Tag Archives: politics

CLEAN UP WASHINGTON D C

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While Washington DC was indoors hard a work earlier this month, reminders of month’s end were walking around every day before the American people. Most notable were John Boehner and Nancy Pelosi.

Nancy is older. John looks worn. But they each apply the instant sun tan lotion. Boehner doesn’t wear the stuff well. He always has an orange glow to his complexion, a bronze man of power looking for a woman of his ilk.

That’s Nancy Pelosi, but she won’t waltz with anyone of his color. She knows how to apply suntan or she uses a better brand. She lacks the orange tint and sports a brown skin tone which perfectly matches her dyed hair. Nancy’s hair is done right. It does not have the green or blue tint to it that Senator Diane Feinstein has.

Now that I’m talking about the United States Senate, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention Harry Reid, who appears to wear no makeup except for flour. He’s as white as a bleached sheet and looks like Casper the Ghost.

Living under the government these guys are running is horrible enough. On all Saints Day, they should stop faking it, remove the make up and return to reality.

WHY SPY?

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America has a right to listen to Angela Merkel, and must do so for its own interests and for the interests of Europe. This opening sentence comes as a reply to a blog, my comment, a reply, my reply (incomplete).

The first observation is Angela Merkel looks completely Prussian. She never smiles; she is incapable of it. She sneers, but she hasn’t sneered for ten days.

What could dear sweet Angela Merkel, what could the Europeans be talking about that would interest Americans and make our decisions and lives better (and their lives better) if we knew what they were saying?

The Germans and their economy has benefitted more than any other country from the existence of the Euro, the Euro Zone and the European Community. Year 2010 intensified the Euro crisis in the PIGS: Portugal, Ireland, Italy, Greece, Spain. The European Community tried to resolve all the problems themselves. They could not. The United States of America got involved with support, advice and lots of money, before 2010 and during those years.

The biggest obstacles to the European effective action were the Germans led by sweet Angela and to a lesser extent the French. The Germans wanted to pay no money to any other nation for any purpose whatsoever. Yet the Germans were benefitting the most because the Euro-zone existed.

What was at stake? If Europe went into a deep rescission and possibly a Depression – lack of confidence, no economic activity, no way forward – the American economy would follow as well as the remainder of the world. Furthermore, all the nations of Europe as well as the USA know how the Germans react to end Depressions.

Listening into sweet Angela allowed the United States of America to advise, to cajole and to convince the European Community to go forward. We countered, blocked or tempered German and French arguments and proposals for inactivity, for conditional loans and for harsh policies that could never be implemented, that would prolong the Euro-crisis and that would end in Depression. Finally, the Germans had to put up much more money and agree to terms they did not like.

Amazingly, today, Halloween Week, 2013, France is protesting American actions and acting as the German lap-dogs. Meanwhile, in that country there have been protests and talk about France leaving the Euro currency, and resuming the French Franc [like the British have maintained the pound to good effect]. The French should reject the Euro. The French had beautiful banknotes, much better than the dour austere paper from the European Community. The French may not other choice but to leave. Requirements from the German-led European Community are onerous and detrimental to current conditions in the French economy. The French do not have the flexibility to react to local conditions to improve their economy and the lives of the French people.

Sour-puss, bad sport Angela wants payback because the Americans knew how to overcome German resistance. Current conditions now allow Germany to continue to screw all the other countries of the European community, just like it was doing before the Euro-crisis. Obama’s reaction to European protests should be to tell Angela and the other protesting clowns to cram it. The United States was correct. The Germans were wrong. Most of the European Community has an improving economy.

But Obama is weak and forgetful. He acts like someone wanting to be the popular Student Body President of his high school. This was a success of his administration. He is now willing to give all the credit to the Germans, apologize and promise, so he can call that Kraut, “Sweet Angela,” and Merkel can give her Prussian sneer again.

 

JFK ASSASSINATION – IV

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Errata: In a previous blog I mentioned that the brass in the School Book Depository, Sixth Floor, had been policed. RATHER, the brass had been left on the floor near the window. The police did a poor job of forensic work. There are no photographs of it in place. There were no finger prints on the brass, “hulls” which is what the Warren Commission calls them.

Also, Oswald got a ride to work the morning of November 22, 1963.

ISSUE 14. Secret Service: The primary job of the Secret Service is to guard the President and to protect his life. Secret Service agents are trained to handle weapons and to shoot weapons. They cull threats to the President, and determine appropriate responses to each threat. They determine which threats are eminent, pending or on-going.

There is nothing good to say about the Secret Service on November 22, 1963. Although many people believed Shot One was a backfiring car, some people realized it was a shot from a firearm. Every Secret Service agent apparently believed the noise was a backfire. None alerted anyone that a shot had been fired, although there was additional noise from a ricochet. All that Secret Service training was useless.

On Elm Street driving slowly comes Shot Two. The driver of the limousine apparently was a Secret Service Agent for a day. He was at the airport and had a cap that said limo driver. Someone came up and asked, “Do you want to drive President Kennedy around for the day?” “Sure, sounds like a blast. I’ll work for free.” Texas Governor was riding in the Presidential limousine that day, heard Shot Two and thought, “That’s a hunting rifle. Who’s shooting?” He was wounded. Rather than realize – two loud noises, someone’s shooting – the driver didn’t accelerate. He reportedly (in 1963) turned to see what was going on. Shot Three hit the President killing him.

CONCLUSION

The strongest evidence of Oswald’s shooting the President is he qualified as a Marine Corp marksman, barely, a few years before. His Marine Corp career was mediocre. Oswald was a screw-up. He lacked discipline. Also Oswald owned a rifle of the same make as the one found at the window of the Sixth Floor of the School Book Depository. That rifle was not found. Only a rifle of that make was found at the window.

HOWEVER,

Oswald lacked discipline throughout 1963. He had various jobs, a few from which he was fired. He moved his residence many times, but could always be contacted. He used his name and did not rely on a Selective Service card in his possession in another name. His wife moved out to share a house with a Russian/English speaking woman. Oswald went to New Orleans and traveled to Mexico City.

The rifle in the FBI’s possession is the make Oswald ordered and received in March 1963, but is it the same weapon? Investigations into the rifle and the scope were inconclusive. No one remembered Oswald at any gun shop or store. No one remembered Oswald buying ammunition. One person remembers a rifle of that make with the cheap scope having no shoulder strap, unlike the FBI/Sixth Floor rifle. 

