Dead time

We need to rethink the period between Thanksgiving and the first of the year. As it is now this is largely just dead time, at least for many. Of course it isn't dead time for those who man the stores and cater to the shoppers, but for many others it is basically a lost month, and whatever activity there is is mostly related to shopping and preparing for the "holidays." This is perhaps most noticeable in offices and in Universities. After Thanksgiving no one seems to think of anything other than doing their Christmas shopping and preparing for the feasts and festivities that are happening. Office Christmas parties galore, extra long lunch hours to allow for shopping, missed days of work due to hangovers and too many days off for travel and such. People are supposed to be at work, but in reality, while their bodies are there, their minds are not. I think we should just take a month long holiday and have done with it. Those who work in stores and shops could take off the month of January to compensate them for having to work during December. There isn't much work for them in January anyway, especially this year, as there apparently isn't even much work for them during December as most people don't have much money to spend this year. Apparently the annual shopping spree has been so bad there are some stores who many go out of business. Of course Wall Street, the banks and insurance companies are doing fine, but how many corporate jets can you sell in one season.

Along these lines, I cannot understand why any working person would ever vote for a Republican. They make no secret of the fact that they are anti-union, anti-working stiff, anti-decent wages, anti-pensions, anti-health insurance, and so on. They are completely up front about this, just witness what is going on with the big 3 auto companies, and what their hero, Ronald Reagan, did to the airline unions, which seems to have made union busting even more fashionable than ever before. "Freedom and justice for all," mean for Republicans "for all who have lots of money and power," not for "all." It has been so ever since I can remember. Republicans seem to think that ordinary people do not deserve living wages or benefits of any kind. I think it is no exaggeration to say there is a "war" between those who "have" and those who do not have, and the goal of this war is to make sure than no one, who isn't already someone, should have the right to anything other than work in a sweatshop. If Republicans have their way we will return to the conditions that obtained at the turn of the 20th century. To this end they have starved our public school system and fought every labor initiative for years and years. They do not believe in democracy, and would prefer that most of us would not even vote. And if we must vote, they fill our heads with garbage like the threat of gay marriages or abortions or gun control or, even worse, "socialized medicine." I am not sympathetic to Obama's plan to reach out to these people. Why should he reach out to those who basically want to destroy our democracy? He's something like the woman who believes she can change her man if only she can get him to marry her. I do not believe these "free market" believers will ever change, no matter how badly their philosophy has failed

I simply do not understand why it is that people are so resistant to reality or change, or to doing the fair and just thing. Take the Israeli case, for example. Now they are talking about invading Gaza again, in order to stop the rockets the Palestinians are launching from there. So once again they are going to meet violence with more violence, which will breed more violence, which will also breed more violence, ad infinitum. This has been going on for years and hasn't worked. Nothing could be more obvious than this. But will they try something else, like, for example, negotiating in good faith for a Palestinian state, or some other solution to this problem. Of course not, especially if that warmonger Netanyahu gets elected. The Israelis would rather cling to their stolen land and water than negotiate any kind of peace with the Palestinians. The never-ending violence will continue, apparently until the Israelis have successfully destroyed the Palestinians entirely. Why the U.S. continues to support this slow genocide I do not know. I cannot see any good reason for it. The Palestinians don't have any oil or other resources for us to gain. We are not going to gain any land or resources of any kind. You might say "we do not have any dog in this fight." And yet we persist in our mindless support of anything the Israelis wish, no matter how it violates all canons of International law and fundamental human decency.

Of course this year the dead time is worse than usual because we are waiting impatiently for the crooks in the White House to get out. If Bush/Cheney had any sense whatsoever of human decency they would have resigned years ago, and now they are busily trying to sabotage anything positive Obama might wish to do, destroy our environment for their corporate buddies, and pass new rules that are blatant attempts to steal and pillage right up to the last moment. This could have been avoided had democrats not been so cowardly, but, then, they all seem to be members of the same ruling class.

LKBIQ:

Every decent man is ashamed of the government he lives under.
H. L. Mencken

TILT:
Controversy continues to the present day over the authorship of Shakespeare's many plays, sonnets, and poems, but no proof of other authorship exists.