Author: Gnerphk

I am The Gnerphk, writer extraordinaire, opinionated, radical, and extremely humble by nature.

#VoteAgainst

A vote for a third party is a vote against.  Not against Republicans or Democrats individually, but against the system that says one or the other is inevitable, that divides us against one another and distracts us away from finding common ground.  Environmentalists and hunters both love the wild; they should work together.  The NRA probably has some excellent ideas about gun control (in addition to Use both hands) but (more…)

Thoughts On The Second Debate

I wasn’t going to watch it.

After all:  Why bother?  The nation just watched Donald Trump’s campaign implode over something horribly distasteful; we mostly agree now that he has no chance to win.  And I really dislike Senator Clinton*.  So why put myself through that torment? (more…)

Who Won The Debate?

Some of us just finished watching the first Presidential debate, and we’re probably all still shell-shocked.  The commentators are still lobbing rounds at each other, but I’ll emerge from my foxhole long enough to shoot a bulletin back from the trenches, for the benefit of those wiser souls who spent time watching Monday Night Football.

Well, it was entertaining; I’ll grant that. (more…)

What’s Faster?

“Which one do you reckon is faster?”  Cousin Terrance posed the question, and despite the interposition of the Internet I thought I could spy the mischief in his eyes.  He’s like that.

It’s one of those questions that inspires some thought, especially considering where it’s coming from.  Now, which one would go faster — jet or bike?  I’m guessing (more…)

Star Spangled Slavery?

I don’t generally bother to get involved in whatever the current trending national outrage phenomenon happens to be.  Our country loves to be outraged, so there’s always something different, and it’s usually petty.  So when a random sports guy did something to protest something else, I just let it pass by unnoticed.  After all, he’s probably just another overpaid egoist who does something I’ll never care about for a living.

So I ignored the furor, the counter-furor, the anti-furor furor, and the inevitable Fuehrer comparison — until someone mentioned history, in particular military history.  The points on the ends of my ears stood upright and I suddenly took notice. (more…)

Those Little Trees

A lovely lady of my acquaintance once asked me how many of those little pine trees you’d have to hang in the cellar to hide the scent of a corpse.  Since I was visiting without a chaperone at the time, that question got me to thinking, and once I’d finished my slice of apple pie I thanked her cordially for a fine meal and made my excuses without tasting her mince.  I’m mostly sure she was just making conversation, but I didn’t reach my present advanced age by taking needless risks.

Those pine trees are some powerful, it’s true, but my experience is they just cover things up, burying them in the olfactory noise (if there is such a thing).  They hide the lesser sins, (more…)

How To Lose All Your Facebook Friends In A Single Post

The longer I spend talking to people about the upcoming presidential elections, the more I’m convinced that Mencken was right:  The American people know what they want, and deserve to get it — good and hard. (more…)

EpiPens aren’t the problem.

(For those few of you who’ve been living in a cave in northern Nunavut for the past ten days, you might have missed Ben Popken’s story on the EpiPen price gouge.  Go read it, then come back and join the rest of the class.  Slacker.)

I’m going to call “bullshit”. Once again, the American Media, courtesy of political campaigns, is indulging the American Media Consumer — blinkered, pig-ignorant, and proud of it — in a pointless round of outrage at nothing.

Look, the basic problem isn’t the damn EpiPen, or that some CEO got a raise of $18 million. It’s that we have a system where people make a profit from other people being sick, and nobody is even remotely interested in changing it. (more…)

Don’t Waste Your Vote

Is Donald Trump a dangerous madman?  Is Hillary Clinton assassinating her political foes?  Is someone rigging the ballots and cheating us out of our elections?

I’m pretty sure Trump is far more clever and personable than he lets on, and I’m also quite certain that nobody who’s as much in the spotlight as Senator Clinton could sneak away from her Secret Service entourage long enough to commit murder.  But the answer to that third question is an emphatic “YES!” (more…)