Momma gets her shoe out

"...we’re facing a coalition of the heartless, the clueless and the confused." These words Paul Krugman used to describe our very own Congress and their failure to renew/extend unemployment benefits before they hied off last week to their summer retreats (or, do forgive me, for their constituencies, whose sweltering homes, oddly, appear generally rather far removed from the breezy summer playgrounds of congressfolk).

And he's right. This is the Congress of Heartless Bastards. (And that includes some of the ladies, and I'm sorry I don't know the word for female bastards, if there is such a thing. Perhaps the compositeurs of the language never thought we gals were worth acknowledging as such.) Bloodsuckers, the lot of em, perhaps taken with vampire fever like the rest of the moviegoing nation. And the obsession speaks volumes, don't you think? Are we a nation of the Undead? Floating purposelessly in that place we dreaded ending up where Sister Mary Whatsername told us unbaptized babies go forever: Limbo? Like your basic nouvoRepub, or smug suburban upper middle class "liberal", or Tea Partyer, our Congress is filled with folks content with the notion that "I've got mine. There must be something wrong with the rest of ya'll out there." It's a mentality that, beginning with the Raygun presidency, has swept the country. Members of Congress are lately quite open about this neoCalvinist take on those who suffer. And we can't hope for much with such a congress in place. But take heart, America. A Revolution is brewing. It ain't what you think and it's not gonna be pretty.

Note to future voters: BEWARE THE OXYMORONS. YOU CANNOT BE COMPASSIONATE AND CONSERVATIVE AT THE SAME TIME. It's an oxymoron. One describes open hearted empathy, the other reservation, controlled emotion. A CC says, " I feel sorry for you, but not enough to help? Jesus will save you. And that bit He said about If you have two coats, give one to the man who has none? I need all my coats. Get your own. This is tough love." The very least a responsible voter can do is keep a dictionary handy for this crap. I mean... come on. How lazy can you get? You know by now that the Republican party has perfected the art of perverse oxymorons ; only one of the many perversions at which they excel (u-hem..). (The masters of Divide and Conquer as well, they well know that an impoverished nation is one whose citizens live in fear of the other guy taking what's yours and they play to that fear.) Did you let them convince you such a social theory was possible? More the fool, you. You wanted to believe you could be a good guy and still be stingy. WWJS? He'd say you're an ass.

So it seems likely (our kharma I'm sure, let's just throw in all religious philosophies here, shall we?) we are in for a fast trip down the greased slide of a major Depression. We're talkin fast, five years to the bottom, the worst since 1720, according to socioeconomist Robert Prechter, and one that no amount of bailouts will remedy, one that will last for decades. The socioeconomic results of his prediction are unimaginable; think life on The Road by Cormac McCarthy, a grim version of Little House on the Prairie. Nothing will be the same. (Personally, I'm looking forward to the change. We'll need to consult with Cuba on this.) Congress' Christian failure to help the least among us, and the Republican party's now thirty year adoption of that as a party platform, sends a clear message that the wealthy aim to survive and the hell with the rest of us. But if Prechter is right (and his predictions for the most part have been dead on for decades) even the semi wealthy will suffer this time. At least anyone who's still in the stock market will. Time to buy a farm and make it work for ya, and for your neighbors if you still believe in the best principles of the 60s: share the wealth, all you need is love, Let it be, all things must pass, can't buy me love, come together, get back, happiness is a warm gun (we all gone need ta hunt), etc., right on down to When I'm 64 (did you ever think you'd actually be there? Surprise!) Otherwise we'll all be sittin around singin maudlin renditions of Yesterday, incapable of carrying a tune without our iPods.

In the meantime, meaningful things are afoot to grease the slide. The student loan market is about to implode. There have been numerous musings about this for more than a year in print. It will be like the mortgage market scandal only this one will sock it to the recent college grad crowd (and their co- signing parents) loaded with debt in a country with no free meritocracy based higher education for the hard working student (unlike, say, that old bastion of socialism, Cuba, with its efficient free health care and middle schoolers who consistently rank substantially higher than our own on international tests.) And if that isn't enough, even folks who've lost their homes and shop at Sam's club and other big box stores will get hosed in the coming collapse. That's right, big retailers, desperate to get folks in to buy crap they don't need, are now going to give people loans, up to 25 grand! to buy groceries!!??? H e l l o?? In one of the wealthiest nations in the world you need a friggin LOAN to buy FOOD !!Can't actually qualify for that loan? No problem! We'll give it to you anyway! Is there a pattern here? Does no one recall that scene in the Beatles movie where the fat guy consumes so much he simply explodes??!!

For God's sake, WHERE IS MY SHOE!!!

AH! There it is. Now where did those bastards go?

later... cold/flu remedies that actually worked!! (Clearly feeling my oats and back on track here after four days of misery), a few items (and you tubes) that reveal just how sick a society we really have become, and tips for learning a new language in case you need to make a quick getaway to a country that still knows the meaning of compassion.

HEY, shoutout (or should I say ciao!?) to our new follower, Paolo, a real Italian romeo. Grazie!

Prego!