Even Walmart Knows that Homophobia is Bad for Business

Almost everybody is familiar with the demographic marketing phrase: "the key 18 to 54 age group." As if every human being over or under that age range is somehow less valuable. Well, they are actually--at least to corporate America. The first half of that age group is supposedly when young adults form the brand loyalties and shopping habits that they will retain for a lifetime, while the latter half are in their prime earning (read: consumption) years. This is why marketing for most products other than dietary fiber supplements, incontinence garments and mobility scooters are slick, flashy and heavy on the "coolness" factor. Given a choice between possibly offending older consumers versus cementing brand loyalty of the 18 to 54'ers, most companies figure that while granny may indignantly chuck a slipper at the screen, she's unlikely to change her 50-year love of a particular breakfast cereal brand as a result.

All of this is a long winded way of explaining why Walmart shocked a lot of people when it came out strongly against the Arkansas religious "freedom" measure that was very similar to Indiana's. It was one thing for Apple to condemn the Indiana law--Apple presumably has lots of gay and lesbian customers and the bigoted old white fuckers who support these shitty discriminatory laws aren't likely to ever understand how a smartphone works, let alone ever buy one. But the stereotype is that Walmart customers are exactly the kind of Fox News watching, assault rifle totin,' Jesus lovin' morons who would applaud a law like this. After all, to cite another common but probably not completely inaccurate stereotype, your average gay couple's tastes in home furnishings do not likely run to the kind of clapboard crap on display at Sam Walton's megastore hellholes--nor would they ever want to be caught dead wearing the sweatshop assembled, ill-fitting polyester dress shirts hanging on the clothing racks.

Walmart probably could have stayed quiet regarding the proposed Arkansas law. After all, no one was ASKING the company for its opinion. The fact that it chose to say something represents an obvious awareness that younger Americans, even those less financially well off, on average tend to be more socially tolerant than older ones. Young adults today are far more likely to have friends who are openly gay than their older cohorts. Walmart just found a free way to get the best advertising it could have in the form of news stories that will make little Brandi and Justin feel better about shopping there so they will hopefully develop a lifelong habit. After all, what are Bessie and Elmer going to do, stuck as they are on a fixed income and living in a trailer with no savings account, suddenly boycott Wally World in favor of Nieman Marcus?

So let's all get our warm and fuzzys about this shining example of good corporate citizenship without getting all wrapped up in the truth of the matter, which is that if they didn't think it would help improve their bottom line the greedy fuckers who own and run Walmart wouldn't have said jack shit. And let's not ponder the day when predatory megacorporations like America's biggest retailer have finally destroyed the livelihood of average Americans to the point where even most gay and lesbian couples have no choice but to shop there whether they like it or not.


Bonus: "Indiana wants me--but I can't go back there"

Thousands Protest in Indiana--Should Have Been Paying Attention Earlier

"First they came for the unions, but not being a union member I did not stand up. Then they came for the black people, but not being black I did not stand up. Then they came for the gays...and I realized that maybe I should have been paying attention earlier."

So once again, there are protests in the streets decrying massive injustice. This time, it is in the form of thousands of people waving signs in downtown Indianapolis decrying the passage of a horrendously discriminatory bill against the rights of gays and lesbians allegedly in the name of "religious freedom." Just like the 2011 pro-union protests in Madison, Wisconsin, and last year's post-Michael Brown shooting protests in Ferguson, Missouri, the protestors have a legitimate reason to be aggrieved. Nevertheless, I would still like to ask the them one simple question: how many of you got involved in the midterm election campaigns for your state representatives last year and, relatedly, how many of you actually bothered the vote in said elections?

Because I just went and checked the voter turnout and saw that only 30% of Indianan registered voters even bothered to show up at the polls. In addition, you cannot tell me that the voting records and political views of the cretins in the state legislature who voted for this horrendous, pandering law were not easily available before now.

