The Essence of what it is to be a Neo Con

"Whenever Money Changes Hands - It's Taxed"

"Don't ask me what I want it for - -

If you don't want to pay some more"

Men who get divorces know this truth all too well!

Here is a coralary saying "Whenever a Christian changes churches - - the Faith and religious knowledge meter gets reset to zero".  Just think about it.

So - - are "tough eggs" laid by unhappy chickens?"

WHAT IT IS TO BE A CONSERVATIVE

The other day Shawn Hannity said the thing which distinguishes a conservative is that they want to be self reliant and don’t want the government ‘holding them back” either with regulations or with “assistance”.   Shawn has this idea that people are conspiring every day to “get on welfare”.  I thought they pruned back “Welfare as we know it” in 1996.   People who get on SSI are diagnosed as disabeled, either physically or mentally.  It’s by no means an easy process to get on, as I found out first hand.  (You have to have someone hounding you too keep at it till you succeed, as in my case)   I didn’t WANT to get on SSI.  I honestly didn’t think I needed it, and didn’t like some of the “vow of poverty” ramifications.  I personally would say that what distinguishes a conservative is “hatred of the Other”.   I would also say there is an inherent fear of the democratic process and openness all around by conservatives.  This used to be just the OPPOSITE in Goldwater’s party where they championed Democracy.  No more.  I would also say there is a basic sense of self delusion among the adherents that “They think they are better than they really are”.  Don’t be insulted by that; just accept it as true.  Most of them think some how some way “the rules everyone else has to live by don’t apply to them”, almost as if they had been “chosen by God” or something.  And this I submit is the true meaning of what they are getting at with that word “exceptionalism”.  There is a disregard altogether of the future- - of the human race, and also of Planet Earth.  There was an Irraquois saying that “When we pass a law, we need to think about how it will affect the next seven generations”.   There is a need to “Impress” and to wow with the immediate “first impression”, and a tendency, as there was with Captain Queeg “Of reverting to clichés and second hand phrases”.  Think about it.

JEB BUSH IS A FIRST RATE MAJOR CROOK
The International Business Times reports that Jeb Bush Funneled $1.7 BILLION of pension cash to W’s donors – some who are now Jeb donors.

The former Secretary of Health and Human Services says that Jeb lobbied on behalf of an infamous Medicare swindler.

Bush is also a hardcore neocon, and member of the influential warmonger group Project for a New American Century. He’s for mass surveillance by the NSA. He supported the Iraq War, and has tappedkey architects of his brother’s failed Iraq War as his advisors.

Mother Jones notes:
Financial support flowed to Jeb through Miami’s right-wing Cuban community. Republican party politics and a series of business scandals — including Medicaid fraud and shady S&L deals — were inextricably intertwined. A former federal prosecutor toldMJ that, when he looked into Jeb’s lucrative business dealings with a now-fugitive Cuban, he considered two possibilities — Jeb was either crooked or stupid.

Mother Jones also notes that Jeb supported the Contras, and may have been involved in the Lincoln S&L scandal.

Alternet reports:
Five months after he left the governor’s mansion in 2007, he joined Lehman Brothers as a “consultant.” No doubt he was well-compensated, as reporters may learn if and when he releases his tax returns someday. The following year, Lehman infamously went bust — and left the state of Florida holding about $1 billion worth of bad mortgage investments. (A Bush spokeswoman said, “His role as a consultant to Lehman Brothers was in no way related to any Florida investments.”)

***

He performed a similar service, with more success, on behalf of the Cuban militant Orlando Bosch, for whom he sought a presidential pardon from his father. The boastful murderer of dozens of innocent people — and a prosecution target of the U.S. Justice Department — Bosch deserved a pardon about as much as the worst jihadi in Gitmo. But his sponsors were the same Cuban-Americans in Miami who had fostered Jeb’s real estate business there, so he ignored the Republican attorney general’s denunciation of Bosch as an “unreformed terrorist.”

And Jeb “helped” his brother become president. Noted social historian and author Michael Parentiexplains:
Under orders from Governor Jeb Bush (Bush Jr.’s brother), state troopers near polling sites delayed people for hours while searching their cars. Some precincts required two photo IDs which many citizens do not have. The requirement under Florida law was only one photo ID. Passed just before the election, this law itself posed a special difficulty for low-income or elderly voters who did not have drivers licenses or other photo IDs. Uncounted ballot boxes went missing or were found in unexplained places or were never collected from certain African-American precincts.

