Why the name Ranch Chimp? it was in humour because, science says that humans have similar DNA to a chimpanzee,so I felt some way related biologically to a chimpanzee. 2nd, everytime I was out of Texas on a vacation or for whatever reason I’m always asked things like, do I live on a ranch?,or have cattle? so I commonly call Dallas the Ranch. "Politically Depressed" was also humour inspired by the 1993- 2002 Bill Maher TV/ tele show "Politically Incorrect".
This entry into the music/ arts honour roll society of this journal/ blog will go to the "Bridge City Sinners" out of Portland/ PDX, to sample and taste some of their music, which is in a league of it's own ... combining the old school with the new in genre, incorporating violin, clarinet, banjo, saw, ukulele, guitar, and instead of drums, using washboard/ frottoir for percussions. I opened in the above link from Source Weekly of an interview with the crew. From what I gathered though, lead vocalist/ lyricist/ strings Libby Lux, and standup bass player Scott Michaud go back to around 2012, as far as unrehearsed street busking in Portland with some other musician friends, and this crew officially started as BCS in 2016, starting to professionally record and release music. And I love Libby's vocal work/ style, she said she was so used to singing without a mic on the street, which led to her having to throw her voice loud. They are a crew that been working the club circuit all around the U.S. now too, and managed to get gigs with some festival line ups, and I would guess just for old times sake, like to still do some busking or private parties. Most of the members have background/ roots in punk music, but have taken that spirit and combined it with genres that contain quite a versatile mix of folk, folk- punk, swing, bluegrass, jazz, some classic sound with a raw and rowdy type flavour, with a type of roots americana to it too, instrumentally and vocal harmonies, and a touch of humour, which makes the lyrics fun too. The fresh twist that they put on St. James Infirmary was nice, I think the roots are not exactly known, but Louis Armstrong made it popular recording it back in 1928, and Cab Calloway in 1933. Their song Pussy Cat, is one of them songs that would be fun for a sing- along, also with humour. I wanted to close out though with "Five Foot Two", which was known as "Five Foot Two, Eyes Are Blue" or "Has Anybody Seen My Gal?", unsure, but it's said that the song goes back to 1914 by Percy Wenrich (music), and Jack Mahoney (lyrics), credit though went to the Ray Henderson version, but it was first recorded by The California Ramblers in 1925 ... I remember this song from childhood, since my grandmother, Thora, enjoyed playing the record. On the piece "Dungeon Song", they are joined by members of the folk- punk "Days N' Daze" band out of Houston. I opened below with their official studio video of "Through And Through" released in 2018. Best to this crew, and wishing them alot of fun and more on their journey, you guyz sound great ... Enjoy!
Bridge City Sinners- Through and Through- Official Music Video ... Thanx to Punk With A Camera
BRIDGE CITY SINNERS- "Dungeon Song" w DAYS N DAZE- THE GHOST MOTEL SESSIONS ... Thanx to The Ghost Motel
This posting will serve the "Elizabeth Warren" and "Neoliberalism Crisis" series of this journal/ blog. The posting is to highlight a recent piece of read and proposal by Senator and Presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren. For several years, I have looked at Warren as more than just another politician, for me she is kind of like a teacher, and inspiring in her ideas ... looking out for American consumers, workers, small and medium business interests as well, and an advocate for "true" free market. I look up to her, like she would look up to former U.S. President Teddy Roosevelt, concerning related issues. Warren doesn't just talk this stuff during her campaigns for Senate or President, she's alwayz in the trenches, and instead of only talking, she comes up with so many detailed ideas/ proposals on how to fix things, and she's a workaholic in this field, committed, disciplined and tough, and not focused on fear of these multi- billion dollar entities like some others. I don't know much of anything on these big techs and how they do business, so that's why it's educational to me and interesting. I asked my daughter about this for example, because my daughter caters her services to some of these tech industries big and small as her business ... and my daughter confirmed much and agrees with what Warren is saying here, as far as what overreaching powers these big techs have. How is this an attack on Silicon Valley or free market? When she was recently in Austin at SXSW, instead of just political highsiding, she was with the young tech entrepreneurs asking what they need and what roadblocks they have been running into, as far as advancing their endeavors/ careers/ ideas/ products ... what about the attacks on those by mega entities? ... is it a one way street?
