the MADMEN: From Dean Moriarty to Cowboy Neal

Over the last several months i've been trying to figure out what it is i personally don't like about the rave-reviewed TV drama Mad Men. In one comment i wrote:

I am sensing that my disconnect from the show is ingrained in the notion that this “artistic work” plays much more to those who grew up 20 years after this period, than it does for those of us for whom it was our daily lives (certainly the ratings demographics show this to be true--but that is more an anomaly of the basic cable programming schedule i think). I knew a number of young women who were forced (by law and circumstance) to “go off” to those special schools where they would proceed with their pregnancies and give up the babies, to return to “normal” lives. It would be fair to say that a more than a small minority of them were forced to do so because of coerced sex and date rape; though in the early 60s neither was considered outside the norm (sadly and grievously so), nor called anything other than “sex.”

Many of those, that are part of the discipline of cultural studies (across the departments) in the academe and the professoriate in the US, seem to have begun examining the TV series as a powerful and evocative work of fiction. They (collectively) regularly discourse on various underlying plot elements as providing some degree of representational critiques of the core moral dilemmas of both the 20th and 21st centuries (sexism, cognitive and physical disability bias, genderism, victimless and victim perpetuated crimes, ethics, etc.). There appears a fascination with the particulars of these issues (even proposing a hermeneutical scaffold upon which to align plot elements as coherent and consistent within some sort of consensual critical base), and deeper analysis of character than with other such television series. It seems that the they, to which i refer (an interesting amalgam of well-learned, knowledgeable, intellectual curious folk), fit within a demographic construct that is both well known and respected, the 25-50 population of graduate students and professors. Thus it is not easy to ignore, nor disrespect, their humbly given opinions and insights into Mad Men.

Be that as it may, my spider senses have been jangling and tingling for a couple of years now about this popular and honored tv series. It doesn't feel right, it smells bad, it seems to only present a tiny glimpse of the national picture of the period. The producers, either by conscious choice or by staggering ignorance, choose to present only a very tiny and select view of what was happening in the US in 1963. If, as it seems, that some in the academe are promoting the program as a form of cultural apologetic that is representative of the mainstream of the US in that period (as evidenced that the cast of advertising executives and clerks, are part and parcel that is the relationship between corporations and the population), then i think they are sadly mistaken (or at least on par with the critiques presented by Thomas Frank in the issues of the Baffler and his first opus THE CONQUEST OF COOL). As an older adolescent/young adult during this period, living in the Los Angeles region, i can attest that much of what i see on Mad Men is not at all what i was observing in the world around me.

One might ask why my observations might have any relevance to the discourse, given that nearly 9 million US teenagers were experiencing the world in relatively the same way as me (the 1946-1947 baby boomers). I was inordinately blessed with being born into a well-established and well-connected social and cultural network that included the glitterati, literatti, and all other 'rattis' one can imagine. For example, from birth to well into high school i attended weekly services at All Saints Episcopal Church in Beverly Hills, CA (being an altar boy in love or lust with the granddaughter of Gloria Swanson, and her many girlfriends, whose names i remember to this day--Brooke, Torrey, Roxanne, Sandra) on Sundays sitting next to actors and actresses, CEOs and Executive Directors of the most powerful LA corporations and foundations, politicians, and so forth. I started school at the age of three, attending a private academy for gifted and wealthy kids, later to be thrust into a public school filled, for the most part, with the scion of parents (nation's best and brightest) brought together by NASA and the Department of Defense (with elements of Hollywood, the auto industry, and professionals included). I was forced (really coerced) to attend cotillion with many of the same folks as well as others from the gated burbclaves of the economic aristocracy (again, i still remember those beautiful young women especially Alice and Noreen), being an escort for a big time Beverly Hilton Hotel debutante ball evening.

I also grew up at the beach, was a swimmer which led to surfing and to surf culture. I knew that surfers were cool but that greasers' ruled; especially when i was thrown out of my old high school (as a student body officer for being too high on drugs and alcohol during a special student function on December 7, 1964), and had to attend the mid-west valley high school where all the real greasers ruled. Immersion in car culture, at the very peak of the emerging muscle car era, coupled with being a nationally acknowledged athlete (swimming), afforded me the access to fully observing two of the dominant early 60s cultures of US history. The fact that neither is recognized, nor acknowledged, in Mad Men speaks volumes about the disconnect i feel from the show.