There are holes and omissions in all the investigations and analyses of each. It is impossible to explain the discrepancies by looking at Lee Harvey Oswald as a lone shooter. Supplying another shooter – one with a reliable weapon (like the reenactments) and a capable shooter (unlike Oswald) – fills in holes and omissions. 

Oswald’s fingerprints on boxes near the Sixth Floor window is inconsistent with no fingerprints on the brass (shell casings, the “hulls”) found on the floor there. There is no indication when and how Oswald’s fingerprints got on the boxes – did he move them from a lower floor to the Sixth Floor?

If Oswald had shot the President would he act innocently after the shooting. He was cool and civil, unlike most of his behavior throughout 1963. He did shoot the Dallas Police Officer, but no one actually knows what transpired between them. In 1963 carrying a concealed weapon in Texas was not unusual, so carrying a handgun was not evidence of Oswald shooting the President.

We do not know if Oswald was part of a conspiracy. It is concluded early on that Oswald likely did not know any other shooter. It may be that Oswald, unaware, helped a shooter in the School Book Depository. After the shooting he put two plus two together and knew he was in trouble. During any interrogation Oswald knew his life, however non-criminal and disjointed, and all his acquaintances and “friends” would come under scrutiny. He did not like the government and its meddling. He tried putting distance (not much) between himself and the scene.

The attempted assassination of Walker [April 1963] has been challenged. The bullet fired at Walker may not have been fired from a rifle Oswald had access to. Two men may have been involved. Suppose Oswald did not attempt that shooting: He still had a very unreliable weapon with which he had not practiced up to November 22. Indeed, while doing the investigation, the FBI was unable to shoot with the Sixth Floor rifle without shots drifting.

I note no reenactment and no analysis has its expert, its marksmen, its sharpshooter, etc. adjusting sights, moving and reloading before each shot and taking all the shots within the five seconds. Also no reenactment expert, marksman or sharpshooter missed the Shot One by so wide a margin, yet put the next shots on target.

Supposedly, Oswald had a ride to work, and he carried a length of “curtain rods” in a brown grocery bag. Some say the bag was Oswald’s lunch; he had carried one on many work days before. [He was eating something in the lunch room.] Almost everyone agrees that if the “curtain rod” bag was the rifle, Oswald had to assemble much, some or part of the rifle. It seems Oswald had no time to test it. He likely put it together in a hurry. [Indeed, the FBI found the weapon in poor assembly.] He shot and missed Shot One.

Summarizing, Oswald’s marksmanship credentials are old; he is not a good shot. He’s not the same guy in November 1963 as he was when he barely qualified as a marksman. The rifle is very mediocre; it is unreliable. Shot One is the strongest support for refuting Oswald’s role as the lone gunman. He couldn’t hit the broadside of a limousine. Because of poor police work (state and federal), the American people will never get answers and receive a definitive answer.

 

JFK ASSASSINATION – III

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Previous blogs discussed issues 1 – 4, about the basic condition of Oswald’s rifle and Oswald’s qualities as a marksman. This blog will discuss Lee Harvey Oswald.

ISSUE 5: Politics.

Oswald’s politics have been investigated, considered, hyped and misinterpreted. Oswald said he was a “Marxist, not a communist.” In the Leftist world that is like saying “I’m a Christian, not a Catholic [Lutheran, etc.]” Marxism is a philosophy; Christianity is a faith rooted and using philosophical means to bring followers to Jesus. Unlike Islam or Judaism there is no law by which to structure a civil society based upon interpretations of the teachings of Jesus. Indeed, in the Christian world most of the wars among Christian nations have stemmed from disagreements from one interpretation of Christianity or another. Marxism elevates economics to primary importance in civil society and attempts to structure society around these economic truths. Communism unsuccessfully uses Marxism to establish and perpetuate itself. 

I believe Oswald understood these differences between Marxism and Communism. He moved to the Soviet Union intending to live his life there. He married a Russian. When he decided to leave the Soviet Union, remarkably his wife was allowed to go with him. That freedom of travel might indicate that Oswald was going to spy or be a sleeper for the Soviets in America. 

But little about Oswald recommended him to the Soviets for espionage or sleeper purposes. He was an American; his returning made him high profile. He had a Russian born wife. He wasn’t very intelligent. After returning to the United Stats, he joined leftist organizations and met leftists, and at some points distributed leaflets. He bought a rifle and was photographed with it, writing a leftist mentor a caption, Fascist killer. All this plus other facts suggest Oswald was a blowhard and a braggart. That’s not someone to put on anyone’s espionage payroll.

ISSUE 6. Rifle Ownership.

Oswald owned a rifle from March 1963. That rifle was fitted with a cheap scope. Ownership and possession are not the same thing. Indeed, Oswald did not possess the rifle the whole time. Presumably it was in storage, at someone’s house. It is unknown who had access to the rifle or if Oswald let someone use it. Note, Oswald did not have a car; he did not drive. Days before November 22 Oswald returned to the place where the rifle was stored claiming he was taking curtain rods. In subsequent investigations the curtain rods became Oswald’s rifle. 

ISSUE 7. First Assassination Attempt.

Documents found in the possession of Oswald’s wife support the theory that Oswald used his new rifle in April 1963 to shoot at General Walker, retired. Oswald surveyed the shooting site for two months. That shot was at night. The general was sitting at his desk in a lighted room. It was an easy shot at a stationery target. Ballistics were inconclusive about the rifle. Oswald left instructions with his wife about what to do if he were arrested.

ISSUE 8. Oswald’s Ventures Until October 1963.

Oswald moved around a lot. His wife lived with another woman, speaker of English and Russian. Oswald held various jobs. He traveled to Mexico City. He went to New Orleans. He returned to Dallas.

ISSUE 9. Employment Along Motorcade.

It was certainly fortuitous that the presidential motorcade passed by the building where Oswald had a job from mid-October 1963. The motorcade route was presented in the newspapers no later than November 20, 1963. What we’re supposed to believe, this Marine Corp marksman decided to kill the President when the motorcade passed his workplace. This spur of the moment decision is unlike the care he took when trying to kill General Walker seven months earlier.

The suppositions for the Oswald’s mindset to commit this assassination are highly speculative. There are not written ramblings about JFK {Robert Kennedy and Sirhan-Sirhan}. Whether Oswald was mentally -ill is supported by sketchy evidence. He wasn’t overly intelligent. He was a flake and unstable. Oswald was paranoid about the government surveilling him. Many of those disabilities would make his ability to act as an assassin on three days notice (November 19, 20, 21) unlikely. Initially bothering Oswald would be self-preservation: If I shoot from the School Book Depository, every cop in the world will be in the building in a minute. I’ll be trapped like a rat by a government I don’t like. I wish I were in the Soviet Union. How does Oswald get the rifle to the building? On the bus? No bus driver or passenger saw him carrying a rifle or curtain rods onto the bus. No one saw him bring in his show-and-tell exhibit in or put it anywhere.  No one saw Oswald construct a sniper’s nest along side the Sixth Floor window. No one saw Oswald outside the building looking the site over on November 19, 20 or 21. 

