Hunger Strike is over and canned Spam is better than the comments here

Yeah, I quit on the hunger strike after day six. Nobody gave a fuck. Especially the Veteran's Administration at whom it was aimed. I've sicked my State Representative on them. For all the propaganda that is pumped out about how much this suck ass country wants to honor and care for its Vets one could use it to build a causeway from Miami to Cuba complete with Circle K stops... and a few titty bars!

But the thing that I find most annoying is the spam comments that these posts have generated. This blog was linked to by CNN for over a week at one time. I had regular readers. I had thoughtful comments. I met wonderful people. Now, all I get is spam. I kind of like canned spam once in a while. But the crap that appears here (awaiting moderation as I have that option turned on) are nothing short of insulting.

Capitalism is sooooo wonderful. I'm posting shit about my health deteriorating and the VA doing nothing when it is contractually their obligation and all anyone wants to say in their comments is "come to my website and buy my shit". So, capitalism is doing exactly what it is created to do: benefit from the suffering of others.

I'm a heartbeat away from turning comments off completely. I tire of seeing that crap. If you don't have anything to say about what I am writing - good, bad, or indifferent - then simply move along. I don't care if you like me or agree with anything I say. And I don't care if you say so! But if you provide a link to some "buy my shit" bullshit in a comment IT WILL NOT BE PUBLISHED!

So, read or don't read. Comment if you like so long as your comment has anything at all to do with the post. If I keep getting spam I'll just turn the shit off... you blood sucking capitalist pigs.

---

Guidelines for current and future endeavors

In order to move toward a more meaningful and just society, we need to have target goals and a strategy to get there. Here is a list of guidelines given by  Father Jose Maria Arizmendiarrieta, a priest who had fought Franco After World War 2 in Spains Basque country, ended up in prison, but managed to get released instead of executed. Father Arizmendi, as he is popularly called, was assigned by the church to the valley in the Basque containing the small town of Arrasete-Mondragon. He set to work trying to solve the massive war-created problems at hand. He began building a small technical school, and then a credit union where the region's peasants and workers pooled meager funds. After a few years, with just five of the best students of the school, he started a small factory making one product: a small paraffin-burning stove so people could cook and heat water. It was a good stove, and sold well.

Most important, he gave the project a set of ten carefully thought-out principles to serve as guidelines for the current and any future endeavors:

1. Open Admission, meaning no worker is to discriminated against because of nationality, gender, political party or religion and such.
2. Democratic organization, meaning one worker, one vote.
3. Sovereignty of labor
4. Instrumental and subordinate nature of capital
5. Participatory Management
6. Wage Solidarity
7. Cooperation between Coops
8. Social Transformation
9. Universality
10. Education

We could all learn something from these simple guidelines. The goal of all of us remains to create a more just, peaceful, and prosperous society in which we can all live with some security. And it will take all of us to make this happen.