numbers are static, unfeeling, unbiased, neutral... fuck no.

 a new thought about flat taxes.

a big fat glaring misconception about flat taxes is that its "fair". to be honest its hard to debate this logic if you have shit for brains. yet I, like my brethren, know we have far more to consider when discussing the intimate details that make up fair.
what is fair? is it an arbitrary number? is it a slice of pie? is it birth order? heredity? life chances? purchasing power? leverage? POWER? the answer is yes.
to a person with perhaps high intellect but limited wisdom will jump to numbers. numbers are static, unfeeling, unbiased, neutral. a flat tax, 15% maybe 25% and no deductions. it has a ring to it that would sound like what fair could sound like. ok 15%. 15% what? how about 15% dry cleaning for everybody in the world? yeah, thats pretty cool. I'd like to dress sharp. a car. wow! only 15%? thats fuckin cool. an apple... 15%? oh wait... now were not really making sense anymore. we are just throwing numbers at a dartboard and pretending that everything that lands is 15%. that is not how the world works. 15% of one thing to me is very likely a different 15% to you.

the prices we pay can vary. a wealthy person can afford to splurge on certified organic robin's eggs for breakfast. a non-wealthy person can afford chicken's eggs. but the only people to be able to afford either or both are the wealthy. that is not fair.

lets try another number. a traffic ticket of $300 to me is 0.85% of my annual pay. to a millionaire its 0.03%. by that factor alone it affects me orders of magnitude more than it affects a millionaire. that means a traffic ticket for a millionaire, to be fair, should be $8540. now I will ask you; does a millionaire actually get a traffic ticket at the rate of 0.85% or at 0.03%?

that was the easy one...

life.

lets say you need medication that costs $10,000 in order to live 1 year. apply that same factor of fair and you can see where I'm getting. a millionaire doesnt question living at an extra $10,000. my grandmother has to. 15% to a millionaire is NOT 15% to my grandmother. is it fair that one lives in terror and the other can ignore a fraction as inconsequential?
fuck no.

now we ask: can it, should it be more fair than a flat tax?

despite what they profess; conservatives ARE that wrong

recently I watched a fairly impressive TED Talk by Jonathan Haidt. it provided much needed insight to progressives. it made the declaration that humans commit only so much to the professed goals of trust, fairness and justice. if the progressive system were wholly committed to, we would experience vast twists in actions of truthfulness. the trust games presented in the talk show that if given the opportunity to punish were given, in addition to trust, the participants suddenly started "behaving themselves" even more than trust alone. it turned to describe that conservatives only wanted the world to be better so they desired to bypass the unreliability of trust or justice and jump right to the punishment. supposedly just to get people to BE nice through the introduction of fear.

but my arguments still stand. IT is not about making people behave. it is about Quality of Life. hands-fucking-down, Quality of Life WILL be better under progressive trust than it will be under conservative punishment —albeit sometimes we will lie to one another. it is still way-fucking-better than living in fear. what is a better argument to make.

the argument for conservative tradition / punishment: dont eat pork or shellfish for they are unclean and god(s) will punish you through disease and pain and death.

the argument for progressive knowledge: dont eat pork or shellfish that is undercooked. because sometimes they live with parasites that are incompatible with our own biology. still they are safe to eat when stored and cooked properly.

notice how one tries to scare you into behaving through fear and the other just tells you what the fuck is up? both aim towards the same goal of helping people live a higher Quality of Life but one aims for freedom from fear. THAT is why we cant get along. THAT is why we wont get along. THAT is why I can appreciate the good intentions of conservatives AND I despise the methods of conservatives. progressives have intentions for and employ methods of Quality of Life. conservatives have good intentions (for some) but employ fucking-hideous methods*.

* WTF?...
 - creating an unequal society against women to "protect" women from the wretchedness of man
 - enslaving "savage" man to save the "savage" from his own "savagery". making them BE better through service to a master which is somehow more "godly" 
 - punishing dissent to prevent dissent
 - killing doctors to prevent abortions
 - blowing up clinics to prevent abortions
 - forcing prayer in school to instill fear of a god to install control of all children
 - using capital punishment not to prevent crime but using the fear of execution to prevent crime
 - endless examples of fear and hatred disguised as for the better of society...

