Jotting down a few notes for this post-Roe world, the first item on the list being Roe v Wade — the absence of a period following “v” is intentional — USC Title 18 is my favorite book.
Roe v Wade has long been a Red Line between the Yanks and the Rebs, and this is not the deepest divide between the Union and the Second Confederacy — its first President will be its last, when the Russians, Chinese and North Koreans parachute in, a la “Red Dawn”.
Yes, it’s Civil War II, or Civil War III if you count the failed coup, and this time it will not be fought BETWEEN the states, so much as WITHIN the states, neighbor against neighbor, brother against sister, children against children.
Emerging from this conflict will be three separate countries — Atlantica, Pacifica and, in the middle, “Trumpland”, which will be immediately renamed after he passes, but the effect will be the same — unrelenting racism. anti-semitism, anti-socialism, anti-liberalism and, of course, mysogyny.
Note the root of the word “mysogyny” — it’s “gyne”, referring to the uterus, or womb. It’s men who are afraid of the womb, and rightly so, but both men and women are behind this bloodless coup staged by the Republicans, because many women are bound to a powerful and cruel religious belief system.
For years now, the Far Right has fought to bring back slavery.
It almost worked. For the moment, the Republicans think they’ve won, but wait until the mail-in ballots arrive in unmarked trucks for the Mid-Terms, and you’ll see a complete circus just before the shooting starts.
Like I have often said, “irreconcilable differences” are the cause of any breakup, and if ever there were more irreconcilable differences than exist today between Conservatives and Liberals, it’s now.
So what’s the next move?
I’ll tell you the next move, but you’re not gonna wanna hear it. Read my recent blogs back about two weeks, then get to a morning meeting.
The very first thing you’re going to want to do is to raise a LOT of money, and I have a wonderful opportunity to make that happen.
I have 60 years of paintings stored in four warehouses, about 125,000 works on canvas and an equal number of works on paper, plus many hundreds of sculptures, left over from when we closed our gallery.
In addition, I have important works by other artists like Chagall, Miro, Picasso, Matisse, Renoir, Rembrant and van Ostade, to name just a few, also tucked away in storage.
Anytime you feel confident enough to try selling them, I can tell you how it’s done, and it has nothing to do with the art itself.
Placement starts with Concept. You have to have a plan, even though plans never work out — the plan starts the ball rolling, and it’s up to you to keep it rolling.
That skill only comes with personal experience personally experienced, and it gets worse the higher the level of artwork.
Truly important art will always sell, but the collectors have to know about it, and that’s the problem in a nutshell — getting the item in front of the face of the buyer, who isn’t going to make the decision to buy.
It’s the decorator, designer, architect or personal shopper who’s going to make the initial contact and the final decision, not the customer, at least not at these prices.
If it were an offshore painting in an eleborate carved gilded wood frame at a retail price of $89.95, it would still require a conference with the spouse.
You can’t count on people to be educated about art — it’s largely considered to be strictly optional, like fabric shopping bags.
People around me are wondering when it’s going to begin. Actually, it began back about 60 years ago, but the only people who knew there was a war going on were the Republicans.
The Democrats still don’t take this seriously. They think it can be a fair game, but it can’t. The Republicans always cheat to win, and sometimes to lose, when they’re caught at it.
As much as you might want to grab up a gun and start shooting wildly in every direction, let me tell you right off the bat that it doesn’t pay to get involved in a firefight. Everybody loses.
On the other hand, perhaps you should consider “arming up”, especially since all those Second Amendment people have already done so.
I don’t like automatic weapons. I fired “Expert” on every small caliber weapon in the U.S. Army, and was a weapons instructor with stripes at Fort Ord during the Vietnam War.
I didn’t stay at Fort Ord — I went into the Army Security Agency, where the second thing I learned was, “don’t tell everything you know”.
I never tell what the first thing was.
The point I’m making is that I know my weaponology, can handle handguns, long rifles, grenades, rifle grenades, most surface-to-surface launchers, knives, swords and even a bit of wrestling and hand-to-hand combat, which I also taught at Fort Ord.
Even with my vast knowledge of weapons — I can strip and rebuild a Garand M1 blindfolded, and have done so many times — I don’t prefer weapons, and don’t engage in any form of combat, physical, mental, emotional, verbal or spiritual.
Combat is a waste of time, unless you’re playing a videogame.
NFTs are a rip, a pyramid scam with us at the bottom. Nevertheless, you can buy some of my NFTs at a very low price, less than $20, probably closer to $10, each, with the transfer gas fee running also under $20.
They won’t get any more valuable, but they are a way of holding Blessing power, but that won’t help in an all-out armed conflict like what we’re about to experience when the mob gets its danger up, which will happen after the first suppression.
