Where the fight is fought

Such an epic title! Where the fight is fought, where the war is won! TONIGHT, WE DINE IN HELL!

How I Imagine All Mecha Anime. 

Seriously, I wanted to get your attention, but the battle isn't some Frank Miller epic. 

History does show that eventually violence is the way to solve income disparity. The problem with "Guns, God, and Grenades" is that the wealthy can buy way more Guns, way more god, and many more grenades. 

So let's call violent insurrection plan D and see what else we can bring to the table. 

My solution to the wealth disparity is pretty straight forward. It's small business.

I know I am hearing groans from some my more socialist friends, but hear me out. You see, when we get upset about business, it's rarely the small business that we rage against. It's the Wal-marts and the targets and the Krafts. The huge corporations.  That's who we have a problem with. 

We never have a problem with the Yellow Bicycle Shops or The family Run Coffee shops or the Greek Diners. It's not the farmers at the Farmer's market who are the utter cockbites 

At least from a capitalist standpoint. As people, I hear anecdotal, some small business owners can be real dicks. 

It usually happens when a small or medium size business grows just so to put profit over people. A small business - say, a local bike shop, is run by people who love bikes, who live and breathe and talk bikes, and who hired people so in love with bikes that they hung around a bike shop until hired. 

I am talking about the Coffee shop owner who had a vision of a comfortable place with well made  locally-sourced food at a fair price. The type of coffee shop or diner restaurant where the owner is still in the kitchen, willing to come out and chat with the customer. 

Or the record store where the clerk is an elitist snob - who wouldn't be caught dead listening to "Now that's what I call Pop Vol 3784634739" but can rattle of the influence to Mars Volta (That's a band, right?)

This song is the cat's Meaow! It's sure to give the bluenose's the heebie-jeebies

These companies and people aren't making a mint, and while the bottom line is important, they have yet to reach the point where money is more important than quality of service, product and experience.

Passionate, grassroots capitalism is going to save our asses. I guarantee it.

Now, why we should be doubly mad. These companies are often under the same laws that larger companies are under. A rule for Wal-mart is a rule for Small businesses. What's worse, these small businesses don't have the money to fight these regulations. They have to follow the rules but aren't the rule makers. 

And if violence comes, guess which businesses get looted? The small ones. The ones that can't afford to get robbed or to pay for lawyers. 

Regulations and risks make it hard for small businesses today. As ever, your anarcho-moderate writer isn't suggesting pure deregulation. I am just hopping on the hipster bandwagon by saying small, local businesses, who care about the product only a little more than the bottom line, are how we are going to beat the wealthy. We put our money into those companies, and not into the Wal-marts and Palermo's.

So today, I say to you, gird up they loins with thy thin and spare wallet, and take your hard earned dollars (75 cents after inflation) and spend it locally as often as you can. 

. 

An Addendum (in the Vernacular)

Warning -Edited for clarity, and now fucking long as hell. Seriously, take kitten breaks.

Hello, my friends. I am particularly unfriendly today, and so I am once again using Written Kitten to keep my blood pressure from spiking. The last thing anyone needs is a blood vessel bursting and spraying my computer screen crimson.

Whew. Alright.  *click*

 *click*

Ok, so long-time reader Chris sent me this, a well-written and worded rebuttal to this, a adequately written argument about why Gen Y is unhappy.

Yes, in true contrarian-anarcho-moderate style, they are both fucking wrong.

I will start with the cheeky coward who hides behind a funny/procrastination website.

*click*  *click*

Shit, did I just lose an hour?

Wait but why says

To get to the bottom of why, we need to define what makes someone happy or unhappy in the first place. It comes down to a simple formula:

It's pretty straightforward -- when the reality of someone's life is better than they had expected, they're happy. When reality turns out to be worse than the expectations, they're unhappy."

And continues to say:

"With a smoother, more positive life experience than that of their own parents, Lucy's parents raised Lucy with a sense of optimism and unbounded possibility. And they weren't alone. Baby Boomers all around the country and world told their Gen Y kids that they could be whatever they wanted to be, instilling the special protagonist identity deep within their psyches.

This left GYPSYs feeling tremendously hopeful about their careers, to the point where their parents' goals of a green lawn of secure prosperity didn't really do it for them. A GYPSY-worthy lawn has flowers. "

 

Alright. I don't deny that "Gen Y" was set up with some pretty damn high expectations. I would liken them to the first immigrants. Streets were supposed to be paved with fucking gold, and we were promised robots. Robot sex maid robots.

Seriously. Where are my sex-maid-robots? Thanks Obama!

