Thursday, May 30, 2013
















Taxation without Representation: A tale of two Tea Parties

     In 1773, a bunch of colonial patriots in Boston got totally pissed off at King George because they were being taxed severely by Britain and yet had no say in the matter.  "No taxation without representation!" these brave American colonials cried.  And then they dumped several bales of English breakfast tea into the Boston harbor.  And the rest is history.

      "No taxation without representation," American patriots cried way back then.  And now let's fast-forward approximately 300 years ahead -- to see how far we have fallen.  There is another Tea Party in America now but these new modern Tea Party guys are currently doing the exact opposite of what the 1773 Tea Party guys did.  This new Tea Party is now fighting as hard as it possibly can to get patriotic Americans taxed up the ying-yang instead -- but with NO representation.

     "But wait a minute," you might say.  "The new Tea Party does have representation.  A whole bunch of its members are currently in Congress -- and even the President and the Supreme Court seem to obey their every command."  Yeah, but.  As the British used to say, "The proof of the pudding is in the eating."  And if you look closely at all those silver-tongued government "servants" in Washington who now swear all up and down that they are conscientiously representing the hopes and fears of this new 21st-century Tea Party?  Well.  Then.  How come in real life these supposedly-loyal TP representatives actually always seem to be doing the bidding of Wall Street and War Street and huge greedy corporations instead. 

     Americans today are certainly being taxed and taxed and taxed all right -- but not by any officials who actually represent their best interests.  Clearly, policy-makers in Washington right now are not representing the new Tea Party's interests -- and they are certainly not representing your interests.  Or mine either.  


     Unlike the brave Tea Party of 1773, our 21st-century Tea Party has been hood-winked. 

     According to www.salary.com, the average Washington lobbyist is getting paid over $100,000 a year to happily whisper sweet nothings into the willing ears of government officials in Washington -- so that said lobbyist's employer will get all kinds of tax breaks and perqs.  And of course these government officials in Washington then go out of their way to represent only the folks with big bucks, not people like you and me or even the new Tea Party members -- and especially not the new Tea Party rank and file.

      Are you currently paying your very own lobbyist $100,000 a year to represent you in Washington?  If not, then you clearly have no representation.

    And mega-corporate road-hogs such as the Koch brothers and Americans for Prosperity spend how much on buying their representation in Washington?  According to Mother Jones Magazine http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/11/charts-map-koch-brothers-2012-spending, just these two groups alone paid out 96.7 million dollars in campaign contributions during the elections of 2012.  And did you also pay out 96.7 million dollars as well, to get your representative elected?  No?  Then your representative owes you diddly.  Sorry, but that's how it goes.

    If We-the-People actually did have any representation in Washington, America would certainly not be in the hot mess that it is in now.  We would all have good schools, a solid infrastructure and lots of housing and jobs, and with no outsourcing, no wars-for-profit, no bankster dirty tricks, no super-fund tax breaks for the wealthy 1% -- and definitely no more "trickle up"
http://my.firedoglake.com/wibudgetproject/2013/05/30/new-wisconsin-tax-proposal-overwhelmingly-favors-highest-earners/.

     If modern-day Americans had only still managed to maintain that feisty American historical spirit of "No taxation without representation!" that our brave ancestors fought so hard for, then Monsanto and the nuclear industry and Big Pharma and oil barons
http://tinyurl.com/oz8jqyw and banksters and Citizens United and the Koch brothers and Wall Street and War Street would not be running our government and owning it like they do.  WE would be running it and owning it.

     But now here we are instead -- approximately 300 years after the original Tea Party heroes did their bit to bring us freedom from taxation without representation -- and most Americans still haven't learned a single thing since King George was our boss.  Not one single thing. 


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Advertizements for myself: In these hard times of brutal (and illegal) corporatist ball-busting socialism-for-the-rich-only, I am doing whatever I can to make a spare dollar. Here are some of my current alternate-economy schemes that never seem to work -- but I keep hoping!

******

 If anyone ever wants to hire me on as a travel writer (or war correspondent), "Have laptop, will travel!"




******

Need someone to help you throw out stuff? I'm really good at deciding what needs to be thrown out (starting with all those corporate-owned bums in Washington!)

****

Need an actor to play an older woman in your movie?
Then I'm your man! I can portray all kinds of older women -- from judges, business execs and other insane zombies to bag ladies, cancer patients, kindly grandmothers and dying patients in rest homes. I've played them all. So send me a script and let's do this. Hollywood, here we come! Here's my reel:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C91uEYjLUXA

****
Are you a plaintiffs' attorney who is tired of writing those pesky personal injury settlement briefs all the time? No problem! I can write them for you. Years of experience. And pay me only if you win the case.
****


I recently got my Notary Public commission!

