Sign of the Month - June 2016 - The Reason Rally

You choose the best sign from a surfeit of riches. I want to go to this rally next year. Got to be a hoot. 

I remain a theist. However, I think atheists have a damn good argument.

I want to give atheists some free advice. It probably does not help to call religious people crazy. Momma said "You get more flies with honey than you do with vinegar."

The first sign is from Reason Rally 2012. I like it so I put it in here anyway.

I am not sure what this sign has to do with reason or religion but it is kool. Kind of.

FEAR

Frank Herbert fans, do not slay me for using the Bene Gesserit litany this way. I mean it with all my heart.

LITANY AGAINST FEAR

I must not fear.
Fear is the mind-killer.
Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration.
I will face my fear.
I will permit it to pass over me and through me.
And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path.
Where the fear has gone there will be nothing.
Only I will remain.

Perfect Days

And what is so rare as a day in June? Then, if ever, come perfect days...

- James Russell Lowell

                                          

                                                                                                                                                            "...dancing up a storm," Kelly says. It's a beautiful day, not a cloud in the sky. There's a little bit of mist in the distance hanging over the river. But it's a nice time."

This 1846 painting made George Caleb Bingham's career. Known around Missouri primarily as a portrait painter, he went national with The Jolly Flatboatmen with help from an East Coast arts group. Judith Brodie, curator of prints and drawings at the National Gallery, says, "If it weren't for the American Art Union, this painting may never have been painted."

READ MORE HERE...

The Toilet Laws #5 - Rebuking Target

I am at a loss for words. So I will let you see what is going on at Target and say nothing. Tell what you think, if you please. Or not. Shaking my damn head.

Okay, I lied. These folks seem to be trained carefully. They say "You cannot touch me." They leave before the cops come.

What other group can take a bullhorn and do this? Maybe we should think about doing this kind of stuff at their churches?

Seems like a dance. It is The Dance of the Sugar Plum Fundamentalists.

SuperBugs

I wrote two articles on SuperBugs. Sometimes I hate to be right. This is one of those times. I wrote one in 2013 and one in 2014.

The Poster Art comes from the WPA. I am just a small voice crying in the wilderness. 

SuperBugs in Our Food

and

A Vast Wasteland May Soon Be Upon Us

Guess what. SuperBugs are here now.

Superbugs are routine bacteria that have learned how to avoid being killed by antibiotics. When this ability extends across multiple different types (classes) of antibiotics, the bugs are deemed multi-drug resistant (MDR) and qualify as “superbugs”.

We are now entering a dangerous time in the control of superbugs. For each of the four superbug categories we know the control solutions but ensuring these get implemented is a key challenge to our health system and society.
-. M. Lindsay Grayson, Professor of Infectious Disease, University of Melbourne

Our government as a whole dithers around worrying about who pees where and does nothing. Worst Congress ever. To be fair, I must commend Obama for his actions during the Ebola crisis. But then, Obama is not Congress.

The pharmaceutical industry works only to develop drugs they can market quickly and make a huge profit on before the inevitable class action suits arrive. Many of these superdrugs, quickly developed and marketed on TV, kill and maim people. 

Work on new antibiotics, do they? GO HERE for a report on that and maybe tell me what you think. I think the large pharmaceutical companies are little more than legal drug dealers.

Congress works on keeping people from having drugs they need as a solution in the War on Drugs. See Mike Evans for how well that is working.

The Toilet Laws #4 - Some Sanity Enters the Scenario

Some sanity here from a Hispanic Republican. Good to see. We need more of this. More Hispanics in government and more sanity in Republicans.

I remember sane and dignified Republicans like Howard Baker and Margaret Chase Smith. Before LePage they were sane in Maine. Nice to be reminded that Republicans can be sane and intelligent. And bilingual. This woman is amazing. I can only repeat her sentiments in my second language. La famiglia è tutto

I am not far from the immigrant experience. My Grands emigrated from Italy. My Nonna never spoke English well. Many Americans are like me. We do not respond well to folks who trash immigrants. The KKK burned crosses in Italian neighborhoods when my Father was a toddler.

