MarkLimacher.com

So I’ve been gone for a little while, and have nothing much to show for it.
That isn’t to say I haven’t done anything mind you, because as with all such lapses in website updating, I’ve been reading new stuff, rereading old stuff, developing a bizarre respect for the work of Peter Weller, and growing hopelessly disillusioned at the point of writing music in 21st Century North America. I say this after a great deal of careful thought, but let me first clarify that I mean not to conjure a romantic ideal of Europe or South America (as many routinely accuse me of), but rather to call into question the very society I find myself at odds with day after day. I find it profoundly concerning that by and large I can count all the people who share in my musical intellectual stimulation on two or three fingers. This seems not to be the case with other expressive mediums, as it is not the movie theater with an aging audience and not enough younger participants to make up for the mounting losses (deaths).
I’ll try my best to update more often, although I did manage to post the collaboration I did with Simeon Poulin last spring.

If the history books used in American classrooms were grounded in any sort of reality, I often wonder what will be said about the age I am currently living in. Knowing that the fight to teach accuracy in schools is probably a losing battle, I wonder what lies the authors may come up with in the future to explain away the current right-wing psychopaths that have seemingly endless potential for media coverage. The incoherent verbal assaults taking place at the health care reform town hall meetings are bound to bring laughter to any reality-based person, myself included. Nothing elicits a grander guffaw than watching these encephalitic psychopaths completely mischaracterize socialism, the ‘founding fathers’, or the very Medicare they themselves receive. Our laughter must be carefully monitored, however, for it masks the precipitous horrors these people will bring to fruition. Having said that, I do recognize the necessity to express my stupefaction at the overwhelming ignorance displayed by these people.

Yes, you read correctly, I referred to the offending individuals as a collective ‘these people’, and there is a hard intention behind that. They are the genesis of a mass movement, a movement that has been gradually shaped and molded over the decades, a movement that has emerged from its adolescence with a hunger for violence.

The brains behind this movement lie in many hands, be they the practitioners of free market extremism, promulgators of the many systemic-industrial complexes, or proselytists of religious fundamentalism, but they all require the aid of the malleable. This is where the birthers, the deathers, and the tea-baggers come into the picture. The necessity of an angry mob, a collection of cognitively deficient pawns with which to direct as per your bidding, has always been necessary for those wishing to overthrow a regime of some kind. The one thing that needs to come about, however, is both a consolidation of message and the establishment of some kind of leadership, no matter how anti-establishment these people claim to be. Thus far we seem to be seeing a loose association of individuals with disparate objections, ranging anywhere from the anti-federal government, anti-tax lunatics to the viciously racist militiamen. Indeed, what seems clear at the moment is that no such consolidation seems to have happened, and frankly, it is often impossible to discern a decisive message with a great many of town-hall disruptions. Even a casual dip into Wikipedia reveals that the Sturmabteilung didn’t exactly coalesce into the kind of organization we associate with the term until 1922, by which point both the German Workers Party and the structureless pugilists had reconfigured into the NSDAP. Any further reading on Hitler’s rise to power, or any totalitarian regime for that matters, suggests the same, that consolidation of interests enables the success of a rise to power¹.

If it weren’t for disturbing trends that suggest such a cohesion is just around the corner, I might consider relaxing. Finding myself at teapartypatriots.org brought a little phrase back into my vocabulary, lost in the din of the town hall psychopaths: The 9-12 Project. Looking at the extensive list of ‘Tea Party Patriot Groups’, a.k.a. angry white idiot douchebags, the term ‘9-12’ appears more times than I am comfortable with. In case you’re still unconcerned, the The 9-12 Project is one of Glenn Beck’s masturbatory experiments in delusion that first came to my attention in March. In case you’re still vacillating on the connectivity here, I think it’s safe to say that the 9-12 project is precisely the coalescent meme necessary to bring about the dreaded consolidation. Given that Glenn Beck’s latest book, Common Sense: The Case Against an Out-of-Control Government, Inspired by Thomas Paine (shazail!) has been on the New York Times non-fiction best sellers list for weeks², and knowing that the book ends with instructions on how to organize a 9-12 ‘club’ of your very own, my unwillingness to calm down is not a result of my own superfluous anxieties, but an objection to the unfolding of ensuing darkness.
Take a quick peek at the 9 Principles, and tell me you aren’t disturbed given specific trends in American Society (as written about here by friend of the site, Samantha Fingerhut).

