Brendan Calling

living in an alternative universe of permanent outrage and relentless negativity fostered and fueled by the blogosphere

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Big Days

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I’ve been going nutso trying to get my house finished up. Over the summer, as I think I mentioned, we repaired the porch roof frame, re-roofed, and painted the entire exterior. Now we have moved to the floors. (Sorry, no pictures for now, as I don’t have a digital camera).

I have exposed yellow pine sub-flooring, 3? planks, but they are not in the best shape. When i bought the place, the floors had this ugly orange finish that was old and crumbling, so I scraped where I could and then hit it with a layer of grey floor paint. Now, almost 10 years later, that paint is in bad shape too.

My original plan had been to do plywood floors, but C and I were both concerned that it might not appeal to a buyer. So instead, I settled on hardwood floors — but as the search went on I realized that the stuff I liked was out of my price range, and the stuff I could afford was ugly or poor quality. So then we reconsidered plywood: perhapsplanks like this or this; or maybe tiles.

But when my contractor and I discussed, she abruptly said, “hey let me show you something.” She got down on the floor with a scraper and sander, and in a few seconds the a spot of raw pine wood was peeking through the paint. She popped open the can of denatured alcohol I had used to strip paint off the baseboards and brushed a coating onto the pine, which turned a beautiful,glossy butterscotch.

“I’ve refinished worse floors than these, dude,” she said looking up at me. “Heck, I can replace the one or two boards that need replacing, it’s not like yellow pine’s in short supply.”

“Yeah, but the mess of refinishing,” I began but she reminded me “You’re gonna have to sand if you do plywood. And i can have these floors done in a couple of days once the room is cleared.”

So now we’re back to re-finishing, which will be completed in October (contractor leaves on vacation Tuesday).

So I’ve been working, largely by myself, to prep the rooms for refinishing. The dining room is largely done in terms of being emptied, and now it’s on to the living room. I have a few unrelated tasks to take care of first –harvesting the year-end basil for pesto and returning my friend’s food processor, harvesting another jars worth of hot peppers for pickling– and then I’ll be emptying and storing a bookshelf, sorting through my son’s toys and storing that away, moving more furniture into the storage room, and perhaps even breaking down the stereo. I doubt I’ll get this all accomplished today, since I stayed out late last night and woke up just before 11:00. But that’s the plan, Stan.

Piggie of the Week: the GOP Makes a Boo-Boo. Again.

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Ben Franklin is believed to have said “Nothing is certain but death and taxes.”

If he had been alive today, he would have added “and Republican’s complete lack of foresight.” The Iraq War, for instance, was going to be over in weeks. OOOPS. Holding the debt ceiling hostage would make them look strong. OOOPS. Scott Walker was going to dominate Wisconsin. OOOOPS. The Tea Party was going to be their personal conservative army. OOOPS. Sarah Palin would rally the GOP. OOOPS. Impeaching a sitting president would work out swell. OOOOOPS.

In today’s Piggie of the Week, AP Ticker considers how the Citizens United decision backfired on the Republicans.

Driving in Philly, 10/3/2011

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I was on my way to Northern Liberties, a neighborhood just north of old Philadelphia, when I got involved in some classic Philly driving.

Let me set the scene. I was headed north on 7th Stree, behind an enormous maroon Durango, one of those SUVs that are so big they look like some kind of prehistoric cow made of metal, the kind that’s so wide they almost take up a lane and a half.

I don’t know why people buy these things for city use. The cost of filling up the tank must be a fortune, and you can never get the vehicle up to speed simply due to the characteristics of urban driving. But there he was in front of me, leaving just enough room for traffic in the right lane to squeak by. We were at a stoplight just before passing under the entrace to I-95 when I heard the distinct shriek of a police siren, and saw the lights in my rearview. It must have been a real emergency, because that car was making a TON of noise.

So, like all the other drivers, I pulled over to the side to let the cop get by. Well, like ALMOST all the other drivers. The SUV didn’t move at all. It just sat there. The cop blared on his horn, flashed his lights, but nothing. Finally, I leaned on MY horn, and the driver’s head popped up. Realizing he was blocking the cop, he FINALLY pulled off to the left. The cop hit the gas and sped by.

As we continued up 7th, two more cop cars shot by, lights and sirens in full display, followed by ANOTHER car. Big times up the street to be sure, and as we crossed Spring Garden Street, the cops had amassed at the Edgar Allen Poe housing project. [and may I add here that, historical figure or not, the name “Edgar Allen Poe” conjures up images of horror and murder, why would you name a housing project after that?]