GingRich is just thinking of what's best for the children...

GingRich seems to think that poor people's children —for some reason the other people's children (rich people's) dont apply— have a degraded work ethic. he wants to increase those children's work ethic but for some reason he has no interest in building up the work ethic of rich people's children. somehow they are exempt from that critique. and what better way to increase the work ethic of poor people? ...cleaning the toilets that rich people's children use.
somehow rich people's children either would not benefit from that type of work ethic or would not best be suited for that kind of learning. obviously there are other opportunities that are being made in GingRich's mind; apparently poor people's children should be exempted from those other opportunities.

20 ways to lick an armadillo and not get leprosy:

I had a hard time titling this piece. I want to convey a series of waypoints that illustrate why republican ideas are so fucked up.

religion
   specifically separation of church and state:
    when religion —mine, not yours— is enforced by the nation, none will be spared. why would I let you enforce your religion through state. I simply illustrate that if I have my way I will take it all. giving someone else's superstition the might of law probably wouldnt be a good idea either.

big guv'ment
   exactly what the fuck do you think the military is?

free-market
   exactly, what is the market? if you cant answer that then you have no place in this discourse. there are things we consider property and things we cannot consider property. property can be exchanged and traded. if it were a "free" market then EVERYTHING could be traded. including people, traded as slaves —or worse: food. clearly we dont even want a "free' market.
anyone who proposes that they do want that style of atrocity get to be the first slaves —or hamburger meat.

self-made man
    feral humans are self-made and they barely resemble a human. go figure...

low taxes make good-time happy-fun perfect-world feeley-squirts
    watch or read "Lord of the Flies". I might expand on this later.

war is peace
    guns. guns are a lot like poison. it is easy to salt the earth with guns. suggesting that mutually assured destruction is a perfect deterrent are not using their brain's critical thinking capacity. weapons do not get aimed at one another in a perfect symmetry. guns are a tool used by the wealthy to exploit the poor —in more ways than one. this is a cacophony of exploitation and phallic extension. there is not one way that increasing our inhumanity towards one another is somehow good. 

wealthy people are good
   job creators: bullshit. why is thin logic allowed anymore? there arent job creators anymore than there are gravity creators. gravity just is there —until other evidence proves otherwise. jobs are attracted to multiple sources of motivation. not just wealthy people's whimsical desires. jobs invent themselves based on desires of base: hunger, shelter, sex, friends / reputation, enlightenment. any of this making a pattern? ICanHasMaslow anyone?

conversely; poor people are bad
   those who do not demand respect will be given none. even those that are weakened by acts of the gods are not exempt. giving the wealth hoarders anything to point at is begging to be trampled upon.

Ronald Reagan is a great man
   great men are often caricatures that resemble less and less reality as the desires, technology and opportunities of the people change. I desire that people learn of EVERYTHING that Reagan did: Iran-Contra traitorous acts, unleashing the US military (including the CIA) and the private sector Chicago Boys, on South American nations —directly leading to mass deaths, torture, disappearances, rape, enslavement (basically the worst parts of the bible).

Homosexuality is unnatural
   just how many homosexual creatures does nature —or god, if youre ignorant— have to create before you realize that they are part of the natural landscape.
lets actually explore that one... if youre not gay you probably cant even imagine being gay. if youre a man you probably cant imagine being a woman. if youre white you probably cant imagine being black. if youre short you probably cant imagine being tall. if youre young you probably cant imagine being old. theres a lot of shit you cant even imagine. quit pretending that somehow you know better!

it was once said...

growing up I learned that by gaining power you also used that power for good. having a great ability meant that the ability would be used in effort to better the lives of everyone even those without the great ability. comic book heroes that could lift cars off injured citizens, mental acuity to solve crimes, compassion for those that have injury by evils hoisted on them by merciless gods or horrible souls.

