ROAD JOURNAL: Dick Cheney Trolls You

DICK
I forget now which year was the sweet springtime from Arabia to Biafra, but it was one of these last few that has slipped by.  All because of Twitter.
2.  Anyway, I was thinking: were I Dick Cheney, were I sitting around in 2003 figuring out how to maintain my power over the world even up to and despite my ousting via election in my home country, it would be a two-fold strategy:
a -- ARAB SPRINGS via TWITTER.  That's right, as any old pro wrestling booker will tell you, the people want to believe; for instance they would love to believe change comes from uprisings by the people, not by the incremental downdrafts of the powerful.  And, were I a Dick Cheney, (or fill in any dictatorial right-winger you like), I'd want the people to think that a decade of chaos caused by the military and intelligence agencies was actually due to a year or so of Twitter... because then, well, people get wit that.  But only if if we enact B.
b -- Give them there guy.  That's right, feed them, (in pro wrestling parlance), a babyface, a good guy -- because as I, (as Dick Cheney), knows, when this babyface gets into office, when this babyface gets the intelligence reports we gave the last hero, well, he'll do exactly what we need him to do, and, as Americans are stubborn folk, if they stand in a field for the guy, they'll excuse the guy for any decision he makes.. but this really only works so long as we mark these people out on the fact that their Twitter and their Facebook makes a difference..  These poor bastards will be so busy posting placards that make them feel good about their beliefs, that, before they know it, we'll have revolutions wherever we need them, and they'll be congratulating themselves for them, as if they had something to do with it besides for remarking on it.  Sweet victory.  And if they question for a minute, we'll throw them some cultural bone, something we all knew has been coming for twenty five years anyway, because when it comes to the people, nothing softens up their revolutionary belly like allowing them to clap each other on the back for evolution.
3. Okay, I was just trolling you up there.  The truth is, Facebook is a tool to keep you from revolution.  That itch you used to feel of changing things, well, hey, there's always a new placard to share from your favorite website.  Look, I'm not like you, I quite unashamedly love my world of Playstations, and NFL football, and so long as Apple will always allow me access to Blue Christmas by E Presley, I'm fat and happy.. but you, YOU! -- you, the would-be revolutionary -- what the fuck are you doing watching Jon Stewart?

ON: The Last of Us

The Golden Age

PICS: Two Years Ago -- 81 South

PICS: Lolly's Lost Limtuck Weekend

ribeye

and veg

MLH: 1 Dead Cow Bounce At Little Indian 10

Perhaps this is the draft to an opening chapter.  Perhaps you've read about RR Beth's car crash before.

BOOKS: Hamlet is The Son of Anarchy and Lion King

I watched the pilot episode of Sons of Anarchy from 2008; I don't know where the show goes beyond this episode, but one can guess.  As a pilot, a mission statement of what a show will be if it survives beyond it, this show intended to be Motorbike Hamlet.  I watched it to see just how Hamlet it is.  And it is.
+ Libraries are filled with writings about Hamlet; of language, parallel storylines, and the deeper meanings -- it is a holy text, (one would think the Writer carved it on stones at the top of a mountain).  So much of the text over all these years has masked the plot that SOA copies: a dude's dead dad started a motorcycle gang; presently the gang is at a moment of truth where it will either rise or fall down the food chain of tough guys, as the gang's new leader, (who had been second in command when the kid's dad was alive), knows well.
What I would guess comes next on this show is further muddied waters for this young protagonist as questions of his father's death arise, and he becomes suspicious that the new leader of the gang had something to do with it, (and, by the way, the new gang leader is dating the kid's mother); in stark relief the kid begins to see the leader no longer as a caring uncle reminding the kid he'll be king one day, but as a jealous second banana covetous of the juice, the crown, and the wife.