The Face Of Insanity

Photo: © Stan Banos

They say a picture's worth a thousand words, you know, the usual bromide. And for quite some time now I've tried to describe to people what it's like walking many a street of today's San Francisco. The deterioration, depravity, hopelessness- people not only without a home or resources, but without a working mind even capable of bettering those circumstances. People whose profound mental illness forever bars them from any semblance of normality on their own. And if you live anywhere near the downtown area, you need not search it out, it’s all around you, right next to you, in front and behind you- not just in the streets and sidewalks, but in your bus, subway car, local convenience store... 

Sometimes, people think you're exaggerating for effect, or they just dismiss it as a generic, nationwide problem, and you want to say- no, this is a bit different, on another level, this is truly out of hand... and in one of the richest cities in the land! This is not the first time I've seen someone babbling to themselves, laughing aloud, encased in their own shit. It's horrible to witness, beyond imagining having to live it- and yet, it is a horror that is allowed to continue and metastasize... right beneath the tech built, luxury condos that helped create it.

The Words of the Prophet...

Must hear video... Here!

P-A-N-D-E-M-A-N-I-A!

A year and a half in the making, P-A-N-D-E-M-A-N-I-A! has been something we have all experienced- to whatever extent (hopefully not the most extreme), wherever we live. Those of us who have emerged whole with jobs, homes, families and health intact are the lucky ones! We can look back at our discomfort, inconveniences, trials and tribulations as a rather unique and unfortunate chapter in our lives- not the trial by fire others did not escape.

Now that we start to reclaim the lives we led before the great disruption (or begin the new ones we have forged) is perhaps the best time to: let loose, reflect, mourn, rejoice, plan, relax... do whatever required to make ourselves whole- and perhaps realize that we can much better face future calamities working together for a common good.

P-A-N-D-E-M-A-N-I-A! is not so much the solemn, somber look back at the worst of times (those are yet to come), it's more a somewhat light hearted reflection on the daily disruptions, adaptations and insanities to a situation we did not foresee, but nonetheless endured...

Please Note: Once at Blurb, make sure to click on arrows on upper right to view and embiggen. Copy discount should you choose to purchase (I do not make profit- either way).

Pandemania!

By Stan Banos

I'll Walk...

Photos: © Stan Banos

If anyone would have told us this past March that our unexpected but thoroughly welcomed two week vacay would expand to two months and then go on to inhabit two years... one could only imagine the looks. And yet here we are, still amidst a killer of thousands that is only growing stronger, and does so quietly, silently and behind closed doors- killing in such stealth that thousands more refuse to believe that anyone is actually even sick, let alone dying. This so called pandemic is but a hoax, a fraud perpetrated to scare, confuse and defraud us of our wealth, health and liberty!

Now, it's not for me to tell those good people what to believe, they ain't gonna hear it anyway; some actually go to their very death swearing it's anything but Covid- "it must be lung cancer!" And the virus, well... it doesn't give a good goddamn what anyone believes, politically or otherwise (though word is, it's somewhat partial to non believers); it's just gonna do what a virus does- multiply, the less encumbered, the more so. 

Perhaps, perhaps we should do what we did with the good Germans who lived by the camps- make the deniers go to these out of the way places (called hospitals), see for themselves and even lend a hand. And so as not to infringe on their precious liberties, they wouldn't even be required to wear a mask. Alas, unlike those Germans, they would simply call out the dead and dying as... crisis actors!

Of course, these delusional, reality free hordes were created in large part by the seminal, reality free, Great Leader who has been twisting, perverting and torturing truth and reality for the last four years to their great delight. Magically thinking the virus away, he managed to prolong the destruction of both our health and economy (the one he single-handedly took credit for). Soon, very soon, he will leave center stage, certainly well before the virus (that he declared would be history by last Easter), but very much like it- kicking and screaming every step of the way into oblivion. 

The great state of New York has its cross hairs aimed firmly upon his massive butt- in both civil and criminal court. And if there is anything near justice on this mortal coil, his White House ouster is but step one of his long and much overdue appointment with the word "NO." This con man, criminal and traitor writ large who has been awash in Russian money and favor since the eighties is as guilty as he is bald. After decades of listening to Republicans whine and scream about Red traitors, lying Commies and dirty Rushkie sympathizers- it's time to send their own beloved, number one mole to the gulag where he belongs.

Pretty much, almost... not really.

Meanwhile, the rest of us all have enough on our plate. And I'm one of the lucky ones- neither sick, nor unemployed. This whole pandemic mess has been botched most bigly from day one, without any semblance of leadership or support in a time exactly when government is most needed, when citizens are most in danger: physically, economically, morally... Instead, we were left adrift to fend for ourselves as a worldwide, pandemic Katrina flooded our entire nation, and then some.

So here's to us in 2021, hopefully Ol' Joe will be able to right the ship and keep it afloat- not to return to a failed status quo, but to finally address the real problems and promise of the 21st century. 'Cause when the full scourge of climate change does hit- the days of Covid will be but a warm and fuzzy, nostalgic golden oldie from the easy peazy days of yore...

WHY?

