The Dominionist cabal to control the military and why it's like Dune

Actually, sort of disconnected rants about women and gays in teh military and the forced fundamentalism in the US military.

This stupidity started in the late '70s when the far right evangelicals began to take over the military. The first thing was deglamorization of alcohol, which destroyed the Club system. The club system was rank specific, and acted as a way to teach and monitor drinking. It wasn't perfect, but we looked out for each other.

Then the brass decided to make it impossible to drink on base - the military police waited outside the Clubs to arrest drivers. And being stopped on post was a career killer.

By the mid-80s, the brass had managed to institute rules that you couldn't drink while deployed in Bosnia. Then it became you couldn't drink on any deployment. In other words, they would trust us with people's lives, but not with a beer.

In our current debacle, beer is rationed out like morphine. Imagine combat and having nothing to let you relax your screaming brain. No wonder we have so many PTSD cases coming out of the theatres.

Now that they think they have a cadre of teetotalers, they're going to kill off the last of the smokers.

The idea is to have a Puritanically biased military force without those distracting nasty vices - a Crusader ideal of the Christian Soldier. They want religious cultists to replace an apolitical, professional military cadre. They want a armed cult that owes allegiance to what they think their god wants, not to the Constitution and the rule of Law.

This is the model for other cult driven militias such as the Taliban, Al-Qaeda, the SS of Nazi Germany, Serbian nationalists, Chinese Communists, North Korean Army, etc.

It's Un-American.


Note: Iran/Kuwait as a means of isolating and conditioning the military, ala Dune. Isolation, control of access to vice. Computer links normalize harsh conditions and enhance susceptibility to influence.
Sets up a we/other relationship with an esoteric and Puritanical enemy which does not (apparently ) display vices except extreme brutality and mindless violence. (cartoon/graphic/computer aspect) death by remote and video game point system.

I could have written this.

I want to not be invisible anymore.

I want to get up and shower and have somewhere to go.

I want to punch the people who talk about the recession being over.

I want to not have to choose between toilet paper or dog food.

I want to take back all the money I spent on student loans for an education that does me no good now.

I want to stop mending the waistband of five-year-old sweatpants.

I want to not consider two tacos for a dollar at Jack In The Box a splurge.

I want to walk into a job interview not reeking of desperation.

I want to be able to afford a simple goddamned urn for my daughter's ashes.

I want to pay just one bill on its due date, not have to wait until the FINAL NOTICE.

I want to be able to drive across town to pick my kid up so he doesn't have to walk in the rain.

I want to shop at the Dollar Store because I'm thrifty, not because it is the only way I can afford luxuries like body wash, toothpaste and laundry soap.

I want to be able to drive the two hours to Santa Cruz to visit my dying friend.

I want to pay for a haircut, instead of using the kitchen scissors to “even up the ends again”.

I want to have a shit job to bitch about.

I want to not panic every time the doorbell rings unexpectedly.

I want to split a tab or treat someone to something.

I want to wear contact lenses again, instead of these wobbly old glasses.

I want to be able to buy a present for my goddaughters.

I want to go to the theater to see a movie and pay for my own damn ticket.

I want to drive a completely legal car legally.

I want to not have to choose between buying tampons or a pound of ground beef.

I want to buy a book that ISN'T on the 25-cent rack at the Thrift Store.

I want to stop avoiding my friends because they're pitying or worse.

I want to not have to invent new ways to rearrange my resume and STILL get no response.

I want to get my dogs their shots so I can take them to the park.

I want to use good trash bags.

I want to wake up without dread that today is the day it will all come tumbling down.

I want to consider owning a spicebox and a mortar and pestle NOT a pipe dream.

I want a new bra.

I want to feel like a real person again.

I want to BE a real person again.

I am sick to death of this Middle Class poverty (not a penny to my name, but the remnants of a better life all around me)

I am sick to death of dumbing down my resume, groveling for jobs I could have done at sixteen and STILL not getting hired.

