Teabaggers, Their Philosophy, And Its Unintended Consequences...

Hello again everyone! I hope everyone is doing well and still has their health (because having a job might be a little too much to ask.)
The topic of today's "rant" is the Tea Party, its philosophy, and the unintended consequences of that philosophy.
We all know that the Tea Party, or as I like to derisively call them, the "Teabaggers" (if you don't know what "teabagging" is, look it up on Google [trust me, to call someone a teabagger is NOT a compliment]), are a group of people upset that their fascist agenda has been derailed by the fact that a moderately liberal Democrat occupies the White House. Now the fact that most of this hand wringing by the teabaggers is primarily due to the fact that the occupant of the White House is Black (or African-American, if you prefer), has nothing to do with what I am about to speak about. While the racist element is a big part of teabagger philosophy (see their attitude toward Mexicans and Latinos in general), that is not the part of their philosophy I wish to address.
The part of their philosophy that I wish to address has to do with their espoused Libertarianism. Libertarians like to believe in something called "rugged individualism." Rugged individualism is the idea that people should make their own way in life with no help whatsoever from the government. In other words, if you lose your job and are starving, rugged individualism dictates that you should become homeless and starve to death rather than ask the government for aid such as food stamps. You should become homeless and starve because according to rugged individualism, and the teabaggers, it isn't the government's problem that you lost your job (even though your job loss probably wasn't your fault) and cannot feed yourself. The teabaggers add to this tenant that the reason that you can't get a new job isn't because the economy is in the shitter due to eight years of the Republicans raping it for their and their rich patrons' gain, but simply because you are LAZY. That's right, no one is willing to hire you because you are LAZY, not because there are few jobs to be had. Apparently, according to the teabaggers, unemployment isn't an economic condition, it is a character flaw. This lack of economic understanding is one of the first things that alarms me about the teabagger movement. These people want to lead our country. They want to take control of one of the world's largest and most complex economic systems, and yet they don't have the faintest idea of how that economy works. They bandy about slogans like "Buy American," but they haven't a clue as to how the world economy is integrated to such a degree that it is nearly impossible to buy something that is made solely and wholly in the US.
Another tenant of teabagger philosophy is that all spending on domestic infrastructure should cease. However, at the same time, the teabaggers believe that the domestic economy should grow. Once again this indicates that the uneducated leaders of the teabagger movement have no clue as to how economic growth and infrastructure improvements are interrelated. Way back in the 1800's, before America was an expanding country with an expanding economy, businessmen and the government wanted to expand their markets. The economy at the time was primarily regional rather than national. Businessmen wanted to expand the regions in which they did business to improve their profits. The government also wanted to expand the economy so that they could collect increased tax revenues and so that they could provide the citizenry with increased economic opportunity and access to the improved good and services that expanded businesses would provide. The solution to this desire to expand the economy was to improve domestic infrastructure. At first, this consisted of paving existing roads with, primarily, stones. Later, the national road system was expanded, followed by the digging of canals, then the railroads came along, and finally asphalt paved roads and the national interstate system we are familiar with today. At all stages of this improvement, the government spent money on domestic infrastructure by improving existing structures and building new additions. Now let us look at what the teabaggers would do. First of all, by stopping spending on infrastructure, countless highway and transportation workers would be thrown out of work, thus adding to an already flagging economy (just what we needed, more unemployment). Then, as less money was sent to the states for the purposes of upgrading infrastructure, roads would begin to deteriorate, bridges would begin to fail, and if left in place long