#In American elections they give us a little sticker for voting

[flowergardeninthewall]

I voted in the @qsmpficsarchive 's Fic awards! Did you?

[leupagus]

On Voting in America

So one of the most profound comments on routine chores that I've ever encountered was, hilariously, the Pickle Rick episode of "Rick & Morty," where (after a lot of shenanigans have already ensued) this therapist absolutely lays Rick out:

"I have no doubt that you would be bored senseless by therapy, the same way I'm bored when I brush my teeth and wipe my ass. Because the thing about repairing, maintaining, and cleaning is: it's not an adventure. There's no way to do it so wrong you might die. It's just work. And the bottom line is some people are okay going to work and some people, well, some people would rather die. Each of us gets to choose."

I think about this at least once a week — usually while I'm doing my laundry or sweeping or some other task that needs doing and won't get me anything more than clean clothing or a dog-hair-free floor. There's no Pulitzer for wiping down your microwave or scrubbing your toilet; no one's awarding you for getting all the dishes out of the sink. At best you have the satisfaction of crossing it off your list.

Voting is very much the same (and I'm talking about the US here, as an American). Sure, you sometimes get a sticker; but nobody's going to cheer for you. There's no adventure here, no potential for anything more than crossing something off of a list. It's a chore, something that needs doing in order to repair, maintain, and yes even clean. So I get why people don't like doing it.

And I've decided I don't give a shit.

Do it anyway. Your country takes astonishingly little from you — taxes, the once-in-a-blue-moon jury duty, and a theoretical draft that hasn't been used in over half a century and likely will never be again — but it asks you (asks! not requires! not demands!) to vote once or twice a year. It's not always easy; especially in conservative states, the impediments to vote can be ridiculous. But it is once a year and unlike in our nation's all-too-recent past, you will not die if you do it.

In fact, the worst outcome from voting these days is that the person or issue that you vote for loses — but you won't know if they lose until after the election. Polls are less accurate now, for a whole host of reasons; you cannot know until after the election who or what will win. This makes your vote more valuable than possibly ever before.

Use that power. Not because it's exciting or even rewarding, but because your vote is what keeps our country's metaphorical teeth from falling out and our metaphorical ass from stinking.

Brush, wipe, vote.

[ceasarslegion]

Do you think visiting America changed your political views?

Honestly no, my political views are a bit too weathered to be too rocked by a week in a country I have been to before (been to NYC once before, plus Montana, Seattle, Oklahoma, and Texas before, I was just either a kid or a dumb college student for all of them so those trips were very much led by either the adults around me or my terminal disease of being 20 years old and in the same room as my dorm buddies at the time. What made this trip different was that it was entirely sponsored by me as an independent adult who pays his own bills, so I could really stop and take in the americanness of it all)

What it did do was give me some more depth regarding my political views around the US. Of course you're going to think easy access to killing machines is cool and progressive when there's guns on display for sale in Walmart. Of course you're going to act like the way they do about strategic voting when you've been entrenched in the sheer individualism in every mundane little facet of life that they are. Everything about that country screams "im special" rather than "im one part of a global community."

My doctor told me he couldn't let me in good conscious go to the US without travel insurance because if I got sick or injured I'd be in medical debt to a foreign country for the rest of my life. And I saw military discount stickers on street food carts and hometown heroes banners in every hovel we drove through because their military gobbles up every red cent of their tax dollars instead of a functioning healthcare system. It's so isolated and bubbled away it reminds me a bit of those bubble wrap kids but if it could be a country, and if those bubble wrap kids wrapped themselves up and then watched the rest of us playing and cried that we were doing it wrong

Idk man, ive always kinda suspected the whole "you only think the US is right wing because of gerrymandering without it we'd out-progress the whole world!!" thing that gets touted every US election season was hot horseshit. Like don't get me wrong gerrymandering does skew results in favour of Republicans but I don't think that person I saw with the trailer car that just said "LAW + ORDER" on it with a bunch of guns hanging off it and a dummy in a maga hat sitting up top would be a shining communist leader if there wasn't any gerrymandering. I think a lot of Americans are just organically fucked up as a result of the self-isolation and I don't think a lot of them even realize that. Even the ones who say they do

[acesgroupchat]

Stickers

you know what I love more than anything? VOTING!! I love it. In person I'm more than a little annoying about it actually. When I was little, I loved going to the polls with my parents, and getting stickers and usually candy from the nice old ladies. Then I grew up and my state switched to vote-by-mail which is way more convenient but I missed the stickers so I bought a thousand voting stickers for myself, a generally deranged move that got me laughed at by many people. They recently started mailing us stickers with our ballots which is great but BESIDE THE POINT.

THE POINT: I'm trying to turn my anxiety into something productive and I have already panic-cleaned my whole house. SO: WHEN (not if) you vote in this current election, send me an ask and I will give you a "sticker" (a short fic. probably a drabble). Bonus points if you send me a pic of your actual voting sticker. You can request any fandom or pairing but fair warning if I'm not familiar with your fandom I'm not going to do any research so your fic might not make any sense.

If you voted early I celebrate you! You can definitely have a sticker. If you aren't American... idk did you vote in your country's most recent election? Have you told an American acquaintance that they should vote? You can have a sticker too.

GO VOTE

[stephenjaymorrisblog]

There is a Christo-fascist in the House!

Stephen Jay Morris

10/28/23

©Scientific Morality.

I remember it vividly. During the Vietnam war in the 60s, the overall sense of helplessness among Americans as the U.S. Air Force dropped bombs on Vietnamese villages full of children, mothers, elderly people, and other innocent humans. The government said that the Viet Cong were among the peasants and was using them as human shields. Those civilians were merely “collateral damage.” In other words: oops! It got to the point, during the anti-war movement, where every tactic we employed was futile. Demonstrations, civil disobedience, voting for liberal Democrats. The killing continued. So, what could we do? A group of militants from SDS became “The Weathermen” and utilized terrorist methods, like planting bombs in public buildings or at corporate headquarters. It didn’t work!

Doesn’t that sound familiar? You see, if you criticized the U.S. government then for its war strategies, you were “anti-American.” The Conservatives were stanch supporters of the war in Vietnam. After all, not only was this a war against communism, it was also a war on yellow people! Bumper stickers abounded on 10-year-old cars: “Love it or leave it!” along with antenna-mounted American flags! My favorite Bumper sticker was: “Don’t like the police? Next time you are in trouble, call a hippie!” One thing they used to talk about was the man-made tunnels in which the Viet Cong hid.

The same thing exists in Gaza city; Hamas has tunnels everywhere! That is why Israel must flush them out by carpet bombing the city! So, if civilians are crushed under collapsing buildings, oh well. Blame it on Hamas! If they’d never attacked Israel, then nobody would have gotten hurt! In this war, if you criticize Israel, you are Anti-Semitic! History repeats itself, repeatedly.

The primary reason I hate Hamas is because they are Theocrats. They want Palestine to be an Islamic state. Israel is a Secular democracy and an asylum for Jews in the diaspora. There are some Judeo-Fascists who want to turn Isael into a Theocratic state, as well as a separatist state for Jews only. “Kick out all non-Jews!” This was the Rabbi Kahani doctrine when he was Aliyah to Israel. He was the founder of the American Jewish Defense League. They were a Right wing militia group for Jews. Got the picture?

Here is more bad news: The MAGA Republicans are one step closer to making America a Christian state. In Congress, the Republican majority just elected a certified Christian-Nationalist to be Speaker of the House. If that doesn’t put a chill in your spine, then you must be high on meth! Maybe you ought to forget your family problems and show a little concern. If not, well I don’t give a happy shit! You got so many warnings from the Anti-Authoritarian Left. If you believe it’s only a shower, then take off your clothes and walk in and get a whiff of Zyklon B. When Democrats warn you about the dangers of a fascist state, then you know you are the deep state. The Democrats never used the word, “fascist” until now.

You should worry. When the God Squad enters your homes and conducts a search for anti-American books and other Satanic contraband, then hauls you into Jesus’ camp for owning an art book full of photos of 17th Century paintings of nude, fat women, then you will say, “The far out Left was correct! Politically correct! Go ahead—laugh now, cry later.

Me? I will protect my family the best I can, but I will laugh at your tears the way you laughed at me. I will get the last laugh.

[oh-mother-of-darkness]

Hello. I am, as you know, an American. I turned eighteen in 2014, voted in my first presidential election in 2016, and voted in my second presidential election last week via early voting in the state of Texas. 

I’m reflecting right now on the difference between those experiences. This is going to be a very self-indulgent essay. 

The 2016 election was in my third and final year of undergrad at Texas A&M University. At the time, I was living with a roommate who grew up in a town of 2,000, all of them members of her church. I loved her very much, but she was the most sheltered person I’ve ever met. 

I was only a few years ahead of her. My home growing up was deeply liberal about many of the things that counted, but deeply conservative on equally important things. For me, leaving for college was a radicalization speed-run.

I, a good Memphis girl, moved to Texas and encountered for the first time in my life white homogeny and everything that comes with it. I made most of my friends at A&M through a Christian orientation camp that I attended, then worked at. I went to school at a history department that was overwhelmingly male and war-obsessed. 

My second semester, I was randomly sorted into a writing seminar on the American Civil War and Reconstruction. There were eight other students in that class, all of them Texans. By day two I had gotten into a open fight with one of my classmates after he used the phrases “one of the humane parts of slavery” and “the secession declarations are moving and beautiful appeals, if you read them,” and “well I’m not going to criticize my own state.”

We got into at least one yelling match per week from that point forward. It was a formative experience for me-- not just him but the seven other students that took his side every time because they just couldn’t conceptualize anything outside of their own experiences, and frankly, I couldn’t either. 

It rocked my world to be surrounded by people who told me, among other things, that their high schools flew the Confederate battle flag or Lee was their all time role-model (because he actually didn’t want to secede! He didn’t believe in it, but Virginia did, so he put his own qualms aside and served his country, and that’s what we all have to do). I ran a survey once by knocking on every door in a dorm hall and asking the two people inside why the Civil War happened. 

I feel like you can guess the most common answer I got. Only two said slavery. Six didn’t know what the Civil War was. 

The last week of the semester, my class read a collection of recorded oral accounts of freed slaves during Reconstruction. My nemesis told me that he “didn’t realize black people actually had it bad.” At the same time, I was struggling with my sexuality, my relationship to my religion, my relationship with my parents, and a handful of newly-diagnosed but long-existing mental illnesses. I wasn’t having fun. 

