Humor – Page 4 – education and deconstruction.com

Around the World in Fifty Years – BONUS POST

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“What kind of people would so violate the customary rules of survival as to pillage a disabled vehicle and steal the equipment we need to repair it?”

No, the above does not refer metaphorically to a political system on its way to dictatorship, but rather, lawless tribesmen who stole the author’s traveling group’s gas cans, bootjacks and some tools from their Land Rover and trailer in 1966 in the border area between Afghanistan and Pakistan.

The Bonus Book of the Week is “Around the World in Fifty Years, My Adventure to Every Country on Earth” by Albert Podell, published in 2015.

According to the book (which appeared to be credible although it lacked a detailed list of Notes, Sources, References, Bibliography and an index), the author risked his life countless times in all kinds of circumstances. In March 1965 in Algeria, he was lucky not to have been blown up by land mines.

The author had to take flights and other means of transportation back and forth thousands of miles out of the way of his destinations due to diplomatic difficulties between or among territories. He had to postpone visiting a bunch of countries because at the time he applied for a visa, the United States wasn’t on the best of terms with them (such as Chad and Angola). Luckily, he had contacts who helped him get onto their soil via extralegal means. It seemed he had a death wish. Why would a sane person want to visit ultra-dangerous countries that have extremely low living standards, for fun?

Well, in countries such as Chad, Angola and North Korea, up until the late 1990’s, the people who dominated release of information about themselves to the rest of the world, were those in the government or journalists with a martyr complex.

Nowadays, it’s those who have World Wide Web access. So the only way to obtain accurate information about the common people in those countries (most of them did not have Twitter) was to visit them personally. So that is what Podell did.

Of course, the author’s stay was supervised and severely restricted as to what he was allowed to see, but he got clues just by making observations about his surroundings.

Read the book to learn the details of the travels of this James-Bond wannabe.

ENDNOTE: Those who are spreading hate-speech on Twitter are shaming themselves and their own countries– projecting a childish image for people such as Albert Podell, who want to learn about other cultures. As has been recently revealed by a probe led by Jim Jordan (Republican Congressman from Ohio), more of his own supporters launched mean-of-spirit Twitter attacks against the Democrats rather than vice versa. Here’s a little ditty that describes the situation.

OOH, TWITTER

sung to the tune of “Moon River” with apologies to Henry Mancini, Johnny Mercer and any other rights-holders this may concern.

Ooh, Twitter
both sides of the aisle, are sick of Jim Jordan today.

You deal-maker,
you reputation-breaker.

Name-callers need the trolling,
so they’re not GO-ing away.

Smearers and fibbers, angry at the world.
Their political aims are easy, to see.

It’s the same old pol-it-i-cal show, and,
what a huge waste of time,
on the taxpayers’ dime.

Ooh, Twitter, spare me.

Ooh, Twitter
both sides of the aisle, are sick of Jim Jordan today.

You deal-maker,
you reputation-breaker.

Name-callers need the trolling,
so they’re not GO-ing away.

Smearers and fibbers, angry at the world.
Their political aims are easy, to see.

It’s the same old pol-it-i-cal show, and,
what a huge waste of time,
on the taxpayers’ dime.

Ooh, Twitter, spare me.

Dobryd

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The Book of the Week is “Dobryd” by Ann Charney, published in 1996. Prior to WWII, the author’s Jewish family owned a house in Dobryd in the country of Poland. This suspenseful personal account described how the author and her immediate family survived and recovered from the traumas and deprivations of the war. Hint: they were not sent to a concentration camp. The book appeared to be credible although it lacked a detailed list of Notes, Sources, References, Bibliography and an index.

In the late summer of 1945, when they were informed the war was over, the author, her family, and fellow survivors were still starving to death. They savored the luxury of finding firewood in order to make a sauna of sorts, and “Occasionally someone would bring a few sugar cubes and then the evening would become a true party.” They entertained themselves by playing a harmonica and telling each other stories.

The author wrote about the ravages of the war: “I scarcely noticed the landscape of ruins we passed. It was simply the place where I lived, to be taken for granted.”