~time out~
here are some of my most favorite of my top 50 songs in 1963 in the US markets (including Billboard, American Bandstand, and Wallach's Music City):

Surfin' U.S.A., Beach Boys; Sugar Shack, Jimmy Gilmer and The Fireballs; Rhythm Of The Rain, Cascades ; Hey Paula, Paul and Paula; Blue Velvet, Bobby Vinton; He's So Fine, Chiffons; So Much In Love, Tymes; Can't Get Used To Losing You, Andy Williams; My Boyfriend's Back, Angels; Sukiyaki, Kyu Sakamoto; Puff (The Magic Dragon), Peter, Paul and Mary; Blowin' In The Wind, Peter, Paul and Mary; Wipe Out, The Surfaris; I'm Leaving It Up To You, Dale and Grace; Walk Like A Man, Four Seasons; Mockingbird, Inez Foxx; I Will Follow Him, Little Peggy March; Pipeline, Chantays; Surf City, Jan and Dean; Heat Wave, Martha and The Vandellas; Walk Right In, Rooftop Singers; Surfer Girl, Beach Boys

Really! All those surf and drug songs, that were being constantly played across the US. Where are they in the soundtrack of Mad Men? Where is Dylan, Baez, New Christy Minstrels, Everly Bros, early Motown, et al? You must remember that this was the last great American music gasp before the English invasion; and the list also doesn't include the flood of movie and musical soundtracks (OLIVER!) of the period. Will the next season (post JFK country-wide wake) bring a full Beatles, Kinks, Stones, and Dave Clark Five soundtrack?
Here is a short list of movies with soundtracks that ruled the airwaves:

Cleopatra; The Longest Day; Irma La Douce; Lawrence of Arabia; How the West Was Won; Mutiny on the Bounty; Son of Flubber; To Kill a Mockingbird; Bye Bye Birdie; Come Blow Your Horn; 8 1/2; Contempt; Tom Jones; The Birds; Hud; The Great Escape; Shock Corridor; The Servant; This Sporting Life; Billy Liar; The Haunting; From Russia with Love; The Pink Panther; America, America; The Nutty Professor; Dr. No; Charade; Jason and the Argonauts

~time in~

As i was walking home the other night, under the first early morning rise of the Pleiades, i was pondering all that made Mad Men so discomforting to me, why i just feel that i don't like it when i watch it. Certainly the acting, directing and writing are superb; the show is a major artistic success, and has garnered a weekly dose of academic blogging following each episode. Yet the show just feels like sandpaper on my conscious mind, like my brain being shaken almost stirred, as if my bowels were force-fed wood chips instead of rice. What is it that so bothers me??? Then it hit me; wham bam oh gawd man. The characters and the entire construct are part and parcel of all the things i truly hate about America. They are all that is, at their core, bad, for the planet and the human consciousness. We had words for them in the 60s: square, establishment, bummers, head trippers, the man, authority figures, the generation gap, the credibility gap, screwheads, numbnuts, et al, and so far forth. These people, the characters and the corporations that are presented, were, and still very much are, the enemy of the Earth, the planet, the species, the well being.

Wow, i didn't think i felt that strongly at first, but as it sank in i realized it was true. I abhor all that is being presented by Mad Men. It seems to me more of an apologetic and hope-filled rant about how we, as a nation, can do better, than for what it really is; an indictment of a time in this nation when assholes once again stuck it to the people. i don't need that. I know that. And those watching it aren't getting that in a lot of ways. Even after Kennedy died we had some hope; LSD was still available, new frontiers in space and in consciousness, led by scientists, yogis and pranksters, we still felt optimistic. What happened in 1963 pales in comparison with what happened in 1968. Those people on Madison Avenue were evil and still are. I would rather ride the bus and stay on the street (and tracks) than donate $$ to Hilton and Mad Ave.

