OREGON MILITIA NOT SO TOUGH.

About time the law quit playing games with the militia morons in Oregon.   If they had been black and taken over a federal building  they would have all been dead or arrested on the second day. 

The FBI and other law enforcement agencies have often been seen as too quick to use deadly force; however, in this case LaVoy Finicum had bragged on tape that he wouldn't be taken without fighting back.    He had the choicer of surrendering peacefully, but instead nearly hit an officer with his vehicle and then presented himself as a threat to the officers.   

Enough with this bullshit.   These grown men playing military have gotten away with sedition for too long, and have been encouraged to bolder actions by the lack of swift accountability to the law. 

I 'played Army' when I was twelve years old; but I out grew it.   I spent 22 years in the military.  If these flakes want to dress in camouflage and carry assault weapons - there is a place for them in the Middle East where they can actually serve and protect the Constitution and the United States. 

Fuck these retards.
the Ol'Buzzard     

FOR SQUATLO

The hokey-pokey is really what it's all about

the Ol'Buzzard

ENJOY YOURSELF IT’S LATER THAN YOU THINK

ISIS in the Middle East; terrorist around the world; militia morons talking of fighting the government; Korea developing a hydrogen bomb; nuclear weapons stockpiled by nations; police violence; racial violence; religious violence; social prejudices spawning hatred; carbon pollution of the atmosphere; financial motivated dependency on fossil fuels; violence; mayhem; corruption; climate change…  

This is mankind’s legacy for the earth.   This is who we are.   As individuals we are not bad animals; but let us organize in packs and we a blight on the earth.

There was a time when our actions didn’t affect the planet we live on.  We were devastating to the weak and vulnerable of our own species, but the earth could absorb our folly. 

About three million years ago Lucy (Australopithecus Africanis) walked across the plains of South Africa.   It took over three million years for our species to finally gain one billion in population and the ability to change the earth.  

We throw around words like million, billion and trillion until they finally seem small in our imagination.   Actually, If you banged on your desk once every second, twenty four hours a day – nonstop,  it would take you 32 years to bang out one billion, and 32,000 years to bang out one trillion.

The human race population reached one billion about 1800:

1927 – two billion

1960 – three billion

1974 – four billion

1987 – five billion

1999 – six billion

2012 – seven billion

And on January 28, 2016 @ 10:05 am – the time of this writing – the world population topped 7,397,975,316 and climbing.

Check out this link:

http://www.worldometers.info/world-population/

With each increase in population we increase the consumption of food, water and natural resources; we create exponential garbage pollution, release more hydrocarbons into the atmosphere, and increase our own destructive tendencies and ability to bring about global annihilation.   

When we talk about pollution of the earth it is like blaming the mosquito for malaria: we are the virus.

We think we are so God Damn smart that we can fix things when they get to the panic phase.   But, at some point, because of our pettiness and conceit, a hand is going to reach out of the mire and haul us down.   We will reach a deserved ending: we will inherit the wind.   

Have a good day

the Ol’Buzzard

JITTERBUG PHONE

I have an ole flip phone, 12 years old, and still have prepaid phone service through an Alaskan company for $100 per year.    

I have been thinking about replacing the phone service to something local.   Then, last night my wife brought the JITTERBUG advertisement to my attention.  It looked like exactly what we need: fifty minutes a month for $14.99.  

This morning I called the JITTERBUG customer service intending to sign up.    I dialed the number and got a partial recording telling me to leave a number.   Figuring that I must have dialed wrong I tried again.   This time I got a JITTERBUG recording telling me to stay on the line.   I listened to music for about five minutes and then an operator came on and told me that all the customer service lines were busy.    She said I would have to leave my number and someone would return my call within 24 hours.

Wow!  My call was to sign up for a new phone service and I could not connect to customer service?   What if I were on the road and having trouble with my phone only to be told that I would have to wait up to 24 hours to speak to someone in customer service?  

Unacceptable.

So, online I go looking for JITTERBUG customers to find what their experience has been with JITTERBUG.   The responses are unbelievably bad.  I am enclosing the web link, and suggest that if you are considering purchasing a JITTERBUG you would be advised to read it.

JITTERBUG CUSTOMER COMPLAINTS

OR

http://jitterbugcellphonescamsseniors.blogspot.com/2008/03/more-complaints-about-jitterbug-dba.html

Forewarned is forearmed.

