John Lennon Yoko Ono Rare 1981 Rolling Stone Cover

The post assassination of John Lennon Rolling Stone magazine intact   There is small damage in the left corner and around the bottom staple.  Also small damage on the back cover.

I bought this magazine in 1981.  I am looking for someone who wants to add this magazine to their collection.  If you are interested contact me by my blogpost email.

Cateye Strada Slim (CC-RD310W) Fits A Retrospec Harper Coaster Break Bicycle

Cateye says the Strada Slim cycling computer (CC-RD310W) is designed for road type bikes and is not compatible with other bicycle designs. The Harper Retrospec is a single speed coaster hub break bike, and the Cateye Strada Slim works perfectly on this bike.

The Retrospec Harper has a conventional saftey bicycle design.  There are no factory disc or side-pull breaks included with this bicycle. However, after market breaks can be purchased and added for safety reasons. Here is my bicycle equipped with a front break in case I drop the chain somewhere along the road. This side-pull break has no effect on the computer sensor or any effect upon computer output.

I have read scathing reviews of the Cateye Strada Slim online. Maybe these negative reviews are written by cycling computer competitors, or by idiots who are functionally illiterate as to the proper set up and maintenance of cycling computers.

Regular road rides tend to knock things out of adjustment. Strange behavior exhibited by your Cateye Strada Slim is most likely caused by weak batteries or by the wheel magnet becomming misaligned with the sensor unit. Check the batteries and wheel magnet first. The wheel magnet should have a gap of no more than 5mm from the sensor. If the gap is too large the computer will record either intermittent data or no data. If the batteries are weak the computer will show strange unexpected displays of data, or intermittent data, or no data.

Securing the computer and sensor to resist road imperfections is extremely important for excellent error free data streams. Here are some methods.

Double Up. The Strada Slim comes with three heavy duty elastic bands. Two for the head set and one for the front fork. If you use the stem and not the handle bars to mount the computer use both elastic bands, and the small zip tie provided in the kit. This will greatly stabilize the computer against road imperfection and if one band breaks, the other will survive long enough to hold the computer in place to ride home.  Replace both bands if one breaks. Fatigue failure in one one band usually indicates imminent fatigue failure in both bands.

The same thing applies to the sensor. Double large heavy duty all weather zip ties. If one zip tie breaks the other should hold the sensor long enough for the ride home and you won't lose your sensor somewhere on the road. Double zip ties also hold the sensor firmly in place to avoid sensor wheel magnet misalignment issues.

The wheel magnet has caused some mighty complaints among Cateye Strada Slim users. Some complain that the forks and spokes are too far apart on some bicycles to meet the 5mm wheel magnet to sensor tolerance. The problem can be fixed by adding rare earth magnets, perhaps secured by hose clamps to the existing wheel magnet provided in the kit, or perhaps constructing shims out of old tubes to fill in the gap. I was lucky enough to own a old style wheel magnet that is chrome and is secured with a screw. This magnet is a perfect fit and does not slide up and down the spoke.

Here is a photograph if my slightly modified Retrospect Harper coaster break bicycle.  

Have a great ride today!

Fatal Rage. Mutha Records 004. 1983 Classic Hard Core Punk Rock.

Fatal Rage.  Mutha Records 004.  1983 classic hard core punk rock.

Lyrics insert.

The vinyl.

Some bozo listed this record for $8,000. Hell I will sell my mint condition copy for $7,500. My e-mail address is available in "about me", if you are interested.

USADA: The Reasoned Decision: A Review

The Reasoned Decision is the United States Anti-Doping Agency, (USADA) summary of testimony from former teammates of disgraced seven-time Tour de France champion Lance Armstrong.  Other testimonies from involved persons connected to the U.S. Postal Service Professional Cycling Team, Astana, and the Discovery Channel Cycling Team doping scandals are also included.  Along with a large volume of doping-related financial records.  Of utmost importance to USADA was the financial arrangements between Lance Armstrong and the convicted doping doctor Michele Ferrari.  USADA contends that Lance Armstrong paid Michele Ferrari money in exchange for dope and medical expertise.  This arrangement between Lance Armstrong and Michele Ferrari would expand into an organized doping conspiracy involving select cycling team riders, team doctors, and team trainers.  The doping conspiracy would extend from 1999-2010, or for most of Lance Armstrong's professional cycling career.*

Background

Floyd Landis wrote USA cycling president Steve Johnson a letter describing past doping offenses Lance Armstrong had engaged in.  Many of these Lance Armstrong doping offenses Floyd Landis had personally witnessed and/or participated in.  Jeff Novitsky opened a criminal probe, convened a federal grand jury, subpoenaed witnesses, and began to record testimony to discern whether taxpayer money had been used to fund a doping conspiracy within the United States Postal Service Professional Cycling Team.  But, suddenly the criminal probe ended.  Why Jeff Novitsky ended the criminal probe remains a mystery.  But due to the serious charges alleged by Floyd Landis, USADA had no choice but to investigate the case.

Ground Rules: The "Non-Analytical" Positive

In any investigation it is necessary to establish some ground rules.  USADA had no laboratory tests to extract evidence from to establish a doping violation.  Lance Armstrong never failed a dope test.  USADA would have to utilize the "non-analytical" positive.  People would be asked or compelled to testify about their participation in, or knowledge of, doping offenses Lance Armstrong had engaged in. The accumulated testimony would prove the "non-analytical" positive case.  The response to this appeal for information concerning the Lance Armstrong doping conspiracy produced a bonanza of informants.  Former cycling teammates, former team support staff, businessmen, people who Lance Armstrong had abused with accusations and slander, all came forward.  Frankie and Betsy Andreu were praised for their courageous whistleblowing.  Floyd Landis and Tyler Hamilton provided devastating eye witness facts.  USADA had an open and shut case.

The one holdout, the man who refused to testify?  Lance Armstrong.  But USADA had an answer for Mr. Armstrong.  The Reasoned Decision states;

Weight to be given to Lance Armstrong's refusal to testify

Article 3.2.4 of the [USADA] Code provides for the adverse inference to be imposed against an individual [if he or she] fails or refuses to testify on any relevant matter on which USADA seeks to question him.  Long before Article 3.2.4 was adopted in the 2009 version of the Code, Court of Arbitration for Sport, (CAS) Panels recognized the propriety of imposing an adverse inference against a respondent in an anti-doping case who invoked the Fifth Amendment to avoid testifying or otherwise failed to appear and respond to the charges against the respondent.  For instance, in the case of Lazutina v. IOC an athlete failed to appear, and, as a result, the panel drew the adverse inference that she had intentionally ingested the prohibited substance found in her blood. 

The panel held: "Ms. Lazutina did not give evidence and there has been no explanation from her as to how that prohibited substance came to be in her blood.  In the light of that failure to explain, the Panel concludes that the prohibited substance was in Ms. Lazutina's blood as a result of the intentional exogenous ingestion by her.

Lazutina v. IOC, CAS 2002/A/370 Paragraph 9.10.

In addition to the overwhelming evidence of Lance Armstrong's doping it should not be forgotten that Lance Armstrong refused to confront the evidence against him and in-person appearing in front of neutral arbitrators.  Armstrong's refusal to confront the evidence against him in-person in a hearing, leads to a strong inference that Armstrong doped exactly as charged by USADA. PP. 87-88.

Well there are several issues here.  Apparently, the CAS and USADA have determined that the right not to be compelled to admit a criminal act against one's self in a civil or criminal case, the right against self-incrimination, no longer applies in sport doping arbitration.  Federal judge Sam Sparks should have considered Code 3.2.4 before issuing his ruling dismissing Lance Armstrong's lawsuit against USADA.  Apparently, the CAS thinks the rights afforded to defendants in the United States do not apply in sports arbitration, and the American Constitution is nothing more than exotic toilet paper.  Perhaps the CAS decision against Ms. Lazutina was written in the Republic of North Korea.  The second problem here is the definition of exogenous.  An exogenous substance is not found naturally in the body.  An endogenous substance is found naturally in the body.  There is no such thing as "exogenous ingestion".  The statement should read, "willful ingestion of an exogenous substance".  The third problem here is the endless narrative provided by the prosecutor who wrote this summary.  "Armstrong's refusal to confront the evidence against him, in-person, in a hearing, leads to a strong inference that Armstrong doped exactly as charged by USADA".  An irrelevant fanciful opinion.  A fantasy.  No factual evidence to support this assertion.  The reader will encounter this narrative many times on "evidence" that amounts to hearsay.  "Evidence" that would never be admitted into a court of law.

The writing style of The Reasoned Decision.

