#this only applies to drawbridge situations

[thatsbelievable]

[ilynpilled]

edited for person im arguing with lol

we do not excuse jaime for just being an inexperienced teen, we are acknowledging the reality of it straight up not being possible for him to teleport over from 7 to the drawbridge of 26 faster than it takes two men to finish scaling the walls of 26 (the text confirms twice that the scaling was happening already when jaime was murdering aerys) to prevent an order the text says he doesnt know about that also contradicts a command that he explicitly gives to his father’s men after hearing incomplete information about the state of the situation. and all this after he finishes committing one of the most significant oathbreakings in history and the most defining act of his life of murdering his own king to prevent a whole city from being nuked. he was left alone as the only kg to guard the red keep. there is a core issue here of him being unable to do all of this alone even if he had all the information. even if he tried to do everything in his power and had all the right suspicions and the knowledge to act he would have been unable to stop it. the text emphasizes this, it emphasizes that he was with the king, slitting his throat, to save a city, instead of being near or at the drawbridge at maegor’s (a knight of the kingsguard is positioned there usually for a reason). jaime was surrounded by the kg, experienced adults, who for two years enabled an erratic and paranoid tyrant to burn people alive, start a war by doing so, rape and abuse his wife, and place caches of wildfire across a city. and all this time these adults have told jaime nothing but “accept this, you swore to obey, stay near him. keep your oath.” but the person that has to be condemned for “incompetence” and “cowardice” (because, yes, based on all this information it is the only ground you have. there is no evidence of malicious intent or apathy of any sort. we know what information he has. we know what he thought during) is him. i dont even blame rhaegar, again, he expected to return “we will talk when i return”, and even finally do what was long overdue and deal with aerys, and he was likely confident he would because of a prophecy that i know concerned an existential threat to humanity, and he did not know what would happen at the trident and that his father would be so paranoid that he would lock elia and her children in the red keep (if you use the argument that jaime should know and think about everything his father may or may not do the very minute he is found murdering the king by the men that tell him, incorrectly, that the place is secured, and he should suspect that his order to spare everybody that yields is already being contradicted by a secret order of his father’s, then this same exact argument can be applied to rhaegar and he should have had a different strategy or a safety net, or been more cautious when it comes to the threat his father represents or straight up just been able to deal with him as if it is that easy. his family were just not allowed to leave with rhaella and viserys (who was named heir, with aegon effectively disinherited) as elia wanted because aerys felt like he was betrayed by dorne and lewyn after the trident (also speaks to what duty rhaegar even expected of jaime when he left. it is present in their last conversation. what threat he is aware of. we see what he tells him. both he and darry expect him to remain with the king at all times and serve as a hostage against tywin and keep aerys in check. they also know he is just one person)

why is jaime even singled out? not other kingsguard who knew he was in the city alone (post the trident or before the trident) and that aerys is a tyrannical threat (but my vows and orders wahh), not pycelle, not tywin, not the men that did the horrid action themselves. in order to absolve rhaegar of any and all responsibility when it comes to naivety or lack of foresight (neither flaw is a detriment to his moral character) u shift the blame and criticize jaime for the exact same thing in an even more absurdly unfair way. you guys want him to be someone this evil and apathetic from the beginning, with his guilt over failure rooted in that, when the whole point is that he stagnated and morally deteriorated due to how cynical all of this made him.

and regarding the argument that he is considered the most skilled kg by these people and so they rightfully think that he should be able to handle the red keep and all these responsibilities alone: “Selmy had never approved of Jaime's presence in his precious Kingsguard. Before the rebellion, the old knight thought him too young and untried; afterward, he had been known to say that the Kingslayer should exchange that white cloak for a black one.”

[radiicn]

lips moves in slowly enough to be stopped, aeron’s height being used against him to bend down closer. and closer … and CLOSER until he’s finally where he’d imagined about being since junior high. the kiss is dry, brims locking just right before he dares to apply any pressure. his right paw carefully hooks around her lower back, the same hand that’s weeks away from methodically triggering a bullet into their classmates brain. her lips are warm and inviting — and he’s all of a sudden wondeirng why he’s never fucking done that before. lids are still closed while he pulls away, breaking the only intimacy they’d ever shared — and probably ever would. he waits to speak until he gathers SOME composure … enough so he’d at least be a quarter way coherent. ‘ … if i didn’t do that tonight, i don’t think i ever would’ve, ’ — before i DIE, not that you fucking care, ‘ so … sorry. well, not really. ’ shoulders heave gently, ‘ there’s a shit ton of food in the kitchen if you’re hungry. i’ll be in the basement if you need me. ’ a single turn of his heels and he walks away, anxious digits pushing away unkept curls from his line of vision. if she wanted to get in his head, he was going to fucking do it right back.

