I read this article today and just LOVED it. Let me retype that.
L-O-V-E-D this article.
Gallup Poll Finds: Republicans and Mental Health go together
Here is a quote from the conclusion/discussion at the end of the article. I had to frame this somewhere. This blog became the 'where'.
"Correlation is no proof of causation, of course. The reason the relationship exists between being a Republican and more positive mental health is unknown, and one cannot say whether something about being a Republican causes a person to be more mentally healthy, or whether something about being mentally healthy causes a person to choose to become a Republican (or whether some third variable is responsible for causing both to be parallel)."
Have a beautiful day.
Friday, November 30, 2007
Wednesday, November 14, 2007
Capitalism and Free Markets.
I was recently sent a fantastic video clip of Milton Friedman explaining capitalism and free markets. It is spectacular http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RWsx1X8PV_A.
I then made a colossal mistake. I scrolled down. There was the comment section. Filled mostly with good comments (after all, how many people who don't like capitalism or this charming small giant in economics would bother watching this? Phil Donahue gets his (surprisingly ugly) head handed to him). But there was one person who had posted claiming Friedman had been proven wrong on everything, and who said (full quote lifted) "but i don't want business to even exist, i want everything in public ownership".
This was too juicy to pass up. I spent the next 1/2 hour putting together a response from my heart, only to find there is a 500character limit for posting on YouTube. Probably wise of them. Or the comment sections would outweigh the storage of the videos. Anyway, not to be deterred, I tried to post it in parts. I obviously don't understand the vagueries of posting on YouTube. After all, I'm only a webmaster with my own dedicated server and a bloggist here.
Still not to be deterred (too close to "détente" for my taste) I decided to post it here. So. Here it is. Unedited. But then, unposted on YouTube also, so perhaps I should have edited it.
I find it difficult to believe bigmac's links are working properly. He could not have been watching the same video clip. But then again he certainly can't be right anyway, because he claims Milton Friedman was proven wrong on everything. The whole middle of this clip appears to have escaped detection (you know, you're supposed to watch the whole thing...) Friedman is completely correct when he says the only times in history where people have escaped true poverty (not the two-car, four-television, 300lb cable-watching couch potato poverty we have here) is when there is capitalism and free trade. It is not called "equal distribution of wealth" it is called capitalism and free market economy.
Your premise is completely and totally flawed and it is proven by every example in history: if you vote in politicians who are going to redistribute wealth to you, you are going to get what they want to give you, not what your dreamy vision expects. Only the privileged few (chosen by the politicians) are going to have "wealth" and that wealth is going to be in the style of the former USSR where one car, an actual free-standing house, and enough food to eat was considered "aristocracy". How do I know this? My best friend as I was growing up was from the USSR where he lived in "upscale" housing because his father had a highly respected job. They shared a floor of a ten-story building where the elevator never worked (!) with seven other families and ONE BATHROOM for the whole hall. Apparently, he said, people drilled holes in the bathroom in order to see who was taking so long. Again, this was "upscale".
Perhaps the impression that communism (or, if you prefer, call it socialism - though the arguments here seem to be for actual communism) is going to be some "everyone lives a six-figure lifestyle" solution comes from our current examples of communism? Perhaps it comes from the high standard of living enjoyed by our current welfare recipients?
Even China has moved towards capitalism and free trade. They're giving up the only part of communism that is apparently being espoused by some on this thread.
Taking businesses out of private hands and putting them in the "public trust" has the very unfortunate (and very foreseeable) effect of putting someone else in charge of what goods and services you are allowed to have. Government officials, based on their personal self interests (not the self interests of those who elected them) decide what services you may have, what foods and drinks you may consume, what pastimes you may enjoy, what habitations you may use, and what the punishments are for going against their will. In a free market, if enough people want something, it is made available. How much people want it - what else they are willing to sacrifice for it - determines how much that something will cost.
It is an illusion that you will be able to have everything you want if all things are publicly owned. Look where it is tried: you have quotas and lines. The government decides only so many rolls of toilet paper are going to be made, and therefore how many you are allowed to have. If you use your roll up for the week, you are ".... out of luck" so to speak. You can't get a bunch in advance, you can get only what is given out on the day it is given.
The plea to have business removed form society can only come from those who imagine themselves able to lounge around in hedonism if only the government ran everything.
They had better awaken and look around the world: as was mentioned in the beginning of the video, there are a lot of have-nots out there. That's what you get when there is no capitalism.
Yes, capitalism and free market economies produce some insanely wealthy people. It also produces a "poverty line" which has to be measured against a national average because there is no comparison to real poverty found in non-capitalist societies.
It is NOT in your best interest to vote for politicians who want to redistribute wealth. They will (as is proven throughout history and current events) CAUSE - YOUR poverty.
So, as you can see, my post was a little over the 500 character limit. Sorry about that.
I then made a colossal mistake. I scrolled down. There was the comment section. Filled mostly with good comments (after all, how many people who don't like capitalism or this charming small giant in economics would bother watching this? Phil Donahue gets his (surprisingly ugly) head handed to him). But there was one person who had posted claiming Friedman had been proven wrong on everything, and who said (full quote lifted) "but i don't want business to even exist, i want everything in public ownership".
This was too juicy to pass up. I spent the next 1/2 hour putting together a response from my heart, only to find there is a 500character limit for posting on YouTube. Probably wise of them. Or the comment sections would outweigh the storage of the videos. Anyway, not to be deterred, I tried to post it in parts. I obviously don't understand the vagueries of posting on YouTube. After all, I'm only a webmaster with my own dedicated server and a bloggist here.
Still not to be deterred (too close to "détente" for my taste) I decided to post it here. So. Here it is. Unedited. But then, unposted on YouTube also, so perhaps I should have edited it.
--==<< >>==--
I find it difficult to believe bigmac's links are working properly. He could not have been watching the same video clip. But then again he certainly can't be right anyway, because he claims Milton Friedman was proven wrong on everything. The whole middle of this clip appears to have escaped detection (you know, you're supposed to watch the whole thing...) Friedman is completely correct when he says the only times in history where people have escaped true poverty (not the two-car, four-television, 300lb cable-watching couch potato poverty we have here) is when there is capitalism and free trade. It is not called "equal distribution of wealth" it is called capitalism and free market economy.
Your premise is completely and totally flawed and it is proven by every example in history: if you vote in politicians who are going to redistribute wealth to you, you are going to get what they want to give you, not what your dreamy vision expects. Only the privileged few (chosen by the politicians) are going to have "wealth" and that wealth is going to be in the style of the former USSR where one car, an actual free-standing house, and enough food to eat was considered "aristocracy". How do I know this? My best friend as I was growing up was from the USSR where he lived in "upscale" housing because his father had a highly respected job. They shared a floor of a ten-story building where the elevator never worked (!) with seven other families and ONE BATHROOM for the whole hall. Apparently, he said, people drilled holes in the bathroom in order to see who was taking so long. Again, this was "upscale".
Perhaps the impression that communism (or, if you prefer, call it socialism - though the arguments here seem to be for actual communism) is going to be some "everyone lives a six-figure lifestyle" solution comes from our current examples of communism? Perhaps it comes from the high standard of living enjoyed by our current welfare recipients?
Even China has moved towards capitalism and free trade. They're giving up the only part of communism that is apparently being espoused by some on this thread.
Taking businesses out of private hands and putting them in the "public trust" has the very unfortunate (and very foreseeable) effect of putting someone else in charge of what goods and services you are allowed to have. Government officials, based on their personal self interests (not the self interests of those who elected them) decide what services you may have, what foods and drinks you may consume, what pastimes you may enjoy, what habitations you may use, and what the punishments are for going against their will. In a free market, if enough people want something, it is made available. How much people want it - what else they are willing to sacrifice for it - determines how much that something will cost.
It is an illusion that you will be able to have everything you want if all things are publicly owned. Look where it is tried: you have quotas and lines. The government decides only so many rolls of toilet paper are going to be made, and therefore how many you are allowed to have. If you use your roll up for the week, you are ".... out of luck" so to speak. You can't get a bunch in advance, you can get only what is given out on the day it is given.
The plea to have business removed form society can only come from those who imagine themselves able to lounge around in hedonism if only the government ran everything.
They had better awaken and look around the world: as was mentioned in the beginning of the video, there are a lot of have-nots out there. That's what you get when there is no capitalism.
Yes, capitalism and free market economies produce some insanely wealthy people. It also produces a "poverty line" which has to be measured against a national average because there is no comparison to real poverty found in non-capitalist societies.
It is NOT in your best interest to vote for politicians who want to redistribute wealth. They will (as is proven throughout history and current events) CAUSE - YOUR poverty.
--==<< >>==--
So, as you can see, my post was a little over the 500 character limit. Sorry about that.
Monday, November 05, 2007
Lightening Up.
Okay. I admit it. I need to lighten up.
Not politically (I need to heavy down some more there) but physically. I was just joking (well, partly) with my family and friends, and here are some of the highlights:
A lot of us have tried low-carbohydrate diets, and most of us who have, had great results at one point or another. I lost 45 lbs and got into some of the best shape of my life the first time I tried the Atkins diet. I was leaner, more energetic, fit into all my old clothes, enjoyed the food, had a better attitude, absolutely everything. My health was phenomenal. But, as with almost everyone I've talked to who had "done that diet" or one like it, we stuck with it for a long time, had fabulous results, and then at one point (usually a major holiday) we just reverted (fast or slow) to old eating habits. For most of us, the 'bad' results happened slowly. We stayed slim for a while, and we had changed enough to drop certain carb-heavy foods (for example, sugary drinks almost never make a comeback). Instead of with many diets, where you finish the diet and bounce back to your old weight and then surpass it, most of us seemed to gain the weight back slowly, and often were less heavy than originally, but now stunned and disappointed because we knew we could take and keep it of.
That's right. The ultimate problem with the Atkins or low-carb diet is that you have proven to yourself you're in control. You can lose the weight, you can keep it off, and it's only your big, fat, greedy, oversized mouth that does you in. I say you. I mean me.
I know that, if I can stick with the diet again, honestly and seriously, I can lose the weight and fast. Unfortunately, it is never as easy as the first time. I have several interlaced theories why: First and foremost, we aren't doing it seriously and honestly. We're doing it half-assed (which, ironically, provides for a full-sized ass). We know all the little secrets for the so-called "maintenance" phase, which is after the diet when you do have a smattering of carbs here and there. Only we have more than a smattering, we have confused the maintenance phase with the regain-the-weight phase we enjoyed so much after we actually (and usually unknowingly) stopped doing the diet right. This "more than a smattering" for most of us takes the form of (or the shape of, if you're the other Wonder Twin, or both form of and shape of if you're the size of two people) little semi-or-full carb snacks that, on their own, would not destroy even a day's worth of carb count. After all, for me (and most, I believe) we can have well over 30 grams of carbs a day and still keep the weight off. You can eat a nice serving of chips, or a bowl of actual ice cream, of have a delicious "adult" beverage, or two slices of pizza. The problem is like a poorly written formula that gives the wrong results we go from "or" to "and". Our 30 gram day goes to 300. Then, we decide that today is the "one day" off of the diet this month, and we have a bowl of Fettuccine Alfredo with garlic-bread, chased down with the ice-cream version of Mississippi Mud Pie, and for a treat (as if that wasn't enough) a nightcap-tumbler of Kahlua & Cream (the cream, of course, is on the diet, so it makes everything else okay, right? Our 300 gram day goes to 1200. Then we repeat the process, if not tomorrow, then worse, the day after tomorrow, for the day between we have a lot of high-fat, low-carb foods that would have comprised a great day for the diet, but now is merely fodder for the set of four full-sized tractor spare tires around our waist because the carbs on either side of being "good" won't let us metabolize the fat.
But, we tell ourselves, at least we got a lot of protein.
Small consolation when your ass is the size of Wisconsin. (No offense is meant to Wisconsin, I have never been there. I would have said Arkansas, but that would have been intentional and personal).
So, most of us reason, we will exercise. We could do with a little buffing up, some nice pectorals, some rounded biceps, some washboard abs. Now, most of us forget a couple things here, namely that it takes many more years to exercise yourself into shape than to diet yourself into shape. Bodybuilders don't become Mr. Universe overnight. It takes decades. Decades of going to the gym every day for more than a 30-minute "I feel better about myself but accomplished almost nothing" workouts. Decades of going to the gym and burning valuable eating time. Since you can't edge out the other responsibilities in your life (work, kids, whatever else you must do) you have to take away personal time. This is time that could have been put to better use watching your favorite television shows, playing mindless computer games, eating your fifth three-course meal that evening, stuffing ultra-cheese popcorn in your mouth, polishing off that wasted extra piece of cake in the freezer, and washing it all down the with gallon of milk that was just opened close enough to its freshness date that you don't want it to go to waste.
Here's the worst irony for me: every time I exercise, because I'm not going to sacrifice hours of my time to exercise (I simply don't like it enough until it gets really expensive as in playing ice hockey on a team) I exercise about 30 to 45 minutes a day. And I gain weight! Not just that lame excuse of "muscle weighs more than fat" which is meant to comfort people who are losing ground despite trying harder but actual around-the-middle-jiggle weight that makes my attempts to exercise look absolutely comical (when it's not so sad you cry). I mean, the fatty-fat-fatso jiggling and bouncing on the dance-mats or rippling and lapping like a kiddie-pool while working the free weights kind of sad comedy.
It was pointed out to me (and I had actually been doing research about this about 10 years ago) that the problem is our bodies are not designed with modern civilization in mind. We have to remember that for 50,000 or more years we were designed to survive on the "feast and famine" concept. There was food to go around, but it was a heck of a lot more savvy about its impending fate. Around my house the deer get aggressive if you don't feed them enough, and will actually stand around your car waiting for you in the morning. Not to mention with greenhouse farming (which is often more 'organic' than traditional farming, by the way) we have fresh fruit and produce year-round. On top of that we know how to preserve food in cans and freezers. There is no famine! It is feast, feast, feast! But while our minds know this, our bodies do not.
The body is convinced that The Big Famine is coming. After all, that's the only reason we could be eating this much, right? It had better store every morsel and scrap of processable fat (carbohydrates, as I understand it, are translated into gooey body-fats by insulin) for the time when the food runs out. We just might, it reasons, live through the famine if we're fat enough. That is, after all, why we don't stay hungry after two or three days of no food. The body realizes The Famine has begun and starts happily consuming all the fats it was smart enough to store up.
Of course, there are other problems with fasting, or intentional starvation. Largely, we still don't get enough exercise (which would have been hunting the next wildebeest about 7000 years ago, or farming land diligently for food that won't show up for weeks) and often we don't pay attention to when we should really be stopping. Our body isn't designed to live off our own fat forever. Even during "famine" it was used to having berries or grasses or something to vary up the steady flow of internal fats. So we end up with heart murmurs (I can't help it - I picture a strange muppet sketch where the heart is grumbling in some mauve cave), we pass out, we skate perilously close to death... and that's only if you can actually convince yourself to fast. (For more than ten minutes, people). I only know one person who has done that and she said risking death wasn't worth it. Fat and alive beats skinny and dead - or even hospitalized and possibly permanently broken.
Sorry, there's no great ending to this post that solves some major political question if only everyone in the world would agree with me and do it my way. I think I am going to keep exercising in the "almost helpful" area and eating "almost low-carbohydrate" days. The fact is that I can do everything I want and while I'm noticeably overweight, I'm not as spectacular an example of rotund as I sometimes make myself out to be. I think I'm just going to keep hanging out in public, after all there are so many really fat people out there maybe I will look skinny by comparison.
So, thank that fat person next time you see them. They're doing you a public service.