Complete and utter garbage. The Reasoned Decision proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that cyclists are not doctors.  The medical conclusions reached by former teammates of Lance Armstrong are preposterous.  Most of the incoherent summary presented in The Reasoned Decision is based on hearsay, conjecture, press releases, innuendo, surmise, everything but hard evidence to prove Lance Armstrong used performance-enhancing drugs.  The narrator obviously has no concept of cycling history, and the tapestry he weaves of circumstantial evidence is far from convincing; even under the "comfortable satisfaction" standard. Sam Sparks, the judge who castigated Lance Armstrong for "vilifying" the anti-doping process, obviously chose to censure the wrong party.  Judge Sam Sparks should have reprimanded USADA for this sleazy character assassination of Lance Armstrong.  Travis T. Tygart should have been ashamed to affix his signature to this summary.  The Reasoned Decision reads like a blog; full of inaccurate statements and factual errors.

Mistakes

It would be impossible to list every mistake in The Reasoned Decision without going insane.  I will mention a couple of glaring examples.  Kristen Armstrong is savaged with libelous accusations when ex-teammates of Lance Armstrong claimed that Kristen Armstrong distributed cortisone tablets to the riders, in brown paper lunch sacks, at the request of Lance Armstrong.  Kristen Armstrong was "rolling joints."  Inadmissible hearsay.  Kristen Armstrong may have distributed harmless placebos or vitamin supplements.  Was Kristen Armstrong a chemist?  Was Kristen Armstrong a doctor?  Did someone chemically analyze the contents of those sacks?  Will USADA produce a sample as evidence?  Did Kristen Armstrong have any first-hand knowledge of the contents of those sacks?  A defense attorney would have a field day cross-examining these idiotic accusers!  No court in the world would accept or admit this nonsense as evidence.

Then Emma O' Reilly makes the preposterous statement that the blood of the 1999 Tour de France Lance Armstrong cortisone "positive" test came from a cortisone injection administered to Lance Armstrong "weeks earlier," during the Route de Sud.  The half-life for cortisone is six hours.  Total elimination from the body 20-24 hours.  A stored blood bag containing cortisone may account for the positive test result, but why would anyone draw oxygen-depleted blood during an exhausting race.  Insane conjecture is totally unsupported by scientific facts or common sense reasoning.  The cortisone did not come from the Route de Sud.  You would think with a budget of 15 million taxpayer-funded dollars a year, USADA could have hired an editor to proofread the document before publishing the damn thing.  Yet the narrative drones on about the accumulation of "facts" that support the case.  Absurd.  Voodoo science does not generate facts.

The Reasoned Decision reads like an outline of David Walsh's, Seven Deadly Sins.  I might suggest The Reasoned Decision is a masterwork of plagiarism, but most of the facts presented in the report are common knowledge.  The author engages in infuriating circumlocutions, selectively grasping quotes without providing any context.  USADA should have published the witness statements instead of publishing this incoherent rambling mess.  I could not believe The Reasoned Decision was written by a legally trained professional writer.

David Zabriskie

One gem I found, though.  The story of David Zabriskie.  David Zabriskie raced to escape a broken home and a drug-addicted parent.  David Zabriskie wanted to find solace and sanctuary in cycling.  David Zabriskie was reluctant to embrace the doping culture in cycling.  David Zabriskie was concerned about the side-effects of EPO.  What impact would EPO have on his health, on his body, would EPO cause genetic mutations in his children?  David Zabriskie joined the peloton to escape from his own chaotic family situation.  Cycling was a cathartic escape, a panacea.  Then, according to USADA, Johan Bruyneel sent Jose "Pepe" Marti and Dr. Luis del Moral, under the direct orders of Lance Armstrong, to inject David Zabriskie and teammate Michael Barry with EPO as a part of an illicit team doping program.  David Zabriskie was so upset at this misfortune he cried bitter tears. P. 111-112

Betsy Andreu.

I made some notations about Betsy Andreu; but suffice to say; Betsy Andreu is a true anti-doping crusader and not a hypocrite, like her husband Frankie Andreu.  I was surprised to learn that Frankie Andreu used performance-enhancing drugs in multiple races, not in just one stage of the Tour de France.  Frankie Andreu said he "wouldn't put that shit in my body" meaning dope.  But when Betsy Andreu saw Frankie Andreu breaking wind for Lance Armstrong up the col, in the lead group, on television, during a stage of the Tour de France, she flipped out!  "What is Frankie doing?"  "He's juiced!"  Besty laid down the law.  Besty told Frankie, "choose, EPO or me"!  Betsy Andreu told Frankie Andreu she would not marry him unless he stopped doping.  Frankie obeyed Betsy and became an outspoken anti-doping crusader himself.  The way Lance Armstrong treated Betsy Andreu was disgusting.  Betsy Andreu claimed she heard Lance Armstrong confess to a group of doctors that he used a large number of performance-enhancing drugs as a professional cyclist.  Betsy and Frankie Andreu, and Lance Armstrong, were all together in a hospital room, in Indiana, where Lance Armstrong was being treated for testicular cancer. This room is where the "drug confession" occurred. Lance Armstrong called Betsy Andreu "a crazy bitch, with a personal vendetta.".  The cycling world was split right down the middle about Betsy Andreu.  Some people loved Betsy, some people hated Betsy.  The haters have probably forgiven her.  So, Betsy Andreu, you get a special mention, and many thanks, for helping to expose "cycling's greatest fraud".

Conclusion

The Reasoned Decision is a morass of disconnected statements, poorly organized, badly written, seemingly without aim or purpose.  "Non-analytical" positives lower the bar so low that a simple smear could destroy the career of an athlete.  USADA is so arrogant and smug that they don't even seen to care about the image they are projecting to anti-doping professionals, or to the cycling community.  USADA seems to take no pride in their work.  Refusal to incriminate yourself is not a doping violation.  The fact that Lance Armstrong quit without firing a shot, or contesting your accusations, does not justify your slovenliness USADA! Results are not all that matter! Damn the torpedoes!

Addendum:

Why did I bother to write this review, you might ask?  I was looking for Paul Kimmage's classic book, Rough Ride, but I found this sorry excuse of a report instead.  The report is dated, having no real value or interest to anyone today except for cycling doping historians.  Without a doubt, USADA created the greatest eyesore in the history of the anti-doping crusade, and USADA should be ashamed of themselves.  The Reasoned Decision will forever serve as a model of how not to report a doping violation.  Athletes shouldn't need to worry about being humiliated by an anti-doping agency that makes a pretense to unbiased professionalism.

*These allegations include all seven of Lance Armstrong's Tour de France victories, (1999-2005)  plus two comeback years, (2009-2010).  The Motorola years are not included even though Lance Armstrong won the World Championship.  Doping allegations during the Motorola years were dealt with in other litigation.

James Clavell: Shogun: A Novel of Japan: Book Review

Shogun is James Clavell's best work.  The contrast between Japanese and Western culture is masterfully portrayed by Blackthorn in his comic blundering.  Blackthorn's buffoonery, although unintentional,  does cause a great deal of consternation in the minds of the Japanese people he interacts with.  Japanese people who have contact with Blackthorn think his mentality and behavior are unbelievably incomprehensible.  But Blackthorn also suffers from these encounters with deep pain within his own tormented psyche.  Blackthorn was trained in puritanical religious extremism, and his bigoted opinions cannot be reconciled with Japanese permissiveness.  Clearly, Christian virtues do not comport with Buddhism or Shinto Japanese culture, and Western values, in Shogun, are portrayed as barbaric, primitive, and inferior when compared to Japanese standards of conduct.  Blackthorn struggles to suppress his hysterical outbursts and the raging anger he feels when Japanese behavior crosses a line that would be considered heinous acts in European society.  Murder, suicide, and promiscuous sexuality seem to be praiseworthy endeavors, or ignored as trivialities, under the samurai law of Bushido.  In England such abhorrent acts would be considered capital crimes, punishable by sentences of death, demanded by public outcry, and English common law.  Mariko, a highly intelligent woman, taught Portuguese and Latin by Jesuit priests, a Catholic convert, devout Christian, and fiercely loyal samurai woman, tries to navigate the complexities of feudal Japan for Blackthorn; as an official interpreter for her liege lord Yoshi Toranaga.  But Mariko becomes hopelessly entangled in contradictions between her Christian faith and her Bushido duty of honor to her liege lord Yoshi Toranaga.  Nevertheless,  in spite of Mariko's great love for Blackthorn, Mariko dies defending her samurai honor, rather than surrendering to her Christian ideals.

However, it is important to note that Mariko may have feigned her Christian ideals as a method to foist revenge upon the Jesuit priests who, Mariko believed, duped her father into betraying his liege lord, the Taiko.  When Mariko dies during the ninja attack, Lord Ishido and the Jesuit priests are greatly weakened, with catastrophic consequences to follow.  Lord Ishido dies a humiliating death, his feet firmly planted in the ground, his head removed with a bamboo saw.  The Jesuit church will be banned from the interior of Japan for many years.

