Adaptive Curmudgeon

So the shutdown is in full bloom and shenanigans abound.  The award for most photogenic example goes to locking WWII vets out of their memorial.

I’ve written about shutdowns before in 2011 Tour of Reality Denial: Part I and the incredibly cleverly named follow up; 2011 Tour of Reality Denial: Part II.  I even coined the a term to describe things like the vet / memorial kerfluffle:

Punitive Ineffectualism: When a person or organization deliberately chooses to be outrageously incompetent to piss people off. Example; “I’d ask Bill to pick up beer for the hunting trip but he doesn’t drink alcohol and he’d buy Zima or some other crap. Rather than deal with that idiot’s punitive ineffectualism I’ll get it myself.” It is a gambit which can backfire by generating unforgiving animosity. Example: “Remember last year when Bill threw $50 worth of Cuban cigars into the lake because he wanted to save us from cancer? As payback I’m waiting until we get to bear country before smearing his tent with bacon. Take that you sanctimonious motherfucker!”

What?  You thought this was something new?  Of course not.  Governments “shut down” from time to time and when they do they invariably deploy “punitive intellectualism”.

It just makes sense.  If everything is done competently and professionally then citizens find the shutdown more palatable.  Simple game theory says that the best gambit is to shut down in such a way as to annoy as many people as possible.

I observed the same thing when Minnesota shut itself down in 2011:

Example five: Kicking Citizens out of their Park and locking the gates.

At the time I had a simple observation:

“Why the hell is there a gate at all!?!”

(In the 2013 D.C. version, unlike the 2011 Minnesota version, the gates were temporarily installed.  Same concept though.)

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Now for a silver lining to all this.  Pay attention because I’m really happy to see it and nobody (but me) seemed to notice.

Optimistic Observation Of The Day:

Nobody got hurt!

Men with guns and badges, with orders to keep people out of the park, refused to commit mayhem to keep their orders.  Excellent news!  That’s not as easy as it sounds.  They had jobs to do with clear instructions.  Yet when the time came, they acted like grown adults.  They did the sane thing and stood down.  Well done gentlemen!

The folks who stood down and let veterans (citizens!) into their monument did the right thing.  All up and down the chain of command, once they realized what was happening, people did the right thing.  Nobody handcuffed grandpa or fired tear gas, no guns cleared leather, nobody did anything rash.  The whole thing was resolved in an unexpected outbreak of common sense.  America rocks!

Park based mall cops; for your example of looking into the face of authoritarian disasters and choosing not to leap, I salute you!  Thanks!

Also to the veterans, well done!  When some jackoff with a badge was doing wrong you spanked their ass.  As it should be.  Well done in 2013 and thank you for your previous service as well!

I decided to haul all of the building materials myself.  Am I not a country boy?  Can I not survive?  If I can skin a buck and run a trot line I damn well can deliver a load of shingles!

Mrs. Curmudgeon (who had arrived independently in her own car) saw the writing on the wall, gave me a hug, and skipped out before things got too interesting.  Wise woman.  I’m sure she monitored the cell phone for the rest of the day; anticipating either a call from the emergency room or the police.

I’d ridden there in a contractor’s truck.  (If it gets the job done well he will be elevated from “contractor” to “hero”.)  While I’d been haggling over shingles he’d been picking out a bunch of dimension lumber.  He showed up and shook his head sadly at the thought of delivery trucks which are unavailable.  He too knows a society which lacks trucks and drivers is going to hell in a handbasket.

Together we went to the “yard” intending to pick up the load.  We had his 3/4 ton Chevy.  We were towing a car trailer which had been intended for just the lumber.  I was optimistic the trailer would work with shingles too.

I learned something new that day.

Shingles are heavy.

Like the sodden and compressed soul of a politician, shingles sag toward the earth and crush anything in their path.  I might as well have been stacking depleted uranium.  You don’t know heavy until you’ve played with shingles.

A forklift put what looked like a tiny little load on the trailer.  The truck sagged precipitously.  I was worried.

“Dude, you’ve got to drop the trailer and leave it here.  Let me come back with my dually.”  It was a reasonable and cautious idea… therefore entirely unacceptable.  Like all rednecks, my contractor wasn’t about to bail on a job simply because he was risking a busted axle.

