Monday, July 1, 2013

BARACK OBAMA: HOPELESSNESS AND THE STATUS QUO (Or, “THEY PUT A BLACK FACE ON THE NEW WORLD ORDER”)


[1 4 U, Robin...]

“George W. Bush was a deceitful thug.”
~ Alex Jones
‘The Obama Deception’; 2009, March

The single most disturbing thing in any Alex Jones documentary is the sight of Jones looking like a bulldog and seemingly shouting bullshit through a bullhorn at a building.
~ Stephen T. McCarthy

Alex Jones made a name for himself by being the only person to sneak into a Bohemian Grove (Luciferian) ceremony and videotaping it. For that reason, I’d say his most important DVD is ‘Dark Secrets: Inside Bohemian Grove’ coupled with ‘The Order Of Death’. Those programs represent something you can’t find anywhere else.

The other Alex Jones documentaries contain information that you can gather from other sources – and likely already have if you’ve extensively researched the ‘New World Order’ subject intensively for about two decades, as I have.

Even so, some of his ‘New World Order’ (NWO) documentaries are very much worth seeing, particularly if you have not yet reached the point of “diminishing returns” in your NWO studies.

Overall, I think the best NWO documentary is probably Aaron Russo’s ‘America: Freedom To Fascism’. But amongst the Alex Jones DVDs I’ve seen, I would rate ‘Endgame’ on the weaker end of the scale (despite the coolest cover). I thought ‘TerrorStorm’ and ‘Fall Of The Republic’ were both quite good.

But after his outing of the Bohemian Grove ceremonies, I think I’d most recommend Alex Jones’ documentary ‘THE OBAMA DECEPTION’.
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"Hope And Change"? Pshaw!...
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Is ‘The Obama Deception’ a flawless presentation? No. Not close. And in fact, I could probably go through the documentary chapter by chapter, pointing out what I disagree with and why, and by the time I got to the end, I would leave you with the impression that I thought the program was total garbage.

But sometimes one needs to overlook some of the questionable or even outright wrong details and evaluate something in an overall sense. That’s how I feel about ‘The Obama Deception’ which in the main is very accurate, even if I would dispute various points along the way as the program played.

Three examples of divergent views:

1: To quote Abraham Lincoln as opposing the Money Powers leads a person who has not looked deeper into Lincoln’s agenda to believe that Lincoln really meant to save the nation from the Money Powers. In fact, Lincoln utterly shredded the Constitution not to save the Union, but to save and TRANSFORM the Union. And on whose behalf, the Yankees or the Confederates? And on which side would you find the Money Powers, the Yankees or the Confederates?

2: Again we have reference made to an anguished confession on the part of Woodrow Wilson, lamenting that he had been duped by International Bankers into ruining the United States of America. This same quote was utilized in Aaron Russo’s otherwise excellent documentary ‘America: Freedom To Fascism’. I’ve studied president Wilson enough to know that he was a conscious and willing agent of the International Bankers, and I do not believe he ever regretted being their puppet. If anyone can actually authenticate that supposed quote of remorse from Woodrow Wilson, I would love to see their evidence. Right now, I don’t believe Wilson ever said that.

3: For anyone to propose the idea that John F. Kennedy was the last independent-thinking president in this country is preposterous. You’d have to go back a lot further than JFK. Yes, Kennedy was murdered by Insiders (almost certainly with the help of the Mafia), but to try to sell the idea that Kennedy was killed because he opposed the ‘New World Order’ is simply wrongheaded.

So, you see, I am not in full, 100% agreement with every detail you will find expressed in A.J.’s documentary ‘THE OBAMA DECEPTION’. Nevertheless, the overall theme of the production is spot-on, and the vast majority of the information presented can be easily determined with objective, independent research to be factual.

I would strongly urge everyone to watch at least the first hour of ‘THE OBAMA DECEPTION’. That will take you through the ‘Meet The New Boss – Same As The Old Boss’ segment of Barack Obama’s administration appointments. You will clearly see that the so-called Mr. Change carried the same organized criminals into his administration that George W. Bush had surrounding and advising him.

I’ll ask you to watch it for one hour, at least up to the point where former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan admits in an interview that our president’s relationship with the Federal Reserve is irrelevant (because The Fed operates beyond the control of the president of the United States).

Whether you believe me or not, I really don’t relish playing the part of Elihu to an old codfish’s codger’s Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar (see Job chapter 32+), and even I find it embarrassing that I know more about this stuffs than does a representative of the so-called “Greatest Generation” who has 30+ years on me, but here it is:
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“In the real Executive power structure, the president serves the Military-Industrial Complex, itself owned by the International Bankers.”
~ ‘The Obama Deception’; 2009, March
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(It’s unfortunate that every old codger hasn’t yet figured that out.)
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The Obama Deception HQ Full length version
Released in March of 2009
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“It is very disturbing to see well-meaning people falling for high-tech propaganda over and over again.”
~ Alex Jones
‘The Obama Deception’; 2009, March

In case you didn't realize it, this blog bit was yet another stalling tactic until I can find the time to get my next A-list post put together. But you gotta admit, my ‘stalling-for-time’ installments are still pretty interesting, eh? (No one does B-list blog bits better’n I do.)

