Response to Neil Lock’s ‘Rant To End All Rants’.

Neil is a friend who goes back a number of years. We agree on a number of things but disagree on others.

That makes for an interesting exchange of views.

Neil sees himself as a liberterian. I am all for freedom but also want a social order where the powerful are held in check.

My response to Neil’s Rant – Part 1

Bloody hell Neil!!  Fifteen thousand words is a book!

I shall do my best to respond to things as they come up.

Straight away we hit this major crisis that you brush off as a global conspiracy. Global warming. How you can think this is a conspiracy is beyond me. Why? What is the ulterior motive for all these diverse governments wanting to do this? What do they gain?

I can clearly see why the oil, gas, fracking, cement and steel industries might want to buy off bent scientists. They make big big money out of pollution. But all the governments around the world??? They hate each other. They couldn’t conspire if they wanted to.

You glibly brush over the devastating effects of global warming. That’s easy to do when living in a temperate country. We have our floods, heatwaves, droughts and, like this year, messed up weather, but we don’t get the full impact. For us it’s an inconvenience. We don’t get the massive floods like Pakistan, China and Bangladesh, the huge forest fires like Greece, Australia, California and Portugal. We don’t get terrible droughts like South Africa, Ethiopia, Texas and Spain. We haven’t had unbearable temperatures like they are getting in Africa, the Middle East and now in Europe. But that does not mean we aren’t going to be badly affected.

As more areas become uninhabitable due to arid conditions there will be mass migration. Millions, perhaps billions, will no longer be able to live in these extremes. They will either move or die. We are already suffering from an influx of immigrants. This is the thin end of the wedge. Who can blame them.

Food prices will soar. Crops will fail. We, as a planet, will not be able to feed a population of eight billion.

With the melting ice and warming seas we can expect more extreme weather, higher winds, storms and a substantial rise in sea levels. As most major cities are at sea level this will mean catastrophic flooding and billions spent on flood defences. New Orleans is testimony to what happens when that fails.

This is without consideration of the massive impact on nature and the delicate ecosystems already stretched due to the impact of human beings.

I know you always put people first Neil and take nature for granted but, as a biologist, I can tell you that it is not as simple as that. We are part of that ecosystem. Our food, oxygen and the chemistry of our own bodies depends on a delicate interaction of millions of species. Soil, on which our crops depend, is a living interaction of millions of organisms from bacteria, fungi, thrips, insects, nematodes and worms. Pollination is dependent on insects. Our health depends on the commensal and symbiotic organisms that inhabit our bodies. What we eat and how we interact with the world affects that balance. We are only beginning to understand how it works. Gut bacteria can affect your mood, your thinking and your health. They live on what we eat. We cannot live apart from nature.

And that is quite apart from the joy of interacting with wild life.

We already live in a vastly impoverished world. Our ancestors lived in a far richer world. We have the rump of nature; of what was. The teeming herds, flocks and shoals have gone. We have the vestiges.

I move on.

You make the point that mankind seeks to ‘make its mark’. That is certainly not the case. We are hunter/gatherers. All humans were hunter/gatherers. There is hardly any evidence of the hunter/gatherer societies that filled the planet. That is because they did not seek to leave any mark. They lived in some kind of harmony with nature (even though they wantonly and stupidly hunted all the mega fauna to extinction). Black Elk talked of walking through the landscape without leaving so much as a footprint and castigated the whiteman for wanting to make everything that lives crawl.

It was with the advent of farming, ‘civilisation’, huge populations, cities and nations, that we started having powerful leaders, politics and religions, and narcissistic power which made individuals want to ’leave their mark’.

That’s an aberration.

As for politics; we might be on a slightly similar wavelength, but with vastly different reasoning.

I agree, the world is run for a powerful elite for their own benefit. We are given the least they can get away with without provoking a revolt. The system was set up by the rich for the rich. Politicians are bought and sold. Profit for the wealthy is all that matters. They deal with megabucks; we get the crumbs. They do not care about the impact of what they do on people, nations, or the planet; as long as it makes them very rich.

