Yup, says it all really.
A friend of mine forwarded me some concerns about tracking devices being placed in drivers licenses… I hadn’t heard anything about it so I got to reading. I’ve been reading about tracking devices and national ID cards and drivers licenses and such… I read a lot, I travel a lot and talk to people and I listen to a lot of talk radio. The games that we play with statistics, with people’s opinions, with the control of information – it makes me highly dubious of conspiracy and makes me highly suspicious of every call to action.
I listen to a lot of Republican talk radio and it infuriates me. I first started listening to things like Sean Hannety and Rush Limbaugh because it literally got me so riled that it got me through morning traffic faster – much the way I’ll listen to speed metal while I’m typing to type faster and classical music to keep me focused on the visual (it’s what we listened to in my art classes in high school) and any number of other things… aural stimulus perhaps controls me…
In any case, listening to these things doesn’t infuriate me half so much as listening to the people who call in…. usually the studio engineers manage to cull the really off-subject ones, they edit out anything too racist or racy… but it forms a pretty clear picture of a xenophobic, closed-minded group of people who believe in nothing but helping themselves. A mass insanity that believes in America as a Christian country where if we play with statistics, with people’s opinions, with the control of information – it makes me highly dubious of conspiracy and makes me highly suspicious of every call to action.
Heather and Ash playing at An Poitin Stil in Timonium, MD. I like heading over there – for as much as I’m not really ocmfortable in most bars, it’s been one of the friendliest, warmest environments we’ve gotten to play in for a while. Me likee. Plus they have Patron Cafe. Can’t go wrong with that, really.
I listen to a lot of Republican talk radio and it infuriates me. I first started listening to things like Sean Hannety and Rush Limbaugh because it literally got me so riled that it got me through morning traffic faster – much the way I’ll listen to speed metal while I’m typing to type faster and classical music to keep me focused on the visual (it’s what we listened to in my art classes in high school) and any number of other things… aural stimulus perhaps controls me…
Acacia Sears, Rowan and Sharif performing at the Artmosphere open mic in Mount Rainier, MD. Tuesday night was, strictly speaking in terms of attendance, kind of pathetic. However, with just a couple of players it meant that we got to play a number of times and it was really just the tight little family. Sharif got to relaxing and I got to play bass with everyone which is alllllways good. Not to mention it meant I got to have some sweet potato cake. For as much as I hadn’t felt like coming out initially, I ended up really enjoying the night.
In any case, listening to these things doesn’t infuriate me half so much as listening to the people who call in…. usually the studio engineers manage to cull the really off-subject ones, they edit out anything too racist or racy… but it forms a pretty clear picture of a xenophobic, closed-minded group of people who believe in nothing but helping themselves. A mass insanity that believes in America as a Christian country where if we just owned enough guns and listened to enough Jesus-rock the borders would close themselves and we wouldn’t have to worry about nightmares like left-wing black presidents.
Danny had come to my Java Mammas open mic the week before – it was a pleasant surprise to run across him in a new spot. We’d been invited to come play the open mic at Hightopps Backstage Grille… Danny had himself a huge harem of tanned blondes. I guess he’s the REAL rockstar as they sure as Hell didn’t stick around for us.
Tim Cypher, host of the Hightopps open mic in Timonium, MD.
But then I listen to “left-wing” media. People will claim that it doesn’t exist – but listening to NPR will definitely show a particular political bent and they don’t have it right either…. And I think the MOST frustrating thing is listening / reading / seeing news items from multiple points of views and seeing that there’s almost NO author out there willing to concede the reader’s intelligence. They all edit the facts heavily so that there seems only one logical viewpoint (right up until you read someone else’s article).
And so I’m reading about tracking devices in our national ID cards and there’s logic on one side and paranoia on the other. I don’t think we should ever allow ourselves to reach the point where something in our pocket is reporting our exact location to our government at all times, but we’re coming very close to paying for that service as it is. My phone doesn’t have a GPS in it, but Heather’s parents’ and her brother’s do – and I’m sure the information of their location could be subpoenaed from AT&T with enough legal backing (or government pressure) and then they can be pinpointed with far more accuracy and from a far greater distance than with the RFID chips being discussed. We pay to have our location broadcast from our cars… II think that generally I have more to fear with third-party solutions eventually developing some freeware app that publishes my cellphone’s location on a website than from the US government knowing where I happen to be.
Rick Millman gets everyone dancing at my open mic at Java Mammas.
Yeah, yeah, yeah…
And so I read further and as usual, the people who are freaking out about it now aren’t really in possession of all the facts. This is probably something that a friend forwarded to a friend… I see that a bunch (8?) of states are definitely adopting RFID-based IDs next year, but most of the information I can find is from 2005… it looks like portions of that at least passed. In other words, it’s old news – at least according to when Time Magazine was making a big deal out of it.
I think the thing that’s REALLY pissing me off as I read further about it is that it’s linked to one of my two huge pet peeves about our government. I despise the fact that when a “law” is passed, it’s often not a single thing but a sheaf of dozens of actions, with some things hidden and bargaining points combined. The RFID chips and databasing of our IDs were originally packaged as an Iraq war funding bill… what the fuck do they have to do with one another?!