These are concerns that would enter the mind of every Marine marksman because getting away or defending the position is the training.

ISSUE 10. Sixth Floor. Shot One.

Below the Sixth Floor window, Houston Street approaches the School Book Depository on the perpendicular. At the intersection below traffic can make a 270 degree turn onto Main Street, or a 300 degree turn onto Elm Street roughly running on a diagonal toward the underpass.

All vehicles in the presidential motorcade had to slow to a crawl, 5 miles an hour to turn, for appearance, comfort and safety. 

President Kennedy was in the right backseat of the car. The First Lady, Mrs. Kennedy, was in the left backseat of the car.

Any shooter in the Sixth Floor window is standing (a more difficult shot) looking down at the intersection. Oswald purportedly aimed at the President 90 feet away. He fired. This shot was “mistaken” for a “backfiring” car.

Shot One missed. Oswald missed by yards. It has been analyzed and tested that this bullet hit the road or something in the road. It broke apart and a fragment went as far down Elm Street as the overpass about 150 yards off.

For the ricochet to travel that distance, it had to hit the street on the left side of the Presidential limousine, where the First Lady was sitting and at least nine feet from the President.

If Shot One had hit the street between the School Book Depository and the Presidential limousine [on the right side where the President was sitting], the ricochet and all fragments would have gone into the car. Apparently, no bullets or fragments were found in the limousine.

ISSUE 11. Oswald’ State of Mind.

Shot One was Oswald’s kill shot, easy, close very slow moving target, everything a marksman ought to be able to hit at 30 yards. He missed.

It is very likely Oswald intended to take one shot, the easy kill shot. He shot, left the window and did not know that he missed. Trees obscured his view. He put the rifle to the side and hurried away. He was on a lower Depository Floor, in the stairwell. He didn’t seem rushed; he was cool and civil. He passed a police officer who didn’t notice anything unusual about him.

If Oswald took shots Two and Three, he had to reload before each shot. Rather than shoot from concealment, inside the room facing Houston Street, he had to move to look down Elm Street. While reloading, adjusting his position so he doesn’t lean over and not to shoot while his body was partially twisted, trying to keep the barrel of the rifle from sticking out the window. What’s a snapshot of Oswald’s thinking at that moment? I missed! How did I do that? I shot at the General and missed an easy shot! I took an easy shot at the President and missed! I’m a lousy shot. I can’t hit the broadside of a barn. This rifle is not good. It’s in poor condition! I should have spent more time at the firing range. I never should have done this. I have to hurry to take more shots!

This is a lot of think about for anyone to consider while moving himself to shoot at a moving target that was moving away at 12 miles an hour.

If Oswald carried three rounds with him, what happened to the other rounds? Where did he keep the added rounds, 2, 3 and more?In his pockets? I’ve heard and seen no evidence of rounds on the window frame, handy and ready to load. Oswald wasn’t wearing shooting gear, a vest where ammunition could be quickly obtained. Presumably, he was in work clothes. No vest was found in the School Book Depository. If Oswald had put out rounds, he likely would have put out more than two rounds on the window sill or someplace handy to the Sixth Floor Window.

Oswald did not lose a bullet on the Sixth Floor Window. None was found. Remarkably, Oswald policed his shots. No one found shell casings on the Sixth Floor floor at or near the window. No one found a spent casing in the chamber of the rifle left at the scene. Oswald did not have bullets or shell casings on him at home. None were found anywhere he traveled by bus or taxi.

Needless to say, if Oswald had to fish rounds from the pockets of his work clothes, he could not have taken Shots Two and Three. It would have taken much too long. If he were rushed to extract rounds from pockets, he likely would have dropped some on the floor near the window.

ISSUE 12. Psychology of Assassination.

When shooting at a high profile target, most assassins get close. It eliminates doubt and intensifies hatred, delusions and demented motivations. Assassinations with rifles, at a distance, have different methods and motivations. For instance James Earl Ray in 1968 had an escape plan; he was tracked and arrested in Europe. But Oswald’s after-the-incident actions are at best poorly conceived and distorted, unlike a Marine marksman who is trained to get away.

Either Oswald was plenty stupid or he had no reason to get away. Americans do not know if Oswald was on his lunch hour at the time of the shooting. Oswald left the School Book Depository by the front door before it was closed. He went home, got a jacket and went out, taking a bus to a business district. He was stopped by a Dallas police officer, whom he shot with a handgun. 

At that time he knew the cops were after him for the death of the officer. Whether he knew he was a “person of interest” in the death of the President, we don’t know. Oswald next went to the movies, albeit without paying, where he was arrested.

An intelligent assassin would have assumed a disguise – mustache and a wig, using a cane, and he would have traveled away. Not for Oswald. He was in public and not running. In March 1963 Oswald left instructions for his wife, with whom he was living, when he tried to shoot General Walker, but left no writing or instructions for his wife in November 1963.

ISSUE 13. Killing of Oswald. 

On Sunday, November 24, 1963, the American people watched Jack Ruby kill Lee Harvey Oswald. 

The American people never got much of the story of Oswald, his background, his intelligence, his abilities and every detail of his life from November 20-21 and especially on November 22, 1963.

Oswald was dead. Quick resolution. Case closed.

 

JFK ASSASSINATION – II

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There was more than one shooter in Dallas on November 22, 1963, and that person(s) was likely killed soon after the President was dead. It is unlike that Oswald knew this other person(s). However, these other persons were much better shots than Oswald. 
Throughout these blogs I assume Oswald owned the rifle that was recovered by the FBI.

ISSUE 1: Condition of Oswald’s Rifle. After the assassination the American people were told that Oswald had purchased a rifle of Italian make through the mail for $13.00. It presumably was war surplus, or a knock-off of a World War Two model. There aren’t many improvements that can made to a rifle like that. Oswald got what he paid for. The idea that Oswald’s rifle could be modified to improve it is wrong.