~ Stephen T. McCarthy

Beer: Stone ‘Smoked Porter’
Music: ‘Living Water: The Surfer’s Mass’ by The Malibooz
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YE OLDE COMMENT POLICY: All comments, pro and con, are welcome. However, ad hominem attacks and disrespectful epithets will not be tolerated (read: "posted"). After all, this isn’t Amazon.com, so I don’t have to put up with that kind of bovine excrement.
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Monday, June 24, 2013

I AIN’T LIVING LONG LIKE THIS! (CAN'T LIVE AT ALL LIKE THIS, CAN I, BABY?)



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No, this isn’t the political blog bit(s) I alluded to in my last post. Nor is it a post about my (semi-)impending move to Reno. This is really just a quick little ‘Product Review’ that I’ve thrown together on the fly in order to stall for time.

I probably won’t get back into the political scene until next weekend and I knew I was past due to post something here, so... HERE it is:

Some of you already know that the legendary Country music “Outlaw” WAYLON JENNINGS is one of my all-time very favorite musicians. He passed away in 2002, but I was very fortunate to have seen him perform live on stage with his band four times in the late 1980s / very early ‘90s. He was the most charismatic entertainer I ever saw and his concert performances were second to none.

I went to perhaps four Bruce Springsteen concerts in the mid-1980s. They were tremendous. I saw Brenda Lee on a little casino stage. She was great. I saw Blue Oyster Cult in the 1970s when lasers were still a big part of their stage production. Highly memorable.

But Waylon was the best!

In 1978, Waylon released his album ‘I’VE ALWAYS BEEN CRAZY’. My FM Rock radio station of choice (it wasn’t called “Classic” Rock back then) began playing the title track from Waylon’s new album. The song instantly became my personal theme and I quickly purchased my first ever Country-Western music album. Also on that LP was a song titled ‘A LONG TIME AGO’ (more about that below).

Lately I’ve been playing some of my Waylon CDs and DVDs and decided to stall for time by writing a little blog entry about him. I liked that Ol’ Outlaw so much that I even read his autobiography which – just like the man himself – was funny, exciting, and at times disappointing. Below are three things that a lot of people don’t know about Waylon Jennings:
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#1: He was “expelled from music class in high school for ‘lack of musical ability’.”

#2: Waylon was the bass player for his buddy Buddy Holly. That’s right, Waylon was one of the traveling Crickets (that’s before there was a Traveling Wilburys). On “the day the music died” in 1959, Buddy Holly chartered a plane to fly through bad weather to the next gig, but there weren’t enough seats for everyone; some would take a bus there. Those who flew didn’t get there.

Ritchie Valens flipped a coin with a member of Holly’s band for a seat on the plane and won. Or lost. The plane went down, killing all the passengers. Waylon Jennings voluntarily gave up his seat to The Big Bopper, best remembered for one of my favorite early Rock ‘N’ Roll hits ‘Chantilly Lace’. (I can’t hear that song without thinking of a certain girl named Lisa.)

When Buddy Holly learned that Waylon had given his seat to The Big Bopper, he jokingly said, “Well, I hope your damned bus freezes up again.” Waylon replied in jest, “Well, I hope your ol’ plane crashes.”

Waylon writes in his autobiography:

That took me a lot of years to get over. I was just a kid, barely twenty-one. I was about halfway superstitious, like all Southern people, scared of the devil and scared of God equally.

I was afraid somebody was going to find out I said that, and blame me. I knew I said that. I remember Buddy laughing and then heading out for the airport after the show. I was certain I caused it.

In the song ‘A LONG TIME AGO’, Waylon references that fateful day when he offered his seat on that plane to The Big Bopper.

#3: Waylon was asked to write the theme song for a new TV series, ‘The Dukes Of Hazzard’. When the producers heard what Waylon had come up with, ‘Good Ol’ Boys’, they had a suggestion. Waylon, take it away...

“They thought that was good but said all it needed was something about two modern-day Robin Hoods, fighting the system. So I wrote ‘Fighting the system, like two modern-day Robin Hoods’, and they didn’t even know they wrote the damn line. It was my first million-selling single, and one of the easiest records I ever cut.”

Waylon was a very funny man and a clever songwriter. He was also the founder of the ‘Country Outlaw’ movement; a true maverick, and one hell of a masculine looking man’s man! If I could look and sound like anyone, I’d choose Waylon.

Alright, let’s hear a couple Outlaw tunes. This first one is from ‘85, featuring a little older and heavier Waylon, but this stuffs rocks! (The video will begin after the fifteen-second dog food commercial. At least that’s the commercial I got)...

Waylon Jennings - I Ain't Living Long Like This
(Live at Farm Aid 1985)



Next up is ‘A LONG TIME AGO’ from the first Waylon album I ever owned. I had no idea who he “gave his seat to on that plane” when I got my vinyl album home, peeled off the shrink-wrap and plopped it down on my turntable for the first time in 1978...

I don’t look the way the average cowboy singer looks.
I’ll admit I’ve taken things I never shoulda took.
You can read a different story in a lot of different books.
But even then you won’t really know,
How it was a long time ago.

Women have been my trouble since I found out they weren’t men.
In spite of that I stopped and took a wife now and then.
They built their fences high but they couldn’t hold me in.
I was born with a fire down below,
And I learned to fly a long time ago.

Don’t ask me about the years I spent out in the rain.
About the ones I spent in love, or the ones I spent insane.
And don’t ask me who I gave my seat to on that plane.
I think you already know.
I told you that a long time ago.

