Archive for April, 2011

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Glory in the morning

Posted in Commentary, News, Politics, Uncategorized, writing with tags , , , , , , , , , on April 30, 2011 by B Schiff

Power corrupts.  It corrupts mightily and famously.  It corrupts hedonisticlaly, morally, severely. It turns virtue on its head and relegates expression to a game.  Power fuels the laundered images of fear and the abject lack of restraint.  Power goads and practices, flails and takes what it takes.  It can be a serene thing  it can be a strong thing, a mocking thing, a self satisfied thing.  Power can shine like a beacon, drop like a stone, crush like a runaway truck.  It lures.  It calls.  It wants.  It produces sweet songs to calm the ear, sweet reason to sack the instincts.  It may turn away from its prey and seem to be something else, a trivial thing that hides itself  from challenges and flies sweetly from inspection.  Power knows.  It sweats.  It works very very hard. It knows itself.  It knows its dupes.  It glorifies all.

From The New York Review of Books

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2011/apr/28/wall-street-leviathan/

From The Washington Post

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/standardized-tests-prove-im-better-than-michael-jordan/2011/03/29/AF4sdL4C_story.html

http://bschiff.com/   the rancid bastards ….. the true…..the dumb ……  the honored creed…..the books I am pushing .

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The landscape gets cold at night

Posted in Commentary, News, Politics, Uncategorized with tags , , , , , , , on April 29, 2011 by B Schiff

Again we mock the human soul.  Again we mock the human spirit.  The cadres of popular imagery are apparent no more.  Damn the torpedoes, all speed ahead.  The more we behave the better we become at ability.  The more we are drunk with the powers of observation, the more we are observant of the void.  The emptiness of the great desert of formless nothing haunts our futures and it is a barren desert, a hot dry place.

The landscape gets cold at night, a counterpoint to the extreme heat of the day. It is an uninviting place, the future in times of trouble and uncertainty.  It mocks us, our belief in it, in its presence, its shape.  It can retreat and hide, run away or crush.  It stares us down a hungry lion.

Deal with what isn’t there.  Build monuments to what is not real.

A view from the other side.

A view from trying to beard the tremulous lion.

Both from The Washington Post

Ian Morris

http://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/books/two-books-on-the-future-of-power-and-diplomacy/2011/02/28/AFHSsSHC_story.html

Robert Samuelson   Washington Post

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-real-tax-avoidance-scandal-centers-on-dividends-and-capital-gains/2011/04/01/AFRz6TXC_story.html

http://bschiff.com/   the rancid bastards ….. the true…..the dumb ……  the honored creed…..the books I am pushing ….

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Balanced civilized history

Posted in Commentary, News, Politics, Uncategorized, writing with tags , , , , , , , on April 29, 2011 by B Schiff

Civilized history.  Trials of insouciant thought and defining principle.  The backbone of  daunting things.

The regal.  The royal.  The sublime.   Fairness.  Temperate temperance.   Demeanor.   Cool.  Tolerance.  Tradition.  The  sullen hammer.

The respect.  The fear.  The taut and tight.   Tis fear all about.

The tacky hammers.  The gods of Olympus .  The want of a hammer.  The hammers of good avocation.    Political hammers.

Taut and tight.  Taut and tough.  The whip hand.  Unnerving posture.    Better than their lessers.   Lesser than their betters.  Grinding hands  creating.  Creating  hands grinding.   Fairy tales.

Balance power.  Rough justice.  Principle in the winds.  The court of courts.  Tough bastards know justice.

From  The Atlantic

http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2011/04/a-conversation-with-john-paul-stevens/237984/

The Nation

http://www.tnr.com/article/politics/87543/ginsburg-breyer-resign-supereme-court

The dumb …… the honored creed. The rancid bastards …… the true.

http://bschiff.com/

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Cold warm water

Posted in Commentary, News, Politics, Uncategorized, writing with tags , , , , , , , , , , , on April 28, 2011 by B Schiff

Sick questions are here to stay.   Sick questions are here today, tomorrow, forever and a day.  The weepers, the shouters, the deadly droll.  Paper our hearts with flimsy tears.   Paper our pockets with dew.  The streets of  mulch turn fallow and dry. The seeds of doubt are ever planted.

