copyright 1998 Chris Garvey

© 1998 Chris Garvey

Pataki and D’Amato run

With lots of Wall Street money,

From men for whom government bonds

Comprise their milk and honey,

Who made a bad investment

In a LILCO plant at Shoreham

And now want rate and taxpayers

To pick the tab up for ‘em.

Half-hearted grunts of protest came

From Sheldon Democrat,

‘Till Wall Street made it clear

His war-chest also would get fat.

Copyright 1978 Christopher B. Garvey

It's time to change the rules.

They're even known by fools,

We have no edge

If all can hedge

And fiddle with our tools,

So

It's time to change the rules.

They think they know the song.

We'll make things go real wrong,

Then we'll mis-tell

Why trouble fell;

Place blame where not belonged

And then we'll change the song.

The scape goats are displayed.

Popular wisdom's made.

Just hear the row

"Do something now"

Our program's on parade,

To change the rules we're bade.

So now we'll change the rules.

That should slow down the fools.

We have an edge.

They cannot hedge.

We've new exclusive tools.

They made us change the rules.

There's sixty-five billion each year,

To corp'rations Congress holds dear,

And to nurture this hay,

There’s campaign funds to pay,

To make friends who will lend corp’s an ear.

They've got taxpayer money to steer,

Rob from poor, give to rich folks, each year,

Don't waste cash on the poor,

When the rich thank you more,

But, just don’t let the taxpayers hear.

Speeding towards my mid-Manhattan law office,

I climb to the elevated Bruckner Expressway,

And merge my 16 year old Camaro into formation with a Puerto Rican

From General Sheridan’s Expressway.

He drives a Firebird;

A comparable, contemporary, Pontiac counterpart to my Camaro;

We glance at each other’s dents and rust;

Nodding at the "350" badges on our fenders;

Relics from the glory days;

Our crank-cases are positively ventilated;

Our engines are ninety-percent cleaner than their forebearers;

But we predate the ridiculous power-robbing smog pumps and plumbing.

We are buckled to our bucket seats by manually adjusted belts,

Without shoulder straps or boa-constrictor retractor contraptions.

Our ends are not weighted by giant expensive government-mandated bumpers.

Five-hundred dollar ultimate driving machines.

Our exhausts are in their loud phases of a biennial decay cycle,

And our identical V-8’s thunder back at our open windows,

Off the concrete barriers that define our pathway through the sky;

At 87 miles-per-hour.

There is no place for a police car to hide;

No one in front of us;

The horizon is blue and cloudless.

High above the Bronx,

We look at each other;

Sharing the common bond of our Bondo’d GM F-bodies;

And, grinning ear-to-ear,

We accelerate towards Manhattan.

Sometimes I feel like I want rear wheel drive.

Sometimes I feel like I need rear wheel drive.

Sometimes I wish I still had rear wheel drive.

My old Camaro--O

My old Camaro.

Posi-Traction; An axle that's live;

My old Camaro--O,

My old Camaro.

Sometimes it seemed like the body was gone,

Sometimes it seemed like the chassis was gone,

Sometimes it seemed like the floorboards were gone,

All rusted to the bone -- O,

All rusted to the bone.

Hurst and four-speed; Three-fifty V-Eight;

But rusted to the bone -- O,

But rusted to the bone.

You who meets me,

You who greets me,

You, persistent, who entreats me,

You so pleasant,

Eating pheasant,

Try'ng to show me you're no peasant;

Flaunting power,

In your tower,

Bark to make the servants cower.

Richly dressed,

And daily pressed,

With sparkling Lambourghini blessed;

So impressive,

Your successive

Ex's, who you made depressive.

Hint enhancement - -

My advancement - -

Subtly - - to avoid harassment.

Sweets and flowers,

Gifts you shower,

Reluctance, to overpower.

Why do I think something's missing?

Why do I resist your kissing?

With your wordly assets proved,

Why do I remain unmoved?

How can I be unimpressed?

Why should I not get undressed?

Love,

it's not there,

You don't cause care,

I shall not be moved.

There is no percentage

In letting cash stay,

In the pockets of earners,

To spend as they may.

What if they invest?

What if they are wrong?

Or worse if they're right?

Won't that make them too strong?

With millions of decisions,

Some are bound to be right.