Me and ol’ Willie, Lordy, we’ve been sold and bought.
I guess you all heard about some kind of system that we fought.
We ain’t the only outlaws, just the only ones they caught.
They tried to run us off but Willie’s slow.
And I quit runnin’ a long time ago.

Waylon Jennings- "A Long Time Ago"


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If you dig those two tunes, then you might want to think about obtaining the two-CD set ‘THE ESSENTIAL WAYLON JENNINGS’. It contains every song mentioned in this blog bit and 38 more. Truly some of the best tracks in Country music history.

Rock And Roll's been going downhill ever since Carl Wilson died, and I saw Satan laughing with delight the day the Outlaw died.

~ Stephen T. McCarthy

YE OLDE COMMENT POLICY: All comments, pro and con, are welcome. However, ad hominem attacks and disrespectful epithets will not be tolerated (read: "posted"). After all, this isn’t Amazon.com, so I don’t have to put up with that kind of bovine excrement.
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Sunday, June 16, 2013

I DARE CALL IT “CONSPIRACY” (Or, LEARN TO SEE “THE DONKEY, THE CART AND THE BOY”)


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[NOTE: The following book review is really an addendum to my blog bit(s) posted above it. What? There are no blog bits above this book review? Well, give me a few days. I’m working my way backwards and up to ‘em.]

Yesterday, my Brother Napoleon and I went to ‘The Main Ingredient’ ale house and café where, sadly, my waitress informed me that I had just ordered their last bottle of Lagunitas ‘SUCKS’ ale. That means I’ve tasted it for the last time until December. Now THAT sucks!

Oh well, enough about MY troubles; let’s talk about this country’s troubles:

Now that ‘NONE DARE CALL IT CONSPIRACY’ is available, I no longer need to answer “no” to the question which is often put to me, namely: “Mr. Dodd, is there a book which I can read so I can know what you know?” No higher praise is possible for this book.
~ Norman Dodd
Chief Investigator
‘Reece Committee to Investigate Foundations’

This book concerns the way in which our nation and other nations are actually governed. ... For the reader who is intelligent but uninitiated in the literature of superpolitics, I can think of no better introduction to the field than ‘NONE DARE CALL IT TREASON’.
~ Dr. Medford Evans
‘Former Chief of Security for the Atom Bomb Project’

The real menace of our republic is the invisible government which, like a giant octopus, sprawls its slimy length over our city, state and nation. At the head is a small group of banking houses generally referred to as “international bankers”. This little coterie of powerful international bankers virtually run our government for their own selfish ends.
~ John F. Hylan
‘Mayor of New York City
March 26, 1922

Until a person has a working knowledge of 'The Federal Reserve System' and 'The Council On Foreign Relations', he or she has no real understanding of the contemporary American / geopolitical landscape. Anytime you find a Democrat and a Republican arguing politics, you can be sure that neither one of them actually knows the truth . . . unless they're professional politicians, or professional propagandists like Talk Radio hosts.
~ Stephen T. McCarthy

In the comment section of my recent installment TELEVISION-THINKIN’ TIME (Or, ARE YOU SMARTER THAN ARCHIE BUNKER?) I mentioned ‘NONE DARE CALL IT CONSPIRACY’ (‘NDCIC’), published in 1972 by Gary Allen. Despite being a praiseworthy publication, I acknowledged that I had rarely sung its praises. Primarily because by the time I read ‘NDCIC’, I had already studied other, more detailed books about the subject; for me personally, ‘NDCIC’ was old news and I learned only a few nuggets of new information by reading it.

My recent focus on it in that ARCHIE BUNKER  comment section inspired me to reread Gary Allen’s publication, and this time I read it with the mindset that it was all new information to me; I read it while pretending that I had never before heard of the Council on Foreign Relations (C.F.R.), the “New World Order” (NWO), and knew nothing about the Federal Reserve System.

Having done that, I have to say that ‘NONE DARE CALL IT CONSPIRACY’ by Gary Allen might well be the perfect introduction to the very real International Banker conspiracy against the United States of America for the uninitiated “Americonned” citizen.

Like the vast majority of NWO conspiracy books, the primary weakness of ‘NONE DARE CALL IT CONSPIRACY’ is its failure to address the false spiritual / supernatural foundation that secretly undergirds the One-World Government conspiracy. Tal Brooke gets that part right in his essential book ‘ONE WORLD’, but, unfortunately, Brooke alludes frequently to the Jewish heritage of many of the conspirators. Allen correctly points out that the conspiracy is not entirely “Jewish”, “Catholic”, or “Masonic”. Eh... “Masonic”? Uh... well... Nah!... Don’t get me started. Let’s not get into Freemasonry or I’ll never get this review written.

It’s pretty rare, but occasionally you come across a mere booklet that contains more valuable information than many books three times its size and length. Some examples: ‘WHY A BANKRUPT AMERICA?’ by Devvy Kidd, and ‘THE PRIVILEGE OF BEING A WOMAN’ by Alice von Hildebrand.
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At only 138 pages sized 4 1/2" X 7 1/4", Gary Allen’s ‘NONE DARE CALL IT CONSPIRACY’ is a booklet, not a book. Even so, it contains more truth, valuable information, and political penetration (like, how you’re getting screwed by the secret government) than you’d find in 50 books by the likes of Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Glenn Beck, Dipshit O’Reilly, Barack Obama, Chris "Thrill Up My Leg" Matthews, Michael Moore, Bill Maher, Hillary Clinton, Bill Clinton, and Billary Clinton (I didn’t mention NeoCon Ann Coulter only because she makes me laugh.)

