Electrified! FREE Download, Notes & Lyrics

Posted on October 12, 2015 by admin

Download ELECTRIFIED!

Credits:

Tom Pearce: percussion, backing vocals
Craig Roy: bass
Bill Pelick: lead guitar, bass
Jessy Lynn Martens: violin, backing vocals
Rachel Decker: chanteuse
RS: vocal, guitar, bass, harmonica

Recorded at Jay Stanley Productions in Apopka, FL; summer/fall 2013

Produced by TomP

Cover photo is a video still shot by Susan Cameron; layout & artwork by TomP/RS

All tunes Published & Copyrighted: No Cliché Songs/ Infinitelink Records 2015

Electrified! is the soundtrack to this unfinished film:

mp3/blogs from Electrified!

No one buys CDs anymore; the mp3/blog is a self-invented format upgrade– discussed fully here.

All tunes individually credited on their mp3/blog link.

mp3 blog link

Spirit of the Road       The Spirit of the Road
Schooldaze                      The Circus of Dr. Lao & the SOL
Ridiculous                        The NBA: I Can’t Watch this Game
Atheist Psalm            What is Zionism & Anti-Semitism?
Anna Rex               Modelling as Art
Old Friends                      Action Cinema: Keepin’ it Real
Tip of the Cap                  What is Grunge?
Just Because              Why Marxism?
Listen to the Woman       Understanding Men & LieSpotting
Brothers                Children of Alcoholics
Moneybug               Zombieland Redux
Kararak                 Plutocracy & Marxism
More Like Us?            John Lennon: Working Class Hero

ELECTRIFIED! LYRICS

SPIRIT OF THE ROAD

Twin-cam sixteen valve FI
Sunroof down with the crankin’ hi-fi
Out on the road up on I-95
No room to pass only two lanes wide
With the air-bags off no cruise control
Carburetor’s blown check the manifold
Rain pourin’ down at twelve at night
Battery’s dead got no headlights
With my baby by my side it’s such a relief
We’ve got wind in our hair we’ve got bugs in our teeth
At 110 I’m losing my nerve
Suspension is shot and we’re starting to swerve
Six hours on the road and I’m starting to freak
Pull over for gas and to take a leak
Need and oil change the cylinder’s stuck
It’s been fifty thousand miles and we’re pushin’ our luck
Call AAA and get the tow truck here
Brake line’s gone can’t power steer
With three flat tires and a spare in the trunk
Oughta strip it for parts and sell it as junk

That’s my fuel-injected hotrod driving fast around Deadman’s Curve

Road rage behind don’t tailgate me
Rearview check another SUV
Those US cars look sick I note
Guzzle too much gas and drives like a boat
Loaded with gadgets they’ve got all the toys
Expensive options make too much noise
Japanese cars are better for me
Reliably built for efficiency
My Toyota Tacoma she’s a haulin’ machine
My Honda Accord runs super clean
My Toyota Corolla she’s a mini-jet rocket
When she gets up to speed you just can’t stop it

That’s my fuel-injected hotrod driving fast around Deadman’s Curve

MORE LIKE US?

Are there more like us?
Someone you trust
To show you some guts
Are there more like us?

Song of youth, make it rhyme, rock & roll music right in time
Contagious joy infects my soul, I’m in love with rock and roll
Are there more like us?

Show us your stuff
We’re calling your bluff
Do you have enough?
For when things get rough

KARARAK

July 1, 2002
Out of the night their gunships flew
Fifty women and children mowed down that day
By Uncle Sam and his Green Berets

In God We Trust defend our cause
On Eagle’s wings and imperialist claws
Who pulls the strings? We cannot say
Of our Special Forces and CIA

Johnny’s remains were laid to rest
They pinned a medal where he had a chest
How many more must die this way
For the Stars & Stripes of the USA?

OLD FRIENDS

Today is a good day for and old friend to slip away
Promises that we keep, promises we just make
An instinct hard to find a habit that’s hard to break
Today is a good day for an old friend to slip away

An old friend calls me up asks me who I was
Someone he once knew someone she once loved
A dream lost in the past a forgotten point of view
Someone who holds on someone I outgrew

On what I rely it’s just a crutch
If less is more then I’m too much
Who I am is hard to know
This cool facade is just a show
That stays too long when it should go
Living high means sinking low

RIDICULOUS

The ridiculous nature of US life
For most of the people it’s hardship and strife
This hourly grind for our daily bread
We keep falling behind we can’t get ahead
With bumper to bumper everyday
It’s hard to believe we’re living this way
Rush hour crunch in sweltering heat
Drizzling rain freezing cold sleet
This constant rat race is unpaid labor
Why doesn’t it count as work in your favor?
And when you get home there’s a TV to face
To reinforce values put you in your place
That it’s money and power and beauty and fame
And if you don’t have this then you’re not in the game
Creativity and talent they don’t want any here
Too hard to control it’s hype that they cheer
So the new season’s line-up is more pabulum for you
Some really weak stuff it’s the best they could do
So sit with your Friends, Seinfeld and Ed
American Idol live it all in your head
Because you don’t have a life and you’re going nowhere
And you forgot how to think so you don’t even care

Ridiculous/Quit

In central Florida I’m tellin’ y’all
Doc River’s team could not get a call
Heart & Hustle did not mean a thing
It’s size and strength that gets the ring
So the bigger you are the harder you hit
The more that you win well that’s about it
Shaquille O’Neal bull-rush to the hoop
Lacking the skill to set up and shoot
At the charity stripe even money he’ll brick it
Painful to watch for c-notes a ticket!
It’s a wrestling match down in the paint
Grabbing and holding pretty it ain’t
Unwritten rules just part of the game
It’s one of those things no one can explain
How veteran players use all the tricks
To maintain advantage the whole league’s a fix

Bills pile up so you can’t pay the rent
You’re throw in the street to live in a tent
Credit card balance stuffed to the limit
Twenty five percent well who can afford it?
So pawn all the chairs and rummage the table
US economy is highly unstable
The American Dream has bitten the dust
It’s all a big lie In God We Trust
When pension funds and retirement savings
Are stolen and looted for capitalist cravings
A shrug of the shoulders it’s out of our hands
The invisible market a shift of the sands
The working people get only contempt from above
The ruling elite incapable of love
It’s time to organize the laboring classes
An independent perspective of militant masses
To end the corruption in this critical hour
With socialist goals of seizing the power

Because the whole capitalistic system is…

BROTHERS

Two boys from the same home
Raised in the country where the sweet corn’s grown
With baseball games and snowball fights
And flashlight tag of summer nights

So long ago as brothers and friends
In our tree fort and on our bikes
From joy and laughter two brothers start
How did it happen we grew apart?

We had a father with a bottle of gin
Became addiction killed the man within
And all that was left became bitterness and shame
And the roles we played in a twisted game

I played the hero because I came first
Born to succeed with obsessive thirst
But all that guilt became such a cost
For trying to save a family lost

As the scapegoat you took the blame
For an affliction we could not name
That hurt and anger which pushed you away
Remains deep inside up to this day

November wind blows through the trees
These naked branches have lost their leaves
Oh how I long for the boughs of June
And the robin’s nest and iris bloom

Our childhood lost still lives inside
Beneath the loneliness and compulsive pride
It’s not too late if we try hard
We can reclaim who we are

TIP OF THE CAP

This train ride’s a tip of the cap
American music all across the map
So climb aboard we’re moving fast
To show our love celebrate the past

Now modern rock is NYC
And country time Nashville Opry
I’ve got a ticket for that Memphis soul
Stax/Volt/Sun Records rock and roll

It’s a northbound ride for electric blues
Windy shoulders and stockyard crews
Where guitars sting and mouth harps blow
That urban vibe of Chicago

This Mystery Train rolls southbound too
Jambalaya and crawfish stew
Jazz& blues is what it means
Mississippi delta and New Orleans

I’m on that train I’m westward bound
for LA punk and that surf-rock sound
but I’ll jump rail for the riffs I dig
Those lightnin’ leads flash Texas big

Train, train roll down the line
Tune your ear and you will find
that the sound you hear at every destination
is the folk-rock-soul of a heartbeat nation

JUST BECAUSE

Shake
Slither slide snake
No need to fake
Don’t be a flake

Just because
You feel the buzz
Don’t call the fuzz
Act like you was

Get up and dance
Step from stance
This could be your last chance
To snap out of that trance

Hey beautiful– smile
It never goes out of style
Haven’t seen it in a while
Why impose self denial?