Talking about dodging a bullet.

The Ol’Buzzard

CURSE WORDS AND OTHER EXPLETIVES

It has been said that there are too few words in the English language to express strength of feeling.   We must remember that the proper Englishman, when his ire rose, might have exclaimed ‘Poo to you with knobs on,’ or if he was really pissed, call you a Cad or a Bounder.   Then we add in the obsessive control of the Puritan Christians, carried on today by the Christian fundamentalist, and we can see why mere words are band from ‘proper’ conversation.

Whenever I hear someone use Effin as a place holder for fuck, or substitute Fudge, I feel like yelling: ‘Say fuck, you fucking moron – it is just a word.

Expressions should be colorful and anger should be express with resolve.

  

My go to is always: Fuck me silly – sometimes with less passion just crap.   Personally I don’t use the word Shit too often, you’re welcome to; but to me it just sounds nasty. 

I had an old Mainer friend that use to cry out: God damn I.   Should it have been God damn me:  Me is God damned; I am God damned – hell I don’t know? 

An uncle in Mississippi always exploded: Shit, Fire and molasses.    That does sound expressive doesn’t it?

I love these sayings.  Someone should collect and publish them, so the rest of us can choose among them and be more colorful in our speech.

But my pet peeve is the word FUCK.   Only in some fucked up Christian parallel universe could you take a word that connotes the height of passionate and personal sharing between two friends and turn it into something nasty – and explicative of anger and disgust. 

Bastard, cock sucker, mother fucker etc. are not really explicative – they are words of angry personal attack.   Not that they are not warranted in some instances; but they do express disdain on the verge of violence – something to be carefully considered.   

Well, fuck me silly – it is almost time for breakfast.

Have a good day

the Ol’Buzzard

And for those of you that would like to remember the king of explaining 'dirty words you can't say on TV: George Carlin.   CLICK THE LINK BELOW.

SEVEN DIRTY WORDS

You're welcome

the O'B

MAD MAX FURY ROAD

My wife took a nap this afternoon and when she came downstairs I told her, 'I just watched the worst fucking movie I have seen this century.   It had no plot.  It was totally unbelievable. It was fragmented and it consisted of two hours of a car chase across the desert.  The acting was flat and the ending would have been improved if everyone had died in a fiery crash, because the end made no sense.'

She looked at me and shrugged and walked away.  

Sometimes a look is all that is necessary.   

This is as good as it gets

A truck mounted hard rock guitarist stage with flames shooting out of the guitar, leading the charge.

The super villain and his son

Why did I sit there and watch it for two hours?   The only excuse I can give is:  I am a man, and sometimes we are not bright enough to change the channel.  

the Ol'Buzzard

BEFORE ROCK AND ROLL THERE WAS BOOGIE WOOGIE

turn up the sound and rock on
the Ol'Buzzard

NINE DEGREES AND FORTY MILES PER HOUR WIND IN MAINE TONIGHT

WIND

I am obsessed with the wind

Of all natures children

Of all natures gods

It is the wind that awes me most

I can view the sunrise and sunset

And feel the sun's warmth on my skin,

I can appreciate the eerie light of a full moon

reflected on a snowbound world,

I can see and hear the tumbling water of a stream

And experience the pleasant serenity of a lake.

But it is the wind

I can welcome the soft touch of a snowflake

as it kisses my face,

And shiver as the rain soaks my clothes

and chills my frame,

I can hear thunder 

and startle at the streak of lightning ripping the sky.

But it is the wind that speaks to me.

I have bask at the fire that brings contentment

and warmth to my home,

And choked as my lungs fill with smoke 

as the forest burned away,

I have driven on the ice

on the Kuskokwim River.

But it is the wind

I have seen the northern light

blaze in the twenty-four-hour night,

I have felt the penetrating chill

of the cold at fifty below,

But it is the wind

the wind I remember most.

Huddled in my bed in a tiny log cabin

In the darkness of the never ending Arctic night

While the wind outside, unrelenting, warned me

‘You do not belong here.  This is my world.  I rule here.  Hear me and quake.”

It is the wind

The relentless wind that keeps me awake tonight.

