brainiac conspiracy

Tuesday Night Music Blogging

Because Dickwad the Internet Service Provider has been playing tricks on me all afternoon with Denial of Service notices because, allegedly, I have "exceeded my monthly browsing limits" even though I didn't know I even had any. I think this means, "Give us more money or you don't get to play on the YouberTubes." I'm sure glad that I can count on the people who govern us to protect Internet access, but as soon as my contract with these people expires, a new ISP beckons.

---Baron V

Not Keen on This at All

So we've already established that Donald Sterling is a racist shit, but even racist shits have some rights, and one of them---presumably---is the right to hold racist-shit views. His beliefs may be repugnant, but I don't see how you can bar someone from his chosen profession for being a racist shit without trampling all over his First Amendment rights to be a racist shit. Okay, I know why the league is doing it---because they've conveniently overlooked all the other horrible ways he has treated people throughout his career as an owner---but it sure seems to me that he'd have a decent court case if he wanted to contest them. He might not bother since his sponsors are deserting him in droves, and that, not the league, is what may ultimately force him to sell off his team.

---Baron V

Monday Night Music Blogging

Because being a First World nation sure was fun while it lasted.

---Baron V

Sterling

The racism and misogyny are icing on the cake, but it bears remembering that for most of his career in basketball, his franchise was one of the most incompetently managed organizations in the history of professional sports. What's more, he didn't give a shit about it. For decades. In fact, it made more sense for him to field a crappy team than a contender. Why? Because loading up his roster with minimum-wage rookies and retreads allowed him to rake in a tidy profit thanks to league's revenue-sharing program, even if the team finished last and nobody attended the games. In most endeavors, we'd call someone like that a welfare moocher, but this being America, he's a job creator par excellence.

---Baron V

Another Minimal Blogging Day

Because someone is losing his religion, or his mojo, or whatever. Meanwhile, rich white assholes.

---Baron V

Minimal Blogging Day

Because your humble blogger grows ever more weary of his task, and is starting to think that his available spare time could be more productively applied in other pursuits. Griping ain't easy!

---Baron V

The Negro Problem

I can vividly remember having debates in middle school and high school history classes about slavery in the Old South. A number of my classmates back then had been led to believe (by guess who?) that the colored folks were actually quite content as slaves, and were well cared and provided for. And this was back in the much-more-liberal '60s and '70s! I guess this only proves that there has always been---and still is now---a virulent cultural strain of white Americans who innately view African-Americans as savages who can't be trusted to exercise their own free will in a liberal democracy, hence the need for plantations or prisons. It's always made no sense since besides being viciously racist, the savages didn't exactly come to America of their own accord, now, did they.

---Baron V

Credit Where Due

Looks like they're going to roll out the new policy in baby steps---don't they always?---but whatever the number of nonviolent drug offenders they grant early release from prison, our society, and our wallets, will be the better for it. Even better would be the knowledge that they are releasing the drug offenders to crate cell space for bank executives, but I suppose that's asking too much.

---Baron V

Believe It When You See It

If the President actually pardoned every nonviolent drug offender who is currently incarcerated, on parole or on probation, I suspect---strongly---that history will remember more for that than for the Goldberg Act. I mean, the health-care law keeps in place our terrible, overpriced private-sector health-care regime while merely shifting the costs around, while freeing tens of thousands of inmates would mark a profound sea change in our long-failed drug policy. I doubt it'll happen, but we can hope!

---Baron V

Late Night Music Blogging

Because justice delayed is justice denied.

---Baron V

Nothing New, Really

I know I kvetch and moan a lot on this blog about income inequality, widespread poverty that's about to get much worse, etc. And yeah, it's a problem! But it's probably instructive to remind ourselves that the fine Christian men who founded the Republic believed that only people like themselves deserved the franchise, and that inequality is a feature, not a bug, of American life. Doesn't mean we should stand for it, of course, but we also shouldn't act as though it's some modern-day phenomenon, either.

---Baron V

Totally Unacceptable

This.

More to the point, if we are ever to have a truly healthy and productive society that works for everyone and not only the wealthy, a job should be a right, not a privilege. If there aren't enough jobs to accommodate everyone who wants one---which is gonna be a long-term problem---we will need to earnestly discuss one day a guaranteed annual income. Sure, we'll never eliminate poverty and unemployment entirely, but the people who govern us today aren't even pretending to care about the misery and suffering of their constituents that could be alleviated tomorrow if they chose to.

---Baron V

"Those People"

You know, they're the ones who don't want to work and who mooch all your hard-earned tax dollars in the form of food stamps and welfare. It's been a standard right-wing trope for nearly as long as I've been alive, and obviously, it's been quite successful at gaining them the allegiance of many white voters. One reason for this success, I think, is that a great many white folks have had very few real-life encounters with many of "those people" because America is still, you know, a deeply segregated society. It's easy to stereotype people you don't know, after all.

---Baron V

Hump Night Music Blogging

Because who knows, maybe we are living in the Last Days. Sure seems like it sometimes.

---Baron V

Tuesday Night Music Blogging

Because sometimes it's nice to know which way you're going.

---Baron V

Another Light Blogging Day

Because some days I just don't feel like grousing. Life's too short, y'know!

---Baron V

Late Night Music Blogging

Because unleavened bread and collie weed are on the menu tonight.

---Baron V

Light Blogging Day

Because work-related program activities---real paying ones!---take precedence over this dopey blog today. The usual fulminating will resume shortly.

---Baron V

Light Blogging Day

Because your humble blogger is off to Goldwater Country for family fun, and he won't be back until later tonight. Go out and have some fun of your own today!

---Baron V

Unpaid Internships Are Evil

You need a job done, you hire someone and pay him an honest day's wage for an honest day's work. It's the American way! Or should be, anyway, and particularly so when the interns in question generate hundreds of millions of dollars for their employers every year. It speaks volumes to the moral caliber of the interns that there isn't a chronic epidemic of game fixing-for-hire in college sports.

---Baron V