Blackthorn never adapts to Japan as his adopted country.  After the death of Mariko and the burning of Erasmus, Blackthorn's central role as a dangerous military threat diminishes to a paltry role of petty Lord Toranaga vassal.  Blackthorn is assigned to lead a salvage operation to reclaim the burnt skeleton of his lost warship Erasmus from the sea.  Lord Toranaga commissions Blackthorn to build a replacement ship.  Blackthorn is assigned other mundane shipbuilding tasks.  Blackthorn's plan of plundering the Portuguese Black Ship of treasure and returning with accolades to England to be Knighted by the Queen as a peer and historical legend is over.  Blackthorn is marooned in Japan forever.  Lord Toranaga will tightly control Blackthorn, as a vassal, and burn any future ship Blackthorn may build, on a whim, depending on political expediency.  The threat Blackthorn presented to the status quo has passed.  The crisis is over.  Blackthorn no longer has any influence on Japanese political affairs.

Shogun follows James Clavell's model of delay, negotiate, repeat.  In Shogun the reader waits with bated breath for the attack on Osaka castle, only to realize that the attack will have to wait until the next book is written.  Lord Ishido dies as foretold by the soothsayers with his feet firmly planted in the ground, implying that Lord Toranaga has won the war and will be soon named Shogun.  Lord Toranaga will quickly enforce the Christian expulsion edicts.  But the war is omitted with a single stroke of the pen.

The Asia Series

All of James Clavell's books in the "Asia" series use the same formula, endless delay, perpetual negotiation, repeat.  If you are looking for hard paced decisive action, James Clavell is not the author for you.  This endless delay works well in Shogun, (unless you spend 300 pages waiting for the attack on Osaka castle), but if you read Tai-pan, Gai-jin, Noble House, or James Clavell's Whirlwind, the model becomes tiresome and predictable.  What I call the James Clavell fatigue factor.  The plot summary of these books follows the same trite cumbersome pattern.  Avaricious businessmen endlessly plot trade agreements to circumvent impossible odds, destroy a rival competitor, and dominate the market.  The goal?   Power, gloating, pride, and fabulous profits.  King Rat, is a story of an American POW con-artist trading contraband in a Japanese prisoner of war camp during World War II. King Rat is an excellent book written prior to the "Asia" series.  King Rat is a straightforward tale of a black market profiteer who manipulates his less affluent comrades with bribes and favors.  But the war ends with a rat, who was captured to be served as dinner to some unfortunate person as meat, chewing through the mesh of his cage determined to escape.  The manipulative black market profiteer is reduced in status to just another common trooper headed for home.  Tai-pan is a good read-only because May-May is such a well developed Asian female fantasy every pre-pubescent boy dreams about.  The other two books in the "Asia" series, Gai-jin and Noble House are average in quality and could be passed over without any regrets.

The Velveteen Rabbit

The Velveteen Rabbit, Margery Williams, (author), William Nicholson, (illustrator), George H. Doran Company, 1922.

Rummaging through some forgotten keepsakes I found an old velveteen rabbit a woman had purchased for me over forty years ago.  She also gave me a book; The Velveteen Rabbit, and some old schoolgirl photographs I returned to her by mail for her family archives years ago.  I want to return the velveteen rabbit to her as well.  But I am reluctant.  Perhaps it would be better to give the toy to a poor local child in need.  I wanted to send this letter with the toy, but will probably do neither.  So I will publish the letter instead.

Dear 🐇,

I think this rabbit belongs to you.  I overlooked it somehow.  As you can see she is still in pristine condition, ignored, unlike the velveteen rabbit in the story who was loved to excess by a childhood friend.  But, perhaps, the poor little neglected rabbit may have a second chance to ponder all of the contradictions of what it means to be real if she acquires a new childhood friend.  I am sure there are plenty of poor children who would love to have her.*

Of course, the velveteen rabbit accepts the skin horse definition of "real" as unconditional love from a child, up until the moment he encounters live rabbits in the garden.  The velveteen rabbit was worn out, soiled, his stitches showed through, he looked as worn out from unceasing affection as skin horse.  But when the live rabbits invite him to play, the velveteen rabbit looks down upon himself and says, "I would love to play with you, but I have no legs."  Thus, the velveteen rabbit faces a dichotomy.  Am I real?  Are live rabbits real?  Am I nothing more than a cheap facsimile?**

After the little boy acquires a contagious disease, and the doctor orders immediate burning of all his intimate objects, including the velveteen rabbit, only then is the paradox resolved by the nursery fairy.  The velveteen rabbit overhears the doctor say his friend must go to the seashore, for the climate, to heal.  The velveteen rabbit thinks he is about to embark on a grand adventure to the seashore with his friend, so he ignores the fact that he was placed outdoors in a rubbish pile.  The velveteen rabbit notices it is getting dark and cold too, and though the house lights have come on, nobody has come from the house to fetch him.  But the velveteen rabbit shrugs off the chill and loneliness, and the fact that he is not in a warm bed and safe with his friend.  No matter, in the morning, he and his friend are going to leave the drab city and voyage to sunny warm seashore climes to restore their health.  The velveteen rabbit never realizes he is to be burned early next morning.***

The nursery fairy makes her appearance!  Velveteen rabbit asks, "Who are you?"  Nursery fairy replies, "I am your nursery fairy."  Velveteen rabbit asks, "Why are you here?"  Nursery fairy replies, "I am here to make you REAL!"

Nursery fairy does make the velveteen rabbit a living, breathing, rabbit.  Nursery fairy settles the issue at once and ends all doubt.  When the boy returns from the seashore all cured and is strolling the garden path with his nurse, the velveteen rabbit looks up at them from a thicket.  The boy exclaims, "that rabbit looks just like my old velveteen rabbit!"  And the velveteen rabbit is happy, alive, breathing, and REAL!

Yes, a very simplified summary.  The Velveteen Rabbit is rated among the top five of all childhood literature.  Thank you for giving me the opportunity to read the book.  There is no more.

Goodbye,
🐇

*In the Velveteen Rabbit, the velveteen rabbit is ignored or tormented by the mechanical toys until the nurse throws him to the boy at random; "here take bunny"!  Then the boy and bunny become inseparable companions.

**For reasons not apparent skin horse is not made real by the nursery fairy.  I thought skin horse was a stick horse.  Skin Horse has a limited mentality and a limited outlook on life, otherwise, he would have been much more pessimistic and cynical.  The skin horse never evolves beyond the level of an inanimate object.  The velveteen rabbit has a much greater range of experience than skin horse, thus there is always an aura about the velveteen rabbit of conflict, depersonalization, stress, and skepticism.  The velveteen rabbit searches for his own identity even when facing his own certain destruction.

The arrival of the nursery fairy at the critical moment does have strains of dues ex Machina.   But most children would probably react to the surprise appearance of the nursery fairy in awe and wonder, not with cheap adult cycnism.  Perhaps, Margery Williams thought up the nursery fairy concept on the spur of the moment.  With a little more foresight the nursery fairy could have been developed into a powerfully moving character.  Nevertheless, overall, The Velveteen Rabbit is a troubling thought-provoking childhood literary classic.

***The velveteen rabbit is very lucky.  The doctor ordered the immediate destruction of the rubbish, but the workmen decided to do it first thing in the morning.

🐇 🐇 🐇 🐇 🐇 🐇 🐇 🐇 🐇 🐇 🐇 🐇 🐇 🐇 🐇 🐇

Deep South: A Social Anthropolical Study of Caste and Class: A Brief Summary

A group of social anthropologists directed by Allison Davis of the University of Chicago went to Old City and Old County Mississippi during the Great Depression to study the amount of racial prejudice existent in the Deep South of the United States. Old County and Old City were selected because the economy is based on the old cotton plantation system. Old City contains a population of roughly 50% black, 50% white, Old County contains a population of 80% black, 20% white. Apparently, two types of social order exists within the Deep South. A class system based on sociological factors, status or income, and a caste system based primarily on race.

"A caste may be defined as a endogamous and hereditary sub-division of a ethnic unit occupying a position of superior or inferior rank or social esteem in comparison with other sub-divisions."* This clearly does not denote a class system which contains upward or downward social mobility. A caste system allows for no such mobility because members of different castes cannot intermarry. Therefore, competition exists between castes for control of power. One caste will assume a superordinate role, another a subordinate role. In our present discussion the white race is disproportionately dominant and "all social institutions in the South including family, school, association, clique, church, and so on, are formed to fit the dominant caste social situation."**

In this paper the situation will be viewed as the social order existed during the study and as a afterthought speculate about what kind of conditions might be evident to change the social pattern.

The White Ideology: Keeping the Black Man in his Place.

It is a prominent belief along whites that blacks are a illiterate group, incapable of learning, child-like in their behavior, unmanageable people. This belief is demonstrated through caste sanctions and behavior. Blacks are expected to pay deference to whites. If a black and white person meet on the street, the black person is expected to give way. When addressing a white man, a black man must use the adjective "Sir," to denote respect, while a white man must never show respect to the black man. Violations of this caste sanction is considered "rebellion." After a series of minor infractions of the caste regulations, "whipping parties," or in some extreme cases "public hangings" are initiated to demonstrate to other would be offenders the "correctness" of the white cast ideology.

