Congress have been abusing it to send out anti American propaganda. After the Trump administration, we have got to be careful and continue to review the abuses, until we know all of them. In order to protect ourselves. And our democratic Republic.

So, I have now finished and published my book, “Suffering Long Covid“. I’ve written my next book which I’m now editing on the history and format, to explain my filmic poem and award winning historical documentary “Pvt. Ravel‘s Bolero“. After that I need to finish the DVD that I’ve already started creating for that film. But then what? I bought equipment to digitize my family's home films from the 1950s, 60s and 70s. But I also have some of my grandfather's films from the 1940s, 50s and 60s. He used to travel the world. Much of the time, for the US Army, setting up diesel engine shops around the world, training locals, and then moving on and doing it elsewhere, and in another country. He spent time in India, I think Cambodia, definitely Vietnam and then came home in the 60s to retire. I have his passport. He also traveled Europe during a very interesting time, around World War II. So I’m thinking about doing a documentary on him. Very interesting guy, who my older brother, seven years my senior, and myself both tried, but neither of us could get much information out of our grandfather. He would just say, "You don’t wanna hear about that, it’s not that interesting." Now, I’ve been fascinated about investigative work since I was as young as I can remember. I loved those detective and espionage shows from the 1950s and 60s, and so on

My mother first introduced me to James Bond films with his first, "Doctor No", when it came out. She took me to the Community Theater on 50th St. and M St., in Tacoma, Washington. She had grown up half a block away, after being relocated from Brooklyn, New York, where she was born. When her and her older sister our mother, were transplanted by my grandfather. So I have to wonder. With my father having been a construction electrician. My mother having been a housewife, with some kind of ADHD, or something, because I grew up with it. I have to wonder if I got my interest in investigative work and espionage from my grandfather? I always assumed it was from ingesting so much of that kind of TV in my formative years. But why did I take the test for the Tacoma police department at 19? Why did I join the OSI in the USAF? Why did I enter the USAF as law enforcement? This could just be a very interesting documentary. But I have a lot of work yet to do, to get to that point.

Back to the loser seditionist Donald Trump. He needs to lose his Secret Service protection. That may be premature at this point, until it’s proven that it should be yanked from him. But what can be and should be proven about the man, needs to have nothing to do with our US government in having American citizens paying someone who so overtly tried to damage our country, and kill US citizens. The man has hundreds of thousands of American deaths on his hand from having on purpose or misused his office and purposely fumbled the COVID-19 pandemic medical ramp up.

My second podcast for the day is from a Pod Save America episode, “Between Barack and A Hard Place.”

Today’s walk it seems will be only four miles. I know I said on my last walk that it’s good to achieve your goal, which is five miles for me. But we also need to listen to our body. And my body today is telling me five miles is going to be too much and I’ll regret it. Sure I could push myself. But I’m not gonna be stupid about it. Be smart.

That's it for the day! Cheers! Sláinte!

Reality Through Personal Filters Darkly

We have to stop looking at everything through these filters and start seeing what we're talking and voting about.

I get it if you vote to keep as much money as you make on each paycheck, simply because you don't make enough money. But consider if you're thinking at all about paychecks, you're simply not one of the many who never even know when they get a paycheck, just because they have so much money to begin with. You're in a different league altogether. Certainly a different social strata and definitely a different tax bracket.

But you can't vote because you do not want to be taxed or pay for someone else's healthcare. You have to expand your awareness as to why you don't make any money in the first place. Where is all that money going?

It's not just going to taxes. Because you're not, none of us are, paying ENOUGH in taxes. No one is anymore. Even though Republicans think cutting taxes is ALWAYS the answer. It's not. When you cut taxes as they have for years, down into the meat, into the bone, into the bone marrow of our country, then we have got to stop cutting taxes and start getting that money back into the government so it can once again be functional.

So, where is all that money?

When you finally do start making enough money per paycheck, for whatever reason, then you have to ask yourself, exactly when DO you have enough? According to the tenets of capitalism, you never do.

And that in itself is wrong. NO ONE ever should have as much money as a small nation because we live in a closed economic system. Either within our local municipality or nation or our entire planet. IF some take most of all the money, that becomes destructive to the whole, illiberal, unfair, and it should be outright illegal. Who fights against that? The wealthy, the powerful and then they convince the poor to argue in their place, and for their benefit.

We are so caught up in our concerns and considerations of "freedom" that we cannot even see all that to be true.

Belonging to a nation is a responsibility. You do not just get to live here for free, but you do have some inalienable rights. The wealthy want to live for free. So they must be held accountable. These grey areas that conservatives fight against in healthcare, judicial representation, and civil protections for police, fire and emergency care, should simply be rights. These are not and should not be privileges.