Over the next three years, I tried my hardest to humanize the people that said disgusting things about minorities, poverty, and me personally. I barely won on that one, and I’m actually really proud that I did, even if it took me a few years. I can trace the biggest change in me directly to my nemesis from the history department, the kid that made me so mad that I started arguing back. I was too scared to do that before. 

By 2016, I was in full existential spin-out-- a very suddenly liberal kid fighting my whole family, all of my classmates, and most of my friends in an explosive political climate, the first I had ever participated in. 

I voted by Tennessee absentee ballot in 2016. On election night, I ordered takeout for me and my roommate, who I knew had voted red. Confident, like pretty much everybody, that Clinton would win, I was trying to show her that I didn’t hate her. She went to bed after dinner, also so certain that Clinton would win that she didn’t bother to stay up. 

I sat in front of my laptop sewing a birthday present for a friend (Kenza, actually), while the votes came in. I wasn’t super alarmed when the map turned red. I just figured the blue states hadn’t finished counting yet. 

The map didn’t get any bluer. By 1am, I knew what was about to happen. They called it an hour later, while I was sobbing on my floor. I threw up in the bathroom out of pure anxiety. I got two anonymous messages telling me the asker was going to commit suicide. Neither of them responded to my replies. I don’t actually know what happened to them. 

I remember riding the bus to class the next morning and distinctly seeing that most of the racial minorities there had swollen eyes from crying. The girl with the pride stickers all over her laptop didn’t show up that day, and I’m kind of glad she didn’t, considering the way some of our classmates in the back were loudly talking about “the gays.” Hope she’s okay.

My roommate came home completely unaware that Clinton lost. I was crying in my room when that happened. I remember showing her a demographic map of who voted which way. She got visibly upset when she figured out what races how. I think she really did feel guilty. 

That Thanksgiving, one of my cousins tweeted, “I can’t wait to go argue with my liberal cousin today. The wins. Keep. Coming,” an hour before he walked into my house. Inauguration day was January 20, 2017. I decided to go to law school a week later, the day the president signed the Muslim ban. That’s when I figured out for the first time just how much power the courts have. The last three years have only enforced that. 

I got angrier and angrier during law school, egged on by a few friends but more than anything just... finally conscious of exactly how the American system works and exactly who’s behind it. I still live in Texas, farther west now, and I’m working my first legal job. I’m going to be a licensed attorney next week. 

I went back and forth for months about how this election was going to shake out. I knew there wasn’t going to be an overwhelming red majority this time, but my big fear was an election close enough that the Supreme Court could take it. That fear doubled last month, at RBG’s death. 

I was hoping for a blue enough victory on election night that there wouldn’t be a week of uncertainty, but that was unlikely, and it didn’t happen. I obsessively refreshed my election map all of Wednesday and Thursday, aware that at least some states would flip after mail-in ballots came in, but unsure which would. 

Again, my great fear was a blue victory held down by only one state. Given (I would say “any” chance here, but I don’t mean “any” chance because genuinely jurisdiction or facts or legal merit don’t matter to the Supreme Court) an opportunity to make one (1) decision that hands over a red election, please know that a conservative supermajority would take it. I cannot emphasize enough how true that is and how important it is for all of us to grasp that. 

Watching Georgia flip was one of the best experiences of my life, and it’s a little hard for me to articulate why, but I’m going to give it a shot here. I’m southern. I’m from the South, and for this conversation it’s really important that I’m from Memphis, a black city and a center of black music and culture. 

When people think about the South, they think of the white South, and on some level, they should. It is absolutely essential to understand the white South in order to understand American history. Let me be 100% clear here. That is not a good thing. American majority history is not good. We are not a good country. 

It’s near-impossible to understand why that’s true without knowing exactly what happened in the white South and exactly what is still happening there now. With that, however, is another truth that most folks don’t get. 

The SouthTM is white and needs to die. The South as it actually exists is partially white yes, but it is also everyone else that lives here, particularly black folks. Southern culture is black, not white. Georgia flipped because the people that have always, always been there finally got to crack apart the conservative machine holding the South hostage. 

That’s amazing. It’s fucking mind-blowing. I watched it happen at 3:30 in the morning days after Election Day, and holy shit holy shit, Georgia flipped. Atlanta won. Holy fucking shit. 

I would be terrified right now if only Georgia flipped, because SCOTUS would have found a way to throw out a few thousand votes. Inevitable. Absolutely certain on that one. 

With a few states of buffer, I don’t think that’s going to happen. I really do think it’s over. 

I came home after work on Friday and immediately went to sleep because I hadn’t really done that since Tuesday. I woke up at noon today, checked the map, checked my messages, and saw what happened while I was gone. After that, I went back to bed until 5:30pm. I’m really just getting up now, after most of 24 hours asleep. 

I don’t know if I would say that I’m happy right now, but I am overwhelmingly relieved. I’m under no illusions that a Biden victory will solve everything, but I also do think this is a real thing to celebrate. I’ll take suggestions on how to celebrate right now, actually, since I’m finally awake. 

I’ll be angry forever, I think, but this is a good thing, and I’d like to enjoy it. If you’re happy right now, hey, tell me about it. I’ll be thrilled with you. I want to hear it. Congrats to all of us. Love y’all. 

[fogcityemu]

When my daughter was less than one month old, I packed her into the car and took her to her first polling place. She looked around while I filled in the little circle next to Hillary Clinton's name, and later wore my "I voted" sticker on her little white onesie.

I was filled with excitement and joy at the prospect of a woman finally becoming president. How wonderful it would be for my young daughter to grow up in a country where women are valued, and respected enough that the people chose one to lead them.

The fear and uncertainty that has lived in my heart since that awful night 4 years ago has faded ever so slightly tonight. So much damage has been done to this nation, so much ugliness has been exposed because of the current president's outspoken vitriol, and because of this my heart is still filled with fear for my child.

However moving into the future we will know that this racism and misogyny not only still exists in this country, but runs rampant. Knowing this gives us the power to seek and destroy the backward and harmful values of the people who have crawled out of hiding in the last four years under the umbrella of hate speech and anger being spewed from the white house. Moving forward we need to be better.

Tonight my 4 year old daughter watched Kamala Harris speak as not only the first woman, but woman of color, to be elected vice president. She repeated words after Kamala said them, she knew this was a big deal.

The woman on tv looked like she could be related to my daughter, who comes from a family that is large and culturally diverse, and utterly American. My daughter is peacefully asleep as I write this and weep with joy at the prospect of my daughter finally having a chance at the future I'd hoped for 4 years ago.

[batboyblog]

Election 2020 Promise

Okay! it’s ALSO 2020 (or already is depending) and that means all us Americans have some super important stuff to talk about. We have ONE! shot at voting Donald Trump out of office, and it’s on November 3rd 2020, so before than I need you all to make a few promises to me, yourself, your fellow Americans, everyone on earth who has to live with our choices, and all the future generations who have to live with the consequences if you don’t. 

1. If you are 18 years old or older you will do whatever it takes to vote for WHOEVER the Democratic nominee for President is on November 3rd. Wait in line no matter how long, take the day off work if you have to, register to vote, and just, double check triple check they you stay registered, bring your ID even if you don’t think you need one. 

2. Talk to EVERYONE you know between now and Election Day November 3rd, be shameless, say whatever they need to hear to vote Donald Trump out of office, work on everyone you can think of, if you can get just one non-voter to vote or Republican to change their mind it will be worth all the hours.

3. Doesn’t matter how old you are, get involved. voting on November 3rd 2020 is very very important, but it’s not the only important thing. If you live in a swing state sign up to knock doors, if you live in a hard blue or red state, you can phone bank or send postcards to voters in swing states, you can give money to the Democratic Party and the nominee, they will be selling t-shirts, and bumper stickers and yard signs, buy those, every extra dollar goes to reaching voters and changing history.

4. Pull together. Odds are when the nominee is picked it might not be your very first choice. Suck it up. The fate of the world is on the line, we’ve not only not made progress on climate change, we’ve gone backwards as Trump cuts regulations and allows more global warming causing pollution. Thats one example of us sliding backwards there are many others, we can’t take 4 more years of backsliding, we can’t wait 4 years for a Democrat to start undoing the damage to get us back to were we were in 2016. So you see any one say “Never” Biden, Buttigieg, Warren, or Sanders, shut that shit down. The only never is TRUMP. Don’t let anyone drag this primary out, if on Super Tuesday someone takes all or nearly all the states commandingly, pack it in. Don't let us stay divided and fighting each other, rather than the real enemy to everything we care about. 

5. Be a happy warrior. Again the nominee might not be your favorite you still need to vote for them, you still need to fight for them because thats the only way we save the world from even more damage. So from the second it’s clear who’s gonna be the nominee to the day after Election Day, have nothing but nice things to say about the Democratic nominee. I’ve been around long enough to remember, Gore, Kerry, Hillary, and the endless “well he/she’s not my choice” “I don’t like” “I would have” guess what those wishy-washy non-voters see that shit and they say “well her own party doesn’t even like her, why should I....” and they don’t vote, or waste a vote on 3rd parties, or even vote Republican because at least they’re making a unified case for their candidate. So you tell all your friends and family and anyone who will listen how great this person is, all the good you look forward to happening. And the day after they’re elected, then say whatever you want. 

2020 is here guys, we have one shot to get rid of Trump, take back control, get back on track, maybe save all life on earth, you know the little stuff. So Vote, Donate, Volunteer, 

Democrats 2020, November 3rd.

[somehow-on]

Notes - 2020

Wiping your ass is next to godliness.

I'd throw a fat man in front of a train for you.

I'm alone in the center of the universe, everyone else is just increasingly complex epicycles.

Everyone plans to empathize until they're punched in the mouth.

I'm always on time, I'm a true punc.

Do I talk to myself? I do everything to myself.

Stay woc.

Nihilist in theory, pragmatist in practice.

Vectorian Grey.

H2650-1, J-bend, 1.25 inch. Compression Washer.

Full grown, adult sized, bangeroos.

How about instead of doing everything shittily all at once, you do one thing well?

Third Riech Feminist.

Lee Moses - she's a bad girl

If I'm going to die on a hill it's going to be frigging mount hillaminjarro.