Maybe, just maybe, instead of whining, complaining and protesting the better strategy would be to organize, get your own people on the ballot, resist the corrupting overtures of the Democratic Party (form your own third party would be my advice) and beat these fuckers at their own game. Again, I realize that national and even statewide elections are so rigged by the big money as to be virtually hopeless. But the bigoted, opportunistic assholes who created and voted to pass this law by and large won their seats with only a few thousand votes. They CAN be defeated.

But no...have fun instead chanting your chants and waving your signs. It's all just sound and fury, signifying nothing. It'll feel good for a few days--kind of like watching an episode of The Daily Show or Real Time with Bill Maher. Then most of you will no doubt go home to your iPads, iPhones and 500 channels.

And that law you hate so much will still be on the books.


Bonus: "Breaking rocks in the hot sun"...indeed

Down the Memory Hole: The Assassination of Alan Berg

In wake of the appalling Charlie Hebdo attack this week, I found it somewhat bemusing to see lots of American right wingers--in their haste to waste no opportunity to smear all Muslims as freedom hating terrorists--valiantly defending a publication they normally would not have stooped to wipe their asses with given that its lampoons of Christianity were every bit as biting as those against Islam. Charlie Hebdo was an equal opportunity basher of religion, and that normally isn't the kind of stance that will get you invited to answer loving, softball type questions as a guest on Fox and Friends.

I frequently make a point on this blog of demonstrating that there is very little difference between America's two major parties, but I will never say the same thing about liberals (however much I loathe mealy-mouthed mainstream liberalism) versus hardcore conservatives, who now unfortunately make up an overwhelming majority of the conservative movement. Because the fact is a liberal will (usually) defend and respect freedom of expression as defined by the Constitution (Congress shall pass no law, etc, etc) whereas far right wingers (who profess to wear the Constitution on their sleeves) often make no bones about how they would love to see those they disagree with silenced by whatever means necessary.

As an example of what I'm saying, one needs to look no further that the most notorious American parallel to the Charlie Hebdo slayings...namely the 1984 (now THERE is irony for you) assassination of liberal Denver radio talk show host Alan Berg. Though it seems difficult to imagine in these times in which talk radio has become a wasteland of rightwing shouters each trying to out-outrage the other, in his day Berg was the liberal equivalent of Rush Limbaugh. His schtick was to spout his unabashed anticonservative views and then rip into those semicoherent callers to his show dumb enough to try and take him on.

Berg must have been quite good at what he did, because he managed to whip up a murderous rage on the part of a white nationalist group called The Order. The group ambushed Berg outside of his home, shooting him twelve times at close range. Two members of The Order were subsequently convicted of the killing. It was by any definition an act of terrorism--one that has sadly been mostly forgotten today despite being fictionalized a few years later in the Oliver Stone movie Talk Radio. Alan Berg was killed for exercising his freedom of expression, just as the staffers of Charlie Hebdo were. Yet the brevity of his Wikipedia page, which doesn't even include the word "terrorism" in the section about his murder, should be an indication of how such acts that do not fit the prevailing narrative get excluded from our national conversation--even at a time when they are quite relevant.

Another aspect of Berg's murder that never gets discussed is whether as an act of terrorism it wasn't actually a huge success. Liberals are always quick to blame corporate media consolidation in the 1990s for the fact that conservatives rule the radio airwaves, and certainly that has been a factor. Conservatives counter that there is no market for liberal radio talk shows as demonstrated by the Air America debacle during the Bush junior years.

I would actually split these arguments. On the one hand corporations are still motivated by profits, and a liberal host who could score big ratings would certainly not be kept off the air. On the other, for some reason the liberal hosts who were on the air in 1990s when media consolidation began failed to survive (there was a halfway decent rabble rouser I used to listen to on WLS when I lived in Chicago in the early 1990s, though I forget his name) just as Air America failed to draw ratings. Why is that?

