(Commentary and Criticism by Loren Bliss)The future home of wolfgangvonskeptik.new.mu.nu2007-05-23T04:07:32ZLorenhttp://wolfgangvonskeptik.new.mu.nu/atom.xmlNOW THE END HAS TRULY BEGUN: NOTES ON THE FIRST DEATH TREMORS OF THE PETROLEUM AGE2007-05-23T04:07:32ZWith the nation hopelessly dependent on automobiles and runaway inflation pricing fuel ever more beyond the reach of lower-wage workers, the apocalypse is already here. I. DENY IT AS VEHEMENTLY as you choose, the apocalypse is upon us. I have sensed its imminence since the still-unexplained regional power outage of 9 November 1965 -- I was riding home on the Eighth Avenue Subway when the electricity failed, and I was the young man, later mentioned in a couple of news reports, who organized and led the evacuation of the A Train that had died three cars into West 14th Street...Lorenhttp://wolfgangvonskeptik.new.mu.nu//now_the_end_has_truly_begun_notes_on_the_first_death_tremors_of_the_petroleum_ageTHE GLOVES COME OFF: DEMOCRATS, BUSH COLLABORATE TO IMPOSE NEW TYRANNIES2007-04-29T17:28:19ZTHERE ARE TWO EXCEPTIONALLY grave dangers to American liberty arising from the present, post-Virginia-Tech forcible-disarmament frenzy. These are: (1)-The criminalization of even the mildest forms of mental illness, as proposed by Rep. Carolyn McCarthy (D-NY), in HR 297. (2)-The criminalization of political protest and dissent, as proposed by Sen. Frank Lautenberg, (D-NJ), in S 1237. Each of these measures is enthusiastically supported by the Bush Regime. The Lautenberg bill was written at White House/Justice Department request -- a leading Democratic senator serving as the mouthpiece for a despised Republican administration -- an unprecedented act of collaboration with the most corrupt...Lorenhttp://wolfgangvonskeptik.new.mu.nu//the_gloves_come_off_democrats_bush_collaborate_to_impose_new_tyranniesBACK IN TWO WEEKS: MY APOLOGY FOR THE TEMPORARY SILENCE2007-04-06T11:32:41ZTHE PRESS OF PROJECTS is such that until mid-April -- sometime during the week of the 16th -- I am unlikely to post here again. Believe me, this is no vacation: the demands of my normal monthly writing deadlines are vastly complicated by a number of seasonal matters piled on by the calendar, and most of the seasonal stuff is the kind of non-creative energy-draining drudgery I despise: seemingly endless tasks that leave me exhausted and feeling frustrated at the same time. However, this too shall pass. Meanwhile thank you for your interest and...Lorenhttp://wolfgangvonskeptik.new.mu.nu//back_in_two_weeks_my_apology_for_the_temporary_silenceTHE U.S. DOMESTIC CRISIS INTENSIFIES: THE ADVERSARIES BARE THEIR FANGS2007-03-28T19:04:43ZOUR NATION IS SUNDERED by a huge and worsening schism, its two sides evident in the contrast between the Democrats’ vicious betrayal of their own tax-reform pledge and Bill Moyers’ desperate plea for organization of popular resistance to the ongoing plunge into sweatshop fascism. These two concurrent developments -- or more accurately the contrast between the long term trends they represent -- vividly illustrate the parameters of the class struggle provoked by the increasingly merciless excesses of the corporate plutocracy: on one side the tiny ruling class of obscenely wealthy fat-cats and the increasingly ruthless politicians who are their protectors...Lorenhttp://wolfgangvonskeptik.new.mu.nu//the_u.s._domestic_crisis_intensifies_the_adversaries_bare_their_fangsPROTEST BY DISRUPTIVE INSULT: THE CULTURAL LEGACY OF BRITNEY SPEARS2007-03-20T16:37:03ZIT SEEMS TO ME the Britney Spears antics by which a certain ostensibly "anti-war" cult disrupted the recent Valerie Plame Congressional hearing provide an especially instructive example of how the self-proclaimed “Left” in the United States is not only hopelessly paralyzed by faddism but -- precisely because of the savage anti-intellectuality that is faddism’s essential core -- is unable to achieve even the slightest degree of responsiveness to anyone outside the cult’s exclusive and infinitely conformist ranks. Thus the cult itself (and a cult is precisely what it is, whether exemplified by the prom-queen