Despite articles like this, proclaiming Eagle Ford world's largest oil and gas development, depletion rates tell a different story.

Post Christmas Greetings!

As I watched Republicans Ron Paul and Gary Johnson, Democrats Dennis Kucinich and Mike Gravel first marginalized, later vilified, and finally eliminated from presidential debates, my thoughts sounded much like this:

A Christmas Speculation by John Michael Greer.

Peak oil

With all the new-found production coming from shale production, we have stories describing a North America awash in oil.

Conventional oil supplies continue to diminish at an alarming rate.

Article, here.

While you were sleeping: Fukushima

The disaster that is Fukushima has not been fixed:

10 minute video, here.

Is war with China inevitable?

Some of the more troubling parts of this Alt-Market piece excerpted here:

Global financiers created the circumstances that have led to America’s probable economic demise, but they don’t want to be blamed for it. War provides the perfect cover for monetary collapse, and a war with China might become the cover to end all covers. The resulting fiscal damage and the terror Americans would face could be overwhelming. Activists who question the legitimacy of the U.S. government and its actions, once considered champions of free speech, could easily be labeled “treasonous” during wartime by authorities and the frightened masses. (If the government is willing to use the Internal Revenue Service against us today, just think about who it will send after us during the chaos of a losing war tomorrow.) A lockdown of civil liberties could be instituted behind the fog of this national panic.

Primarily, war tends to influence the masses to agree to more centralization, to relinquish their rights in the name of the “greater good”, and to accept less transparency in government and more power in the hands of fewer people. Most important, though, is war's usefulness as a philosophical manipulation after the dust has settled.

And....

National identity and sovereignty are the scapegoats, and the Fabians (globalist propagandists) are quick to point a finger. Their assertion is that nation states should no longer exist, borders should be erased and a one-world economic system and government should be founded. Only then will war and financial strife end. Who will be in charge of this interdependent one world utopia? I’ll give you three guesses...

The Fabians, of course, make no mention of global bankers and their instigation of nearly every war and depression for the past 100 years; and these are invariably the same people that will end up in positions of authority if globalization comes to fruition. What the majority of people do not yet understand is that globalists have no loyalties to any particular country, and they are perfectly willing to sacrifice governments, economies, even entire cultures, in the pursuit of their "ideal society".  "Order out of chaos" is their motto, after all.  The bottom line is that a war between China and the United States will not be caused by national sovereignty. Rather, it will be caused by elitists looking for a way to END national sovereignty. That’s why such a hypothetical conflict, a conflict that has been gamed by think tanks for years, is likely to be forced into reality.

I'd say get ready, but there's no way to be ready for such an awful event.

May God have mercy on us.

Watch this, if you dare:

You've been lied to:

9-11 Explosive Evidence

PS.

Something else in support of potential explanations: Susan Lindauer.

Discussion, here.

CIA gone awry

Bill Conroy posted a well-sourced piece on CIA involvement in the drug trade, including possible involvement in the death by torture of Kiki Camarena, an American agent of the DEA. The more things change, the more they stay the same.

Edward Snowden receives Sam Adams award

Edward Snowden received the Sam Adams award in Moscow yesterday.

May those that bless him be blessed, may those that curse him be cursed.

Come and take it

I couldn’t help but notice the irony while attending this year’s Come and take it celebration at Gonzales: people of pure white background were a small minority in the crowds I saw. I’d guess at least half of the attendees were Hispanic; a sizable number were black or exhibiting various shades of cross breeding.

Come and take it celebrates an event that began Texas’ fight for independence from Mexico; the story goes that Mexico demanded that Tejanos in Gonzales surrender a small cannon—they refused—Mexican soldiers were dispatched to retrieve the cannon, and the first shots of the revolution were fired as the soldiers arrived.

As commonly told, you’d think the battle pitted white Americans against brown Mexicans, but that story proves inaccurate under scrutiny. Many people of Hispanic origin, Norteños, also fought for independence from the Mexican government alongside their white neighbors. And settlers of African origin that arrived as slaves were represented as well.

To be sure, after the revolution, wars along racial lines did occur in Texas; lands and properties were appropriated and both blacks and hispanics were treated as second class citizens by people of European origin.

Many from blue Northern States harbor misconceptions about Texas and the rest of the South in general due to our less than equitable history along racial lines; the assumption is made that we’re all racists. While there are those among us harboring such prejudices, they’re losing the battle.

I am one of five children. I am married to a white woman with a tiny but genetically provable portion of African breeding. My first wife, the mother of my children, is white. My brother Bill is married to a New Mexican Hispanic, half Spaniard and half American Indian. Pat, the third child, is married to a woman born a Mexican national and has two children. Kyle was married to a white woman.

My grandchildren present the full spectrum of modern Texas. Some are pure white. Latino blood from both Mexico and Colombia appears, and now, Dusty, my second son has chosen a black woman with black children from a previous marriage as his second mate.

I’d met Morgan, Dusty’s significant other, about a year ago, but this weekend was the first time I’d met her children. During Come and take it, we went to a barbecue restaurant in Luling. While I waited in line behind a black man, Morgan took a seat at a table with her daughters, reserving a place for us. I saw the black man check her out. Dusty arrived, red headed and so white it hurts the eyes. The black man did a double take. You could almost hear the thoughts going through his head as he weighed the situation, struggling, I think, with prejudices of his own. Morgan is a beautiful woman.

I retrieved our food and we took our seats. As the line meandered by, one older black woman after another spoke to us, in a way voicing approval, without actually addressing the issue.

Later, Dusty took Morgan to meet my parents: I haven’t heard how that went, but I suspect it probably went well.

The reconquista is over, the battle won without a single shot. The results are not what any proud national would have expected.

