Author: Mark Tokarski

Just a man who likes to read, argue, and occasionally be surprised.

Words of hope for the five percent

I don’t read much anymore, or better said, I don’t find much worth reading anymore. I love reading. It has been my morning activity for decades, the reason I come bounding down the stairs after awakening at ridiculously early senior citizen hours. (For any who wonder, I am 67 and in excellent health, still able to do all of the very hard work involved in living in a mountain home. Every year my wife and I look at the future and wonder how much longer we can keep this up, and the answer is always … five more years.)

But what is there to read? You can take every book in the current events or history section of the library or at Barnes and Noble and have a bonfire, and nothing of value except paper would be lost.

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Just one photo …

IMG_1611

Here is just one photo from the latest event, taken from the comments in the post below. Stop and have a gander, and then ask …

  • Why is no one tending to these victims? How long will they just lay there?
  • How much time did the photographer spend on this photo? He got the angle right, and the lighting is superb. His camera, obviously a very good one, was f-stopped in such a way that objects in foreground and background are blurred, and only the victims are in focus.

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No nukes? Yes folks. There are no nukes.

The following words are taken from another blog:

Consider that the nuclear bomb was impossible to make. The science was not there. The theories were incorrect. The geniuses of all geniuses were fabrications. Not even a thousand billion dollars could produce the impossible – a weapon of apocalyptic proportions, that produces the heat of 10,000 suns. Just bollocks. The bomb never made anyone surrender. It never won a war. It did not deter wars. It did not stop communism. The communists were never any nuclear threat. The cold war was based on poorly done fantasy movies. The build-up of military industrial complex, which was sustained to counter the Soviet nuclear threat, was actually a big lie. The massive secret infrastructure to counter the Soviet nuclear threat was a big lie as well. The space race based on superior technology is in question consequently. Excuse me, but the whole rationale for building the massive state super complex after WWII is a complete fraud. And all the nuclear paranoia promoted by the state is down right evil. Even now the rhetoric, that States fart out on mass media about this or that power trying to obtain nuclear weapons, is a complete charade.

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Suggestion: A new national anthem for the United States

The national anthem of the United States of America is an awkward tune that tests the limits of our vocal ranges. It is also not a very good song, clunky and lacking a catchy melody, barely lending itself to harmony. Singers at ball games often try to improvise on it, adding a note or two to show off their range. Even so, after singing it perhaps 50,000 times most of us are (or should be) tired of it.

I see that the European Union chose Ludwig von Beethoven’s Ode to Joy, part of the fourth movement of his Ninth Symphony, a very moving piece of music. They added new words as follow:

Europe is united now
United it may remain
Our unity in diversity
May contribute to world peace.
Faith and Justice
And freedom for its people
In a bigger motherland.
Citizens, Europe shall flourish
Golden stars in the sky are
The symbols that shall unite us.

Those are good words, appealing to our higher values with no reference to war or rockets going off.

That in mind, with Europe having set a precedent of sorts by using classical music for an anthem, I thought perhaps I could get a movement going in this country to do the same. See below the tab for my suggested national anthem of the United States of America.

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Postcard from Denver, home of fake events …

I only had to look at this once before thinking “fake, fake, fake.” What do you think? He needed to choose a larger hostage, one big enough to cover both his front and back. He leaves the store thinking the only police are stationed to his right front?

Placement of police car conveniently hides him as he takes his fall.

For those who believe in TV news, video is beneath fold. Proceed with caution.

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This house is clean? Maybe.

I spent my morning going through old posts, and deleted many. At one time I was going to review all of the twins, but finally decided face splitting, while somewhat useful, was not reliable enough to make bold conjectures. More evidence was needed. So on the menu on the left what is left of twins are those in which I am confident I am on to something. Drake, Lindsay Lohan, Rihanna, for instance – we have photos of the two of them together. The others – McCartney, Dr. Phil, Buddy Holly, Joplin – I have worked very hard on them and stand by the work.

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11111111111……

IMG_2474As might be readily apparent, we are killing time here before flying back home tomorrow. Yesterday we walked in the wine country on the north shore of Lake Geneva near the town of St. Saphorin. This part of Switzerland is low in elevation (about 1,200 feet) and so supports vineyards and wineries.

I noticed that the official growing season begins after September harvest with pruning and removal of older vines, and that it is traditionally on the feast of St. Martin of Tours, which falls on 11/11, or if the much older calendar is used, 9/11. (“Nova” is nine, so that “making a novena” is attendance at nine masses in a row, as all current and fallen-away Catholics know, including those of us who never did one).

The insertion of January and February caused the last ten months to be pushed back two months (so that the last four, Septa, Octa, Nona and Deca, 7, 8, 9 and 10, became 9, 10, 11 and 12 .) Quintilus (fifth month) and Sextillus (sixth month) were renamed July and August, but this did not cause the two-month pushback.

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