from us to us – collage & foto by smith

Back in the early days of movie houses, they had a cartoon, news reel, episode of a serial, a B-movie, and an A-film. Best I can do today is this two-for-one double horror bill.

Recent news announced the Bush/Cheney run White House has doubled the national debt to $9 trillion dollars. However . . .

“The official U.S. debt ceiling was recently raised to $11.3 trillion. In addition, Medicare is facing a shortfall of $30 trillion that the usual Washington budgets fail to recognize. This, plus other entitlement program shortfalls, means that our true fiscal gap is $53 trillion. And that is a “present value” number, meaning that we need $53 trillion today earning interest so that we can have even more money for the benefits that have been promised.

“The Bush Administration does not want you to know that it borrowed more money in the last eight years than all U.S. Presidents combined had borrowed in the previous 219 years. It also borrowed more money from foreigners that all previous Presidents combined.”

Audit the Books
by Rep. Jim Cooper (Democrat, Tennessee)
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rep-jim-cooper/audit-the-books_b_143748.html

Congressman Cooper says the debt share for each of us–man, woman, child, baby–in the United States of America is $175,000. Man, I must be rich to owe that much.

National Debt

Huddled beneath behind
Green metal stalls
The tile encrusted
Yellow, he sews an
Empty money bag
To his crotch, watches
His reflection mirrored
In regimented urinals
   five six seven
Decaying down the wall
Cradling his existence
Fraying five to seven
In staid erotic fear
Small spider woven
Through uninforming ears
Tired of heaven he sews
His money to his crotch
He huddles

– Steven B. Smith, 1973

And our second horror feature is called BSP or Bisphenol A or (CH3)2CO + 2 C6H5OH > (CH3)2C(C6H4OH)2 + H2O:

“Suspected of being hazardous to humans since the 1930s, concerns about the use of bisphenol A in consumer products grabbed headlines in 2008 when several governments issued reports questioning its safety, and some retailers pulled products made from it off their shelves.

“It is used to make a variety of common products including baby and water bottles, sports equipment, medical and dental devices, dental composite (white) fillings and sealants, lenses, and household electronics.[5] Polycarbonate is used in the manufacture of all CDs and DVDs. Epoxy resins are used as coatings on the inside of almost all food and beverage cans.[6] It is also a precursor to the flame retardant, tetrabromobisphenol A, and was formerly used as a fungicide.[7]” – data from Wikipedia

Doses of bisphenol A, in the range currently being consumed by people, can alter the adult reproductive system in mice. Low doses of BPA cause structural changes in the brain that trigger learning deficits and hyperactivity. Exposure to BPA has been blamed for cancer, diabetes, obesity and attention deficit disorder. Bisphenol A shrinks seminal vesicles, enlarges preputial glands (which produce sex pheromones), and reduces sperm efficiency as well as causing heart disease and diabetes. – data from several online sites.

Our Earth is breaking down due to humans, our economic system is breaking down due to greed, our inner physical bodies are being poisoned by man-made toxins – our food chain earth chain life chain mind chain is naught but one weakened link after another.

Welcome to the Chinese curse of living in interesting times.

dead fun – foto by smith