Endogamy and the Caste Sexual Taboos

Sexual taboos exist in the caste system to support the law of endogamous marriage but they vary depending upon the sex and color of the person involved. Due to the notion of white female purity, any acts of sexual intercourse between white females and black males violates the strongest sexual taboo and warrants a terrible punishment. If discovered, white females will either be publicly whipped, hanged, or "put on a train.". Sexual intercourse between white men and black women is permitted, if the relationship is conducted covertly. Most sexual encounters of this sort are for profit,  the black female is paid a wage. But in some cases white men actually have black mistresses and families they support for life.

The implications of sexual intermingled  castes is clear. If the white man could incorporate his children into the white caste group the caste distinction based upon race would disappear. But caste endogamy extends also to children. Children born miscegenation are always placed into the mothers caste group. The effects of this law are discussed more thoroughly in the section on black social class groups.

The White Social Class System

The white class system is rooted in ideological differences. The white upper-class group pay deference to "old wealth," or the amount of time money has existed in the family. Middle-class groups base their ideology in morals, middle-class people place a high value on wealth, and emphasize the "need to improve." Poor whites distinguish themselves on the basis of "consistency of a job," for a great many lower-class families are either unemployed or are working on work relief programs. Class differences are rooted in antagonisms. A sociological death and re-birth is needed to leave one social class and enter another. This involves severing old ties, abandoning old modes of behavior, and incorporating new ones.

The base of class, then, is to distinguish who does and who does not belong. A person trying to enter the middle-class may be excluded due to lack of demonstrated middle-class qualities. A person wishing to climb from middle-class to upper-class may be excluded for lack of "old wealth."

The Effect of Miscegenation on the Black Class System

The black caste base class antagonisms primarily upon three factors; income, occupation, and race. Because black elites have no clearly defined occupation or income guidelines, to identify with, blacks often turn to race as a qualification for higher status. The degree of a persons skin color as a value is the result of two basic problems. Blacks are discriminated against in the labor market, and for psychological reasons. "The effort of black upper and middle-class individuals to maintain or to increase their class status appears to be equated psychologically with a attempt to acquire the traits of the white caste. The distinguishing traits of the white caste are skin color and hair type, so it is to be expected that whiteness of skin and straightness of hair will have value as a class sanction in the black group."*** Black upper-class members designate commonness to lower-class blacks partly on the possession or lack of these white characteristics. Also, a notion exists in black groups that blacks with a more  pronounced negroid tint are regarded as unclean.  Black nurses with more pronounced white attributes were found to be washing their hands quite frequently and expressing disgust when handling darker black patients. A white doctor exclaimed, "Why they abhor those people worse than I do!"

The Changing Economy

Old County's economy depends on cotton. Cotton cultivation requires a long growing season, (210+ days) and a large group of skilled and unskilled workers.

When a tenant rents from a landlord in Old County he or she either pays a fixed cash or lint payment. This is largely dependent upon two factors,  The number of people in the tenants "squad," or the number of people in the tenants family, or whether a tenant has his or her own implements or farm stock. This is fundamentally important when viewed in context with uncontrollable changes in Old County's economy.  During 1934-35, a large boll weevil infestation destroyed a majority of the crop. That year the harvest was so low as to force a large number of tenants into the newly developed industrial firms in Old City. The entire economy suffered from deflated cotton prices as a result of the Great Depression.  The Federal  Government began the cotton reduction program.***** This caused a labor shortage. Landlords soon found themselves competing for labor. The tactics landlords used to keep labor on the farm and still maintain profit included economic or physical intimidation, or violence upon the tenants to keep them in a perpetual state of peonage.

Literate tenants cannot challenge the plantation system for several reasons. (1) Blacks are excluded from holding political office and in most cases are excluded from the polls. (2) Blacks are excluded from buying land. (3) Blacks cannot sue landlords for theft. (4) Black testimony is considered invalid in criminal cases. (5) The police ignore black civil or criminal complaints. Whites exclude black participation in the most fundamental and basic institutions in the United States. Therefore, all law, legislation, political platform, and judicial decisions favor the white caste.

Conclusion: Death of the Plantation System

The plantation system cannot endure.  Old County is no longer isolated from the world of technology and industrialization.  When the system of agriculture changes planting more acres of land by share croppers to tractors and fertilizer, a great number of farm workers will no longer be necessary.  Migration from Old County into Old Town will change demographics and culture as well.  The standard of living will improve.  This will prompt educational opportunities and stimulate class awareness. The result is certain, the entire cultural restructure of the Deep South.


Footnotes

*Please refer to page 3 for more details.
**Please refer to Chapter 1.
***Page 235
****The Federal Government placed a limit
on the number of acres a planter could grow in cotton to stabilize cotton prices. Those acres not grown in cotton were compensated for in subsidiary payments.

William S. Burroughs: Drug Dependency Versus Drug Addiction

William S. Burroughs in Junkie wrote the best definition of drug dependency versus drug addiction I have ever seen.  Burroughs points out that opium derivatives cause physical addiction.  Marijuana causes psychological dependency but no addiction because if you run out of the pot and cannot secure more the body does not go through physical opium-based withdrawal symptoms.*  William S. Burroughs also noted that even though cocaine increases dopamine levels in the brain, and despite the fact that pigeons will peck a lever for a dopamine reinforcement to the exclusion of all else until they drop dead, these facts have no relevance, if the stimulus is withdrawn and the behavior ceases without the physical distress associated with opium withdrawal syndromes.  Thus by strict definition behavior associated with cocaine use is driven by dependency, not addiction.

I have had discussions with potheads who insist they are addicted to marijuana.  But potheads function in a fog of altered perceptual awareness.  True some potheads will spend days running around town looking for an elusive lid, waiting around in cars for hours, while friends look for contacts.  Most times they come up empty-handed.  But this behavior to secure more dope is not driven by physical distress that requires "the cure" at Lexington's Narcotic Farm.

Marijuana as a gateway drug has never been established.**  However, marijuana dependency has some adverse consequences.  I knew a woman who would steal items from her family members and run off to a pawn shop.  While stoned, she would craft a masterful plan to steal without being caught.  This woman had a very reduced mental capacity, an intelligence quotient of 70, but when she was stoned she thought she was an exalted princess of a higher dimension.  Of course, when challenged, she resorted to habitual lies and denials a narcissistic psychopath would envy.  Her denials were so transparent a three-year-old child could have seen through them, and when confronted with absolute facts as to her culpability, she would explode into childish temper tantrums intended to intimidate you into backing down.  The old biker gang momma bitch act.  I always thought she was nothing more than a second rate con-artist.  If she had been a little smarter, she would have run a Ponzi scheme like Bernard Madoff, living like a queen in a mansion, with high priced cars, a yacht, dining at the finest restaurants, swindling other people like a bloated parasite until she was arrested.  Later on, she would act all innocent and friendly like nothing happened.  Anti-social personalities have a lack of impulse control, they take things without permission based upon immediate need, rush off to the pawnshop, pocket the money, then congratulate themselves on a job well done.  Anti-social personalities have no morality, no conscious, they are indifferent to the damage they do to other people.  People exist to be used as pawns.  Why does she do these things?  She needs to get stoned!  Marijuana dependency mixed with anti-social traits is as damaging as a heroin addict committing burglary to support a habit.

Update

*Police officers, prosecutors, and judges all make the same mistake when classifying marijuana as a "narcotic".  Opium based derivatives such as heroin are narcotics.  Marijuana is a hallucinogen, not a narcotic.  Hunter S. Thompson in Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, correctly points out that a "roach is not called a roach because it resembles a cockroach".  This idiotic idea was presented to a gullible law enforcement audience by some quack "drug expert" psychiatrist during a "police anti-drug convention".  In the same vein a prosecuting attorney who calls marijuana a "addicting narcotic" is doing nothing more than demonstrating his or her ignorance of the facts at hand.  Unfortunately, some judges have been brainwashed into believing that marijuana is a "dangerous drug" with no "medicinal value," and that use of marijuana constitutes a "clear and present danger" to society.  An argument straight out of 1965.  Of course, the cannabis prohibition law was formulated by ignorant legislators who were probably indoctrinated by the clergy, or by anti-drug propaganda films written by Nancy Reagan and shown in high schools, or by watching cheap camp movies like Reefer Madness.  Marinol (dronabinol) is a synthetic form of delta-9 tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), the psychoactive component of cannabis.  THC fits into cannabinoid receptor sites in the brain.  Marinol is prescribed to patients as an appetite stimulant, antiemetic, and sleep apnea reliever.  Marijuana has medical efficacy for cancer and AIDS patients.

