Watching BBC News this am...it seems the folks in Berlin are unhappy about the nature
and composition of the city changing as all the money and the people who make it
are flooding into their city, driving out the hippie/grunge contingent which, since the demise
of The Wall, has recently given the city its counterculture energy...
Welcome to my nightmare...
I watched, personally and closeup, as my Manhattan went from a trans-European, multicultural
Nirvana, composed of working-class (and hard-working) immigrants and their children, to
a Disney/Starbucks/Gap, Vegas-version parody of itself, populated by overpaid, over-dressed,
self-appointed Ubermensch with little but cash-flow to contribute to the lifeblood of the city.
I witnessed the destruction of all the little ethnic neighborhoods, from the Irish to the Italian to the
Eastern-European Jew to the German, with their walk-up apartments with bathtubs in the
kitchen and 6, 7, 10 people living in them--mostly happily--and saw the city hemmorage as it
suffered the transplantation of its vital organs, replacing them with Armani and Gucci
and Patek Philippe-adorned mannequins..
It's the way of the world, it seems... Los Angeles, the place I live now (God help me), has suffered
a similar fate, of sorts... Of course, to call LA a city is kind of a joke...it is a loosely-knit, over-
populated amalgam of lots of different, independent but interdependent cities/towns with their own
police departments and city councils...but DOWNTOWN LA (another misnomer) has suffered
this kind of gentrification, driving out the homeless who used to roam its streets after dark, or
the vagrants who roamed the pier locations of Santa Monica... But that is hardly the same
as the forced diaspora of employed, working class people who were made to leave the
dwellings where they bore, birthed and raised children...where they tended to and, eventually,
laid out for burial their elderly... That was the singular fate of the New Yorkers of
Little Italy, or Greenwich Village, or the Lower East Side, or Chelsea, or Clinton, or
Yorkville...
I am sure other cities suffered similar fates, but I do not come from Chicago, or Boston, or
Oakland... If you have similar stories to share, then please do so. I am sure that the slow
and inexorable death of cities as havens for the middle/working class is pandemic, marching along
in perfect step with the slow and inexorable death of the middle/working class...
Thursday, March 29, 2012
Mandate, Schmandate...
The Supremes...that off-tune, badly-dressed group of mentally and physically decaying
lifetime-appointed cretins sitting on The Bench (if only they were only bench-warmers) in DC...
seem to be concerned about the big, bad government forcing broccoli, or burial, upon the
poor citizens of this country. One of them, shamefully named Kennedy, is concerned that
this mandate will change the relationship of government to the citizen...
he says that forcing the citizen to do something against his (possible) will is unconstitutional...
WHAT??? Has this idiot heard of INCOME TAX? AUTOMOBILE INSURANCE?? PROPERTY TAX??? THE FRIGGING DRAFT???????? This country has a long history of NECESSARY EVILS
being forced upon its citizenry since its inception. IT'S CALLED BEING A CITIZEN. IT'S CALLED ADULTHOOD.
Ah, crap....who cares? Why bother? Go back to sleep, Richard...
lifetime-appointed cretins sitting on The Bench (if only they were only bench-warmers) in DC...
seem to be concerned about the big, bad government forcing broccoli, or burial, upon the
poor citizens of this country. One of them, shamefully named Kennedy, is concerned that
this mandate will change the relationship of government to the citizen...
he says that forcing the citizen to do something against his (possible) will is unconstitutional...
WHAT??? Has this idiot heard of INCOME TAX? AUTOMOBILE INSURANCE?? PROPERTY TAX??? THE FRIGGING DRAFT???????? This country has a long history of NECESSARY EVILS
being forced upon its citizenry since its inception. IT'S CALLED BEING A CITIZEN. IT'S CALLED ADULTHOOD.
Ah, crap....who cares? Why bother? Go back to sleep, Richard...
Wednesday, March 28, 2012
Usery...(no, not "sic")
So...I recently canceled all my credit cards...let's say voluntarily...and started living on a cash-only (including debit cards) basis... For practical reasons, however, it was deemed wise to acquire a secured credit card (try renting a car without a cc)... I applied for, and was approved by, an outfit called FIRST PREMIERE BANK...very high "independent" ratings from consumer bureaus--yeah.... I sent them a certain amount of money, allocating that $50 of that money be used for their "annual membership fee", and waited to hear that all was ok. After about 3 weeks, I called their "customer service" number and was assured that, yes, all was ok and I would be receiving my card "soon." Another 3 weeks passed with no card arriving. Then, yesterday, I received an email to which was attached a copy of my BILL for a minimum payment of $30...for a card I had never received, let alone used. True, the card did arrive later in the mail, but the fact remains that it was never used, and that there should have been no charges against it, hence no minimum payment due.