now we have a new, relatively untested, morality. one that says those of great power have the ability to serve themselves, to gorge themselves. insatiable appetites lined up at the trough with no regard to limited resources, with no regard to others in need. being a hero used to mean something great. now we are lucky if superman drops a few coins as he robs the bank. now we are lucky if he doesnt endanger everyone in the room when he is unpleased with his godly offerings. doctors no longer consider quality of life, only focus on pharmaceutical kickbacks and their busty ski-bunnies in Aspen. priests are no longer considering the good deeds in their neighborhoods but only serve other people's souls as offerings to their gods —if they arent too busy diddling little boys. in fact I cannot see one hierarchical segment of the global society that isnt infected by a core of selfishness.

the weak can no longer look to the strong for help. the weak now must rise up in anger and wicked retribution against those who choke us with their greed. I prescribe two flaming torches and a pitchfork; and call me in the morning.

Rant - 2011/09/19

weep and cry for the misfortune of the job creators. (known as oligarchs)

but rejoice for the fortunate job creator CREATORS! (known as customers)

but we will not be acknowledging —at this juncture— the job creators creators Creators. (known as breeders)

this shit could go on as an exercise in futility. the trick is to be the first and loudest propagandists. wealth hoarders have labeled themselves in positive terms —as the benevolent slavers have done throughout history. which leads me to believe the polar opposite. I view their every utterance as evidence of their evil.

Rant - 2011/08/01

argument: if you tax the employers they will just pass the costs down to the customers who are pretty undeniably, to a considerable degree, employees but if you tax the employees they will just request more money in wages from their employers who will raise the costs to the customers due to higher overhead which will cause the employees to request more money in wages from their employers ....

pity for the unfortunate employer who cant seem to ever extort anywhere near enough all the while all the selfish bottom feeders want to steal their gots.

circular logic much?
the person who makes this argument wishes all those pesky employees were just slaves so they wouldnt have to split the profits. oh and also, no taxes, EVER.

Rant - 2011/08/01

I usually try to keep to a normal volume about hypocrisy. albeit I have no intention to ignore said hypocrisy(s). that being said I find myself fuming whenever I hear someone call for a flat tax and in the same breath say that the lowest earners would be granted exemptions from that tax burden; so 0%. So lets recap... I know I threw a lot of —or very few— big and complex —or brain dead simple— social engineering ideas out there. the flat tax that they want is applied progressively —or we could call it a progressive-flat tax. well, not to sound as stupid as flat taxers, isnt that what we have? we have a flat tax for people who make between 8,500 and 34,500; they pay a flat tax of 15%. and we have a flat tax for people who make below poverty; they pay a flat tax of 0%. and we have a flat tax for people who make 379,150 and above; they pay a flat tax of 35%.
oh, the flat taxer would say, we meant that we want to get rid of all those exemptions...
but didnt you just say that low earners would be getting an exemption? no one else merits any exemptions at all? what about the military? what about first responders? what about the people who work in less hospitable environments where as a condition of their employment they are unable to buy insurances at the rates that a normal person would pay? what about the disabled? what about the un-employable elderly?

so, thank you to all who have vomited out nonsense about flat taxes all these years. you are officially stupider than 4th grader logic.

Rant - 2011/05/03

it is often said —by assholes— that vast income disparity is not a horrible thing. the assumption is that if we all get wealthy enough that we can all rest comfortably. that is obviously NOT true. 100% of the population cannot ever live off of trust funds and dividends. that would leave 0% of the population growing food, 0% of the population making products and 0% of the population providing services.

it IS a fucking zero sum game and only part of the population can win it.