Not politically (I need to heavy down some more there) but physically. I was just joking (well, partly) with my family and friends, and here are some of the highlights:
A lot of us have tried low-carbohydrate diets, and most of us who have, had great results at one point or another. I lost 45 lbs and got into some of the best shape of my life the first time I tried the Atkins diet. I was leaner, more energetic, fit into all my old clothes, enjoyed the food, had a better attitude, absolutely everything. My health was phenomenal. But, as with almost everyone I've talked to who had "done that diet" or one like it, we stuck with it for a long time, had fabulous results, and then at one point (usually a major holiday) we just reverted (fast or slow) to old eating habits. For most of us, the 'bad' results happened slowly. We stayed slim for a while, and we had changed enough to drop certain carb-heavy foods (for example, sugary drinks almost never make a comeback). Instead of with many diets, where you finish the diet and bounce back to your old weight and then surpass it, most of us seemed to gain the weight back slowly, and often were less heavy than originally, but now stunned and disappointed because we knew we could take and keep it of.
That's right. The ultimate problem with the Atkins or low-carb diet is that you have proven to yourself you're in control. You can lose the weight, you can keep it off, and it's only your big, fat, greedy, oversized mouth that does you in. I say you. I mean me.
I know that, if I can stick with the diet again, honestly and seriously, I can lose the weight and fast. Unfortunately, it is never as easy as the first time. I have several interlaced theories why: First and foremost, we aren't doing it seriously and honestly. We're doing it half-assed (which, ironically, provides for a full-sized ass). We know all the little secrets for the so-called "maintenance" phase, which is after the diet when you do have a smattering of carbs here and there. Only we have more than a smattering, we have confused the maintenance phase with the regain-the-weight phase we enjoyed so much after we actually (and usually unknowingly) stopped doing the diet right. This "more than a smattering" for most of us takes the form of (or the shape of, if you're the other Wonder Twin, or both form of and shape of if you're the size of two people) little semi-or-full carb snacks that, on their own, would not destroy even a day's worth of carb count. After all, for me (and most, I believe) we can have well over 30 grams of carbs a day and still keep the weight off. You can eat a nice serving of chips, or a bowl of actual ice cream, of have a delicious "adult" beverage, or two slices of pizza. The problem is like a poorly written formula that gives the wrong results we go from "or" to "and". Our 30 gram day goes to 300. Then, we decide that today is the "one day" off of the diet this month, and we have a bowl of Fettuccine Alfredo with garlic-bread, chased down with the ice-cream version of Mississippi Mud Pie, and for a treat (as if that wasn't enough) a nightcap-tumbler of Kahlua & Cream (the cream, of course, is on the diet, so it makes everything else okay, right? Our 300 gram day goes to 1200. Then we repeat the process, if not tomorrow, then worse, the day after tomorrow, for the day between we have a lot of high-fat, low-carb foods that would have comprised a great day for the diet, but now is merely fodder for the set of four full-sized tractor spare tires around our waist because the carbs on either side of being "good" won't let us metabolize the fat.
But, we tell ourselves, at least we got a lot of protein.
Small consolation when your ass is the size of Wisconsin. (No offense is meant to Wisconsin, I have never been there. I would have said Arkansas, but that would have been intentional and personal).
So, most of us reason, we will exercise. We could do with a little buffing up, some nice pectorals, some rounded biceps, some washboard abs. Now, most of us forget a couple things here, namely that it takes many more years to exercise yourself into shape than to diet yourself into shape. Bodybuilders don't become Mr. Universe overnight. It takes decades. Decades of going to the gym every day for more than a 30-minute "I feel better about myself but accomplished almost nothing" workouts. Decades of going to the gym and burning valuable eating time. Since you can't edge out the other responsibilities in your life (work, kids, whatever else you must do) you have to take away personal time. This is time that could have been put to better use watching your favorite television shows, playing mindless computer games, eating your fifth three-course meal that evening, stuffing ultra-cheese popcorn in your mouth, polishing off that wasted extra piece of cake in the freezer, and washing it all down the with gallon of milk that was just opened close enough to its freshness date that you don't want it to go to waste.
Here's the worst irony for me: every time I exercise, because I'm not going to sacrifice hours of my time to exercise (I simply don't like it enough until it gets really expensive as in playing ice hockey on a team) I exercise about 30 to 45 minutes a day. And I gain weight! Not just that lame excuse of "muscle weighs more than fat" which is meant to comfort people who are losing ground despite trying harder but actual around-the-middle-jiggle weight that makes my attempts to exercise look absolutely comical (when it's not so sad you cry). I mean, the fatty-fat-fatso jiggling and bouncing on the dance-mats or rippling and lapping like a kiddie-pool while working the free weights kind of sad comedy.
It was pointed out to me (and I had actually been doing research about this about 10 years ago) that the problem is our bodies are not designed with modern civilization in mind. We have to remember that for 50,000 or more years we were designed to survive on the "feast and famine" concept. There was food to go around, but it was a heck of a lot more savvy about its impending fate. Around my house the deer get aggressive if you don't feed them enough, and will actually stand around your car waiting for you in the morning. Not to mention with greenhouse farming (which is often more 'organic' than traditional farming, by the way) we have fresh fruit and produce year-round. On top of that we know how to preserve food in cans and freezers. There is no famine! It is feast, feast, feast! But while our minds know this, our bodies do not.
The body is convinced that The Big Famine is coming. After all, that's the only reason we could be eating this much, right? It had better store every morsel and scrap of processable fat (carbohydrates, as I understand it, are translated into gooey body-fats by insulin) for the time when the food runs out. We just might, it reasons, live through the famine if we're fat enough. That is, after all, why we don't stay hungry after two or three days of no food. The body realizes The Famine has begun and starts happily consuming all the fats it was smart enough to store up.
Of course, there are other problems with fasting, or intentional starvation. Largely, we still don't get enough exercise (which would have been hunting the next wildebeest about 7000 years ago, or farming land diligently for food that won't show up for weeks) and often we don't pay attention to when we should really be stopping. Our body isn't designed to live off our own fat forever. Even during "famine" it was used to having berries or grasses or something to vary up the steady flow of internal fats. So we end up with heart murmurs (I can't help it - I picture a strange muppet sketch where the heart is grumbling in some mauve cave), we pass out, we skate perilously close to death... and that's only if you can actually convince yourself to fast. (For more than ten minutes, people). I only know one person who has done that and she said risking death wasn't worth it. Fat and alive beats skinny and dead - or even hospitalized and possibly permanently broken.
Sorry, there's no great ending to this post that solves some major political question if only everyone in the world would agree with me and do it my way. I think I am going to keep exercising in the "almost helpful" area and eating "almost low-carbohydrate" days. The fact is that I can do everything I want and while I'm noticeably overweight, I'm not as spectacular an example of rotund as I sometimes make myself out to be. I think I'm just going to keep hanging out in public, after all there are so many really fat people out there maybe I will look skinny by comparison.
So, thank that fat person next time you see them. They're doing you a public service.
Saturday, October 27, 2007
It's FICTION, people.
JK Rowling announced Dumbledore is gay. http://www.newsweek.com/id/50787
Sigh. I really wish I could go with my own reaction: "Who the hell cares?" but I have been asked about it, and quite frankly it is a very interesting issue to kick around, when you strip away the layers.
I will start with (and probably come back to - frequently) the bottom line. This is a work of fiction. The characters, even if they were based on real people, are fictional. They are made up. They are the fabrications of an author and do not exist. Their patterns of behavior, their personalities, their appearance, their actions, everything about them is made up. What this means is that you can't make inferences or extrapolations about other people because of these fictional people.
Look, how many times have you played the game with your friends of "who are you in this movie" or this "series" of movies? How many times have you come up with a perfect match - a character you didn't have to change in any way? One that was everything positive (and negative) about you without having some quality that wasn't part of you or that you had to overlook? How often has everyone who known you agreed with your selection? Typically it goes like this: you choose someone you feel is best associated with yourself. Others not only refuse to pick that person, they choose someone else who, to their mind is either better suited or a funnier association, and to your mind is nothing short of offensive.
For me there are several, unfortunately sad, issues here. The saddest is that, from what I can gather, gays and gay activists (at least the ones who bother to write articles or have the luck to have a voice in the media) are thrilled with this revelation. I can understand why they might feel that way - Dumbledore is a lovable, powerful, likable, popular character who is solidly good. Good people like Dumbledore (meaning that anyone who doesn't like Dumbledore is probably someone you wouldn't care to know either).
Return to bottom line: Dumbledore is a fictional character. Assumptions about reality based on Dumbledore is just as fictional. Bluntly: you cannot assume that all gay people are like Dumbledore simply because an author in danger of losing a fraction of the intensity of her limelight has announced he is gay. Some gay people (just like some non-gay people) are probably very much like Dumbledore. How many other drivers on the road have the same car you do, or a car the same color? Are they the same kind of people you are? Do they even drive the same way you do? Do they even take care of their car the same way you do?
Further sadness: The incredible capacity for short-term, limiting thinking (yes, I believe that statement approaches oxymoron) many people have astounds me. Doesn't anyone else see that if it takes an author's announcement, after all seven books have been read, re-read, analyzed, talked through, round-tabled, and a full five of them have been released as major movies, for anyone to realize that one of the characters -- who might be argued to have as much attention and love from his fans as Harry himself (possibly more, as Harry isn't always as likable) -- is gay mean that she is saying you have to be so far "in the closet" that not even the dust-bunnies know you're in there? Isn't this actually damaging to the gay image? Didn't an author just say you have to be able to successfully hide yourself despite years and years of millions of people examining you with a microscope? True support for the gay community would have been to announce it at the beginning, or even in the books - best from his own statements and actions. Instead what we have is more hiding and deception. He has to be so thoroughly un-gay in his outward actions and appearance that the author's post-series announcement is a "shock".
Baseline sadness: In order to promote itself, or to feel good about itself, the gay community has reduced itself to trying to associate itself with fictional characters "after the fact". Due to a culture in the world wide media (traditional-entertainment and news-entertainment alike) authors and fans alike are trapped into reacting in only one way: unqualified support. Otherwise, they are labeled as homophobic bigots. She herself seems to take this action in order to feel good about herself, either by supporting a group of people she feels compelled to pity (again, a sad failure of the gay movement itself that pity is their main tool) or by throwing a sensational wrench into the works (which in itself would either be a sad statement on her literary confidence or the evidence of a dangerous megalomania). If it is the former, the gay movement had better take a good, soul-searching look at itself as it means they are doing more to ostracize and separate themselves than to integrate and be welcomed by others. If it is the latter, someone had better start popping the popcorn, Rowling is going to be quite something to watch as she implodes.
Well, to tell you the truth, I simply don't care what Rowling says about her characters. I do care what she wrote in the books, because I enjoy sharing them with my friends and trying to wrest out the neat nuggets of mystery that tied the series and the characters together across seven books. There are many other series of books out there much better at this than hers, but none of them are so widely read and cross so many reading groups. It is easy to find someone else who likes the Harry Potter series, and to talk about who you do and don't like. Unfortunately, as we stop sending in money for new books, and as the movies finish their (spectacular) run, the focus does become us instead of her or the publishers (Scholastic or Warner Brothers). In order to force themselves back upon us, they have to say or do something sensational or titillating.
The fact is that all of us, "straight or gay" alike, want to know that our way is right. For a few, the "right" way is determined internally, without reference to others and their foibles. For most, unfortunately, the only measuring stick is determined externally - usually through acceptance by others. This leads, ultimately, to enforcement. The inability to accept that our own approval is sufficient comes from insecurity, typically generated by our own doubts - that in fact perhaps we are wrong! This answer being terrifying, it becomes all too easy to lash outward, finding ways to "convince" others that our way is right. While this may start gently enough, the fact still remains that because people are different, what is right for one person is not right for another. In the end, the person who can't survive on self-approval alone must force others to approve of them. This leads to double-speak, filtered intake, and self-delusion, followed by brute force.
This cycle is bad enough when based on the truth - which in this case is "who you are". If you're gay, so be it. Be strong in yourself, present yourself as a model of gayness to the world. The bad cycle of forced acceptance would at least be based on who you really are. But to return (for the final time) to the bottom line, basing this oppressive (yes, I just implied the gay rights movement is oppressive, which is ironic for one so rooted in the concept of pitying its adherents) cycle of forced acceptance (which is not really acceptance at all) on an illusion - that of a fabricated character in a work of fantasy-based fiction - carries with it the oppressive danger an element of the pathetic.
And, if you are not careful, it also carries the seeds of your own destruction. You risk exposing an incredible foundation of desperation, causing us to wonder just how many of your other assertions are based on illusion.
Sigh. I really wish I could go with my own reaction: "Who the hell cares?" but I have been asked about it, and quite frankly it is a very interesting issue to kick around, when you strip away the layers.
I will start with (and probably come back to - frequently) the bottom line. This is a work of fiction. The characters, even if they were based on real people, are fictional. They are made up. They are the fabrications of an author and do not exist. Their patterns of behavior, their personalities, their appearance, their actions, everything about them is made up. What this means is that you can't make inferences or extrapolations about other people because of these fictional people.
Look, how many times have you played the game with your friends of "who are you in this movie" or this "series" of movies? How many times have you come up with a perfect match - a character you didn't have to change in any way? One that was everything positive (and negative) about you without having some quality that wasn't part of you or that you had to overlook? How often has everyone who known you agreed with your selection? Typically it goes like this: you choose someone you feel is best associated with yourself. Others not only refuse to pick that person, they choose someone else who, to their mind is either better suited or a funnier association, and to your mind is nothing short of offensive.
For me there are several, unfortunately sad, issues here. The saddest is that, from what I can gather, gays and gay activists (at least the ones who bother to write articles or have the luck to have a voice in the media) are thrilled with this revelation. I can understand why they might feel that way - Dumbledore is a lovable, powerful, likable, popular character who is solidly good. Good people like Dumbledore (meaning that anyone who doesn't like Dumbledore is probably someone you wouldn't care to know either).
Return to bottom line: Dumbledore is a fictional character. Assumptions about reality based on Dumbledore is just as fictional. Bluntly: you cannot assume that all gay people are like Dumbledore simply because an author in danger of losing a fraction of the intensity of her limelight has announced he is gay. Some gay people (just like some non-gay people) are probably very much like Dumbledore. How many other drivers on the road have the same car you do, or a car the same color? Are they the same kind of people you are? Do they even drive the same way you do? Do they even take care of their car the same way you do?
Further sadness: The incredible capacity for short-term, limiting thinking (yes, I believe that statement approaches oxymoron) many people have astounds me. Doesn't anyone else see that if it takes an author's announcement, after all seven books have been read, re-read, analyzed, talked through, round-tabled, and a full five of them have been released as major movies, for anyone to realize that one of the characters -- who might be argued to have as much attention and love from his fans as Harry himself (possibly more, as Harry isn't always as likable) -- is gay mean that she is saying you have to be so far "in the closet" that not even the dust-bunnies know you're in there? Isn't this actually damaging to the gay image? Didn't an author just say you have to be able to successfully hide yourself despite years and years of millions of people examining you with a microscope? True support for the gay community would have been to announce it at the beginning, or even in the books - best from his own statements and actions. Instead what we have is more hiding and deception. He has to be so thoroughly un-gay in his outward actions and appearance that the author's post-series announcement is a "shock".
Baseline sadness: In order to promote itself, or to feel good about itself, the gay community has reduced itself to trying to associate itself with fictional characters "after the fact". Due to a culture in the world wide media (traditional-entertainment and news-entertainment alike) authors and fans alike are trapped into reacting in only one way: unqualified support. Otherwise, they are labeled as homophobic bigots. She herself seems to take this action in order to feel good about herself, either by supporting a group of people she feels compelled to pity (again, a sad failure of the gay movement itself that pity is their main tool) or by throwing a sensational wrench into the works (which in itself would either be a sad statement on her literary confidence or the evidence of a dangerous megalomania). If it is the former, the gay movement had better take a good, soul-searching look at itself as it means they are doing more to ostracize and separate themselves than to integrate and be welcomed by others. If it is the latter, someone had better start popping the popcorn, Rowling is going to be quite something to watch as she implodes.