The author recounted an anecdote in which the Jewish survivors who moved into abandoned houses in Bylau (which has since been renamed; also in Poland) were distressed by a cultural misunderstanding. The Jewish relief agency had marked their houses with a red cross with the good intention of indicating they should receive food parcels. The emotionally-spent survivors assumed (wrongly this time) that yet again, “… the Poles were about to practice their traditional rite, the terrorizing and murder of Jews.”

Read the book to learn much more about the author’s experiences during and after the war, and how her family decided to start a new life in a place other than their homeland. For decades, occupying imperialist powers (Soviets and Germans especially) had repeatedly made them feel numbness, self-pity, rage and hatred. They knew that wasn’t going to change anytime soon.

Speaking of numbness, self-pity, rage and hatred, here is a song about the current emotional climate in the United States in connection with the spying going on. Hint: It is worse than ever.

Under presidents LBJ and Nixon, American males of military age were under constant threat their lives would be disrupted or prematurely ended due to a war.

Currently, the U.S. government is data-mining in a way that tracks where all Americans (innocent as well as guilty) are, what they are doing, and a lot of what they are saying– which makes every man, woman and child vulnerable to: defamation from the lies and smears of political vengeance, cancel culture, victimization with regard to financial and other crimes; not to mention, makes them subjected to feelings of violation– when the vast majority are truly innocent (never mind the small percentage of cases in which truly guilty sociopaths have hubris syndrome.)

I THINK I’LL PROBE YOU

sung to the tune of “I Think I Love You” with apologies to the Partridge Family, and to whoever owns the song’s intellectual property rights.

I’m reading, that public figures, have-no-privacy.

Like all at once, we’re naked,

from their desire to get even, make us pay.

Big Brother’s here to stay.

The Fourth Amendment is in shreds,

and HAS me seeing red.

The Patriot-ACT provisions said:

I think I’ll probe you! (I think I’ll probe you)

Our nosy, government gathers-our-data.

There’s too much to deal with.

They say we have an enemy within.

Without spies, the criminals win.

But political DONors profit more.

Against their-foes, leaders-SETtle scores.

Hey, there’s a Chinese balloon…

I think I’ll probe you! (I think I’ll probe you)

I think I’ll probe you!

So what are they so afraid of?
Their what-about-ism is tiresome.
Politics, there is no cure for.
I’ll acCUSE you, before you accuse me.
It’s a new McCarthy-Era today.
We’re all guinea pigs this way.

We can’t fight what we’re up against.

But we do know what it’s all about.

We’ve got so much to worry about.

Hey! I think I’ll probe you!

Really, there IS cause for worry.

Current alpha-MALES will never be happy.

And if you say “Hey, go away,” they won’t.

Reform this nation, they don’t.

We’d better elect NEW blood and MOVE on.

They’ve worn OUT their case.

They will probe you to your face.

And you don’t deserve that.

I think I’ll probe you! (I think I’ll probe you)

I think I’ll probe you! (I think I’ll probe you)…

Nice Guys Finish Last

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The Book of the Week is “Nice Guys Finish Last” by Leo Durocher with Ed Linn, published in 1975.

Durocher was born in 1906 in West Springfield, Massachusetts. He began his baseball career playing utility infielder for the New York Yankees in 1925. He developed a reputation as a contentious alpha male. Branch Rickey, one of his bosses through the decades, said he was a “… man with infinite capacity for immediately making a bad situation worse.”

Durocher squandered his initial $5,000 annual salary on clothing, food and nightclubs in New York City. Always in debt, he was a pool-hall hustler, too. But everyone wanted to be seen with him, as his social set consisted of celebrities who lived life in the fast lane.

According to the book (which appeared to be credible although it lacked Notes, Sources, References, and Bibliography) professional baseball culture for most of the twentieth century was mean-of-spirit, with alcohol-fueled violence. Team personnel such as Durocher were always thinking of new dirty tricks to win games.

Durocher admitted to trash-talking to batters to psych them out so his team’s pitcher would strike them out. Players suffered injuries galore due to lack of protective gear that would minimize or prevent injuries; batters especially suffered, as team-managers told their pitchers to deliberately hit batters with their pitching.