Could it be that conservative hosts are safe in knowing that they can routinely make base emotional appeals to their audience without worrying about their personal safety? After all, it is hard to imagine a Volvo-driving, Chardonnay drinking, global warming worrying, gun control advocate blowing away Rush Limbaugh. On the flip side, did liberal radio hosts in this country circa 1984 begin to consciously of unconsciously tone down or deliberately intellectualize their arguments after seeing what happened to Alan Berg? And did the resulting lower ratings then give Clear Channel, for example, the excuse it needed to cancel them in favor of another Sean Hannity clone? We'll never know for sure what kind of chilling effect Berg's murder had on his professional colleagues at the time, but it is difficult to imagine that it didn't have any. If I'm right, Berg's death is a major early milestone in the creeping fascism that has been overtaking America these past 35 years.

So RIP, Alan Berg. Unlike the cowards in patriotic guise who killed you, you were a true American hero.


Bonus: "I'm here to lead you by the hand through the dark forest of your own hated and anger and humiliation"

It is What it IS

Okay, I have REALLY had it with all these ragged looking, religious extremist back country hicks demanding that everyone who refuses to conform and worship God EXACTLY the same way they do be exterminated like cockroaches. These people are CLEARLY a threat to our American way of life, and President Hopey-Changey needs to stop being such a spineless, spluttering little pansy-boy and sic our ginormous military on them post-haste.

Oh, wait a minute, did you think I was referring to ISIS (or ISIL or IS or Whatever-the-fuck-it-IS?)? No silly, I was talking about Phil Robertson and his merry band of drooling, ZZ Top-wannabe troglodytes.

It's at about this point in the program that the Internet's vast legion of armchair warriors gets itself worked up into a rabid froth and begins firing off bile laden comments about how it is the Mooslim fundamentalist whack jobs from ISIS who are running around lopping off heads of anyone they deem an infidel and posting videos of the executions on You Tube for your entertainment. All poor ol' Phil was doing in that Hannity interview, they would argue, was exercising his God-given First Amendment right of freedom of expression.

Fair point. Okay, for the moment I'll take back my facetious call for military action against the Duck Dynasty. After all, there is a BIG difference between committing hideous acts of violence and merely spouting virulently violent rhetoric on national teevee, right?

Well, maybe not that much.

Let's examine for just a moment who Phil Robertson is. Beyond being a self-professed fundamentalist Christian, Robertson has a net worth of around $15 million that is the result of both his hunting apparel business and his reality television show. In other words, he is despite his apparent fanaticism one of the LEAST likely guys in the world to go out beheading reporters and risking having a predator drone dropped on his rich-ass head.

On the other side of this equation are the mostly anonymous ISIS fighters, who these past few months have been rolling up Iraqi and Syrian controlled enclaves even faster than they have the heads of kidnapped American reporters. But think for just a moment about who the ISIS guys actually are: mostly dirt poor young Sunni males who until recently were living under the oppressive Assad and Maliki regimes and whose life choices came down to either whiling away their days tending goats under a blistering hot desert sun for a few dinars a day, or joining up with the local militia boys and being handed AK-47s to go tear-assing around the countryside blowing away soldiers of those very same regimes that had had their boot heels so firmly placed upon their collective necks.

So which choice do YOU think they were gonna make? If you said "goat herder," you fail and clearly need to be sent back to retake Basic Fundamentals of Human Nature 101 all over again. It's a well worn cliche to say that when people got nothing, they got nothing to lose, and few people on this here old Earth have less to lose right now than your average Muslim living in those unfortunate Middle East and South Asian states that have been ripped apart by more than a decade of unbridled American and NATO militarism--to say nothing of a century's worth of exploitative Western imperialism.

But hey, let's flip this narrative over for a minute and imagine that it was Phil Robertson and his clan who had had the misfortune of being born Sunni down in old Mosul. And let's take it a step further and imagine that it was instead a handful of ISIS fighters who had been lucky enough to be born Christian on the Bayou, where the humidity may be high but one at LEAST generally has recourse to the rule of law, especially if one has managed to build a small fortune and can afford to sue rather than shoot their enemies. NOW who do you suppose is going to be rolling heads through the desert sands like zombie bowling balls versus who'll be raking in millions from their duck calls, parading around like circus freaks on their stupid reality teevee show and for some reason being asked to go on a national "news" network so some idiotic airhead can ask them to opine about world events?