Well, to tell you the truth, I simply don't care what Rowling says about her characters. I do care what she wrote in the books, because I enjoy sharing them with my friends and trying to wrest out the neat nuggets of mystery that tied the series and the characters together across seven books. There are many other series of books out there much better at this than hers, but none of them are so widely read and cross so many reading groups. It is easy to find someone else who likes the Harry Potter series, and to talk about who you do and don't like. Unfortunately, as we stop sending in money for new books, and as the movies finish their (spectacular) run, the focus does become us instead of her or the publishers (Scholastic or Warner Brothers). In order to force themselves back upon us, they have to say or do something sensational or titillating.
The fact is that all of us, "straight or gay" alike, want to know that our way is right. For a few, the "right" way is determined internally, without reference to others and their foibles. For most, unfortunately, the only measuring stick is determined externally - usually through acceptance by others. This leads, ultimately, to enforcement. The inability to accept that our own approval is sufficient comes from insecurity, typically generated by our own doubts - that in fact perhaps we are wrong! This answer being terrifying, it becomes all too easy to lash outward, finding ways to "convince" others that our way is right. While this may start gently enough, the fact still remains that because people are different, what is right for one person is not right for another. In the end, the person who can't survive on self-approval alone must force others to approve of them. This leads to double-speak, filtered intake, and self-delusion, followed by brute force.
This cycle is bad enough when based on the truth - which in this case is "who you are". If you're gay, so be it. Be strong in yourself, present yourself as a model of gayness to the world. The bad cycle of forced acceptance would at least be based on who you really are. But to return (for the final time) to the bottom line, basing this oppressive (yes, I just implied the gay rights movement is oppressive, which is ironic for one so rooted in the concept of pitying its adherents) cycle of forced acceptance (which is not really acceptance at all) on an illusion - that of a fabricated character in a work of fantasy-based fiction - carries with it the oppressive danger an element of the pathetic.
And, if you are not careful, it also carries the seeds of your own destruction. You risk exposing an incredible foundation of desperation, causing us to wonder just how many of your other assertions are based on illusion.
Tuesday, October 02, 2007
Hemispheres and Sacrifice
A friend of mine recently proclaimed that she is a Democrat, and also mentioned that, while she was still trying to investigate and learn politics (understanding that it does affect us, not because she wanted to start a political career) she pretty much responded to things emotionally.
To my observation, the two are somewhat intertwined. Whether or not it's right-hemisphere vs. left-hemisphere of the brain, it does seem that there is often a struggle between emotion and reason. This does not mean that Republicans don't fly off the handle and get emotional about their opinions, nor that Democrats refuse to reason out their arguments, but merely as a general statement, liberal solutions appear to be based on emotion while conservative solutions appear to be based on reason.
Classify it as cold logic or far-thinking, the difference is that with reason you actually get a solution, while with emotion you get only a fix. There may be some pun in that, as emotional solutions are often designed to give emotional stimulation, be it assuaging guilt, happiness high, or some flavor in-between. They are often short-term, not intentionally but accidentally. Some emotional solutions turn out to be the right ones, but usually by chance.
Modern politics, though there have been a very few other examples in history, gives "power" to a great number of people. We all have a voice through our vote, and through a few other very limited opportunities (which we often avoid, such as Jury Duty). The problem is that being informed on political issues is basically a full-time job. Those of us who have not chosen a career in or around politics don't want to spend that kind of effort remaining informed. We would much rather focus on what makes us happy or what is our breadwinning career.
Unfortunately, this created a fertile ground for manipulation. We just want to be ourselves, living our lives in a way that is stimulating to us. We want the issues, when it comes up to our need to affect them through our vote, laid out simply and clearly.
Enter the bad politician. While good politicians will attempt to do just what we want, the bad politician is in the game like the stereotyped evil business tycoon - they want money and power and everything that goes with it. They know that, if they spend the time, money, and effort on manipulating the facts (or creating outright illusions) they can make their answer seem simple and clear. It may even be simple and clear, but in all likelihood it is not what we thought we were getting. We happily go into the voting booth, vote for something, and find out later (if it comes up at all) that we have actually voted against common sense and an easy, effective solution.
Emotional manipulation has a much higher success rate and requires much less effort than manipulation of logic. If you're asking people to feel, they act emotionally, impulsively. If you ask people to think, they may just do it and reason things out for themselves.
Unfortunately the solution is not easy. You have to start by trusting yourself - trust your instincts, not your emotions. The line is often blurry (and I believe it is made blurry intentionally). Follow common sense. Then you have to take it to the next level. Start with your instincts, but if you feel there is something hidden, something that doesn't make sense or match up, you have to spend a little time and effort either thinking things through to their logical conclusion, or researching the issue further. It takes an informed public, which takes time away from the public - time the public doesn't want to sacrifice, and doesn't feel it should.
The fact is, we live in a republic democracy, and that means we have signed on to sacrifice some of our time to the running of our country. We do not sacrifice as much time (nor get compensated for it) as politicians or those who work in and around politics, but we must still do it. It is our responsibility, part of the price for being a citizen of this country. Eliminate this sacrifice, and the manipulators will reshape your government so that you not only don't have to sacrifice your time, you are no longer allowed to. The decisions will be made for you.
To my observation, the two are somewhat intertwined. Whether or not it's right-hemisphere vs. left-hemisphere of the brain, it does seem that there is often a struggle between emotion and reason. This does not mean that Republicans don't fly off the handle and get emotional about their opinions, nor that Democrats refuse to reason out their arguments, but merely as a general statement, liberal solutions appear to be based on emotion while conservative solutions appear to be based on reason.
Classify it as cold logic or far-thinking, the difference is that with reason you actually get a solution, while with emotion you get only a fix. There may be some pun in that, as emotional solutions are often designed to give emotional stimulation, be it assuaging guilt, happiness high, or some flavor in-between. They are often short-term, not intentionally but accidentally. Some emotional solutions turn out to be the right ones, but usually by chance.
Modern politics, though there have been a very few other examples in history, gives "power" to a great number of people. We all have a voice through our vote, and through a few other very limited opportunities (which we often avoid, such as Jury Duty). The problem is that being informed on political issues is basically a full-time job. Those of us who have not chosen a career in or around politics don't want to spend that kind of effort remaining informed. We would much rather focus on what makes us happy or what is our breadwinning career.
Unfortunately, this created a fertile ground for manipulation. We just want to be ourselves, living our lives in a way that is stimulating to us. We want the issues, when it comes up to our need to affect them through our vote, laid out simply and clearly.
Enter the bad politician. While good politicians will attempt to do just what we want, the bad politician is in the game like the stereotyped evil business tycoon - they want money and power and everything that goes with it. They know that, if they spend the time, money, and effort on manipulating the facts (or creating outright illusions) they can make their answer seem simple and clear. It may even be simple and clear, but in all likelihood it is not what we thought we were getting. We happily go into the voting booth, vote for something, and find out later (if it comes up at all) that we have actually voted against common sense and an easy, effective solution.
Emotional manipulation has a much higher success rate and requires much less effort than manipulation of logic. If you're asking people to feel, they act emotionally, impulsively. If you ask people to think, they may just do it and reason things out for themselves.
Unfortunately the solution is not easy. You have to start by trusting yourself - trust your instincts, not your emotions. The line is often blurry (and I believe it is made blurry intentionally). Follow common sense. Then you have to take it to the next level. Start with your instincts, but if you feel there is something hidden, something that doesn't make sense or match up, you have to spend a little time and effort either thinking things through to their logical conclusion, or researching the issue further. It takes an informed public, which takes time away from the public - time the public doesn't want to sacrifice, and doesn't feel it should.
The fact is, we live in a republic democracy, and that means we have signed on to sacrifice some of our time to the running of our country. We do not sacrifice as much time (nor get compensated for it) as politicians or those who work in and around politics, but we must still do it. It is our responsibility, part of the price for being a citizen of this country. Eliminate this sacrifice, and the manipulators will reshape your government so that you not only don't have to sacrifice your time, you are no longer allowed to. The decisions will be made for you.
Friday, September 28, 2007
It's about sex, stupid!
I would love to hear this elucidated by even our more controversial megaphones, but I don't know if anyone is ready to stand on this particular soap box.
I postulate that the vast majority of liberals owe their philosophy to sex, and the control of it. Guys (particularly in college as it represents those formative, hormone-ridden years, though anyone 16 to 24 is dangerously susceptible to this manipulation) all too easily adopt whatever attitude is required to get in good with the girl (or as many girls as possible) in order to score. Guys want to score. No matter what they're thinking in their own minds, or what answers make sense to them, if a hot (or even moderately attractive) woman sends signals she wants a certain answer, it will be delivered on a velvet pillow in hopes the favor will be returned. Girls have been conditioned to believe it is not only a "man's world" but they can only make it in this "man's world" by controlling a man.
Examining this argument for a moment, let's say it is true. Control through sex manipulation will only work so long as the reward continues to appeal to the manipulated. This leads down obvious roads that either require a woman to do things she simply doesn't want to do (and not because she loves her partner - but because she is prostituting herself) or ends up in separation (because the woman decides, through simple market economics models, that the price for control has become too high). Part of what has happened is that the man has been led to believe that he can have whatever he wants so long as he says what she wants to hear. Whether it be unusual acts, multiple partners, a partner with an "augmented" athlete's body, or simply more of this "good thing" than his partner can stand. When the blessing is denied, the manipulated looks elsewhere, or becomes bitter. Abuse of one kind or another follows.
Examining this argument for another moment, let's say it is false. We would find ourselves in a world where women can support themselves, if necessary, without men. That they can not only do so effectively, but can actually excel. I do not talk about personal fulfillment, but simple economics. This does not mean that a woman must support herself, but she could if she wanted to.
Kind of sounds like where we are: a lot of people have bought into the lie, so we have a high rate of wrecked relationships (all I have to do there is look at my own street) but yet the women in those wrecked relationships are the ones on my street, in nice apartments or homes, with children, driving newer and more expensive cars than the one I bought as a man with income, and going on vacations (I know, because I am often asked to care for pets left behind).
Why did I go through all that? Because I believe young women have been deliberately sold a host of lies that are designed to convince her that she must dominate a man through sex. The pivotal fulcrum is abortion. Whether you support abortion or not, the issue here is that women have been convinced (wrongly) that only one ideology (liberalism) will allow her to make any abortion decision whatsoever, and that this is the ultimate (almost only) leverage that the woman has to control the man. This is achieved by suggesting that the woman is therefore free to use sex as a manipulative reward because if something goes wrong, she can always abort and continue with her life unaffected. (Never mind that women might have to deal with emotional issues if they actually do become pregnant - don't warn them about that, though it is likely to happen - just beat it home that they can have one and "everything will be okay", attempting to preempt this potential life-altering snag).
In addition, men have been manipulated to believe that abortion is their get-out-of-jail-free card. Not only can they have the sex they crave (and it is a serious craving, folks, I am not about to deny that) without fear of the consequences, but they don't even have to be involved in the decision making process - after all it is completely up to the woman only! He has no rights, so why should he bother or worry?
As it is now liberal to have this attitude or approach to sex - and realize I do not mean that conservatives don't approach sex as recreational, we certainly do, we simply don't approach the consequences of sex in such a destructive, ignorant way that leaves people unprepared for reality when it hits them - liberals go further to claim that anyone who wants recreational sex must therefore be a liberal, and with all the other liberal issues attached. Naturally, craving sex goes hand in hand with saving the environment through the destruction of capitalism, raising taxes on everyone (especially the middle class), regulating health care an insurance, deciding banking policies, reducing or eliminating our military, ignoring aggressive nations or institutions, etc. etc. etc. Don't you think? I mean, come on - don't you really think about all those things while you're horny?
Um. No. I tend not to think about much of anything else. In fact it becomes difficult to concentrate at all.
Liberal policies reduce or destroy families (welfare for unmarried women, more money for more out-of-wedlock children, but not married women; promotion - instead of simple tolerance - for alternative lifestyles that do not produce children; abortions on whim; etc.) They face a huge problem. Conservative policies nurture and salvage families (tax benefits for families; religion to counsel and help those in need; encouraging adoption instead of abortion; etc.) Political ideology, if allowed to run its natural course, is handed down smoothly from parents to children. The only places where this can be routinely interrupted is when parents and children are separated - which happens mostly through educational institutions. It becomes imperative that liberals therefore attack this section of children's lives. They aren't going to produce enough liberals to keep up with conservatives, therefore they must find ways to steal them.
The irony is that they have chosen the very policies which so dangerously retard their growth to be their champion, their defining issue.
How many men do you honestly think would be liberal if there weren't liberal women willing to sell their sex to manipulate them? How many liberal men would remain liberal if their partner(s) refused to give them sex just to have them toe the party line?
Don't even try to turn the tables on this one. How many conservative women do you honestly believe are using sex to manipulate men into becoming conservatives, particularly for control over their men? Yeah. That one fits. Conservatives believe women ought to dominate men.
Try again. We believe men and women should work together, overcoming the challenges they face, finding mutual support and comfort (yes, that kind of comfort too, often especially) in their relationship. These people, rooted in solid relationships, will not require government assistance programs designed by liberals to keep them in misery and poverty. They will learn from their mistakes, or absorb their challenges, turning them to good, possibly even advancing their own standard of living.
Listen guys, I'm not letting us off the hook here. It's our impatience and insecurity in the first place that enables this whole dangerous, manipulative, destructive cycle. Yes. That means we need to learn to be patient and we must be confident in ourselves. The rewards will follow, and there will be no strings attached - in fact the rewards and the mechanisms for achieving them will be wings strapped to our feet and back. Sounds an awful lot like "seek ye first the Kingdom of God and all these things shall be added unto you" doesn't it?
But that leads down another road liberals can't stand.
I postulate that the vast majority of liberals owe their philosophy to sex, and the control of it. Guys (particularly in college as it represents those formative, hormone-ridden years, though anyone 16 to 24 is dangerously susceptible to this manipulation) all too easily adopt whatever attitude is required to get in good with the girl (or as many girls as possible) in order to score. Guys want to score. No matter what they're thinking in their own minds, or what answers make sense to them, if a hot (or even moderately attractive) woman sends signals she wants a certain answer, it will be delivered on a velvet pillow in hopes the favor will be returned. Girls have been conditioned to believe it is not only a "man's world" but they can only make it in this "man's world" by controlling a man.
Examining this argument for a moment, let's say it is true. Control through sex manipulation will only work so long as the reward continues to appeal to the manipulated. This leads down obvious roads that either require a woman to do things she simply doesn't want to do (and not because she loves her partner - but because she is prostituting herself) or ends up in separation (because the woman decides, through simple market economics models, that the price for control has become too high). Part of what has happened is that the man has been led to believe that he can have whatever he wants so long as he says what she wants to hear. Whether it be unusual acts, multiple partners, a partner with an "augmented" athlete's body, or simply more of this "good thing" than his partner can stand. When the blessing is denied, the manipulated looks elsewhere, or becomes bitter. Abuse of one kind or another follows.
Examining this argument for another moment, let's say it is false. We would find ourselves in a world where women can support themselves, if necessary, without men. That they can not only do so effectively, but can actually excel. I do not talk about personal fulfillment, but simple economics. This does not mean that a woman must support herself, but she could if she wanted to.
Kind of sounds like where we are: a lot of people have bought into the lie, so we have a high rate of wrecked relationships (all I have to do there is look at my own street) but yet the women in those wrecked relationships are the ones on my street, in nice apartments or homes, with children, driving newer and more expensive cars than the one I bought as a man with income, and going on vacations (I know, because I am often asked to care for pets left behind).