Never compromise nor coordinate.

Dump sack.

Tracing paper.

Sex, the world's oldest commodity.

Arm Q's: infection vs bursitis, bone spur, IV soreness, basketball, drinking, elevation, some reason antibiotics aren't working

I'm no racist, I voted for Biden.

I'm not a socialist, I'm a social distancer.

I'm a Hooverist.

Other people's money.

Stop taking my chances.

Beautiful/fertile, ugly/sterile.

Get good at hitting your target, or get good at coming up with excuses for why you missed.

Life is for the risk tolerant.

Never regulated.

Sicker than sars-cov'ers, higher than Mars rovers.

60 Watt, 75 Watt

No one has a clearer vision of the absence of truth at the center of existence.

The meek and the brash.

I'm jewlatto.

Your amazing ability to invent clever new ways to be miserable.

Barry White - I'm gonna love you just a little more baby

Admiral Sissy Mary.

Imagine sisyphus getting prizes.

social darwining not distancing.

Wyatt Dykeman.

My life in bits.

You should see the other 7 billion.

Eyes are the windows of the cell.

The Heat of Composition.

The arrows of time.

It's not free will that is the illusion, physical cause and effect itself is illusory, all there is is brain chemicals and/or qualia.

My life as a trophy case to my disillusionments.

Theories on life list.

What is a superstition but an illusion of control?

This country's been in the toilet ever since we elected that Catholic Kennedy.

X is a religion, but not because it's a ethics, but because it's an explanation. Nothing can be explained.

What does the urkel tv show have to do with anything?

Was the most popular girl out behind the school. - 2013

puts the miscue in promisuous. - 2013

It doesn't bother me that people call me fat; I'm just thick-skinned. - 2012

Parezewsky, Mozca.

Vanguard Commodity Fund. VCMDX.

Gleeconomist.

I'm just a tall, hairy, little girl.

Diligence. Due diligence. Owed diligence.

Get yur kit off.

Smart as a button.

Sysiphus laughing.

Bluff the devil.

To sugar in our boogers and cream in our jeans.

The one inch of spacetime in front of my face.

The matrix but it's your own brain simulating your life one second at a time.

God gave his only son as a false flag operation.

Shitposting cannot be refuted, it can only be repeated. - TIB

Can't be arsed.

Breath spilled.

To me, every bumper sticker is basically a swastika. Tattoo.

S. J. Perelman. Mort Sahl. George S Kaufman.

Wide eyes nights late lying awake.

I just wish I could do less.

Meaningless, purposeless, alienating, novelty.

You don't have to hold so tightly to your ideas of how the world ought to be. If you relax just a little it's not going to fall apart. It will still keep getting a little better every day, and you'll have given yourself some room to enjoy what is good in it.

Ethically-Sourced Sadism.

Pathos-Aggresive.

The answer to every question is either everything or nothing.

People are always trying to help me find my wallet.

For a while I was living in my car dealership.

Avoid work, acquire orgasms.

The real reward is the silence and nothingness you make along the way.

Our relationship is purely physical, she's my aerobics instructor.

Pogo - Walt Kelly

Ameianto - super combo. Liniker

MMT is just communism with extra steps.

Crown of mud.

Don't count other people's status.

The emperor is fully clothed but is actually just a homeless weirdo off his meds.

Repeater.

Blackface is offensive, I only ever do African-American-face.

We must protect the children and coincidentally my social status.

Jeff Bezus Christ.

Born and bred and dipped in butter.

VMBSX - mortgage backed securities

Your son is going to grow up loving me, so who's the real cuck after all?

Avarice.

The dead infant is fulfilled. Baby coffin.

Chiaroscuro.

Data Based God.

Laugh while you burn.

Boredom is gravity always pulling you back to earth. Comedy is ramp that tricks your penchant for boredom in to launching you for a brief moment into the sky and closer to God.

Nihilists know the price of everything and the value of nothingness.

Acquisitive.

Speak less, smilf more.

The world is my cloister.

Breads Benedict.

Hose down, pimp up.

Health, wealth, and mirth. Birth, worth, and mirth.

London Fog.

I don't want to be in any club that wouldn't have me as their president.

Recognize the future.

You only do two weeks anyhow, the week you go in and the week you go out.

Use my time machine to go back and kill clippy before he is ever shipped.

It's not about the size of the boat, but the ocean of lotion.

The weight room is where we determine the proper weights for our pitch randomizer.

Failed Utopia. Utopia of the failed.

South of the wall.

Mektoub, my love. Movie.

She wants me to take her to the pound town county courthouse to apply for a liquor license, if you know what I mean.

I only do two things, break hearts and chew gum. And I'm delivered a monthly subscription of gum.

Beckett-head Wendy. Wundy.

I'm a consummate consumer.

Billy Joel: The father of hip hop.

Bask & wallow.

There's nothing to be done. I'll do on. Call that doing, call that on.

Hell and madness: trying to control that which you cannot.

Only reason anyone does anything: to make friends.

We are all united against the past, but in a war against all for the future.

Elena ferrante, the lost daughter.

Paul oster, hunt for herman miller.

Reality is plastic - hypnotism book

Fund the police! Coming straight from the underground.

My life's just a $10M bit.

There's a method to my badness.

Good fences make good neighborhoods.

Someone's gotta keep the bad world from the door.

Dom-text.

Isolate your favorites.

Huey Newton and the Lootings.

Too hasty by far!

Drinking my Soylent, doing my thang.

We only like the beginning of things.

Johnnie Ray.

Having sex astride a grave, the love gleams an instant and then it's dark once more.

Give us this day our daily death.

Live small & petite mort.

There's no small lives, just petite morts.

Gems in the mud.

Mud-miner.

I let you lose.

Air, water, food, hugs.

Shut up, show off.

Friendship is forever, romance is by the hour.

A shoulder to sigh on.

Pithetic. Inspires pith.

Everything is dim, inapparently.

Cum-dumptruck.

Mr. Smarty.

Moist with meaning.

Covid-wife.

Cuddle to completion.

I'm a very adorable pervert.

Still chasing my perfect compliment. Ultimate.

You don't pay me to be doing something all the time, you pay me to do the right thing at the right time, and to know what and when that is.

Melo-chromatic.

Go with Goethe. Go with Godot.

Off-black.

Peddling my piddling wares.

Godot waits for me.

Thick-stick thespian. Dipstick lesbian.

To want something is beautiful, to get it is obscene. Cloying. Nauseating.

I'm not smart enough to say little, I have to say a lot.

Papa Pill.

Pall.

Patience Zero. Seize the delay. It gets better, then worse.

Worrier-Princess. Golden State Worrier.

I'm looking for someone out of my league physically, intellectually, and morally; who I will try desperately to hide all my shortcomings and flaws from until one of us dies, hopefully me.

Greylord.

[nadiawrites14]

voice of gen z

word count: 2784

for english class. tw for school shooting and police brutality mention

AN INTRODUCTION.

“GEN Z is too afraid to ask a waiter for extra ketchup but will bodyslam a cop.”

Dated June 5th, on Twitter. Many of us sit holed up in our rooms, laptops resting in our crossed legs as we scroll through social media, or the blue light of a phone screen on our face as the world around us is sleeping. Many of us are also the ones organizing, the ones leading, the ones fighting. News spreads that in Dallas, Providence, and in many more cities, teenagers were the ones organizing, the ones fighting. Teenagers were the ones turning viral memes into protest signs, organizing protests and sharing methods of resistance through apps like TikTok and Instagram. It echoes the methods of the Hong Kong protestors, using technology to battle their government head-on. 

Teenagers who dance along to songs such as Megan Thee Stallion’s “Savage”, as well as teens who live in the world of ‘deep-fried’ memes, whose bizarre absurdity reach ungodly levels of abstractism, are the ones leading in this young revolution. Teenagers are the ones who chant ‘no justice, no peace’ in filled city streets; teenagers are the ones working to create graphics and share information, a new form of armchair activism. K-pop fans fill conservative hashtags with videos of their favorite performers, burying rhetoric and dismissal of the protests with dances and songs. In hours, #BlackLivesMatter trends. It’s hard to believe that these new pioneers and leaders in activism and technology are children who are scared to give class presentations, share Juuls in bathrooms, and find humor in the most strange and ironic of places. While the old term goes that ‘the revolution will not be televised’ in many ways, this growing movement will be televised, publicized, expanded, through its own means and methods.

I.

We are the generation of school shootings. 

December 14th, 2012. My mom tells me, as I hobble out from the red doors of my elementary school in Stamford, Connecticut, that something very bad has happened. I don’t understand. Nobody does. I see the faces of startled adults. I don’t remember the rest of that evening, or the day that followed it. Every time I think about Sandy Hook, the senseless school shooting that left 28 dead, I think about the multicolored walls of my school’s hallway, my sneakers on the white linoleum, the fear in my mother’s voice and in her eyes. That day was the first day I began to accept that I was a child in the United States of America in the 21st century. That day, and the brutal and confusing months that followed it, solidified something in my peers and I. Not just in Stamford, or even Connecticut, but within all young American students. The people in power didn’t care that a gunman marched into a wealthy and predominantly white Connecticut neighborhood and slaughtered kindergarteners. Because as I grew older, I saw the patterns, the televisation of suffering and permitted slaughter among my peers, our youngest, our posterity. This was normalized to us, just another school shooting, another period of brief outrage followed by inaction. The slaughter of children, the preventable slaughter of children shouldn’t be normalized. But it was.

February 14th, 2018. A gunman kills 17 students in Florida. As I’m waiting in a doctor’s waiting room with my mother, I lean over and tell her, “On Monday, all my teachers will talk about is school shootings.” I was wrong. School was another silent funeral march, my teachers quiet and solemn as they assigned us our work and progressed with their work. At dinner with my dad, I tell him, “It’ll never change.”

That isn’t entirely true. Leaders are found in teenagers who now walk through haunted hallways with clear backpacks. They are the face of a new movement, a march for our lives. Many are summoned to Washington and elsewhere a month later to organize, to fight. On March 27th, a day meant for students to walkout and protest the preventable slaughter of students, my school barricades the doors.

No legislation is passed. Nothing changes. The resistance lulls and fades, despite a number of school shootings following the tragedy at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. Gen Z is a symbolic Sisyphus, haplessly pushing a boulder of pleas up a mountain of indifference.

II.