Regarding Kings and Princes

by now you have all read Common Sense by Thomas Paine. so you will likely agree with me that there is not a genuine reason to have kings, princes —or any hereditary title for that matter. so I would rather devote some time to the wants and wishes of man. those who have children are a force to be reckoned with. they have a deep love for their children. those that can put aside anything and everything they can afford to ensure a good life for their children. they sacrifice their own happiness for that of their child. they attempt to make a balance of joy during childhood for a solid quality of life after adolescence. AND they will go to hell and back before they let someone take away ANYTHING from their child's quality of life.

this is pretty easy stuff to understand. even those who do not have children will agree about those human conditions. I wont argue the wants and wishes of the parents. but I will argue the exploitation of those human conditions that give rise to the inheritant* aristocracy. the ones who align the roads of our society that benefit themselves and almost no others. passing virtually unlimited wealth down generations does not guarantee good people with good intentions will use that wealth for good. often those born into hordes of wealth are not only insulated from hardship, they will in fact not even know hardship exists. there are PR firms dedicated in preventing out-of-touch gaffes like"let them eat cake". no one likes to have their head cut off, least of all the aristocracy; its just beneath them to be executed by the rabble. but no matter how much publicity is scrubbed the fact remains that parents should keep in mind that there is too much of a good thing. the idea of insulating you children from any labor whatsoever produces a have and have-not society. furthering a split society is something that we should all condemn.

///////////////////////////Stop Reading Here, You've Been Warned//////////////////////////

I do have an idea to propose: parents bequeath a socially acceptable amount of money to their children. a tax exempt stipend for their children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, etc (but limited to family within the bequeather's* lifetime). that amount would be the median income salary of the people inheriting it but not more. and the grandchildren upon reaching the age 25 (I pick this age as it is the age at which someone can get state/federal college assistance) earlier if they join the military, have disabilities, dependents of their own etc. but all in all you cannot pass on the whole horde as a lump sum. essentially what I'm getting at is that a billionaire cannot birth another billionaire. your billions ARE passed on as a comfortable life but when that child grows and desires more wealth or desires to ensure that their great-grandchildren get that same way of life they must labor. it will be understood that if you have less money than monthly checks cover then the money runs out. but if you have even more then the money becomes part of the federal/state coffers. everyone involved gets to lead a decent life but no one gets to go berserk. clearly if we were nomads or hunter-gatherers we would not have to make these special social arrangements but ever since the earth was parceled out among the aristocrats of old we have been at each other's throats and there must be some form of acceptable equalization.

* yeah Shakespeare, I can make up words also

Rant - 2011/03/26

providing safe distribution of power —as in electricity— is not a significant problem. getting past obstruction is the significant problem. there are sources of energy that are not openly discussed and there is no logical reason why they are not being discussed.

there are sources of energy that have proven themselves time and again as inherently unsafe. that means that without active, unceasing preventive measures being jostled in place the energy system would break apart and cause widespread and relentless harm to people and the ecosystem.

that being said, there are also sources of harnessing energy that inherently are benign in the effects they pose to their surroundings, requiring no external effort to make them safe.

given those current day options why would anyone choose the prior? those who obstruct the safe and benign sources of power should be discredited and their input should be soundly rejected until irrefutable evidence is presented.

Fragile Free Market Fundies

Apparently the free enterprise economic system is infinitely fragile. have you noticed how Libertarians —or the free market fundamentalists— always have some enormous setback to their perfect world? they always decry that: if only there were no taxes, if only there were no regulations, if only there were no free roads, if only there were no social security, medicare, OSHA laws, national military, ... they would have a perfect world. not even one iota of regulation can be applied without the whole system collapsing. It is an all in gamble that the 'free market' will work and if even one miscalculation is made the whole system falls into climactic disarray. into the free market fundie nightmarish regulatory tyranny. its all bollocks, in all sense of reality the moment that land ownership began the true free market ended.

fundies have such a laundry list of: fractional reserve currency, regulations and programs to cut or eliminate. anecdotes are abundant that illustrate the attempt at regulation that fundies attest do not work yet wildly participate in hindering. they ask us to believe and participate in their fantasy and actively try to bring the roof down on all our heads to prove regulation does not work. we can accurately say the new deal regulations survived 60 years of constant attack and has held firm until now. we can also say that free markets as libertarians would have it cannot suffer even a slight breeze of regulatory influence. yet nations will never stop attacking each other. they will make attempts both physically or economically. can the free market survive the tariff or subsidy of a single nation? in their mind, No. yet fundies continue the quest for a magical world without government.