**Whoever invented the notion that marijuana is a dangerous gateway "narcotic" needs to have his or her brains tested.  52% of Americans over 18 have smoked marijuana at some point in their lives.  According to the pot gateway theory logic, there should be 171.6 million deranged "addicted dope fiends" running amok terrorizing suburban neighborhoods.  Science calls the weak "correlation" between pot smokers and heroin users a spurious relationship.  The appearance of a comet did not cause a plague, even if a plague occurred shortly after the appearance of the comet.  People who blamed the comet for the plague reached a spurious conclusion based on superstition, not on scientific facts.  Much like the advocates of the theory cannabis is a "gateway" to more destructive drug abuse.

I am not an advocate of cannabis recreational use.  Actually, I think potheads are some of the stupidest people I have ever met.

Dr. Rachel McKinnon: Women's Cycling Fraud

Women's cycling has gone off the rails.  A Transgender "woman" Dr. Rachel McKinnon, won the women's 35-39 UCI masters track sprint world championship.  Dr. McKinnon edged out two biological females, Carolien van Herrikuyzen of the Netherlands, and Jennifer Wagner of the United States.

Social media went crazy.  Comments ranged from gender fluidity to political correctness, to the death of women's sport.  I questioned the sanity of the UCI who allowed a biological male to compete with females, apparently with the acquiescence of USA Cycling, when cycling boasted a mantra of "fair play."

When Chris Froome tested positive for salbutamol no one cared.  When Floyd Landis had a 4.1/1 testosterone/ epitestosterone ratio the UCI raced to fire up the carbon isotope ratio test.  But, now the newly crowned Transgender women's track sprint master, Dr. Rachel McKinnon, is complaining about a dangerously low endogenous testosterone level, "below a woman" that is impeding her performance. Dr. McKinnon is demanding an exemption from taking testosterone suppression drugs as a human right.  Apparently, her fast twitch fibers were inhibited somehow and she wants to build a little extra muscle mass from the testosterone produced by the gonadal Leydig cells women do not possess.  Dr. McKinnon wants total domination of female sport thanks to unnatural biological advantages Transgender athletes have acquired as men.  This domination must be embraced by all female cyclists and cycling fanatics.  Of course, the fact that biological women will suffer a penalty from this unnatural arrangement is of no concern to Dr. McKinnon.  Perhaps, all future female cycling races will evolve into exclusive Transgender "women," athletic events.

Poor women's cycling.  Hanging by a thread.  In local criteriums, class 1, 2, and 3 women all raced together in a single race.  The men had multiple teams in multiple races. The women's Tour de France has generated marginal interest.  Now we have a man winning a woman's masters sprint world championship jersey.  I am so sickened by this folly I could almost puke.  How do we endear women to our sport if men are allowed to win every women's race?  Who wants to watch a group of men masquerading as women in criterium races?

Women of the cycling world hear my plea: if a man enters your race, strike!  Lay down your bicycles and leave the velodrome.  Bernard Hinault would not have tolerated this bullshit for one instant!  Women!  You are being cheated.  Refuse to ride!  If the UCI doesn't like it tell them to pound sand!

The UCI should know better than to inflame women's passions.  This is a mistake.  The women cyclists on social media are angry!  There is no reason to train for an important race if a man is going to participate and win.  Women are not going to put up with this nonsense for long.  Then, beware!

Carolien Herrikuyzen is the true world champion.  Dr. McKinnon is a fraud, she should have never been allowed to participate.  The master races are being trivialized, cycling will be mocked and ridiculed.  Regain sanity, gender fluidity has no place in cycling!

UPDATE

Dr. Jennifer Wagner has tweeted that the UCI was wrong to allow a biological male to compete against women. Dr. McKinnon called Dr. Wagner a "transphobic bigot," a standard cliche and label Transgenders use when anyone is critical of their viewpoints. Carolien Herrikuyzen stated that the race was conducted under UCI rules and if anyone disagreed with the rules they need not race. Therefore, the race was "fair." Dr. Wagner is correct, the race was not fair, the UCI needs to change the rules, and women cyclists need to boycott races until the UCI makes the necessary modifications in the rules. Women's races are to include biological females only. Allowing men to race in women's races is cheating and far worse than doping.

2018 Tour de France Bedlam

Geraint Thomas and Team SKY wins another Tour de France!  Break out the champagne!  Whew!  The international cycling fanatics were outraged.  (An aside to David Brailsford, cycling fanatics attend the Tour de France from all over the world, you dolt! )  Along the course international cycling fanatics pelted team SKY cars with eggs, people attempted to leap over barriers to knock team SKY riders off their bicycles!  People spit in the faces of team SKY riders! It has been alleged that people threw urine bombs at team SKY!  Totally dangerous bedlam.

Chris Froome, four time winner of the Tour de France, had to settle for a podium third place.  Chris Froome and team SKY were lucky to get invited to race the Tour de France.  ASO did not want Chris Froome or SKY, after the UCI mysteriously dropped the salbutamol adverse analytical finding Chris Froome was charged with.  Chris Froome tested positive after Stage 18 of the 2017 Tour of Spain for salbutamol, a beta-2 agonist bronchial dilator.  The WADA threshold for salbutamol is 1,000 nanograms/milliliter. Chris Froome tested 2,000 nanograms/ milliliter.  Since salbutamol is not an endogenous substance produced by the body, the only source is an external application, like an inhaler.

Never, to my memory, has an adverse analytical finding been so thoroughly debated among the worthies at the UCI and WADA.  Dick Pound the former president of WADA, amazed me when he stated that Chris Froome may have innocently snorted too much salbutamol!  What turnabout is this?  In every other case on record riders were banned for the mere presence of a prohibited substance, regardless of circumstances.

I am simply astounded at the myriad of excuses WADA and the UCI are dishing out to explain away this innocent snorting of salbutamol.  Usually, excuses to explain away positive tests fall under the purview of the riders.  Unique physiology, specific gravity, they actually proposed doing a longitudinal study to determine if Chris Froome could keep his values constant.  Constantly above threshold?  What manner of insanity is this?  WADA standards are so variable! WADA standards should be discarded as useless rubbish!  The goal posts change either in favor of, or against, athletes depending upon the person being considered.  If you are going to use a set of standards as a bludgeon, at least be consistent, or exit the field.

Unbelievable.  Dick Pound says WADA only try cases, or spend money on cases,  prosecutors expect to win.  Really?  Floyd Landis was prosecuted with zeal based upon a single metabolite above threshold, WADA spent millions to support weak evidence, no concern for unique physiology then!  At the point of being sarcastic, Mr. Pound, your long drawn out charade proved nothing except WADA laboratory incompetence.  However,  Chris Froome is an open and shut case.  But WADA declines to appeal the UCI decision to drop the case, even though Mr. Froome would likely be banned with overwhelming evidence.  Mr. Froome was double the threshold limit on both samples.  Mr. Froome has no credible excuse to explain away these test results.  Any credible prosecutor would rip Mr. Froome to shreds.

I remember when Dick Pound wanted to throw the entire peloton in jail, suspecting everyone of doping.  Now he is acting as a apologist for the dopers, accepting every half baked spin job in existence.  Dick Pound has gone mad.  Mr Pound should refrain from adding future senile commentary until he consults with his doctor.

In 2013, I warned people about SKY and David Brailsford .  Nobody listened.  Now their biggest star Chris Froome has tested positive for salbutamol.   Nobody cares.  The indifference by the regulatory agencies almost started a riot at the Tour de France. People may get hurt next time.  David Brailsford did not improve relations when he called the people of France xenophobic hillbillies.  Next year, David Brailsford may be the spark that blows up the whole Tour.

Finger Frostbite Amputation Photographs

I lived on the street for twenty-five years and never had a serious health issue, even though I slept outdoors under a tarp through every imaginable weather.  But, I got caught in a canyon downslope wind storm that resembled wind storms recorded in the death zone on K2.*  My hands turned blue, but I thought if I warmed them up, they would recover.  Next morning I had blisters, I thought I had second-degree frostbite.  Instead of recovering from a moderate frostbite, my hands died from blood clots.  Apparently, the body will reduce the blood flow to the extremities in order to protect the vital organs in the core during life-threatening wind chill events.  I should have gone straight to the hospital.  Maybe Dr. Amalia Cochran could have saved my digits.  After all, Dr. Amalia Cochran pioneered the use of blood thinners in severe frostbite cases to save fingers and toes with remarkable success rates.  I was blessed with one of the best frostbite experts in the country as my doctor, and all she could do was cut off all of my fingers.

The dynamic duo.

Amalia Cochran MD 

Katherine Elizabeth Smiley MD

If you need an excellent surgeon, (or two) look no further than this blog post.  Fortunately for me, both of these accomplished ladies were working together at the University of Utah hospital intensive care burn unit.

