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Posts Tagged ‘United States’

Scanned image of author's US Social Security card.

What Bank is your Mommy?

CONSPIRACY THEORY WEDNESDAY

It’s Wednesday and therefore time to explore another conspiracy theory!  Since I finished posting COUP D’ETAT ,  an extensive theory as to WHO was involved in the assassination of President  Kennedy, I wanted to continue with conspiracy theories.  In about a New York minute, I knew where I could find a treasure trove of theories to explore – The Tea Party Movement.

This week I found an article in The Economist in which Bob Inglis, a Republican candidate who lost in the primary speaks about a meeting he had with Tea Party-activists just before the primary. I’m going to include the link to the full article, however I just can’t resist posting the part where Bob Inglis is quoted.

“…This week’s Mother Jones has an interview with Bob Inglis, the Republican congressman from South Carolina who just lost his primary to a tea-party-backed candidate despite having a 93% rating from the American Conservative Union. Mr Inglis, a former right-wing firebrand from the GOP‘s Class of 1994, says he lost his seat because he simply couldn’t go along with the kind of radical conspiratorial rhetoric required to remain viable in Republican politics today. He tells the story of a meeting with tea-party activists that took place shortly before the primary.

‘I sat down, and they said on the back of your Social Security card, there’s a number. That number indicates the bank that bought you when you were born based on a projection of your life’s earnings, and you are collateral. We are all collateral for the banks. I have this look like, “What the heck are you talking about?” I’m trying to hide that look and look clueless. I figured clueless was better than argumentative. So they said, “You don’t know this?! You are a member of Congress, and you don’t know this?!” And I said, “Please forgive me. I’m just ignorant of these things.” And then of course, it turned into something about the Federal Reserve and the Bilderbergers and all that stuff. And now you have the feeling of anti-Semitism here coming in, mixing in. Wow.’ ….”

The tea-party movement: First they came for the Bilderbergers | The Economist.

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Castor and Pollux

The Gemini Twins

Last week I told you I had discovered an Hors D’Oeuvre Cookbook written in the “80’s and it listed 52 reasons to hold a party or celebration.  At first I thought it was meant to be the 52 weeks of the year but I was wrong – It’s just 52 reasons to celebrate and not weeks because of course some holidays fall close together, duh!

So here is reason #11 – Starting A Diet Tomorrow We all eat and drink like it’s our last meal!  Big portions, comfort food served family style.   Count me in.

Here’s a little personal anecdote;  I used to blame it on my astrological sign, Castor and Pollux – those souls of opposing views and ultimate indecision because sit me down in front of  a menu especially a large one and I just can’t make  up my mind as to what I want.  This could go on for 15 minutes until my husband would say, “This probably isn’t your last meal”.


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The "Second Revolution" flag, first ...

The Second Revolution Flag

I am continuing with the format of exposing and/or bringing to light some of the myriad conspiracy theories that abound – most especially within the Tea Party movement.   They (the Tea Party) make it so easy for me – there are lots of articles out there about their conspiracy theories and most recently about the distancing between that fringe group and the core membership of the Republican Party.

I’ve copied and pasted the first paragraph of the article written in The Atlantic Wire and below that is the link to the entire article.

“The Tea Party movement proudly boasts an anti-establishment, anti-incumbent, small-government worldview. But, as a movement, it continues to struggle with its conspiracy-minded roots. Andrew Breitbart and other conservatives recently rejected a high-profile birther speech at the first Tea Party convention in Nashville. There, the tension between the Tea Party’s mainstream political ambitions and its vocal, conspiracy-theorist fringe was on full display. Clearly, the conspiracy theorists do not make up the whole of the Tea Party, but they are just as clearly a force within the movement. Why is this strain so strong?”

The rest of the article is below:

Probing the Tea Party’s Conspiracy Theorist Fringe – The Atlantic Wire.

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With a really good  camera, a super lens, the patience of a saint (not Latter Day) and the eye of  a wonderful photographer, we can see just how one clever little squirrel builds his new home in Central Park.

Step 1.  Location, location, location-this squirrel knows the first rule of real estate

Central Park, New York City,

Location, location, location

Step 2. Start with a solid foundation.  In this case, oak leaves and twigs.

 

central park, Murray Head, new york city

Putting in a good foundation

Step 3.  Making sure the footings and foundation are set.

 

central park , bushy tail

Inspecting the foundation

Step 4. Double checking the work before continuing.