Art by Favianna Rodriguez. 

Third Leading Cause of Death and Misery is Medical Mistakes

I am going to share some of Mike Evans writing today about a mutual concern.

I have been putting the task off because it means ferreting around in the feelings I had when I fell in my garden and got badly hurt. I experience ptsd when I go into my garden.

I am still going to grueling physical therapy twice a week. So trauma is still very fresh in my mind. I could not remember where I put whatever crap I wrote about falling and not receiving proper medical treatment. I am still feeling the results of concussion.

As I find stuff, I will add to this essayette. So Mike and you, Cher Reader, can read them. I might have put it under the label Torture. 

So this is what Mike Evans wrote. He spoke to my condition. You can contact Mike Evans directly with any feedback at:

5702450544@windstream.net

https://disqus.com/by/6abcmember

Art by Favianna Rodriguez.

Philadelphia doctors accused of selling $5M in pills (6abc.com)

Editorial page

commentary by @6abcmember:disqus

posted Fri May 13th 2016

Sorry Jim. But the "ugly truth" and far greater crime behind this story is how the DEA's forcing our nation's doctors (thru intimidation and outright threats) to stop writing prescriptions for painkillers of any kind regardless of a patient's health circumstances and genuine medical need for them.

The untold truth is millions of patients every day are being given no alternative but to purchase whatever they can get off the black market or continue suffering in constant chronic pain. Isn't that a wonderful choice for lifelong decent law-abiding citizens to be forced into having to make?

Why don't you do some genuine investigative research and reporting into that unspoken part of this story rather than simply towing the all too familiar self-aggrandizing government line? "Oh, look at the wonderful deed we just accomplished today. Everyone paste a gold star upon our forehead and pat us on the back for a job well done!"

Our nation's DEA has turned into yet another rogue Draconian government agency that's become totally out of control and now biting the very hands which feed it. Please make a sincere effort to report the hidden truth behind this greatest portion of the overall story rather than parrot the latest stream of Orwellian newspeak oozing from the government pipeline.

The black market for painkillers exists solely because a genuine medical need for them exists. The DEA has artificially and intentionally created that situation to justify its own existence and self-perpetuation. Get off the backs of our medical professionals and let them do their jobs!

The DEA is wholly unqualified to make any such medical or judgement calls thus has no business inserting themselves into our lives as if they did. What PhD's do they hold ensuring they're the least bit qualified to make any medical decisions and judgement calls which profoundly affect our daily lives and physical well being? None, nada, zip!

Get in a serious car accident where you break several ribs and are struggling literally every passing second in agonizing pain with each breath you take as your rib cage expands and contracts worsening the already unbearable pain.

We'll see what you think about the need for any serious kick butt painkillers then. I've been thru that very scenario not just once but twice during the past decade so fully understand their purpose and need.

I've also been in a few car accidents and serious winter season falls which injured my spine and neck. Try sitting at your desk in front of a TV camera doing your job at the 6ABC studios under those difficult circumstances.

An Rx grade analgesic becomes absolutely necessary to reduce the pain level just sufficiently enough to make it thru your workday. I've also been thru that scenario well over a dozen times during the past 59 years. You'll be stunned to discover just how dramatically slower clocks run when under such physical duress.

Not many of us are as fortunate nor well off as you benefit and salary wise where we might have the luxury of taking a day or two off under such difficult circumstances. Many can't afford to take even a single day off without being unable to pay our grocery and other monthly bills.

Without the proper level of pain medication (such as Morphine) when medically necessary given severe injury or trauma a patient will quickly go into shock and die before anything can be done to reverse the situation.

Anyone who's ever served on the battlefield has witnessed and knows this cold hard reality. In fact, it's how most everyone will eventually die. The body lapses into a state of shock for one reason or another and completely shuts down organ by organ like a chain of dominoes in very short order.

Respectfully, Mike Adams

Bye bye, Morans. Don't let the door . . . well you know.

