I have not written much about politics lately. Sure I have watched Joe on TV. He is the president. All I see is a angry old man. For me he is the personification racism, hatred and corruption. It is not what can I do about it, because there is nothing I can do about it. It has been how can I deal with it. The easiest way to deal with politics now is to just not talk about politics. I just keep on working, pandemic or not. I work to make the world a better place. At least I try to.

Today I took a break. I took the little convertible out to drive on the back roads. It was a gorgeous spring day. I drove the back roads that I had not drove before. The old Simon and Garfunkel song America came to my mind. I stayed off the dirt roads because of the mud, so I was mostly on pavement. I also tried to stay off the state routes. I had seen most of them before. I wanted to see new things and places. I did, we have such a beautiful country. Simple things can be so amazing. Oh happy day.

Yet, this is about politics. I was really surprised to see so many Trump signs. The must have been a hundred Trump campaign signs along the back roads. I did see one hand made BLM sign, and no other campaign signs. I wondered how so many Trump signs survived the campaign. I had seen so many vandalized. Then I realized that the methodical extermination of Trump signs may have only happened on state routes. That would kind of make sense, logistically.

So how much of America lives on back roads? Probably less than half. Cities are big, with many people. It is probably easier to intimidate people politically in cities. I no longer see any Biden signs in the city. Also Bernie Sanders has completely disappeared. He had a continuing presence after the previous election. Yet now he is gone. Maybe his folks are satisfied with the current regime. I have read that there are more people who vote that don’t work than there are working people who vote. I guess it is only natural that people would vote themselves free stuff.

I do not put campaign signs out. I had numerous signs stolen or vandalized. I live on a dirt road. So I have to wonder if all the signs I saw were put up after the election. Or a new thought is maybe my signs were targeted because my name was used by the Trump campaign as a town chair. Intimidation can be an effective weapon. Yes, I was intimidated. The question is was the intimidation purposeful.

So why does the politically defeated have such a large presence on the back roads? I know everything CNN says is lies. I know unions can be intimidating. Maybe I am not the only one that believes these things. Of course President Biden and his supporters will say all these people are racist white supremacists. I suppose that makes.them feel better. My thought is, unlike me, these people on the back roads failed to be intimidated. Of course I really do not know the answer. All I can say for sure is, I have seen the signs.

When I talk with friends about Amazon deliveries I say I have Amazon Mountain. They then ask me what that is as most people have Amazon Prime. I reply that everyday Amazon delivers a mountain of stuff. That is power!

Some folks say that cancel culture is a privet enterprise thing. For some reason Amazon canceled a documentary about conservative Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. For me canceling conservative views is nothing new. It is business as usual. Of course it was kept quiet. Canceling Clarence is clearly quite blatant, and open. It is a fact.

Why? Why would a private corporation engage in cancellation.Does the government tell them to. Or is the corporation trying to curry favour with the government, you know taxes and regulations. Most likely there is a calculated value to cancellation. It is something that is probably more valuable than writing a check. It is quite clear that Joe Biden does not like Clarence Thomas on a deep personal level. Will no one did me of this turbulent justice? I am quite sure such a extravagant cancellation came from the top.

As I said earlier, these folks will eat their own. Dr Seuss had himself canceled by his own corporation. Then others joined in and canceled the used Seuss market. Personally I am perplexed as I see not the motivation. I am simply reminded, it is racist. No one is safe.

I am a bit sad that I supporting cancellation when I buy from Amazon. But then again, I hear of some people that simply want to cancel Amazon.

Let the good times roll. What are the visuals in your mind after reading the headline? For me bottoms up represents good times with friends enjoying adult beverages with uninhibited conversations. Top down represents wind in the hair on a winding road in a red convertible. Talk about mutually exclusive good times!

Unfortunately this is a political blog. I write because uninhibited conversations are a thing of the past. Wind in the hair should still be a thing, yet it is not what top down represents. I will try and define political movements here.

Bottoms up is a reactionary movement. Think Love Canal. Or the environmental movement of the sixties. People saw the effects of pollution. The dirty water, the foul air. The sickness of Love Canal. The people then demanded change from their politicians. I might say the problems at the southern border was a bottoms up movement. People dying in the desert should not happen. People should not be paying smugglers for admittance into this country. There was something wrong going on. The end of the Vietnam war was definitely a bottom up political movement, along with civil rights.

The alternative to bottoms up political change is change driven from the top down. What would you call change that nobody asked for? Change from the top down. I will go fully politically incorrect. No group of people suddenly realized that we were putting to much carbon into the atmosphere causing distress to a segment of the population. It was true we were putting plenty.of bad things into the atmosphere affecting our health. Anyone driving from the country to the city fifty years ago would have had their eyes water from the smog. Now there is almost no difference between the air in the city and the country. Things had gotten a lot better, because of science. Then we were told CO2 was bad. In fact we were told.that CO2 was.so had that we had to revert to diesel engines, that spewed all sort of nasty stuff to reduce CO2. That is where they lost me. The earth has been getting warmer for ten thousand years. So what else is new?

Not that I really care. Yet what I do care about is the cost of transportation. The cost of transportation effects everyone. The rich do not care, the poor suffer. The rich make money on carbon credits, the poor pay. The rich fly and add more carbon, the poor stay home. That is the way the rich like it. Top down policy, for their benefit.

I know a guy with five doctorates. He has been saying we are going to run out of oil for 50 years. Of course we have not. He is simply keeping his employers happy. The are happy when the price of oil is high. Artificially high.To my great surprise we are making all the oil we need. We can do it if allowed.

I actually have nothing against electric cars, they can be more efficient. Faster and more quiet too. Even better they can remove the source of pollution from the roads. What is not the way to promote more electric vehicles is to raise the cost of everything else. Compeate on merit.

Yup, in one month the price of gas has has gone up 50¢. At this rate summer driving season will be brutal. I am simply extrapolating, 50¢ a month for five months. We are looking at $5 gas. Ouch! I sure hope I am wrong.

Bottoms Up