please remember the fifth of november

"by excluding men under thirty-five from the first office, and those under thirty from the second ( president and senator respectively ), it confines the electors to men of whom the people have had time to form a judgement and with respect to whom they are not liable to be deceived by those brilliant appearances of genius and patriotism, which, like transient meteors, sometimes mislead as well as dazzle."-john jay federalist LXIV_______________________"the exhaustion of the masses is unquestionable."-grigory zinoviev, 15 novemmber 1917 in a central committee meeting__________________today is guy fawkes day...a quasi diminution of an act of rebellion/subversion/treason/terrorism depending on who is writing about it...and i usually don't need to wait for some particular day to express an opinion about the sorry state of hegemonic culture in these once united states...that the last election offered a dismal choice of the venal and corrupt for high office ( yes...that woman is no better...fucking sue me ) is an unquestionable fact and i am wondering just how that came to be...partly because the "masses" are "exhausted"...not so much by lying whore politicians...those have been around since the beginning ( we will get to jay in a minute ) but by the dead end appearance of the economy...the erosion of economic middle ground...the gig economy and the inability to make ends meet, seemingly no matter how much one might work...so they rebelled at the polls and installed , incredibly to my mind, just another member of the hegemonic elite who was posing as a regular guy...a "meteor" that "mislead" if he didn't "dazzle"...then again when hasn't a member of the hegemonic elite people the white house ( no dissent...obama was of that elite and he will not be unwealthy for the rest of his days..and "honest" abe may have been a rail splitter once but the house he lived in before his turn as president was a prosperous lawyer's, pot a cabin in the woods )..bear in mind that the franchise was limited tot he "better" men in jay's day and he was all for that...who knows who the hoi polloi might elect...his rants about the masses are manifold in the federalist papers..so the "people" he wanted to form "judgements" about the "electors" were not the common folk...candidates were vetted by the interests of the elite and the real decisions about who stood for what were made in an arena removed from public scrutiny...sound anything like the recent past? people believe in this system mostly because of high school civics..i have been out of high school for nearly fifty years ( 1971 ) i was skeptical about these people then ( there was viet nam and watergate ) i find them loathsome now...odd that "lock her up" ( which i am inclined to think she should be on general principles ) was such a refrain in 2016 and mat apply to that cretinous freak in say 2017 or 18...fuck these people...fake news..alternative facts...just the same old political lies and dissembling...smoke and mirrors...slight of hand...they keep us divided and they win until the system collapses from its own entropy ( shall we talk about an eroding tax base and the consequences in terms of infrastructure? climate gentrification of areas higher above sea level and the displacement of the poor? that climate change...there's the outside, objective force that will not be placated...collapse is there...take a look ) time to start looking to forming alternative cultural structures.

dystopian relativism

anyone who has sat on a jury knows that "truth" is a slippery subject..."the facts" may be lurking in the courtroom but that's not what you are there for...they are obscured by the manifold versions of "the truth" that everyone, from witnesses, to plaintiff, to defendant are trying to sell you on ( when i was a juror a husband and wife pair of witnesses who were in the same car could not agree on whether the scene was lit by the cars headlights or a porch light which probably wasn't on since it had been established there was a power outage due to a storm )...it is true we are all mired in an ego viewpoint...stuck behind our eyes and no matter who hard we try, in the end, everything is relative to us...so there's a kernel of truth to the relativism academics have seized on as a basis for explaining almost everything and even questioning the validity of "self" ( which is patent bullshit by the by...someone needs to tell these poor sods they are actually deconstructing themselves and so their crack brained hypotheses about who and what we are...get a grip...where's g.e. moore when you need him? in intellectual disrepute because he would have agreed it's all fatuous and lame academic self-aggrandizement )...so it shouldn't be a surprise that the current resident of the white house seizes on relativism to explain away disquieting "facts" with "alternate" ones...so his inauguration wasn't mobbed by millions..a media conspiracy to discredit him..and those photos? digitally manipulated...and in an age where that sort of trip down the memory hole is rampant..or ,at least, reasonably possible...even the n y times can photo-shop...what can you know? well...i know instability when i see it...and condescension...and arrogance...and disregard for the rights and prerogatives of the bulk of the population...an elitist take on the character of the wealthy and the implied lack there of of the less well to do ( and the non-existence of the indigent )...if it is a government "of the people" i have a fair take on which people...and that "for the people" business? those "people" comprise a distinct minority of the polity...and their bought whores are in charge of the legislature and if the judiciary...products of the same elitist universities as the rest of the ruling cadre...are "independent", they are independent of a sense of justice...something very different than the current state of "the law", or the government as a whole.