If they're better than ours

Can we still sleep at night?

Take away those decisions!

Let them do as they're told!

Keep the big bucks and fortunes

Where they were in times old.

There is no percentage,

In letting you do,

What is best for yourself,

As determined by you.

You should need our permission,

And apply for your needs;

To maintain your condition:

Overlook our misdeeds.

And a little donation,

At election time can

Bring the wealth of a nation

To assist in your plan.

Take away your volition;

You will do as we say

Which can be what you ask for,

If you know who to pay.

There is no percentage

In laws you can obey.

How could we find you guilty,

If you stand in our way?

We will grow regulation,

With the speed of a press,

That can send you to prison

For what e're you confess;

And take all that you own

If suspected of crime.

(Try to mount a defense;

When we have your last dime.)

No, there is no percentage

In intelligent man,

Who has learned how to think,

Who can see through our plans.

Let's control education;

Run the schools by the state;

Set the rules of the discourse;

And the terms of debate.

And by all means don't teach

Them poor kids how to read.

Restrict their information,

To a media feed.

There sure is no percentage

In a fixed cash supply.

How would we induce price waves?

...Know when to catch the ride?

Or create buying power

By the Federal Reserve,

That inures to the privileged,

And the banks that it serves.

No, there is no percentage

In letting cash stay,

In the pockets of you folks,

To spend as you may.

Copyright 1997 Chris Garvey

There is always a still greater fool, wit-

ness the high prices of tulips.

They look very nice,

And their increasing price

Makes them better investments than blue chips.

Oh, the more of the throng learns what's there,

The more speculators will dare.

For tomorrow, crowds may,

Think the goods, bought today,

Are increasingly valued and rare.

You may think that the price is too tall

For something so worthless and small,

But, it's not what we need,

It is what we perceive

As desired and valued by all,

That's what makes rising prices a trend.

'Cause we know, round the very next bend,

There'll be buyers galore,

Who'll pay still even more,

And the price will just rise without end.

But, when all-who-will are interested,

And, their spare cash they've fully invested,

Then to sell, if you try,

You'll find no one to buy,

Your peak price can't now still be digested.

Yes, there's always one more greater fool,

But take care if you live by that rule,

When the smoke clears away,

Let the mirror not say,

"You're the last and the greatest of fools."

4-19-93

4-22-93 revision

Dear old grand dad could delight in

What was perfectly all right in

The good old days

that came before

The Securities Act

of Thirty-four.

He could grow so rich.

He could feel so smart,

As he practiced his

Manipulative art.

And if outsiders got a little burned,

'Twas a tiny harm,

Of which they'd never learn.

Though the news might still be pending,

Yet unpublished, it caused trending;

'Cause the insiders

knew which way to sell,

And (just as they should)

Caused the price to fell.

And the shock of big surprises

Could be cushioned by

little rises.

Great big market perturbations

Often came from combinations.

But the industry

Wants us all to feel

Like we're on a level

playing field.

So the S.E.C.

Comes down hard on those

who

trade with-reference-to

What they-only knows.

But of course, what all these regulations miss

Is that price-setter: the market specialist.

His secret order book knows who wants to buy

As he sets the prices low or high.

And while insiders

Go to prison,

His great assets have

only riisen;

Yes, he buys

when he has the price real low,

Once he sets it high,

Then he lets stock go.

He's behind all the debating

On the ills of program trading,

Cause if any turkey, on or off the floor,

Can trade fast as him,

Then what's he there for?

Hailed for making

orderly markets,

Glad that insiders are a target,

For if market forces got the jump on him,

There would be less cream

For himself to skim.

Copyright 1993 Christopher B. Garvey

Sing we the praises of music that's classical.

It may be quite old, but it's not quite jurrassical.

It is so convenient: no live author hassicle;

Copyright expired, play it free 'cause it's classical.

Expired copyright; no royalty one pays,

A composer so long dead,

He is quite safe to praise.

One can well afford to credit, his turn of a phrase,

He will never one debit, for whatever one plays.

When in the course of human events

A people, once free, are pressed to relent

Inestimable rights to a distant tyrant

Then the bands that connect them they need to have rent:

As we take up our station,

with nature's consent,

That is sep'rate and equal,

respect that's decent,

For Opinions of Mankind,

requires we present,

And declare all that caused

and impelled this event.