One car had blocked access to the cross street, Brown. Cops were heading north on foot, into the project. A federal homeland security van pulled up alongside us and parked. Meanwhile, a policeman was waving the line of traffic through.

Unfortunately, the maroon SUV had other ideas. Instead of moving along, the SUV just sat there taking up a lane and a half. People started honking, but the driver wouldn’t budge. There was no way to get around him without damaging the federal van.

But finally, very very sloooooowly, the SUV moved to the left, just enough so the rest of us could go on our way. He pulled up onto the curb, his ass-end blocking the cross-street like he was an unofficial deputy.

As I passed the behemoth, I saw that the driver and his wife were staring out the window, watching the activity up the street with their jaws dropped. Yes my friends, they had decided that traffic be damned, here was an actual crime investigation taking place, for once it wasn’t on the teevee, and by gum, they were gonna watch the fun.

I hate Philly drivers.

Note to fellow Liberal Bloggers: Just Because You’ve Heard About Something for the First Time Doesn’t Make It News.

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Now, a group of House Republicans is launching a new stealth attack against union workers. GOP Reps. Jim Jordan (OH), Tim Scott (SC), Scott Garrett (NJ), Dan Burton (IN), and Louie Gohmert (TX) have introduced H.R. 1135, which states that it is designed to “provide information on total spending on means-tested welfare programs, to provide additional work requirements, and to provide an overall spending limit on means-tested welfare programs.”

Much of the bill is based upon verifying that those who receive food stamps benefits are meeting the federal requirements for doing so. However, one section buried deep within the bill adds a startling new requirement. The bill, if passed, would actually cut off all food stamp benefits to any family where one adult member is engaging in a strike against an employer

Sounds pretty bad.

Atrios wonders if, DUH, “It’s Almost As If This Was Part of A Grand Plan”, and links to Think Progress.

the Daily Kos takes note too:

So cut off federal food stamps for an entire family if one person in that family strikes a private corporation, company, business?

Forward – to the 19th Century. RepublicSCUMS are the most evil, wicked fuckers on the face of the earth.

Sponsors of this bill, H.R. 1135, include, GOP Reps. Jim Jordan (OH), Tim Scott (SC), Scott Garrett (NJ), Dan Burton (IN), and Louie Gohmert (TX).

Susie Madrak takes aim, and so does John walker at FDL. All of them describe this as an attack by the GOP on organized labor, by making it more difficult to strike. And how cruel the GOP is, cutting off whole families from food stamps if even one member strikes. That is just so terrible and awful of them.

The problem with all of this is that it’s not news. I know because I work at a hunger-relief organization, and part of what we do is help individuals and families sign up for food stamps (now known as SNAP). It has now been confirmed to me, by three people who work here, including our policy manager, that this has been the case dating back to about 1996. In fact, it’s in the training materials I was given when I first got hired: “Strikers: make a whole household ineligible.” That’s because of a 1988 court decision abstracted here: “THE wives and children of men who are on strike lost one of their rights on March 23rd, when the Supreme Court upheld, by five votes to three, Congress’s decision in 1981 that they could be denied food stamps.” here’s the policy as it pertains to Pennsylvania.

But furthermore, while the language is offensive, it’s largely unworkable if the idea is to kick people already receiving SNAP off the program. When you apply, there’s a requirement to report if you’re on strike. If you’re already receiving SNAP, it’s a lot harder to determine that, simply due to the fact that the welfare offices where the majority of SNAP cases are handled are overworked, understaffed, inefficient, and in general swamped. That’s the reason my employers screen applicants and do case management. County assistance has enough trouble handling their already huge workload: no one has the time (or for that matter the resources) to go through every applicant’s files to see which ones belong to unions and which unions are on strike at any given time. The only way this “policy” (and I’m using the term charitably) could work is if a striker went into the county assistance office and said “hey guys, those food stamps i’m getting? Cancel them, I’m on strike”. So if that’s the case and it’s not simply a repeat of legislation that was passed by House Democrats and Senate Republicans in 1981 and upheld in 1988, it’s ludicrous, empty posturing to make the GOP look tough to their foaming-at-the-mouth, mentally ill, right-wing retards (”cognitively challenged” is too kind a term for the thickwitted GOP base).