Below, a short read and lesson from Elizabeth explaining the importance of what and why she proposes these things, and the advantages from such action, and the pitfall of inaction, and the growing need of unwinding anti- competitive tech mergers. I also wanted to post this, because the minute she pulled out her pen/ keyboard and opened her mouth, she received all kinds of criticism, even though this is only about keeping big techs in check. I admit, she is bold, and her ideas/ proposals are very big, like we haven't seen in decades, especially from politicians over the last few decades ... again, you have to have big ideas and a full plate, because you are only going to get a fraction of it after chopping it down and negotiating ... but she's straight up and answers questions immediately without the usual runaround, she's pretty firm. And yes, there are legitimate consumer and privacy concerns, regardless of all the opposition lawyer talk, about there is never any concerns or harm to anyone. Also below is a recent interview where she answers questions about this one on one with Ari Melber of MSNBC. 2 pieces below that from Politico, on how Facebook removed her content concerning this, but then put it back up after criticism of Facebook. Another on how Elizabeth has taken campaign donations from employees of some of the same big tech companies she is directing this break up at. This is why I like public funded elections too ... if Warren is wrong for taking employees donations of $20 to a couple hundred bucks a pop, that also means that anyone that takes even a $30 donation on their campaign, even from a fast food mega chain employee, Walmart employee, or any big corporate employee, including a janitor is wrong, eh? ... please, give me a goddamn break! At the very bottom, I will add some thoughts of my own on this.
Elizabeth is not some anti- business hard- ass, nor am I, and I don't feel trying to better enforce, revise, and implement antitrust policies, which is all this is, is such a bad idea, at least look at what Elizabeth has to say and proposed, and use it as a base to go on. To me, what you see today, reminds me of just another sort of Gilded Age of the 19th century, same shit in new packaging, which was the neoliberalism model of that time, and this is the latest model of neoliberalism today/ 21st century, with these latest entities. We seen what happened back in that day, and today we are more vulnerable and markets much more volatile because of the changed global market, newest neoliberal policies, prepaid corruption through campaign finance, the laxed enforcement of existing antitrust, etc. And these giants want there to be no oversight of themselves, besides by themselves, whether it's too big tech, too big pharma, too big banks, or too big anything ... history of such like the Gilded Age show that ... it's either enforcement of antitrust or bust. That's why this is in the Neoliberalism Crisis series too, again, since the word neoliberalism is widely misunderstood, let me point out, that neoliberalism has nothing to do with anything like social liberalism of society, it's more "classic liberalism", being economic than social. Unlike classic economic liberalism though, this neo/ new requires governments to help build the corporate businesses, and subsidize it with tax money, some of this is cloaked in the new term of "public private partnership" (PPP, P3 or 3P), which is clever wording to make you think these entities are partners with us, but it's nothing but corporate welfare for those who could not hold their head above water on their own anywayz.
It has to do with making markets to become the acting governments to control all, and no, it's not true free market, it's only for a few to dictate, when the few/ oligarchy control everything to their absolute power, the majority has nothing left, everything becomes privatized and owned by the richest only, which is monopolization, as well as corporate communism control. I can understand that huge entities for utilities and services are also needed to an extent, because easier to handle such large consumer demand, such as in energy, at least I would guess that's the argument on why you need such large entities/ providers ... being it simplifies oversight and distribution. At the same time though, we should also understand, that there needs to be more competition, to actually promote free market, so, how do you do that? ... we have many experts with many ideas on how we can do that, we don't have any shortages in that area, so you can make a more level playing field with more opportunity. I had no idea even about this "kill zone" that venture capitalists shy from, but it makes sense ... we know how fast these big entities gobble up anything and everything that can expand their profit margin, Hell, even the speed trading/ high frequency trading on Wall Street is eating up the small stocks players ... you can clearly see how this is a problem for expanding true free markets. As I'm writing this, my daughter texted me about some big move today by Google getting into the video game industry, I'll need to look into that ... I have no idea if that is a good thing or lousy thing?, nor did she give her view/ opinion.