1. America Is Good.

2. I believe in God and He is the Center of my Life.
God “The propitious smiles of Heaven can never be expected on a nation that disregards the eternal rules of order and right which Heaven itself has ordained.” from George Washington’s first Inaugural address.

3. I must always try to be a more honest person than I was yesterday.
Honesty “I hope that I shall always possess firmness and virtue enough to maintain what I consider to be the most enviable of all titles, the character of an honest man.” George Washington

4. The family is sacred. My spouse and I are the ultimate authority, not the government.
Marriage/Family “It is in the love of one’s family only that heartfelt happiness is known. By a law of our nature, we cannot be happy without the endearing connections of a family.” Thomas Jefferson

5. If you break the law you pay the penalty. Justice is blind and no one is above it.
Justice “I deem one of the essential principles of our government… equal and exact justice to all men of whatever state or persuasion, religious or political.” Thomas Jefferson

6. I have a right to life, liberty and pursuit of happiness, but there is no guarantee of equal results.
Life, Liberty, & The Pursuit of Happiness “Everyone has a natural right to choose that vocation in life which he thinks most likely to give him comfortable subsistence.” Thomas Jefferson

7. I work hard for what I have and I will share it with who I want to. Government cannot force me to be charitable.
Charity “It is not everyone who asketh that deserveth charity; all however, are worth of the inquiry or the deserving may suffer.” George Washington

8. It is not un-American for me to disagree with authority or to share my personal opinion.
On your right to disagree “In a free and republican government, you cannot restrain the voice of the multitude; every man will speak as he thinks, or more properly without thinking.” George Washington

9. The government works for me. I do not answer to them, they answer to me.
Who works for whom? “I consider the people who constitute a society or a nation as the source of all authority in that nation.” Thomas Jefferson³

The sun is truly setting. Brace yourselves.

I feel it necessary to share three articles I’ve stumbled across in the past few weeks that I’ve been otherwise unable to comment on.

No. 1

As I urgently await the release of her new book (on topics similar to the ones discussed in the following article), I read Arundhati Roy’s critique of the democracy-free market synergism of our contemporary age.

No. 2

Truthdig’s marvelous Financial Meltdown 101 interface. Spend some time on here-
get lost a while.

No. 3

Matt Taibbi’s Rolling Stone piece about Goldman Sachs, The Great American Bubble Machine. I’m sure most of you are aware of this article by now, but it bears further mention. Sam Seder, in the final weeks of Break Room Live, interviewed Taibbi. I post this mostly to mourn the loss of Seder & Maron (yet again) from Air America Radio.

So I read the following Chris Hedges piece from Truthdig the other day, and couldn’t help but grow concerned about my well being (yes- again). The jist of the article is about the meetings that took place earlier this week in Yekaterinberg, Russia by the BRIC & Shanghai Cooperation Organizationg, and the panic that should be starting to sink in about the future of the US dollar. A brief sample:

…It is the first formal step by our major trading partners to replace the dollar as the world’s reserve currency. If they succeed, the dollar will dramatically plummet in value, the cost of imports, including oil, will skyrocket, interest rates will climb and jobs will hemorrhage at a rate that will make the last few months look like boom times. State and federal services will be reduced or shut down for lack of funds. The United States will begin to resemble the Weimar Republic or Zimbabwe. Obama, endowed by many with the qualities of a savior, will suddenly look pitiful, inept and weak. And the rage that has kindled a handful of shootings and hate crimes in the past few weeks will engulf vast segments of a disenfranchised and bewildered working and middle class. The people of this class will demand vengeance, radical change, order and moral renewal, which an array of proto-fascists, from the Christian right to the goons who disseminate hate talk on Fox News, will assure the country they will impose.

Yet another take, Prairie2 put it rather bluntly, but effectively:

…The turmoil that this could produce has no large scale precedent. With almost no Americans having any sense of ownership in our society the reaction will be a feeling of hopelessness and an every man for himself mentality. The crazies on the right have been priming themselves for this sort of apocalyptic collapse for forty years and will have no doubt who is to blame. Those that don’t know who to blame will get a fair and balanced list on Fox News. Watch your back.