Suzanne Collins published the Hunger Games on September 14th, 2008. It finds its way into the hands of teenagers of all shapes and sizes years later, and it has its cult following. Maybe the televised murder of children strikes a chord within the audience of young adults, as does the story of a growing revolution and a coup against a selfish government.

Gen Z gets its hands on theory at a young age, through Wikipedia and the uncensored vastness of the internet that we are handed. We are denoted as the generation born with the phones in our hands, but all I can remember is having a technology class from a young age, where we were measured on our abilities to type and memorize a keyboard. Our ability to cite and surf and stay safe in the face of danger. This wealth of information at our fingertips molds us.

Dystopian fiction is popular among young teens and young adults. Titles like Divergent the Giver, Harry Potter, the Maze Runner, all influence the devouring young readers. We are raised to see atrocity, in a place where atrocity is accessible to us in every way, shape and form. We are exposed and we are no longer innocent as we rise to 6th, 7th, 8th grade. Girls wear makeup for the first time and scream at the sight of bloodstained underwear. Boys become privy to the joy of video games and self-exploration. In this time, the internet truly consumes. There is no more script taught in classrooms, whiteboards have been replaced with Prometheans, and chromebooks are becoming normalcy.  

In 7th grade I receive my phone. The niches and underground media I discover shape me. I find acceptance, friends, in places where I had lacked them before. As my classmates begin to enter into weeklong flings that end in Instagrammed tragedy, I take a quiz online to find out if I’m gay. I begin to think for myself, and I find independence and a voice on internet circles.

By the time we are promoted to high school, something has shifted. Something is different. Something’s coming, something good. Gen Z keeps calm and carries on.

III.

Donald Trump is inaugurated on January 20th, 2017, to much outrage, but also to much support. In my town, there is a protest around his building that overlooks much of our city center. It’s peaceful, energetic, and beautiful. A Planned Parenthood sticker is on my bedroom door, and I have accepted that maybe, just maybe, I’m into girls.

In 2018, we are in high school. Little fish in a big pond. I don’t have friends in my grade, but stick closer to my premade friends in the Class of 2021. My teachers are lovely, kind, and supportive, and I shine in this new environment. Politics is a force in my life as I begin to write, and as I begin to form opinions and do research. 

It’s easy to say that all of Gen Z is progressive, but this isn’t true. It’s actually very incorrect. The internet is a miraculous tool, one that can provide and produce and create new forms of communication and spread new ideas. But it is still an ocean that is widely uncharted, and young teenagers will fall into holes constructed by right-wing superstars. The racism and homophobia circulated by 4chan is on the internet for anybody to see. New popular figures and icons pledge their vote to Trump. Right-wing rhetoric overtakes in the forms of Ben Shapiro, Pewdiepie, 4chan, Reddit. There’s a neutrality to all things, but the dogwhistles and the normalization of prejudice are dangerously overbearing. As the 2016 election divided our country, it divides the new generation. A divided house cannot stand, and that is for certain. 

It is around this time, in my Freshman summer, where the politics makes a crescendo. I have broken 1K followers on my Instagram art account, where I draw fanart for a variety of musicals and plays. I discover Shakespeare, and lose myself in Hamlet. I am happy with my identity and with myself, and as the 2020 election nears, I stay informed on current events, common issues, the things that need changing.

Sophomore winter. My dad and I take two-hour drives spanning Connecticut, and we talk. He says, “You know, your generation’s fucked. You’re the ones who are going to have to cope with our mistakes.” I tell him I know. I tell him about my feelings towards racial injustice in America, the battle for a higher minimum wage against growing costs, issues in healthcare, housing, poverty, climate change, all thrown aside and discarded. Our generation, of course, when most of our white and male politicians are dead and buried, will have to deal with the repercussions of rising sea levels and global temperatures, volatile weather and crippling natural disasters, all overlooked due to blatant ignorance. “You guys are going to have to fix all of this.”

“I know.”

I’m sick of the battle being placed on the backs of teenagers. I’m sick of our faces being the fight for climate change, the faces of Greta Thunberg and Emma Gonzalez and young revolutionary congresswomen being mocked and heckled by throngs of keyboard warriors. I’m sick of the battle our leaders and representatives should be fighting being placed on our backs, when we are already our own Atlas. Ignorance is dangerous, biting, and overwhelming. We look back to the images and words we were raised upon, the story of the Hunger Games and the broadcasting of school shootings for us all to see. 

It is 2020. Happy new year! I watch from my living room as the ball drops. A brief Twitter moment about a newly discovered disease pops up in my recommended, I brush over it. Photographs of Australian fires are surfaced, and we joke about what a fantastic start it is to the year. 

Sisyphus reaches a fork in the road.

MMXX.

At around 11PM on Wednesday, March 11th, I send a strongly worded letter to the principal and local superintendent. The coronavirus has picked up worldwide, and has made its way into the states. Johns Hopkins has an interactive map that shows bubbles above cities where cases have been reported. Stamford, Connecticut Dead: 0

Recovered: 0 Active: 3.

New York’s cases are on the rise. On that same day, I began to realize the severity that would soon overtake us. I spent the afternoon first at what would be our last rehearsal for our school musical, James and the Giant Peach, and then I went to the library. I did my homework, read The Cripple of Inishmaan by Martin McDonagh, then bought a Subway cookie from the mall. I always keep a copy of King Lear in my backpack, and as my dad pulls up to the sidewalk I gloss over Edmund’s first monologue.

It’s the last normal day for a while.

March 12th comes in like a lion. In my first period class, civics, a classmate yells out, “Trump 2020!” A period later, my friend pulls me aside in the hallways, and asks if I heard that school was closing. 

“It can’t be true,” I said.

“Schadlich just showed us.”

I take my route to my next class, and find the hallway a chaotic mess of energy and camaraderie. What was meant to be kept under wraps has been instantly transferred across the student body over Snapchat stories and texts. People dance, sing, hug. It’s branded as a “Coronacation.” Broadway announces its closure, and I walk out of the front doors for the final time in my sophomore year.

Once again, ignorance overtakes. Within months, the death toll skyrockets, spikes, as we stay holed up in our online classes. My focus wavers, but I press on. Many other students resort to simply neglecting their work, choosing to take this time to focus on their own health or fill up their new time with their own hobbies. Teenagers find solace in each other, through social media and through the connections we’ve built online. As ignorance mounts among our leaders, teenagers jokingly refer to Covid-19 as the famous “Boomer Remover”. It trends on Twitter. Graduation, prom, is cancelled. The generation whose childhood began with 9/11 is once again cut short by a tragedy of preventable errors. Gen Z is subject to adapting once again to an unfamiliar environment, and we undertake.

Protests take over the streets, screaming against government tyranny. The deaths crescendo to nearly 100,000. A video surfaces of a young black man, Ahmaud Aubery, being publicly killed on a road while jogging. Ignorance continues as cases spike, and the political climate is ripe for change. On May 25th, a black man from Minneapolis named George Floyd is killed in a brutal act of suffocation by a policeman. More names resurface -- Breonna Taylor, Tony McDade, Joao Pedro. Names neglected to injustice are once again in the limelight -- Trayvon Martin, Tamir Rice, Philando Castile, Eric Garner, Mike Brown, Terence Crutcher, Atatiana Jefferson, and more. 

Sisyphus has had enough of pushing the boulder, and Sisyphus takes to the streets. It is the perfect storm. A storm fueled by ignorance and the preventable death of thousands, by decades of injustice, by the mere political climate in the United States of America. Gen Z, our generation, my generation, has lived the darkest hour. We were born at the cusp of a millenia, in an awkward position where society has begun to find its footing in an unfamiliar time. A time of domestic and overseas terrorism, shaped by 9/11 and a countless number of school shootings and slaughtered people of color. Where the new generation has accessibility to the injustice and wrongs committed by those before and those above, right at our fingertips. We have new ways to organize, new ways to televise, new ways to fight. In our armchairs and in our streets, wearing masks as we hold up our hands in surrender.

Generation Z marches. They lead. They throw tear gas back at officers with no hesitation. They create chants, organize through grassroots, and find a chorus of support online. 

Generation Z leads. As politicians and leaders sit in ivory towers, like President Snow in Panem, our generation cries for change. We witness and feel the repercussions of their ignorance in our daily lives, from cuts to education to the publication of school shootings to the absence of American atrocity in our history textbooks to a pipeline that directs BIPOC and low-income students to prison or the military as they step off the graduation stage. Each year, our winters get warmer as our summers turn boiling. The preventable pile of corpses rises in front of us, and we have been taught to sit by and let it occur while the world burns. 

No longer.

Sisyphus steps aside and allows the boulder to descend down the mountain. They are bruised, bloodied, their palms calloused and scuffed and their feet lacerated and sore. Up ahead, shrouded by clouds, is the mountaintop. Sisyphus wipes their mouth, finds their footing, and begins the march.

A CONCLUSION.

We have a future.

It’s awfully dim right now. Barely a light at the end of the tunnel. We began a dead march towards it from the moment we were born into this decaying way of life, held together with glue and string by leaders with fumbling hands and staunch indifference. Our backs are tired, and we are barely adults. Generation Z is tired of fighting a fight that shouldn’t be theirs. How desperately we still crave childhood joy and humor and innocence. 

Change is necessary. It is something that is especially necessary in our time. We can no longer let people die because they can’t afford food or medicine or housing. Students cannot go into school wondering if it will be their last day. Black people should not fear for their lives while wearing a hoodie, driving, jogging in their neighborhood, shopping, or sleeping in their own homes. Elderly white men which encompass most of our political elite can no longer sit on their hands as their population suffers.

The voice of Generation Z screams louder than anything else. It screams in its silence, its activism, its useless martyrdom and battle. Change belies itself within our voice, and it has gone unheard for too long.

Change is the voice of Generation Z.

[architectnews]

Architecture under Biden Presidency

Biden Presidency Architecture, US Building News, Social Housing Shortage, American Election

Architecture under the Biden Presidency

Historic US Election Review of Architectural Aspects: Architectural Column by Joel Solkoff, PA, USA

Nov 12, 2020

US Architecture under the Biden Presidency

The steeple of Independence Hall was the masterpiece of 18th Century architect William Strickland. Photograph in the public domain by Captain Albert E. Theberge, NOAA Corps (ret.).National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Independence Hall is the birthplace of the Constitution of the United States–ratified in 1788; in operation since 1789. If nothing else, the big victor in the US elections of 2020 is the Constitution of the United States.

