After a long hiatus the ParkingLotFields is back. My apologies to you ten or so readers. I realize you must have been terribly lost in the great swashy-swashy of the network news cycle, amidst the tremors of what looks like the end of the world as we know it! I was  too occupied traveling up a “degree” in society to maintain my efforts knocking the rest of it down a few. Now that I am done with four years of the medieval  institution called the University and had two weeks to drink myself back to present day, I will once again commence my blabbering on this blog.

Seriously, though the shit has hit the proverbial fan. Pehaps I’ve been drinking myself back to modernity to hard as post apocalyptic science fiction movies are beginning to take on a new and frightening dimension of reality. Oil leaks, that people keep calling a spill (a spill is a one time expulsion of a finite amount of liquid; a leak is the letting of a ongoing stream of liquid which if unattended will continue into perpetuity) are turning the gulf of Mexico into a toxic lagoon.  Out of which, the swamp thing will someday emerge. Its not funny though, and not simply for the poor quality joke. The reality is BP is using a toxic chemical to disperse the oil. So if you plan to go to the beach in Forida anytime in the next few or… years, you’ll get the chance to swim in crude oil and poisonous dispersant.

The dispersant doesn’t actually break down the oil into anything else, it just spreads it out. That way all the crude and dispercent will coat you evenly in a cancerous toxic bath. The last step is a nuclear emergency in the gulf and we’ll have a legit zombie bath on our hands. Wild life will turn into mutant zombie life forms and spread the mutanous zobie disease that so many comic books and movies predicted.  Yeah, if I lived on the gulf coast I would run to the mountains. Get to the highlands before the inevitable nuclear “incident” creates a tidal wave of zombipathiocancertitus.

On second thought… The mountains might not offer the same protection they once had, since many have been blown to bits. I suppose as long as we don’t blow up all the mountains and posion all the oceans, we  can still sit at home not enjoying them just the same whilst whatching too much T.V. That way will still have the un-exercised option to get off our fat asses and do something that doesn’t involve buying something or being tempted to buy something.

Anyways, I’m writing a letter to some editors about what I think should be done to those responsible for ruining the gulf of mexico so they could make a quick killing.  I’ll put an extended version up when it is done and the papers haven’t published it.

Indeed though much more shit, hath passed.  Here is quick recap. Close to my locale a Chicago area man shot a boy because the boy’s dog shat in his yard while two State reps from illinios called for the national gaurd to deal with violence. A bit further away the mind bending masters of the economy at Goldman got called to congress for a national bitch-out. Luckily the geeks at Goldman were well tutored by their attorneys. While the Senate was too spineless, well paid, or clueless to really cue into the parts of the argument that could have landed some execs in Sing Sing for a date with some of the meaner boys from Harlem. That way the Fabulous Fab and friends can keep ruining the economies of the world.

Here’s a clue for the brilliant minds who managed to kiss enough butt to get to the running joke we call congress: when bankers say they are paying special attention to liquidity, it means they are paying attention to how quick they can off load their miracle elixir securities laced with iodine to widows and orphans. It means they are not concerned with the actual value of the securities. Therefore selling said securities under the pretext of real or underlying value is at the least scum-baggery and at best felonious.

Out West,  the state of Arizona wants to check your papers or throw you in jail. We could conceivably trick the type of gentleman who likes ruining our economoy and envioroments with some sort of trip to the only remaining oil-free vacation coast in the mainland United States.  Once california legalizes the ganja in November, the stoners of the Golden State can just take it upons themselves to prey on the unsespecting corprate leaches.  Once Medicino county becomes the Napa Valley of cannabis all the elites will look to the newly legal means of intoxication as a status symbol. Once these light weights get baked beyond composure, the hippies of Humboldt can get vengeance for all of us by stealing their I.D. and then taking them against their will to Arizona for imigrant bounty. I don’t think immigrant bounty part of the law just yet, but I’m sure its only a matter of time . Then we can lock these tie toting pricks up in the pen for spilling toxins into our our oceans and financial systems (well technically we’d be locking them up for being foreign, but it’s the locked up part that matters).

On the world stage revolutionary acts are being perpetrated all over the place with out racist laws to take advantage of. Some very pissed of K rygs, Thai, and Greeks all rose up in acts of defiance of their governments this spring. The Krygs kicked their government out. The Thai kicked a significant dent in the GDP, by shutting down the heart of Bankok for six weeks.  While the Greeks burned down a bunch of shit. People died in all of these clashes, though the only deaths the media seems that sympathetic about are the late bank workers in Greece. There is a lesson to be learned here though: work is less important than crossing a general strikes picket line. Anyways I suppose the main stream mediagarchy doesn’t give two shits about the violence in Kyrgyzstan and Thailand because they can’t clearly blame the rebels for the violence and, well central and southeast Asians rebels aren’t quite white enough to be given the full human treatment reserved for pussy bank workers who should be out in the streets. Anyways its a great time to travel to these countries if you like cheap hotel bills or throwing rocks at cops.

That is my Triumphant (err fairly routine) return and recap of the craziness occurring everywhere. Hopefully, from this point onward I’ll be posting thrice weekly. If I don’t live up to this, there is absolutely nothing you can do about it. Unless… you click on the donate button a few times. Then you can threaten not to anymore. So give me some cash so I can rationalize ignoring others and laying down on the job to blabber on this blog.