We hold, now, these truths

to be self-evident,

That all men, by God, here,

with some rights, have been sent,

To secure these rights, men institute Governments,

Which derive their just Powers from Governed's consent.

When these ends, any Government tends to demolish,

It's the Right of the People

to change or abolish.

We would not do so lightly;

prudence would admonish.

But follow our inj'ries,

by King George, despotish:

On his sole will, our judges

he has made dependent.

Made multitudes of offices

(which we resent),

And swarms of new officers,

hither he's sent;

To harrass our People,

and eat out their Substance.

World trade he's cut off,

though demand, up is pent.

He's imposed on us taxes,

without our consent.

Altering fundamentally our government.

Burning towns, killing people, who's thoughts are diff'rent.

At each stage, for our redress,

petitions we've sent,

We have warned British brethren,

against their attempts,

And explained the conditions

of our Settlement,

They've been deaf to it all.

So, Dear God, our intent's,

To declare that these STATES

are now INDEPENDENT!

And to be sure,

That the Tyrant's a gonner,

We pledge our lives, Fortunes, and our sacred honor.

I am a stark example of a semi-sane law student;

And I never hoist my hand unless I'm sure the answer's prudent

Though professors may be boring and class interest seems to taper,

I'll endeavor to catch every word in books of white note paper.

I've a photographic mem'ry, and no concept can evade me;

And if my professor says it, that's sufficient to persuade me,

When confronted with a blue book I'll dump reams of information,

At high speed in writing reasonable and rife with ripe quotation.

With my yellow underliner I'll extract the case's kernel,

Wading through judicial verbiage, convoluted and infernal,

But before I hoist my hand I must be sure the answer's prudent,

For, I am a stark example of a semi-sane law student.

I am about the apex of aspiring associate.

I always dress in garments that the partners think appropriate.

I'm usually found lost in the firms vast legal library,

Preparing to defend some client's foreign office bribery.

I'm very good at obfuscation, legalese and subterfuge.

The world may seek to clarify, but my objective's to confuse.

And, if you seek discov'ry of some relevant reality,

It's my job to obscure it in a mass of triviality.

Then the assets of estates I can so subtle-ly expropriate

With billings that the devisees could only deem extortionate,

But still befrocked in garments that the partners think appropriate,

I am about the apex of aspiring associate.

I am that perfect pinnacle, the practicing law partner.

Years of living with the law has turned me into an old fart, there.

Though I live to oil the mechanism of a great democracy,

Within my firm I'm happily ensconced in an autocracy.

I've a battery of recent grads who keep their meters ticking,

While preparing me to give my client's foes a legal licking,

And for every hour I contemplate said client's legal pickle,

He receives a bill that's in excess of twenty-thousand nickels.

Though my billing's so preposterous the clients thing they're bleeding,

It's a question, not of wanting me but absolutely needing,

So, if money is the thing that warms the cockles of your heart, there,

Think how warm can be the cockles of the practicing law partner.

I am a geriatric, jowled jaded japing judge,

And my decisions flow forth from my pen, with all the speed of sludge,

All though to get to my exalted post, I've done my share of bowing

It's forgotten now, for all in court, to me do their kowtowing.

I'm the only one in court who can afford a sense of humor,

And to be the target of my wit, is more fun than a tumor.

And if o'er the years my oratory's lost some of its sizzle,

It's still brighter than a counselor's, whose case begins to fizzle.

For although in each decision, with me, one side's disagreeing,

It has no effect upon my post, within which, I'm still being.

O' there's no one who is so immune to other people's grudges,

As a genuinely geriatric jaded japing judge is.

5-27-93

Copr.. 1998 CBG

Time of Halloween;

Scary creatures abound. Some

Will be elected.

Bifurcation

Is funny

It separates blame from the money

If your claim should prove to be spurious

No need to figure, just how injurious.

Judicially

It’s economical;

If the factfinder thinks your case comical

O’ why take evidence about the amount

When your silly claim

Just doesn’t count.

Oh bifurcation,

Can hurt you,

It’s a way for the court to desert you.

If that defendant

Does not get the blame,

The court avoids

The damage game.