“I got this.”  He said.

I had my doubts.  He looked worried too.  The tires were smushed.

While we were eying the tires I watched a particularly dense forklift operator drop a bunch of 2″ x 6″ planks.  (Which were neither 2″ nor 6″ in size because… shut up.)  They almost hammered a little Honda SUV that was parked nearby.  I sure was glad that forklift driver hadn’t been loading our trailer!

Returning to the tires (they resembled crushed marshmallows) I decided we were doomed.

“Are you sure.” I waved at the squatting truck, “you want to drive that?”  He looked at the tires and whistled.  Nothing good comes from an exploded sidewall.

Then he checked the pressure.  “Does 20 pounds sound low to you?”

“Only if you want to live.”  I responded.  Soon the tires were pumped up to 50 pounds and things looked much better.  Huzzah!  We zigged and zagged down the road with questionable steering, low speeds, and brakes that weren’t up to the task.  Surprisingly, we made it to my house in one piece.

This was about a third of the shingles.  The majority remained back at the yard.  Life is like that.

At my house we discovered that his Bobcat (which I lust after!) could lift no more than 15 “bundles” of shingles.  We’d stacked it much taller than 15 bundles.  The Bobcat did an epic pirouette.  Luckily it didn’t face plant.

(For reasons only known to J Edgar Hoover and the Pope, shingles are sold by the “bundle” and estimated by the “square”.  It takes 3 bundles to make one square which isn’t quite 100 square feet worth of material depending on the manufacturer as interpreted by the lunar cycle and the growth rings on barnacles found in the North Sea and…  did I mention that those bastards shaved 1/32″ off my plywood?   But I digress.  I’m sure it makes sense if you’ve been punched in the skull.)

Manfully facing the inevitable, I shifted bundles by hand.  Each one weighs about the same as a bag of feed and smells like burning money.  Eventually we got them all off the trailer.  (Did you know there are people who think “jazzersize” is hard work?  They live on the same planet.  Yeah I know.  Me too.)

More in Part IV.

My cheap, ugly, scratched, “disposable” cell phone has died after more years of service than most vehicles can muster.  I’ve been without it a couple weeks (I’m a blogger without a cell phone… go figure).  It sucks.  I’ve reluctantly accepted that it’s damn near impossible to do business and travel in 2013 without a cell phone.

So I guess the bastards are getting some of my money.  I’ve been looking around the web for advice about replacing my broken piece of shit phone with an unbroken piece of shit phone.  Everything was ok… at first.

Then I decided to get one with capacity for an earpiece.  (Which is apparently the incorrect vocabulary.  It seems that only octogenarians and I use “earpiece”.  I’m refer to one those blue tooth hands free devices that make it look like hipsters are talking to the air in front of them while they step into open manholes.)

There is some sort of “if it saves one life” rule that if you hold a cell phone to your ear while driving a commercial truck, the cops punch you in the balls and ship you to Guantanamo.  I never talk on the phone while driving (privately or commercially).  Why?  Because I’m driving dammit!  However, should I, in a moment of weakness, answer a call while at the wheel of a dump truck I’m suddenly a terrorist.  My previous phone was so old that I couldn’t buy a “hands free” headset.  They probably made them once but I’d need to find an antique dealer in Botswana to get one.  (Scratch that… everyone in Botswana probably has a smart phone in their mud hut.)  With a new phone I might as well remove the legal liability (appearance of impropriety?) by getting an earpiece/headset/implant/matrix visualizer.

Once I typed the word “hand free” and unleashed Google, things got funky.  The universe attacked me with smart phone errata.  I’ve been stuffed down the rabbit hole by nerds with plungers.  Also companies that make money selling nothing on monthly payment plans smelled blood in the water.

This is precisely why I hate it when old but functional equipment breaks.  Now I have to ponder stuff that bores me; CMDA versus GSM, Android 4.0 versus 4.x, Bluetooth and/or 3GWifi, and lions and tigers oh my.

This isn’t to say I’m incapable of grokking CMDA versus GSM.  (I not a complete idiot.)  It’s just that I don’t give a rat’s ass about it.  Every second my brain is distracted by smart phones and the people that love them, God kills a kitten.  I like kittens.  (Though I hate cats.)