enough, the economy would grind to even more of a halt due to the fact that you couldn't ship good from their place of manufacture to the existing markets. That means that, if you live in, say, Pennsylvania, and you need tires for your car, and those tires are manufactured in Ohio, you are shit out of luck since most of the interstate between PA and OH will be potholed beyond drivability, not to mention that most of the bridges between here and there will have collapsed due to lack of maintenance. On top of that, you won't be able to afford those tires because you won't be able to get to work since the roads you take will have long since fallen in to such a state of disrepair as to be all but impassable. But hey, if this is your idea of improving the US, just vote for those clueless teabaggers come November 2nd.
On top of this, services currently provided by the government such as school lunch programs, the Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) nutritional programs, Aid to Families with Dependent Children, Food Stamps, and just about anything that doesn't benefit big business or the military, will be ended by the teabagger agenda. If you want to see mass poverty and starvation on a scale not seen since the Great Depression, vote for the teabaggers. If you want to see the US turned into a third world country where the rich and big business can do anything they like, regardless of what the law says, vote for the teabaggers. If you want an employer to be able to work you 80 hours a week with no overtime, if you want to work for a few cents an hour with no minimum wage, if you want no unemployment insurance, if you want your Social Security to be invested in the stock market with no protection against market crashes, if you want no Workman's compensation protections should you get hurt on the job, if you want no paid holidays, if you want to be a slave to big business with little or no protections against unjust firings, if you want no leisure time whatsoever, then vote for the teabaggers. The above are all things that the teabagger movement has vowed to abolish, curtail, or enact if they are elected. These jerkoffs claim to be pro-American, they claim to want to improve the country, but their policies are anything but pro-American or improvement oriented. Instead, their policies will turn this country into a third world banana republic with untold riches for big business and the already rich and crushing poverty for the average person.
The teabaggers like to say that the national debt is the highest ever and that this will turn us into a third world country. Wrong (as usual). The uneducated, and frankly, dumb as dogshit leaders of the teabaggers can't even get simple numbers right. That or they are just outright lying. Which one is it guys, stupidity or lies? The current debt as a percentage of GDP, according to the Congressional Budget Office is 62%. The record, also according to the CBO, occurred in 1946 with the debt being 109% of GDP. Gee another item that Beck, Palin, and the teabaggers got wrong.
I hope and pray that people will see that the supposed "experts", like Beck, Palin, most Fox News talking heads, and the teabaggers are nothing more than shills for a new neo-fascist agenda. I hope and pray that people will wake up and see that these folks are more anti-American, and can do greater damage to this country, than all of the terrorists in the world. After all, these folks are espousing a return to the failed policies of the Bush Administration. The same policies that lead us into this recession/depression in the first place. Why in the world would anyone want to return to those policies, and why in the world would anyone with half a brain want to vote for a movement that espouses policies that will lead us to being a third world nation. Why would anyone want to vote for a bunch of uneducated rednecks who believe that the Constitution is something that says what they want it to say, not what it actually says, and who believe that the body of Constitutional law (all of the Supreme Court decisions regarding the meaning of the Constitution) is, in itself, unconstitutional? Mark my words, if the teabaggers come to power, blogs like this will be outlawed, and I will end up in prison, or in a camp with "Work makes you free" hung over the door, and all because I disagree, and am vocal in my disagreement, with the new teabagger master race.
Wake the fuck up America!
As always, I am Chuck and this has been my rant. Oh, and if you teabaggers are so smart, how about a debate on politics and history in a public forum where I can show exactly how inferior your sub-100 IQ's are compared to my 170+. What say you?