Why did I go through all that? Because I believe young women have been deliberately sold a host of lies that are designed to convince her that she must dominate a man through sex. The pivotal fulcrum is abortion. Whether you support abortion or not, the issue here is that women have been convinced (wrongly) that only one ideology (liberalism) will allow her to make any abortion decision whatsoever, and that this is the ultimate (almost only) leverage that the woman has to control the man. This is achieved by suggesting that the woman is therefore free to use sex as a manipulative reward because if something goes wrong, she can always abort and continue with her life unaffected. (Never mind that women might have to deal with emotional issues if they actually do become pregnant - don't warn them about that, though it is likely to happen - just beat it home that they can have one and "everything will be okay", attempting to preempt this potential life-altering snag).
In addition, men have been manipulated to believe that abortion is their get-out-of-jail-free card. Not only can they have the sex they crave (and it is a serious craving, folks, I am not about to deny that) without fear of the consequences, but they don't even have to be involved in the decision making process - after all it is completely up to the woman only! He has no rights, so why should he bother or worry?
As it is now liberal to have this attitude or approach to sex - and realize I do not mean that conservatives don't approach sex as recreational, we certainly do, we simply don't approach the consequences of sex in such a destructive, ignorant way that leaves people unprepared for reality when it hits them - liberals go further to claim that anyone who wants recreational sex must therefore be a liberal, and with all the other liberal issues attached. Naturally, craving sex goes hand in hand with saving the environment through the destruction of capitalism, raising taxes on everyone (especially the middle class), regulating health care an insurance, deciding banking policies, reducing or eliminating our military, ignoring aggressive nations or institutions, etc. etc. etc. Don't you think? I mean, come on - don't you really think about all those things while you're horny?
Um. No. I tend not to think about much of anything else. In fact it becomes difficult to concentrate at all.
Liberal policies reduce or destroy families (welfare for unmarried women, more money for more out-of-wedlock children, but not married women; promotion - instead of simple tolerance - for alternative lifestyles that do not produce children; abortions on whim; etc.) They face a huge problem. Conservative policies nurture and salvage families (tax benefits for families; religion to counsel and help those in need; encouraging adoption instead of abortion; etc.) Political ideology, if allowed to run its natural course, is handed down smoothly from parents to children. The only places where this can be routinely interrupted is when parents and children are separated - which happens mostly through educational institutions. It becomes imperative that liberals therefore attack this section of children's lives. They aren't going to produce enough liberals to keep up with conservatives, therefore they must find ways to steal them.
The irony is that they have chosen the very policies which so dangerously retard their growth to be their champion, their defining issue.
How many men do you honestly think would be liberal if there weren't liberal women willing to sell their sex to manipulate them? How many liberal men would remain liberal if their partner(s) refused to give them sex just to have them toe the party line?
Don't even try to turn the tables on this one. How many conservative women do you honestly believe are using sex to manipulate men into becoming conservatives, particularly for control over their men? Yeah. That one fits. Conservatives believe women ought to dominate men.
Try again. We believe men and women should work together, overcoming the challenges they face, finding mutual support and comfort (yes, that kind of comfort too, often especially) in their relationship. These people, rooted in solid relationships, will not require government assistance programs designed by liberals to keep them in misery and poverty. They will learn from their mistakes, or absorb their challenges, turning them to good, possibly even advancing their own standard of living.
Listen guys, I'm not letting us off the hook here. It's our impatience and insecurity in the first place that enables this whole dangerous, manipulative, destructive cycle. Yes. That means we need to learn to be patient and we must be confident in ourselves. The rewards will follow, and there will be no strings attached - in fact the rewards and the mechanisms for achieving them will be wings strapped to our feet and back. Sounds an awful lot like "seek ye first the Kingdom of God and all these things shall be added unto you" doesn't it?
But that leads down another road liberals can't stand.
Wednesday, September 19, 2007
Inevitable Iraq
Quite a lot has been said about Iraq, and justly so because it is a defining issue of our times, and a great deal of political hopes have been pinned to it (all across the spectrum). The arguments have been made, and as I am no expert in the field, I cannot refute them, that the Bush Administration succeeded in the military action but did not plan for the aftermath. They fall into one form or another of "win the war and lose the peace" slogans and dialogs.
The fact is, this is the only place where politics can debate on Iraq, because we have gone there and our military was not going to lose that fight. The argument about whether or not we should have gone happened, and was overwhelmingly supported by Congress. Twice, and then several times again. The numbers are staggering that suggest, not only here in the USA but around the world, Saddam Hussein had to be dealt with.
Even the latest chicanery by political detractors in an attempt to wildly distort Alan Greenspan's words actually highlights the fact that Hussein was a global disaster actively trying to happen. When people claim he said the Iraq war was for oil, what he was saying was that he advised the Bush Administration that Saddam Hussein had to be dealt with in order to secure the world's oil supplies or there would be worldwide economic meltdown. So he wasn't saying the war was for oil, but he was certainly making a case that it could be, and that he would have supported it.
So the accusation today (because detractors are fast running out of enemy ground upon which to stand) is that the Bush Administration rushed to war without a plan for securing the victory. That we won military objectives in no time but managed to create a political and social vacuum in which atrocities and terrorism spread. Whether or not we are making some progress now and whether or not Iraq becomes a peaceful, supportive democracy in the future (hopefully near) is beside the point.
The "elephant in the room" (a phrase I happen to love now, despite my general dislike of clichés) is that we had to go in there, and we had to act fast. Whether or not the intelligence reports were correct that there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq (some were found, but not the hoards that the media expected) or Saddam Hussein was looking to buy weapons grade uranium from Niger (and Joe Wilson's own report claiming that he found no evidence of the attempted deal actually increased non-USA intelligence estimates that Hussein actually was seeking uranium) or that oil was in danger of being globally destabilized (though how you call a resource in the hands of Iran and Venezuela "stable" is beyond me) the votes were in from a huge coalition (larger than World War II) as well as massive numbers here in the USA (especially in Congress) and we had to act.
Just how does one plan to help a country become stable after a war? I would love to hear more about how it was done after World War II. Germany and Japan are amazing countries well worth extolling for where they are today.
First and foremost, in my humble opinion, the problem today is with the immediacy of media and their vapid, rapid need for higher ratings through controversy. In the aftermath of WWII there were journalists, and doubtless on the scene in Germany and Japan, but their ability to affect public opinion with sensational headlines was diminished by the technology of the day. Not to mention there was a Democrat in office during and immediately after the war. Not a modern day Democrat, thank God, but a Democrat nevertheless.
As a result I believe we were forced to appear too nice, too hands off, and there was a powerful microscope watching our every move lest we attempt to turn Iraq into a little mini-USA, or puppet state. Due to this public sentiment, we attempted to turn too much over to the Iraqis too fast. The accusation that we were occupiers was everywhere. Well, we occupied Germany and Japan, and last I checked they were doing pretty well, were very independent of the United States, and certainly did not do whatever the White House told them. Yes, we might have had to control the country for a year or two, and we might have had to appoint people to certain positions, and we might have had to make stronger recommendations about what should and should not be included in their constitution, but the result would have been a stable Iraq faster and more reliably than we have seen.
In short, the Bush Administration was told not to have a plan for the peace, because it could have only been a Puppet Plan, and then was accused for not having a plan when the people of Iraq didn't magically fall into place and create a beautiful, sparkling, model democracy overnight.
Where did peace happen, and quickly? Where there was martial law, or military control over areas. Those places have been handed over more quickly, and with better results, than the places that were told we couldn't help them set up their politics.
Well duh. Maybe it was a little much to ask people who had been oppressed by their leadership for decades to suddenly become elder statesmen. They needed guidance, they still need help, and we're going to be there longer because we "didn't do it right the first time". Why didn't we? Because the decisions would have been unpopular with the people who (politically) needed us to fail.
Will Iraq become a peaceful democracy, or at least a country that isn't hell bent on our destruction? I can't say. I believe so, and I believe we're seeing great progress over there. I do believe the human spirit yearns to be free, to make its own choices, to succeed on its own merits. It may be a bumpy road, but let's face the ultimate fact, people: while we like to believe (and I do) that God created everyone with equal value, not everyone's path is, or challenges are, the same.
The fact is, this is the only place where politics can debate on Iraq, because we have gone there and our military was not going to lose that fight. The argument about whether or not we should have gone happened, and was overwhelmingly supported by Congress. Twice, and then several times again. The numbers are staggering that suggest, not only here in the USA but around the world, Saddam Hussein had to be dealt with.
Even the latest chicanery by political detractors in an attempt to wildly distort Alan Greenspan's words actually highlights the fact that Hussein was a global disaster actively trying to happen. When people claim he said the Iraq war was for oil, what he was saying was that he advised the Bush Administration that Saddam Hussein had to be dealt with in order to secure the world's oil supplies or there would be worldwide economic meltdown. So he wasn't saying the war was for oil, but he was certainly making a case that it could be, and that he would have supported it.
So the accusation today (because detractors are fast running out of enemy ground upon which to stand) is that the Bush Administration rushed to war without a plan for securing the victory. That we won military objectives in no time but managed to create a political and social vacuum in which atrocities and terrorism spread. Whether or not we are making some progress now and whether or not Iraq becomes a peaceful, supportive democracy in the future (hopefully near) is beside the point.
The "elephant in the room" (a phrase I happen to love now, despite my general dislike of clichés) is that we had to go in there, and we had to act fast. Whether or not the intelligence reports were correct that there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq (some were found, but not the hoards that the media expected) or Saddam Hussein was looking to buy weapons grade uranium from Niger (and Joe Wilson's own report claiming that he found no evidence of the attempted deal actually increased non-USA intelligence estimates that Hussein actually was seeking uranium) or that oil was in danger of being globally destabilized (though how you call a resource in the hands of Iran and Venezuela "stable" is beyond me) the votes were in from a huge coalition (larger than World War II) as well as massive numbers here in the USA (especially in Congress) and we had to act.
Just how does one plan to help a country become stable after a war? I would love to hear more about how it was done after World War II. Germany and Japan are amazing countries well worth extolling for where they are today.
First and foremost, in my humble opinion, the problem today is with the immediacy of media and their vapid, rapid need for higher ratings through controversy. In the aftermath of WWII there were journalists, and doubtless on the scene in Germany and Japan, but their ability to affect public opinion with sensational headlines was diminished by the technology of the day. Not to mention there was a Democrat in office during and immediately after the war. Not a modern day Democrat, thank God, but a Democrat nevertheless.
As a result I believe we were forced to appear too nice, too hands off, and there was a powerful microscope watching our every move lest we attempt to turn Iraq into a little mini-USA, or puppet state. Due to this public sentiment, we attempted to turn too much over to the Iraqis too fast. The accusation that we were occupiers was everywhere. Well, we occupied Germany and Japan, and last I checked they were doing pretty well, were very independent of the United States, and certainly did not do whatever the White House told them. Yes, we might have had to control the country for a year or two, and we might have had to appoint people to certain positions, and we might have had to make stronger recommendations about what should and should not be included in their constitution, but the result would have been a stable Iraq faster and more reliably than we have seen.
In short, the Bush Administration was told not to have a plan for the peace, because it could have only been a Puppet Plan, and then was accused for not having a plan when the people of Iraq didn't magically fall into place and create a beautiful, sparkling, model democracy overnight.
Where did peace happen, and quickly? Where there was martial law, or military control over areas. Those places have been handed over more quickly, and with better results, than the places that were told we couldn't help them set up their politics.
Well duh. Maybe it was a little much to ask people who had been oppressed by their leadership for decades to suddenly become elder statesmen. They needed guidance, they still need help, and we're going to be there longer because we "didn't do it right the first time". Why didn't we? Because the decisions would have been unpopular with the people who (politically) needed us to fail.
Will Iraq become a peaceful democracy, or at least a country that isn't hell bent on our destruction? I can't say. I believe so, and I believe we're seeing great progress over there. I do believe the human spirit yearns to be free, to make its own choices, to succeed on its own merits. It may be a bumpy road, but let's face the ultimate fact, people: while we like to believe (and I do) that God created everyone with equal value, not everyone's path is, or challenges are, the same.
Wednesday, September 12, 2007
Frogs and Voters
There was an assertion made, when I was in high school (I don't know what the official label is now, but most people still know what high school means), that a frog does not notice water is getting dangerously hot if it is heated slowly. Apparently, my grizzly friends assured me, the frog couldn't tell the water was too hot until it died, boiled to death (though this implies that it can tell after it dies, but let's not get into grammar, this was a biology lesson - another reason I'm glad I never took biology). Just what the point of the biology lesson was supposed to be (if it was indeed factual and not an urban legend dreamed up by kids sleeping in boring biology classes) I couldn't tell you, but I am glad I heard it. The principle applies so well in other parts of life.
As a side note, I must confess I believe most of my teachers would be shocked and dismayed that I was able to take practical, conservative value lessons out of a grizzly biological lesson that no doubt is part of the underlaying Hollywood assertion that they can make movies based on nothing but disgusting gore "because that's what we want".
So, what is this wholesome goodness that comes from such an icky concept?
The idea was that a frog's natural instincts were to avoid other dangers. They could see motion and jump away from it. They could feel direct or sharp pain and try to avoid or evade it. They had survival instincts and could live in water or near it (probably better than we can). But if you came up on them slowly, if you increased the danger a step at a time, they were incapable of recognizing their peril until it was too late. Patience and small steps won the day (at least if you wanted boiled frogs-legs for dinner)
It seems to me our politicians (and I will not spare any other country, though I am speaking mostly of my own - the United States of America) have figured the basics of this principle out. They had been, for ages, able to simply strong-arm us into whatever agenda they wanted to push. Unfortunately, the more success they had in pushing their agenda, the easier it was to see not only what that agenda was, but the horrible, misguided effects of that agenda could be, and furthermore that most of us did not want those agendas or their effects.
To wit, the politician's new tack is to ratchet up the heat slowly. Some might argue (and I hope they are right) that politicians are reduced to no other power - that we have successfully disarmed them from major movements (by proving that they are, actually, held accountable - at least enough of them that the rest can't accomplish their radical agendas) and therefore all they have left are smaller movements.
I may have a more jaded, cynical point of view when it comes to politicians - particularly those whose opinions and agendas are so far removed from the average American. I think they've just come to realize that we won't go for sweeping, massive liberal changes any more. Yes, liberalism used to be the core of American freedom and conservatism was associated with monarchy, theocracy, and other totalitarian concepts. The reversal has been stunning and complete.
Another side note: I believe this is why they cling so desperately to abortion, it is the last issue upon which they can rest any claim to offering choice, even if it is a horrible one.
Anyway, it takes some sharp eyes and connect-the-dots mentality now (sometimes leading down the dark, frightening road of conspiracy theories, and I am not guiltless there) in order to uncover the true agendas behind seeming innocuous legislation, rulings, or actions. You have to think several steps ahead - to when the water is uncomfortably hot or even scalding as opposed to hot-tub warm - to see the ghastly effects of these agendas.
Their outright stated concepts are boiling water. Their hidden double-speak is the slow raising of temperature. Be careful that you're an informed voter and not a frog.
As a side note, I must confess I believe most of my teachers would be shocked and dismayed that I was able to take practical, conservative value lessons out of a grizzly biological lesson that no doubt is part of the underlaying Hollywood assertion that they can make movies based on nothing but disgusting gore "because that's what we want".
So, what is this wholesome goodness that comes from such an icky concept?
The idea was that a frog's natural instincts were to avoid other dangers. They could see motion and jump away from it. They could feel direct or sharp pain and try to avoid or evade it. They had survival instincts and could live in water or near it (probably better than we can). But if you came up on them slowly, if you increased the danger a step at a time, they were incapable of recognizing their peril until it was too late. Patience and small steps won the day (at least if you wanted boiled frogs-legs for dinner)
It seems to me our politicians (and I will not spare any other country, though I am speaking mostly of my own - the United States of America) have figured the basics of this principle out. They had been, for ages, able to simply strong-arm us into whatever agenda they wanted to push. Unfortunately, the more success they had in pushing their agenda, the easier it was to see not only what that agenda was, but the horrible, misguided effects of that agenda could be, and furthermore that most of us did not want those agendas or their effects.
