Here we are again, Dave Shadrick is shaking the shit and throwing it out at the world. Lawsuits against Rudy, Fox News and an assortment of other Trump water carriers have been filed. Defamation can be costly. Enjoy here on www.calamitypolitics.com and on YouTube.
The vision of going to work has changed for many of us during the COVID-19 pandemic. Working from home may continue for many workers as we move out of the pandemic and back to normalcy. A Harvard Business School study reported that more than one third of the companies surveyed believed that post-pandemic work environment will include an increase in remote work.
The shift to at-home work can have long term positive financial advantages. Such possible benefits could include such things as:
It is not hard to imagine saving as much as $5,000 each year by working from home. If this new phenomenon becomes the norm you should think about saving or investing this potential windfall. Edward Jones suggests two possibilities to make the most of this extra money. One, build an emergency fund containing at least one year of emergency cash. Two, an IRA or a similar employer-sponsored plan could provide an approximate $97,000 ($2,500) to $200,000 ($5,000) after 20 years at 6% interest.
https://www.calamitypolitics.com/2019/10/16/energy-saving-tips-that-cost-nothing/
The cold days of February bring thoughts of one of my favorite holidays, Valentine’s Day. Some of my fondest memories involve Valentine’s fun. We all remember when we were growing up getting those tiny Valentines in their little white envelopes placed in a big wooden box on the teacher’s desk. Each year my miniature Valentines had a different theme: puppies, kittens, Barbie, and of course, princess. My earliest Valentine’s memory is my kindergarten campaign to provide trousers for that little guy with the bow and arrow, since it was cold outside. Those timeless teddy bears with pink and red bows, and heart-shaped boxes of candy covered in ruffles, bring back many teenage memories.
Of course, I have a few specific Valentine’s memories: one in particular was actually after Valentine’s Day: I snatched up all the clearance conversation Sweetheart candies as I had just won the Miss American Sweetheart Pageant, and decided tossing boxes of stale Sweethearts during summer parades was a classy thing to do – this idea was short-lived, however, thanks to that guy on the corner with the sunglasses on his head. I’m still amazed at how far a pair of shades can travel when they come in contact with an airborne box of conversation hearts.
My favorite Valentine’s memory was when my husband and I were found by an adorable black terrier in our condo parking lot on a particularly cold Valentine’s Day. We named him Cupid, and he was a part of our family for over 17 years. In more recent times, Valentine’s Day has been celebrated by my spouse’s penchant for hiding expensive jewelry in food. My first diamond cocktail ring arrived in a dish of carrots because it was a “1 carat” ring. My engagement ring was presented, much to the delight of the charming waitress at Red Lobster, in a plate of mussels – my husband’s theory was since pearls come in oysters, diamonds can come in mussels.
Another diamond ring embedded in Tiramisu (ladyfingers…) appeared at our favorite Italian restaurant. A sapphire ring came atop a cupcake; my diamond and sapphire wedding set was encased in a miniature pink gumball machine. Hmm, I wonder what I’ll find topping our heart-shaped pizza this year (hint, hint…). Fortunately, I never broke a tooth on or ingested any of these gifts so I don’t have any trips to the emergency room stories to share.
Now if your significant other isn’t a foodie romantic, and you don’t receive bracelets or earrings in side dishes or desserts, then perhaps a few well-placed hints will get you the goodies you desire this Valentine’s Day. If you do seek something sparkly, put a jewelry catalog in his toolbox. Or if you’re like me, a gift certificate for a mani-pedi is a perfect present – I suggest placing a flyer from your favorite salon in his sock drawer.
If a romantic dinner is on your wish list, wrap coupons from a favorite place to dine out around a six-pack of beer and secure it with a pink ribbon. My personal favorite hint, sure to work every time, is to tape a business card from the local flower shop on the TV remote control – he’ll never miss that. No matter how you end up celebrating, may your Valentine’s Day be blessed with style…
I have been enormously blessed. I wake with a grateful heart each day.
I am however, angry with so many well-meaning people that assume that it is because they worked hard, or because they are especially smart is why they have done well financially in this society. The presumption then being that those who aren’t doing well must be lazy, stupid, unworthy or some other white elitist measurement of failure. There are millions of people every day that have their dreams smashed for reasons that have nothing to do with how hard they are working. Born in poverty, birth defects, disease, accidents, divorce, abuse, homelessness, hunger. The list of adversity is long.