Feelin’ kinda groovy
Starring in a crazy movie
Well this flick should have some nudie
With myself and a cutie

SCHOOLDAZE

I think back to schooldaze I think back to fifth grade
My first love a deep crush, how it felt how it stayed
To notice the first time the features in her face
I can’t help to just stare and daydream into space
Her eyes and her lips and her hair are so pleasing
Does she feel the same way or is she just teasing?

In high school a dull day perfume note thrown my way
Such boldness and fashion and humor on display
A quick sketch endowed with a caption that’s asking
Why is it your true love is afraid of unmasking?
I turn to her blue eyes and my nerve is unsteady
A flower in full bloom I don’t think I’m ready

Cute girl I don’t know asked her friend to meet you
Why is it so hard for emotion to break through
Words of confusion advice that is all wrong
Frustration is the rule peer pressure is so strong

Athletic young lady I don’t know your name
Weak stomach and no spine were always my shame
I buried my feelings of true love down inside
With dumb stuff like jealousy machismo and false pride

Music is my love that never was spoken
This song is a gift to the hearts that I’ve broken
What means love is yourself the essence of being
Expression whose life force is vital and breathing
A love that extends through the cosmos and all time
A passion so pure it transcends sublime

ATHEIST PSALM

For bedtime stories of ancient belief
An atheist psalm is welcome relief
A revolutionary theory the Church will dismiss
Made for today we’re ready for this
It’s a vision of God with 20/20 sight
From an unholy roller; Oh I’m feeling it tonight
The power to heal is back in my hands
And control of my fate is in my command
I rely on myself and what is around me
It’s removed all the doubts that used to confound me
It’s cleared the confusion of a head that was reeling
To believe there’s no God is a cleansing feeling
It’s cleared the confusion of a head that was reeling
To say there’s no God is a cleansing feeling

There is no God
Just a theistic clan
Superstitious fraud
Do you understand me man?

Jesus and Allah and Buddha and Yahweh
Tall tales of old help little today
So on guard defense spine up straight
For hysterical attacks of right-wing hate
From an invalid pope in a flowing cape
And a Vatican that harbors bishops who rape
Little boys molested silenced to tears
Intimidated to protect orthodox careers
Priests hide in the closet as pious pretenders
It’s the Holy Roman Church and its sex offenders
They don’t believe what they preach and neither should you
These hypocrites and liars teach little that’s true
So clear the confusion of a head that was reeling
To declare there’s no God is a cleansing feeling
So clear the confusion of a head that was reeling
To yell there’s no God is a cleansing feeling

Because of different faiths
We must kill each other
Doesn’t this seem stupid?
Can I get an “Amen” brother?

Will my life matter to humanity?
How long can I live and fight off insanity?
On the vigor of youth works the grit and the sweat
It weathers my face so I don’t forget
That the strong and the brave with the weak and the measly
Can live just as long and die just as easily
So I keep no illusions concerning mortality
Death is the end the spiritual finality
When I look in the mirror I see the wisdom is there
In the lines in my skin and the strength of my stare
It’s cleared the confusion of a head that was reeling
To know there’s no God is a cleansing feeling
It’s cleared the confusion of a head that was reeling
To scream there’s no God is a cleansing feeling

ANNA REX

Anna Rex what happened to you what makes you see yourself this way?
That beautiful girl, not much left on that skin and skeleton frame
It’s not fair what men expect I wish we all could feel the same
Distorted view is food for thought while the body wastes away

Video killed the brain that’s how it goes it’s such a shame
Supermodels on TV dream of fortune, desire fame
The message to us all: what’s life without sex appeal?
Just illusions of ourselves in a world we can’t see what’s real

Anna Rex how can I help?
I wish I knew just how you felt

Obsession in the mirror reveals the ghost that was your face
Your self-denial robs youthful glow and leaves a husk in its place
The conflict over want and need rages in your mind
Always yearning ever searching for satisfaction it won’t find

MONEYBUG

In America we’re mostly the same
In our cities the pace is insane
In our leisure we must be entertained
That’s why drugs numb all the pain

TV Billy stays up late
In school he can’t concentrate
But there’s a pill to keep him calm and sedate
That his parents feed him twice a day

Moneybug– the cure is a new drug
Moneybug– always with the… / the cost of these… / the side-effects of these… new drugs

Doc, I got a tooth that hurts
If you touch it just makes it worse
Can you give me a prescription first?
Narcotics are what I prefer

Pedro young and gay
He’s sick dying of AIDS
The cost of treatment is beyond his means
With healthcare run by insurance schemes
So he can’t afford the….

Martha disabled and old
Wasting away in a nursing home
With a dozen meds side effects unknown
Would you want this life to be your own?

More research is to find a cure
But it’s a business that’s for sure
Profit & loss is how they keep score
We forgot what we’re fighting for…

LISTEN TO THE WOMAN

The words I say to you will always be true it’s a promise I won’t betray
Kiss me on the lips with a look and a smile, I forget how to play
I love you so much somewhere in my heart for reasons I can’t explain
I listen to the woman even if she’s wrong, there’s something in her way

A toast to our love it will conquer all take away the pain
Believe it in your heart feel it in your soul sear it in your brain
When I became strong I wrote this song it put me on a plain
Stretched me to the limit then I went beyond I’ll never be the same

When I say “I love you”
She knows that I do
What else matters if that’s true?

With infinite patience always in her nature to be warm and kind
A sensing intuition knowing what to say and when to change her mind
She knows herself well, measures all her words in what & how to say
Listen to the woman even if she’s wrong there’s something in her way

MLB General Manager 101

Posted on October 11, 2015 by admin

On top of this list are egomaniac owners, with way more money than brains:

Where you REALLY don’t want to be on this chart is near the top & out of the post-season– those team’s CEO’s & GM’s all deserve scrutiny.

MLB teams spent an average of $1,573,000 per win in 2015. In today’s free agent market, teams pay an average of $6M/win. Teams determine player value by calculating the number of wins a player will add above replacement level (WAR), using a blend of scouting and advanced metrics. A championship-level player at any position is 2-3 WAR, an all-star is 4-6 WAR, and a MVP is 8-10 WAR. Finding & signing bargains, while minimizing mistakes, is how you win as a GM.

All players need to be objectively valued, starting with the most important baseball skill– hitting. Hitting is best measured using the triple slash stats of AVG/OBP/SLG which gives a true measure of a hitter’s ability. OBP is life in baseball. It is the most important measure of a hitter’s value, carrying around three times the weight of SLG, which is second in importance. AVG is prone to severe fluctuations, even from season to season, and doesn’t measure the batter’s ability to take a walk– a critical hitting skill.

For reference, 2015 MLB triple slash averages for all players was .254/.317/.405.

Q: What is a batter is trying to do at the plate? A: Create runs. He does this by: 1) not making outs, and 2) hitting for power.

Productive outs are WAY over-rated in most situations. Sacrifice bunts give the other team an out, which is generally bad in terms of winning. Base stealing is also over-hyped, as caught stealing hurts– especially in this modern power-hitting era. Team SB% needs to be >75% to be effective towards winning.

A hitter’s value always needs to be understood in the context of the defensive position he plays. Catcher, shortstop, centerfield, and second base are critical & difficult defensive positions, which must be played competently for a pitching staff to be successful & stay healthy. Power & run production is usually expected from the less-demanding defensive positions: first base, corner outfielders, and third base. Of course, DH has always been about power in the AL, since 1973.

