Adventure on Our Hillside

We can see the fire from our vantage point on top of one of those famous L.A. hills. We're a bit too far east to be sitting in the Hollywood hills. But we have had a spectacular view of the fires to the North, in the La Canada mountain sides.


We also have a lot of dry grass that has sprung up over the summer. Dry grass is fire fuel. I had an idea to get down on our slope and cut it with a Toro Weedeater. It seemed like a good idea at the time.

Our terrain just below the house tilts at a 45 degree angle or steeper. I have tried on occasion to negotiate that slope, only to fall and slide down on my backside, scraping my jeans in the dust halfway down before I can stop by grabbing some well-anchored vegetation. My solution to this, in order to carry out my mission, was to tie a rope to the lime tree at the top of the hill and hang on as I carefully backed down. The lifeline was actually several ropes tied together. I didn't have one single long rope.

Of course, as I was backing down the hill, I was also hanging on to my Weedeater. Not an easy thing to do. I got about halfway down, amidst a patch of the grass I intended to level, and began cutting. Work was going well, until the Weedeater malfunctioned and flew apart, sending the spool flying somewhere off into space. While I was looking for it, one of the knots let go on my makeshift lifeline and I went flying downhill, slamming into the dirt, rolling and finally coming to a stop. I had a feeling in my chest that I had broken another rib. Rats. I broke a rib earlier this summer stumbling over something in the dark outside.

But I hadn't. All this was yesterday, and the rib is fine.

Final Score: Hill 1, Russ 0

GOP Candidate Threatens Life of the President with a "Joke"

From the Huffingtonpost:

BOISE, Idaho — An Idaho Republican gubernatorial hopeful insists he was only joking when he said he'd buy a license to hunt President Barack Obama.

Rex Rammell, a long-shot candidate slated to run against incumbent C.L. "Butch" Otter in the May 2010 GOP primary, made the comment at a Republican rally Tuesday in Twin Falls where talk turned to the state's planned wolf hunt, for which hunters must purchase an $11.50 wolf tag. The hunt is due to begin on Tuesday.

When an audience member shouted a question about "Obama tags," Rammell responded, "The Obama tags? We'd buy some of those."

Rammell told The Associated Press Thursday he sees no reason to apologize for the comment because it was just a joke.

"What I would say to all my Democrat Idahoans: Take a deep breath and relax," he said. "We're not going to go out and hunt Obama."

He also told the Times-News newspaper, "I would never support him being assassinated."

After Rammell's comment was published in the Times-News, he said one person sent him an e-mail indicating he would ask the FBI for an investigation.

Threatening the president can be a felony punishable by five years in prison and a $250,000 fine.

His headshot confirms that he is a bubbleheaded twit.
This evening, I called the United States Secret Service and asked them to investigate this idiot.

My Reply to Annette, Who Thinks Obama is Doing OK

Annette is over at Just My Little Piece of the World. First you gotta go over and see her reply to my complaints about Obama. She's a big Obama supporter. I am a big critic, wanting Obama to do more. After you see what she wrote, you gotta come back and see my reply to her reply. Here is my reply:

OK, you see the glass half full. That's a legitimate position to take. I see it half empty and I and my "radical lefty friends" have a lot of hope and idealistic aspirations for this presidency. He has important accomplishments.

But it drives me nuts that he can't see that the Republicans have no intention of cooperating on health care reform. They haven't voted with him on anything important. The process isn't nearly as important as the result, and the Republicans have stated clearly they want to destroy his presidency. Health care is a life and death issue. No small thing.

The Dems went along like sheep with Bush tax cuts and war. Bush wouldn't put up with non-cooperation from Democrats. Obama needs a little more of Bush-style cracking the whip.

BTW I was thoroughly offended with the remarks of THEMOM: "We need to keep reiterating the "facts" to those who want to twist and spin the acts to date of this administration. There are days I get so aggreavated arguing these same issues with the ignorant." That's what she wrote up there.

I'll tell you what's ignorant. Those morons who believe in Death Panels and Killing Gramma and Health Care for illegal Aliens and Government funded Abortions and Watering the Tree of Liberty and all that crap.

