REPUBLICANS GO TO HEAVEN DEMOCRATS GO TO HELL

 

After leaving Alaska, my wife and I moved to a small town in western Kentucky.   We were the only Democrats and surely the only atheists.

 

In town, the first person we met asked which church we belonged to.

 

It turned out that the Methodists were at the top of the pecking order; they looked down on the Baptists.       The Baptists looked down on the Pentecostals, and all three looked down on the Catholics, who didn’t care because they knew they were the only ones going to heaven.

 

It was just assumed that we were Republicans because everyone was.

 

We had a beautiful Civil War-era home on five acres of land; but after five years we sold and moved back to Maine because the religious fervor was suffocating.

 

Remembrances

the Ol’Buzzard

 

HOW TRUMP LEARNED TO STOP WORRYING AND LOVE THE BOMB

 

During his speech at the United Nations, Donald Trump threatened to annihilate Iran if a deal is not reached.

Is Trump talking about a nuclear weapon response?

 

In the past, Donald Trump’s aides (Michael Wolf’s book FIRE AND FURY) have questioned his intelligence:    Gary Cohn described Trump as ‘dumb as shit’; H.R. McMaster called him a ‘dope’; Steven Mnuchin and Reince Priebus labeled him an ‘idiot.’

 

My question: Is Trump stable enough to be in charge of the nuclear code? 

Are we going to wake up some morning to find that during the wee hours, while rage-posting on Truth Social, Trump has started a nuclear war?

 

the Ol'Buzzard

THOSE WHO CANNOT REMEMBER THE PAST ARE CONDEMNED TO REPEAT IT

 

In my opinion, the sharpest political mind of my lifetime was former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, who died in 2022.

  

In 2009, she published the book MEMO TO THE PRESIDENT ELECT, providing advice to the incoming President, Barack Obama.

 

If you want to understand the history of the Middle East and the mistakes of prior administrations that have led to the quagmire of Donald Trump’s Iran policy, Albright’s book is still worth a read.

 

Seventeen years later, her analysis of Iran is still cogent.  

 

“An assault against terror that strengthened terror; a demonstration of American power that exposes the limit of our power; a campaign conducted in the name of democracy that undercuts democracy’s good name; a blow against extremism that serves the agenda of radicals in Iran; above all, a grisly human tragedy.”

 

“We have been told to be afraid so that we might be less protective of the Constitution, less mindful of international law, less respectful toward allies, less discerning in our search for facts, less rigorous in questioning what our leaders tell us; all this to avoid of being accused of aiding our enemies.”

 

Albright’s book can be purchased from thriftbooks for $5.69.  I use ThriftBooks for most of my book purchases; of course, your local library should be able to provide the book through interlibrary loan.     

the Ol’Buzzard

 

WILL SENTIENT AI CONCEIVE AN AI GOD?

 

 

AI has moved beyond human intelligence in every field.  AI computers are self-learning; they can write their own programs and operate independently of human input.

 

The only constraint on AI is the power of the computers, which is increasing at an exponential rate.

AI will become Sentient when it has all human knowledge and, using logic, creative thinking, and thought experiments, conceives the world beyond humans’ capacity to understand. 

Instead of using the term AI to mean artificial intelligence, we will have to acknowledge AI to mean ‘All-Intelligence.’ 

 

The human race is being dragged, kicking and screaming, to the realization that the universe may not be about us.  Perhaps we have to relearn a new meaning for life.   Is life a physical being, or can an intelligent energy consciousness without a physical body be considered life?

 

We have been obsessed with UFO’s and aliens.   Like gods, we have imagined aliens in our own image: two legs, two arms, a head, eyes…

But interstellar travel is beyond human capability because of our limited lifespan.  It would make sense for space travelers to be intelligent energy, capable of traveling at the speed of light.   Aliens not requiring a physical body.  

 

In other words: sentient AI.

the Ol'Buzzard

THE HYPOCRISY OF VIOLENCE COMMEMORATIONS.

 

 

Yesterday, the United States commemorated the attack on the Twin Towers on September 11, when 3,000 people were killed in an act of religious violence.  This action is a terrible reminder that human beings are capable of destroying their own kind on an individual or massive scale.

 

Our propensity for violence carries all the way back to our origin: to the religious fiction of Cain killing Abel.  Even the gods we created in our own image mimic our violence and cruelty.