I recommend an exploratory poll of libertarians. if only to get a sense of exactly the tolerances, imagined and proposed by fundies, that the human world can bear in the form of: military, taxes, subsidies, tariffs, etc. only through that can we engage their ideas with a sense of how much they will allow the weak people to suffer and how absurd their proposals can get. hell we might even be able to implement some of their less cruel ideas if they prove beneficial.

but one of the biggest mysteries is the fundies' view of a perfect world. there isnt much more than a novel by Ayn Rand to hint at the kind of world they wish for. the character, John Galt, did not live in their perfect world. he lived in his own nightmarish struggle against his regulatory dictators. but I am ill fit to attempt the description as many of the ideas are in such discord to what I think of in quality of life. freedom. absolute freedom is the very definition of anarchy. in my imagination, a life of total anarchy splits the difference between harmony with earth and deep deep terror of crime, exploitation and daily suffering. I am intrigued by other ideas of living but I prefer my own unless someone comes up with a convincing idea. a large part of the New Deal is still with us and survived vicious attacks by the libertarian and authoritarian-right wingnuts. it built the greatest middle-class that is only now being dissolved in corporate feudalism. this dissolution is the result of endless attacks against progressive economics. just think of it. the stability of progressive economics have survived thus far and libertarian economics has yet to ever be tried at all due to its infinite fragility against any pressure. I dont want to trade a robust middle-class engine for a corporate feudal engine.

2011/03/09 - Rant

Greed is good

is it? good for who? everyone? really? what if everyone suddenly were wealthy? who would work? who would just live off the wealth? it is obvious the economy as it is would just stop if that were the situation. so it prompts me to ask: why is the nation's economy and incentive program geared toward the wealthy rather than the working class? the nation should have a disincentive to hoard wealth and should give true and direct incentive to live the other way. greed is not that great.

2011/03/08 - Rant

if youre not open minded stop reading NOW...

seriously, what is the point of marriage? and I mean SERIOUSLY? finish this sentence. it is imperative that the nations of the world legally recognize matrimonial marriage (because / to / for) ...

procreation?
   what? you cant fuck without a ring, cake and a contract?

clearly we can agree that procreation is not about marriage; or the inverse. 

marriage (specifically the tax loophole) is a financial incentive to grow population. the world has more than enough people. women, historically, have been homemakers. they have also been the gestation engines of the human race. of course they are the mothers of the future generations but in all honesty if there were no children you would still live out your own life, with your own thoughts and your own experiences; would you not? having a child is only to satisfy a biological craving. this is not a "need"; it is an earthly want. babies do not come from a magical either-world they are the biological soup of sperm and ova provided from the DNA donors. this is usually what results from extracurricular, pleasure sex.

women, historically, have also been prevented from engaging in all of: education, ownership, record-keeping (history), commerce, ...all manner of professions not related to human-livestock.
that being the case, women were in fact considered less than second class humans, they were considered property, human breeding livestock and chattel. regarding that inequality some men were probably not monsters. so they probably did not require their women to live in abject poverty while they gestated the children. but they still probably kept in mind the general financial cost to bared child ratio. naturally you just cant ... a woman who doesent put out a decent amount of children.

men want tax write-offs for their women livestock and the children that they bare. to that end they declared the women and children as financial burdens —a.k.a. dependents. these, so called, burdens were previously not document-able and exchangeable wealth; now they became a tax write-off. still, children are not a necessity; then, and even in this day and age they are optional. and like all other optional things there should not be a significant national endorsement of children.

so what would happen if children cost more money? what would happen if we stopped giving a tax incentive to have children? 