The Mad Men represented all that we hippies knew was categorically malevolent and evil in our culture. We hated the establishment, and cursed them for laying heavy head trips on us with their manipulation of public perception and their propaganda for the "man" (the government including the administrations of Kennedy, Johnson and Nixon). While it took years (apparently) for the "mainstream" to figure out, we knew that the Kennedy's were crooks, liars, and philanderers of the highest order. After Rachel Carson came forward in 1962, we became aware of the disaster that modern consumer culture had perpetrated on the earth. We knew the Doublemint Twins and Breck girls were icons of all that was crappy about America. The response of the media to the Civil Rights demonstrations of the early 60s bespoke volumes for the inherent racism of the establishment mainstream. Where were the blacks in the minds of these advertising ministers, other than being wage slaves to the man???

update (11/01/2009): After watching tonight's penultimate episode of the season, featuring the Kennedy assassination and the struggle to comprehend how "it all changed," i was reminded by a couple of other things from that fateful day. The announcement came to my high school during my class of concert and marching band. We were rehearsing for our upcoming studio album recording; we were one of the top music programs in the State of California, and widely honored. At the moment of the first click of the activation of the school sound system, we were playing a dirge by Holst; i was, at that very moment, playing the Concert Bb-flat double bass clarinet for that piece--the lowest hertz woodwind instrument{good thing i was a swimmer} and was also played the bass clarinet, baritone sax, and bassoon.

We sat quietly, listened intently, and then did the only reasonable thing; we played the entire dirge straight through. Since lunch break was the next period, the administration closed school and we all went home. I ended up at the beach in Malibu, sitting on the sand watching the pelicans do their spacial dances less than six inches above the crests of waves. I think everybody on the beach that afternoon was staggered by the reality. People driving up PCH, heading home from offices or such from LA and Santa Monica, would pull over and get out to walk on the beach. No radios, no sounds other than muffled cries and sound of all the sea birds. The waves and the birds didn't change, they remained immutable in their ongoing lives, teaching us that (as the Jefferson Airplane sang a few years later) the human name doesn't mean shit to a tree. That incredible historical moment really didn't mean anything at all to the Earth and the universe; it was a blip on the shoulder shrug of planetary spin. As we have seen in the last 46 years, in the long run none of those politics seemed to really matter near as much as the Earth.

Glenn Beck on Rush Limbaugh: dog pile of insanity

Will President Obama "seize power overnight" in a move to consolidate White House control of the U.S. government? That's the fear of Fox News anchor Glenn Beck who discussed the issue at length today with another broadcasting powerhouse, radio's Rush Limbaugh:

If you watch what could only be called the administration's organ - anything involved with GE or NBC - you've got [GE CEO] Jeffrey Immelt on the board of the Federal Reserve, you have him in the Oval Office consulting not only on health care, but the financial situation, and they are an organ.

If you watch MSNBC, I contend that you will see the future because they are laying the ground for a horrible event ... anything from the right, there's some awful event and I fear this government, this administration has so much framework already prepared, that they will seize power overnight before anybody even gives it a second thought.

Limbaugh responded, "I don't think they're going to be able to seize it overnight without anybody knowing about it."

h/t to Ed Brayton

With apologies and gratitude to William H. Gass a contributing editor of Harper’s Magazine, and author of a book review in the August Harper’s:

In order to prepare private citizens for supporting a militarized police state, a humiliating and painful bullying is generally prescribed. Its aim is to inculcate obedience and create callousness. Leaders must be resolute and heartless, prepared to send any enemy “to their deaths, pitilessly and remorselessly,” as Fox has demanded. Next a campaign of denigration of the chosen opponent is undertaken. This is designed to reduce the humanity of the enemy and to prepare a social web of support for behavior that is basically cruel, immoral, and normally disapproved. It strengthens every aspect of your plans if the society that you represent brings to the project a tradition of paternal domination and abuse, reaching from the family to the office of Rupert Murdoch and to its final station, God. Deep feelings of injury, inferiority, and large reserves of resentment—the fresher the better—are nearly essential. Any widespread unhappiness within your country can then be directed at the selected scapegoat by every available instrument of indoctrination and propaganda. If the enemy can be enticed to return fire, that will help solidify the nation’s resolve. Since a saw’s cut is painful either way it moves, the soldier knows that it is safer to risk death at the front rather than execution in the rear. A general sense of uneasiness helps, as if you knew someone were watching where you walked, reading your mail, and overhearing you talk. This atmosphere of anxiety can be sustained when the agents of power are ruthless and pitiless.

musings on torture...