Despite fears of violence and foreign interference, over 100 million US Americans cast their votes safely and without significant problems in the midst of our worst health crisis in over 100 years.

Joe Biden clearly won the Presidential election by over 4.4 million popular votes. Biden also won the electoral college vote—that aristocratic relic difficult to explain; likely to be reformed—. by a comfortable margin. It is with the considerable emotion that I recollect and write with pride that twelve times I have sworn to uphold the Constitution of the United States and “defend it against all enemies foreign and domestic.”

https://ift.tt/2iaNIlE

This is the complete text of the Constitution from the U.S, Senate website, I will be writing and talking about Independence Hall and the Constitution a lot–perhaps, not all today.

To contain Covid, architects must build cities

The first rule of writing is know your audience. You, my readers, are architects and members of the AEC community. If taming the deadly virus is to be achieved, the AEC community must build cities on an order of magnitude far greater than in the 1950s when Levitowns dotted the US countryside.

In the wake of World War II, soldiers returned to have children as the massive Baby Boom generation (my generation) converted the US from a nation of urban dwellers to one of suburbanites.

Aerial view of Levittown, Pennsylvania circa 1959 (when I was eight years old). Wikipedia: “Levittown is the name of seven large suburban housing developments created in the United States by William J. Levitt and his company Levitt & Sons. Built after World War II for returning veterans and their new families, the communities offered attractive alternatives to cramped central city locations and apartments. The Veterans Administration and the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) guaranteed builders that qualified veterans could buy housing for a fraction of rental costs.”

Right now, architecture commissions in the private sector are drying up. Massive public spending will begin shortly as housing our most vulnerable children, women, and men is required to prevent death and contagion. Urgently, architects must learn a skill rarely taught in architecture school: Politics. Architects must become, as the expression goes, “political animals,” a subject on which my future columns will descend on you with passion and this is what you must do next information.

Before the pandemic, the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) had a waiting list of 3.5 million low income individuals who are in danger of contracting corona virus because of the unsafe housing where they live.

Breadcrumbs demonstrating what we can expect from Biden when adults return to govern

“Infection Control Deficiencies Were Widespread and Persistent in Nursing Homes Prior to COVID-19 Pandemic” is a report from Congress’ General Accountability Office (GAO) on the failure of US nursing homes, where most corona virus deaths are taking place, to protect its residents–people like me who are elderly and have considerable health issues.

One of the number of places in the US government (where I worked in Washington DC for nearly 20 years) is the General Accountability Office (GAO). Here is a report the GAO released on May 20th of this year: “GAO analysis of CMS data (content management system data from Medicare and Medicaid) shows that infection prevention and control deficiencies were the most common type of deficiency cited in surveyed nursing homes, with most nursing homes having an infection prevention and control deficiency cited in one or more years from 2013 through 2017 (13,299 nursing homes, or 82 percent of all surveyed homes).

https://www.gao.gov/assets/710/702638.pdf

Hail to the Chief

Even before the election results where confirmed by the widely-respected Associate Press, a serious-minded President-to-be Biden had already begun the process of preparing to fix the problems of nursing homes, inadequate housing, and Covid virus specifically. Within his first week as President elect, Biden had already appointed a panel of distinguished and credentialed scientists to make suggestions regarding the pandemic. “Covid, covid, covid, covid,” President Trump repeated sing song like in his re-election rallies which because of the absence of social distancing and laissez-faire mask use have been spreader events.

All Architects Today Must Be Covid-19 Architects

Joel Solkoff’s Column Vol. VI, Number 4

West front of the Capitol of the United States where Joseph Biden will take the oath of office to “preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies foreign and domestic” on January 20,2021 at noon. Photo in the public domain.

The annual budget of the U/S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) is $44.1. billion.

Secretary of HUD Ben Carson tested positive for Covid-19 after results of the Presidential election were announced by the authoritative Associate Press. One reporter suggested Secretary Carson may have contracted the disease at a Michigan rally for President Trump where Secretary Carson did not consistently where a mask.

Yesterday, the US death toll from the corona virus was 2.7 million children, women, and men.

DATELINE Thursday, November 12, 2020. Williamsport Pennsylvania, a town of 28,000 people (a treasure trove of architecture) 178 miles southeast over rotten roads to Philadelphia’s Independence Hall where my fathers (mothers did not apply) ratified the Constitution of the United States.

The biggest of the big news from this month’s election is that President Donald John Trump will no longer be President of the United States even if it means the Marines have to drag him out of the White House kicking and screaming. An ongoing question is whether the United States will ever recover from the Trump Presidency. On this issue, I take the long view. Maybe. It is the forthcoming Presidency of Joseph Robinette Biden, Jr. on January 20, 2021 that gives me some hope. Biden has run an excellent campaign. His choice of Kamala Harris, Senator from California, former attorney general of the state of California was sheer genius–a word I seldom use.

Senator Harris was my first choice for President during the crowded Democratic nomination process. Senator Harris mopped the floor with candidate Biden during one debate. This debate

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S6-UC8yr0Aw

Embedded in accordance with the terms of YouTube’s licensing agreement

When I heard that Biden had selected Harris, this bumper sticker came to mind. “It takes brass balls to play rugby.” This is a time for US and global architects to understand that politics is about power. In your case, it is about exerting your power to design housing for the most vulnerable to Covid 19. Here is Kamala Harris questioning Bill Bahr who in 69 days will no longer be the Attorney General of the United States:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bHd_UlebyoM

The press’ failure in covering the election results

“Counting inches forward in Pennsylvania, and both sides predict victory.” asserted the New York Times inaccurately on November 4th.

Before Hillary, Pennsylvania consistently cast its electoral votes for Democratic Presidential candidates even ones who lost the election. If it were for Pennsylvania, John Kerry would have been President of the United States. Pennsylvania has voted for Democratic candidates consistently because there are a lot of voters in Pittsburgh and Philadelphia at each end of the state and few voters in the center, in the burned out Rust Belt where the existence of a Donald Trump was the inevitable result of the failure of Democratic and Republican Presidential Administrations from preserving and protecting this rich beautiful land between the two oceans.

My condemnation is considerable of the New York Times, the US’s newspaper of record, for dangerously pretending that the king-making electoral vote in Pennsylvania was a close vote. The only reason former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton lost the 2016 election, was because she ran an incompetent campaign. That is putting it mildly.

Following election day when I voted for Joe Biden in a Trump county in Pennsylvania e-architect Art Critic Sarah Schmerler drew the following rough approximation of reality. The New York Times, leading the world, kept us all on the edge of ours seats unnecessarily. New York Times reporters were incapable of telling the difference between big and little.

If you have a large number of votes in one place and few votes in another place and if all votes are equal, then you do not have a close race.

Joel votes. Photo reproduced with his permission by my health aide Frank Rasole, Jr.

As you can see, the parking lot was not crowded. There were no lines. Few voters. A mile away at the Williamsport Regional Airport on Friday evening, Air Force 1 arrived and Trump conducted a large super-spreader event where his fervent followers promised the President they would vote for him. My polling place: Loyalsock Twp Building, 2501 East Third Street Wi lliamsport PA17701.

I have not yet had the chance to examine the vote count there/here four years ago, but I would be surprised if in 2016 the Loyalsack polling place had fewer voters than poll workers as I experienced. Meanwhile, while the entire process of my voting took fewer than 15 minutes, in Philadelphia potential Biden voters were spending hours in line. I do not understand why the alarmist press was unable to see that Biden would obtain my Commonwealths’ 20 electoral votes handily.

++++

Off to New York City to save my life

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4YEs2rVINpU

I have been hopeful of moving to the Peter Herdic Park Hotel completed 1865. Williamsport’s best architect, Anthony Visco, Jr took my amanuensis Frankie Resole, Jr. and me on tour of the hotel which was an alluring rural attraction.

Sadly, while I am hoping to maintain a legal residence here in the Appalachian Mountains, now is the time to head Noah’s call and move to New York City. As an elderly man with significant health conditions, Remaining in Lycoming Country–with its failure to test physicians and nurses in the emergency room of its largest hospital, its failure to test at all my primary care physician, and its failure to socially distance or wear masks consistently–may very well be a sentence of death.

The most dangerous spot on the planet from this deadly disease is South Dakota–beautiful South Dakota. Lycoming Country, Pa has all the characteristics of South Dakota’s danger. Within the next two weeks, the infection that has closed down London and Paris will be coming to the US with a wallop. Now is the time to get out.

New York City, once the epicenter of the pandemic, is now the safest place to be in the US.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=krm2VwxdOjM

Embedded in accordance with YouTube’s licensing agreement

My editors beckon: “All right, stop writing, Joel.”

Isabelle Lomholt and Adrian Welch, Editors at e-architect

“Good night and good luck,” as Greensboro, North Carolina born Edward R. Morrow, my hero, used to say. My hero Edward R.Murrow broadcast this 1960 example of classic investigative reporting.This documentary was broadcast on Thanksgiving Day where I watched it at my maternal grandmother’s apartment in Brooklyn. I was 12 years old at the time.Murrow’s documentary shaped my future career in measurable ways. Note the hideous conditions of farm worker housing. Little effort would find in Florida and Canada- where inadequate housing for migrant workers in danger of spreading the Corona virus have been reported. Think Black Lives Matter when you hear the words of a grower Murrow quoted: “We used to own our slaves. Now we just rent them.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yJTVF_dya7E&t=9s

Embedded in accordance with YouTube licensing

Joel

Selfie, Lycoming County, Pennsylvania, USA

jsolkoff@gmail.com 2019: East Third Street Williamsport, PA, US 17701 Please feel free to phone me at US 570-772-4909 Copyright © 2020 by Joel Solkoff. All rights reserved.

Door by Kathy Forer sculptor. From her Architecture collection. Copyright 2020 by Kathy Forer, published by permission

Architecture Columns

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Renzo Piano’s Whitney Neighborhood

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Joel Solkoff’s Column Vol. IV, Number 2

Joel Solkoff’s Column Vol. IV, Number 1

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Detroit will be a Trendy City

Belt and Suspenders Routine – Joel Solkoff’s Column

Joel Solkoff’s Column Volume II No. 6

Joel Solkoff’s Column, Vol.II, Number 7

Comments / photos for the Architecture under Biden Presidency – page welcome

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[anthonybialy]

Worse and Worser

You don’t have to approve of mesothelioma if you hate lymphoma. Choosing between diseases neglects how one can be just as rotten as the other. As so often happens during our stupid sentences on this dumb planet, preferences matter as little as hopes and dreams. Loathing something may not affect it, I'm afraid to report in my dispatch from the front line of existence.

