Wuhan Kung Flu

Posted on by Alan Webb

Let’s stop dancing around the elephant in the room. It’s the Wuhan Flu (武漢流行性感冒). Actually . . . it’s the Wuhan Kung Flu. SARS COVID-19 is a novel SARS virus similar to the Spanish Flu. As time goes on it seems that it is very, very highly infectious but about as deadly as the seasonal flu we get every year. The deadly thing isn’t the virus. It is our collective freak-out over the Wuhan Kung Flu.

There are two illnesses afoot in our country. One is Wuhan Kung Flu. The other is a collective panic attack yeasted up by media celebrities and Maoist Yellow True Believers who saw the tea leaves and decided that this is their moment. These YTB’s happily get naked and flop onto the couch with their legs akimbo for a GFE with the Chinese Communist Party.

Obummer and the Debaclecrats used their 8 years to sell our country to anyone with enough money. The Chinese, ever enterprising, wooed the Sowshul Demutants with promises of a dynasty and epic wealth. We are the drug sick crack-whore willing to fuck for a $10.00 piece.

Wuhan Kung Flu Sauce for Your Laptop?

Name a laptop that isn’t made in China. My Lenovo t480s that I bought last year was made in 深圳. Ditto my phone and tablet. Very little is made in this country anymore. Smithfield Country Hams? Chinese. Even critical technology in the F35 fighter is made in China. Last, we owe $1.09 Trillion to China.

Whatever. Right? Not even. When China coughs, we get sick. One theory floating out there is that the Wuhan Kung Flu is a virus hatched under Chinese research contract managed by none other than Dr. Anthony Fauci. Fauci and the Obama Administration paid the lab in Wuhan to work on a novel SARS virus that they could in turn, figure out how to treat. Ok, fine.

Problem. That virus escaped the lab in Wuhan. It’s in our world now making people sick. Dr. Fauci, if this theory is true, you fucked up.

We thought China was our whore. Since 1972 we have been in bed with a country we thought was a nubile, docile exotic flower. That country is a war dragon playing the long game. She’s good with a little bed time because she knows the power of sex, money and fear.

Not Yet Up

Rock bottom is a thing. I don’t know if we are there yet. We are close. China is revealing her true nature as a dragon queen with a taste for ‘merican meat. Orange Menace’s opposition is losing. And it seems that the Lotus Flower we thought was our bitch played us.

We are her bitch. The Dragon Queen owns us. Yes, this connects to Wuhan Kung Flu. I’m about to get to that. You can tell who has Chinese hemorrhoids by the propaganda they publish. The true believers are the ones with the most shrill, dystopian tantrums blaming everyone except the Chinese.

Empress Cixi Wuhan Kung Flu

This is an apocalyptic, end of the world health crisis say the Yellow True Believers (YTB’s). Their answer? Maoism. We need a fundamental change to our society. A Cultural Revolution will cure us of Wuhan Kung Flu and save us from our sinful ways.

True Belief

Obama’s Administration further embedded a seditious cadre of Maoists and صحيح المؤمنين الإسلام within the White House. With Billary in the Oval Orifice the road to الجنة would be improved. This is part of a long term plan to make America Maoist Again (MAMA). After all, Mao is the one true way to a perfect world. Anyone who doesn’t see that needs reeducation.

The YTB’s lost a crucial battle when their attempted coup d’etat of Donald Trump turned into a limp dick dystopian tantrum that was full of sound and fury and signified nothing. Nothing Orange Shitweasel has been accused of has stuck. Quite the contrary. Most of the accusations turn out to be things that the Democrats did.

It is a familiar political play that has been invincible for decades. Convict someone in the court of public opinion and leverage that conviction into political death. One problem: Dumpf fights. This is not how it has worked for the YTB’s. They don’t have a counter strategy for someone who answers their accusations with political blows.

Enough specious political theory. I want to move on to our collective freak-out. We were told in February that this was the arrival of the Day of Judgement. The excesses of the ‘Mericans would be called to account and the final judgement pronounced on a corrupt system that profited the rich and oppressed the proletariat. This would be to the glory of Mao.

Shut It Down

The answer was to shut down the country, cower in our homes, stay at least six feet away from each other at all times, wear a face mask 247365, and wait until the YTB’s had burned Washington D.C. to purify it of it’s capitalist excesses. In exchange, the YTB’s claim they’ll pay for everything. This might work in a country that has a long history of imperialism. ‘Merica is a country of dissidents. We don’t comply in the good times. Making us panic makes us even more ornery.

Panic attacks have a cycle. Our reptile brains scream at us to either fight or flee during the attack. That’s where we are today. Soon, though, comes depression as all that adrenaline and dopamine exhausts itself and the thing we want most is sleep. Maybe peanut butter and banana sandwiches. And beer, definitely beer.

A noisy minority of our leaders and media celebrities want the attack to continue for as long as possible. They know that in the heat of our aroused state we’ll say yes to damn near any crazy idea if it will help us calm down. Free shit? Sure. Bigger, more authoritarian rule? Yeah, if it makes us safer.

Mama Knows Best

Various mayors and governors have showed their true colors as Maoist Yellow True Believers (YTB). As we start to venture out of our homes these brokers of anxiety have escalated demands that we stay in our homes in the name of public safety. These wanna-be barons insist that non-essential businesses stay shut down. “Essential” seems to mean, “contributed to my campaign.” These mayors and governors have a narrative they are sticking to.

There have been multiple, conflicting narratives about Wuhan Kung Flu. One is that this is our fault as the seat of the Evil Capitalist Empire. We did this and we should genuflect before Mao while asking for His mercy and forgiveness. Another is that this is a serious crisis but it’s been exploited by YTB’s who believe this is their moment in history to rise to their rightful seat of power. My favorite is that this is an alien virus released by the Illuminati to make us amenable to mind control by Google’s DeepMind AI.

So we get a range of responses. Some of my customers worry about me, about my car, about what sort of evil festers back there where about 20 people a day sit for 15 minutes or so while I drive them to their destination. They come armed with hand sanitizer and Lysol spray ready to do battle with the capitalist demons laying in wait for them.

Just a Ten Piece

One of them didn’t last more than two minutes eight weeks ago before asking me to stop the car and he got out. As he exited the door his words were, “this car is infecting my brain. I hate your sinful capitalist ways! You need to come to Mao and put copies of the Little Red Book in the seat pockets back here.” The problem? I didn’t want him spraying the seats with Lysol. Also, I wasn’t’ wearing a mask. Yeah . . . I’ll get right on that.

My dysfunctional customers are just happy that the voices in their heads are quiet enough to get through the ride. They don’t wear masks and chat with me about the Illuminati implanting an AI in Salmon Voldemort’s brain. For the last couple months I haven’t seen much of the dutiful YTB’s. I’ve made money giving rides to my other customer base: the crazies and criminals. It’s made me nostalgic for 1980’s Oakland, CA Friendly Cab.

At some point even the most devout YTB’s are going to have to come out of the house. All this social distancing stuff has become a farce. It’s simply not possible to shop in a grocery store and stay six feet away from everyone. Masks are another farce. People wear masks incorrectly. The variety of face coverings is emblematic of attitudes towards Kung Flu. You see noses peaking over the top of Harley Davidson handkerchiefs tied around the face. I see people evaluating the crowd coming toward them in the store or on the street and raising or lowering the mask based on their level of anxiety.

Iterate

What’s coming is an emotional crash after an anxiety attack like the one we experienced. To recover we’ll want to shut down. This means that the number of folk who stop giving a fuck will outnumber those praying to Mao in their living rooms. There will be propaganda in the press telling us what sinful people we are and that the answer is to double down on the Cultural Revolution. Some will but more won’t. And the YTB’s will find themselves becoming a topic of snarky meme’s gone viral.

After a fight there is depression, apology, honeymoon and rinse, repeat. “Plus les choses changent, plus elles restent les mêmes.” We are still in the fight so ahead of us is depression. I don’t think we will see an apology because neither BuyDem or Twitler do that. The YTB’s will move the ball and scream about the next perceived dystopian nightmare. They are losing the messaging game so their future is as an amusing reason to waste mass storage on the cloud.

So much of what folk do and feel about Kung Flu has to do with their attitude towards risk and misery. Folk who lean choleric or melancholy resonate with the YTB’s. Marxism and Maoism are angry political philosophies. Being a successful Maoist means being pissed off at an ephemeral enemy that is the reason for one’s misery. It is that ephemeral enemy that must change so the Maoist YTB can feel good. These are the ones still cowering in their safe spaces inside their homes. The ones with eight weeks of delivery containers from their favorite takeout places still piled up around the trash can(s) inside the house.

Life Goes On

The other half, the phlegmatic and sanguine folk, are going about their lives. Some do the needful, some don’t. Our Guvna KnawThem’s dictates fall on their deaf ears. In my neighborhood the smoke from BBQ grills is part one of a two part proscription for Wuhan Kung Flu. Part 2 is beer. The resulting symptom is a drunken sermon on the front lawn accompanied by Spotify’s RapCaviar.

I can’t resist a little preaching. Our institutions are failing us. It’s going to get worse. We’ll have to rely on kin, friends and neighbors. If you don’t already own the land you live on now would be a good time to buy. Start a garden or expand the one you have. If your municipality will let you have chickens, rabbits and maybe a goat, you need those. Spend some time at the gun range so you can hit what you are aiming at. Yes, own a gun. Own something to defend yourself and something you can hunt with. Join a church or something like the Rotary Club.

Start bartering with people so you don’t rely entirely on cash or credit to acquire what you need. Get out of debt except for your mortgage. Keep a supply of water and food sufficient to keep yourself and your kin fed for a month, longer if you can. For more on this, Survival Sullivan.