Pitching, as related to winning, is also about power. Pitchers with high K/9 and low BB/9 have the low ERA’s. Strikeout pitchers handle the best hitters with their stuff, and cover up for poor defense. The value of true-ace pitching in the post-season is exponentially higher than in the regular season.

Relief pitching has only the fraction of the value of starting pitching. Most organizations still overpay on closers and set-up relievers. Smart organizations stockpile power arms, then convert them to relievers if they fail as starters, in order to keep payroll costs down.

Defense was the final baseball frontier to be conquered by sabermetrics, begrudgingly earning respect from the old-timers. With the advent of digital video technology in the 2000’s, each player is now more accurately measured for their true defensive value. As recently as the 1990’s, assists, put outs, and errors were the only stats for individual defense; making Gold Glove awards (and any other opinions on defensive ability) highly subjective. Now, Zone Ratings, etc… use statistical analysis to objectify range, accuracy, arm strength, and competence at all positions.

As productive players at premium defensive positions get older, their defensive skills erode necessitating their being moved to easier spots, usually 1B or DH. Baseball history proves that it is nearly impossible to move a major-league player up the defensive spectrum, which runs C-SS-2B-CF-3B-RF-LF-1B-DH.

All this new data gives savvy GM’s (with a competitive payroll) the ability to budget their ball club, from its rebuilding to World Series champion. This is exactly how in 2015, the Houston Astros & Chicago Cubs rose from the ashes into the post-season. The St. Louis Cardinals are an example of an organization that is always competitively-funded & well-run from top to bottom.

Pennants & WS championships are won in the off-season. The deals a general manager makes through trades, free agent signings, and Rule 5 draft acquisitions shape the roster for the field manager. Most big league skippers will manage their talent equally well; and even the best, such as Joe Maddon can only add a few wins to a season’s total. The field manager’s primary value is in the post-season where game-management skills win & lose pennants. That’s why rebuilding organizations punt on experience and often give the manager job to a rookie at minimum salary– because they aren’t too worried about the post-season.

Generally, you need a good manager to win it all, and having a great one really helps. The most infamous example of an incompetent manager winning the World Series was in 2001, when Arizona Diamondbacks skipper Bob Brenly so horribly mismanaged his 2 HOF aces– Randy Johnson and Curt Schilling; along with his bullpen to the point where HOF NY Yankee closer Mariano Rivera was pitching in the bottom of the 9th of Game 7 with a one-run lead. A last-gasp rally started by Mark Grace, and aided by a Rivera throwing error, saved the Diamondbacks from eternal ridicule.

BTW, the Diamondbacks/Yankees 2001 was (IMO) the greatest World Series in the history of the game.

The most important GM questions of each off-season are: What is the payroll budget and where is this organization on the win curve? Understanding where a team is on its win curve determines spending priorities. Is this a team ready to win it all, or does it need to keep building, or rebuild? With an answer fairly determined, spending is then balanced accordingly on MLB payroll and draft/player development. Teams with no shot at winning (<75 wins projected) are well-advised to dump veteran payroll, in order to re-invest in prospects, the draft, and young international free agents.

Looking at basic team numbers can reveal much about where an organization sits on the win curve. Today with two Wild Cards, a team can virtually guarantee a playoff birth with 92-94 wins. Runs Scored (RS) & Runs Allowed (RA) objectify won/loss record, through Pythagorean projections. Intelligent GM’s can look at their roster before the season and use advanced metrics to estimate RS/RA, in order to approximate their team’s final W/L record.

Proof of this is in hindsight too. For instance, in 2015, the NY Mets were 90-72 scoring 683 runs and allowing 613, projecting to an 89-73 record. Most teams fall near their RS/RA projection, but not all. Sometimes teams can be lucky or unlucky in one-run games and/or extra innings– usually these contests are split around 50/50. This can distort a team’s final record, and reflect a false picture of their true talent.

An example of this were the 2015 Oakland A’s, who were 68-94, yet they were only outscored by 35 runs on the season (694-729). OAK’s Pythagorean projection was 77-85, but a 19-35 record in one-run games, the worst winning % in MLB, sunk their season. The good news for A’s fans is that OAK probably isn’t as bad as their 2015 record, and their Moneyball GM Billy Beane knows it.

Other GM’s don’t understand this so well, and they are usually found in organizations that perennially miss the post-season. Managers are hired and fired more often, and with more fanfare. Field managers probably receive too much of the credit & blame for winning & losing, while the GM’s off-season moves have much more impact on a team’s performance & final result.

Fans who don’t know their team’s general manger have very little clue as to why their team succeeds or not. For franchises that continually lose, this is likely the way it will continue to be, until their fans take a closer (and more serious) look at the business of baseball.

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What is The Villages?

Posted on September 23, 2015 by admin

The Villages, FL is an age-restricted retirement community controlled by several quasi-governmental Community Development Districts (CDD). These CDDs are controlled by the H. Gary Morse family, which created The Villages in the 1992.

Note: It’s considered bad form not to capitalize the ‘T’ in The Villages. Villagers take that very seriously.

Billionaire H. Gary Morse [google pics]

The Villages is located here:

Here’s a link to it’s demographics.

Thirty years ago this whole area was swamps, forests, and cow pastures; today it is the largest age-restricted retirement community in the world. No one under age 55 is allowed to own a home or live within The Villages, unless an exemption is granted. Children really aren’t welcome, as kids under 18 are only allowed to stay a maximum of 30 days/year, and this is strictly enforced within the community. Many of the strange & elitist facets of this adult playland are highlighted in Andrew Blechman’s Leisureville (2008).

An anecdote from Leisureville: Two brothers (Carl & Ben) in their twenties from Iowa, are visiting their mother who recently moved to The Villages. Carl, who is pounding tequila shots at the bar, notices the author’s notebook and asks if he’s writing a book, to which he answers with a nod. Carl replies (with his brother in agreement) “It’s a good thing, because this place is fucked up!”

The Villages isn’t a town or municipality, and everything in it, from it’s 50,000+ homes to all the businesses are controlled by the Morse family. Gary Morse, who died in 2014, made “unbelievable efforts” to ensure “these assets did not go to the community.” [1]

Morse financed much of the construction using something called a community development district (CDD), where the district levies fees on the homeowners to pay for roads and other improvements, and under state law can borrow money using tax-free bonds.

The CDD’s in the Villages paid Morse millions of dollars to buy his golf courses, guardhouses, and other amenities from him at inflated prices (reaping a nifty 500-1000% profit in many instances). The IRS has ruled since 2009 that the Villages’ CDD bonds did not deserve to be tax-exempt, because everyone who sits on the district board—like everything else in The Villages—is controlled by Morse. The Village Center CDD was organized and operated in a manner intended to perpetuate private control, and to indefinitely avoid responsibility to a public electorate. [2]

So far, the Morse family has successfully bribed Florida politicians from both parties to hold off the IRS– and the tax bill they face on $364 million worth of municipal bonds. Attorney’s for the Morse family are currently looking for a way to get the dispute out of the domain of the IRS and into tax court, where it can get a friendly judge to rule in their favor. [3]

Land-secured debt is the riskiest part of the $3.7 trillion municipal-bond market, accounting for almost half of non-payment default filings, according to industry experts. Village Center revenue bonds maturing November 2032 are now rated just above non-investment grade by Moody’s Investors Service, with an average yield of about 5 percent, or about 2 percentage points above an index of benchmark municipal bonds with similar maturities.

Needless to say, Wall Street & bond traders are paying close attention to this case. [4]

The financial house of cards that built The Villages isn’t the only thing about to collapse, as the ground underneath this massive development is literally caving in. Sinkholes are now popping up with alarming regularity, as the water table and underground aquifers become depleted due to wasteful overconsumption. [5] The Villages (within its 33 square miles) now has over 30 golf courses.

