I took a good look at my college loans yesterday. It kinda made me feel like a slave. Maybe not that extreme, but the Worker-Master relationship started to become apparent to me.

I pay $200 per month, I've paid about $6,000 so far, and I've only paid off $2,500 of my principal balance, which was only $27,000 to begin with, because I was part of the most generous government program I've seen for poor people like myself, EOP.

So let me get this straight, I'm paying double?!?! These assholes Own me.

There was no question in my mind about going to college, and living in Buffalo I'm glad I did. A lot of my friends have a high school diploma or less, and it is a real pain in the ass for them to find a job. My one friend went back to Boces for a trade, he's still only making $10 per hour, and he's driving all over the county in his own truck.

If you're in the lower middle class in this country, they basically grab onto your nuts and squeeze. Your part of the Worker class, and they Own you. Same for women, they're squeezing your nuts too.

Let's compare my situation to my fiance, who was born a little above my class. her parents could afford to pay her college in full, no loans. She went to a SUNY school with me, not too expensive, if you call $50,000 a bargain. But still, no loans, that means she can keep her money. I had to sell my body to start making more than $10 per hour.

Here's the kicker, She puts $200 into her retirement account each month. I take that same $200, and flush it down to toilet. Or to be more specific, I give it to my masters at the student loan company.

Meanwhile, you know what the government is trying to do with my retirement account? You know Social Security? They want to give it away to the same blood-sucking companies that are already squeezing my nuts. They're trying to convince me that Social security is going to run out, and all that money I already paid into the system since I started working at 15, belongs to them, not me.

Ironic, they call this the "Ownership Society" all I own is hand-me-down furniture and a bunch of electronics. but THEY own ME.

Here's a pleasant thought, I don't have health insurance either. I had Healthy NY, that super affordable government program which costs $270 per month, and is somehow tied to the SCHIP federal program which the Republicans refused to expand a couple months back. Yea, I had that for about 4 months, and I still had to pay $40 for a doctor to look in my ear and tell me to take claritin D. that probably would have cost about $80 without my budget ass Healthy NY.

No health insurance. That means I'm one broken arm away from being better off in jail. Isn't that a peachy little thought. Maybe that's why we have more violent crime than any other nation in the world, besides some of those that are in a state of civil war. People are so fucked, that jail doesen't seem much worse than 'freedom'.

Yes, America, this is what we have become. We have betrayed our country. FDR is rolling over in his grave.

You know... I didn't learn much in my social studies classes growing up. But there's one thing that sunk in, they told me this is a land of opportunity. You can't control what class you're born into, but if you're smart, and you work hard, you can have a good life, and maybe even become the president.

They also told me I'd be better off if I went to college. They didn't mention the fact that I'd be paying double, because I was born in the lower middle class.

What happened? When did we become a nation of Masters and Workers? This doesn't look like the America they told me about.

But this isn't about my story. This is the story of America. I don't even have credit card debt, and I have 4 times more savings than my mother. How many Americans have $2,000 in the bank, and are making minimum payments on over $10,000 worth of credit card debt?

You know that the top 1% of Americans own 40% of the wealth? and the bottom 80% of people own a pitiful 8%.
What the hell is going on here, and why aren't we more pissed off about it?

We have been fooled.

How long will it take for us to realize that they lied to us about opportunity, they lied about freedom, lied about equality, lied about fairness, lied about justice, and they lied about America being a society of upward mobility, withouth classes. They lied about the American Dream. They made us thankfull to live in the most just, fair and democratic society on earth. And it is all bullshit.

I'll tell you how we can get our country back. I hate leaving people pissed off, without a solution. That ultra rich 1% is buying more than just resort homes, helicopters and private islands.

They have bought our government. Our representatives care more about money, than they do about the public. Because it takes so much money to get elected, donations are more important than votes. Elections must be free and fair. When I say free, I mean no cash.

I don't care how we do it, but the bottom line is that money has corrupted our political system. That is the one issue that is more important than everything else. We are divided... global warming, war, security, national debt, health care, these are real issues. Why aren't politicians addressing them, when they talk about them in campaigns all the time? Because if they act, it will change the system, and the system is making some people a lot of money, they don't want change, they don't want uncertainty. Change won't hurt the economy, but it could hurt individuals who are making a lot of money in the current system. That's why we get such minor changes in policy, they're trying to appease us, and obey their masters, our masters.