Surely there is a market niche for someone in cyberspace to service the low cost low care caller?  Someone who’ll identify a cheap phone that’ll meet my needs, write the number on the case phone in black marker, FedEx it, and then disappear from my life forever.

By the way, I did lay down a couple of ground rules that make it harder.  I use prepaid service.  Tracfone I believe.  Why?  Because I don’t do monthly plans for anything less important than a house (or when I’m desperate… a vehicle).  Also, I’ll die before I let an iDevice sully my truck cab.  I’m just sayin’.

I’m thinking I may have to go to WalMart and deal with Lakisha at the electronics department.  I’m not that desperate yet.  I might choose instead to become a sheepherder and join the Basques in Spain.  I’m pretty sure they’d let me borrow their smartphones once in a while and my dog loves guarding sheep.

A.C.

Update:  I’m also looking for a small metal case for the phone.  It must be metal… because Faraday.  Remember the good old days when wondering if the Government was spying on you phone meant you were paranoid instead of correct?

Update 2:  I had to venture inside a WalMart.  It was horrible!  They were out of stock and the salesman seemed confused by the concept of a TracFone pre-pay as opposed to the “Pay A Monthly Bill Until You Die” approach that is apparently our patriotic duty.  They were sold out and some kid sneezed on my pant leg.  For the greater good of society I should have cracked the little cretin in the noggin.  Instead I fled.  I will order off the Internet and have a phone delivered by FedEx… after I take a bath in Lysol.

Today’s roofing based journey of discovery started at a store I’m not going to name but rhymes with “Bone Despot”.  After some time I arrived at the conclusion of… Fuck them.

The next store was more helpful; which is like saying it’s better to be groped by the TSA than shot by Stalin’s henchmen.  Should I cheer for the TSA?

I already knew I had X square feet of roof.  This was non-carpentry math and therefore made sense.  I have a tape measure, understand the concept of “slope”, and mastered fifth grade geometry.  Yay me.

“I need enough shingles to cover X square feet” I explained.

They looked at me like I had a face made entirely of armpits.

This is when I remembered that I was buying construction materials and was therefore no longer participating in a logical universe.  I needed to speak their inane language of units based on astrology.  A “square”, for reasons known only to carpenters and the Illuminati, is the amount of shingles that’ll cover 100 square feet.

I tried again.  “I need X/100 ‘squares’ of shingles.”

They sprung into action.  Soon I was looking at a “parts list”.  It started with the “squares” and continued through endless picky little details right up to and including several huge boxes of coil nails.  I liked the list.  It looked complete.  A job well defined is half done!

Then I read the price and shit myself.  After that I started talking in tongues, smelled brimstone, and passed out.  “Why not just bend me over the counter and have your way with me right here?”  I wailed.

OK I didn’t actually say that.  Instead I stuffed it all down inside for that heart attack all men have waiting for them.

I soldiered on.  Apparently a “square” is no longer 100 square feet.  Why?  Because screw you that’s why.  It’s about 97.9 square feet.  Or maybe something else.  Yep, it varies depending on which brand of shingle you select.  (Is this what women experience with dress sizes?)

My fuse was lit again.  What good can come of a unit of 97.9 square feet?  Those Godless bastards had gone too far!  I started winding up for a righteous speech about how 100 square feet is reasonable and everyone else needs to have my foot kicked so far up their…

At this juncture Mrs. Curmudgeon said some soothing words (“shut up fool and pay the man”).  Well said dear.  I mellowed my inner harsh and adjusted the order slightly to make up for suckitudinous unitage.

I was back on track.  Like water off a duck’s back baby!

Then they asked if I wanted to put it on my “store card”.  Screw that!  I have my own resources.  What’s this? I get a hundred bucks cash back?  Well sign me up!  I surrendered my personal information (and dignity) because I’ll get a $100 “rebate” in six weeks and daddy needs a new toolbox.  Then I noticed the APR.  24%.  Really?  Are you kidding me?  I started another rant.  This time centered on usury and the appropriate reaction to a 24% APR.  Mrs. Curmudgeon distracted me by promising to arrange the check within 24 hours.  Whew!  If I pay even one penny of good money on their evil card I’ll never forgive myself.  After all, 24% would make Al Capone seem benevolent.