expect the unexpected -- a mantra to live by when you’re a perpetual control freak who refuses to be caught off guard ( hi alyson anderson ). dozens of scenarios and potential outcomes ; there’s not a one that the femme hasn’t lended a thought to. well, maybe except this situation. brims coated in cherry red lay motionless against that of her opposite. perhaps she’s caught in some parallel universe or knocked back one too many christmas cookies that she’s been comatose’d into some sort of dream state that’s left her with nothing more than sleep paralysis. lashes flutter rapidly like wings, dazed optics studying the taste his lips provided -- one that had only ever been given to her by the means of shared joints and dr. pepper bottles. the drawbridge of her jaw falls agape, breath warm and tainted spilling out like a flood. newton’s third law states that for every action, there’s an equal and opposite reaction ; aly’s just toying with the idea of disproving such a thing. still stiff, her gaze will trail around the room -- noting the surplus of party guests before landing on the plant dangling above them. well, i guess that partially explains things. just as fast as he came, aeron’s biding her farewell in the same manner. she’ll scoff at his nerve as a manicured paw wrapped tightly around a solo cup elevates to exchange aeron’s leftover taste with that of a toxin. what ? couldn’t expect aly to show up to some lame christmas party without a bit of liquid courage to dull the annoyance, could you ? two swigs down and she’s followed the leader straight to the basement. booties hover against the top step as she’s brought back in aeron’s presence. ‘ really ? ’ another step is taken, orbs latched to the boy like tunnel vision. ‘ so you’re back-handedly telling me that you were sorta curious about what kissing me was like -- ’ she’s billowing down the stairs like some sort of princess making her grand entrance, strides calculated and leisurely. ‘ and you used the excuse of something as lame as mistletoe to find out ? ’ soles greet the flooring, their proximity only diminishing with each syllable spoken. ‘ that’s a pretty pussy move, brooks. ’  

[cruisersnet]

LNM: Dismal Swamp Canal Opens March 31, Alternate AICW Route

LNM: Dismal Swamp Canal Opens March 31, Alternate AICW Route - https://cruisersnet.net/lnm-dismal-swamp-canal-opens-march-31-alternate-aicw-route/ Having just celebrated their 30th anniversary, the Dismal Swamp Canal Welcome Center is located adjacent to the Dismal Swamp State Park, offering trails, exhibits and ongoing programs in Camden County, NC. Docks and information are provided at the Dismal Swamp Canal Welcome Center, A CRUISERS NET SPONSOR and a NC Having just celebrated their 30th anniversary, the Dismal Swamp Canal Welcome Center is located adjacent to the Dismal Swamp State Park, offering trails, exhibits and ongoing programs in Camden County, NC. Docks and information are provided at the Dismal Swamp Canal Welcome Center, A CRUISERS NET SPONSOR and a NC DOT Rest Area facility. The canal is re-opening to navigation on March 31st. Our thanks to Matt the Bridge Tender for this notice. CENAO-WRO March 26, 2020 Notice to Navigation Interests U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Norfolk District DISMAL SWAMP CANAL AND ALBEMARLE AND CHESAPEAKE CANAL ATLANTIC INTRACOASTAL WATERWAY Effective at 8:30 AM on March 31, 2020, the locks at Deep Creek, Virginia and South Mills, North Carolina will return to their normal operating schedule to accommodate vessels desiring to use the Dismal Swamp Canal of the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway. The locks will be operated at 8:30 AM, 11:00 AM, 1:30 PM, and 3:30 PM seven days per week. The drawbridges adjacent to these locations will operate as normal and in conjunction with the lock openings. There will only be one operator at Deep Creek and one at South Mills, so the bridge will not be manned when the lock is being operated, and vice versa. Locks and bridges monitor channel 13. Vessels and crew entering the locks shall comply with the latest Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) guidance related to the Coronavirus Disease (COVIDS-19). No one will be allowed to exit their vessels and crew must handle their own lines during lockings. The lock operators will provide a pole for lines as needed and will be standing by for any emergency situation. There are state and local government ordinances closing public docks along the waterway. Boaters should plan their trip accordingly. The above COVIDS-19 procedure also applies to the Great Bridge Lock in Chesapeake, VA at mile marker 12.2 on the Albemarle and Chesapeake Canal. The latest surveys of AIWW-Deep Creek, AIWW-Dismal Swamp Canal, and AIWW-Turners Cut are available at: http://www.nao.usace.army.mil/HydroSurveys/. Those planning to use this route are advised to refer to the Coast Guard Local Notice to Mariners, contact the lock operator at 757-547-3311, or call the Norfolk District office at 757-201-7642. Keith B. Lockwood Chief, Operations Branch Click Here To View the North Carolina Cruisers Net’s Marina Directory Listing For the Camden TDA/Dismal Swamp Canal Welcome Center Click Here To Open A Chart View Window, Zoomed To the Location of the Dismal Swamp Canal Welcome Center -March 28, 2020

[dustinwmooney]

The Hermit Hypocrisy

The bomb slinging by both President Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has not yet given way to the real thing. Despite Trump’s “fiery” statements, he is not wrong on the Hermit Kingdom. The North Korean problem has plagued administration after administration without any favorable results.