I am dealing with facts. Obama has ignored Bush era War Crimes serious enough to warrant the death penalty for Nazis and Japanese officers alike after WWII. That's a fact. I am far from ignorant. And to ignore such serious violations of our Constitution and our national history on this issue is dangerous to future generations. Why didn't he go after at least John Yoo immediately? And maybe work his way up to Cheney and Bush. These people are classic examples of war criminals. You can't sweep it under the carpet. Do you know at least a hundred men died under torture by the CIA during the Bush era? I am not proud of that. And hundreds of thousands of men, women and children in Iraq.

Obama is embroiled in wars that will do nothing but drain more treasure and bring home more bodies. He needs to show that it is important to bring those wars to an end. We can't afford them. They are his Vietnam. I am not especially surprised that he has not moved more aggressively to end these wars. I am disappointed that he has not done so. I will also not be surprised that both of them will end like Vietnam, with nothing accomplished except the creation of more families without fathers and husbands and sons. Read "Johnny Got His Gun," by Dalton Trumbo.

You can say all you like about Obama's inheritance of the economic bailout from Bush, but the fact is, Obama endorsed the biggest bank robbery in American history. Hank Paulson, Treasury Secretary was CEO of Goldman Sachs and he threatened the government with collapse of the entire economy if Congress didn't immediately turn $700 billion over to him to do as he pleased, and they did. And he gave $14 billion to Goldman, And Goldman ended up posting a gigantic profit and distributing $18 billion in bonuses to its employees. This was typical of the bailout. Big bucks for Wall Street, CitiBank, B of A and the rest and they turned around and hiked interest rates on credit cards.

Meanwhile, we have near Depression-era unemployment and people still losing their homes by the millions. Over 8 million foreclosures are expected in 2009. That is a national disaster. Where is help for the little guy?--homeowners and credit card holders?

I just want Obama to show some spine and some leadership. I am not alone. Dr. Howard Dean seems to believe that Obama needs to take the Blue Dogs to the woodshed. Seriously, if Congress comes out with a weak health care plan, that's it. The rest of the Obama Presidency is lame duck. The Republicans will have accomplished what they set out to do--make it his Waterloo. That's what they want. And the Republicans will capture the House next year and Obama will be a one term president. Is that what you want? Of course it is not what you or I want.

None of us wants to see a bunch of ignoramuses like Chuck Grassley or Mike Enzi or Tom Price or John Boehner or Tom Coburn running Congress. These guys are idiots, liars, greedy sons of bitches who would sell out their own mothers for political or economic advantage. I detest Republican politicians and their stupid philosophy of every man for himself and to hell with children and old people. That is why I am so passionate about wanting Obama to stomp these people into the ground. They need to be destroyed, politically.

Democrats have the White House. They have the Senate. They have the House. They should now all act as if they are the majority party and get some important work done for the people in this country.

And I haven't even mentioned the Union Card Check Employee Free Choice Act, which Obama is allowing to die a slow death in Congress because the corporations want it dead. Don't get me started, Annette.

Oh wait, you already did.

I'm Worried About My FREEDOM!

A woman at McCain's town hall this morning stood up and said, "I'm worried about my freedom." This is code language for "Screw health care, let it go down the tubes, I believe in death panels and the gramma killing clause, and a government takeover that would dictate my choice of doctors and taxpayer-funded abortions and illegal aliens getting health care on my dime."

OK lady, let's not enact serious health care reform, and you can have your freedom.

* Freedom to get sick and die because you can't afford health insurance.

• Freedom to get sick and die because your health insurance company won't sell you health insurance due to a pre-existing condition.

• Freedom to get sick and die because your health insurer cancelled you noting that you were sick and ready to die and it was just too expensive to keep you insured.

• Freedom to see your family members treated the same way by Cigna or Blue Cross or any of a half dozen other giant insurance companies.

• Freedom to go bankrupt and lose your house through foreclosure because your medical bills have wiped you out.

And the insurance companies enjoy freedom too:

• Freedom to riaise rates whenever they damn well feel like it.

• Freedom to deny you insurance or kick you off the rolls.

• Freedom to tell your doctor you really don't need that kidney transplant or that chemotherapy.