Today President Obama took the historic step of removing Cuba’s name from the list of official nation terror states.  The only three on the list now are Iran, Syria and Sudan.  I’m surprised Cuba remained on the list while North Carolina or Libya or some of these other obvious terrorist nations such as Yemen, are not there.  And most of the terrorist acts Cuba is accused of by us were prior to Ronald Reagan’s putting Cuba on that list of nations in 1982.  They were supporting leftist terrorists in Columbia.  This has been deemed a road block to Cuba’s agreeing to establish diplomatic relations with the United States.  It does kind of seem from here that the United States is making all the concessions, and Cuba is getting their way.

My stance on "Free Speech" and "Higher Education" is that this the essence of "liberalism".  Liberal means to say what you want to- - and the only criteria is whether it is "intellectually respectable" and "brings something accademic to the conversation".   Higher discourse is supposed to transcend politics, and not seek refuge in Ad Hominum arguments.  The Greeks believed "Education" was the "bring out" of knowledge which lies to be within a man or woman, that is - helping them to be what they were meant to be.  I had my problems with one teacher in particular - Mr Richi - - in two different college classes - - Philosophy of Religion in fall of 1972 and Logic in the fall of 1973.  In both cases I was arguing from a Born Again Christian point of view.  It was Michael Benner who spoke of certain things "ticking you off" or striking a reaction point,  Some may call that emotional baggage.  Conservatives have a lot of emotional baggage and are unable to argue an Issue on its merits alone.  If there were "politically correct speech" rules in a University, I would be equally against these whether they originated from the left or from the right.

 Loretta is back.  I saw her smiling face - - wearing what looked like a fresh hair style.  She related all the experience she’d undergone in the “nine or ten” weeks she was gone.  She was transferred from hospital to hospital.  In one hospital they had smoking breaks only three times a day, at 7:45 AM and 7:45 PM, and at 12:45 PM.  That’s it.  My pink eye was acting up.  Sinus troubles weren’t that bad.  She related how she’d interacted with Glen at one of the hospitals (closing that circle). Food never came up as a topic.  People thought she had gang affiliation because of her tattoos.  She talked about how she used to ride on the back of a Harley with one of her husbands, but she’d never ride solo.  One time she threw a table through a window or something.  Another time she had “a really good roommate” who was orderly and didn’t have screaming fits in the middle of the night.  She said that people here had gifts for her like shampoo and things delivered to her room, which was neat.  I might have stayed and talked longer if - - [it weren't for my pink eye discussed below] .   I took inventory of the laundry and made out a list on a fresh piece of paper.  It was NCIS and I only watched the one episode because I was pretty tired.

This is Wednesday April 15, 2015, Income Tax day.  That’s the reason I turned it from Sean Hannity because when he says “people who ride the subway to work are in such high brackets that the government gets half of their estate when they die”, I know he’s nuts, because only a fraction of one percent pay any estate tax at all, and I know even his staff isn’t that well paid.  As to the constant rain of remarks about leaving New York, they bitch and moan about it and they’re still there and it’s been a year since I first heard it.  If Republicans and Shawn are that upset about the "freeloaders" who don't pay Federal Income Tax, sure we could adjust this number a little if you want.  Maybe we could institute lowering the threshhold income to say 27% who will no longer pay Federal Income Taxes, just so Shawn will feel better.  Then I turned to Bill Carol talking about these water swamps on Mars (?) which so far are lifeless.  There are no microbes or anything yet found on Mars.  Then he talked about this new version of the dog flu, which differs from a previous version of a dog flu because cats can also get this one. 

 On Days of our Lives the big news is that both Brady and Melanie have figured out Teresa’s dark secret that Teresa doesn’t know herself.  (Those are the worst kind of secrets)  Even if you were in regression and related a tale of being drugged and your embryo forcibly removed from your body the therapist would call it “false memory sidrone” but that’s exactly what happen.  Christine Di Mira made her return to the script today.  For the second day in a row I sprouted a bad case of pink eye or something after the noon hour.  Today it’s more explainable because we had Santa Ana winds kicking up pollens in the air, which are rampant right now.  I went to smoke and paid Paul back three more cigarettes after buying a fresh pack at the store.  Then Larry chimed in and demanded the two I owed him.  I went for coffee in the courtyard and got two cups from Dora.  I called Mom at her place and obviously she’s feeling better.  Her voice is back to normal, she sounds chipper and she was leaving for an appointment to have her hair done.  I just took off that heavy black and white shirt.  In the early morning there were no winds and it was pretty cool out.