That means most (not all) politicians are crooks, in it for themselves. They seek power and wealth. They are bought off and controlled by the wealthy.

However, this is where I think we digress.

Forgive me if I’m wrong, but your solution is to devolve into small autonomous communities, each controlling itself.

My solution is much more global. I want complete scrutiny and accountability. I want the bank accounts and all communications open to scrutiny. I want the elite and politicians held accountable.

You always claim not to have exterminated any species and that you are innocent. That is not true. We are all guilty. What we have with species destruction and global warming is an incremental damage. Your defence does not hold.

If a fatal dose of a poison is a million moles and one million people all deliver 1 mole so that the person dies, it is no good all those million people all claiming innocence.

By living we impact on the environment. By using power, eating and moving about we add to the destruction around us. Of course, some individuals have far greater impact than others.

Under your system there would be no accountability for the international organisations, nations and individuals who are presently plundering, exploiting and killing with impunity. We’re beset by wars, tyrannies, massive pollution and environmental degradation. These greedy, power-mad nutcases require controlling and being brought to justice.

War, exploitation, tyranny, pollution, crime and poverty have no national boundaries. If we retreat into our own communities we leave them to do what they like. They are bad enough now; with no controls they would be beyond all levels of bad.

The only way of dealing with this is a fully accountable, fully scrutinised global government.

And yes, I can see all the dangers involved with that, but……

Politics of Slime

Politics of Slime

They love their tractor porn.

                They love their cash.

Corrupt to the core

                They defend their stash.

They steal from the nurses,

                Teachers too,

To give to their chums

                In the banking crew.

Allowed enormous profits, quite obscene

                CEO bonuses grew

Pub landlords and PPE

                Money for nothing – it’s true!

Lies and spin

                Propaganda and skew.

Dark Arts, dirty tricks

                Tory political stew.

Politics of slime

                Where nothing is true.

Tories in the gutter

                Where all the turds are blue!

Opher – 4.5.2023

I have never heard of a government more corrupt, sleazy and incompetent than this Tory one (maybe Trump).

Money for questions, money for honours, money for wallpaper, money for holidays, money for mortgages.

Tractor porn and sexual sleaze, partygate and nepotism.

Chucking money at friends, at family and donors. Wasting billions on bogus PPE, or covid trackers and Dildo Harding, pub landlords and Russians.

Allowing enormous profits for companies. Allowing tax loopholes for the wealthy.

Destroying public services.

Cuts and austerity.

The Voyage – Part 20 – In the doldrums

Travel and Photography

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For some reason the journey back across the Atlantic only took three days this time. Perhaps the captain was in a hurry to get home?

We were heading for Cape Verde – that volcanic archipelago off the coast of Africa. This time it was Santiago and its capital Praia. But that was three days away.

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The captain thought that we might get bored so they put on quizzes and organised a chocolate event. I slunk away for the quizzes and read or wrote elsewhere but I was intrigued by the chocolate. I am a nascent diabetic and alcoholic. I show no signs of being either but I think it is something you have to work on. Chocolate was, as the Incas well knew, the food of the gods. Wine is the drink of the gods.

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I was expecting big things. What I got was chocolate cakes in every shape and size. That was OK but I found that there is only so much chocolate that even I could consume.

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What I was more taken with were the amazing sculptures the cook put together using fruit and vegetables. He was quite an artist. He also did these remarkable ice sculptures. It was quite incredible, in the heat of the tropical sun, to see a guy attack a block of ice with a knife – ice shards spraying in all directions, and end up with a couple of intertwined birds or fish. He did it so quickly.

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There were great sunsets but the journey was choppier than it had been on the way across when the sea had been silken. It seemed troubled. We soon lost the boobies and there were few sightings of whales, turtles or dolphins. But the sun still shone and we were in the tropics. Life was good.

    The coffee machine – the most important bit of equipment.