ISSUE 2: Marksmanship. In the mid-1950s Oswald joined the U.S. Marines, and he qualified as a marksman. That means in a shooting position or shooting positions, he hit the target frequently on the firing range at a given distance, 100 -200 yards. BUT Oswald was not a sniper. He did not receive that training, which involves much more shooting with different sorts of weapons. It involves firing many more rounds at targets from various positions. Oswald likely could not meet the psychological and other standards which Marine snipers must have.

ISSUE 3: Practice. There has been a dispute about a photograph in which Oswald holds a rifle similar to the one he bought for $13.00. I do not know if that photograph was real.  As a “marksman” Oswald needed to practice. Did Oswald practice on a firing range, or did he just occasionally shoot at tin cans from the back porch of his house? How much did Oswald practice? Did he shoot off 5,000 rounds, or was it 35?

When did the route of Presidential motorcade become known to the public and to Oswald? It is obvious that Oswald did not have months to prepare. He may have had a week. Any sniper as well as any marksman will explain to anyone that it is necessary to practice such a shot from the actual shooting position, if possible. If not shots can be made, it is very helpful to stand with the weapon in the position and project circumstances at the time of shooting. Where to aim for the kill shot?  It is doubtful if Oswald did anything like that, although in the Sixth Floor of the School Book Depository, Oswald would have to turn his body some to take shots Two and Three. 

It has not been explained how devoted Oswald was to firing his rifle. A single photograph of Oswald holding a rifle does not make Oswald a fiend for guns or for that rifle. Under normal circumstances it is improbable Oswald would have made shots Two and Three without intense practice. Oswald’s marksmanship qualifications are a red herring.

ISSUE 4: Reenactments. The History Channel [Military Channel, Assassination Channel] have reenacted the setting of the November 22, 1963 site down to the last millimeter. They have used the same model of Oswald’s rifle, but have not used Oswald’s rifle. It is probable that the rifle being shot is in as fine a condition as that rifle can be (and very much unlike Oswald’s rifle). The shooter is a sniper, or someone with sniper abilities. He knows he has three shots to fire, not one. And it is to be assumed that the shooter practiced, including with his body turned (for shots Two and Three).

The reenactments are wrong and misleading.

More in the next blog.

 

JFK ASSASSINATION – I

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FIFTY YEARS AGO sitting in a classroom in 1963 I got the news from my teacher. John Fitzgerald Kennedy had been assassinated.

LB JERK was the new President, and how bad was LB Jerk? Nine (9) year Vietnam War with 56,000 deaths and hundreds of thousands of casualties, fighting for what?   Two more assassinations, a political opponent of The Jerk and a meddlesome troublemaker.    Trillions spend on well-intentioned, ineffective social programs that don’t work to this day despite 45 years of legislative tinkering.   Being president in 1968, a weak, unhealthy old man.

A joke, black humor, about the assassination fits the Sixties:  LBJ couldn’t go hunting this year. Why not? Oswald would give him back his gun.

SPORTS & POLITICS

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It seems American politics has become much like watching sporting events. Everyone play is the same; every pitch is the same; every dunk is the same; every hole is the same. Or if you’re watching car racing and the world go in circles, every lap is the same.

I no longer watch sports on TV or in person. [I’ll watch kids play sports because it’s fun. Most of them are out there for the fun.] Professional sports is bad entertainment and a horrible waste of time. I’ve seen games before, and today nothing seems new, better or improved. Going to the park is a rip-off – expensive seats, expensive parking with delays, slow play, expensive and poor concessions. And by going to the park the fan doesn’t avoid advertising, which allows big salaries and great profits but long, boring performances. There is no telling why a long-haired, unkempt, fat, unshaven slob takes as long as a minute between pitches unless he’s as slow and stupid as he looks. Hasn’t any pitcher watched Sandy Koufax in a 20 second delivery routine: Strike out. If batters took their time with Koufax, they could strike out slowly. In the 1963 World Series Koufax pitched the first game, struck out 15 Yankees and won a complete game. Reportedly, Yogi Berra said after the game, “How did he ever lose five [games]” [Koufax was 23-5 during the 1963 season.]

I watch pitchers today and wonder, how come he didn’t lose 15 [games]. Complete games are rare. PItchers are unprepared and pampered. Nothing is expected of them beyond six innings, when a bunch of relief pitchers with concocted names [titles] handle the remainder of the game. It is no wonder why many pitchers can’t get beyond four innings and allow no runs: Reduced expectations + reduced performance + reduced abilities = mediocrity. The New World Order protects the pitcher’s arm. 1963 when Koufax won 23, Warren Spahn was 23 -7 and 42 years old. Spahn weighed 170, was six feet tall and disciplined, unlike the hairy, disheveled, drooling, drug-cursed, mama’s goons pitching on the mound today.

The first point about sports today is, mediocrity is punctuated by advertising to make it palpable. There are readers who don’t believe it. Anyone who saw Wilt Chamberlain play, who saw the speed, maneuverability and strength, knows that if Walt were playing basketball using today’s rules, he’s score 100 points a game. If the strong men today got tough, Wilt would slam dunk them. 

What do we have in Washington DC: Executive, Legislature and Supreme Court: Mediocrity punctuated by cable TV favoring one group of Ordinaries or another. We expect no excellence in sports; why expect any extraordinary in government.

Has anyone listened to today’s sportscasters? Their speech is an insult to human beings, unintelligent and incoherent, and long exposure will reduce the IQ of any listener a point every month. Listeners learn the cliches, to replace intelligence, reason and cogency. Sportscasters use cliches as emotional nuggets which lack any bearing to what’s happening on the court, diamond, field, course or track. 

There are exceptions. Chick Hearn – “air ball,” “no harm, no foul,” ‘pop-corn machine.”  Hearn was absent from the radio for a while. Upon returning he used cliches which had originated with him. The reaction of listeners: Why doesn’t he say something original?

I wrote a screenplay about baseball announcers, and I’ll compliment myself: It is very funny. The research was torturous. I listened to baseball announcers for a season, and took down as much nonsense, stupidity and irrelevance as I could: About the pitcher looking at the catcher before tossing the ball: “He wants the next pitch to be a strike.” OR, “The score is Giants 4, Reds 2.” Immediately the announcer does the arithmetic: “The Giants have a two-run lead.” Because nobody bought this screenplay, I concluded, the whole country needs to stop taking itself so seriously and improve its sense of humor.

The problem with selling that screenplay was (1) Everyone in the hometown was mortally offended, once they realized the local favorites were being accurately targeted and fairly portrayed. (2) Everyone out of town believed the whole scenario improbable.