Perhaps you’re not inclined to purchase and spend time studying highly detailed tomes like I am; maybe you’re not apt to acquire the 1,311-page ‘Tragedy And Hope’ by Carroll Quigley, or G. Edward Griffin’s nearly 600-page masterpiece ‘The Creature From Jekyll Island’, the 400 dry pages that constitutes ‘Foundations: Their Power And Influence’ by Rene Wormser. And, OK, so you’re not willing to pay a lot of money for a rare, used, out-of-print copy of ‘Treason: The New World Order’ by Gurudas.

Nevertheless, you can acquire a used copy of Allen’s booklet ‘NONE DARE CALL IT CONSPIRACY’ for under ten dollars at Internet bookseller sites like ALIBRIS.
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Follow that up by reading a cheap, used copy of Tal Brooke’s ‘ONE WORLD’ which covers much of the same ground but dives even deeper by shining a Light on the spiritual dimension of the deception, and you will know most of the essential information that I have spent nearly two decades learning. In 1994, if someone had pointed me toward ‘NONE DARE CALL IT CONSPIRACY’ by Gary Allen, and ‘ONE WORLD’ by Tal Brooke, I would have quickly acquired 85.5% of the crucial information I spent two decades gathering. (I’m making it SO EASY for all y’all! You should pay me some money for this massive time-saving shortcut. Why don’tcha?)

Those that create and issue the money and credit direct the policies of government and hold in their hands the destiny of the people.
~ Reginald McKenna
‘President of the Midlands Bank of England

In a nutshell, the great truth that Gary Allen’s booklet sets out to show is this: Certain individuals - primarily International Bankers – have as their goal to gain control over all nations by means of global Socialism which they will oversee.

The International Bankers have made great strides toward the fulfillment of their goal by the use of various tactics. The most effective was the sneaking of ‘The Federal Reserve Act’ through Congress in 1913, putting this nation’s entire economy in their private hands.

The establishing of the Federal Reserve System provided the “conspiracy” with an instrument whereby the international bankers could run the national debt up to the sky, thereby collecting enormous amounts of interest and also gaining control over the borrower.
~ Gary Allen
‘None Dare Call It Conspiracy’, page 58

From page 51:
Neither Presidents, Congressmen nor Secretaries of the Treasury direct the Federal Reserve! In the matters of money, the Federal Reserve directs them! The uncontrolled power of the “Fed” was admitted by the Secretary of the Treasury, David M. Kennedy, in an interview for the May 5, 1969, issue of ‘U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT’:

Q: Do you approve of the latest credit-tightening moves?
A: It’s not my job to approve or disapprove. It is the action of the Federal Reserve.”

Another effective tactic was the International Bankers’ 1921 formation of an elite group called the ‘Council on Foreign Relations’ (C.F.R.) which largely directs governmental policy foreign AND domestic, Republican AND Democrat, and influences every facet of basic American life from the judiciary and education to publishing and the entertainment industry.

If you want a worldwide monopoly, you must control a world socialist government. That is what the game is all about. ...First by establishing socialist governments in the various nations and then consolidating them all through a “Great Merger”, into an all-powerful world socialist super-state...
~ Gary Allen
‘None Dare Call It Conspiracy’, page 35
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On the first page of his booklet, ‘NONE DARE CALL IT CONSPIRACY’, Gary Allen draws an analogy between the “political reality” and the “real picture” that is hidden in those drawings where the viewer is supposed to discern the image within an image. He writes... The caption reads something like this: “Concealed somewhere in this picture is a donkey pulling a cart with a boy in it. Can you find them?”

The rest of his booklet is devoted to showing the reader the “political reality” that is cloaked within the deceptive landscape that is continually put before the Americonned People by politicians, writers, and television and radio pundits. Some might say that the booklet is outdated, since its current events focus was on President Nixon and the Vietnam War. But I’d answer: Think of it as an ideal example of illustrating how ‘The Song Remains The Same; ‘It’s The Same Old Song And Dance, My Friend’; ‘Meet The New Boss, Same As The Old Boss’.)

‘NONE DARE CALL IT CONSPIRACY’ covers a lot of ground in just 138 small pages. It corrects some of the most basic political misconceptions in the U.S.A. today. For example, how often has someone (a coworker, an arguing partner, a newsman or Talk Radio commentator) tried to mislead you into thinking that (Leftwing) Communism and (Rightwing) Fascism represent two opposite ends on the political spectrum? Well, as Gary Allen correctly illustrates in Charts 1 and 2, that’s B.S.

Correctly understood, Communism, Socialism, and Fascism represent “Total Government” on the Left end of the scale. Anarchy represents “Zero Government” on the Right end of the scale. Just to the Left of Anarchy is Liberty, or Limited Government as understood by our Founding Fathers in their creation of a “Constitutional Republic”.
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But ‘NONE DARE CALL IT CONSPIRACY’ also digs a lot deeper into International Banking and the tax-exempt Foundations created by those bankers. It shows some of the evidence supporting the validity of the statement that “Communism Was MADE IN THE U.S.A.”, and also illustrates why it’s true that there’s not “a dime’s worth of difference between the two parties” - Republican and Democrat. Both puppet parties and their ideologies are merged by the Council on Foreign Relations (C.F.R.) puppeteers.