CHENEY: Chris, my sort of overwhelming view is that the enhanced interrogation techniques were absolutely essential in saving thousands of American lives, in preventing further attacks against the United States, in giving us the intelligence we needed to go find al Qaeda, to find their camps, to find out how they were being financed. … It was good policy. It was properly carried out. it worked very, very well.

WALLACE: So even these cases where they went beyond the specific legal authorization, you’re okay with it.

CHENEY: I am.

Perhaps we might want to follow Dick's logic out through its natural process. Chris Wallace followed up his interview with the erroneous statement facetiously suggesting that it was not coincidental that the US had not been attacked since 9/11. Of course this is a bold and bald lie, as there have been numerous terror-driven attacks in the US since that time, including, among others, a young man entering a high school in CA last week with several pipe bombs (two of which were detonated) and guns w/ ammo. The list of such attacks includes shooters and bombers across the country, albeit, mostly carried out by those on the extremist far right.

So, if we accept Dick's ideas, then we need to begin to pick up all of the far-right wingnuts, starting with high school students, detaining them in special environments and removing any semblance of their rights and protections of the US Constitution. Then we need to torture them (okay let's even call it enhanced interrogation) into revealing the names of all of those who may have talked about, or been supportive of, various terror activities. Imagine we take our 13-17 years old students and waterboard them to tell on their friends so that we can continue this effort until we rid the nation of any possible terror attack. Wow, what an effective and productive strategy. We could save millions of lives long before any of the threatened even knew that they were in any possible danger (probably even before the perpetrators would know they could become perps.

Hell, we could start with the gubernatorial candidate from Idaho, Rex Rammel (or is that Rommel??--hehee), who thought that killing the President of the US would be a good idea. Since that is an act, by definition, one that is most heinous, then with Dick's logic, torturing Rex is an absolute necessity. He might know others who feel the same, who own the weapons and have the knowledge to carry it out, who might direct their efforts towards similar acts of treason and threat to the US. Indeed, we should demand that Dick offer his (and Addington's) services to this effort.

And should our local law enforcement personnel, in their zeal to facilitate the extraction of the most information, torture and harm (even kill {the count is well over 100 now by CIA count}) innocent teens and citizens, we would, again following the rule of Dick, not ever want to prosecute them. They must be free to do as they please in hopes that all possible future threats are eradicated.

Seems to me a poem by a certain Pastor Niemoller would be relevant.

a complete idiot:

But she is our fucking idiot.

I heard you loud and clear! Thank you to the thousands of people who called and e-mailed me letting me know what you thought about the Majority’s cap and trade legislation. Today, I voted against that tax hike and job killer.

Oh, that amazing mind that is composed of numerous sleazy greedy staff calling themselves Congresswoman McMorris-Rogers (R-WA). She (the summa of too many parts) is known for her inability to actually create anything of substance, relying, in toto, on such entities as the WSJ, FoxNews, AEI, Heritage Foundation, Cato Institute, et al, to produce her public statements and views on all issues. Today she uncorked the trifecta in talking points of the GOP/FOX alternate reality in claiming her important vote on the American Clean Energy and Security Act: it will cost each family thousands (nope); it will make jobs disappear (approx direct increase in employment = 1.7 mil); and it is a tax (energy producers would pay to capture carbon, and will choose to pass costs directly onto customers as they continue to do today anyway to guarantee their continued profitability).

She of course mentions the erroneous data on cost per household, the complete abject lie about taxes, the AEI and API claims to job loss (imagine the petroleum industry losing jobs in a local semi-rural economy with minimal public transportation?), and the rest. Lie lie lie lie and more so, hoping that her Fox breathing minions, only listen to Rush and Bill on the radio, will continue to support her. She refuses to debate anyone on any subject--albeit, debating fifteen staffers (her composite being) at one time might be a bit complicated--because she is essentially clueless and dependent upon the chosen talking points and choice of information (constructed and framed from the "alternative reality") that is at best untrue and without factual substance. At her worst, she spews only lies and misinformation to promote the agendas of big energy, big agra, big pharma, and lots of fascism.


I am sure "she" would completely agree with Glenn Beck when he said:

And these people know it. They are either the dumbest people to ever walk the face of the Earth, which I think some of them are. They are just greedy and just want their own power and their own control, which I think some of them are. Or, they believe in a different system other than the Republic, which I think some of them do. They are, they have exposed themselves as incompetent. They have exposed themselves as wicked. They have exposed themselves, quite honestly I think, as treasonous. I think some of them are treasonous. They have exposed themselves. Now the question is are there enough people in America still that believes in liberty and freedom and the Constitution?