But this has not stopped my friends in left blogistan from acting like the hysterics on the right. Not one single poster, except for Think Progress, has amended their claims. Not one.

hey guys? I thought we were the honest, thoughtful, level-headed, reality-based community. Just because you’ve only just now heard about this policy, which I agree is an unfair thumb on the scale that makes it more difficult for people fighting for better working conditions to strike. But that’s policy for both the hated Republicans and our so-called “friends” the Democrats

Allyson Schwartz Should Shut Her Piehole about Wiener’s Wiener

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Oh look, here’s pennsylvania’s favorite family-destroying scold, Allyson Schwartz, calling for Anthony Wiener do step down. Someone tell this loudmouthed sack of shit to shut her piehole.

Let’s get some shit straight, shall we? Anthony Wiener’s penis pictures don’t hurt me. They don’t damage my relationship with my fiancee. They don’t take money out of my pocket. They don’t bankrupt my city and schools. They don’t send my friends and neighbors off to die. Anthony Wiener and his wiener have never hurt me. EVER.

Allyson Schwartz on the other hand?

Allyson Schwartz voted for the Bankruptcy Bill of 2005, which allowed credit card companies to charge any interest rates they like, while making it much more difficult (if not totally impossible) for consumers to get bankruptcy protection from those debts, even if they’re incurred by medical expenses or other catastrophes. My rates, probably like yours, went up to 25% or more. So right there, Allyson Schwartz has hurt me much more than Anthony Winer’s dick.

Oh, but it gets better. As a direct result of the Bankruptcy Bill, the mortgage industry took a HUGE self-admitted hit, and the banks admitted it:

Washington Mutual Inc. got what it wanted in 2005: A revised bankruptcy code that no longer lets people walk away from credit card bills.

The largest U.S. savings and loan didn’t count on a housing recession. The new bankruptcy laws are helping drive foreclosures to a record as homeowners default on mortgages and struggle to pay credit card debts that might have been wiped out under the old code, said Jay Westbrook, a professor of business law at the University of Texas Law School in Austin and a former adviser to the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank.

“Be careful what you wish for,” Westbrook said. “They wanted to make sure that people kept paying their credit cards, and what they’re getting is more foreclosures.”

Washington Mutual no longer exists. Wachovia was absorbed by Wells Fargo. Anthony Weiner’s penis had nothing to do with the mortgage collapse that destroyed banks, homeowners, and retirement savings. Allyson Schwartz, on the other hand, had a LOT to do with that. And here she is, strutting around moralizing: what kind of morals do you have when your votes destroy entire sectors of the economy, and you don’t voluntarily resign?

On the other hand, when it comes to sending young kids off to war to die for no reason, Anthony and Allyson are both wieners, idiotically sending our kids to die in Iraq for Dick Cheney’s fever dreams. However, Wiener’s publicly regretted his vote: Allyson voted several times to keep our kids dying for no good reason. Her war, in which she has no personal stake to the best of my knowledge, no kids overseas in the desert, has drained our national treasury, causing deficits and enormous pain for our people. And that says nothing of all the grieving families she’s left in her wake.

My opinion is that Allyson Schwartz should, if she’s going to open her piehole at all, stuff it full of a bag of dicks.

Update: A solid majority of Weiner’s constituents think he should stay. Maybe Senator Lieberman Allyson Schwartz should stick to sniffing her own panties.

On the Occasion of the Glorious Obama Tax Cuts for the Wealthy

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DemocRAT, banks, big business as usual, calling bullshit, civil rights, corporate deadbeats, crime, economy, elections,equal rights, fascism, history, hypocrisy, lying republican filth, politics, poverty, pure evil, youtube December 17th, 2010

the tax cut for the wealthy, which will almost certainly lead to cuts to human services and attacks on Social Security, is fait accompli. Quite a few Democrats said no to this piece of shit, but in the end, too many were too scared to vote the consciences, while many others are simply not on the side of working people. The Democrats are indeed a party of cowards and crooks, much like their partners in crime across the aisle.

You know, it’s funny. I’ve never understood why the wealthy, who already have so much, are determined to have it all at the expense of everyone else. It’s been a long time since 1917 and even longer since 1789, when the rich (perhaps) learned why it’s important to keep the proles well-fed, employed, and financially secure. It’s not rocket science: well-fed, employed, secure proles don’t rise up en masse and kill rich people.

I suspect that 2011 is going to be a very bad year for the United States, with more desperate people doing something stupid as they watch their lives circle the drain. It’s already happening: