Tag: Americana

I told you that Baby Boomers were, collectively, the most despicable generation in American history. But now they’re really outdoing themselves:

“My goal is when they carry me away in that box that my bank account is going to say zero,” Willison said. “I’m going to spoil myself now.”

Upending the conventional notion of parents carefully tending their financial estates to be passed down at the reading of their wills, many baby boomers say they instead plan to spend the money on themselves while they’re alive.

In a survey of millionaire boomers by investment firm U.S. Trust, only 49% said it was important to leave money to their children when they die. The low rate was a big surprise for a company that for decades has advised wealthy people how to leave money to their heirs.

Needless to say, they’re not too worried about fixing the economy either. All far too many of them care about is that Social Security and Medicare last long enough to see them to their graves. Still talking about Woodstock, of course.

I agree with Paul Krugman:

What happened after 9/11 — and I think even people on the right know this, whether they admit it or not — was deeply shameful. Te atrocity should have been a unifying event, but instead it became a wedge issue. Fake heroes like Bernie Kerik, Rudy Giuliani, and, yes, George W. Bush raced to cash in on the horror. And then the attack was used to justify an unrelated war the neocons wanted to fight, for all the wrong reasons.

The Giuliani as America’s Hero Mayor was particularly ludicrous. And I think it’s totally ridiculous that the NFL teams still have American flags on their helmets. A few more attacks and they’ll look like the Ohio Buckeyes.

Secular faux holidays like the media are trying to pump up today are simply ludicrous. There is nothing sacred about 9/11 and nothing good has come of it.

Joseph Lozito, husband, father, and American badass:

It turns out that Maksim Gelman wasn’t just any nutjob riding pantless on the Subway – he was a bona-fide spree killer in the middle of a 28 hour stabbing rampage that had left four people dead and five more wounded across the boroughs of New York City. Earlier in the weekend, Gelman had done a shitload of crack and murdered his stepfather and his girlfriend’s mom with a knife, stabbed his girlfriend 11 times, ran over a dude with a car, slashed another motorist, and carjacked an unsuspecting couple, stabbing both of them in the process. He was a career criminal who had completely lost his fucking shit, and now he was swinging a goddamned machete around a crowded Subway train filled with women, children, and more innocent bystanders than a superhero comic. And now he’s coming straight for Joseph Lozito, and there isn’t a hell of a lot this Pennsylvania native can do to avoid the confrontation. It’s like a bad 80s movie about gang violence on the Subway, only this was rush hour traffic, real life, and Gelman is definitely not wearing an awesome headband or listening to rad jams blasting from the tape deck on his boombox.

But Joseph Lozito isn’t just any chump on his way to work, and he sure as shit isn’t about to sit there and let some psychotic madman knife him to death without putting up a fight. This guy is a life-long MMA fan who took his love of the sport to super-fan levels – he’d been to UFC 1 in 1993, never missed a pay-per-view, and celebrated his friggin’ wedding anniversary by taking his wife to see the Ultimate Fighting Championship live.

He’s also fucking gigantic – standing 6’2″ and weighing in at 260 pounds. Gelman wasn’t going to know what the fuck hit him…. As Gelman approaches, Lozito does the last thing the knife-wielding maniac expected – he attacks.

That’s the best line in the article: “he attacks”. As my sensei always taught us, “when you go, you go!” In other words, once the moment for action arrives, commit 100 percent. Lozito appears to have had little idea what he was doing – a simple arm bar and break would have been significantly safer than a takedown – but that only emphasizes his courage and heroism.

It’s easy to be pessimistic about Americans. They tolerate one of the smartest, most predatory political classes in the history of the world. They pretty much don’t want to do anything except go to work, eat, drink beer, and watch television as their country is overrun by Mexican gangs, Somali jihadists, and people with names like Maksim.

The country is broke and heading for collapse, but there is still hope for what comes after. Because despite all its many flaws, America is still the place where MMA was invented, where paintball was invented, and men like Joseph Lozito not only fight when they’re forced to fight, but fight to win. New York City and Washington DC and Hollywood and San Francisco and Maksim Gelman aren’t America, they’re all tumors indicative of the imported cancer will eventually kill the United States. The real America is where a man isn’t trying to rule the world or live as a parasite, but merely wants to do his job, do his own thing, and kick your ass if you won’t leave him alone.

And where were the cops that Gelman confronted first? New York’s Finest where you’d expect them to be, hiding like little girls and waiting for it to be over: “Two transit cops locked themselves in the train’s front room with the conductor and didn’t immediately open the door when straphangers called for help, because they thought the madman had a gun.”

I think we can safely drop the idea that God has any particular affection for America now:

A 5.9 magnitude earthquake centered in Virginia forced evacuations of all the monuments in Washington and rattled nerves from the southern state of Georgia to Martha’s Vineyard, the Massachusetts island in the northeast where President Barack Obama is vacationing. No injuries were immediately reported.

And across the South, a single thought echoed throughout a million minds as if they were one. “Only 5.9? Come on!”

Are you more knowledgeable than the average citizen? The average score for all 2,508 Americans taking the following test was 49%; college educators scored 55%.

Take the Full Civic Literacy Exam.

I scored 97%. Not bad, although I somehow managed to blow a quote that I should have known. But yes, it’s official, I am in fact more knowledgeable than those esteemed intellectuals, the college educators of the nation.

Such a surprise.

UPDATE – I had Ender take the quiz. No economics yet, hasn’t ever lived in the States, but still scored 63%. I didn’t realize how different his perspective is from mine until the WWII question, when he mused out loud “I suppose they must mean the United States”.

This is what a vibrant American community will increasingly look like. You simply cannot expect to maintain civilization by giving barbarians responsibility for upholding their share of the social fabric. As the social scientists have discovered, much to their chagrin, the more diverse a community becomes, the less contact people wish to have outside of their race and ethnicity. This is not hard to understand, given incidents like these. The problem is that European cultures tend to do nothing about obvious problems for far too long, then brutally overreact. The Western way of war is unlike the Eastern, it is total and destructive in nature rather than limited and predatory.

In other words, when the reaction finally comes, history suggests that it is going to be very ugly indeed. And the worst thing is that it will have been completely unnecessary.

Apparently only colored people, blacks, Afro-Americans, African-Americans, people of color are permitted to use the word “nigger”. Because everyone is equal, you know?

Burlington, who is white, was fired after using the “n” word during a June 2007 staff meeting at which reporters and producers were discussing reporter Robin Taylor’s story about the symbolic burial of the word by the Philadelphia Youth Council of the NAACP.

Burlington, who began work at the station in 2004 and is now working as a real estate agent, was suspended within days and fired after an account of the incident was published in the Philadelphia Daily News. He alleges that he “was discriminated against because of his race,” according to court documents. He claims in his lawsuit that at least two African American employees at Fox29 had used the word in the workplace and were not disciplined.

The dispute began after Taylor, who is white, used the phrase the “n” word during the 2007 staff meeting. She said participants at the burial had said the full word “at least a hundred times or more,” according to court records.

“Does this mean we can finally say the word n-?” Burlington asked colleagues, according to depositions. Nicole Wolfe, a producer and one of the three African American employees among the nine people at the meeting, exclaimed: “I can’t believe you just said that!”

The speech police are in judicial favor, so it will be interesting what emanations and penumbras will be required in order to justify certain words being legal for some people and illegal for others. But I particularly enjoyed the way in which this “news” article wraps itself into contortions in order to avoid reporting the actual news. Panicked avoidance of the word nigger is particularly amusing when seen from a European perspective, where white people use the word without thinking about it because they see and hear black Americans in the entertainment world using it on a regular basis.

Burlington’s big mistake was not appealing to the one-drop rule, thus granting him permission to use the noun of his choice in reference to his people. The funny thing is that so few people realize that this sort of speech-controlling behavior is an indication of weakness, not strength. Anytime someone tries to pull the “I can’t believe you just said that” card for whatever reason, the optimal response is to immediately crush them. It’s just a test; clearly Burlington failed his.

I always find it amusing when people get upset over a clearly understood label, whether it is flattering or not. If you’re getting upset because someone calls you by a label that describes what you are, then you quite clearly regard yourself as inferior. And if you think someone else regards you as an inferior, you should probably be at least open to the possibility they are doing so because you are.

Whereas it is the duty of all Nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey his will, to be grateful for his benefits, and humbly to implore his protection and favor– and whereas both Houses of Congress have by their joint Committee requested me to recommend to the People of the United States a day of public thanksgiving and prayer to be observed by acknowledging with grateful hearts the many signal favors of Almighty God especially by affording them an opportunity peaceably to establish a form of government for their safety and happiness.

Now therefore I do recommend and assign Thursday the 26th day of November next to be devoted by the People of these States to the service of that great and glorious Being, who is the beneficent Author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be– That we may then all unite in rendering unto him our sincere and humble thanks–for his kind care and protection of the People of this Country previous to their becoming a Nation–for the signal and manifold mercies, and the favorable interpositions of his Providence which we experienced in the course and conclusion of the late war–for the great degree of tranquility, union, and plenty, which we have since enjoyed–for the peaceable and rational manner, in which we have been enabled to establish constitutions of government for our safety and happiness, and particularly the national One now lately instituted–for the civil and religious liberty with which we are blessed; and the means we have of acquiring and diffusing useful knowledge; and in general for all the great and various favors which he hath been pleased to confer upon us.

and also that we may then unite in most humbly offering our prayers and supplications to the great Lord and Ruler of Nations and beseech him to pardon our national and other transgressions– to enable us all, whether in public or private stations, to perform our several and relative duties properly and punctually–to render our national government a blessing to all the people, by constantly being a Government of wise, just, and constitutional laws, discreetly and faithfully executed and obeyed–to protect and guide all Sovereigns and Nations (especially such as have shewn kindness unto us) and to bless them with good government, peace, and concord–To promote the knowledge and practice of true religion and virtue, and the encrease of science among them and us–and generally to grant unto all Mankind such a degree of temporal prosperity as he alone knows to be best.

Given under my hand at the City of New York the third day of October in the year of our Lord 1789.
– George Washington

Even in the present difficulties, even given the way the American nation has moved away from God and abandoned its historical liberties, we still have much for which to be thankful today. It is better to thank God for the abundance of what we have than to bemoan that which has been lost.

Have a Happy Thanksgiving. And I encourage you to be grateful. It may be a long time before humanity again knows such a period of relative wealth and ease.