If hit, the batter was awarded the equivalent of a single as compensation. Durocher wrote, “I once saw Diz [pitcher Dizzy Dean] hit seven straight Giants [the baseball team players] in Miami early in the exhibition season, because the Giants had the nerve to score seven runs off him in one inning.” Finally, in 1940 (!), team-executive Larry MacPhail of the Brooklyn Dodgers ordered his players to wear plastic batting-helmets. This, after batter Joe Medwick was knocked out by a pitch by Bob Bowman of the Saint Louis Cardinals.

Durocher claimed that during the time he managed the Dodgers, MacPhail “fired” him zillions of times in the mid-1930’s, but most of the time, didn’t really mean it, until a tipping point was reached. As is well known, from the 1970’s into the 1980’s, the “You’re fired” situation became a running joke between Yankees owner George Steinbrenner and team manager Billy Martin, in order to entertain baseball fans.

Read the book to learn of other similar episodes, and trials and tribulations Durocher faced in his career (hint– major issues included his own newspaper column; the ongoing hostilities between the Yankees and the Dodgers; the media’s anti-Durocher lies and smears in its baseball reporting; punishments imposed by a few baseball commissioners over the years for alleged libel committed by, and gambling among, members of the ball clubs managed by Durocher; and a few of the colorful characters whom Durocher recruited and managed) and more. Curiously, Durocher failed to mention performance-enhancing drugs.

Anyway, speaking of contentious alpha males, here’s some advice for voters in this ditty concerning the 2024 candidates.

SHOW, NOT TELL

sung to the tune of “Express Yourself” (Official Video) with apologies to Madonna.

[spoken] C’mon America, do you want to see substance and quality in 2024? Of course you have something to SAY about it. That is how we roll.

Ignore the candidates’ bragfest, people.
Feel FREE to put them to the test.
You know, you know you’ve got to make them disPENSE with their spiel.
We want to KNOW their positions for REAL.

Politicians PULL the strings and THEY reap all the gold.

Their eight-year plan is way too vast.

You know, that never lasts, no, no.

What we need is a maTURE public-servant whose policies are smart and sound.
What we usually GET is a king on a throne, who’s abOVE the law and brings us down.

Ignore the candidates’ bragfest, people.
Feel FREE to put them to the test.
You know, you know you’ve got to make them disPENSE with their spiel.
We want to KNOW their positions for REAL.

Deep tax cuts are the way to your heart, but they treat you like an airHEAD. No, budget plans are NOT romantic. We’re hypoCRITically in the red.

Well, there’s no FREE lunch in life, it is TIME for the nation to move ON. Govern-ment should give you chances, but you’ve got to CRE-ate wealth on-your-OWN.

Ignore the candidates’ bragfest, people.
Feel FREE to put them to the test.
You know, you know you’ve got to make them disPENSE with their spiel.
We want to KNOW their positions for REAL.

De-STRESS yourselves. You’ve got to make them SHOW, not tell. Hey, hey, hey, hey.
To distinguish the greats, make them have the debates.
Show what they’ve GOT. We’ll see the best of the lot.

After all, you won’t reGRET it. Think about how much support they deserve.
If they don’t deserve it, they shouldn’t get it.
It’s YOU they should serve. So please

Show themselves. Show themselves. Hey, hey.

What we need is a maTURE public servant whose policies are smart and sound.
What we usually GET is a king on a throne, who’s above the law and brings us down.

After all, you won’t reGRET it. Think about how much support they deserve.
If they don’t deserve it, they shouldn’t get it.
It’s YOU they should serve. So please

Ignore the candidates’ bragfest, people.
Feel FREE to put them to the test.
You know, you know you’ve got to make them disPENSE with their spiel.
We want to KNOW their positions for REAL.

De-STRESS yourselves. You’ve got to make them SHOW, not tell. Hey, hey, hey, hey.
To distinguish the greats, make them have the debates.
Show what they’ve GOT. We’ll see the best of the lot.

SHOW themselves. SHOW themselves. Hey, hey.

To distinguish the greats, make them have the debates.
Show what they’ve GOT. We’ll see the best of the lot.

