SAME OLE…SAME OLE

It’s been some time since my last posting. The reason is simple. There’s hasn’t been anything new in politics. To find humor in any of it is simply kicking a dead horse. The liberals are relying on rumor and innuendo to try to get Trump to throw in the towel. They do nothing else. The GOP is chasing its tail and getting nothing done. Hurricanes and wildfires aren’t funny.

Ho hum…..

PROTESTS DON’T WORK

Group protests really became the vogue during the Viet Nam conflict. Some former hippies might think these gatherings were the reason the U.S. left that country, but that isn’t the fact. The reason we left was because the war was prosecuted in an unwinnable way. Add to that the growing unpopularity of the “police action” at the ballot box. The protests were (as they always are) a form of communal  masturbation.

While I could cite countless other protests which did nothing, let me jump to the more recent Black Lives Matters protests. In the process of supposedly displaying anger at the number of officer involved shootings of African American males, the result has been a heightened defensive posture among the police…and for good reason. It is true officers in many jurisdictions are wearing body cameras now . That has had a positive effect as fewer logical people want to be recorded behaving poorly. Sadly, not all people are logical. Many are driven by the frenzy of a protest to be unconcerned about consequences. So, these protests are not only pointless, they are mostly counterproductive.

I’m really tired of all this protesting and was considering launching a social media call to like minded folks to protest all this protesting. I dropped the idea when I realized it, too, wouldn’t do a damned bit of good.

THE NUTTY PROFESSOR.

According to The Washington Post, University of Kansas professor Kevin Willmott recently wore a “bulletproof vest” into his classroom to protest a 2013 state law allowing concealed weapons permit holders to carry their weapons on college and university campuses.

He said there was an “audible hush” as he entered the room. “One of the things I told them was, ‘You try to ignore that I’m wearing a bulletproof vest, and I’ll try to ignore that you could be packing a .44 Magnum'”.

I wonder how long Kevin thinks the list of private citizens with concealed carry permits being convicted of gun violence actually is.

Willmott must believe that if the law in question did not exist, no students could carry on campus. He must think students intent upon doing harm simply could not break the law and carry their gun onto the campus anyway. Right? Well,  It seems kindly professor Willmott is an idiot.

Willmott is a professor of film and media studies (there’s a surprise) and I assume he has some type of degree indicating he is competent to teach these fantastical things. Logic, on the other hand, appears to be alien to his realm of expertise.

If, someday, a disgruntled, “non-permit carrying” student does the impossible and pulls a handgun out of his waistband in class, I wonder if  this arrogant and cowardly douche nozzle would wish there was a permit holding, armed student there to mitigate the threat.

Note to Professor Willmott: Trade your bulletproof vest for a pair of Depends.

 

DON’T BOTHER.

I watch cable news because I disagree with so much of the hilarious bilge offered by all of them.  I may be among a minority of viewers.

However, for the majority, I think cable news stations do their regular audiences a disservice by inviting and interviewing people who mostly share the same political views as the stations and the hosts. Very little is ever learned by trading ideas with someone who believes the same as you do. Don’t you agree?

If you do, then I’ve just succeeded in wasting your time all by myself and without the help of a panel of bloviating “experts”.

TALENT VS. ART.

I caught another installment of “Full Frontal with Samantha Bee” last night. For those of you who are unfamiliar with this “comedy” TV show, Canadian/American  actress/political commentator, Samantha Bee, hosts a weekly Trump/GOP bashing fest. She is the Democrats’ answer to Rush Limbaugh.

Ms. Bee began her program with nine writers: Jo Miller, Miles Kahn, Pat Cassels, Ashley Black, Melinda Taub, Joe Grossman, Jason Reich, Mathan Erhardt and Samantha (herself). These folks had previously worked for “The Daily Show”, “The Late Show with David Letterman”, “College Humor”, The Onion” , etc.

Mr. Limbaugh employs an executive producer, an announcer, people to research subjects,  a broadcast engineer, call screeners and a transcriber. No writers.

I thought Rush had the easiest job in the world when he took Obama to task. I was wrong. Publicly noting the foibles of Hillary, during her bid for the Whitehouse, was much easier still.

Samantha’s job is to poke fun at “The Donald”. What could be easier than that?

The differences between these two entertainers and their products are that one of them has talent and can think on his feet. The other needs a writing staff. One is clever and verbally civil. The other relies on the ineffective shock of four letter words as she sarcastically whines and complains. One demands the audience to think. The other offers to think for the audience.

One offers controversy via a pompous,  partisan, political perspective. The other is art.

Artist, Andre Serrano, won the Southeastern Center for Contemporary Arts “Awards in the Visual Arts” competition, sponsored in part by the National Endowment for the Arts, for a photograph he took displaying a crucifix submerged in a plastic bottle of his urine. This is the level of cleverness and talent offered on “Full Frontal with Samantha Bee” (which has been nominated for an Emmy). Bottoms up!

THE SCHOOL BUS.

Imagine a school bus driver (Mr. D) had been elected recently by the children. He wasn’t everyone’s first choice, but he got the job anyway.

Now imagine some of the children don’t like the different road Mr. D. is speeding along to drive the boys and girls home from school, so they climb over seats and rush down the aisle to try to yank him out of the driver’s seat. They want to drive the bus to their house first. They are diverting Mr. D.’s attention from keeping his eyes on the road as he pushes them away and yells at them. This is endangers everyone. They don’t understand that they will be late for dinner if their bodies end up in the morgue. Kids are stupid that way.