“Now about the free delivery…”  What’s this?  It’s not free?  “I drop the price of a three karate diamond on pebble covered felt and you jackoffs want $79 to deliver it?”  I harrumphed a bit and pondered the hassle involved.  Finally I wavered.  Sometimes it’s worth it to pay to avoid a tough job.

“OK, ship the stuff to my house at…”  What’s this?  The truck ‘aint here?

“Well fine, call the guy and have him deliver it to…”  What’s this?  Not coming until Wednesday?  Can you say “blow me”!?!

Everyone at the materials counter came to a halt.  Most people simply accept the delay while the delivery guy is gone.  Why?  Because we’re slowly devolving into a population of spineless chickenshits that’s why!  I will not go quietly into that dark night.

More in Part III.

Just for the record I’m good at math.  I’m not afraid to calculate anything; ranging from the rate of return on your “investment” in a chromed out Harley to the odds you’ll get struck by lightning while having sex with a supermodel.  (Hint: still higher than the ROI on a Harley.)  Also, and I say this to prove I’m fearless (or stupid), I do my own taxes.

However, I loathe “carpentry” math.  It’s a bullshit combination of medieval superstition, corporate malfeasance, and dipshit tradition.  The units associated with construction materials are so gruesome that my brain takes flight and I start whirling around in circles until I fall down.  (Try that in the plumbing isle and see if you can find a “sales associate” to help you find the right roll of aluminum flashing.)

The worst part is that everything, and I mean everything, is a fractional size that is almost but not quite something that makes sense.  Why must they do that to me?

I hate the fact that a 2″ x 4″ stud is really 1 1/2 ” by 3 1/2″.  It’s like saying the Easter Bunny is really a marsupial from Jupiter.  Further, since everyone accepts that explanation I should just shut up and eat my damn candy. Really?  I say no!

That’s just the tip of the iceberg.  There’s a cosmic injustice involved in 3/8″ nominal plywood that clocks in at 11/32″.  I implore the universe to make 3/8″ stuff 3/8″ thick.  I’ll pay extra just to avoid getting emotionally hosed trying to evaluating an obscure fractional series while standing in the lumber isle.

The 1/32″ of wood the lumber companies squeeze is causing me to hate my fellow man and that’s too steep a price for society to pay!  For that matter, I’d every time I buy a stud that’s not 2″ x 4″ I just know I’m participating on the death of something holy.  Some day I’m going to buy a goddamn Woodmizer and make my own dimension lumber.  A man needs to take a stand!

Now lets talk about shingles.  Shingles are, in my opinion, proof that humans are just monkeys with cell phones.  Asphalt shingles are essentially a sheet of felt, slimed with tar, and sprinkled with gravel.  That’s the pinnacle of our monkey brained innovation?  These slabs of pretend asphalt road are stacked on the house in an interlocking weave of suck.  Then, because God hates us, they degrade and must be replaced.

Each successive generation of monkeys has to replace the roof.  This year, I drew the short straw.  Someone give me a banana.

It’s backbreaking labor to remove the old crap someone nailed up during the Carter Administration.  Ibuprofen?  Check!

Once there’s a mountain of shingles leaking nails on the lawn you’ve unearthed the tip of the iceberg.  Now you can see how poorly the old roof was functioning.  Not surprisingly I wound up with an axillary home improvement project involving plywood and angles.

Some things are better left unknown.

All this to nail up what seems like a comically crude roofing design for the sole purpose of not getting wet?

(Spare me the talk of metal roofs.  I couldn’t afford that shit if I sold a kidney and smuggled cocaine in the empty cavity.  For me it was a choice of architectural shingles or letting my house rot and selling it as compost.)

The rest of the story follows in part II.

A thousand monkeys hammering a thousand typewriters for a thousand years might produce Shakespeare but spambots aren’t up to the task.  Not that I care.  Most incoming spam is killed by filters long before it slimes up my in-box.  (My filters do a shockingly good job.  I liken them to a pack of trained wolverines.  Why?  Because nothing says “get off my lawn” like a wolverine.  If I could buy a wolverine guard “dog” I’d get three!)

That said, here are a few bits of spam that washed up on my filter:

“I’d like to shoot you ann e-mail. I’ve got some creative ideas for your blog you might be interested in hearing.”