I called the lovely folks in Kansas or some other Red State to ask what this charge was all about, and I was told that there was an unpaid balance of $50 charged to my card... "What?", I asked. "The fifty dollars for the annual membership was already paid, and with MY MONEY, not yours, so why do I owe anyone anything??"
This line of questioning went unanswered, with the customer service rep parroting an
obviously-scripted response to a question doubtlessly heard hundreds of times a day.
To make matter worse, if I (like countless others) decided to only pay the "minimum payment due"
of $30, I WOULD HAVE AN UNPAID BALANCE OF $20 ON WHICH I WOULD THEN BE CHARGED 19.5% INTEREST!!!
So...I have placed myself in a situation where I would have pay usurious rates of interest to SOMEONE ELSE for the use of MY MONEY.
And people wonder why banks are hated more than lawyers.
CAVEAT EMPTOR. Stay away from First Premiere Bank if you can, although I imagine they are no worse than the other vultures in this game.
I called the lovely folks in Kansas or some other Red State to ask what this charge was all about, and I was told that there was an unpaid balance of $50 charged to my card... "What?", I asked. "The fifty dollars for the annual membership was already paid, and with MY MONEY, not yours, so why do I owe anyone anything??"
This line of questioning went unanswered, with the customer service rep parroting an
obviously-scripted response to a question doubtlessly heard hundreds of times a day.
To make matter worse, if I (like countless others) decided to only pay the "minimum payment due"
of $30, I WOULD HAVE AN UNPAID BALANCE OF $20 ON WHICH I WOULD THEN BE CHARGED 19.5% INTEREST!!!
So...I have placed myself in a situation where I would have pay usurious rates of interest to SOMEONE ELSE for the use of MY MONEY.
And people wonder why banks are hated more than lawyers.
CAVEAT EMPTOR. Stay away from First Premiere Bank if you can, although I imagine they are no worse than the other vultures in this game.
Sunday, March 25, 2012
Smile...
I got a FB response from a friend...it seems she was shocked that I put a "smiley face" on my post to her timeline...and it kind of perplexed me. I am a "professional curmudgeon"...an old, bearded fart who grunts and snorts and generally provides the "Ed Asner" note to the proceedings...but people who really know and love me know I'm a softie who loves to laugh.
Perhaps my readiness to smile broadly is tempered by my progressively lengthening upper teeth...a cross between Milton Berle and Mr. Ed...brought about by years of not flossing, heavy smoking and a dental insurance establishment which is criminally skimping on plan payments. It would take about $6-8 thousand dollars to fix my problem...some painful and expensive gum surgery followed by a nice bridge or implants to make my upper teeth look as good as my (already done) lowers. I'll never be George Hamilton, but they would look acceptable in this LA-land of overdone cosmetic dental work.
The problem I, and about 30 million other Americans, face is that the dental insurance companies have yearly limits of between $1000-$1500 on what they will pay, and astronomical exclusions on procedures which, if they pay for at all, they pay ridiculously small amounts. It means nothing if, like me, you haven't used their services for 2-3 years...there is no "roll-over" (like cell phone plans)...the yearly limit remains the same. So you can't "bank" the money to use at a later time. Use it, or lose it.
So, if (again) like me you are broke and unable to fork over large amounts of cash to oral surgeons, cosmetic dentists and the like, you are screwed. Going for cleanings is a waste of time now, and that's about all your dental insurance covers.
I hope Obama-Care looks at this problem and comes up with a solution. All the current thinking, and all the current research, shows that dental health is crucial to the health of other bodily systems, including heart and blood vessels. I've never understood why DENTAL INSURANCE is not pooled in with HEALTH INSURANCE...is this someone else's mouth??
One body, one system, except to CIGNA, Blue Cross, Met Life and the like.
Someone please explain, because I am at a loss...
Perhaps my readiness to smile broadly is tempered by my progressively lengthening upper teeth...a cross between Milton Berle and Mr. Ed...brought about by years of not flossing, heavy smoking and a dental insurance establishment which is criminally skimping on plan payments. It would take about $6-8 thousand dollars to fix my problem...some painful and expensive gum surgery followed by a nice bridge or implants to make my upper teeth look as good as my (already done) lowers. I'll never be George Hamilton, but they would look acceptable in this LA-land of overdone cosmetic dental work.