Mountain People Playing Music Wuhan Kung Flu

That’s enough. Kung Flu isn’t going to kill us all. And the Yellow True Believers don’t know it yet but they are becoming a joke. China? I won’t be surprised if we end up in a war with the dragon we thought was our bitch.

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Risk

Posted on by Alan Webb

My friend is very proud of this lovely bon mot, “Nothing has killed more businesses than ill-considered expansions.” Let’s make it sound more impressive, “Rien n’a tué plus d’entreprises que des expansions irréfléchies” or “Occidit Nihil amplius, quam ill-elit considerari expansiones“. He is sure that my best path forward is to heed his advice about risk.

My friend used to be a regional jet pilot. He hates risk. Which is good. The last thing we need is a pilot who decides that his passengers don’t have enough fun in their lives so what they really need is a vomit-comet flight plan.

I ain’t mad at his hatred of risk. We all have to decide for ourselves how much vomit-comet we want in our lives. Where he steps over the line for me is proselytizing. I am worthy of shade because I won’t comply with his implied dictate to avoid ill-considered expansions.

This is the End

In August of 2018 my boss came to my desk and asked me to walk out of the building with him. I knew what was coming. Once outside the door he asked for my badge. Yep. This ended my days as a Deskside Support Technician for Altria.

The usual thing is to start another job search. I’m done with usual things. Time to do the other thing I do—drive. I’d been doing that part time to make extra money. I also had registered Baugh Holding Company with the State Corporation Commission. So I had a company. Moribund but it was extant. I didn’t need to look for a job.

I walked to my car, drove home and within hours I was driving for Uber. This ill considered risk became my job. It’s May 2020 as I type this. My ICR has a 20 month gross income of $70,000.00. It operates a new Ford Flex for its customers. We’ve survived COVID-19, the loss of our rental car, the loss of our Subaru that we started with, months of slow sales, and working out of our normal RVA service area in South Jersey and Philadelphia.

RUN?

We are not all the same. Some, like my friend, perceive an ICR and run from it. Others like myself decide it’s an awesome idea. The world needs both of us. Repeating, a pilot who thinks ICR’s are a plan shouldn’t be flying. A small business owner who won’t take even well considered risks should get a day job.

Failure is an always an option. Great reward has great risk. Folk hear your plan and passionately say that the idea is incredibly ill-considered, stupid even. That said, you can’t succeed without taking on ICR and failing a lot.

Failure is more frequent than success. Successful people had to slog through years, decades maybe of miserable failure. NPR’s, “How I Built This” features an entrepreneur who built a company that has national notoriety. All the shows I’ve listened to come around to a point in the story where the entrepreneur reaches a desperation point. His endeavor is failing. He can’t pay the bills, both personal and business. Instead of folding up his tent, he finds a way to keep going. That low moment becomes the beginning of new success.

Better Rocket Fuel

My granddad Wells wanted to end world hunger. So he created a way to vacuum fry fruit. Puffed apples would do it. He just needed to figure out a way to get rid of the oil impregnated in the apples by vacuum frying. In the 1930’s we needed a better rocket fuel for our RPG’s. My granddad suggested a formula that was very ICR. In spite of skepticism the DOD tested his formula and it was better. A third idea of his was to put huge vacuum cooling tanks in the lettuce fields so that the lettuce could be cut and cooled quickly. All three of these ideas are ICRs.

The rocket fuel helped us beat the Nazis. The lettuce growers got annoyed with my granddad’s fiddling with a design for mechanized lettuce picking. So they hired a consulting engineering company to design equipment that got around his patent and made it possible to vacuum cool produce in the fields. Vacuum cooling is still widely used. Puffed and dried apples can be bought today. My granddad never gave up the idea of puffing apples in oil. His vacuum frying method had that failing–the oil turns rancid and limits shelf life. These days, the vacuum cooking method uses microwaves so there is no problem with rancid oil.

Then there is my Dad. His life is full of ICR’s. Driving a logging truck in Humboldt Count, CA. Pumping gas at the gas station down the street from where he grew up. Majoring in Electrical Engineering against the wishes of his Mom. She knew that in the Cold War 1950’s that degree was in high demand by the military. She feared he would end up building missile guidance systems. Her fears were realized.

She is Right

He started at RCA’s Camden, NJ plant. Along with pressing vinyl records, RCA made commercial radio transmitters, radar systems and mainframe computers. My Dad began his career building power supplies for commercial radio transmitters. Then RCA asked him to build power supplies for their mainframe computers.

Then my Dad didn’t have a job because RCA closed the Camden plant. The months while my Dad looked for a job were full of arguments with my Mom over my Dad’s numerous ICR’s. Yet he landed on his feet with a job at RCA’s Defense and Missile Systems division in Moorestown, NJ. One problem. For my grandma, this was a very, very bad ICR.

My Dad settled in to his job at Moorestown. Fast forward to RCA’s work to build the first generation of the AEGIS weapons system. There was talk of building three generators for each type of electricity needed on board the ship. One key requirement the Navy had was to build smaller, faster, more maneuverable ships. A boatload of generators would obviate small and fast.

From my Dad’s experience building commercial radio transmitters he was sure he could design a device that would take one power source and convert it to whatever the ship needed. From established knowledge such a device would not be smaller or lighter than a boatload of generators. Such a device would be an ill-conceived risk. So my Dad, on his own time, sat down with a slide rule and a drafting board and designed a “static generator”.

Chicken Dinner at Risk?

Win? Hardly. He was shot down by his bosses and fellow engineers at RCA. So he stepped outside the chain of command and pitched his design to one of the admirals responsible for paying RCA for their work. That’s a hell of a play. It’s a move that should have gotten him fired. It is absolutely an ICR. The admiral liked the idea and asked RCA to build a prototype of my Dad’s static generator.

Suddenly, my Dad is the most brilliant engineer on the team. He’s untouchable when layoff announcements come around. RCA patented my Dad’s design and gave him a plaque honoring him for his innovation. Job security.

Last item with my Dad. In 1986 GE acquired RCA. By then my Dad was a senior managing engineer. He was expensive and very much part of the old boys. So GE wrote a layoff list. Because of his seniority he had the option of staying on. He declined to stay, an ICR according to my Mom and many others. For the next thirty years he lived on his savings and a small severance package offered by GE.

You LOSER!

Then there is me. My life since 1979 has been a string of ill-conceived risks. I never stopped bumbling along the bottom of the pit over which the outhouse sits. I should not be doing this well. Yet I am. I own a transportation company in spite of so much failure and bad choices. I experience that rock bottom moment spoken of on “How I Built This” many times.

Nothing has killed more businesses than ill-considered expansions. Nothing generates more innovation and wealth than ill-considered expansion/risk taken by someone who bet everything on an idea and won. Tesla is entirely a company of ill-considered expansions/risks. We wouldn’t have social media or search engines or even the Internet if the people who built these things worried about whether their idea was an overly ill-conceived expansion.

I get to be that guy. The one who takes a phone call on a Monday afternoon and spends the next day driving with a customer from Long Island to Cincinnati. The driver who responds to the loss of his rented Chevy Equinox by going to Richmond Ford Lincoln and signing a finance agreement for a 2019 Ford Flex. The guy who lost his job at Altria and decides to start a business with no cash on hand.

Rock nettles risk

Risk the Thistle at the Bottom

I’ve done this so much over sixty years that it’s become routine: I see something I want to do. I don’t have the resources I need or the knowledge necessary. Friends and family warn me that it’s a really, really bad ICR. I start anyway. Then I accomplish what everyone said I’d fail at. I win.

Last thing. Baugh Holding Company is my latest ill-conceived expansion. It has no money, no plan, no revenue outside of my money doing rideshare. I’ve said I want to build it into a 5 million dollar company in five years. Year one is done, I’m in the middle of year two. It’s not looking good. It never looks good. Most of the time it looks like I fucked up again.

In the queue for this year are a couple things. The first is to follow through on this guy’s program to build $300,000 of Federal contracting money in nine months. The next is a really bad idea—Homemade hand sanitizer. Bringing a product to market is very tough and expensive. It is absolutely an ICR. So, for my buddy who thinks I am about to screw up again I have this, “hold my beer.”

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Swamp Lizards

Posted on by Alan Webb

tbh, I don’t care about Swamp Lizards. I am Christian and until Constantine, we were a group of dissident Jews who followed a lowly Nazarene carpenter born in Bethlehem named Jesus. The Roman Empire tried to eliminate us because we were a threat. Still today there are places in the world where fielty to Christ could get you jailed or killed. So what I care about is my fellow disciples of Christ. The Swamp Lizards are not my circus nor my monkeys. And yet I’ve added 1500 words to this blog because I can’t ignore their declared war on us, the Others.

The Swamp Lizards have been on a multi-year tantrum because their king left the White House to go play golf in Palm Springs. He left the keys with his bitch, Hillary Clinton. On the darkest day in Swamp Lizard’s history, she lost the keys and the devil himself found them. Donald John Trump won the 2016 Presidential Election.

Pussy Hat Swamp Lizards

Swamp Lizards Knit Pussy Hats

Plenty have rejoiced and/or protested over the fact that the Queen is busy knitting pussy hats in Chappaqua. The Blue Swamp Lizards want their 2015 back. Instead, they’ve got two horrors. Hair Gropenfuhrer usurping the throne and the Swamp King responding to cries to come out of retirement with Instagram pictures of Mai Tais.

Why worry? Reason #1 is that the level of redunkulousness exhibited by powerful Swamp Lizards in Congress has achieved epic levels. Somebody within the Swamp gave the greenlight to revolution. It’s all in for them. Reason #2 is that on the way to defeat they are hard at work building a legacy that fucks over the Others. That needs to stop.