histrionics of Code Pink or the...Lorenhttp://wolfgangvonskeptik.new.mu.nu//protest_by_disruptive_insult_the_cultural_legacy_of_britney_spearsTHE INTERNET: AN EVER MORE TREACHEROUS MIASMA OF MALICE2007-03-10T22:57:23ZHATEFULNESS IS INCREASINGLY an identifying characteristic of life in the present-day United States. We see it everywhere: the political paralysis inflicted by fanatics, the skyrocketing incidence of road-rage, the spiteful arrogance of bureaucrats and elected officials, and the outrageous rudeness -- especially the defiant, trod-on-our-heels invasion of personal space -- by which the nation’s young demonstrate their infinite contempt not just for their elders but for any semblance of human civilization. It is therefore probably no coincidence that the Internet -- overwhelmingly the domain of America’s singularly amoral, apolitical youth -- reflects this hatefulness more vividly than any other facet...Lorenhttp://wolfgangvonskeptik.new.mu.nu//the_internet_an_ever_more_treacherous_miasma_of_maliceFIREARMS AND WOMEN’S BODIES: GUN RIGHTS AND REPRODUCTIVE CHOICE (REVISED)2007-02-26T05:52:10Z(For the sake of greater clarity, I made a number of revisions to this essay about seven hours after I posted it. While the language is now a bit more precise, the underlying conclusions remain unchanged. My heartfelt thanks to Barbara M., Mike B., Gretchen, Barb G., Traci K. and Barbara B. for the conversations, online and in person, that led to the insights here expressed.) JUST AS MOST REPUBLICAN leaders instinctively seek to criminalize those of us who oppose capitalism, fascism, theocracy or the now-ever-more-apparent triumvirate of tyranny that combines all three, so do most Democratic leaders reflexively scheme...Lorenhttp://wolfgangvonskeptik.new.mu.nu//firearms_and_womens_bodies_gun_rights_and_reproductive_choice_revised'NIXON LIVES': FIVE TELLING PORTRAITS OF THE REAL UNITED STATES, WITH LINKS2007-02-19T05:13:11ZTHANKS MOSTLY TO PRESIDENTS Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, the genocidal policies President Richard Milhous Nixon initiated 33 years ago with a curiously under-reported declaration of economic war against the American people have now escalated into a mercilessly savage crusade against each and every one of us who is not part of the increasingly omnipotent corporate plutocracy -- the fat-cat faction in whose exclusive interest the war is being waged. Nixon issued his declaration of class-war during a 1973 post-inaugural interview by William Randolph Hearst Jr. Curiously, Nixon was at the peak of his popularity -- an apparent paradox...Lorenhttp://wolfgangvonskeptik.new.mu.nu//nixon_lives_five_telling_portraits_of_the_real_united_states_with_linksSORRY FOR NOT POSTING SOONER; I AM TOO BUSY HOUNDING NEWS2007-02-11T16:22:54ZWITH THE LEGISLATURE IN SESSION HERE IN Washington state, my part-time job with the advocacy journal has become momentarily full-time (never mind the fact my pay remains the same miserly sum), and I have simply not had an opportunity during the past week to do any contemplative writing, for which I nevertheless apologize. Meanwhile, though, here’s something definitely worth contemplating: an analysis by the Medicare Rights Center of how the two parties structured the Medicare Prescription Drug Lord Benefit to do just what the Democrats, the Republicans and their corporate overlords intended: The confusing array of private plan options for...Lorenhttp://wolfgangvonskeptik.new.mu.nu//sorry_for_not_posting_sooner_i_am_too_busy_hounding_newsHOW THE DEMOCRATS GUARANTEE WAGE-SLAVERY AND SUBJUGATION2007-02-01T13:52:02ZONCE AGAIN THE DEMOCRATS are betraying working-class interests, backing forcible disarmament measures that will guarantee -- just as they did in 1994 -- another decade of Republican rule, with all its attendant outsourcing, downsizing, union-busting and Enron concentration of wealth. Thus -- in keeping with the practice John Ehrlichman acknowledged during the Watergate hearings -- Washington state is again being used as a human rat-maze in which to test techniques of oppression: this time not by Machiavellian Republicans