As with the horror of imagining a Patriots/Cowboys Super Bowl, both options can suck. Weighing which of the two is less appalling does not precisely inspire that feeling historians have identified as joy.

At least strive to refrain from thinking one is good on its own terms even if it's relatively so. It's better to be attacked by hyenas that were not roaming around Chernobyl, but the non-glowing ones are still bitey. The best case involves pointing out the other option would inflict even more agony, which is a sure sign circumstances are terrific. There's no reason to try to buy happiness when so much is free.

Voters are hungry in an airport terminal around 11 p.m. where only Subway and Arby's are open. The choice to starve doesn't seem so bad. Unfortunately, we'll be forced to dine with Darth Vader.

Poor Americans only get two candidates in the perfect example of why the private sector is inherently preferable to anything involving government. Sure, picking the less worse of a pair is probably better than having 17 icky options for president where one oddball just sneaks ahead. On the other hand, look who wins under present conditions.

Emphasizing how everyone who votes differently is pro-molestation rather than bringing up any advancement of one's own represents the sort of binary thinking that has made this era particularly enjoyable. One is bad if the other is good according to particularly sophisticated Twitter debaters who point out the other choice is flaming trash in response to criticism about their garbage dump of a savior.

Fox News has staked its entire primetime lineup on the notion that we're being saved from becoming New East Germany from their unofficial CEO, which is apparently enough of an accomplishment to never stop kissing presidential ass. Rich Jesus only has to save us from ghastliness by those globalist commies to maintain his status as the most selfless hero who's ever graced our nation.

George Washington wishes he could have been brave enough to own libs. Laura Ingraham would condemn most of Trump's policies if his name were replaced with Hillary Clinton's. But at least he's not her.

The only problem is we're not exactly being protected from overreach. A quasi-Republican loves inflicting tariffs on us, spending money the government doesn't have, and abandoning the Kurds. And George R.R. Martin will finish the books before Obamacare gets repealed. But at least Mexico hasn't paid to build a wall. The president's defenders take a break from trying to justify the worthiness of rash federal meddling to note it'd be way worse if Vox was running the State Department.

We're on course to enjoy another delightful election between an obnoxious phony who would keep a team of psychiatrists in business and an unnamed frothing commie lunatic who will make those who endured the Soviet Union beg to be consulted. Boasting to overcome doing nothing worthwhile and plenty that's unfortunate might be the most appealing contestant. As always, Trump only looks palatable by comparison.

Cunning Democrats could be trying to reelect Trump so he keeps making the other crew look awful. That's the one way their extreme impulses would seem logical. There's a first time for everything.

Screeching government fans surreptitiously enjoy how many liberal policies they get from a purported free market legend. But that'd require a capability for foresight that stands against everything else they've ever attempted. New Coke wasn't a scheme by sodie pop executives to get people to miss the original: a colossal screw-up is the only chance some have at success.

Change labels and nobody would notice. The generic can of green beans tastes just the same as the one with the mascot and advertising budget. Also, we ordered fries. The blind test's unpalatability should make everyone ponder what role marketing has in preferences. Instead, it prompts demand for stickers on every product.

Trump convincing voters the other contender will give babies AIDS will continues this inspirational era of bliss. The utterly positive presidential race presents the choice of getting infected with socialist germs versus continuing to taint the office with an orange monster. Both are sort-of almost in the ballpark of being right in what I'd gently classify as exaggerations. Meanwhile, neither have worthwhile remedies.

We're sure to end up with continued undignified growth of debt with abandonment of allies while sucking up to tyrants. Just make sure you do so for the right reasons. No, not that side: they want bankrupt orphans to die.

[go-diane-winchester]

J2 and politics and how the hellers are misguided

Jensen Ackles said religion and politics are very sensitive topics to talk about.  He is right.  Because no matter how hard you try not to, you are still going to offend someone.  I am South African.  And as a South African, I have access to information that American's don't see because their information outlets are compromised.  Americans are ensconced from the truth.  However, some Americans are themselves aware of this.  It was one of the reasons that Donald Trump is liked by his supporters.  He called out Fake News.  Unfortunately, [and this is a marketing term] Trump is a political gatekeeper.  He tells the truth mixed in with lies, in order to sway your emotions and gain your trust.  Sort of like satan.  Every American news outlet is telling you lies.  Because they all get their news, primarily from a single source: Reuters.  What people don't know is that Reuters is a private company, and not a public entity, operated by the people, for the people and certainly not of truth.  Reuters is owned by the Rothschild dynasty, the richest and most unscrupulous family on Earth.  Americans get information in a way that the Rothschilds deem acceptable.

Jensen also said during one of his latest Vancon panels, that cars had bumper stickers encouraging votes for certain candidates, during the last national elections.  He was baffled by that because why would Canadians care about the American elections.  That alone shows how little Jensen knows.  In fact, Americans generally are the most outspoken and opinionated people when it comes to the opposition and politics.  But they don't realize that they are operating on compromised information.  Even the ones that are ''woke'' because they are using alternative media, don't realize that they are being hoodwinked by the same people, from a different angle.  That is why, even though I have done many posts about Misha and his queer baiting antics, I have never done a single post about his politics.  Because just like Jensen and everyone else in America, Misha is ignorant.  However, he truly believes that what he is saying is right.  And, because fairness is important to me, I could never truly begrudge for his political beliefs.  He doesn't know the whole truth about American politics. 

What irritates me however, is that in the case of the messy topic of politics, because Misha speaks so openly, the hellers and minions demand that that J2 should speak about politics too.  And Jensen, in particular, is easy to push around and so he gives in.  And when he does, he gets slandered for it.  That is why he wasn't talking about politics in the first place, people.  Not everyone shares the same ideals.  And the minute he opens his mouth, ''woke'' SJWs who are themselves not very smart, tear him apart for saying something they did not personally agree with.  Or they will behave like utter hypocrites.  A few days ago, George Bush sr, died.  As a foreigner, I do not see this man as a politician.  I see him and his family as problematic elements in the political world, not just American but global.  However, Americans don't know the whole truth about him.  And he was their leader for some time.  The man is now dead.   And many individuals, including Ellen DeGeneres, tweeted out condolences to him.  Jensen did as well.  And this happened.

Iangallagher is ''woke''.  I am not using that term as a compliment.  To me, a ''woke'' person, is not someone who has woken up to the truth.  They are either, someone who has woken up to compromised lies churned out in alternative media or they are SJWs who have agendas and are masquerading behind the guise of social justice.  So Ian was offended that Jensen sent out a condolence message because a man who just died.  And remember, Jensen is operating on compromised information.  Ian said nothing when Misha did the same thing.

Both actors believed that Bush served the country well as a leader.  And they both did the decent thing by sending condolences.  And a Misha fan [look at Ian's profile picture] decided to tear Jensen apart only.  There are more responses that he sent, about Danneel cheating on Jensen and the twins not being Jensen's babies.  If I met Ian face-to-face and quizzed him about politics, I can assure you there would be many questions he would not be able to answer.  If Ian is a heller and not a minion, I am certain that politics was not the reason, he went after Jensen.  He did it because of destiel. 

The reason why American politics is important to the rest of the world, is because the USA has placed itself as the leader at the helm.  When America makes socio-political changes in their land, it affects the rest of the world, especially monetarily.  America also subtly pushes these changes on other nations because she is a world leader and can do that.  The South African educational system suffers daily because of the Outcome-Based Education system that our Minister of Education imported about America.  ''Woke'' people call Outcomes-based education, the systematic dumbing down of America.  Remember, if I call you woke, I am not complimenting you.  Nobody is dumb.  They are just misinformed.   

[somewitmostlyexhaustion]

Another big thing is the time commitment. Many Americans view voting as a full day commitment. My uncle in the states often has to wait for several hours to vote and that is the norm in many states. Waiting several hours, sometimes all day to vote making it extremely difficult to vote on a workday, or if you have school or kids, and hard for people with disabilities.

I can't speak to other countries, but at least in Canada employers have to give you as much time as is required for you to go vote. They legally cannot prevent you from voting and must accommodate your time off to do so. There are definitely places that try to work around this, but the majority of employers make time for you to vote because voting is not difficult here. Along with mail in and early voting, there are often so many voting centres set up, especially in cities that it voting is often quite easy.

If you live in rural or remote areas you can opt for mail in voting, and while you can still do that in cities, it's often not necessary. I've lived in a major Canadian city most of my life and voting is simple, and by major Canadian city I mean a city with a population in the millions of people. And despite living in a major metropolitan area, I think the longest I have ever stood in line to vote is 25 minutes. I don't think I've ever waited longer than that. In our most recent federal election I didn't even wait in a line. The voting system is so efficient that I walked in with a bunch of other people, went to the table for people with M-R last names, showed them my driver's licence, which had my previous address on it, which wasn't an issue because if you register to vote ahead of time, which takes about five minutes to do, you don't need photo ID to vote. Just a piece of ID with your name on it. But also, even if you don't register ahead you only need a single peice of ID, again not photo, just with your name and address, and the list of acceptable ID includes any government licences, mortgage paperwork, school admissions letters, even utility or cell phone bills in Ontario. There are other's too but I won't list all of them here. After I showed them my driver's licence and voter information card or VIC, (which is what you get mailed to show you are already registered to vote and is valid ID to show your address) the people at the voting station cross your name off of a list, give you your ballot, you mark it off, drop it in a box, get a sticker, and then leave.

