Cultural Court Jesters

When it comes to hypocritical left you can believe the hype.  The entertainment industries are replete with liberals and leftists who have no problem promoting their particular strain of social justice.  The irony is completely lost on them when it comes to China.  Those who, in the past, would have balked at the idea of censorship are now showing that they are, in fact, capitalist pigs.  The NBA and Hollywood production companies are more than willing to surrender their ideals as long as the price is right.  These people claim that our current president is a fascist and call for his impeachment or assassination while at the same time cow towing to fascists in China because it will benefit them financially.  The love of money is the root of all kinds of evil.  This can certainly be seen in our cultural court jesters who claim the moral high ground domestically while submitting to the immorality of fascists overseas. 

Climatic Catachlism

Fear leads to anger.  Anger leads to hate.  Hate leads to suffering  - - - Yoda

Political leaders use fear to get your vote.  All of them do.  Trump wants us to fear illegal immigrants, Beto wants us to fear the end of the world in 12 years from "climate change".  Funny thing, the human species is horrible at reading tea leaves.  The only people who came close were the optimists like Roddenberry.  Communicators are REAL!  But when we look to the future of the human race we almost always see it falling further and further into despair.  Politicians leverage that predisposition to gain more control and make more money.

We have been hearing about catastrophic climate change for 50 years and each time the prediction is that we only have 10 years (give or take 730 days in Beto's case).  We are told that we must DO SOMETHING!.  Usually that "something" involves a tax with the supposed goal of punishing those causing the end of the world.

Do you use coal to create electricity?  Well, you're going to have to pay for that.  Pay who?  The government of course.  Will they use the money to plant trees thereby reducing CO2?  NO!  They will give it to green energy.  How will that fix the problem?  It won't and your electric bill will be in the ozone layer because green energy can't produce the amount of power we need.

So, no I won't support that "solution" since it solves nothing.  What I will support is free market innovations.  If the government wants to use some of their billions of dollars in grants to fund research into green alternatives instead of building an Iron Man suit then that's fine....I guess.  But in the mean time stop scaring people. 

FAST FORWARD

I feel like a just stepped out of the telephone booth with Bill and Ted.  I'm coming back to blogging to keep my sanity.  I left because of Facebook but Facebook has become too much of a time suck so I'm back.  I've noticed, after reading my posts from over 12 years ago (ouch!) that I've also lost my sense of humor.  Well, it's time to get it back baby! I'm looking forward to some catharsis here.  Hopefully my actual friends will read this stuff and chime in but if not, so be it.  I need to vent and laugh at my own jokes.  So here we go!

Turn off Thomas the Tank Engine

I have stumbled upon the greatest re-education program that has ever been propogated in our United States of America. Who is behind this insideus propaganda campaign? Is it a vast right wing conspiracy? Is it funded by Haliburton? Does it involve the falsifying of international intelligence to justify a war, or the controlled demolition of World Trade Center building number seven so it can be blamed on islamo faschists? No my friend...It is funded by corporate coal and involves the assault on our most valuable, impressionable, and innocent natural resousces...our children and our environment. As a result of the propaganda provided through Thomas the Tank Engine our future leaders will have an unconscious desire to return to eeevil coal as an energy source. The facts...

1. Thomas and all his comrades need coal to run...worse, it is the very life-blood of the lovable Thomas.
2. The character Deisel has been portrayed as both lazy and mean even though deisel engines run like tops (albeit noisy tops) and get high miles per gallon.
3. Delivering coal is consistently portrayed as the most important job on the island.
4. No coal = chaos aka "confusion and delay".

I think the facts speak for themselves. Say no to coal and environmental homocide. Turn off Thomas. T.O.T. T.O.T. T.O.T.! mmmmm tater tots.

Good night and G.B.A....er I mean God Bless America
Name withheld to avoid death threats from corporate coal.

It's that time of year again.

When hurricane predictions lead the news? Nope. When we all complain about the humidity? Nope. When their is unrest in the middle east...again? Well yes but I'm not talking about that this week.

Of course I'm talking about the time of year when local high schools conduct their graduation ceremonies. I have developed quite a pessimistic attitude related to these festivities. I was invited to my nieces ceremony last Thursday evening. I entered the stadium prepared to surrender 3 hours of my life to gallons of sweat, annoying cat calls "Woohoo! Johnny!", and speeches conducted by people you never new existed let alone wanted to hear speak for 15 minute...EACH.

As I perused the program for the evening I immediately assessed the torture I was about to endure. Would I hear from the school board secretary? Would I hear from the class President, VP and Secretary ProTem? Surprisingly...no. There appeared to be a short list of speakers. I would not be deterred from my bitterness and pessimism so as the ceremonies began I whipped out my cell phone to time the speeches. While they were few in number surely they would rob me of at least 15 minutes each.

Again I was...disappointed? The speeches were no more than 7 minutes. While they weren't captivating they were minimally invasive. As the ceremony wound down I checked the ticker...1 hour and 30 minutes. Hurray I had escaped with an extra 90 minutes to spend how I chose. So I promptly left the ceremony to use my time to expand my horizons, climb every mountain...ford every stream...follow every byway til I found my dream, er, I ate a mountain of ice cream covered in a stream of hot fudge to expand my waist line.

Politically Correct Patriot

The following was an email that was sent out to everyone at my workplace. What stands out to you?

Good morning to everyone. I've never really done something like this before & I hope my comments do not offend anyone. I usually only address the educational staff but this year I felt compelled to do more. As everyone knows, Memorial Day will soon be upon us and I continue to think (as the years go by) that more and more people tend to forget about the true meaning of this holiday. Thoughts often lean more toward picnics, Bar B Q's, the pool, or even vacation plans. Many years ago, I made a commitment, especially to my buddies whose names are now on a wall in DC that I would never forget them or let this particular holiday go by without giving honor and respect to the service men & women who have served our great country and are serving now. To my three closest friends, I will truly never understand why you are there & I made it back. Perhaps, it is so I can send a message such as this. Memorial Day is more than just a day off of work, it's a time to reflect on what we have as individuals and as a country. Again, I hope I have not offended anyone. This message comes from my heart and nothing more. Name omitted for confidentiality.

How have we come to a place in our society where a person can risk his life for his country and he feels he has to appologize TWICE for bringing it up?

Anyone who's offended by this man's comments should keep it to themselves and this man should never have to appologize for honoring our fallen heroes and more importantly his fallen friends...UGH!!!

Helplessness...

...is that feeling you get when things are completely out of your control. I'm a therapist and sometimes I get a dose of reality. I just can't help some people. Today was one of those days. So much of therapeutic success is dependent on what the kid is willing to do it's scary. This kid I was working with had almost no concern for himself and less for others....really sad situation.

I guess it's a chicken and egg argument...Do you have to care for yourself before you can care for others or does your care for others make you care more for yourself? I believe that when we put others first our problems shrink and therefore they have less of a negative impact on our lives. If we get caught up in our own pity party it's all over.