From The Shop

Well, as you all know, I maimed myself last weekend while working in the shop.

The wound is healing, the swelling is almost entirely gone now, and I’ve managed to make it through the week without tearing out the stitches, accidentally or otherwise.

Despite slicing myself open, I still was able to complete the week’s projects, and I thought you might like to see what I’ve been working on – you know, what was worth maiming myself over.

 

Remember those bear statuettes I showed you a while back?

 

The same folks asked if I could do something similar. 

The Air Force provided me with three large statuettes, resin casts of grizzly bear heads, that needed to be mounted, along with a number of military Challenge coins and a brass plaque.

 

Two of the statues were similar, and one was much larger.  Two of the mountings were to get eight coins, one would get only two.  All were to be unique works of art suitable as presentations for departing officers.

I decided that the eight coin mounts would be made of Sitka spruce, and the two coin mount would be made from Alaskan birch. All three would be made in a similar fashion, using similar techniques and design elements.

I had a piece of dried birch already cut in the lumber rack, but the spruce I had to cut from a large log.  The spruce log had been taken from a dead tree, killed by a bark beetle infestation, that had been drying in my log pile for several years.  I cut the log into two foot lengths with the chainsaw, then split the log down the middle also using the chainsaw.  Then each piece was trued up using hand planes, cut to a round blank on the bandsaw, and roughly shaped on the large disk sander.

Then I marked out where the mounting, coins, and plaque would go – and then cut out a mounting platform for the statuette using the drill press and hand chisels (and, yes, this is the step where I managed to gore myself with a razor sharp wood chisel).

Because of the injury and subsequently having to take a couple days off, I didn’t get to the carving for a couple of days.  That gave me time to sit in the shop and stare at the blanks and sort of imagine what I wanted.

Normally I carve using a combination of both power tools (primarily a Foredom rotary tool) and hand tools such as mallet and chisels and carving knives. Because I’m predominately left handed but strongly ambidextrous, I tend to use power tools in my left hand and hand tools in my right. Obviously that wasn’t going to work, since my right hand was splinted and bandaged and about as useful as having a turkey drumstick grafted to my wrist.

So, obviously, the first thing to do was get rid of the splint, then rewrap the injury with a smaller bandage, and then cover that with a nitrile glove to keep out dust and dirt. I still couldn’t use hand carving tools, but at least I could use the right hand to steady the work piece while using power tools in my left.

I used the Foredom and a variety of burrs to sculpt the block.

 

And then smoothed that into the final shape with fine carving heads and sandpaper:

 

Check for fit:

 

Using Forstner bits and one of the Shopsmiths in horizontal boring machine mode, I cut sockets for the coins. Then did the finish sanding and fit by hand – since each coin is slightly different in size.

The other two bases were made in a similar fashion, then they were saturated in Danish oil and several coats of a tough acrylic.

Once the finish was dried, the whole piece was glued together.  I finished each statue with a cork base on the bottom.

In the photo below, the statues on the right and left are finished except for the brass plaque which will be affixed to the flat area just in front of each statue. The left one is birch, the middle and right are spruce. The larger middle one is not yet finished.

 

The finished pieces were delivered yesterday, the unfinished one is due tomorrow.

With that said, if you’ll excuse me, I have work to do.

Enjoy your weekend.

Latest From the Shop

I’ve been rushing to meet some project deadlines.

I lost an entire day yesterday, what with the water related crisis and sleep deprivation (More on that later).

So tonight instead of writing I was out in the shop finishing up those projects.

 

First, three more of those bear statues I do for the Air Force. These were a rush job – but aren’t they all? It normally takes me a week or so to make one, in this case they needed three.

You’ll notice the urn in the above picture – that’s custom made for a nice lady who has been waiting patiently for me to finish it.  It’s made from spalted Alaskan Birch and rosewood.  You’ll also notice the pens. The next picture is a close up of those.

A lot of turners make pens, some only make pens.

Not me.

In fact, I’ve never turned pens before. But one of the places I buy turning supplies from in Anchorage had a bunch of pen kits on sale last week and I thought I’d give it a try. A pen kit is the metal hardware and the ink cartridge, you supply the wood for the barrel. I never throw wood scrap away and have plenty of interesting stuff to turn pens from.  Turns out that making pens is a lot of fun, I turned each of these while waiting for the finish on the bear statues to dry.

 

And this last picture is a pair of coffee cups I turned for my dad for Father’s day, made from walnut and butternut. I really like how those came out. The dish is a square turned piece of quilted maple.

That’s it for tonight, folks. I’m beat, I’m going to bed.

Saturday in the Woodshop – Carving Day

 

Bear Statues.

Long time readers have seen these before.  For new readers (and there seems to be a bunch of you lately, and you know I appreciate that, thanks), I make these types of things for the local military base.  They’re given as gifts to departing officers as a memento of their service here in Alaska.

I do quite a number of the smaller, simpler ones and the basic process was described in a previous post here.

Upon occasion, I do much more elaborate (and much more expensive) pieces for senior officers – in this case a departing Group Commander, i.e. a senior Air Force colonel. Unlike the simpler designs which have only two standard Air Force challenge coins mounted on their bases, this piece was to have a much larger and more elaborate bear statuette and seven coins of varying sizes representing the group commander’s subordinate squadrons. 

The customer gives me a lot of latitude in the design process, describing the general gist of what they want and leaving the actual design up of the piece to my creativity.  I happen to know the commander in question personally and wanted to do something special for him. And I wanted all of those coins visible from the front and not wrapped around the sides, since I know most of the squadron commanders too and didn’t want anybody to feel slighted.

Also? To be honest – I hate those bear statuettes. As I mentioned in the previous post, I don’t make those, they’re resin copies of some other artist’s work, the Air Force buys them and asks me to incorporate them into the finished piece.  Now, those statuettes are beautifully detailed and the original sculptor is obviously pretty damned talented - but to my eye the statue lookd like a creepy lollipop, big round head floating above a little skinny base. I can certainly understand what the artist was going for with them, given the market they were intended for, but they’re not really my thing and they’ve just always bugged me. 