As the cost for repairing & maintaining all these amenities increases, the homeowners (who are locked into paying for all of this), increasingly won’t be able to afford it. The Villages resembles nothing so much as the boomtowns of the old West; in fact, their latest project is called Brownwood– a western-themed development.

Golf carts are ubiquitous in The Villages:

This is what a typical one costs:

$10K+

From 2005-09, physicians working in The Villages reported cases of syphilis and chlamydia increasing 71% among those 55 and older. [6]
Factors driving the rise of STD’s in this demographic include their not heeding safe-sex messages that younger generations follow; along with new medications, such as Viagra, making more sex possible for geriatrics. Villagers as a group, strongly object to any form of social or personal responsibility– ranging from paying taxes to using condoms.

Everything in The Villages is about entertaining the old folks. The level of kitsch is over-the-top, with fake façades & other pabulum passed off as real entertainment. Most Villagers don’t seem to notice the difference, or if they do– don’t care.

Est. May 2015

Fake Lake with Fake Boats

Fake Lighthouse & Historical Plaque

The media in The Villages is also controlled & operated by the Morse family, including its newspaper:

The Daily Sun’s content is exclusively banal, vague and right-wing. The scan below is an example of their “reporting.” Go to their online archive, and it comes up as a blank page. [7]

The Daily Sun and its Intentionally Vague Reporting

The Daily Sun’s intentionally vague reporting

WVLG 640 AM (a FOX news affiliate licensed in 2004) is the local radio station, endlessly playing moldy oldies between its conservative talk.

Transmitter location is actually here

If all this sounds like paradise to you, then join the zombies in The Villages; where there’s no concern for the world outside– as everything is safe, self-contained & soothing. Think of it as Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World, where everybody takes a soma holiday; or better yet– don’t think at all.

Here we are now– entertain us…

I, Me, Mine

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2015 San Diego Padres

Posted on September 15, 2015 by admin

This team was going to be a story in MLB in 2015, with all the off-season dealings and free agent signings by newly-hired GM A.J. Preller. Opening Day payroll was increased to $108 million (a record expenditure for the franchise), and everyone in the organization from owner (beer distribution magnate) Ron Fowler to CEO Mike Dee was optimistic about the Padres chances of making the post-season.

San Diego Padres CEO Mike Dee

In reality, it was all over by July or August, depending on one’s level of sobriety. The 2015 San Diego Padres will go down as one of the most ill-conceived teams in modern baseball history. As of this publication, they are 67-77, 4th in the NL West; 16 GB in their division and the wild card. Mercifully, only three weeks remain in the season, with their playoff elimination # now well into single digits.

The 2015 Padres were a tantalizingly streaky team early; one that wins five, then drops six on a whim. The Padres now rank: 28th AVG at .244; 30th (last) in OBP at .299; and 26th in SLG at .387. Despite playing half their games in an extreme pitching park, the Pads are no better than 20th in team ERA. Their pitchers are tied for 4th (w/ TB) in K’s, but they’ve allowed the 4th-most walks. Their Defensive Efficiency Rating (DER) is .687, ranking 20th. Petco Park has one of the roomiest outfields in MLB, so poor defense hurts even more there than in a bandbox.

A.J. Preller Padres GM

The entire starting rotation was right-handed, allowing opposing mangers to stack a lefty lineup, day after day. This extreme right-handedness included relief pitching– until Marc Rzepczynski was acquired at the trade deadline, as LHP reliever Frank Garces (35 IP, 5.14 ERA) doesn’t really count towards winning. Evidently, it took A.J. Preller months to realize the value of having at least one reliable left-hander in the bullpen. It’s really tough (for whomever is managing) to get outs against tough lefty hitters in crucial late-game situations, with only right-handers in the pen. This is baseball 101, not complex sabermetrics.

Bud Black– fired after a 32-33 start

Speaking of managers, the Padres haven’t had one since they fired Bud Black in mid-June. Did you hear about it? Since then it’s been interim manager Pat Murphy, who can best be described as a warm body. Black had been the second-longest tenured manager in MLB at the time of his firing, and was well-respected by the players and other mangers.

Darren Balsley– one of the best

Ace pitching coach Darren Balsley worked well with Bud Black, particularly in the development of their young starters RHP’s Tyson Ross & Andrew Cashner. Since Bud Black was fired as manager, Balsley (who is a master a spotting breakdowns in pitching mechanics while offering helpful advice) rarely makes a trip to the mound anymore.

Ross & Cashner were the most-asked-about Padres players up to the trade deadline, instead of the players they were trying to deal; including closer Craig Kimbrel, SP James Shields, and LF Justin Upton. To GM A.J. Preller’s credit, he didn’t panic and give away valuable assets at the July 31st deadline, despite shrieking hysterics from the media. It was a buyer’s market, as top talent including: SS Troy Tulowitzki, and ace LHP’s David Price and Cole Hamels outshined Shields & Upton, or anything else the Padres had available.

The off-season deals that brought in Wil Myers, Matt Kemp, Justin Upton, James Shields, Craig Kimbrel & Melvin Upton, Jr reshaped this team completely, while affecting their payroll flexibility going forward.

The most hurtful deal to the Padres organization was trading C Yasmani Grandal to the Dodgers for RF Matt Kemp. Grandal is a good defensive catcher, age 26, with a career line of .247/.356/.418; who makes $693,000 in 2015, and won’t be eligible for free agency until 2019 at the earliest.

Matt Kemp is now turning 30, and really is much older in terms of playing age. It hurts him to run; watch closely and you’ll see a once-great athlete with degenerative arthritis in his knees, hips & back. The skills still flash at times, but the body has broken down, so he can’t perform with consistency. Preller not only traded a valuable commodity in Grandal to get Kemp, but also took on too much salary. LA pays $18 million of the $21+ million he’s owed this year, after that the Padres are on the hook for $18+ million/year through 2019.

Wil Myers came over from the TB Rays in a frenzied 4-team deal. Myers was/is a RF. Joe Maddon is considered one of the best, and most creative managers in the game, and he never considered Myers in CF. The Padres started the season with the-player-formerly-known-as B.J. Upton on the DL, with turf toe in the right foot. Wil Venable was the only SD Padre capable of playing centerfield. Instead, Myers was moved to center, flanked by Justin Upton & Matt Kemp.

Predictably Myers was a disaster in center– missteps & bad jumps, taking awkward routes, diving for balls other centerfielder’s catch easily; costing his pitchers outs, runs and wins. None of this was Wil Myers’ fault, as his coaching staff & GM put him in a position to fail– and he did. His wrist problems which began in TB, were aggravated by playing an unfamiliar (and more demanding) defensive position, and Myers ended up needing wrist surgery– costing him half the 2015 season. He’s still one of their most valuable long-term assets.

Justin Upton was brought over from the Braves in a series of multi-team trades that (in hindsight) really didn’t cost the Padres much in terms of prospects. He’s paid $14.5 million in 2015, which is considered a bargain. He’s a free agent at season’s end. The Padres would love to keep him, but the problem is they have Matt Kemp too, and only enough room in the outfield for one of them.

Wil Myers (if he’s going to stay healthy & productive) has to be a corner outfielder. Unless the Padres can move Kemp, which will mean eating a huge chunk of his contract, then they can’t even entertain the thought of resigning Justin Upton. San Diego will likely make Upton a qualifying offer, and then take the draft choice when he signs a free-agent deal elsewhere.

Melvin (I’m calling him B.J.) Upton isn’t the greatest option in CF (thru 72 G: .244/.310/.417), but the Padres have him for 3 seasons at $15 million/year, so they have to play him. Like James Shields (mostly) and Carl Crawford (surely), his best years were in Tampa; and the B.J. stood for Bossman Jr., which was the best name in baseball for years.