UPDATE:

Texas Republicans barely avoided having to vote on whether Texas should secede from the United States on Friday. So I dragged out this old chestnut. TEXIT y'all! Founder lives in Russia.



November 13, 2012

Some folks want to secede "peacefully" from the Union and they have petitions at whitehouse.gov.

Some Authoritarian types petitioned in return that the Secessionists should be deported. My Grands emigrated here from Italy and Poland. My question to the Deporters is this: To which Country would someone like me be deported? Do I get to choose? Most everybody here in America is an immigrant or a child of immigrants.

The second Authoritarian response I saw was "Bring it on." Those who do not remember the Civil War may be doomed to repeat it. Do you want your backyard looking like this again? "Bring it on," my Ass.

And the Authoritarians wonder why they lost the election? Shaking my damn head. You just cannot make this stuff up

I confess I signed the petition to deport the Secessionists even though I know it is bullshit. Sometimes Poo must be flung, know what I mean? Better Poo than Bullets. Or rocks.

Then somebody had a better idea. It was suggested in a petition that we give the poor forlorn Secessionists a nice warm cup of soup. I agree with the Soupers. This election has been exhausting. We are all a bit peckish.

Who knew the White House petition site was going to be so fun?

I love my Daughters

Luscious Lulu accompanied me to the yarn store, we tried on a million shoes and bought none. And then Margarita's. Good Mexican restaurant. Always crowded and noisy. I had Chiles Rellenos and a Corona.  I have done my physical therapy duty. It hurts good hurt. And I am hanging at home. 

Tomorrow Lizzie Borden is taking me to the garden store in her car so I can carry stuff I cannot carry on the bus. Life is good. Tomorrow it may not rain. I may see Sun. I am going to plant cilantro and basil for sure. Life is good.

Art from Sun Inspired Mandalas.

I decided I am going to stop reading or looking at or listening to anything about the election for my own mental health. Woosah.

How many peaches will you get if you harm the Tree?

So I used my magic google finger again and searched WOMAN TREE and TREE WOMAN.

I got so many images, that like the Old Lady in the Shoe, I did not know what to do.

These are the images that spoke to my condition. You can use your finger to take you to magic googleland too.

http://www.deviantart.com/art/Tree-of-the-knowledge-of-good-102566327

Richard Mourdock Redux

Fetuses could be granted constitutional rights under measure approved by Missouri House

State Rep. Tila Hubrecht, R-Dexter, said during debate that women shouldn’t decide to get an abortion just because they are raped.

“It is not up to us to say ‘no just because there was a rape, they cannot exist,’” she said. “Sometimes bad things happen — horrible things, but sometimes God can give us a silver lining through the birth of a child.”

Read more...

You can email Ms. Hubrecht. And just in case you do not remember Mr. Mourdock, you can go here to find out what and who he is.

The artist is is Kate Salley Palmer. 

She started doing political cartoons for The Greenville News in 1975.

In 1976, Kate joined the Association of American Editorial Cartoonists and attended her first AAEC convention. She and Etta Hulme, of The Fort Worth Star-Telegram, were the only two women cartoonists in attendance that year. Kate's husband, Jim, was the first male member of the then-called "Ladies Auxiliary".

In 1980, the (now renamed) Field Newspaper Syndicate began distributing Kate's cartoons nationwide. In 1981, she received the Freedoms Foundation's George Washington medal for editorial cartooning.

Signs of the Month - May 2016

I stopped finding signs when my garden bit me. So good to be back and at them. Them, of course varies.

The first image is sexy and funny. First Prize.

The second is a screen shot. It is the sign on the shirt that really creeps me out. Video below.

My Gritty City Gets It Right - Update

Update:

Kathryn Knott, Dad, Bucks County Sued for $5 Million for “Retaliation” Over Anonymous Internet Comments
Read more at... 

Now send the Bucks County detectives after me, Knotts. I have bupkis and balls of steel. Will be a hoot to participate in a free speech mess. I am old. I got nothing to do but hang out. And I have a new screen name. See the comments.

Written February 9, ,2016

Kathryn Knott is going to jail for gay bashing. And she has been kicked out of the City of Philadelphia and cannot enter without a compelling reason to do so. 