Anyway, then goes on to blame Gen Y

GYPSYs Are Wildly Ambitious

GYPSYs Are Delusional

 GYPSYs Are Taunted

And adds what is obvious to fucking everyone:

Unfortunately, the funny thing about the world is that it turns out to not be that easy of a place, and the weird thing about careers is that they're actually quite hard. Great careers take years of blood, sweat and tears to build -- even the ones with no flowers or unicorns on them -- and even the most successful people are rarely doing anything that great in their early or mid-20s.

But GYPSYs aren't about to just accept that.

Fuck you. Fuck your fucking face. Die ina  fire of pink slips. We accept this. We accept that hard work gets you ahead. We accept work.

We are the janitors, the barristas, as Hotel Clerks, and the anarcho-moderate bloggers.

That's how post recession Amercia worked. Asshole.

 Mr. Weinstein posts as much:

You have no idea about student debt, underemployment, life-long renting. “Stop feeling special” is some shitty advice. I don’t feel special or entitled, just poor. The only thing that makes me special is I have more ballooning debt than you. I’ve tempered the hell out of my expectations of work, ... I’m still poor and in debt and worked beyond the point where it can be managed with my health and my desire to actually see the son I’m helping to raise."

And he's right, we aren't entitled. Just poor.  We are busting ass.

Most of us who got shit degrees (like yours truly) understand, by now that they "done fucked up." Philosophy, gender Studies, English. If you ain't teaching, you ain't doing. And those with Education degrees might not be teaching either.

We know that companies want STEM degrees. if we didn't know then, we know now, for sure.

But, a friend of mine who has a MATH degree raises chickens because he can't get a job. The fuck?

Adam Weinstein touches on the issue, that \the promises of a high technology and better science has been an increase of productivity, but the consequences of that - more idle time and greater wealth, have been sucked up by the wealthy.

American workers have changed from generation to generation: Since 1979, the alleged Dawn of the Millennial, the average U.S. worker has endured a 75 percent increase in productivity...while real wages stayed flat.

The problem is: Long ago the government realized that as long as they said the right thing, they weren't accountable to the citizenry. And then doing the right thing became more expensive than making laws.  And distracting, imprisoning, and impoverishing the masses was cheaper than educating, liberating, and enriching them.
When the government no longer feared the masses, they just decided to follow the money.

And the poor folk don't have any.

Last weekend my baby had a fever, and we contemplated taking him to the ER, and my first thought was - had to be - “Oh God, that could wipe out our bank account! Maybe he can just ride it out?” Our status in this Big Financial Game had sucked my basic humanity towards my child away for a minute. If I wish for something better, is that me simply being entitled and delusional?

No it isn't. And yes, it is (see below)

Anyway, I'm ranting. I really just wanted to share Mr. Weinstein's blog post.

Weinstein says:

The latter maxim lurks in the heart of every critique of millennials. It assumes that if we're worse off than previous generations, the fault is ours, and our complaints are so much white whine.

He's not wrong. American's love their "Prosperity Movement" That with a little elbow grease, we can make it after all.

He continues to discuss how awesome it was for our parents:

They had room to advance and buy things. Yes, even the creatives. I once listened to a professor, who is in his sixties, read us the first published piece he'd been paid for, in the late 1970s. A thousand words or so. The rate, he says, was something like two bucks a word. That's four times what the Village Voice pays today, even for an award-winning investigative cover story. It's geometrically greater than what most writers can earn today writing daily brilliance for nationally renowned publications online. And writing daily brilliance, which many of them do, is hard goddamned work.

The economy post WWI was AWESOME. The BEST EVAR, actually. and that economy isn't here anymore.

 And my rebuttal, to all this naval gazing:

"So what?"

Reality doesn't care if you are poor. It doesn't care if have ER bills. it doesn't care if you are worried about a stroke but can't afford an ER visit (my version - I don't have a baby). It is on the side of the winner. Lower your expectations, or don't.

This is why, my kiddos, while I do not advocate violence (They have more bullets than us), I do advocate that you do your best to win. To make yourself a success. You're poor, you're fat, you're struggling and you want things.

Well, then go out and get them. This isn't a "suck-it-up" post. The truth is suck-it-up and bust ass only works when the other side is playing fair.  And the other side of the 99%, the 1%, is and always will be playing dirty fucking ball.

And the refs we elect to stop it are in their pockets.

So what is the solution?  Weinstein touches on it

Take the system that siphons off our capacities for human flourishing in hopes that we get thrown a little coin of the realm in return. Take that system and blow it up, you cowards.

Right now money is valuable, and so the 1% have learned what rules to make and change and follow to get as much as they can. And never did we slap their hand and tell them to get out of the bank and give back those properties.