To wit, the politician's new tack is to ratchet up the heat slowly. Some might argue (and I hope they are right) that politicians are reduced to no other power - that we have successfully disarmed them from major movements (by proving that they are, actually, held accountable - at least enough of them that the rest can't accomplish their radical agendas) and therefore all they have left are smaller movements.
I may have a more jaded, cynical point of view when it comes to politicians - particularly those whose opinions and agendas are so far removed from the average American. I think they've just come to realize that we won't go for sweeping, massive liberal changes any more. Yes, liberalism used to be the core of American freedom and conservatism was associated with monarchy, theocracy, and other totalitarian concepts. The reversal has been stunning and complete.
Another side note: I believe this is why they cling so desperately to abortion, it is the last issue upon which they can rest any claim to offering choice, even if it is a horrible one.
Anyway, it takes some sharp eyes and connect-the-dots mentality now (sometimes leading down the dark, frightening road of conspiracy theories, and I am not guiltless there) in order to uncover the true agendas behind seeming innocuous legislation, rulings, or actions. You have to think several steps ahead - to when the water is uncomfortably hot or even scalding as opposed to hot-tub warm - to see the ghastly effects of these agendas.
Their outright stated concepts are boiling water. Their hidden double-speak is the slow raising of temperature. Be careful that you're an informed voter and not a frog.
Monday, September 10, 2007
Holy War over Schools
I have been hearing a lot about possible terrorist attacks on children, using our school system. The general idea is that Muslim extremists wish to cause a holy war because "their side" is not fired up enough, they don't have the support they need in order to win against the infidels. Their concept is to do something so horrific that the people of the United States will over-react, causing such division between Muslims and Infidels that they cannot avoid a world-wide holy war.
What is this horrific act? Apparently it has to do with hijacking and/or blowing up school busses packed with children, taking over elementary-level schools and doing the worst things you can imagine to the boys and girls before killing them, and even blowing up entire schools or releasing poisons or chemicals near the hijacked schools because people will "come to watch" and will be added to the death toll.
If this is not just a crackpot conspiracy theory, then the Muslim extremists are quite right: much of America will go completely animal. The extremists aren't actually targeting the young boys and girls who will be direct victims of brutality we would like to think doesn't exist in the world. They're targeting moderate Muslims. They're targeting those of Islam who actually believe it is a religion of peace. Those on the fence who are not strapping bombs to themselves and blowing up civilians, but who won't come out and condemn these acts. They want enough of those Muslims killed by wound-up Christians (not to mention atheists) that the rest of the moderates will join the holy war for their own protection. They aren't counting how many American children need to be raped and killed, they're counting how many Muslims need to be beaten to death by vigilante parents.
This scenario, again if it isn't just total mind-blanking fear tactics (and let me tell you I am afraid due to some things I will outline below), has three possible outcomes, two likely and one unlikely. The unlikely outcome is that infidels will cave in, implode and Islam takes over the world. The likely outcomes are not so good for the Islamic Extremists.
Outcome One: the lesser of two evils. I call this the lesser of two evils because in order for this to happen, the Extremists must have actually carried out such an unthinkable horror that nothing associated with it can actually be called "good". In this lesser of two evils case, the terrorist-extremists have finally crossed a line which the rest of us believe they crossed long ago: they so alienate their own Muslims that they lose all support and are hunted down by Muslims who see the possibility of Outcome Two. I admit I do not have much of an opinion of "moderate" Muslims. They should have spoken up long before now. They are either living in fear, which should make them question their own faith, or they are secretly supporters of these terrorists, which makes them extremists in sheep's clothing.
Outcome Two: they get the holy war they want. This will not go well for them. The world has a mistaken impression of the United States. Beyond that, Muslim Extremists have a mistaken impression of the non-Muslim world outside the United States. If there were one way to unleash, to actually remove all restrictions and inhibitions this country has against retaliation, it would be to attack our children. Not just attack them, but abuse them in the most horrifying ways first. The result would be genocide. And it would not be the elimination of the Christian faith. Mecca would be 20,000 degrees for 56 years. Medina? Gone. Islam would be eradicated from the world. If they actually succeed in igniting a holy war, it will be their complete and total end. Nobody but their own deluded selves could possibly believe they could win that war. Some of them are, actually, seeking the "end of the world". I do not believe they would get it, but I do believe an entire religion would be completely and violently erased from the face of the earth.
Please, Muslims, please wake up. Please pay attention to what is being done in the name of your religion. Yes, there were horrible things done in the name of Christianity, and there are places in the world where that is still a battle cry. There is a major difference: Christian nations and peoples denounce and work actively against those horrible religious crimes, and we shook off the dark ages. Please, please shake off your dark ages. Please wake up. It was hard, bloody, and often called for martyrs and sacrifices, but we managed to do it. Please, don't drive us down the path to Option Two.
Why am I actually afraid about this?
The Innocuous Beginning: "Foreign Nationals" (is that an oxymoron?) getting involved in bussing.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,259168,00.html
An alarmingly written article telling us not to worry while stating it is a threat
http://www.safehavensinternational.org/SchoolBusTerrorism.php
School busses and school bus radios stolen - but don't worry, the drivers are being trained to watch out for suspicious behavior
http://www.nationalterroralert.com/updates/2007/08/27/school-bus-thefts-concern-houston-authorities/
And this one is the Mac Daddy of the concept:
http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_id=54975
Think about yourself. If you got a call saying your child's bus or entire school had been taken over, the children had been raped and brutally murdered by men proudly proclaiming to be middle-eastern terrorists, all of whom were Muslim, what would your reaction be? How about if you only heard that the bus had been taken over - how would you react as you were forced to pay attention to the story? I suspect here in Texas there would be civilians with high-powered rifles trying to snipe the terrorists themselves, then shooting anyone with a tan or scraggly mustache/beard who looked 'Muslim enough'.
I sincerely hope they're not stupid enough to mess with our kids. We might kill atheists/Christians simply for opposing retaliation. The world would find out we're not 'bullies', we can be enraged bulls when our children are in danger.
What is this horrific act? Apparently it has to do with hijacking and/or blowing up school busses packed with children, taking over elementary-level schools and doing the worst things you can imagine to the boys and girls before killing them, and even blowing up entire schools or releasing poisons or chemicals near the hijacked schools because people will "come to watch" and will be added to the death toll.
If this is not just a crackpot conspiracy theory, then the Muslim extremists are quite right: much of America will go completely animal. The extremists aren't actually targeting the young boys and girls who will be direct victims of brutality we would like to think doesn't exist in the world. They're targeting moderate Muslims. They're targeting those of Islam who actually believe it is a religion of peace. Those on the fence who are not strapping bombs to themselves and blowing up civilians, but who won't come out and condemn these acts. They want enough of those Muslims killed by wound-up Christians (not to mention atheists) that the rest of the moderates will join the holy war for their own protection. They aren't counting how many American children need to be raped and killed, they're counting how many Muslims need to be beaten to death by vigilante parents.
This scenario, again if it isn't just total mind-blanking fear tactics (and let me tell you I am afraid due to some things I will outline below), has three possible outcomes, two likely and one unlikely. The unlikely outcome is that infidels will cave in, implode and Islam takes over the world. The likely outcomes are not so good for the Islamic Extremists.
Outcome One: the lesser of two evils. I call this the lesser of two evils because in order for this to happen, the Extremists must have actually carried out such an unthinkable horror that nothing associated with it can actually be called "good". In this lesser of two evils case, the terrorist-extremists have finally crossed a line which the rest of us believe they crossed long ago: they so alienate their own Muslims that they lose all support and are hunted down by Muslims who see the possibility of Outcome Two. I admit I do not have much of an opinion of "moderate" Muslims. They should have spoken up long before now. They are either living in fear, which should make them question their own faith, or they are secretly supporters of these terrorists, which makes them extremists in sheep's clothing.
Outcome Two: they get the holy war they want. This will not go well for them. The world has a mistaken impression of the United States. Beyond that, Muslim Extremists have a mistaken impression of the non-Muslim world outside the United States. If there were one way to unleash, to actually remove all restrictions and inhibitions this country has against retaliation, it would be to attack our children. Not just attack them, but abuse them in the most horrifying ways first. The result would be genocide. And it would not be the elimination of the Christian faith. Mecca would be 20,000 degrees for 56 years. Medina? Gone. Islam would be eradicated from the world. If they actually succeed in igniting a holy war, it will be their complete and total end. Nobody but their own deluded selves could possibly believe they could win that war. Some of them are, actually, seeking the "end of the world". I do not believe they would get it, but I do believe an entire religion would be completely and violently erased from the face of the earth.
Please, Muslims, please wake up. Please pay attention to what is being done in the name of your religion. Yes, there were horrible things done in the name of Christianity, and there are places in the world where that is still a battle cry. There is a major difference: Christian nations and peoples denounce and work actively against those horrible religious crimes, and we shook off the dark ages. Please, please shake off your dark ages. Please wake up. It was hard, bloody, and often called for martyrs and sacrifices, but we managed to do it. Please, don't drive us down the path to Option Two.
Why am I actually afraid about this?
The Innocuous Beginning: "Foreign Nationals" (is that an oxymoron?) getting involved in bussing.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,259168,00.html
An alarmingly written article telling us not to worry while stating it is a threat
http://www.safehavensinternational.org/SchoolBusTerrorism.php
School busses and school bus radios stolen - but don't worry, the drivers are being trained to watch out for suspicious behavior
http://www.nationalterroralert.com/updates/2007/08/27/school-bus-thefts-concern-houston-authorities/
And this one is the Mac Daddy of the concept:
http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_id=54975
Think about yourself. If you got a call saying your child's bus or entire school had been taken over, the children had been raped and brutally murdered by men proudly proclaiming to be middle-eastern terrorists, all of whom were Muslim, what would your reaction be? How about if you only heard that the bus had been taken over - how would you react as you were forced to pay attention to the story? I suspect here in Texas there would be civilians with high-powered rifles trying to snipe the terrorists themselves, then shooting anyone with a tan or scraggly mustache/beard who looked 'Muslim enough'.
I sincerely hope they're not stupid enough to mess with our kids. We might kill atheists/Christians simply for opposing retaliation. The world would find out we're not 'bullies', we can be enraged bulls when our children are in danger.
Thursday, July 12, 2007
The Pre-Report Card.
Imagine: you are in school. The end of the term is coming. You've not always been a great student, but you have been trying hard. You think you've done well, but the actual grades are not in. You're waiting to hear how you've done.
Your siblings, concerned because your standing with your parents has been on shaky ground, yet they're often in even more trouble, are pre-broadcasting your grades (though they have no way of knowing them) to your parents. There is a reward being offered for the kid with the best grades, and they know you're trying harder than them and that your study habits are going to pay off. They're going to lose. "He's always playing games - he is okay playing PlayStation, but his grades? They suck. You should see how bad things are - teachers are always talking to him, he's always getting stopped in the hall. It's disgraceful.
The fact is that you have been studying, you haven't been playing games excessively, teachers are talking to you because they're telling you how well you're doing, and you're being stopped in the halls because people are impressed with you turning your life around.
The report card comes back. Three As, two B+s, and a B.
What happens? Do your parents question you, thinking you've gamed the system? Do your siblings get in trouble or are they believed over the teachers? How does everyone's position change on this result?
Very shortly now we will be getting General Petraeus' report on how things are going in Iraq. Democrats are pre-broadcasting that not only is the war lost, they are attempting to make it impossible to believe the Commander in Iraq. We must believe them and their news more than the actual people on the field whose job it is to assess risk and determine how we're doing. Yes, the General is going to be optimistic-bias, but he is going to be realistic and practical. No general wants to be recorded in history as having lost their war. They want to win it.
By contrast, the Democrat Party has based their whole foundation on the fact that President Bush is incompetent, a bungler, and a liar. They have done this by investing all their political future on the failure of the Iraq war. In short, they can't afford for us to win this war. If they are to gain more power in our government, we must lose.
What I see as most likely is that we are winning. That the "surge" has done exactly what it was supposed to, and that we are going to get very good news from General Petraeus' report. I may be wrong, and I am willing to take that advice and work with it, but I am going to wait for that advice - the source before making my decision. The only reason to pre-guess publicly and loudly is if you want to influence someone else.
It disgusts me that one entire political party in this country has not only bet everything they have against America, against the best among us at that, but is actively attempting to undermine us in order that they gain power politically.
I have little to no hope that President Bush will take the gloves off and battle like I so desperately wish he would, but soon we will elect a new President. A strong President. One who smokes big cigars and acts in movies. One who will put an end to flippy-wristed whiners in the legislative branch.
One can hope, anyway.
My message to President Bush:
Please, kick ass. If you refuse to do that, at the very least, just talk to us, tell us more often how things are going, so that there is no place for these horrid, undermining tactics.
Your siblings, concerned because your standing with your parents has been on shaky ground, yet they're often in even more trouble, are pre-broadcasting your grades (though they have no way of knowing them) to your parents. There is a reward being offered for the kid with the best grades, and they know you're trying harder than them and that your study habits are going to pay off. They're going to lose. "He's always playing games - he is okay playing PlayStation, but his grades? They suck. You should see how bad things are - teachers are always talking to him, he's always getting stopped in the hall. It's disgraceful.
The fact is that you have been studying, you haven't been playing games excessively, teachers are talking to you because they're telling you how well you're doing, and you're being stopped in the halls because people are impressed with you turning your life around.
The report card comes back. Three As, two B+s, and a B.
What happens? Do your parents question you, thinking you've gamed the system? Do your siblings get in trouble or are they believed over the teachers? How does everyone's position change on this result?
Very shortly now we will be getting General Petraeus' report on how things are going in Iraq. Democrats are pre-broadcasting that not only is the war lost, they are attempting to make it impossible to believe the Commander in Iraq. We must believe them and their news more than the actual people on the field whose job it is to assess risk and determine how we're doing. Yes, the General is going to be optimistic-bias, but he is going to be realistic and practical. No general wants to be recorded in history as having lost their war. They want to win it.
By contrast, the Democrat Party has based their whole foundation on the fact that President Bush is incompetent, a bungler, and a liar. They have done this by investing all their political future on the failure of the Iraq war. In short, they can't afford for us to win this war. If they are to gain more power in our government, we must lose.
What I see as most likely is that we are winning. That the "surge" has done exactly what it was supposed to, and that we are going to get very good news from General Petraeus' report. I may be wrong, and I am willing to take that advice and work with it, but I am going to wait for that advice - the source before making my decision. The only reason to pre-guess publicly and loudly is if you want to influence someone else.
It disgusts me that one entire political party in this country has not only bet everything they have against America, against the best among us at that, but is actively attempting to undermine us in order that they gain power politically.
I have little to no hope that President Bush will take the gloves off and battle like I so desperately wish he would, but soon we will elect a new President. A strong President. One who smokes big cigars and acts in movies. One who will put an end to flippy-wristed whiners in the legislative branch.
One can hope, anyway.
My message to President Bush:
Please, kick ass. If you refuse to do that, at the very least, just talk to us, tell us more often how things are going, so that there is no place for these horrid, undermining tactics.
Saturday, July 07, 2007
Socialism, Dictatorships, and Universal Health Care
I believe socialism is less sustainable than a dictatorship.
I am going to trust that you understand capitalism is incentives based: you do more, you get more. On the contrary, socialism (a mild form of communism which leads to that end) has no incentives: do more or do less, you get the same. Dictatorships sound as though they should be the least sustainable: do what you are told and get what you are given.