...The policies of the government today, whether Republican or Democrat, are closer to the 1932 platform of the Communist Party than they are to either of their own party platforms in that critical year.
~ Walter Trohan

From pages 89 & 92:
“Colonel” House believed we should have two political parties but only a single ideology – One World Socialism. This is exactly what we have in this country today. (See Chart 8) Although there are philosophical differences between the grass roots Democrats and the grass roots Republicans, yet as you move up the party ladders these differences become less and less distinguishable until finally the ladders disappear behind the Establishment’s managed news curtain and come together at the apex under the control of the C.F.R. ...Administrations, both Democrat and Republican, come and go – but the C.F.R. lingers on. This is why the more things seem to change, the more they remain the same. The fix is in at the top, where the same coterie of Insiders, bent on control of the world, runs the show.

When you get to be the leader of a big country, someone else makes all the decisions.
~ President Bill Clinton
Speech in Ireland; August, 1998
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From page 124 & 125:
The real name of the game is 1984. We will have systematic population reduction, forced sterilization or anything else which the planners deem necessary to establish absolute control in their humanitarian utopia. But to enforce these plans, you must have an all-powerful world government. You can’t do this if individual nations have sovereignty. And before you can facilitate the Great Merger, you must first centralize control within each nation, ...and remove the guns from the hands of the citizenry. ... “Change” is a word we hear over and over. By “change” these groups mean Socialism.

There’s only half-a-difference between the Presidencies of Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, George H. W. Bush, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and Barack Obama. What is that half-a-difference? Barack Obama is “half” Black.

From pages 9 & 10:
...People have over the years acquired a strong vested emotional interest in their own errors. Their intellects and egos are totally committed to the accidental theory. Most people are highly reluctant to admit that they have been conned or have shown poor judgment. To inspect the existence of a conspiracy guiding our political destiny from behind the scenes would force many of these people to repudiate a lifetime of accumulated opinions.

It takes a person with strong character indeed to face the facts and admit he has been wrong even if it was because he was uninformed.

Such was the case with the author of this book. It was only because he set out to prove the conservative anti-Communists wrong that he happened to end up writing this book. His initial reaction to the conservative point of view was one of suspicion and hostility; and it was only after many months of intensive research that he had to admit that he had been “conned”.

[Don’t lose sight of the fact that by “conservative point of view” in 1972, Gary Allen was NOT referring to the NeoConservative point of view that passes for “Conservatism” today by pseudo-Conservatives like Limbaugh, Hannity, Beck, and O’Reilly.]

...“Intellectuals” are fond of mouthing cliches like “The conspiracy theory is often tempting. However, it is overly simplistic.” To ascribe absolutely everything that happens to the machinations of a small group of power hungry conspirators is overly simplistic. But, in our opinion nothing is more simplistic than doggedly holding onto the accidental view of major world events.

...With the leaders of the academic and communications world assuming this sneering attitude towards the conspiratorial (or cause and effect) theory of history, it is not surprising that millions of innocent and well-meaning people, in a natural desire not to appear naïve, assume the attitudes and repeat the cliches of the opinion makers.

These persons, in their attempt to appear sophisticated, assume their mentors’ air of smug superiority even though they themselves have not spent five minutes in study on the subject of international conspiracy.

Go ahead, read Gary Allen’s little booklet ‘NONE DARE CALL IT CONSPIRACY’, published in '72, and then come back and tell me that you’re stillA Coincidence Theorist”. 
Come on, I DARE you!

Link:
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~ Stephen T. McCarthy

YE OLDE COMMENT POLICY: All comments, pro and con, are welcome. However, ad hominem attacks and disrespectful epithets will not be tolerated (read: "posted"). After all, this isn’t Amazon.com, so I don’t have to put up with that kind of bovine excrement.
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Sunday, June 9, 2013

“P” IS FOR “PRISON MOVIES” (Or, "P" IS FOR "PAPILLON")

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The Judge: “You know the charge!”
Papillon: “I’m innocent.”
The Judge: “Your real crime has nothing to do with a pimp’s death.”
Papillon: “Well, then, what is it?”
The Judge: “Yours is the most terrible crime a human being can commit. I accuse you of ‘A Wasted Life’. The penalty for that is death!”
Papillon: “Guilty... guilty... guilty...”
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On Thursday, April 18, 2013, during the ‘A TO Z BLOGFEST’, my friend and the creator of the Blogfest, Arlee Bird, posted ‘PRISON MOVIES (#ATOZCHALLENGE)’
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In that post, he wrote the following:

The Shawshank Redemption (1994) -- If you haven't seen The Green Mile I'm somewhat surprised, but if you haven't seen The Shawshank Redemption I'll be amazed.   Everyone has seen this film and if you haven't then you must be the only one.  Probably the best prison movie ever made, this one makes it into many a film fan's top ten list period.  A must-see film! ...

 Am I right about The Shawshank Redemption?

I disagreed with my friend and posted the following comment:

Alright, BOIDMAN OF ALCATRAZ, here comes the McContrarian view:

I thought 'The Green Mile' was too contrived. Not a bad movie, but way overrated.

'The Shawshank Redemption' - WTH?!
I saw it once long, long ago and thought it was "OK". But for years afterwards people kept raving about it, which convinced me that I MUST HAVE missed the point somehow; maybe I was drunk at the first viewing and couldn't appreciate its greatness.