constant enforcement

“the lesson should be constantly enforced that, though the people support the government, the government should not support the people.”-- grover Cleveland in 1887 in response to request for drought relief from texas. “for that matter, it never occurs to apian that his class as such needs defending, rome is imperiled by plebian violence. likewise when the dictator sulla give fortuitous birth to himself, saving rome from herself, by means of easy bloodshed, his tools demand ‘that the voting should be controlled by the well-to-do and sober-minded rather than by the pauper and reckless classes; there would no longer be left any starting point for civil; discord.’ sulla and apian do not conceive of mass revolution, only of mass disorder.”__william t. vollmann from rising up, rising down. "the convention...have directed the president to be chosen by select bodies of electors to be deputed by the people for that express purpose; and they have committed the appointment of senators to the state legislatures. this mode has, in such cases, vastly the advantage of elections by the people in their collective capacity where the activity of party zeal, taking advantage of the supineness, the ignorance, and the hopes and fears of the unwary and uninterested, often places men in office by the votes of a small proportion of the electors." the federalist LXVI ( john jay)_____________ most politicians have distanced themselves from “the demos”…”the mob”…never fully trusted it not to turn on them like a pack of jackals half-starved by b f skinner for one of his twisted experiments in “operant conditioning” ( a form of behavioral amendment and control that lures elites like moths to flame…skinner is still a very popular man in some circles…and starvation is a useful tool when it comes to behavior…from the potato famine to the great depression [ with some truly gruesome refinements by stalin] it had its uses )…oh they are more than happy to divide “the people” and turn a well indoctrinated and controlled “mob” loose on real or perceived threats to their hegemony…but a populist mob with a reform from below agenda scares the crap out of them...so from apian and sulla through john jay and grover Cleveland the elites have cloaked their interests in the guise of national interests”…make resistance to those interests tantamount to treason and allowing them to bring down the full weight of the legal system and a group of raging “patriots” down on anyone who might have thoughts about a “different way” or some sort of alternate distribution of wealth and power…violence isn’t always necessary and, usually, isn’t really productive…indoctrination ( we are back to skinner again ) can be more effective and less costly and if violence is deemed a necessity it will ensure a nob of properly aimed and controlled goons who won’t question their handlers too closely…at least at first…those three guys in the photo…they are hegemons…don’t let the bubbaness of two of them ( one an ivy leaguer and the other a rhodes scholar ) or the hopeful ethnicity of the other ivy leaguer fool you into thinking they were any less bent on a class oriented agenda than the current denizen of the white house ( who has displayed some skill at energizing a mob of dilatant thugs but seems oblivious to the mood of a seeming majority of the nation…he is also, i might add, a profound devotee of the ideas expressed by Cleveland…”the government” and the elite he surely comes from are on in the same...in his mind [ oddly much like the attitude of richard Nixon] we owe him unstinting loyalty and the recognition that he is above the law and can do what he pleases)…the history of the interests of wealth as the national interest have a long and fabled history…all that neo-classical kitch in the nation’s capitol is an indication that the early republic and its later celebrants saw themselves as the true heirs to rome..in many ways they still do…a close reading of gibbon or tainter might be illuminating for them…one presumes they are not interested in anything emanating from “neo-mathusian nay sayers”…well…denial will bite you on the ass every time…i have to wonder what hunter would have made of all this.