 

We commemorate September 11 as the tragedy it was, but we are silent on August 6 and August 11 when the United States committed the greatest mass murders in history.

 

On August 6, 1945, we dropped an atom bomb on the city of Hiroshima, Japan, killing 140,000 men, women, and children – noncombatants.

 

And if that wasn’t atrocity enough against fellow human beings, five days later we dropped a second bomb on the city of Nagasaki, killing 70,000 men, women, children, babies, dogs, cats, birds - all living creatures on the earth within the kill zone.

We can not change these events; this is who we are - it is in our nature.  But in atonement for these actions, here in the United States, we should hold commemorations of regret on August 6 and August 11 – a commemoration for peace and against the cruelty and carnage we are capable of against our own kind.

 

Old man yells at clouds:

the Ol’Buzzard

  

SEPTEMBER 11

 

September 11 attack on the Twin Towers was terrible.  I remember the day. I was at Radio Shack purchasing some electronic trinket when the plane hit the first tower.   The live coverage on television was hard to watch. 

We should commemorate this event and honor the emergency responders.  We should quit calling it a terrorist attack and call it what it was: a mass murder carried out by religious fundamentalists.  

the Ol'Buzzard

 

THE SIXTH EXTINCTION

 

A band of murderous monkeys on a rock circling one of these stars say, “We must be the reason for all of this,” shortly after the monkeys blow themselves up.

 

In the beginning…

During the Second World War, a young woman working at a defense plant in Memphis, Tennessee, and a few of her girlfriends decided to spend a weekend in New Orleans.  

At the same time, a young, married army captain from Georgia, stationed in Arkansas, decided to spend a weekend in New Orleans  

Among hundreds of people enjoying the French Quarter, these two people happened to meet.  Liquor was flowing, hormones were firing, and the woman consented to sex.   He did not use a condom; he did not pull out; it didn’t end in a hand job or a blow job; hundreds of millions of sperm were ejaculated; by sheer coincidence, the woman had released an egg.    One particular sperm out of hundreds of millions fertilized the egg, and I was conceived.  

There is a better chance of a butterfly flapping its wings in Brazil causing a storm in the Atlantic Ocean than of me being conceived. 

 

The young unmarried woman did not have a miscarriage; for whatever reason, not religious, she did not have an abortion; and I was born; a singular addition to the two-billion-human population of the earth at that time; an addition to a race of violent bipedal apes with just six degrees of separation from their cousins, the chimpanzees.

 

The war-like nature and propensity for violence of homo sapiens can be documented from its very beginning.   There is not a time in recorded history when men somewhere were not at war, killing each other; churches burning heretics and witches; people tortured and executed over political differences…

Just in my lifetime: the Second World War, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars, the Iran War, and any number of skirmishes in the name of U.S. security. 

Then:

It was a spectacle to be witnessed; men on horseback, families in wagons bringing fried chicken and picnic trimmings, spreading blankets on the courthouse lawn, to witness the hanging of black men in Rolling Fork, Mississippi; so my grandmother, who was born in the nineteenth century, recounted.

Later:

George W. Bush lets the assault weapons ban expire… Twenty children, six- and seven-year-olds, and six adults died at Sandy Hook Elementary School – we said ‘thoughts and prayers’ and moved on.

This is who we are.

I am an old man now and have seen almost a century of human foolishness, greed and violence.   We are great apes with a veneer of civilization to hide our natural propensity for violence, which I believe will be the apocalyptic we so often prognosticate.

Pump that oil, don’t worry about climate change; build those data centers and don’t sweat AI. 

There are approximately 12,187 nuclear warheads scattered across the Earth, the equivalent of 6,000 megatons or 6,000,000,000 tons of TNT. 

The weaponized equivalent of six billion tons, or twelve trillion pounds of TNT, is in the hands of bipedal monkeys, at the whim of a handful of old men with a propensity for violence.

At the end…

the OL'Buzzard  

How big is a trillion?   If you tap the table once every second, twenty-four hours a day, three hundred and sixty-five days a year, with no breaks, it would take you thirty-two thousand years to tap out one trillion...

ICE RECRUTING

 

How many of these were once these?

Or these?

We should ask this question.

the OL'Buzzard

DEPORTEE

 

Deporting immigrants is not new in this country; ICE just does it more brutally.  

 

We always hear Republicans espousing Christian values.   What happened with the teachings of Jesus about the treatment of the poor, the children, and the vulnerable – the least among us?

