Living in a World of Minutia Obsession

This is Tuesday November 3, 2009 and this morning what happens when I don’t smoke for extended periods becomes evident. I become a little O C D, that is, I obsess and worry about aimless things either possibly missing items or things I have left undone. I shouldn't be bothered about that missing crucifix that Gary gave me the summer before last, after all, I'm not Catholic. This morning it was tough sledding to get cigarettes. Tuesday mornings are the worst time to borrow because everybody is out. After being turned down by numerous people finally John let me have a few puffs on his cigarette that he got from Janet. It was a good brand with a high nicotine content. The TV was working good this morning with KTTV on. I went out again and Nancy let me have about ¾ of a cigarette she was smoking, that I paid my last seventeen cents for.

In the news people are obsessing over these three elections they are having today. It looks as if the democrats will lose all three of them, and if they do I say it’s irrelevant. There is one in way upstate New York where the Republican running dropped out of the race, Afghanistan style, in favor of the whacko Conservative candidate, who will win now. The Republican endorsed the democrat. Then there are the governorships of Virginia and New Jersey, which both appear likely to fall into Republican hands. This in the big scheme of things means little. Of course you know I wish the Obama administration didn’t arm people like Glen Beck with so much amo such as - -essentially doing what Republicans do best. They appeal to “The Big Picture”. They are always talking about five year plans and fifteen year plans. A democratic candidate might ask a man or woman on the street the price of a bagel and coffee and gauge the economy that way. Democrats are more micro, and “people oriented”. People like Larry Summers and Timothy Geitner are more given to grandiose abstractions. But in LA county the next unemployment statistics will be higher, as more corporations plan to drop employees. And that’s what people really care about.

For the fourth day in a row we had that lousy brand of oatmeal. Our remedy for having pancakes seldomly, which was our policy before last week, now that situation has been remedied. We no longer have pancakes at all. We had a fried egg and toast with grape jelly already on it, and we did have sausage. It’s always good to get more meat in our diets. Marsha gave me a cigarette to smoke after breakfast.

Hamid Karzai is the defacto winner of the Afghanistan run off election because the other guy withdrew from the November 7^th election. You wonder whether the CIA used muscle power to intimidate him out of going through with the campaign. I guess you better not say you want something unless you mean it. Because now President Obama has comitted himself to making a decision now on those 40,000 troops. . Randy Rhodes thinks the heroin trade in Afghanistan is affecting our military policy, and she reviewed the facts of Iran Contra. What we need is the moral purity party. Where only candidates who aren't compromised by shady business or financial deals are allowed to run. Perhaps I should join the green party. Last week Hillary criticized the Pakistani leaders for knowing where Al Qaeda people were hiding out, and refusing to tell us. Pat Buchannon threw one of his curve balls from the left saying that we should always take foreign leaders at their word and not state the obvious.

Arab leaders want all Israeli construction on the West Bank stopped before negotiations begin. And I agree with them since they are illegal under any standard. I watched videos on this last night. Also Israel has been evicting Palestinians from their homes on the West Bank, and this isn’t too kosher, if you know what I mean. If President Obama is really the raving Palestinian sympathizer that the Christian Right claims he is - - then - well let's just say Israel would already have had a peace treaty crammed down their throat whether they liked it or not. The United States has the power to make the Israeli nation eat dirt. It's all a question of which we value more, Mideast peace and justice for all, or saving Israel's pride. This whole functional apartite situation with native Palistinians just is not just or fair.

The Orion Federation takes exception to my remarks about the Muhajadeeb last week, or the freedom-fighters of Afghanistan. The fact is that patriots of any country will rise up and defend their homeland be it the USSR or the United States that is invading. The Federation still believes the nation we have to worry about is Iran. The problems we are having with Afghanistan and Pakistan will prove inconsequencial in the long view of things. But with Iran we have a virelent threat that people like Pat Buchannon can't see because his motto is "I never met an anti-semite that I didn't like". Russia may ally itself with Iran in the coming years.

I watched the video of Glen Beck I was going to do a blog on today. Glen does these extended twenty minute comentaries on FOX using the blackboard and other visual aids. Except that Glen is regarded as so nutty that I didn’t want to keep bad company. Glen has the theory that the money supply went up 120% in the past year and back when the money rate was hiked only 13% they had to jack the interest rate to twenty percent to counteract that. So this time they’ll have to jack the interest rates up close to two hundred or triple percent. This would be intolerable. Glen says that the “power” has not yet been applied to the money flow and we’re all just “waiting for that to happen”, which Glen says is certain. My own theory is that the banks and brokerage firms operate as a giant vacuum cleaner more greedy than a black hole, and for this reason we will never have inflation now because as a requisite money has not only to be in circulation, but we pretty much need a full employment economy that can’t take up any slack. 1980 and 1981 were a different case, and things aren’t at all like that now. We don’t have cost, push, or demand, pull, or any other kind of inflation. We don’t have any inflation at all, basically.

Sixty Minutes had a thing on the H1 N1 virus and growing all those chicken eggs to culture the virus, and dress it up in a tux. They say they will kill the virus before use in a vaccine. That Baree syndron people got in 1976 from a Swine Flu vaccine won’t happen again. Basically the H1 N1 vaccine is as safe as any other vaccine you take today. After this was a segment on the Yakasoo or that Japanese mafia organization where people are tattooed all over and have portions of fingers missing as punishments for “making mistakes”. One thing about this evening- - I was very alert the whole evening, if not anxious. My first borrowing of a cigarette was from Joe Drisco about a quarter after six. I did not attempt to have another cigarette the rest of the evening.