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Earlier this week I commented on Pat Robertson’s interesting insights about geological phenomena. I’m referring to his comments about the earth quake in Haiti being caused by the Haitians deal with the devil. I joked that Robertson believes that the Dark Lord controls plate tectonics, but another Robertson gaff has shed some life on his literal brand of Christianity. If you can remember back that far, Robertson said that Katrina was God’s redemptive punishment for our secular society’s permissible attitude towards homosexuals. I’ve always thought that most people who believe in Jesus, the Devil, Heaven and Hell and all that jazz believe that these places exist on a spiritual, non-material plane of existence. Not that your soul literally goes up into the sky or down into the furnaces of the inner earth but that it is transported to another spiritual realm. Clearly Robertson takes a more literal interpretation. He seems to reason that Hell is down. Down would be underground. And since Satan Rules hell he must control the interior of the earth. So he controls earthquakes. Heaven is up. Up is towards the sky. So God controls hurricanes. Following this logitc it is funny the devil seems to enjoy messing with LA. For how much hedonism there is in LA it seems like they would be getting way more typhoons or rain storms. Funny too God seems to hate Florida. There always getting hurricanes. I wonder what God has against retirees?

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The tragedy in Haiti has blindsided the world with another natural disaster that has caused human suffering on an absolutely massive scale. I don’t read the papers. It is 2010. But all the major news outlets are today covering the latest development, President Obama sending 10,000 troops to Haiti, on this our glorious inter-web. Other side show acts have also been playing themselves out on the national stage. Glover is shooting his mouth off about things he doesn’t understand. Pat Robertson is reminding us why the Christian right is often mocked as absolutely grade-fucking-A crazy. Keep in mind he did offer a pray to save their souls of Haiti from the clutches of Beelzebub. So his intentions were in the right place. He just thinks that plate tectonics are controlled by the Dark Lord. An editorial in the LA Times is accusing Rush of providing cover for Robertson with his own suggestion not to donate money to relief as you have already donated through the U.S. income tax. Rush makes a valid point lets just go march down to the FED and make them up print off a hundred million. If Haiti were a bank the U.S. would have saved it already!

Oh Wait… I’m sorry.  Obama already did march down to the FED and get those presses-a-printing. $100 million in “immediate aid” are scheduled to arrive as soon as the check clears. This immediate response seems knee jerk. I wonder how politician settle on these numbers. $100 million seems fairly pie in the ski arbitrary, like they spun a wheel to pick how many zeros to go with. Don’t go down and just spend whatever it takes on what’s needed. That would require figuring out what’s needed! They just have to put a number on it. We allocated $100 million no need pay attention if it actually buys the stuff people need. Just incase they do spend the whole amount, lets look at some figures to try to put that huge amount into perspective.

The Haiti economy made about $6.943 billion in 2008 according the CIA. The 100 million promised by Obama is equivalent to 1.4% of Haiti’s GDP, slightly larger than its growth rate in 2008. That is .004 % of the 2.5 trillion we’ve spent so far bailing out the financial sector. It is just over a quarter of the largest Mega Millions lottery pay out in U.S. history.  These figures make the big number seem less impressive.

Nonetheless, it is great that as a nation we have the ability to send our troops down to give out food and the bank credit to back up the aid effort financially. I’m sure the rush of private aid is as impressive as the public response. Although, I can’t help but find the massive push for relief after any high-profile disaster some what revolting. It takes perhaps 100,000 people dead to alert the masses that a react to a situation necessary.

I’ve fundraised for political groups for a job before. It’s ugly work. Anyone who lives in a major metropolitan area has had to put up with the street walkers, hideously smiling at you, and always asking, “Do you have a moment for the earth?”  Well I guarantee if I was out talking to random people last week to get relief for the people of Haiti most people wouldn’t given a shit. Today people would be lining up to contribute. It is like the feed the poor on Thanksgiving routine. They are going to be hungry tomorrow. It is impossible to care about everything but the glaring inequities we experience in this world make me wish people weren’t so blithely unoriginal in their politics. It seems too confusing a topic so the temptation to give up is easily succumbed to. Or the lusty two-party spectacle distracts and co-opts people’s dissatisfaction in the favor of one party or the other.

Haiti the poorest country in the western hemisphere is located within 700 miles of the richest nation. To borrow from Mr. Bush, we’re  “in the neighborhood.” Haiti is a hell-of-a-lot closer than Bolivia the second poorest in the hemisphere. Similar gross inequities play themselves out in Chicago. If you travel from the west on Chicago Ave from the posh River North neighborhood you will pass by what’s left of Cabrini Green. Once the most infamous housing project in the nation, all that’s left is a few loan burnt up high rises and the replacement  low rise projects, that have now been build up to the north and east. It is devastating to one’s delusional ideals about the America dream to travel from some of the highest income brackets in the city to some of the lowest with in a mile. What does it say about the way American state-capitalism works that 11 blocks away from some buying a $1000 pair of shoes there is a baby who can’t get enough to eat.  What does it say about the world capitalist system when a country where children eat dirt cookies to fill their stomachs is less than a thousand miles away from a country facing an obesity epidemic. Note the hidden paradox that our sugar quotas keep Haiti from having a sugar industry while keeping us fat and diabetic from all the high-fructose corn syrup.

Though this point is redundant by now, if Haiti wasn’t so poor the death would not have been so high. Anytime an earthquake hits a country with out modern building falling rubble claims hundreds of lives.  The U.S. does dole out massive aid dollars to the poorest country in the region each year. But even though we were sending aid to Haiti, international bank-sters had put the squeeze on Haiti for sometime. World Bank just forgave Haiti of some 1.2 billion in debt in July of 2009. The interest payments were costing Haiti 1.6 million a month while the average Haitian survives less than 2 dollars a day.  If we want to really feel good about ourselves as a people we need to address problems that aren’t glaringly evident too. To only help only people that are stricken with an extraordinary plight while ignoring all the plights considered ordinary demonstrates a moral immaturity and lack of perception. The ordinary plight to find food each day is ignored by millions. Just keep that in mind as the suffering in Haiti pulls on all our heart strings.

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