Bossman Jr

James Shields is in his 10th MLB season, with over 2000 IP in his career. He will be 34 in December, and is probably best recognized now as a very good #3 starter on a championship-level team. In his prime, Shields was a horse #2 starter. Once again, the problem for the Padres isn’t that the player stinks, it’s that they overpay him. The $10 million this season seems fair enough, but the $21 million/year from 2016-18 limits the trade options.

Yangervis Solarte 3B

Yangervis Solarte at 3B has been a nice surprise hitting .272/.335/.430 as of this writing, while playing good defense at the hot corner. A.J. Preller’s original ‘plan’ was Will Middlebrooks at third, whose 4 MLB seasons have so far produced .231/.274/.399. Middlebrooks is a classic example of someone who is overvalued because he played on a great team (Boston Red Sox). As a comparison, he’s less valuable than NY Yankee utility IF Luis Sojo: .261/.297/.352 in 13 seasons.

Shortstop is still a mess for the Friars, as it’s been an endless carousel since the inconsistency of the Khalil Greene era, from 2003-08. Suffice it to say it’s really an important position, and you can’t be a good team without one.

The latest experiment is to try 2B Jedd Gyorko at SS. Gyorko has the hands & skills, but neither the athleticism nor the arm for shortstop. This move reeks of desperation, and highlights the inability of Padres leadership to learn from their past mistakes. More than anything, Gyorko needs to hit better as his .239/.292/.397 line is approaching replacement level. He is making $2 million this season, but is owed at least $33 million though 2019.

The Padres snagged 1B Yonder Alonso (along with Yasmani Grandal!) from the Reds in the Mat Latos deal. He’s still light on power for first base, and he can’t stay healthy (which is also a skill). His career .282/.361/.381 batting line helps, if only a little. Not all of his injuries have been his fault. This video of Justin Upton unintentionally hitting Alonso with his batting helmet, succinctly encapsulates the frustration & futility of Padres’ 2015 season.

Other SD Padres notes:

1B Adrian Gonzalez would have been a great organizational investment.

West coast bias in sports is real. One reason I chose to be a Padres fan was to test that theory.

RHP’s Brandon Morrow & Josh Johnson both spent the season on the DL, which should have surprised no one.

On 7/19/15, the Padres had their first rainout since 4/04/06. It almost never rains in San Diego. The game against the Rockies was suspended in the 5th inning, and was made up on September 10th– which COL won 4-3.

Dick Enberg does the Padres play-by-play on television, and he’s still a first-rate announcer. He was selected as the 2015 recipient of the Ford C. Frick Award, presented annually for excellence in broadcasting by the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum. I personally remember enjoying Enberg when he called the NFL, NCAA basketball, professional tennis, and Olympics for NBC in the 1970’s & 1980’s. He’s always been a thoughtful & pleasant conversationalist on the air, and still has a great voice.

Ted Leitner is in his 36th season behind the microphone for ‘My Padres.’ Baseball is a great game to listen to on the radio.

The Padres military programs which started in 1996, are the most successful in baseball– in terms of market penetration. San Diego is home to several of the largest military installations in the world; including the Marine Corps Air Station Miramar, Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton, Marine Corps Recruit Depot San Diego, Naval Base Coronado, Naval Base San Diego, and US Coast Guard Station San Diego. Taped games are sent to the entire U.S. Pacific fleet for on-board viewing, via the Padres at Sea program. Every Sunday home game is Military Appreciation Day (along with Memorial Day, Independence Day, and Labor Day), as the Pads wear their camouflage jerseys, which has now been copied by other teams across MLB. I have mixed feelings about all of this.

The Padres organization has tried to reach into Mexico, as San Diego is the city closest to the border, with mixed results. Note to management: the best way to get Latin America to follow your baseball team, is by having good Latin American players in the organization & lineup.

Matt Kemp hit for the cycle on 8/14/15 , becoming the first Padre in franchise history to do so, in the club’s 7,444th game. Now only the Marlins haven’t accomplished this feat.

The Padres still haven’t thrown a no-hitter, nor won a World Series. They began play in 1969.

The Padres enshrined C Benito Santiago and SS Garry Templeton into their Hall of Fame. In 1981, the Padres traded a young Ozzie Smith to STL, for Templeton.

In conclusion, this organization is a mess, and A.J. Preller has a 5-year contract; so it’s going to be up to him to learn on-the-job and fix it, or suffer the consequences. This fan remains unconvinced after the spectacular crash of 2015. Preller often seems enamoured with his ‘rock star‘ image, to the point where it affects his better judgement.

He succeeds GM Josh Byrnes, who left due to serious disagreements with CEO Mike Dee, over where this organization is in terms of winning a championship. As a Padres fan who signed up on a one-season deal, I’d only take another one-year fan contract from this organization. One of the best parts of being a Padres fan is knowing that many of us really don’t care about winning. Baseball is paid-for entertainment, nothing more. I personally love streaming their games, listening to the drunken fans at Petco chanting “Let’s go, Padres!”– then hearing it quickly lose its rhythm & enthusiasm, completely collapsing upon itself several responses– signalling to all, that Padres fans actually know their team.

Electrified!– (Rough Cut)

Posted on August 31, 2015 by admin

Electrified! is a documentary film about the evolution of a practicing family dentist into musical artist & filmmaker.
This practice no longer exists; as it was shuttered in early 2014.
The staff & patients featured in this film are a fair representation of what went on during its 18 years of existence.

The film was shot & edited from June 2012 through December 2013.
Electrified! still needs money, in order to be truly finished.
It is being released as is on YouTube, because its creators desire the widest viewing audience.

Written & Directed by Ric Size
Edited by Susan Cameron
Produced by Susan Cameron & Ric Size
Directors of Photography: Susan Cameron & Bruce Marcho
Uploaded to YouTube by TomP

Film Cast:

Eric Meeker………….DDS & Ric Size
Tom Pearce………….Drummer & Watch Repairman
Cynthia Lancaster….RDH
Jennifer Jusino………Receptionist
Lidia Barrera………….Dental Assistant
Allan Marsh……………Featured Patient
Elijah Salhani………….Cafe Owner
Art Rich…………………Auto Repair Shop Manager
Bill Warden…………….Tai Chi Sifu
Jay Stanley……………Recording Engineer & Studio Owner
Carol Gray…………….Denture Lab Technician
Mitchell Jim…………..Crown & Bridge Lab Technician
Becca Pearce……….Monopoly Game Contestant
Adrian Pearce……….Monopoly Game Contestant
Brighton Pearce…….Monopoly Game Contestant
Maya Pearce………..Monopoly Game Contestant

“Talented” Crew:

Camera/Editor: Bruce Marcho
Production: WildZebra Media
Lighting: Matt Sowers
Sound Op: Allan Marsh

Basketball scene shot on location at Pat Burke Hoops, in Mount Dora, FL – June 24, 2012.

Challenge Player: Corey Sutherland
Janitor: Pat Burke

Office party and outdoor scenes shot at Belton Bail Bonds in Tavares, FL – July 27, 2012.

Beautiful Woman #1: Angelica-Naia Gabor
Beautiful Woman #2: Jenay Nadine
Beautiful Woman #3: Amber Sym
Beautiful Woman #4: Amber English
Cop: Mitch Bromwell
Gay Guy: Sherwood Heineman
Straight Guy: Allan Marsh
Lady Justice: Ali Camp
Rich Businessman: Robby Camp
Secretary: Stephanie Sherman
Waiter: Tom Pearce
Young Kid #1: Ross Hackney
Young Kid #2: Jamison Moore
Young Kid #3: Katie Hohman
Young Kid #4: Victoria Strawbridge
Young Kid #5: Hunter
Young Kid #6: Jeffy

* In the historical discussion section; German imperialism is shown in green, not purple

Electrified! film Copyrighted by Infinitelink Records/ WildZebra Media

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What Songwriters Need to Know

Posted on August 7, 2015 by admin

Find a drummer, one who can keep time & swing.
Songwriters are generally guitar players, who sometimes mistakenly believe music should speed up & slow down.
All competent drummers understand this to be wrong, as music needs to stay in time for it to be listenable.
It is the ability to swing around the beat, which makes the music feel faster or slower.