RACISM IN AMERICA TODAY

This morning on Morning Joe on MSNBC two authors were introduced to discuss racism in America as it relates to the Flint, Michigan water crisis.

Bryan Stevens (America’s Original Sin) and Professor Eddie S Glaude Jr (Democracy in Black) were the guest.  The discussion covered the same old ground of changing demographics the answer to the move toward a multicultural society.

The thing that struck me was that after everyone expressed their opinion, there was a commercial, and then the show moved on to a completely different subject – the prior discussion on race forgotten.

 

This is personification of the race issue in this country – state an opinion and then move to the next more exciting subject.

 

We all believe what we believe, and when it does not directly affect us we state an opinion and then move on.

It is my contention that any subject of discussion has to be brought back into the context of a personal history (instead of the history of a movement) to truly understand it.

My grandmother was born in the Mississippi Delta in 1892, shortly after the Civil War.   Racist is not the word I would use to describe her.   She was raised by parents whose cultural values had been destroyed by reconstruction.   She did not hate black people but honestly felt that they were inferior, and she was terrified of black men.   There was no cultural advancement that she could accept.   She and her generation of white southerners had to die out in order for some incremental change to occur. 

My mother, born about 1920, did not have the same history as her mother (my grandmother,) but her disrespect for black people was impressed by being raised in the segregated south and the prejudice of her mother and mother’s family.   She could truly be called a racist.    She and her generation of southerners had to die off before racist attitudes at that level could incrementally modify.

 

I was raised in western Kentucky where there were only a few black people, and the half dozen black children in the county attended the school with whites.  I moved to Mississippi as a preteen without the inherited prejudice of children born and raised in the segregated Delta land.   I left Mississippi when I was eighteen and never returned.    Had I been born and raised and remained in the racist environment of the Mississippi Delta of the 1940’s and 50’s, I have no doubt that my values would reflect my demographics’ covert racism that exist there .

It is not until my generation, and possibly the next two generations succeeding me, die out that attitudes can truly evolve toward multiculturalism; and among the least intelligent and least educated of the southern red necks, entrenched against change, it may never be accomplished – for ignorance is a breeding ground for bigotry and intolerance. 

It is just an ol’man’s observation

the Ol’Buzzard

TWO PICTURES ARE WORTH A THOUSAND WORDS

U.S. SAILORS CAPTURED BY IRAN

HERE THERE ARE TIGERS

I spent eight years of my military career as a SERE (Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape) instructor.

I watched the American sailors captured by Iran with special interest.  They did everything contrary to SERE training; but an allowance has to be made.  

SERE students are chosen from service units likely to fall prisoner into enemy hands.  SEAL teams, Green Berets, Pilots etc. are required SERE training.  The majority of military personnel never experience SERE, and this is probably the case with the boat sailors captured by the Iranian Coast Guard.  SERE graduates would have behaved differently because of specialized training.    

These young sailors should not be vilified. They acted on instinct in a stressful situation for which they were not prepared.    It is more than likely that anyone reading this post would have acted exactly the same.

It especially pisses me off when people who have never served in the military express an opinion critical of these young sailors.  They are doing a dangerous job and training for the eventuality that someday they may be required to lay down their life in defense of their country. 

the Ol’Buzzard

PEPPERMINT FARTS

PEPPERMINT BRAIN FARTS

PIGS:  THE PHILOSOPHERS OF THE ANIMAL WORLD

the Ol'Buzzard

AMMON BUNDY MILITIA NEEDS HELP

The ill planned take over of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge left Ammon Bundy and his militia without snacks and toilet paper.   Militia symphatisers from all over the United States responded with a mail-in effort.   Now after a number of days another need is being expressed.   

Please chip in and send the much needed stress remover to the brave patriots.   

POWERBALL

All right, I did the odds: it's easy.    There are 310 Million people in the United States.   On average, 280 people in the United States are struck by lightning ever year.  

Which means, approximately one person out of every one million people in US will likely get a lightning strike this year.  

Your chance of winning the POWERBALL is is 1 in in 292 Million.

Conclusion: You have the same chance of being struck by lightning 292 times as you do winning the POWERBALL.

I think I will buy two tickets tonight and double my chance.