Talk About Bizarre!

Howdy everyone. I hope you are all in good health and doing well.

Today's title comes from what has to be the most bizarre story I've read in a long while. According to a report in The Guardian (UK), there seems to be an ultra-nationalist movement afoot in Mongolia. It would seem that somehow, some way, neo-Nazism has taken hold among Mongolians who fear that China may be preparing to take them over. I'd write more on the story, but I am, having just read the story, still in a state of disbelief. Here is a link to the story.

I am Chuck and this has been a short rant. To paraphrase one "Joliet" Jake Blues, "Mongolian Nazis?!!? I hate Mongolian Nazis!"

The Assassin's Gone.

Hello again everyone. I trust that everyone is getting by (I'd say doing well, but unless you've just hit the lottery, I don't know too many folks who are doing well in this economy.)

Today brings a sad post to the Rant. Yesterday, 28 July 2010, one of the truly great safeties in the history of the NFL passed away. I speak, of course, of Jack "The Assassin" Tatum. Mr. Tatum (and if you ever saw him play, you had better call him "Mr"!!) died of a massive heart attack in an Oakland, CA hospital. According to various reports, Mr Tatum had also been battling diabetes and other health issues at the time of his death.
Born John David Tatum on 18 November 1948 in Cherryville, NC, the young Mr Tatum grew up in Passaic, NJ. He didn't get involved in football until he started playing for Passaic High School. Mr. Tatum was gifted enough to be recruited by Ohio State's legendary Woody Hayes. Hayes recruited Tatum as a running back. Another legendary coach, Lou Holtz, convinced Hayes to move Tatum to defensive back where Tatum excelled. While playing DB for Ohio State, Tatum became a two time All American, helped OSU to a National Championship in 1968, and was named National Defensive Player of the Year in 1970. As a tribute to the ferocity of his hits, Ohio State gives the Jack Tatum Hit of the Week Award to one of its players after every game.
Jack Tatum was the 19th pick (overall) of the 1971 NFL draft. He was taken by the Oakland Raiders where he encountered another coaching legend, John Madden. From his first game in a Raider uniform, Tatum began to establish his reputation as a hard hitter. In that first game, against the then Baltimore Colts, Tatum knocked out two Colts tight ends (not one, but TWO, and in his first NFL game no less!!!!) Tatum went on to play 9 seasons with the Raiders. In that period, he started 106 of 120 games, had 30 interceptions, and helped the Raiders to win their first Superbowl title 32-14 over the Minnesota Vikings on 9 January 1977. Tatum played his 10th and final season with the Houston Oilers in 1980.
During his time with the Raiders, Tatum was also involved in two of the most memorable plays in NFL history. The legendary "Immaculate Reception", and the tragic paralyzing of New England Patriots wide receiver Daryl Stingley.
The hit on Stingley took place during a preseason game between the Raiders and the Patriots at Oakland Coliseum on 12 August 1978. On the play in question, Stingley had cut inside and lunged to attempt to catch a pass. Tatum, who was coming the opposite way at full speed, met Stingley while Stingley was off balance and leaning forward. The ensuing hit broke Stingley's fourth and fifth vertebrae and damaged his spinal cord, leaving Stingley a quadriplegic. Over time, Stingley regained limited use of his body, but was wheelchair bound until his death in 2007. Despite the intervening years, Tatum never apologized for the hit, and Stingley and Tatum never reconciled. According to sources close to Tatum, the failure to apologize to Stingley and the realization by Tatum that he ended another player's career and nearly killed him, had a great impact on Tatum, driving him to become a near recluse for a number of years.
The other legendary play Tatum was involved in was the "Immaculate Reception." The play took place on 23 December 1972 during an AFC Divisional playoff game between the Oakland Raiders and the Pittsburgh Steelers at Three Rivers Stadium. The Raiders had just completed a scoring drive to give them the lead 7-6. The Steelers were facing a 4 and 10 from their own 40 with 22 seconds left on the clock and no time outs. Bradshaw took the snap from center, dropped back, and under great pressure, threw the ball to Steelers halfback Frenchy Fuqua who was at the Raiders' 35 yard line. Tatum met Fuqua at the same time as the ball arrived. The ball bounced off Fuqua or Tatum or both (depending on who you were rooting for) and was caught by Steelers running back Franco Harris just before the ball hit the ground. Harris then ran the ball in for a touchdown giving the Steelers a 12-7 lead. The play was initially signaled a touchdown by one official and after a huddle by the officials and a phone call by the Referee to clarify the rules, the play was confirmed as a touchdown. The Steelers kicked the extra point and went on to win their first playoff victory ever by a score of 13 to 7. Neither Tatum nor Fuqua has ever stated specifically what happened during the play. Tatum claimed that he didn't know what happened, that he was just trying to tear Fuqua's head off and, for his part, Fuqua has claimed, "I know exactly (what happened on the play). What happened on that play was truly immaculate." NFL Films has called the Immaculate Reception the greatest, and most controversial, play in NFL history. To this day, John Madden, then coach of the Raiders, claims that the ball hit the ground before Harris caught it. (For a full and detailed description of the Immaculate Reception see the Wikipedia entry for it, here.

In his later years, Tatum battled diabetes, losing several toes and eventually a leg to the disease. Tatum also set up a charitable foundation in the Columbus, OH area to help kids fight diabetes and had, up until his death, raised over $1.4 million.
Tatum was also a published author. He wrote three books detailing his career, “They Call Me Assassin” in 1980, “They Still Call Me Assassin: Here We Go Again” in 1989, and “Final Confessions of an NFL Assassin” in 1996.

