Who's the Fucking Genius Now, Francis?

You Americans are loserpussies. The world's top three banks are now Chinese and USA's biggest shows up at the 5 spot. When I last played organised hockey, nearly 30 years ago in a hangover league with my best friend and his father, our pregame cheer was "We are Number Five!" because there were six teams in the league. Let me hear you say it now America!
You Chicago School, free market, deregulation geniuses still don't get it. You are done. All over the world and in this country, only you don't know it yet because all you see is Kramervision.
Joe Stiglitz says that Fukayama was wrong about the end of history, that "The forces of liberal democracy and the market economy would inevitably triumph". Joe is wrong with all the other American liberals who allowed this to mean all market and no democracy with a lot of lies to grease the skids. Fukayama is wrong because he is a professional apologist for the corporate liars who are raping the earth to death.
Economics has been perverted into voodoo by what it purports to study- MONEY. The bosses of the world have bought and paid for their own school of solemn liars, who act as if debt and sustainability did not exist.
Accountants and economists do not count the cost of environmental pollution because it is inconvenient to those who hired the counters, not because the cost is unknowable. Where is the fiduciary responsibility, the due diligence, the risk management? Pay for performance anybody?
We are all struggling in what has been called a crisis of confidence. Confidence indeed, because a "confidence man" pretends to be something he is not, for the sake of unlawful self enrichment. Under deregulation, the rule of law has become voluntary for the rich, and the entire financial system is policed and staffed by con men top to bottom, backed up by the Heritage Foundation and the Federalist Society, Exxon Mobil and Citigroup. Bernie Madoff was in business for 40 years and did just fine.
Why must we simply put the banks in charge of saving the banks? Just what is the contingency for when a barrel of oil is priced in euros or Yuan? Hello Treasury? Hello Big Oil? Why are the tough love policies of the IMF and World Bank so diametrically administered from the US perspective at Home v Abroad? Could this entire Chicago School be a bunch of well funded and self serving liars who threw all the rules away only to crash the US economy bus?
The Bus is upside down in the ditch and just because the wheels are still spinning doesn't mean we should still be listening to the driver's story about how it is all going to be allright and these things just happen naturally and it can't be helped. I want to see the tow truck and I want to talk about the new bus.
What I want to say about the metaphor is I don't want a damn bus- I want a train that doesn't pollute and moves everybody efficiently, and runs on wind power. If we don't spend all this made up, borrowed stimulus money on this and right now, there will be no economy to grow. Saving the planet saves the economy, stupid. Commerce must be society's tool and not its master.
Let them make steel. Let them be pourers of concrete and raisers of windmills. GM, GE, the UAW and the EPA. Go forth and actually make something of yourselves before you become a nation of fat, well armed salesmen, surrounded by shiny things you can no longer afford.
How bad does it have to get before we admit the corrupt self interest of the very rich captains of FIRE (Finance, Insurance and Real Estate) has destroyed the credibility of American national interest abroad. This is the high water mark of the American Century. America had better become something beyond a slogan bearing arms or it will soon find itself at the mercy of the forces it has unleashed.