Recent examples are the “reasonable” gun control laws working their way through the Virginia Legislature this session and passage of a $15.00/hr. minimum wage. The high minimum wage pisses me off because it means the expansion of my business just got a lot more expensive. I’m not going to be able to afford new hires in the short term. Paying $15.00/hr. means the job costs me $25.00/hr. But Blue Lizards don’t think beyond the good feels that go with deciding to pay a living wage.

Core Principles

The tenor of the edicts sent to me by registered mail is this: “stop doing that“. Doing what? Defying the laws of the Swamp Kingdom. To which the answer is, “I follow Christ.” Wrong answer. Whatever.

It’s useful to review the Swamp Kingdom Core Principles:

  1. They are nothing without the Swamp.
  2. All Hail the Swamp King, who provides their every need and comfort through the benevolence of his Court.
  3. It’s not their fault. Swamp Lizards are victims of the oppression of those Others outside the Swamp Kingdom that are to blame for their miseries.
  4. They own nothing. There is no need to own anything because the Swamp King provides everything for them. Chicken is rationed because of shortages. Stupid others. There is no announced timeframe when chicken will be more widely available.
  5. All Swamp citizens will be treated equally. Though, some Swamp (Blue) Lizards are more equal.
  6. Swamp citizenship is open to anyone. Their borders are open to anyone seeking refuge from the Others.
  7. Truth is what the Swamp King’s court says it is.
  8. To each according to his or her needs from each according to his or her ability.
  9. The Swamp King is the law. There is no other law.
  10. It’s not theft if you need it and you took it from someone who has more ability.

It seems reasonable, no? No messy Senate to trouble with. The Justice system is streamlined because all the judges are vassals. Everything important is free—prenatal care, health care, education all the way through college, mincome, housing including all utilities and Internet connectivity, and food. No worries at all, right? Try paying cash for a whole, raw chicken at a Blue Swamp Lizard store.

Anxiety Swamp Lizards

You Shall Know Them

Whelp . . . actually . . . not so much. You can check out this link for reasons why. There is also this search result with the tag socialism. First, though, I want to list some characteristics of Swamp Lizards.

  1. Swamp Lizards are grounded in anxiety. People are basically evil. The reality we live in is a shit-show, then they die.
  2. While they are all about the law their adherence to the King’s law is tricky. The law is a weapon used against the Others and enemy Swamp Lizards. Swamp Lizards are indifferent to following the law themselves.
  3. The only thing of worth Swamp Lizards have is their reputation. Even that isn’t completely theirs. They get their reputation from the Swamp King’s court through an app on their phones.
  4. Swamp Lizards are redeemed through the Swamp King’s Law. That’s what Swamp Lizards say in earshot of the surveillance systems. In truth, they are masterful cheaters.
  5. Emotional truth overrules demonstrable fact. Said another way, if it feels true it is true.

Not my circus, not my monkeys, right? I wish. I live in Richmond, VA. A Blue Swamp Kingdom Duke is our governor. The Blue Swamp Lizards won a majority in our legislature. We’ve spent all of Cheeto Satan’s tenancy in the White House trying to replace him with a swamp lizard. Which is tangential to me.

One more thing before I continue—black and brown humans are livestock to the Blue Swamp Lizards. Blue Swamp Lizards need blacks and browns so they have the proper virtue signals. There has to be an oppressed proletariat of brown and black humans for the Blue Lizards to fend off challenges to their zeitgeist. All in the name of being down for the cause.

Don’t Care

I said at the beginning that I really don’t care about Swamp Lizards. That is true. Actually, no it isn’t true. Things have escalated and so now I have to care at least a little. The Swamp King’s Court has declared war on the Others, starting with Tang Tyrant. Their terms are victory or death. They are losing so I guess it’s death for them.

So they’ll say this post is a call for genocide. The Blue Lizards will call the FBI, the NSA, the CIA, M-6, friendly diplomats from Massachusets Avenue in DC and cohorts in social media to demand that this post be removed. Ok, fine. The claim will be that my words, “I guess it’s death for them” are a dog whistle to White Nationalists and Right-Wing Fascists to use their assault weapons to kill blue lizards on sight. Because they feel this to be true, it is true.

Here is the thing. I don’t think we have to do much to witness the loss of face and eventual political death of the Blue Swamp Lizards. No histrionics are needed from the Red Lizards. The Blue Lizards are already hard at work providing the bloviating. They are already self-immolating with the Iowa Caucus. We just have to stick to our Way.

Singing Off-Key

I’m not going to recite the hymn detailing Cheeto Satan’s sins/ac­comp­lish­ments since taking office. I’ll let you do the search for yourself. I wasn’t a huge fan of Tang Tyrant. 2016 was another Hobson’s choice where I could vote for Billary or PEEOTUS. I voted for Trump because I was tired of the Swamp Lizard’s promises that ended up being wind and water.

I knew then that draining the swamp was a declaration of war with the civil service under the Executive Branch. It’s not surprising that Trump has lifted a few rocks and discovered lizards that needed political death. Obama promised Hope and Change and we got nothing. Trump said he’d drain the swamp and the swamp went to war. Trump is winning and in turn, the Others (Us) are winning.

We are at an inflection point in our history. Blue Swamp Lizards are gathering in covens to cast spells in a desperate effort to eliminate the existential threat they feel after 173 years of trying harder. It’s not working. Impeaching Trump was supposed to be a penultimate victory that would protect the swamp. Instead, he was acquited.

Feckless Blue

The Blue Lizards have a slate of candidates for the Presidency that is pitiful. None of them have a practical vision for the next leg of our 231-year experiment in constitutional republicanism. The Blue Lizards say they are about diversity and inclusion and yet the leading candidates are old/older white men. They are a mess.

Which . . . actually . . . is a good thing. I said a few paragraphs previous that I don’t think we have to do much to continue the political deaths of the Blue Swamp Lizards. They lost in 2016 and the fallout of that is going to continue.

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Not Tweedly Dumb

Posted on by Alan Webb

An actual lead line: vote for Tina Ramirez in the November election for Virginia’s District 7. She’s better than the tweedly dumb litter of swamp lizards seeking to replace Abigail Spanberger. Quoting Ramirez’s campaign web site, “Tina is committed to cutting federal regulations for small business, protecting life, reforming immigration, making healthcare affordable for the average family, and bringing conservative values back to Washington.” Also, Tina is a human, a mother, and a Christian. She has Mexican heritage. She is not a lizard woman. Her loyalties run red–a problem for blue swamp lizards.

Tina Ramirez. Candidate for Virginia's District 7 seat in Congress. Vote for Tina Ramirez.

Full Discloser: I know Tina from St. Giles Church. Which makes us married so say the lizard people. There is no middle with them. A handshake and a polite chat after church and the lizards have us deep into baby formula stains on the mini-van upholstery territory.

On November 3rd, 2020, let’s send Congresswoman Abigail Spanberger packing!She does not and has not represented her constituents of #VA07 while in office.Let's send a message to the liberals in DC, that Abigail Spanberger is standing right in lockstep with, that you will not impeach OUR President and you will not take away OUR conservative values! #VoteHerOut #TakeBackVA07

Posted by Tina Ramirez on Monday, December 16, 2019

Komodo Seeks Ketchup

Sorry, no, not yet. I’ll get to why we need Ms. Ramirez in a minute. Certain folk in D.C. have discovered that they can win elections by talking to our lizard brains. Turns out that careful exploitation of our lizard brains can shut down the other less triggered parts of our brain and cause us to believe that 135 years of promises will be fulfilled by one more old white pimp Daddy. So we vote for them. And find out that the old white pimp Daddy is a hungry Komodo dragon asking us if we have any ketchup.

Also, I wrote this. I didn’t have help from Tina’s campaign. Any flames generated by this post should be directed at this web site. Don’t blame Tina for my words. Last, in case y’all forgot, this isn’t a site for fair and balanced factual content. Back to endorsing Ms. Ramirez.

This is why you should vote for Tina Ramirez: she’s not just another swamp lizard. Spanberger and the six lizards are all part of the swamp in the Executive Branch that feels Trump as an existential threat to their fiefdom. Trump broke the tradition of leaving alone the stench in the swamp and for that he’s cast as the devil himself. Ms. Ramirez’s change threatens the cozy life of the swamp. For that, we should elect her.

Out bright and early in #VA07 today. I want to hear from you! Comment below if you would like to attend one of my meet and greets today. #TakeBackVA07

Posted by Tina Ramirez on Saturday, January 25, 2020

A Human Woman for Congress

Tina is a teacher who founded Hardwired, a non-profit that promotes religious freedom through training leaders. She’s a foreign policy expert who has testified before Congress and spoken before the United Nations and the African Union.

I’ll tell you why this matters to me. For 135 years we have been told that the answer to our miseries is more Mao, more Cultural Revolution, more government that will cradle to grave sate every hunger, satisfy every need, and make us safe from every nightmare. We are spending almost 5 trillion dollars a year trying to spend our way to utopia. Our pimp daddy Uncle Sam is stupid wealthy and all he has for us is a promise that next election he’ll get us our money. Uncle Sam also says that if we don’t love his revolution enough those red lizards will eat us. It’s Uncle Sam that gave us the bruises we hide with a cheap foundation because he said we are lazy and useless.

I’m over being threatened and promised more money. The blue lizards tell me that because I am an old WASP I’m the reason they are so miserable—old business on this site. Tina’s intersectionality score is 41. That’s right in the sweet spot where she is suspicious—a good thing. If it were higher I’d be worried.

Tina’s background in foreign policy and advocating for religious freedom has taken her to places where people live on far less than our minimum wage and questionable loyalty to the government could be a capital crime. She knows what oppression looks like. It is not the lack of organic, raised on a collective co-op farm tiny radicchio in our public schools.

Why Tina?

