(I see this mentioned here and there, but wonder if it has gained any currency in mainstream US media. Cuba and Russia have agreed to reopen a sensitive electronic eavesdropping base on the island, a response to the US poking its nose into every telephone conversation on earth. Every action has an equal and opposite reaction.)
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The TV series Mad Men is such a beautiful metaphor for American life. On the surface it is about advertising, the seediest of professions, the one where people try to mislead us with emotional symbols into making poor decisions. Second, it is about Don Draper, and I cannot imagine this is not intentional: He is running from himself. He grew up in a whore house.

There comes a time in our growing up process where we confront reality, if we grow up at all. I think Don Draper is going to do that in the final half-season, and hope that he becomes a complete human, full of faults and favors, but more aware of himself and his surroundings.
Continue reading “Madmen” →

See Footnotes
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To: NPR Ombudsman
From: Mark Tokarski
Regarding: Weekend Edition, Sunday, July 20, 2014

On your Weekend Edition this morning … the host was interviewing someone at the crash site of the airliner in Eastern Ukraine, and made two inferences: 1) Rebels are stealing bodies, and 2) (and this was so clever), he repeated an accusation by Kiev that rebels were altering the crash site. The on-site person said yes, indeed, people had said that wreckage seen the day before was not present the following day.

Got that? Here’s what we know: A reporter gave second-hand knowledge of missing debris. The host allowed the Kiev accusation through without a rebel response to the accusation. The inference of the news report: Rebels have altered the crash site.

What do we know for certain? Nothing. Agents of CIA, MI6, or Kiev could have as easily removed debris, stolen bodies, altered the crash sites. But NPR only infers rebel activity in the matter.

NPR is subtly inferring the the rebels shot down the airliner.
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(This is not part of the message to the ombudsman): It was apparent, reading between the lines, that the crash site is not secure, so that the investigation is already compromised. Further, NPR reported that official investigative work has not yet started, that the investigators are in Kiev. I think it safe to say that the anti-Kiev rebels are going to get the Lockerbie treatment.
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Score one for the rebels: They have control of the black boxes.

“Aircraft parts looking like black boxes were found at the site of the plane crash. They are currently in Donetsk, in the People’s Republic’s (DPR) government headquarters, under my personal control,” Aleksandr Boroday, the republic’s prime minister, told reporters.

The self-defense forces are ready to hand the data recorders over to international monitors “in case they arrive,” he said.

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JC has some links in the comments below that are quite informative, one of a video put out by the Ukrainian government that asserts evidence that the rebel forces shot down the airliner. The problem with it is that it was, ahem, made before the plane crashed – it is time-stamped, and has been pulled down, but just like Dr. Laura’s nude pictures, gentlemen, once they go out, you cannot get them back.

The other is some mathematical/calculus analysis of the crash, which is above my pay grade.

Too often we enjoy the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought. (JFK, Yale graduation, 1962)

If newscaster ‘facts’ land in your lap and you uncritically accept them as true; if you find yourself siding with one or another pundit in a televised debate; if you repeat talking points; if you’ve never looked at the hard evidence of the major events of our times, accepting official explanations as true; if you have ever ridiculed someone who does not accept official truth….

You’re an American. A thought-controlled, behavior controlled, no-threat-to-anyone-in-power American.

American public opinion is under complete control of the state. You, as a Democrat, might vociferously disagree with Republicans. That’s allowed, even encouraged, and the state will even furnish the issues you are allowed to vociferously disagree about. (Abortion, gun control, etc.) Once elected, they are the same people. But if you stray beyond the bounds of party politics, you’ll be ostracized, marginalized.

Think of what they do now at political conventions: They erect fenced areas, force demonstrators inside them, and then ignore them. They are called “free speech zones.” I am not kidding about that. This is what they are called.

That’s a nice metaphor for party politics. But there are real jails too. Eugene Debs campaigned from a prison cell in 1920, and Ralph Nader was arrested when he appeared at the two-party “debate” in 2000. We are only allowed freedom within the fences. Stray outside, the gloves come off.

Once every two or four years you get to throw the bums out. It does not change anything, but validates you. That is why we have elections. Otherwise, we might have real change, real progress, which is not allowed.

If the man or woman you support enjoys wide media coverage and is welcomed at newspapers editorial board meetings for serious scrutiny by serious journalists, and gets to ride on floats and is touted as a “front-runner” … move on. You’re supporting an apparatchik. Your candidate has already been vetted and found acceptable to insiders.

American party politics is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.

We are in Aspen, Colorado today. Our trip here started two days ago when we drove, late in the day, to Crested Butte, a gateway to the Maroon Bell Snowmass Wilderness. Its claim to fame is flowers. On the Crested Butte side, the glacial till provides high moisture retention and flowers grow in amazing abundance. There is an eleven-mile trail through there, over a mountain pass, to where we are now. We decided last year to book a room here and make that hike, and spend a couple of days here during their music festival.

Since we are here without a vehicle, we had to pack our street clothing and stuff in, meaning I loaded a regular backpack instead of a day pack. I haven’t done that since 2011, carried such a heavy load. The hike was long, and included a 2000 foot ascent over a pass and then a 3000 food drop into Aspen. There were a couple of stream crossings, but all told, it was not a difficult affair. Yet we were very tired. Must be that aging thing I keep hearing about.

Other folks we met on the trail were doing the “four pass” trek, a 20+ mile trip that, as the name says, takes them up and over four high mountain passes on a circular route starting and ending in Aspen. (I say “in Aspen,” but it is a shuttle bus trip of about ten miles to the trail heads.) That’s an overnight affair, at least a two-day trip.

As we got closer to the trail head, where the bulk of the hikers are found, we found a cacophony of languages, much like hiking in the Alps. This is always a delight.

The photos shown here are pulled off the Internet, explaining their high quality.

And then … we were so tired we just turned on the tube and vegetated last night, and were reminded once again what is being done to the American people. The programming is stupid, and the ads incessant. I don’t, can’t make myself watch “news,” as that is the source of my countrymen’s colossal ignorance. It has two effects, one to dumb them down, and two to insulate them so that they do not know its true impact. They do not know what they do not know. It’s diabolical. Merely having that thing on has got to be harmful to people, and god almighty … what about the children?