This is not the new Europe. Not Mexico. Barely even part of the United States. We’re a multicultural community, with citizens of a number of various ethnic backgrounds. South Texans. A hybrid, unique in many ways: tacos, barbecue, turnip greens, chicken fried steaks and mashed potatoes all on the same plate. A young generation is laying down prejudices of old, creating a new world as they do.

Somehow this feels right to me, like we’ve crossed some invisible barrier. The battles are not over, but times they are a changing and outcome is clear: the bad guys lost.

 

 

 

 

 

Dying over marijauna

Last week, a man lost his life in a rural area near here when cops arrived to bust his pot patch. The surviving grower sits in jail charged with attempted capital murder of a police officer.

Gonzales Inquirer.

Exposing the transnational elite

An article outlining who runs the world, here.

These guys sit high above in their glass towers, laughing, while we fight among ourselves: Republican, Democrat, conservative, liberal, capitalist, socialist, Christian (Catholic, Protestant, etc.), Muslim (Sunni, Shi-ite, etc), Buddhist, atheist, white, black brown, red and yellow, Northern, Southern, East and West, straight or gay; all the while no one can lay a hand on them.

Stirring the cauldron, laughing....

Troubles abound

Sabbath eve.

It’s raining outside. We’ve had healing showers on and off again for a couple of weeks. There’s still little or no tank water for livestock and grasses are only now stirring back to life. Late season rain is better than no rain at all.

I’ve sold calves, giving me a bit of breathing room at the bank and the pecan crop looks good so far.

Troubles abound, nonetheless.

A front tire to a tractor was ruined by the stub of a tree branch. The tire dealer told me a good tire is $610. A cheap Chinese throwaway is $385 and a cheap but decent off-brand $460. I don’t know in what universe a cheap tire costs $460. The back tire three weeks ago cost $1,200 and change.

Fuel is high and likely to get higher.

Grain prices have been cheap, all on rumors of a bumper corn crop in the Midwest. Probably below the cost of production, here in Texas. How long do you continue to produce goods below the cost of production?

Forget all the cheerleading about shale oil. Yes, there’s oil to be had but production costs are far greater than any other source we’ve exploited in the not so long history of the petroleum age and all costs cannot be measured in dollars.

As James Howard Kunstler would say, you’re not going to power Wal-Mart with wind and solar energy.

The PNAC (project for a new American century) is failing quite spectacularly, less than two decades from its inception.

Attempts at false flag events are harder than ever to pull off when most walk around with a cell-phone/recorder/computer and get their news from bloggers. Old geezers calling the shots got left behind by the frenetic pace of technological advance and don’t even know what their own devices are capable of.

Those that do understand these beasts (mostly Millennials) are not all on board with the manipulation of world events through deception and fraud, as people like Edward Snowden have so aptly demonstrated.

I’d like to punch John Kerry in the face. And bitch slap John McCain. Your goddamned lies are paid for with someone else’s blood, innocent people’s blood, and you are not innocent.

Don’t think for a minute some Russian piece of work like Putin is any better than our own reprobates; he does serve a useful purpose in helping to out degenerates, but that sword will cut both ways. He’s up to no good.

The whole damned scene in the Middle East from an American perspective is about maintaining the status of the dollar as the world’s reserve currency. Russia, China, Iran, Syria, and now a significant number of Latin American countries are working to free themselves of these economic chains.

Forget all the religious and political bull shit; the American army gets called out for one reason and one reason only, to control the world’s natural resources. The rest of the reasons issued are lame excuses designed to herd the masses.

Climate has continued to generate surprises; only this week Colorado had massive flooding and a large swath of Mexico was ravaged by two not-so-powerful but extremely persistent hurricanes.

Crop failures continue the world around, not everywhere, all the time, but often enough that it’s hard to feed the people. No amount of money printing alters this fact.

Much of the world is standing up and saying not only no, but hell no to Monsanto and their goddamned genetically modified food grains. We continue eating the shit and suffer the consequences of doing so. Obesity, diabetes, infertility, acid reflux, irritable bowel syndrome, etc, ad nuaseum.

Don’t worry; the pharmaceutical giants are more than happy to sell you drugs for all of these ailments. And then some more drugs to curb side effects of those fucking drugs.

Migrations are fueled by shortages as are most uprisings and revolutions. Changing parties does nothing to heal ills when there’s not enough to go around and what is available is unfairly distributed. Check out Egypt and Libya, both of which got rid of dictators and now once again face irate masses.

Fukushima continues to smolder, slowly but surely emitting invisible poisons; think how many more nuclear reactors could and will go off in the event of an electromagnetic pulse event or something along those lines. Going nuclear will likely prove a very bad mistake.

I don’t have answers to all these ills or the power to do much about them, but I refuse to lie to myself and say all is well when it ain’t.

Rethinking 9-11

Never forget. We have not yet answered questions concerning 9-11. Not to my satisfaction:

Rethinking 9-11.

Not so fast, cocksucker

Just watched Obama, the liar in chief, deliver his assessment of the Syria conflict. All the while he's describing the horrors of civilians killed by poison gas, I'm thinking about his weekly murder fix, partially sated by non-stop drone attacks. How we used white phosphorus and depleted uranium munitions on civilian populations. Etc.

First he makes the case that we all know Assad did gas his own citizens and we must do something about it, then he declares that he has called off the vote by congress for authorization to attack Syria (which he would have fucking lost), followed by a possible diplomatic solution proposed by Russia, all the while knowing by damn that he has fucking torpedoed any chances of it succeeding.

I hate being played for a fool.

Followed by a long string of cuss words you probably don't want to hear....

PS. To begin, I do not know that Assad gassed his people. In fact, after listening to his interview and after hearing alternative versions of what may have happened I very much doubt it.

I suffered through a few pundits after the speech, all of which bought this part of Obama's speech without question. It's being touted as fact, just because this lying son of a bitch says so?