Today’s driver is different from the last one. That guy took the inner city route (never climbing out of first gear). He used to pick up lots of kids who weren’t enrolled at the school. The bus had forty seats, but sometimes there were sixty kids on-board (and an unknown number on the roof). The bus ended up tagged with graffiti (the driver considered it to be art), had three tires shot out and some of the regular kids were robbed of their lunch money and sneakers (the driver didn’t consider it robbery. He thought it was a leveling of the playing field through redistribution of wealth). This was the driver’s ideology, but if there was anyone who tried to yank him from his seat, that person was told to sit down and shut up. They did. As many expected, the bus ended up stuck in a ditch, facing the wrong way.

The above was and is the United States as it is pushed by the liberal media, liberal professors and Hollywood to believe cooperative consensus if peacefully combined with constructive criticism toward success,  is a bad or useless modus operandi, (and this relates well beyond any administration into many areas of socio-cultural interaction). They can’t envision the bus crashing due to their acting out. This is a bit short sighted. It is reactionary. Like the liberal firefighter playing his hose on the flame while the conservative firefighter plays his on what’s burning. And,\just like the deniers of “human caused” global warming on the right side of the aisle, what lies beyond the tips of their noses, they think does not exist. But, as to the current administration:

ANNOUNCEMENT! : WILL THOSE WHO VOTED FOR MS. H. AND MR. B., PLEASE RETURN TO YOUR SEATS. You will have the opportunity to vote for another driver next semester.

“YOU’RE FIRED vs. FIRE ONE!”

Kim has launched a second ICBM. Scientists in North Korea as well as Japan, South Korea the U.S. and elsewhere agree it would have had the capability of reaching Los Angeles, Denver and Chicago.

It was believed North Korea was at least two years away from achieving such a thing. It is also something Donald Trump said he would not allow to occur. Scientists now say Kim won’t be able to mount a nuclear warhead on this vehicle until 2018. Really? Continue reading “YOU’RE FIRED vs. FIRE ONE!”

NEEDLESS DEATHS OF MILLIONS.

I think we are in for some terrible and horrendously tragic news in a very short while.

North Korea’s president Kim Jong-un has just crossed the line, putting U.S. president Donald Trump between a rock and a hard place with the D.P.R.K.’s  launch of the new Hwasong-14 ICBM. The new missile’s potential range was judged at 4100 linear miles, although it traveled only 600 linear miles in a high arch with an apex of over 1740 miles above the earth. Achieving such an altitude is the milestone allowing North Korea to launch sub-orbital and orbital  weapons capable of delivering thermonuclear payloads anywhere in the world in the near future.

North Korea believes this ability will neutralize its perceived threats by the U.S. and others to Kim’s rule. Sadly, the opposite is true.

The general population of North Korea knows little or nothing of the workings outside its own borders. Citizens have been systematically isolated and indoctrinated to believe Kim is their sole provider and cherish him as one would a deity. This farce has gone on for generations, beginning with his grandfather (Kim II-sung) and then his father (Kim Jong-il)and now Kim Jong-un himself. Their beliefs are ironclad. There is no apparent hope of internal pressure to change Kim’s path and to, instead, allow him to survive and to save the lives of countless innocent men, women and children. If Kim only realized his brain-washed public and military would provide far more than enough internal defense from invasion for his regime, he might not be creating doom through his nuclear program and threatening rantings of blatherskite.

There are three superpowers (cops) on the planet. Kim envisions his nation as the forth. This is so far from rational, any debate is pointless. Thus, Russia, China and the U.S. must come to a meeting of the minds about how to quash Kim’s ambitions.  Unfortunately, both China and Russia are pushing for de-escalation through the same avenue of negotiations which have proven not only useless, but, actually counterproductive, in the past. The U.S. has requested a meeting of the 15 member U.N. Security Council to hopefully convene on Wednesday in an effort to avoid the inevitable. All prior meetings on this issue have also proven useless.

Kim Jong-un is like a child with a live grenade. The world has told him to put the pin back in, put it down on the ground and step back, but he’s too  proud of his “grown-up toy” and insists upon walking into a crowded room (the world) to show it off to everyone. Nobody wants to hurt the kid and the cops protecting the room don’t want to shoot the little guy, but he refuses to obey or listen to reason. Two of the three cops won’t act. What are the options? That is Trump’s dilemma.

I believe Trump will act. I’m convinced he will think he must act. The U.S. and North Korea have technically been at war since the 1950s. This war will now be concluded one way or another. History will either liken Trump to Truman or to Hitler, depending upon the number of innocent lives lost in the process. The questions are: What will Trump do? How will it play out?

The complexity of the issues involved bring to mind several scenarios, each worse than the prior.

I will address these imagined scenarios beginning with my next blog-post.

 

NOW!

My eight year old grandson is a bright fellow. Sometimes too bright for me. We often discuss theoretical and ethereal subjects. When he visited today, we discussed the concept of “infinity”, again.

I don’t claim my thoughts on such subjects are original and haven’t been broached centuries ago. Still, these subjects are interesting and fun to attempt to understand.

As a new way of trying to understand “infinity”, I posed the idea of “now”, as it pertains to the concept of linear time. I explained my thought that the word “now” has no real meaning, because, unless time ways able to stand still, everything is either in the past or in the future.

Is “now” a minute long? A second long? What portion of a second long would “now” be? Perhaps some fraction of that amount of time? Since it can’t ever be divided down to any finite amount of time, I told my grandson that “now” fit the concept of “infinity”.

Just after we finished our conversation and I told him to find his shoes because his dad was due to arrive at any moment to take him home. He asked when Dad would arrive. I told him, “Very soon”. He asked when he should put his shoes on. I answered, “Now!” “You’re kidding, Pop-pop. Right?”