wealthy people would budget to have children. people who are not wealthy would have to budget to have children. those who cannot afford another person in their life would have to accept that as the way the world is. resources are not unlimited; endless exponential growth is not sustainable. if they want children they need to find the resources to make that a reality or they have children in the face of no financial incentive and go broke. this is not class warfare. I do not promote a desire for the wealthy to 'feel the joy' of child rearing. children are not a toy and they are not there for your entertainment, they exist to live their own lives regardless of what you desire. it is just eliminating an unreasonable tax incentive to increase population.

what about accidental births? 

what accidental births? birth is not accidental. like I wrote before babies do not come from somewhere. they are grown in the sexual gestation organs of the female species. if a woman willfully ignores the fact that a human is growing inside her, it is her financial responsibility. she can sue the man for financial support, sure, its up to the court to decide that case.

what I am recommending is to just take away all financial (tax) birth incentives. nothing else. this is not a hyperbolic argument to anything else. marriage would have no legal or financial meaning. marriage would just be the arrangement among the consenting adults. women who desire to be wives become wives. men who desire to be husbands become husbands. no magical thing happens. women and children cease to be the property (or tax write-offs) of their husbands. 

and I hope that everyone recognizes: a lack of 'citizens' is not a lack of people.

corporate personhood

I think I can settle this debate once and for all (how modest of me /s). so many people for so many years have been arguing back and forth on behalf of human rights for corporations. why do we have to argue if these rights are human rights? can they not just be rights granted in mere legal terms on paper? human rights are unalienable. granted rights are just bargained legal terms. corporations only exist as bargained legal terms; humans exist regardless of legal jargon. clearly corporations are simple bargained rights, not unalienable rights —perhaps we can just call them rules. to call into question the personhood of a corporation is a slippery slope, a premeditated effort to twist, bypass or usurp logic that would otherwise limit wealth accumulation/hoarding. the goal is clear: the property —or tool— known as a corporation is designed to accumulate wealth for its owners. giving the owners more leverage —in every possible way. the most popular example in current media is corporations exercising freedom of speech (as if corporations distribute dialog not directly from the owners themselves or coerced employees afraid to lose their jobs). property cannot be used give a person's freedom of speech duplicity. the rule has always been: one person one vote. a corporation is not a stake holder; it is actually a stake to be held. their existence is that of property. a corporation is, by its very definition, property.
it can be bargained that property can own other property but is, in and of itself, always owned. the property owned by that corporation, by transitive rules, is owned within that same hierarchy of ownership; the roots always go back to some flesh and blood human (regardless how dead their soul is). in fact, nothing about a corporation can ever be free from ownership. in my opinion that is in antithesis of what a person is.

the deliberate purpose to gain corporate personhood is wealth accumulation/hoarding. if that is its stated goal then we have the rights as actual persons to deny that, bargained, granted "right". the purpose of gaining corporate personhood is not a matter of fighting persecution or some lofty social good that would be achieved; it is simple greed. anyone fighting for the rights to hoard excessive wealth should fight an uphill battle. that said, we have the right —I would say the obligation— to resist them.

I can use analogies of past slavery or current pet ownership but I feel these arguments hold up well on their own. I request constructive dialog on the matter. if there are holes in my logic, I welcome reasonable criticism.

2011/02/22 - Rant

people who sided themselves wit Egypt's Mubarak regime would normally also self identify as Tea Party Republicans. the people who sided with President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali of Tunisia also Republicans. the people who reject calls for democracy in all protests, all revolutions, are in essence sided with dictators. Tea Party Republicans side with dictatorships.

and now its happening in Libya. but why the sudden silence by the Tea Partiers? did they finally figure out how stupid they sound?

2011/02/20 - Rant

now I'm sick of this bullshit.
Wisconsin's authoritarian republicans are launching a fight against contract law. the law only affects people who sell their labor. based on their fucked up world-view, if you attempt to get a better contract by bargaining with other people, who also are selling their labor, it prevents that type on contract from being enforceable through the justice system. if you have money you are allowed to pool it in any way, in fact you can pool it in ways that defy reason, logic or math. in fact you can even pool and sell other peoples labor through temp agencies. but those same temporary workers will not be able to do the EXACT same thing on their own.

now where else are authoritarian republicans preventing contracts?