Forcing Assad to admit to a crime he didn't commit as part of the UN resolution is a non-starter.

We are not all sheep, sir.

Drought and global conflict

Here's an article describing how drought contributed to the ills in Syria.

An excerpt:

Syria has been convulsed by civil war since climate change came to Syria with a vengeance. Drought devastated the country from 2006 to 2011. Rainfall in most of the country fell below eight inches (20 cm) a year, the absolute minimum needed to sustain un-irrigated farming. Desperate for water, farmers began to tap aquifers with tens of thousands of new well. But, as they did, the water table quickly dropped to a level below which their pumps could lift it. 
In some areas, all agriculture ceased. In others crop failures reached 75%. And generally as much as 85% of livestock died of thirst or hunger. Hundreds of thousands of Syria’s farmers gave up, abandoned their farms and fled to the cities and towns in search of almost non-existent jobs and severely short food supplies. Outside observers including UN experts estimated that between 2 and 3 million of Syria’s 10 million rural inhabitants were reduced to “extreme poverty.”

The domestic Syrian refugees immediately found that they had to compete not only with one another for scarce food, water and jobs, but also with the already existing foreign refugee population. Syria already was a refuge for quarter of a million Palestinians and about a hundred thousand people who had fled the war and occupation of Iraq. Formerly prosperous farmers were lucky to get jobs as hawkers or street sweepers. And in the desperation of the times, hostilities erupted among groups that were competing just to survive.

Syria--why are we there?

Via James Howard Kunstler's blog, a link to Jim Willie and answers to the question: Why are we in Syria?

Fred Eaglesmith--free music

Here's a free playlist from one of my favorite performers, the great Fred Eaglesmith.

Miley Cyrus spreads her ass

Monday morning, August 26, 2013

I turned cows into a field of hay grazer we had irrigated into existence this week. We’d hoped to cut hay from this field, but we are already feeding hay from a dwindling supply and it made little sense to make one bale while feeding another when the cows could do the harvesting for us.

We border a river, so we have livestock water, but most stock tanks not fed by a well have gone dry. The pastures above that river are sick; large patches of bare dirt marred only by an occasional bleached bone and dirt tubes created by desert termites occupy space normally inhabited by grazing cows.

Anything remotely green has been sawed off at ground level by grasshoppers.

Buzzards circle above, waiting for the next victim.

We did manage to grow and harvest milo but we sold the grain for a ridiculously cheap price, probably below the cost of production when all costs are considered. We’re baling the stalks because that’s the only thing we have left to bale.

I’m reasonably sure we will be forced to sell some cattle to get through winter; most of the ranchers in this county have already done so.

I turn on the TV, looking for a bit of distraction from these woes only to learn that my country is threatening war on Syria, once again based on questionable if not downright deliberately misleading information, the next step in some evil plan devised years ago.

How can people believe these lying sons of bitches?

The Internet describes multiple crises from around the world; an ongoing nuclear disaster in Japan, economic woes in Europe including unemployment rates above 50% for Millennials, riots throughout the Middle East, bloody conflicts and famine in Africa, new and damning information concerning the spread of genetically modified food grains and the ill effects they have on the health of the planet. Mainstream media lies with impunity; those trying to tell the truth are persecuted and prosecuted.

High finance fraudsters continue to profit with the aid of central banks and governments; the divide between rich and poor has reached unprecedented levels. Poor and local producers are denied access to markets while mega-corporations continue to gobble up resources.

Republicans damn Democrats; Democrats damn Republicans; the scope of material allowed in public debate is so narrow you have to split hairs to differentiate policy between the two.

Oh, and Miley Cyrus bent over and spread her ass on stage….

Knew I was forgetting something important.

 

Fukushima--crisis not averted

Here's an article describing the ongoing Fukushima nuclear disaster.

It's not over, not by a long shot.

Humanity is drowning in Washington's criminality

By Paul Craig Roberts, via Informationclearinghouse.

Pretty much sums up my thinking on the matter.

Obama is a lyin sack of shit

Compare and contrast:

Obama and Jay Leno.

“We don’t have a domestic spying program,” Obama said. “What we do have are some mechanisms that can track a phone number or an email address that is connected to a terrorist attack,” he said. “That information is useful."

Glen Greewald and Amy Goodman.

America discredited

I didn't write this, but I agree wholeheartedly

by Paul Craig Roberts, via Informationclearinghouse.

August 02, 2013 "Information Clearing House - As Washington loses its grip on the world, defied by Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador, and now Russia, the US government resorts to public temper tantrums. The constant demonstration of childishness on the part of the White House and Congress embarrasses every American.

Washington’s latest outburst of childish behavior is a response to the Russian Immigration Service granting US whistleblower Edward Snowden asylum in Russia for one year while his request for permanent asylum is considered. Washington, having turned the US into a lawless state, no longer has any conception of legal procedure. Law is whatever serves Washington. As Washington sees it, law is nothing but Washington’s will. Any person or country that interferes with Washington’s will is behaving unlawfully.

Because Obama, like Bush before him, routinely disobeys US law and the US Constitution, the White House actually thinks that Russian President Putin should disobey Russian and international law, overturn the Russian Immigration Service’s asylum decision, and hand over Snowden to Washington.

Washington expected Russia to hand over Snowden simply because Washington demanded it. Like a two-year old, Washington cannot conceive that its demands don’t take precedence over international law and the internal legal procedures of every country. How dare Russia stand up for law against “the indispensable nation.”

The White House spokesman, who is so unimpressive that I cannot remember his/her name/gender, declared that the White House moron might punish Putin by not going to visit him in Moscow next month. I doubt Putin cares whether the WH moron shows up.

