Category: Capitalist swine

Serfs on safari

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 15 Comments
What organizers estimate to be our biggest No Kings crowd yet in Montgomery Park on Saturday.

Bigger and better? Yes and no.

Albuquerque’s third No Kings rally topped its predecessors in terms of turnout; organizers say we had 50,000 attendees here, with more than 8 million nationwide.

And the crowd, while still heavy on gray hair (and no hair), seemed to have more young people than did the previous editions.

A couple of smiling young folks from the Party for Socialism and Liberation buttonholed us, passing along a flyer for a May Day rally and general strike. The Democratic Socialists of America said they’d be around, but once again, no confirmed sightings.

But emcee Robert Luke seemed to have some trouble generating a solid call-and-response from the throng, which really didn’t get fired up until special guest speaker Stacey Abrams brung the heat. (Respect to the band ShyGuy, which tore up a stout cover of Green Day’s “American Idiot.”)

It was the march that put a smile on my face. The 3-mile route from the park wound north on San Mateo, east on Montgomery, south on Louisiana, and back to the park via Comanche, and we flat filled our half of the road, singing, chanting, and waving at passersby.

One group of youngsters could really sing, at one point tackling Queen’s “Bohemian Rhapsody,” with enthusiasm if not 100 percent accuracy. Lots of horn honking, most of the single-digit salutes involving an upraised thumb, and only one small, semiorganized group of dissenters at the far side of Comanche and Louisiana, with a sign that said something like “No Commies or Socialists In Our Neighborhood.”

I sang, “I am a commie, and so is your mommy” at them. Not as melodious as the kids, but what the hell, I ain’t Bruce Springsteen. Anyway, you know the rule: While smashing the State, kids, keep a smile on your lips and a song in your heart.

50,000 people? That’s what they say. …
O, indeed. Our body politic, our choice.
Stacey Abrams was in town to campaign for Deb Haaland (photo by Herself).
Come back, Woody Guthrie. …
The march was epic. I thought we were near the front until we turned from San Mateo onto Louisiana. The front was turning onto Comanche.
Props to the Party for Socialism and Liberation. They keep meeting the people where they are.

No kings (just one royal pain)

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ Leave a comment
Let’s give the TV-addled stumblebum a show worth watching on Saturday.

Yes, kids, it’s almost that time again — time to hit the streets and make a Joyful Noise Unto the Lard.

More than 3,000 No Kings events had been scheduled as of a couple weeks ago, with organizers and supporters alike hoping for a mammoth turnout:

Last June, more than five million people took to the streets across more than 2,100 events during the coalition’s first day of action. Then, more than seven million people protested across more than 2,700 events last October. The March 28 mobilization is the next step in this growing movement, with organizers anticipating it will be one of the largest single-day nonviolent nationwide protests in U.S. history.

It’s not a riot going on, or at least it shouldn’t be. And with any luck at all we won’t all wind up on Cellblock No. 9, wearing bruises and zip-ties. Here in The Duck! City we’re gonna be in a park, with shade trees and music, even a march! (Cue the revolution scene from “Reds,” but without all that winter garb.)

Rallies and marches can feel a tad performative, mostly because they are. But they help you remember that you’re not alone, it’s not just you or the Voices in your head, there really is something of a problem here, and if we’re lucky, and there are enough of us intent on doing something about it, we can use ballots instead of bullets because the last game in town that needs a shot in the arm these days is the funeral racket.

A mass thumbing of the national noses may also give an atomic wedgie to a certain diapered dictator at some point during his 24 hours per diem of TV-watching, assuming the legacy media actually turns on and tunes in.

Which is always something of an assumption. So, before you head out the door to your local No Kings gathering, call a couple TV stations and invite them to join the party.

No, not that party. Whaddaya think this is, a Warren Beatty movie?

Price capades

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 18 Comments
¿Juanita, hermana, qué te pasó?

While making a smallish grocery run today I snatched up a can of Juanita’s Mexican Style Hominy, which I like to have in the pantry in case I find myself in a mood for a pot of posole, prepared in lazy gabacho fashion.

But it didn’t look quite right. … and it wasn’t.

These suckers used to be 30 ounces. Now they’re 25. Last March 15, a can cost $2.99. Today, it cost $3.79. For 5 ounces less hominy.

Hmmm. Whatever could’ve happened? Wait for it. …

From foodnewswire.com, dated May 2, 2025

Apex Capital, a private equity firm focused on investing in the consumer sector across the Americas, is pleased to announce the acquisition of a majority stake in Juanita’s Foods, a leading producer of authentic Mexican food products in the United States.

Maybe this is why Juanita’s has been tough to find lately. For the last pot of posole I made I used canned white hominy from Goya Foods, whose CEO is a big fan of the pinche pendejo Charlie Pierce calls “El Caudillo del Mar-a-Lago.” The boss-fella’s breath may have a whiff of ass to it — ¿quien sabe? — but it was a 29-ounce can and it only cost $3.69.

In any event, while I can’t say for sure exactly when it happened, it sure seems like these capitalistas carroñeros from Apex Capital have done slipped the pork to my posole via shrinkflation.

Fuelishness 2: $3.89 for all my friends!

~ Patrick O'Grady ~ 15 Comments
Valero: $3.89
Circle K: $3.89
Speedway: $3.89
DK: $3.89

Everyone’s on the same page along Tramway Boulevard.

Way back in the Glory Days of Monday — remember that fabulous Monday? — a happy Duck! City motorist could gas up for $3.39 or $3.59 per gallon, depending on his/her choice of station.

On Saturday … not so much.

The going rate for a gallon of go-juice on Tramway today is $3.89, from Lomas to San Bernardino. Affordability is on the march, and soon the American public will be legging it around and about, too.

Just wait until Addled Hitler sinks Kharg Island, a small coral island off Iran’s coast that according to The Associated Press is “the primary terminal through which nearly all of Iran’s oil exports pass.” The Guardian has a nifty explainer, too.

Petras Katinas, an energy researcher at the Royal United Services Institute who calls Kharg “the main node” of the Iranian economy, said that if Iran were to lose control of the island, it would be difficult for the country to function, even though the island isn’t a military or nuclear target.

“It doesn’t matter which regime is in power — new or old,” Katinas said.

Oh, good. This is like blowing up a 7-Eleven and replacing it with a Circle K, only the Circle K has empty shelves, fuel pumps that don’t work, no employees, and an angry mob forming in the cratered parking lot with weapons in various calibers and configurations, craving a word with management.

Send Whiskey Pete Kegsbreath out to restore order. He can show them his tats. They can show him their rat-a-tat-tats.