Harleys, Cars, Girls & Guitars

Space.com... Space Exploration Website

I’m always looking for interesting new websites. Political websites… boring. Confessional sites… who cares?

So, I’m happy to have found Space.com, a site devoted to space exploration.

Extensive links will lead you to a wide variety of sites that discuss current technology, the search for extraterrestrial life, astronomy and much more.

This is a very negative period of time. The news is ultra depressing. How to escape this barrage of awful news? Go to the world of exploration and technology. That is a world of optimism.

We Gotta Do Something About It!

Many years ago, I believed that politics was the solution to my problems. I don’t know when that fell by the wayside. In my old age, I think of politics as some sort of goofy religion.

Below, a nice YouTube video that explains everything about the current crisis: Hightower’s Guide to the Subprime Mortgage Rip-Off.

The subprime mortgage mess is one of the most bizarre episodes of thievery and villainy I’ve ever witnessed. Over at 2Blowhards, the boys suggest that we should take to the streets and stone the villains to death. Shit, I’m just trying to get by day by day.  Tell me who to kill so that it will fix this mess and I’ll get my gun.

As usual, you’ve got to read Steve Sailer to understand the awful stupidity and self-dealing that led us to this sorry state. Sailer referred me to this great article about the origins of the subprime scam.

The Karaoke Queen said it best: “They’re ripping us off right in front of our faces.”

And what are we gonna do about it?

Absolutely nothing.  Well... I take that back.  We’re going to pay for it.  And the thieves will buy villas in the south of France and drink champagne.  Many of those most guilty will be rewarded with jobs in the Obama administration. President-elect Obama is, in fact, one of the worst villains.  Years ago, he served as a lawyer to ACORN, pressuring banks to give out subprime mortgages.  (I don’t want to be partisan about this.  President Bush played a big role in this debacle, too.  Both parties are guilty... guilty... guilty.)

I’m struggling for survival as my savings and retirement funds melt away. Listening to the constant babble of bad news is enough to drive me crazy, so I’ve stopped listening.

The social contract is collapsing. How do you justify the actions of our politicians? First, they band together to plot the theft of billions of dollars, then they use public funds to bail out the institutions they gutted. And, the villains hail from both parties.

The law has ceased to be a moral obligation. Our political class is simply holding a gun to our heads and demanding that we pay up to rescue them from their own evil deeds.

And, what are you gonna do about that?

Tree Houses in Manhattan

Back in the city last week to visit yet another potential new client… this time an advertising and multimedia firm. I’m taking a hit from the economic downturn. Everybody wants to talk. Nobody wants to write a check.

Finding a place to sit down in Manhattan without spending money is always a challenge. I had a half hour to blow before my appointment, so I walked over to Madison Square Park on 23rd Street and Fifth Avenue.

A half dozen tree houses have been constructed in the trees in the park. I’m enough of a redneck to ask the old question: What in the hell does this have to do with art?

Don’t bother visiting the website referred to in the sign below. It doesn’t work. Another sign informed me that the tree houses were “transformative” art. God alone knows what that means, although I know that that word is currently fashionable in colleges and should be included in any grant proposal.

The interview was just about what I expected. I’m averaging about two interviews a week, sometimes more. Often, the guy interviewing me is 30 years old, wearing torn blue jeans and a t-shirt. I’m dressed up in a suit and tie.

The advertising houses don’t often pay off for me. Age discrimination is just a fact of life in those firms. Although the kids have an incredible sensitivity to racial and sexual discrimination, they don’t seem to see anything wrong with trying to exclude people over the age of 40 from their businesses. They prefer to work with other young people, and in their outlook, what’s wrong with that?

I do better with more corporate businesses… publishing houses, pharmaceutical companies, insurance companies… boring stuff.

I’m not out to change the world. I just want to find enough work to get along and put some money away for retirement. The transformative no longer interests me. Tree houses are for children, not for old men.

Vacancy in Woodstock Business District

Woodstock has considerably more retail space than it needs. This building has been sitting idle for a number of years. I’m including it in my walk through the Woodstock business district… because it’s there!

For many years, this building was occupied by Just Alan’s, another relic of our town’s hippie past. Just Alan’s, named of course for its owner, featured that exotic staple of hippie life… Asian stuff. So, if you wanted a statue of Buddha or a Japanese room divider, Just Alan’s was the place to go.

Just Alan’s also featured paraphernalia for performing magic tricks.

I thought that Just Alan’s had disappeared entirely from the scene, but I discovered this website.  The store has, in fact, moved to a lower rent district out on Route 28. Unfortunately, the new location doesn’t seem to be working out either. The owners are trying to unload the property.  Asking price $795,000! For that price, you can buy a mansion, far away from the state highway, with all the privacy and amenities imaginable. It’s safe to say that this property will be on the market for a long time.