The WH moron’s term of office is close to an end, but Putin, unless the CIA assassinates him, will be there for another decade. Moreover, every Russian leader has learned that a US president’s word means nothing. Clinton, the two Bushes and the current WH moron violated every agreement that Reagan made with Gorbachev. Why would the president of Russia, a nation ruled by law, want to meet with a tyrant?

Not to be outdone by the WH in childish behavior, members of the House and Senate added their two-bits to America’s embarrassment. Congressional morons “reacted furiously,” according to news reports, and warned “of serious repercussions in US-Russian relations.” Here we have another extraordinary demonstration of Washington’s hubris. Only Russia has to worry about repercussions in the relationship. Washington doesn’t have to worry. His Imperial Majesty will simply deny Putin an audience.

Congress seems unaware of its schizophrenia. On the one hand Congress is outraged about the National Stasi Agency’s illegal and unconstitutional spying--especially on Congress--and is attempting to defund the Stasi Agency’s surveillance program. The amendment to the military spending bill by Justin Amash, a Republican from Michigan, almost passed. The amendment was barely defeated by votes purchased by the spy industry.

On the other hand, despite its outrage over being spied upon, Congress wants the scalp of the brave hero, Edward Snowden, who informed them that they were being spied upon. Here we have a demonstration of the historical stupidity of government--shoot the messenger.

Only a few right-wing crazies believe that universal surveillance of every American is necessary to US security. The National Stasi Agency will fight hard and blackmail every member of the House and Senate, but the blackmail itself will lead to the National Stasi Agency’s wings being clipped, or so we can hope. If it is not done soon, the Stasi Agency will have time to organize a false flag event that will terrify the sheeple and bring an end to the attempts to rein in the rogue agency.

The United States is on the verge of economic collapse. The alleged “superpower,” a bankrupt entity, was unable after 8 years of efforts to occupy Iraq and had to give up. After 11 years the “superpower” has been defeated in Afghanistan by a few thousand lightly armed Taliban, and is now running for cover with its tail between its legs.

Washington compensates for its military impotency by committing war crimes against civilians. The US military is a great killer of women, children, village elders, and aid workers. All the mighty “superpower” can do is to lob missiles shot from pilotless drones into farm houses, mud huts, schools, and medical centers.

The schizophrenic denizens of Washington have made Americans a hated people. Those with the foresight to know to escape from the growing tyranny also know that wherever they might seek refuge, they will be seen as vermin from the most hated nation and subjected to being scapegoated as spies and evil influences, and at risk of being decimated in reprisals against Washington’s latest atrocity.

Washington has destroyed the prospects of Americans both at home and abroad.

The Son, by Phillipp Meyer

A  short note to recommend a book I just finished, The Son, by Phillipp Meyer.

A novel chronicling two hundred years of history of a South Texas family.

We got plenty of secrets down here.

Read the reviews at the link to learn more.

The fourth amendment to the constitution

If you support the NSA indiscriminately collecting private information on American citizens, then grow the balls to publicly repeal the fourth amendment to the constitution which reads as follows:

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

Otherwise, leave Mr. Snowden alone and prosecute the real criminals in this case.

Lies and liars

We all lie, to some degree. But not all lies are created equally.

My dad once said the worst kind of lie is when you lie to yourself.

We, collectively, the United States of America, are lying to ourselves on so many fronts, I don’t know where to begin.

The narrative goes something like this. We have the best system in the world. Despite obvious problems, all will be well if we just stay the course.

We’re awash in bad debt, but bad debt can be “cured”. It’s just a matter of creating more new debt to add to the old until we get out of this temporary slump. Keep pumping money. New growth will kick in and take care of things; we just need a bit more priming of the pump.

Well, I got news for you. We’ve been priming this goddamned pump going on six years and the real economy ain’t kicking in. We’re not even recovering new money dumped into the system, much less seeing gains on our investments.

Obama won the election on promises of change. Under the previous administration, we had seen wars fought on false pretenses, foisted upon the public by corrupt politicians and compliant lap-dogs in the press, including horrible acts of aggression and torture.

Rather than exposing these sins against humanity and the world at large, the Obama administration determined identifying the criminals and the crimes they committed a waste of time. We need to look forward, move on….

To more goddamned wars, based on lies foisted on the American public by corrupt politicians and compliant lap dogs in the press, including new and better horrible acts of aggression and torture….

We were promised a more transparent government.

And when one of our public servants tried to help with that cause, exposing unconstitutional, unwarranted spying on our own citizens, he, like others before him, but to a much more severe degree, has been declared an enemy of the public.

Fucking John Kerry had the gall to threaten pretty much every other country in the goddamned world if they offer asylum to the man.

Kerry’s latest shit-for-brains idea was to threaten to stop buying Venezuelan oil….

We’re getting real oil with fake money and he’s threatening them?

We’ve been told that domestic shale oil is going to save the day. I have a front row seat to that charade, living just a few miles away from the Eagle Ford fields. There is oil here. But input costs are so high and depletion rates so steep, I’m not sure we’re recovering the massive amounts of new money (or for that matter, the energy this money represents) being pumped into these fields.

It damn sure ain’t going to replace Venezuelan crude.

I enjoy advantages most farmers and ranchers don’t—land without a mortgage—the ability to irrigate in an area where most can’t.

We’ve been in and out of drought, mostly in, since 2006. We’ve consistently produced crops. And consistently have failed to turn a profit, when all costs are considered.

To be sure, I have made mistakes.

Like trying to grow non-genetically modified grains, which, under the current system, are not profitable or even marketable on any scale worth mentioning.

And I did waste a bunch of time squeezing milk from cows I can’t sell and making cheese I can’t sell and growing produce in a garden I can’t sell and shelling pecans I can’t sell.

Then there’s all those horses I failed to send to slaughter. Wait, that’s illegal too. Should have sold them to someone else I guess so they’d get stuck with my problem.