Drums are the heartbeat that drives rock & popular music.
A great drummer can take a good song to new heights, a sloppy one will kill it.

The best rap & electronica artists have this similar understanding, in their use of sampled & programmed beats.

A singer/songwriter/rhythm guitarist needs accompaniment, otherwise the songs quickly suffer from a sameness of sound.

Bass players are often their own breed of rock musician, maybe because they are relatively uncommon compared to guitar players.
The best bassists are the ones who play bass only.
Like anything else, one needs exclusive devotion to an instrument to become truly proficient.
Guitar players who double on bass have trouble with correct fingering technique (without a pick), and never get the true bass sound & feel.

The bassist is the critical link between guitar and drums.
They must know how to play in time while swinging in the pocket— otherwise known as groove.

With an on-time drummer and groovy bass player, the nucleus for a tight rock sound is established.
Extra support comes in the form of a lead guitar player, and any other gifted musicians that can be found.
Most songwriters are not ace guitar players– and rock records often need one.
Any other support to fatten up & round out the sound, with brass or other stringed instruments, should have classical and/or jazz training.

It is well-understood among musicians, that the best players are all in the classical & jazz domains.
It is much more difficult to be a good jazz guitarist, than a good rock guitarist.
Classical music is even more demanding.

All serious musicians have egos, so make such you have the goods when approaching them. Treat them with respect, but set reasonable boundaries so you aren’t tolerating head-case nonsense.

Not really a bass player

Assembling the right players to go with strong songs, is only half the task in recording a great album.
Studio recording & production is the other half.
Understanding sound and how to record it is a blend of science, experience & artistry; so find a real producer.

The best producers understand the importance of establishing a neutral listening baseline, by “pinking” the recording studio; amateurs aren’t even aware of this concept.
“Pinking a room” means setting up a reference microphone, so a pink noise signal can be measured throughout the studio; and then equalized flat, using a real time analyzer (RTA).
Any room that isn’t acoustically balanced through architectural design will have places where certain frequencies are favored or filtered out, due to the way sound bounces off the walls and other objects.
A knowledgeable producer will equalize (pink) the studio– anywhere microphone recording, monitoring, and playback listening occurs. [1]

Failure to do this will cause errors in distortion and loss of select frequencies.

Example: An unpinked studio has a hotspot in the low-midrange frequency (250 Hz to 500 Hz– a common problem area) where the producer sits, causing distortion errors in monitoring & mixing playback.

If uncorrected, the tendency will be to lower those frequencies because they sound too loud. An inexperienced producer mistakenly thinks the recording is too hot in the low-mids, when really it’s distortion in that range, created by the room itself. Therefore the low-mids get mistakenly lowered in the recording & mix-down, disappearing in the final song when played externally, on a different set of speakers or headphones.

Mix-down is where all the separate tracks (drums, guitars, bass, vocals, etc.) are put together, with effects & stereo placement.
While mixing, the producer’s job is to create fullness in all dynamic ranges (low-mid-high), with tightness, punch & clarity.
The most useful effects for all instruments (including vocals) are compression & reverb.
Auto-tune & equalization are helpful as a vocal sweeteners, and are required by today’s listening standards if singing isn’t pitch perfect.

After the songs have been properly mixed, the album is then mastered.
Mastering is defined as final compression & equalization of audio material, so it plays loud and evenly on all audio systems.
This can now be easily accomplished with freeware. [2]

Pro Tools is considered today’s industry standard for sound recording.
Unfortunately it comes with a lot a baggage, which doesn’t seem to get enough frank discussion.

Firstly, any honest audio producer will tell you that Pro Tools has serious stability issues, and is infamous for crashing at any time.
Another major problem is incompatibility with non-Apple plug-ins, as many freeware effects (compression, reverb, auto-tune, etc…) won’t operate on Pro Tools.
Also, updates for purchased plug-ins often require more money, and it all starts to feel like a money pit after awhile.
The overall audio quality has also be described as “boxy”, meaning the snare & kick drums sound like they’re being played on cardboard.

The above photo is Pro Tools for PC, which has even more stability issues. Even this Express package (a bare-bones 8-track console) is a memory hog, using every ounce of a computer’s resources. If other program’s are running, crashes will be even more frequent. Updated mixes should be backed-up constantly, to avoid a sudden loss of productive work.

This synopsis of band theory & audio recording may seem a long way from songwriting and creativity, but learning these lessons is essential. At some point, a songwriter has to give up control of the project, and place it in the hands of other professionals. This writer is not a drummer, bass player, or producer; but familiarization with these basics allows new songs to flower with artistic creativity, and ultimately achieve a professional level of audio fidelity.

The more a songwriter knows of this, the more he/she can helpfully guide the process. This knowledge is required for making music that other people will want to hear, as writing a great song just isn’t good enough; it has to be captured into an acceptable recording & polished into an exciting final production, otherwise it falls flat onto deaf ears.

U.S. Government 2015 Budget Analysis

Posted on August 5, 2015 by admin

The graph below is where the U.S. government gets its income:

The main problem with the above chart is that corporations only contribute 13% of the tax revenue, and yet they get to buy all the political influence; while working individuals contribute most of the 46%, and get very little in comparison.

Here is the breakdown of U.S. government total spending:

Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid, along with parts of the budgets for the Department of Agriculture, Department of Defense, Department of Education, and Department of Veterans Affairs are mandatory spending items.

Mandatory spending cannot be changed without an Act of Congress. The Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) and Obamacare (ACA) are new forms of parasitism in mandatory spending; while Social Security, Medicare/Medicaid, Education, etc. are being systematically de-funded. This is intended to push these programs into bankruptcy, allowing equity capital to raid its coffers through privatization.

Here is the breakdown of U.S. government discretionary spending:

The U.S. military eats 55% of the discretionary budget, and it’s hard to believe that essentials such as housing, education, health, environment, etc… each receive no more than 6% of the discretionary pie.

Food & agriculture gets only 1% of discretionary spending.

The pie graph below is mandatory spending (65%), discretionary spending (29%), and interest on national debt (6%), with the actual figures listed below:

Total revenue $3.34 trillion
Total expenditures $3.90 trillion
Deficit $564 billion (3.1% of GDP)
Debt $18.69 trillion

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Note: Close to $4 trillion will be spent by the U.S. government in fiscal year 2015 (October 1, 2014 — September 30, 2015), while virtually nothing is done to improve the lives of working people in terms of job creation, housing, education, health care, urban renewal, environmental clean-up, or any other issue that matters to them.

No bourgeois politician– Democrat, Republican or “Independent”– will honesty explain any of this to the working people or the kids, much less take any serious action.

The only answer is for workers & students to unite and replace this corrupt capitalist system with a worker’s government, armed with a socialist program in order to rationally allocate resources for the maximum benefit of society.

Signs of the Time

Posted on July 10, 2015 by admin

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Plutocracy & Marxism

Posted on July 4, 2015 by admin

Kararak RS: vocal, guitar, bass; TomP: percussion & production

Plutocracy is defined as a government by, and for the wealthy– which is the United States of America in 2015. It has actually always been this way, since its Constitution was first enforced in 1789, as wealthy landowners wrote the rules. But the point was, the Constitution had ten amendments, known as the Bill of Rights, which offered certain protections for individual & legal liberties, placing restrictions on governmental power.

Today, the U.S. Constitution is a dead letter, obvious to anyone who thinks; and the horrible truth is none of us are actually free. We are all held prisoner by the fetters of capitalism, which bind us in all forms– visible & invisible.

The American Heritage dictionary definition of free is– to not be bound or constrained; at liberty.