I am sick to death of feeling powerless.

I am sick to death of apologizing and being shamed and embarrassed for being one of the long-term unemployed.

I am sick to death of tailoring my resume to each job and STILL not getting a response from 99% of the companies I apply to.

I am sick to death of people telling me that I “really should see a doctor” when nothing would please me more, except that I can't afford to do so.

I am sick to death of not even getting interviewed for open positions, and then getting shitty service from the person they DID hire when I didn't even get an interview.

I am sick to death of turning down invitations to do things with friends, because I can't afford to do so.

I am sick to death of pretending that holidays don't exist because I can't afford to celebrate them.

I am sick to death of throwing away 2/3 of my mail without even opening it because I know that there's a bill or a statement from someone I owe that I can't afford to pay.

I am sick to death of explaining to other people that “getting a job at McDonalds” is not as simple as they think.

I am sick to death of hiding, being quiet, trying to play nice, mentally composing suicide letters, trying to figure out who can take care of my dogs/cat/kid when it all goes to hell like it is bound to do.

I am sick to death of feeling powerless.

I am sick to death of being unable to pay my own way.

I am sick to death of people telling me that “it could be worse”, because I know that it could and I am convinced that it will and I am only biding my time in this limbo which is a certain kind of hell all its own.

I am sick to death of these conversations where my friends and I try to brainstorm ways to get the hell out of this town/state in hopes that there is some place where we can still trade hard work for decent wages and crawl out of the hellhole we've fallen into.

I am sick to death of having to look my son in the eye and admit that I have failed him, that I failed his sister, that I have failed us all.

I am sick. And sad. And exhausted. And undone.

3:46 PM PT: I am overwhelmed by the support and suggestions and the stories you have all shared. I wish new bras and shoes and hope and joy for each one of you who is, in one way or another, where I am at. What I did not expect was the laughter you also managed to squeeze in there, though some of it through tears, and for that too, I am so grateful. Thank you all.
Originally posted to laurustina on Fri Jul 08, 2011 at 12:27 PM PDT.
Also republished by WYFP?, Personal Storytellers, Unemployment Chronicles, and Class Warfare Newsletter: The Plutocracy VS the Working Class.
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ABC sides with Reality

http://www.politicususa.com/en/constitution-religious-document

As humans re-start using both sides of their brains to mass communicate, the Power of the Word wains.

Damn, sounds all LTR.

The point is, people are still trying to use just words to control others. The Bible is out of their hands, but they would like to replace it with a mythology of the Founding Fathers and their Sacred Words - The Constitution.

Hm - Ben Franklin as Bacchus or Priapas. I can see that.

The same old language - Latin - but the new priests are lawyers, who speak together and dispense law from their esoteric knowledge of the mysteries of the Bill of Rights.

They will, of course, fail. They've learned nothing from the Arab Spring or Rep. Weiner. The private is once again public.
Or at least our notions of what 'private' is are changing. We'll probably go more Japanese, or at least European.

Americans and the notion of the suburbs have created notions of entitlement to space. (Virgin Land, Machine in the Garden, John Ford, etc.) Which is why the cities are considered corrupting - because they ignore your obvious insight and wisdom and do strange things you're not comfortable with.

We haven't run out of land, but we've made that irrelevant. YouTube. CNN. Comcast. You can't escape the gazillion stimuli your brain processes daily. The trick is, we're using the right brain now, which isn't used to non-linear thinking. It's learning, though.




Used to lecture Korean Exchange students on American Culture. 10 hour series. Wonder if I still have my notes...


I suspect new taboos will take their place.

Hello

Here in Ma Ryan's Home for Wayward Musicians, Dr Robyn Ryan has decided to start a blog to share her interesting social an political commentary. Consider it a great page for your coffee hour and enjoy her thoughts on communication in the internet age, citizenship, women's issues, and New Orleans life.