Rebukes and rebuffed invitations have lead us to this catastrophic certainty: North Korea will almost certainly achieve their nuclear ambitions.  With this in mind, our leaders should push for new approaches to this daunting prospect. A combined approach of diplomacy and containment would provide the much needed security support to our allies while giving North Korea an on-ramp to rejoin the global community.

How should the United States face this looming challenge? First, contrary to conventional wisdom, North Korea’s nuclear inevitability could prove to be an international triumph. It’s possible that, over time and with nukes in hand, the North would lower their drawbridge to the world. The North’s nuclear arsenal will likely protect it from external threats, which might allow the regime to focus on the domestic issues of its citizens.

There’s no significant evidence that the North would be any more likely to use nuclear weapons than their nuclear-powered counterparts. As Thomas Friedman writes, “North Korea’s ruling Kim family is homicidal, but it has not survived for three generations by being suicidal. And firing a nuclear missile at us would be suicide.”

Incidents aside, countries with nuclear arms — China, France, Russian Federation, United Kingdom, United States, India, Pakistan, and Israel — have conducted themselves in a manner befitting such destructive power.

More importantly, few options remain for those who oppose this foregone conclusion. War would leave hundreds of thousands dead without removing the North’s nuclear crosshairs from the continental United States and victory would be far from certain.  

Less apocalyptic options aren’t very appealing either. Sanctions are mere half measures for a regime so close to the nuclear promised land and China is unlikely to apply the pressure needed to shift North Korea’s calculus. China would rather have an unpredictable nuclear capable neighbor than a US ally on its border. China continues to walk the tightrope between their interests in North Korea and their relations with the world.

Of late, China has relaxed its support of North Korea in certain areas. They, along with Russia, supported UN sanctions against the regime. Potentially more important are reports that the Chinese have decided they would not defend the North if they provoked an international conflict.

Those less apocalyptic options require a more complex approach. If a nuclear powered North is inevitable, then the country must come to terms with it. Rather than worry about when the North Korea will get “the bomb” we should be looking for diplomatic solutions to bring this menace into the global community.

Overtures in the past have done little to quell the North’s aggressive rhetoric and nuclear tenacity. As with the Soviets, we won’t be able to sit back and take North Korea at their word. Diplomat George Kennan once said of the Soviets that, “the accords were fig leaves of democratic procedure to hide the nakedness of Stalinist dictatorship.” Similar logic often applies to diplomatic accords with North Korea.

Diplomatic delay tactics and broken promises often accompany North Korean agreements. Protected by China, the North has acted like a child raised without rules. Only time will tell if the Hermit Kingdom’s baby blanket of nuclear arms will lead them on a path toward global reconciliation.

North Korea’s economy has grown significantly since the king took his throne. This growth could signal Kim’s broader ambitions and that shift toward reconciliation once he has secured his spot atop the throne. He’s investing heavily in infrastructure not known for going boom. Beyond bombs and bullets, Kim has invested in orphanages, factories, amusement parks and other similar ventures since taking power in 2011.  

These investments, if continued, should provide a measure of stability and decrease any future domestic turmoil.

In a sign of supreme confidence in both his nuclear arsenal and his domestic situation, Kim has only increased his rhetoric over the last several months. Kim’s peace through strength approach has won him the short game. Since nuclear-armed nations are rarely attacked, it seems he has protected his regime from outside actors for the time being.

The long game, however, may prove more challenging. Jong-un will need to continue domestic investments, but the more he provides the more will be expected. Given the state of the North Korean economy, providing sustained benefits to the North Korean people will be challenging. Most improvements to date have been superficial measures like theme parks and ski resorts. If Kim wants stave off a Venezuelan-style disaster he will need to generate substantial economic growth over time. In refocusing efforts inward and away from bombastic military adventurism Kim could make other world powers more willing to do business with his regime. That’s especially true of nations unaligned with western interests. Increased economic aid, trade, and investments should spurn the growth required to ensure stability.  

The North has the weapons, that game is over and we’ve lost. Now we must find ways to contain and converse with the Hermit Kingdom to ensure regional stability and our own security. Given Kim’s actions, that may not prove as impossible as some would believe. If we can live with a nuclear armed Pakistan and the threat of armed terrorists seizing their arsenal, North Korea should be a walk in a Pyongyang park.