De-STRESS yourselves. ReSPECT yourselves…

Our House – BONUS POST

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Here’s a little ditty that summarizes events of the past week or so in the United States House of Representatives.

OUR HOUSE

sung to the tune of “Our House” with apologies to “Madness” (the band).

McCarthy sold-his-SOUL, feeling pressed.

Reps are tired, they need a rest.

The committees are plotting beHIND closed doors.

The Caucus’s power took a LEAP. [ah-ah-ah]

Biden holds an olive branch, his legacy is now.

Our House, in the middle of the heat.

Our House, in the middle of the–

The Caucus was uncowed.

Males are always power-struggling and they’re usually quite proud.

The Speaker went-fifTEEN-rounds.

Only concessions slowed him down but defeat was not allowed.

Our House, in the middle of the heat.
Our House, in the middle of the–

Our House, in the middle of the heat.

Our House [Tabloids tell us that the radicals took hold of it.]

in the middle of the–

McCarthy rejected-the-Jan.-6 panel’s work.

His base didn’t know, whom to desert.

Then he wanted to probe the probers.

See him long-to-stay where Trump’s YOKE is. [ah ah ah]

Pelosi’s the one they’re going to miss in lots of ways.

Our House, in the middle of the heat.
Our House, in the middle of the–

[I remember way back when, men had honor

and the world didn’t have so very MANY spies.

No more PRIvate lives.

Such a FREE time.

And I remember how we’d live, simply face to face,

used our brains.

Software wouldn’t come between us.

No Tweeters.]

McCarthy sold-his-SOUL, feeling pressed.
Reps are tired, they need a rest.
The committees are plotting beHIND closed doors.
The Caucus’s power took a LEAP. [ah-ah-ah]
Biden holds an olive branch, his legacy is now.

Our House, in the middle of the heat.

Our House, in the middle of the–

Our House, we need IT for demo-cracy.

Our House, in the middle of the heat.

Our House, that is where some people sleep.

Our House…

A Primate’s Memoir

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“Hearty, strong, large people who ate like hogs and worked like mad and filled their few leisure hours with hexes and witchcraft and clan feuds and revenge curses.”

No, not American political workers.

The above described the tribes such as Masai and Kisii– born in British East Africa. According to the book (which appeared to be credible although it lacked an extensive list of detailed sources, and an index), the warrior-tribes fought against each other, and on behalf of Britain during the world wars and against other tribes in Tanzania, Somalia and Uganda, near the Kenya borders, into the late twentieth century.

The Book of the Week is “A Primate’s Memoir, A Neuroscientist’s Unconventional Life Among the Baboons” by Robert M. Sapolsky, published in 2001.

Starting in 1979, on and off, over the course of fifteen years, the author began observing a 63-member troop of baboons in Kenya. He learned about every aspect of their lifestyles. He made many errors in attempting to acquire experience anesthetizing them in order to test their bodily fluids and excretions. He finally learned how to shoot a tranquilizer dart from a blowgun, but even that had its complications.

The author also gathered a vast quantity of knowledge about the Masai tribe in the village. The women there were voicing their opinion that their children should receive a formal education. However, at that time, there were no supplies, no teachers, and most school buildings could be tens of miles away from villages. Even when progress was made on that front, the Masai men used their children’s school fees to buy alcohol.

The men felt entitled to be leaders in their communities, where they did almost no work. Herding cows and goats and deriving food from the animals was the mainstay of the Masai economy. The women did the housework and childcare; the boys did the herding until they became men, and in their late twenties, they were considered village-elders deserving of respect.

The Masai associated the author– a white male in his twenties– with someone who was knowledgeable about providing medical treatment to their people. He looked all official, with a box of bandages and a stethoscope. So he was pressured into dispensing the few drugs he had for a few different maladies, such as chloroquine for malaria and antibiotics for eye infections.

After a couple of years of graduate-school fieldwork, the author noted that there was no clear-cut “second banana” to the alpha male of the baboon troop. In fighting, the males bit each other using their sharp canine teeth in addition to pummeling each other with their fists.

