Open Thread - 11-01-24 - More Cowbell
"I've got a fever, and the only prescription is more cowbell".
~ Bruce Dickinson aka Christopher Walken
Four more days. Four more days of the overtly loud and incessant drone of cowbell in our ears.
Imagine, if you will:
An overweight American media, gut hanging out over a strained belt line, with disregard for the consequences of their ululations and stomach jiggling gyrations, calls out in multi point harmony for a more divergent version of a well known sound track. A track about "The Reaper", replete with fear of "the other", and with overtones of cataclysmic repercussions of a miscast vote in the most important election of all time, immemorial.
A "fevered" uniparty studio producer driven by an expedient need to subvert the arrangement of a score laid down long ago, from a different time and a different place, proclaims with a wink and a nod to the duopoly: "Don't be burdened by what has been, let us make cowbell great again" as his lips flutter and twist while talking from both sides of his mouth. His job, besides his bank account's bottom line, is choreographing your thoughts into a leitmotif of fascist and nazi symbolism. Like a conductor he points his baton to the left and then to the right which results in a discordant cacophony of noise that rises above the signal as it crescendos into a chorus of hatred towards one another.
The American polity, divided by a classic standard gone awry, are split into camps that want to leave the song as they remember it and those that want to embellish its rhythmic aspects, in an oppositional dichotomy of status quo versus change. The cowbell represents a new normal, an instrument of change. It's a producer's tool. Its purpose is not so much to change the song as it is to bend the will of the listener. And to keep the listeners divided, like a two channel stereo output, ultimately, combined into a singular monophonic output source.
And the cowbell drones on.
Tink, tink, tink, tink, tink, tink, tink.
This is my last open thread before the 2024 election.
I've stated in the past that I believe that whoever wins the election, be it Kamala Harris or Donald Trump, that she or he will call for unity and reconciliation with their supporters and the opposition. I still believe that will be the case, but I'm hedging my bets on whether the public itself will stay cool, calm and collected. The propaganda (or "more cowbell" as I call it above the fold), has been so thick and pervasive that it's not unthinkable that there will be unrest and possible violence across the country. If there's one thing I've learned in the last five years is there's no limit to the crazy. This very well may be one of the most dangerous periods in this nation's history and the next few weeks may be a bumpy ride.
One strong possibility is there will be mass censorship and a lockdown on communications and information. If this site goes dark please know that I will do everything in my power to bring it back online. There are already numerous examples of censorship and sites disappearing across the web. We've managed to stay lit up without any censorship because of two major reasons:
- We are an independent site, we use an open source software platform that has no ties to any third party affiliates, so we have no overlords above us that can shut us down other than our web host and so far we've had zero problems with them. Sites that use third party software such as Blogger or Wordpress have to walk on eggshells. So far we do not. That's not to say that things could change in the future, but so far we are good to go.
- We have no advertisers to pressure us into censoring our content by cancelling any ads.
These are uncertain times and uncertain things may happen. I'm hoping for the best.
See you on the other side.
5:43
I'll close with a sign off from an old friend of ours that I wish was still with us to give us his insight:
Comments
Good morning Free Rangers...
A message for the 2024 presidential candidates:
But don't ask me what I think of you
I might not give the answer that you want me to.
Fleetwood Mac: Oh Well
Hey now
.
Not exactly cowbells but does have the tick, tick, tick
kinda sound.
Seems the polls and propaganda machines are doing their damndest to disenfranchise
voters this turn around the wheel. A very blatant attempt to belittle 'democracy'.
Hope you can keep the lights on JtC.
Gracias
What is this...
"democracy" you speak of? The word has been so overused that it's been relegated to the dustbin of irrelevancy with other words such as nazi and fascist.
I caution that those that are doing their damndest to disenfranchise voters may disenfranchise themselves in the process. Folks are waking up.
Hopefully all the talk about post election repercussions is just that, talk.
Thanks Q, I'll do everything I can to maintain our voice in the wilderness.
Keep the faith, brother.
As if on cue
I got a text with a link this morning from the Republicans with this rationale in the second paragraph:
The screed continues to list the elements of this "plot." First, Hillary Clinton is "making the case" to censor Conservatives. Second, the incumbent Dems have filed Federal litigation against the State of Alabama for trying to remove non-citizens from the voter roles. Third, "They fast-tracked a new Liberal media empire including 200+ radio stations in 40 markets right before the election."
Of course it is laughably easy to show how absurd this fund raising effort is. But it clearly shows how the two sock puppets on the hands of the Permanent Government are setting up for perpetual squabbling over who is destroying our democracy -- that has been dead for a very long time.
I cried when I wrote this song. Sue me if I play too long.
It is absurd...
but there's money to be made and fear is the way. Fear of losing a choice we never had in the first place.
There's no one that's done more to damage "democracy" than Hillary Clinton. What a piece of work she is.
Thanks, my friend, for the poignant example of the modus operandi of the "Permanent Government" in their quest to scam the electorate into thinking that we/they really have a choice in the direction of this country.
What right does the government have to fear monger its citizen?
They’ve got shitlibs so wound up they can’t function anymore. A doc on naked capitalism has been describing what his patients are going through. Depression. Anxiety. Sleeplessness. Eating disorders….
If the media hadn’t covered everything Trump said and did and lie about it or just make things up then he wouldn’t have been any different than previous presidents. Obama never had to face any pressure from the media because they ignored him. Murdering 2 Americans should have been front page news…. Excusing torture was just as bad as Bush authorizing it…long,list.
Now if Kamala loses all he’ll is going to break out. Yay for the return of the pussy hat brigade…blehh.
“When out of fear you twist the lesser evil into the lie that it is something good, you eventually rob people of the capacity to distinguish between good and evil.”
~ Hannah Arendt
I hold the main stream media...
to blame for much of what's happened. We get no news from them, only opinion disguised as news. They deserve their fall into irrelevancy. The internet is changing the course of history much like the printing press did back in the 1400s. That's why the would be rulers of the world are so intent to censor it.
I told otc a while back that a good investment for the future would be cult deprogramming, for both the blue and red team, although that can be easily accomplished by simply turning off the TV. Post election should be a sight to behold.
Give Sam a scritching for me.
I guess that we will soon see if the party with the most money
will bring love and joy to the suffering 99%.
Good afternoon humpfrey...
you want to see how it's done? Watch this movie:
Jones Plantation
It's low budget and a bit campy but the storyline is brilliant. Watch it to the end, you wont be disappointed.
Good morning, still, barely. Please do keep the lights on
and the show on the road. Myself, I took the morning off to do some baking experiments because I have nothing to say about our putative elections. Even if they were structured to be half-ass fair, so what? Somebody once pointed out that the ability to select, choose or elect one's master does not mean that there are no masters nor any slaves or servants, only that one gets to select among them.
Oh yeah, we're having an election:
be well and have a good one
That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --
Heh...
the movie Idiocracy comes to mind.
I'll keep us lit up as long as we're allowed to.
Thanks, mi hermano.
That film
was amazingly prescient, wasn't it? A true classic, right in there with "The President's Analyst"...
Twice bitten, permanently shy.
Yep...
it has what plants crave. Could President Dwayne Elizondo Mountain Dew Camacho be any worse than what we have now?
I invite you to watch the other movie I posted about in this thread, Jones Plantation, it's an eye opener. I do have to tell you though that it's setting is in the past so there's no Brawndo.
This makes some sense as the name has become tainted by
others who have destroyed it's image.
Also too:
Hi JtC, ya got me with the closing from OPOL.
I have his book and I got kinda attached. Yes I miss him and others too.
Thank you for this life raft/plank. Many need it and the company of friends. I so wish that we could meet in real life for music, conversation and gardening. But this will do.
This election season is fraught...no easy conclusions. Jimmy Dore has a different take on a possible Trump administration. He mentions that after meeting Netanyahu at Mar a Lago he said he had expected someone who would be eager for a deal. He was surprised to find and asked BN if he wasn't interested in stopping the war/conflict with Palastine. His conclusion was that a deal to stop the conflict was not what BN wants. Hmmmm
Dore also points out that when statements are made about stopping the killing it's about wars plural not just Ukraine. Lately, Vance, Gabbard, RFK, Jr have implied wars anywhere are subject to change and that we could use the money in the US. It's not a contract, but I haven't heard talk like this since....
Now it seems that Donald Trump has a transition team in place meeting in NYC rather than DC and has turned down the transition money as it comes with strings as to timing, location and maybe some players. He's also refused to meet with Nikki Haley who is whingeing over at CNN that she and her team are ready to campaign for Trump but he won't talk to her. Hmmmm
I have had hope and soul dashed too many times but something is truly different with Trump. He acts with a confidence in his internal compass; has a sense of humor; and has a sixth sense about things.
I used to buy what legacy media said about him, but lately I am more open to changing my mind and I do see a quick and diverse person at work. I hope he can hold firm the tiller and continue to steer into the chop. The neocons have not given up and he is susceptible to ego.
It's much more nuanced than I could ever have imagined.
The number of French who believe what they have heard about Trump being the source of all of our troubles, is shocking. We have TDS here for sure. They think that we will follow suit with tales of woe and commiseration. But we have usually tried to assure them the world will not end if he and a different group of people come into place. Of course our feckless leader, Macron, takes the cake.
How we choose leaders of nations and countries is more than imperfect. We have no assurance a person or group can lead, work well with others, have a brain fit to deal with a complex world and other leaders, a soul that isn't crooked. How could this be done differently or better???
Thanks loads for a place to meet with others willing and able to think with more than black and white ideas and for finding kind words when they are warranted. We owe you a debt of gratitude.
Thank you Caucus 99.
A society grows great when old men plant trees in whose shade they know they shall never sit. Allegedly Greek, but more possibly fairly modern quote.
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Hi Dawn...
thank you for the kind words. I think OPOL would be on fire if he was still with us.
I've been thinking of doing remote meetups via ZOOM. If it comes to fruition I'll announce it on the site.
Thanks for the reporting from the streets there in France. It seem all of us in the West are in the same boat floating down the river Styx.
I'll reserve judgement on Donald Trump until if and when he gets elected again. His actions will speak louder than his words. We shall see.
I think we all know what we'll get with a Kamala Harris administration.
I lament what has become of the Democratic Party that I grew up with, they have drifted so far away from the party of the people that they used to be. I no longer recognize them. Actually I feel like a political nomad lost in the wilderness, or maybe a stranger in a strange land is more apt of a description.
Thanks for hanging in there with this motley crew of disaffected wanderers.
Hola JtC
I read yesterday where a 150 of the wealthiest families in the US have spent nearly 2 billion dollars on the 2024 elections.
That 2 billion dollars should be going into the US Treasury through taxes. Bring back the 90% tax rate and the inheritance taxes.
Thanks for the OT.
Neither Russia nor China is our enemy.
Neither Iran nor Venezuela are threatening America.
Cuba is a dead horse, stop beating it.
Que pasa, mi amigo...
I gotta agree. The 90% tax back in the 50s for the top rate helped to create the largest middle class ever seen in history and led to a booming economy and made the US the super power that it is, or should I say was.
Now a few individuals and corporations siphon it all up.
Have a good one, my friend.
Our population has been subliminally altered
during this election cycle.
Persistent fear, uncertainty, anxiety have been fire-hosed relentlessly over all media this 2024 election “silly season”. Actually this is anything but silly. It is both intentional and purposeful.
Think Brave New World, where several classes of subservient human drones were produced by impeding full brain development through oxigen deprivation during fetal development.
Chronic stressors can actually degrade our mental functioning, our critical thinking ability and our sense of self. Confused and frightened people will crave a return to order, even at the expense of our independence, human rights, and our freedom. Totalitarian or Fascistic government begins to look like a good idea. This is not an accident. This is how we lose our freedom and independence.
Michael Nehils’ Indoctrinated Brain brings the situation into clear perspective. Even those who eschew MSM will get our dose to some extent. I can feel it and see it in my disrupted sleep patterns. I have begun to limit my screen time and make a point of getting as much sun and nature time out of doors as possible. Nehils has other suggestions for how we can limit the ongoing brain drain.
This election cycle could be the final iteration of the struggling remnants of our vaunted representative democracy. Vote wisely, and then make the election spectacle secondary to communing with Great Nature in all her glory!
“ …and when we destroy nature, we diminish our capacity to sense the divine,and understand who God is, and what our own potential is and duties are as human beings.- RFK jr. 8/26/2024
I think that’s the goal
It’s why we were scared the crap out of a virus that had over a 99% rate of not being dead from it just so that people would line up and get an untested vaccine.
It’s why the democrats and their mouthpiece media covered everything Bush did and said, but went silent when Obama continued what Bush did. It’s also why the media didn’t cover Trump’s ruthless warmongering that was even more brutal than Obama’s. Or how he sanctioned the crap out of Russia even though he was a Russian puppet.
It’s why the media isn’t covering that Biden has continued most of Trump’s policies that it berated him for when he did them.
Kamala is telling us that Trump is a fascist whilst she is attacking freedom of speech and Biden attacked freedom of the press with his continuation of the Assange persecution.
Neither party does what it’s accused of while doing everything that they aren’t. In other words it’s kabuki bullshit to keep us distracted whilst the oligarchs rob us blind.
“When out of fear you twist the lesser evil into the lie that it is something good, you eventually rob people of the capacity to distinguish between good and evil.”
~ Hannah Arendt
Great comment...
I've been shouting this very thing from the mountain top for some time now. We're a fear driven polity.
Thanks, ovals.
This is interesting...
Immigration has been a key issue separating Trump and Co for Harris et al.
The EU has their claws out for Orban.
Had some concrete work to do yesterday repairing an old ford. Finished it but to whooped to comment.
“Until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.”
Funny how...
many Western nations are now talking about deportations. I think I saw somewhere that Orban has also added extra security for himself. What a world.
Thanks for stopping in, Lo.