Mergers and Acquisitions are in high gear too, since the green light was given to a handful of big deals already, I read not long ago of the long line of corporations waiting to join and merge with others, or gobble up others through acquisitions ... and just today Disney married (owns) FOX, ohhh, how sweet! We hear constantly about the race we are in against the east (China and Russia, which is nonsense, because we're all tied in as far as business, just like with India), we have to outdo them?, or they will take over the world, doom and gloom, etc, etc? ... it's getting silly! The same big players that are screwing us, are the same big players that are playing the east, and out to screw them too, so we are in a race basically to appease the largest entities only, and putting ourselves/ consumers/ workers, as well as upcoming investors and entrepreneurs, such as my/ our own kids, more at their mercy (and we're talking about some that are unmerciful ingrates, at that) ... and none of these too big to fail entities have any commitment or national favouritism, borders, allegiance, or whatever to any country or continent. If we were to lose our asses in our own country economically, who in Hell would bail us out? (and currently because of our debt, we owe too much as it is), and if we did get more help or loans, what would be the payback price? Look at the pressures on several other countries that have financial problems (some were put in by these entities even) as far as pushing everything from austerity, to sanctions, to almost a prison type confinement of sort, to where they can't even function on a global level, basically a hostage and extortion situation, that's how these folks are.
I'm not saying the big banks, energy, or even popular folks that are charming when they talk like Zuckerberg or Bezos are evil, I'm saying we are playing in a jungle, and that's how it worx. And it doesn't matter what line of products and business they're into, whether it's banking, energy, health/ pharma, social media platforms, utilities, services ... when they are so huge, and have so much power, it challenges democracy, free market, competition, consumer costs/ choices, and much. What does this have to do with breaking up, at least in the way Warren is proposing, Facebook, Google, Amazon? ... everything! ... because it sets a precedent, which gives us more bargaining leverage too. None of what Warren is proposing, is shutting down these entities either, it is saying that there has to be some breakup or divestment of conflicting interests, what's the need for the platform utilities to own the marketplace too? These entities lawyers say "well, you don't have a case/ grounds to break up anything, without proof that this done any harm or injury to anyone" or related ... but there is plenty of harm, when folks have their information and accounts, funds or whatever of value hacked, traded or sold, damage to their credit, privacy, denial of basic rights, choice, and the list goes on, there are PROBLEMS and HARM. We have heard talk since the Great Recession of 2008, about breaking up too big to fail banks, corporate monopolies, enforcing regulation and antitrust policies, safeguards so this don't happen again, etc, even though history shows that IT WILL happen again, both political parties have failed to challenge this in any significant way, and those politicians who have, were swept under the rug, on both sides in some way, or ignored.
This posting will serve 3 series of this journal/ blog ... "Pharmaceutical Cash Cows", "Political Corruption & Ethics", and "War on Drugs". This will be about the Opioid Crisis that been covered by CBS 60 Minutes over the last couple years, which I been following since late 2017 to this latest segment late February 2019. I even read that they won an award for at least one of these segments. But this is really some great informative stuff they done ... and also great that this is coming from mainstream media ... not China, Russia, or so called "fake news" sites. Being in the MSM as well, shows you the severity of this too, because it's much worse than you may think ... but of course, another crisis, and America is saturated today with one crisis after another. There is 5 segments in the CBS 60 Minutes link below ... it covers who's to blame, Congress and the Big Pharma lobby, the distributors, doctors and manufacturers, and the FDA ... and how this culture of corruption inspired by "profits over consumers/ people" has spread from corporations to Congress, the FDA, DEA and DOJ. Combined time over an hour for all segments to be viewed, but well worth the view. Clearly by definition, what you have here is organized crime too, millions of new people becoming addicted to opioids in America, and deaths that already went into the hundreds of thousands numbers, because of the tolerance you build to them and overprescribing them for long term use, to make billions in profits ... bottom line. After, at the bottom of the post, I will add some of my own thoughts of the reality we have, and a more innately reasonable and sane perspective ... because the way were told to react or deal with these things, is just more corporate and politically designed nonsensical garbage.