We never learned, it seems, that wealth will make more wealth- for the wealthy. Trickle down economics could have been stopped by a cursory reading of history. If the cost to make wealth is too great, via regulation, inflation, or bureaucracy, then only the wealthy and criminal will make money.

I don't know kiddos. Somewhere along the lines the Aristocracy realized it didn't need to hide. We had been given enough rope of liberty and democracy to hang ourselves.

What we need to do is create value that cannot be taken. Value that can be traded. A new currency for a digital age. I'm not offering examples. It might not be enough to just have a new currency. It might have to be a new system.

We live in a unique place to do that. We have anonymity of the Internet, we have ways to create value from nothing, and more and More of us have nothing to fucking lose. We are career-less, jobless, and homeless. So fuck it. Reach for the fucking stars, assholes. What will happen? Lose your Mcjob? Hah! Go to jail? Free housing and a free (to you) Education. So paint on building walls and rant in the street.

We are not new yuppies. We are new hippies. We aren't changing the world for the better because we have luxury and a good post WWII economy, We are changing the world because we have nothing and therefore nothing to lose.

I needed to repeat that.  having nothing means you have nothing to lose. So go out and be a dreamsmith. Paint yourself fucking green. Steal from dumpsters, build gardens in empty parking lots. Shit.

So do what helps you, and if helps your fellow man, awesome. I hope it does. I hope we start building a world out of the junk the 1% let's us have. And it will be much cooler than manicured golf courses.

Alright, I need a kitten break, kiddos. Good luck, and do something fearless.

The Paradox of Wages (Walmart and Middle Class)

Hello, Friends!

I promised that I would write more polemics in the vernacular to which I am accustomed . Currently my job at The Mineshaft has me on an incredibly tight schedule. So expect at least one post a week.

Last week  I posted a maudlin mopey post. Don't read it, kiddos. I reeled on painkillers and bad training. My hands slapped, my ego bruised, and my morale spinning in the can from training. Made more in tips than my bitch of a trainer. That may be why she was so pissy.

I read this post the other day about raising the minimum wage. The argument from both sides can be summed up thus (Paraphrase):

Pro-wage-hike: More disposable income means more money to spend and more money through the sluices!
Anti-wage-hike: Suck my fat capitalist dick.

OK, that's not actually how the conversation goes. The wage hike supporters (towards which I lean) basically lean on one argument with two premises. More money in the hands of the average spender means more money over all, and it won't cost that much to raise wages.

This is common sense - a man (or woman) can only enjoy so many yachts, have so many parties, and so many "escorts". Eventually the amount they can spend dries up. Mostly   Jesus. How many zeros?*

This is true of the commoner too. I can only spend so much on blow before I have to slow down, take a pill (a different pill) chillax and let my heart rate get below 200.

But, I need to point out, there are a lot more of us, the commoner, than them, the wealthy. And those parties may benefit a few people. Maybe they have a hundred or a thousand servants, but that money doesn't go through he sluices as nicely as giving everybody working for large corporations a fat check.

I am not completely on board with government mandated wage increases. I am a friendly anarcho-moderate, and while the government has done some good things, a cumbersome juggernaut is she. So I am always cautious with regards to it's movements. But what else can we do? The corporations will be dickbags. Not even good business men, but actual shortsighted cuntnuggets.

I hate when we have to make laws to protect people from Dickbags, but see below.

Anti-wagers contend that this will cause businesses to offer less jobs, and fire people and generally continue to fuck up the economy like giant dickbags.  Truth is that most of the huge corporations could probably handled the loss in income. It's not that much. Sell a yacht or two.

This PDF happily explains what would happen with an increase to $12 an hour. Dick-all, really. Big corporations like Walmart and Target would not feel much of a pinch, nor would the consumer.
If wages increased 6 grand a year, but costs go up 1500 smackers similarly, that means the average consumer makes out to the tune of $4500 dollars a year.

Not too shabby. And according to these leftist folks there will be no affects on business. They also suggest rose-colored glasses, because they seem to forget the rule of business 101*.

BUT, my dear readers, this is all from progressive (pinko-commie) writers. Surely the conservative view can give us the "fair and balanced" style you expect from me.  So I did some research.

They say: Fuck you, worker. Dance for your dimes!
The third article above discusses it.
Some fuckwit named Mark Wilson  says that "fringe benefits" might be curtailed by a raised wage.

To him I ask: "What "fringe benefits?" Like, what benefits would be taken from someone? Insurance? Not fringe. Half-off burgers? Not a big deal for my last job. And most box stores don't give you that much of a discount.