Voting in Canada is extremely easy do. We also don't have mandatory voting, though I think we should, but even if we did it would be fine because voting here is extremely easy. We don't have tons of hurdles set up to cause us to fail when we get to the voting stations. It's decently well understood that voter fraud just isn't a problem. There are way better ways to rig or interfere with an election (robocalls in 2011) than misusing a VIC which is a ton of work for very little gain. Usually at most it's believed that you would only be able to get one extra vote, something that is recorded and will likely be caught by Election's Canada, but also requires a mistake on the governments part, extra work to travel between voting districts, potentially a fake ID, AND the malice to do so, and it's just not likely enough to happen that it's a big enough problem to outweigh the benefits of ensuring that everyone eligible is able to exercise that right as per Section III of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

That's not to say we don't have issues regarding our elections, we absolutely do, we're by no means perfect, and we've dealt with people trying to suppress voters (the Fair Elections Act of 2014, fucking Harper conservatives, which prevented around 100,000 of our 27.1 million eligible voters from voting in 2015). But I think the concept of mandatory voting for many Americans seems daunting because of how much work is required for them to vote. If their system wasn't designed to make it impossible to vote, many people might view compulsory voting much differently.

[dailynewswebsite]

How to be a good digital citizen during the election – and its aftermath

You’re a key participant in efforts to curb misinformation on-line. John Fedele/The Picture Financial institution through Getty Pictures

Within the runup to the U.S. presidential election there was an unprecedented quantity of misinformation in regards to the voting course of and mail-in ballots. It’s virtually sure that misinformation and disinformation will enhance, together with, importantly, within the aftermath of the election. Misinformation is wrong or deceptive info, and disinformation is misinformation that’s knowingly and intentionally propagated.

Whereas each presidential election is crucial, the stakes really feel notably excessive given the challenges of 2020.

I examine misinformation on-line, and I can warning you in regards to the sort of misinformation you may even see on Tuesday and the times after, and I can give you recommendation about what you are able to do to assist stop its unfold. A quick-moving 24/7 information cycle and social media make it extremely simple to share content material. Listed here are steps you possibly can take to be digital citizen and keep away from inadvertently contributing to the issue.

Election misinformation

Current experiences by disinformation researchers spotlight the potential for an unlimited quantity of deceptive info and disinformation to unfold quickly on Election Day and the times following. Folks spreading disinformation could also be making an attempt to sway the election in some way or just undermine confidence within the election and American democracy normally.

U.S. intelligence companies have reported that the Russian authorities is orchestrating disinformation campaigns aimed on the U.S. elections and pandemic response. AP Photograph/Pavel Golovkin

This report by the Election Integrity Partnership (EIP) particulars narratives meant to delegitimize the election and present how uncertainty creates alternatives for misinformation to flourish.

Specifically, chances are you’ll find yourself seeing deceptive info shared about voting in particular person, mail-in ballots, the day-of voting expertise and the outcomes of the election. You may even see tales on-line circulating about coronavirus outbreaks or infections at polling places, violence or threats of intimidation at polling places, misinformation about when, the place and methods to vote, and tales of voting suppression via lengthy strains at polling stations and other people being turned away.

We seemingly gained’t know the outcomes on Election Day, and this delay is each anticipated and bonafide. There could also be misinformation in regards to the winner of the presidential election and the ultimate counting of ballots, particularly with the rise in mail-in ballots in response to the coronavirus pandemic. Will probably be necessary to know that not each state finalizes their official poll depend on Nov. 3, and there could also be narratives that threaten the legitimacy of the election outcomes, like individuals claiming their vote didn’t get counted or saying they discovered discarded accomplished ballots.

What if the supply of misinformation is … you?

There’s a lot you are able to do to assist scale back the unfold of election misinformation on-line. This will occur each by accident and deliberately, and there are each overseas and home actors who create disinformation campaigns. However in the end, you might have the facility to not share content material.

Sharing mis/disinformation provides it energy. No matter your demographic, you could be inclined to misinformation, and typically particularly focused by disinformation. One of many largest steps you possibly can take to be digital citizen this election season is to not contribute to the sharing of misinformation. This may be surprisingly tough, even with the perfect of intentions.

One sort of misinformation that has been fashionable main as much as the election – and is more likely to stay fashionable – is “good friend of a good friend” claims. These claims are sometimes unverified tales with out attribution which can be rapidly unfold by individuals copy and pasting the identical story throughout their networks.

You may even see these claims as social media statuses like a Fb submit or an Instagram Story, and even as a little bit of textual content forwarded to you in a gaggle chat. They’re usually text-based, with no identify connected to the story, however as an alternative forwarded alongside by a “good friend of a good friend.”

Such a misinformation is fashionable to share as a result of the tales can heart across the good intentions of wanting to tell others, and so they usually present a social context, for instance my good friend’s physician or my brother’s co-worker, that may make the tales appear respectable. Nonetheless, these usually present no precise proof or proof of the declare and shouldn’t be shared, even when you consider the data is beneficial. It could possibly be deceptive.

Easy methods to keep away from spreading misinformation

Many helpful sources can be found about methods to determine misinformation, which may information you on what to share and to not share. You’ll be able to enhance your potential to identify misinformation and study to keep away from being duped by disinformation campaigns.

Suggestions for recognizing misinformation on-line.

A key strategy is the Cease, Examine, Discover and Hint (SIFT) approach, a fact-checking course of developed by digital literacy skilled Mike Caulfield of Washington State College Vancouver.

Following this method, whenever you encounter one thing you need to share on-line, you possibly can cease and examine to see if the web site or supply of the data. Then examine the supply and discover out the place the story is coming from. Then discover trusted protection to see if there’s a consensus amongst media sources in regards to the declare. Lastly, hint claims, quotes and media again to their authentic contexts to see if issues have been taken out of context or manipulated.

Lastly, chances are you’ll need to share your personal expertise with voting this yr on social media. Following the advice of Election Integrity Challenge, it’s a good suggestion to share optimistic experiences about voting. Go forward and share your “I voted” sticker selfie. Sharing tales about how individuals socially distanced and wore masks at polling places can spotlight the optimistic experiences of voting in-person.

[Deep knowledge, daily. Sign up for The Conversation’s newsletter.]

Nonetheless, EIP cautions about posting about detrimental experiences. Whereas detrimental experiences warrant consideration, a heavy give attention to them can stoke emotions of disenfranchisement, which might suppress voter turnout. Additional, when you submit one thing on social media, it may be taken out of context and used to superior narratives that you could be not help.

Most individuals care in regards to the upcoming election and informing individuals of their networks. It’s only pure to need to share necessary and significant details about the election. Nonetheless, I urge you to apply warning in these subsequent few weeks when sharing info on-line. Whereas it’s in all probability not attainable to cease all disinformation at its supply, we the individuals can do our half to cease its unfold.

Kolina Koltai's funding comes from the Middle for an Knowledgeable Public on the College of Washington, the Knight Basis, and The College of Washington's Inhabitants Well being Initiative.

from Growth News https://growthnews.in/how-to-be-a-good-digital-citizen-during-the-election-and-its-aftermath/ via https://growthnews.in

[xtruss]

Lukashenko Stands in the Way of Fire Sale of Belarusian Industries

The last country in Europe where 80 percent of its industries are publicly owned

— Israel Shamir | Enti-Empire.Com | Russia Insider | The Unz Review

It’s not over yet, but can Lukashenko survive the storm? Ever since the presidential elections of 8/9/2020, Belarus has experienced fitful waves of protests. The protesters claim the elections were rigged, just as the pussy-hat ladies accused Trump in 2016. The protests are presented to the world through the magnifying glass of the global fake news machine. There are dozens of media channels, all elaborating on the theme of election rigging and protest suppression.

But Belarusian suppression is not something to write home about. The crowds aren’t big, for Belarusians are quite civil and obedient folk, they even wait for the green light (a rare quality in the East). Despite provocateurs and Soros-trained revolutionaries, there are few wounded, much less than your average confrontation between globalist protesters and local police, whether they be called Gilets Jaunes or Black Lives Matter.

One protester tried to throw a hand grenade into police ranks; by his own miscalculation the grenade exploded in his hand and he died of his wounds. This incident is already being presented by the mass media as “mass murder” and even “genocide”. EU ambassadors came to place flowers at the place of his martyrdom. This latest media hero is being turned into the new George Floyd, an apt comparison because the unfortunate Belarusian Bomber also had a rich criminal record. They are now producing a BLM sticker where the B is for Belarus. Should this be called “cultural misappropriation” or is this a “violation of terms of use”? Youtube would give it an automatic copyright strike.

The presidents of Poland and Lithuania offered their mediation implying that Lukashenko should step down. It is hardly a tempting offer. In 2014, the then Ukrainian president accepted the European offer of mediation and in a few days he was forced to flee to Russia.

Lukashenko is made of sterner stuff; his policemen succeeded in putting the protests down, and the protests weren’t that strong anyway. It is still too early to bet whether the colour revolution will definitely fail or win. What is the cause of the protests, beyond complaints that life is unfair? Who is financing and organizing these demonstrations?

Well-endowed Belarus has a few suitors. The NATO enemies of Russia want to move their tanks within shooting range of Smolensk; Poland wants to regain its old dependency (Belarus was under the Poles for hundreds of years). Russia wants to swallow Belarus, and Papa Lukashenko is too tough for them to chew.

An additional hazard to Belarus sovereignty is the murky and mighty body that has organized the worldwide over-reaction to coronavirus and forced billions of people into detention. Lukashenko is the hero who reject all demands for lockdown; Belarus remained calm and free in the midst of global hysteria. Belarusians enjoyed football games while the rest of the world ducked and covered. Easter time, Belarus churches remained open and mass was celebrated. On May 9, VE day, Belarusians had their Victory Parade, while even the steely-eyed Putin was forced to cancel. Such disobedience to the global regime had to be punished.

Like Fidel Castro, Papa Lukashenko has ruled his country for generations now. He has been re-elected every five years since 1994 when he, the youngest politician in Europe, defeated the incumbent Prime Minister in open election. Even now, at a spritely 65, his stature remains uneclipsed. His results in Minsk, the capital city, were over 60%; his main competitor received 15%, while for the whole country he received about 80% of the vote, an impressive result. Too impressive, his enemies say. In any case, there is no doubt he carried the majority of his countrymen.

Belarus is a mono-ethnic state, with very little diversity; there are no strong political parties, no powerful and independent media, no oligarchs, no super-rich. It is still very Soviet-like, but a very neat, clean, modern, well repaired version (the USSR was quite shabby). Another difference: no party politics. While the Soviets were always ruled by the official Communist party, Lukashenko has no party. He doesn’t like parties because they separate people. He wants people to be united – and it works. There is no significant opposition party. The opposition says, “AGL [Alexander Grigoryevich Lukashenko] go away, you ruled for too long time, we are tired of you”. A sane citizen will not vote for people who have no agenda beyond power lust. Being tired of a president is not really a good argument.