It is about at this point in the essay that I imagine at least a few of you are thinking, "hey, Bill, who really gives a flying FUCK what Phil Robertson has to say?" Well, if these were "normal" times in America I'd agree 100%. But as I've pointed out so often on this blog, these interesting times of ours are anything but normal. America has for years now been skating along the edge of the economic precipice just waiting for SOMETHING to shove the country over into the abyss of at least partial economic collapse. And when the day finally does come in which either that happens, or enough Americans see their livelihoods ripped away from them that the country reaches political critical mass, what do you suppose the millions of heavily armed Americans who heard what Brother Phil said and thought "you're God damned right!" are gonna do?

America as a political entity is already beginning to splinter, just as James Howard Kunstler predicted it would in The Long Emergency, as evidenced from such events as the Ferguson riots and the various secession movements around the country advocating separation from certain states or even the U.S. itself. When it starts to actually break apart things are going to get ugly in a hurry for minorities, gays and even women, and many Americans are going to wake up and suddenly find themselves living in a dystopian world little better than the one those unfortunate civilians in the ISIS occupied territories are currently residing in.

I deplore Phil Robertson's comments for their obvious blind bigotry, hatred and sheer fucking ignorance. But what's worse is the fact that his hate filled words were not universally condemned from the moment he closed his mouth after uttering them. Sadly, what they represent is yet another weather vane pointing to which way the wind is currently blowing in our very broken body politic.

Ironically, by funding the Syrian rebels against Assad our government stupidly created the conditions that has allowed ISIS to flourish, while at the same time its domestic policies of continually rewarding banksters and Wall Street while fucking the middle and working classes is slowly creating the conditions that may well someday allow intolerant, violent, ISIS-like extremist groups to flourish right here in the homeland.


Bonus: My papa said "son, don't let the man getcha...do what He done to me."

Eight Old School Diseases Making A Comeback

The economic collapse is only just beginning, and already some infamous long thought defeated diseases are alarmingly starting to reappear. The reasons for the resurrection of these various scourges upon humanity vary, but the timing of their return is quite ominous. This helpful list comes to us via Mental Floss.com:

1. Scarlet Fever

This deadly disease was first described in the 1500s. Due to its contagious nature and debilitating, if not deadly, effects, outbreaks of scarlet fever were greatly feared. Fans of the Little House on the Prairie series will remember that it was scarlet fever that resulted in Mary’s blindness.

Penicillin proved an effective treatment for the disease, until last year. A sudden spike in scarlet fever cases in China and Macao, up almost threefold and fivefold from 2010, respectively, has alerted scientists to a new, more virulent form of the disease. It was not just Asia that reported more cases, with a sharp increase in incidents in Michigan last year.

2. Rickets

Rickets was most common in industrialized cities during the 1800s. Children who worked in factories had poor diets and got little sunlight, resulting in a Vitamin D deficiency. This can lead to bone problems, bowed legs, and stunted growth. Since it is such an easy disease to avoid simply by spending a few minutes in the sun each day, as child labor laws limited kids’ time trapped inside, rickets all but disappeared.

Since rickets had been perceived as a disease that was “taken care of” for almost a century, doctors in the US and Europe were astonished when it suddenly started showing up in increasing numbers of children in the last decade, with several hundred cases in England alone in 2009. Part of the problem is that many children are back to having poor diets and spending very little time outside. But the problems also present themselves in infants, ironically because new mothers are trying to do everything right. Breast milk does not contain Vitamin D and as more women breastfeed their children exclusively, and for longer time periods, as well as protecting their children’s sensitive skin from the sun when they go out, Vitamin D deficiencies are becoming more common in infants. Doctors urge women to keep breastfeeding, but to give babies vitamin supplements as well.

3. Gout

The first documented case of gout was in Egypt in 2600 BC. While anyone could get it, it was known as “the king’s disease” because symptoms most often presented themselves in royalty and the wealthy; Henry VIII and George IV were both sufferers. There was no cure, and once someone had one attack of gout they were likely to get it again. The main symptom was unbelievably excruciating pain in a joint, usually a toe. Attacks could last up to a week, made walking almost impossible, and even covering one’s self with a light blanket was usually too much pressure on the joint.

The number of people suffering from gout in the US has almost doubled since the early 1990s, with 4% of adults presenting symptoms in 2010, and the numbers are expected to keep rising, for two reasons. One, our diets are atrocious. Eating rich, fatty foods, and drinking alcohol add to your risk of getting a gout attack. Two, gout is much more prevalent in the elderly. 13% of Americans over 80 suffer from gout, an increase of 7% in the last 20 years alone, and as more people live to that age the number will most likely continue to increase.

4. Syphilis

This sexually transmitted disease first appeared in Italy in 1494. While no one is sure where it came from, the date and location have led many historians to conclude it came to Europe from the Americas. For over 400 years it was completely untreatable, and became an epidemic in some areas. Vincent van Gogh’s brother, Winston Churchill’s father, and Al Capone all died of syphilis, while everyone from Henry VIII to Oscar Wilde to Adolf Hitler are suspected cases.

The discovery of penicillin in 1943 as well as a greater awareness of the dangers of unprotected sex led to increasingly fewer people presenting symptoms of the disease. In 2000, public health officials announced that syphilis was almost completely eradicated in the US. But over the next decade the number of people testing positive more than doubled.

There are a few reasons for this. One is that more people are getting tested for STDs in general, so more cases are being caught. But doctors also say it is because of problems with sex education. Many people who test positive contracted the disease through oral sex, which they mistakenly believe is safe without protection. Also, since the disease was so close to being eradicated, many young people were not taught about it in school and are unaware of the symptoms to watch out for.

5-7. Measles/Mumps/Rubella

In the last 150 years, measles is estimated to have killed over 200 million people. Mumps was once the leading cause of viral meningitis. And rubella epidemics resulted in tens of thousands of miscarriages and deaths. Then in the 1960s, vaccines for all three of these diseases were developed. They were combined into one simple vaccine, the MMR, and the number of cases plummeted.

But in 1998, the prestigious medical journal The Lancet published a study that linked the MMR vaccine to autism. The results were widely reported, fueling the anti-vaccine movement, and large numbers of parents stopped vaccinating their children against these diseases. In 2004 and again in 2010 the article and its findings were officially rejected as “utterly false” by the medical community, but the damage had been done. Outbreaks of all three diseases are increasing.

In 2011, 25 states recorded cases of the measles, the most in a decade and a half. The disease is especially dangerous in populations that have had no exposure to it, as the US hasn’t for forty years, meaning incidents are expected to increase among the unvaccinated. Britain, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Norway, Romania, Russia and Switzerland all showed increasing numbers of cases in the past decade. In 2010 a mumps outbreak occurred in young, unvaccinated men in Ireland. A mumps outbreak at the University of Iowa lasted 6 months and spread to 13 states. And just last month, more than 20 mumps cases were diagnosed on the Berkeley campus. Doctors expect more outbreaks of these diseases, as the children who were not vaccinated in the immediate aftermath of the article start sharing dorms with each other.

8. Polio

While suspected cases of polio go as far back as Ancient Egypt, the first clinical description of the disease wasn’t written until 1789. While occasional individual cases were not uncommon, it wasn’t until the 20th century that a worldwide polio epidemic occurred, peaking in the 1950s. Franklin D. Roosevelt is probably the most famous sufferer, but at its peak polio paralyzed or killed half a million people every year. Then two different vaccines completely eradicated the disease in all but four countries.