No you don’t.  First of all you can’t spell.  Who makes a robot that can’t spell?  Further, your link goes to something called “Paint On Bridal Position”.  A site which is apparently about shoes.  If you’re going to entice me with something called Paint On Bridal Position it had better darned well be porn on a level that has gone beyond merely prurient and drifted full circle into awe inspiring.  Imagine my disappointment to read of shoes!

“When some one searches for his vital thing, so he/she wants to be available that in detail, thus that thing is maintained over here.”

You’re this dog aren’t you?

“Heya! I’m at work browsing your blog from my new iphone 3gs!”

Put down the phone and get back to work.  The boss isn’t paying you to sit on your ass.

“It’s the best time to make some plans for the future and it’s time to be happy. I’ve read this post and if I could I desire to suggest you some interesting things or tips. Maybe you could write next articles referring to this article. I desire to read even more things about it!”

Ahhh… nothing better than “politician spam”.  Politician spam (a term I just coined) is when spam starts with a statement that is beautiful in its poise and simplicity… then drops a truckload of irrational gibberish on it.  It reminds me of the political speech our society has seen fit to substitute for reasoned debate.

Folks, we should heed the spam.  Right now really is the best time to make plans for the future and it’s always a good time to be happy.  Thus I’m logging off and will immediately adjourn for the porch swing, where I’ll happily make plans of the bright and shiny future when there will be wolverines frolicking on the lawn.

Brilliant!  (Hat tip to The Whited Sepulchre.)

The Worlds Only Rational Man pointed me to a delightful quote:

“The society which scorns excellence in plumbing as a humble activity and tolerates shoddiness in philosophy because it is an exalted activity will have neither good plumbing nor good philosophy: neither its pipes nor its theories will hold water.”

John W. Gardner, Secretary of Health Education and Welfare under JFK and author of “Excellence.”

I’d never heard that one before.

He included a story about a New Detroit splash park [which] opened, minus the water. Now I could make fun of Detroit because they built a “splash park” and didn’t have water but that would be mean.

Bwa ha ha ha ha! Yes I’m mean. What a hoot!

Then, in mid laugh, I had another thought.  The government builds “splash parks”?  WTF?!?

Curmudgeon that I am, I have limited experience with “splash parks”.  In recent centuries I’ve only been to one.  I was dragged there (like all other adults who go to such places) by a child.  Child dove and I oozed into several water filled objects that resembled gargantuan cement mixers.  We sloshed around on the spin cycle until we were both half drowned.  Here’s a hint; the five story slide that children go down on their belly was not calibrated for a two hundred pound man.  I believe my ass broke the sound barrier while my balls were still on the launch pad.  In the end… I lived.

It was fun for child.  It was OK for me (but if I ever go down the five story slide again it’s because Vladimir Putin pushed me).  Also it was expensive.  I left more or less penniless.  Well played oh splash park nemesis!

So what is this Detroit based “government subsidized waterless splash entity”?  Aren’t “splash parks” run by capitalist entities like Six Flags or something?  Apparently not.  The photos make it look like a tepid shadow of the outrageous capitalist ball buster I encountered.

Next question; why?  For this I turn to the Detroit News (which reads like they cut and pasted the press release). Detroit opens splash park in Palmer Park neighborhood. It begins with this:

“Because her Palmer Park neighborhood didn’t have a splash park, [City Council member] Carla Rivers would have to drive her 9-year-old daughter Karis to Farmington Hills to enjoy the experience.

Now after years of having their neighborhood pool shut down, residents like Rivers and their children have a brand-new splash park to call their own.”

So there you have it. In the horrible oppressed days of yore people had to drive their own cars to have the recommended annual dose of splash park experience.  Detroit, because it’s awesome, rectified this situation by using tax dollars to build a “free” splash park.  It was financed, apparently, by unicorns.

Of course I live in the middle of nowhere.  If I want to go to a splash park I have to drive several hours.  Once I get there it’ll cost money to get in and I’ll get raked over the coals for purchases of everything from corn dogs to sunscreen.

What’s the word for someone who must finance his own vehicle, drive it himself, and pay to play?  Oh yeah; it’s called “being an adult”.