After the first exit poll, “rigged elections” became the battle cry of the opposition. Like the Clintonites, who could not believe that anybody would vote for Trump, the opposition in Belarus could not imagine why people would vote for this ancient (65 yo) fossil. Indeed such claims are the staple food of modern politics; there is hardly a country on the globe where election results are not disputed. The claims are always that the results were falsified, or the people misled, or the elected president didn’t deserve being elected; or he was voted in by racist rednecks; or Russia swung the polls. The reasons why election results should not be recognised is limited only by the human imagination.

AGL’s latest election victory was officially recognised by countries around the world. He was congratulated by the presidents of China, Russia, Turkey as well as by the Moscow Patriarch Kyril (Belarus Church is an integral part of Russian Orthodox Church). The opposition is trying to stimulate interest in regime change by following Gene Sharp’s textbooks: heat it up with attacks on police, then cool it down with girls dressed in white sharing flowers and posing with those same cops. It is the carrot and the stick. Point and counterpoint. Freedom Fighter and Martyr. The technique has worked successfully in many countries, and probably will be tried this November in the US.

Belarus shows us what “foreign meddling in elections” really looks like. It is not placing a few ads on Facebook. It is training hundreds of young men in the arcane arts of inner-city warfare: how to mix Molotov cocktails; car-ramming 101; cross-border infiltration; how to smuggle cash; recruiting and paying merceneries; how to run a 24-hour crisis centre from abroad; where and how to assault police; how to prepare and run a scripted colour revolution – this is how foreign interference influences Belarus elections.

What do the protesters want beyond the removal of AGL? It turns out they do have an agenda: they want to make it easy to hire and fire workers, to end trade union protection and state labour laws; to end price regulation. These are the usual neoliberal ideas, but here is the most important: they plan to privatise and sell the country’s assets. But here their unified front collapses: the Pro-Western opposition wants to sell Belarus to Western investors, while the Pro-Russian opposition wants it to be sold to the Russian oligarchs. These assets are rich and plentiful. 80 per cent of all industry and agriculture remain in public property, more than in any other European state.

Belarus is the last surviving remnant of the Soviet Union, the last Soviet Socialist republic. The USSR was based on state ownership of the means of production; that is, factories, research, industry and agriculture. In the Russian Federation, these national heirlooms were privatised by Boris Yeltsin and given away to a few oligarchs. Not so in Belarus. Their industry is still publically owned; their farms still belong to local farmer cooperatives and not to globalist agro holdings.

Belarus is still quite wealthy; its industry has been modernised, and so has their agriculture. They produce and export a lot of everything, mainly to neighbouring Russia. Europe has little interest in Belarusian lorries and sausages because they have their own lorries and sausages to sell, but Russia buys them because they prefer them and know they are a good value for the money. Belarus’ dairy, furniture and fashion continue to be popular in Russia.

Belarus inherited two huge refineries, one in Mozyr and another in Novopolotsk, capable of turning raw oil and gas into ready products. Russia produces raw oil and gas, Belarus refines it; they should be able to make a good profit working together. But the Russian oligarchs behind Gazprom weren’t satisfied with their usual take, so they created an intermediary company based in Lithuania; the company “buys” Russian gas and then “sells” it to Belarus. The Belarusian payments are redirected offshore to the oligarchs’ bank accounts. Some of it eventually reaches Russian state coffers, but much goes astray.

Gazprom kept raising the price of oil delivered to Belarus refineries until this ostensible ally was being charged more than the hostile states of Ukraine and Germany. In response, Belarus switched to refining Norwegian and Saudi oil: it was cheaper than Russian oil. Now they refine American oil. Belarus has since decided to cut off Gazprom’s intermediary company, and Belarusian police are now investigating the siphoning-off of Russian state funds to offshore accounts. The Russian oligarchs are very unhappy about all this; they are now bankrolling the Belarus protests and funding a shrill campaign against AGL in Russian media and social networks.

President Putin has a different game in mind. He would like to see Belarus joining Russia as its constituent republic. He does not care much for AGL (who stood up to the corona hysteria even better than himself), but neither does he want to be led by his oligarchs. That’s why he expressed his support during the elections and congratulated AGL with his victory. But Russian media continues to play against Lukashenko, whether it is by the media lords’ demand or because of their desire to echo their Western brethren.

All oligarchs, East and West, would like to destroy the last remnant of the USSR and erase all possibility of learning from it. This is what the elections and the attempted regime change is all about at the bottom line. They are annoyed by the successes of AGL’s Belarus. If you think socialism is not a successful strategy in economics, consider Belarus and think again.

For a time, at least until 2015, the Belarus economy was the fastest growing one in Europe; its GDP grew 10% a year. After the terrible collapse of 1991, Belarus was the first to rebound (by 2002), while Russia lagged behind until 2006. Just look at the evidence: (1) the totally unnecessary destruction of the USSR resulted in a complete economic recovery in just 16 years for partially-privatised Russia; (2) state-owned Belorus was able to bounce back within 12 years; (3) the totally privatized Ukraine was never able to recover. Even now their economy is 65% of what it was in the last Soviet year of 1990.

You can see in the below graph of the Russian (light grey) and Belarus GDP (solid line) between 1990 and 2018, that good old Belarus has managed quite well under AGL. There, salaries grew faster than labour productivity (as opposed to, say, the US or UK where labour productivity grew while salaries stagnated); there was (and is) practically no unemployment in Belarus.

After 2015 Belarus stagnated, and this was closely connected to the stagnating Russian economy, but still they managed fine.

One of Belarus’ secrets of success is that Belarus has practically no corruption. I was told by a friendly Russian businessmen that it is almost impossible to bribe a Belarusian official (as opposed to Russia where officials are legendarily corrupt). They told me that the Belarus KGB (they retained the brand name) is always vigilant, always fighting corruption. They have a transparent banking system, and the average Belarusian citizens’ support of the anti-corruption ethos makes a Belarusian official very, very reluctant to accept a bribe. (It has to be paid into a European bank in another country, and it is not an easy thing to arrange in the present climate).

As a post-Soviet state, Belarus is quite strict. The country is so clean because AGL is known for prowling the streets personally. If he discovers some garbage lying around, he calls out the local mayor and forces him to clean it right away. He has more than a touch of Lee Kuan Yew (LKY), the legendary Prime Minister of Singapore from 1959 to 1990. Perhaps AGL will also serve as long as LKY (31 years!), meanwhile he has 26 years under his belt.

Another mark of strictness is a special tax that non-working persons are obliged to pay. It is heir to the Soviet Parasite Tax. A non-working person can be even tried and sentenced. Belarusian socialism is not a haven for welfare abusers.

The average tax in Belarus is 30%, unless one works remotely in the IT industry. Computer-savvy Belarus has 75,000 IT consultants, engineers and technicians who work for companies located in the EU, Russia and the US. If the average salary in Belarus is about $500 per month, the IT specialists earn over $2500 and pay only 7% tax. I suspect that AGL wants to make it cheaper to pay the tax than to evade it. One would think these guys would be happy, but they are not. Many of them joined the protests. They want a more liberal society, and this is natural.

The US wants to bring Lukashenko over to its side; and wily AGL is ready to play along. Now he processes American oil in his refineries. AGL wants to stay friendly with everybody, and his new close friend is China. In Belarus, the men in power say their country will become the Chinese hub in Europe. Belarus is very, very close to Russia, but it is also afraid of being engulfed and devoured by this friendly giant. If the pressure upon AGL keeps increasing he may have to decide to get off the fence and join Russia. The US knows this and tries not to push him too far, but Russians are smart enough to encourage the protests with exactly this goal in mind.

Will Lukashenko liberalise his state? Is it possible at all, without surrendering all their hard-won social achievements? I am not so sure. Perhaps as long as imperialist powers ply their trade there may be no way to create a liberal socialist state. That was the conclusion of Vladimir Lenin: he wrote that the liberal stage would be reached when there are no predators laying in wait. He was quick to smash the Kronstadt revolt.

The workers of Belarus must understand what will happen to them if the rebels achieve victory. Their industries will be sold and dismantled so it can’t compete against the globalists’ preferred vendors, as has already happened in Russia, Poland and Latvia. The terrible example of the Ukraine should keep them out of the revolt. But will it?

Such differences may have to be solved by force, if protesters will not accept the democratic vote. If it is only force that neoliberals will accept, then force it must be. Force may have to decide whether or not Belarusian socialism will survive. After all, colour revolutions are not doomed to succeed – they have failed in many countries. In case of a pro-Western coup, Russia is likely to intervene, as she is permitted by the CSTO treaty. But Russia is not in favour of socialism, in Minsk or elsewhere.

My advice to the US administration is to capitalize on their success in Venezuela. When the US wasn’t happy with Venezuela’s president, Mr Maduro, they didn’t bother with elections but instead they chose (“recognised”) a certain Mr Juan Guaido, a rather junior member of the opposition. They assigned to him the assets of Venezuela, including all the gold the country carelessly kept in the Bank of England; they took over the Venezuelan embassies and gave them to Mr Guaido, and the man gratefully signed a contract promising millions to US-based mercenaries for kidnapping the actual president and enthroning Guaido.

Now the West is dissatisfied with the Belarus presidential elections. The Belarusians stubbornly reconfirmed their president Mr Alexander G Lukashenko (AGL) into his position, and he is himself a stubborn guy who refuses to sell his country’s assets and invite in the NATO tanks. My advice to US leaders is to re-use Mr Guaido; recognise him as the new President of Belarus, and have it done with. Why pretend that sellouts are different because they sell different countries? Guaido has proven his devotion to Uncle Sam; he already has experience at being a “recognised” un-elected president. Long live President Guaido of Belarus!

P.S. Re Beirut. Some people suggest “mini-nukes”. I doubt it, for Israel and the US do not possess the required technology, as I’ve been told by a Russian physicist. Only the USSR had the mini-nuke technology; Russia inherited a few; new ones weren’t manufactured for years.

The problem is that mini-nukes are made of californium and suchlike isotopes, and can be produced only in the course of large-scale military-grade plutonium production as its byproduct. Israel never produced that much plutonium, and the US uses a different process altogether. So I advise taking the “mini-nuke” revelations with a grain of salt.

— Source: The Unz Review