Those countries—Afghanistan, Nigeria, India, and Pakistan—are all showing increased cases of the disease in the last decade. In 2003 leaders in northern Nigeria warned against getting vaccinated, claiming it could cause infertility. This resulted in the disease spreading into Chad, where it had previously been eradicated; 132 cases were reported there in 2011. Afghanistan reported an all-time low number of cases in 2010, but that number more than tripled in 2011, thanks to some people’s refusing to vaccinate their children on religious grounds, as well as the open border with Pakistan, who also saw their reported cases more than double in 2011. Some extremist Muslim leaders in that country have denounced vaccinations as a Western conspiracy.

Of all the diseases on the list, Gout would have to be the least worrisome. There are going to be a lot fewer people eating rich fatty foods and aggravating their joints in the near future. Rickets will probably cease to be as much of a problem when people begin having trouble finding shelter and are out in the sun a lot foraging for food.

As for the others, I can picture them reaching epidemic proportions not long after the medical system finally collapses. This list serves as another sobering reminder of how grim the post-collapse world is likely going to be for most people.


Bonus: Difficult to cure

Bible Belt Towns in Kentucky Consider Liquor Sales to Raise Revenue

It seems incredible that nearly 80 years after the passage of the 21st Amendment to the Constitution overturning Prohibition in America that there are still plenty of dry jurisdictions around the country. My own hometown still had a Sunday ban on liquor sales when I was growing up, and even that seemed old fashioned at the time. In my January 18th post, "States Doubling Down on Bad Gambling Bets," I commented on a story about how cash strapped state governments are now turning even more to casinos in a desperate attempt to try and raise money. Not to be outdone in chasing the sin tax dollar, here is the Courier-Journal.com with a story about dry Kentucky towns considering allowing alcohol sales to raise tax revenue:

In this Appalachian college town where socially conservative views are bedrocks of life, some people want to do what was once unthinkable: legalize liquor sales.

Supporters say passing the measure in Tuesday’s special election in Barbourville would tap a new revenue source in a place where hundreds of jobs are evaporating as one plant shuts down and another cuts its workforce in half. But from the pulpits to the courthouse square, opponents have been pressing their case that uncorking liquor sales would irreparably harm the town of about 3,200.

“We’ve got a fine community,” said the Rev. Leonard Lester, a leading spokesman for church-related groups and other opponents that have rallied and waged an aggressive media campaign. “To reverse that and to bring decay into our community is senseless and dangerous.

”There is nothing good about liquor,“ he added.

The issue in the town that’s home to Methodist-affiliated Union College is the latest in a series of special elections popping up all over small-town, socially conservative Kentucky, where voters are asked whether they want to approve liquor sales as a way to bring in much-needed tax dollars.

Ironically, as the story points out, Kentucky is a leading producer of one of the strongest types of alcoholic beverage:

The state brags about its title as the world’s bourbon capital, where distilleries churn out fine whiskeys and lure tourist dollars. But elsewhere, temperance attitudes have preserved broad pockets of territory in Kentucky where liquor sales are outlawed. Nearly one-third of the state’s 120 counties are dry.

There also would likely be a bit of a zero sum game here that would raise revenue for the dry counties by draining it from those where alcohol is already legal:

Some people in town like to imbibe, but Barbourville isn’t reaping any financial benefits, area resident Kenneth Gregory said. Now, they have to drive about 15 minutes to have a drink while dining out, and more than twice that far to pick up a six-pack of beer.

”Why send our taxes to other counties and let them get the use out of it,“ said Gregory, 56. ”Boy, this is 2000-something. This ain’t back in the 1950s again. That’s what they try to run it like.“

And, as always, when a widely used product is stupidly banned by the government, it's the criminal element which benefits the most:

”This city has never been dry. It’s just been illegally wet,“ Jewell said.

A vote to legalize liquor sales would effectively drive bootleggers out of business, he said.

Bootleggers typically load up their vehicles with beer and whiskey obtained in wet areas, then return to resell the alcohol.

Ultimately, however, money eventually trumps everything in America...even religious convictions:

In Paintsville, liquor sales generated about $150,000 in tax revenue in 2011, said Bob Porter, mayor of the eastern Kentucky town. The town of about 4,000 has package sales and by-the-drink sales at some restaurants.