So, I thought I do something different with this one.

I had some time to think about it, instead of the usual rush job, and played around with a couple of ideas. Eventually I hit upon a design that I thought would work.

I started with a base similar to the ones described in the previous post, and then began adding some additional pieces like so:

In this step, the whole thing is held together with double sided tape, so I can get an idea of how it will go together and so I can check for fit.  You can see the pencil marks of my rough outline.

Doesn’t look like much, does it?

 

The pieces are removed and cut to rough on the bandsaw. Mounting recesses are drilled for the coins and the whole thing is put back together with tape to see how it looks:

I like it.  It’s going to look like what I have in my mind’s eye.

 

The wooden pieces get glued together. Bear and coins removed (the bear slides out the back). And I shape the wood using a variety of powered and hand carving tools. Testing for fit along the way:

In this case, the wood is dried spalted birch. These pieces have been drying in my shop for years now, and are very stable, they won’t shrink or expand much and they are pretty nice pieces with very cool figure and grain.

 

Once the basic carving is complete, I added color to the wood with some black, yellow, and green dyes:

I know what you’re thinking: Holy crap, Jim. That looks terrible!

It does, doesn’t it?

 

Next the wood is darkened with a torch:

I know, I know – Aaaaugh! you’re just making it worse!

Relax.

I know what I’m doing.

I lightened things up with the final carving and finish sanding, leaving behind just enough of the color to provide contrast, interest, and help blend the base into the original piece:

Told you I knew what I was doing, didn’t I?

 

And finally the base is coated in multiple applications of a tough satin finish, which gives it the appearance of being wet without being too shiny:

The coins and the bear are glued permanently into place and the finished product matches the image in my head pretty much right down to the T. That big empty space in the bottom left is where a brass plaque will go with the commander’s name and other details commemorating his service here in Alaska.

I’m pretty happy with this piece.

More importantly, the customer was ecstatic with it.

Things That Chap My Ass About Christmas

It’s Socialist.

Really, think about it for a minute.

Christmas is just a big old pile of steaming liberalism.

Take this guy, Santa Claus.

Santa was never elected, he apparently just took over the whole process when nobody was looking.

He wears a red suit. Duh.

Claus sounds a lot like Claws. And a claw looks a lot like a sickle, which as everybody knows is the symbol of communism.  He’s got the population under continuous surveillance, and he keeps lists of people based on some arbitrary socialist measure of good and bad.  People stand in line to see him, in fact there are queues everywhere during the Christmas season – and standing in line is one of the defining pillars of socialism.

Then there’s the whole gift thing. He apparently sneaks into your house at night - without a warrant or probable cause or any kind of Constitutional controls, I mean you don’t need to be sent to a reeducation camp to see this do you?  And he leaves presents for the “good” kids based on some kind of arcane request system – which to me sounds a heck of a lot like “From each according to his ability, to each according to his need” – and the presents are made in some kind of collective factory run by an oppressed ethnic workforce.  And the “bad” kids? They get a lump of coal – the very symbol of the lumpenproletariat – it’s like he’s just rubbing your face in it, isn’t it?

Next there’s the whole green vehicle thing. Santa’s sleigh runs on hay and grain like something Ed Bagley Jr. would drive to his weekly party meetings at the Al Gore I Hate America Sustainable Headquarters. And reindeer? Where do they come from? Right, exactly, Russia!

And this entire political apparatus is propped up on the backs of the workers, who are expected to support the power structure with the fruits of their labor – i.e. they are forced to give up a portion of their grain and dairy production in the form of cookies and milk – in support of the entire society. What’s next, socialized healthcare? My God, before you know it, we’ll be living in Canada!

You have only to look around, shake off the shackles of oppression, to see it:

Music: Heroic music has long been a tool of the power elite.  Designed to lull the masses into a malleable state of submission through endless repetition.  Two months of Joan Jett’s Little Drummer Boy and Dogs Barking Jingle Bells will turn all but staunchest anarchist into a pudding-brained drone.  People will band together in collectives and go door to door spreading the propaganda of socialism through the vehicle of “Christmas carols.”  The more easily influenced will actually leave their homes and join the mob of carolers like Bolshevik peasants joining the October Revolution. 

And speaking of the the Mob: Have you been in the stores during the holiday season?  The shelves are stripped bare by crazed crowds driven to a frenzy by the sounds of Carol of the Bells blaring from every speaker in the nation.  Let the rumor spread that Wal-Mart might have a new shipment in from the state factories and mile long lines form almost instantly. What is it? Zhu-Zhu Hamsters? Fisher-Price’s Elmo Live Encore? Toilet Paper? Shoes? Cabbages? We don’t care! Get in line!  Wait, what’s that? black market Twilight Barbies sold from the back of a nondescript truck? I’ll take two, Comrade!

The Secret Police: If mind numbing music wasn’t enough, while you’re standing in line for hours on end you get to listen to the endless ringing of little bells. It’s the Salvation Army, Santa’s intelligence gathering arm. They’re everywhere, on every corner, in every store, always watching like the pervasive surveillance system they are.  Shaking you down, demanding a cut, all in order to “redistributing the wealth.” They wear red jackets for crying out loud, could it be more obvious?

Socialist Art: The symbols of this Socialist Season are everywhere. Armies of giant inflatable Frosty The Snowmen and Santas dominate the landscape like those concrete statues of Marx and Lenin that once filled the squares of Moscow.  Yesterday I saw a pickup truck that had its “Truck Nutz” replaced with two large red mirrored balls and a garland of tinsel – my friends, when the state comes for your testicles, you’re living under the jackbooted heel of communism.

Propaganda: The socialists are piping their message directly into the minds of our children. The airwaves are filled with TV specials like that one with the Island of Misfit toys, a not so subtle reference to Gulags and the fate of those who don’t fit in. Who can fail to see the subliminal message in the final climatic battle scene when the imperialists subvert The People’s Heroic Heat Miser into a decadent display of dancing?  Or how about when that communist Charlie Brown attempts to convince the gang that his miserable substandard shrub is really a beautiful Christmas tree? For the love of the Almighty Dollar, people, open your eyes!