If I had only planted every square inch of my ground in Monsanto’s best and hung out at the local branch of the FSA to get every giveaway our benevolent government offers, things could have been better.

Hell, we might not have gotten audited by the IRS. Again.

Funny thing, the only receipts they requested so far are copies of non-genetically modified seed purchases.

I shit you not.

I’m sure you’ve heard that unemployment rates are down.

Why then do I have all these people calling me looking for work they wouldn’t even have considered a few years back? Begging for work is a more apt description.

Could it be that the new way we measure employment rates is a goddamned lie?

Keep telling yourself all is well; the stock market is higher than ever before. Ben Bernanke has saved the day.

Just so long as you remember, that too, is a goddam lie.

Update for my Facebook friends

Wednesday July 17, 2013

I decided to reactivate my Facebook account a couple of days ago. To my surprise, all this entailed was signing into my account which had been dormant since July of 2011. Aside from a few formatting changes, it’s as though I never left. It’s nice to reconnect with family and friends that use the site.

Consider this an update:

I’m older, uglier, meaner, walking on a bad knee, chewing and smiling with less teeth. But I chew and smile, nonetheless. I still milk cows every morning, currently three. We still have a semblance of a garden and raise food for the public: beef, chicken, pecans and grain crops. Also hay. I still love horses and watching them run and have acquired so many that it’s difficult to keep them properly fed, trained and cared for on my budget, a condition commonly referred to as being horse poor.

Leah still makes pottery and turns what milk I don’t drink into cheese. Our pantries overflow with canned goods, the freezers are full.

I’ve determined some people are good at turning work into money; I myself excel at turning money back into work.

I remain deeply troubled with my government and a society that would tolerate the shit they’re peddling.

The recent fiasco with Edward Snowden and the despicable way the press and our government have portrayed and persecuted this young man for doing his duty—informing the public of governmental illegalities and criminal behavior—really pisses me the fuck off.

Assholes, when you swore your oath, you swore to uphold the constitution of these United States and I damn well expect you to do just that. You work for us, motherfuckers. Not the other way around.

You should be ashamed of yourselves, but since you’re obviously not, I am ashamed for you.

As Ray Wylie Hubbard says Martin Luther King once said: The arc of the moral universe is long, but it swings toward justice.

I’d be quaking in my boots if I were you.

 

 

 

National ID Card

Hidden among 1,200 pages of legalese called the Immigration Reform Bill now being contemplated by congress is a law that will require all US citizens and immigrants seeking employment to obtain a national ID card.

This is not your run of the mill card, but instead a chipped card containing biometric information on the cardholder. All employees will be required to have this card and all employers will be required to scan the card before offering employment to a worker, thereby allowing the federal government to track us, one and all.

It's just a matter of time until all health related issues, purchases, etc. also require the use of this card.

One more step toward a totalitarian society.

From the land of the free....

War Criminals

A third party view of our last two presidential regimes, courtesy of RT:

http://youtu.be/rrTeBDetcfw

Heat Wave

It’s Sunday, about 9 PM and it’s still 101 degrees outside my door. The official high for the day was 108. I am told it’s worse out West. A couple of weeks back I told Sean Paul Kelley that we’ve done OK this year on rainfall. I lied. While we had timely showers during the spring, this killer heat wave has scorched the land, leaving green grass kiln-dried, like hay in a bale, and corn crops withered, several weeks before they should have.

We made hay on irrigated land, but what dry-land grass the heat didn’t kill, biblical swarms of grass-hoppers decimated. Livestock ponds are going dry and the fish die from the hot water. Without rain, and soon, we are in trouble.

Cattle hide from the sun’s sweltering rays during the day, coming out to eat only in mornings and evenings. My poor milk cows are confined to a paddock with limited shade. I fear for their lives when it gets like this.

I had a really nice garden this spring and Leah has filled the panty with canned goods. We have eggs and cheese and meat and grains, but money is tight. I need money to pay the bills.

Production costs on the farm are high, and while food costs may seem high to you, they’re not high enough. The same can be said for just about any essential product, including parts and supplies I think too expensive.

A lot of this comes down to the cost of energy and it’s not going to get better. Call it peak oil or resource depletion or what you will. I call it a fact. It affects everything we do. The cheap and easy oil is gone and gone for good, never to be had again.

We remain in a crisis period. It’s world-wide and it’s not going to get better until it gets far worse.

Politicians and preachers may tell you otherwise but they’re either full of shit or have something to sell.

Revolution is in the air around the globe. It will be long before it arrives here.

War will follow.

It’s better to know than not to know.

 

 

Treason

In light of recent charges filed against Edward Snowden, I, as a citizen of the United States charge members of Congress, the White House, the Department of Justice, The FBI, the CIA  and the NSA with aiding and abetting enemies of the United States (citizens).

With violating your oaths to defend the constitution of the United States.

With misprison of a felony (multiple counts).

And treason.

You are liars.

You are cowards.

You are scum.

NSA Whistleblower

It comes as no surprise to me that the NSA leaker is a Millennial.

Nor that he will be targeted as a criminal for what he did.

Shame.

His interview:

http://youtu.be/kaRvzQ887HM

It's not just Horizon

The NSA is recording all domestic phone calls, emails etc.

And more.

Neo-prophets

Last week I made it to San Marcos and the Lonestar Music store. While there I bought a bag full of CD’s, many from artists I once admired and also a few produced by young up and comings. I am sad to report that most of my own peers are putting out music that goes down like lukewarm piss. Gone is the outrage and anger that fueled protest during the 60’s and 70’s, and even later during the bush years. Gone is the soul of a generation, aside from a select few, and most of those have gone silent.