Let's say Walmart gives you 10% off your own purchases. In order for you to make out the same as a wage hike (that hypothetical 4500 bucks) you'd need to spend 45 thousand dollars there in a year (while making, for those bad at math, an average wage of 15-20 grand a year). . At the Mineshaft I'd have to eat there for 1500 meals a year.

No wonder poor people have bad credit and are obese. Look how we have to spend and eat to take advantage of our fringe benefits.

Yeah, OK. keep your 25 dollar gas cards at Christmas, you petty jizzstains, I'll take the raise, thank you very much.

Math, Mr. Wilson. Either you do math or you fucking don't.**
I mean, are you fucking serious?

I can almost  -almost see the argument that Smaller businesses may have to fire employees. Well, most of them pay a little better than minimum, and can be more choosy. I agree that a higher wage will make better employees think about taking the job. God knows that some of my employers could have done better picking anyone else and paying them more.

Regarding the argument that these are "not meant to sustain a living wage." Newsflash, dickweasel, they are.  I never planned to be a cuss-spitting gonzo commentator, but there you fucking go. I never wanted to be on the side of more laws. I am. They are. The middle class isn't moving up. Old folks are staying in their jobs longer. So where's a poor dickhead kid gonna go?

Nowhere. We are going nowhere.

And finally, let's look at the free market. "Let the free market handle wages." Yeah. Let's Fucking Do That. Except that it's cheaper to buy a politician than produce a better product. Can't compete? Have Uncle Sam wag their finger at your opponent.

And don't get me started on cheap entertainment and expensive consumable goods. Christ. That's a great way to keep us down.

It's all shit, my friends. The song and dance of Walmart is just a mummer's show. They are spending more than they pay out to keep wages right where they are.

The rich are in bed with civil servants. Democracy is dead to the almighty dolla'. It's just aristocrats partying on top.

Do your best. And if you are one of those rich fucks at the top, remember, many of you didn't get there by yourself. You worked, sure, but you also had help. Mentors, friends, lucky breaks that made your work worthwhile.  Remember that. Mentor and befriend, and occasionally give in on fiscal policy.

Because as the French Nobility learned, it's awful hard to spend your money when you're dead.


* Dickbaggery.
** Yes, those numbers may be massaged.

A Good Fit..(Idle Morose Mobo Musings).

I happened to go back and reread this blog post.  I realize most of my readers already know, via various sources that I am no longer a Mobo. I am tenant, temporarily resigned to a couch in the middle of no-fuck-where.

Aside from cruising for spelling errors and typos, of which, there are many. I shall endeavor to not continue with errors. My hands yearn to be free of your bourgeois rules of spelling! Occupy my hands! Grammar is the tool of the one-percent!

Enough frivolity, my kids. Recently I have had a spat of bad luck Job-wise. Those who know me might ask me to edit the recently out of it.

Jobs and I do not get along.

Let's be honest. Jobs seem to have a problem. Jobs are demanding, tedious,a bore at parties, and until recently, not really good with the ladies. Jobs are dirty, smell of various substances, and are prone to become injurious.

Few people are besties with a job.

I myself wonder often if I am just not cut out for a job. If by some perfect storm of genetics, upbringing, and ill luck that leaves me less-than-qualified for most jobs.  I

I self-indulgently like to think that the Peter Principle has something to do with it, that I am so inept at the lower level jobs because I am meant to do a higher job. Perhaps that is true.

My current job, which is my...40th? since I started working at 14, has got me a little down, kiddos. I seem happier and more productive when I am unemployed. regardless, I have spent so much time under and un-employed that the one thing a job gets you (money) holds little appeal to me.

Somewhere, I imagine, when I close my eyes, there is a culture that exists wherein work is not nonsense jobs, but actual, worthwhile work. Perhaps a tribe that has yet to discover exploitative capitalism*


 I will be writing more on the subject of shit jobs and the shit that comes with them, but I have to go to bed.
.

*Exploitative, not enlightened...

Leadership (An Outsider's View)

Hello, Kiddos!

Hopefully I make a little more sense than my last post. Sorry, I was shaking off the rust. Today I want to discuss leadership. From the outside.

I say from the outside because I have never considered myself a leader. Even when I've lead, I don't consider myself a leader. I am just doing what I do. No worries and cheers, mate.

If I were describe my leadership style, I would call it Positively Absolutely Canadian.

"Eh."

I was a leader, I just didn't know it. And don't tell me. If I found I was actually responsible, I might have an attack of the vapors.

