Taverner
Taverner's JournalWe are the "evil empire" we warned everybody about
We are the bad guys - WE are the "evil empire." America is an authoritarian, murderous, short sighted, genocidal empire.
We always HAVE been an empire: our history is written in the blood of those who we killed for "civilization."
We are not a kinder gentler empire - there is no such thing. The empire is spending our kids' future, and making us the most hated people on Earth. And right now we deserve that designation. We ARE the bad guys. We ARE the evil empire. We ARE the boogeyman that we scare people into joining the army. There has never, ever been a just war. The kind of people who want to keep the empire are either (a) crypto-fascists or (b) people who never read the final chapter on the history of empires. Guess what? Empires fall, always. And when they do, it is not pretty. We need nothing more than a national guard.
The army needs to be abolished, period. There is no need for anything beyond a national guard at this point. "But what about the terrorists?" you might ask. They're already dwindled down to nothing, and the new recruits are all the result of our actions.
Empires fall, always. And when they do, nasty shit happens.
It is not a matter of if but when.
I think our genocidal government needs to come out of the closet as crypto-fascists. That includes all of the Feinstein DINOs, John Kerry Hypocrites and "hawks."
"Breaking Bad" and the Vanishing Middle Class
Breaking Bad just ended a 5-season streak of awesome recently, and after last week's finale, "Felina," I had some time to think about the show, and why it was such an addiction.
Right now, being in the Middle Class in the US is a tenuous spot. As Sen Elizabeth Warren pointed out, most families are one layoff away from bankruptcy. It's not because we are spendthrift. Quite the opposite: they money we did spend went to furhtering our carreers, making ourselves more competitive and we engaged what Suze Orman would have called "good debt." That is, debt for school. training or something that would boost our earning power.
Enter Walter White. He was born at the cusp between Boomer and GenX. He has a little of both.
Master chemist and a modern day alchemist. Working a steady but unfulfilling day job as well as a second shift at a car wash.
He is now given that "event" that could send his family into bankruptcy.
How could someone so talented, so intelligent be in such a position?
That's what all of us are asking as we open new credit cards to pay for food, as we, college graduates and and trained professionals are now rendered useless by this economy.
Walter White's pain was our pain, and in that first season we understood what Walter was going through.
Throughout the seasons, Walt became darker, more sinister, more evil.
Yes he took an unethical path, but he wouldn't be alone in that desire.
It is like the modern middle class homeowner says
"GODDAMN IT! YOU'VE PUSHED ME TOO FAR!
I've done the 'good' thing and you see where it gets me?
FUCK the good thing. I am doing the WRONG thing because it pays better!"
Add to that how Wall Street Execs made billions, even after pushing the world into recession. Life ain't fair - so why play fair?
Yes he was given the option of kowtowing to an ex-partner who screwed him over. Walt's ex business partner offers to pay for all of his treatment.
But this would be the final insult to Walt. We don't know what happened in the past, but his pride would not allow that.
As a result he uses EVERY one of his cards at once.
Brilliant chemist? Make meth and make money
DEA Brother-in-law? You know what the feds are looking for - play this connection.
Ex-Student knows the meth biz? Blackmail him into being your assistant.
This is the middle class grasping for all our straws.
Walter White is the personification of the middle class.
He IS us.
He is every thought we have had while ripping our hair out doing the books.
He is every threat we've made partly in jest to our significant others.
And what happens in the end?
The house ALWAYS wins.
Yes, he was able to financially secure his family's' future, but at the loss of his family's love, respect and trust.
Bitter irony.
The irony that we GenXers have been seeing since we joined the job market.
The irony that Boomers are now seeing, as all of their hard work has been systematically devalued.
"Treat me like a piece of meat"
Well, guess what, you ARE meat.
So am I, and so is everyone reading this.
Granted, you may not be fit for human consumption, but you sure are fit for insect and bacterial consumption.
Every animal is another's meat.
Treated like meat? Well that's Capitalism. Capitalism, a system by which everything has its price. Even people.