Fruitcake.  Yes, I know, you were wondering where the hammer in the “hammer and sickle” was.  Look no further than this abomination.  When the revolution comes, it will be fruitcake that smashes the windows and staves in the head of the free man, mark my words.

And finally:

Coincidence?  Not bloody likely, folks, not bloody likely.

Things that Chap My Ass About Christmas

It’s Socialist.

Really, think about it for a minute.

Christmas is just a big old pile of steaming liberalism.

Take this guy, Santa Claus.

Santa was never elected, he apparently just took over the whole process when nobody was looking. 

He wears a red suit. Duh.

Claus sounds a lot like Claws. And a claw looks a lot like a sickle, which as everybody knows is the symbol of communism.  He’s got the population under continuous surveillance, and he keeps lists of people based on some arbitrary socialist measure of good and bad.  People stand in line to see him, in fact there are queues everywhere during the Christmas season – and standing in line is one of the defining pillars of socialism.

Then there’s the whole gift thing. He apparently sneaks into your house at night - without a warrant or probable cause or any kind of Constitutional controls, I mean you don’t need to be sent to a reeducation camp to see this do you?  And he leaves presents for the “good” kids based on some kind of arcane request system – which to me sounds a heck of a lot like “From each according to his ability, to each according to his need” – and the presents are made in some kind of collective factory run by an oppressed ethnic workforce.  And the “bad” kids? They get a lump of coal – the very symbol of the lumpenproletariat – it’s like he’s just rubbing your face in it, isn’t it?

Next there’s the whole green vehicle thing. Santa’s sleigh runs on hay and grain like something Ed Bagley Jr. would drive to his weekly party meetings at the Al Gore I Hate America Sustainable Headquarters. And reindeer? Where do they come from? Right, exactly, Russia!

And this entire political apparatus is propped up on the backs of the workers, who are expected to support the power structure with the fruits of their labor – i.e. they are forced to give up a portion of their grain and dairy production in the form of cookies and milk – in support of the entire society. What’s next, socialized healthcare? My God, before you know it, we’ll be living in Canada!

You have only to look around, shake off the shackles of oppression, to see it:

Music: Heroic music has long been a tool of the power elite.  Designed to lull the masses into a malleable state of submission through endless repetition.  Two months of Joan Jett’s Little Drummer Boy and Dogs Barking Jingle Bells will turn all but staunchest anarchist into a pudding-brained drone.  People will band together in collectives and go door to door spreading the propaganda of socialism through the vehicle of “Christmas carols.”  The more easily influenced will actually leave their homes and join the mob of carolers like Bolshevik peasants joining the October Revolution.  

And speaking of the the Mob: Have you been in the stores during the holiday season?  The shelves are stripped bare by crazed crowds driven to a frenzy by the sounds of Carol of the Bells blaring from every speaker in the nation.  Let the rumor spread that Wal-Mart might have a new shipment in from the state factories and mile long lines form almost instantly. What is it? Zhu-Zhu Hamsters? Fisher-Price’s Elmo Live Encore? Toilet Paper? Shoes? Cabbages? We don’t care! Get in line!  Wait, what’s that? black market Twilight Barbies sold from the back of a nondescript truck? I’ll take two, Comrade!

The Secret Police: If mind numbing music wasn’t enough, while you’re standing in line for hours on end you get to listen to the endless ringing of little bells. It’s the Salvation Army, Santa’s intelligence gathering arm. They’re everywhere, on every corner, in every store, always watching like the pervasive surveillance system they are.  Shaking you down, demanding a cut, all in order to “redistributing the wealth.”

Socialist Art: The symbols of this Socialist Season are everywhere. Armies of giant inflatable Frosty The Snowmen and Santas dominate the landscape like those concrete statues of Marx and Lenin that once filled the squares of Moscow.  Yesterday I saw a pickup truck that had its “Truck Nutz” replaced with two large red mirrored balls and a garland of tinsel – my friends, when the state comes for your testicles, you’re living under the jackbooted heel of communism. 

Propaganda: The socialists are piping their message directly into the minds of our children. The airwaves are filled with TV specials like that one with the Island of Misfit toys, a not so subtle reference to Gulags and the fate of those who don’t fit in. Who can fail to see the subliminal message in the final climatic battle scene when the imperialists subvert The People’s Heroic Heat Miser into a decadent display of dancing?  Or how about when that communist Charlie Brown attempts to convince the gang that his miserable substandard shrub is really a beautiful Christmas tree? For the love of the Almighty Dollar, people, open your eyes!

Fruitcake.  Yes, I know, you were wondering where the hammer in the “hammer and sickle” was.  Look no further than this abomination.  When the revolution comes, it will be fruitcake that smashes the windows and staves in the head of the free man, mark my words.

And finally:

 

Coincidence?  Not bloody likely, folks, not bloody likely.

---

 

Note: Sarah Palin is in town for a book signing and Jim is suffering a reaction to the excess Conservatism that is currently smothering the MatSu Valley like an oily gray oppressive blanket of stinking fog. Please be patient, things will return to normal shortly.

Put Away Childish Things

 

“I am sure you have come across older people who behave like children. They want everything, whine for attention, bitch about the smallest things and argue about virtually everything. They stopped growing up at some point but continued growing older.”
― Saidi Mdala, Know What Matters

The day began in the usual fashion:

I'm not entirely sure what this was in response to -- if indeed it was a response to something I actually said and just not some spontaneously generated Budweiser fueled 2AM outrage at something he thinks I might believe.

Let's take each point in order:

"Hey coward, you're also a self righteous prick."

Also?

I mean, you start out with a conjunction? A connector to another thought? Also what? Why do I feel like he's been in this conversation longer than I have?

Maybe he forget an introductory paragraph? Also.

Grade school English aside, he might be right.

I might be a coward. I have a bunch of medals here from my military service that say otherwise, but I admit anything is certainly possible.

I've been called worse.

By better people.

That said, I comfort myself with the fact that coward though I might be, I at least don't send anonymous hate mail to random strangers on the internet.