Mr. Tatum leaves behind a wife, Denise, and three children.
Jack Tatum was 61.

As always, I am Chuck and this has been my rant. My sincerest condolences go out to the Tatum family during this sad time.

I'm Back With Truly Alarming News.

Hello again everyone. I trust that you are all either rich and famous, or you are being crushed by the weight of 30 years worth of Republican economics (in other words, poor). I know that you aren't middle class.
How do I know that you aren't middle class? Well, take a look at this article on Yahoo. THE ARTICLE. And now you know how I know that you're not middle class.

Folks, the sheer fact of the matter is that the loss of the middle class is not the work of the Democrats, or the Obama Administration. The erosion of the middle class has been occurring ever since Reagan introduced the "Trickle Down" theory of economics. The idea in Trickle Down economics is that as the rich get richer, they invest that wealth in the financial markets (stocks, bonds, etc). As the rich invest in stocks, companies find that they now have more capital to work with and, subsequently, they can expand operations, hire new workers, and, generally, make the economy grow, which will have the beneficial effect of higher wages and benefits for the average Joe (due to a limited labor pool and higher demand for that pool).

Unfortunately, Trickle Down economics ignores two vital components of any capitalist economy, greed and limited demand for any product that any company produces. Let's start with limited demand, ok? In any economic market, demand for a product will be limited by it's cost and by the number of consumers who need or want the product. As an example, let's say you make widgets (economists love widgets). Let's also say that you make the finest widgets on the market and therefore you charge a bit more for them than the crap widgets from China. By pricing your widget above that of the Chinese widgets, you limit the number of people who can afford to buy your widgets. We'll say that your widgets cost $100 versus $75 for the Chinese version. Now we will say that the average widget buyer has $300 to spend on widgets, food, rent, etc. The average widget buyer will most likely buy the Chinese widget due to cost (if he spent all of his money on widgets, he could get 4 Chinese widgets as opposed to only 3 of your widgets). As consumers, we have been taught either through our parents, our education, or real world experiences to shop around for the best bargain possible. We are also taught that sometimes the best bargain isn't the least expensive item, but the item which offer the best value for money. Thus if you make widgets that break after 5 uses and the Chinese widget breaks after 5 uses, the Chinese one will be a better bargain, and more people will purchase it. However, if your widget breaks after 10 uses and the Chinese one breaks after 5 uses, then your higher priced widget is a better bargain (yours: $10 per use vs China: $15 per use) and, subsequently, consumers will pick your widget. However, there comes a point where, no matter the cost, everyone who needs, wants, or can afford a widget will have obtained one. At this point, your widget company, as well as the Chinese widget maker's, will start to experience downturn in the demand for widgets. As a result, you won't have to make as many widgets to supply the lesser demand. If you don't have to make as many widgets to satisfy the market demand, you will also experience a drop in profits. When a company's profits drop, people get laid off. When people get laid off, the labor pool increases and wages begin to shrink due to greater supply but lesser demand for the labor in the pool. That wage shrinkage means that fewer people will be able to afford to buy your higher priced widgets, which means less profit for your company, which means more lay offs. Trickle Down economics completely ignores this component of the market place. It offers no solution to a downturn in the economy. Trickle Down only works if the economy is already running at a high level. Trickle Down worked during the economic boom of the 1980s because consumer confidence was high and subsequently people spent their money freely. When the economy went to shit in the early 90s, people curtailed their free spending ways and we had a recession. The same economic model that made Reagan look like a genius made George HW Bush look like an inept moron. Why you ask. Simply put, the market was saturated by consumer good that we didn't want or need. When people realized that they could live without $150 sneakers, and bought a $30 pair, retailers started to feel a pinch in their profits and began to jettison unnecessary staff. On top of all this, real wages actually shrank in the period from 1981 until 1991 due to the change over from a manufacturing economy to a service economy. The wages didn't shrink by a vast amount, but it was enough to make people have to think about what they bought. This was coupled with the fact that the rich started to pull their money out of stocks and put it into safer investments (like Treasury bonds and gold), meant that companies had less money to put into wages, and thus wages shrank and people got laid off. Trickle Down never anticipated that the rich weren't about to lose money on a deal. It viewed the rich as benefactors when in fact, the rich are normal human beings with lots of money that they want to hang on to. If you inherited your money, you might be a little free with it, but if you earned your money, you're going to do everything possible to hold on to it and to make more if you can. Trickle Down economics never anticipated that someone might be somewhat greedy. It never anticipated that the rich might want to make more money off the backs of the working man. The tax breaks granted to the rich under the Trickle Down theory were supposed to be invested in things that would make the economy stronger. Instead, the rich pocketed the money that they saved through the tax breaks and, in most cases, moved that money into off shore banks (where they could hide it). They also took the profits that they had made on their investments, and instead of reinvesting it, moved the money out of the country.

