At the start of each day I follow much the same pattern. I do a quick perusal of various sites, ignoring the BS snooze sites because they spend so much effort blowing smoke up my behind. Believe me, after the last week or so and even to this day I am totally disgusted with the smoke situation. I haven't seen the night sky in a couple of months.

On Friday last we got the extreme hazardous air quality warning (https://www.airnow.gov/). Meh, breathing is overrated. In any case, we closed up the apt and did a lockdown for the next 4 days, minimizing the influx of outside air(?). The smoke from the out of control Canada fires was flowing south to us and it was joined by the fires in the Cascades and the Spokane fires. Oh what fun we had. At one point the visibility was down to under a half mile.

But I digress...

Following on the heels of the BRICs conference where Argentina is most definitely in play as a vital battleground against the hegemony, Global South has an essay about the current situation there and the dollarization issue. It appears our neolibcons are going all out (can anyone take away those shithead's open ended credit card?) to make sure Argentina remains under the colonialist's thumb.

Argentina on the Political Brink – Again
With thanks to our writer, Peter Koenig

No country can adopt another economy’s currency without an economic failure. It lasted 10 years before 2001 / 2002 the total downfall occurred. Between 40% and 60% of people unemployed, from engineers, to medical doctors, to laborers, all in the streets, some in their finest attires, apologizing that they had to beg for money for survival… it was one of the saddest sights to see.

The Kirchner’s way of Peronism – in the image of Eva – salvaged the country with a 200% devaluation of the Peso – detached from the dollar in 2001. Almost all creditors (97%) participated and finally agreed with the negotiated debt discount. About 75% of the total debt was “forgiven”, including with the blessings of the IMF. Twenty-five percent on average remained to be repaid over a period of ten years.

Argentina was flourishing even through the 2008 / 2010 worldwide economic crisis.

https://globalsouth.co/2023/08/27/argentina-on-the-political-brink-again/

A while back there was another essay that provided background for the current events. I won't bother with a link because it is easily located on the site.

And now the point of my musing: I have always been moved by "Don't Cry For Me Argentina", especially the Sinead version, and that led off the essay above. In it there was a reference to Eva Peron's My Message (Mi Mensaje) book. She completed the book just before the end of her young life. Someone who accomplished so much in such a short lifespan. After some effort I managed to find a transcript and translation of it. I found this ending statement in the book even more moving than the song.

It ties in well with the "Rich Men North of Richmond" kerfluffle.

On edit: fixed freudian slip.

30. ONE CLASS

It is necessary that the men and women of the people are always sectarian and fanatic and never surrender to the oligarchy. There cannot be, as Perón's doctrine says, more than a single class: those who work. It is necessary that the peoples impose this Peronist truth throughout the world. Union leaders and women who are pure people cannot and must never surrender to the oligarchy. I do not make a question of classes. I do not endorse the class struggle, but our dilemma is very clear: the oligarchy that exploited us for thousands of years in the world will always try to defeat us. We will never understand each other with them, because the only thing they want is the only thing we can never give them: our freedom. So that there are no class struggles, I do not believe, like the communists, that it is necessary to kill all the oligarchs in the world. No, because it would be something that would never end, since once those of now disappeared we would have to start with our men turned into oligarchs, by virtue of ambition, honors, money or power. The path is to convert all the oligarchs in the world: to make them a people, of our class and of our race. As? Making them work so that they integrate the only class that Perón recognizes: that of men who work. Work is the great task of men, but it is the great virtue. When everyone is a worker, when everyone lives from their own work and not from the work of others, we will all be better, more brothers, and the oligarchy will be a bitter and painful memory for humanity. But, in the meantime, the fundamental thing is that the men of the people, those of the working class, do not surrender to the oligarchic race of exploiters. Every exploiter is an enemy of the people. Justice demands that he be defeated!

