It gets more invasive all the time, and more disturbing because these random driver pullovers were run by a private contractor. Fort Worth, Texas police were apparently not involved even as it was done in its jurisdiction. Instead, a test that randomly pulled drivers over and then got them to “voluntarily” submit blood, saliva and breath tests was run. Intimidated drivers cooperated. Unknown to the drivers, their breath was being tested anyway.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration authorized the tests, done by Pacific Institute for Research and Evaluation, a private government contractor.

While trying to get my clock turned around here, I was lazily listening to podcasts and YouTubes, and came across the old “Paul is Dead” controversy surrounding the Beatles in the early 1970’s. I’ve never really understood it well, but am not surprised that there are people still spouting the myth. After all, “evidence” is abundant.

And then came the Rolling Stone magazine cover in the piles of mail – I love it! Rolling Stone is having an inside joke. Paul is lying in state! And smirking.

Anyone who reads this blog knows that I believe 9/11 was an inside job, largely fabricated for TV audience, and that Osama died in ’01 and the Boston Bombing was staged and so much of our life is governed by TV illusions. That is all evidence-based, but with that in mind, I want the reader to understand that Paul McCartney is alive and well.

And also that there is lots of evidence, clues strewn about on album covers and song lyrics that hint that he died in a car crash (and lost his hair) on Wednesday morning at five AM on November 9, 1966 driving his gray Aston Martin, a car nicknamed the “Silver Hammer.” What was up with that?

I think it helps to remember that the Beatles were a phenomenon that will never be seen again, a mixture of marketing and charming young men with real talent. But the marketing was important. The screaming crowds that greeted them in New York on first arrival had to be brought in, along with the kids who were in the audience of the Ed Sullivan show. The illusion had to be fostered by suggestion so that other kids would pick it up and start screaming on their own. There were real brains behind that operation, and a cash cow of gigantic proportions.

The question was what to do when inevitably the bubble burst and they came down to earth. The answer, and a real act of marketing genius, was to kill Paul. They did it well in advance of dropping hints when Abbey Road was released. The cover of Sgt. Pepper was literally strewn with clues, from the grave made of flowers forming a bass guitar to a doll holding a car and bloody driver’s glove. Magical Mystery Tour had inside a picture of the band performing, Ringo’s drum saying “We love the 3 Beatles” alongside a pair of bloody shoes as the new Paul is singing barefoot.

Some time in 1969 or 1970 there was a radio phone call to a music station in Michigan, surely planted, that mentioned the clues on Abbey Road. The result was a nationwide frenzy. People went out in droves and bought the albums looking for clues … and are you getting this? The Beatles were breaking up, unknown at that time. It was going to happen right after one more album required under contract. They needed to keep sales going.

I love it! Thanks, Rolling Stone, for the funniest magazine cover ever.
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PS: Rolling Stone cover caption: “Scenes from a nonstop life.” Funnier still!
PPS: Changed name of post from “PID redux” to “Paul is Dead redux” to get more Google hits. It’s a marketing ploy.

Ah the beauty of jet lag, up at 3AM, asleep at 5pm in the chair, hoping to make it at least until 9PM to get on track again. We are very fortunate to be able to travel, and seeing other countries, far from making us experts on anything, merely reinforces the reality that everyone on this planet is concerned first with family, friends, making a living, and only secondly with more ethereal matters like impressions of other countries they have never visited.
Continue reading “Thursday morning at 3AM … jet lag” →

Note to subscribers: I’m fresh back from a long vacation, jet lagged and so forgot how to write on this blog. This post got out of hand, was mis-posted and disappeared, and then reappeared in very, very long form, which is probably the one that turned up in your email. What follows is shorter (though never short enough) and severely edited.
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Years ago before I met my wife I had a brief encounter with a lady of the feminist persuasion. Having been brought up very conservative and then only recently having made the jump to more leftist ideologies, I assumed that my attitudes regarding women had been sanitized and that I was safe dating material. I was so wrong.

Feminism (as opposed to suffrage and other kin movements) was a late arrival on the domestic scene, and a kid sister of civil rights. We take so many things for granted now due to the success of the feminist movement. Female athletes are well-trained now, and programs are in place in every school for girls and boys alike to develop their abilities. There are no legal barriers to access to all professions. Sexual freedoms now taken for granted were once condemned as acts of trollops and whores when done by women, though winked at by men.
Continue reading “Thoughts on abortion” →

We head to Bangkok today, and then to Colorado via Tokyo. It’s been a wonderful experience. People are the same where you go, but they are affected by culture. Indians have a reputation for being greedy, Chinese for bullying and rude. We haven’t seen enough of either to understand those stereotypes.