Constraints are all-too-real to ignore for those with limited means, as they include: money debt, re-occurring bills that become harder to pay, and the threat of unemployment with no pension or retirement savings.

Those with a job they dislike are the lucky ones among today’s U.S. proletariat (working class), as the unlucky ones face an inability to obtain a workable job at a liveable wage, homelessness, being the target of police violence, imprisonment, and premature death.

The hooligans of the working class are defined in Marxist terms as lumpen-proletariat; a mixture of criminals, provocateurs, and bigoted ignorance. They are a relatively small (but dangerous) portion of the working class, that needs to be recognized & ruthlessly crushed by an educated proletariat, for any progress to occur. Otherwise our society ends up with fascism, followed by obliteration.

The petty bourgeoisie (formerly the middle, now upper-middle class), are financially stable, but certainly not free. The petty bourgeoisie are full of disorders, mostly stemming from their insecurity in not being rich enough (and therefore not good enough), by capitalist standards. They are (like the U.S. proletariat) equally divided among Democrats & Republicans in their illusions, usually focusing passionately on a single issue or two. Those who remain apolitical, become pawns in the grand chessboard of politics.

Petty bourgeois politicians always miss (avoid) the big picture. Trotsky correctly summarized liberalism as “half-thinkers with half-baked ideas, pronouncing half-truths they half-heartedly support, all to justify their political half-lives.”

V.I. Lenin once remarked, “The power of Marxism is that it is true.”

The petty bourgeoisie are the professional class of doctors, lawyers, engineers, and other vital problem-solving intelligentsia. They also run the universities & the mass media, and their conformity to the plutocracy is critical; as all capitalist ideology rewards them, in return for their services & obedience. It’s a Faustian deal one makes.

Capitalism must be understood dialectically, as a global system that is constantly evolving. The only source of wealth is human labor, and capitalism extracts it at below actual cost, more efficiently than feudalism or chattel slavery. This extracted wealth is defined as capital.

Marxism is the only scientific method of studying economics, as money is created through commodity production by human labor. It’s philosophy is dialectical materialism. Dialectics is the study of change and revolutions. Materialism is the insistence that all thinking be rational– based on actual matter.

Marxism rejects all forms of idealism, which always leads back to god; insisting on a rational scientific method in all questions of political economy.

At an earlier stage, say the pre-Industrial Revolution era, capitalism was a spur to creative development and free thinking; in other words, capitalism of that time could (at least in some sense) honestly claim it was progressive– because it was founded on Enlightenment principles.

Today, understood dialectically, capitalism is in its death throes– an impediment & mortal threat to our future. Human civilization needs an international socialist revolution in permanence, as capitalism is pushing its ruling class towards nuclear extinction.

The truth is: the ruling class isn’t even in charge, as the combined forces of a global political economy under the irrationality of capitalism are determining what each nation’s political leaders must do. Their marching orders come directly from the global economic powerhouses, such as the IMF, ECB, Downing Street, and Wall Street; who are ruled by the logic that profits always come first.

This completely dehumanizes the leaders of these institutions, which of course makes them thoughtless, self-serving slaves of the capitalist system; and thus, by definition, not free. The bourgeoisie which controls the world’s wealth is the sickest, and most decadent class in human history. Even the most gluttonous of Roman emperors, medieval pontiffs, and royalty would surely envy the level of luxury & destructive waste among today’s richest of the rich.

Their disorders are among us everywhere, most conspicuously in the never-ending glorification of their celebrity & money. This can be seen as an ideological offensive by the bourgeoisie, in insisting that brains & real work have little value in comparison, in order to justify their pathologies & parasitic existence.

Official bourgeois ideology is called post-modernism, which simply states: there is no truth, except what is in your mind– so therefore anything can be true. Post-modernism is a convenient ideology for a class with all the money. The bourgeoisie monopolize all the levers of power, allowing corporate fascism to broadcast nationalist consumerism 24/7, while marginalizing any expression of free thought.

All this leads to a pathological need to own & control everything, hence domestic spying operations by the FBI, CIA, & NSA. Every bit of electronic data from every American, is stored in vast intelligence databases; for analysis, profiling, and the marketing interests of the ruling class. The police & military are increasingly the favored tools of the bourgeoisie for mass enforcement of undemocratic policies, at home & abroad.

Domestic spying never includes sharing with the public of high-level, closed-door meetings concerning major economic, political or social policies. Disclosure is always made to flow in the same direction as the money & power. Presidential and top administration emails, texts, & phone conversations over policy are always ‘national secrets’, and if revealed, becomes their paranoid nightmare ‘threat to national security.’ All this is simply couched language to justify concealment of bourgeois criminality.

Therefore, secret discussions of nuclear war with Russia & China, by top U.S. government officials & military commanders of all the armed forces, are never honestly revealed or discussed with the working people. [1] This Orwellian logic keeps us ‘safe’ we are told.

Instead of mindlessly consuming the Great American Holiday, step outside of the jingoism and notice this mad parade we’re all made a part of. When the fireworks dazzle the crowd, eliciting reflexive “oohs” and “aahs”– think about what they represent.

They represent shock & awe, which began on March 19, 2003; and since then has claimed over a million Iraqi lives. The most advanced society in the Middle East was destroyed, by insatiable capitalist greed for oil. It is precisely this impulse that will kill us all, if we don’t stop it.

Today is the 239th anniversary of the adoption of the Declaration of Independence by the Continental Congress, which declared the United States of America a sovereign nation.

True nationhood wasn’t that simple, as Great Britain was the mightiest Great Power of its time; but through determination, the richness of its resources, and bitter struggle– the newly-born United States prevailed.

In today’s epoch, our struggle is different, as the leaders of all nations– the U.S. foremost– are war criminals. Here in the U.S., its proletariat is faced with the task of having to disarm the mightiest and most sophisticated military/intelligence apparatus in human history, in order to head-off mutually assured destruction.

Any help from the petty bourgeoisie is appreciated, but not expected. It is now the task of the working people of all nations to unite, and overthrow its capitalist paymasters.

The alternative is to go on as if none of this matters, as human civilization eventually becomes consumed by a nuclear fire-storm, through the inexorable logic of capitalism; which prefers that outcome over socialism.

To those of us who think homo sapiens are better than that, we must truly begin to reflect on what these days really mean; and what needs to be done; as the time for action is coming soon.

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Kararak credits:

TomP: percussion & production
RS: bass, vocals & guitar

Inspired by this piece, and John Dos Passos’ USA Trilogy.

Understanding Men & LieSpotting

Posted on June 30, 2015 by admin

Listen to the Woman mp3 RS: guitar & vocals; TomP: percussion & production; Craig Roy: bass; Rachel Decker: chanteuse

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Men: Read this & speak up!
Women: Listen

Dr. Warren Farrell’s Myth of Male Power lecture notes:

We objectify what rejects us.
Therefore men see women as sex objects, and women see men as wallets.
It is easier to be rejected by this, than by a thoughtful and caring person.

Reflexive male-protector role
Men as a group take the most dangerous jobs, work the longest hours at their career, and die 7 years younger.
For men: obligation, sacrifice, and powerlessness is called “power.”
This is the myth of male power.

Power is actually the ability to control one’s life.
Both sexes have roles, which is not power.
To achieve true power, one must move past survival into self-fulfilment.

Stage 1: Survival
Stage 2: Self-fulfilment

What is functional for Stage 1 survival, is often dysfunctional for Stage 2 self-fulfilment.
That’s why 97% of us come from dysfunctional families, as our parents came from the survival stage.
Our parents worked and freed us to be able to ask & explore a whole set of questions, which they never had a chance to address.
For that, they deserve our gratitude & understanding.

Many middle-class women have moved beyond survival into self-fulfilment, because they have been given the opportunity for self-examination, by men who sacrificed for them.
Men largely still struggle to survive, as they don’t understand their feelings or what the problem is.
This is because they completely sacrificed themselves to their career, and don’t know how to love at home.