People get all up in arms over prostitution, but what do you call wage slavery?
That McDonalds worker is being exploited - in ways FAR worse than prostitution. And it's perfectly legal.
At least the prostitute gets paid a living wage (most of the time)
But here's the kicker: that CEO who keeps wages at poverty levels? That politician who does nothing for workers? That consulting agency who busts unions?
They are all going to die.
Someday, they too will be another animals' meat.
And during this time, all of their money will be useless. All of their power, gone.
They will be left just a pile of stinking, rotten meat.
California, my home, does things just a little different than everywhere else
We didn't have exit numbers for years.
We also used to be horrible at marking highways (I am told.)
For the longest time, highways were known by their honorary name, rather than the number. "Hollywood Freeway" for example.
I honestly think, if we could drive on the Left side of the street, like in Tokyo and London, we would.
We have BBQ, but Texans and Missourians would laugh.
Tilapia flash grilled with lime and green onion.
Chicken Breast, grilled with oak, white wine and garlic.
A lot of this place looks like a place Ewoks would live.
We put our taxes up to a popular vote, sometimes. Always to disastrous results.
We smoke weed like you drink lite beer.
Our women truly are the most beautiful in the world. This is not an accident. This is the Tinseltown effect.
You will always be able to find a non-chain good restaurant, no matter where you are. Unless you are where the Ewoks might live.
"He's a Republican!?!?!?!" comes as a surprise to many. Including Christians. I've never seen so many Evangelical Christian Democrats.
This place is diverse, and that is not an accident either. Tinseltown effect + Tech effect. Smartest and most beautiful.
In our cities, parking is easier to find, but more expensive if you pay.
Having a band in your spare time is a perfectly fine adult hobby.
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Tell me about your state 
The generational cycle hypothesis is proving true. Fourth Turning and all
The generational cycle hypothesis is proving true. That is the Strauss–Howe generational theory.
Basically our current state is known as the "fourth turning," which will be a time of frugality, prompting a reduction in our consumer culture - thus destroying their marketing, IT, accounting, and sales departments and replacing them with automated ones.
Basically we are seeing something akin to the industrial revolution, where old jobs were phased out, labor was cheap but started to organize. This swell built up throughout the gilded age with the Anarchist, Socialist and Communist movements. With the perceived Bolshevik win, and Makhno's Ukraine, a new society was beginning. But unfortunately the Anarchists were chased out, and in the case of the US, hunted down. (The Anarchists kind of had it coming though, with "propaganda of the deed" and the bombing of Wall Street, and killing of a President.)
Anyway, at this point we are all connected digitally - which means organizing is going to make it work this time. And without violence - it can be as simple as the abolition of the stock market, a general strike and a redistribution of wealth.
It's time again for "When did the USA cease being a Republic and instead an Empire?"
Was it 1963?
Was it 1968?
Was it 1980?
Was it 1991?
Was it 2000?
Or was it 1886? (Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad)
Was it always an empire?
In my waking up to sobriety, I find myself angrier and angrier
Not at my loved ones, or even other people.
But I find myself ANGRIER and ANGRIER at the corporations who enslave us, the government who is their lapdog, and the absolute loss of hope we as Americans find ourselves in.
We were promised hope in 2008. Like a good drunk drone, I believed it. Hell, even sober people beleived it so I don't think it was just the alcohol that gave it to me.
Now I look around, with sober and clearer eyes, and see we were given a President who, yes, may embody hope, but he's President of a rotten system by which no change can occur.
It is not clear when he realized this, nor does it really matter. He has given up, and is just counting down the days for him to leave and then join the Carlyle Group like those before him.
The system IS rotten.
I can see this now.
My drinking, drugs and other psychoactive agents obscured this reality from me, or at least made it seem less dire.
But now that I can see - it's like waking up while the Titanic is sinking, and the lifeboats are all taken.
What is to be done?
Certainly not more avoidance and denial.
Fuck that.