But sports fans and watchers are swamped in cliches. That’s all they hear and think about. They remember nothing else but, is the running back going left or right; is the quarterback going to pass? Frequently cliches are ironically nonsensical. Marv Albert, sports announcer and backbiter yelled, “Yes. Yes! YES!” when a basketball player made a basket, I assume.1/  Frequently, the cameraman missed the shot, and Marv was so overwhelmed with the thrill, that he didn’t mention the change of score. Or course, I’ve heard that exclamation from women under much different circumstances.  To me “Yes. Yes! YES!” is a confusing, meaningless cliche when referring to action on the basketball court, but Marv may have different experiences.

Cliche thinking, cliche uttering, cliches in the heart, Americans know nothing else; they remember nothing else. Should the Congress of the United States review all programs and pass a budget every year? Note, the last budget passed was in 2008. The Democrats want a Clean Continuing Resolution. The Republicans want to cut the budget, or what’s left of it. Cutting a clean continuing resolution sounds messy. What do Americans think? Consult the cliches. Another situation: Obamacare – Website Failure is just like a football team that has three downs and punts. It happens all the time. Considering the Administration has had three years to put it into place, Obama’s claims about creating high tech jobs doesn’t ring true.

Why do I feel “fourth down and 25 yards to go” are upon us in America. Peyton Manning is not at quarterback. Barack Obama has the ball, and everyone knows but is unwilling to tell him, “Barack, you can’t play no ball!” He knows it. His game has become golf, a one man effort against the elements, letting the President hide undesirable traits: impatience and a poor team play. How often does he call anyone? Democrats say, not too often.

Who are the announcers in the political arena? An example. An American was watching MSNBC and laughing. “I thought Chris Matthews was going to have a heart attack or a stroke.” Terrific! I thought. Just what America needs. Announcers having heart attacks and strokes on TV.

I next considered it might be a good idea. The 100 or so announcers on cable TV should all have heart attacks or strokes and be off the air a while. Reporting and news will be better.

Today there is no reason to watch cable TV and the announcers. There is no NEWS, just loads of talking from opinionated, dogmatic, overwrought, emotional clowns mugging to Americans. It is bad news and also bad entertainment. [For good entertainment watch the movie, Network, and as a game figure out who on cable TV best plays Peter Finch’s character. Who plays Sybil the Soothsayer. Guess who’s going to sponsor the new reality show, Revolution – not the Steven Spielberg knockoff.] Today, there are empty suits and straw women on cable TV aping one group or pleasing another.

 

I have nothing against Chris Matthews. I know he can’t be as irrational and wild as he acts. He has to have some sane moments. {Replace Chris Matthews’s name with the name of any other Cable TV person.}

What all these Cable guys and gals should know is, stick to the news and give it. If you slide into entertainment, you may end up naked, and Miley Cyrus will be your co-host. 

Where does this leave Americans? Most situations in politics and sports cannot be described, and for most fans, spectators and observers, they hear no reason, intellect or logic. There are cliches to explain the emotion of everything but leave people empty and discontent.

1/ Marv Albert was at the leading edge of the vampire craze. Today his actions may noteworthy and prescient rather than be proscribed by ancient laws.

CLICHE SUNDAY

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It is my perception that every Sunday the cliches for the week in Sports and in Politics change. I suppose this is healthy so we don’t belabor points and we don’t bore ourselves.

SPORTS: Saturday and Sunday are big football days. The focus on certain teams change which means the talents of this player or that defense comes into focus. New is not the cliches used to describe the teams of the week. New is that the cliches are applied to a new set of players, defenses and cities. Few Americans feel left out.

POLITICS:  The cliches change frequently. A set of terms, cliches, are used on the talk shows, and for the remainder of the week, columnists, pundits, letter writers, commentarians, personalities, broadcasters, editorialists and others with public exposure exhaust the discussion of one cliche or another. I do not know what are the upcoming cliches; I don’t want to know what they are. I’m sure by the end of Sunday [today] I will have heard enough of them to wish for a new batch.

However, it will take the politicians [Republicans and Democrats] to digest a whole week’s worth for any of them to sink in.

JUNKETS

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Junkets, Michael Ulin Edwards, $.99 iBookstore

I’m amused by anyone exorcised by Ed Snowdon, prime moron proven traitor, who downloaded crap from the National Security Agency. Everyone reading this post should comment, “You’re a nut,” if you do NOT believe that when you download anything from the National Security Agency, you don’t also download a bunch of stuff the NSA wants on your computer or in your storage systems.

Those readers who would never download anything from the NSA because you don’t want to invite the NSA into your life, signal your agreement by liking this post.

It is likely, probable, a certainty that when Snowdon removed stuff, he took a few things the NSA didn’t want to share with the world; he took a a lot of stuff the world already knows; and he took a bunch of stuff that the NSA wants people and countries to put into their storage systems and computers.

JUNKETS is about the next American intelligence mission, to one of the two targets: China. A middle aged woman on a tour is the operative. The first chapter follows. The remainder at 41,500 words are on the iBookstore for 99 cents, under my name, Michael Ulin Edwards.

CHAPTER 1

Gladys Goode was happy the garbage man had come early. It was noon on her walk to the street. Usually she had to drag the trash container up her long, unpaved drive in the evening. June 2013, no mud, she would get gravel delivered and spread before the fall rains.

She pulled the can toward her, and it slumped right and fell. She stepped around and looked at the rear – a wheel had fallen off. With a foot she moved the container a few feet. There was no wheel.

“They took the damned wheel with the garbage!” she yelled and kicked the container. It moved some but didn’t roll. She kicked it again, again, and again!

She looked across the street, and those neighbors‘ container was fine.

Mine was all right when I wheeled it out, she thought. He wheeled his lame-ass can over and stole mine. He – his whole family was disgusting and despicable. He had had a large boulder on his undeveloped side lot, and always during high water and drenching rains, water rolled off his property onto the street and took out the front of Gladys‘ yard. She had asked politely and offered to make improvements. NO. Secretly, she got tests and solutions, drilled holes and filled them and cracks in the imposing boulder. After the next storm and water, big rocks from the boulder, cracked off and rolled down the street smacking cars, lamp posts and mail boxes. Those neighbors filed claims, all within the last year, and the neighbor across the street had more than a foot of topsoil covering his front yard.

Gladys believed that guy hated her but had no reason to. She had done her work quietly. Now he had traded his defective container for hers.

To feel better she looked uphill at the neighbor’s side lot where the rocks and earth had moved and spread. Coming over the crest was a car, a late model American SUV. She recognized the vehicle for what it was – two men.