but by fanatically anti-gun Democrats who intend to turn Washington into a national poster-state for forcible disarmament. As I wrote on 23...Lorenhttp://wolfgangvonskeptik.new.mu.nu//how_the_democrats_guarantee_wage-slavery_and_subjugationA TERMINAL ENCOUNTER WITH THE MINIONS OF MORON NATION2007-01-27T01:23:15ZAS A POLITICALLY CONSCIOUS American, I have for as long as I can remember gleaned considerable pride from my nation’s rejection of ideology in favor of pragmatism: the belief, taken so much for granted it often goes unspoken, that the ultimate test of a policy, a law or even a principle is summed up in the question, “does it work?” Throughout most of our history (and with the very notable exceptions of slavery, the Indian Wars and Prohibition), our national pragmatism has served the greater good (as in the New Deal and its successor the Great Society). But sometimes --...Lorenhttp://wolfgangvonskeptik.new.mu.nu//a_terminal_encounter_with_the_minions_of_moron_nationWOMEN ON HORSES DO WHAT MEN WITH MACHINES COULD NOT2007-01-17T22:08:43ZDESPITE MY HARSH CRITICISM of the U.S. brand of feminism -- chiefly for the bourgeois bias that allowed it to be co-opted by Big Business and turned into an instrument of class warfare (note the gender quotas that literally destroyed my life) -- I nevertheless passionately support female equality, and in fact have done so for as long as I can remember: to such an extent that often during my childhood and occasionally even in manhood as well, my friendships with girls and women got me labeled a sissy or suspected of being homosexual. Moreover (and mostly on the basis...Lorenhttp://wolfgangvonskeptik.new.mu.nu//women_on_horses_do_what_men_with_machines_could_notA TRUTH SUPPRESSED, A BIG LIE PROVEN, A PETITION IN PROTEST2007-01-12T03:05:59ZBECAUSE THIS IS THE deadline week of the monthly journal I write for, I won’t have a lot of time or energy to contribute much original writing to this space for another several days. Meanwhile here is a miscellany of five important links, the first of which, from The News Tribune of Tacoma, shows us how corporate-controlled public-school educators serve their murderously greedy Big Business masters by ensuring we remain ignorant of the looming environmental apocalypse. The next three links tell us all we need to know about how the dependably treacherous Democrats are already breaking their promise to raise...Lorenhttp://wolfgangvonskeptik.new.mu.nu//a_truth_suppressed_a_big_lie_proven_a_petition_in_protestAMERICA’S LEFT- RIGHT SUCKER-PUNCH: UNION-BASHING AND CLASS WARFARE2007-01-07T18:49:32ZGEORGE ORWELL WROTE “Politics and the English Language” in 1946, but the collective degeneration that prompted him to write this provocative essay has become so widespread (and so obviously induced), the passage of 60 years has transformed the following paragraphs from protest to prophecy: Most people who bother with the matter at all would admit that the English language is in a bad way, but it is generally assumed that we cannot by conscious action do anything about it. Our civilization is decadent and our language -- so the argument runs -- must inevitably share in the general collapse. It...Lorenhttp://wolfgangvonskeptik.new.mu.nu//americas_left-_right_sucker-punch_union-bashing_and_class_warfareRETITLED TO ELIMINATE WORDS THAT SEEM TO ATTRACT SPAM2007-01-04T01:57:46ZTHIS PAST WEEK I was beset by a worse-than-usual conjunction of the kinds of crippling disasters that typically mean financial ruin when we are impoverished -- disasters that invariably plunge us ever deeper into poverty and thus underscore the inescapable misfortune inflicted by life under capitalism. First my too-old-to-ever-again-be-reliable automobile broke down once more; next my left eye began showing symptoms suggestive of retinal detachment; then I was hammered by the emotional one-two punch of a deeply respected employer felled by a heart attack and my primary source of income suddenly threatened as a consequence; and now finally atop everything...Lorenhttp://wolfgangvonskeptik.new.mu.nu//retitled_to_eliminate_words_that_seem_to_attract_spam