Woodstock is a great place to go bankrupt. The town is 20 miles from the nearest center of business… Kingston. Our hippie determination to drive out all development and business is quite effective. Don’t expect to find a job here… at least one that pays more than a subsistence wage. If you are determined to live in Woodstock, go to nursing school, get a job in the state highway department or become a school teacher. Otherwise, you’d better be collecting a check in the mail from New York City or Social Security.

The locals even invented a term for the poor souls who move to Woodstock in search of… whatever… and end up broke and marooned. Woodstuck!

Hard to imagine who might rent out this building. It might sit vacant forever.

The Sex Lives of Animals

New York City is sex obsessed. All those different racial and ethnic groups crammed onto the island of Manhattan… a pervert’s dream!

I visited a client just off Union Square yesterday, just steps away from one of the most sex soaked blocks of the city. East 27th Street between Fifth Avenue and Madison Avenue boasts the Museum of Sex, the Gershwin Hotel and Le Trapeze.

Did you know that deer enjoyed threesomes? That was the boast from one of the window displays at the Museum of Sex. I didn’t know that my friends in the backyard are swingers.

Next door, the Gershwin Hotel hosts world travelers at a budget price (by NYC standards). A haven for young people, the Gershwin has the look of a bordello. 

If you want to know the real attraction of the Gershwin, walk one door east and you’ll arrive at Le Trapeze.  Trapeze is the French word for swing. Le Trapeze is the longest running, most notorious hetero swing club in the city.

The city offers the cover of anonymity. It’s easy to get lost in tens of millions of people. For centuries, kids have fled the stix to get lost in the city. Nobody back in Iowa will ever know if you visit the bathhouses, orgy rooms or sex shows in the city.  Unless you tell them.  Telling them about it is the ultimate joy of the New York City hipster.  What’s the point of being hip if you can’t lord it over the yokels?

The sex obsession of NYC is not a new phenomenon. Read Henry Miller, the great chronicler of sex in the 20th century, and you’ll discover that the sex circus has been going on non-stop for over a century.

Your Cheatin’ Heart

Last night, while I was watching the new episode of South Park, I caught the commercial for Ashley Madison, a dating service for cheaters!

This YouTube video is a controversial Ashley Madison commercial… although not the one I watched last night. The tag line: “Life is Short. Have an Affair!”

This is so crazy that it could be fodder for a South Park episode.

Sailer Publishes His Obama Book in PDF Format

Steve Sailer writes some of the funniest, toughest stuff on the web. He writes primarily about all those taboos we call “political correctness.” I read him every day.

Sailer published his book on Barack Obama, “America's Half-Blood Prince: Barack Obama's Story of Race and Inheritance,” yesterday. You can download it in PDF format.

I’ve read the first two chapters. It’s hilarious and absurd. Sen. Obama’s background is so fucked up… well, you would have to be a comic novelist to invent this lunacy. Obama’s mother was a screwed up hippie woman who hated America and lusted for black men. His father was a drunken bigamist.

I won’t spoil the story for you. And, I’m not suggesting that Obama is disqualified for office because he came from a fucked up, crazy family. Most of us (or perhaps all of us) did.

The PDF is free. If you can afford to, give Sailer a tip.

Obama, the Radical Leftist?

I’m going to wear you out with some political talk.

McCain’s final hope of winning seems to be to paint Obama as a radical leftist. I think that this strategy is likely to fail. It’s failing with me, although I am likely to vote for McCain.

Yes, Obama kept company with some awful people… Bill Ayers, the Rev. Wright, etc. He seems to have embraced black liberation theology. He talked a lot, in the past, about income redistribution and a whole new set of rights that include housing, health care and jobs. Obama clearly comes from a far left background.

The reasons for this are pretty obvious to me. First and foremost… blacks are not completely assimilated. Blacks are far more likely to be leftist and radical than whites precisely because they are outsiders. It seems like ancient history to most of us, but 80 years ago Italians, Irish and Polish immigrants were still outsiders, and they were much more leftist and radical than their children and grandchildren. Why? Because those European immigrants gained access to the political process, developed an ownership interest, and stopped seeing themselves as outsiders.

The labor union movement of the 1920s and 1930s was extremely radical, and the union members were almost entirely white. That seems like a vague memory now, but it’s true.

So, as odd as it may seem, I understand why leftists keep shrieking “racist!” whenever Obama is accused of being a radical leftist. You can’t find a legitimate black candidate for high office who isn’t (or wasn’t) a radical leftist. When I say “legitimate,” I mean one who appeals to 95% of black voters the way Obama does. Thomas Sowell is not going to win many black votes.

