The Great American Mistake

Coca-Cola is America. Or so they are always telling us.

Can anybody really argue? It was invented in America, patented in America, peddled in America, and mutated into a thriving international megacorporation by generations of enterprising American businessmen over the last 125 years (happy anniversary, btw).

Coca-Cola is a potent symbol of American ingenuity, a shining emblem of American capitalism, and the perfect example of everything that is wrong about where we have come as a nation.

Fact: The syrup used by Coca-Cola bottlers (who are largely independently-owned and operated, although Coca-Cola, Inc. is a minority owner in most of them) is manufactured in the United States, the process involves spent coca leaves imported from South America, and the story is fascinating.

Fact: Foreign bottlers have the option of sweetening their country's Coca-Cola to local taste--the syrup is just the patented secret flavor and contains no sweeteners.

Fact: I buy my Coca-Cola from Mexico because they use real sugar instead of corn syrup.

Fact: Any American who tastes Mexican Coca-Cola will never go back to American Coca-Cola.

Fact: This should be phenomenally embarrassing for Coca-Cola, Inc. and yet they don't seem to care at all or have any plans to revert to using real sugar. Why would they? They are making a shit-ton of money ["Shit-ton" = 1 with 100 million zeroes after it. -Ed.] and sugar costs $0.02 more per shit-ton than corn syrup, so it makes NO sense from a corporate-bottom-line standpoint to make their beverage taste the way it used to and always should.

Fact: This is proof that American businessmen have their heads so far up their asses they only think in the short-term and don't care what customers want, only what they are willing to consume because they don't think they have a better option.

Return to Serfdom

How do you know your job sucks? When they attach semi-permanent suicide nets to your employee housing:

Foxconn Technology Group — the Taiwanese company that manufactures hardware for Apple, Dell, HP, Nokia and Sony and has been hit by a dozen suicides at its plants this year — is holding rallies at all of its factories to raise morale. The theme? “Treasure Your Life, Love Your Family, Care for Each Other to Build a Wonderful Future.” The impact so far? Check out the picture above.

In case the rallies, slogans and pay increases don’t raise morale enough to stem the tide of suicides, Foxconn left suicide nets in place at its facilities that are designed to catch workers before they hit the ground, although it removed them from one facility.
"No matter how hard we try, such things will continue to happen,” is how Louis Woo, assistant to the founder of Foxconn’s parent company Hon Hai Precision Industry explained the situation at its factories, in a statement.

After the rallies, Foxconn left them up at all of its factories except for its Taiyuan Campus location, said Woo in his phone statement, because more employees there have the support of their friends and family. The nets remain in place at the other facilities.

(courtesy Wired)

Strange that an employee workforce of 470,000 people [Literally! -Ed.] living in dormitories on the same campus would not make some friends to build support networks.

Or maybe when they try the prison guards dump barrels of hot oil on them and stretch them on one of the racks in the mess hall?

If there was ever a more direct modern parallel to medieval serfdom, I don't know I don't what that would be...

Long live King Woo, Lord of Foxconn Castle, loyal subject of King American Corporations!

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Abilify Your Life Today

Abilify is a drug made by Bristol-Myers Squibb that is used to treat schizophrenia and bipolar disorder.

But, let's face it, that's a limited market (read: limited profits), so the greedy assholes over at BMS decided to widen the pool a bit by shifting gears and pushing it as an add-on drug to treat depression.

Because, naturally, if everybody wasn't already depressed (they are), they would be so depressed by this depressing news that Abilify's potential consumer pool will eventually reach 100% of the global population. Regardless of whether the drug works (it doesn't), this represents a near-perfect blow in the struggle between pharmaceutical companies and the forces of good.

Are you depressed about the side affects of your antidepressant--and even more depressed that it isn't effectively combating your depression? Is it getting in the way of you smiling while giving foot massages to your wife on an isolated dock at your lake house?

Well, then force your doctor to prescribe Abilify to, you know, make you more able to face the day, silly!

These happy customers could be you! 