This is no longer the case, however.  Dr. Cochran is now off to Bozeman, Montana!   Dr. Smiley has a private practice as an allopathic trauma surgeon in Bloomington, Indiana.

Ha!  Look at your flowery hat, Amalia!  But because I am a sixties counterculture guy, you can wear tye-dye day glow in surgery for all I care!  I don't place a priority on being a misogynist when facing certain death.  I can't understand gifted feminists and their persecution complexes.

I don't think these ladies are iron maidens who have to maintain a facade of inflexible super-rationality because some idiot invented a notion that women go mad every twenty-eight days.  Therefore, women can't be trusted with the nuclear football.  But we don't live in the world of Betty Friedan and the Feminine Mystique, or in the world of Father Knows Best anymore.  1950's retro thinking is so cliche.  I was so thankful for these women surgeons, and for my free clinic doctor Tanya Williams MD who got me admitted into the hospital.  Superior intelligence, skills, and empathy.  Who cares what sex they are, or what they wear at work.

I needed great surgeons, not a militant Gloria Steinem manning the barricades.  I was lucky to receive such awesome care at the University of Utah burn center.  Amalia Cochran is a universally recognized expert in frostbite, with a slew of medical journal publications. And Dr. Amalia Cochran has published a book on introductory surgery.  Dr. Kate Smiley graduated from medical school with honors! and she has a very successful practice that is based upon a diversity of medical experiences!

I may be thick, but I know good health care professionals when I see them.


* When the Wasatch mountains experience conditions that generate easterly winds, gravity straight line winds may occur with speeds exceeding 100mph.  These straight line winds historically have caused considerable personal and property damage.

Post Traumatic Stress Disorder: Random Thoughts

Living a life of chronic pain is something I never imagined.  One becomes hyper-aware of environmental inputs to the point of morbid intensity.  The stress is unendurable.  The realization that this condition will never improve inspires fatalistic thoughts and deranged conjectures.   For example, when I die will I awake in some religious purgatory with this infernal misery as punishment.  I was indoctrinated as a child and have lasting scars.

I understand the reasoning of our wounded warriors who return from a valorous fight maimed for life and who have been changed forever.  I empathize with these brave patriots who after experiencing unimaginable trauma, can no longer maintain their former personalities.  Brave soldiers who have become so physically and mentally dysfunctional they no longer fit properly in the context of our society, or in the context of their own families.  This may explain the huge number of homeless veterans who sleep on American streets daily, forsaken and cast aside by the most giving of all nations.  This abandonment of our veterans is a national disgrace.

I knew homeless veterans personally, not as a detached social worker, but as a homeless bum.  Our group did not drink alcohol or use drugs.  We did not fly signs, pester people for handouts, receive food stamps, or receive cash assistance.  Some of my old friends were pensioners who actually contributed years of work to society.  Yet these gentlemen preferred to dine at soup kitchens and live under tarps under trees through every type of imaginable weather, exposed, harassed, fearful, hungry, dirty, and insane.  Why am I telling you this?  Stereotypes, as conceived from afar by ivory tower talking heads, don't apply to everyone who lives on the street.  They are not all lazy people either.  Some take day jobs desperately wanting to escape their plight.  The rent-a-bum industry makes a fortune off of down and out hard luck people.  Some even gain long term employment through temporary services, but most aimlessly drift from job to job, from town to town, accomplishing nothing.

When I was in the University of Utah burn unit (costing the taxpayers God knows how many thousands of dollars) I asked to be released before the doctor even considered it.  I had nowhere to go except for the shelter medical bed.  When I was being discharged from the hospital I had a chance encounter with a homeless liaison social worker.  She shamelessly shouted at me in the hallway from afar, that I could not continue to mooch off the hospital forever.  I was never so offended in my life.  Did she think that I was using the hospital as a sort of vacation retreat and that the hospital staff had to force me from my bed?  If that cunt had expended five minutes of her time familiarizing herself with "my case" she would have never been so rude and insulting.  Social workers have no business among poor people.  Her behavior typifies the prevailing response you can expect from these social justice warriors who claim to have a monopoly on compassion for the sick and injured in this world.  Snide condescending jeers and sneers.  Mangled veterans suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder probably run the same gauntlet when dealing with professional psychiatrists who consult their diagnostic manuals, and like pontificating gods, espouse factitious disorder or malingering.  Meanwhile, people are left to dangle in the wind to deal with a constellation of mental horrors alone and unaided.  Have no doubt, people derive a great deal of sadistic satisfaction from the misery of other people.  But when the laughter subsides, when fatigue of supporting a chronically debilitated person takes over, people do get bored with the plight of disability and frustrated being around people who cannot control their moods and who involuntarily express discomfort, sometimes irrationally.  I have been guilty of irrationality on many occasions.  This has lowered my self-esteem, damaged my interpersonal relationships with family members, and has filled me with remorse.

There is a distinction, however.  I am entirely responsible for my folly.  I had a choice to behave like a fool.  I was not serving my country as a loyal patriot.  I was not ordered into battle.  I deserve my misery.  I understand that some injuries change people forever.  I understand why so many people consider suicide.  The country can do better to help people who are not at fault and who served with distinction.

I used to spend days in the library researching depression.  I thought I had rewired my neurons, a firm believer in plasticity.  That was a voluntary effort, but this chronic pain is beyond conscious control due to the sheer number of damaged pain receptors in my bones and skin.  Extinction is impossible.  Recently, I have been fighting suicidal ideation.  There is a concept in psychology known as learned helplessness.  A rat is placed on an electric grid and shocked.  No matter what kind of behavior the rat engages in, it cannot escape the shock.  There is no avoidance response to learn.  So the rat cowers in the corner doing nothing.  The rat has an instinct to survive, but the rat has no language skills to communicate the trauma the rat is experiencing.  Human beings have the ability to conceptualize uncontrollable suffering, even rate pain intensity on a theoretical scale, but there are limited behavioral strategies available to reduce the perceived stimulus.  There are certain pharmaceutical interdiction available, opioid or anticonvulsant remedies, that can be ingested to reduce chronic pain.  Drugs could be considered a behavioral strategy, which produces fleeting medical efficacy.  The effect of pharmaceutical interventions is temporary and implies negative secondary psychoactive side-effects such as increased suicidal ideation.  Pharmaceutical behavior designed to reduce pain is directly contravened with increases in distorted perceptual sensory input; into the association cortex, pre-frontal cortex, and limbic systems; the centers of long term memory assimilation, executive planning, conceptual thought, and emotion.  Gabapentin causes mood swings, and has a high suicide incident rate.  Opioid derivatives have high overdose rates.

Pharmaceutical interventions have a transitory effect, high tolerance, and short half-lives.  Dependency on pharmaceutical drugs becomes a huge problem.  Delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), the psycoactive component of cannabis, and similar holistic remedies have theoretical pain relieving medicinal properties.  However, delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) is a hallucinogen that fits into the cannabinoid receptor active sites within the brain.*  Delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) like opioid compounds alter perceptual awareness, creating transitory euphoric effects.  Endorphins and enkephalins can be theoretically generated by and reinforce euphoria.  Endorphins and enkephalins may be referred to as endogenous opioids.  But altered perceptual awareness is no panacea.  Chronic pain though suppressed below threshold briefly, always returns to remind you that the situation is hopeless.

It is inhumane to force people to suffer, but millions do every day without any possible respite.  We as a nation can do better to help those who cannot help themselves.

A physiological experiment worthy of Sigmund Freud

*I have considered experimenting with delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) like the intrepid researchers of yore, to find out if medical marijuana is real or a hoax.  But I don't want to sit around like a stoned zombie all day long.  And I can't stand the stink of Mexican skunk weed.  But there are synthetic variations of THC, dronabinol or marinol, that would be very effective research tools sans the stink.  I have talked to people who smoke marijuana and have asked for their opinions on the painkiller properties of marijuana.  One person said marijuana alters pain awareness, you feel pain, but don't care.  This indifference to pain, under the influence of cannabis, intrigues me. Maybe, even though the brain percieves pain, the brain through some unknown mechanism considers the pain a trivial concern.  Maybe, the solution to the problem can be found in trait-state pain perceptual thresholds.  The pain threshold in the trait mode has value x.  Pain threshold in the stoned state mode has value y.  This idea is most intriguing as a hypothetical construct and should be explored scientifically in controlled experimentation.  However, formulating a measurement tool for threshold would be a daunting task, as all responses to be measured would be subjective opinions of the person being measured.  But pain is measured by opinion now.  Walk into a clinic or hospital and notice the row of cartoon faces.  The faces change from happy to angry, each face is assigned a number.  Zero is assigned a happy face with a broad smile, indicating little pain.  Ten is assigned to a angry frowning face, indicating severe pain.  You ask the person sober to indicate a face that reflects his opinion of his or her pain at the moment.  Then after taking a dose of marinol you repeat the question, which face represents your current opinion of the pain you are experiencing at the moment?  Then measure the difference.  Crude, primitive, unreliable, with very little validity, but what else is there?  You might increase the dose of marinol, or reduce the dose of marinol, or vary the time scale, or monkey around with a million other variables until you establish some approximation to scientific truth.