Need a Notary Public? Have seal, will travel. E-mail me at jpstillwater@yahoo.com and I'll stamp your document, make it official and only charge $10. Of course if you live outside of Berkeley, I may have to charge travel expenses -- but am well worth it!

****
Want something good to read? Buy my book! "Bring Your Own Flak Jacket: Helpful Tips for Touring Today's Middle East," available at Amazon and Barnes & Noble. http://www.amazon.com/Bring-Your-Own-Flak-Jacket/dp/0978615719/ref=cm_pdp_rev_itm_title_1. It's like if Jack Kerouac, Mark Twain and/or Janet Evanovich went to war.

I also wrote a book about going on Hajj (also included as a chapter in "Bring Your Own Flak Jacket," but this book is cheaper -- but it's worth buying them both!) My book on the Hajj is so outstanding that I bet even Christian fundamentalists will love it! Please buy it here: http://www.amazon.com/Mecca-Hajj-Lessons-Islamic-School/dp/0978615700/ref=cm_rdp_product

****

"Imagine a world where EVERY child is wanted, nurtured, protected and loved: World peace in one generation!"
You can now buy T-shirts, coffee mugs, tote bags, truckers' caps, baby gear and/or teddy bears with this logo printed on them. They make great gifts, especially for parents and teachers. To purchase, just click here:http://www.cafepress.com/StillTWaters

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"Life is a competition. The winners are the ones who do the most good deeds."
You can also buy T-shirts, coffee mugs, tote bags, truckers' caps, baby gear and/or teddy bears with this logo printed on them. They make great gifts, especially for those of us who are still idealists in these troubled times. To purchase, just click here: http://www.cafepress.com/StillTWaters  

Monday, May 20, 2013














Getting used to the future: Why I'm going camping this weekend

     Consider this message in your inbox to be like a vacation e-mail response.  "I'm going camping this weekend -- roughing it, so to speak.  No electricity.  No automobiles.  No computers!  No heating and cooling units, no public library, no TV and no Berkeley Bowl Marketplace for food." 

     Just me and a tent and the great outdoors, up on the Tuolumne River.

     Will I survive?  Given my low-level camping skills, the answer to that question might actually be "no".

     But going camping occasionally is always a good idea.  It makes us more grateful for the soft life we now live down in the cities.  And it should also make us appropriately angry that our greedy, stupid and immoral leaders have systematically squandered the incredible wealth of our national cornucopia on unnecessary, stupid, immoral and endless wars.

     Happy Memorial Day -- although it looks like no one in America seems to remember what our thousands and thousands of heroic dead soldiers should have been fighting for but were not -- the right for ALL Americans to have a future that doesn't involve living in tents.


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*************************************

Advertizements for myself: In these hard times of brutal (and illegal) corporatist ball-busting socialism-for-the-rich-only, I am doing whatever I can to make a spare dollar. Here are some of my current alternate-economy schemes that never seem to work -- but I keep hoping!

******

 If anyone ever wants to hire me on as a travel writer (or war correspondent), "Have laptop, will travel!"



******

Need someone to help you throw out stuff? I'm really good at deciding what needs to be thrown out (starting with all those corporate-owned bums in Washington!)

****

Need an actor to play an older woman in your movie?
Then I'm your man! I can portray all kinds of older women -- from judges, business execs and other insane zombies to bag ladies, cancer patients, kindly grandmothers and dying patients in rest homes. I've played them all. So send me a script and let's do this. Hollywood, here we come! Here's my reel:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C91uEYjLUXA

****
Are you a plaintiffs' attorney who is tired of writing those pesky personal injury settlement briefs all the time? No problem! I can write them for you. Years of experience. And pay me only if you win the case.
****


I recently got my Notary Public commission!

Need a Notary Public? Have seal, will travel. E-mail me at jpstillwater@yahoo.com and I'll stamp your document, make it official and only charge $10. Of course if you live outside of Berkeley, I may have to charge travel expenses -- but am well worth it!

****
Want something good to read? Buy my book! "Bring Your Own Flak Jacket: Helpful Tips for Touring Today's Middle East," available at Amazon and Barnes & Noble. http://www.amazon.com/Bring-Your-Own-Flak-Jacket/dp/0978615719/ref=cm_pdp_rev_itm_title_1. It's like if Jack Kerouac, Mark Twain and/or Janet Evanovich went to war.