No doubt, insanity ... or what we consider as civilized thinking, acceptance, correctness, has reached all time high levels. It was sickening as well having to listen a couple weeks ago to some of these Big Pharma heads and their excuses on why they have to rip- off consumers with over- inflated prescription costs (Politico News) ... when they were called for questioning on Capitalism Hill (aka Capitol Hill). They didn't even have any solutions, or could give straight answers, it was one runaround after another ... they rob the American people, then they insult us as a whole. And whether you are left, center, or right ... you know something is systematically wrong, and not just some "flaws", but really wrong ... especially when you get burned not just once or twice, but time after time with increased intensity. The corruption alone in this country is now comparable to what is said about some corrupt third world and developing countries and their dictators on other continents that we commonly talked about as being horrible, but we don't look at these parasites the same here, because they are well educated and wear top dollar well tailored suits. This is EXACTLY why we need legislation like Senator Elizabeth Warren pushes, because without action, history shows us, it will NOT stop, but only get worse, until it destroys our country more, and eventually itself. This is also the reason why these thieves and snake oil peddlers would be willing to spend millions to make sure she would never become a President (she is running too). They don't want a President in this country like her, that supports the average worker and consumers, they want someone that will turn their head when they rob and rape our country blind, bottom line. The President (Trump) proposed not long ago to even execute some of these drug kingpins that are behind the drug trafficking ... I doubt he would try to have any of these, who are the worse of the worse executed. But these people should be stopped, their corruption should be exposed, not just by "60 Minutes", but every media big and small across this country, and organized roadblocks and disruption against some of these giants and their business ... the same as you would go after some street kid slinging opiates outside of your kid's school in your community. The only difference between that street dealer and these big pharma dealers and their peddlers in lab coats, is that big pharma is far worse, many of these people, whether they're from the Washington crowd that transplanted through the revolving doors, politicians, or the top crust of these businesses, should be investigated, criminally charged and tried.
The half century "war on drugs" in this country has also been a total failure, and over that time period, we have more drug addiction than ever ... and I say addiction, because this is NOT recreational, but now a need and sickness, as any hardcore addict gets dope sick without their dope. I'm sure after they get all these millions of people dependent on their drugs as long as they can, they will start a new business to try to cure them ... like a church creating evils so that they can sell the remedy to cure it ... all these monopolistic businesses work the same way ... and it's all predator and prey, simply. Having large corporations in our country was supposed to be for the common good for all, that was the whole reason to incentivize and reward them ... but some have become too large, crushing competition and progress, and starting to rule and regulate us like a communist government would do to its citizens. When you have a town like Kermit, West Virginia, with about 400 population being flooded with 9 million Hydrocodone pills, or a state with 20 million population like Florida, and a company dumping 500 million Oxycodone on it, you get those involved with distributing them and criminally charge and try them ... these drugs are not like marijuana, this is physically addictive and hard to put down. Some in Washington say, when demand for justice comes up for these folks in big pharma ... "but, they went to Harvard", or "they gave campaign donations to so and so" ... I don't give a shit where they went to school ... or who their favourite politician is ... they are creating a major drug problem in our country ... these companies known for years how highly addictive these drugs are, and know the need for very tight regulation on this. We have thousands today in America, with no prior drug use, or association with those street circles, that are now as addicted as any illegal heroin addict. I know 2 guys, one in his 40's and one in his 50's, that are both addicted to prescription opiates, and they have to go now to the black market to get theirs when their script runs out for the month, they both were loosely prescribed them, because of aches/ pains/ injuries from physical labour, that was job related. I know another woman in her early 40's, same thing ... she is hard addicted, she was prescribed them after some kind of back surgery after a car accident, and told to continue them over and over, and they did not try other alternatives ... none of these 3 people used drugs when they were younger, not even for recreation ... they are hardcore addicts today. I myself don't use them, or ever had chronic pain or related ... however, I smoked illegal raw opium several times when I was young, but for only recreational reasons ... to get high basically.