She glowered and stared.
The car stopped.
“That’s Gladys Goode,” said the middle-aged man in the passenger seat. His nickname was Honcho except to Gladys. He had been around – around the block, around town, around country, around the world. “Don’t think she’s been drinking. Looks pretty good.”

“What’s she doing?” asked the young driver, Ashton, two years out of the Ivy League, from a wealthy family who always considered Bill Donovan an honorary member. He was green so asked, “Why is she staring at us?”

“She knows I’m in the car, or someone more senior. She waiting for me to flinch.”

The driver looked at his supervisor. He didn’t know much. He had been moved to personal development testing – already he had identified five employees with Jason Bourne tendencies. Now he was on a road trip, chauffeur into the sticks.

He took his foot off the brake.
“Stop!” the older man ordered. “She can’t win this easily.”
“She doesn’t look that tough. I can talk to her,” the novice advanced.

“She’ll only talk to me or someone higher. And never underestimate her intelligence or adaptability. ” He looked ahead. “I’ve known her 23 years. She is a cat now – sit, be patient, relax, watch our gas gauge go lower.”

“How does she know how much gas we have?” the apprentice asked looking at the gauge near empty.

“We drove from Washington. It’s noon. She knows how much fuel the tank holds, the mileage we get and the time. We didn’t stop for gas. She also knows I have to take a leak.”

“I also suppose she doesn’t want to talk to us,” the young man said.
“Certainly, but don’t be offended by anything she says.”
The boy looked at Honcho – chief, supervisor, boss. It was supposed to be a privilege to drive him into the wilds, but the kid didn’t know which state he was in. Honcho had been known to drop personnel off at no where, completely forlorn to find their own way home. So Ashton would do everything he was told.

He interpreted a hand gesture – roll ahead, and releasing the brake, drove the car down the hill.

Gladys Goode watched it come like she would stop it on her own. But it stopped, and Honcho got out.

“Hello, Gladys. Hello, hello, hello.”
“There’s a urinal in the public park down the street, Bosco.”
“I’m very happy to see you’re so well.”
“I don’t want you taking a whiz anywhere near my property. It will confuse the dogs.”

“How long’s it been? Five years?”
The assistant got out, and Gladys looked at him disgusted. She asked, “Which shit-for-brains Ivy did you pull him out of?” She peered at Honcho, “I left because too many Ivys were coming in – they’re so innocent and incredulous. I bet that little girl, smiley-face, tiny-voice, big- busted wench has been promoted!”

“When’s the last time you had a vacation?” Honcho asked.

“I don’t consider seventeen days getting back here, using every chance to rinse my clothes because I had to leave my luggage, a vacation!” she looked and shook a finger at Mr. Ivy. “You fly a 1950s vintage Beechcraft across the Gulf of Guinea and have a good time.”

“Why don’t we talk inside?” Honcho suggested.
“Have Ivy bring up my trash container.”
“Mr. Ashton is my assistant…”
“I’m demanding because I can, Bosco!” she spit a response and stepped toward the car.

Her eyes left his and looked behind him.
Ashton turned and saw the neighbor’s trash container, and the neighbor and kids were driving from their driveway. As they passed, they looked at the people on the street, and their expressions changed.

Ashton looked at Gladys and saw the meanest countenance he had seen on any human being. It was scary.

Gladys noticed him and walked up her drive. Honcho accompanied her. She asked, “Why did you hire him? He’s too pretty to be of use to anyone.”

Out of earshot Honcho said, “We’re looking for someone to be a high school biology teacher, from the Mid-West.”

Her house was functional and looked lived in without dirt or dust. The front porch shaded a wide picture window. The wall underneath, inside, was taken up by a couch and a chair. The wall opposite supported a humongous TV purchased the month before. At the end of the room were two rocking chairs and foot stools with a lamp between them. Opposite them was small wall with paintings hiding the hallway between the kitchen and the bathroom, now in use.

Gladys turned on the TV news, muted. She waited sat in a rocker, no cushions, wooden flat slats giving an instant back massage with rocking. She shut her eyes to feign dosing.

Honcho came from the bathroom, and noticed the TV. He didn’t want to sit on the couch, and not in the other rocker. The easy chair was too small for him, but he headed to it. He said, “You’ve made this home very comfortable.”

“I turned on the TV to see what was happening worldwide to cause you to come see me.”

“There’s no crisis. I’m visiting an old friend.”
“Let me get this out. Those clowns running the show are incapable and incompetent! Let’s have more revelations, more screws loose, operate by trusting, be completely naive and promote unsupervised innocents. I thought the previous administration was bad. Who do I berate most, because it needs doing: Moron One! Idiot Two! Jackass Three! Asshole Four! Why would I want to work for you again? I’ve seen your beaming mouth and blinding teeth. I have a big screen TV. Football season’s about to start.”

“You’ve never been a fan.”
“It’s in the package.”
“We’re paying: Your pension gets a thousand-dollar a month boost.”
“No taxes?”
“Everything you’ve ever done has been done in war, so no. And your neighbor doesn’t have to know about your tests and analysis of their boulder and your purchase of various acids.”

“Too cheap.”

He noticed on the floor under a small table a plastic box filled with books – software, programming, were words in the titles.

“Are you studying for a new career?”

“That deluded sap who stole all that NSA data. First, most of it is nothing – email addresses and telephone numbers. Trolling for words, phrases, and once anyone realizes its insignificance, he’s toast. I can buy more complete information from Google, Facebook and Link-in as well as get the buying habits for any American from Amazon, Yahoo, the credit card companies, box stores, the local grocery store, pharmacy, art and auto supply shops and nursery companies. What’s that fool thinking?”

“Every American has a right to privacy, except every commercial transaction tells the political parties how you’re going to vote. And he’s now committed treason! No one, our side or theirs, will ever trust him. He’ll end up in a village of peons, probably an elementary school teacher, or he’ll be stuck checking the sewers and flood control channels for the remainder of his life in the middle of Asia, living under repressive regimes until he’s ninety! Howdy-doody to the rest of the world. That kid saw too many Jason Bourne movies! He even gave information to The Guardian newspaper!”

Ashton stood in the kitchen, looking into the living room.

“Ivy, the toilet is to your right, down the hall. Lift the seat! That kid is so innocent, he’s committed every bone-headed mistake.” She looked at Honcho who was non-committal. “Unless he’s a plant.”

“I don’t know,” Honcho responded.
“Or a dupe.”
Honcho shrugged.
“Otherwise, this kid’s experience has been seen and told, and is what every American should have learned from the after-traitor troubles of Benedict Arnold.”