[If you were actors not taking Abilify -BMS Legal]

Sorry to have to spoil all the fun times here, freedom-lovers, but that communist towelhead Obama (who can't even prove that he was born!) makes us have to say shit like this:

Side effects of Abilify include, but are not limited to...

Nausea, vomiting, constipation, headache, dizziness, an inner sense of restlessness or need to move, anxiety, insomnia, restlessness, an increased risk of death or stroke, very high fever, rigid muscles, shaking, confusion, sweating, increased heart rate and blood pressure, abnormal or uncontrollable movements of the face, tongue, or other parts of the body.

Also, be careful when you stand up, as you might faint from lightheadedness caused by a sudden change in blood pressure. And don't get sick, because your white blood cell count will plummet when on Abilify. Don't ever drive or make a decision either, because Abilify adversely affects your judgment, thinking, and motor skills. It will also "impact your body's ability to reduce body temperature."

Don't drink alcohol or breast-feed, and be aware you may experience suicidal thoughts and/or fall into a coma unexpectedly.

And don't forget, these side effects are in addition to any you are already experiencing from your regular, inneffective antidepressant medication (which we want you to keep taking, since we make money off that, too).

And let's also not forget that antidepressant meds are Selective Serotonin Re-uptake Inhibitors, which means they are attempting to treat an emotional problem as a biochemical problem, despite the fact that the link between depression and a biochemical imbalance has never been proven.

Anyway, whatever--enjoy your easy solution, lazy Americans!

And do be careful behind the wheel of your 5mpg XL-SUV--I'd hate for you to scratch the bumper as you plow through a class field trip because your medication made you think they were ducks and you were playing a video game in your dreams where you hunted animals from your Escalade.

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Hungary: The Louisiana of Europe

Imagine living in a village in Hungary, sitting in the town pub eating some hearty goulash, and drinking some fine draft ale after a hard day's work in the mines, when a river of toxic sludge suddenly floods your town and burns you alive before dumping into the Danube River and spreading across Europe.

Sound like a nightmare? Well, it is and it isn't:

KOLONTAR, Hungary — The wall of a reservoir filled with caustic red sludge will inevitably collapse and unleash a new deluge of red sludge that could flow about a half-mile (1 kilometer) to the north, a Hungarian official said Sunday.

On Monday, the sludge flooded three villages in less than an hour, burning people and animals. At least seven people were killed and at least 120 were injured. Several of those who were hospitalized were in serious condition. Around 184 million gallons (700,000 cubic meters) of the caustic red sludge was released.

The red sludge devastated creeks and rivers near the spill site and entered the Danube River on Thursday, moving downstream toward Croatia, Serbia and Romania. But the volume of water in the Danube appeared to be blunting the sludge's immediate impact.

(courtesy HuffPo)

Not only has it already happened, but it will happen again when the crack in the North Wall eventually collapses.

Yikes.

Well, what do you expect would happen when the government allows a 24-acre reservoir of toxic sludge to be created and maintained by a corporation who doesn't give two shits about anything other than selfish greed?

This is what I would expect:

(courtesy Reuters)

Oh, but don't worry about the long-lasting effects of this toxic spill on the life inside and around Europe's second-longest river--a river so beautiful they compose waltzes in its honor--because the offending aluminum company has been dumping other chemicals into the river that will supposedly reduce the effect of the toxic sludge they put in it.

Great. More chemicals.

And by the way, let's just ignore the fact that the local groundwater will be fucked for eternity and everyone who lives nearby will never be able to sell their houses and may start growing superfluous eyeballs.

This sounds so much like the BP oil spill, but maybe even worse. When will people in charge realize they cannot trust corporations to be responsible? When our rivers and oceans are boiling, poisonous stews that eat through everything except specially-crafted mega yachts?

Jobs created to clean-up toxic disasters are not the kind of jobs we need in this world, especially considering the cost of cancer treatments for all the workers will far exceed whatever meager wages they earned cleaning up an irreparable mess that should never have happened in the first place.

Just look at that stinking, steaming, caustic tidal wave at the starting gate...

Anyway, the clock is ticking on this beast, so keep your ears pricked and re-think that summer cruise on the Danube.

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