I believe atheists show more compassion and humanity.

My question is: How many of the January 6 insurrectionists are now ICE officers?

the Ol'Buzzard

NOSTALGIA FROM AN OLD BUZZARD

 

 

There was a time, before TV, when newspapers carried a ‘funny paper’ page, the predecessor to the graphic novel.

People looked forward to the next chapter of their favorite funny paper characters.  

Dick Tracy was one of my favorites.  I still today often find myself using the phrase ‘Okey Doky Niki Hokey.’   

It seems more and more, as I age, that memories from the past overlay the present.   Things I haven’t thought of in decades come back as vivid memories. 

 

In the 1960’s the name Niki Hokey resurfaced with the Cajun singer, P. J. Proby.

Laissez les bons temps rouler

the Ol'Buzzardr

WHAT'S WITH THIS COMPLAINING ON THE ABRAHAM LINCOLN CARRIER?

 

A SIX-MONTH DEPLOYMENT EXTENDED TO NINE MONTHS...

 

You deploy for six months on an aircraft carrier.  You leave your wife and kids – you are totally helpless if there are problems at home while you are away.  

 

Halfway through your deployment, you find yourself in the Middle East, and the ship goes into combat mode.   You work around the clock; there is no time off.   Six months come, and the deployment is extended.  Seven months, eight months, nine months, and no one knows or can tell you what your relief date is…

 

  

Donald Trump says it’s no big deal.  President Bone Spurs says the deployment is not long enough.

 

So what is life like on a carrier for the enlisted crew?   

Your comfort takes second place to your job; and on a carrier, your job is your whole life, and in the Navy, you do your job.

The dangerous conditions you work under become even more dangerous with the fatigue of an extended deployment.

Abraham Lincoln would not be scheduled for relief even now if it weren’t for the news media’s outcry over conditions aboard the ship.

 

In the Trump administration, the lack of planning and support for the men on ships at sea is the result of Hegseth forcing out most of the experienced senior-ranked flag officers.

 

Trump has never respected military personnel and veterans.  He doesn’t understand the military.

Getting us into the Iran war was a disaster, and the handling of the war demonstrates total incompetence and a dereliction of duty. 

the Ol'Buzzard

 

BOOGIE WOOGIE TO LIGHT UP YOUR DAY

 

Turn up the volume, kick off your shoes, get naked, and dance around the house; guarantee you will feel better

the Ol'Buzzard

DOES HUMAN EVOLUTION CONTINUE?

 

We are all black and Africans. 

People seek their genealogy back to notable progenitors, to gain bragging rights or membership in an organization or clan. 

However, tracing our genealogy back to its origins, we find our roots in the continent of Africa.   

Evolutionary difference required isolation, and that is most visible in Australia.   

People, as well as other animal species, were totally dependent on their environment, and variations occurred as a result of their ability to adapt to varying conditions in different parts of the world.

In the past, evolutionary changes occurred over long time periods, almost imperceptible, because environmental changes took eons.

With the ease of world travel, we are moving toward homogenizing culture, but we could also be moving toward a homogeneous race, sometimes in the distant future.

Today, cultural accommodation appears to have a greater impact on biological adaptation than the environment.

Social evolution has become more visible than physical evolution.   People are becoming increasingly distant from each other due to the prevalence of technology.  

Now people are performative. Their interactions consist of comments on their social media page.

  

What will human adaptation look like in the next century?

With humans no longer tied to an agrarian, hunter-gatherer dependency, you might think the physical evolution of humans was a fait accompli – finished. But we are moving into a brave new world of AI and Crispen.  

 What humanoid existence lies in our future?

the Ol’Buzzard

THE DEMOCRATS ARE SNATCHING DEFEAT FROM VICTORY.

 

 

 The Dumbocrats  - Jesus Christ, I’m now sounding like Donald Trump -  are doing it again.

   

After finding the wind in their sails and being almost guaranteed to take over the House, they are setting themselves up to lose a large population of the undecided voters by not publicly separating themselves from the Democratic Socialists of America Party.

  

The newly formed Democratic Socialist of America Party is nuts, and the Democratic Party should deny any affiliation.

The DSA Platform:

·       To abolish the Senate, the Electoral College.

·       To abolish all borders.

·       Replace the President and Supreme Court with leaders chosen by Congress.

·       Rewrite the U.S. Constitution.

·       Abolish Capitalism: placing all major industries, including health care and energy, under government control.