[ringokhan]

Star Spangled F*cktards

... Or Why I Hate the 4th of July

I hate the 4th of July more than any other holiday. Hell, I hate it more than I hate tax day, and I'm a self-employed writer who never manages to set aside enough dough to pay the IRS or remember to apply for an extension. Yes, Independence Day sucks worse than the tax man.

What's to like about a day that celebrates our nation's birth (via the anniversary of the adoption of the Declaration of Independence by the Second Continental Congress), but does so via the detonation of explosives that follows drinking in the hot sun All. Damn. Day.? At least that's how the day plays out down here on the Redneck Riviera of the Florida Gulf Coast. Each year I pray for rain, and this year that asshole on the television promised me we'd get some—and we did—but my 4th of July still turned out to be the worst one yet.  

It all started on the eve of the big day while I was driving home from work—in the rain—when I suddenly felt the telltale bump-bumpity-thump of a flat tire. The rubber on the Fiero had been balder than my editor's head since Memorial Day, but this being tough times for freelance journalists of my ilk and political leanings, I couldn't put together quite enough scratch to spring for a new set.

I pulled over into the Amscot parking lot on Manatee Avenue to inspect the situation. It wasn't good. The steel belted radial looked as though a grenade had gone off inside of it. I had no umbrella or even plastic poncho to speak of, so I embraced the warm, sticky rain as it soaked my clothes and pulled the spare out of the trunk. It wasn't in much better shape than the other three but would have to suffice.

For the next 40 minutes, sweating like a whore in church despite the rain, I filthied myself up while proving that I would never work in a NASCAR pit crew—and not just because of my snobbish aversion to motorsports and the people who watch them (particularly those who advertise their favorite drivers on ball caps and window stickers).  

Just as I was finishing up, a man whose clothing suggested homelessness emerged from the Amscot to ask if I had a dollar he could borrow in order to get something to eat. Everyone knows that Ringo is down with supporting the less fortunate, but I was nonetheless unable to manage anything more than an angry look meant to say, Do I, the sweat-soaked gent in the pouring down rain who’s changing the blown out tire on a piece of shit (if classic) '86 Fiero, and changing it with a bald spare, no less, look like I'm well heeled enough to spare a generous thought let alone a buck?  He shook his head and mumbled, “fucking cheapskate,” as he walked off.

Properly shamed by the (possibly) homeless man—though it had by this time occurred to me that you usually come out of Amscot with money—I made for home. On the way, I stopped for a sixer of my new favorite beer, Motorworks Pulp Friction Grapefruit IPA—the perfect antidote to this blistering summer heatwave—but only after I'd checked the balance in my checking account on my phone to ensure that there would be enough left for the bargain basement tires that the Walmart oil, lube and tire clerk had just told me they could put on the next day, being the only tire center open on the 4th.

Hoping to settle in for the night, catch a buzz, drink a couple of tasty, refreshing beers and binge watch some Silicon Valley on the HBO Now account my roommate’s ex-girlfriend had forgotten she'd programmed into our Smart TV, I was halfway there only to be awoken by the sound of what seemed to be large-caliber gunfire or possibly anti-aircraft missiles raining down from above. It had started already. Actually, the first signs of Redneck Christmas had presented themselves as early as Sunday, but the festivities had indeed begun in earnest by 10:45 p.m. on the 3rd.

To make matters worse, my roommate, who was out of town with his new girlfriend, had coaxed me into dog-sitting said girlfriend's boxer, Rufus, who, I shall make it known, has no affinity for fireworks and had pissed on the hardwood flooring (is there softwood flooring?) of the house we rent on three occasions by this point. He and the other dogs on the block—which often seem to outnumber the humans—were barking, whimpering and I suspect pissing more or less in unison through much of the night, giving us all a preview of what the 4th would bring, which is to say utter redneck misery.

Rufus whose best trick is impersonating a thoroughbred horse, while taking a piss.  

Actual Redneck Christmas started off the way the usual mornings in my neighborhood begin, which is to say to a chorus of barking dogs that their lazy asshole owners let out as early as 5:45 in the a.m., as to not have to put the beasts on a leash and walk them to the corner.

Being self-employed, I give myself the day off for all Federal and Jewish holidays (I'm not kosher or even Jewish for that matter, but they have a lot of holidays, which often seem to fall on weekdays, so I figure observance is the least I can do, given their historic plight). My disdain for dealing with the muckety-muck on Redneck Christmas notwithstanding, I had decided to go to the beach, as I do on most holidays. I knew I'd have to get there early, well ahead of the parade of morons who typically tend to spoil our national holiday by 2 p.m. when the island falls prey to a large assembly of low-brow, lite beer-drinking fucktards with expensively-modified pickup trucks emblazoned with fishing, NASCAR and/or “Salt Life” regalia.

