June, 2021 archive
Public Good Private Greed
0
Shorter Will Bunch: Them what has, keeps.
A Titanic Challenge 0
Leonard Pitts, Jr., is somewhat less than optimistic. A nugget:
This country no longer has that. Rather, it has the Democrats and the Donald Trump Fan Club the Republicans have become.
Too many Democratic lawmakers seem not to understand this. They don’t get that you can no more negotiate with a cult of personality than you can with a shattered window . . . .
A Picture Is Worth, Just Deserts Dept. 0
Aside:
I’m really tired of calls telling me that warranty on my 2003 vehicle will soon expire . . . .
(Actually, I’m starting to fear the vehicle’s about to expire, but, as my old mechanic in New Jersey used to say, it doesn’t owe me a dime.)
The Privatization Scam Redux 0
At the San Francisco Chronicle, Jack Schneider and Jennifer C. Berkshire detail how the current ginned-up “controversy” on critical race theory in public schools, where it is not a thing, can be traced back to Ronald Reagan’s hostility to funding the public good. A snippet (emphasis added):
What matters, instead, is generating enough ill will to drive forward the only education policy Ronald Reagan ever cared about: privatization.
“An Armed Society Is a Polite Society” 0
Where do these folks get the notion that a Glock is somehow the new Fanner Fifty? Hell, I had a Fanner Fifty when I was a kid. I knew it was not the same thing as the .32 calibre revolver that my Daddy had inherited from his father.
One was a toy. The other was an instrument of death.
Raging against Reality 0
The phrase, “white rage,” has been bandied about lately in the wake of General Milley’s takedown of the racist fulminations of Matt Gaetz.
At Psychology Today Blogs, Rupert Nacoste offers a definition of what exactly that is. Here’s a bit (emphasis added); follow the link for the full article.
“White rage” is racial neo-diversity anxiety catching that fire. Imagine being made to feel safe by a false sense of racial superiority and then suddenly having to deal with real information that made it clear that your beliefs about “them” were false; they were stereotypes that had nothing to do with real people. Panicked distress; violent emotions; erratic, irrational (lashing out) behavior (call the police); all that occurs because of having to face the now-very-real member of that group — one of “them” standing up to you demanding respect.
Afterthought:
If all you’ve got on which to hang your identity is the color of your skin, you are poor and hollow person indeed.
A Quibble 0
Methinks that what Michael Corrigan thinks “will be interesting if” it happens has already come to pass.
Geeking Out 0
VirtualBox virtual machine of POP!OS with the default Gnome desktop (I loath Gnome with the fire of a thousand suns–Gnome spells “simplify” as “d-u-m-b-d-o-w-n”) on Mageia v. 8 under the Fluxbox window manager. The wallpaper is from my collection.
Old Wine, Just a New Barrel 0
At The Roanoke Times, John Kitterman takes a long and thoughtful look at the who-shot-john around critical race theory. He points out that, for persons who pay attention to history, there is really nothing new or surprising about it, except, perhaps, its name.
He also finds nothing surprising about some of the attacks being levied against it. For example (emphasis added):
I commend the entire article to your attention.
All the News that Fits, Backlash Dept. 0
Sam and his crew discuss Tucker Carlson’s white rage.
Aside:
I wish I could write “rage against the marine,” but General Milley is not a Marine.
Market Exploit(ation) 0
Vaccine Nation 0
At The Denver Post, the University of Colorado’s Seth Masket runs the numbers:
Follow the link for his thoughts on what that means.
In related news, the “Show Me” state gets shown.