Because we have other things to pay for besides corporations or our massive military budget.

What the problem is here is that for many decades now, our priorities have been skewed from what they should be. We have heard too much derision and disinformation about socialism for instance. Before that it was communism. Before that probably a fear of freed slaves or of freeing slaves.

We have evolved and bettered ourselves and now we are at a point of backsliding and we need to stopgap it. End it. But fake news, the bastard child of spin has overtaken our media and our citizens.

Those who wish to stay in power have found it useful to abuse our political process and we find we are stuck with them. Beyond what is right. Beyond what is reasonable. We have had our taxes cut to where education has gone downhill. Easy access to instant media has polarized our beliefs. Beyond Russian dezinformatsiya (disinformation) which the Republican party has absconded with and made their own. Then they have turned about and blamed what they have done, when used against them, as "fake news".

We need to re-attenuate our own mental filters with real information, accurate news, truth and what is reasonable. We have to allow our ideas to fail, when they are bad ideas, rather than doubling down just to win, especially whenever it is in the worst interest of the country. Our method of democracy has been damaged, hopefully not permanently, but the abuse of politics and the discovery of disinformation.

We now have to deal with cyber attacks, hacking from Russia, China and elsewhere to a lesser extent from places like then North Korean hermit kingdom. So it is even more imperative that we get our beliefs, our filters, straightened out and correct.

It all stops with agreeing on what a fact is, on seeing the filters we use having the same basis in reality, the same criteria for what is fake and what is actual, and on our priorities being agreed upon.

Because aside from our filters are our priorities which have been broken for many decades now.

What are we, who are we first and foremost? Nationalists against all other countries and all other humans? Theists against all other religions or religion itself? Right or left leaning politicians against all others who disagree with us? Or just greedy or power hungry against all those we can walk upon in order to raise ourselves up above all others?

We have to decide these things. And we need to decide them very, very soon.

Death Throws of Theistic Nations

When your government starts talking about there needing to be a new leader of the Nation's morality, you KNOW the government is in trouble. Because whenever they are in trouble, they always start going back to the basics we all thought we had evolved beyond: morality and religion.

We've been hearing this from the conservative right for a long time now. And look how they are doing. It's been killing the GOP. And in their current incarnation, good riddance.

The real issues are almost hands down that the government, the politicians, the legislators, the leaders have yet to catch up with the morality of the Nation as a whole. We have been held captive but a sad conglomeration of conservative, theist group of Fascists.

As a people we are evolving, but leaders usually do not. They are always slow to change and tend to get old and stuck in the ways they believe work to keep them in office. It's not that the Nation has lost it's way and that the leaders need to draw the Nation back into the folds of those "Holy Know Betters". It's that the leaders need to lead the direction the Nation is headed and show the best way to go in order to achieve that. Yet, they almost always fail in that task, even though that really is the task they were hired to do in the first place. To Lead.

So when you consider the few Nations left in the world that aren't secular, you can be pretty sure they are on the way out and it's only a matter of time. Iran is on the way out. Islam is on the way out, it just doesn't seem like it because of the violent temperament of those hardliners in those Gangs of God. But we also see this in Nations like North Korea, right, some of you might say. And they are secular. Not really. They are a kind of Earthbound theism. A twisted form of the ancient ancestor worship traditionally common in that area of the world. They worship their leaders, who remain in power even after death.

The counter intuitive thing about a secular government is that it allows for more freedom of religion / morality. The problem there being that it also allows for the other kinds of thought, of belief, to prosper. Which is the problem those leaders are having in going that direction. That it isn't JUST THEIR morality or religion that would prosper, but that of others who also live in their Nation.

The problem with the world's few surviving theistic Nations that are now in their religious / morality death throws (and yes these could take decades to finally die), is that during this period of their Nation's Phoenix rising (which many leaders will do anything to avoid acknowledging), they become a very, very ugly thing indeed. Why?

Try holding someone's head under water and see how hard THEY struggle for that last, final gasp. Still, it is the people of their Nation who truly suffer, and far more than the Leaders usually ever do. Except for those few leaders who do pay the ultimate price for their selfishness, greed and narrow-mindedness, who at times allow their Nation its truly sad, yet fresh air to breathe. How long will this world have to suffer the death throws of those like Assad in Syria? Or the twisted government of Iran? Or that of the government of North Korea that also seems now to be on the way out.

It will happen. It's only a matter of time.

The only hope at this time that the people of these Nations have (and the World in general) is to know that one day, all the sooner for the harder they work and sacrifice for it, these theistic nations will one day go the way of the dinosaur and perhaps exist only in History as a kind of intellectual fuel for our descendants of how not to run a Nation and put down the masses for the benefit of only the egos of those few in power.