Having successfully fought the urge to hit snooze a seventh time, I rose from bed by 8:20, pressed the handle on the cold-pressed coffee and cruised into the public parking lot at 9 a.m., easily scoring a choice spot and setting up my gear far enough from the maddening crowd to safely pull out my Pulp Friction and enjoy a cold brew—its pinkish can can easily mistaken for flavored water or a sports drink. For five glorious hours, I enjoyed one of the only fair-weathered, rain-free beach days this summer. 

By noon, however, the crowds had swelled and the beer was being imbibed more liberally and openly, despite the signs warning of illegality and threats of steep fines. It was already a menacingly-hot 94 degrees, topped with staggering humidity. Beach-goers had long since ran out of bottled water and were drinking their hooch more for the sake of hydration than to chill out—never a good recipe at this devil latitude of just 27 degrees north of the equator.

It's hard to properly describe such a day to anyone who's never been a problem drinker and/or lived in a sub-tropical environment. The heat here in July and August is nothing short of evil, a relentless blanket of bad vibes that fouls the air with the scents of dying musk and vegetative detritus. Most of us have no choice but to drink cold and stubbornly alcoholic beverages that, while refreshing, have the effect of pulverizing good sense and obliterating sound judgment. For those in this region who begin their cool, air conditioned, non-alcoholic mornings with much less common sense and sound judgment than the average high-school dropout—and by this I mean the ignorant, under-educated, possibly-inbred, red-necked hillbillies of which Florida has plenty—the results range from disappointing to disastrous.

By 2 p.m., the scene had turned ugly. A few feet from my chaise lounge, a pot-bellied man who one could only guess sustained himself with a bullshit disability claim had begun yelling at a fat lady in a confederate flag bikini whose daughter insisted on feeding grapes to the sea gulls.

“They're gonna bite her fucking finger off!” he screamed. “Whatcha gonna do then, you dumb broad? DCF will take her ass off you for sure.”

“I told her not to do it,” the woman slurred back. “What the fuck do you want from me? She don't listen! If I beat her, they'll take her from me just the same. I suppose you think she'd be better off in foster care? I fuckin' hate you!”

It took a couple of moments for me to put enough of the conversation together to surmise that they were a couple, and though they had recovered enough of their anger to be kissing sloppily by the time I had finished packing up my gear, it still seemed like bad foreshadowing of things to come.

As I crossed the parking lot at 2:15, cars were now hovering for open spots like vultures looking to descend on festering carcasses. An available space had apparently emerged, and two rednecks with aggressive trucks began fighting over their entitlement to it from their respective cabs, each revving their engine and inching toward the other's flat-black bumper.

The one whose bumper stickers ran the gamut from INFORWARS.COM to #Vaginatarian and Your Girlfriend On Board seemed to be winning the pissing match thus far, but the beefy-armed sport with the Louder Than Your Girlfriend Was Last Night sticker over his suspiciously-large exhaust pipe seemed to be making inroads, nonetheless. I waved my hand and told them that I'd be pulling out of my spot in the next row, and that they could refrain from scratching the paint on their pretty trucks, but they looked only half-happy to receive such news, since it meant the redneck mating ritual would come to an end without bloodshed or gunplay.

*************************************************************

While driving home, I wrote a haiku as I waited out a painfully-long drawbridge opening, while wishing that I'd sprung for a Freon charge for the air conditioning unit of my car. After getting back onto the mainland, I spun by Walmart and shopped for a new deodorant that could stand up to this year's particularly brutal summer heat while the crew put the “performance” discount tires on my ride (because the Fiero is nothing if not a high-performance vehicle), while the skies finally opened and the rains fell. Yes, I screamed to no one in particular, celebrating the fact that a downpour might tame, or at least mildly dampen that evening's explosives. Again, no such luck.

The skies cleared by early evening, and the mood for the night was set around dusk when a large woman with red and blue curlers in her hair and too much of herself spilling from a tank top emerged from a neighbor's (above ground) pool party with the kind of rubbery-legged sway that suggested shitfacededness of the highest order.

“Fuck you and the horse you rode in on,” she screamed at the much skinnier man that was giving chase. Her words came through the sort of slur that is generally only facilitated by a full day of drinking hard liquor in the Florida sun; that or a liberal dose of prescription opioids. Faaaaawwwwk youuuuuuu, she said again to punctuate her statement, using a slurred out oral elongation that would have made Michael Buffer proud.

Another girl emerged to successfully cajole her back into the party, which by 9 p.m. had become a full on cacophony of high-powered munitions that left my neighborhood sounding like the war-torn streets of Aleppo, crossed with Beirut in the '80s. Rufus began pissing on the floor before I got through half an episode of Silicon Valley and, after cleaning it up, I realized I was out of beer. I am not ashamed to admit that I cried … a lot. By 10 p.m. the dog had muddied the floor, and I'd had about all I could take of this absurd carousel of hillbilly horrors. 