I'm here to fight.
There is no "generation gap"
Yes, we are all products of our generation. The Boomers witnessed some of the most horrific events in our history. GenX had to pretty much raise ourselves (not the Boomer's fault, but rather the decline in real wages forcing both parents to work,) and the millennials came of age with 9/11 as a starting point.
But we are all Democrats, all Americans (mostly) and all have empathy.
How do I know we have empathy? Because this is Democratic Underground, not the Free Republic. DU is empathy, FR is antipathy.
But I see jabs at generations from others, or perceived jabs by generations.
We're all on this dying planet together.
We're all on this sinking ship.
At this point, does it really matter if we're sitting on the North or South end of the doomed vessel?
Does it really matter who boarded first?
And we are at war.
Not with one group, or a cabal, or even a party.
Our enemies are in both parties, and they have been since we can remember.
I invite all of you to read up on a little history. It's called "The Business Plot."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_Plot
The plan was to overthrow FDR in 1933. You will recognize a lot of the family names: there are Morgans, Bushes and many others.
They failed because their chosen leader, Maj Gen Smedley Butler (who later wrote "War is a Racket"
turned them in instead of going along with the coup.
No one went to jail, no one was even reprimanded. The story was buried. But they didn't go away.
When you hear Grover Norquist talk about "drowning government in a bathtub" or other such nonsense - this is what the business plotters had in mind. They hated FDR and especially VP Henry Wallace. They wanted corporate fascism, where the corporations told the government what to do.
Sound familiar?
This is our war.
This is our enemy.
Peace.
I am going to say it - we, humans, are angry apes
We're mostly a hodge-podge between Neanderthals, Cro-Magnon and and the elusive but very real Denisovans.
These are all descendants of Homo Heidelbergensis, a pack hunter and a body evolved to wreak havoc, either on animals or each other.
Thus, the "angry ape" we all come from.
Thing is all three parts of our genetic makeup incorporate two major things: aggression and empathy.
We know for sure the Neanderthals took care of their old and sick, and even set up a very crude kind of "hospital."
No idea on the Denisovans, but if they are like their brothers, they too cared for the old and sick.
We do as well - and all three of these used tools - as did daddy Heidelbergensis.
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Moving on from our origins, as societies we are capable of terrible aggression that no other species alive today is capable.
Just name any war, name any act of violence, any act of unprovoked aggression, or reaction to perceived aggression.
That lizard brain takes over and pushes us out of our ethics and reason.
And yet it is a third component - empathy - the ability to see through another individuals perspective compassionately - that can stop these things.
It is no surprise those champions of empathy such as Martin Luther King Jr. worked so hard towards peace. After the civil rights act he dedicated himself to unions, urban poverty and stopping the Vietnam War. LBJ hated him for this.
And there you see the dichotomy of man - Empathy vs depersonalization, ethics vs impulse, and reason vs superstition.
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We need to stop reacting towards our base, lizard brain that made the "Angry Ape." Chimps and Bonobos, which are extremely similar genetically, have radically different societies.
Chimps are war like, and kill, Bonobos are peaceful. Chimps have a concept of private property, Bonobos share resources.
It is a choice which society we want - will it be empathy or will it be aggression?
Johnny Cash couldn't do it. John Lennon couldn't do it.
Bob Dylan couldn't do it.
Jack Kerouac couldn't do it.
Hunter S Thompson couldn't do it.
Sid Vicious and Johnny Rotten couldn't do it.
Kurt Cobain couldn't do it.
Jim Morrison couldn't do it.
Daniel Ellsberg couldn't do it.
Sidney Shanberg couldn't do it.
Barack Obama couldn't do it.
Howard Dean couldn't do it.
No one can do it - but you...
Because it's up to us...to do it...
Profile Information
Name: Jason TavernerGender: Male
Hometown: California
Home country: USA
Current location: The Great San Francisco Bay Area
Member since: Fri Apr 9, 2004, 01:58 AM
Number of posts: 55,476