Oh, my peers gripe about jobs lost and so forth, but it sounds a whole lot more like, where’s mine, than true righteous indignation over injustices of the world. The crimes Obama and his crew have committed, one-upping bush and clinton across the board, suddenly don’t matter anymore. Perhaps it’s because they’re fucking Democrats, and we all know Democrats are better than Republicans….

What happened to our cojones?

Strauss and Howe refer to the baby boom generation as the current manifestation of prophets. I got news for Mr. Howe. He needs to add Neo to the prophet. As in False. We have neo-conservatives that aren’t conservatives, new-liberals that aren’t liberals and now Neo-prophets, all guiding our country to its own destruction.

Why is Bradley Manning on trial for exposing the crimes of our own government employees? Why is Julian Assange hiding in a British embassy? Why is our news a mix of propaganda and distractions, with almost no real substance?

Why is it OK for drones to fly above the people of the world, killing at will? Why do we maintain illegal prisons around the globe and subject people to torture? Why do we start new wars and continue to act like we run the whole world?

Why do we enable the Monsanto Corporation to monopolize our food industry, poisoning populations with genetically modified grains and driving those that would plant and raise good food into bankruptcy? Why do we arrest small scale producers of raw foods and or deny them access to markets?

Why do we continue to conduct this insane war on drugs?

Why do we maintain the world’s largest prison population, both in gross numbers and also o a per-capita basis?

Why do we spy on our own law-abiding citizens?

Where is the outrage?

I pray today. I cry today. I seethe in anger today. But I won’t be crying when we get our just reward.

We will have earned it.

Every goddamned bit of it.

 

The social cost of capitalism

This article, penned by Paul Craig Roberts is essential reading but alas, sure to be ignored by most.

We all have our reasons.

(Tip of the hat to Michael Collins.)

Joe Bageant--bearer of the torch

I was recently reminded of the passing of Joe Bageant. Joe was an unusual sort, best known for a book called Deer Hunting with Jesus. Joe was raised poor, a working class southerner. At some point in his life he developed leftist leanings, went off and received a good education and became a magnificent writer. However, Joe never fully forsook his roots; the people, the plants, the animals, the soil, the smells, the blood, and the spirit of the South remained alive in his heart and soul and sprang to life in his words, despite having left that world behind.

Over the years Joe became disillusioned with the intellectual elite of the left as well as hard right Capitalist barons, both of which seemed exceedingly willing to allow his kin to work in poverty, trapped by ignorance: to fight the wars, feed the mouths, man the mills, and toil in mines for minmal compensation, only to be discarded when bodies failed. For the biggest part Joe's kin were unwilling to take handouts, preferring to earn the meager life they had, a hard and proud people. He admired them for these traits, yet simmered in anger at those that took advantage of their ways.

Most of Joe’s kin considered themselves libertarian minded when it came to beliefs in governance, but in actuality, were very much practicing socialists on a local scale, though they’d be loathe to admit that fact. They shared meager provisions with neighbors, lending helping hands when needed. They did charity work through churches and local organizations like unpaid volunteer fire departments, coaching little league teams, or conducting charity drives and bake sales for any number of good causes.

Joe traveled and lived in Mexico and Belize in latter years, finding other poor hardworking people, differing in color and language but similar in spirit to those he grew up with. He joined them in their daily lives. Over time he became less hopeful of political solutions; his tone became bitter and angry, but all the while, cognizant of the great capacity humans have to love and care for each other on a personal scale. Joe documented random acts of kindness and sharing and savored what he could of the simple world of the poor in all its various manifestations.

He shunned big money and fame for with that money and prestige comes censorship and Joe refused to be censored, nor would he toe the party line when the party line lacked merit.

Joe fought for the things in which he believed because he gave a damn. He really cared.

It wasn’t some intellectual pursuit or a game of one-upmanship that spurred Joe to write, it was seeing others in pain and misery that by damn could have been avoided by   more sensible thinking. He became the voice they did not have.

The opposite of love isn’t hate. It’s apathy.

Joe cared.

We should, too.

 

The death of truth

An article written by Chris Hedges at Truthdig concerning government efforts to silence Julian Assange and Wikileaks.

Shameful.

The SS is alive and well.

A crisis of values--Jeffery Sachs

Jeffery Sachs addresses a crisis of values that allows rich Wall Street crooks and bankers to stay in power, to grow richer, while everyone else suffers.

Brief update--the passing of Oscar Cabello

I haven't written much of late. Between a hectic schedule and a feeling of helplessness/uselessness it hardly seems worth the time. That's not to say that important matters have not arisen.

Among those is the recent passing of my friend Oscar Cabello. Those of you that have read Contrabando should remember the name.

I knew Oscar too well to lionize him at this point. He was great beyond the norm and yet, a flawed man, nonetheless.

What I will say is that when I looked into his eyes, we communicated without words. I knew his thoughts; he knew mine.

I call him brother.

I look forward to joining Oscar on the other side someday. In the meantime, there's a void left in this world no one man is going to fill.

Time to step up.

Life's hard (little victories)

Life on a farm is often tragic—the specter of death a constant companion. Nature claims animals without qualm; the calf, foal, or kid goat that fails to rise and nurse in a matter of hours usually dies.

Livestock are raised for their flesh, meaning near certain death by slaughter if they survive all else. Just this week I sent 7 goats, 48 calves, 31 cull cows and a bull to the auction. One of the cows was a Jersey milk cow named Smiley.

Smiley had ample and good tasting milk a few years back and was one of my favorites but has failed to breed since. I had her palpated while the cowboys were here only to learn she had cysts in her reproductive tract preventing her from conceiving. Lamentably, I made the decision to send her to to the sale.

The lone bull was also a Jersey, Bully, we called him. Bully did his job, and part of that job was protecting what he considered his harem of milk cows. Problem is, Bully was too good at his job. Bully greeted anyone and everyone approaching his paddock with a bowed neck and a bulging eye. If that didn’t obtain the desired result, he’d beller and begin pawing the ground. If you crossed the fence, chances were good he’d attack. People stayed the hell out of his pen.

