Phlogiston: idiosyncratic and out of context

Martin Delany was the would-be founding father of a West African colony who secretly supported John Brown's treasonous raid on Harpers Ferry—only to ally himself with Southern Confederates after the Civil War. Why did endorse a Democrat for governor? Should he have been canceled from history?

Looking into the distant past, we see people fighting over arcane differences. Are our fights any less trivial?

In this episode we consider Warrior Culture.

Edmund Burke (18th century) and Karl Popper (20th century) were two political philosophers who failed to see the danger of the status quo and moderation. Audio on audio.

The principle of generosity in a debate or dialogue: don't ignore or mischaracterize your opponent's argument. In this podcast, we consider Churchill and the Bengal famine of 1943-44 versus Stalin and collectivization. Here are some of the sources we consider: Gandhi & Churchill: The Epic Rivalry That Destroyed an Empire and Forged Our Age Arthur Herman 2008 - A History of British India By: The Great Courses, Hayden J. Bellenoit 2017 - Churchill's Secret War: The British Empire and the Ravaging of India During World War II Book by Madhusree Mukerjee - Rise and Fall of the British Empire Patrick N. Allitt - Churchill, J. Rufus Fears - Churchill, Paul Johnson/Simon Prebble - David Stafford - Roosevelt & Churchill - Stalin New Biography of a Dictator by Oleg V. Khlevniuk- Churchill Walking with Destiny (Audiobook) - Shashi Tharoor - Inglorious Empire_What the British Did to India - 2018

A call about the Federal Reserve's Main Street lending program.

in the subreddit r/changemyview I battled an army of neoliberal billionaire's boots lickers and whooped them. They had no argument, just a bunch of irrational hypotheticals and nonsensical arguments about something being "arbitrary" and in fact eliminating all science and law as "arbitrary" in the process without realizing. No argument. The revolution is the answer and no one can explain why it isn't.

BBC History Extra Podcast interview with Steven Clark critiqued. If you want to debunk myths of the French Revolution, beating up the Jacobins is not the way to do it. Rather, if the French revolution failed, the flaw was the increase in state power.

Discussing lyrics in hip hop.

Dissecting NPR propaganda. The key sources for this podcast include: https://www.democracynow.org/2018/2/23/masha_gessen_did_a_russian_troll https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/29/pageoneplus/corrections-june-29-2017.html https://theintercept.com/2017/09/28/yet-another-major-russia-story-falls-apart-is-skepticism-permissible-yet/

Back in the podcast saddle with some media criticism (which is not entirely negative) of the BBC, Democracy Now!, and the economist radio. Follow and review the podcast please!

Both Meyen and Saatkulov were Soviet Uzbek composers. (Meyen was originally from St. Petersburg, but he spent most of his life in Uzbekistan.) Very obscure even in the former USSR. Saatkulov is probably better remembered because he also composed several film scores. This is a very rare record. Mezhdunarodnaya Kniga Profile: ОАО Международная Книга / Mezhdunarodnaya Kniga (in English: International Book Company) was founded in 1923 and is the oldest Russian foreign trade organization. Engaged in the export and import of books, periodicals, audio and video recordings and other goods for cultural purposes. Logo shows "MK" For the an artist use, please use Международная Книга. More Sublabel Mezhkniga, U.S.S.R. Sites: mkniga.ru, Wikipedia

Both Meyen and Saatkulov were Soviet Uzbek composers. (Meyen was originally from St. Petersburg, but he spent most of his life in Uzbekistan.) Very obscure even in the former USSR. Saatkulov is probably better remembered because he also composed several film scores. This is a very rare record. Mezhdunarodnaya Kniga Profile: ОАО Международная Книга / Mezhdunarodnaya Kniga (in English: International Book Company) was founded in 1923 and is the oldest Russian foreign trade organization. Engaged in the export and import of books, periodicals, audio and video recordings and other goods for cultural purposes. Logo shows "MK" For the an artist use, please use Международная Книга. Less Sublabel Mezhkniga, U.S.S.R. Sites: mkniga.ru, Wikipedia

1970-1976 when the funk meteor hit planet earth

Idiosyncratic wanderings around all popular music... and I didn't cover nearly enough, so there will have to be a part two soon. No reason to stick to one place and time.