 

Double Checking

Step 5.  Looking to see if any home invaders are casing the neighborhood.

Anyone watching?

Step 6.  Re-enforcing the studs and joists.

Studs McGee - Master Builder

Step 7.  Installing dry wall.

Putting in the dry walls

Step 8.  Shingling the roof.

Hauling up shingles

Step 9.  Inspection before the C.O.

central park

Home Inspector

Step 10. Home Sweet Home

squirrel nest, cental park

Home Sweet Home

All photos by Murray Head

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The Pageant Of Childhood

Image via Wikipedia

The day is quickly slipping awayMe 

My days/life so often feel like they’re quickly slipping away that I decided I should begin this blog with my own Six Word Memoir.

And from some faithful readers:

Bought ski pass -now love snow! – Anonymous

A birthday again I am blessed – Rachel

Snow, snow, melt, sleet, more snow – Susan in the Grove

And from the “book”…

Soul’d out so I could prophet – Gotham Chopra

Strange name. Transparent shame. Instant fame – Bumble Ward

In the office. It smells here. –Meera Parthasarathy

I am trying in every regard – Lionel Shriver

Birth, Childhood, Adolescence, Adolescence, Adolescence, Adolescence… – Jim Gladstone

Happiest when ignoring huge financial debt – Ayanna Bryan

Looking forward to hearing from a few more readers next week.



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Central Park,snow day,

Big Dog Little Dog

photo by Murray Head

duck feathers, Central Park

Just Ducky

photo by Murray Head

red dress, only in New York, red lady, new york crazy, mystic

I Hear Voices

photo by Murray Head

stop light, New York city, Fifth Ave, Stop hand

STOP!!

photo by Murray Head

cross country skiers, Central Park, New York city

Who Needs Snow?

photo by Murray Head

American Heart Month, Valentine’s Day – RED is everywhere!

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The "Second Revolution" flag, first ...

Second Revolution Flag

Sorry I’m day late but at least not a dollar short ~ Week two in the exploration and exposition of various conspiracy theories held dear by members of the Tea Party movement.  This week there is a link you will have to copy and paste into your browser to read.  I thought about cutting and pasting the entire article for you all but quite frankly it is long, but most definitely interesting and intriguing.  Below is an excerpt to tantalize your interest.

“Why does the Cloward-Pevin conspiracy hold great appeal? And what, if anything, does it accomplish? On one level it’s entertainment. It allows believers to tease out the left’s secrets and sinister patterns. Since none of the evidence that supposedly confirms the existence of the Cloward-Piven strategy is, in fact, secret, this proves rather easy to do, and so the puzzle is both thrilling and gratifying.”

I also love a descriptive list of who makes up Tea Party membership: “… the tea party is an uneasy conclave of Ayn Rand secular libertarians and fundamentalist Christian evangelicals; it contains birthers, Birchers, racists, xenophobes, Ron Paulites, cold warriors, Zionists, constitutionalists, vanilla Republicans looking for a high and militia-style survivalists.”

Take a few minutes and explore the dark regions of a conspiracy at its best!

Roots of The Tea Party’s Conspiracy Mania – CBS News.

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Future Shock

FUTURE SHOCK

OBSCURE ORIGINS OF COMMON PHRASES

and some OBSOLETE ones too

In one week I heard three almost-obsolete phrases used…so you can safely assume I’m hanging out with people my own age, lol, lol.  With language changing at a speed equivalent to Alvin Toffler‘s Future Shock,  that is phrases, terms, and words I grew up with are now nearly obsolete and now there is a host of new words or rather in my opinion old words and the younger generations have assigned new meanings to them – but more about that later.

First off, I heard someone say, “You don’t know diddly-squat about….”.  So what exactly is diddlysquat? I think you can pretty much guess that anyone under the age of 50 is going to say, “you don’t know shit and that’s the meaning of diddly-squat.  Actually in this case, squat is a euphemism  for the word shit.

The original term doodly-squat dates from about 1934.  There is no definite origin except that the word doodly was used to refer to: a fool, a Union soldier, a penis, cheating…well you get the gist.  And squat was the nice way to say shit.  About 1963 Diddly-squat appeared in dictionaries and in 1964, Diddly-shit.

Then in a TCM movie (do we ever watch anything else !!??), one of the characters went “on the lam”.   The roots of this term are in Old English; lam, lammister, on the lam all refer to a hasty departure and were common in thieve’s slang.   The allusion in lam is to beat or beat it in Old English meaning to leave.