But those people we met, Nepali and Thai, are remarkable. They are courteous. The Thai smile is everywhere, not just in those in the tourist economy, but also in every face we see. They are a gracious people. There is a vibrant economy here, and we have not seen beggars as we did in India and Nepal. Cars are mostly new, streets bustling.

Politics is lively, public opinion influences public policy to a degree, unlike the USA where such a high-falutin’ idea is just an illusion. Class structure is everywhere, and wealthier people always have more influence, but in the US, that rule is virtually absolute.

It’s very hot. That makes trekking, even walking across town, a sweaty experience for me. Our next otrip is Switzerland or New Zealand – somewhere where we need heat rather than fight it.

I did think I could score a fortune betting on American football, as Thailand is 14 hours ahead of the US so we would know the outcome of games ahead of people in the States. It does not work that way, I’ve learned.

Note to self … when in Thailand, eat Thai food. They are pretty good at making it. I had a craving for something different at lunch today, and so had lasagna at a place that offers European food in addition to Thai. It had the meat, noodles, cheese, but Thai cooks were not aware of spices. Imagine Italian food without spice. It’s been repeating on me for the last hour.

Anyway, a few more days here and then home to Colorado. I’m ready. The heat is hard on me, one of the reasons we live at 7,800 feet. I grew up in Billings, pre-air conditioning. I used to hang my head out the window at night gasping for air until finally it cooled off at like 2AM. My mother had the same internal thermostat, so I sweated and she perspired all summer long.

Here’s what’s interesting going on now: Candidates. Ryan Zinke, John Bohlinger got the usual suspects all up in a lather.

That is all these party people can think about – winning elections. Are any of them aware of what their Tester, Baucus, Obama are up to these days? No. They follow Steve Daines like hawks, but let their own people escape accountability.

That’s why we’re better off with Republicans in office – Democrats are then paying attention instead of asleep at the wheel.

The US is corrupt and defective, and the Democrats the worst of the two parties because they are fear-based voters. They let their own people get away with murder, literally (I’m looking at you, Barack Nobel Obama) because they are so damned afraid of the Tea Party.

Those are the spooks that Obama uses to keep them in line. He knew he could do anything he wanted his first term because Democrats would support him out of fear. Millions of us who supported him in ’08 begged out in 12 because he was Bush III.

He needed the Tea Party, and they came through for him.

When a Republican takes over the presidency in 2016, the TP will cease to matter and will die on the vine, its purpose (making Obama look moderate) having been served.

Democrats don’t get that. They don’t see that the system is dysfunctional, and dammit, here we go again.

Is Bohlinger pro-choice (wedge politics at its best)?

Did Zinke speak out of turn about Seal Team Six?

They take the most inconsequential of issues and hammer us with them. It’s all election talk, and all goes away quietly after the voting.

Meanwhile, money works quietly behind the scenes, writing bills, crafting policy, bribing and pressuring to get its way, the party faithful blissfully unaware. Behind closed doors in DC, there are no parties. Only interests.

Man I hate American politics.

Here in Thailand, there is real grassroots politics going on. There’s an amnesty bill before their congress – there was turmoil in preceding years and some crimes are punishable, but it is largely a bill to grant immunity to Thaksin Shinawatra, a corrupt billionaire forced to leave the country or face jail. He was the older brother of the former PM, and took advantage.

Yingluck Shinawatra, the prime minister elected in a landslide in 2011, promised to clean house if elected. She then turned around, Obama style, and pushed through an amnesty bill in the dead of night.

She’s paying now, as the streets of Bangkok were full of protesters and the amnesty bills are poison.

That’s how politics work in real democracies – people are held accountable.

Nepal is a different story, dysfunctional, but not as much so as the US. There are 120 political parties there, but the most prominent are Democrats and Maoists, if our guide on our trek is correct.

The latter have been the source of violence and were responsible for overthrowing the monarchy after a ten-year conflict. All the country is trying to do now so write a governing document, and it hasn’t gotten done. So there’s another election on November 19 to elect a new body to write a constitution.

Maoists are split over whether to incite violence or merely boycott, as other parties are doing.

If they boycott with others, and the resultant election has a light turnout, they can then claim that the election result is illegitimate. Then follows violence.

While we were there police were in training, loudspeakers mounted on cars went up and down streets, large assemblies of people listened intently to speakers.

We’re in part of the world where politics is more than just for show. That’s refreshing.

Back home it’s a circus with no influence on public policy (except at times at a very local level). Nothing could matter less than Zinke or Bohlinger getting elected.

But that will consume all of the band width for the coming months.

(Oh yeah, and I guess you could say that the Nepali Maoists are anti-choice, in a place where choice really matters.)