Here's the basic problem that makes socialism the least sustainable of those options. Socialism provides the illusion of freedom and the realities of dictatorships. It plays to the absolute laziest elements in human nature. While there is enough capitalism left in socialism that someone who tries to get ahead can actually have some things that others don't (rich people with nice cars, etc.) the process is so much more difficult, and such a larger piece of the hard-worker's profits are taken away, that hard-workers and achievers are severely discouraged. Instead of offering incentives to those people to achieve, discover, expand, and do great things, it becomes easier to live a smaller, easier, hand-fed life.
In socialism, the leaders must still be elected, and the products must still come from the willing. If the leaders are no longer "fairly" elected, and the people are forced to produce, socialism becomes dictatorship (and dictatorships are ultimately unsustainable - witness the vast change in global politics since the 1700s - though the dictatorship model lasted far longer than socialism has to this point).
If, therefore socialist leaders are going to remain in power and not become dictators (who have a habit of dying horrible deaths at the hands of other wannabe dictators, in coups, or in revolutions) they must continue to keep the populace happy. Unfortunately, as life becomes boring, or as people look around and see that other people have things they don't (government leaders with private jets flying all over the world, going on cruises, eating expensive food, driving nice cars or being driven in them) people start to want to have those things too. Socialism goes from offering the needy something they really need to offering what people want to people who don't really need it, to inventing things people "need" (but don't) in order to provide them.
This causes a massive, out of control spiral of resource consumption. If everyone can have free medicine, where is that medicine going to come from? Who is going to make it, and at what price? Most important of all: who is going to pay for it?
In the original model, the "first hand-out" of socialism - someone who desperately needs assistance is given something they couldn't have otherwise afforded. The rest of us split the cost, and the cost is minimal. One person requiring $100,000 of surgery split 300,000,000 ways does not cost much. However, if everyone needs $500 worth of prescription drugs, everyone has to come up with $500 to pay for them. Meaning, if ten people are covering the cost for ten people's worth of drugs, it comes out to the same as one person covering the cost of one person's worth of drugs.
Where does the fairness stop? Should everyone have life-improving drugs? How about life-improving transportation? What about life-giving food and water? How about life-improving internet connectivity? In today's society, couldn't you make an argument that cell phones can save a lot of lives - being able to contact police or medical services in an emergency? Do we move on from there into laptops? Should it be one per household? One per adult? One per person?
Where are all of these products going to come from? If there are only a limited number of drugs to be had - only so much of the chemicals to go around, who decides who gets what is available? What happens when enough people are expecting their drugs but don't get them because there is a shortage? In that case, they don't have the option of selling their house and living in their basement for treatment because MONEY CAN'T BUY IT. Not even a sad, sob-story case where we all cringe and wish we could help because it truly is awful. NOTHING we do could help it, because the resources simply aren't available at any price.
In that case, the populace begins to rise, to throw out the politicians (by electoral process or military) who got them there, or the populace is repressed. The very fact that the people feel some entitlement (which is the name of most of these social programs) entices them to, at last, take some action. Unlike in a dictatorship where they are already living in physical and political fear and are easier, therefore to control. In a socialist government, enforcement (internal as well as external) consists of the very citizens who are starting to feel cheated. In a dictatorship, enforcement consists of those people who are where they are because the dictator compensates them and improves their lives over those of the other subjects.
In a perfect world, all people who need help would get it. The question is, how do we get to that perfect world?
Socialism will result in the absence of resources, due not only to a lack of incentive to produce those resources, but an artificial demand for those resources. Dictatorships result in the supply of those resources only to the ruling class (except in a "benign dictatorship", a difficult concept on its own to sustain). Capitalism, on the other hand, results in the distribution of those resources to the achievers.
Here is how these systems affect the needy: Socialism eventually can't provide resources to the actual needy because they are being used by those who don't need them, but who have been convinced they must have them and only the government can provide them fairly. Dictatorships could provide the resources, but the resources are in the hands of a select few who hold on to power by denying it to others - not exactly an environment that fosters charity. Capitalism makes resources available to those who can earn them, and because those resources are in the most hands possible, there is a greatly increased chance that one of those people with more resources will feel charitable and help those who do not have them. Capitalism also has the side benefit of reducing the number of needy without resources (though elimination of the needy would require global capitalism).
I am going to trust that you understand capitalism is incentives based: you do more, you get more. On the contrary, socialism (a mild form of communism which leads to that end) has no incentives: do more or do less, you get the same. Dictatorships sound as though they should be the least sustainable: do what you are told and get what you are given.
Here's the basic problem that makes socialism the least sustainable of those options. Socialism provides the illusion of freedom and the realities of dictatorships. It plays to the absolute laziest elements in human nature. While there is enough capitalism left in socialism that someone who tries to get ahead can actually have some things that others don't (rich people with nice cars, etc.) the process is so much more difficult, and such a larger piece of the hard-worker's profits are taken away, that hard-workers and achievers are severely discouraged. Instead of offering incentives to those people to achieve, discover, expand, and do great things, it becomes easier to live a smaller, easier, hand-fed life.
In socialism, the leaders must still be elected, and the products must still come from the willing. If the leaders are no longer "fairly" elected, and the people are forced to produce, socialism becomes dictatorship (and dictatorships are ultimately unsustainable - witness the vast change in global politics since the 1700s - though the dictatorship model lasted far longer than socialism has to this point).
If, therefore socialist leaders are going to remain in power and not become dictators (who have a habit of dying horrible deaths at the hands of other wannabe dictators, in coups, or in revolutions) they must continue to keep the populace happy. Unfortunately, as life becomes boring, or as people look around and see that other people have things they don't (government leaders with private jets flying all over the world, going on cruises, eating expensive food, driving nice cars or being driven in them) people start to want to have those things too. Socialism goes from offering the needy something they really need to offering what people want to people who don't really need it, to inventing things people "need" (but don't) in order to provide them.
This causes a massive, out of control spiral of resource consumption. If everyone can have free medicine, where is that medicine going to come from? Who is going to make it, and at what price? Most important of all: who is going to pay for it?
In the original model, the "first hand-out" of socialism - someone who desperately needs assistance is given something they couldn't have otherwise afforded. The rest of us split the cost, and the cost is minimal. One person requiring $100,000 of surgery split 300,000,000 ways does not cost much. However, if everyone needs $500 worth of prescription drugs, everyone has to come up with $500 to pay for them. Meaning, if ten people are covering the cost for ten people's worth of drugs, it comes out to the same as one person covering the cost of one person's worth of drugs.
Where does the fairness stop? Should everyone have life-improving drugs? How about life-improving transportation? What about life-giving food and water? How about life-improving internet connectivity? In today's society, couldn't you make an argument that cell phones can save a lot of lives - being able to contact police or medical services in an emergency? Do we move on from there into laptops? Should it be one per household? One per adult? One per person?
Where are all of these products going to come from? If there are only a limited number of drugs to be had - only so much of the chemicals to go around, who decides who gets what is available? What happens when enough people are expecting their drugs but don't get them because there is a shortage? In that case, they don't have the option of selling their house and living in their basement for treatment because MONEY CAN'T BUY IT. Not even a sad, sob-story case where we all cringe and wish we could help because it truly is awful. NOTHING we do could help it, because the resources simply aren't available at any price.
In that case, the populace begins to rise, to throw out the politicians (by electoral process or military) who got them there, or the populace is repressed. The very fact that the people feel some entitlement (which is the name of most of these social programs) entices them to, at last, take some action. Unlike in a dictatorship where they are already living in physical and political fear and are easier, therefore to control. In a socialist government, enforcement (internal as well as external) consists of the very citizens who are starting to feel cheated. In a dictatorship, enforcement consists of those people who are where they are because the dictator compensates them and improves their lives over those of the other subjects.
In a perfect world, all people who need help would get it. The question is, how do we get to that perfect world?
Socialism will result in the absence of resources, due not only to a lack of incentive to produce those resources, but an artificial demand for those resources. Dictatorships result in the supply of those resources only to the ruling class (except in a "benign dictatorship", a difficult concept on its own to sustain). Capitalism, on the other hand, results in the distribution of those resources to the achievers.
Here is how these systems affect the needy: Socialism eventually can't provide resources to the actual needy because they are being used by those who don't need them, but who have been convinced they must have them and only the government can provide them fairly. Dictatorships could provide the resources, but the resources are in the hands of a select few who hold on to power by denying it to others - not exactly an environment that fosters charity. Capitalism makes resources available to those who can earn them, and because those resources are in the most hands possible, there is a greatly increased chance that one of those people with more resources will feel charitable and help those who do not have them. Capitalism also has the side benefit of reducing the number of needy without resources (though elimination of the needy would require global capitalism).
Tuesday, May 01, 2007
The Mathematics of Hypnosis
I once heard, from a source I trust completely, that during one of the stretches where Britain controlled India, the Royal Navy had difficulties with Indian hypnotists. The story goes that sailors would come back from shore leave, appearing quite normal (for sailors that were coming back from shore leave anyway) and would act normally until suddenly they were discovered doing strange things, even treasonous acts like preparing to hand over information. The concept was this: the sailors would be hypnotized while on shore in India, and would return with instructions to act more or less normally except for some specific instructions (generally, to find and prepare information they would deliver next time they were on shore leave).
Stay with me here, this is the story, and I will certainly research it more now (as you will see why). When the Navy figured out what was happening, they figured out how to combat it because apparently, when one is in a hypnotic trance, it is nearly impossible to do math. What the officers did was to subject returning sailors to a series of math tests. Those who couldn't do even the simple math were the ones under hypnosis. Furthermore, the hypnotized sailors had a near-violent reaction to the math tests, despite being horrified when they were released from the hypnosis (it being a rather large offense to be even verbally violent around, let alone to, an officer).
Another source I tend to trust claimed (in the late 1800s) that humanity would go through three major wars: a chemical war, a physical war, and a mental war. I have heard it said that World War One was considered the chemical war, due to the emergence of chemical weapons, and World War Two was the physical war due to the development of nuclear, atomic weapons.
It is not too difficult to believe that we are in the midst of the mental war. Battles are still being fought conventionally (as they were in WW1 and WW2) but the biggest blows in the war appear to be all mental: waged through the portrayal of information. The information doesn't have to be true, doesn't have to be a lie, it's just information, packaged (as this blog) with the intent to appeal to mental warriors on either side.
What becomes more than a little troubling is, of course, the thought that great groups of people may be unwittingly hypnotized, or its counterpart - mesmerized. How easy it is to be sucked in by powerful personalities on either side. Wielding their charisma, people produce written, audible, or even visible words or concepts designed to motivate us to advance their agenda.
Does this sound like I am perhaps attacking both sides? If I stopped there, yes I would be. However, I believe there is a difference between arming minds with information and hypnotizing them with dangerous instructions. Both sides are likely, at this point, to claim the other side is brainwashing their followers. How are we to be able to tell which side is providing compelling truth and which side is using alarming manipulation?
For me it is simple, and it comes back to mathematics and hypnotism. Mathematics is the embodiment of logic. Objects and operands interacting to set rules, producing the right results when applied correctly. If you find one side of an argument having a violent reaction to logic, it is almost a certainty they have been hypnotized. Perhaps not by some classic hypnotist with a fob watch and fuzzy words, but speeches, movies, images, lyrics, music, and other emotional and mental manipulation - generally reinforcing each other. This phenomenon has been widely observed - the way speeches can be written to play out upon our minds, what we expect in the ebb and flow of well-spoken words - can greatly influence not only our support or opposition to a concept, but our very actions (and the intensity thereof).
I beg you, nobody will know but you, but next time you are feeling wound up about something, or perhaps just feeling strongly about an opinion or a political stance, an agenda or anything that brings contention into the world, see if you can do simple math. Start with the simplest, 2+2=4, 4+4=8, etc. Then move on to something more difficult 4*4=16, 2*11=22, 100/20=5, etc. See if you can hold on to what you believe about the subject - be it war, abortion, global warming, gun control, whatever - while doing math in your head. Not that you think about it at the same exact time, but see if you can remember why you feel so strongly about your political beliefs between math operations. Nobody needs to know except you, but I do hope that, if you find it difficult to concentrate, you will consider the very real possibility that you have been hypnotized. If you can't expound on your beliefs while calm, you had better reconsider the beliefs.
If faced with someone who seems completely unhinged about a political or global problem or concept, ask them to do simple math (not if they are holding a dangerous weapon). Tell them you will not argue with them, you will not listen to them or believe them until they can reiterate their argument after doing the simple math problems I have included above.
Don't do it for me, don't do it for the person you're arguing with, do it for yourself. Consider how much of your life you could be wasting because someone else has hypnotized you.
Stay with me here, this is the story, and I will certainly research it more now (as you will see why). When the Navy figured out what was happening, they figured out how to combat it because apparently, when one is in a hypnotic trance, it is nearly impossible to do math. What the officers did was to subject returning sailors to a series of math tests. Those who couldn't do even the simple math were the ones under hypnosis. Furthermore, the hypnotized sailors had a near-violent reaction to the math tests, despite being horrified when they were released from the hypnosis (it being a rather large offense to be even verbally violent around, let alone to, an officer).
Another source I tend to trust claimed (in the late 1800s) that humanity would go through three major wars: a chemical war, a physical war, and a mental war. I have heard it said that World War One was considered the chemical war, due to the emergence of chemical weapons, and World War Two was the physical war due to the development of nuclear, atomic weapons.
It is not too difficult to believe that we are in the midst of the mental war. Battles are still being fought conventionally (as they were in WW1 and WW2) but the biggest blows in the war appear to be all mental: waged through the portrayal of information. The information doesn't have to be true, doesn't have to be a lie, it's just information, packaged (as this blog) with the intent to appeal to mental warriors on either side.
What becomes more than a little troubling is, of course, the thought that great groups of people may be unwittingly hypnotized, or its counterpart - mesmerized. How easy it is to be sucked in by powerful personalities on either side. Wielding their charisma, people produce written, audible, or even visible words or concepts designed to motivate us to advance their agenda.
Does this sound like I am perhaps attacking both sides? If I stopped there, yes I would be. However, I believe there is a difference between arming minds with information and hypnotizing them with dangerous instructions. Both sides are likely, at this point, to claim the other side is brainwashing their followers. How are we to be able to tell which side is providing compelling truth and which side is using alarming manipulation?
For me it is simple, and it comes back to mathematics and hypnotism. Mathematics is the embodiment of logic. Objects and operands interacting to set rules, producing the right results when applied correctly. If you find one side of an argument having a violent reaction to logic, it is almost a certainty they have been hypnotized. Perhaps not by some classic hypnotist with a fob watch and fuzzy words, but speeches, movies, images, lyrics, music, and other emotional and mental manipulation - generally reinforcing each other. This phenomenon has been widely observed - the way speeches can be written to play out upon our minds, what we expect in the ebb and flow of well-spoken words - can greatly influence not only our support or opposition to a concept, but our very actions (and the intensity thereof).
I beg you, nobody will know but you, but next time you are feeling wound up about something, or perhaps just feeling strongly about an opinion or a political stance, an agenda or anything that brings contention into the world, see if you can do simple math. Start with the simplest, 2+2=4, 4+4=8, etc. Then move on to something more difficult 4*4=16, 2*11=22, 100/20=5, etc. See if you can hold on to what you believe about the subject - be it war, abortion, global warming, gun control, whatever - while doing math in your head. Not that you think about it at the same exact time, but see if you can remember why you feel so strongly about your political beliefs between math operations. Nobody needs to know except you, but I do hope that, if you find it difficult to concentrate, you will consider the very real possibility that you have been hypnotized. If you can't expound on your beliefs while calm, you had better reconsider the beliefs.
If faced with someone who seems completely unhinged about a political or global problem or concept, ask them to do simple math (not if they are holding a dangerous weapon). Tell them you will not argue with them, you will not listen to them or believe them until they can reiterate their argument after doing the simple math problems I have included above.