The problem I, and about 30 million other Americans, face is that the dental insurance companies have yearly limits of between $1000-$1500 on what they will pay, and astronomical exclusions on procedures which, if they pay for at all, they pay ridiculously small amounts. It means nothing if, like me, you haven't used their services for 2-3 years...there is no "roll-over" (like cell phone plans)...the yearly limit remains the same. So you can't "bank" the money to use at a later time. Use it, or lose it.
So, if (again) like me you are broke and unable to fork over large amounts of cash to oral surgeons, cosmetic dentists and the like, you are screwed. Going for cleanings is a waste of time now, and that's about all your dental insurance covers.
I hope Obama-Care looks at this problem and comes up with a solution. All the current thinking, and all the current research, shows that dental health is crucial to the health of other bodily systems, including heart and blood vessels. I've never understood why DENTAL INSURANCE is not pooled in with HEALTH INSURANCE...is this someone else's mouth??
One body, one system, except to CIGNA, Blue Cross, Met Life and the like.
Someone please explain, because I am at a loss...
Saturday, March 24, 2012
Parenthood...
As some of you may know, my days are made bearable by my bringing my furry, 4-legged and ever-so-sweet canine daughter Whimsy to her daily (firm commitment--I tell casting directors I have a conflict if they try to bring me in during the appointed time slot) play date with her friends Riley Rooney (a handsome Irish Setter) and Peaches (a zaftig Anatolian Shepherd). We all meet at place nicknamed The Dunes, a relatively-wild and unspoiled patch of land running a course about 1 1/2 miles long above the shoreline of El Segundo. The dogs love it, and it passes as exercise for the owners, so its a win-win for all...
Today a ton of dogs were there with us, all having a ball and behaving well, when a middle-aged man came along walking far ahead of a very young puppy--a 2-month old version of Peaches, actually, albeit male--and paying very little attention to the safety and welfare of this little dog. Of course, this new (and puppy-smelling) addition to the pack drew the attention of all the other dogs, who gathered around it sniffing curiously, causing the poor puppy to cower in fear. The man just kept walking. The puppy tried to crawl into the thick underbrush and bushes to escape the inspection of the larger dogs, but the dogs just kept pursuing him. The man kept walking. Finally, in my finest and most-exasperated New York high volume, I shouted "hey, man, how about looking after your dog!!??" while pulling Riley, Peaches, Sammy, Dante and 3 or 4 other adult dogs away from the bushes, trying to give the puppy an escape route. (It should be noted that Whimsy, my girl, did not participate in the puppy-terrorism event...she was a very timid and submissive puppy herself, and she is especially sensitive to dogs who show fear).
The puppy-owning (or at least the puppy-monitoring) moron simply stopped, turned around and stood there, making no effort to retrieve the little guy and assuage his fears. When the puppy (named Fargo) finally saw his chance and made his escape and rushed to his "protector", the man just turned again and started walking, leaving the puppy to trail behind.
Question: what kind of idiot do you have to be to be that insensitive to the plight of any creature,
let alone your "best friend"? And an infant at that?
I know that all kinds of people have children they shouldn't have,
and treat them in ways they shouldn't be treated, but it takes an especially clueless jerk
to be blind to the plight of a puppy. Go home and kick your kids, abuse your wife...
but be nice to your dog, asshole, or I will find you and make your life a living hell.
That's it. Have a nice day. :)
Today a ton of dogs were there with us, all having a ball and behaving well, when a middle-aged man came along walking far ahead of a very young puppy--a 2-month old version of Peaches, actually, albeit male--and paying very little attention to the safety and welfare of this little dog. Of course, this new (and puppy-smelling) addition to the pack drew the attention of all the other dogs, who gathered around it sniffing curiously, causing the poor puppy to cower in fear. The man just kept walking. The puppy tried to crawl into the thick underbrush and bushes to escape the inspection of the larger dogs, but the dogs just kept pursuing him. The man kept walking. Finally, in my finest and most-exasperated New York high volume, I shouted "hey, man, how about looking after your dog!!??" while pulling Riley, Peaches, Sammy, Dante and 3 or 4 other adult dogs away from the bushes, trying to give the puppy an escape route. (It should be noted that Whimsy, my girl, did not participate in the puppy-terrorism event...she was a very timid and submissive puppy herself, and she is especially sensitive to dogs who show fear).
The puppy-owning (or at least the puppy-monitoring) moron simply stopped, turned around and stood there, making no effort to retrieve the little guy and assuage his fears. When the puppy (named Fargo) finally saw his chance and made his escape and rushed to his "protector", the man just turned again and started walking, leaving the puppy to trail behind.
Question: what kind of idiot do you have to be to be that insensitive to the plight of any creature,
let alone your "best friend"? And an infant at that?