”It’s not the savior, but it helps,“ he said. ”It’s allowed us to put off or not administer any additional taxes to this point.“

I'm not in favor of any kind of prohibition, of course. I'm merely pointing out that this story represents another telling sign of the times completely at odds with the national mainstream media narrative about our supposed economic recovery.


Bonus: Doug Stanhope on drinking

Delusional Optimism in Ohio in the Wake of a Factory Closing

At first, this local news story on yet another factory closing seemed pretty routine:

Another slap in Wilmington's face... the town that lost DHL is about to lose another company. The result is that one-hundred and 22 people are now out of work.

The Fortis plastics plant announced it is closing. It was called Kurz-Kasch until about a year ago. The company makes components for the airline and automotive industries. Fortis plants in other parts of the country have also closed in recent months.

Randy Riley officially became Wilmington's new mayor on January first. January second was a holiday. So when Riley arrived for his first work day, there was a surprise. "And I came in to work yesterday morning and the headline in the Wilmington News Journal was plastics plant to shut down, 122 jobs."

Fortis Plastics, a troubled company based in South Bend, Indiana, is closing several plants around the country ... including Wilmington. "To lose 122 jobs is devastating to the community and just like you said Jeff, it's 122 families, how many more children will be affected, people are on unemployment because of the closure. This is just a kick in the gut for the city of Wilmington and Clinton County."

Just another sad day in blue collar America. But then there was this passage towards the end of the article:

But even in bad times, even right across the street from bad times there can be good times if you know where to find them and you're willing to work. "We're gonna open up a child care center." In an old industrial building, across from the soon to be empty Fortis plastics plant, Hope Bell is putting in a 24-hour a day, 7-day-a-week day care center: "What gives you the optimism to think that this can work in today's environment? I've never been a quitter. It has to happen. Failure is not an option."

Wilmington is still aggressively searching for other new businesses. "It's like fishing. If you have a whole lot of lines in the water sooner or later you're gonna get a strike. We have a lot of lines and we're going to land a fish here, a good one that will bring 250-300-400-500 jobs."

And if that happens, lots of those new workers will need day care. "God has a plan for Clinton County. He certainly has one for us."

I'm not so sure God has a plan for Clinton County there, Ms. Bell. But peak oil and the ongoing collapse of our fossil fuel based economy certainly does. You'd be a lot better served placing your faith in geology rather than the almighty on this one.


Bonus: "I'm calling you from somewhere deep in Ohio"

Saturday Night Music Video: "Happy New Year" by Todd Snider

Smart-alecky hippie singer-songwriter Todd Snider has written a ton of witty yet biting songs over the past couple of decades, the best known of which was his 1994 send up of grunge music, "Talking Seattle Grunge Rock Blues." But for this last night of the unlamented year 2011, I thought I would link to Snider's appropriately titled snarky tune, "Happy New Year." The accompanying slide show was dated last year, but that doesn't detract from the fun.

Enjoy!

Dance Monkeys, Dance

image: "You ever notice how people who believe in creationism look REALLY unevolved?" - Bill Hicks

You may have noticed that I don't post very much about religion here on TDS. It's not necessarily because I don't want to offend people (I actually seem to do pretty well at that in other areas). Even though I always strive to keep myself utterly grounded in rationality, I also don't look down my nose at people who need some form of spiritualism just to make through their day in this insane world. If you're not using your religion to promote ignorance and hatred, I say knock yourself out. In that I am very much in agreement with comedian Marc Maron, who once said, "I'm not an atheist, I just don't care."

That was a long winded introduction to the brilliant and funny video I ran across the other day on You Tube. For whatever else we are, whether we are willing to admit it or not, at the end of the day we are just monkeys.

Enjoy!

Friday Rant: Why Do So Many Americans Put Their Faith in Prayer but Not in Science?