One last quote:

“It’s important to keep our kids occupied,” she said. “This facility will definitely keep them occupied.”

Shitty schools and rampant crime in a bankrupt city;  no wonder they’ve got to keep the kids “distracted”.

Meanwhile, curmudgeon that I am, I go swimming fairly often.  I never cost a penny of tax dollars.  I find the nearest lake and jump in.

The water may be a bit cold but it’s free; and when I say something is “free” I don’t mean “paid for by someone else”.  Plus there’s always the chance I’ll catch a fish for lunch.  Detroit, which is essentially bankrupt, could learn a lot by jumping in a lake.

[This part II of a post in which I insult both political parties and try my best to feel sympathy for a lawyer (presumably) who has labored in secret to perpetuate a colossal injustice.  How do I get myself into these things?]

OK fine, assuming I’ve made the point that shit has already hit the fan, who cares?  For part two of my little rambling note I’m going to out myself as having sympathy for one of our oppressors. Yep; I’ve found in my heart a bit of sympathy for one of our nameless overlords. Who knew I had it in me?

I’m referring here to the unnamed person who, in secret, was ordered to justify spying on all Americans. Imagine that job! I’ve shoveled shit. I’ve dug ditches. I’ve worked in brutal cold, blistering heat, dangerous environments, long hours, and I’ve even had to fly to Newark… but no job has ever asked me to shave off a piece of my soul and burn it on my bosses desk.

Someone, presumably a well educated individual, had to form a logical construct about why it’s legal to spy on all Americans. This couldn’t be done by the unaware. The person (or team) who did it knew what he or she was doing. Now they have to carry that burden. Dirt washes off but that won’t fade.

Remember, I’m not talking about the amoral or deluded who did the spying. I’m talking about the poor sap who had to justify it.

Here’s the article that got me thinking about what may be the shittiest job on earth.  It was written by Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner (R-Wis.) and discusses a memo that “justifies” wiretapping every American all the time whenever the NSA feels like it.

“On Aug. 9, the Obama administration released a previously secret legal interpretation of the Patriot Act that it used to justify the bulk collection of every American’s phone records. The strained reasoning in the 22-page memo won’t survive long in public light…”

Imagine that.  Someone had to write a fig leaf to justify folks who intended to do whatever the hell they wanted.  I can’t imagine what that sort of internal dialogue would do to me.  It had to hurt.

It makes sense that the Patriot Act was used for this charade.  The Patriot Act was an affront to civil liberties when it was passed and remains one to this day. As surely as night follows day, it was misused as soon as the opportunity presented itself.  Anyone who’s read history would have seen abuses coming.  Why create a hammer if you’re not looking for a nail?

I find it instructive that both parties are at fault.  When the party of R was in power they passed the bad idea and promised they would never misuse it.  Oh really?  The party of D was not in power so they opposed it (ineffectively).  Then, just about the millisecond the party of D was in charge they decided the Patriot Act was totally awesome.  Oh really?  Meanwhile the party of R suddenly decided the monster they’d created was totally not cool anymore.  Too late suckers!  There is a beautiful (and morally bankrupt) symmetry in a world where both parties embraced spying but only if they got to be the spies.  Neither party did the right thing when they were in power.  Both parties changed their tune when they weren’t holding the reins.

“…the Patriot Act authorizes the collection of certain business records — in this case, phone records — when there are reasonable grounds to believe that the records are relevant to an authorized investigation into international terrorism. The key legal term is ‘relevance.'”

Whomever was forced to write the secret memo to justify spying on all Americans played around with legalese and definitions trying to make a case.  Even then they were hampered by the fact that in the end, they were speaking English.  You cannot do whatever you want by redefining words:

“The administration’s memo begins by acknowledging that its interpretation of the statute is at odds with the plain meaning of ‘relevance.’ It argues there is a ‘particularized legal meaning’ of relevance, but it ultimately concedes that it fails to meet this standard as well.”

Nor was this accidental drift.  They knew precisely how far they were going:

“….no public court has ever upheld document collection that is remotely close to the dragnet at issue. The administration concedes as much: ‘To be sure, the cases that have been decided in these contexts do not involve collection of data on the scale at issue in the telephony metadata collection program, and the purpose for which information was sought in these cases was not as expansive in scope as a nationwide intelligence collection effort designed to identify terrorist threats.'”

Having nowhere else to go it concludes that Congress knew so it was OK.

“…information concerning the use of Section 215 to collect telephony metadata in bulk was made available to all members of Congress, and Congress reauthorized Section 215 without change after this information was provided.”

Of course nobody in Congress seems to know what they’re talking about.  Maybe it was one of those “pass it to know what’s in it” things?

“As I have said numerous times, I did not know the administration was using the Patriot Act for bulk collection, and neither did a majority of my colleagues.”

The article winds up with a Conrgessman shooting down 22 pages of misdirection with 16 words of common sense:

“Regardless, the suggestion that the administration can violate the law because Congress failed to object is outrageous.”

Then we see our Congressman end by claiming to have  a spine:

“But let them be on notice: I am objecting right now.”

That’s all well and good.  I’m glad that we’ve got a Congressman who’s calling bullshit.  Good luck sir!

Also I really do feel empathy for whatever is left of the person who wrote the original 22 pages of justification.  Jobs that force you to chose between a clean soul and a paycheck erode you inch by inch until there’s nothing left.  I’d like to think I’d do the right thing.  We all would like to think that highly of ourselves.  We’d like to think we’d tell the boss to suck it and walk out the front door unemployed and guilt free.  We’d stand straight and tell the president himself “no”.  Then they’d roll the credits on our heroic awesomeness.

However, life isn’t like that and from experience I’ve seen great men slowly collapse.  As for me, the few times I’ve been put in positions where the boss wanted “wrong” I have indeed refused to go there but it wasn’t easy and nobody congratulated me.  I suspect it gets harder the more compromises you made on the way to where you are.  I’m guessing it was just another step in the diminishment of someone who’s already given up.  I doubt I’ll ever be put in that position because I have made a point out of avoiding it.  None of us truly knows what we’d do when a very expensive and highly lucrative career was on the line and the boss was one of the most powerful men on the planet.  Standing up to your boss when you were a 19 year old delivery boy ‘aint the same thing as doing it when you’re 50.

Back to our bravely squawking Congressman.  Thanks and good luck but it’s not going to get better soon.  Call me when you’ve made a difference but don’t expect a parade for feeling angry that shit went down on your watch. Nobody in Washington D.C. of either party is even remotely likely to do any good toward civil liberties.  This mess didn’t happen by accident.  They fostered the mindset that led to it (both in the populace and in themselves). They created the conditions, they amassed the funding, they put the tools in place, and they only put on the brakes when they don’t get to control the monster they jointly made.  Both parties screwed the Nation when it suited them and they’ll forget all about their rhetorical outrage soon enough.

A.C.

P.S.  I’ve just dropped 1,500+ words hassling both Democrats and Republicans.  I already anticipate earnest Republican readers carefully explaining that their favorite party has acted much better than Obama and his posse. (Perhaps Republicans have a point.  Much like it’s better to stick your finger in a light socket than have your arm chewed off by a wolverine, Bush Jr. didn’t run quite so amok as our current glorious socialist leader. Then again when Republicans had their chance to shine; they didn’t.  Thus, when they get the chance again; they won’t.)

Surely Obama’s 22 page secret memo justifying “spying on all Americans” is nothing like Bush’s performance.  Oh really?  I recall a 50 page secret memo in 2002 that was the mirror image of a 22 page secret memo in 2013.  It was filled with pretzel logic explaining that pain had to be “equivalent in intensity to the pain accompanying serious physical injury, such as organ failure, impairment of bodily function, or even death” or it wasn’t torture.  I’d like to find anyone who went along with that and smash their fingers one at a time with a hammer.  If I inflicted slightly less pain than organ failure they presumably would agree that it’s not torture.  Which is good because I’d have to hammer a lot of fingers to to test my theory on all of the people that tried to put a good face on doing wrong.  My arm would get tired.

You might think you’re being tortured without pain “equivalent in intensity to the pain accompanying serious physical injury, such as organ failure, impairment of bodily function, or even death”.  You’d be right.  You might think it’s unreasonable that every call you make is logged by the NSA.  You’d be right.