• Freedom to lobby Congress to block any meaningful legislation reining in the big insurance companies

• Freedom to make huge profits and pay their top execs enormous benefits with taxpayers' bailout money.

So you see, that lady was right. There's plenty of freedom to go around. We don't need no stinkin' health care reform to deny us our precious freedom.

The Ad That CNN Won't Play

It is OK for the Republicans to play dirty tricks like Stealing an Election. Or Two Elections. Or Starting an Unnecessary War. Or Torturing People. Or Running Secret Prisons all over the world. Or Telling Huge Whoppers about Obama's health plan.

But it is not OK for Our Side to tell the Truth about the health insurance companies.

I guess CNN decided this ad was unfair to Cigna Insurance and its CEO. Well in this health care debate, we wouldn't want anyone to be unfair, would we?


Here's another ad from the same people.

These ads were produced by Americans United For Change. They've produced a lot of ads. I am not sure just how successful they have been in getting these ads out there. I think I saw the first one once on MSNBC. Other than that, I have not seen any of the rest of them anywhere and I see a lot of cable news. Nowhere on the site does it reveal where the ads have aired, if ever. Possibly they rely on bloggers to pick them up and post them around on the Web.

Breakfast -- Cream Cheese on Home Made Toast and Fruit

With a piece of fresh salmon, bacon and home grown tomatoes. And coffee.

Home Made Bread

The Republican Plan for Health Care Reform

To be fair, we thought we should post the Republican Plan for Health Care Reform. And here it is:











And that about sums it up.

Chuck Grassley on Health Care Reform

Senator Chuck Grassley is probably the highest profile member of the Senate Finance Committee, considered a key panel in health care reform. He is one of the Gang of Six, a Republican from Iowa. He has been especially dangerous to the prospect of real health care reform. At one point he even endorsed Sarah Palin's nutty idea of Death Panels. Here are a couple of grafs from Dakota Farmer outlining Grassley's latest Pearls of Wisdom.

Senator Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, says the outpouring of anger at town hall meetings this month has fundamentally altered the nature of the health-care debate and convinced him that lawmakers should consider drastically scaling back the scope of the effort. Grassley says the public has rejected the far-reaching proposals Democrats have put on the table, viewing them as overly expensive precursors to a government takeover of health care.

"People are signaling that we ought to slow up and find out where we are and don't spend so much money and don't get us so far into debt," said Grassley. The ranking member of the Senate Finance Committee, Grassley hopes the panel can draft a better, less costly plan capable of winning broad support from Democrats and Republicans.

Grassley has had no problem voting for wars that cost billons of dollars each month.

Incidentally, Grassley has also said, no matter what Judiciary cranks out on health care reform, he ain't gonna vote for it. No wonder. Look at the bribes he has taken. (Source: Open Secrets)

As you can see, most of the bribes are from health industry companies and are self-explanatory. DaVita, Inc., specializes in kidney disease and dialysis.

Gang of Six -- Unplugged

The Gang of Six, three Democrats and three Republicans on the Senate Finance Committee seem to have been appointed or appointed themselves the six go-to people on the Health Care Reform issue. In other words, nothing is supposed to get done without them. They are
• Finance Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.)
• Charles Grassley (R. Iowa)
• Mike Enzi R. (Wyo.)
• Sens. Jeff Bingaman (D-N.M.)
• Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-Maine)
• Kent Conrad (D-N.D.)

You will notice that Republicans Grassley of Iowa, Enzi of Wyoming and Democrat Baucus of Montana are all from relatively small states. These three have way too much power representing way too few people. And Conrad, of North Dakota. What's up with him? Not especially supportive of the President, and from a state with just enough people to fill a bingo hall.

OK, here is what we are going to do. Over the next six days, or so, we will feature each one of these Gang of Six Senators, explaining their positions on Health Care Reform, along with a listing of the bribes they have taken. (Bribes are usually described as campaign contributions, but we call it as we see it.)

We'll start with Grassley tomorrow unless the Little Woman has too many chores around the house for me to do and I can't get to it. In which case I'll get to it Monday.

Sewer Cleanout

If you ever have a blockage in your sewer pipes, this orange snake thing will save you a hundred bucks or more. I bought it for $20, it fits on the drill shaft and you feed the steel snake down into your sewer line through a cleanout opening.

