Assholes abound

I have been accused of being a pessimistic, dramatic, and even downright negative. Say what you will though, all that seems to have been the result of all the history of human development is that more and more assholes dominate all aspects of human life. The Burmese Government has recently had to deal with all the Buddhist monks in that country deciding to protest, in the hope it will make the military Junta that runs things relinquish their grip on power. Well, long story short these officers have decided that killing people for trying to peacefully make themselves heard is the way to go. The really depressing part about this is that no matter where you look the cold calculating hand of the few are ringing as much out of the world as they can before the whole shit house goes up in flames. I think people who degrade themselves by abusing others probably already suffer greatly, if not physically then psychologically and spiritually. It seems like the more they fuck shit up, the more they grow in their desire to do so. Like all the fat cats just keep upping the ante and no one wants to be the first one to fold. Well, once again I'm going to resort to great Greeks to tell it like is:
"Hope is a waking dream" -Aristotle
"No human thing is of serious importance" -Plato

Dreamers

I am now a resident of a very peculiar and unique corner of California. Jules de Gaultier once commented that- "Imagination is the one weapon in the war against reality". If such is true, then the Humboldt Bay Area is waging an all out blitz against the ghastly state of human existence. The economy has been pretty much shit ever since the huge logging mills shut down, although a few are still in operation. Arcata is wholly dependent upon the University for keeping it from becoming a hobo-hippie commune. Luckily there is one cash crop up here that has to account for at least half, if not more, of the income for this area. You would think that cultivating an illegal black market crop would in some way lead its growers to get into some sort of full blown confrontation with the Federal Forces that swoop down each harvest season to wreck havoc. That just isn't how things function in America though. As long as the potential for personal economic survival exists it appears that people in developed countries will always prefer arbitrary laws, corrupt international policy and the omnipresent threat of incarceration to that of anything honestly resembling a responsible role in their political systems. The sad fact is that it's impossible to criticize the system that sustains ones whole existence. You might as well start talking shit about the Milky Way, saying that there are thousands of vastly preferable galaxies you would rather live in. The bottom line is that humans don't just pull societies out of thin air, they are the accumulation of centuries of struggle, culture, ideals and geography. Revolutions always fail because they try to make a dramatic break with the past and jump headfirst into a hypothetical future that can always be undermined by cruel reality. Having done some traveling and being somewhat aware of the demographic makeup of the world, I readily admit that Humboldt is nothing but a provincial backwater of the Colossus that is the US Economy. And no matter how much the residents of this land wish to deny it, all the dreaming and hoping does little besides ensuring that no effective action will ever be taken. The fact that the aforementioned cash crop is consumed in large quantities locally makes coherent thought for a large number of residents difficult at best.

#43

When a candidate for public office faces the voters he does not face men of sense; he faces a mob of men whose chief distinguishing mark is the fact that they are quite incapable of weighing ideas, or even of comprehending any save the most elemental — men whose whole thinking is done in terms of emotion, and whose dominant emotion is dread of what they cannot understand. So confronted, the candidate must either bark with the pack or be lost... All the odds are on the man who is, intrinsically, the most devious and mediocre — the man who can most adeptly disperse the notion that his mind is a virtual vacuum. The Presidency tends, year by year, to go to such men. As democracy is perfected, the office represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. We move toward a lofty ideal. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart's desire at last, and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron.
- H.L. Mencken /Baltimore Sun (July 26, 1920)
A lot of people have been talking about how dumb Bush is for about 8 years now. At the APEC meeting in Australia this week he referred to it as an OPEC meeting and thanked the 'Austrian' PM for hosting. This is but one of countless verbal train wrecks that GW has been father to. The point I'd like to make is that by being an apparent dipshit, that makes him more thoroughly American than any of his predecessors. And since each successive generation of Americans seems to be getting dumber at an exponential rate, the situation is unlikely to improve. If nothing else it proves that the system we have here in the USA isn't actually run by figure heads.