Fit to be tied, I stormed over to their bungalow and fought my way through the overgrowth of landscaping to the back patio where a decades old four-foot (above ground) pool with a tiny cylindrical filter that could not have possibly been managing all of the dirty urine these exceptions to Darwinism were spilling into the chlorinated (I hoped) water—at least judging by the pile of semi-crushed Natural Ice cans littering the landscape.

“Excuse me, my friends,” I said in the voice of an angry pacifist. “Might we have adequately awoken the dead?”

“What,” said a tall, thin peckerwood with tattooed arms, one of which held a beer, the other an e-cig. I recognized him as the man who was chasing the woman with the curlers down the street earlier.

“The fireworks,” I explained. “What say we be done now?”

“It's 4th of July,” he answered, looking at me as though I were wearing two more heads on top of my own.

“This is true,” I conceded, “but while I can't be entirely certain, I'd be willing to bet that we've met whatever quota on explosives might be required to prove that we're good, patriotic Americans.”

“You don't look American,” said a red-headed gent with freckles and bottomless eyes who was standing in the (above ground) pool while lighting firecrackers.

“Well, I have some Pakistani on my mother's side, and my dad's British, but I was born here,” I explained. “So were they, in fact.”

“So you're an immigrant?” asked the first one, suspiciously.

“And a Muslim?” asked/said the other.

“No, actually, when you're born here, you're American, particularly when you're born here to other people who were born here, I mean not more so, but it should be more clear, I would think. My citizenship is not in question. I am, as they say, a native, and a second generation one at that.”

They looked at me like I was speaking French.

“So you pray to Allah?” asked the ginger.

“No, I'm an atheist, though I did consider praying to Buddha, L. Ron Hubbard and Jesus Fucking Christ Almighty that the explosions would cease, but thought that instead I might come over here as a good and decent human being, appeal to your humanity and ask you to cool it on the fireworks so that my dog—Rufus, well, he's my roommate's new girlfriend's dog—will stop pissing on the hardwood floors.”

“What do you want us to do, light fuckin' sparklers like a bunch of fuckin' pansies?” the first one asked. “Maybe throw some snaps and light them little snake things, while we're at it?” he laughed. “That shit's for kids!”

“Look, Ace, I hate to point this out, but it's all for kids, and I feel that it's worth mentioning that I don't see any of them around (thank God), just a bunch of grown men getting their jollies on loud explosions. I'm not sure what that's all about, but I know Freud had some interesting theories.”

“You sayin' we're queers?” asked the red head, who had clearly not worn sunscreen for the afternoon leg of the party.

“No, and neither was Freud,” I answered. “He was suggesting impotence, or at least fears of inadequacy in terms of, shall we say, boudoir skills.”

They both turned their heads sideways and looked at me as though they knew they should be offended but couldn't say why.

“He's sayin' your dicks don't work, you fuckin' retards!” shouted the large woman who'd given the suggestion about leaving town on a horse earlier in the day. “And I know he's right in at least one of y’all's cases (apparently there is a such thing as softwood, and this house had some).”

Utter silence. 

“Look, buddy,” said the tall fellow. “I didn't serve in the Marines for 10 years to come home and be told that—as a veteran no less—I don't have the right to celebrate our country's birthday.”

Finally, some commonality.

“Look, I served too—Coast Guard—but I ...”

“Fuckin' Coast Guard?” he managed to say through his hysterical laughter. “Are you shittin' me? What the fuck kind of pussy are you?”

At this, they all had a good laugh.

“Look, pal,” said Red. “You can call the cops, or you can come over here and try to stop us from settin' off these here fireworks, or you can go fuck yourself, for all I care. But that's about the long and short of it. So why don't you just take your pansy, Coast Guard ass home and clean up the dog piss.”

Being a devout pacifist, I put my palms in the air and walked off, shaking my head at yet a bit more lost faith in humanity.

“Yeah, go on now,” shouted the large woman who'd understood the Freudian reference. “And one more thing, FAWK you AND the horse you rode in on, AND your damned dog Rufus!” she cackled as the three of them broke out into more side-splitting laughter. 

"It's my roommate's girlfriend’s dog," I muttered in dejection.

Defeated, I headed back to the house, cleaned up the newest puddle of piss and decided to make the best of a bad situation. I pulled out the last of the edibles my sister had sent me from Colorado from a shoe box under the bed and ate them greedily, though not before tossing Rufus one of the sweet gummies to help with his anxiety. Then I put in my Redux edition DVD of Apocalypse Now with the extended footage.

Somewhere around the time Captain Willard and the boys had made it halfway up the river toward the camp of Col. Kurtz, the THC began to take hold. By the USO scene, the collective fireworks were blending into sync with Coppola's masterpiece and soon I couldn't tell the firecrackers in the street from the bombs on the TV. Rufus had managed to settle into chillax mode, as well. Somewhere around the time Robert Duval was giving his famous, “Charlie don't surf!” line, I dozed off into a peaceful sleep where I remained until half a dozen dogs began the morning chorus that calls me to wake each day in this godforsaken hell hole of a neighborhood.