I have a troublesome sewer line to our septic tank. I bet I've saved a thousand dollars using this thing. It cleans out blocked sewer lines like a charm. The toilet won't flush, it backs up into the shower and the sweetest sound when you are using this tool is the drain opening up and sewage and water swirling down the drain. Then you have to clean out the shower.

I have no stock or any other interest in the company that makes the thing.

There must be a joke about Republicans in here somewhere.

Against Health Care Reform? Let's Get Out to a RALLY!

Hey, anti-health care people, lets get out to a rally this week to drive home our points for No Health Care Reform.

• No shackles on insurance companies forcing them to hold down costs, keep sick people enrolled, or allow people with pre-existing conditions to become policyholders. We believe in the free enterprise system, not socialism! Millions of children uninsured in this country? Boo hoo. Let the kids learn early, no socialist fascist Hitler takeover in the good old USA!

• Some Democrat liberals will tell you that Stephen J. Hemsley, CEO of United Health Care, a big insurance company made a billion dollars last year. Don't you believe it. He only got $3.24 million in salary and $250 million in stock options. Now does that seem extreme to you for an important guy in charge of an important insurance company that makes life and death decisions for your doctor?

• No big government public option in competition with the insurance companies. Another socialistic fascist Hitler government takeover scheme.

• No fascist schemes to allow people without health insurance to get cheaper health insurance than whatever we have now. If people can't afford health insurance, let them work harder until they can afford it. Simple as that.

• And if you can't afford health care (who can these days?), just don't get sick. Remember, we have to fight the idea of a big socialistic nazi government takeover of the health care business.

• No health care for illegal immigrants or aliens from outer space or endangered polar bears.

• No sneaky hidden amendments allowing government bureaucrats to kill gramma. No Hitler Death Panels.

Let's get out to a rally soon. We can't let Obama reform health care. And don't forget to bring your gun!
Photos from CBS News

What's in the Obama Health Reform Plan

THIS IS the second time I have posted this blog. It's important for everyone to know what is really in the Obama plan.

• Gramma is toast. Bye Bye Gramma.
• Your Medicare will be cancelled, and Obama will charge you for that.
• After going before the Peoples Glorious Collective Death Panel, Sarah Palin's new baby will be ground up and fed to zoo animals.
• The plan will cover all illegal aliens, even if they have been deported to Mexico.
• The plan will pay for all abortions, including those of illegal aliens from outer space and polar bears.
• The new health care plan will be administered by a Health Czar Ivan Boris Walkitov, who served as The People's Glorious Commissar of Health in the Soviet Union. Here he will have the title, First Secretary of the Peoples Glorious Central Committee on Health Care which will tell your doctor whether you should live or die.
• If you have leprosy or any of a hundred other nasty diseases, they will send you to a Peoples Medical Concentration Camp in Utah.
• You will be required to have a picture of Karl Marx tattooed on your forehead
• The government will install chips in your head to listen to everything you say.
• The government will install chips in your doctor's head.
• You will be required to go to Peoples Re-education Meetings once a month to familiarize you with the new health plan.
• The government will send you to whatever doctor they like, even if it is 200 miles from your house. This is designed to control costs.
• If you have a medical emergency, get in line. You may have to wait a couple of weeks for that nasty head injury or ruptured appendix.
• Wealthy people will be paying more taxes, so they will be way ahead of you in line.
• At your doctor's office you will have to wear a hospital gown decorated with red hammers and sickles.
• In the waiting room you will be required to read old copies of Soviet Life, and you will hear piped in MUZAK featuring the Internationale, over and over and over and over.
• You will not get your country back. A black man born in Kenya will still be president.

My Latest Message to President Obama

President Obama, we supported you and worked for you during the campaign. You have become a disappointment. You have allowed the Republicans to define your health care reform efforts with lies. Death Camps. Bye Bye gramma. Government takeover. All that. You have got to offer some leadership. I suggest you commandeer some network TV time to put the lies to rest and clearly lay out your vision, including the public option which is necessary. Without it, there is no health reform, no matter what you call it.

I hope you are sending messages to your Congressional Representatives and Obama.