I actually own what I say. I put my name on it, in front of half a million people every day.

I don't know if that's courage or not, but I can tell you that it very often makes me wish I was back in Iraq. As dangerous as that job was, it was often a great deal less shitty, insane, and soul draining than dealing with my own countrymen on the internet every day.

As to being self righteous prick, I admit that is likewise a possibility.

Others have made similar observations. Perhaps I should endeavor to be more humble, friendly, and less self-confident like my modest critic?

No?

No, I suppose not. And frankly, I'm not sure my readers would respond well to a suddenly unassuming and self-effacing Jim Wright.

Self-righteous prick suits me.

"You're happy to bully people who will be screwed under. Biden administration into voting for your own interests. [sic]"

Ah, now we're getting somewhere.

Again, he might be right.

Yes, he just might be.

You see, my interests are liberty, justice, and equality for all.

I want a poor black woman to have the same exact rights, respect, and opportunity as a rich white man.

I want the hungry to have enough to eat.

I want the sick and infirm to have medical care. I want the hale and healthy to have it too.

I want the homeless to have shelter and comfort.

I want the wealthy to pay their fair share.

I want the working stiff to have a living wage, good benefits, a safe and modern workplace, an expectation of a decent and timely retirement, and a say in how things are done.

I want every student to have a comprehensive quality education in a safe and violence-free environment and the realistic chance at higher education without a lifetime of crushing debt.

I want corporations to share equally in the risks they force onto the public, and I want the public to share in the vast profits businesses reap from the exploitation of public assets, land, and resources.

I want a nation that holds the peacemaker in higher regard than the warrior and employs the reasoned skills of the diplomat before the violent physicality of the soldier.

I want a society that tears down statues of generals and raises up instead monuments to the teacher, the artist, the engineer, the healer, the bridge builder, the homemaker, the mechanic, and the garbage man -- those everyday invisible unknown heroes who keep the wheels of civilization turning.

And most of all -- most of all -- I want a government that is accountable to its citizens and I want rational citizens educated, willing, and determined to hold that government to account every single day without regard to political party or ideology.

What I really want is a better nation, a better world, dedicated to a better future for all and not just a privileged few.

THOSE are my interests.

So, yes indeed, if you stand against those interests, if you're one of those selfish sons of bitches who get "screwed" under a new administration that seeks to make those interests a reality? Why, yes, then I'll gleefully mock your impotent fury every single day without pause.

I will.

Just as I mock the failure of Confederates, the Klan, Nazis, racists, bigots, sexists, and florid toothless little haters just like my critic.

"Nothing worse than a piece of shit who believes his own interests make him righteous enough to justify his bullying."

Heh heh.

Though I have no proof -- because as previously noted, he left off the introductory paragraph that would have explained the impetus of his complaint -- I strongly suspect this is in response to something I said the day before. To wit:

(A commenter complained that I wasn't showing the proper respect to recently deceased Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and that I shouldn't make her death into a political statement because that makes those liberals and progressives who didn't vote, or who threw their votes away, feel guilty)

I respected Justice Ginsburg just fine.

It's people like you, you miserable son of bitch, that I have no respect for. People like you who put the burden of your duty on an 87-year-old cancer patient so that you could have the luxury of throwing your vote away, of not showing up, of using your precious franchise for some idiotic protest, instead of doing your goddamned duty like a citizen. You screwed us all. You fucked over the most vulnerable members of our society solely so that you, you smug asshole, could pretend you have principles. You fucked not only us, but generations.

Now? Now you can own it. This is on you and nobody else. You don't deserve the Republic.

So, don't you dare come at me, you fucking ghoul, and demand respect. Because I'm fresh out.

Harsh?

Perhaps. But these are harsh times we live in. Sugar-coating it and coddling those who steadfastly refuse to do their civic duty doesn't seem to be working.

And to be honest? These people piss me off. Here we are on the very brink of fascism if not already over the edge, on the very verge of losing everything these perverse sons of bitches claim they care about, and they still won't accept responsibility for their own actions.

So, yeah, I'm a little harsh.

If you see my comment as bullying, well, that's just too goddamn bad.

No one is making you read my comments or hang around my social media feeds. I don't seek you out. You came to me, to boast about how you refuse to do your civic duty. So, if you don't like what I have to say or how I go about saying it, shove off. If you don't, that's on you. I'm not going to pull my punches for a bunch of shitty self-involved little snots who can't be bothered to show up.

OR for a bunch of wannabe fascists.

Because frankly, at this point, there's not a lot of daylight between the two.

If you think that's bullying, well, then you should perhaps have a talk with your president -- and he is your president and make no mistake, but we'll come back to that. Your president who daily uses the most powerful platform in the world to bully his political enemies, the weak and helpless, the crippled, the hungry, the tired, the homeless, and the soldier alike, all of those people you claim that you care about -- just not enough to actually show up and pull the handle for better leaders. And then he goes golfing.

Perhaps you should look to those of your persuasion who march on the capitol with their guns and their bibles and threaten to visit violent murder upon their neighbors.

Perhaps you should see to those who would kneel on a black man's throat while those like you righteously cheer on that oppression in the name of "law and order."

And while you're at it, have a talk with your miserable small capricious god about how his shitty followers, people like you, think they have the right to tell a woman what she can and cannot do with her own body, who think they have the right tell others who they can love, who they can marry, and what they can do in the privacy of their own homes. So long as we're accusing others of being self-righteous and all, I mean.

And perhaps instead of sending hate mail and threats to others on the internet, perhaps you should spend a few minutes looking into the mirror and ask yourself who the real bully is.

What's that?

You're a not a Trump supporter?

Huh.

Oh, I see, you're a Democratic Socialist, are you? With your little rose and your framed picture of a sparkling unicorn. Yes, I see.

And you stayed home, right?

A lot of your fellows, they went to the polls and they voted for a candidate they didn't particularly like. But not you. You stayed home. You threw your vote away.

You know what?

Those who stood silent while the Nazis herded Jews into the gas chambers may not have been card-carrying fascists themselves, but they might just as well have been.

And that's you.