reading the n y times ( sort of )

today's n y times weighs in at a hefty three pounds twelve and three-quarter ounces...who knew there was so much news? i mean i knew there were climate related issues ( i talked to my brother in florida yesterday and will try to do so again today ) and the assorted tererorists and diplomats and batshit crazy north koreans ( well complimented by the current swamptown crop of loons cast in ideological concrete...where is the lake of fire? ) but an almost four pound newspapaer? then i opened it and things began to gain perspective...lots of inserts..the usual sunday magazine and the quarterly "style" magazine ( more on those soon enough...patience )..additionally there is a "special offer from the economist to n y times readers ( i can, if i act quickly, save $321.87 off the twelve week regular subscription rate of $333.87 by claiming the unheard of low price of a buck a week...that's right...twelve weeks for twelve bucks because i am a n y times reader...astonishing...you can see my response in, i believe, the sixth photo...the only people who believe economists anymore are other economists and "free market" geeks with their heads up their asses )...there is an entire brochure for wonderful cruises and another for "eight exceptional days" of $9590 sofas and $7180 dining room sets...a pattern was becoming discernible...so...armed with the latest times advertising rates for color and black and white advertising i began to look at the magazines..the "style" magazine (http://nytmediakit.com/uploads/rates/CRS-9040_2016_Rate_Cards_TMag_EC3.pdf there's the price list url ) had advertising worth $7,200,322 and, as a side note, turned an article about the travel writer and novelist bruce chatwin into a vehicle for selling outdoor clothing...everything is for sale at the times...while the sunday magazine "education issue" ( educating whom to what i wonder ) had a measly $1,927,350 (http://nytmediakit.com/uploads/rates/CRS-9040_2016_Rate_Cards_Magazine_EC2.pdf )...interestingly enough milton hershey, fordham, uc davis, ucla, nyu, harvard medical school seton hall, adelphi, pace, and loyola marymount universities accounted or $1,177, 825 of that total...you have to spend money to make money...every university bean counter knows that...my news is distorted and my desires are engineered ( at least that is the hope )...we all live in the memory hole now and everything is spun to the point of unrecognizability...i never looked for "truth"...it is too subjective...sifting through all this blather and self-serving crap for fact is a tedious business...i keep trying though...everyone has an agenda and the world is replete with liars, grifters, and swindlers...america in the 21st century has tapped into the main nerve of that...the "hog butcher to the world" is turning into a nation of gated communities and flea markets...we passed the crossroads a ways back and i wonder if the street us wide enough for a u-turn.

pharmakon

being neither a logician or an academic will not deter me from thinking: 1.) humans are tribal and territorial by nature. 2.) that being tribal imparts a sense of security and “belonging. 3.) that belonging is not universal…it is exclusionary…it is a pharmakon and, eventually, it poisons…there is always “the other”. 4.) that any treaty promulgated by the united nations banning nuclear weapons is irrelevant to those who possess nuclear weapons. 5.) because of an evolutionary predisposition to tribalism the hegemons who control their various socio-political system will not surrender what they see as an ultimate defense of “us” against “them”. We have a multitude of ways of disposing of ourselves as a species that we actively engage in on a daily basis because it is structured into the institutions we were born into…whether it is me recklessly using resources and emitting carbon dioxide ( despite the carbon offsets of the coniferous trees and deeply rooted perennials in my yard ) or kim jong un and his increasingly unstable counterpart unleashing a nuclear exchange and a general war ( and don’t doubt there are those here who would favor a “first strike”…the military mind is the uber-tribal mind )…are we doomed? may be…perhaps not…humans are adaptable too…we may find a way to live with our destructive ways ( we have always been deleterious to the environment ) but I wouldn’t expect idealism to trump weaponry…if you have it the impetus is to use it…add in the ascendancy ( or, perhaps, their assumed ascendancy ) of life-hating christian nihilists and you have a dangerous and lamentable combination of human hubris mixed with flat stupidity…trump and kim may dispose of themselves as they see fit…I care for neither…they should leave the rest of us out of their puerile posturing.