Incredible News from Unnamed Mysterious Unreliable Sources

We have leaned that Barack Hussen Obama was not born in Kenya as has previously been reported. Nor was he born in Pakistan, Indonesia or Hawaii. The Hawaiian birth certificate, obviously a fake document created to support the illusion that Obama is a U.S. citizen, has been debunked by dozens of patriots who have shown up at health care rallies with posters questioning Obama's place of birth. To put an exclamation point on it, some of these people have carried weapons.

Sadly, these people are somewhat misguided. But it is not their fault. The facts have been concealed by the government for years.

The fact is, Barack Hussein Obama is an alien from outer space. The problem is not that he is a foreigner not constitutionally eligible to be president. Obama was not even born on this planet. To those skeptics and liberals ready to laugh this off as the ravings of an uninformed nut, we have proof. The photo here is of an alien taken shortly after an exraterrestrial saucer crash at the notorious Area 51 north of Las Vegas. Note the close resemblance to Barack Hussein Obama. Now it becomes clear why Obama pretends to be African-American. He is concealing his alien appearance under the guise of an earthling of a different race. But now we know better. Obama is an extraterrestrial being from outer space! What further proof do you need?

However we invite those skeptics still unconvinced to inspect the photo of the spacecraft of the type we believe carried Obama here from a distant planet. Solid proof.

We are ready now to be interviewed by reporters at CNN and Fox. We welcome inquiries from Lou Dobbs Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity. We are determined to put to rest the ridiculous stories that Barack Hussein Obama was born in some foreign country, or even Hawaii. He was not. He is from somewhere out there.

Message to Barack Obama

YES WE CAN. But only if the Republicans give us permission.

Watch This: Arguing With a Dining Room Table

Congressman Barney Frank gets off a good one. Puts an idiot Republican idiot in her place.

Of course, I expect anyone reading this blog to have at least left support for the public option on the White House Web site. You can also leave a message of support at Health and Human Services, but there is no actual place to comment, only an indication of support by leaving name, address, etc. But here's a sneaky way of getting the message across. Where it says name, type in PUBLIC OPTION. Where it says address type in PUBLIC OPTION, etc. etc.

Remember it was Kathleen Sebelius who suggested the public option was no big deal and could be taken out with the trash. So go on over to: < http://www.healthreform.gov/support.html> and leave your comments. I finished by leaving my actual phone number and email address. Pass this on.

We're having a huge effect on the debate. We have to keep it up.

One more thing. The Senate Finance Committee is still in the 19th Century. No email address. Their phone number is (202) 224-4515

HOWEVER, you can leave messages for individual members whose links are on the Senate Finance Committee Web site. It's a bit of a chore, but you have go Google their positions on the public option so you can properly tailor your message. For example Grassley is a stuck-in-concrete Mr. No. He needs a strong message of support for the public option, not that it will move his sorry ass. Rockefeller is a big supporter of the public option. Thank him.

How do Conservatives Ignore the Truth?

We are puzzled. We are truly scratching our heads. Liberals can't figure conservatives out. Today on the radio, one of those right wing talkers actually said, "America has the best health care system in the world."

This is what we can't figure out. It is clear that America does NOT have the best health care system in the world for a variety of reasons. It is easy to demonstrate that America has a lousy, very bad health care system.

• Seven out of ten bankruptcies in this country happen because of catastrophic health care costs. And millions of people are going bankrupt and losing their homes because health care costs zero out their resources.

•  Insurance companies are screwing us to the tune of billions of dollars. They make their profits denying health care. Their CEOs take home millions in compensation. That is because their CEOs are psychopaths willing to let people die in order to post huge profits. Health insurance companies are not in the business of health. They are in the business of making money and satisfying their shareholders. And that is a conflict of interest. This fact is obvious, but conservatives can't see it. Why?

• Fifty million Americans have no health insurance. This means they have no access to "the best health care system in the world," unless they go to an emergency room, the most expensive public option there is. And emergency rooms don't treat for chronic illnesses like heart disease or cancer. Millions of adults and children have little or no regular health care.

• Right now in Inglewood, California, near LAX, a volunteer health care organization, Remote Area Medical is providing thousands and thousands of people free health care. RAM has transformed the Forum into the largest free clinic in the world. These people are desperate for health care in the country that has "the best health care system in the world."