I want Tina because I want someone who will upset the swamp. We’ve had over a century of swamp promises that the government can do for us what we ought to be doing for ourselves. Trump’s sin is that when he said he would drain the swamp he didn’t just move into the white house and get drunk on Stolichnaya. He’s done the things that he promised. You can’t do that in D.C. Tina sounds like she’ll do what she’s promising. I hope so.

The other six candidates are all swamp lizards. Their stripes might be red but it makes no difference. They are part of the problem. We need Tina because she can join with Trump and fellow freshmen Congress members and continue the fight to end over a century of empty blue swamp promises. D.C. is overdue for actual hope and change.

Here is the thing about D.C. I want you to remember. People in D.C. that work in Congress and the Executive Branch are not all humans. Some of them are swamp lizards. Spanberger is a swamp lizard. She’s one of almost two-dozen freshmen members of the House of Representatives elected with big-donor Democrat money. During her campaign, she emphasized her career in the CIA (swamp home of spooks)and as a Postal Service Inspector. Her through-line was that she could make us feel safe and get us what we’d been promised by those Komodo dragons.

Komodo Dragon and Spanberger's Funding Manager. Vote for Tina Ramirez
Spanberger’s Funding Manager

Pay the Vigorish

So Spanberger has a political debt to DNC big money. She has made payments on that debt by voting with the majority on the Articles of Impeachment. In a year she has shown herself to be a blue swamp lizard. I don’t think it’s coincidental that the evidence put forward for impeachment is sourced from the CIA and State Department.

Spanberger’s CIA career is relevant because of this: the six tweedly dumbs who want to replace her are all swamp lizard retired special-operators. Whatever she’s doing these former military lizards don’t like it.

When Spanberger was campaigning she was wind and water. Where David Brat was brass tacks she was chiffon curtains covered by satin window dressing. She had a big checkbook from the DNC who sold us the same empty promises we’ve heard for more than a century. Enough about her, though.

Red Swamp Lizards

So let’s review the six swamp lizards who want to replace Abigail Spanberger. First up is Craig Ennis.

Craig Ennis

Craig Ennis. Tweedly Dumb. Vote for Tina Ramirez
Craig Ennis

Ennis has a listing on Ballotpedia. He was an electrician for Marine Special Operations and a member of the Virginia National Guard. His web site returns a 404 error. He and Ralph Northam look like they were hatched from the same lizard litter.

Nick Frietas

Frietas represents District 30 in the Virginia House of Delegates. He is a former Green Beret endorsed by John Fredericks and Ted Cruz. His big issue is the second amendment. He is an early front-runner based on polling. Frietas spoke to the crowd outside Capital Square on Lobby Day recently.

Pete Greenwald

Pete Greenwald. Tweedly Dumb. Vote for Tina Ramirez
Pete Greenwald

Greenwald is a retired Navy pilot who flew missions in Afghanistan. Many pretty words. He seems to be more of the same from the red lizards–defeat the blue lizards.

Andrew Knaggs

Andrew Knaggs. Tweedly Dumb. Vote for Tina Ramirez
Andrew Knaggs

Knaggs is a former Green Beret, Bronze Star recipient, and West Point Graduate. He is a senior official in the Pentagon leading special operations policy. Knags and Greenwald both don’t have a vision beyond defeating the blue swamp lizards.

John McGuire

John McGuire. Tweedly Dumb. Vote for Tina Ramirez
John McGuire

OOORAAAH!! McGuire represents District 56 in the Virginia House of Delegates. He served for ten years as a Navy SEAL before founding SEAL Team PT. He says on his web site that he, “wants to . . . increase border security, support our veterans, and protect our conservative values . . .” He’s got a lot of red swamp lizard backing.

Jason Alexander Roberge

Jason Alexander Roberge. Tweedly Dumb. Vote for Tina Ramirez
Jason Alexander Roberge

Roberge is a Coastie and a lawyer. He’s agin gun control and the creeping socialism infecting society. ‘k. That’s easy. Like the other five red lizards, he looked on Wikipedia for “red lizard talking points”, scraped the page and posted it as his campaign web site.

Better than Tweedly Dumb

I'm excited to announce that Congressman Gus Bilirakis has officially joined #TeamRamirez! The support for our campaign has been humbling from the start — and it's tremendous to see the number of people genuinely interested in backing our campaign message of limited government and individual liberty. Let's keep the momentum going!! >>> TinaRamirez.com

Posted by Tina Ramirez on Friday, January 10, 2020

Tina is the change we need. She’s not just another tweedly dumb swamp lizard. She’s seen the consequences of letting the swamp get bigger. A bigger swamp isn’t the answer after 135 years and a federal budget of over 4.5 trillion dollars. The answer is us, is Tina Ramirez representing us in District 7.

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Adulting Sucks

Posted on by Alan Webb

For Mr. Krischin adulting sucks. Why? Because his wife wants him home and his friends want him to go to the next bar and drink some more. That wife is so annoying. Says Mr. Krischin, “I have a right to the cornucopia of first world depravity. Damned bitch needs to understand. It’s fucking Saturday and I lost the golf round.” However, not adulting sucks more. I’ll get to that later in this essay.

Adulting Sucks

Let’s start with some back story. I picked up a foursome at a rather bougie country club. They had spent a fair bit of time at the 19th hole. As guys do, they were talking smack. But one of them wasn’t a believer. He hadn’t come to CHEEEEEEEZUUUS. So another of the foursome felt it was his duty to make that heathen come to heal. It’s life and death, you know.

The dutiful krischin doing God’s work was sure that it’s St. Lucifer’s fault and that his heathen buddy was going to DIE if he didn’t come to his senses. It’s always nicer to be compassionate about somebody else’s shit. Owning your own shit isn’t safe or happy.

Wise Heathen

The heathen shut down the evangelism rant, almost. Drunk people sometimes get up a head of steam that isn’t stopped until a couple of hours after they are in a restraint chair in the drunk tank. So Krischin was a nice guy and had put the rant on pause. Until the ride started.

What I was supposed to do is get Mr. Heathen to come correct. If Mr. Heathen understood he’d come correct and come to CHEEEEEEEZUUUS in the half-hour of the ride to the next bar. Mr. Heathen wasn’t having it. Good man.

It’s not effective to threaten apocalyptic, dystopian doom if someone won’t come to Jesus. Much less effective is apocalyptic, dystopian doom driven by a mythological narrative. CHEEEEEEEZUUUS isn’t a very good boogeyman.

It’s God’s Fault

Mr. Heathen roped me into this. WOO, “What do you think, driver?”
“About what?“
“About predestination?” Oh crap. tbh I don’t know, “I think predestination makes my hair hurt.” I have to get to the end of this ride with a good rating. Taking a position on predestination could be a problem. Nobody in the car acted as if they heard me. Drunk people, drunk Mr. Krischin, “God has a plan for everything. He planned this golf outing where I lost. I hate God right now. Adulting sucks.” I hope this guy goes home and sleeps it off. Alcohol makes some people morose and angry. Wait, right, it’s God’s fault. Forgot. Sorry.

Now we get down to the bottom of it for Mr. Krischin, “Everybody says God is a loving God so why am I miserable, why is there so much misery in the world? Couldn’t he fix it? Why can’t he protect me from sucky adulting?” Yeah, drunk confessions.

After almost twenty years of rideshare/cab driving, I have a pretty good instinct with people. I can feel subtext well. Mr. Krischin seemed to have a conflicted relationship with his image of God. His God was authoritarian and comforting. He could let God protect him from the evils of sucky adulting. God would take care of him in the way he wanted to be taken care of. But . . . he didn’t like it that God’s plan for him didn’t include a cornucopia of first world depravity.

Jesus is Annoying

Mark 10:25, “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God.” Christ can be a pain in the ass. Where we might wish material wealth Jesus says we need spiritual wealth. Right. Sure. Can I have my mansion now? This isn’t much comfort: Matthew 6:25-34, “Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? 26 Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?

34 “Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.

God isn’t helping with the plan for an abundance of first world depravity here. Rather, he is suggesting we trust him. Ok, fine. The average middle-class family has a monthly burn rate of a little less than $5400.00. I know, I know, that’s a little more than seven months’ salary in a lot of the world. Still . . . Mr. Krischin is entitled to the cornucopia, no? Besides, happy wife, happy life and telling the wife she can’t spend $5400.00/month isn’t a solid plan for a happy life. I mean, what about the kids? And well, golf at the country club with drinks after, right?

Why Not My Way?

That’s one thing. Money is absolutely a thing in our country today. The other is the way in which this world just won’t behave. Mr. Krischin wants God to force everyone to behave in a manner he likes. Good luck with that. After all, Mr. Krischin with his legalist leanings is in a car with his friend, who is a non-believer. C.S. Lewis said, “if God is wiser than we, his judgments must differ from ours on many things, and not least on good and evil. What seems to us good may therefore not be good in His eyes, and what seems to us evil may not be evil.” Ruh-roh. If God doesn’t agree that we are entitled to all the first world depravity, we can consume then maybe it isn’t Him that is messed up? That can’t be right.

At the final third of the ride, Mr. Krischin’s friends started to push him to go to another bar near his house. Mr. Krischin’s wife was texting him about coming home. It was 5:00 on a Saturday and he’d been ignoring the honey-do list. She wasn’t happy. She was messing with his entitlement. The battle inside Mr. Krischin flared up. Fight to keep his entitlement or let the depravity get a little further away from him. The good disciple that I am I know the answer, let go of the depravity. I am not Mr. Krischin though. He still is in the fight for his entitlement.

In “It’s Eve’s Fault” a friend of mine wishes she could slap the apple out of Eve’s hand. She’d rather give up free will for safety. My friend wants protection from her fears actualized. The evils of men, etc. Both my friend and Mr. Krischin value safety over freedom. Good on them. I value freedom over safety.