Controlled medical experimentation is a much better idea than relying upon the hysterical debate of people who are either in favor of, or against, the notion of medical marijuana use.

Eugene Onegin: Alexander Pushkin

Dover Publications 

Eugene Onegin is an epic poem written by Russian poet Alexander Sergeyevich Pushkin.  The poem published in 1833 profoundly depicts Russian culture of that period.  Eugene Onegin is considered by Russian literary scholars as the first epic poem written in the Russian language since The Lay of the Host of Igor, (1185).*  Eugene Onegin served as a template for future Russian literary works.  In 1833 books written in Russian were rare, or of poor quality, or the product of the sentimentalists.  Suddenly, Russian genius blossomed.  Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol wrote, The Inspector General, (1836) a classic Russian comedy and play.  The plot of The Inspector General was originally suggested to Nikolai Gogol by Alexander Pushkin.  Mikhail Yuryevich Lermontov, a great Russian poet, wrote the prose classic,  A Hero Of Our Time, (1839).  Ironically, Alexander Pushkin and Mikhail Lermontov were both killed in duels, although Mikhail Lermontov was allegedly shot in the back by a solider with a carbine rifle, during the duel, under the direct orders of Czar Nicholas.  Czar Nicholas was a particularly spiteful man who crushed the Decembrists, exiled Alexander Pushkin, murdered Mikhail Lermontov, and exiled Fyodor Dostoevsky to Siberia.  Nevertheless, in spite of the heavy handed censorship, the 1830 publications would spawn the Russian literary Rennisance, which reigned supreme until the Boleshivek revolution reduced Russian letters to petty partisan formulaic gibberish.  After the publication of Eugene Onegin, during the Rennisance, the Russian people would be blessed to read and enjoy literary classics written in Russian.  Everything from romance to the seminarists.  The years of literature imported from Europe, and read mostly by aristocratic families, had come to an end.

N.B.  French, the universal language, was taught to children by tutors in wealthy Russian homes.  Speaking French coveyed aristocratic status upon the speaker.  Alexander Pushkin spoke, read, and thought in French, not in Russian.  Eugene Onegin changed the Russian literary landscape forever.  Simply put, Alexander Pushkin wrote a poetic masterpiece in the neglected Russian language.  Alexander Pushkin demolished the idea that Russian language and culture was barbaric and offered no artistic merit.  Alexander Pushkin is a genius of the first order.  Alexander Pushkin is the greatest Russian poet, and one of the greatest revolutionary thinkers Russia has ever produced.

Eugene Onegin is a story of a young girl, Tatyana, who is passionately in love with young rake Eugene.  Eugene has inherited a country estate from his uncle; a man whom Eugene despised; adjacent to Tatyana's ancestral village.  Eugene is a man notable for treading upon theatre patrons feet with crass indifference.  Eugene has a remarkable tendency to offend people with a cavalier swagger.  Eugene is a misanthrope; a precursor to the superfluous man; a wealthy landowner without any purpose in life, who is imprisoned by social convention, and who is unable to make any meaningful contribution to society.  This lack of social graces will prompt Eugene to make callous decisions that will chart the decision-making process of Tatyana after she has matured into a sophisticated societal married woman and is forced to make a choice.  Tatyana is stifled in a world of social ennui, but when forced to choose she refuses to abandon her husband for Eugene who is now passionately in love with her.

Tatyana is a young woman trapped on a landed estate in rural Russia before the emancipation of the serfs.  Russia during this time was a highly stratified society with classes of people ranging from landed serfs to aristocratic gentlemen.  Social mobility between classes was impossible.  However, it was not uncommon for serf girls to become impregnated by landowners.  Pushkin fathered a child with a servant girl on his family estate while in exile.  Pushkin abandoned this girl, and when she died, he expressed in a poem no regret or interest in her or his child.  On rare occasions, a landowner would marry a serf girl.  But in most villages, the land owner's illegitimate children would live with the mother in poverty and would run about among the peasant children.  However, for women, standards were inflexible and exacting.  The slightest indiscretion could ruin the reputation of a young woman forever.  A young woman writing a young man an innocent love letter was expressly forbidden.  Public shaming of women accused of infidelity was not uncommon.  Smearing pitch on a gate post of a home of an accused woman would invite public community ridicule and shame her forever.  Even if the accusation had no basis in fact.

Tatyana faced a second problem.  Young Russian women above twenty-five years old were considered by frantic parents as destined spinsters.  Plus the availability of desirable suitors was limited by geography and class.

One fine day, Eugene agreed to accompany Lensky on a visit to the Larina household.  Lensky was enamored with Olga Larina, a silly, flighty girl.  Instantly, the family and community declared Eugene and older sister Tatyana Larina a perfect match.  Tatyana was under tremendous family and social pressure to find a husband.  Tatyana was willing to accept Eugene as a suitor.  But was Eugene willing to accept Tatyana?

Occasionally Eugene would accompany Lensky when he visited Olga.  Tatyana longed for these visits to see her imagined lover.  On one occasion, when Eugene and Lensky left her home, Tatyana spied upon Eugene from her bedroom window.  Tatyana passionately drew the initials E.O. in the frost on her windowpane.  Tatyana loved Eugene!

Tatyana was a wholesome Russian girl, superstitious, she would not have refrained from casting salt over her shoulder to ward off the evil eye.  She loved the outdoors and rustic life.  Tatyana was also an impulsive, impatient, headstrong girl.  When Eugene did not respond to her advances, Tatyana made a rash decision to send him a letter declaring her intention to serve as his faithful devoted wife, and she arranged a clandestine meeting with him in her family garden to discuss her proposition.

The letter and meeting were very dangerous for Tatyana if she were to be discovered.***

Before the meeting, Tatyana spent time in flights of fantasy, she would visit her favorite grove of trees and pick her favorite flowers.  On the night of the engagement, when Eugene arrived, Tatyana raced from her bedroom down the stairs to the garden to speak to her lover before anyone could intervene.  Eugene declined to offer Tatyana marriage, but Eugene did assure Tatyana he would extend her respectful "brotherly love." ****

Tatyana turned away from Eugene "in despair."

Vladimir Lensky was an idealist and a romantic with poetic aspirations.  In contrast to Eugene, Lensky loved social gatherings and life.  Lensky persuaded Eugene to attend a name day party for Tatyana, under the pretense there would be few guests.  However, when they arrived at Tatyana's residence, every landowner in the district was in attendance at a grand ball.  Eugene was extremely irritated by Lensky's ruse and vowed revenge.  Losing all restraint, the impetuous Eugene taunted Lensky by forcing Olga to dance with him all evening.  Lensky was so incensed he challenged Eugene to a duel. *****

Some may argue Eugene was a heartless beast who went to the duel with callous indifference as to the consequences of his actions.  I disagree.  I think Eugene did not care to fight and he would have found a plausible excuse to avoid the whole issue if it were not for the prompting of his second, Monsieur Guillot.  Monsieur Gulliot is portrayed poetically as a retired military officer, a confused busybody, incompetent opportunist, drunkard, and mountebank.  Eugene overslept, missing the scheduled rendezvous, and he would have probably dismissed the whole duel with ennui had not his second, Monsieur Guillot, arrived reminding him that he was late for the engagement.  When Eugene killed Lensky he was horrified at this senseless act.

The specter of Lensky would haunt Eugene forever.

Eugene disappeared.  He did not wish adieu to Tatyana, he simply ordered his carriage and horses one morning and vanished to parts unknown.  Tatyana was abandoned without a thought.  Alone and sorrowful Tatyana would take long walks until one day she arrived at Eugene's abandoned estate.  There she conversed with the old caretaker who out of sympathy allowed Tatyana to access Eugene's study and to peruse Eugene's books.  This was the pivotal moment for Tatyana.  Tatyana diligently studied the underlined passages and marginal notes in Eugene's books to discern Eugene's soul.  Also, the passage of time heals all wounds in love.  Separated from Eugene her ardor cooled.  Tatyana's feelings for Eugene had changed.  Tatyana now knew the true Eugene.  Tatyana saw her naive romantic idealism shatter like a pane of glass.******

After Eugene departed without a word after he killed Lensky in the duel, Tatyana stubbornly refused numerous proposals for her hand.  But for poor Tatyana times were changing.  Although Tatyana and Olga made numerous forays to Lensky's lonely grave to mourn Lensky shortly after the duel, over time memory fades and people are replaced.  Tatyana's bosom companion Olga soon forgot poetic Lensky.  Olga met and married a military man who was on assignment to a distant front.  After Olga left with her husband, Tatyana faced terrible loneliness.  Determined to do something, Tatyana's desperate mother decided to take Tatyana to Moscow to the matchmakers and marriage market.  Tatyana was placed in a sleigh, driven to Moscow, shopped among balls, and eventually, she married a "fat general".**  The idyllic lifestyle Tatyana had envisioned as a simple country housewife with Eugene had vanished forever.