Copr. C.Garvey 1984, 1998

copr. 1998 CBG

Sold last month for loss;

Stocks are re-bought -- prices rise;

Tax-caused artifacts.

copr. 1998 CBG

I try to sleep

In the unscreened hold of a wooden schooner.

The tires over the Brooklyn Bridge

Are indistinguishable

From the mosquito around my head.

A million times a year, a victim’s handgun is displayed,

And thwarts a villain’s ill intent, by making him afraid.

Without a shot: rape, robbery, and mayhem thus are thwarted,

And oft’ as not, the incident, will pass by unreported.

Floridians, by change of law, with handguns were provided;

Rape, violent crime, and murder all immediately subsided.

And tourists found protection from car-jacking and from road kills;

When plain rental-car plates let them

pass for

maybe-armed locals.

In Israel, would-be massacres are thwarted without cops;

When crowds of armed civilians return fire, killers stop.

Contrast that to our Capital, where good men were disarmed,

When D.C.’s new gun-ban laws increased victims’ chance of harm.

Without a gun, when evil looms, you’ve less chance to survive.

If poor Vince Foster had a gun, he might still be alive.

When Adolph Hitler was elected

by the German nation,

He subjected his people to

broad weapons registration.

After he’d used that registry

for weapons confiscation,

His victims were quite helpless

to resist annihilation.

Non-governmental entities,

In this twentieth century,

Have killed approximately eighteen-million.

While governmental entities,

In this same very century,

Have killed at least a hapless quarter billion.

And one-hundred-eighty-million,

Were governments’ own civilians,

Whose rulers thought, would be improved, if dead;

Whose low race or foul opinions,

To who exercised dominion,

Justified a bloody bludgeon to the head.

Before each bloody genocide,

So "peace" would rule the countryside,

The victims’ guns, by force of law, were taken,

Conveniently, it’s not denied,

For those with arms did most abide,

Right where it said upon gun registrations.

Tyrants have favored arms control,

From Nero to Pol-Pot;

They figured out their programs would

Make people want them not;

They know they cannot have their way,

In a home of the brave;

They know an unarmed populace

Is simpler to enslave;

They wish to have the people’s views

all rendered less than moot;

They count on people being not

historically astute;

They’ve ordered: " Raise your right hand,

in assent and in salute;"

They set the stage for East Timor,

Tibet, Tienamine Square;

Before they knock upon your door,

Gun control will be there.

© 1997 Christopher B. Garvey

A short time ago,

In nineteen forty-seven,

They were married in June,

With a joy quite unleavened.

Many years after that,

Or, well... only a few,

Came the first Garvey brat,

Who recites this to you.

No dysfunctional unit,

Was I welcomed aboard,

But a happy young family,

In a cream '50 Ford.

Three more infants arrived,

In ten subsequent years,

Pretty well insulated,

From the worst of life's fears.

And yet always encouraged,

If things got at all rough,

To avoid sad self pity,

To be mentally tough.

There was always black humor,

We learned that disasters,

Death, trouble, or rumors,

Are best dealt with by laughter.

And if in our brains

Dark thoughts did accrue,

It probably meant,

We'd come down with the flu.

As children of the Depression,

They taught us to be cheap,

In fact,

Paying for this party

Goes against training deep.

Truth, justice, and honor,

We were taught to strive for,

Which I've found,

As a lawyer,

Has helped keep me poor.

We were taught to avoid

Stupid conflicts of life,

By the way that they managed

Our small sibling strife.

We were taught, how to, safely,

Carefully, handle guns,

And, so far, so good,

We ain't shot anyone.

We were taught

what a rip-off,

All taxes were made for,

And to thank God

We don't get

All the government

We've paid for.

In our earliest years,

We got lots of attention,

Which made us all smart,

And encouraged invention.

Every question we asked,

Got a thoughtful response,

So the way the world works,

In our minds, was ensconced.

We learned that,

If stuff breaks,

There's no reason to panic,

And now even their daughters

Are decent mechanics.

We learned skidding

in snow;

We learned how to

use power;

We learned how to

back-up, at

fifty miles-an-hour.

We learned to

Set our sights

On the earth

Or the stars,

And we've helped

split the atom,

And built brand new cars.

We've taught many hundreds

To sail in small boats.

We've pumped, over wires,

Mil-li-ons of volts.