God bless the Judge and Jury for keeping the Gayborhood safe for everybody. Philadelphia Magazine provides an archive of the whole affair.

Hugh E. Dillon's photographs of Brian Sim's protest in Love Park show you that in Philly, we really do take 'brotherly love' seriously. No bashing people just because you can.

Fuck YOU Adsense.

Update: The fuckers at google paid me. But now they will not let me use adsense on my food blog. Cute. Push me around and then kick me again
--------------------------------------------
Google:
Close my adsense account. You will not censor my blog.

You will not force me to list my account as a porn site.

Publisher ID: pub-1222599309808625

Please remit money accrued. You have my bank information. You provide no other way for me to communicate with you. I looked and looked.

I think this is beautiful. You think it is porn.

I have Russian readers. What happened? Putin get upset? You want to see what real pornography is? Go here.

Crappy Crap

Somebody posted a link to this study on disqus. I am banned by the disqus blog, so I thought I would comment here. Really sucks to be bipolar sometimes. I cannot be tactful when crazed. 

I think the study is crap. People are influenced by what they read? Well duh. I must admit that the site is interesting otherwise.

Abstract
As people increasingly turn to social media to access and create health evidence, the greater availability of data and information ought to help more people make evidence-informed health decisions that align with what matters to them. However, questions remain as to whether people can be swayed in favor of or against options by polarized social media, particularly in the case of controversial topics. We created a composite mock news article about home birth from six real news articles and randomly assigned participants in an online study to view comments posted about the original six articles. We found that exposure to one-sided social media comments with one-sided opinions influenced participants’ opinions of the health topic regardless of their reported level of previous knowledge, especially when comments contained personal stories. Comments representing a breadth of views did not influence opinions, which suggests that while exposure to one-sided comments may bias opinions, exposure to balanced comments may avoid such bias

Memento Mori

Song: “Fear no more the heat o’ the sun” 

Related Poem Content Details

BY WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

(from Cymbeline)

Fear no more the heat o’ the sun, 

Nor the furious winter’s rages; 

Thou thy worldly task hast done, 

Home art gone, and ta’en thy wages: 

Golden lads and girls all must, 

As chimney-sweepers, come to dust. 

Fear no more the frown o’ the great; 

Thou art past the tyrant’s stroke; 

Care no more to clothe and eat; 

To thee the reed is as the oak: 

The scepter, learning, physic, must 

All follow this, and come to dust. 

Fear no more the lightning flash, 

Nor the all-dreaded thunder stone; 

Fear not slander, censure rash; 

Thou hast finished joy and moan: 

All lovers young, all lovers must 

Consign to thee, and come to dust. 

No exorciser harm thee! 

Nor no witchcraft charm thee! 

Ghost unlaid forbear thee! 

Nothing ill come near thee! 

Quiet consummation have; 

And renownèd be thy grave!

Redneck Liberal - Language Warning for Those at Work

I love this guy. I will not editorialize this too good speech. Says it all with no help from me. Enjoy. 

Art by Terry Bradley. You can purchase a print at his website. I call it Working Class Hero. I do not know what Terry calls it.

My heart leaps for joy... Psalms 28:7

For a long time, I was a member of the Society of the Friends of Jesus (Quakers). It was and is a Hicksite congregation. We had silent meeting. No pastors. Each member had a ministry. I had an Arts ministry. It was austere and good. Note: Quakes would disapprove of my trashmouth ways. 

Truth be known, I love African American congregations and this is why. I understand why Friends choose to have no pastors. I must say nevertheless, this man speaks to my condition.:

Springing Off with Update

http://www.bloomingrosephotography.com/blog

It is Spring and the Bipolars are blooming. I am out of my mind. Please leave a message.

Trump makes me wonder if I have company on the trip.

Update: Seems I am not alone in wondering if Trump has diminished mental ability.