THE DEERSLAYER

My bike has developed a taste for blood.
It is my creation, my Jesse James Pinocchio child which has taken on its own identity, and grown up to be a killer. It's the blue one in the photo gallery.
The 1971 T120R was rebuilt in the late 80's, about 26,00 miles ago but it has evolved over the years I've owned it with various modifications and upgrades occurring randomly, often after accidents. I have crashed the bike more than six times. I can no longer claim full control for its appearance and behavior.
There is also nothing more permanent than a temporary repair.
It was a day in June when I got around to a session where a number of niggling details which had evolved through sequence of events not of my choosing. After a few hours with the tank off, the Bonneville had no situation to be rectified. I declared it perfect and took it out for a ride that night.
I was wearing what I call the Dead Man's Hat, a white open helmet I inherited from a former client who had a fondness for heroin that eventually took his life. This headgear apparently has a supernatural power to protect me the wearer from death, much like a temporary acquisition of a super power.
I was returning from my destination late that night on the South Shore Road just over a mile from my house when a deer bolted out from behind a guard rail and tackled the bike before I could even hit the brakes. Traveling about forty five miles an hour, I stood up and launched into a roll with my left shoulder making first impact for three full turns. I could see the bike sliding sideways on the road with the deer pinned underneath, when the deer dug in at the gravel shoulder of the road and the bike flipped upside down before landing on the gas tank against the edge of the pavement.
I walked the fifty feet back and picked up the bike while the deer blinked and moved its doomed head stupidly. The bars were bent on the left, but I yanked them up so it cleared the tank and I could steer. I fumbled into neutral while I expected the sheriff to come round the corner with a bunch of stupid questions. The bike started second kick and I puttered home in the dark. As I got the bike in the garage I realised my keys were no longer hanging from the snap clip on my beltloop. I was forced to walk back down the road with a flashlight and find the keys to my house and vehicles, so there was anything but compassion in my heart for the pitiful and clearly homicidal creature laying in a splintered heap of just deserts thirty feet from my keys.
The pain in my shoulder had mostly subsided by the time all the replacement parts had arrived and my spare gas tank fetched. The new tank was a different style and came down low onto conflict with the oil cooler, which had to be removed. Aside from the bars and some shredded rubber bits, the chrome had just acquired a few tiny scabs which were acceptable patina due to my condition of poverty. The bike looked low and mean with its wide black tank and a new seat cover was shiny. It definitely looked more badass and stated"no bullshit" quite clearly.
Riding again was another story especially at night, where every shadow in the forest was reading to leap out smash into you. I had a deer run into the side of my truck in broad daylight just a few months previous, a couple hundred yards from the driveway. I was stuck on high alert. By August another deer had assaulted my poor little Toyota on the way in to the track one early morning and that was a new windshield and mirror. Right about then, a friend's father struck a deer while riding his motorcycle in Connecticut and was killed a few miles form his home.
By that October of 06 I was very carefully pottering my way over to my pal Bart's house to watch Monday night football. As I crossed the dam a few miles away, I saw 2 deer charge up from the water again from the left and form a moving barrier across the road in my path. I grabbed all the brakes I could and steered away from the closest with my back wheel just locked. Which brought me skidding into his buddy who was able to easily smash into me as I slowed to a walking pace.
The deer went flying back about eight feet and my bike was knocked instantly sideways, trapping my right foot under the gearshift lever and swinging my body against the pavement like a rag doll. This broke some ribs on my left side and caused some soft tissue trauma to my foot as fulcrum. The deer scrambled to its feet and struggled up the hillside after his departed partner, so the second kill remains unconfirmed.
After some difficulty finding neutral, I was able to start the bike and ride home in the dark with another smashed headlight. I should also point out that there is no cellphone service in the Adirondack Park where I live.
At this point I parked the bike in the garage and left it for a year or so until returning in the depth of winter after my neighbor hacked a hole in the six foot high frozen plow berm with an excavator for access to the garage. I loaded my wounded warrior into the chevy and drove it out to Vancouver. The black tank had some issues keeping all the combustible contents inside so I found a small old style tank for a hundred bucks and put my old badges and knee pads on it after a quick rattle can. Some new headlight glass and more rubber bits made it fully functional and a pretty, compact oil cooler sourced cheaply from Lordco has now transformed my big boy into a lean American killer. Black and blue, alloy and chrome, the angry hotrod has people asking about it every time I ride it.
And we cannot be killed.

CORRUPTION IS WHY WE WIN

Let me say first that I follow politics, news and economics the way people in this country follow NASCAR. I have mental baseball cards for all the players. I know the stats, dynasties and the history before history. Let me also say that I am an alien in this country, a legal resident for over 15 years, so I have not grown up with the biases that y’all were raised on. What I am offering is just an objective opinion.