As the years went by, two lower-level males– afraid of the top leader– formed alliances, but the leader was still sufficiently physically powerful to dominate them. The two allied with a third male, but all three were still too weak to stand up to the top baboon. They partnered with an old-timer male. It took a little longer for the boss to put them down. Finally, six males banded together and defeated the alpha male.

Read the book to learn much, much more about the lifestyles of the baboons, the Masai, and about how powerful-people were never caught and punished for knowingly spreading a plague among some baboons (Hint: “The meat was dutifully sold [by the Masai to the butcher], everyone became sick. The police came to investigate…”)

As can be seen from the aforementioned, the baboons have a social system largely similar to humans’. Here’s a little ditty one alpha male (Donald Trump) is singing now.

NO ONE WILL EVER

sung to the tune of “Nobody Told Me” with apologies to the Estate of John Lennon.

My foes are always talking. What they say is absurd.

America, I love. About you I really care.

There’s Socialists in the White House. Now we have Wall Street bears.

The IRS is out to get me. But my campaign is going on.

I always have something cooking. I foil all their evil plots.

They sent us disease from China. I started the Wall we’ve got.

No one will ever bring me to my knees.

Kudos to me. Kudos to me.

In ’24 I’m runnin’. No one else has made a move.

I’LL be the winner. I’ve still got lots to prove.

I’m a big super hero to all who are good and true.

Everybody’s on a witch hunt, and hauling me into court.

I’m a privileged leader. That’s my retort.

I belong in a million movies. But too bad. Life is short.

No one will ever bring me to my knees.

Kudos to me. Most excellent, MAGA.

The economy’s doing poorly. Prices are getting HIGH.

The liberals are crying. They’re eating humble pie.

All of them are liars, and I ain’t too surprised.

No one will ever bring me to my knees.

Kudos to me. Most excellent, MAGA. Whoa.

The Good American

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The Book of the Week is “The Good American, The Epic Life of Bob Gersony, the U.S. Government’s Greatest Humanitarian” by Robert D. Kaplan, published in 2021.

Despite the sensationalist title, this large volume recounted the adventures of an international aid consultant. The author described how Gersony actually did the difficult, dangerous, rigorous work involved in assessing conditions “on the ground” during times of strife– all the gory details– in the world’s still-developing countries, during several American presidential administrations. In the Reagan Era, most of the tens of territories Gersony visited were in Latin America. He truly strove to get at the truth, regardless of his political bosses’ strategic interests.

Gersony often freelanced for USAID, interviewing refugees or peoples suffering from very common life-threatening situations of Third-World places: dictatorial oppression, ethnic or religious violence, atrocities, genocide; then generating a report that recommended how to allocate funds in assisting those peoples. Suggestions might include educational programs or building infrastructure involving transportation, medicine, water, etc., that improved the recipients’ quality of life.

In 1988, in a rare instance, Gersony’s influence actually reversed America’s plan to aid a political militia supported by Angola’s leader, Jonas Savimbi. That militia, RENAMO, was committing atrocities against people in Mozambique. It was fighting a rival group, FRELIMO.

But various officials, including president Reagan, senators Jesse Helms and Bob Dole, aide Pat Buchanan, UN ambassador Jeane Kirkpatrick and CIA director William Casey supported Savimbi anyway because he was anti-Communist. As is well known, the Reagan administration tended to turn a blind eye to extreme human rights abuses if there was a chance Soviet influence could be contained in the region.

For example, the United States funded violent groups in (to name just a few troublesome places where Communism might have taken root were it not for heroic “freedom fighters”): Afghanistan (for decades!), Nicaragua and Angola; never mind the resulting countless, needless deaths and ruined lives. To be fair, other American presidents (after the Communist threat was greatly reduced) have also used (misallocated?) billions of taxpayer dollars in top-secret projects for the purposes of allegedly reducing threats to democracy from conflicts over fossil fuels, nuclear weapons and in cyberspace.

At any rate, in refugee camps, Gersony interviewed 196 Mozambicans who had fled the violence. He was able to convince key people in the Reagan administration to put the kibosh on funding RENAMO. For a change, concern for peoples’ well-being trumped attempts to contain Soviet influence through strong-arm tactics. Unsurprisingly, the aforesaid Jesse Helms and the Washington Times were less than thrilled.