“Other than the TV and your course work, what’s life like here?”
“Killing neighbor’s pets, shooting at the cops every so often. We have a lot of fun. My pharmacist knows me.”

“Other than pay, what do you want?”
“Details – itinerary, how long, whom I’ll see, whom I’ll be with. It’s been twelve years, and the body doesn’t respond as well as it did once.”

Honcho grimaced. He knew her recent medical check up was sterling. “Is much changed since your Peace Corp experience in 1976?”

“When my parents thought the university was making me a revolutionary, a feminist, a liberationist, a communist and a drug addict?”

Ashton came into the room and stood.
Gladys spoke to him: “I told my parents I wanted to be an anarchist, another “ist” noun, whether Communist or Christ. So the Corp sent me to Bolivia. I found a boy, sex and no love; we never married. It was convenience. I wasn’t a college grad, but had an ear for music and words in language and could remember a lot. So Ivy, are you shocked at the casual way I entered the rat race?”

Ashton hesitated. He didn’t expect to be addressed or to hear her history. She wasn’t the sort the agency was made of today.

“So what did you do?” Gladys demanded of him.

“I considered the neighbor’s barrel, but they had seen me. There was a telephone number on each container, so I called about getting a new container. I figured they owned each one. They said it would take two weeks, so I got emotional and said how you hurt yourself trying to move it without a wheel. You had fallen down. I didn’t know your name but I told them I was married to your niece, and everyone was at the hospital but me. I had the undesirable assignment of calling about the defective container. So they said they’d get a new container to you in two days.”

Gladys looked at Honcho and said, “That’s a good lie.”
“We’d like the up-front expense to be the same, but we can pad the pension.”
“Is that going to be paid at all, in full?” she coughed disregarding that flummery.
“Your articles about local plants have been fascinating.”
“If we can come to larger terms, and I like it, I may do it. Do you boys want something to drink, or eat? Save your per diem for something special.”

“She a sleeper?” Ashton said driving from Gladys house.

“The best agent I’ve ever worked with. Has always known how everything works. And she’ll know what we’re asking her to do. She reads a lot – has a huge library in the back rooms. That’s her family and company, knowledge. There are no kids, but a sibling sister with brats.”

Trying to get the true message Ashton looked at the road.

“You notice how she dropped in, ‘I want a dog.?’” Honcho asked. “That’s the way to say, ‘NO,’ to me. Old people with dogs never go anywhere.”

“She really doesn’t want a dog? But I asked, ‘Which breed?’”

“Not the first person to be confused. I’ve had conversations with her since the beginning, and I thought she was tizzy, but she knew what was happening – the goals and approximately how to do it.”

“Is that why she was talking about buying the contents of storage bins and ebaying everything?”

“That may have been an entrée to learn about the assignment, but I haven’t figured that out. I mostly never do, but I know she understands and will act independently and appropriately.”

Ashton looked over, so long that Honcho pointed to the road.

“Let me explain. I complained to her once about roundabout, beating around the bush, never-getting-to-the-point conversations. She likes those. There are no specific instructions. And what’s going to happen if anyone ever interrogates her? Nobody has told her anything. She works on her own doing a specific job. It’s part of who she is: Gladys.”

“Gladys?”

“She brought in a book with definitions of names, and Gladys is is from the Welsh, ‘of unknown origin, of uncertain derivation.’”

“She likes to be in and solve puzzles?” Ashton asked.

“A whiz at crosswords. Never get into a contest with her. She’ll take all your money; she didn’t leave me with carfare. And that’s why she’ll do this. You see the way she was kicking the can? The puzzle solving in her neighborhood disappeared with the boulder.”

Michael Ulin Edwards, 99 cents, iBookstore

THE WRATHFUL GRAPE – John Steinbeck

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THE WRATHFUL GRAPES

The Grapes of Wrath, John Steinbeck.

The first chapter of this novel was excellent. It is three pages long.

Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4 – at the end of that reading I had a hint, becoming suspicions, impressions and conclusions that if an editor did a hard read of this novel, they would shake 50,000 words from it, lose no content and make it more intelligible and comprehensible.

I had a sharper reaction. It seemed written by a government employee or someone working on a government program. So I checked, and I was correct. John Steinbeck spent time during the 1930s on the Federal Writers Project. No telling what he did, but government writing did do very little for him. It left Steinbeck very undisciplined. The only discipline he had was writing an outline which he followed but didn’t know how to use. This novel is the result of any government activism in the arts – poor works of literature, badly composed music, ill-conceived sculptures and paintings by applying colors identified by numbers.

Should anyone write a novel like The Grapes following an outline? It is impossible to figure out at the beginning. The length of this novel is about 200,000 words. Notating this point, explicating that point and figuring out the relationship between them is important, and how to express each, but a detailed outline [I. A. B. 1. 2. a. b.]? Idiots believe they can use microscopic analysis to make every point, identify every adverb and specify every comma and period for 200,000 words.

Indeed, reading WordPress blogs for two months, I’ve come across posts acclaiming the benefits of outlining without the writers telling what their outlines consist of, or how they are used or how the outline prompts their imaginations to produce any passage, chapter or book making the novel, story or writing memorable and excellent. Moreover, I’ve seen a blog advertise a “Storyboard” for novelists, like film writers do so they have illustrations they can show actors, art directors, directors and producers [people who do not read]. This is outlining at its worst, and removes the imagination of any writer from the process. These Storyboards reveal the accuracy and truth of George Owell’s analysis (my previous blog READ ORWELL):

“It would probably not be beyond human ingenuity to write books by machinery…Even more machine-like is the production of short stories, serials and poems for the very cheap magazines. Papers such as the Writer abound with advertisements of Literary Schools, all of them offering you ready-made plots at a few shillings a time. Some, together with the plot, supply the opening and closing sentences of each chapter. Others furnish you with a sort of algebraical formula…” (Orwell, “The Prevention of Literature,” January 2, 1946.)

Chapter 5 of The Grapes starts with 2,000 words of presentation. [Chapter 5 itself starts 10,000 words into the novel]. I suppose readers are to pay attention to identified parties – landowners, tenants, spokesmen for landowners, the Company, the banks. Steinbeck attempts to set up the relationships of all the people, and their visceral reactions to one another. In all those 2,000 words is not one character, no one to sympathize with, no one to hate, just Steinbeck’s raw, clunky social propaganda. The outcome to this outlined argument might be, tenants should remain on the land for free, although neither they nor anyone else can farm the land or otherwise live there without public assistance.