So, in fairness to the movie, I rented it a second time and watched it again. I came away with pretty much the same opinion. I probably liked it slightly better after the second viewing, but I still wouldn't grade it above "OK". I would love for someone - you or anyone else - to explain to me in detail WHY that movie is so great. Because, seriously, I do NOT get it.

So then what prison movies DO I like? Well, there are probably more, but the three that come immediately to mind are (the frequently aforementioned) 'COOL HAND LUKE' ["What we have here is a failure to communicate!"]; 'PAPILLON' [Wow! No one mentioned 'Papillon'? - That's a freakin' crime, man!]; and my Number One favorite prison film (as well as one of my Top Ten favorite sports films), the original version of 'THE LONGEST YARD' starring Burt Reynolds.

Come to think of it, 'STALAG 17', with William Holden, would certainly also make my list of all-time favorite prison movies.

I only scanned the comments above, but is it true that no person above mentioned 'Papillon', 'The Longest Yard', or 'Stalag 17'? If so,... whoah!

~ D-FensDogg
'Loyal American Underground'

My good buddy, LEE, responded with this:

StMc -- Maybe Shawshank was too optimistic for your tastes. The film is pretty universally rated high so you are in the minority on this one.

I wrote back:

>> . . . Maybe Shawshank was too optimistic for your tastes. The film is pretty universally rated high so you are in the minority on this one.

How unusual to find myself in "the minority" about something. (Still don't know what makes it so "great".)

'Papillon' - Steve McQueen and the always popular (and great) Dustin Hoffman. How could it have become so forgotten?!

'The Longest Yard' is absolutely hilarious!

'Stalag 17' was so good it became the inspiration for a long-running TV series - 'Hogan's Heroes'.

The entire modern American culture seems to have roots no deeper than about 1995. ...


~ D-FensDogg
'Loyal American Underground'

That was the end of our conversation.

But later I got to thinking about how long it had been since I’d seen the movie ‘PAPILLON’. I probably hadn’t seen it since about 1974 or ‘75 and, generally, I’m no fan of Steve McQueen. So, I began to wonder if perhaps ‘Papillon’ was better in my memory than it was on film.

To scratch that mental itch, a few weeks ago I rented ‘PAPILLON’ from NetFlix. It was even BETTER(!) than I’d remembered it, because in '74 or '75, a lot of it undoubtedly went over my head.

Here’s a very brief synopsis:

Henri "Papillon" Charierre is sentenced to life in prison and transported to the penal colony in French Guyana. Aboard ship on the voyage over, he meets Louis Degas, a forger. They form a bond that will last them a great many years.

Papillon Trailer
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There was only one weak segment in the movie ‘PAPILLON’. A good ways into the film, Papillon finds himself on an island paradise, surrounded by beautiful, dark-skinned, topless, native women.

I’m not going to lie and say that I (a normal, heterosexual male) did not like those scenes in that segment of the film. But from an objective and informed movie critic’s viewpoint, I must reluctantly admit that those scenes were problematic: HOW did Papillon wind up in that paradise? WHY did the natives suddenly abandon him there?

That segment did not make much sense, but the scenery was... A-list “GORGEOUS”:
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In one of its rare moments of sanity, Mick Martin & Marsha Porter’s ‘DVD & VIDEO GUIDE’ gets it right: 

‘THE SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION’ (1994)
4 Stars

‘PAPILLON’ (1973)
4.5 Stars

“Unfairly criticized, this is a truly exceptional film biography of the man who escaped from Devil’s Island. Steve McQueen gives an excellent performance, and Dustin Hoffman is once again a chameleon. Director Frank Schaffner invests the same gusto here that he did in ‘Patton’.”

That’s true. And the reason ‘Papillon’ is better than ‘The Shawshank Redemption’ is because most writers in our “postmodern” era are not as intelligent and creative as their predecessors were. Today’s audiences think the most recent stuffs is great only because they haven’t seen and aren’t intelligent enough to comprehend the greatness of the old stuffs.

If you disagree, take it to... The Judge.

If you thought ‘The Shawshank Redemption’ was a great prison movie, you had BETTER see ‘PAPILLON’, and I’ll give you until the count of five to do so...

One...
Two...
Three...
Four...
Five...

...Six.

[You didn’t "get" that, did you? If not, you are charged with the crime of ‘Never Having Seen PAPILLON.]
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My 10+ hours spent in a Mexican jail in 1982 or ‘83 were worse than anything in the movie ‘The Shawshank Redemption’. And all of it is child’s play compared to ‘PAPILLON’.
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~ Stephen T. McCarthy

YE OLDE COMMENT POLICY: All comments, pro and con, are welcome. However, ad hominem attacks and disrespectful epithets will not be tolerated (read: "posted"). After all, this isn’t Amazon.com, so I don’t have to put up with that kind of bovine excrement.

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Sunday, June 2, 2013

TELEVISION-THINKIN’ TIME (Or, ARE YOU SMARTER THAN ARCHIE BUNKER?)

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DEAR YOUS ~

As yous know, ordinarily I post blog bits here at ‘Ferret-Faced Fascist Friends’ in which I yak, Yak, and YAK about the subject at hand. I dictate what we’re gonna address, and then I do a lot of thinkin’ an’ yakkin’ about it – explaining my viewpoint to yous, telling yous WHAT I think about it and WHY I think what I do about it.

It’s a pretty good, time-tested system that often leads to some really great discussions in the comment sections.

