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The ‘economic individualism/economic collectivism’ dichotomy is so idiotic, I wish it could be binned, preferably along with those who propagate it.

Welfare and the NHS, designed to relieve and alleviate the suffering of real people, rather than of meaningless abstractions, are much less ‘collectivist’ concerns than the Tory veneration of ‘the economy’ and ‘the national interest.’ Continue Reading

Suppose I told you this was the result of a conversation I had with a dear friend?
Let’s call her Fatima.
Suppose that, however, were only a pretext for a dialogue I imagined myself?
Never mind.
One way or another, we are here…
And we are here now.

***

ONE TONGUE JOHNNY:
It’s interesting that the people who are often most capable of taking a dispassionate and objective view of Islam, recognizing its merits and demerits in context, with rigor and nuance…
FATIMA:
Oh, here we go!
ONE TONGUE JOHNNY:
Are secular liberals and libertarians (either atheists, agnostics, or people with a loose and critical attachment to religion)….
FATIMA:
What? Are you serious?! Continue Reading

If demagoguery plays to our prejudices and fears, then demagoonery adds our gullibility and a dearth of honest information to the mix. Here’s an example:

During Obama’s second term the stock market did a little 50 point dipsy doodle. One side blasted out, “Market Tumbles in Response to Obama Economic Disaster.” The other side said, “Small Market Correction Shows Economy is Healthy”.

When the same thing happened two years later under a different administration, the people who thought the first 50 point dip was a healthy sign now proclaimed it a harbinger of doom. The other side who hinted we were headed for a crash now claimed it was the sign of a robust economy. Nothing but demagoonery.

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I recently got a bad headache and had to lie down. It snuck up on me while I was researching the word fascist. The reason for my interest in fascism was Yvette Felarca.

She’s a special kind of crazy. People who take things way too far are either deeply admired or deeply despised. Yvette feels if you don’t take things way too far, nothing will ever get done. Continue Reading

In the occasionally some news is good news department, Gadfly is happy to report that there’s a new kid on the block, a new lab at MIT started with a private donation, that has expressed a desire to find a cure and prevention for autism.

Hock Tan and Lisa Yang, parents of two autistic children and MIT alumni, have donated 20 million dollars for this laboratory.

In another article they state they want to erase the devastating effects of autism and want a world free of the burdens of autism.  Continue Reading

Glossy News is a non-partisan satire site.
But even a co-editor is entitled to express one’s view on divisive issues, once in a while.
I’m going down soon to the ‘One Day Without Us’ event in Leeds.
Make sure you go too, if you are interested in this issue.
Here are some tweets to get your brain juices a-movin’!
If you’re unsure and undecided, please remember that the truly hard headed and pragmatic thing to do is to not split up families, unless there is an overwhelming reason to do so.
I don’t believe there is, on this occasion. Continue Reading

Strange days indeed!- I actually agree with Trump on something.

First off, build that damn wall!!!!!

11 million Hispanics are living illegally in the U.S. and they have the cheek to insist that they are justified in doing so? Wrong! By sneaking across the border they have already shown that they have no respect for our laws by doing so. Are they going to respect the rest of the laws while they are here?

It is said that they are escaping poverty. Yes, but their countries were formed at the same time as ours and have abundant resources. Why are they not economically better off? Is is our fault they are poor?

Somewhat, yesl because we do tend to dominate the policies and the economies in this part of the world.

But a greater share of the reason would be that they have allowed themselves to be dominated by leaders and religions that tend towards repression and by domination by the landowners and the wealthy. Edward Abbey once said that we should send all illegals back to across the border but give them all a gun to cure the corrupt politics back home.

Temporarily restrict travel from seven Muslim countries who tend to have a lot of terrorists? Sounds sane to me! Give us some time to let muddy waters clear so we can make our homeland a little more safe. Quit yelling folks, it is a TEMPORARY ban, not permanent.

I wish as much yelling were made about the poverty in our own country with homelessness and working people not making enough to make the basics of life. The Sioux reservation in South Dakota is still the most poverty stricken district in the U.S. How about helping them to get the jobs that are going to immigrants?

The major reason we let in so many immigrants is that companies and businesses want a cheap source of labor. Remember- a bunch of guys got into the country on student visas and killed over 2,000 people by flying jets into buildings.

The ones shouting the loudest are the immigrants themselves (sorry, this really isn’t your country to begin with. Quit telling us what we are supposed to do with it). And, interestingly the tech industries. Gee, white collar geek guys, you are purposely hiring engineers and computer whizzes from foreign countries that use English as a business language because they will work cheaper than born in the USA people.