Read the book to learn of many episodes in which Gersony’s attempts to sway American foreign aid decisions toward a humane approach– through providing recent, accurate forest-and-trees analyses– were frustrated. Nonetheless, every situation was super-complicated by geopolitics, though the media often oversimplified stories with sensationalist propaganda meant to (excuse the cliche) sell papers. Along these lines, here’s a little ditty that liberal news-junkies sing:

WHENEVER PUSH COMES TO SHOVE

sung to the tune of “The Things We Do For Love” with apologies to 10cc.

Too many OPpressed people have-been sold, down the river.
Too many power-hungry men, too much greed.
When leaders lay their bets, we-all PAY the price.

WhenEVer push-comes to shove.
WhenEVer push-comes to shove.

Arming fighters is NOT always the answer.
They whip up panic that we’re in the danger zone.
Violence has turned, and the media’s GONE to town.

WhenEVer push-comes to shove.
WhenEVer push-comes to shove.

Like wading in their predecessor’s muck
and they’re out of luck,
and they can’t change horses in mid-stream.
They’re lookin’ for reelection in a short time.
They think they’ll compromise, but they fool enough people with lies.

Ooh, you make me cynical. Ooh, stop your POWer play.
Ooh, I’ll vote against you. Human-rights today!

Ooh, you make me cynical. Ooh, stop your POWer play.
Ooh, I’ll vote against you. Human rights today!

Transparency MIGHT help the situation.
You can’t fool all the people, all of the time.

Make America KIND again.

WhenEVer push-comes to shove.
WhenEVer push-comes to shove.

WhenEVer push-comes to shove.
WhenEVer push-comes to shove…

Did Elon Musk Lose Your Favor – BONUS POST

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As is well known, the messaging-clutter in the United States has reached a screaming crescendo. Here’s a question in connection with the tenor of the times.

DID ELON MUSK LOSE YOUR FAVOR

sung to the tune of “Does Your Chewing Gum Lose Its Flavor” [1961 Hits Archive] with apologies to the estate of Lonnie Donegan.

Oh [bleep], oh [bleep], oh you.
Whatever shall we do?
And YET one more bleep.
The question is so deep.
At stake is big-time dough.
Politicos want to know,
the pollsters’ Twitter question:
Is it yes or is it no?

Did E-LON Musk lose your favor by poor judgement overnight?
If the critics say just quit it,
do you keep your account in spite?
Do you seek out all the radicals?
Do you follow the Left or Right?
Did E-LON Musk lose your favor by poor judgement overnight?

Here he COMES with excessive pride.
His atTORNeys by his side.
THOSE lies and smears
everywhere are stoking fears
that our country could be wrecked.
But free speech is guaranteed,
and as Musk has trouble with control, he wants to take the LEAD.

Now the nation’s split in two.
Democracy will come through,
at every level, yeah, every single level.
Each side keeps the other in check.
We do it with Big Tech.
The most influential voices keep the candidates neck and neck.

If a price tag’s made of a price,
what’s a hashtag made of? [Boom, boom]

By poor judgement overnight?

You’re the best, and Twitter loves you, and it wants to make things right.
It’s going to be the most trendy, uncensored social media site.

By poor judgement overnight?

A spade is a spade and
a fact is a fact.
He’d sing another chorus but
he’s afraid of getting hacked.

By poor judgement overnight? Yeah!

Due Process – BONUS POST

As can be seen lately, due process for removing politicians from office in Britain, starkly contrasts with that in the United States.

Liz Truss herself wasn’t accused of committing any crimes. Her wrongdoing consisted of spouting empty rhetoric, and drafting unpopular budget plans. She wasn’t a shameless megalomaniac hiding behind an army of attorneys, so she was pressured into resigning (!)

Here’s a little ditty that explains why former president Donald Trump stayed a full four years, while Truss lasted only weeks.

DUE PROCESS IN THE FREE WORLD

sung to the tune of “Rockin’ in the Free World” with apologies to Neil Young.

There’s fighting in the States, between red and blue.
There’s chaos in Great Britain, and a leadership coup.
America learned a lesson on the road behind.
OUR former leader was accused of crimes.
Some SAW Trump as Satan but his PR was so good.
He acted like a god any way he could.