We live in a cruel capitalist society, with thousands of devices designed to keep the already advantaged always on top. In every city in this country huge numbers of people are living in tents, surrounded by garbage, no mental health services for people in crisis, police officers so comfortable in their indecency that they feel no shame in holding their knee on the neck of another human being for nearly 9 minutes. The injustice in this country should have us on our fucking knees. DSM/Calamity
I am back at the computer making my second post to my Calamity Politics blog, today. Before I started this blog, I worried that I wouldn’t have enough to scream about, but I’m finding that I could probably do half a dozen posts a day related to the misinformation flooding the ether. But I thought, before I start my rant on the collapse of Western Civilization I should deliver something positive and uplifting.
So, dear hearts here are twenty-five things to make you smile:
I know this Saturday distraction did little to take your mind off the continuing implosion of the Republican Party. My Lord, a large share of these folks sound totally crazy, out-and-out bigots, or radicalized MAGA’s. These people seized the capitol. They were incited for months by Donald Trump in his attempt to overturn an election he knew he had lost. We watched it on television. Convict the traitorous SOB. Sorry. I wanted to forget politics for a few minutes.
Meanings can be tricky. Some words taking on cultural coloring, in no way reflecting the actual meaning. One of the main examples is the notion of stereotypes. Generally, a neutral term for observable trends it has come to be used interchangeably with prejudice or racism, only one of which is actually bad. It might seem strange because of how it is now used, but prejudice isn’t inherently negative. All it really means, going to the Latin root, is to pre-judge. Pre-judging something negatively is what people now mean when they used the term. Completely ignoring the fact that it is just as possible to pre-judge someone or something positively.
The way this all relates to politics, aside from the fact that language is generally how people understand the world, and very much informs our world-view, is that there is a word in the political arena that has been both misused and misunderstood almost from its inception. Propaganda, like post-modernism, is probably not what you think. Used by the political set, in one way or another, going back to Ancient Greece, propaganda is the use of information mediums to advance a particular political agenda or world-view. This can be done in a particularly bias or intentionally misinforming way, as seen in China and Russia, but such is not an inherent element. A bug rather than a feature, one might say.
It is just such misuses and lies, particularly perpetrated by the Russians in the form of agitprop, that has led to the sullied reputation propaganda now has. In reality, everything from pamphlets for political candidates, to campaign ads, as well as certain types of billboards, books and even songs, plays and movies, count as propaganda.
The main thing that determines whether something is propaganda comes down to the intention of the creator. Whether said propaganda is considered good or bad, is almost entirely left to one’s own distinction. A notorious case of conflict in meaning came with the film V For Vendetta. Based in the graphic novel of the same name by British author Alan Moore, the film set off a minor fire-storm both the left and the right saying it was hate-filled propaganda against their own side. Which is ironic, because the ethos of the original book, somewhat lost in the film, is apolitical. The work is still propaganda but of a much different sort. Rather than advancing a particular political ideal, it largely transcends politics, instead going into the realms of moral philosophy. The basic message of both the book and the film is one of autonomy.
Seeing governments as little more as methods to organize. It is individuals who are truly important. A sentiment most clearly shown in the line: “people shouldn’t be afraid of their government. Governments should be afraid of their people.” The government in both the book and the film is presented as fascist, but the general idea is that any government, of any description that gets above its station needs to be brought back down to earth.
A case in which intention was presumed, came with the hit series Black Mirror. Premiering on British television in 2011 many, critics and viewers alike, presumed creator Charlie Brooker, known for his style of ‘satirical pessimism’ was an ardent Luddite. Assuming the show’s damning take on information technology to be a Boomer raging against the technology they don’t understand. Never mind that Brooker was 40 during the first season. There was an idea behind the darkness to be sure but one far from what was assumed. Brooker has gone on record saying he has no problem with technology.
The horror elements in Black Mirror derive entirely from human causes. Basically people using what could be elevating technology to ruin their lives. The title is indicative of this. Brooker noticed that if you turn off a smartphone or tablet the screen becomes reflective, creating a black mirror. A darkened reflection of one’s true self. So, while there are certainly ideas and world-views at play in Black Mirror, they are so subtly present that most people missed it. Making it at most failed propaganda, rather than the anti-technology screed most assumed. Putting a different spin on the show and the incorrect use of the idea of propaganda itself.
https://www.calamitypolitics.com/2018/10/29/on-line-bullying/
Strange as it might seem, there is a standard in the study of history that sources used should be the most recent. This is because new things are being discovered all the time and what we knew about a particular event or context in 2001, can be radically different than what is now known in 2021. Philosophy and more theoretical disciplines have no such standard. Which is the only way to account for the continuance of some of the less applicable ideas. Economic theory is no exception.