Not Adulting Sucks More

Mr. Krischin is headed for a cycle of escalating negative consequences—the usual cycle of hospital, rehab, jail and either recovery or a toe tag. I got the feeling his marriage was already on the rocks and that his coping mechanism was to escape to the bar. After all, God planned this. God planned to fuck him over and interfere with his buffet receipt entitling him to his first world depravity.

He’s a grown-assed child. After six decades of life and facing my final third, growing up is a process of letting go, of dying to childish things so we can live closer to God. Mr. Krischin is stubbornly holding on to things of his youth that are gone. He clings to an authoritarian father God who will bring hellfire on those who don’t behave to his impudent liking. That’s not what I hear in St. Paul’s words—1 Cor 13: “When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways.”

I’ll say this to Mr. Krischin. Not adulting sucks more. I had my fill of first world depravity. For me, it wasn’t liquor that caused my descent into escalating negative consequences. It was a love of anger and conflict. With a measure of overindulgent introspection for good measure. I lost a marriage and a close relationship with my son to that addiction. I’ve been homeless a half-dozen times, lost countless jobs, bounced along the floor of first-world life for a long time. Not adulting sucked more.

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2019 in Review

Posted on by Alan Webb

I’ll start my 2019 in review here. In October I turned sixty. That’s officially old to me. The boomer thing of “sixty is the new thirty” doesn’t work for me. I don’t want a redo. I’m here on the final third after forty years of fits and starts at picking a direction and succeeding with it.

In August of 2018 Compucom and Altria let me go. There was no explanation. Just Steve walking me to the door and collecting my badge. I decided I wasn’t going to look for another job. I don’t fit the corporate world. 1995 to 2018, 23 years trying to enjoy wearing business casual clothes and pretending I’m just another cube rat. Steve did me a favor.

The Stick Car 2019 in Review
The Stick Car

I am a rat—a rat king. My place, though, isn’t in a cubicle. It’s behind the wheel of a taxicab hunting for money. Since 8/2018 I’ve been doing Rideshare through Uber & Lyft. My idea of a company became a fact. @transitwebb is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Baugh Holding Company. Today it is the legal entity for my rideshare work. In the next four years, it needs to be a multi-million dollar competitor in the transportation business in Richmond, VA.

@transitwebb

Impossible Rats

Impossible? Probably. This rat has been in business for himself 478 days as of this essay. In those days he started the business with a single paycheck from his previous job, a Subaru Legacy and nothing to lose. Since then the Subaru was in a wreck and can’t be used for rideshare any longer. The rented 2015 Chevy Equinox gave me a year of business before being turned in for a newer Chevy Equinox that was wrecked before I got it. Which meant I couldn’t keep the newer Equinox. Which meant I didn’t have a car for work.

Also in 2018, my Dad’s chronic heart disease put him in the hospital twice, each time scaring us that this time he would go home to Christ. The first call came at the end of October as I was pulling out of McGeorge Toyota on West Broad. As I headed down West Broad Street I told my sister I’d start the drive to South Jersey in the morning.

Long Live the King

When I got to Kennedy Hospital my Dad was in bad shape but on the mend. While I was there he managed to sit up on his own. The docs cleared him for release and he went home. I went home feeling good that he’d pull through again.

I’ll get back to what happened with the work car story. Looking back at my facebook posts from October of 2018 I was conflicted. Yes, I’d like to see him heal. Also, he’s 86 and at some point “extraordinary measures” don’t seem compassionate to me.

My Dad went home to Jesus on December 5th, 2018. He was 86. He died in my sister’s arms after trying to get to the car and a doctor’s appointment and falling. When people die things don’t just stop. They leave behind an estate and a legacy. The survivors gain the task of wrapping up a lifetime of assets. It took until March of 2018 to finish my part of that. My sister Linda is the executrix and still has work to do.

Slack Wire Cottage

My Dad’s passing set a tone for most of this year. I tried to make a home in a cubicle because of him. His fondest wish for me was that I’d find a nice, white-collar union job and stick with it. Doh. Sorry, Dad, I ran out the clock on that one. His fiscal security came from a lifetime of prudent saving and investing. Yeah . . . well . . . my rent got paid on the 5th this month. I haven’t paid the light bill yet. Savings? Is $23.00 enough to retire on? No. Ruh-roh.

Where I thrive is on the edge of disaster with no safety net. I’m at my best when life is at its worst. I also am fearless when everyone can’t figure out how to accomplish a goal. Not knowing how to do something isn’t a hindrance to me. So my nirvana is dystopia where all the king’s men are bending over to kiss their own ass goodbye and nobody knows what to do.

$1500 to my name and at least that in bills, just got fired and I decided to start a business. My Dad falls ill and I have enough cash to buy gas to get me to South Jersey but that’s it. It’s a shitshow and reasonable to believe it’s all going to fail. Yet it didn’t.

Miriam 2019 in Review
Miriam

Miriam

So, back to the car. I inherited some money from my Dad. Not a lot but mayhaps enough to fix my Subaru and put a nice down payment on a new car. The rental car company claims I wrecked their car. They are wrong. Their car had damage to the front fender that made the driver’s door rub on the fender. I didn’t think much of it until two days later when I worked a half-shift and took a closer look at it. I initiated a call to have it fixed that within a few hours became an at-fault accident report. No newer rented Chevy Equinox for me.

All is well that ends well. Over a week in September of this year, I talked with Richmond Ford about buying a new Ford Flex. They said yes to me so now I have a huge loan for a new Ford Flex. It’s not cheaper than the rental but it’s new, it’s a loan so I’ll have equity over time, and because of depreciation, it’ll be paid for sooner than the 3-year note.

2019 has been a milestone year for me. When my Dad died I inherited the patriarchy. I am the oldest male on my bloodline. We are not a family that takes kindly to kings. We bristle at the scent of imperialism. So my reign is an odd one. I rule over a contrary bunch of women who think of me as the odd duck who does crazy oppressive shit.

King of the Impossible

The king metaphor is important to me. I’m not the troublesome prince that gives the family nightmares. I am the king now. What I do, how I serve, affects my contrary kin. I am consequential in a way I wasn’t before my Dad died. It is good to be king. It is also terrifying.

60 and the average life expectancy in the US is 79 years. If I make the average I’ll be having beers with Jesus in 2038. 19 years to finish strong. A generation to fill the royal shoes of my Dad—starting from my usual dystopia and confusion.

I’ve heard it my whole life, “you can’t do that. You aren’t capable of it. You have no resources and no plan. It’s going to fail.” Yeah. Then I do it.

Many Decembers as I look at my life it’s not a happy time. The level of shitshow is acute. Dystopia and disaster loom once again. Death is sleeping on my couch. Here I am anyway.

This December the lights are on, the house is warm, I own the car I use for work, my cash flow is improved. It’s still a shitshow but the feared dystopia is dimming in the starlight above my house. I am a king, mayhaps a bit too pitiful but a king nonetheless.

Last thing, the WU folks (formerly PUDFARB and now World Union) are rather desperate. They hate the idea that I’d launch a podcast mocking them. Sucks to be them. Look for WUPR to launch in 2020.

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You Are A Racist!

Posted on by Alan Webb

Yeah, again again, “You are a racist!” spat at me with derision. All because I own merchandise from Black Rifle Coffee and voted for Cheeto Satan. It doesn’t help that I can trace my whiteness back through Plymouth and Jamestown to England. I am Presbyterian. Oh, it’s worse. I am a covenant partner with the Evangelical Covenant Order of Presbyterians. If you don’t know, sorry, but ECO is bad says PCUSA. Also, I am a cisgender man, another evil adjective and another reason to hate me.

I’m not done. I beat my Taiwanese wife repeatedly over seven years of marriage. So in addition to my WASP evils, I am also an abuser of a woman of color, a mortal sin of the worst sort. Let’s add a couple more: I voted for Trump, own a MAGA hat, and like guns.

Despicable enough for you? Here is where I am going with this. My family has been loyal Democratic voters for at least a century. We are socialists when it is impolite to say we are communists. TBH, we are Stalinist or Maoist. At least, that’s what PUDFARB will tell you.

You Can’t Leave

PUDFARB wants me back so they can convict me of a couple of felonies. The first is leaving PUDFARB. You can’t leave PUDFARB. Ever. If you were born there you must stay. If you visited there even for a moment, forever after a repatriation squad is assigned to you. They want you back.

My family is from PUDFARB. My Dad left, married my Mom, raised four kids, had a career designing power systems for radios and radar, and went home to Jesus last year. There is some history with our family leaving PUDFARB. His Mom never forgave him for his career with RCA designing weapons. It was great news when I announced I was taking a bus to my Grandma’s house at age 19. The prodigal son returns. For a while.

The second felony happened slowly. I joined St. Giles Church. St. Giles is odd for the Puritan strains of Presbyterianism. They speak in tongues. They hold prayer meetings where people get healed. There is a lot of Holy Spirit stuff happening there. Terribly evil, PUDFARB says. I love it and that’s the thing. Last I heard I’d been convicted in absentia and I’m being sought so I can serve my time in a reeducation camp.

Why I Live in Richmond

Lately, some of my friends have said that I have to choose. I must either spew invective at our President with sufficient fervor or accept that I am the lowliest of low minions living under the hoof of Satan at the deepest circles of hell. For my family and for these friends there are only two kinds of people: loyal Democrats and traitors. It’s hard to keep a reputation as a loyal Democrat. There are legion venial sins that lay in wait like tiny devils to trip you up and stain you a bit redder. It’s exhausting.

Also, I get pissy when backed into a corner and threatened with damage if I don’t comply with a demand to demonstrate my virtuous fielty to PUDFARB. Trump may be many things, but at least those loyal to him are not constantly evaluating minuscule details of my life to see whether they are المؤمنين للشريعة. I’ll take my chances living in Richmond as a traitor.