You refused to make the adult choice, and so it was made for you, by those you claim to despise the most.

You're not a hero.

You're not righteous.

You're just another complicit stooge.

"People like you, wretched, entitled, boomer filth, is the reason 50% of the country didn't vote in 2016 and will sit out 2020."

And now we're down to it, aren't we?

The bitter crux of the matter, yes.

Somebody was mean to you on the internet and so you stayed home and pouted with your little bottom lip stuck out. The Nazis are marching in the streets of your nation, and there's you, sitting on the bed, arms crossed, holding your breath until you turn red.

Your candidate wasn't the nominee.

You didn't get what you want.

So you stayed home in petulant fury.

Boy, you sure showed us.

But here's the curious thing about your rage: According to you, I'm a horrible, self-righteous cowardly prick, right? "Wretched entitled Boomer filth," that's what you think of me, those are your words.

And yet -- and yet -- that's who you expect to do your job.

That's what you're saying here, isn't it?

Cowardly wretched entitled Boomer filth that I am, and yet I showed up.

I show up every time.

Where the fuck were you?

You don't show up.

By your own account: YOU. DON'T. SHOW. UP.

And you wonder why the world never goes in the direction you want?

Those like you don't show up, because those like you never do.

It's got nothing to do with the candidates.

It's got nothing to do with the choices.

It's got nothing to do with the system.

And it's for goddamn sure got nothing to do with me.

You don't show up because that's just who you are.

And this bluster and outrage? It's just an excuse.

Because that's all you've got, excuses. That's what defines you. Excuses. Not showing up. You can write hate mail, you can rage on the internet all goddamn day, but you just can't find the time to go vote. Instead, you expect somebody else to fix the world.

Somebody like me. A person you despise.

Why?

Because you're a child, that's why.

You're a child.

You want to talk about entitled? You expect everybody else to do the grunt work of democracy for you -- like your mom picking up your dirty laundry scattered all over your room and washing it for you and putting it away in the drawer all neatly folded and smelling of fabric softener.

You throw a tantrum when the world gives you choices you don't like, when you have to work for what you want instead of having it handed to you.

So you sit home and pout and blame everybody else.

Hell, you can't even be bothered to do the bare minimum as a citizen. Instead you dress yourself up in some imaginary "Resistance" like a kid playing at Star Wars and pretend you're actually doing something by sending hate mail to random strangers on the internet.

Because you're a fucking child.

You're an immature little turd whose life will never amount to a goddamned thing, nothing but daydreams and outrage and endless excuses. Your mom will be picking up after you your whole damn life. Your entire worldview is that of a child. Your politics are those of a spoiled little brat. You call me a coward, but you expect an 87-year-old woman with metastatic terminal cancer to do the heavy lifting for you and you can't even put forth the bare minimum effort of showing up to vote -- and then you announce that dereliction of duty as if it's some sort of accomplishment.

You seem to think nonperformance is a statement.

And it is.

But your petulant impotence is very likely not the message you think it is or much of a reflection on the generation you claim to speak for.

You, you fucking child, you're why the world is what it is.

Yes, others and other generations fell down on the job too. But that doesn't excuse you, because you could look to their pitiful examples see the cost of your cowardice. You saw that and still you elected this cretin, and it hardly matters if it was with right wing MAGA hat wearing malice aforethought or out of some pot smoke scented far-Left indolent spite.

You want a better world, but you won't do even the minimum work necessary to make it so.

You claim to care about others, but you'll sacrifice the most vulnerable if you don't get what you want. Burn it all down, you shout. You're not a patriot, you're just another goddamned arsonist. You blame others, play the victim, and watch from the bed while your mom picks up your dirty clothes.

And because of that, that's all you'll ever be: a victim of your own failure and selfishness.

Your threat to stay home isn't much of an ultimatum. Go on, stay home. Leave the world to those you despise. That'll show us.

We'll be out there, holding back the fall of night, without you. Same as we always do.

“With President Trump, however, the masculine archetype seems to have regressed. Trump is less the strict father than the petulant child: a boyish figure who rejects advice, shirks discipline and refuses to be beholden to behavioral norms. He is rarely even seen as the patriarch of his own family; as Melania Trump said after he was caught boasting about assaults on tape, “Sometimes I say I have two boys at home.” ― Amanda Hess

 

“Trump taught us how easily seemingly serious people can become profoundly idiotic. He turned career politicians into circus freaks.” ― Thor Benson

Birthers: Why Stupid Should Be A Hanging Offense

 

This will be the third time I’ve written about Birthers in the last two weeks.

You’re sick of it, aren’t you?

I know I am.

Normally, when stupidity on this scale amuses me or offends me and I’ll write a snarky lampoon and move on.

But the Birthers are pissing me off. And they continue to piss me off.

And their deluded stupidity should be pissing you off too.

No, it’s not the money, though they are costing you gobs of money.  This irritates me, but it’s the cost of doing business in a free society (wince. Sorry, couldn’t resist the pun). Every president gets sued repeatedly by the wackjobs. The Crazy Conservatives do it. The Limpwristed Liberals do it.  The People that ought to be in an institution but are loose on the streets do it.  Hell, the inmates that are in institutions do it.  Frivolous lawsuits against the President can’t be prevented in our society, and they cost us money and assets and our attention – but there’s not much that can be done about it.  The Birthers’ legal shenanigans are no different – but frankly it does say something about you when your lawsuit is on the docket right next to the twitchy little goof who’s suing the President demanding that the government release the alien autopsy tapes from Area 51 and the mental midgets who are suing to stop the Large Hadron Collider before it spawns world destroying black holes. The Birthers’ de facto leader, Orly Taitz, melted down in shrill spectacular fashion on MSNBC yesterday (video here, in yesterday’s post) and it’s fairly obvious that the woman is a couple shots of potato vodka short of a Russian Nuclear Safety Officer.

Look to the company the Birthers are keeping is what I’m saying here.

But, no, it’s not the money.

 

It’s a Civil Rights issue.