Does Donald Trump have dementia? by Steve King

Trump’s father, Fred Trump, suffered from Alzheimer’s Disease before his death in 1999. Recent studies have shown that Alzheimer’s affects its victims much earlier than previously thought, and, considering The Donald’s behavior on the campaign trail, it might not be too far off the mark to consider that Fred Trump gave more to his son than millions of dollars and a particularly virulent form of racism.

 

List of other articles re: Trump is nuts and/or has brain issues.
http://www.politicususa.com/2015/06/16/insane-rant-donald-trump-announces-president-rich.html
http://www.cnn.com/2016/03/18/politics/michael-dukakis-donald-trump/
http://bigstory.ap.org/article/648886cc45364935bbd2ea82c8bcbdc2/graham-trump-nut-job-who-likely-wins-gop-nomination

Hillary loves Henry. Henry is a dick. I feel the Bern.

This post has musical accompaniment below.

I am an anarchist who caucuses with Democrats. I am voting for Bernie. Hill thinks Henry Kissinger is just grand. Grand. He may be be charming and funny and intelligent. Still a dick.

Military men are just dumb, stupid animals to be used as pawns in foreign policy.
― Henry Kissinger

The issues are too important to be left for the voters.
― Henry Kissinger

Henry Kissinger gets the Flying Dick award. First time recipient. My Brother and my Uncle are not useless dumb animals. If I have to hold my nose and vote for Hill, I will do so. We cannot have a Republican. But I do not like it. 

Florida Asshat on Parade - Was Cara right that Ricky is an asshole?

Rick Scott met one of his constituents in a coffee shop. She tried to talk to him, got frustrated and called him an asshole.

Here is part of what she did:

Here is what Rick Scott did in retaliation.

Here is why she did it:

Cruiser Cruz Gets the Bronx Cheer

I am the child of Polish and Italian immigrants. This event cheers me up. Notice they threw out an articulate non violent community leader.

I will vote for any Dem who gets the nomination. Dems do not want to shove things up my vagina for God.

Bronx cheer
noun
NORTH AMERICAN informal

a sound of derision or contempt made by blowing through closed lips with the tongue between them; a raspberry. 

PETS - Home Alone

I posted this because I love my pets and I know you love and care for yours too. I did not know this, although I knew plugged in electric coffeemakers have caused tragedies.

PETS - Sunday Morning or How Hard Does Your Cat Work?

This is too funny. Just perfectly funny. On Sunday morning, all this pet owner wanted to do was watch the news on the TV. However, his cat, Henry, and black lab, Ellie, had wrestling in mind.

"Ever notice how sometimes you come across somebody you shouldn't have fucked with?"

The men of the Republican party believe that women and women alone are to be held responsible for the fact that humans have sex. Republicans lost women voters by 10 points nationally and are headed for a 20 point loss.

My Mother had an abortion because of financial hardship when it was illegal. She and my Dad decided three of us was all they could handle. We were 14, 12 and 10. My Mom could have died. I know a past President of NJ NOW whose Mother died of illegal abortion when she was 9 years old.

Mom was 37, working full time and doing IBEW work. Dad was intermittently crippled with a congenital form of arthritis. Another pregnancy would have been a serious social, financial and physical disruption for her and for our family. Most women who get an abortion already have children.

It is despicable to compel folks to give birth to children they cannot afford, and/or do not want, or are defective BY LAW. It is Nazi stuff.

Woman forced to give birth to stillborn in Texas

If you are one of the "prolife" activists, I have questions for you.

My body and its contents belongs to (pick one):

1. You.
2. the State.
3. Me and my family.

My children belong with and to:

1. You.
2. the State.
3. Me and my family.

I look forward to your answers. I will tell you something right now. You Republican ghouls will not turn me and my daughters into baby farmed corpses like poor Mrs. Munoz. We vote.

ILLEGAL ABORTION and CHILDBIRTH (sepsis and hemorrhage) are the leading causes of maternal death worldwide. Fertility is serious business for women. Abortion/contraception is a human right.

We know contraception prevents abortion. Why do folks like Huckabee want to interfere with women getting contraception? How many peaches will you get if you wound the Tree? And why is this fat jowly guy calling me a slut with a Sugar Daddy? That is the Christian Republican idea of good politics evidently. Jesus loves Huckabee but I think he is an anus.

