. . .
K “When the government pays folks not to labor, folks learn to enjoy not laboring.”
J “Many if not most of the jobs were crappy, but many of the jobs on this planet are crappy. There will always be some crappy job that cannot be automated.”
. . .
Bumper stickers Sweatshirt of the week:
College
. . .
K “The word for our time.”
J “It is a four letter word.”
. . .
K “The business plan is to insert every tentacle into every pocket forever.”
J “Remote start for a car strikes me as an acceptable bourgeois indulgence, but for the auto companies to demand a monthly charge for the service is underhanded and over the top. Imagine if the credit card company botched the person’s payment for the recurring monthly power window fee and also the recurring monthly door lock fee. A driver may be imprisoned in the vehicle.”
K “Remember the song ‘M.T.A.’ performed by the Kingston Trio that told the tale of a rider on the MTA who did not have an extra nickel to pay the fare and was condemned to continue riding the subway in perpetuity. Poor Chuck’s wife had to toss his lunch to him through the window.”
J “Imagine flying down the highway and the red light erupts to inform the driver that the fee for brake service is in arrears and the braking system no longer functions.”
. . .
K “In the early days of the Internet, those who mined and secured general internet addresses made a small fortune. For instance, the person who first mined and secured www.pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis.com made a tidy sum selling it. Now websites are leased with the original holder retaining ownership and charging monthly rent. It is legal and it is ethical, yet it is reflective of a desire to keep a tentacle in every pocket. The lessee could develop the site as part of a brand and then lose the site for failure to make a monthly payment.”
J “Will the public resist?”
. . .
Bumper stickers of the week:
Brake service monthly fee in arrears
Will we ever return?
[DuckDuckGo is completely blocking www.e-commentary.org.]
. . .
K “The Cheney/Bush crime families are at war with the Trumpi crime family. With the recent primary election in Wyoming, one warrior on the battle field is now throttled, at least temporarily.”
J “Whatever her motives, Liz tried to clean up the public sphere. And now finally after a disturbing hiatus, the authorities are going after Trumpi. That is promising.”
. . .
K “She will land in a thoughtless think tank or an sketchy hedge fund and look for an opportunity.”
J “Nothing ever changes.”
. . .
K “Dick Cheney is not really bright and not really astute and not really witty and not really honest and not really charming and not really real, really. That is what the system seeks and rewards.”
J “Give credit where credit is due. Dick is amoral and ruthless and psychopathic and sociopathic.”
K And he is the patriarch of a crime family that now may not have a player on the public stage.”
. . .
[See the e-commentary on the major crime families in America at Impeachment Imbroglio. Oh, And Happy Saint Nicholas Day! (December 2, 2019).]
Bumper sticker of the week:
“If voting made any difference, they wouldn’t let us do it.” Mark Twain
. . .
K “The ‘War of Northern Aggression’ is an accurate description.”
J “The ‘War of Southern Aggression’ is an accurate description.”
. . .
K “We must conform Mercator’s depiction because the ‘West’ is really the ‘North’ and the ‘East’ is really the ‘South’. Russia and China must be relocated to the ‘South’. Australia and New Zealand must be relocated to the ‘North’. And voila! everything is geographically and economically and politically and socially copacetic. The architectonic shifts are manifesting in tectonic shifts. The lines are being drawn.”
J “The poles are shifting. The battle lines are being drawn.”
. . .
K “About three quarters to four fifths of the world’s population are ‘Southerners’ and about one quarter to one fifth are ‘Northerners’. The ‘Southerners’ have land and people and resources. The Northerners led by the U.S. have fiat and finance and firearms. The ‘Southerners’ are the future. The ‘Northerners’ are the past.”
J “Everything turns on how much longer the PetroDollar is the world’s reserve currency. In the short term, however, as Europe and the emerging countries suffer, assets are likely to flow to the dollar.”
. . .
K “The U.S. War against Russia via a duped, duplicitous and culpable proxy Ukraine has triggered many of these fundamental geographic, economic, political and social changes that are acknowledged by few and understood by even fewer. February 24, 2022 will be another red letter day on the calendar. 2022 will be another red letter year on the calendar.”
J “Because the Chinese won.”
. . .
[See the e-commentary at World War E Becomes World War III: The West Versus The Rest: Uni-Polar Versus Multi-Polar (March 28, 2022).]
Bumper stickers of the week:
G7 versus BRICS and many other nations
“Land and people and resources” versus “fiat and finance and firearms”
The “North” rules (while breaking all the rules) at this time
February 24, 2022 will be another red letter day on the calendar
The Chinese won/one
Was Sir Halford John Mackinder prescient?