 

See, this isn’t any pack of random dittoheads who are costing you a couple of bucks in tax dollars.  The alien hunters you can usually ignore and for the most part they’re harmless. The Anti-LHC folks, less so, but for the most part those idiots have little impact on the average American.

But the Birthers are different and far worse and it’s time for Americans to stand up and put an end to the Birther insanity.

These people are not harmless cranks.

Don’t get me wrong, they are cranks. But they are not harmless.

They call themselves Americans and patriots and concerned citizens, but what they really are is about as far from American as it gets. 

These people are not patriots, they are a skin cancer eating away at the face of liberty. They are a mob, the dupes of liars and rabble-rousers and snake oil salesman like Lou Dobbs and Glen Beck.

In reality, the Birthers are little more than brainless thugs waiting for their own Kristallnacht*.

See, the Birthers are deliberately attempting to deny you your franchise. 

They’re not alone, the anti-healthcare reform fanatics have joined forces with them and adopted the same tactics.

As detailed in a leaked memo, these rightwing nutjobs have outlined their strategy to disrupt town hall style meetings. The strategy urges protesters to be disruptive, to “yell out” and “shout out” and artificially inflate their numbers to make it seem as if they hold the majority opinion – when clearly they are the fringe minority (and they know it). The targets of these attacks are bipartisan in nature, both Democrats and Republicans have been harassed – and if anything, moderate Republicans are fielding the worst of these assaults. For example: Birthers shouted down Representative Mike Castle (R-DE) during a town hall meeting, and dozens of forums have been disrupted by the idiot dupes opposed to healthcare reform.

Now, it’s one thing for the random goof to wander into a town forum.  We’ve all seen it, it’s irritating or amusing and eventually the police escort the crazy Bird Lady or Cat Piss Man out of the meeting so the sane people can get on with business.  It also makes an amusing video when you put the crazy people on YouTube.

It’s another thing entirely when nationally organized groups deliberately seek to disrupt the connection between an elected official and his or her constituents.  By organizing, by adopting tactics with the specific intent of deliberate disruption and denial of access, these people have moved beyond the 1st Amendment right of all US citizens to protest and into the same territory prosecutable under Federal RICO statues as abortion activists. 

These nuts are deliberately and with malice aforethought attempting to keep you from accessing your government.  They are denying you the right to address your Congressman in a public forum.  They are doing this deliberately and on purpose and they are being directed by prominent members of the media and leaders within their movement. Those leaders and those members of the media should be charged for violations under the RICO act, exactly the same as those abortion opponents who attempt to deny woman access to clinics.  They need to be formally charged and tried and, if found guilty, sent to prison.

Understand something here, I’m NOT advocating that we should deny them their right to protest.  They may believe whatever crazy nonsense they like, they may speak of it loudly to those who will listen, they can stand on corners and wave signs and copies of their birth certificates.  They can even attend town hall meetings and speak their minds, as individuals and in turn. But the minute they organize and deliberately seek to disrupt meetings so that I and my neighbors cannot address our elected officials they are infringing on my Constitutional rights as an American citizen. 

This is a violation of federal law**. 

I’ll tell you flat out and in no uncertain terms, I spent twenty years defending the Constitution of this country, I am a Patriot in the original sense of the word, and if these assholes attempt to get between me and my government, I will cut them down without mercy.

It’s about time that our elected officials show some backbone.  We have every right to expect members of Congress to display courage in the face of this nonsense. Those that do not have no business representing the people of the United States.  Any Representative who panders to this hysteria is a coward, and I won’t stand to be represented by cowards.  I risked my life defending this country, and I demand no less from my elected officials. The least they can do, the very least, is risk a few votes. 

We need a roll call, right now, in both the House and the Senate.  We need every single Representative and Senator to state clearly and unequivocally for the record their position with regards to the Birthers’ claims. We need it said on the Official Record and in public.  We the people of the United States have the right to know if members of Congress are catering to the nuts at our expense. We have a right, and duty and obligation, to know if members of our own government are part of this hysteria, and we have a right to know if members of Congress are so Goddamned chickenshit that they’ll pander to the Birthers just to keep their jobs. 

It is time, long past time, for Congress to display solid and clear leadership, to guide this country in the manner that we as Americans rightfully expect, and crush this nonsense once and for all.

The Birthers must be relegated to the ridiculous fringe were they belong.

 

 

 

---

* Kristallnacht: Don’t think so? Think I’m engaging in hyperbole?  Listen to the words the Birthers are using. Listen to them talk about Obama’s treason – the same way the SA used to talk about the Jews and Gypsies and outsiders in 1930’s Germany.  Taitz herself is the one who brought up the term Brownshirts, don’t tell me she’s not thinking about it. Listen to the Birthers talk of “taking back America for Americans,” we’ve heard that phrase before, different country, different time, different recession, different war, but the rhetoric is the same. Exactly the same. 

 

** Some additional thoughts: 

As noted yesterday, if Obama were shown to be unfit for office, for whatever reason, the Vice President would be sworn in as President to execute the office until the next election. 

Now, two things:

Category 1) If the Birthers expect a do-over, if they demand a do-over (i.e. a new election, or the installment of McCain/Palin or some other candidate as President) then they either a) obviously don’t understand the Constitution, or b) don’t care.  This makes their participation in the Birther movement hypocrisy of the highest order.  On one hand, they demand compliance with a single passage of the Constitution, but ignore the part the does not directly support their desires (and here we have an exact, repeat exact, mirror of the the Creationist mindset – no wonder both groups seem to be inclusive sets of the other).

Category 2) If the Birthers do understand the Constitutional clause, and they accept Joe Biden as President, then it is obvious and indisputable that their primary motivation is not Constitutional, but rather a personal dislike for Barack Obama the man.  This is also high order hypocrisy, given that the Birther movement seeks to hide their hatred behind false Constitutional issues, and it means that the lawsuits filed by Orly Taitz and her clients are completely bogus and motivated purely by hatred and little else. This makes participation in organized Birther disruptions of town meetings and harassment of civil servants a hate crime.

Statistics bear out that for those who fall into Birther Category 2 above, the majority are likely racist in motivation, i.e the majority of Birthers are white ultra religious conservatives from the Deep South.  Again, making this movement a hate crime in all but name.