I recently watched Syriana for the second time. I was excited to see it the first time, and though there was a lot of information coming in a hurry, this is my Days of Thunder meets The Longest Yard or maybe North Dallas Forty. What I got was more like Apocalypse Now in that it was a Film whose vision was not being held back by the lowest common market denominator. I also knew a few of the folks involved; producers Georgia Kakandes and Steven Soderberg and actors George Clooney, Chris Cooper and Matt Damon to drop a few names. All of them are people of the finest quality and possessed of keen intelligence and artist’s conscience. I came away from the first viewing actually moved that these people had obviously tried their best to tell a deeper truth of a story that is driving this country to the edge of Rule of Law, and hit a home run.

My girlfriend had rented it when I visited but when I arrived she was watching some God awful light romantic comedy where 2 homely girls impersonate drag queens in dinner theatre to escape a Russian drug gang that somehow wants to kill them. When we sat down the next night for something with a soupcon plus gravitas, I had every expectation of an enjoyable experience. Heather couldn’t connect the early vignettes and was clearly frustrated after fifteen minutes. She left the room after Damon’s boy is electrocuted in the Emir’s pool. I tried narrating some of the plot turns to her but she would not return. I sat back and concentrated on soaking up a lot of details about the American side of the story that I had missed the first time.

The second viewing is more wistful for me as familiar lines resonate and new details illuminate. During the hunting scenes at the 777 Ranch in Hondo, Texas I was recalling my own visits to the infamous game ranch, a month of shooting scenes for Ace Ventura Two. The 777 is one of these exclusive menu-ordered custom carnage farms, where you chose the beasts you wish to kill from a list and you write a suitable check. At an appointed time and place the (insert- dikdik, polar bear, brace of pheasants, Nubian lion, all of the above) is presented and the client duly opens fire. This is just the kind of place where Dick Cheney and Antonin Scalia go to party, as reported in the Daily Show.

The 777 Ranch is real and Syriana is a work of fiction. Global Oil Politics is a reality, and yet with all the various reasons trotted out by the Decider and his Prince of Darkness for our adventure in Iraq, the oil has never been mentioned.

I was enthralled by the lawyers and sank into a trance while they spun their deals and reaped their rewards. I was repulsed and fascinated by the Dalton character, who must ultimately take a fall and he had so many great lines. You see him on the kitchen TV during a tense scene between the black lawyer Bennet and his alcoholic father, testifying with that special drawl of arrogance to some committee. “Why is it some dirty little secret that it’s in America’s national interest to do business overseas?” It gets even better when the implacable and low key Bennet confronts him with the news that he will be indicted on corruption charges. Dalton loses control and shouts an incredulous justification of corruption itself, “Corruption, is why we win!” is his punch line. I grew increasingly morose as Bennet dutifully manufactures the “appearance of due diligence” that lubricates the wheels of commerce in this film and this country. Again, Christopher Plummer is an actor. Scooter Libby is really taking the fall for an actual political hatchet job.

When they put up the equals sign from between Clooney’s Bobby situation being cleaned up by a predator drone and the half bright Pakistanis riding Bobby’s missile Slim Pickens into the tanker full of LNG, I had my face in my hands, swamped with despair. This is the 800-pound secret that no one can talk about in the actual U.S. policy room.

These intelligent and talented people had shown immense guts in shedding light into some dark corners of American policy. This is as close to the truth as you and I will ever know, thanks to the National Security State. The National Security State is a fact and not just Warren Beatty’s paranoia. Some things are true, even if George W Bush says them. Did I mention that I once shook his hand?

As I mentioned previously, I am an alien and thus recently had some previously inalienable rights removed. As a Canadian we were taught about some quaint artifice of appeasement, a 1215 agreement known as the Magna Carta. The Monarch, under God, accepted the rights of the populace to Habeas Corpus. 800 years later, because of our fear we must be ever more terrible than our enemies.

The protracted efforts of these talented folks in the lingua franca of our middle brow intelligentsia were not going to change the way business is usual. Because it is only a movie, they succeeded in convincing me of this fact to the extent that I felt like getting up and driving the wrong way home on the Thruway from Depew to exit 28 at Fonda.

The System is working.