The worry.  The grumble.  The game of the lame   The worry.  The predicament.    In sickness and in health .   Beyond reproach the dead bargain away our time.  The dear seal our longings with the kiss.   The true kiss our longings with a seal.  Futures to go.  To have and to have not.  To will and to will not.

Simple colds and dead stress.  Cold warm water.  To live and die too damned well.

New Yorker…Bitter Pill

http://www.newyorker.com/talk/financial/2011/05/02/110502ta_talk_surowiecki

Fortune Magazine   Allan Sloan

http://finance.fortune.cnn.com/2011/04/15/paul-ryan-medicare-reform-hocus-pocus/

The dumb …… the honored creed. The rancid bastards …… the true.

http://bschiff.com/

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Noble dreams flirting

Posted in Commentary, News, Politics, Uncategorized, writing with tags , , , , , , , , on April 27, 2011 by B Schiff

Let the workers and the hardy beware.  Let the stern and the staunch beware.  The right way to go about the right things is the right way.  The earnestness which which to pursue earnest goals is earnest.  Dream the dream.  It is a good dream.  It is not a dream worth waking from.  It is a sturdy little devil.  It stands for all goodly things.  It is a lustful dream full of lust for the good, lust for the right, lust for the true.  A compact little dream this .  A compact little dream factory of a compact little dream this.  A dreamers little dreamy dream.  A dream.

The one.  The many.  Good for all.  Good for me.  Goodness goodness all around.  All purposeful goodness all around.  All purposeful goodness, all purposeful poisoned pens of goodness all around.  As always…it is good to be good.

Good dreams walking

Newsweek….Rick Marin and Tony Dokoupi

http://www.newsweek.com/2011/04/17/dead-suit-walking.html

Noble dreams flirting

The Economist ….Direct Democracy…..Vox populi or hoi polloi?

http://www.economist.com/node/18584396?story_id=18584396

The dumb …… the honored creed. The rancid bastards …… the true.

http://bschiff.com/

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Happy cruelties behind the curtain

Posted in Commentary, News, Politics, Uncategorized, writing with tags , , , , , , , , on April 26, 2011 by B Schiff

So the gets are gotten.  The world is ours.  There is the surging march of the gentle tides of gentle history… the light of shining dreams and happy diversions, the constant light, the complacent light.  Happiness fulfilled.   Society successful.  Values given value give  toys of the boys and whirls of the girls.

An honored place this little piece of heaven ours.  Of respect, of standing, of aspiration, of good aspiration.   A meaningful endeavor  is a meaningful haunt.  Aspiration.  Staunch achievement.  A good clean world to have and to hold.   A safe world.  An honest safe new world.  Better than the rest.

from The Economist…Cyber Stalking

http://www.economist.com/node/18584386?story_id=18584386

Andrew Hill   Financial Times….greed is good

The Week….Financial Times

The dumb …… the honored creed. The rancid bastards …… the true.

http://bschiff.com/

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Here there and everywhere.

Posted in Commentary, current events, News, opinion, Politics, Uncategorized, writing with tags , , , , , , , , , on April 25, 2011 by B Schiff

Here there and everywhere.  The world is overrun by the foreign other.  The foreign other is an evil other who is stealth and quiet and who comes as a thief waiting, waiting, waiting to bite the hand that feeds, to ruin the new mother that suckles.  The bad bad foreign other.

The proud defenders of the faith.  Ah…the good for me is good for you.  The right for me is right.  Harmony requires the harmonic.  Identity requires the identified.  Live with me, be of me.  Stand for the good and decent and pure, the right.  Don’t tread on me.  Don’t sing songs of change.

See saw.  See saw.  Up and down.  Up and down.  All the mean spirited dimwits.  All the rotten thieves in the night.  Stealing our heritage.  Stealing identity.  Meaning me harm.  They are not like me.  The interlopers interlope.  The Knights of the round table defend the good.  They are not of the civilized.