I've been waiting for a long time for the Death of the Amurkin Dream

At this time of year i hear a great deal from the students i tutor and mentor (across the spectrum of matriculations) about the struggles they are having with balancing reality (Earth) with earning money to acquire even the most basic needs (Amurka). Early this morning, toodling along the highways of Eastern Washington i was shuffling the music deck and up popped a 35 year old Jackson Browne song. Backed by CSN and the Session, along with the maestro of lap steel Mr. Lindley, this song was the statement of that same set of feelings i am currently hearing expressed. Sadly, too many of us are still trying to be happy idiots and asking ourselves to pray for one another.


I'm going to rent myself a house
In the shade of the freeway
I'm going to pack my lunch in the morning
And go to work each day
And when the evening rolls around
I'll go on home and lay my body down
And when the morning light comes streaming in
I'll get up and do it again
Amen
Say it again
Amen

I want to know what became of the changes
We waited for love to bring
Were they only the fitful dreams
Of some greater awakening
I've been aware of the time going by
They say in the end it's the wink of an eye
And when the morning light comes streaming in
You'll get up and do it again
Amen

Caught between the longing for love
And the struggle for the legal tender
Where the sirens sing and the church bells ring
And the junk man pounds his fender
Where the veterans dream of the fight
Fast asleep at the traffic light
And the children solemnly wait
For the ice cream vendor
Out into the cool of the evening
Strolls the Pretender
He knows that all his hopes and dreams
Begin and end there

Ah the laughter of the lovers
As they run through the night
Leaving nothing for the others
But to choose off and fight
And tear at the world with all their might
While the ships bearing their dreams
Sail out of sight

I'm going to find myself a girl
Who can show me what laughter means
And we'll fill in the missing colors
In each other's paint-by-number dreams
And then we'll put out dark glasses on
And we'll make love until our strength is gone
And when the morning light comes streaming in
We'll get up and do it again
Get it up again

I'm going to be a happy idiot
And struggle for the legal tender
Where the ads take aim and lay their claim
To the heart and the soul of the spender
And believe in whatever may lie
In those things that money can buy
Thought true love could have been a contender
Are you there?
Say a prayer for the Pretender
Who started out so young and strong
Only to surrender
Say a prayer for the Pretender

FUCKin' damn it! When Kesey reported that the Dream was Over back in the Last Supplement to the Whole Earth Catalog, i promised myself i would live long enough to see the death of the other dream that has destroyed the planet for generations to come. I am just getting old i guess, but that damn dream is doing its damndest to out survive us all. American exceptionalism indeed, fuck you bastards.

far to the left:pragmatically, psychedelically, and hermeneutically conscious cognitive libertarian

I have publicly stated on several occasions that i insist that my president would be one who has admitted to taking a relatively large dose (250 to 500 mcgs) of LSD. There are many, many reasons for this, but first and foremost is that the first time i voted for a presidential candidate, my candidate said the following about LSD:

Senator Robert Kennedy, in 1966 said: "Perhaps to some extent we have lost sight of the fact that LSD can be very, very helpful in our society if used properly"

Now of course he was assassinated a few hours after convincingly taking the CA primary election of 2008, and LSD had been relegated to the CSA category of Schedule 1 a few months after RFK's remark.  Thus we have lived in a nation unrepentant for its abject disregard for the well-being and wellness of its citizenry, and for the cavalier attitude towards murder, torture, and imperial invasions.  In these last forty years, one sure thing you could count upon was the repression and massive interdiction into the manufacture, distribution, and use of LSD.  At the core of this successful government operation was/is the vigilant awareness that of all the things that could substantively change our society for the better (and away from the disgusting greed, planet destroying, human enslaving, species slaughtering consumer capitalism) was LSD.  As a molecule in very small quantities, it is capable of radical shifts in how one thinks about consciousness and the relation of that consciousness with the universe outside of it.  Nobel prizes have been awarded for discoveries made; incredible feats of sport have been achieved; and milestones of creative energies revealed--all under the use and influence of LSD (see David Jay Brown's CONVERSATIONS AT THE EDGE OF THE APOCALYPSE).   