Evolving due process in the free world.
Evolving due process in the free world.
Evolving due process in the free world.
Evolving due process in the free world.

I saw accuSA-tions everywhere: tax evasion, accounting fraud.
Hush money, quid-pro-quo, in-trigue a-broad.
Trump’s lawyers delayed, but he could still take a hit.
Look at his life– and the PATterns in it.

There’s one more leader who’s played many for fools,
who harnessed discontent, who broke all the rules.

Evolving due process in the free world.
Evolving due process in the free world.
Evolving due process in the free world.
Evolving due process in the free world.

We got a thousand-lawyer fight, for every powerful man.
For the rich, an easier litigation hand.
We got courts galore and Presidential Papers.
Got the Supreme Court for the elite players.
Elected an alpha male to lead a nation in decline.
He had legal fees to burn.
He refused to resign.

Evolving due process in the free world.
Evolving due process in the free world.
Evolving due process in the free world.
Evolving due process in the free world.

Burn Rate

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The Book of the Week is “Burn Rate, Launching A Startup and Losing My Mind” by Andy Dunn, published in 2022. Born in February 1979 in the United States, the author won the lottery in that he had family and friends who knew him well enough to recognize that, given his personality, his behavior was anomalous. He was doubly lucky that not only did he get mental-health treatment before he ended up in jail (well, at least on one occasion) or in the cemetery, but also, he could (with assistance from others) afford it.

“… for many, even a ‘chill’ drug like marijuana can stimulate a manic episode.” The author got to college still unaware that bipolar disorder (aka manic-depressive illness) ran in his family; his grandmother had had it. People who actually have the condition suffer under a Damocles sword their whole lives, as their mental state goes through unpredictable cycles, even with medication. Of course, stress exacerbates the highs and lows. The medication has side effects that are meant to dull the emotions, so bipolar patients don’t experience and enjoy life as much as people whose brain chemicals are more stable than theirs.

According to the book (which appeared to be credible although it lacked Notes, Sources, References, or Bibliography and an index), while in college, the author was ingesting alcohol and controlled substances such as ecstasy, magic mushrooms and marijuana on a daily basis, and taking the (radical) acne medication Accutane. Somehow, he graduated anyway, and got his MBA at Stanford. He explained that the professors there educated students in entrepreneurship, if they wanted to go that route. The author did.

After years of interesting ups and downs, in 2016, the author– a lifelong fan of the Chicago Cubs (who had last been World Series winners in 1908)– was afforded the opportunity to see game 7 of the World Series in Cleveland. But first, he had to rush to JFK airport from the streets in the East 50’s in Manhattan, beginning an hour before his plane took off, to get there. His cab driver did 90 MPH. Sympathetic people at the airport made way for him when they heard about his situation.

Read the book to learn of the author’s other trials and tribulations, triumphs and defeats. Speaking of defeats…

This is the song Hillary Clinton is singing now.

IN POST-CLINTON TIME

sung to the tune of “Sunny Afternoon” (Official Audio) with apologies to the Kinks.

My opponents BEAT me the last two times.
Deplorables and BERnie were unkind.
I SOREly miss the Situation Room.
And though I CAN-not be in charge,
I’m not locked up, I’m still at-large.
All I WANT’S in-the Situation Room.

Save me, save me, save me
from bad publicity.
I’ve got lots of enemies.
It’s a VAST right-wing conspiracy.

And I love to hobnob with elites,
brag about my political feats.
I SOREly miss the Situation Room,
in post-Clinton time,
in post-Clinton time,
in post-Clinton time.

Donald Trump’s ruined my rep.
He’s in his safehouse doing ’24 prep,
spewing the usUAL blather and cruelty.
Now I’m here online,
doing the grass-roots, make-work grind.
I SOREly miss the Situation Room.

Help me, help me, help me
revive my ca-reer.
Well, give my Party money
to get me out of here.

‘Cause I love to hobnob with elites,
brag about my political feats.
I sorely miss the Situation Room,
in post-Clinton time,
in post-Clinton time,
in post-Clinton time.