I know that all kinds of people have children they shouldn't have,
and treat them in ways they shouldn't be treated, but it takes an especially clueless jerk
to be blind to the plight of a puppy. Go home and kick your kids, abuse your wife...
but be nice to your dog, asshole, or I will find you and make your life a living hell.
That's it. Have a nice day. :)
Friday, March 23, 2012
To Facebook or not to Facebook...
I had to post to Facebook, because there was no place else for me to rant about this, but:
I was watching a rerun of LAS VEGAS (yes, I was that bored) which dealt with a Marine who was being forced to go back for a third tour in combat, and was freaking out over it--ultimately committing suicide...
The headlines are full of stories about the Sergeant who killed 17 Afgans, including 3 children, recently...it turns out he was being sent back for a FOURTH TOUR in that shithole... Now, I am a Nam-era vet...in my day you did one tour and you didn't get sent back unless you volunteered, period. But, then again, we had the draft in those days... As flawed as it was, it was a system whereby ALL citizens of a certain age were placed in a pool of available and ready recruits...cannon fodder for the boys in the Pentagon...but at least it was reasonably fair and provided a TRUE CROSS-SECTION of the population of our country. I served with Latinos, Blacks (yes, this is before they were called African-Americans), poor white trash from the bayous and swamps, and rich kids from Long Island. We all placed our asses on the line and took an equal share of whatever shit Westmoreland and his cronies threw at us, and we came out either dead or better men for it.
The point is this country can't function without a pool of citizen-soldiers, and you don't get that
without a draft.
Now we have a mercenary army, composed mainly of the poorer classes in the ranks and (mostly)
rich kids in the officer corps--or, if not rich, at least privileged enough to have gotten college degrees prior to enlistment...
So now our troops, or at least those lucky enough to survive their first tour with body and--hopefully--mind intact, are being thrown back in the cesspool for another, and another, and ANOTHER tour of combat!! This is unconscionable!! If we insist on having a "global military presence" we have to be able to sustain our pool of combat-eligible soldiers, and that has to come from a draft. If the children of privilege belonging to the "1%" aren't exposed to the same risks and responsibilities as those of the 99% (actually, it's more like the lowest 25%), then the whole system stinks and is out of whack.
God save these poor kids today. And God damn the politicians who are afraid to even mention the
word "draft" in their national political campaigns.
I was watching a rerun of LAS VEGAS (yes, I was that bored) which dealt with a Marine who was being forced to go back for a third tour in combat, and was freaking out over it--ultimately committing suicide...
The headlines are full of stories about the Sergeant who killed 17 Afgans, including 3 children, recently...it turns out he was being sent back for a FOURTH TOUR in that shithole... Now, I am a Nam-era vet...in my day you did one tour and you didn't get sent back unless you volunteered, period. But, then again, we had the draft in those days... As flawed as it was, it was a system whereby ALL citizens of a certain age were placed in a pool of available and ready recruits...cannon fodder for the boys in the Pentagon...but at least it was reasonably fair and provided a TRUE CROSS-SECTION of the population of our country. I served with Latinos, Blacks (yes, this is before they were called African-Americans), poor white trash from the bayous and swamps, and rich kids from Long Island. We all placed our asses on the line and took an equal share of whatever shit Westmoreland and his cronies threw at us, and we came out either dead or better men for it.
The point is this country can't function without a pool of citizen-soldiers, and you don't get that
without a draft.
Now we have a mercenary army, composed mainly of the poorer classes in the ranks and (mostly)
rich kids in the officer corps--or, if not rich, at least privileged enough to have gotten college degrees prior to enlistment...
So now our troops, or at least those lucky enough to survive their first tour with body and--hopefully--mind intact, are being thrown back in the cesspool for another, and another, and ANOTHER tour of combat!! This is unconscionable!! If we insist on having a "global military presence" we have to be able to sustain our pool of combat-eligible soldiers, and that has to come from a draft. If the children of privilege belonging to the "1%" aren't exposed to the same risks and responsibilities as those of the 99% (actually, it's more like the lowest 25%), then the whole system stinks and is out of whack.
God save these poor kids today. And God damn the politicians who are afraid to even mention the
word "draft" in their national political campaigns.
The start of the rantings...
This is the first day of the rest of my life, and the first day of this blog. Facebook isn't really the place for this volume of verbage, and it has too many restrictions on content. So, I will post that sort of stuff here, and hopefully some dialogue will come from it. At all events, hello Reader. Feel free to comment here or email me, but be kind, please... Ah, screw it... Be kind, be brutal, whatever; I can handle it...
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