Why can't conservatives see what is so obvious? Our health care system is broken. It doesn't work.
When a conservative's car stops running and smoke is coming out from under the hood, do conservatives think it is going to take them to work anyway? Do they sit behind the wheel and go "vroooom vrooom" and work their turn signals?

And now it appears that the loudest and angriest of these people have forced the administration to scale back health care reform. It's insane.

I would like to hear from any conservative who can explain to me his or her disconnect. That ought to be fun.

I am Done with Whole Foods

This is a response I left on the Whole Foods Market Forum in response to WFM CEO John Mackey's Wall Street Journal attack on the Obama Health Care Plan.


As a regular customer of Whole Foods (aka Whole Paycheck) after reading John Mackeys attack on President Obama's health care proposal, I am done with Whole Foods. I used to go to our local Pasadena WF market as often as I could afford it. But no more. It will be a long, long time before I ever set foot in a WF market ever again and I will be urging my friends to consider doing the same.


Mackey opens his attack with a quote from Margaret Thatcher (Ronnie Reagan's good buddy) "The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other people's money." In other words, Mackey begins by equating good health care reform with socialism, and his piece goes downhill from there. He advocates weak sister reforms like health savings accounts and tax reform, tort reform and making health costs transparent. That last one is a laugh, as if knowing more about costs will allow me to shop around for the best price on an appendectomy or heart transplant.

Mackey may be a good CEO for a store chain, but he is a lousy public policy analyst. He is just one more right-winger in love with unfettered free market theory. And that has worked well for Wall Street, not so much for the rest of us.

It is clear that the big health insurance companies make billions in profits simply by denying their policy holders health care. It is clear that people in other civilized countries enjoy far better health care than we do in the U.S. For proof of that, check the U.N. World Health Organization.

Someone should tie Mackey to a chair and make him watch Michael Moore's Sicko. He might learn something. In the meantime, bye bye Whole Foods. I'll do my shopping elsewhere

What's in the Obama Health Care Plan

• Gramma is toast. Bye Bye Gramma.
• Your Medicare will be cancelled, and Obama will charge you for that.
• After going before the Peoples Glorious Collective Death Panel, Sarah Palin's new baby will be ground up and fed to zoo animals.
• The new health care plan will be administered by a Health Czar Ivan Boris Walkitov, who served as The People's Glorious Commissar of Health in the Soviet Union. Here he will have the title, First Secretary of the Peoples Glorious Central Committee on Health Care which will tell your doctor whether you should live or die.
• If you have leprosy or any of a hundred other nasty diseases, they will send you to a Peoples Medical Concentration Camp in Utah.
• You will be required to have a picture of Karl Marx tattooed on your forehead
• The government will install chips in your head to listen to everything you say.
• The government will install chips in your doctor's head.
• You will be required to go to Peoples Re-education Meetings once a month to familiarize you with the new health plan.
• The government will send you to whatever doctor they like, even if it is 200 miles from your house. This is designed to control costs.
• If you have a medical emergency, get in line. You may have to wait a couple of weeks for that nasty head injury or ruptured appendix.
• Wealthy people will be paying more taxes, so they will be way ahead of you in line.
• At your doctor's office you will have to wear a hospital gown decorated with red hammers and sickles.
• In the waiting room you will be required to read old copies of Soviet Life, and you will hear piped in MUZAK featuring the Internationale, over and over and over and over.
• You will not get your country back. A black man born in Kenya will still be president.

Ignorance is Abundant

I would be ashamed to be seen with a poster like this in public. I would be embarrassed. What is this man thinking? Does he think at all? Where do these people come from? What is going on in their lives, that they think it is appropriate and right to stand out in the street with a poster like this?

I am totally mystified. As far as I can figure, this guy with the baseball cap and the Hitler reference is from another planet. So are his friends. I would bet he thinks God created people and the world 6,000 years ago.

Is it possible that some folks are further evolved than others, that this guy is still operating with a lizard brain not far removed from the alligators?

What happens to the country when the knuckle draggers dominate the democracy? Wait, we already know. Eight years of George W. Bush.

The photo is from Huffington Post.