A few months back, Bully broke through a fence and trapped a woman and two daughters inside a mobile home after butting their car and tearing at an A/C window unit with his one short horn.

I lured Bully back into the pasture with a sack of feed. Another neighbor’s property butts up to the dairy cow paddock. I’ve seen visiting grandchildren in that yard and I’ve seen Bully starie them down.

While I had made an uneasy pact of sorts with the bull—he’d let me come and go out of a combination of fear and trust—I couldn’t take the chance that he might again escape the confines of his trap and hurt someone.

So I violated our truce and sent him to certain death.

Three of the cows we culled left behind small calves (two of the three represent a mistake on my part). I spent a good portion of the day yesterday trying to get them to suck a nurse cow. One nursed, the other two did not. We forced milk into their bellies with a bottle, but not without difficulty.

This morning, all three calves nursed.

I can’t tell you how relieved I was.

Another young bull slated for slaughter took Bully’s place in the pasture; death for the one meant a reprieve for the other.

One of our dogs, Missy, arrived at the house this morning with a four inch gash in her abdomen, probably the result of a boar’s tusk. Leah packed her up and took her to the veterinarian. The prognosis of survival is good.

Tim Ervin, my race horse trainer, called to tell me that Dust Bowl Diva, my best racing prospect, was exhibiting signs that could be colic. She responded to a shot of Banamine delivered by a veterinarian and should be OK in a day or two. She may have to carry the financial burden of a lot of other horses and even me and my family—only the really fast ones make money and she is really fast.

Life is hard. Little victories make it a bit more tolerable.

http://youtu.be/-zDAPOTLVGE

http://youtu.be/9IvacMBoNiM

 

 

 

Economics 101

Numerian from the Agonist has written an overview of our economic situation that renders complicated issues into language understandable by commoners like myself.

Well worth your time.

I want this....

Sedgwick Maine declares total food sovereignty opposing state and federal laws.

Listening, Belmont, Texas?

Contrarian economists

A few contrarian economists have helped me better understand our current predicament.

Two examples: Michael Hudson, and supporting evidence at Washington's Blog.

Bailing out banks, trying to reflate real estate prices were/are mistakes.

http://www.youtube.com/embed/dQ74wWIxe4E

Manuel

Sabbath morn

Irrigation pivots needed turning off around midnight. Stopped sooner, they wouldn’t have completed rotation. But I couldn’t stay awake last night; instead I opted to allow them to pass slightly beyond the start point. I arose early to shut them off and now I am left fully awake with nothing to do.

Not exactly honoring the Sabbath, I suppose. I've given up practices once prescribed for the day; about the best I can manage is to mark its passing.

In a trailer, not fifty yards from where I write, sleeps a modern day saint. I’ve written of him before, first in Ruminations from the Garden, and then later in a post describing how he was shot multiple times in that same trailer, miraculously surviving the attempt to take his life. He goes by the name of Manuel.

Manuel is a seer. Some might say a prophet. Some might say a crazy man. In these times, all these can and often do go hand in hand. But Manuel’s not the same man he was before he was shot.

Manuel is out on bond, awaiting charges for the event that almost killed him.

The story is complicated, and I won’t go into details here; suffice it to say that I think the law has charged an innocent man. Manuel's accuser is a liar. Perhaps the shooting was accidental, the result of being awoken while in a drug and alcohol induced state, an excusable offense when it happens in the privacy of your own room, but the minute the lie was formed, a crime was committed, exceedingly worse and far more willful than the original event.

Meanwhile, Manuel spends his days seeing to the needs of our farm and a menagerie of assorted animals and plants. He does not only what I ask of him, but more, proactively trying to make this a better place for all. The cattle, hogs, goats and chickens know him as their provider, and eagerly await his arrival each and every day of the week, regardless of the weather. I routinely find sign of his passing, disappeared trash or discarded limbs, something broken mysteriously fixed, a plant watered, weeds dislodged, ground tilled, produce harvested.

He’s frugal with his money, rarely indulging himself, instead, sending money to his wife and an ailing mother in Guanajuato.

I made Manuel’s bond; at his insistence, he has repaid every dollar. He sends $50 a month to the military hospital that saved his life, and to the life-flight company that whisked his body away on that fateful night.

I fear for a country, for a people that would charge such a man with a crime. Such misdeeds will not go unpunished.

But I fear more for the fate of my friend and his people. Should Manuel be convicted, he faces a potential prison sentence, revocation of legal status in this country and eventual deportation, while the man that shot him continues deriving his livelihood from government assistance programs. I can’t find words strong enough to describe how terribly wrong that is.

http://youtu.be/aDs5mG3svzU

 

The Lord's Prayer

Monday morning.

When asked how we should pray, Jesus offered words we now refer to as The Lord’s Prayer. While milking a few days ago, I reflected on this prayer and for whatever reason noticed a few things that hadn’t occurred to me.

First, the prayer:

Our Father, which art in heaven,
Hallowed be thy Name.
Thy Kingdom come.
Thy will be done in earth,
As it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our trespasses,
As we forgive them that trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation,
But deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom,

The power, and the glory,

For ever and ever.

Amen.

I had long recognized the surrender of personal need/want to the will of God, implying trust in the goodness of our maker and his superior knowledge.

But what escaped me until recently is the plural nature of the prayer. It’s not forgive me, but rather, forgive us.

We, not me....

Think all is well with the American economy?

Think again.

Scroll down at the link to see how we rate.

Spring draws near

Sabbath Morn

We’ve a chance of rain. But we’ve had chances before and few have materialized of late. I hate to use the dreaded d-word, but that’s the way it feels. Not to say we have no moisture, just that the combination of warm, dry weather, wind, and a lack of rain have taken a toll and I’m uneasy about prospects for the upcoming crop.