Forcing Birth in Indiana

Indiana Gov. Mike Pence on Thursday signed a bill that bars women from seeking an abortion because the child will be born with a disability - like these in the video below perhaps.

Legislatures and Mike Pence must not practice obstetrics/gynecology or mandate unnecessary suffering for women and their families.





Birth defects can cause problems in overall health, how the body develops or how the body works. Learn about birth defects and other health conditions, what they are and how they happen. Common birth defects include heart defects, cleft lip and cleft palate and spina bifida. Read more from the March of Dimes. 

If the State acts in loco parentis and takes choice of whether to bear a child with Downs Syndrome, a more common birth defect, from its biological parents, then the State must pay all expenses associated with such forced birth.

Enjoy, Indiana, the tremendous tax burden you have just assumed with this bill. I know the State will love and provide for these babies generously. Sure they will. 

I hope they vote as hard as they rap. I hope everybody votes.

I have a great relationship with the blacks. I've always had a great relationship with the blacks.
Robinson, Eugene (18 April 2011), "Donald Trump as GOP hopeful: Take him seriously", The Washington Post, retrieved on 2011-05-07

I could stand in the middle of 5th Avenue and shoot somebody and I wouldn't lose voters. - Donald Trump

Laziness is a trait in the blacks. ... Black guys counting my money! I hate it. - Donald Trump

"Fuck Trump." Thank you, dat Terance and your friends. I second that emotion. And I am a 73 year old Pink Lady.

Philadelphia Easter Promenade Men's Category

Men's category at the Easter Promenade pic.twitter.com/Omkmlb7qi3

— PhillyWeekly (@PhillyWeekly) March 27, 2016

Sharron Angle is a Hoot - UPDATE

UPDATE:  Sharron Angle, the GOP’s disastrous 2010 nominee, is back for another Senate campaign in Nevada. READ more... 

October 19, 2010

Sharron Angle (I call her Spangle because she sparkles so) is one of the most entertaining candidates running for public office. Every day she presents us with some new atrocity.  I am laughing myself silly. And buying lots of popcorn.

Spangle calls press conferences and then runs from the press.

Spangle is campaigning to do away with Social Security as we know it, just as the biggest population wave the USA ever experienced, the Baby Boomers, are getting ready to apply for the retirement funds they spent their entire lives paying into. Bad timing at the least.

Spangle thinks my sex life is her business and rapists should be able to choose the Mother of their babies the old fashioned Biblical way: If you rape her, she must marry you and/or bear your child.  As Big Ed would put it, it is Psycho Talk. Spangle smiles while she compares incest pregnancy to ... "lemons?" Huh?

I note lots of Folks asking if Spangle is stupid or crazy for taking these stances and smiling away while people gasp. Spangle seems not to hear the gasps or notice the dropped jaws.

Spangle is neither stupid nor crazy necessarily. I am a recovered addict. I can spot an addict easily. Spangle is making my High Alarm clang bigtime. Spangle looks and acts like a lady in my Quaker Meeting who is misusing (with the help of her physician daughter) Xanax. Same ever present big fat meaningless smile, same vacant wide eyed countenance, same lack of appropriate affect. Smiling and smiling.

 If it is yellow like a duck, quacks like a duck ... well, you know. Prescription drug misuse is common in America. It happens to the nicest people even, witness the lady from my Meeting. Nicest lady you could meet and she runs the First Day School. Smiling.

I could be wrong; I often am. Bigtime wrong. But in this case, I don't think so. We need to randomly and regularly drug test public employees, especially Congress. What is sauce for the working American must be sauce for our employees.

This is why Horsey is a Pulitzer Prize Winning Editorial Cartoonist.

David Horsey
Editorial cartoonist

David Horsey is a Pulitzer Prize-winning editorial cartoonist in the United States. His cartoons appeared in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer until December 2011 and in the Los Angeles Times currently and are syndicated to newspapers nationwide. - Wikipedia