Crap, somebody won and I missed it.   Think I will save my $4.00

Of course, I have had two near lightning strikes in my life; that means there is still a chance I can have 290 more - or perhaps win the POWERBALL next time.  

the Ol'Buzzard

IT IS TURTLES ALL THE WAY DOWN

THE WORLD IS FLAT AND SITTING ON A TURTLE.

THEN WHAT IS UNDER THE TURTLE?

IT’S TURTLES ALL THE WAY DOWN

When I was in Vietnam the story went around that there was such a virulent strain of VD carried by some of the whores in Hundred-P Alley in Siagon, that if you contracted it the military would ship you off to Turtle Island to die and notify your next of kin you had died in action.   When the shit really hit the fan and things got bad and stressful the obvious reply was: ‘It won’t be like this on Turtle Island.’ 

I've seen Jesus play with flames in a lake of fire that I was standing in
Met the devil in Seattle and spent 9 months inside the lions den
Met Buddha yet another time and he showed me a glowing light within
But I swear that God is there every time I glare in the eyes of my best friend
Says my son it's all been done and someday yer gonna wake up old and gray
So go and try to have some fun showing warmth to everyone
You meet and greet and cheat along the way

There's a gateway in our mind that leads somewhere out there beyond this plane
Where reptile aliens made of light cut you open and pull out all your pain
Tell me how you make illegal something that we all make in our brain
Some say you might go crazy but then again it might make you go sane

Every time I take a look inside inside that old and fabled book
I'm blinded and reminded of the pain caused by some old man in the sky
Marijuana, LSD, psilocybin, and DMT they all changed the way I see
But love's the only thing that ever saved my life

So don't waste your mind on nursery rhymes
Or fairy tales of blood and wine
It's turtles all the way down the line
So to each their own til' we go home
To other realms our souls must roam
To and through the myth that we all call space and time

Songwriters   Sturgill Simpson - Turtles All The Way Down

take care
the Ol'Buzzard

THE STATE OF THE UNION

Forget about Congressional inaction, the conservative court, job growth, a budget in the trillions, gun control, health care and the minimum wage; and let’s look at the real issue that defines us and our time. 

We are fighting the Taliban in Afghanistan, involved in a religious war in Iraq, fighting ISIS in Syria, Libya is in civil war; there is Boko Haram in Africa, Russia is posturing in the Middle east and the Ukraine, North Korea is claiming a hydrogen bomb. 

We have drive-by shootings in the big cities, police assassinating black people on a regular basis, self-radicalized Religious extremist conducting attacks not only in this country but around the world, nut cases, with guns that are too readily available, killing children in schools; and we have heavily armed civilians playing militia, fantasizing some make believe scenario, and inciting sedition.

In other words, the world is going to shit in a hand basket.

It is fairly easy to pinpoint the problem.   All the Judeo-Christian religions identify it in their creation myths:

In the beginning there was first man and woman.

The woman gave birth to two male children.

One of the males murdered the other sibling.

That is who we are.   A violent and destructive species.   It is in our DNA.  

The only thing that has prevented our extinction is the unavailability of weapons of mass destruction to the general male population.   As our technology advances that shortage is bound to be supplied in the not too distant future. 

In other words, the State of the Union, the State of the World is”

Look at our history.   We are who we are.   We’re fucked.

Have a good day

the Ol’Buzzard

A DECLINE IN OIL PRICES: A GOOD THING, OR A BAD THING?

LET’S FINALLY, ONCE AND FOR ALL, KILL OFF THE FUCKING DINOSAURS

Republicans this morning on the news are bemoaning the low price of oil.   They are throwing around their usual mantra about low oil prices costing jobs.   They fail to mention that in the last six years they have done nothing to increase jobs: spending their time voting to close and defund Planned Parenthood Clinics and voting sixty times to kill health care.

  

There are three classes in this country: the mega-wealthy, the well to do that are invested in the stock market, and the people like myself that live from pay day to pay day.    For older people and working people at the bottom tier, the lower oil prices are wonderful – a big boon facing a winter with heating oil prices declining.  But, people invested in oil are taking a hit.  

  Perhaps these lower prices may spur investment in renewable energy production.    The Republicans, of course, will cry about the loss of jobs, but their real concern in for the companies and wealthy investors who depend on oil for their profits. 