I also wrote a book about going on Hajj (also included as a chapter in "Bring Your Own Flak Jacket," but this book is cheaper -- but it's worth buying them both!) My book on the Hajj is so outstanding that I bet even Christian fundamentalists will love it! Please buy it here: http://www.amazon.com/Mecca-Hajj-Lessons-Islamic-School/dp/0978615700/ref=cm_rdp_product

****

"Imagine a world where EVERY child is wanted, nurtured, protected and loved: World peace in one generation!"
You can now buy T-shirts, coffee mugs, tote bags, truckers' caps, baby gear and/or teddy bears with this logo printed on them. They make great gifts, especially for parents and teachers. To purchase, just click here:http://www.cafepress.com/StillTWaters

https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTiqVCTMaMEgkTRhPenqIefocM4Ov6OwXPD0Ys-DI8GblFCdA-sjGWzIc5F64b7vCMm0iwwL2AYkD2pi9xPT6tsd4Oqgr4O6tuO3QN3cyg0YIWlUy2-3oPs07XEXssLliSwhly/s1600/IMG_0045.JPGhttps://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfaqs_lZVD9OiBwQV6_gUkgvGHjprj9K2p4tTAQ2hnwi4yQ2pcM0gQ2FqJeGDmdiSFF70_llhC2w4EczqZ17ODHpx4TdovL2YjGl57fg90f9j5BuOTf2q2Rajc7Znqi_1Ep5Is/s1600/IMG_0041.JPG
"Life is a competition. The winners are the ones who do the most good deeds."
You can also buy T-shirts, coffee mugs, tote bags, truckers' caps, baby gear and/or teddy bears with this logo printed on them. They make great gifts, especially for those of us who are still idealists in these troubled times. To purchase, just click here: http://www.cafepress.com/StillTWaters  

Tuesday, May 14, 2013



















America: The place where Israeli neo-cons get their Big Ideas!

    Some people are always unjustly accusing Israeli neo-cons of learning their rather barbaric occupation strategies (of torturing, killing, harassing, stealing from and jailing Palestinians) from the Nazis -- but that's just not true!  Israeli neo-cons actually stole their barbaric, inhumane and uncivilized methods and ideas from America!  And I have the maps to prove it too.


     You know that map series that shows the changing demographics of land distribution between Israel and Palestine, from 1947 to present times?  With the Israeli lands all illustrated in white and the shrinking native lands illustrated in green? http://en.avaaz.org/1108/palestine-gaza-statehood-bid-un

    Well, I've been working on creating a demographic map of America between 1492 and present times too -- illustrating land distribution between Native Americans and Euro-Americans in 1492, 1700, 1850 and now.  And will it look familiar?  Oh yeah.  So stop trying to blame the current Israeli neo-con foreign and domestic policies http://www.roitov.com/articles/inventions.htm on the Nazis -- when we already gots a winner right here in the good old U.S.A.

PS:  Here is my version of the above-described demographic map of America, that I've drawn so far -- except that I got the green bits and the white bits mixed up.  Mercator would probably be rolling over in his grave right now but, hey, it's the best I could do.

     And now perhaps it's time to start working on a new map -- of what America's very own "Project for a New American Century" neo-cons have in mind for Israel next.  And this one is gonna be big, even bigger than my map of the U.S. 
And it's gonna use up a hecka lot of green ink too -- stretching all the way from Algeria and Libya, through Egypt, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Iran, all the way to Uzbekistan by 2050.  Will get back to you on that one.

PPS:  A mainstream Israeli newspaper has just reported that an ex-Bush official believes that the current chemical weapons charges against Syria are all false flags, planted by Israeli neo-cons.  And if Bush's guy is right, the Israeli neo-cons probably also copied that idea from all those American false-flag reports that Saddam Hussein had chemical weapons as well  http://www.haaretz.com/blogs/west-of-eden/former-bush-administration-official-israel-may-be-behind-use-of-chemical-arms-in-syria.premium-1.519172

    And now those copy-cat Israeli neo-cons have just dropped bombs on the Damascus airport

     Since 1997, Syria http://www.freepalestinemovement.org/home.html, Libya, Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen, Iran, Pakistan, etc. have all suffered violent military and economic attacks by American neo-cons.  And this roll-call of preemptive aggression on the Middle East reads just like a page out of the PNAC playbook http://morallowground.com/2011/06/03/on-this-day-1997-project-for-the-new-american-century-founded/.

     And now even East Jerusalem is under attack by Israeli neo-cons http://www.roitov.com/articles/jerusalemroads.htm

    When we all voted for Obama in 2008 and again in 2012, we naively assumed that we had finally put an end to all that PNAC craziness.  But no, no, no and no.  The PNAC plan is obviously stronger than ever right now.  So much for hope.  Obama is clearly a PNAC type of guy. 

      And apparently America's current upper escalations of power are also Al Qaeda types of guys too.  According to Global Research, "
[T]he recent Israeli strikes prove outright that Israel, acting on behalf of the US, is fighting on the same side as Al Qaeda in Syria.  Western efforts to bolster supposed ‘moderate rebels’ have clearly only bolstered what has always been the main demographic of the militant ‘opposition’:  Salafi/Jihaddi inspired and fomented militias, that do not espouse anything close to democracy."   http://www.globalresearch.ca/war-and-moral-expediancy-us-and-israel-support-salafist-jihadist-terrorists-in-syria/5334315

    
As Dorothy Parker used to say, "What new hell is this!"  It's a Hell that is costing American taxpayers their very life-blood, that's what.