[This is part I of a post in which I insult both parties and try my best to feel sympathy for a lawyer (presumably) who has labored in secret to perpetuate a colossal injustice.  Frankly I couldn’t get to the point without a couple pages frothing at the mouth about past, present, and future asshattery emanating from D.C.  How do I get myself into these things?  Ah well, here goes:]

Years ago I was furious. An ill day was about to dawn and there was nothing I could do about it. The economic misery preordained by elected miscreants and their pet army of the economically illiterate was drawing nigh. The tools both parties had constructed to inflict civil liberties disasters that were literally (not figuratively) Orwellian loomed ever closer.

There was shit. There was a fan. The next step was just a matter of time. I was tense.

Denial was the name of the game. I knew it wouldn’t last. Realty cannot be denied. I just had to hold my breath and hang tight against the tide. Luckily, time has passed. I’m far more laid back now. Why? Because, in large part, it’s a done deal.

For example; the economy tanked. It’s no longer about to tank unless we take action to avoid it. In case you haven’t noticed, it’s still tanked. In fact we’re getting used to tanked. Americans are a rich and fortunate people and our version of tanked isn’t as bad as some versions of tanked. (See: Greece, et. al.) Sure, things can get worse and in some ways they will. (See: Cyprus, et. al.) Sure, some folks want to go back to the glorious naiveté of the past. (See: Washington Post, et. al.) At least we’ve reached the point where nobody takes them seriously. The press has been reporting “green shoots”, “housing restarts”, and whatever drivel Paul Krugman spews for years. End result: they overshot tanked and charged straight into bankrupt. (See: New York Times, et. al.) NPR may still blare from the dash of a Prius but nobody is waiting on a Unicorn car. (See: the Chevy Volt.) Also the Prius is en route to the Obamacare mandated 30 hour work week (if the driver is lucky). Tough economic times are a reality enforcing mechanism that makes us thankful the fossil fuels in North Dakota are on private land and the yoyos didn’t dig any deeper trying to build their particular Utopia. I’m glad we’re done with that. Misery sucks but unreality was worse.

The civil liberties front has been worse. You can try to “opt out” of the economy but privacy has been hammered remorselessly for everyone. This is a very bad thing because money comes and goes but distrust goes to the core where it resides for life. Privacy concerns were once the private hell of networked Linux fans and the tinfoil of hat. The last few years made it everyone’s business. Grandma knows the NSA has spied on her Facebook posts of knitting projects. Clueless teenagers, who en mass had iPhones grafted to their ear, know their cell phones have been monitored. Children have seen Michele Obama glaring at them from posters at the school cafeteria. The rest of us know the IRS has targeted it’s enemies and will soon have our medical records. A people who’ve seen guns seized in Katrina, martial law in Boston, an occasional “botched” no knock raid that kills an innocent, and of course suit wearing liars misrepresent each event in its turn… such people can’t quite return to their status of unaware.

Things change when your phone goes from “theoretically insecure” all the way to “has been, most certainly still is, and will continue to be monitored”. It’s not good news but it’s true. I prefer truth. As I’ve mentioned before, careening toward the guardrail is scarier than winching the wreck out of the ditch the next morning.

Now, in 2013, only the most unteachable, emotion soaked, true believer can avoid the obvious about both the economy and civil liberties. So, paradoxically, I’m relaxed.

…

So now that I’ve made my argument that we’re going to hell in a handbasket and I deal with the disaster better than the denial, I’d like to ponder a little piece of collateral damage.  Administrations (of both parties) hire lawyers to justify their actions.  Their lackeys never ever fail to come up with some sort of bullshit reasoning that allows their boss to do whatever the hell the boss wants to do.  It’s their raison d’etre.

That’s a peculiarity of our system.  Other monsters don’t hire “justifiers”.  Stalin didn’t hire lawyers to justify his madness any more than Capone needed one to justify ruling the Chicago underworld.  Recent administrations, uniquely, have done just that.

What madness flows through the mind of a person who has been hired to legally, morally, and rhetorically justify an administration bent of doing that which is both wrong and illegal?  What does that do to them?  How do they feel afterward?  I guess what I’m trying to say is that the folks who twist logic probably wind up twisted themselves and I suspect it’s an unpleasant experience.  That’s why I say that they’ve got the shittiest job in all of creation.