Later today I will do a side load of the book to my Kindle and add it to the queue. BTW, the last one was "Winters Tale" by Mark Helprin. Excellent if you get the chance. A different treatment of the evil in the world and how pervasive it is. Pay no attention to the attempted coopting by the holy crowd in the reviews.

Be well, please. Send air if you have any to spare.

Reminded me of a homicide near Brunswick GA about two and a half years ago. I don't think I've posted this anecdote here before.

My ex and my son once lived in the same area where the shooting death of Armaud Arbery took place. Because my son grew up near there, and although they had moved from the neighborhood long before Arbery was murdered there in broad daylight, they still lived in the same part of Georgia, where I have spent a fair of amount of time. Although I've lived in the South for decades and traveled widely in the Southern US, I know parts of Florida and southeast Georgia best. I had earlier learned of one other homicide and a disappearance in this area as well. There are plenty of guns, gators and swamplands.

Southeast GA is like something out of Coolhand Luke imo. Prisoners in the labor crews on the side of the highway wear those striped prison outfits one sees in black and white movies, and the guards ride shotgun on horses. It's not that its just racist, it isn't safe for whites either. Drugs are a terrible problem there.

The video below is an analysis of the Arbery case in terms of self defense laws, the host is apparently some sort of self defense teacher, not that laws or principles would have helped Arbery. This video was just a convenient analysis of the situation on the ground at the scene of the crime. The guy does a little Bible thumping near the end, which seems apropos somehow. This may be true anywhere in the US, but any encounter with the police in this part of GA could be fatal. I suspect Montgomery and Little Rock aren't much different. I had this told to me about Florida too, by one of the state's top criminal trial lawyers at a seminar once. It may not matter where you are. It's something I've always kept in mind. fwiw

(edit spelling)

yeah, well, you know how it goes...

Hi all, Hey EL! Hope it's all good out there!

Big day today, eh? Midway? We seized the biggest nesting colonies in the world of Laysan and Black-footed Albatross on this day in history. Must have been some battle. I hear the birds have suffered tremendous losses.

I'll lift a glass for Roger Tory Petersen. At the Am. Birding Assoc. meeting in Kenmare N.D., maybe 1972, he told a story of (his address was reprinted) when he noticed his eyes starting to go. He lived in Old Lyme CT, went to the optom. Who did not know who he was. Suggested to Roger he might consider trying birdwatching as good exercise for the eyes. ROFL. The father of modern field ID. When he first called female Cape May Warblers, and fall Blackpoll vs. Bay-breasted in fall in the Bronx, the Linnaeus Soc. guys shot em to prove him wrong. You can't ID that by sight from 150' up in a tree. They were wrong. That was in the 30's I think... I saw him at a Ross' Gull at Oyster River CT, April 1984.

Being rasied in Org. Co. socal schools we were essentially taught Junipero Serra was a deity. Certainly he was already sanctified to hear how it was taught. Tamed the uncivilized natives and all. Standard bus load field trip in elementary school to see a mission. Every school did it, about 3 buses at once, fourth grade, so 10 or so. We went to San Luis Rey. Great for a youth to see, the tallow room was the most awesome thing, 8' candles and such hanging from big wood beams, no doubt of the live-oaks that used to be there. Somehow we were not taught the whole truth about what happened. No one gave the natives more... diseases and enslavement than the conquerors... To later find out what happened, it seemed more than odd that we were taught to worship the great enslaver of native peoples, with hardly an afterthought to the fact that THEY built these places. Gee, that sounds familiar, too familiar.

I determined over a half-century ago I would not hear Volunteers by the Airplane enough times in my life.

Big Tull fan. As I recall, they are not in the Rock Hall of Fame. But Donna Summer is. Jan must have hated Tull. They were awesome. That early stuff, the first 5 albums through Thick as a Brick especially, and Stand up and Benefit in particular. Glenn Cornick and Clive Bunker. WOW. I saw them a few times; 72, 74 and 75 or so. They were amazing live, complete with minstrel show and theater act. There was nothing like it.

Thanks for the tunes, thread, and thoughts!

have good ones all!