When I left for my morning walk with the dog—because I'm that kind of guy, the assholes in my neighborhood notwithstanding—the smell of dynamite from the quarter sticks and M-80's was still lingering in the already thick and humid air. And for once, that's all there was … that chalky, smoked out dynamite smell. It smelled like … victory.

[avanneman]

Yo, Paleoliberals! You can’t go home again! (not really)

David Ignatius reports that Charles Peters, long-time editor of the Washington Monthly and, not incidentally, one-time mentor/editor to David, has the solution to the Democrats’ electoral woes, presented in his new book We Do Our Part.

In writing the book, Charlie gets in line behind paleolibs Thomas “What's the Matter with Kansas?” Frank and Michael “Up From Conservatism” Lind, not to mention Robert Reich and a host of others, about whom I am too lazy to be funny. The gist of all these books is that “we” need to go back to the good old days of Franklin D. Roosevelt, Harry Truman lunch-bucket liberalism when the Democrats stood up for the little guy and won all the elections, instead of all this Chablis-sippin’ bicoastal milquetoast1 bullshit that doesn’t help anyone with less than five mil in his portfolio.

Well, I agree with about 40% of their rap, but since I live two blocks from Dupont Circle and listen to opera, when I’m not watching it, I’m not crazy about their tone. Still, they make some good points. I’ll get to those later, however, since it’s more important to talk about the ways in which we differ.

My basic point is that we can’t go back to the good old days and (point two, actually) we shouldn’t want to. The New Deal liberalism that all these dudes love so much what “Recovering Republican” Chris Ladd has shrewdly labeled “white socialism”. The original Social Security Act did not apply to farm workers (i.e., share croppers and others) or servants, cleverly excluding the majority of the black population. Eligibility for unemployment insurance was governed by state law, ensuring that lazy good for nothings (like, you know, black people) would be kept off the rolls. Employer-provided health insurance, which came in during World War II and was officially recognized as a non-taxable benefit in the early 1950s, was effectively restricted to white-collar (that is to say, white) employees and workers in union shops, found only in the North. Farm subsidies poured cash into the pockets of land owners, who were almost all white as well.

The GI Bill provided extensive benefits to veterans, but blacks were largely left out, for a variety of reasons. Thanks to substandard educational opportunities, and non-existent health care, many blacks could not meet minimum standards for service. In addition, blacks were more than three times as likely as whites to receive a “not honorable” discharge, disqualifying them from any benefits.

Blacks were defenseless against this discrimination both because of their numbers (about 15% of the population) and because most of them lived in the South, where they couldn’t vote. As blacks began to move north their economic and political situation improved, but as Democrats moved to expand “white socialism” to include everyone, the New Deal coalition cracked. Peters, Frank, Lind, et al. simply won’t recognize that the white working class stopped voting reliably Democratic when the Democratic Party leadership made clear its intention to make blacks full participants in the social programs once reserved informally but effectively for whites. The “Tea Party” was very largely born as a reaction to passage of the Affordable Care Act, which effectively turned “white socialism” into “socialism”.

Peters and the rest of the paleolibs gloss over the "white only" aspect of the New Deal reforms because what they remember is not the thirties but the fifties and sixties, when the post-war boom did float all boats, although, even then, white boats rose faster than black ones. The paleolibs believe we can go back to the way we were in a sheer act of will, despite the fact that none of the "objective factors", to sound a bit Marxist, that led to the postwar boom exist today. After WWII, the U.S. had been starved for investment in such basic areas as housing for a good fifteen years. Consumers had spent the war buying savings bonds, and now they were ready to spend. The population was growing rapidly, and so was the education level. Above all else, the United States had the only "advanced" economy in the world--American goods were the best, and the cheapest, that you could buy.

It didn’t matter that the U.S. economy was heavily cartelized. Even though there was little real competition, U.S. goods were the best, and the cheapest in the world. It didn't matter, very much, that they could have been appreciably better, and cheaper. The dominant companies, like U.S. Steel, General Motors, Boeing, etc. could enjoy monopoly profits, and pay monopoly wages to their unionized workers, and still provide their customers with unbeatable "bargains".

Those happy days are gone forever. It's true that the U.S. infrastructure could stand some sprucing up, but there's nothing like the underinvestment that once existed. The population isn't growing the way it did after WWII, and it probably never will. Educational attainment in the U.S. soared through the seventies, but has plateaued ever since. Most of all, of course, we are no longer a unique economy. Other nations have learned all our tricks. We can't change monopoly prices anymore, because we aren't a monopoly.