We went up to the bridge and had a go at steering the ship. It was easy. I’d quite like being the captain. You just told people what to do, sat in your seat with your cap on, and everyone did it. From what I could see the boat was being commanded by a young guy with a pair of binoculars.

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The radar was good. You could see all around for tens of miles. It could even pick up whales. It confirmed my suspicions. We were all alone in the middle of the Atlantic. There wasn’t even another vessel over the horizon and even the whales had buggered off.

Fake Memories

Fake Memories

Fake memories

Fake fears

Fake News

Fake tears

Rousing the faithful

Feeding the lies

Inflaming the emotions

Deaf to the cries

False truth

False fed

False economy

Falsely led

Deliberately stoked

For selfish gain

Cynically oblivious

To the generated pain

Fake news feeding real crimes

Fake smiles for our times

Fake sincerity for personal gain

Fake compassion masking real pain

Real people hypnotised

Following blindly

The veiled disguise.

Ignoring all the shouts

Of the truly wise.

Led up the garden path

That’s built of where’s and why’s.

Opher 23.6.2018

Fake Memories

How to pick your way through the exaggerations and lies that are trotted out to frighten us?

I think we are being manipulated for political reasons! Even our memories are fake!

We no longer believe experts and are instructed to ignore them. Now we believe the headlines of the tabloid press.

The Disaster of Brexit portrayed as a Triumph

The Disaster of Brexit portrayed as a Triumph

The true costs are staggering!! Johnson negotiated an appalling deal!!

Posted in UncategorizedTagged BREXITPoliticssatireThe Disaster of Brexit portrayed as a TriumphTory liesLeave a commentEdit

Captain Beefheart On Track: Every Album, Every Song

5* Review

5

Superb Companion Guide For Every Beefheart Nerd

Submitted 4 months ago

By The Inconsistent Jukebox

From UK

Firstly, reader, I’ll tell you what this book is like: You know when you go into an art gallery or museum and have an accompanying guide book explaining a little about the art or artefacts? Well, this is very much like that. A companion piece for every track. The author has lovingly reviewed and described every song and it is also full of little facts and interesting information. If, like me, you are a Beefheart and The Magic Band aficionado (and I’m guessing that you are) then you’ll appreciate this book. We’ve all read John French’s definitive horse’s-mouth and meticulous account, Bill Harkleroad’s equally valid (but not so obsessively detailed) story and we’ve also read Mike Barnes’s fantastic and accurate outsider view. There are a couple of other tomes too but those three are the glorious triumvirate of Beefheartian history. This book isn’t trying to be that. What it does is makes you revisit the albums. Not with a different perspective – we all have our own, as does this, but with another incentive; to listen to the most original, influential, unique music in rock history. It’s a book for Beefheart lovers, nerds and obsessives. If you don’t agree with some of the author’s viewpoints on the music it really doesn’t matter. The purpose of the book is as a companion to this vast and broad decade of sheer creativity, originality and music-as-art from a genius/tyrant/eccentric and the supremely dedicated and unique musicians who helped to realise the vision, even taking a backseat to his ego for the sake of the art. I love it and so will you.

In the UK

In the USA

The Sun Don’t Mind

The Sun Don’t Mind

There’s a war in Ukraine

                But the sun don’t mind.

Though millions starve

                It will continue to shine.

One day I’ll die

                But eternity won’t care.

My mind will cease,

                My atoms everywhere.

While we’re fed conspiracy

                The universe expands

Unaware of devastation

Oblivious to our plans.

Fleas on an elephant,

                A tear in the ocean.

Voyagers on a rock

                Living without a notion.

So big in our heads

                So tiny in reality.

An invisible flash

                In the uterus of infinity.

Opher – 25.6.2022

So important to bring things into perspective.

We take ourselves too seriously.

Yet our lives are important.

The wonder of life is quite unique.

We take so much for granted.

We are busy trashing paradise for a pocket full of baubles.

How can we give this life purpose?