After George HW Bush left office, Clinton got the economy going again by relaxing the lending rules for obtaining a mortgage, and by allowing the banks to now invest in the stock market (that is normal banks, not investment banks who were allowed to invest all along.) The problem with Clinton's plan was that by encouraging a relaxation of the rules regarding mortgage lending, banks were lured into making loans to people who couldn't afford to pay them back. At first, this wasn't a big deal. Then, as the rule of supply and demand kicked in, real estate prices started to trend upward to the point that a house worth $100k in 1990 was worth double or triple that amount in 2000. The real value of the house didn't increase, but the demand for the house drove the asking price through the roof. The idea behind increasing home ownership was a good one. Home ownership has always been a benchmark of being middle class. By increasing home ownership, the intent was to increase the size of the middle class (which had shrunk under Reagan and GHW Bush). While the intent was good, the results were not. When the sub-prime bubble burst, those who were barely making their mortgage payments each month ended up in foreclosure. Now couple that increased foreclosure with the tax breaks given to the rich by GW Bush and his Republican lapdogs, the increased drain on the economy by fighting a bullshit war in Iraq (not to eradicate terrorists, but to satisfy W's Macbeth complex), increased fuel costs due to the Iraq war, and the fact that the idiot Wall Street bankers invested in bad debt that they knew was bad before they invested in it (they were hoping to sell it before anyone realized what was going on, thus turning a quick profit), and you can begin to see how the economy went to hell in a hand basket.

Now for a real challenge. Guess who gets to pay for the mess that the Republicans and GW Bush made? Anyone, anyone, Bueller? That's right, the rapidly shrinking middle class. The rich won't be paying for it. They've already moved their wealth out of the country to places where it can't be taxed. As far as the money they have inside the country, well thanks to GW Bush and his Republican buddies, the rich aren't getting taxed on the majority of that either. So therefore, the burden of paying for Bush's failed policies, his war in Iraq (all because Saddam embarrassed W's daddy), the no bid contracts that Cheney got his Halliburton buddies, tax breaks for the rich, and W's free money giveaway to Wall Street (i.e. his "you don't have to pay it back" bailout) falls on an already overburdened middle class.