I’ve opted to plant milo instead of corn on the few acres we will dedicate to grain; milo is more drought resistant; the seed costs less, is a non-GMO product and the fodder can be harvested for hay. An additional benefit: I won’t need to buy crop insurance, an endeavor I have grown to hate.

I kept seasonal help acquired during pecan harvest last year and the weight of carrying them through the winter has taken its toll on our bank account. Prospects for employment elsewhere for these men are poor, despite the boom in the nearby Eagle Ford shale play.

The big dollars required to develop the oil field comes from somewhere else; I suspect sources very near the Federal Reserve money-making machine; the oil produced leaves on rail cars and through recently installed pipe lines and the money generated returns from whence it came. Those fortunate few who live atop land bearing oil and owning mineral rights are getting rich, but most of that money fails to recirculate into the local economy.

Modern day shanty towns have sprung up in the area, only now instead of tents, residents live in travel trailers, stacked as closely together as space will allow. Most inhabitants are men, but there are some families. I feel sorry for the kids and the wives as few of these “parks” provide anything in the way of common space or recreational areas. Despite talk of good pay in the oil field, most of these workers are poor, living from one pay check to the next. I’d bet many have a home and a mortgage elsewhere, or conversely, are burdened with debt from a previous life that consumes every extra dollar they earn.

Hotels do well; none of these are owned by locals. Wal-Mart and McDonalds are having a field day. Taco venders, flat tire fixers and a few local men with good driving records and without drug habits are making a living. Gas stations and grocery stores thrive and local cops feast on an ample supply of overweight and illegal trucks.

We’ve had numerous accidents and fiery crashes related to oil field traffic. The wear on the roads is visible and it’s quite a bit more difficult the get in and out of parking lots.

We don’t have much in the way of bars and whorehouses, but I suspect the nearby cities of San Antonio and Austin are providing those needs. With all the drug-testing surrounding oil field jobs, local drug dealers haven’t shared in the current boom cycle like those of times past. I am sure whoever has the local beer and ice contracts are happy, nonetheless.

I hear the stock market is at an all time high, but I also see data pointing to a greater disparity in income than ever before. I hear politicians refer to a middle class. No one I know in this supposed middle class owns any stocks. If current trends continue, I doubt that such a thing as a middle class will survive. We will have rich, various levels of working poor and the outright destitute.

The climate ripens for political conflict between regions and classes of people in our land. I hope this conflict remains constrained to the political arena, but I see possibilities for it to escape those boundaries.

I pity the poor soul tasked with taking guns away from my neighbors. It ain’t gonna happen without a fight, a fight that potentially could pit state, local and federal forces against each other.

If you don’t believe me, then read this recently published article from our local newspaper.

Is this so much hot air? We shall see, soon, I suspect.

Points ignored in the seqeustration debate

The debate over sequestration provides a distraction from real issues that caused our current predicament.

Read more here.

and then they came...

...for the for the raw milk drinkers.

A song for the times

Natalie Maines performs "Mother":

For the record

Sabbath morn.

Your government lies to you and mainstream media serves as a willing outlet to spread those lies.

It’s for that reason I first visited the Agonist and other alternative media sites during the buildup to Iraq 2. I knew the stories we were being fed were bull shit. That’s not to say everything I find is true; in fact I often have to wade through considerable crap in my search, but the truth is to be found with a bit of investigative work and common sense.

I found another source of truth mired amongst Russian propaganda on the RT network.

You should not surprised to learn from Abby Martin’s Breaking the Set that cops intentionally set ablaze the cabin where cop-killer Christopher Dorner took refuge, nor that mainstream media first ignored this unsavory detail and then later lied about it to protect the police force.

Wal-Mart and low, low prices....

OK. I confess. I went to Wal-Mart again.

It all started when Leah and I decided to drive to Boerne last Saturday to pick up a mare I bought. I borrowed a trailer from a brother—his is a two horse—smaller and easier to navigate in tight places than my gooseneck.

I noticed the tread on one of the trailer tires was cracked so I stopped by a local tire shop. He had nothing used that’s fit the trailer. Apparently the change to larger wheels in modern trucks has left a dearth of 14 and 15 inch tires, once easily acquired for a spare $20 bill.

I asked how much a new tire would be.

“Do you really want to know?”

“Yes.”

“One hundred and twenty bucks.”

I passed, thinking the tire might hold up, or that I could acquire another elsewhere for less.

About ten miles before reaching Boerne, the tire exploded, spewing shards and scraps of rubber into the air and onto the highway behind. I called the man with the mare only to learn that all tire dealers in the small town closed for weekends, except for my favorite-in-the-whole-wide-world establishment, the friendly Wal-Mart, home of low low prices….

We limped into the parking lot and found the tire and battery section. I went through the door that you can get in but can’t get out of and told a woman I needed a tire.

With a go-to-hell look, she asked what sized tire I needed.

I went out and retrieved the number after she let me out of the one-way door.

Number in hand, I returned and gave her the info.

“That tire runs $130.”

“OK. Guess I have to have it. It’s on my horse trailer….”

“We can’t change tires on trailers. You’ll have to take it off and bring it in.”

Which, I did.

And then we waited for three hours. I shit you not.

During the three hour wait I went shopping twice and Leah went once. What the fuck else you going to do? Of course, each trip in the one-way door necessitated getting let out, reminiscent of jails and prisons I once inhabited.

When the tire was fixed, I hunted down the friendly “staff member” who was hiding elsewhere in the store so I could pay and leave, only to learn that when all was said and done, my new low, low price Wal-Mart tire cost me $180 and change to retrieve and I got to put the damn thing back on my trailer in their parking lot for no additional charge.