Life here is nice. I can grill a venison steak and serve it with GMO potatoes and the only comments I get are, “good steak”. I don’t’ have to spend a half-hour describing how the Buck was raised, whether it was killed Halal, or what it ate before it was killed. The potatoes? Forget about it.

Still a Wife Beating Racist

I’m repeating myself. Among my church friends and around those who lean right it’s no never mind whether I chose paper or plastic at the checkout line. When I try to blubber about being such a miserable wretch with so horrid a list of evil adjectives they let me finish and reply with, “Well, bless your heart.” It’s a much simpler life without the buzzing gnats of micro-angst biting at my balding skull.

When I tell the story of my abuse of my Taiwanese wife more than a few said, “she probably deserved it.” Those are horrid words to a member of PUDFARB. The guy that said it was out on parole for felony distribution of a controlled substance.

My kin and PUDFARB friends say pretty words about inclusivity and diversity. These words are bullshit. Here is who is included: disciples of Mao and Mohamed that memorized 毛的小紅書 and القران الكريم, are a person of color, are more than a little LGBTQ, poor AF, older, disabled, speak English as a second language, born elsewhere, and less educated. The through-line is anyone who is Maoist and Muslim with one or more attributes putting you into the proletariat side of the scale. If you are all of the above, your score can approach 97.

At the Intersection of Fear and Loathing

Another through-line for those included is a core belief in being oppressed by some other. The misery of those included is caused by some other, it’s not their fault. It is the other that has to change in an amenable way. To be included is to be a victim.

My intersectionality score? 5. I am all the bad things wrong with the world. I’m too old and mean to give a fuck about my low score, you and your misery. I don’t want the power over your life that you assign to me. It’s your poison you keep drinking with the expectation that I’ll get better. The bad news is, the older I get the meaner I get. You can’t fix me.

Go Fix Yourself

I voted Trump and count Republicans as friends because life is so much calmer with them. There are manners. People are more gracious. At PUDFARB every moment is fraught with tension. At any moment I could overstep some unspoken rule and find myself facing outrage, claims of abuse and violence and demands that I face a tribunal. In Richmond at most I might get, “Bless your heart.”

My friends let me talk. They listen. We don’t always agree but at least we can be civil. Not so with PUDFARB. There, fights break out when an SJW spots someone with a red Solo cup instead of the approved Non-GMO JoyCode bamboo fiber cups.

Motes and Logs

One bit of preaching before I go. My answer is constant. It’s motes and logs, Matthew 7:3-5: “Why do you see the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? 4 Or how can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when there is the log in your own eye? 5 You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye.“

There lies the difference. PUDFARB is focused outward, on the world and its ills, in an evergreen battle to get the world to come to heel. Popular PUDFARB causes like Climate Change, Racism and Gun Violence lend themselves to perpetual cries to “do something”, doing something that increases the tyranny of the majority and iterating.

With each iteration, they escalate. Lately, their fight is with God’s creation. God screwed up when he made the world. His creation is an existential threat to PUDFARB. Removing the threat will require more law and a bigger government. So they battle against it, forever pushing their rock uphill.

Jacob Wrestling the Angel You Are a Racist

I’ll Take Richmond

We don’t care about the world. The world and people in it are fucked up. They do stupid shit that hurts others. We just stipulate that and move on. Our starting position is MYOB. The battlefield is within us. The war is with our own hot mess. Victory comes over a lifetime as we conquer sin separating us from Christ.

This is my choice: anxiety-filled life under constant reminder of what a shit I am, how I oppress *everyone* and background noise of suspicion that I might be better off in a reeducation camp. Or . . . live at the Capital of the South where it turns out that there is more grace, more sanity than the hallowed walls of City Hall in San Francisco. Give me Richmond. People are better here.

The beautiful thing about my status as a racist, evil bastard is that I’ll never be enough. Nothing I say or do will ever be sufficient. PUDFARB says I was born this way and will die this way. With each attempt at repentance, some new infraction is revealed and I am again the reason for a legion of worldly ills. To which I pay no attention.

So Judgy

I’m judged racist because of things I was born into. My adjectives make me profoundly evil. In addition, I am racist because of the moments when I’ve been violent to PUDFARB citizens. Nothing I say can change my reputation. I am only those slivers of time when I was at my worst. That is my story for PUDFARB.

So be it. It’s actually easier if PUDFARB believes I am as evil as they claim. Being this evil means they leave me alone. Which is good. This last batch of peas had venison sausage in it. Yum.

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Eeevul Again

Posted on by Alan Webb

It seems that I am Eeevul Again. This showed up on my Facebook feed, “God allowed Satan to cause havoc with Job, killing his stock, his family and more, and although Job questioned why those things were happening, he still stuck with God. I believe God has allowed Satan to do that again through Donald Trump to see how many Christians would stick with Him, we failed horribly!

So many Christians were quick to turn away from God and they continue to stick with Satan. If you are a Christian that continues to condone and make excuses for this presidents’ racist attacks, you’re doing exactly what Satan wants. I’m pointing this out because it’s my job as a Christian to do so.

Trump is breeding hate with one of his victims now in jail for killing 20 people while trying to kill as many Mexicans as he could. It’s time for you to scream out to the president to stop this! You can agree with some of President Trump’s policies but STOP making excuses for his racist behavior. If you believe God condones these things, then you are following the wrong God. If the person that holds the highest position in our land continues to spew hate, the hate will continue to get worse. Christians need to love people, not hate them because of where they come from or turn your nose up at people because they don’t have as much as you do.

And if you believe and trust in God, then you would be more willing to find ways to help people than get rid of them. God comes through, He fed 5000 people with a fish and a few loaves. As you see, some people find ways to get rid of people of color by shooting them. In one of President Trump’s speeches, someone yelled out “shoot them”, President Trump laughed. He made a joke about it and HE LAUGHED!!! I’m not laughing because it’s not funny, are you?

✜ ✜ ✜

Yeah . . . uhm . . . sorry but it’s kind of funny so . . . I might be giggling. Here is the thing. When someone yells at me that it’s time for me to scream out to the President that he must stop this I get a little rebellious. The author of the post continued in the comments: “I don’t know where your heart is after 10 years. In this atmosphere, I’ve found out many things about people that I didn’t know. So why don’t you tell me, I want to understand why you believe, according to me, you are not a Christian. You can do it here or in a private message. These emails and facebook posts are to try and open up these type of discussions.“

Let’s answer her question. I am not a Krischin according to her because I won’t act like a toddler and scream at Doorknob Trundlefuck that he is the evilest creature ever created.
Yay!! Scream at me that I must scream at the President and expect that this will put me in the mood to talk?! Getting screamed at this way tempts me to be the one going to jail and the author of the facebook post the one carried away on a stretcher. Please don’t call the authorities because of the last sentence. I have too much life lived following Christ to seriously consider acting on a threat like that.
Let us repeat the ways in which I am hateful and evil to the fashy set. Starting with White, Anglo-Saxon and Protestant. Privileged because my Dad busted his ass and raised four kids on a union engineer’s salary. Old–my 60th birthday is in a few months. Let’s not forget that I am a convicted wife-beater. Last but not least, I voted for Trump.

MAGA!

The fashy set wants me to devote myself to their orthodoxy. This clique claims to be tolerant folk, the ones seeking diversity and inclusion. My friend spouts all the fashy catechisms on the topics of LBGTQRSTUVWXYZ, the extensive list of rights claimed, is against weapons because weapons kill people, and so on. She’s on the board of a local non-profit claiming to save the children. Good on her.

When it comes to me, though, I fail her. I won’t scream at the President with sufficient passion against his misogyny, homophobia, racism and general evil nature. So I must be a supporter of the President. I mean, I voted for him, so there you go.

Eeevul Again Again

Which means, once again, I have someone who believes that he or she can scream at me, call me all sorts of ugly adjectives, shun me and that will get me to behave in a manner pleasing to her. The grownup thing to do is ignore her and allow her to shun me. I’m not being grownup.

I can hurry this up by reminding her and you, dear reader, of something I posted a few years ago: http://worldofwebb.net/blog/you-spose-to/. I might be willing to talk to someone who can be civil while expressing their extreme anger at the perceived evil acts of Cheeto Satan. But that’s not what got posted. Instead, I am accused of being a hypocrite, a false, backslid Christian who must repent for my sin of mayhaps liking some of what Augustus Orange Julius has done since he took office. To which my reply is, “no.” And, “ok, byeeee!”

Jesus of Nazareth was crucified by the Romans at the request of his church leaders. I follow Christ, Jesus of Calvary, who died and rose again. Washington D.C. is Rome to me, the White House Caesar’s Palace. Like the song says, I’ve got no more fucks to give when speaking of the affairs of Dumpf and the clowns in the capital building.

All Hail The Nacho Nazi

Which brings me around to another thing that pisses me off about this crowd. To them, the President is a god-king residing on Mount Olympus. He is Zeus. He can do anything. He’ll smite those evil racist, homophobic, misogynist assholes so they’ll either get with the program or turn into fairy dust. Caesar Augustus Clinton will get us the money a century of Democratic politicians has been promising. S/he’ll make all the good things free–cell phones, Cadillacs, food, housing, medical care, and education up through a Doctorate. The President will melt all the guns into plows and give everyone their forty acres and a mule. Unless we elect the wrong one. Then we had better look out because it’s going to be four years of ass beating and street hustling.

I dunno about you, but I’ll pass, thank you. Let someone else don a Mao suit and move to a collective farm. I like my evil capitalist ways, my global warming job taking Grandma to the doctor and back, and my two-bedroom cottage in a bad neighborhood.

