but what did gibbons know?

just back from poker and with a story to tell: in my very first played hand i had aces under the gun so i raised to 12 dollars (1-2 nl game) and two people went all in, one for his last 60 dollars and another one for his last 120 or so. i, of course, called. here were the hands: first player Ah, Kh, second player Kc,Kd. perfect! flop was amazing A,K,3 no hearts. nice way to start. for the rest of the session, however, i pretty much stayed where i was and came home after a couple of hours with close to 200 dollar win.

so, okay, okay, i can't help myself...more politics.

dick, 5 deferments during vietnam war, cheney is off telling lies about the value of torture and trying to scare people about putting the gitmo prisoners into american supermax prisons. somebody needs to tell this man to shut up. no one has ever nor will ever escape from a supermax prison. as a former prisoner and someone who did manage to escape from l.a. county jail, let me tell you there is NO FUCKING WAY you could get out of one of those joints other than being released or dying. PERIOD.

clinton and gwb are off speaking together. makes one think that all of them are in cahoots together. how could the man who left us a record surplus share the stage with the man who, not only spent that surplus, but then left us with record deficits and an economy in such dire straits that comparisons are being made to the great depression? how could clinton, who gave gwb a security memo that said, OSAMA BIN LADEN IS PLANNING ON ATTACKING THE UNITED STATES BY FLYING AIRPLANES INTO BUILDINGS, and then had that warning ignored stand on the same stage and smile and joke with bush???? could it be that all of our presidents are of the same party, THE WAR PARTY?

methinks that in a real democracy bush would be in the dock along with cheney and rummy. methinks that an invasion of a country which had done nothing to us and was no threat to do anything to us and that invasion lead to tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, iraqis dead and millions displaced would be a WAR CRIME. if it is not, please tell me why. and that begs the question of why is obama willing to overlook the past and tell us to focus on the future? we didn't do that at Nuremberg (sp?) nor did we do it with pot pol in cambodia. why is the bush/cheney gang exempt from the law?

i can kind of understand the argument that the photos of the real atrocities committed by american troops in iraq not be released because they would put american troops in more danger but THOSE PHOTOS ARE EVIDENCE OF WAR CRIMES AND WE SHOULD RELEASE THEM AND LET THE CHIPS FALL WHERE THEY MAY!!!!!! our troops should not be there in the first place so their argument is flimsy at best. they tell us, "oh those photos would enrage the people there." but what they are really afraid of is that those photos would ENRAGE THE AMERICAN PEOPLE. and then, perhaps, we would demand accountability and demand our troops come home. remember, if the reports are right, we are talking about beyond torture to things such as rape, which is, in some states a capital crime and in the rest carries prison sentences in the decades range. if one of our troops raped an iraqi prisoner and we knew about it and did not bring that man to justice then everyone in the chain of command that knew is FUCKING GUILTY. what kind of country are we that we would let this slide?

have you read THE DECLINE AND FALL OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE by gibbons? if not, do so. if you have don't you see the sameness here? the decadence, the looting of the treasury to support foreign wars, the bread and circus (oh we call it tv and sports but it is the same) and how we have alienated entire sections of the world? no? oh well.

go dodgers. lol

who was that riderless horse?

so i wasn't going to write about politics but the comments i got, for the most part, were about politics. sincity has the best point in that we need to rail against the puppet masters. those monsters in the military industrial complex who are running and ruining the country. some of my readers write directly to me and one of them said that we all need to keep involved by writing our congresspeople and speaking our minds. politicians are whores and their only loyalty is to getting re-elected so they can keep sucking on the public teat. by writing them about our concerns and if enough of us do it then they will respond...not out of love of country but love of self...they will do what they think will keep them in office. i, for one, will write all my congress people, democrats especially, and tell them that the promise was to GET US OUT OF IRAQ and that is what we expect. we are an occupying force in someone else's land. we bombed their cities, we killed their people, we ruined their lives, the least we can do is to get our bloody asses out of their country. if iraq disintegrates into civil war so be it. it is their country. let them have it and do with it as they will. i have said before the only way to insure that we will not have radical islamic terrorists attack us is for us to quit giving them reasons to attack us and we can only do that by getting out of the middle east.

anyway....lakers will take orlando in 5 or 6. i was pleased that the cavs were eliminated after hearing one of their players brag that they were the best team in basketball. no, you aren't. you may have the best player but you are far, far from being the best TEAM.

a guy at the poker tables today said that the last horse he bet on came in last and that was behind the horse whose rider fell off.

hit three teamer yesterday, dodger/cubs to go under, sf to win and the lakers on the money line. how sweet it was.

yesterday as well i got two people to put all of their money in when i had the best hand. how sweet it was.

dodgers to win national league pennant and the world series are two bets i also have.