In describing his vision of how important LSD can be for the future of the planet, Jonathan Ott wrote:

I firmly believe that contemporary spiritual use of entheogenic drugs is one of humankind's brightest hopes for overcoming the ecological crisis from which we threaten the biosphere and jeopardize our own survival, for Homo sapiens is close to the head of the list of endangered species.
We are indeed at the apex of a series of events that require the best and brightest minds, the most creative thinkers and artists to provide divergent and vastly numerous solutions to the catastrophic problems we face living on the planet today. It is beyond hope and reason to tacitly concur with this thought, yet do absolutely nothing to contribute to being part of the solutions. We need to agree that reason and rationality be paramount to the din of verbose, useless, religiospeak during this period. Idiotic acceptance of prophesies spoken by priests, pastors, imans, avatars, etc. concerning the whims of invisible, masculine, anthropomorphic, omniscient energy entities (illusions of deities), only further the planetary degradation and the loss of sustainable habitats for all living (actual real living) entities and species. Pragmatic reason must ascend to levels hierarchically paramount to rhetoric of faith, party, and money. Greed is no different a religion than its servant Mormonism or Scientology. 

I wholeheartedly endorse LSD as a therapeutic treatment for living in the US.  So rich and powerful a transformer of change it be, that our own government chose to use it as a remedy for curing the Soviet empire in the late 1980s.  In the mid-1980s, agents of our CIA and DEA were encouraged to make contact with a large number of LSD distributors, coaxing them to procure large scale weekly purchases for European shipment. Many of these distribution sources were very closely connected (necessary when one is asked to provide up to 15 grams of pure LSD crystal per week) with the manufacturers.  This government operation had a two prong agenda.

The first was to flood eastern Europe with Gorby acid (as some of it was labelled) encouraging citizens of Hungary, East Germany, then Czechoslovakia, Lithuania, Yugoslavia, Poland, etc., to declare their personal freedom and independence from the constraints of oppressive and coercive rule.  Rising up in these new nations were young adults who could see beyond the constraints of greed and power, and become leaders of creative and substantive change.  The second was to gain immediate access to the suppliers and manufacturers in this US, so that when the anti-Soviet operation was concluded the CIA/FBI/DEA could shut down LSD in the US. Both prongs were incredibly successful.  Coupled with the draconian drug laws of Reagan/Bush, dozens of the best LSD manufacturers and distributers were incarcerated for 20 to 40 years terms in Federal prisons, thereby securing for decades the potential for the flow of LSD to reach the citizenry of the US.  I could make a substantive argument that were it not for the near complete lack of LSD, FoxNews would not currently be able to reach and exist the large numbers of brain-dead it does.

Rising up in this wake of extreme interdiction against entheogens and other psychedelics, while permitting a huge and constant flow of heroin, cocaine, pharmaceutical painkillers and other vicious narcotics to reach the citizens, three groups have made the effort to promote new venues and directions of research.  Spawned during this same period of DARE and Just Say No, the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies, the Center for Cognitive Liberty and Ethics, and the Center for Consciousness Studies--all have been moving forward with their efforts to fund research and spread the news.  Around the world, agencies of governments as diverse as Israel, Brazil, and Canada have been interested in funding and engaging in research using MDMA to reduce PTSD and other similar pathologies.  Switzerland has recently embarked on work with LSD for people who are terminally ill and near death, as well as treatment for various chronic pain from migraines.  The US has three similar projects ongoing, and others for medical marijuana.  

At the heart of these developments is the consensual understanding that citizens of the US are endowed with the inalienable right of cognitive liberty.  We are absolutely free to keep our own minds and counsels, without accepting interference from anyone in that regard.  Indeed the Bill of Rights is formulated (and the 13th &14th Amendments) on the principle of cognitive liberty.  This crosses thresholds and emboldens misguided folks to think that a celebrant of cognitive liberty would accept libertarianism as a path towards political pragmatism. This is decidedly not true.  Libertarianism is not about cognitive liberty, it is about property liberty, and at its base is the fomenting of the same dangerous greed and selfishness that is destroying the planet through capitalism.  A citizen, knowledgeably informed of the principles of cognitive liberty, would not interfere in any regard with the freedom of thoughts and minds of others, whereas libertarians and other capitalists rejoice in the desire to attribute economic value to thoughts and minds.  Do not confuse the two, please.  