Looking at the modern political landscape, and one would be left with the impression that there are only two ways of doing an economy. Laissez-faire capitalism as laid out by Adam Smith in his book The Wealth of Nations and communism, as dictated, no surprise there, by Karl Marx, in several, mostly unreadable books. Wars have been fought over these ideas, and continue to be cause of strife and division to this day. Despite most people not really understanding what they are.
As evidenced by the slogan, on the communist side, “smash capitalism” without specifying which of the three primary schools of capitalism to which they are referring. On the other hand, those who support a free-market capitalism have been blinkered enough to refer to nations such as Norway as “communist.” An absolutely hilarious accusation considering the system is most accurately described as a “corporate democracy.” It is a little known fact that the main reason so many Norwegians speak such good English, roughly 80% of the population being fluent, is the nations massive export industry, the majority of the buyers being from English-speaking nations.
Basically both schools of thought are wrong in my humble opinion. At least in terms of modern society, root cause of their obsolescence being the time when the ideas were formulated. The Wealth of Nations was written soon after the kick-off of the Industrial Revolution, and was at least partly an attempt to explain it. The Communist Manifesto was written in 1848, and was one of the main criticisms of the effects of the Industrial Revolution and a low-key rebuke to Smith.
They are both important documents in terms of understanding basic economic theory, and how we got to where we are. Neither, however, have any real bearing on modern society. Neither Smith nor Marx could possibly predict nor comprehend the massive change technology has made in the last couple of centuries. To the point that the rise of the Information Age is largely seen as a Digital Revolution, on par with the Industrial Revolution in terms of its overall impact. The production based economies in which both Smith and Marx were writing, either no longer exist or are rapidly dying. The term “disruptor” coined specifically to refer to this process.
In the post-Digital Age, with old industry corroding into rust belts and an increasing number of people working for themselves, particularly online, how does one now engage with the new reality? Might I suggest a hybrid approach, similar to that practiced by the Calvinists. In this system, there is an emphases on service-based businesses, usually run by an individual or family, working as hard as they can to make as much money as they can to put back into the business. Paying the employees, if there are any, more, while putting money into the economy and providing a needed service to their fellow citizens, and taking care of their own needs. Just a thought.
https://www.calamitypolitics.com/2018/11/20/the-revolution-wont-be-live-streamed/
https://www.calamitypolitics.com/2019/02/08/economic-inequality-a-danger-sign/
I was in my home office going through old magazines trying to decide what to send to the recycler and what to keep for later reference when I flipped through a February 2016 Reader’s Digest article that offered information on shredding. Most importantly they described when and what to shred. It seems our greatest danger is through ‘mass hackings’ of our credit information. No matter how cautious we are our greatest danger is as victims of other people’s carelessness, or bad intent. But, every bit of protection we can develop should help keep our private information private. Kelsey Kloss article suggested the following things, we as individuals can do to protect ourselves.
Remember, any little thing we can do to help keep our private information private should be considered important. Do it, you’ll be glad you did.
Black Sabbath was a rock group formed in 1968 in Birmingham, England. They distinguished themselves through occult themes with horror-inspired lyrics and tuned-down guitars. Ozzy Osbourne was the vocalist with Tony Iommi lead guitar, Bill Ward drummer, and Geezer Butler as bassist.
Black Sabbath were the pioneers of heavy metal music. The band defined the genre with such hits as Black Sabbath (1970), Paranoid (1970) and (1971) Master of Reality. Black Sabbath had multiple line-up changes after vocalist Osbourne’s departed in 1979. Tony Iommi was the only constant member throughout its history. Calamity takes full responsibility for today’s Jukebox Choice of the Day, Ozzy singing “Paranoid”. Enjoy. DSM
https://www.calamitypolitics.com/2019/04/11/xenophobia-fear-of-others-different-shade-paranoid/
T.K. McNeil suggested this great Goodbye rant from YouTube by Jonathan Pie. Jonathan says everything I have ever thought about Donald Trump, plus some I never thought of. One hell of a rant. It is the best goodbye, good riddance speech you will ever hear. Check out Jonathan’s YouTube channel and subscribe. Enjoy. DSM
"If puppies and kittens don't make you smile, you might consider therapy." D. S. Mitchell 2015.
Self-isolating has forced us to turn even more to telecommunication and social media.
The Major Cause Of Sex Trafficking Is Poverty
Many great charities, here are a couple that I support: Sierra Club, World Wildlife Fund, ACLU, and Planned Parenthood.