Brexit Blues

Brexit Blues

A shortage of staff.

                We’ve driven them away.

Cut all the standards.

                Robbed them of their pay.

They’re still in denial

                As Brexit takes it’s toll.

The economy’s shrinking.

                We’re digging a black hole.

Can’t get the workers.

                Haven’t got the skills.

There’s no raw products.

                Hit with soaring bills.

They tell us it’s global forces,

                We’ll soon be in Brexit heaven.

But there’s no sunny uplands.

                Worst in the G7!

The cost of living

                Has gone through the roof.

How much misery

                Before you have the proof?

Is it worth all this poverty

                To take back control?

They promised us the earth

                Now we’re buried in the hole!

Opher – 11.11.2022

Project Fear turns out to be Project Reality!! We should have done what parliament was urging – to compromise!

We should have left the EU and stayed in the Customs Union and Single Market!

Johnson, Gove, Farage, May and the rabid loony ERG forced us to shoot ourselves in the head.

Now our economy is freefall. After twelve years of Tory cuts and austerity, during which they’ve been breeding millionaires and billionaires like maggots, we are rewarded with another decade of cuts and austerity.

Nothing is working.

Poverty, food banks, warm hubs, closures, shortages, low pay, strikes, cardboard cities, homelessness, freezing pensioners, crime, lack of care and support, education in crisis and Tory millionaires.

The huge amount of money squandered, wasted and doled out to Tory donors through VIP lanes – £37 billion on a test and trace system that never worked, tory contracts for useless PPE, £40 Billion lost in handouts. What a shambles.

But people like Rees-Mogg have made millions out of it.

Cameron, Osborne, Johnson and Farage are making millions.

Even Hancock, in the jungle, is not freezing to death!!

Once upon a time (a poem from my new poetry book ‘Broken Britain’ – Out Soon!)

Once upon a time

Once upon a time

                There was a mutation in an ape;

                                A tiny change in sequences

                                                Leading to murder and rape.

On a beautiful planet

                With a myriad of life

                                The arrogant apes are kings

                                                Creating kingdoms full of strife.

Inventing gun and bombs

                To protect their ivory towers

                                They set about subjugating

                                                All beneath their power.

They thought they were above

                All other animals

                                By building torture chambers

                                                Safe behind castle walls.

Such a small mutation

                In a strand of DNA

                                Is now threatening all life

                                                With a burst of gamma ray.

Opher 2.10.2022

It feels as if there are always two forces at play in human nature: the side that is for creating, helping and building and the side that is for violence, destruction and death.

The planet is either heading for a slow decay into polluted ruin or a fast meltdown into a nuclear pit.

Everything is run by greed and the lust for power. The world is soaked in fear and hate.

We’ve created religion and politics and use both to destroy each other.

What hope is there for these psychotic apes. On a positive thought – the planet will eventually recover from our brief custodianship. It might take a few million years, a lot of mutations, but evolution will plug the many holes we’ve created!

Life will prevail!

Rubble to Rubble

Rubble to Rubble

Rubble to rubble,

Dust to dust,

Nothing survives,

Especially the just.

When the man decides

To clench his fist

It becomes impossible

To resist.

Rubble and dust

Rubble and dust.

The whole world runs on greed and lust.

A game of power;

Flex of meat;

Callously cruel;

Shrapnel and heat

Putin’s gamble;

Existential threat;

Where’s it going?

Place your bet!!

Rubble and dust

Rubble and dust.

The whole world runs on greed and lust.

Opher 5.3.2022

Power is corruption.

Putin lives in his palace with full control of millions. His generals quake before him. The Czars of the past would have recognised him as one of theirs.

Yet power and greed have no limits.

Paranoia builds.

There is always a threat. Lots of similar psychotic minds want what he has.

Do not fool yourself that it is any different where you live. Trump, Johnson, Modi or Erdogan, Bolsonaro or Macron; they are part of the same elite, tools and puppets with power.

Power corrupts.

They want more!!