Don't do it for me, don't do it for the person you're arguing with, do it for yourself. Consider how much of your life you could be wasting because someone else has hypnotized you.
Monday, April 23, 2007
Conservation Exemptions
I couldn't help it. A few things happened today that snapped me back to politics. I hope the stay is brief because I have been having so much fun with cosmology.
In order to be successful, conservation must be a function of the free market, not government mandates issued by people who intend to exempt themselves from those mandates. (Note the ideological paradox that it is the liberals who are claiming to be conservative with the environment, and you will have most of the answer right there.)
Conservation works when you decide that, due to the cost of printer ink and paper, you are going to become selective about what you print out - preferring to keep documents stored electronically and print them only at need. Conservation works when, in order to be more competitive, you make your farm so efficient that you feed twice as many people with half as much land.
It is not regulation that has turned around forestry in this country, it is industry. In the 1800s our country's forests reduced at tremendous rates. In the 1900s this trend slowed to a stop, despite population explosions, and since 1985 our country's forests have actually grown. This was not due to the government mandating that forests must grow, but to the fact that industries are using less wood to achieve the same goals. They had to - competition required it. The company that could reduce its overhead could lower its prices, increase its profits, and leap ahead.
Environmental movements face one major, underlying problem. They cannot get people to change their hearts and minds, and therefore their habits.
They discovered this at their conception, and began with attempts to argue with the individuals. This is, frankly, the only place where they can be ultimately successful, but when they were not, they did not face the fact that perhaps they were wrong, they chose the explanation that people were too ill-informed, outright stupid, or malicious to accept environmental "truths".
They left the attempt to change the hearts and minds of the masses on the back burner, and turned instead to institutions. Institutions affect many people, but are run by few. Target those few, and you can affect the many. Institutions such as governments and schools have a vast effect on the populace. This has had alarming success, despite the fact that environmentalists would still claim it is too little. What they have done, however, is create environmentalist-dependent careers, a whole industry of people whose very livelihood requires the environmental movement. With money behind them, they forge ahead. Still, however, they meet resistance. Not enough of the people's hearts and minds were changed, and as a result, there have been just enough politicians to retard (though not eliminate) their agenda.
The latest attack has been the logical outcome. Change of heart and mind did not occur when the appeal went to individuals. Change did not occur 'enough' when the appeal went to leaders, certainly not enough to keep up with the new dependence on this movement - now environmentalists have more mouths to feed, more offices to support, more jobs that require funding. Change of heart and mind is now being attempted through Celebrity.
The latest weapon in the arsenal of the environmentalist is to pick popular personalities, get them to spread the message, and hope that hearts and minds of the people will follow. This is having even more alarming effect than going through political leaders (though, in many cases, the celebrity is a political leader or tries to become one).
It can only be hoped, however, that the seeds of environmental-movement destruction are finally beginning to bear fruit. As each level of attack has been ramped up, more exposure to the fallacy of Enforced Environmentalism has been risked. I bear your attention to three high-profile examples:
1) It turns out that Al Gore's family, while he put on his biggest push for us to change our lives, used, consistently, more electricity in one month than the average American household used in one year. Under tremendous pressure, he is having solar panels installed at his mansion. We'll see how helpful that is, and if it has any affect whatsoever on his use of large, private jets, SUVs, and other carbon-emitting tools. When it was uncovered that he uses much more than his "carbon footprint" allows, he claimed to be purchasing carbon offsets from a brokerage firm that buys them from companies and individuals who use much less than their carbon footprint. Not only is this concept ludicrous (you conserve or you don't, and he wasn't - meaning no matter how well other people did, he was still going to have his big impact on the environment) it turns out he owned the carbon-offset brokerage firm.
2) John Edwards' mansion proves the concept of the Two Americas. The breezeway between his "house" and his "recreation center" has more square footage than the typical, large, suburban home. Two typical apartments could fit inside the breezeway. Why we call it a breezeway I'm not 100% sure. It is fully enclosed, heated, and air conditioned. Perhaps it's the breeze of the ventilation system that keeps out the fresh air that allows us to call it a breezeway? I would have called it a hallway or a corridor, but perhaps that sounds too industrial. I can't imagine the power consumption comparison between his family and mine.
3) Sheryl Crow came out in the last few hours and proclaimed that we should use only one square of toilet paper per visit to the bathroom. I have heard that she amended her statement to say we could use three squares for "pesky" visits to the bathroom. While I would love to say that this statement itself needs no comments, there are some I cannot keep myself from providing (though I bet any reader could outdo me on this one). First, when I was in college there was a joke sent around campus (we actually had "eco-heads" in many of the student houses) that one eco-head wrote up suggesting that we could do a lot to help the environment if we used only three squares of toilet paper per wipe. The flack this girl got was astounding, and it came from the very granola-heads that established the eco-head position in the first place. The fact that she had to explain it was a joke is just sad. But look what we have come to. Not three squares per wipe, but one square per visit. The other comment is, of course, that Sheryl Crow's own "rider" (the list of demands she has for her touring conditions) is on display on the internet. It hardly reads like someone who uses only one square of toilet paper per visit to the bathroom.
All the while, average people like you and me, and yes, our President, use less electricity and fewer resources to go about our business, whether that be to account for corporate taxes, make candy, deliver packages, or run the whole damned country than the self-appointed leaders of the environmentalist movement.
It can only be hoped, as I stated above, that the seeds of destruction for this movement have finally begun to flower and the full blossom will be revealed as we examine just who is leading this movement, how they behave in their own life compared to how they want everyone else to behave, and how they intend to exempt themselves from the very regulations they would like to impose upon us.
If not, I fear we are going to have a rather bloody revolution. And no offense, we have the guns.
In order to be successful, conservation must be a function of the free market, not government mandates issued by people who intend to exempt themselves from those mandates. (Note the ideological paradox that it is the liberals who are claiming to be conservative with the environment, and you will have most of the answer right there.)
Conservation works when you decide that, due to the cost of printer ink and paper, you are going to become selective about what you print out - preferring to keep documents stored electronically and print them only at need. Conservation works when, in order to be more competitive, you make your farm so efficient that you feed twice as many people with half as much land.
It is not regulation that has turned around forestry in this country, it is industry. In the 1800s our country's forests reduced at tremendous rates. In the 1900s this trend slowed to a stop, despite population explosions, and since 1985 our country's forests have actually grown. This was not due to the government mandating that forests must grow, but to the fact that industries are using less wood to achieve the same goals. They had to - competition required it. The company that could reduce its overhead could lower its prices, increase its profits, and leap ahead.
Environmental movements face one major, underlying problem. They cannot get people to change their hearts and minds, and therefore their habits.
They discovered this at their conception, and began with attempts to argue with the individuals. This is, frankly, the only place where they can be ultimately successful, but when they were not, they did not face the fact that perhaps they were wrong, they chose the explanation that people were too ill-informed, outright stupid, or malicious to accept environmental "truths".
They left the attempt to change the hearts and minds of the masses on the back burner, and turned instead to institutions. Institutions affect many people, but are run by few. Target those few, and you can affect the many. Institutions such as governments and schools have a vast effect on the populace. This has had alarming success, despite the fact that environmentalists would still claim it is too little. What they have done, however, is create environmentalist-dependent careers, a whole industry of people whose very livelihood requires the environmental movement. With money behind them, they forge ahead. Still, however, they meet resistance. Not enough of the people's hearts and minds were changed, and as a result, there have been just enough politicians to retard (though not eliminate) their agenda.
The latest attack has been the logical outcome. Change of heart and mind did not occur when the appeal went to individuals. Change did not occur 'enough' when the appeal went to leaders, certainly not enough to keep up with the new dependence on this movement - now environmentalists have more mouths to feed, more offices to support, more jobs that require funding. Change of heart and mind is now being attempted through Celebrity.
The latest weapon in the arsenal of the environmentalist is to pick popular personalities, get them to spread the message, and hope that hearts and minds of the people will follow. This is having even more alarming effect than going through political leaders (though, in many cases, the celebrity is a political leader or tries to become one).
It can only be hoped, however, that the seeds of environmental-movement destruction are finally beginning to bear fruit. As each level of attack has been ramped up, more exposure to the fallacy of Enforced Environmentalism has been risked. I bear your attention to three high-profile examples:
1) It turns out that Al Gore's family, while he put on his biggest push for us to change our lives, used, consistently, more electricity in one month than the average American household used in one year. Under tremendous pressure, he is having solar panels installed at his mansion. We'll see how helpful that is, and if it has any affect whatsoever on his use of large, private jets, SUVs, and other carbon-emitting tools. When it was uncovered that he uses much more than his "carbon footprint" allows, he claimed to be purchasing carbon offsets from a brokerage firm that buys them from companies and individuals who use much less than their carbon footprint. Not only is this concept ludicrous (you conserve or you don't, and he wasn't - meaning no matter how well other people did, he was still going to have his big impact on the environment) it turns out he owned the carbon-offset brokerage firm.
2) John Edwards' mansion proves the concept of the Two Americas. The breezeway between his "house" and his "recreation center" has more square footage than the typical, large, suburban home. Two typical apartments could fit inside the breezeway. Why we call it a breezeway I'm not 100% sure. It is fully enclosed, heated, and air conditioned. Perhaps it's the breeze of the ventilation system that keeps out the fresh air that allows us to call it a breezeway? I would have called it a hallway or a corridor, but perhaps that sounds too industrial. I can't imagine the power consumption comparison between his family and mine.
3) Sheryl Crow came out in the last few hours and proclaimed that we should use only one square of toilet paper per visit to the bathroom. I have heard that she amended her statement to say we could use three squares for "pesky" visits to the bathroom. While I would love to say that this statement itself needs no comments, there are some I cannot keep myself from providing (though I bet any reader could outdo me on this one). First, when I was in college there was a joke sent around campus (we actually had "eco-heads" in many of the student houses) that one eco-head wrote up suggesting that we could do a lot to help the environment if we used only three squares of toilet paper per wipe. The flack this girl got was astounding, and it came from the very granola-heads that established the eco-head position in the first place. The fact that she had to explain it was a joke is just sad. But look what we have come to. Not three squares per wipe, but one square per visit. The other comment is, of course, that Sheryl Crow's own "rider" (the list of demands she has for her touring conditions) is on display on the internet. It hardly reads like someone who uses only one square of toilet paper per visit to the bathroom.
All the while, average people like you and me, and yes, our President, use less electricity and fewer resources to go about our business, whether that be to account for corporate taxes, make candy, deliver packages, or run the whole damned country than the self-appointed leaders of the environmentalist movement.
It can only be hoped, as I stated above, that the seeds of destruction for this movement have finally begun to flower and the full blossom will be revealed as we examine just who is leading this movement, how they behave in their own life compared to how they want everyone else to behave, and how they intend to exempt themselves from the very regulations they would like to impose upon us.
If not, I fear we are going to have a rather bloody revolution. And no offense, we have the guns.
Paradox of Compressing Expansion
I admit this came to me last night, after writing my last post. It is therefore a little raw, but it does not surprise me that more and more thoughts about this whole thing are coming to me.
The quick background is that the theory of the big bang, as mentioned, relies on a few things: the speed of light being constant (therefore red-shift can only be a Doppler Effect of the source moving away from us), and the discovery of background radiation in the universe (they were specifically trying to find it and when they did, they claimed it was exactly what they were looking for - kind of like assuming someone is a pessimist because they said "no" to your first question) are the two that seem to me the biggest claims.
The assumption, therefore, is that the universe itself is expanding. The reasoning behind this is that if the galaxies are all moving away from each other, and the further galaxies are from each other, the faster they are moving away, there can be no "center point" from which they are moving - every point in the universe would appear to be the center from its own perspective. The illustration (which evolved into another "interesting" assumption) is that what we perceived as three-dimensional space was like the surface of a balloon. A picture (the galaxies) is painted on the balloon. You blow the balloon up, and the picture expands. Not from some central point, but (basically) at all points somewhat evenly. The claim is that space is therefore curved like the surface of that balloon and expanding just like that balloon does. Some creature that lived exclusively on the surface of the balloon and had no knowledge of the inside or the outside - only the surface - would think that space was simply expanding and would not be able to explain where it all came from.
The only way this makes sense (and therefore that I don't contradict much more accepted theories and brains than my own) is if the universe is actually four-dimensional. Just like the creature on the balloon, who thought the universe was two-dimensional and expanding, the expansion was actually due to a third-dimension - the "inside" of the balloon being exchanged for some of the outside of the balloon. Three dimensional space did not change or expand, it simply moved from the outside to the inside, pushing the surface of the balloon out.
This is why I thought the universe must be four-dimensional, something that I am beginning to argue myself out of (though I am a stubborn hold out simply because I like the concept).
However, in order for this to be supportable, everything inside the three-dimensional universe must be contracting or collapsing at exactly the rate of expansion of space itself. Why is this? What did I just say? Huh? Can he stop typing now and let your dumbfounded head implode? Guess that was a bad choice of words considering what I'm saying... let's return to the balloon illustration.
The picture on the balloon expands at the same rate at all points. It appears to get bigger, right along with all the empty surface of the balloon. This does not happen in our universe. The galaxies move further apart from each other, but the individual parts of the galaxies - stars, solar systems, planets, mountains, houses, people, atoms - are not growing larger. Remember, the analogy of the balloon will break down because I chose a material object to be expanding. The claim in relativity and Big Bang is that space itself is expanding. This would mean the space between planets, the stars, and even between electrons and protons would be expanding. The suggestion that local forces hold local pieces together seems a lame afterthought. They would all have to be balanced perfectly against the force of expansion - all atoms, all planets, all solar systems, all galaxies all acting identically against this force of expansion - or some of them would shrink and some of them would expand as one force or another proved the stronger. Either that or the expansion of the universe would have to be uneven, miraculously choosing only (and evenly) the space between the galaxies.
Oh, and by the way, that bit about all galaxies moving away from each other based on how far apart they are? We have pictures from the Hubble (ironically) telescope that show galaxies colliding. And, I believe, there is some talk that our own galaxy is headed for a collision (or at least near miss) with Andromeda. So much for all of them moving away from each other. Again, what seems to me a lame, quiet afterthought, we are told there are exceptions to this "Hubble's Law" (Is it therefore really a law of nature? Sounds more like a law of politics!) and that sometimes local forces (just how local is Andromeda??) overcome this "law".
The contradictions between these theories come from observed and observable phenomenon. The problem is not with the observation, it is with the assumptions. As near as I can tell (again, rank amateur that I am) if you remove one assumption from the pile, that the speed of light is constant, the contradictory theories must be discarded and something resembling logic returns to the galaxy.
Wouldn't it be ironic if after all this study we found out "You know what? The universe just sorta makes common sense." How many times has that happened? A simple concept is totally messed up by people who want (because they make a handy living doing it) to make it more complex only to find out that no, it really is a simple concept and easy enough to understand.
Perhaps, as Einstein theorized, if you travel far enough in a straight line, you'll eventually go through the entire universe and come back to exactly where you started.
The quick background is that the theory of the big bang, as mentioned, relies on a few things: the speed of light being constant (therefore red-shift can only be a Doppler Effect of the source moving away from us), and the discovery of background radiation in the universe (they were specifically trying to find it and when they did, they claimed it was exactly what they were looking for - kind of like assuming someone is a pessimist because they said "no" to your first question) are the two that seem to me the biggest claims.
The assumption, therefore, is that the universe itself is expanding. The reasoning behind this is that if the galaxies are all moving away from each other, and the further galaxies are from each other, the faster they are moving away, there can be no "center point" from which they are moving - every point in the universe would appear to be the center from its own perspective. The illustration (which evolved into another "interesting" assumption) is that what we perceived as three-dimensional space was like the surface of a balloon. A picture (the galaxies) is painted on the balloon. You blow the balloon up, and the picture expands. Not from some central point, but (basically) at all points somewhat evenly. The claim is that space is therefore curved like the surface of that balloon and expanding just like that balloon does. Some creature that lived exclusively on the surface of the balloon and had no knowledge of the inside or the outside - only the surface - would think that space was simply expanding and would not be able to explain where it all came from.