 PPPS:  Here's a recent report from Gaza by an American doctor visiting there: 

     "...
The refugee camps we visit seem even more soiled and overcrowded than before, and there is trash everywhere.  The UN is running out of money to maintain its food assistance program and people are revolting....  Gaza is a pressure cooker.  The UN predicts that Gaza may become inhabitable after 2020.   But we will keep coming back as long as we can.  Our conscience demands this of us http://palestinechronicle.com/gaza-we-will-keep-coming-back/#.UYQsxsqcHBY

     Sounds like a Native American reservation to me -- as best described here by Johnny Cash:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NdNV9JX-Xi8 and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MCAf_Ajh_KQ and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x0zbD84Q1U4.

PPPPS:  Sanctions on Iran?  Screw that.  Somebody needs to put sanctions on those sleazy, war-mongering Israeli and American neo-cons
http://vimeo.com/64853585.  And what if Russia, Iran, China and India started a boycott of America and Israel too?  What then?  Here's what:  All of the shelves in all of the WalMarts in America and Israel would stand empty quick as a wink.  

*************************************
*************************************

Advertizements for myself: In these hard times of brutal (and illegal) corporatist ball-busting socialism-for-the-rich-only, I am doing whatever I can to make a spare dollar. Here are some of my current alternate-economy schemes that never seem to work -- but I keep hoping!


******

 If anyone ever wants to hire me on as a travel writer (or war correspondent), "Have laptop, will travel!"



******

Need someone to help you throw out stuff? I'm really good at deciding what needs to be thrown out (starting with all those corporate-owned bums in Washington!)

****

Need an actor to play an older woman in your movie?
Then I'm your man! I can portray all kinds of older women -- from judges, business execs and other insane zombies to bag ladies, cancer patients, kindly grandmothers and dying patients in rest homes. I've played them all. So send me a script and let's do this. Hollywood, here we come! Here's my reel:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C91uEYjLUXA

****
Are you a plaintiffs' attorney who is tired of writing those pesky personal injury settlement briefs all the time? No problem! I can write them for you. Years of experience. And pay me only if you win the case.
****


I recently got my Notary Public commission!

Need a Notary Public? Have seal, will travel. E-mail me at jpstillwater@yahoo.com and I'll stamp your document, make it official and only charge $10. Of course if you live outside of Berkeley, I may have to charge travel expenses -- but am well worth it!

****
Want something good to read? Buy my book! "Bring Your Own Flak Jacket: Helpful Tips for Touring Today's Middle East," available at Amazon and Barnes & Noble. http://www.amazon.com/Bring-Your-Own-Flak-Jacket/dp/0978615719/ref=cm_pdp_rev_itm_title_1. It's like if Jack Kerouac, Mark Twain and/or Janet Evanovich went to war.

I also wrote a book about going on Hajj (also included as a chapter in "Bring Your Own Flak Jacket," but this book is cheaper -- but it's worth buying them both!) My book on the Hajj is so outstanding that I bet even Christian fundamentalists will love it! Please buy it here: http://www.amazon.com/Mecca-Hajj-Lessons-Islamic-School/dp/0978615700/ref=cm_rdp_product

****

"Imagine a world where EVERY child is wanted, nurtured, protected and loved: World peace in one generation!"
You can now buy T-shirts, coffee mugs, tote bags, truckers' caps, baby gear and/or teddy bears with this logo printed on them. They make great gifts, especially for parents and teachers. To purchase, just click here:http://www.cafepress.com/StillTWaters

https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTiqVCTMaMEgkTRhPenqIefocM4Ov6OwXPD0Ys-DI8GblFCdA-sjGWzIc5F64b7vCMm0iwwL2AYkD2pi9xPT6tsd4Oqgr4O6tuO3QN3cyg0YIWlUy2-3oPs07XEXssLliSwhly/s1600/IMG_0045.JPGhttps://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfaqs_lZVD9OiBwQV6_gUkgvGHjprj9K2p4tTAQ2hnwi4yQ2pcM0gQ2FqJeGDmdiSFF70_llhC2w4EczqZ17ODHpx4TdovL2YjGl57fg90f9j5BuOTf2q2Rajc7Znqi_1Ep5Is/s1600/IMG_0041.JPG
"Life is a competition. The winners are the ones who do the most good deeds."
You can also buy T-shirts, coffee mugs, tote bags, truckers' caps, baby gear and/or teddy bears with this logo printed on them. They make great gifts, especially for those of us who are still idealists in these troubled times. To purchase, just click here: http://www.cafepress.com/StillTWaters