Pays to have a vision. Just listen. https://soundcloud.com/will-pflaum-1/call-to-chuck-schumers-office-no-reasons-for-his-leadership-no-legislation-for-working-people

https://medium.com/@willpflaum/or-bust-or-bust-or-bust-got-it-d7cc3e914e08#.u7hbtx8ht We need leaders, not bank employees. And here is Bernie's office by way of comparison: https://soundcloud.com/will-pflaum-1/here-is-bernies-office-handling-the-same-questions-well-pays-to-have-a-vision-that-is-easy-to-remember-and-articulate

I started to write it at midnight on election day and of course it's rough but it's only a sound track for the day...

The corporate media bias and collusion with the DNC as revealed by wikileaks is serious. If you can stomach 4 days of a North Korea style propaganda show as the DNC convention, you can endure me breaking it apart in 30 minutes. I'll cover ground quick and you might need to listen twice. Awake progressive should not vote for Hillary Clinton. Do not buy into the fear Trump dynamic. Use this audio file with anyone who tries to shame a Bernie or Bust voter into approving this outrageous and anti-democratic Obama/Clinton farce. Real democracy requires first truth. We may not have troops marching into the newspaper and shutting it down or rounding people up as in Turkey, but the net affect is similar. The drone program and Obama's decision to pass his legacy over to Trump are linked -- yes, Clinton and Obama do not fear Trump and neither should you. They chose to pass the government over to Trump. Let him have it then.

In this podcast I review an exclusive article on terrorists reading Hillary Clinton's email (media: pick this up!), David Frum, a Republican complaining about Trump, some thoughts on Radiolab's recent "Buried Bodies" episode, and questions about what the law is. Is the justice system a complete fraud? Should lawyers argue about how many angels dance on the head of a pin or fix a broken system? Links: http://www.newsweek.com/hillary-clinton-email-terrorism-sloppy-communications-463605 http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/05/the-seven-broken-guardrails-of-democracy/484829/ http://www.thegreatcourses.com/courses/history-of-the-supreme-court.html http://www.thegreatcourses.com/courses/the-first-amendment-and-you-what-everyone-should-know.html http://www.radiolab.org/story/the_buried_bodies_case/

Here is the article about the mob attacking a journalist for writing about Trump's wife: http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/apr/28/julia-ioffe-journalist-melania-trump-antisemitic-abuse Here are some organizations mentioned in the podcast: http://www.flyingdeernaturecenter.org/ http://kitesnest.org/ http://northstarteens.org/

In 2004, I moved from Brooklyn to upstate New York. Next thing you know, I had sheep. Why? Wool? Meat? Milk? None of those reasons. And, by the way, the milk is good. See sheep here: https://youtu.be/Wbl6azRdEEU

HRC has about 12 million votes so far. Bernie, including the unreported popular caucus totals has a bit more than 10, closer to 11. We have about a fourth of the voters to go in the primary process. Obama won in 2012 with about 66 million in the popular vote. Trump is perhaps the most popular primary candidate among Republicans ever, with about 10 million votes so far. Obama won 2012 by 5 million, 2008 by 10, Bush 2004 by 3, and Gore 2000 by .6. The links at the end of this piece show current primary totals, historical general results and a statistical estimate of what the caucus results would mean if the popular votes were reported. Points: ONE Before we're done, Bernie will have gotten more than 14 million people to vote for him, in all likelihood, more than twice the number needed to win an election this century and more than needed to win any election this century (I mean more than the margin or difference in every election). We are an important demographic already, not considering the millions more who were motivated to vote could not vote because of closed primary rules who are every bit feeling the Bern... maybe another 4 or 5 million already down. So, the current Bernie constituency represents about 18 million active voters or more than 25% of what you need to win. I know there is a lot more potential support out there, I mean who already know Bernie now and are supporters now. TWO You can't predict a general election based on a primary. You may need at least 5 times as many votes as you get in the general as you get in the primary. Even if you add all the votes in your party's primary for yourself and your opposition, you will need to way more than double the total. The procedure for adding these two columns of voters is called unifying the party and is a prerequisite for victory. To say your candidate is electable because he/she won a primary is obviously nonsense (as if looking at the candidates ahead in the process were not sufficient to confirm that bad general election candidates can win primaries). Poltifact says that 25% of us won't support HRC in the general, or more than 4 million people. Then the article below compares 2008 to 2016 and concludes that in the end we will all move over to vote for HRC and she is right that she doesn't need to worry about us very much. But, did her supporters have a Facebook page like this in 2008 to support our organized resistance? CONCLUSION We are a huge constituency, well organized, with clear leadership, a massive fundraising capacity, and very clear policy goals. In fact, we are the only constituency with these characteristics. And that is how we are NOW. By November, with the nomination, there is no telling where we'd be. http://www.politifact.com/…/hillary-clinton-history-shows-…/ https://en.wikipedia.org/…/List_of_United_States_presidenti… http://www.realclearpolitics.com/…/democratic_vote_count.ht… https://www.reddit.com/…/sanders_and_clintons_popular_vote…/

https://www.facebook.com/groups/berniesandersactivists/1715266468745006/?notif_t=like¬if_id=1462793037578402 http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2011/07/26/wealth-gaps-rise-to-record-highs-between-whites-blacks-hispanics/