Here's to having a debate about campaign finance in 2008, instead of flag burning.

Ok, it's the president, doing standup, about himself!! it's from the Radio correspondents dinner. Last year Steven Colbert roasted the president, this year the president is the opening act, and he's roasting himself!!

Just wanted to share a video I made for the West Seneca Music Center. I created their website last January,

They wanted to update the photography on the website and add a video sideshow. Their inventory has improved quite a bit since the last photoshoot I did for them.

They have tons of guitars! they've just about run out of room to store them. If you know anyone in a band, they have some really stylish stuff, classy designs, and realy loud designs. You can see a bunch of stuff in the video. I was pretty impressed.

The video is pretty fun. I just created it from the photos I took, and animated the slides together. Youtube degrades the quality a little bit, it will look more crisp on their site..

I read the news with disbelief.

Pakistan suddenly jailing thousands of Musharraf's political opponents. Arresting members of the government and the courts, for no reason, other than their political opinions. He shut down the Supreme Court, and All independent news and TV stations. As of yesterday around 2,500 people had been arrested.

The US has given this asshole $10 billion dollars since 2001. And don't worry, we've agreed to continue funding his tyranny, regardless of the whole martial law thing.

The short explanation is that, Pakistan has no term limits for its prime minister, Musharraf has been in power for two 5 year terms. There was a recent amendment to Pakistani law that the Prime Minister could not simultaneously be a Military Leader. So General Musharraf was supposed to make a choice, Prime Minister OR head of the military. He said, Fuck That. He was reelected, and even though he promised to give up the military if he won, he kept both of his roles, and awaited the consequences. A few months back, he removed the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, but that didn't do the trick.The Supreme Court was about to hear the case, and determine whether or not this was legal (it's not) so a week before the Supreme Court was scheduled to rule on the issue, he shut the motherfucker down. Shut the whole country down.

One self interested Power hungry asshole terrorizing the entire population.

Luckily I don't have to research and summarize the whole thing for you, because there's a great synopsis on Huffington Post which gives a bunch of sources like I usually do.

Oh, almost forgot to mention, Musharraf says it's about terrorism. what a load of horseshit. That makes me hate him even more. A poor excuse for the rest of the world and America in particular. Were fighting terrorism, just like you, so were abandoning the constitution, just like you. Fuck off.

Yea, and the US, still giving him funding, no worries. Condi Rice said we're "disappointed" in what he has done.. wow, tough words. I'm disappointed when the Bisons lose. And the Whitehouse is disappointed when a tyrant abandons democracy and arrests thousands of political opponents. nice.

I'm going to write a letter to the foreign relations committee and call my representatives. This has to stop.


If you're interested, don't forget to read the article from the Huffington post, Tyranny and Terror in Pakistan, by Ali Eteraz


Joe Biden talks about it too.

So here's a question, What is the point of the Iraq War? Why are we there and what is the goal? Give me an opinion, a joke, a cynical rambling run on sentence, whatever, I just don't get the reason.

The purpose of the war is rarely explained or questioned. Here's some words from the Whitehouse website "If We Withdraw Prematurely.. Violent Extremists Would Be Emboldened.. Al Qaeda could gain new recruits and sanctuaries.. Iran would benefit from the chaos and be encouraged in its efforts to gain nuclear weapons and dominate the region. Extremists could control a key part of the global energy supply. Iraq.. could face a humanitarian nightmare, and democracy movements throughout the region would be violently reversed."

All these Whitehouse points can be refuted, here we go... We embolden violent extremists by allowing military contractors to Kill civilians without punishment. Al Qaeda's biggest recruiting and training tool is Iraq, and if we left Al Qaeda would have a diminished purpose, fewer recruits and the Iraqis would kick them out. Iran has been the biggest beneficiary of the Iraq War so far, we got rid of their enemy Saddam, dismissed the UN which might have prevented nuclear activity, and more. The Mideast might control their own oil, ok that's true, but what gives us the right to control someone else's oil? Iraq already faces a humanitarian nightmare 2 million refugees inside Iraq and 2 million in neighboring countries, the whole region faces a humanitarian crisis, and nothing the US has done so far has helped. Democracy movements? Anybody seen any Mideast countries saying "Check out Iraq, I need to get me some of that Democracy!"