. . .
K “One federal judge held up a pen and stated that he affixes his signature to more motions and stipulations for extensions of time than to any other pleading. Every deadline is absurdly short in practice. The legal beagles in power should double all deadlines in the rules with one pen stroke. Even the time to notice an appeal should be doubled. A party oftentimes needs a longer period of time to accept intellectually and emotionally the consequences of a decision and the challenges of taking an appeal. 60 days instead of 30 to take an appeal.”
J “That is the problem. The deadlines are short to benefit the judges not the public. Judges and lawyers do not take reasonable action without tremendous public pressure.”
. . .
J “A judge who orders that you give up a long planned vacation on short notice to generate a draft order and do his work and then dawdles for six months before guessing which way to go is not a sage jurist or a good person.”
K “Standard operating procedure (sop) in the court system. Judges view themselves as gods rather than public servants. Something must change. Rule changes will not solve everything without a change in behavior.”
. . .
Bumper stickers of the week:
If you cannot fully explain why you believe what you believe, you might be brainwashed.
Society has become so fraudulent that the truth actually bothers people.
“In the Fall an old man’s fancy lightly turns to thoughts of reforming the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure.” With a nod to Al
. . .
K “The U.S. is being the U.S. again and funding a ‘blacklist’ of journalists and commentators who ask hard questions and demand honest answers. The U.S./Ukraine ‘Enemies List’ list includes individuals who are on the short list for a Pushitzer Prize and for the highly coveted Cameo In Courage Award.”
J “I disapprove of what they say, but I will defend to the death their right to say it.”
. . .
Bumper stickers of the week:
“I disapprove of what you say, but [I] will defend to the death your right to say it.” Voltaire
“To be an enemy of America can be dangerous, but to be a friend is fatal.” Henry Kissinger
. . .
K “That description about captures it.”
J “Catchy too.”
. . .
K “Obsequious to those in power.”
J “Sycophantic to those above them.”
. . .
K “Never took a stand.”
J “Never joined a sit-in.”
. . .
K “Their biography reads: ‘Born – Consumed – Died.’”
J “Or ‘Amassed credentials and lucre. Never really did anything of substance or permanence.’”
. . .
Bumper stickers of the week:
Born – Consumed – Died
Make waves
If you stay silent and fail to rock the boat in this war between good and evil, your life might be easier, but your children’s won’t.
Conformity is doing what everyone else is doing regardless of what is right; Morality is doing what is right regardless of what everyone else is doing.
It is remarkable how many people believe themselves intellectually superior for repeating what authority tells them. It is also remarkable how school is structured to reward students for repeating what authority tells them. I wonder if there is a connection?
There was a very cautious man
Who never laughed or played
He never risked, he never tried.
He never sang or prayed.
And when he one day passed away
His insurance was denied,
For since he never really lived,
They claimed he never really died.
(Anonymous poem)
. . .
J “One yard wider.”
K “One meter wider.”
. . .
J “People want points. The games should produce lacrosse scores. 10 – 9 or 14 – 13 or 17 – 11. Two digits for each team.”
K “Purists will object, buy I am a purist who does not object.”
. . .
K “Thirty years ago, the back-pass rule in soccer was implemented to universal and enduring acclaim.”
J “Forty years ago, the shot clock in college basketball vitiated the four corners stall that was legal yet undermined the flow and possibilities of the game.”
. . .
K “Expand the goal by a meter. Enrich the game by a mile.”
J “Or just a yard. And enrich it by a kilometer.”
. . .
[See the e-commentary on sports at On The Vernal Equinox (March 21, 2011).]
Bumper sticker of the week:
Make the Beautiful Game more pulchritudinous
[DuckDuckGo is completely blocking www.e-commentary.org.]
. . .
J “Not a surprise. Everything involving or affiliated with the Internet has been and is being used for evil. When I started hearing ads on the radio for the Duck and then heard that the search engine was censoring speech, I knew it was on the dark side.”
K “Another search engine will come along . . . and be used for evil.”
J “And then another.”
. . .
[See the “The DuckDuckGo Controversy” reprinted in “Peak Prosperity” dated May 29, 2022 by Terence Kam.]
Bumper sticker of the week:
“Every great cause begins as a movement, becomes a business, and eventually degenerates into a racket.” Eric Hoffer
. . .
J “What does it mean to most folks?”
K “Sales and bar-b-ques. Some folks do reflect on its significance.”
. . .
Bumper sticker of the week:
What does Independence Day mean to you?
e-commentary 