The Republicans and the Teabaggers are livid about the things that Obama is doing. They are completely incensed by the bailout (those companies and banks receiving money DO have to pay it back), the health care act, extensions of unemployment benefits, and the like. For the life of me, I can't figure out why. The things that Obama is doing are to help out the poor and middle class. Perhaps, if the Teabaggers turned off Limbaugh, Beck, and/or Fox News for a while, they might figure out that the person responsible for this mess isn't Obama, but George W Bush. If the Teabaggers became literate and read a bit, they might figure out that the legislation that has been passed is designed to help out people just like them. Given recent Teabagger behavior, the problem isn't so much that they have a problem with Obama's policies, but rather that they have a problem with his skin color. The legislation passed by Congress and signed by Obama will help more than 50 million Americans. That's 1/6th of the entire population. Meanwhile, the Republicans, fueled by the neo-fascist Teabaggers, continue to try to destroy the middle class and this country by doing things like twice (once in March, once in June) trying to kill extensions of unemployment benefits, introducing legislation that would reduce the inheritance tax for 55% to 35% for those that inherit over $5 million, and introducing legislation that would extend Bush's tax breaks for the rich. This is on top of trying to deny millions of Americans health care by attempting to block the health care bill (not to mention the outright lies they told while attempting to block it, things like it sets up "death panels", you'll have to get a chip implanted in your hand so that the gov't can track you, that our health care system is the best in the world [it's not, it's ranked 37th by UNWHO]and those with socialized medicine routinely let people dying in waiting rooms due to lack of funding). At every turn, the Republicans have tried to block any legislation that would help out the poor and the middle class. The Republicans have sold their souls to the rich and to big business. And the Teabaggers are supporting them every step of the way, either too dumb to realize that they are being financially raped by the Republicans or too brainwashed by Fox News to understand the issues and think for themselves. Hopefully the Teabaggers will wake up before November and realize that the Republicans using them in a blatant attempt to regain power. After November, the Republicans will jettison the Teabaggers, distance themselves from the Teabagger movement, and treat the the Teabaggers with contempt. Wake up people, if you are a Teabagger you need to know that you are being used by both Fox News and the Republican party to further an agenda designed to destroy you and your family by making you paupers while making the rich even richer. You have rights and dignity, why do you want to throw that away to grovel at the feet of a corporate master? If you Teabaggers don't believe that this is true, just look at the things the Republicans have done to try to destroy the middle class. Open your eyes people. The neo-fascist Republicans only have their own best interests at heart, they could care less about you Teabaggers and your ultimate success or failure. To the Republicans, you are just another resource to be used and discarded at their whim.

Well, enough ranting. The sheer fact of the matter is that the Republicans and their Teabagger bitches are trying to destroy this country and the middle class. It is time for the middle class and the vast silent majority to stand up and say "Enough is enough, we will not let the Republicans and the rich destroy us!" It is time to stand up and show the neo-fascists that spew their lies and vitriol from the bully pulpit of Fox News and talk radio that we see through their plans to turn this country into a third world nation and we're not going to take it anymore! Long live the middle class!

I am Chuck and this has been my rant. And if you're a Teabagger or a Republican and you don't like this, fuck off as I have had about enough of your treasonous, little dicked, homophobic, racist, nazi, theocracy-demanding bullshit!

What A Load Of Fertilizer!