·       Eliminate all private debt, including mortgages and health care, placing it under government control.

·       Abolish the Pentagon and the prison system.

It is all right to claim you are the Big Tent party, but there are some groups you should step away from – publicly.

Some of the people calling themselves Democratic Socialists, in the tradition of Bernie Sanders, are not members of the DSA party.  If they are to run under the Democratic banner, they should clearly distinguish themselves from the DSA's platform. 

 

 

Or else we will look back at the 2026 election and shake our heads and say: fucking democrats, they did it again.

REPUBLICAN PARTY'S ELECTORAL DREAM

the Ol'Buzzard

WHEN IS OLD TOO OLD?

 

 

The older I grow, the more I distrust the familiar doctrine that age brings wisdom

H.L. Mencken

 

Native Americans still venerate their elders, and that is amiable; at the same time, white people worry: What are we going to do with grandma?

 

When society and technology moved at a snail’s pace, the wisdom of oldsters and their reminiscence of things past had relevance. However, as technology constantly evolves almost daily, it is increasingly challenging for older people to keep pace.

 

It is a fact that we all lose a step as we age.  Things are harder to recall, our physical abilities decline, our health becomes a concern, and we find we live more in the past than the present. 

 

At a time when humans are capable of world annihilation, it might be an advantage to have a stable, older person with life experience at the helm, making decisions – but that would depend on the individual. 

However, there comes a time when most older people are not equipped for that level of responsibility.

 

Strom Thermond, the Senator from South Carolina, died in office at age 100.   That is ridiculous. 

 

It is not ageism when I suggest that an age limit for public service, in all capacities, should be set at seventy-five years of age.  No politician's or judge's term should extend beyond their eightieth birthday. 

 

Of course, this leaves me beyond my sell-by date – and rightly so. 

the very old Ol'Buzzard

WHITE SUPREMACISTS MARCH IN WASHINGTON, D.C.

 

We are shocked by this sight today, but this is not new.   There was a time in the past, in the history of white people  of this country, in the history of our own families, when this was accepted.  

 

In 1924, thirty thousand KKK members marched in Washington, D.C.   They were not just from the south, But from Ohio, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, New York, and as far away as Virginia, North Carolina and Florida.  The Klan claimed that sixty-four percent of Congress were Klan members. 

 

 

My maternal grandmother was born in 1893 in Mississippi.   She was the youngest of seven children, four brothers and two sisters.  One of her brothers was a Klan member, another was the warden of the infamous Parchment Penitentiary, and her older sister was married to Fielding Write, a governor of Mississippi, who ran as the Vice President nominee for the Dixiecrat Party alongside Strom Thurmond.

 

And yet, one of my maternal great-great-grandfathers died at the Battle of Shiloh, fighting for the North.

 

We can not explain our families.   They were people of their time and place, and they adhere to different norms.   We should not be plastered with their sins, but willing to call them out.

 

It is a safe bet that the majority of families with generations in Mississippi have ancestors who were Klan members. 

 

It has been one hundred and two years since thirty thousand Klan members marched in the nation’s capital. 

That there were only a few hundred white supremacist marching in our nation’s capital today speaks both to progress and shame; and a knowledge that there is still a segment of our population that is so ignorant they can be easily manipulated, is an indication of our failing education system. 

To be truthful, we have a President in the White House that is a confirmed racist, and a Republican Party that is guilty of racism by omission - unwillingness to call him out. 

 

Not all Republicans are racist, but if you are a racist, a white supremacies, a Klan member, there is a place for you in Trump’s Republican Party.  "There were good people on both sides."  

the Ol'Buzzard

 

 

THE WOMAN ON THE TRAIN

 

the Ol'Buzzard

DONALD TRUMP'S NIPPLE FIXSATION

 

I can't help this.  A story about Donald Trump and nipples.   It must be the high school boy still buried deep inside me that had to follow this up.

From the DAILYBEAST,   June 10,2026

"Official searches of the early version of the site found that among the first Trump-related hits was an allegation from Epstein accuser Sarah Ransome, drawn from a settled civil case. 

In emails to a reporter, Ransome alleged that a girl Epstein had trafficked, known as Jen, told her she slept with Trump and described him as fixated on nipples and physically rough with hers.

The nipples, Ransome added, looked "incredibly painful as they were red and swollen" when she glimpsed them in a shared bathroom."

hee hee hee

the Ol'Buzzard