Fish for Friday

If there were still any doubt aboute shifting balance of geopolitical power away from the U.S. and toward China and other countries, this settles it: "Snowden leaves Hong Kong, may be heading for Venezuela."
     Edward Snowden no doubt foresaw a tenuous and potentially short life anywhere that could be easily reached by the tentacles of U.S. "intelligence" efforts. I suspect he will wind up in Venezuela or someplace similar. At this point I compare Snowden more to the Rosenbergs and their A-bomb decision than to "the Pentagon papers" and similar. What the U.S. is doing with its world-wide computer hacking, while constantly griping about what the Chinese are doing, is basically the same as trying to prevent other countries from having nuclear power or nuclear armaments, while amassing enough weapons-grade plutonium in the U.S. to destroy the world several times over.
    Here are some comments by readers at the end of an article about Snowden heading to Moscow. I did not copy only the ones supporting him; they all supported him or at least took issue with the N.S.A. and the U.S. And most of these people are Americans. It is all becoming very interesting:

"China to U.S. - #$%$."
    "True democracy, the kind that Jefferson, Franklin etc...dreamed of."
    "The U.S. actually thought that Hong Kong would comply with an extradition request after Snowden revealed the U.S. was spying on China? The only ideal solution for the U.S. at this point is to confess to what the N.S.A. did and scrap the program."
    "All politicians are deadbeats, liars and in bed with corporations—Snowden did what needed to be done and the only traitor in this is the corporate owned politicians."
    "The N.S.A. can't even follow an American dweeb. Someone please tell me just how they protect us? Seems China found him. The Russians found him. The antacid bill at the NSA is going to add to the deficit."

Quote of the year: "Putin Says Dealing With Snowden Issue ‘Like Shearing A Pig’." How many ad agencies would it take to come up with something for an American politician to say that would top that?

Could be just a coincidence, but...

• "LAPD Confirms Michael Hastings as Crash Victim, Revealing Email Emerges (Video),"
• "Michael Hastings Death: FBI Says Journalist Was Not Under Investigation (Updated)," and
• "RIP Michael Hastings: Journalist who exposed American military killed in car crash."

    Do you realize how hard it is to get a car to burst into flames on impact? It happens by accident probably once out of every 500,000 collisions or so.

Rwandan President Paul Kagame

On the topic of how far people in power will go if they are really pissed off at you, how about this?

• "Detained: bus driver suspected of being hitman for Rwandan President,"
• "Rwandan exiles in London 'threatened by hitman'," and
• "Britain's aid to Rwanda is funding a 'repressive regime' says former Kagame official"

Speaking of trying to prevent other countries from going nuclear, the U.S. "war against nuclear expansion" has been as hapless as its war on drugs. Thanks to the U.S. efforts at limiting the weaponry, there is now something like 2-million kilograms of highly enriched uranium and weapons grade plutonium spread around the world, and a kilogram of uranium-235 is worth well upwards of $20 million. Eventually someone will get a bit of it and set it off here, and then we will realize just what we lost by wasting so much money on the pointlessly bloated defense budget, and by being so apathetic about it. Read more: "Top Ten Cases of Nuclear Thefts Gone Wrong."

Yes, America is doomed:

1. We have allowed a large multinational corporation to convince us that a regular-size cup of coffee is "Tall," and
2. Good actors like Helen Mirren and Alfred Molina are used primarily to voice characters in the Monsters University movie...sad..soo sad.

What a fiasco we had this afternoon! I looked out the window and was delighted to see a mother quail and five little babies on our deck in the backyard! I have seen baby quail before but not tiny like these were. I was thrilled, called Cliff, got out the binoculars, and then to our dismay the mother decided to jump down two retaining walls, each one about three feet high. Sure enough, those little things followed Mama! We watched them for awhile and realized there was no way the little ones could get out of there! After a couple of hours we decided to try to catch the babies and put them back up to the top part.

    Alas, to our horror one squeezes through a tiny crack in the fence to the other side! So now we have four babies running wildly around on our side and the other one on the other side. The mother goes to the other side and the ones on our side are scared to death. About this time Robert showed up (I call male quails "Robert" because of the wonderful book That Quail, Robert).
    So for the next hour or two Robert checks on the four and the mother is on the other side calling for the others to come to her, and there was no way for them to get over there. By this time I am in tears and we are trying to figure out what to do. Robert is up on the fence looking at us, Mama is calling and the babies are going crazy trying to get through the fence!
    So we decide once again to try and catch them to put them with the mother and baby, when in fear one squeezes through a crack, and Cliff gets the other three to squeeze through! So, all is well and the family is back together again! I sure hope they stay away from our back yard after all that!

Thank goodness the "new and improved" Republicans are developing a more open-minded and inclusive tone, wouldn't even want to think what the old Republicans would have said. "Local GOP leader resigns after rant on former Miss America."

Former Miss America Erika Harold

There is a growing media buzz that Jeb Bush may run for president. Just the thought that another Bush might possibly make it to the White House is almost enough to make me fake my death and live out my years under an alias somewhere far, far away. The Bush family is arguably the most morally bankrupt, dishonest, and corrupt political family in American history. What the two Bush presidencies did to our national economy and international standing is unconscionable, and the death toll uncountable. What a third Bush presidency might do is too horrific to even consider. Most sociopaths kill people and go to prison; sociopaths with money become president and kill millions of people. Neither loses a second of sleep over it.

...going to Yemen was like visiting Disney World then. Although the boat ride was a little rough: "Vacations from hell: Cruise ships, kidnappings & more"

Armed tribesmen gathering in a street in Taiz, Yemen

In the Great State of Mississippi, a new law has gone on the books: "Mississippi Open carry law goes into effect July 1." You do not need a carry permit if you wear your gun on the outside of your pants for the whole world to see. A cop cannot even stop you now. I guess they will have to be ready to draw every time they run into one these assholes. Fun time on a Saturday night.

Hey, Jack Cover's son Micah has a great website for his magic business, and you can see a demo on Youtube:


This is how giraffes drink:

Limerick of the Week:

The young man in the news of late, Edward Snowden,
will need, if he goes to Iceland, coat of loden,
    and with us on his tail,
    to drag him back to jail,
he might also need some help from big god Wōden.

_______________
Copyright © 2013 by Morris Dean

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