Women head-of-households have 141% greater net-worth, as compared to male head-of-households, as of 1994.
Most of the improvement between the sexes is that women now have more options.
Men are still largely programmed into a 1950’s male-protector role.
The change towards true gender equality & transformation can start in any place: with the man or the woman; high and low.

Women expect economic responsibility to be taken care of by men.
Men fear taking on the extra economic responsibility.

ALL heterosexual men are addicted to young, beautiful women.
ALL women covet the economic security & freedom provided by the rich, successful male.

Work is defined as: sacrificing oneself to the workplace, so one can have a better life outside of it.
Work is fulfilling, but can’t be just self-fulfilment; otherwise we would pay to go to work, instead of the other way around.

The pressure on ALL men, is the pressure to succeed.
Men must ignore intimacy to succeed.
Men don’t talk intimately with other men, because it exposes vulnerabilities, which hurts his chances of career success.
Therefore men put all their emotional eggs into the basket of women.

Blacks came from slavery, making their white owners wealthy– that is their unique heritage.
Native American males were destroyed.
Embracing diversity means empathizing, listening and feeling.

Women can’t hear what men don’t say.
Women must provide a safe atmosphere for sharing, otherwise men won’t share.

Men as wallets, women as sex objects, minorities as servants, etc… is a failed paradigm.
The adversarial relationship paradigm, between male patriarchy & female matriarchy, is unhealthy & destructive.
We need gender-transition equality, which embraces diversity and seeks to understand.

When the man has to pay for a gorgeous date, he’s paying for the difference between what he’s worth and what she’s worth.
Men pay for dates 95-97% of the time, at the best restaurants, (minus anniversaries and birthdays) according to maîtres d’hôtel & servers.
Men generally take the expectation of asking out, paying, and the sexual initiative.

The selection of men as protectors by women, with nuclear technology, has to potential to kill us all.
The most successful man at work, learns skills which are inversely proportional to loving at home.

The selection of the beautiful young doll by men, reinforces women as objects who don’t: carry their own, communicate effectively, or value inner beauty.
Our genetic heritage is in conflict with our genetic future.
Our challenge as a species is to adapt to Stage 2– self-fulfilment.
Species that don’t adapt, go extinct.

Socially codified prostitution isn’t working for either sex. Feminism has freed 3-5% of women, who have learned to carry their own & understand men, by listening. 95-97% of females, still expect men to meet their economic needs. In other words, they still expect men to pay for sex & love; the difference being now– this woman is her own pimp. That’s her ’empowerment.’

A real woman, carries her own responsibilities; happily sharing in the work & love. Men need to have realistic expectations & limits, in regards to the age and level of beauty of their prospective mate. Men over-rate their attractiveness, as a survival reflex to protect their ego and obtain the most sex, with the most-beautiful women. All of us need to get past survival thinking, which means men must stop lying about themselves; and women need to stop lying to protect others, in exchange for economic security.

Men: Seek a comparably attractive woman, with who you are compatible. Ideal ‘types’ will be your age & level of attractiveness, who listen and seek to understand you. Improve your own health & beauty (as well as hers!), through the healing power of love. It’s all quite scientific. [link]

Women: This world we live in, has been built by men. Men do the dangerous & dirty work (except for prostitution), and work longer hours– that’s why they are better paid. All of this is to provide protection & comfort– to women & their children. Virtually all the great art was made by men, inspired by and made for, women. The same is true with literature, science, technology, and most of the physical marvels that have benefited human existence. Women owe men their love & gratitude for ALL their sacrifices through the ages, and know they can depend on men to get it done in the future.

Women are correct when they object to being treated as prized-property. Men object to be treated as disposable property. When both men & women learn to listen, respect, and assist each other; that becomes mutual conditional love, which is what homo sapiens must adapt to, in order to survive.

—–<3—-<3—–<3—–<3—–

Pamela Meyer’s LieSpotting lecture notes:

ALL of us are liars.

The reason we lie is because a it bridges the gap between who we want to be, and who we actually are.

Lie-spotting is not about, “Gotcha!”
Lie-spotters are armed with scientific methods to spot deception.
They use it to get to the truth, and ultimately build trust.

Truth #1: Lying is a cooperative act.
A lie’s power is not in its utterance, but in when someone else agrees to believe it.

We are most likely to be deceived over what we desire most.
If you don’t want to be deceived, you need to know what you’re hungry for.

On a given day, the average person is lied to 10-200 times.
Many of those are white lies, used to maintain the dignity of others & social norms, and can be seen as relatively harmless.
However, strangers lie to each other (on average) 3 times within the first 10 minutes of meeting.

Men lie more about themselves.
Women lie to protect others.

Married couples lie to each other in 1 out of 10 interactions.
Non-married couples lie to each other in 1 out of 3 interactions.

Truth #2: We are against lying… but are covertly for it.
It’s part of our history & genetic heritage– ex. Shakespeare, the Bible, the Nightly News, etc…
The larger the neocortex, the more likely it is to be deceptive.
Lying is a survival instinct.

We live in a post-truth society.
Trained lie-spotters get to the truth 90% of the time; the rest, only 54% of the time.
Some people are better at lying than others.
There are no original liars, we all use the same methods and make the same mistakes.

Pattern #1: Verbal Dodging
Non-contracted denial– people who are determined to lie will resort to formal, instead of informal language (Bill Clinton, “I DID NOT have sex with that woman”, etc).
Distancing language– liars will unconsciously distance themselves from the subject, using language as their tool (Bill Clinton again, “…that woman“).
Qualifying language– (“in all honesty”, “to tell you the truth”, etc…) further discredits the subject towards deception.
Repeating the question in its entirety– ditto above.
Testimony with too much detail– ditto ditto.

Pattern #2: Body Language Tells
We all chatter with our fingertips.
Liars are known to freeze their upper bodies while being deceptive.
Liars will look you in the eye, a little too much, overcompensating for the myth that they won’t look at you.

A true smile is in the eyes.
You can consciously contract the muscles around your mouth, but not your eyes.

Look for the ‘hot spots’ to find the discrepancies between words and actions.
Attitude is the biggest tell of all; are they being cooperative?
An honest person will be on your side, enthusiastically helping to solve the problem.
An honest person will be infuriated, during the entire interview (not just in flashes), if they are accused of deception.
An honest person is more likely to recommend strict, not lenient punishment.

Conversely, a deceptive person will pause, look down, and lower their voice during an interview.
They will add extraneous details and tell their story in strict chronological order.
Professional lie-spotters will ask them to repeat their story backwards, then observe the red flags for deception in their gestures.

Red flag indicators include:
1) Saying “Yes,” while shaking our heads “No.”
2) Telling a convincing story, then shrugging our shoulders.
3) Duping delight.

Anger can be healthy; but when it turns to contempt, you’ve been dismissed.
It’s associated with moral superiority, and is very hard to recover from.
Contempt is marked by one lip corner pulled up & in, and is the only asymmetrical facial expression.
In the presence of contempt, say “No,” and leave the room ASAP.

Contempt looks like this:

These behaviors by themselves don’t always indicate deception, but if red flags appear in clusters, then suspicion of lying must be aroused.
These cues must be followed up, with further questioning & lie-spotting to determine the truth.
Look, listen, probe; ask hard questions.
Leave that comfortable mode of ‘knowing’ and walk into curiosity.
Have dignity and establish rapport.
Don’t interrogate aggressively–it doesn’t work.

Character is who you are in the dark.

We live in a much noisier world than our parents; with blogs, social media, texting, etc…
Over-sharing is not honesty.
The subtleties of human decency, character & honesty, are what truly matter.
In this noisier world, it makes sense to be more explicit about our moral code.

The science of lie-spotting, combined with the art of looking & listening, exempts us from collaborating in a lie.
This leads to a shift towards recognizing truth and marginalizing falsehood, which strengthens our world around us.
That’s the truth.

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