Lastly, I heard the term larder which I know to mean a cool place built to store the food supply prior to refrigeration or ice boxes.    Larders were small rooms or areas usually adjacent to the kitchen.  This room would have shelves and maybe a small window covered in fine mesh to keep air circulating but flies out.  Some would have hooks on the wall to hang a slab of meat.

I know this next is worthy of a blog post unto itself so I will only use one word as an example and I know I used it before.  Today’s younger generation and I’m embarrassed to say that my soon-to-be-34 daughter, wife and mother of two darling little girls uses this term regularly.  As in, “so we went to this random restaurant” and “I don’t know, it was some random girl” and “why don’t you just get some random toy” – WTF?  A new language in the making.  RANDOM means: adjective

1.  

proceeding, made, or occurring without definite aim, reason, or pattern: the random selection of numbers.
2.  

Statistics . of or characterizing a process of selection in which each item of a set has an equal probability of being chosen.
3.  

Building Trades .  

a.  

(of building materials) lacking uniformity of dimensions: random shingles.
b.  

(of ashlar) laid without continuous courses.
c.  

constructed or applied without regularity: random bond.
–noun  

4.  

Chiefly British . bank3 ( def. 7b ) .
–adverb  

5.  

Building Trades . without uniformity: random-sized slates.

—Idiom

6. at random, without definite aim, purpose, method, or adherence to a prior arrangement; in a haphazard way: Contestants were chosen at random from the

studio audience.

I’m going to start taking note of more of the new meanings  being assigned to words  and in the future we can explore  just what they are really saying. LOL

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Well after 35 weeks of exploring the conspiracy theory, COUP D’ETAT, I did wonder how I could keep Conspiracy Theory Wednesday an ongoing segment of my blog.  I never thought it would be easy UNTIL I thought about the Tea Party and some of the strange and wondrous ideas it embraces.  A quick Google search revealed a bunch of articles written on that very subject and written by people far more educated and knowledgeable than me and published in well-known and respected magazines and newspapers.

Let’s see how far I can go with this, maybe only a couple weeks… we’ll have to see how it plays out.  I don’t know if I have any readers who identify with the Tea Party and partially that’s because I, like everyone else I personally know, thinks they’re a fringe group of crazies, that the whole idea of the movement  is ludicrous and they can be laughed off. NOT-that’s a dangerous attitude on my part and others.  So maybe posting the articles will be helpful to everyone, believers and non-believers alike.  Because up to this point, the only tea parties I like to go to serve Black Oolong or Lemon Ginger AND scones with clotted cream.

Here’s one from Newsweek published in February ’10.  I won’t know what you think unless you comment or send me an email.

Tea Party Movement Is Full of Conspiracy Theories – Newsweek.

Tea Party, fringe politics, Republicans,

Welcome to the Mad Hatter's Tea Party

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Tasty Tidbits Tuesday

Tonight I’m making a delicious, light and heart-healthy vegetarian meal.  We both love pasta and I especially am happy when I can make a pasta dish with veggies and is easy to toss together – it makes me feel so much more Italian 🙂  My grandfather who was born in Italy always used to say that having meat in your macaroni or spaghetti (there is a redundancy here but that’s how Americans speak) was a special occasion or a Sunday dinner.

So here’s my Tasty Tidbits Tuesday recipe:

12 oz (3/4 box) linguine

1/4 cup olive oil

1/4  cup pignoli (pine nuts)

4 cloves of garlic sliced

2 lb. asparagus trimmed and cut into 1″ pieces

1 cup (3 oz) shaved Parmesan cheese

Cook pasta, reserve a 1/2 cup pasta water, drain and return to pot.

Meanwhile, heat oil in medium skillet over MEDIUM HIGH heat.  Add pine nuts and garlic and cook, stirring frequently, until golden, 1-2 minutes.  Add the asparagus and cook, tossing occasionally, until just tender, 2-3 minutes.

Add the asparagus mixture to the pasta along with a 1 tsp. salt and 1/4 tsp pepper and toss to combine. *if pasta seems too dry, add a little pasta water to form thin sauce). Sprinkle with shaved Parmesan before serving.

Recipe from Real Simple magazine

Real Simple recipe, heart healthy, pasta with veggies, asparagus, Parmensan, linguine

Heart Healthy Linguine with Asparagus

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