a 99% possibility of distortion

"hello, just a question someone can answer if they can find the time...are the photos you publish in in your newspaper ( as opposed to on line ) derived from digital or analog cameras? thanks for your time and attention."__________that is an email i sent off to my friends ( as long as i am a subscriber anyway ) at the n y times asking about the photos they use in their print edition ( obviously the photos in the on line edition are all digital )...i have been reading a lot of philosophy recently and there is a lot of verbiage in that discipline devoted to discussing how we know what we know and why we believe what we believe and i was wondering about the sources of what i was looking at in the media...a couple of days later this arrived in my mailbox..."Good Morning Fred, Thank you for contacting the New York Times. The Photographer has the choice of digital vs. analog. But I would say that 99% of the time they end up being digital. Have a great day today! Chuck Arnold III"__________this was not comforting news...i have something of a distaste for the digital ( i know...i know...this is digital...everything i do here is digital..my cameras [except the vivtar] are digital..i know...i know )...partly because i was born near the middle of the last century i suppose...however there is reason to be a bit concerned...with analog photography there was a mechanical transference of light to chemically treated film that created the negative for the image...things like a flaw in the chemical coating could occur or double exposures, however whatever image was transferred to the film had to be there...it had to be physically present...true photos could be "retouched"..flaws smoothed or removed...stalin had a passion for that and it is part of what inspired orwell's "memory hole" and his conceptualization of the mutability of history ( and his stint at the bbc in the second world war sensitized him to propaganda as news )..some efforts were exceptionally crude ( see photos ) and even yezhov's becoming an unperson was not perfect...you could discern the changes..it was clear things were not as they seemed...digital images and photoshop have rendered the "memory hole" obsolete...images can be seamlessly altered by editing the digital code that is the basis of the photos...you can remove or insert anything and there is no real way to tell...distortions of perception can be had easily and, given the fact that media outlets are, in the end, corporate entities, i don't doubt that some manipulation in the interests of the editorial board ( read advertisers ) or the politically motivated ( all politics are an extension of economics...why do you suppose the "dismal science" began its life being called "political economy"? )...so..what media do i trust? none i am thinking...i can no longer be sure if what i am seeing is real ( if you can manipulate digital photographs one supposes digital video is not immune )...so? so i continue reading the times..and philosophy...and orwell...and i compare what i read and hear with what i see and hear in my own locality ( trust me, the news about the economy is pretty much fiction )...and i make my own judgements.

you will be surveilled

"you see how it is...wherever you are, you always have to work. there's never any excuse for idleness. there are also no wine-taverns, no ale houses, no brothels, no opportunity for seduction, no secret meting places. everyone has his eye on you, so you are practically forced to get on with your job, and make some proper use of your spare time."_____"this ensures that everyone's conduct in public is watched by those who are responsible for their discipline at home." thomas more, from utopia.________and one supposes to think properly as well, no? thomas more was under sheriff of london so his desire to watch everyone all the time is understandable...rule crazy control freak...and it is no surprise that those outstanding teleologies in human history ( so far ) the catholic church and every authoritarian state to date embrace more as one of their own...much of our lives are led under surveillance these days...cameras are everywhere and they claim there is workable facial recognition software out there...my phone is tapped...my emails and texts read..i have no intention of hiding my blog and fucking facebook is trying to hijack my life..so? today's n y times sunday magazine has a two page color advertisement ( something like $214,000 for that ) for nest's iq home surveillance camera you can connect to your smart phone and see what the help is up to while your busy extorting money with yet another wall street ponzi scheme...just because it's legal for you to fleece the public doesn't mean the goddamed help can slack...an electronic overseer...digital simon legree..i don't have a web cam...i don't need some government funded hacker watching me type this...that doesn't mean i am not seriously observed on a daily basis...my gut feeling is this is not going to get better...have a shufti at my last post in "death of the real"...you will be surveilled.