Sojka's Call

http://sojkascall.blogspot.com/2014/10/modern-day-roosevelts-and-us-hegemony.html After watching the Ken Burns series on Teddy, Eleanor, and Franklin Roosevelt it is easy to wonder where the bigger than life visionary leaders have gone in the last 30 years. Are they really gone or have circumstances not provided the need for those kind of people?  Teddy was a complicated person that on one hand was a social progressive who was the first to prosecute anti-trust cases, expanded the national park system, regulated industry, supported striking coal miners, and took on the party bosses who controlled legislation and maintained a corrupt political system . The other side of Teddy was an almost neanderthal guy who believed men had to fight in wars to be men, started wars for almost the express purpose of being able to fight, and expanded executive powers in a way that changed the presidency forever.  FDR did not start out as a dynamic personality but when circumstances like ...

When I first heard someone say "bulletproof coffee" it was like fingernails on a chalkboard or hearing that song you hate for the 2 millionth time which for me is Freebird. I liked the song the first hundred times but now cannot stand it. Famous Paleo Athlete Hunter Pence - BP coffee effect? For about a year I made fun of the stupid name "bulletproof" and read posts by people who hated it like me. Once in a while a positive note would slip past my negative-net and I would read about how much someone liked the effect. Some consider me a coffee snob because I buy fresh roasted beans, have an expensive grinder and espresso machine, and know how to make cappuccinos, lattes and stuff. To me, that does not make you a snob, but I can understand the label. The idea of adulterating my fine coffee in this non-traditional "bulletproof" manner that would offend almost all Swiss, Italians and French seemed very wrong . One day someone's link took me to the b...

This is not really paleo because real paleo folks will not eat anything remotely sweet or even something similar to a grain-based dish because it weakens the resolve of a person to be 100% paleo. I have given up on being totally paleo and just don't want to be a food nazi and worry about being completely grain-free. The idea has been floating around in my head for a few weeks now and came together today. The basics are 1) a Meyer lemon based curd with 1/2 cup lemon juice, 2 tbsp sugar, 2 tbsp xylitol, 2 tbsp butter, 2 eggs, 2 egg yolks, tbsp half&half, and dashes of vanilla extract and salt; 2) meringue with 2 egg whites, 2 tbsp sugar, and dashes cream of tartar and vanilla extract; 3) pancakes made of coconut flour, almond meal, eggs, and milk. Then I assembled the cake in a 9" springform pan with pancake, lemon curd, pancake, and meringue. This was then baked for 20 minutes at 325 degrees. With a cup of cappucchino, it was a great brunch dish. The remainder will...

I went to see Lone Survivor yesterday. If you have been living under a rock the last couple weeks or unplugged from the media world and don't know, this is a movie about a Navy Seal operation in Afghanistan that goes badly. A small group of Seals are vastly outnumbered by a group of Taliban fighters and try to fight their way out of the mess. This true story is about honor, courage, toughness, teamwork, and decision-making on a personal level. On the macro scale this a movie about the horrors of war, tribal society mentality,  and living in a culture still in the middle-ages. This is a powerful movie that left me physically shaken. I literally felt wobbly leaving the theater and the ground did not feel solid for quite a few minutes. Lone Survivor will shake your body, mind, and emotions. Highly recommended movie that makes Zero Dark Thirty look a bit tame in comparison though the stories are very different. I would not bring children or those with heart conditions to this ...

Here is my Best of 2013 list . Maybe it is too early to publish but I doubt anything will change for me in the next 3 weeks and thought this may be more interesting for people to read now. Best beer : Firestone XVII Anniversary . This is a blend of several Firestone beers and at $23 from the brewery is pricey but definitely worth the money. Nothing else was even close though the Lagunitas Cappuccino Stout was my second place pick.  Wine of the year - all of them! I was really struck this year by the amazing quality of most wines. You almost have to try to find bad wine these days. Of course, there is the very low quality bulk wines that are one dimensional and will give you a headache, but, almost anything in the $15+ range is of very high quality. Best music album: Classixx's Hanging Garden . This is like 80's dance music with the updated 21st century sound. Great beats and hooks. The Disclosure Settle album was a solid #2. This was maybe the best year ever for dance mu...

This blog brings up many economic and political issues that are easy to construe as evil. And, figuring out what we can do in the face of seemingly insurmountable oppression and power that negatively affects our lives is why many of us continue to wrestle with understanding what is going on in the government and economy. What if the answer to these problems was already answered hundreds of years ago? How could anyone know what we would be dealing with now? The Chinese civilization is possibly the oldest surviving civilization on earth. They have been dealing with the issues of oppression by a ruling elite for a long time. So, while the specifics may be different now, the issue is the same. In an article posted on IMOS , a modern-day recluse summarizes the philosophical differences of Confucianism and Taoism. I like his analogy of viewing the two as the yin and yang of historical China. The genius of historical China rests in the oscillation between Confucian and Taoism, betw...

A stupid analogy because I cannot think of a better one right now is that when you first heat butter it is milky looking and then starts to bubble and until the bubbling stops you cannot see the bottom of the pan. This morning I saw the bottom of a couple pans. The first one was thanks to a post over on Naked Capitalism where Yves Smith writes about one of the Right's favorite boobs and the left's Economic policy leader, Paul Krugman. The really interesting part of this post was the distinction between fiscal and monetary policy . Basically, Krugman and Summers argue in a NY Times article , for a couple things: First that since it is impossible to balance government spending we must inflate our way out of the budgetary mess we are in, and; Second, since there is no Real economic growth at this time, it makes sense to create economic bubbles. You should read the NY Times article Secular Stagnation, Coalmines, Bubbles, and Larry Summers so you know I did not make this up. B...