And now you are now pretending to be patriotic? It doesn’t fly, folks.

The protests have grown to be embarrassingly knee jerk and empty headed. It is mechanical to just go against everything our pseudo President-select says and does; that makes us just as bad as him. This same energy thrown into helping the ethnic groups already here would do wonders. We don’t need anymore people from elsewhere, at least for a while.

The various crisis’s in various countries are terrible but at some time people need to take care of their own problems. Running over here doesn’t solve them.

Too many think that the U.S., Canada and Europe are Shangri-La’s where everything is all rosy. It isn’t. The immigrants are usually shifted into the poorer neighborhoods where they have to fend for themselves. Their kids often join gangs of their own countrymen for protection and to get some of the financial circulation for themselves.

And how do they have to do it if they have no jobs? You know the answer already- drugs, theft, prostitution.

It used to be once upon a time that people did come over for genuine religious or freedom issues. Now for most it is because they see the U.S. as being one big bank where everyone is wealthy and has no troubles (although compared with some of the countries like Syria it is by comparison).

They want to tap into that bank.

They want a piece of the pie that they didn’t help bake.

We have enough people here already. More than enough.

A Chinese woman I knew managed to get out of mainland China and into Germany by agreeing to work as a computer technician on a stipend with free housing.

She left behind her child and husband to get out because she hated China so much. She did everything she could to stay there. When she mentioned she wouldn’t mind going to America too I told her that we had too many people already.

“No, America has lots of room!” she replied.

It does, if you compare it to China where they let their population explosion get away from them.

Too many times I have experienced foreigners pulling crap in this country. When I go to other countries I make it a point to be respectful and civil with the people there; a sentiment unfortunately ignored by many Americans I have seen go overseas. Many who come here see us as being fools or stupid and show no respect or regard what-so-ever.

Here are some examples I’ve experienced personally here in my own country to name just a few:

1. Being threatened by a large British man because he didn’t like it that I forbid alcohol consumption in a hostel I was running and didn’t let people run around wild like he thought I should.

2. At same hostel got punched in the eye by an anarchistic German who I was kicking out for being a jerk and suffered permanent eye damage.

3. Having a very pregnant illegal Hispanic woman ask me if I wanted to get married while I was working in her house. Turns out her relatives had put her up to it. If I would make a fake marriage with her she could get benefits. The real father had run out on her.

4. Had an Irish roommate here on a holiday visa but was working illegally marry an American just so he could get citizenship and the right to work. I actually got him a job (now I know better) and the boss started paying him and an illegal Aussie more than me. The Aussie still wanted to strike for more money even though he was illegal.

5, Had a big Swiss Hotel General Manager who had the swagger and character of a combination Teutonic Nazi, a white supremacist and a Mafia boss who would be physically and verbally intimidating, was racist and looked down on everyone. Why do we let these people into the country in the first place? He ended up choking on his own karma.

When doing construction work I was often put in charge of guiding the Hispanics, probably half of them illegal. I would always treat them well and try to communicate with them with what Spanish I knew. Then came the day when there was a foreman who was a Hispanic immigrant who had worked his way up. Suddenly they were treating me like crap because I was the minority. IN MY OWN COUNTRY! It was a wakening call for me.

Had a Hispanic gas station worker tell me there wasn’t any work there even though there was a sign up in the window. He was saving the job for one of his buddies.

Even that highly enlightened Comedy Central personality Carlo Mendez had an interview on his show asking a Hispanic guy at a work site if he would feel bad taking a job from an American. “Hell no!” he answered both laughing heartily about it.

Build that wall! We have enough people in this country to do the work we need done already. And we can be compassionate with the people who are here already; there are definitely enough of them.

Not long ago I made a comment below a certain article about the republication of Mein Kampf in Germany:

It runs as follows (slightly edited): Continue Reading

Anarchists are getting pissed because the role of the honest anarchist is becoming a pitiful, diluted version of itself. Once proud agitators, archduke whackers and bomb chuckers, they are now being eclipsed by these neo-anarchists who agitate by proxy for profit. Meaning they get paid well for getting other people to do the dirty work.

I now belong to the group called Anarchist Against Anarchy (Please don’t try to turn it into an acronym and then call me to come tow your car). A real anarchist never truly wanted to destroy everything. Tom can never catch Jerry. We know better. But this new cadre doesn’t care. They are doing it for money and fame. Historically, the most lethal combination of desires. Continue Reading