My dad always told me "Whoever among you who wants to be leader must be your servant." The quote comes from Matthew 20:26. I used to think "that's stupid. I thought that leaders lead. In this age of CEOs and inherited wealth (I'm looking at you Waltons!), it doesn't seem most leaders had to serve in the trenches. They blithely walk in and fire 10 thousand people.  Or they decide to bomb other countries.

Perhaps I ought not listen to Bad Religion while discussing Leaders of today.

Still, My Dad is not wrong. To lead requires service. But a little deconstruction is in order. because I think a lot of leaders have forgotten there job, and why their job is important.

A leader has served. That's why he is a leader. In order to lead effectively, you need to have spent years learning your craft, honing it, and leveraging that experience into success.  So here is how to be an effective leader, from someone who isn't.

A Leader is an Expert
I shall name 3 leaders off the top of my head.   John Taffer, Robert Irvine, and Gordon Ramsey. They are all on Television right now, but they are excellent examples because their fame should make them accessible.  What do they all have in common?

Years and years of service.  They didn't simply walk in to a restaurant, take over, and lead. They started out at the bottom. They didn't read a book and start spouting answers. They did hard work. They slogged in the trenches.  They made mistakes, as a cursory biography makes clear.

But their experience allows them to ask the right questions and to direct people to the best answers. A leader has screwed up, gone down cul-du-sacs, and hit the wall enough times to see things coming. If you have a problem or an idea that is, to put it bluntly, stupid, wouldn't it be nice to find someone who's been in that jam to help you out of it?

Education and Experience are the marks of an expert. And Expertise is the Mark of a leader.

A Leader Is Successful
We love losers. Sitcoms show us this. Movies show us this. Books and Comedians show this. We love a loser. But we don't respect a loser, and we don't follow one. We want proof that our leader has lead and his followers are successful.

Would you follow Custer into battle?.Heck no. Despite an excellent and admirable career, his spectacular failure and death give us pause.  His name is synonymous with failure.

What do you think about Pete Best? Who? Sometimes called "The 5th Beatle."  He has had a unimpressive successful career. But his success has not been meteoric, and few would care about his notions of music and the industry. I daresay, for the sake of hyperbole, he couldn't conduct a kids choir.*

We want to see proof of success. We all want to win, and so we want to follow winners.
A good concept is fantastic. A rousing speech, a handsome face, and a good feeling are all wonderful. But what real followers want - need, even, is to trust the leader will bring them a win.

I find it strange that people would challenge the ideas of Chef Ramsey, Chef Irvine, or Mr. Taffer. I have to presume it's for ratings. These men have awards, merits, and most important, money. Seems when they speak on their  topics, one would shut the fuck up and do as they tell.

Maybe it's me, I dunno.  I respect experts.

Success goes hand in hand with expertise - it is tangible, observable proof of  concept. An expert puts many more wins in the column than losses (But see below).

A person with no successes is a braggart or a liar (but see below)

A Leader Gets A Mentor (And Is One, Too)
A leader is part cheerleader, part director, part shepherd and part drill sergeant. It's cliched to say, but a leader's goal should be success. They may not seem to have your best interests at heart, but they have a vision and they want followers to successfully engage that vision.

I had a professor (several, actually) who encouraged and cajoled effort out of their students. The best were very nearly unsympathetic. They were hard on people, and harder on the people at the top. They did not embrace excuses. They had a vision of a student successfully professing as they profess - provided the student worked hard.

The best thing a would be leader can do is find another leader in his field. This allows you to use the mentor's expertise and learn how to lead. It's a one-two combo, and I cannot stress enough useful this is. Don't follow yours truly and treat your mentor's input lightly.

One last caveat. If your vision doesn't mesh with the leaders vision, you aren't doing yourself any favors, nor them. Likewise if your vision does not engage your followers, you need to change it or work with them.

A Leader Is A Failure Who's Hung On Long Enough. 
Anybody who's read inspirational quotes no doubt knows this gem from Michael Jordan 

I've missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I've lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I've been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I've failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed."

It may soothe the feelings of those without success, but the truth is a leader makes mistakes. When they steer a person away from a course of action, or make a decision, or ask a question, it's because they went there. They fucked up. And that fuck up stuck with them. And they want to spare their charges the same failure.

But it isn't merely self-aggrandizement of the mediocre. experience that teaches nothing is worthless. And so they dust themselves off, and try something else.


So that's it, kiddos. A leader is an expert with experience that helps guide people away from the same screw-ups they encountered.  To do this they had to start at the bottom, and serve and fail and learn.He who is to be master must first be a slave.

So go out, jump in at the bottom, and fail like you vote: Early and often!