The first Mayor Richard Daley of Chicago always comes to mind when I think of Obama. It’s no accident that Obama learned his politics in Chicago. Daley was a roughneck trade union radical who did for the Irish what Obama intends to do for blacks… haul in the money, jobs and perks.

So, sure… Obama comes from a radical leftist tradition. No surprise there. I don’t think that this disqualifies him from office. If I were to vote for Obama, it would be because I think that fully assimilating blacks into American politics and life is a very good thing. Next time around, blacks will begin to forsake the radicalism. Obama, having won the nomination, is already retreating from and denying his radical past.

Politics is all about self-interest. Obama is unlikely to do much for me… which is why I’ll probably vote for McCain. Obama will deliver the goods for blacks. No doubt about that. Maybe something good will come of that. I suspect that we’re about to see the end of the tradition of radical leftist politics in the black community.

The full assimilation of blacks into America will occur when blacks vote in large numbers for a black candidate who is Republican. It’s coming.

Chinatown

Sunday, the Karaoke Queen called the various branches of the family to take their food orders. Then, we drove over to Chinatown for some shopping on a beautiful fall day. I’d spent a week looking at nature in Woodstock, so I was eager for the crush of people in Chinatown

We found dragon fruit (or pitaya) in several vendor stalls. This is the fruit of a cactus plant. No, we didn’t buy any.

We bought chicken soup for a niece at the noodle shop. We placed an order for Chinese steamed and baked pork buns at a bakery. This bakery is so popular that we had to wait in line, place an order and return a couple of hours later.

The Queen pawed through the vegetable stands on Canal Street, while I watched the people walk by. Hot pants have returned to favor among Chinese girls. I’m in favor of that. The streets were full of kids and babies. You have to push your way through the crowds to get to the fish shops.

In an alleyway, we discovered this little fast food stand. Among the delicacies: steamed chicken feet, noodles and soups.

We drove home on the West Side Highway and the Henry Hudson Parkway. Thousands of people were biking and hiking along the Hudson River.

Wish I still had my place in the city. I miss being able to walk out my door into streets filled with people, the anonymity of a huge city, the wild jungle of concrete and steel.  God, give me one more chance at the brass ring before I die.  I promise... this time I won’t screw it up.

Please, God, Make it End!

I can’t wait until this presidential campaign is over. Neither candidate deserves to win. A pox on both parties! 

I wanted to develop some enthusiasm for McCain, but I can’t. He’s run a terrible campaign. I wanted to really dislike Obama, but I don’t. He’s just another Chicago machine politician, playing the ethnic politics game, a contemporary Mayor Daley (the original, not the son).  Daley did for the Irish what Obama will do for blacks... collect the swag.

Both parties have disgraced themselves in the mortgage scandals. I’ve never witnessed such brazen, mind-boggling theft of the public till. Why should I pay my bills? Why should I obey the law? Our public officials… educated, highly compensated people… refused to abide by the law. (Well, in fact, they found a way to make stealing legal.  Read Steve Sailer’s ongoing coverage of the great Diversity Scandal.)  I am, frankly, stunned by the scale of this outrageous grand larceny. And, believe me, Obama is up to his eyebrows in this rip-off.

McCain isn’t really a Republican, and he’s paid for this big time. His campaign refuses to even address the issue of massive illegal immigration. In fact, McCain has repeatedly thrown the “racist” accusation at anybody who raises this issue. Obama is an advocate of open borders and global amnesty. For working people, illegal immigration has to be the most important issue.

The media is in the tank for Obama. No doubt about that. I don’t know whether to trust the polls, because those polling organizations are overwhelmingly liberal and Democratic. So, I don’t know whether I believe in the inevitability of an Obama victory. To some extent this “inevitability” mantra is a campaign tactic of the Obama organization, reinforced by the media’s open rooting interest in an Obama victory..

We are entering into very turbulent times. Who knows what Obama will do? Certainly, he doesn’t.  He’s promised everything, much of it contradictory. He’s playing Santa Claus, handing out perks to one group one day, then to another group the next. Anybody who thinks a guy who’s raised $1 billion to run for president is a champion of the “little guy” should have his head examined. One thing we can count on from Obama is racial and sexual quota madness. Oh, yes, and we’ll be paying much higher taxes.

I don’t see either candidate offering anything that appeals to my self-interest. In a very tiny way, I see McCain as being more sensible about foreign policy. Yet, I think that we have no choice but to get the hell out of the Middle East, and to back away from maintaining over 700 foreign military bases. 700! Certainly, we need to defend ourselves and our interests abroad. Bankrupting ourselves to maintain this empire might be our downfall… the ultimate irony.

I’m going to walk into the voting booth, hold my nose, and vote for one of these clowns. I don’t expect much from them. Thank God… in two weeks this farce will be over.