Don’t panic. All warfare ends in settlement. Eventually, the dust cloud dissipates, but the dust is always there, and in the end, they rebuild and start again, which is why they never get very far in the civilization game.
There can be no agreement between these very different factions. Each regards the other as less than human, and only the Republicans are playing — the Democrats just want to make friends and influence people, but that’s not possible.
Most folks think that most folks are reasonable and can arrive at a mutual understanding of peaceful cooperation.
I don’t agree that it’s possible, but my opinion of humans is pretty raw and low — I think of them as somewhat less hairy chimpanzees in fancy clothing, with the disposition of a mink.
They’ll bite off their own leg to spite themselves, and chase their tails until dead.
Sure, some humans have compassion, have some sense of unity with the allness of it all, but most humans are petty and run by fear and greed, the two prime movers in the stock market, but it also applies to food, sex, water and war.
Greed governs decisions about taking territory, while fear rules the giving up of territory. In the end, it’s always about money, although it may wear various masks.
It’s NEVER honest.
While I’m on the subject, I have a particular fondness for the Ruger 10-22 rifle. It’s only a .22 caliber, so it’s not suitable for home defense, but it’s really useful in the woods if you’re in need of a bit of hunting.
It won’t take down a deer reliably, but it will drop a rabbit.
It may or may not be legal in your area, but I haven’t researched it to see — it’s all so complicated! Every state has its own laws, and some of them allow a five year old psychopath to buy any gun they want.
The more shootings there are, the more they make guns available. More guns is not a good solution to too many guns in the first place.
The takedown of a Ruger 10/22 is easy, cleaning is easy, and it’s a very reliable hunting or plinking or target rifle, but it is definitely NOT a weapon of war. It’s great for kids who are learning gun safety and handling.
I recommend several dozen outings to a local gun range where you can teach gun use, and it wouldn’t hurt to figure on at least 20 hours of training. I did much, much more than that, starting at Riverside Military Academy in Gainesville, Georgia, and continuing through several years in the Army.
The little 10/22 is a .22 caliber long rifle, and is no match for the AR-15, nor is it intended to be. It’s not a weapon of war. I don’t recommend shoot-outs of any kind, even in an apocalyptic battle zone like some cities are going to become, unless it’s in Virtual 3D gameplay.
If you’re in the mood to shoot something, go play a video game and let off steam that way.
There’s no reason to own an AR-15. It’s a lousy hunting weapon, ‘way too far into the “overkill” range — it blows anything apart like a pillow after a pillow-fight, and there’s too much technology built into those things, too many things to go wrong.
I like a simple bolt-action rifle and prefer a built-in magazine rather than detachable.
Actually, even a single-shot like my 700 meter heavy-barrel competition stock .22 caliber pellet target air-rifle, which is scoped, and incredibly accurate.
Normally, I don’t use a scope if it’s 600 meters or less. I can hit a 12″ pop-up slow-moving target at that range with a .45 Colt, no problem.
That doesn’t buy me anything. You can’t win a shootout. In a shooting war, nobody wins, and you won’t want to have that memory if you do have to end the lives of others in order for you and your family and friends to manage to live through it.
In an ordinary war, you can tell who’s on what side by the uniform, but in a CIVIL war, there are no uniforms, although you’ll always be able to tell by the haircut and the swagger.
I was 21 when I went into the Army, and I’m almost 81 now. Realistically, there isn’t much I could do or would be willing to do to survive a war today.
It just isn’t worth it — there is no upside. Are the causes really worth fighting for? What could little mostly harmless you do about any of that crap, anyway?
The answer is, “Plenty”, if you count my remedy for the situation — you forgot what I said? Okay, I’ll repeat it so you get it:
Become a rich, famous and successful art dealer.
Use the money to help the community get through the messy stuff. Oh, a side-note — we DO have several retreats.
You can store food, ammo and water there. Ask how to participate in this last-minute effort to provide a refuge for the non-violent.
If you ask any social group what they want most, it’s to have equal citizenship and respect. That isn’t going to happen any time soon, so stop holding your breath.
Most of us just want to be left alone.
Problem is, the bullies won’t leave us alone, and that’s when we need to think about arming up, but again, I don’t advise doing it, because in the end, you probably are too kind to use a weapon of deadly force on anyone no matter what the provocation, and that’s exactly what the bullies are counting on.
You can do whatever you like, but I refuse to fight, even when provoked. That doesn’t bode well for the survival of the school, but what the Heck, you can’t win every hand.
My friends in the music industry fought with words and music, and that’s my plan. I hope you will join me in this endeavor.
Right now, I could use a few hundred thousand to get my books printed and distributed to the news anchors and government leaders.
Would it do any good?
You’re darn right it would. It would make me feel a whole lot better.
See You At The Top!!!
gorby