Once these people organize, they can be charged under federal RICO and and civil rights laws.

 

Now, I’m done talking about Birthers for a while.

Perspective

I do not believe in a fate that will fall on us no matter what we do. I do believe in a fate that will fall on us if we do nothing.
-- Ronald Reagan, President of the United States, First Inaugural Address, 1981

Are we doomed?

Are we doomed as a country?

Are we doomed as a people, we Americans?

It’s happened elsewhere. Societies too big to manage, nations fractured by conflict and politics and chaos, civil society torn apart by madness and religion, diversity become irreconcilable differences and populations grown more dissimilar than they are alike, national bankruptcy, unquenchable rage, anger, distrust, malfeasance, until it all just … falls apart.

History is littered with the yellowed bones of failed nation states and dead empires.

History is chock-a-block with countries that put a gun to their own head and pulled the trigger.

Is that us?

Is it?

Since November, and particularly since Charlottesville, I've gotten thousands of messages asking the same question: Are we doomed?

Is America done for?

Are we next?

If my email is any indicator, many Americans seem to think so.

A lot of people outside of America believe it.

It certainly seems as if we’re on the cusp and it could go either way.

But then, isn’t that how it always is?

America, we’re always on the brink.

Balanced on one foot, arms wind-milling, teetering over chaos with alligators snapping below. 

We’ve been through this before.

And it’s been far worse.

We …

What?

What’s that?

Oh, you want to know when it’s been worse than it is right now?

When I said that a few days back, it’s been worse, on Facebook, a number of readers called me on it.

When was it worse?

When? Well, I suppose that depends on your point of view.

Better, worse, it’s about perspective. For example: I regularly speak to people of a generation who think the 1950s were just about as damned near perfect as it’s possible for a nation to get.

And they were, perfect.

So long as you were a member of the newly minted, post-war middle class with a well-paying job in one of America’s new industries, and if you weren’t too particular about civil rights or a woman’s place in society or drafted to fight in Korea or suspected of being a godless commie or one of them believers in evolution, well, yeah, things were pretty good. But for people not in that demographic, if, say, you were a black man in The South of that time, well, maybe things weren’t so great, especially when the KKK was putting a noose around your neck. For a lot of older Americans, nothing will ever be as good as the 1950s. But maybe, for some Americans, maybe that time was worse than now.

Maybe that decade was much worse.

It depends on your perspective often enough.

As a nation, as a fractious people, we've been through worse and survived.

Hell, the ink was barely dry on the Constitution when George Washington himself had to send in federal forces to put down armed rebellion. A few years after that, our former masters in London invaded the United States and burned the White House to the ground. The Civil War didn’t just break out suddenly one day without warning, you know. There were decades of tension and acrimony between two utterly incompatible ideologies. If you think Congress is broken now you should study what it was like in the years leading up to that war. And there were decades of tension and acrimony after the Civil War as well. Jim Crow. Separate but not so equal. Lynching. The Ku Klux Klan.

Then there was the Great Depression and then World War II. The Bomb. The Red Scare.

I mentioned those people who grew up in the 50s and how much certain of them idolize that time. Me? I grew up in the 1960s and 70s, the streets were full of riot, drugs, crime, chaos. War in Vietnam and at home. Civil Rights. Woman’s Rights. Equal Rights. George Wallace. Martin Luther King. Malcom X. Bobby Kennedy. Charlie Manson. Love Canal. Segregation. Bussing. The Man. The Establishment. Tune in, turn on, drop acid.  Some days it seemed the whole goddamned world was on fire. Everything just kept getting shittier and shittier. Every day it was some goddamned thing.

Then came the Energy Crisis and the Great Malaise and one recession after another and … well, here we are.

And to me? From my perspective? Things don’t seem nearly as bad now as they could be. Because I’ve seen it worse – or at least it seems that way to me.

History is often damned painful to live through.

And it can always – always – get worse.

Advancement is never without cost, without pain and rage and blood.

But we've been through worse and rebounded better than before. Stronger. Smarter. More compassionate. More equal. Closer to the ideal of a better nation. What came out of the war and riot and chaos of my youth was a better society, a better nation, better for a lot of people in a lot of ways.

But again, “better” is often a matter of perspective.

And it’s always easier to go backwards instead of forward.

It is far easier to destroy than it is to build, to create, to innovate, to dream.

Depression is always easier than optimism. I can think of a hundred ways life is worse now than in my youth. I have to work to think of ways that it is better. But it is better, I believe that.

How and when, if, we emerge from this dark time depends on a lot of things and there are no guarantees.

However, I would point out that while it's easy to focus on the hate and rage and ugliness that fills our feeds every single day of late, what you might be missing is the overwhelming push-back from common Americans.

It’s easy to focus on the terrible, harder to see the good.

But…

But, armed Nazis, Klansmen, Confederates – all the worst, most horrible ideologies humankind has ever come up with, combined together – marched on Charlottesville to defend a monument to racism and sedition. And hundreds of thousands of Americans showed up to tear it down. Pushed the haters back. Faced the Nazis down. The Klan, the Nazis, the Confederates, they came with guns and clubs and they killed one of us. And still they were routed, sent fleeing like the cowards they are. Sent fleeing in defeat, same as they always have been.

Right now they are being found and arrested and they will be held up for the world to see what they are.

Right now, cities across the nation are tearing down these monuments, removing them from town squares and public campuses and banishing them to museums or battlefields or dusty storehouses where they belong.

Forty white supremacists showed up in Boston for a rally. Forty thousand Americans showed up to shout them down.

In San Francisco, the haters were sent packing before they even got started.

That wasn't the government in Boston, in San Francisco, in Charlottesville, that was Americans who did that. That was common Americans, black and white, gay and straight, right and left, who stood up, filled the streets, and pushed back the haters who would burn down civilization.

It’s easy to fall into depression.

And as anyone who suffers from depression can tell you, it’s damned hard – damned hard – to claw your way out.

History is often painful to live through.

As it is right now.

It pains me to say this (you have no idea how much), but the Bern-It-All-Down crowd might very well get their wish.

Perhaps, once again, it has finally become so bad that those of reason and good will on both sides might at last find common ground and get off their asses and do something to make things better.

It has become so bad, as it always does, that those who love America more than they love their ideology and own selfish interests might once again come together to face down a common enemy and stand together against the fall of night.

Civilization advances in fits and starts. Three steps forward, two to the side, two back, and forward again.

History doesn’t flow smoothly forward, it lurches like a drunkard.

History is very often painful to live through.

And this, this right here, is what I warned you about last year. This is what a lot of us warned America about.

If you can't bring yourself to vote because you demand a purity of your principles, because the deck is stacked against you, because the system is corrupt, because the choices are distasteful, because you’re not given the perfect candidate, well, what you get is ... this.

Chaos. Riot. War. Ruin. Rage. Disaster. Two steps sideways and four back.

History doesn’t care about the gains you’ve made. The tide will erase your sandcastle as if it never was and wipe the beach clean to start over.

Unless you take action to protect it.

Unless you care enough, unless you’re pragmatic enough, to do something about it.

Hashtagging your social media posts with #resistance isn't organization. It isn't a plan. It isn't a movement. It's not advancing civilization. Just as slapping a $2 made-in-China magnet on the back of your giant gas-guzzling SUV isn’t actually supporting your troops or doing anything to prevent war in oil rich Middle Eastern countries.

The selfish, self-aggrandizing, self-involved, morally bankrupt conspiracy theory that passes for much of American ideology nowadays should be easy to rally against.

This lunatic in the White House, the barking ninnies who make up congress, the toothless ignorant Nazis, the impotent illiterate beer-bellied Klan, the endlessly defeated inbred Confederates, these people, well, we outnumber them a thousand to one. Ten thousand to one.

They should be easy to beat.

But they never are.

They never are.

Victory is never easy and never permanent.

And it’s three drunken steps forward, two to the side, two back. One painful staggering step at a time. And so, here we are. Life, civilization, adulthood is often a choice between less-than-perfect options. Sometimes you have to choose the best option, even if it's not what you want, even if it's not perfect. Because that's just how life is.

That's how adults have to face the world.

History is very often nothing more than choices between less than perfect options because the universe just doesn’t give a good goddamn what you want.

The streets are today full of liberals and progressives and rational conservatives. But it's going to take more than pink pussy hats and shouting down Nazis on our streets. It’s going to take more than pulling down statues. Those are great starts and well, well worth doing. But Americans of good conscience must get organized. Must rally. Must stand together. Must stop the endless pedantry. Must find common ground.

And more than anything, we must get over this childish demand for perfect leaders and grow the hell up.

Creationists don't build starships.

And modern conservativism has been eaten alive by the Creationists.

But guess what? Liberals don't build starships either.

No, instead they spend all their time and effort arguing about the advisability of sending humans to other worlds when we haven't even fixed (insert endless list of causes) and they never actually get around to building the damned ship.

You know who builds starships? People who believe, that’s who. Those who believe in the future, those who work every damned day to advance civilization, those who stand steadfast against the fall of night. Once upon a time, those people were Americans.

And they can be again.

If we are to build that better future, if we are to claim the stars for our own, instead of falling back into the dustbin of history next to Rome and the Soviet Union, well, then we’re going to have to get organized and do something.

We have to do more than just protest.

We have to do more than pedantically complain and correct each other and engage in endlessly recursive social justice oneupmanship.

We have to organize.

We have to build a coherent vision, one that appeals to all Americans, not just left or right.

Folks, if you can't get it together, if you can’t dream big enough, to beat the sorry shitshow in office right now, well, you'd best just give up. Just give up. Knuckle under. Stand on the side of the street and raise your arm to the fucking Nazis.

It's damned depressing.

It can be damned depressing.

It’s easy to believe we are doomed.

It is. You'd like to think we've advanced beyond this. But civilization is never a steady progression. It's always two steps forward and three back and two sideways and one ahead and stagger to the left and to the right and do it again.

The fight to advance is never over.

The struggle to move civilization forward is never over. Never. That is our biggest failing. Far too often those of conscience achieve some victory, civil rights, economic reform, democracy, social safety systems, something, and then they think it's fixed. They’ve won. So they fire up a fatty and declare victory and go back to watching the game.

But it never ends.

It. NEVER. Ends.

I hear progressives say all of the time, I'm tired of having to keep fighting this battle. We fought this battle for (insert whatever cause is important to you here, civil rights, abortion, gay marriage), we won, now we gotta do it all over again and I’m tired, man, I’m tired.

Well, shit, folks, I'm tired of fighting gravity, but there really isn't an alternative if you want to stay upright.

Are we doomed?

Are we doomed as a country?

Are we doomed as a people, we Americans?

I don’t think so.

Down there in Texas, it’s pretty damned bad right now. But – but – Americans of good conscience, Americans of will, Americans who believe in each other and in a better nation and a better future, have all come together to save each other. Americans have rallied from across the nation to Texas and no one gives a damn who’s left or right, who’s gay or straight, who’s black or white. What matters is each other. What matters is civilization. What matters is pushing back the tide.

That’s America, right there.

That’s why I believe we can change our fate, save our country, build a better future. Because of those Americans.

We’ve been here before. It’s been worse before. And even if we stand together now and once again push back the fall of night, bad news, folks, we’re gonna be right back here again at some date in the future. But we don’t have to join Rome or the Soviet Union, we can push back, we’ve done it before. We can save this nation if we want to. We can emerge from this dark time better, wiser, stronger. We can make this world a better place for all. We can. We will. But sooner or later, we – or our children – will be right back here again.

Because that’s how history works.

And it’s painful.

And it’s hard.

And it’s perilous and uncertain and it just never ends.

It’s about perspective.

It’s about how you face it: on your feet or on your knees.

But if you want a better nation, well, Citizen, you have to keep fighting.

And it's really that simple.

So let's get to it.

---

Note: A  short version of this essay was originally posted to my Facebook page. // Jim