Today on the streets and nightclub scene in Dallas for example, and I'm sure in every other large and small American city, the street drugs in high demand are OxyContin (aka "oxycotton" on the street), Hydrocodone, Xanax (aka "bars" on the street). Since these publicly reputable pharma companies make them and doctors prescribe them, people look at them as designer type clean drugs ... yet are just as addictive and a problem as street crack cocaine or tar heroin. These pharma opiates are one of the most highest demand of "street/ illegal drugs", and are the ones that are manufactured and distributed by these companies and doctors, not by illegal drug manufacturers. And if a person gets caught with these pharma drugs possessing, using, or distributing them, especially without a script with matching name identification of the patient as the name on the bottle, they are charged with one or more felonies ... distribution, delivery, possession or whatever ... yet the actual distributors never are charged with a thing when their drugs flood illegal black markets. We have 100's of thousands across America incarcerated in jails/ prisons, or on paper (parole/ probation and ankle monitor devices), some over and over for their addiction to these drugs, and they committed no crimes against society, just simply using the drugs you dump on our streets by the truck loads. In turn we created a utopia for opiate profiteers, lawyers, and a new private prison system for investors to invest, to profit off of making a revolving door for business to keep locking these lower income people up, and using them for free community or prison labour for other corporations. There is no doubt that pain relievers are needed for folks with chronic pain or other illnesses ... but a one size fix all pain fix of loosely prescribing a shitload of these to people is irresponsible, whether you got a PhD or not ... a street dealer doing this you would not likely support or respect, you shouldn't for these either. Another big issue that has been created in all this, is the new black market on Fentanyl, over 50 times stronger than Morphine, dirt cheap in costs, again, started for good reasons and surgery, end of life or related uses decades ago. The problem with this now is, it's a synthetic opioid, that is being manufactured in large volume and dumped illegally in America from China, and even being manufactured by drug cartels in Mexico. This is being used to cut things like street heroin, to increase potency, product quantity, and profit ... and cutting crack with it, to counter the cocaine stimulant high with a downer type, to make a cheap speedball (upper and downer mix effect), or put in marijuana on the street, it can be deadly, even just using once or twice ... you need more awareness and focus on this. I heard in Kentucky for instance of fentanyl testers being distributed to addicts in needle exchange, testers are cheap, and needed all over the country.
We lack education and meaningful intervention on dealing with the drug crisis in America ... we can start by spending more money fixing the problem, instead of spending all our money on these corporations, because they're not paying for all the research and development they say they are ... WE ARE. We can find better solutions to things like chronic pain, with other less lethal drugs, such as even certain types/ strains of marijuana, or drug free wayz. We can spend more of our money educating our children better in OUR schools/ public, spend more on facilitating the needs of those who have hard addictions, instead of persecution of them, as well as rehabilitation. I'm so sick of hearing the same thing over and over about "where will the money come from?" ... the money is there!! ... we just need to stop supporting these ingrates and letting them take every goddamn thing we have, and dictating everything we do through their lawyer/ lobby drafted legislation, and destroying our dignity, we're worth more than them, because without us, they wouldn't have anything ... but we bend over backwards to please them through a handful of worthless political flunkies, yet do everything ourselves. We are told we should keep on listening to their garbage, and asking them for solutions, they don't have any solutions, they will never have any, unless it's wayz to profit off us and keep us dependent on them ... I have no regard whatsoever for ingrates like these ... that's the same regard as they would have for you/ us. These people running these pharma monopolies, could give a shit less about rehabilitating, curing illnesses, reforming the prison system, or our children ... they are out to take everything they can, from our resources, money/ taxes, to government, and enslaving as many as they can to profit off of in some way. You shouldn't give a crook who robbed/ burned you of billions and destroyed your people and environment a fine of several million after they wronged you ... you wouldn't give a thief a $10 fine who just stole thousands out of your account. The idea that we should keep respecting trash that is of no benefit or use to us as a society is what's insane ... these people rip our country apart, and even want to destroy regulations of any kind, so that they can openly supply even the worst drug dealers ... they bitch and whine about the FDA, yet use the FDA at the same time with their money, to take everything they can from us ... and corrupt our government if anything. They look at regular people the same way any predator animal would look at another animal as prey, they abuse all folks ... our veterans/ military, children, elderly, you name it ... and the bottom line is to keep you dependent on them. Even these politicians should be held accountable ... and as long as people are serving in our government, they should be banned for a period from participating in these racketeering endeavors that are out to screw the public.