My friend and her friends are quite tolerant if I learn their catechism and renounce Christ. As for getting screamed at because I deviate from the orthodoxy a lot, kiss my ass. In nearly sixty years of living, I’ve been homeless a few times, been to jail a few times, been convicted of wife-beating (twice), been fired every few months or so, had a couple of guys try to rape me and then kill me with a kitchen knife, so a few fashy church people saying they won’t invite me to some Bible studies doesn’t exactly move me to comply.

Not Me Too

About the wife-beating thing. I made a promise to my son nearly twenty years ago that I would not speak ill of his Mom. Out of that promise, I also said that I would always be respectful of her regardless of what she said or did. Which got expanded to always giving grace to people until it becomes clear that they don’t respect my way of living and endanger my promise to my son.

My church friend’s screed puts me in an awkward position. To do as she says endangers 20 years of living out the promise I made to my son. It challenges my commitment to forgiving first, giving grace first, loving my enemies and doing for others as I wish they would do for me. She asks me to choose between acting out in outrage at whatever rude and idiotic thing Heir Gropenfuhrer has said today or keeping my word to many who have heard my promise to my son.

She says she doesn’t know my heart anymore because I show an underwhelming excitement at acting like a toddler on social media with invective directed at Pumpkin Pinochet. My lack of fucks to give means she must, therefore, declare that I am not a Christian and can’t be her friend anymore.

We Could Be Friends

With that, was she ever really a friend? Would a friend ask me to violate a promise to my son and his Mom? Would a friend suggest I throw away the last two decades and return to being the man that beat his wife? Some friend.

I want to end on a recitation of my fundamentals through some Bible passages: Matthew 5:43–48, “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good and sends rain on the just and on the unjust. For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same?“

Matthew 5:11-12” Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.“

Matthew 5:21-26, “You have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not murder; and whoever murders will be liable to judgment.’ But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment; whoever insults his brother will be liable to the council; and whoever says, ‘You fool!’ will be liable to the hell of fire.“
My fundamentals: love your neighbor and your enemy alike, seek to serve through small acts of kindness done with great love, love God with all your heart and all your soul, and forgive first. I can’t reconcile these with a demand that I throw a tantrum each time the Orange Shitweasel tweets something the mob says is offensive. Leaving me to end this way, “Love you, bye!“

-30-

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Sexy Democrats

Posted on by Alan Webb

Let’s talk about Sexy Democrats. This is related to my post titled “Fear“. I remember saying that Obama was our Pimp Daddy, that Hillary was his bitch and that Trumpledick was a rich John. Billary was whored out to the Saudis by Obama.

I live in the ghetto. Being a pimp isn’t bad like my bougie white folk kin think it is. Pimp’s have money, nice clothes, nice cars and lots of girls. Obama is a pimp because he, like so many before him, promised us free shit we never got.

Sexy Democrats pine for the days when we convinced everyone that everything should be free–especially sex. We made abortion legal so the pesky problem of children could be dealt with. Contraception should be a right, we said. We believed that we were entitled to every pleasure, every benefit, every/anything we wanted without accountability or consequences.

Laws, Schmaws

The law was for other people. A sex fantasy island where you can get whatever freak on you desire was for us. Epstein’s place existed to provide a safe space for debauchery. Which would be paid for either in cash or in blackmail or both. Though, it’s not true, is it? Comet Ping Pong is just a pizza place. The Pegasus Museum has, uhm, artifacts in it, right?

I’ve been in the ghetto too long to believe people when they say they are more saintly than Mother Mary and more honest than Job. Usually, the one shouting his or her integrity all over social media is getting ass-fucked by donkeys.

Sexy Democrats hunger for free love the way most of us hunger for food. Their hunger means that sex is a currency to gain wealth or influence. No sex is ever free. Marriage is a business arrangement. Everything has a price.

We Need Our Money

Which is fine. Sort of. The problem is that they view us as bitches they can pimp out to their friends. They beat us into the hospital when we ask to be paid for the work we do.

Obama promised us many things, including money. We elected him to be our Pimp Daddy because we believed him. He said we could vote for Hope and Change and it would happen. We were offered money for our junk cars. Healthcare was going to be cheaper. Over eight years we found out that Hope and Change was a brand of concealer we had to buy ourselves.

Billary Clitorin warned us that if we didn’t make her our madame we’d get beat back to Patient First by Tangerine Nutsack. Trundlefuck was a racist, misogynist pig who would ruin the country and economy. She had her shopping list of things we would get if we elected her. We didn’t elect her.

We elected the rich John because of the century of sexy Democrats before the Clitorins who promised us money and free shit while putting the fear of those evil Republicans into us. Sexy Democrats who promised us that this time we would get our money and could stop lying to the Trauma Center about our bruises. That was 2016.

You Will Not

This is how it is with pimps and abusers. The hope is that once we leave the son-of-a-bitch the trouble will stop. It does not. Once we are gone the fight to get us back begins. It is a threat we have to live with.

The sexy Democrats told us he was a criminal with Russian dick callouses in his anus. He was a pig that liked to grab our pussy. Madame Clitorin said he stole the election. If we knew what was good for us we’d stop this silly nonsense and crown her as the rightful queen. TBH, Rue Paul is more entertaining.

He obstructed justice, violated the constitution, just fucking stunk up the whole damned White House with his rich white dude presence. Donaldo was uglier than a pig’s ass. The Dumpf is racist and hates women. He was a John, for god’s sake. He had no business sitting in the Oval Office. Any damned pimp would be better than Donaldo Dumpf.

We have a hard time forgetting the waiting room at Patient First. It wasn’t Trumplefuck who beat us into urgent care and promised us free shit. All the threats don’t scare us anymore. We are still waiting for money. We wanted out and electing the John was our way there.

Sexy Democrats

Since 2016 every damned pimp who ever tried to get with us has been at war with Marmalade Mussolini. There are 24 wanna-be pimps who want Sunburn Stalin’s job. Since forever it has been possible to leak a story to an infobabe that someone like Dreamsicle Demon was torturing goats and fucking young boys. CNN would breathlessly go 247365 with the accusation.

The drumbeat starts; that son of a bitch must resign. If he didn’t he would be impeached for being such a reprobate. It is a mortal sin to fight the accusation. Unless you are a member of the sexy Democrats. Then you get redemption.

Many credible unnamed sources said Orange Foolius was a pig. Once he got elected many said he was Putin’s bitch. PEEOTUS fought. He fought well. Over two years later it seems like he is winning. What insane, absurd nightmare is this that we can’t just accuse Pantone Beelzebub of getting ass-fucked by Putin and win? This nightmare, the nightmare we are living.

Gang of 24

Now, about the gang of 24 wanting a piece of Papaya Batista. Let’s start with Elizabeth Warren. Pocahontas is Obama’s side piece. Her campaign page is all about benjamins. She wants her money. So do we, baby. It’s been a century and we are getting tired of waiting. Yeah, she’s a multi-millionaire who thinks we are impressed when she has a beer on camera. She wants us to believe that she is just like us, that she understands, yes she does.

Pocahontas is a bitch who wants to go solo but belongs to Chicago and the Obamas. She’s in it for her own money. It must be really expensive to get jumped out of Chicago. She says it’s not about those sexy Democrats. No, it’s about rebuilding the middle class and ending corruption in Washington DC. Same shit every other bitch and pimp has been promising for a century.

Sexy Democrats and the Green New Deal

So, she ain’t got nothing for us. Her big idea isn’t even hers, it’s Alexandria Occasio-Cortez’. The Green New Deal is an AOC thing, not a Pocahontas thing. The rest of what Pocahontas wants to promise is more of the same shit–she’ll make John’s pay more and throw some of the increase our way. Obama said that and when we asked for our Jimmy Choo’s he beat us into the hospital. You’ll have to forgive us if we don’t trust a bitch.

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Say what you want about Cheetolini, he pays. All these pretty words about inclusivity and fighting climate change bore us. We want our money. There are bills to pay. The landlord doesn’t give a shit about inclusivity or endangered owls. He wants the rent and fucking him doesn’t change that. So we love Orange Shitweasel because his money is good. He does what he says and says what he does. We asked for Jimmy Choos and son of a bitch, an Amazon Prime driver showed up with our shoes. So President Tang gets mad respect.

Cheeto Satan does something nobody in Washington does. He says what he does and does what he says. The sexy Democrats say a lot of shit before getting jumped in. It’s all so pretty. Free shit for us, chickens in pots, cars, phones and maybe even Jimmy Choos. In the last two years, unemployment is at record lows. He threw us a tax cut. We been wanting to fight our pimps since forever and Trump is winning the fight.

Sex and the Democrats MAGA hat

What’s been the reply from the sex and the Democrats? They want Trump’s head on a pike displayed on the National Mall in front of the National Museum of African American History and Culture. Some of the gang of 24 are promising to tear down the existing walls on our border with Mexico. Like we need more bitches competing with us for tricks.

Wiccan by the Bay

Who else . . . Kamala Harris belongs to Willie Brown. She’s part of the coven of Wiccan’s that include Nancy Pelosi, Diane Feinstein, and Barbara Boxer. She’s also a true believer of American Progressivism. So she promises more of the same shit. More money for us by making John’s pay more. Yeah ok. We are still waiting for our phones, Cadillac’s and Jimmy Choos. Harris may not be a bitch but she ain’t got her own money, so . . .

Kamala belongs to the San Francisco coven. If we elect her it will be four (eight) years of the full slate of California and San Francisco tyranny in the name of progress. More promises to pay us next time, honestly.

Sweet Shit Brown Words

Corey Booker ain’t no pimp. He’s a soldier for New York. But he’s brown and speaks well, kind of. CNN and others think he is a very sexy Democrat because he makes good copy. His shtick is picking at the scabs of old wounds so dearly loved by progressives. We can’t get our money and get beat so much because the rich John’s hate us for being brown and poor. Never mind that it is the soldiers and pimps who beat us and won’t pay.

