destroying america

i really can't understand this talk of killing off the post office --- change it, yes, but eliminate it entirely? cheap and generally reliable, but now a crisis has been manufactured by congress --- just like the state has done with MARTA in restricting how it uses half of its income, a different "they" has done even worse with the USPS and is now closing in for the kill. In both cases, "fiscal responsibility" and all are the purported reasons --- bullshit ---

Union leaders and consumer advocates . . . insist this is all a "manufactured crisis" to drive down wages and break the unions.... Both audits suggest the government has been using post office revenues as a federal pension piggy bank for decades. Were it not for all that lost money, the agency would be in the black.

mammon

what an asshole --- completely and utterly amoral --- "governments do not rule the world -- goldman sachs rules the world" ---

saturday night

the sound of music midtown in the distance and a whole lot going on up and down p'tree --- and absolutely perfect weather

fall!!!

legal murder

many of us are not proud of what the state did last night ---

ma

she turned 90 today and we gave her a little birthday party --- a bunch of her old friends showed, her sister, some nieces, and great grandbabies, the latter of which were totally out of control --- 

do tell

another bastion falls

happy hour

lost another one

the old post oak on the east side of p'tree between fifth and sixth is gone --- it was fairly gnarly, but it had been there for a hundred years

fear and loathing

"What are you so afraid of? That’s my question. Gay people getting married? What is so scary about that? It’s complicated. You grow up in a religion like that and you try to pray the gay away. I feel sadness for people like that. This is where people start short-circuiting—instead of being brave and questioning their beliefs, they are afraid and feel that they have to defend them. I don’t mind a world with religion in it. There are some beautiful tenets within all religions. What I get hot about is when they start dictating how other people must live. People suffer because of it. They are spreading misery." - Brad Pitt, speaking to Parade Magazine.

nearly fall

hear, hear

At the 30th annual Carter Town Hall on Wednesday, former President Jimmy Carter told his audience he thought the Supreme Court decision to roll back restrictions on corporate spending in federal campaigns was "one of the stupidest rulings ever consummated or perpetrated on the American people."

the road to prosperity

This he calls the "Zen road to affluence, which states that human material wants are finite and few, and technical means unchanging but on the whole adequate"

i.e., the less you want, the richer you get ---  i have found this to be a useful rule

the charleston lighthouse

built in 1962, the charleston lighthouse on sullivan's island was the coast guard's last lighthouse --- since it was built as an automated light, access was not as easy as the older brick or iron towers that had to be climbed every day ---- the elevator isn't working and even if it were the last 30 feet or so is by ladders --- so i didn't see the top

fort sumter

checking on the neighbors

fall's coming

blue sky came back yesterday evening and today has been perfect --- temperatures in the 70s, low humidity--- the best

a vortex of ignorance

A real concern I have, and I think many, many people in Cobb County have with this whole idea of light rail coming in here is this backdoor way of trying to get MARTA into Cobb and then bringing all the crime that currently lives in Fulton.

State Sen. Stoner is first Cobb lawmaker to give light rail public support - SMYRNA — A member of Co

www.mdjonline.com

that's been the argument against marta for forty years ---

hear, hear

this was the best line from the president last night:

In fact, this larger notion that the only thing we can do to restore prosperity is just dismantle government, refund everybody’s money, and let everyone write their own rules, and tell everyone they’re on their own -- that’s not who we are. That’s not the story of America.

god and mammon

Wallis and Butler repeatedly asserted that political leaders could not adhere to the teachings of both Rand and the church. “This budget has more to do with the teaching of Ayn Rand than the etchings of Jesus Christ,” Butler said. “I read [Rand] in high school, and she said, ‘You have to choose me or Jesus,’” Wallis added.

lee!

didn't get the amount of rain they predicted, but any rain is good

finished mann's 1493: uncovering the new world columbus created, which puts the whole globalization thing in a new light --- it was easily as good as his 1491: new revelations of the americas before columbus ---- also read bartolomé de las casas' thoroughly depressing a brief account of the destruction of the indies or, a faithful narrative of the horrid and unexampled mMassacres, butcheries, and all manner of cruelties, at the time of its first discovery by them, published in 1552 --- we need to rethink columbus day

dragon*con

 what a mess! from the old spice guy to i don't know what all --- more images here ---

serenbe

 excellent food and all

plants and frogs

gotta love the botanical garden at night --- the chorus of frogs in the conservatory rocks