Here there and everywhere.  They bring not to the table.  They know nothing.  Fractures.  Separation.  The whole is not a liquid thing.  The whole is no boundaried mosaic, pieces separate and enclosed.  The  melders.  Those standing uninvited.  Who flips on who with  goodness of spirit.and common respect? Not me.

European problems.  Not like ours.

Britain, immigraion… The Week

French Panel Debates Secularism and Islam

By STEVEN ERLANGER and MAÏA de la BAUME

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/06/world/europe/06secular.html?_r=1&scp=3&sq=immigration%20and%20multiculturalism&st=cse

The dumb …… the honored creed. The rancid bastards …… the true.http://bschiff.com/

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Kings and things

Posted in Commentary, News, Politics, Uncategorized, writing with tags , , , , , , , , , on April 24, 2011 by B Schiff

So what’s what?  So we know the issues, the stories, the problems.  We know the fears, the contradictions, the prejudices, the tall tales told by the tale tellers.  We get the flack.  We all know that the damned bastards are to blame, that the damned bastards don’t give a rat’s behind for the good of anyone but themselves.  If I were only king of the damned world, we say.  If I were only king of the damned world.  Then things would ge better, we say.  Then things would be a damned sight better.

Sun beams and moon beams frolic together on a merry mist as the bunnies and squirrels dance around the may pole and the little chipmunks do cartwheels 9in the park of our imaginations.

If only I were king of the world, we say,  Then candy canes and marshmallows would be floating in the sky.

If only.

Two for simple answers.

From The Atlantic

http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2011/04/should-big-banks-be-regulated-as-utilities/237342/

http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2010/12/us-education-is-much-better-than-you-think/68635/

The dumb …… the honored creed. The rancid bastards …… the true. http://bschiff.com/

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Rapscallion fancy

Posted in Commentary, News, Politics, Uncategorized, writing with tags , , , , , , , on April 23, 2011 by B Schiff

We beg the grim reaper to not waste our poor little lives.  We watch the angels as they watch over us.  The little devils…they come from there, they come from from here, they saunter about and just come from every  which where.

We have our little lusts.  They have our little lusts.  We have our little  depravities.  They have our little depravities.   We are bold in manner, strong in virtue.  The just want to know the nobility of our character.   We just want our dear little selves spread around for all to see and know.  They will love us to death.

We lust for composure in a void.  They wish us no void, tell us no tale, love the ones they are with…us …always us….always lucky little us.   The marvel of  life’s blood.  No more sneaking through sins unapplauded, unwanted.  We all can reap the wild wind together in a wild dirge of rapscallion fancy….and be better wonders for it.

By Andy Isaacson   the Atlantic

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2011/05/are-you-following-a-bot/8448/

ahh…the fun of cell phone tracking

http://vigilantcitizen.com/latestnews/michigan-police-search-drivers-cell-phones-durring-traffic-stops/

theNewspaper.com: A journal of the politics of driving

http://www.thenewspaper.com/news/34/3458.asp

The dumb …… the honored creed. The rancid bastards …… the true.

http://bschiff.com/

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The righteous right all wrongs

Posted in Commentary, current events, News, opinion, Politics, Uncategorized, writing with tags , , , , , , , on April 22, 2011 by B Schiff

And the virulent shall be pure and the pure shall lead and the true shall beckon heaven and the good shall be forthright.

And the secure shall be strong and the tolerant shall falter and the self righteous shall be our sultry light in the skies.

And the humble shall be honored and the loud shall not be silenced.  The quiet shall not simmer.  The reflective shall have no time, shall have no home.  The reflective shall be taught to do no other thing.

The rich shall be of fire.  The poor shall be of disdain.  The winds shall not be of reaping.  The thieves shall not be of compromise.

Backs shall be straight.  Limbs shall be strong.  Aim shall be true.  Thoughts shall be lustful.

Home shall be where the heart is.  The righteous shall right all wrongs.

F. Brinley Bruton  msnbc.msn.com

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/42225974/ns/world_news-europe

New York Times

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/20/opinion/20wed4.html?partner=rssnyt&emc=rss

The dumb …… the honored creed. The rancid bastards …… the true.

http://bschiff.com/

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