Broadly, yes – IDs are seen as a way of combating terrorism – and that’s the logic brought to bear (lets not get back into asking what Iraq ever had to with terrorism), but I DESPISE the fact that that allows someone against the idea of a national drivers license database to HAVE to be “against the troops” – and someone in favour of the war in Iraq HAS to be for this rather draconian method of information collection. The logic that this is an unfunded MANDATE against the states (a typical “who’s going to pay for this? Not MY problem” federal trick) can’t be brought to bear for the same reasons…
I think there should be very tight guidelines about what can be packaged together as a single bill. People don’t have a grasp of that, so when Senator John Jackson points out that Senator Jack Johnson voted to have polar bears juiced and canned, the public never understands that that was a hidden provision in the Big Ass Bill that was being ADVERTISED as a new federal holiday celebrating parrots.
Ugh.
No doubt brought forth by the parrot lobby. Don’t get me started on lobbyists.
See, i have a good time at my open mic. Minus the times when being surrounded by teenagers makes me depressed like I want to kill my aging self, I’m arguably having a better time than anyone else in the room.
Heather presents the Java Mammas singer /songwriter night in Reisterstown, MD. Sandstorm Love Affair pieces galore!
I’m working my way through somehthing else that was sent to me “Freedom to Fascism” by Aaron Russo, but anyone who doesn’t understand that “he who controls the money, controls the laws” doesn’t understand the concepts of capitalism. I have more issues with the idea of the electoral college than I necessarily have with the concept of income tax and credit debt. The former undermines our ability to legitimately control our governance in a democratic fashion, while the latter only demonstrates our willingness to be controlled by our own materialistic desires.
Yup. Taxes suck. The thing I HATE is that taxes are used as fines. That’s bullshit. Taxes are supposed to fund the government, not punish us for being ungovernable. Another inexcusable thing – when a tax or fee is theoretically levied for a particular purpose (like social security) but that money actually goes to something else (which is why I probably will never see any of my social security money back in my pocket if I Live to 65). Thoughts I have…
1) How would the government function sans taxes? If it’s not an income tax, it’s something else and in fact it’s a LOT of something elses simply because we have one of the lowest income taxes of any first-world country (mostly because our government is NOT responsible for our health care as so many others are). We are paying for a LOT of services that we take for granted – everything from our school system to our roads to our police force and the military. There is a section on how “income tax doesn’t pay for schools, roads” etc – about how it’s about the “redistribution of wealth” – which is what government does! Yeah, the gasoline tax pays for local roads…. And then federal money comes in and builds interstates. Yeah, local property taxes go towards schools, but federal monies match the local funds.
Sharif was called to the mothership shortly after this photograph was taken at Dogfish Head in Fairfax, VA.
2) I hate the fact that a LOT of the money is mismanaged – especially how much is paid in interest for government debts. It’s the same problem that the average person has, with a lot of money on their credit card, not understanding how much of their money goes towards punitive interest.
Laurel, MD.
Mike, bass player and lead vocalist for White Rose Confession, waiting to load in at the 8/13 Festival in Laurel, MD. He’s representing admirably.
Keegan Corbey producing his magic on the outdoor stage at the 8/13 Festival.
Tears of Mars – what an amazing group of musicians. Louder than Armegeddon. But amazing. The sheer pressure of the singer’s voice through the microphone endangered our amps. Jeff was impressed.
The Dreamscapes Project plans evil.
White Rose Confession had driven eight hours the day before. They’d stopped at Chick Fil-A and they’d eaten ribs with us. All that time they’d sat beautiful, serene, calm. Then they take the stage and in River’s words: “They weren’t cows inside. They were waiting to be, but they forgot. Now they see sky, and they remember what they are.” WRC – this is what you were meant to be.
Ah. The Shocker. I pretend like I don’t know.
3) I was also thinking about how money’s mismanaged in terms of “wasted” funds – the fact that NASA pays $100 for a toilet seat in their government buildings or the fact that public schools are locked into particular contracts, often getting worse prices on products (like computers) than the average consumer gets. However, I’ve been reading a lot about finances and how money works and I think the idea behind this (or the saving grace is that) yes, the government is “spending our money” very freely, but generally it’s spending it’s money on us (i.e. the money is generally being spent on American companies with American workers working with American materials – the circulation of money is how money is generated…)
4) I hate the fact that the tax code is so complex that an entire industry has sprung up around it. All the companies offering to help us pay our taxes are parasitic – there should be NO law that applies to the average person that the average person can’t comprehend. (back to the concepts of transparency – I’m good at legalese, but not everyone is)
Okay, enough of my diatribe. Art school makes me horribly suspicious of the left – and Christians made me horrifically suspicious of the right. And the most racist program I’ve ever encountered on the radio? The Jewish morning programs broadcast on Sunday mornings.
Interesting reading? Surprisingly I’d suggest: “Executive Orders” by Tom Clancy (because behind his right wing leanings he’s got an awful lot to say about how the only way to fix the United States is to wipe out the government in place and start again) and “Making Money” by Terry Pratchett which is actually surprisingly insightful when it comes to financial theory.