Breaking down the infrastructure of propaganda is absolutely necessary for a democratic society. Don't believe the mf hype. http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/24/magazine/how-hillary-clinton-became-a-hawk.html?_r=0 http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/28/us/politics/hillary-clinton-libya.html http://www.forbes.com/sites/danalexander/2015/09/29/the-mystery-of-hillarys-missing-millions/#682383cb5505 http://bigstory.ap.org/article/ad3c483d59c9463e9a52ef4bc00351e0/firms-paid-clinton-speeches-have-us-govt-interests http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/07/hillary-helps-a-bankand-then-it-pays-bill-15-million-in-speaking-fees/400067/ http://www.wsj.com/articles/how-the-clintons-get-away-with-it-1431035304 http://www.theguardian.com/business/2016/apr/25/delaware-tax-loophole-1209-north-orange-trump-clinton

I canvassed the South Bronx with my daughter Lotta. In two days there will be an election. If we had a few hundred more people in the Bronx knocking on doors, we could turn the neighborhood for Bernie, and then the state, and therefore the presidency. Unfortunately, there were not enough people canvassing. This is pretty raw (edited but raw) that I uploaded the night after I got back. As I upload this, we could still win the state but it will take a monumental effort. https://imgur.com/a/L5kDD

Today in Kingston, NY, the sound of the election as it goes.

Debate last night. Old stories. Dreams. This morning.

Getting hung up on and other stuff. And good conversations.

Here are some highlights of today's phone banking. Get on the phone. Knock on doors. Be a citizen. Thank you. Feel the Bern.

Video of the debate here if you can stand it. https://youtu.be/ccJZIz5Hq9o Trump. Think about that. The greater evil. I’m the lesser. Evil, yes, but less so He’s low down But I’m less low He’s a straight up clown He’s the devil you less know I’m a devil too At least I got breasts yo His shirt is brown But I was his wedding guest though When he golfs with Bill No Mexican caddy if Donald says no Ivanka and Chelsea Just kissing for the press you know Vote for me? Yeah, I guess so Cause there is no arrest yet though And by my estimation I don’t expect so I did cash that check though Kickback or a bribe Who the heck knows? The guys with his rallies From Modesto to Frenso I’ll be impressed when the press says to Suck up corporate media So here, have a straw Lies dense as a forest So here, have a saw Hit the mud, put the boot in Make money for self Like Vladamir Putin I’m evolving Problem solving It’s my calling The millions I got Richard Nixon did not Kissing ass at Goldman sachs and Transcribing every Word I’m bribing Trump’s a racist And his tacky place is Where I hang out With his ho bride And I watch Bill flirt It can’t hurt my pride If I have no pride to hurt