Ah, save me, save me, save me
from bad publicity.
I’ve got lots of enemies.
It’s a VAST right-wing conspiracy.

And I love to hobnob with elites,
brag about my political feats.
I SOREly miss the Situation Room,
in post-Clinton time,
in post-Clinton time,
in post-Clinton time,
in post-Clinton time,
in post-Clinton time.

Disoriented

[Please note: The word “Featured” on the left side above was NOT inserted by this blogger, but apparently was inserted by WordPress, and it cannot be removed. NO post in this blog is sponsored.]

The Book of the Week is “Disoriented, Two Strange Years in China as Unexpected Expats” by Howard Goodman and Ellen Goodman, published in 2014.

In the autumn of 2009, Howard, a journalist, moved to Shanghai to work for the newspaper, Shanghai Daily. His wife Ellen went with him. They weren’t allowed access to social media, but as foreigners, they were able to get satellite TV channels HBO, CNN and BBC Worldwide Service. Ordinary Chinese people weren’t allowed access to any idiot-box information unsupervised by their government.

Anyway, unpredictably, channels were occasionally blacked-out due to censorship. Further, Howard was continually frustrated by government censorship of his employer’s product. Nevertheless, they were floored by Shanghai’s super-fast completion of construction on buildings and infrastructure that began in the late 1990’s.

According to the book (which appeared to be credible although it lacked Notes, Sources, References, or Bibliography and an index), in a few short years, an efficient, shiny high-speed rail line graced the skyline.

BUT, “It didn’t take long for one of the two new bullet trains to crash in Zhejiang Province, killing forty people and injuring nearly two hundred. In the aftermath, the Railway Ministry was revealed to be a pit of kickbacks, corruption, construction shortcuts, and debt, skimming profits and shortchanging safety.” Americans like to think the United States, unlike China, is NOT as greedy, power-hungry and lawless as all that.

Americans also like to think that their own country WOULDN’T ban all of its media from revealing ugly truths about itself in the interest of image-management (also called “optics”) the way China’s government did. In 2010, China didn’t televise the Nobel Peace Prize awards-ceremony because a then-imprisoned Chinese dissident was the winner. Howard’s newspaper did a workaround– reporting that the Foreign Ministry: was livid about awarding a prize to a dissident, and blasted Norway as the venue of the ceremony.

The United States government is currently grappling with Big Tech’s ability to control free speech. There is great difficulty in deciding where to draw the line when a man as provocative as a “Father Coughlin” type comes along and his power surpasses that of just national radio commentator. Obviously, there are worldwide repercussions if he is a world leader.

Along these lines, here’s a song most ordinary Americans are singing right now:

WOULDN’T IT BE NICE
sung to the tune of “Wouldn’t It Be Nice” with apologies to the Beach Boys.

Wouldn’t it be nice if our-courts-were nonpartisan,
then respect for justice would be strong.

And why don’t we apPLY the law-for-all,
then we’d have a better world ‘ere long.

Resolving conflicts makes us that much better.
We can’t possibly let violence stay, unfettered.

Wouldn’t it be nice if officials could take up,
all the issues IMportant to you,
and we’d get to have a say together, in our town halls,
we CAN see matters through.

But in recent decades we’ve seen hating.
We should ditch the rallies, and demand, real-debating.

Oh wouldn’t it be nice?

Maybe if, we lose the patronage and corruption,
we wouldn’t have to SUE.

Maybe then, we’d be rid of dangerous loudmouths, whose time should be through.

Please ignore THEIR rants. Please ignore THEIR rants.
Reform campaign FI-nance! Reform campaign FI-nance!

Oh, wouldn’t it be nice?

You know it seems the more we read world history,
the less the current situA-tion’s a mystery. So let’s READ world history.

Wouldn’t it be nice?
Bah-bah-bah-bah-bah-bah bop, bah-bah-bah-bah-bah-bah bop,
bah-bah-bah-bah-bah-bah bop, bah-bah-bah-bah-bah-bah bop…

***

Anyway, read the book to learn a wealth of information on what daily life was like for American expats in Shanghai and Hong Kong at the start of the 2010’s, and about the authors’ employment adventures, too.