seattle is a police state

It hasn't made the national news, but there have been multiple
protests here recently over the police killing of a native american
wood carver. the DA has decided not to prosecute the murderous cop and
last night the police pepper sprayed the protesters. (i'm feeling a
wee bit guilty for not having been there as i have protest medic
training, including how to treat for pepper spray and tear gas. if you
want to do something productive, learn to be a protest medic). there
have also been multiple incidents of officers kicking people who are
subdued on the ground while hurling racial slurs. there was a
community meeting recently for people to air the grievences against
the SPD where the police were not invited because citizens rightly
fear police retaliation for speaking out publicly. Minorities (and
anyone who doesn't pass as middle class or better) in the city don't
look on the police as defenders of law and order but as potential
terrorizers and possible murderers, because they are.

--
The trouble with being poor is that it takes up all of your time.
Willem de Kooning

This is the kleptocracy's wet dream

You don't have to be a conspiracy theorist to see it. The financial
'crisis' (which is really just a deepening of the poverty and
struggles of the bottom 80%) is making possible the fearmongering
required to put us peasants into a feudal system, but now we bow and
scrape to corporate masters rather than noble lords. The 'nobody could
have predicted' crews are lying sacks of shit. It was predicted and
exploited. defunding schools, roads, police, fire, social welfare,
social security, from cities and towns to the federal level is on
purpose. it is not the only solution to difficult times. It is the
desired outcome of kleptocrats, banksters, left and right politicians
and the buffer class they reward for keeping us rabble in line.
Austerity is not 'necessary sacrifice' but the end goal.

--
The trouble with being poor is that it takes up all of your time.
Willem de Kooning

first world whinging

i'm about to first world whinge. yes, i know that in the mountains of
crap, from housing to food to blah blah blah, internet access is a
relatively small problem.
but fuckity fuck fuck. i just spent several hours getting the damn run
around in a clearwire store. virgin fucking mobile still hasn't
refunded me for the service i paid for and couldn't use. i would love
to just call qwest and get good old dsl, but in our temporary digs i'm
not allowed to and i'd just have to pay for 2 rounds of pricey
installation charges.
sure, i could go to an internet cafe. but i am in constant pain,
everyday. getting there would be painful, then sitting properly in
hard chairs would do me in. (i told you all, first world whingey, i
whine like a baby)
So i'm tired and hurty and took 5 busses and walked multiple blocks
with nothing to show for it and now i am going to curl up with my
hotwater bottle and pout because i am stuck reading the intertubes on
my phone for the forseeable future.

--
The trouble with being poor is that it takes up all of your time.
Willem de Kooning

stick that in your pipe creepy conservatives

Kid just got his first dose of the HPV vaccine, paid for by the
government. of course one of the side effects of vaccination for hpv
is uncontrolled sexytimes in previously virginal children, so i am at
the drugstore buying him condoms and liquor*.
* if by condoms and liquor i mean acne cream and shower scrubbies.

--
The trouble with being poor is that it takes up all of your time.
Willem de Kooning

fuck yeah howard zinn and charles dickens

i got the kid a graphic adaptation of A People's History of AMerican
Empire and opened it up to Zinn writing about reading Dickens and
getting pissed off as a kid. and then i was thinking about why it is
that A Christmas Carol is the only Dickens novel read in school.
Dickens was the most famous (though not my favorite) of the victorian
social justice writers. he was all about class war, evil rich men and
struggling poor people. A Christmas Carol makes it look like all you
need is for rich men to individually grow a conscience. his other
novels generally include some legal system mechanics to bring about
change, not individual contrition.

--
The trouble with being poor is that it takes up all of your time.
Willem de Kooning

the non-violent meme

There have been these stories about how wonderfully non-abusive
egyptian protestors have been, especially towards the women
protestors. it sounds familiar, a story i've heard before. our boys
aren't abusive, they're good
progressives/democrats/revolutionaries/christians/whatever. I read
these stories with one eyebrow cocked. and then today the story of
laura logan's rape and beating was released by cbs. i don't know who
attacked her, jubilant protestors, the military, the police? but it
was decidedly not non-violent. the murders of protestors at the hands
of police are not non-violent. The beatings and detainment of press
and protestors are not non-violent. it is irresponsible to call this a
non-violent uprising, even though the protestors were non-violent. we
have to remember that. we have to know the risks of violence that
non-violence includes, especially if we are female. that doesn't make
non-violence any less important but it does diminish the risk and the
sacrifice when we don't acknowledge them.

--
The trouble with being poor is that it takes up all of your time.
Willem de Kooning

homeschool help

okay peeps, get your math hats on. kid and i disagree with the book's
answer to this problem.
you have a lightpost 6 meters high and a dude 2 meters tall is
standing 10 meters from the post. how long is his shadow?
kid and i figured that due to the slope his shadow should be 5 meters
long. book says 10. what do you all think? and why?

--
The trouble with being poor is that it takes up all of your time.
Willem de Kooning