Hello again.
I'm writing today to tell you about something that has left me absolutely gobsmacked.
I recently downloaded a free program called TVU Player. The program is designed to receive channels broadcast over the internet by various users of TVU's services. Most of the channels are over the air stations from other parts of the world. A few are experimental, and a few are inaccessible due to regional or national restrictions (ex. Germany's DWTV is inaccessible due to the fact that it is available on some cable systems here in the US). Some of the channels broadcast are entertaining and worthwhile, some are the usual crap that you would find on any over the air or cable network channel. But one of the channels stands out.
The channel stands out not for the quality of its programming, but for the fact that it is absolute bullshit. There's no nice way to put it, the channel is crap. The channel in question is listed as channel 71495 and it is called "The Naked Truth."
I have been watching this channel over the course of several weeks off and on. I'm not sure where they dig up their "documentaries," but I do know that wearing a tinfoil hat might be helpful in understanding the shows.
What set me to writing today was a "documentary" on the banking industry. I will grant you that in the current economy, banks are not the most well liked institutions. However, if one believes the documentary, every President from Woodrow Wilson to Barak Obama has been in on a giant conspiracy with every bank in the world to bankrupt the US and Europe. Not only have the banks and the government been conspiring, but the Fed, the IMF, the World Bank, and the UN are also in on it. Apparently, if you believe the documentary, everyone except the common people are in on this conspiracy.
Now given the anti-big bank/anti-big money sentiments of a few presidents, most notably FDR, don't you think that this conspiracy might have leaked out? There is an axiom in intelligence work that the more people who know about a secret the more likely it is to leak. A little research shows that, according to AAAdir.com, there are 13018 banks in the world. These are not branches, they are actual incorporated banks. That makes the number of executive position people, who would most probably have access to information concerning this supposed conspiracy, at least 13018, more likely the true number is at least double to quadruple that number. So for arguments sake let's set the number of people who have access to this conspiracy at 2 per bank, which means that the total number of conspiring people at just the banks is 26036. Now add in the heads of the 10 largest economies in the world, that's 26046. Add in the heads of the World Bank (1), the Fed (1), the IMF (1), and all of the delegates to the UN from Western Europe / the EU member states (27), Asia (major economies like Japan, China, etc) (3), North America minus Mexico (2), Australia (1), and that brings the total to 26082. Now given that the length of time a secret is kept is inversely proportional to the number of people who know the secret, don't you think that somewhere along the line someone might have spilled the beans?!!?
Not only does this channel show tinfoil hat documentaries, but it also purports to tell the truth about things like the Health Care bill, and other somewhat controversial (at least to the right wing nuts called the "Tea Party") things like global climate change. Most of the thing spewed from this channel can be debunked with a simple trip to websites like Politifact and Fact Check. More worrying, however, is the fact that the propaganda shoveled out on this channel sometimes mixes enough fact with outright fiction to be believable. Even more worrying than that is that some people actually believe what the channel broadcasts is the absolute Gospel truth. What is the most worrying is that the people who believe this crap not only vote, but they tell their friends about this stuff. They tell one friend who tells another and so and so forth until you have a whole herd of people believing that the banks conspired to plunder the economy and that the new Health Care Bill will require death panels (not true) and computer chips to be implanted in your hand for identification purposes (also not true). The sad part of all of this is that, unfortunately, it occasionally finds its way to the likes of Fox News (specifically Glenn Beck) and gets dispersed to all the little "Beckites" who take this bull to be Gospel truth just because he said it.
Now, I am all for free speech (that's part of what this blog is about). However, I am not for turning off your brain and letting people like "The Naked Truth", Fox News, and Glenn Beck do your thinking for you. Unfortunately, this seems to be what a great number of people are doing in this country. Devoid of ideas of their own, people have started letting the right wing nutjobs on channels like "The Naked Truth" and Fox News plant ideas in their heads without realizing that those ideas run counter to what is in the best interest of the person parroting them. Of course, the people parroting these ideas also think that the Health Care bill sets up a system like Canada has (it doesn't, Canada is a single payer system, the US still gets to select a plan from among the dozens of private insurers out there, it is just that the gov't will subsidize insurance for those who normally can't afford it). They also think that some how the Health Care bill takes away their rights (it doesn't, it actually expands your rights if you have a preexisting condition). Yet when asked how the HC bill takes away their rights and freedoms, most have no intelligent response beyond "Fox News said it does and they always tell the truth, unlike the rest of the damned liberal media!" You know, I can name at least five different ways the George W Bush administration took away part of our civil liberties, yet not a single Teabagger can tell me how Obama has taken away their freedoms. I find that curious. But then again, what should I expect out of a movement that aligns itself with an intellectual giant like Sarah Palin ( a woman so dumb that she couldn't find Africa on a map).
So in conclusion, if you use TVU Player and want to be amused (or sickened) watch Channel 71495 "The Naked Truth", and if you don't have TVU Player but you do have cable or satellite and want to be sickened, watch Fox News. Just be sure to wear your tinfoil hat before tuning into either of them!
As always, I am Chuck and this has been my rant.

The World's Greatest April Fools Hoax

Hello again everyone.
Today being April 1 or April Fools Day, I thought that I would bring you the world's greatest April Fools hoax.
Just follow the link below and you will arrive at a 1957 BBC report concerning the spaghetti harvest in Switzerland. I hope you enjoy the "report" as I much as I did (I laughed my ass off).

Here's the link --> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=27ugSKW4-QQ

Enjoy!

Ed Note: Edited to get the link working properly 1APR10 0932hrs.

Hello Again...

Hello again. For anyone who is interested, this blog is NOT dead. I have been without an internet connection for a long time. I now have a borrowed connection, so stay tuned for new blog entries. Among the things to look forward to are commentary on Glenn Beck's historical knowledge (or lack thereof) (and believe me, the man's staff is screwing him over on the accuracy of his historical "facts", not to mention the historical quotes that are taken out of context), a solution to the current economic depression (yes, depression, NOT recession), and many other varied and odd observations. So stay tuned to this blog for more on these developing stories (film at 11).
Until then, I am Chuck and I will soon be ranting again.