Bernie’s pimp hand is weak. He’s got a shit-ton of money but argues with our pimp over every fucking penny. And he doesn’t tip. He smells like ass and bad moonshine.

Bernie keeps promising all this free shit: college tuition, health insurance, and a monthly check for doing nothing. First of all, Pocahontas promises all that and has a beer. Second, we ain’t got time for a rich John that tries to play us and say he ain’t got our money. Getting your nut off isn’t free. He’s got three houses and flies around in private jets. He ain’t got no money my ass. Third, he’s got old hippies and stoners creeping around looking for fresh pussy as supporters. Eeew.

Betel Nut

Listen, even if you are paying for it you have to have at least a little game. Betel Nut is a puppy with a squirrel. He has us but then acts like he doesn’t have a clue. Robert Francis O’Rourke (Betel Nut) is all hat and no cowboy. Plus, he’s all fronting like he’s got some Latino game but he’s white. Not even mildly respectable wigger white. No, he’s fake wetback white.

Betel Nut boy got nothing for us. His ideas are some vague thing about wanting us to maybe get paid more because John’s have too much money. No points for originality. He didn’t even know how to unhook our bra. We got naked. He gets all nervous and confesses that he is married. Seriously?

Fuck. Then we find out his money wasn’t any good. All that anticipation and we get nothing. Asshole.

Yesterday . . .

And . . . Joe Biden. Joe is old. He’s creepy. He thinks he is a sexy Democrat. He isn’t. He’s one of those sick bastard Johns with a taste for young Chinese and Russian pussy. He came to the house and while he was picking a girl, felt us up and told us our hair smelled good. Gross. His money comes from Delaware banks and labor unions. He used to belong to Chicago and HRH Obama. He tells us that we should be pissed because the rich have too much money and are racist. Uh huh. Joe is one of those, who accuse others of his own sins. Worst of all, he said Obama would pay for the girl. Obama doesn’t pay for shit and beats his girls, so there is that.

We can’t end this without Saint Peter Bootie Judge. Mayor Dick Beater is a Former Naval Intelligence and current mayor of South Bend, Indiana. He copied and pasted his big ideas from the DNC web site. Very forgettable except he came to the house looking for dick and said he was a great judge of ass. Whatever. He likes dick so who cares.

Judge My Bootie

I don’t want to get distracted with Peter Beater Bootie Judge’s big idea. I’ll just say this. Many in history have tried to remove all evidence of a story by any means necessary. What we have of 道德清 is transcribed from memory by Lao Tzu’s (老子) surviving followers. Caesar banished Ovid to an island. We have Ovid’s Metamorphosis. Richmond, VA is nearly devoid of tangible evidence of our bitter history with slavery. We have plenty of museums and memorials heralding the heroes of the War Between the States. The story of slavery still lives.

You can kill people. Burn all the books that tell the offending story. You can repeal our First Amendment and lynch anyone who says anything offensive. Stories live even after those who remember are dead. So, Mayor Dick Beater, good luck with your idea to remove Thomas Jefferson’s name from the public record.

Last, the sad thing is that none of the gang of 24 has anything new to offer. It’s the same old shit: this time they’ll get it right and we’ll get paid and won’t have to use so much concealer. They have been saying the same shit for five generations. Every damned time we get them into the room and find out they ain’t got shit for us. So they leave and we are back at Patient First because we don’t have the money.

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Another Dotted Trifle

Posted on by Alan Webb

Yoast pander: another dotted trifle to fill 1500 words including more about what’s wrong with Marxism, some of my buddy’s literary crimes and the foolishness of some of my fellow Uber and Lyft drivers.

I thought I had a couple of thousand words to say about Marx and his childish fantasies. I don’t. Marx was a drunk that failed at most everything he tried. He and his buddies sat in bars near universities and between shots, came up with a political philosophy responsible for the deaths of millions. So . . . yeah, socialism/communism is a danger worth fighting against.

another dotted trifle genghis kahn

The new thing is this: the companies that control the Internet have decided to make an end-run around governments worldwide and create their own empire rooted in Marxist ideas. Right now they are still benign enough that the ideals almost match the implementation. But the move toward a world government operated by a small cadre of very rich companies is visible in the behavior of Google, Apple, Facebook, and their subsidiaries.

✠ ✠ ✠

The next bit will make more sense if you read my buddy’s post. I said in a previous post that my Dad passed in December. In March I went home to help empty the house. The emotional touchpoint for me is this: I would rather have someone stick a red hot skewer through my nut sack than go help my sister empty out my Dad’s house. I went because I felt an obligation to help my sister get the house ready for sale. It used to be that I would choose the skewer if it meant I could do what I want. These days, not so much. And . . . in hindsight, it wasn’t worse than a sizzled nut sack.

The way it ended is about right. I had big ideas about taking a U-Haul full of the things I wished were mine. I took home things that would fit in the back of my buddy’s Toyota Yaris. My head believed I could handle a U-Haul full of my Dad’s stuff. In actuality, I can handle what fit into the back of a Toyota Yaris. So it worked out.

I was useless for the few days I was there with the stated purpose of helping to empty out my Dad’s house. There was too much emotion wrapped up in my Dad’s stuff and the life he lived. Simple things like one of the watches he got when he retired could have been a ton in weight for the way that I felt about them. The day we left and headed for Richmond was huge for me. The sign announcing Virginia on the Woodrow Wilson Bridge was a joy.

Crimes Against Good Writing

My buddy has parents who are capable of being complete asshats. His Dad shares with my family the surety that we are entitled to his opinion. So I get annoyed with him because too often his reply to, “what do you want?” is “I don’t know, what do you want?” There is a part of me that wants to answer, “I dunno, can I shove a red hot poker through your dick?” Probably not. What scares me is that he might reply, “Ok.”

So his piece about the trip to empty my Dad’s house is timid. He’s afraid to have an opinion, to describe the conflict. Fiction gets its energy from strife. Strife births pathos and pathos is still an emotional dish we hunger for. So when I ask him what the central conflict of his piece is I get, “I dunno, what do you think it is?” Yeah . . . that’s a thing with him.

I think the moment emblematic of the emotional truth of those few days is when my sister was asked to move a cabinet from the basement to her house. She’d been asked repeatedly and each time, had a good reason why it had to happen tomorrow. Today became tomorrow and it was time. So she sat in a chair in my Dad’s basement and commented while my buddy and I disassembled the cabinet. We stacked its parts in a corner for her to move and she stayed glued to her phone. Woo.

✠ ✠ ✠

Protest at Wall Street

Tomorrow Uber drivers in several cities are going to strike. Woo. I dunno if they’ll do the usual picket line thing in front of a regional office of Uber. I sort of hope so. The optics will be awesome. The strike is not awesome.

Rideshare drivers are self-employed. In my city, the municipal government wants us to create a registered company that has a business license. So I made Transit Webb. As best I can tell, the dispute is over the usual union demands: better pay and better benefits. It rests on the premise that Rideshare drivers are employees of Uber, Lyft or whatever. The ask is for the things you can expect of a traditional employer. But we are not employees of the rideshare companies.

I’m a cab driver that did stints as a programmer and break/fix technician for banks. I started out working for Taxi Unlimited, which was a front for Humboldt County marijuana growers. Working for Friendly Cab was an upgrade from weed money to cocaine money. When I was younger and more earnest, it bothered me that the people I worked for were crooks, liars and thieves. I got my panties in a twist and tried to tell them they were bad people. The answer was curt, “do you want to work?” Yeah. “Then shut the fuck up and go work.” So I did.

Unfriendly Cab

The way dispatchers at Friendly Cab dealt with whiny cab drivers was to send them on radio calls that were either not there or didn’t pay very well. It didn’t take me long to realize that success meant keeping the dispatcher happy and being quiet. Veteran drivers would poach fares from lazy, incompetent or whiny drivers and complaints about them just made things worse.

Now, hearing that some of my fellow rideshare drivers are upset that they don’t have union jobs and feel that they are treated unfairly has me whipping out a very tiny violin. This song pretty much sums it up:

So, tomorrow, on the day of the strike, I am going to work in Washington DC. My cab driving career stretches back to the ’80s. I agree with the veteran cabbies who taught me to hustle by making me compete against them. I’m going to D.C. to take the money from those whiny drivers who believe they can matter by sitting at home and sulking.

Shut Up and Work

The move is not throwing a tantrum and asking to be treated like a Teamster. The move is to use the fact that we are small business owners to grow into wealthy small business owners. Businesses either innovate and grow or they die. It’s that simple. So while stuck waiting for a ride and sulking that you are not making any money and nobody has any fucks to give and maybe the world would be better if you ate worms maybe figure out how to grow bigger than one driver and one car.

It is hard to work for just one ride-share company. Many of us sign up for multiple gigs and juggle them to stay busy. Doing that you can make a living.

another dotted trifle rideshare averages
Average gross earnings since August 2018

Beyond stacking multiple gigs is smart small business ownership. Fiscal discipline is crucial. It’s something I suck at. Further, take some of the cash flow from ride-share and find places to put it into things that will generate passive income.

No, There Is Not a Point

So, if this was college writing I’d need a conclusion. This isn’t college writing. It’s not even good writing. It’s shitty writing so I can get some shit off my chest. Though, the thing that annoys me and made me write this post is wussies who either won’t stand for something or whine about not being treated the way they want to be treated. Striking has worked in the past. This time it’s just virtue signaling and self-flagellation. I’ve yelled at my buddy about his writing in the past. He hasn’t changed. Whatever.

So, yeah, another dotted trifle that stole some of your time you could have used to watch stupid cat videos. Go back to work.

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