I’m reminded, rather insistently, by the post I made a few months ago in which I linked to the Robert Freeman piece regarding the US facing a possible Weimar moment. I know I do a great deal of yammering about fearing for my life/future, but I’m finding it much more difficult to ignore the sheer volume of evidence that’s beginning to mount regarding the speed with which the American empire is dissolving. Unfortunately, I have been unable to find much information about the results of said meeting, with a New York Times article indicating that the group “concluded with only a cautious statement suggesting a move away from the dollar’s role in global commerce and a call for greater representation of developing countries in global financial institutions.” I will admit that I find the general ‘non-statement’ quality of that reporting to send chills up my spine, but what else can I expect from the Times financial section. This seems likely to be a developing topic over the next several months, which is good only in that it gives me time to go and purchase some canned goods before the right-wing psychopaths band together in an omega-man-esque sort of glory.

As a kind of appertif, a sort of deliciousness in video form, I thought I’d post some of the perplexing sadness that is the David Letterman outrage.

As per usual, a clearing away of the clutter. I have practically OD’d on videos of the psychopathy conventions, er, I mean anti-tax-day-teabaggin’-festivals, so I’ll spare you the links.

I received an email earlier in the week from one of the editors of the book Neo-Confederacy: A Critical Introduction. It couldn’t be more apropos given my last post detailing the mounting secession movement right now. Mr. Sebesta’s blog, Anti-Neo-Confederate can be found here, and I’ve linked it in the ‘Friends of Mr. Limacher Section’. I will have to wait to write a little more on this subject, so expect a follow up, but I implore you to go have a look at the excerpts available on the link above.

Lastly, to the Ron Paul supporter who commented a few days ago, you’ll be pleased to know that Ron Paul is in support of the secession talk. All I have to say about Ron Paul, is all I ever have to say about Ron Paul- I can’t seem to understand what reality he lives in, because it can’t be the same one I grapple with every day.

The Jay S. Bybee memo of thursday, outlining the methods of torture able to be utilized by CIA officials and other US Nationals abroad, came as a revolting shock. The day before, thousands of dangerously brainwashed right wing psychopaths protested taxes, and I suppose, all forms of societal responsibility and human empathy. Today, it is clear that virtually no justice will be sought on the former, as Attorney General Eric Holder vowed not to prosecute those who carried out said acts of Torture.

It has been a very interesting and illuminating few weeks. This is a country where students protesting a known war criminal as their university president are teargassed , beat up, and restrained while being pepper-sprayed by the police, but right-wing extremists protesting imagined tax increases and other racist and psychopathic fantasies are given an international media platform and totally legitimized (and in Neil Cavuto’s case, inflated).
Yes, it has been a VERY illuminating few weeks.

I have read the Bybee memo, and I am sick to my stomach. I thought using insects as torture phased out in the Achemenid dynsasty, but apparently I was way off base. I thought water boarding would remain ‘just a Pol Pot thing’. Again, I was way, way off.
Honestly, where the fuck are the massive rallies about the torture, the deaths of detainees in US custody, the secret CIA black sites? Instead we have rabid right-wing psychopaths en masse protesting everything from a black man in the white house, to secession- yes, read it again, secession. I couldn’t make this shit up if I tried anymore, this is getting so beyond dangerous that I don’t even have words most of the time. I end up stammering like Billy Budd for most of the day now. Example:
For all the coverage of Texas asshole Rick Perry talking about secession, the Georgia state senate passed this doozie 43 to 1. They passed resolution 632. Here is said resolution in full, but I’ll spare you some of the legalese, and cut to the chase. Firstly, they redefine the scope of the federal government’s authority of prosecution, and state that the ONLY crimes they can prosecute are treason, piracy and slavery. Everything else is null and void (somebody tell Madoff already). Secondly, they state that should the government attempt to overreach, the United states of America, and the United States Constitution is nullified and all authority is placed in the State government. What constitutes overreaching you might ask? According to Resolution 632, anything to do with the restriction of the sales of assault weapons would do the trick. By the by, this term ‘nullify’ has a rather distasteful history, such as during the civil rights movement as a means to disregard Supreme Court rulings on segregation, and my personal favorite, the Nullification Crisis on the path to the Civil War.

Once again I will not mince words- I fear that if nothing is done to stem the tide of this fulmination of anger and hate by these right-wing psychopaths, that some manifestation of insurrection is not only possible but likely.

It is getting harder for me to laugh at the ridiculousness of this news, and ridiculous and absurd it is indeed, but sometimes I know not what else to do.

I have allowed things to pile up a little more than I’d like to admit, and thus the introducing a new category: A Little Housecleaning. I’ll use this to clear out the shit that builds up on my pysche in a condensed and blog friendly format. To start this new feature, I want to discuss a few things that caught my eye this past week.
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