Then, as soon as it’s over, it will start again. Gov. Palin will launch her campaign for 2012. Perhaps she will be different. Perhaps she will offer something better. We can only hope. 

Biggest Motorcycle Gang Bust Ever

When it comes to branding, the Mongols have the Hells Angels beat. The Mongols’ name evokes images of the mounted marauders of Genghis Khan sweeping down on an unsuspecting village.  (Check out this picture of a statue of Genghis Khan mounted on a steel horse.  Terrifying!)

Isn’t this image a powerful statement?  "We don’t give a fuck if we die!"  That’s what it screams to me.  Honor and glory before all.

The Mongols’ website even claims to quote Genghis Khan:

“TO OUR BROTHERS: Be brotherly to one another and live in Brotherhood...making the whole great people, walk on the road of the true state and of the law for the sake of attaining honor and glory.”

“TO OUR ENEMIES: A man’s greatest pleasure is to defeat his enemies, to drive them before him, to take from them that which they possess, to see those whom they cherish in tears, to ride their horses, to hold their wives and daughters in his arms.”

To a even greater extent than the Angels, the Mongols call out to our primitive side. They seem to belong to the old world of machismo, action, combat and lust.

Yesterday, the feds busted the Mongols. No doubt the Mongols are a criminal gang. Seems to me that the Mongols are proud of that.  This YouTube video from a Portland, Oregon TV station documents the bust:

This YouTube video from an LA station sets forth the federal indictment against the motorcycle club.

My designer personae loves the Mongols’ style. Check out their colors, or rather, their lack of color:

The Mongol world is truly black and white. Don’t you love the rider’s Chinaman topknot? Note the sword in his left hand.  This is an image of boyish glee:  Vroom!  Vroom!  Combined with the wild abandon of a fierce, merciless warrior.

Somebody really ought to create a biker comic book series, in the style of Robert Crumb’s famous underground comics. Although few of us want to live in the wild warrior style of the Mongols, I think that we can all understand the dream. Sitting in a cube, living without the drama of physical combat, obeying our female bosses… what kind of a life is this for men?

Gas Prices Fall in New Jersey!

I stopped for gas along Route 1-9 in Jersey City a couple of days ago. These prices are not the lowest I’ve seen in Jersey. Yesterday, I passed a station that was selling regular for $2.61.

Posting separate prices for cash and credit transactions has become a commonplace.

Gas prices in Jersey have dropped down to the same level as a year ago.

Route 1-9 is an interesting ride through the industrial underbelly of Jersey. From Ft. Lee, it winds through a crusty neighborhood of truck dumps, welding shops and small manufacturing plants. In Jersey City, you’ll often see some of the hardest prostitutes imaginable walking the sidewalks in broad daylight.

South of Jersey City, Route 1-9 winds through warehouses, truck stops and shops that service the traffic at Newark International Airport.

The old iron bridges are especially worth a look.

It’s not pretty, the territory traversed by Route 1-9. More like the barren landscape of an early Springsteen song.

Jersey City… City of Ghosts

I visited a client in downtown Jersey City on Friday. Myrna and I spent our last years together in Jersey City. Whenever I drive into town, I must pass the places where we were happy, where she became sick and where she died.

The Katyn Memorial stands in a walkway that leads to the waterfront. Dedicated to the Polish officer corps that was murdered by the Russian NKVD during the Second World War, this statue has been re-dedicated to the memory of those murdered in the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center, just across the Hudson River in Manhattan.

In the last ten years, I’ve been inundated in death. This began with my father’s death in 1998. Then, I was right in the midst of the attack on the World Trade Center. I watched thousands of my fellow New Yorkers die on that dreadful day. Now, when I remember that day, I remember mostly that Myrna was still alive and with me. I remember how we walked the streets of Manhattan for hours, searching for a way to get home to Jersey City.

I took this picture as I stood on the promenade. Every time I visit Jersey city, I remember that horrifying day. If you look closely at the picture above, you can see that rebuilding has finally commenced at Ground Zero.

When I left town, I purposely avoided the street where Myrna and I spent our final days together. Jersey City, for me, is a town full of ghosts.

A Tribute to the Life of Elliot Tomai

My nephew, Elliot, passed away last week. Elliot was spina bifida baby. I don’t think many people believed that Elliot would survive more than a few years. It is a testament to the extraordinary devotion of my sister, Janet, and her entire family that Elliot lived into his 30s.

I had not seen Elliot in several years. He lived on the other side of the world. I found the pictures from the last few years of his life especially moving. As he matured, Elliot was tortured by the realization that he would never function as a man.

You can see from this picture that Elliot did, indeed, become a man.

God bless you, Elliot. Say hello to Myrna when you see her in heaven.