The paleolibs don't want to hear this. They aren't interested in economics. Their model of the economy is the "Walter Reuther" model. Reuther was the long-time head of the United Auto Workers. His model was simple: the bosses have an infinite amount of money. No matter how high wages and benefits go, they can always go higher.

According to Ignatius (remember him?), Charlie Peters (remember him?) praises, then faults, Bill Clinton for talking the talk in his 1992 campaign, but then not walking the walk once elected. That’s because in 1992 Bill Clinton ran more or less on a platform of white socialism, promising to “fight for the people who work hard and play by the rules” (that is to say, not lazy blacks), to “end welfare as we know it in two years” (time to go to work, lazy black people!), along with a middle-class tax cut (so the government will stop giving your money to lazy black people).

I agree with Peters’ complaint that Clinton effectively “went Hollywood” when virtually his first act after taking office was to attempt to integrate homosexuals into the military.2 But, as everyone knows, the real catastrophe was the health care bill. Yes, Hillary’s incompetence was a dead weight, but the real killer was the simple fact that a great many working-class whites don’t think health care should be a right. It should, somehow, be “earned”. And they don’t want their “earned” benefits reduced or taxed to pay for the benefits of lazy black people.

The paleolibs simply can’t accept the fact that many working class whites are racist (racist and now xenophobic). They continually moan that white voters are being “tricked” by Republicans when they aren’t being offended by the politically correct shenanigans of the left. Well, there’s something to the latter, but working class whites aren’t being tricked when they vote for Republicans who talk about how much they hate big government. They know that “big government” is code for welfare and foreign aid, not for “white socialism”. Ronald Reagan, who never got tired of telling that hilarious “joke” “The scariest sentence in the English language is ‘I’m from the government and I’m here to help you’” is the same Ronald Reagan who “saved” both Social Security and Medicare (programs that he loathed) and also boasted in 1986 that his administration had given more money to farmers than all previous administrations combined!3

The paleolibs don’t know why the Democrats keep losing and they don’t know how the Democrats can start winning. Where do we agree? We agree that economic inequality in the U.S. is growing, that this is a bad thing, and that “markets”, of which I am much fonder than they, can’t solve the problem all by themselves. So what can be done, and, more to the point, what should be done?

First of all, markets can help. Specifically, liberals in enclaves like New York, San Francisco, Washington DC, et al. should lower the drawbridges and drain the moats. Forget about “smart growth” and go in for “real growth”. Get rid of rent control, height restrictions, and all (or most) of the restrictions that discourage new housing construction. Just let it happen, without planning!

Yes, you read that right. Stop being like the Old Man of Sung, who used to pull on his rice plants to make them grow faster, and just let construction happen. The cost of living will drop, and employment and wages will rise. Yes, your condo/exquisite townhouse will lose value, and you may even lose your view as well (I have a view and I would hate to lose it, but, yes, I would make the sacrifice). The heart-felt cry “That’s why I moved here in the first place!” (so don’t change anything) is not the clincher that most people take it to be. According to a paper by Chang-Tai Hsieh and Enrico Moretti, reducing geezer-friendly restrictions on housing in New York, San Francisco, and San Jose alone would boost the U.S. Gross Domestic Product by 9.5%.

Beyond that (and a few other things), we should address economic inequality directly through the earned income tax credit, discussed by Cass Sunstein here. The EITC could be greatly expanded and, as Cass explains, simplified as well. Unlike food stamps and other economic distribution programs, the EITC is both invisible and portable.

Sadly, to go back to my less than modest proposal for relatively unrestricted housing development in prosperous urban areas, I think it’s very unlikely that anal-retentive condo-canyon liberals will wise up to the fact “letting go” is not seldom the truest wisdom when it comes to economic development. Their hatred of the profit motive constantly leads them to cut off their nose to spite their face. But at least my dream would work. Which is more than I can say for the paleolibs.

“Milquetoast” as an epithet was fading even when I was a kid. “Casper Milquetoast” was a once very famous newspaper cartoon, drawn by H. T. Webster. Mr. Milquetoast, as you have no doubt gathered, was a fastidious sissy. The strip ended in 1953, and Word can still spell his name. Impressive! ↩︎

Actually, I don’t think Clinton “effectively” went Hollywood. I think he literally went Hollywood. I think he tried to bring homosexuals into the military because Barbra Streisand asked him to. ↩︎

Ronnie learned that price supports are sacred the hard way. In the 1976 Iowa Caucus he was holding forth on the merits of the free market when the assembled farmers asked his position on “parity” (i.e., price supports). “You don’t understand,” Reagan told them. “I want to give you the benefits of the free market.” “We don’t give a damn about the free market!” the farmers told him. “Where do you stand on parity?” “Well, I don’t know what ‘parity’ means,” lied Ronald Reagan the coward. ↩︎