It still does, just a little less come 1/20/2021.            Photo: © Stan Banos

 

Why does it always take the needless deaths of thousands for such desperately needed change to occur? Usually, such wantonly sacrificed deaths occur on the far away battlefield- this time, it was right here at home! And the person most responsible even made it a point to spread his callous, self serving policies of death and indifference to his very supporters... who eagerly reveled in their own endangerment. 

This was a man who had known criminal ties and associates throughout his business career, a man whose plethora of failed businesses were frequently in court paying fines that saved him from jail sentences. This was a man whose innate insecurity and emotional (in)stability was such that he continued to insist well beyond any rational discourse that his inauguration crowd was larger than the previous President's- despite the indisputable and overwhelming evidence to the contrary. That petty display of infantile emotion and magical thinking alone was more than ample proof that this man was prone to a terminal and irrational thought process hardly conducive to sentient, responsible leadership. It was the same childlike irrationality that fueled his naked and life long: racism, duplicity, and narcissism; the same nonsensical mindset capable of uttering that windmills caused cancer and that Mexico would pay for it's own involuntary isolation. And-make-no-doubt... Americans would have enthusiastically (s)elected this unabashed criminal yet again- if not for those sacrificial deaths!

Finally, despite the much promised wailing and gnashing of teeth by he who feels perpetually wronged, we will now be soon rid of this all too human of monsters, and hopefully witness an almost endless array of perp walks in New York courtrooms that will culminate in the long term incarceration of one desperate and balding senior criminal (and his family cronies). We have  thankfully been spared an additional four year onslaught of "the worst is yet to come-" pray we do not suffer the deranged attacks of domestic terrorists unwilling to accept the demise of their cult leader. His remaining months will be punishment enough and we will continue to suffer the residual hangover of his criminal enterprise (SCOTUS) for many a year to come.

All said and done, this is but a return to the status quo of a century past... At best, the next four years will begin to address the massive harm done to our: environment, citizenry and relationships throughout the world. Only then will we commence that rarest of opportunities in American history- effectively confronting the existential challenges we already face in a new century.

Commitment March (cont.)

Photo: © Stan Banos

Photo: © Stan Banos

Photo: © Stan Banos

Photo: © Stan Banos

Photo: © Stan Banos

Photo: © Stan Banos

Photo: © Stan Banos

Photo: © Stan Banos

  

Photo: © Stan Banos

Happy 4th- And Don't Forget...

Photo: © Stan Banos

 Fourth of July! The day when even... Archconservatives celebrate- REVOLUTION!!!


But this- this is where it lives....

Here And There...

AMEN!          Photos: © Stan Banos

This weekend, amongst the legion of protests throughout the country, indeed, throughout the world, protestors briefly commandeered the Golden Gate Bridge to make their voices heard. It was the second enormous and possibly most scenic protest within one week in San Francisco- both of which were organized and led by individual seventeen year old girls! What were you doing when you were... seventeen?

6/06/20

Remember when "taking a knee" was a gesture so outlandish, so completely and utterly beyond the pale that it was complete anathema to any White male? Remember how Colin Kaepernick was vilified, banned and threatened for attempting to proclaim and propagate the truth with the most simple, respectful and graceful of gestures? Yeah, I do too. 

Why does it take acts of violent, senseless and preventable death for humans to finally denounce insanity, no matter how ingrained, and embrace the most basic of truths, to acknowledge the most obvious of realities that control and confront us each and every day?

Consequences

Photos: © Stan Banos

Two weeks ago, a White man in a uniform killed a Black civilian- a scenario so common, a list so long that I no longer remember all the: dates, names, locations... excuses- that last detail being the very thing that set this killing apart from the rest. None was exhibited, none could possibly be offered. This murder was a direct and woefully prolonged message- that police could kill openly, deliberately, without pretense of fear or consequence. This public servant purposely ignored the eye of the camera, the desperate pleas of the public, even the very passing of the life he controlled beneath his knee as he continued to debase a then pulseless body.

Somehow, George Floyd's death ignited its own spark of life throughout a nation already so inured to the official taking of life by a power structure ironically monikered: To Protect And Serve. Hope is a youthful playground, I don't know if this movement, this awakening even by some long ensconced in denial or disinterest will amount to any permanent, worthwhile change. Those who ignore that hope, and focus myopically on the violence it has spawned forget that MLK would not have been anywhere near as successful in having legislation passed, had government not well realized that failure to deal with him would have meant being forced to deal with those much less willing to turn the other cheek in the face of racism and injustice.

George Floyd's murder was but the latest manifestation and consequence of White Privilege- blatant, heinous, undeniable. It is where the denial of that simple fact ultimately leads...

Before George Floyd's death, I would have done the proverbial eye roll upon viewing this image, their sincerity and dedication being very much in question to say the very least- as if it was my judgement to make. Being at that march in San Francisco this past Wednesday, with so much youth all around me of every color did present a vision of a new possibility, a hope of what equality can look like when not tainted with the baggage that I personally carry, a realization that it will take all of us...

Jerry

Video and photos by Mark Laita. You can visit Jerry's Go Fund Me page here...
(click on: watch this video)