The Whitehouse narrative is obviously a bunch of BS, and the American people are skeptical about what they say, but we don't really have an alternative. The press usually treats the government opinion as truth, all other explanations are conspiracy theories.

What's the purpose of this war? I'm asking you, why did we invade, and why are we still there. I just don't get it.


We Americans live in a bubble of official sources, part of the reason is that there aren't many journalists in Iraq, and the ones who are there, are usually embedded with American troops and government officials all day. This media blackout means that the Bush administration can create its own narrative about what's going on in Iraq, and we have very little evidence to contradict them.

In the eyes of the American News Media, the view of the government is the official objective analysis, and should be assumed to be as close to the truth as we can get. Why? The officials in government are self interested. This government in particular, is the most secretive and least transparent in this nations history. They won't let us see what they are doing, but instead they will explain it to us in press briefings. Information Control. (Oceania has always been at war with Eastasia by the way)

I'm rambling a bit. Anyway. Here's my thoughts on the goals and purpose of the Iraq War.

The US strategy is NOT, to find common ground between warring factions and foster a lasting peace. The real theory is Divide and Conquer. We are handing out weapons like they're candy, and loosing thousands more. We're training the Shiite army and police to use our weapons against Sunni insurgents, then we turn around and give weapons to Sunni insurgents to drive out foreigners from Al Qaeda. We are essentially arming two militias that hate each other, we are giving them both guns and teaching them how to kill.

8 officers currently serving in Iraq wrote an op-ed and sent it to the times, they said "Armed Sunni tribes have indeed become effective surrogates, but the enduring question is where their loyalties would lie in Americas absence. The Iraqi government finds itself working at cross purposes with America on this issue because it is justifiably fearful that Sunni militias will turn on the government of Iraq should the Americans leave." I'd encourage you to read the whole thing,

That leads me to my next point, we're not supposed to leave Iraq. The war may be bad for Military families, Iraqis, Taxpayers, America, and just about everyone except defense contractors, but that's OK. We blow things up, pretend to rebuild them, and get rich. Good plan, from that perspective the war is going perfectly. They waste our money, and that's just fine, boosts the economy, or something. $88 billion in contracts for Iraq are being audited for fraud
The thing is, since we've been in Iraq everyone has been laughing at us. Iran Russia, we started an arms race and there's nothing we can do about it because we look like fools in another Vietnam. But let's stay there indefinitely.

Here's Tom Friedman after he got back from Iraq on what he saw, "Peace in Iraq has to be built on a Shiite-Sunni consensus, not a constant balancing act by America. So far, the surge has created nothing that is self-sustaining. That is, pull us out and this whole place still blows in 10 minutes."

Iraq is part of a Mideast strategy, which is stupid, evil, and harmful to America. Need proof? "Under the guise of promoting a 'security dialogue' in the Persian Gulf, the Bush Administration has proposed $63 billion in arms transfers to the Middle East over the next ten years... $20 billion worth of high-tech arms to Saudi Arabia and the other oil-producing states in the Gulf." Great Plan, makes me feel real safe.

Divide and conquer, establish permanent bases from which to demand power, and make Americans comfortable with permanent war. Why? I can't figure it out. Power for the sake of power? just for the sake of staying on top in the world, as PNAC stated? Are the Neo-Conservatives really that evil? Can it all be about Oil?

I don't know, it just doesn't make sense. Why stay in Iraq when it helps Al Qaeda and hurts America? Why trash international law in favor of the bomb, when it just proves we are selfish, destroys our alliances, and creates enemies? Why create Mercenary armies, send 180,000 contractors to Iraq, and blow billions of dollars on nothing? Why create so many enemies? Why destroy so many families?

Are we just trying to save face? the best way to do that would be to impeach Bush, no really, I'm serious.

I'm linking to this article again, because it is one of the few perspectives from inside Iraq, from the 8 soldiers in the NY times

Here's Bill Moyers talking about them. video

2 videos inside Iraq, I posted these before but they're a rare and recent glimpse inside Iraq.




Thanks

I promise, non political entries soon! woo hoo! those might not take 2.5 hours to write!