The rich are bored

 The rich, the oligarchs

are incredibly bored.

So they play what-if games

with our world.

knowing that they will get through it

just fine.

Ivermectin - horse dewormer

 Who know that Horse dewormer would play such a large role in this story.

There is such distrust in the government and big pharma, that some people would rather eat horse dewormer and shit out their inside in emergency rather take the free vaccine offered by the government.  The same government that is simultaneously totally incompetent buffoons and diabolical criminals.  And the shelves have been emptied, and horse owners with legitimate need to deworm their horse cannot get the product. horses are scooting their butts around the fields like dogs.

and we carry on

Supreme Court Justices, an appeal the to the Supreme Power in the land

 So, Amy Coney Barrett has been nominated by Trump, to the supreme court.  A young woman, early in her career, so would sit on the supreme court, presumably for a long time.

The question is, what's in it for her?  Ostensibly, Trump is putting her on the supreme court, and she will be loyal to him when the question of ruling who won the 2020 election reaches the court.  What's in it for her?

Once she is on the supreme court, she is on it for life.  That's it.  That's her reward.  Paid in advance.  If the question of who is the winner reaches the supreme court, she can either vote for Trump, or against.  Lets examine those sides.

If she votes against Trump, meaning for Biden, Trump no longer has any hold on her.  He will be prosecuted and jailed after his term is over.   Trump will cry to the media about the deal they had, that she is tainted.  Since he is a known liar, she can say she proved there was no deal by voting against him.  She starts her career on the supreme court being forgiven by the progressive since "she voted for what was right, and voted for their guy".  She can then do whatever the fuck she wants for the rest of time, never bad enough to get impeached for it.

If she votes for Trump, he gets his second term, and finishes dismantling the government, along with his minions.  It won't really look like is collapsed in this first term, cause it still sorta works, but increasingly only for the rich and connected.  He will model it after the Russian Oligarchies, as he loves Putin for his business sense. America could see heavy decline in rights as it spirals into dictatorship.  And she will be on the bench for the entire decline, where ever it ends.  History does not repeat itself, but it often rhymes.  The parts of history this rhymes with all have very bad endings for the participants.  History will not be kind to her.

This will be her legacy, being the judge that made laws in America irrelevant.  Because in Donald Trumps dictatorship, the law will only protect the rich, and only punish the poor.  And the line between the two will constantly move upward.

Maybe she's a 'True Believer'.  That her cause is Righteous, and Holy, and the Ends truly justify the Means.  That she sees this as her opportunity to move more rapidly to those ends.  This is the scariest of all options, that America founded to be separate from religion, being ended by religion. 

Her addition to the court makes it presumably a 6-3 split to the right.  We have some "Survivor" level gamesmanship here.   If she votes against the right, she has to be sure that at least one other of the right leaning judges will vote her way, making it a 5-4 split to the left.

Anyway, nice jawin' with y'all, she's gonna vote with Trump, and gleefully participate in the downfall of America.  Because that is so 2020.

Nothing shouts "Showtime" like a Pandemic

I was thinking about how climate change was somehow involved in this shift.  It certainly started the Oligarchs moving towards just seizing control world-wide.  Holy shit.  This is where the IDU fits in.

Ok Ok Ok
I'm stoned

The effect of climate change has always been presented, at least in the presentations that reach me, as some catastrophic change, where coastal cities like Vancouver, Seattle, New York, Miami, would be inundated and flooded out. Of course, that's silly.  In reality, it more subtle, more gradual, more 'boil the frog' kind of change.   Weather and seasons always oscillate, and we get a nice, long, warm summer, and the next year, cold, wet, short.  A winter that has 8 weeks of -35c temperatures, and wind, then a winter that rarely hits -2, and ends around March 1.

So we expect and hope, that maybe it will be a good summer and we can have lots of BBQ's, and hope that we get a good winter, where the air doesn't hurt my face every time I go out.

What climate change is recognition that we are adding energy into the system.   And we equate energy to power.  The oscillation is more powerful.  The hot stretches last longer.  The storm season creates more powerfull storms, and more of the hurricanes and Cat 5, and more of the Tornados are F5's.  The winter storms drop and larger amount of snow, we continually break records.  Once in a hundred year storms and rainfalls are happening every decade.

I think it was Warren Buffer commented on 9/11 and the losses to business incurred there.   "They didn't properly price the risk".  They knew terrorist attacks where rising, and that the chances of an attack with catastrophic consquences were rising.  But they didn't change the rates they were charging, and the insurance business lost a bunch on 9/11.

Pricing insurance for climate change could be tricky, but is there a more concrete example and edenville.  The insurance (and premiums) are probably no where near enough to cover the damages, and the insurance company might take a bath, as climate change causes a once-in-a-hundred year storm to take out a bunch of dams, and flood the countryside, in the middle of a pandemic.

Climate change has to be where our change starts.  The recognition that we are causing changes to weather, and we might have to change our ways.  And to pay for changing our ways, we might have to tax the rich.  And they were having none of that.

So here we are.  A pandemic pushed up the schedule.  The IDU is pushing to get right-wing govts in power around the world.   There has been a campaign to break up NATO, by separating Britain from the EU.  There is dictatorships in China, Russia, and the USA on the verge of becoming one.  South America, and Central America and a mess of right-wing dictators, and weak lefties.  Mexico might turn out a hero, but the rest our troubled.  There was a valiant effort in install a right wing government in Canada, which failed.  They continue to try to fracture Canada by weakening Alberta to the point of failure.

The passing of my Father-in-law

My father-in-law passed today.  March 24, 2020.  He was kind enough in the end, to delay his passing until after his daughters birthday.

Birthdays and Death both suck during a pandemic.

Its the Economy, Stupid!

The economy slowed down as soon as we realized the threat of COVID-19, and began self-isolation. Schools, post secondary closed, followed swiftly by entertainment business (Theatre, orchestra, cinema, bars & pubs).  Soon it became that only essential services should stay open, that is, food, medicine, liquor.

I ran today.  Just a short run to try to get back to normal.  It was quiet, almost no cars during a wednesday rush hour.  Erie. Weird.  Saw another runner, and chatted, his run was a stress reliever as well. 

The economy grinds to a halt, and we realize that this is an opportunity to talk about how our economy should work.  It's always easier to examine an engine when its not running with a foot pressed on the gas.  Don't think that will happen.  People will demand their rights.  Rights to healthcare.  Rights to food, and shopping.  And Partying.  Eventually when they are told that no, you don't have a right to healthcare, that's when the violence will start. America has never seen a problem that they couldn't solve by apply a little bit more violence.  So it has to be a goto strategy here.

Defenders of the 2A

I want to start a betting pool.

How long after the medical system is completely overwhelmed, until the first Defender of the 2nd Amendment demands, backed by force, that the doctors treat his loved ones. How long until the next Defender of the 2nd Amendment sees a rich person, or a politician, jump the queue, and take exception to it.

Winner gets to be more uniquely horrified that they were right.