LJHalfbreed posted:

LJHalfbreed posted:

I should be upgrading my account on here this weekend so I can PM or whatever.


In the meanwhile, I guess the best way to handle this is to just write more stuff. If anyone feels like pointing me to any other random short-story threads here on SA, that'd be swell.

anonumos posted:

The Probability Broach
http://www.bigheadpress.com/tpbtgn?page=1

Divine Disclaimer posted:

Ecological damage to what? The half-fertile pseudo-wasteland one drought away from a dust-bowl held down only by wind breaks we installed; hundreds of miles from what little pockets of natural prairie still exist? I don't see it. For Kansas, anyway.

Nucleic Acids posted:

Hatred of anything related to environmentalism, I suppose.

TopherCStone posted:

I know that this is a very old comment but I feel compelled to respond. As an environmentalist (not merely "I love the planet" but my field of study is the environment) I am generally opposed to wind power. They are very dangerous to migrating birds as it stands, and expanding wind power to the point where it's a major player in energy production would pretty much guarantee the extinction of endangered species, as well as just being an unnecessary contribution to the deaths of nonendangered species. They also take up a lot of unnecessary space; you can't exactly use the land under the turbines. It's better than fossil fuel plants, but we can and should do better.

I think solar is a better option moving forward than wind, and solid oxide fuel cells powered by biodiesel are getting smaller and cheaper over the years so they are a good low profile option for backups and for areas where solar is unfeasible for whatever reason.

This is not to say that Glenn Beck has good reasons for opposing it (he hasn't), but I do want to show that opposition to wind power is not necessarily a stupid political position.

CommieGIR posted:

What is your view on nuclear energy? Specifically more research into Molten Thorium Salt reactors?

An excerpt from Review of Modern Beckian Literature of the Americas, by Martin Philby posted:

_{With apologies to Bolanõ,}

The Alderman
Jeremiah “Jerry” Osgood
1956-2017

Born in Athens, Georgia, on July 5th 1956, there was no early indication that young Jeremiah Osgood would ever aspire to intellectual pursuits. His father Roy, a low level clerk at a local shipping company, certainly never housed any expectations in that vein, later recalling that his son was “as allergic to books as he was to school”. He was doted upon by his mother Helen and the two were by all accounts very close, as evidenced by the extensive correspondence he was later to write as he left the family home.

His first forays in the world of literature came 1975 when the then 19-year old sent three short stories to American Eagle Magazine, at the time headed by the infamous Robert B. Walston. The old firebrand immediately recognized the latent talent in the young man. Although he rejected all three stories off the bat, describing them as “drab pastiche”, he told Osgood to keep writing. Encouraged by his new-found mentor, Osgood submitted another story, according to himself staying up an entire night to write it in one sitting. The short story, titled American Laocoön, a strident warning of communist infiltration of the United States, garnered high praise, flooding the offices of American Eagle Magazine with appreciative letters. Unfortunately, due to a warehouse fire in 1986, back issues of the magazine with the story are now almost impossible to find. During the next few years, supporting himself through different odd jobs, he kept submitting short stories to various publications, not only AEM, but also Patriot Quarterly and The Minuteman.

In 1979, he published his first novel, Liberty, Ho! with the economic help of Robert Walston, who by that time had become a close friend. The reviews were generally positive, with the notable exception of Georgia Literature Gazette's Caleb Fink, who famously concluded his scathing review with the words “I highly doubt we'll be seeing anything more from Osgood in the future.” Fink himself, in the years to come, never failed to bring that glaring misjudgement up in a rare moment of self-depreciating humor for this otherwise taciturn man. The novel itself is now considered an early forerunner to the New Patriotic genre, directly inspiring, by their own admission, later writers such as Dean Holloway and Kurt Ruby.

His fame only rose when a year later he was arrested on illegal weapon charges, along with his mentor Robert Walston and ten members of a group called American Freedom Legion, then classified by the FBI as a white-supremacist group. Osgood admitted under questioning that Walston had introduced him to members of the group, but that he was not an active member. He was released due to lack of evidence, but Robert Walston was sentenced to 8 years in prison, something that Osgood protested vigorously, writing several scathing condemnations of the federal government published in the nations major newspapers. Walston was later released on good behaviour, serving only four years.

The Cavalry of Faith, his second novel, was published in 1983. It sold nearly 500.000 copies, garnering glowing reviews. Writing for American Reader, a reviewer commented on the characters: “[...]heart-wrenching depth, making them step of the page and into the room with the reader. In John Hard, young Americans everywhere has found a hero for the times.” Flush with money from the royalties and a shrewd contract, Osgood suddenly found himself a wealthy man at 27, able to do whatever he desired. He threw himself into various political causes with a fervour, writing several essays and opinion pieces in support of Ronald Reagan for the 1984 election. The incumbent president even sent a personal note of appreciation to Osgood, which he framed and proudly used to display to all his visitors.

After a brief detour with poetry, released in 1988 as Collected Deaths and Sundry Political Injuries to almost complete silence, he published his third novel, The Shot of an Angel, the following year. This rather bizarre piece, a historical novel examining the motivations and drives of John Wilkes Booth, a man clearly idolized by Osgood, was met with middling reviews and poor sales. Taking this as a personal slight, Osgood largely withdrew from the public light for the next ten years, surfacing only occasionally to weigh in on national issues through acerbic letters to the newspapers. Rumours persistently hinted towards to problems with alcohol and drugs, and the few friends that he allowed to visit him in his large Atlanta town-house, spoke of bizarre behaviour such as consistently dressing in specially tailored replicas of Nazi uniforms, or not wearing clothes at all.

He finally broke the silence in the year 2000, coming out with his autobiography, titled simply Osgood. This massive book was a rambling brick of nearly 800 pages, with episodes of his life interspersed with what can only be called dream-like sequences, where he conversed with famous conservative icons, and long winding diatribes against the variously labelled enemies of America. Most famously, and resulting in a long-running court case, was the claim that he had met Phyllis Schlafly at political fundraiser in 1980, receiving what he described as “the fiercest handjob a man could ask for in a humble utility closet.” Schlafly and Osgood later settled for an undisclosed sum, and the book remained on the shelves.

In 2004 Robert Walston died of aggressive stomach cancer and Osgood attended his funeral, writing a very well received speech for his old friend and former mentor. It was there he met Glen Beck, another acquaintance of Walston's. After a personal invitation from Beck, Osgood became one of the earliest sponsors of Independence, Beck's great life-time project. When it was finished in 2013, Osgood moved there to settle permanently. By this time, he was beset by poor health, caused by a growing obesity problem and his stubborn refusal to see any doctors, all of whom he condemned as “god damned reds”. During his years in Independence, he published but a single piece of fiction, the aptly titled Confessions of a Rebel, a short but powerful work published in 2015, harking back to Liberty, Ho! in its style and sheer vibrancy of language. Reading it now can give the reader the eerie impression that Osgood predicted his own impending future, as the unnamed protagonist fights in vain against the irresistible forces of time.

On January 18th, 2017, Jeremiah Osgood, Jerry to his friends, died in his bed during the night from a massive heart attack. According to his will, all his papers and notes, totalling more than five-thousand hand written pages, were burned after his death.