Anyone who is paying attention must see, that because of environmental issues, we must move away from fossil fuel dependency.   Also as a national security measure we find that Russia and the middle east all depend on oil and oil prices for their economic survival – so there is no down side in seeing our adversaries on economic hard times, as opposed to being involved in military confrontations with them.   

As far as the loss of jobs go in the oil and gas industry, we should begin a transition allowing people to train for employment in other fields as we transfer to clean energy.  It is fairly well recognized that coal production is in its last throws and that at some point coal miners must retrain for other employment.   The same recognition must eventually be accepted for people working in the oil and gas industry.

We have all been sold the snake oil tonic that natural gas is the answer because it is less harmful to the environment than oil.   Now we have the massive natural gas leak in California.   We must at some point recognize that all fossil fuels are past their sell by date and need to be retired for clean renewable energy sources. 

With unlimited power available in solar, wind, water and tidal production, we are hanging on to fossil fuel simply because there are huge profits to be made by existing companies and the mega-wealthy as long as we keep the status-quo.

CANADA, WE WILL TRADE YOU. PLEASE!

Just like Rob Ford, the once mayor of Toronto, Maine’s governor Paul LePage has made the news again. 

 

This week LePage stated that black people come up to Maine and sell heroin and before returning to New York and Connecticut ‘impregnate young white girls.’

In the past he has made such statements as ‘Obama hates white people’; said the president can ‘go to hell’; the NAACP ‘can kiss my ass’; that the Democrats in the Maine Legislature are ‘sticking it to the people without Vaseline’– and I have been taking it for two years’.   

He has joked about blowing up the office of Maine’s major newspaper.  He said he would like to arrest and hang the Democratic House Speaker.    He wants to lower the full time working age for children to 12.   He has turned down the free Medicare expansion for Maine' uninsured.   And the list goes on.

  

LePage in in his second term and both times he was elected because Democrats split their vote between the Democratic candidate and the Independent candidate.

I don’t see any way of getting rid of LePage in Maine unless Canada will trade with us for Rob Ford.

 There are a lot of commonalities.

Rob claims his is bigger

They both have a happy face

LePage has an angry face - but,

I looked and couldn't find Rob with an angry face

Come on.   Trade us - Please.

Please, please, please

the Ol'Buzzard

CLOUDBURST

I saw a movie on Netflix yesterday that I have to watch again.   It ranks as the best movie I have seen in a number of years.   No special effects; just a good story and great acting.

Buy it, steal it, borrow it; but don't miss this movie.  

the Ol'Buzzard

THE INCLUSIVE REPUBLICAN PARTY HOME FOR THE MILITIA

When the Republican Party claims to be the party of inclusion, they are, in fact, right.   The Republican party is the home of racist, bigoted fundamentalist Christians, survivalist, Tea Baggers, gun extremist, grumpy old men, homophobes, Islamophobes, white supremacist, people who deny the legitimacy of our first black President and militia groups preaching the violent overthrow of the government.   Add in a political elite whose aim is benefiting the wealthy and big business, and you can't be more inclusive than that. 

These groups are all a serious concern to the American ideal; but perhaps the greatest danger lost in this mix are the militias.   They fly the American flag while preaching the overthrow of the government. 

These groups are made of of soldier wannabees and ex-military who long for attention.   These people are not the sharpest tacks in the box - they are easily influenced and easily manipulated.  They are out of touch with reality and playing some imaginary scenario in their heads.   The guns and uniforms make them feel macho and heroic - in their minds they are the glamorous Mad Maxs of the near future when they will stand against the U.S. government.  

Ex-military looking for attention

Old man looking for virility 

Not the sharpest tack

soldier wannabees

Every state has them

Seal Teams beware

It is all in the dress

Whacko one to whacko two, come in

You think this will attract women?

What can you say about this picture that it doesn't already scream?

What the fuck do you think they are training for?

Night watch for the black helicopters 

He bought these patches on ebay

Military surplus truck - military surplus brains

It can get you attention: after all that is the object

Why Not?

Parade the flag of the government you talk of over throwing. 

Clothes make the man

The world is looking - moment of fame

Why spend your Sunday watching football?

Child endangerment?

Definitely not the hero

A REAL HERO.

22 years in the military, Vietnam Vet, SERE
the Ol'Buzzard