We've defended the names

Of the skillful and able;

And secured to inventors

The fruits of their labor.

We've fixed people's cars;

And built homes for their spouses;

And given them loans;

And inspected their houses;

And helped keep them safe,

As they flew through the air;

And helped folks relax,

On the yacht Laissez Faire.

We've fixed people's phones;

And tested their blood;

And rescued their boats,

From hurricanes and floods.

And in between all,

Of the stuff

we were buildin',

We even produced

Two fantastic grandchildren.

I'd say they equipped us

to live a good life,

And I'd say,

all-in-all,

That its been pretty nice.

© 1997 Chris Garvey

To tax, to rule, to take their cut,

And other deeds infernal,

The rulers of a people must,

Point to a threat external.

For eons war has been their spook,

Sacrifice justifying,

OK, while they were killing gooks,

And poor folks did the dying.

But thermonuclear armed foes,

Are less attractive bad guys.

If only war they could dispose,

They wouldn’t seem such mad guys.

Their arrogance, to justify,

Some threat needs to be forming.

"I know! C O _Two -- in the sky!

Blame that for global warming!"

The theory goes:

Surrounding Earth,

Just like a hothouse glass is

Carbon Dioxide, holding heat,

And dubbed now:

"Greenhouse Gasses".

As C O _two escapes from flues,

Increasing concentration,

It holds more of the planet’s warmth,

Like better insulation.

The warmth will melt

Antarctic’s cap

Of ice into the oceans,

To flood all coastal cities

Causing horrible commotion.

Each match you burn,

Each step you take,

Each time you fire a neuron,

May cause the very oceans’ rising

Up to meet Lake Huron.

O’ what a theory this will be!

O’ what a tyrant’s treasure!

Just think and plan

What can be banned;

What Draconian measures!

The scared cities,

they will demand

To ban unneeded burning;

Then scarcity will bring to hand

Authoritarian yearnings.

For why should yokels drive in giant

V-8 powered pickups?

Just ban their ass,

and premium gas,

And cows, that breathe and hiccup.

So scientists were mustered to,

To prove:

a heat wave’s forming;

And CO₂ -- the bugaboo,

That’s causing global warming.

They threw vast governmental sums

To make supporting data.

But when the studies had been done,

There was no correlator.

But some inventor showed them how,

The tropics’ desert oceans,

Could bloom and suck up C O _two

If given iron potion.

The scientists rose to condemn

His simplistic solution:

"How dare he find an easy way

To obviate pollution!?!"

Then satellites took surface scans

Across all Mother Earth there;

But no clear path

‘tween heat and gas

Could satellites unearth there.

"The satellites, they must be wrong!

Yes! That must be the trouble!"

But all the data else-wise gleaned,

Did burst that wishful bubble.

Then Doctor Sally, up she spoke:

"Look here, right in these tree rings.

There’s fourteen-hundred years of data,

Correlating three things:

"When solar output increases,

The Earth responds by heating;

And when the Sun goes cooling off

Earth’s temperature’s decreasing.

"And C O _Two, that bugaboo,

As cause you would be passing,

Earth’s thermal state,

Won’t correlate –

There is no greenhouse gassing.

"In fact, in twenty-fifty-one

We’ll end this warm and nice age;

When solar cooling has begun

To start a brand new ice age."

Just feel, yourselves, when sun goes down,

How you get cooler quickly,

And when the sun, comes with the dawn,

How you get hot and stickly.

But Doctor Sally, on the toes,

Of her employ’rs was stepping

Her forthright chants

Endangered grants,

They found that most distressing.

"Now Sally dear, let us not hear

you blame the warming star-ward;

And if you must, our theory bust,

Don’t use the name of Harvard."

"For academic freedom’s fine

And you can be our honey,

But we cannot allow your speech

To cost us federal money."

"Yes, we get paid to seek the grail

Of greenhouse correlation;

Your facts, the train,

they would derail,

toward global legislation."

"And though it might be tempting to

Rise up, for to deplore you,

It’s probably a better bet

For us to just ignore you."

From Rio still there echo cries

for global legislation,

Which wouldn’t pass if folks knew:

Warmth

just comes from insolation.

And still the press promotes as fact

The hoax of global warming,

In hope to justify the new

world order that is forming.