But this time, I want to turn that system on its head – turn it upside down – just to see what we get. So, here’s the plan:

I finally acquired all of the DVDs of the television series ‘ALL IN THE FAMILY’ that I hoped to own, and for several months now, I’ve been working my way through them, season by season (Seasons 1 - 8). As of this post, I am currently up to Season 6, Disc 3, Episode 17.
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Archie Bunker: Wit And/Or Wisdom?
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I would certainly like to know your thoughts and opinions about ‘ALL IN THE FAMILY’ in a general sense: Did you like it? Why or why not?

But even more so, I would like you to share with me, in the comment section below, YOUR thoughts and opinions about ONE PARTICULAR SCENE. I do NOT want to lead anyone in any way, so I am going to keep my own ideas completely to myself... for now. After I believe that I have pretty much heard from all of my regular readers in the comment section below, only THEN will I add my own comment and reveal what I think / believe about this particular scene.

This scene comes from Season 3, Disc 1, Episode 1, titled ‘Archie And The Editorial’. And here it is:
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Alright, what are your thoughts about that? If you want to focus on the acting, the lighting, the sound, that’s OK. But what I’m primarily interested in is your take on the “ideas” that are being presented there. Dig deep...

Tell me what you think the writer was attempting to convey to the viewer. What concepts are being presented there? How effectively do you believe the ideas were expressed? What do you, personally, think about them? Agree? Disagree? Have no clue? Do you prefer cartoons like The Road Runner, Scooby-Doo, and Underdog?

BONUS QUESTION: Without looking it up online to find out, do you remember, or can you guess, how the episode ‘Archie And The Editorial’ ends?

Please, Peeps, respond ASAP. Then I will put in my own .02 cents worth at the very bottom of the comment section. Thanks, yous all!

~ Stephen T. McCarthy

YE OLDE COMMENT POLICY: All comments, pro and con, are welcome. However, ad hominem attacks and disrespectful epithets will not be tolerated (read: "posted"). After all, this isn’t Amazon.com, so I don’t have to put up with that kind of bovine excrement.

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Tuesday, May 28, 2013

MY FAVORITE BEER... SUCKS?


In the comment section HERE, I was yakking with one of my Magnificent Seven, 'Brother Beer Boy Bryan', and having a good time doing it too. In fact, another one of The Seven (FarAwayEyes) told me that she really enjoyed reading the extensive conversation that 4-B and I engaged in THERE. (To me, comment sections like THAT are the best reasons for blogging!)
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As I wrote to 4-B in that comment section:

By no means are you preventing me from “putting up another blog post”. I have been trying to decide where to go next and just haven’t made up my mind...  I have planned (by mere coincidence) another blog bit about why I dislike police officers.

Also, one of my ‘New World Order’ conspiracy pieces about how and why the Republican party has deliberately refused to remove Barack Obama from office when, in fact, he could very easily be serving time in a federal prison right this very minute... if the Republican party desired that.

And then there’s these 1+3 Obama scandals I could write about: ‘Fast And Furious’; ‘
Benghazi’; ‘The I.R.S. Targeting Of Conservative Groups’; and ‘The Department Of Justice’s Snooping Into The Associated Press Phone Records’.


I have so much material right now that my head is spinning and I don’t even know which direction I should go in next. (‘I’m All Over The Map, Which Is My Oyster’, or something like that.)

Well, I’m still in doubt about where to go next. But I’m smart enough to know: When in doubt, yak about beer.

You already know how much I hate – HATE!Phoenix, Airheadzona. Up until recently, the only thing I liked about this city was the annual ‘Glendale Jazz And Blues Festival’, but after 29 years even that was cancelled in 2013 due to “budget cuts” (Bullsh#t!)
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Well, recently, my brother Napoleon and I discovered something else we like about Phoenix. I drove past this place every morning while working and the sign caught my eye:
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I mentioned THE MAIN INGREDIENT Ale House & Cafe to Nappy and he said he’d driven past it and noticed it too. So we got online and checked out their site, and we were so pleased to see so many unique beers and ales available on draft and bottled that we decided to try it out that Saturday.
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I ordered ‘The Main Ale’ and this...

Artichoke Heaven
......a warm dip with artichoke hearts, green chiles, & 3 cheeses served with La Tolteca tortilla chips

It was so good that we went back the next week and I ordered the ‘Artichoke Heaven’ again. The following week I sampled a couple more ales and this time I was more hungry and so I ordered this...

Griddled Cheese
......havarti, muenster, & cheddar, with local tomato, on sourdough

Without question that was the BEST grilled cheese sandwich I’d ever had. So now, to my great surprise, I found myself returning to THE MAIN INGREDIENT more for the food than the brew. The second time I had the ‘Griddled Cheese’ sandwich, I felt compelled to photograph it first:
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'THE MAIN INGREDIENT' BAR
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THE LITTLE TABLE WHERE MY BROTHER AND I USUALLY SIT
(We Don't Know That Woman With The Tiny Feet!)
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But this time I tried a new brew that had suddenly made an appearance on the menu: Lagunitas SUCKS (‘Brown Shugga’ Substitute Ale).