I’ve become a Weather Channel junkie lately. Not so much the teevee version, which has become contaminated with the same devotion to slickness and celebrity as have all other no longer watchable American media outlets, from CNN to ESPN to the History Channel. The MTV-ification of mainstream television, with its minuscule attention span, worship of consumerism and fast cutting images (seriously, if you are someone who still watches television, try counting the number of times the camera angle changes in a minute’s time on almost any show. I’ll bet 15-20 is the average these days) was completed in the decade after 9/11. TWC was one of the last networks I stopped watching altogether, right about the time they announced they were hiring the utterly vacuous celebritard Al Roker as on-air “talent.”

No, what’s riveted my attention lately is the Weather Channel’s website as a series of natural disasters, from floods, to fires to epic tornadoes, have spread across the landscape. Hardly a day has passed since March when somebody, somewhere hasn’t been getting their butts kicked by Mother Nature. From Joplin, to Tuscaloosa, to Cairo, to Minot to New Mexico, it has been quite an unfolding spectacle.

As with any mainstream media website it is almost as fascinating to peruse the reader’s comments as it is to read the articles, as they truly give one insight into the infantile mindset of so many of our fellow citizens. People these days have no hesitation about sharing their ignorant opinions in a medium where they can be read by anyone. What’s worse, we must remember, the ones doing the commenting are likely a bit better educated and more affluent than the average person if they have the means and know how to access a computer. It would be really funny if it wasn’t so damn depressing.

Every website has its own unique brand of lunkhead commenter. On the sports sites it's the morons who have divided up into rabid tribes on the basis of their worship of one group of overpaid millionaire athletes versus all of the others. Economic sites seem to be dominated by Cro-magnon, selfish Randians and teabagger types who would prefer if any “parasite” other than themselves receiving government largess wither and die already. And probably worst are the news sites, where you can always count on some boob to go on and on about Obama’s birth certificate, or his being a socialist, or a Nazi, or a communist, or any dumb thing other than the very legitimate criticisms that could be levelled at his actual policies.

Being devoted to a relatively uncontroversial subject like the weather, you’d think the Weather Channel would be immune from such idiocy. Well, you’d be wrong about that. Just last Friday, in fact, there was a routine story about some powerful thunderstorms that swept through Chicago. Here was the very first comment left on The Weather Channel’s website: “Maybe we should start allowing God back into our country.” Two hours after it was posted it had already drawn 45 “Likes.” And from what I’ve seen in my regular reading of the site, this is pretty typical. Disaster happens and the Weather Channel commenters start falling all over themselves to send out their prayers and make other comments like the one above.

Before anyone gets upset with me for being a religious hater, I’ll state right up front that I have no automatic quarrel with religious people. Joe, my best friend from high school who I’ve written about, is a born-again Christian, and he’s one of the most decent people I know. Some people use religion as a personal force for good to help them cope with life’s madness and I have no problem with that. Sometimes I envy them, in fact. If the Weather Channel commenters want to send their prayers to total strangers in cyberspace, that’s really their business.

The problem is that whenever a comment then gets posted about Climate Change, it will immediately be followed by a bunch of denialist nonsense, often by those very same religious commenters. Pray for the tornado victims, is the mantra, but don’t EVER consider changing the habits that may have helped create the conditions that made the tornado more powerful. That's GOD'S will.

If it were the Fox News website, you might expect this type of stuff. Devotees of Rupert Murdoch’s propaganda machine often loudly proclaim their religious beliefs while denying science and promoting the corporatist party line. But this is the freaking WEATHER CHANNEL, for fuck’s sake. If its programming were any blander and less threatening, they’d have to change the name to The Tapioca Channel.

Sadly, this is just another example how impossible it would be to try to turn things around in this country. As long as people have no shame about loudly proclaiming lack of belief in science as if science and religion have equal merit in explaining phenomena the physical world, and as long as our craven politicians are willing to pander to them in order to win their votes, we are are going to continue to speed towards the abyss at 120 MPH.

The real Bill Hicks, after hearing a fundamentalist Christian assert that God had put dinosaur fossils on the Earth “to test our faith,” replied: “I think God put YOU here to test MY faith, dude.” As usual, Bill captured exactly how I feel better than I ever could.