back again

it has been quite a while since i have "blogged" on this site and the reason was/is that i had run out of words, of thoughts, of comments, of importance (if there ever were any), of humor, of etc. my disappointment with obama and his catering to the military industrial complex (see dwight eisenhower's farewell speech) and his insistance on giving money to the banks without getting money into the pipeline for the american people runs very deep. while i am sure in my heart that we made the right choice for president OF THE THREE WE COULD CHOOSE FROM, he is showing himself to be another puppet of the military. we are NOT getting out of iraq and we have esculated the "war" in afghanastan. while he talks tough with the israelies, we still give them billions of dollars in so-called 'aid' and billions more in military assistance. (gee, why to the muslims hate us?) in the meantime, millions upon millions of our fellow citizens are out of jobs, out of their homes and out of luck. ah well, fuck-em, huh? what happened to the "urgency of now"? NOW is when we need assistance to the citizens. tell it to someone who is out of a job and his children are sick and he has no health care and no money that sometime in 2010 the money for the people will be forthcoming.

with all those thoughts running through my head, i couldn't write. but, my voice is not heard beyond a few dozen people and who the fuck cares what i think about politics anyway? so, i am going back to what i did before the election of 08 and write about my life, poker, my dogs, my wife and other inconsequentual topics.

in the paper today it said that mixed race people were the fastest growing racial group in america. that is great news! mutts are healthier than pure breeds and when you cross races you get the better genes from each. so fuck each other and save the country. if we were all mixed race then racism would no longer exist and if you expand it out for, say, two thousand more years we will all be one race and that would help end wars.

a lot of baseball fans had many bad things to say about juan pierre of the dodgers and how they were paying him too much, he has no arm, is defensive liability, don't need him and so on and so forth but since manny r went down, pierre is hitting over 400 and is scoring runs and batting them in. the dodgers would not be having the season that they are without him. i, on the other hand, have always been a big fan of that little wisp of a man who battles every at bad and can run like the wind. so there you go.

a real shame about mike tyson's little girl. just when iron mike looked as though he was finally getting his shit together this tragedy strikes. tyson is a much more interesting man than people give him credit for. he has always been a mixture of rage and calm, of hate and love and boy and man. if one looks beyond the hype and what other people say and really looks at tyson they will see a different man than is presented in the press. (he has copped to all of his misdeeds with the exception of the rape charge which, to this day, he denies doing and maybe he is right) when he bit holyfields ear he was in one of the dirtest fights ever, holyfield was a very dirty fighter, he just had good press. go back and look at some of his fights and you will see what i mean. tyson basically said that night, 'oh, you want dirty? i'll show you dirty, motherfucker!"

poker is going very well and my win rate is over 65% and my wins are MUCH bigger than my losses. i have a cut off number for losses so i never lose more than that amount on any given day. so i have had 24 wins over 200 and 0 losses of over 200. that makes a big difference.

so, there you are, a new post from the old man.

back home

twenty years ago or so, downtown fort worth was a dive. matter of fact, the whole town basically sucked. times change and now downtown fort worth is thriving and has a wonderful mixture of old and new. on the weekends the whole place rocks with night clubs, bars, shows, movies and outdoor activities during the warmer months. (there was a fight card put on in sundance square this past weekend) they have festivals and other special events there as well.

the shows were pretty much packed and the old man rocked the room over and over. (ask anyone who was there)

back home for a couple of days then off to arlington and dallas the following weekend.

is manny stupid or what? these guys think they will never get caught, amazing. oh well, still think the dodgers will make playoffs but won't go to world series unless manny comes back and has a great second half.

scully and the dodgers.

the dodgers have been on local radio since i first moved here in late 89 but this year the station went to kiddie music and did away with the dodgers. (a great article was in the las vegas review journal today in the sports section..the writer was ed graney if you would like a good read google it up) i have been a dodger fan since 1963 when i was incarcerated in a california prison. due to some rather violent acts i was sent to disciplinary segregation (the hole) for 18 months. we had two radio stations that we could listen to in our cells and one carried the dodger games. vince scully got me through most of my time in there, since they broadcast some of the spring training games then the season, post season and world series. his call of the game was so eloquent, his cadence so soothing, his knowledge so complete that i was able to escape the horror of my day to day existence and transport myself from a concrete dungeon to another place where the breeze blew softly and the grass was green and koufax was on the mound and drysdale was going tomorrow and the yankees didn't stand a chance. roseboro behind the plate, wills at short, fairly at first and others whose names escape me but the third pitcher was johnny padres who pitched the final game of the four game sweep of the hated yankees in the series.

if you have never listened to scully, you have missed the greatest baseball announcer of all time. he has been broadcasting the dodger games since the 1950's and must be in his 80's by now so he won't be around much longer. when he goes, we will lose an icon and on that day i will cry.

hopefully he will last this season because this may be the best dodger team since the early 80's and i have already bet them to go all the way. we have 4 youngsters who are going to be super stars; martin behind the plate, looney at first, eithier in left and kemp in center. they are all in their early 20's and have an unlimited future in front of them.