The beginning of Chapter 5 begins raw, didactic, cold and unfeeling:

“The owners of the land came onto the land, or more often a spokesman for the owners came. They came in closed cars, and they felt the dry earth with their fingers, and sometimes they drove big earth augers into the ground for soil tests. The tenants, from their sun-beaten dooryards, watched uneasily when the closed cars drove along the fields. And at last the owner men drove into the dooryards and sat in their cars to talk out of the windows. The tenant men stood beside the cars for a while, and then squatted on their hams and found sticks with which to mark the dust.

“In the open doors the women stood looking out, and behind them the children – corn-headed children, with wide eyes, one bare foot on top of the other bare feet, and the toes working. The women and the children watched their men talking to the owner men. They were silent.”

Let’s help Steinbeck out of this passage:

Tuffs of dust blew across the farms like last year, the dry earth yielding nothing to the red-brown sun. Closed cars motored among the farmhouses sited in the wide fields. Everyone knew these men, met by tenants in their yards while their women and children watched from the doorways of the houses. Men rolled down the windows and looked: the hard life in the faces of the woman and children, wide, blank eyes, some barefooted, always thinking before moving.

These seven lines pick up the substance of the dozen lines of Steinbeck and provide the same impact. If readers need the children’s “toes working,” [I don’t know why that is important other than to show the kids were minutely active], it can be dropped in later. How about “the tenant men” squatting “on their hams and found sticks to mark the dust.” Other than being unclear, it is out of place where it is in Steinbeck’s paragraphs. It should happen after the conversation has gone on a while.

But as it is written, Steinbeck has no movement by any human being, no one is uncomfortable, no one reacts to anyone else. Steinbeck paints a poor still-life. Everyone is robotic, which makes his passage and the 1500 following words inhuman. There is point after point, point-of-view after point-of-view. Purportedly, humans adhere to some of them, but how many? How are they said to other human beings in that setting? Which points-of-view bring sadness or laughter? [For readers who say none of this is important, you are not fiction writers and likely you are poor non-fiction writers. Your strengths are in law, advertising and other PR pursuits.]

In reality ending tenant relationships and foreclosing on land produced very human situations during the 1930s. No one made money with the dust, drought and kicking tenants and other farmers of the land. In the 1930s America, there were thousands of local banks, and many representatives of landowners as well as landowners themselves. Most tenant farmers and farmers were part of the small community. Tenants knew the bankers, owners and representatives. They and indebted owners knew why they were in debt and that they would have to leave. They knew they could not make the land productive. It is also true that the tenants and land owners lived in communities for years or decades, knowing one another, socializing and sharing community responsibilities: Church, government, schools, community events.

These is no indication in The Grapes that the landowners “in closed cars” knew anyone they were driving out to see. Likewise, did the tenants or debt-ridden landowners know anyone who was arriving “in closed cars.” Steinbeck conveys no community – a banker or owner having extended credit or forgiven a loan, or knowing something about the tenants, gone to school together, to church together, played sports together, knew about health problems in the family and knew about marriages and events affecting that family from the outside. The 1930s American midwest presented a cruel environment, once kind for so long and then taking away lives and livelihoods. And the bankers and owners were not detached; they were unhappy about the destruction of their local communities.

However, The Grapes fails to respond to these circumstances. The next writing from Chapter 5:

“Some of the men were kind because they hated what they had to do, and some of them were angry because they hated to be cruel, and some of them were cold because they had long ago found that one could not be an owner unless one were cold. And all of them were caught in something larger than themselves. Some of them hated mathematics that drove them, some of them were afraid, and some worshipped the mathematics because it provided a refuge from through and from feeling.”

I wouldn’t blame mathematics for a novelist’s inability to explain human circumstances within his medium. Nor would I give mathematics the burden of motivating owners, banks and companies. Mathematics are convenient to Steinbeck because they were abstract and let Steinbeck inaccurately describe the whole situation in a non-human way. Steinbeck is not a novelist. Novelists have told about much more complex situations: Riots, wars and meetings, and successful novelists relay thoughts and feelings. Steinbeck is guilty of the exact faults he attributes to the Banks and the Companies: There are no “thoughts” and no “feelings” in this passage. Perhaps Steinbeck gives those thoughts and feelings attached to characters later, but why is he repeating this passage later by adding human beings? He has to delete this passage or be consistent and delete the next.

There is a reason why Chapter 5 begins without an identifiable human being, 12,000 words into the novel. and goes on without any sense of story telling. Steinbeck merely goes from point to point. This is obviously someone used to writing for the government entities, stating out-of-date motives, craving money for sloppy work, but unconcerned about human beings.This passage displays no traits of a novel, but it characteristics are more like a government story or a textbook.

The film with Henry Fonda is far superior to this novel. Screenwriters have never had to luxury of writing distractions, big generalizations, insignificant minutae and off-point scenes. Henry Fonda was the ideal actor – bitter on demand and an instant sulk as he lived and griped his way on the road from Oklahoma to California. In some ways Henry got typecast to these roles. [I prefer Henry Fonda in “Once Upon A Time in the West.”]

For Schools, it is not acceptable to assign a fat book for students to read for any class, especially English. It the writing – use of language, characters, story, vocabulary – that should recommend a book to students. However, The Grapes is poor; students have nothing to learn from it. It should be marginalized, although it was once considered socially significant.

Today, the grapes are sour and outdated. Knowledge about debt and losing property is much better understood. Millions of people lost their houses or are now underwater. The shenanigans by buyers and sellers abused the whole system that will not be cleaned up. No one is innocent and many are completely guilty of raping a corruptible system. My favorite passing-the- buck-story was about loan forms signed by a woman in Florida through 2006, I believe. She signed thousands of loan forms, the basis for the debt instruments providing security [collateral] to the lenders. I can’t remember which bank or loaning company she worked for, but she didn’t get paid for her years of service because in 1995, she died.

Today, Steinbeck would call the banks, money givers, loan owners: MEANIES. Poor old so-and-so lost her husband just before losing her house (she’s been married six times, is eyeing number 7). She now has to work at a convenience store. Job training has taught her to smile during hold-ups. Security tapes reveal she has lost her front teeth. [Dental Care is not covered by Obamacare – screw everyone with bad teeth like Harry Reid and Ted Cruz.] The widow-lady can no longer pronounce fricatives; she walks around all day saying “uck,” “uck,” “uck.” She’s fired for swearing uncontrollably but brings a disability lawsuit for unjust unemployment. That’s the problem because Obamacare cannot fix the housing market.

MORAL to this story: It is easy to write a character even if the writing is nonsense.