2010/02/16 - Rant

my brain is trying to wrap around a very troubling uneasiness since the Egyptian political deconstruction. I have a feeling that the jobs situation in the US right now is connected to that turmoil, moving from a slow boil to a rolling boil. the current labor union conflicts in Wisconsin illustrate little more than the hatred of any middle class job security: 1 - by the jealous poor who lack security in their own jobs, and 2 - by the greedy wealthy who would gain ever greater wealth by the middle class' slide into poverty and insecurity.

President Obama complains that he cant get things done. FDR hired people to just answer phones at the Whitehouse, for no good reason except a paycheck. just kept hiring people. for no good reason. dig a hole, now fill it back up again. Obama cannot force the Legislative branch to hire people but he can hire people through the executive branch. he is shirking the use of executive responsibility —even the use of Executive Order— to MAKE things happen if the legislative is deadlocked or is actively destructive to the interests of the Citizens. (yes, we know that the militia nutjobs will freak out and buy more guns. yes, we know the legislative will impeach him.) yes, we know ALL of their freak out symptoms. but they are already freaking out anyway, without even one significant effort on behalf of the progressives. the healthcare and credit reforms lost almost every progressive reform in the form of insulting "compromises".

watching Obama do next to nothing is making me ill. the stroke of his pen can create 10 million jobs in electrical windmill factories, mag-lev high speed rail infrastructure, solar-electric farms... even lame ass phone banks like the 1930s.

PNAC waited for a Pearl Harbor like event to ramp up the authoritarian conservative social engineering projects. and we are looking at a Great Depression like event to ramp up our new, New Deal. but instead we are being gutted like fish.

fuck. we still havent even rebuilt New Orleans! this shit is disturbing.

Ayn Rand fanboy project

if Atlas holds up the world, what holds up Atlas?
there is a reason that Atlas is, in the modern term, an absurd mythical being. Atlas is not a caricature of an honorable struggle. it is a representation of defeat and punishment. Atlas was sentenced to perform this task. he did not take the sky on his shoulders for good —let alone for profit. the absurdity multiplies exponentially when the fanboys attempt to convince you to want to be Atlas —or John Galt 3ʳᵈ earl of somesuch whats-his-face.

in all seriousness, the Ayn Rand fanboy project* wants to unleash the transnational aristocrats on us. they want to condemn each and every man, woman and child to a gladiator fight with the corporations —collective bargains of wealth— one on one, for all eternity. the snake-oil they are selling is that you, the middle class peons, can do it on your own if only the pesky government would just get out of the way (no mention of aristocratic billionaires).
when was the last time you actually negotiated a contract? not signed. negotiated. you listed out your terms and they were actually written into a contract. not since elementary school I'll bet. you all remember the my slave for a day contracts with your sister or brother. well, those werent very good terms back then and the terms offered by the billionaires now are not very good terms either. the result? you do not have the time, wealth or infrastructure it takes to protect yourself. not from being nickeled and dimed to death, and you are being nickeled and dimed to death right now. each arbitrary clause, binding arbitration, and ipso facto you find in every contract is not written there to help you; it is there to hurt† or rob from you. what the Ayn Rand fanboys are selling is myth. when land ownership and parceling began the free market ended (read Thomas Paine). you can not do it on your own unless you are a land owner. if you think a mortgage on a house on a 1/3 of an acre is "owning land" you are living in a fantasy world, a schizophrenic Ayn Rand themepark. you will watch your savings dwindle and peter away until you have nothing. you imagined through your life that you would build an empire to bequeath to your children. instead you end up in hospice alone, despised by the free-market fundies you once considered ideological allies. your children will grind out their own meager 9to5 existence among the wolves you helped feed.
that is Ayn Rand's version of success, just not your success.


* credit to Dennis G. —Balloon-Juice.com— February 12, 2011
† the greater your pain / fear the greater the wealth transfer from poor to rich.