go dodgers.

no knowledge---no problem

aha! some stimulus money is going to jobs as road and bridge repair gears up for the summer. the only problem with these jobs is that they end when the money quits flowing. i would also like to see the government get into the building business by financing v.a. hospitals, v.a. retirement homes, schools, homes in new orleans to replace those destroyed by katrina and say, libraries. (that is if anyone reads any more..which judging by just watching and listening to the american public, i doubt) because these kinds of construction use more skilled labor than just roads and bridges do; ie. carpenters, plumbers, roofers and all the assorted material suppliers that would be needed.

there was an article in usa today that said that the next supreme court justice may not be a lawyer. oh good idea, let's get someone in there who knows nothing about the law. jesus!

oh well.

and yesterday i had aces cracked TWICE! once by 3-6 off and k-4 off. jesus!

gotta go take a nap. see you in texas. ye hah!

DANNY GANS

DANNY GANS died at home in his sleep last night. he was the biggest name in vegas even if he wasn't known nationwide. for those of you who don't know who he was, his act was musical impressions of all the greats, sinatra, presley, cole, armstrong and some of the current singers. apparently (i never saw his show) he was a fabulous entertainer and, by all reports, a good guy. there was never a hint of scandal attached to his name. in his last performance he changed the ending from APPOLO to bobby darin's closer, THE FINAL CURTAIN. here are the final stanza of that song and it one that i would wish they would play at my funeral.

"your cheers and laughter will linger after
they have torn down these dusty walls
people say i was made for this
nothing else would i trade for this
and just think i am paid for this

goodnight ladies and gentlemen and God love you all"

rest in peace, danny

jefferson, adams, biden and obama.

just some thoughts while i am waiting for the "stimulus plan" to create some real NEW jobs for unemployed americans and, at the same time, watch our government grow and our debt increase:

"government big enough to supply everything you need is big enough to take everything you have. the course of history shows that as government grows, liberty decreases."

thomas jefferson.

and

"there are two ways to conquer and enslave a nation. one is by the sword. the other is by debt."

john adams

this is not to say that i think that what obama is doing is wrong, it is to say that we, the people, need, for once, to pay really close attention to what is going on. as a nation, we were asleep at the wheel when gwb was getting us into wars and deregulating the financial institutions. now we are still in those wars, both of which should which should not have been started in the first place. and YES, i mean BOTH of them, afghanastan is bogus as well, though we did have to try to capture or kill bin laden (and still do) but we did not need to occupy a country to do so. we could have worked with the taliban (everyone and every nation will do what is in their own best self interest and the taliban would have gotten out of the way if we had a. declared not a "war on terror" but a MAN HUNT FOR A COMMON CRIMINAL and b. offered them some face-saving way to co-operate in his capture.) at the same time we are putting trillions of dollars into the greedy little hands of greedy little bankers and the corrupt financial institutions that got us into this mess instead of taking back our own banking system by nationalizing it and letting the "bad" banks go under.

on to something else: the republicans are having conniptions over specter's defection saying that we should be afraid of what a one party control can do to a country. THEY SHOULD FUCKING KNOW! LOOK WHAT THEY DID WITH THAT POWER. (see above) i don't think the administration should have promised specter anything. the demos would have won pennsylvania without him and would have then had a new, young go getter in place instead of an old political hack.

i used to really like joe biden but apparently i just didn't know enough about him. hey joe. PUT YOUR MIND IN GEAR BEFORE YOU PUT YOUR MOUTH IN MOTION. jesusfuckingchrist, this guy is a moron at times.

obama talks a great "green" talk but consider this: he went to des moines for EARTH DAY and to give yet another speech on how we must reduce our carbon footprint (as the current popular fad calls it). well, that is all well and good...BUT when he went he flew on air force One and along with it came a C-17 which is a HUGE cargo plane and out of that plane came his limo and a helicopter and many, many black suburbans for his security detail. JUST HOW MUCH GAS WAS USED FOR THIS POLITICAL TRIP TO PROMOTE USING LESS GAS?????? an armored limo must get all of 2 mpg and the suburbans which are also armored must get 5. not counting the planes and copter.
hypocrisy is saying one thing and doing another. at least that is what the dictionary says.

i read where there is a movement afoot to make the presidential election decided by the popular vote and to do away with the electoral college. hmmm. i don't know whether i like that or not. i just don't know. i do know that if it were in place in 2000 we would not be in the mess we are now so that is a good argument for it but i have reservations about letting the big states control the election. california, new york, texas, florida, pennsylvannia and ohio would really be in the drivers seat. but, then on the other hand, it would be DEMOCRACY which we claim to be a big supporter of..........

anyway, off to texas next week, come on out and see me if you can.

more;

the swine flu is panicking america and we have had only one death from it. are we a nation of scaridy kats or what? so, come out and see me anyway, chances are all you will catch is a good time.