You’re deluded. She’ll frack your water and leave it polluted. Gullible. You define it. Any old contract, I’m sure you’d sign it. Invaded Iraq. You forgave her as if she could take her vote back. Blew up Libya. Africa imploded before you voted not that you noted. Killed Saddam: She apologized, then killed Gaddafi. Voted for DOMA: Said sorry invited a gay couple for coffee. Evolving, grinding gears, She’ll apologize for the next war in just a few years. Set an alert or a timer, any app, there’s plenty She’ll regret the Iran war about 2020 She evolves to a rhythm that can be quite hypnotic. Fast likes bacteria Resist antibiotic Iraq in chaos, Libya more chaotic She said she’s sorry, the media forgot it Or forgave it, her way they will pave it And you’re a sucker cause you believe it The New York Times, you actually read it You to suck up corporate media So here, have a straw Or cut your cable chord, here have a saw But serve your email at home, that’s no problem at all But drop knowledge like Snowden, then here comes the law Hypocrisy, yeah, that’s the least of the dirt. Making millions from banks doing no work. Speaking for fees Is not a job, or a hobby. Skimming off the top like Robert Mugabe. Deep in dirty dough, Deeper than you can sink a boot in. Making money for self like Vladimir Putin. The Clinton pile, Third world style Wannabe tyrants and plenty petty It’s a pity For money she’s so damn shitty Explain the 150 million she got Crossing ethical lines Richard Nixon would not As an official or a candidate cannot be paid to speak So for the few months in between she made a half million a week I’m not saying she takes bribes Cause the might be be kickbacks So let that Sink in More ethically challenged than Richard Nixon She made terrible speeches And had them transcribed In case there was any doubt that the gig was a bribe The story leaked, she freaked And as much as the transcripts could in fact damage her The way she changed her story shows she’s a rank amateur But Trump, she will say every day, is the greater evil So we should prefer the lesser The lesser is still evil, And you like that bumper sticker? My candidate is sick, but other one is sicker I’m lesser evil, but I saw the greater wed I’m the lesser evil, but the greater is my friend I’m the lesser evil, playing golf with the greater Most of you seem to hate me, but he’s the greater hater He’s the mad monster I used to have for dinner Hanging out with him, I never noticed he was a sinner When we were hanging out, he never talked about a wall No, he was the most perfect gentleman that I ever saw But now, of course, he’s like Hitler Who I used to have to dinner. I used to dine with Hitler But now I have evolved. He says he bought me With political donations And that conversation was not transcribed So I was never bribed Not once, I’m just saying I was paid 150 million But never notice who was paying Was not influenced in the least My friend Trump is a racist beast He’s such a racist I had to smile up in his face And say I loved his tacky place And his mail order bride Holding hands with Bill that flirt And that didn’t hurt my pride Cause I have no pride to hurt My campaign is not built on dreams My campaign is not about visions for the future or lofty rhetoric My campaign is not a promise to reform Washington My campaign does not offer the populace a clear logical reasons for voting for me My campaign simply leverages the power of dynasty and name recognition with the acquiescence of the corporate media and the support of the DNC (Determined to Nominate Clinton or maybe Damn Near Comatose) to simply push this shabby leaky vehicle for my ego over the finish line through sheer force. And as for my concluding statement, let me just say, Queen Elizabeth did not have to make a closing statement before accepting the crown from Henry the 8th and therefore neither do I.

Pretty philosophical, I know that much.

Chapter 5, we find out who was on the boat.

Skipping around, from 1963 to 1931 to 1848 to 1866, meet the knuckleheads

The kids see the donkeys and find something very delicious and special.

Cashing in on political power and adjusting national borders.

The Democrats want us to be polite. Be polite while they pave the way for President Trump to inherit an intact imperial presidency. Thanks, Obama. Nice legacy you got there.

The kids settle in on the the island.

What would happen if you noticed that the East German 10 mark note looked a hell of a lot like the West German 10 mark note, both with the words "Deutschmark" clearly visible? You might have a scam on your hands.

Chapter two of the story of Percy and Thomas and the Magic Balloons. Part one is called Phlogiston 14.

Ways to fix government, make it more accountable, and Vermont political culture.

Right now, before the South Carolina Democratic Primary, Black history month and all, I can't help but re-visit issues: federal versus local power, discrepancies in wealth, and politics.

A serial novel. Stay tuned! Oliver Pflaum, writer, composer of theme music, performed by Cooper Raposo, reader, a novel in episodes, the story of a land and a family, of the spirit of the Nagas, a land in a plateau with only one pass in and out guarded by flies with a fatal bite, the secret of the Racad known only to the priests of the Racad, Shi Po, the granddaughter of the Great Bumo, priest and general... All rights reserved. Copyright 2016 by Oliver Pflaum.

(after some other stories and jokes for kids the story begins) Czechoslovakia was too hard to spell! So, it had to be divided into two countries Check and Slow-vakia. Buddha and Pest got together. Meanwhile Belgium is threatening to become Bell and Igum. Also, fly to the top of the mountain and we'll head to the island of wild donkeys from there.

What kind of noise law is this? Beat frequency? You mean 110 BPM is allowed but not 84? " No noise emanating from the business which is excessive, unnecessary or unusual due to volume, intermittence, beat frequency or shrillness, such that the same shall be perceptible outside the property from where it originates, shall be permitted."

Frank Serpico (wikipedia if you don't know who he is)... and me talking to the FBI. Cover a lot of territory.

James Brown and Bernie Sanders?

From our earliest literature to recent genetic research there seems to be an issue with the Y chromosone. How powerful is this tendency? Is biology destiny?

Did you know you have a right to information? Here I make a case for a constitutional right to information and open government in the US Constitution under the ninth amendment.

For three hundred years most Christians did not believe the Nicene creed and you don't have to believe anything in that document to be a Christian. There is less room to move within Islam and you might want to think about quitting.