Insuring the freedom of consciousness and mind, supported by ever more available information and tools to liberate minds through education and consciousness research, and availing these minds the choices of using entheogens is a path to moving forward in hope for a better, more sustainable future.  Without free unfettered investigations in how thought processes, under the influence of LSD, can engage interactively with other species, and other holistic systems of planetary interconnectedness.  We need our earth to be populated with human beings working at their best in thought mind and deed to solve the critical problems of the upcoming year, decade, and quarter century.  Quashing tools, such as LSD, because one is afraid of the consequences of a population suddenly freed from the confines of mind-numbing media messages, only further serves the destruction of all of the planet's species.  We are on the  brink of creating the greatest period of extinction in the Earth's history.  And we are one of the species that are at great risk.  

 As Terrence McKenna, the profound researcher of entheogens and mystical states, said:

Consciousness is what we're in need of to avoid running off the cliff into armageddon!

airline pilots are raging idiots....

Over the course of the last year, i have had the opportunity to spend a great deal of time with the flight crews of the commercial airlines of the US. Most of these experiences have been pleasant and highly informative; but there has been one consistent depressing and irritating tone: pilots. Contrary to what most people might believe, the men (and 90% of them are men) are for the most part: white, conservative, former military, FoxNews-watching, misogynist bastards. And worse, they are arrogant, self-centered, solipsistic, fascist, rather racist, pinhead peckerwoods who care only and solely about themselves as elitists, while hypocritically demanding they are all about the safety of others. It is painful to experience, and helps one realize why there is a bullet-proofed locked door between them and the world.

These shit for brains, deeply believe they are some god's gift to the planet, while simultaneously dyssing their flight attendants, their peers from other airlines, and the general public. There are, of course, some rare exceptions (as there are a few female pilots and one or two black ones) but for the most part, the members of the airline pilots associations are every bit the reason we have had to endure the Bush/Cheney administration for so damn long. They never apologize for the delays they personally cause (oversleeping, previous night partying (using their carefully negotiated benefit of claiming FAA exempted exhaustion), taking the airplane itself past its safe zones thus requiring FAA ground inspections after legs {and making the next flights cancel} etc. They never apologize for bad landings, because, well, it is really something they had no control over although they spend inordinate amounts of time in the simulators practicing for all conditions. They will not apologize or acknowledge that passengers might perceive the flying of the plane (take off, sudden altitude shifts, and landing) as glaringly unsafe, because the passengers don't know anything about flying.

But pilots will be the first to complain about anything someone outside the airplane does in their daily jobs, because they are magically (and miraculously) experts in all manner of things: religion, education, politics, social relations, driving, dining, packing, music, logistics, etc. How they gain this expertise, one can never know, but experts they are and people better praise them for that. The hypocrisy of this is staggeringly appalling. I can't begin to recount the number of times i have been told this or that by them, regardless that they: possess light-years-less education, are terrifyingly unqualified, and lack even the remotest period of daily experience that this presumed expertise might suggest. If you carefully read the FAA qualifications for becoming a commercial airline pilot, you discover that they need only be 18 years of age, experienced in a variety of aircraft and simulators, have demonstrated skills and attributes to inspectors and instructors at various flight academies, flown diverse planes of increasing size and power. You notice they don't have to pass any basic literacy tests, nor graduate from universities, nor demonstrate skills in any sort of venues outside of flying a plane.

Pilots are: bigots, idiots, fascists, womanizing misogynists, far-right conservatives. They disdain all that are not pilots, as being lesser people than them (though this often includes other pilots of other airlines). Next time you fly off into the blue, remember these are not the friendly skies, but rather the nightmare asshole ones.

***UPDATE: Much is being made about the pilot of the US Airways plane that was ditched into the Hudson River. He is being hailed as a hero for doing his job; thus demonstrating all the more clearly how the general public has enabled these creeps to become giant-headed fucktards. The pilots--yes there were actually two of them who needed to coordinate actions--followed all of the procedures and steps they had been trained to follow in simulator simulations (pilots retrain, on average, two weeks of each year on simulators programmed to create these sorts of emergency situations). If this pilot is a hero for demonstrating his competency for following the script, there can be no wonder how deep into the quagmire of bullshit the Dick-n-Bush administration has taken the connotations of competency. We are fucked.