My papa’s real big. He did like he pleased. That’s why everybody worked on him. The last time I’ve seen my father he was blind in the cedars from drinking. And every time he put the bottle to his mouth, he don’t suck out of it. It SUCKS out of him until he’d shrunk so wrinkled and yellow even the dogs don’t know him.
~ Chief Bromdon
‘One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest’

I’d never heard of Lagunitas SUCKS (‘Brown Shugga’ Substitute Ale) before, but I was very familiar with the Lagunitas Brewing Company. In fact, Lagunitas (along with the Odell Brewing Company of Colorado) was already one of my two favorites overall.
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BROTHER NAPPY AND I BOTH LOVE THIS BREW
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NAPPY AND I GREW UP IN "OLD" DOGTOWN, CALIFORNIA
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I first discovered Lagunitas beer while on a weekend trip in Flagstaff with my Brother in 2007. It’s a somewhat humorous story that involves the Cleveland Indians baseball club and the history of Rock ‘N’ Roll. Maybe I’ll tell it someday... but not today.

Back to THE MAIN INGREDIENT...
Well, by about my 3rd or 4th sip of Lagunitas SUCKS, I was already thinking that it might be the best ale I’d ever had – and that’s really saying something, because I have sampled A LOT of different beers and ales. [Blind Beer Taste Tests (Or, Beer Battles: Who Hops To The Top?)]

‘SUCKS’ starts out with very pronounced citrus-like, grapefruit-y overtones but finishes with that bitter bomb of hops that “hopheads” love so much. I was pretty much hooked immediately (Alc. 7.85%; I.B.U. 63.21).
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THIS ALE DOESN'T "SUCK"
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I was curious whether or not other beer dudes thought ‘SUCKS’ super like I did, so I eventually looked it up on a couple of beer fanboy sites (I was not alone)...




The label on the bottle says a lot, but it doesn’t say it all:

E.K. Ross would have enjoyed our suffering in 2010 when we saw we couldn’t brew our ‘Brown Shugga’. But in that time of deepest despair, as is common to artists everywhere, broke, hungover, abandoned by the muse and prepared to take a job at Arby’s, we found in that darkness the spark of inspiration that would yield up this nearly sanctified recipe!

On a beer-staggered website I found the following extended explanation about how Lagunitas ‘SUCKS’ (‘Brown Shugga’ Substitute Ale) came into existence:

This sad holiday season we didn’t have the brewing capacity to make our favorite seasonal brew, the widely feared ‘Brown Shugga’ Ale.

You see we had a couple of really good years (thank you very much) and so heading into this season while we are awaiting the January delivery of a new brewhouse we are jammin’ along brewing 80 barrels of IPA and PILS and such every 3 hours.

A couple of months back we realized that since we can only brew a mere 60 barrels of ‘Shugga’ every 5 hours, that we were seriously screwed. For every case of ‘Shugga’ brewed, we’d short 3 cases of our favorite daily beers. It’s a drag.

This year, we brewed something that we think is also cool and brews more like our daily brews. The new brewhouse will help insure this kind of failure never happens again.

It’s a mess that we cannot brew our ‘Brown Shugga’ this year and we suck for not doing it. There is nothing cool about screwing this up this badly and we know it.

Maybe we can sue our own sorry selves. There is no joy in our hearts this holiday and the best we can hope for is a quick and merciful end. F*@& us. This totally blows. Whatever. We freaking munch moldy donkey butt and we just want it to be all over...

So this substitute beer is a ‘Cereal Medley’ of Barley, Rye, Wheat, and Oats…. Full of complexishness from the 4 grains, and weighing in at 7.85% abv, then joyously dry-hopped for that big aroma and resinous hop flavor.

Gotta love a brewing company that says “F*@& us” and tells the world they “SUCK” right on their beer label. Ha! That’s a company I can definitely forgive. Funnier still is that if you look up the opinions of WorldWideWeb beer fanatics you’ll find that generally they like ‘SUCKS’ better than ‘BROWN SHUGGA’ – the ale that ‘SUCKS’ was brewed to replace in a pinch.

I have since gone back to THE MAIN INGREDIENT several times and consumed ‘SUCKS’ several more times. If it’s not now my very favorite ale, I don’t know what is.

And with each visit to THE MAIN INGREDIENT, I try some new food item from the menu. Last Saturday, Nappy and I split these:

Veggie Quesadilla
......griddled red pepper & red onion with Oaxacan cheese, sour cream, house-made guacamole, & salsa on the side

Mindy’s Mac & Cheese
......baked to perfection, with loads of cheddar & mild green chiles

Both were excellent! Next Saturday, I intend to try this:

The Calvano
......sopressata, aged provolone, chopped artichoke hearts, & house-roasted red peppers on focaccia

Anyone know what “sopressata” is? (It doesn’t have eyes, does it? I’m a longtime vegetarian.)

OK, so maybe not everything in Phoenix...  sucks.

Lagunitas and they're ice cold, yes, she got 'em for sale.
Man, don't mess around ‘em Lagunitas now
'Cause they too black bad, if you mess around ‘em Lagunitas
They gonna upset your backbone, put your kidneys to sleep
They due to break away your liver 

And dare your heart to beat ‘bout my...
Lagunitas ‘cause they ice cold, 

Yes, they got’ em for sale, I mean...
Yes, she got ‘em for sale, yeah.
~ Robert Johnson
‘They’re Red Hot’ (-reinterpreted)

FarAwayEyes, congratulations!
U R my hero and...
This brew
Is 4 U:
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~ Stephen T. McCarthy

YE OLDE COMMENT POLICY: All comments, pro and con, are welcome. However, ad hominem attacks and disrespectful epithets will not be tolerated (read: "posted"). After all, this isn’t Amazon.com, so I don’t have to put up with that kind of bovine excrement.
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