Eugene traveled from one station to the next over countless versts for two years aimlessly wandering all over Russia.  But one fine day he appeared at a social ball in Moscow.  Victims of Eugene's old pranks were not happy to see him.  But who did Eugene see dressed like a queen in her resplendent glory?  A woman he had completely forgotten, Tatyana!  Worse she was married to a fat general!  When Eugene approached Tatyana she greeted him with majestic glacial reserve.

But instantly, Eugene fell madly in love with Tatyana!

The roles had been reversed.  Tatyana was now indifferent to Eugene.  When Eugene and Tatyana met by chance at receptions, Tatyana always met him with the same icy reserve.  Eugene was so disconcerted he went into seclusion, a veritable recluse, he retired to his study reading books round the clock as a diversion.  Did Eugene think Tatyana would thaw if he improved himself after a wasted youth of slothful dissipation? Eugene even penned two sincerely heartfelt letters to Tatyana.  But these letters were never acknowledged by Tatyana with a reply.  Nothing Eugene did improved his relationship with Tatyana.  Tatyana was as cold and reserved as ever.

Driven to despair, Eugene was unable to endure another moment without Tatyana.  Eugene threw down his book, ordered his coach and horses, and sped to Tatyana's home.  Stealthily passing Tatyana's housekeeping staff, Eugene clamored up the stairs and burst into Tatyana's room.  Tatyana was sitting on a chair sewing some lace.  Eugene fell upon his knees and declared if Tatyana would forgo the "fat general" and renounce her unhappy artificial repugnant social life, he would take her to his country estate, provide for her welfare, and remain loyal to her forever.  But Tatyana would not budge.  Tatyana woefully explained even though she still loved him, and even though she did honestly prefer the homespun lifestyle she outlined in her letter, nevertheless, she would continue to live her current loveless life no matter how stifling.

Tatyana was convinced if she separated from her husband Eugene would regard her as a conquest, a trophy, to be bragged about in jest to all his deplorable friends and rivals all over Moscow.  Tatyana simply did not trust Eugene.  Tatyana thought Eugene's protestations of love poor acting and insincere attempts to manipulate her under false pretenses.  Tatyana hated her husband and lifestyle but she would remain faithful all the same.

The "fat general"** makes an unexpected entry into the room ending the conversation.

Eugene and Tatyana are destined to live miserable lives forever apart.

Tatyana was wrong in her reasoning.  I believe Eugene had abandoned his nefarious life and he had grown weary of his nomadic wanderings.  Eugene did not return to Moscow by accident.  I also believe the death of Lensky weighed like an albatross around Eugene's neck.  The chance encounter with Tatyana gave Eugene a new sense of purpose in life.  Eugene regretted his stupidly squandered years of dissipated youth.

But the reconciliation was not to be.

Afterward

Alexander Pushkin had intended a sequel for Eugene Onegin.  But Alexander Pushkin was killed in a duel by Georges d'Anthes.  Georges d'Anthes allegedly sent Alexander Pushkin an anonymous letter "Certificate of a Cuckold" implying that the court historian, Alexander Pushkin, had been made a cuckold by Czar Nicholas.  There was abundant court rumor beautiful Natalia Pushkina and Czar Nicholas was entangled in a torrid affair.  The insulting anonymous taunting letter prompted Alexander Pushkin to arrange a duel with Georges d'Anthes on January 27, 1837.  The combatants approached each other in waist deep snow.  Alexander Pushkin was shot in the hip, but Alexander Pushkin managed to return fire, the slug grazed Georges d'Anthes hand and knocked him off his feet.  Despite the heroic effort of Konstantin Danzas, who performed on-site surgery, Alexander Pushkin died of infectious complications two days later.  Alexander Pushkin was thirty-seven years old.  It was reported that Alexander Pushkin from his sick bed looked at the books in his library and shouted: "goodbye old friends!"  Thus, the Eugene Onegin sequel was never written.  A great tragedy for Russia and world literature.

Footnotes

*Lays. Old Russian fables or songs were passed from father to son and recited or sung to audiences.  Many lays cited Russian heroes and heroines.  Many of these Russian heroes and heroines possessed supernatural powers.  The content of the lays would evolve over time with additions and subtractions.  For centuries, written language, except for a few clerics, was almost non-existent among the Russian people.  The Lay of the Host of Igor was the first lay to be written down on paper in a Slavic language.  Illustrations were added to the lay by cleric artists at unknown dates.  It is important to note that in 1840, out of a Russian population of ten million souls, only one hundred and fifty thousand people could read.  In certain aristocratic homes people could not speak or read Russian.  Tatyana, when composing her letter, struggles to master fluent Russian grammar.

**In Russian literature generals are often lampooned derisively as bombastic, uncouth clowns.

***This concept was beautifully conveyed in opera when Tatyana began to compose her letter.  She would write a line, stop in frustration, crumple up the sheet of paper, and toss it on the floor.  A peasant servant enters the room and begins to gather up the discarded drafts of the letter, oblivious of the contents, or of the danger to Tatyana.  The Peasant cannot read!  To the peasant, the discarded drafts are nothing but useless rubbish to be removed and thrown out.  The problem?  If Tatyana's mother or nefarious vindictive people who could read discovered these drafts by accident, Tatyana could face hysterical recriminations, blackmail, or tragic social censure.

****In the poem and opera, Tatyana accuses Eugene of rejecting her in the country because of her rural upbringing and demeanor, but because of her newly acquired social polish and wealth, Eugene changed his mind and is now willing to accept her.  Tatyana's bitter feelings are understandable, but her conclusion totally misses the point.  Eugene did not care if Olga, Tatyana, or Catherine the Great wrote the letter.  Eugene would have reacted to all of these women with the same aloof indifference.  Social status meant nothing to Eugene.  Eugene was so detached and jaded at the time from social anomie, he would have scoffed at the ardent desires of any woman without a pang of conscience, including the Czarina of Russia.  And totally forget her next day.  Eugene understood the tremendous pressure Tatyana was undergoing from her family to get married.  After all, the community had matched Eugene and Tatyana and a wedding announcement was expected soon.  Eugene demurred because he thought after attaining security, the good elements of marriage; love, beauty, would be replaced with self loathing and poisonous recriminations.  A harebrained opinion Tatyana would make Eugene dearly pay for.  But somewhere on the road, Eugene faced an existential crisis, thinking about the duel and Vladimir Lensky.  Eugene wanted some relief from his pointless social malaise.  A wife and family life suddenly seemed to be a better option than aimlessly wandering about Russia from one dirty station to the next.  Eugene offered to take Tatyana away from her pointless social suffering and he had the means to make her happy.  Tatyana refused because of the books she read, she did not understand the metamorphic change in Eugene.  Pushkin could have turned Eugene Onegin into Anna Karenina, the general could have refused to give Tatyana a divorce, and the poem could have devolved into a long psychological dissertation of Tatyana and the brutal Russian process of obtaining a divorce for a woman against the wishes of her husband.  But for Tatyana one intolerable situation would have been exchanged for another, with no net gain.  Or Tatyana could have said "yes" to Eugene, "and they lived happily ever after," which would have destroyed the purpose of the story.  Pushkin left the audience in agony over the fate of Eugene and Tatyana.  This is why Eugene Onegin, "a novel in verse" will be acted out in operatic plays forever.

*****Opera, as a time saving device, always has Lensky challenge Eugene to the duel during the ball in front of Tatyana and Olga.  But in the poem, Olga and Tatyana have no clue.  Lensky pays one last charming visit to Olga, while Tatyana spends a sleepless night jealously angry at Eugene.  Unexpected news of the death of Lensky would come as a complete surprise to both Olga and Tatyana.

******A Russian language professor once told me it is important to note that Tatyana read all of Eugene's books.  Tatyana was not satisfied with a casual examination of Eugene's soul.  Tatyana wanted to know everything about Eugene.  Tatyana was very disappointed with what she found.  Tatyana could not forgive Eugene for his amorphous indifference to life or for his callous disregard to her needs and interests.  Tatyana was furious Eugene abandoned her.  Tatyana wanted a husband who would take care of her, her children, and the village.  Tatyana did not want a detached absentee landowner who places the enterprise into the hands of a unscrupulous overseer who would ruthlessly savage the peasants and swindle Eugene out of revenue by under reporting crop yields.  Tatyana did not want to live with a dandified Oblomov in Moscow while the village decayed into dust.  I think Tatyana developed a psychological aversion to Eugene no amount of begging or pleading could rectify.  This may explain why Tatyana was so cold and unfeeling in Moscow, and why she rejected Eugene's entreaties point blank.