The only way this makes sense (and therefore that I don't contradict much more accepted theories and brains than my own) is if the universe is actually four-dimensional. Just like the creature on the balloon, who thought the universe was two-dimensional and expanding, the expansion was actually due to a third-dimension - the "inside" of the balloon being exchanged for some of the outside of the balloon. Three dimensional space did not change or expand, it simply moved from the outside to the inside, pushing the surface of the balloon out.
This is why I thought the universe must be four-dimensional, something that I am beginning to argue myself out of (though I am a stubborn hold out simply because I like the concept).
However, in order for this to be supportable, everything inside the three-dimensional universe must be contracting or collapsing at exactly the rate of expansion of space itself. Why is this? What did I just say? Huh? Can he stop typing now and let your dumbfounded head implode? Guess that was a bad choice of words considering what I'm saying... let's return to the balloon illustration.
The picture on the balloon expands at the same rate at all points. It appears to get bigger, right along with all the empty surface of the balloon. This does not happen in our universe. The galaxies move further apart from each other, but the individual parts of the galaxies - stars, solar systems, planets, mountains, houses, people, atoms - are not growing larger. Remember, the analogy of the balloon will break down because I chose a material object to be expanding. The claim in relativity and Big Bang is that space itself is expanding. This would mean the space between planets, the stars, and even between electrons and protons would be expanding. The suggestion that local forces hold local pieces together seems a lame afterthought. They would all have to be balanced perfectly against the force of expansion - all atoms, all planets, all solar systems, all galaxies all acting identically against this force of expansion - or some of them would shrink and some of them would expand as one force or another proved the stronger. Either that or the expansion of the universe would have to be uneven, miraculously choosing only (and evenly) the space between the galaxies.
Oh, and by the way, that bit about all galaxies moving away from each other based on how far apart they are? We have pictures from the Hubble (ironically) telescope that show galaxies colliding. And, I believe, there is some talk that our own galaxy is headed for a collision (or at least near miss) with Andromeda. So much for all of them moving away from each other. Again, what seems to me a lame, quiet afterthought, we are told there are exceptions to this "Hubble's Law" (Is it therefore really a law of nature? Sounds more like a law of politics!) and that sometimes local forces (just how local is Andromeda??) overcome this "law".
The contradictions between these theories come from observed and observable phenomenon. The problem is not with the observation, it is with the assumptions. As near as I can tell (again, rank amateur that I am) if you remove one assumption from the pile, that the speed of light is constant, the contradictory theories must be discarded and something resembling logic returns to the galaxy.
Wouldn't it be ironic if after all this study we found out "You know what? The universe just sorta makes common sense." How many times has that happened? A simple concept is totally messed up by people who want (because they make a handy living doing it) to make it more complex only to find out that no, it really is a simple concept and easy enough to understand.
Perhaps, as Einstein theorized, if you travel far enough in a straight line, you'll eventually go through the entire universe and come back to exactly where you started.
Sunday, April 22, 2007
A Light Bombshell...
I believe that current, widely accepted theories do not explain light to my satisfaction. Additionally, I do not believe light travels at a constant speed.
I remember when I was going through physics in high school and college, it was explained to me that we don't seem to know what light is. In certain experiments it acts like a wave, and in certain circumstances it appears to be comprised of particles. The problem is that it does not make logical sense that particles would travel in waves. It appears to have energy, it appears to travel in a ray from its source. It certainly moves quickly. It definitely acts like a wave.
It seems to me there are two possibilities (please feel free to point out I'm a dope and there are others). Either there is actually something in the so-called vacuum of space that can then move in wave patterns (such as the "dark" or "transparent" matter mentioned in other theories), or light itself is comprised of something capable of moving like both a particle and a wave.
In either case, and I do hope to talk about each more, I find it easier to believe that light changes speed (and in specific that it decelerates) than to believe that it remains at a constant speed. I will go into these things more, but the ramifications are immediate (and I will explain these too). First, Hubble's assumption that the universe is expanding was based on his assumption that galaxies are traveling further away from us due to the concept of red-shift (basically, the Doppler Effect of light). Because he believed light traveled at a constant speed (as was suggested by Einstein's Theory of Relativity) that could only mean that the source of that light was moving away from us. If, in fact, light does not travel at a constant speed (and that it decelerates over time/distance), it would also explain why the further away a galaxy appears to be, the more its light is red-shifted. This simple assumption of my own manages to contradict not only Einstein and (the conclusions of) Hubble, but Stephen Hawkings himself - because it removes the major support for the Big Bang theory. I am certainly entitled to my own theories (whether they make sense or not) but it is going to be hard to be taken seriously if you contradict, in one sentence, all three of those men (and how many others that support their theories).
There are several observable phenomenon that would be clearly and easily explained/reconciled, along with other "powerful" theories trashed by this one, simple assumption. One such is this:
The study of red-shift as applied by Hubble and others to determine the motion of galaxies suggests that galaxies would have all intersected approximately twelve to fourteen billion years ago (the Big Bang). Unfortunately, the underlying spectrography (the study of element fingerprints in light) also suggests that there are stars that have been burning for seventeen to nineteen billion years. (Yes, these two concepts are irreconcilable). For this and many other reasons (perhaps I will detail them in my next post) I cannot help but believe more in the age of stars than the Big Bang. As the irreconcilable discrepancies are all based on the constant speed of light, I choose to go with what is observed and re-think what is theoretical.
As for myself, at present I must admit it seems more logical that light is actually a wave, and not a specific thing unto itself that travels like a wave. I am certainly willing to be found wrong, but it seems to me much like making a noise, something generates this vibration, and it travels through its medium just like a wave of water or sound. It would seem to explain sight, and it would turn out to be very much like hearing. Our optical sensors would be "vibrated" by this wave, just like our eardrums, and translate that vibration into different frequencies and intensities, just like our ears. This would explain to me how this phenomenon is absorbed (as it is by our eyes or photoelectric cells or film, etc.), and also suggest (again) that light decelerates (in that absorption).
This would mean there is something out there that is being vibrated, even in what we think of as the vacuum of space. Many theories suggest there is "dark matter" or "dark energy" (some of them suggest a better word is transparent, not dark). Since even theories that have nothing to do with light believe that there are massive amounts of matter unaccounted for in observable space, again there is the very real possibility that there is some sort of transparent or dark matter between the sun, the stars, and the atmosphere of the earth. A heady concept, one that begs the question "why, then, does it not produce friction?" but there are many possible answers to that, including the possibility that it is so small, massless, or out of phase with non-dark matter that it does not collide with it, but as I am already disbelieving in major, accepted theories of the Big Bang and the constant speed of light, perhaps disbelieving in the traditional concept of the vacuum of space should be kept for another post.
I remember when I was going through physics in high school and college, it was explained to me that we don't seem to know what light is. In certain experiments it acts like a wave, and in certain circumstances it appears to be comprised of particles. The problem is that it does not make logical sense that particles would travel in waves. It appears to have energy, it appears to travel in a ray from its source. It certainly moves quickly. It definitely acts like a wave.
It seems to me there are two possibilities (please feel free to point out I'm a dope and there are others). Either there is actually something in the so-called vacuum of space that can then move in wave patterns (such as the "dark" or "transparent" matter mentioned in other theories), or light itself is comprised of something capable of moving like both a particle and a wave.
In either case, and I do hope to talk about each more, I find it easier to believe that light changes speed (and in specific that it decelerates) than to believe that it remains at a constant speed. I will go into these things more, but the ramifications are immediate (and I will explain these too). First, Hubble's assumption that the universe is expanding was based on his assumption that galaxies are traveling further away from us due to the concept of red-shift (basically, the Doppler Effect of light). Because he believed light traveled at a constant speed (as was suggested by Einstein's Theory of Relativity) that could only mean that the source of that light was moving away from us. If, in fact, light does not travel at a constant speed (and that it decelerates over time/distance), it would also explain why the further away a galaxy appears to be, the more its light is red-shifted. This simple assumption of my own manages to contradict not only Einstein and (the conclusions of) Hubble, but Stephen Hawkings himself - because it removes the major support for the Big Bang theory. I am certainly entitled to my own theories (whether they make sense or not) but it is going to be hard to be taken seriously if you contradict, in one sentence, all three of those men (and how many others that support their theories).
There are several observable phenomenon that would be clearly and easily explained/reconciled, along with other "powerful" theories trashed by this one, simple assumption. One such is this:
The study of red-shift as applied by Hubble and others to determine the motion of galaxies suggests that galaxies would have all intersected approximately twelve to fourteen billion years ago (the Big Bang). Unfortunately, the underlying spectrography (the study of element fingerprints in light) also suggests that there are stars that have been burning for seventeen to nineteen billion years. (Yes, these two concepts are irreconcilable). For this and many other reasons (perhaps I will detail them in my next post) I cannot help but believe more in the age of stars than the Big Bang. As the irreconcilable discrepancies are all based on the constant speed of light, I choose to go with what is observed and re-think what is theoretical.
As for myself, at present I must admit it seems more logical that light is actually a wave, and not a specific thing unto itself that travels like a wave. I am certainly willing to be found wrong, but it seems to me much like making a noise, something generates this vibration, and it travels through its medium just like a wave of water or sound. It would seem to explain sight, and it would turn out to be very much like hearing. Our optical sensors would be "vibrated" by this wave, just like our eardrums, and translate that vibration into different frequencies and intensities, just like our ears. This would explain to me how this phenomenon is absorbed (as it is by our eyes or photoelectric cells or film, etc.), and also suggest (again) that light decelerates (in that absorption).
This would mean there is something out there that is being vibrated, even in what we think of as the vacuum of space. Many theories suggest there is "dark matter" or "dark energy" (some of them suggest a better word is transparent, not dark). Since even theories that have nothing to do with light believe that there are massive amounts of matter unaccounted for in observable space, again there is the very real possibility that there is some sort of transparent or dark matter between the sun, the stars, and the atmosphere of the earth. A heady concept, one that begs the question "why, then, does it not produce friction?" but there are many possible answers to that, including the possibility that it is so small, massless, or out of phase with non-dark matter that it does not collide with it, but as I am already disbelieving in major, accepted theories of the Big Bang and the constant speed of light, perhaps disbelieving in the traditional concept of the vacuum of space should be kept for another post.
Experimentally Challenged
I know one of the largest faults with what I am posting here is that I have no observational evidence to support my theories - that is, I do not have sufficient mathematics, or access to physics or cosmology equipment, to perform experiments or produce formulas to "prove" or at least agree with my theories. On the other hand, nobody is required to read any of this stuff (and perhaps nobody does).
Furthermore, there is no immediate, practical application for this knowledge. However, I believe it is possible that a further understanding of the phenomenon of our universe may produce new technologies or discoveries that can change our lives. The devices we dream up in Science Fiction tend to require technologies that don't yet exist, but I suggest they are possible.
Consider electricity, or even before that, magnetism. These are used in our every-day life, but before people were producing magnets, imagine a primitive farmer or hunter-gatherer even imagining the possibilities or uses of magnets. Before electricity was in common use, who would have dreamed what it was or what could be done with it? What other amazing things are ready at hand which we will be able, eventually, to manipulate and utilize to do things currently impossible?
Illustratively: the average household (wherever the free market is in effect) can now produce color images on paper, watch movies on various screens, listen to recordings of music made years or seconds ago, freeze water into ice, illuminate the dark, cool the air in summer, be sixty (or more) miles away within an hour, and (thank God) brew coffee.
We can even write down our thoughts in an easy-to-read type and publish them in an internationally-public manner such that other average people throughout the world can read them seconds later. In fact, it is even possible to translate those thoughts instantly into other languages (though the translation is often amusing rather than useful).
With all that said, I now press on, experimentally challenged though I am, with my theories.
Furthermore, there is no immediate, practical application for this knowledge. However, I believe it is possible that a further understanding of the phenomenon of our universe may produce new technologies or discoveries that can change our lives. The devices we dream up in Science Fiction tend to require technologies that don't yet exist, but I suggest they are possible.
Consider electricity, or even before that, magnetism. These are used in our every-day life, but before people were producing magnets, imagine a primitive farmer or hunter-gatherer even imagining the possibilities or uses of magnets. Before electricity was in common use, who would have dreamed what it was or what could be done with it? What other amazing things are ready at hand which we will be able, eventually, to manipulate and utilize to do things currently impossible?
Illustratively: the average household (wherever the free market is in effect) can now produce color images on paper, watch movies on various screens, listen to recordings of music made years or seconds ago, freeze water into ice, illuminate the dark, cool the air in summer, be sixty (or more) miles away within an hour, and (thank God) brew coffee.
We can even write down our thoughts in an easy-to-read type and publish them in an internationally-public manner such that other average people throughout the world can read them seconds later. In fact, it is even possible to translate those thoughts instantly into other languages (though the translation is often amusing rather than useful).
With all that said, I now press on, experimentally challenged though I am, with my theories.
Tuesday, April 17, 2007
Cosmic Overview.
I have been fascinated, lately, with various theories of cosmology. I have been watching documentaries, reading books, and studying online to try to understand (as well as possible) theories such as the big bang, relativity, and quantum physics.
The general acceptance of our time is that the universe had a beginning - the theory of the big bang - and has been expanding ever since. Through the theories of relativity, we also get the explanation of space being bent by mass, which simulates gravity. Also, we have the idea that the speed of light is a constant, always observed the same no matter how fast you are traveling in relation to the object that produced the light.
Several of these concepts are mind boggling, and I admit that I do not understand how these conclusions are reached (only that the theories are explained as having reached these conclusions).
Just as it took tremendous amounts of work and thought to come up with these theories, I cannot sit here and tackle each one and propose my own theories in a single blog entry. Therefore I shall try to keep it to one or two concepts at a time, even though they all interrelate. After all, the concept is to try to come up with some formula or theory that encompasses everything - some explanation that does not require exceptions.
That is the beauty, but also seems to be one of the major flaws of how we are going about explaining the cosmos, and I'm really not going to be much different, so no help there. The problem is that we are trying to come up with the theory that has the least holes, and as we find each explanation, put forth by truly spectacular and hard working minds, we latch on to and accept it until a theory with fewer exceptions earns enough adherents.
The bottom line is that for practical purposes in the every-day life we don't really need to know these things, though for deeper satisfaction we always seem to turn to greater questions - be they physical or metaphysical (or, as so many claim, some mixture of them both).
I am going to give the punch line at the beginning of the joke, so to speak, because I must do this in a disjointed (and probably interrupted) fashion. I will continue posts on politics, begin posts on hockey, and will be posting regarding science as well.
My belief is that the universe is actually four-dimensional, and I do not consider time a dimension. I mean there are four spatial dimensions. Most of us are familiar with the three dimensional terms length, breadth, depth. We can picture three dimensional objects, even render them in two-dimensional drawings. The question of where the fourth dimension goes, or the direction of the fourth axis, is somewhat more difficult to imagine. It can be imagined through extrapolation, which will be one of my next posts (if not the very next.
The difficulty in establishing this theory of mine is a lack of understanding about four-dimensional physics. Perhaps my hope is that through some of these posts, some of the physics can be figured out. Unfortunately, our experience appears to be largely limited to three dimensions, often simulating two or even one, but rarely (outside of Science Fiction) approaching four.
I believe, however, that even with some very basic and acceptable assumptions about four-dimensional physics, extrapolated from the growth from one-dimensional to two-dimensional, and from two-dimensional to three-dimensional physics, will allow us to produce very logical and simple explanations for how our own universe works - and make some interesting predictions about what we may find "out there".
I must also (laughingly) admit that I may, through these very posts, convince myself I am completely wrong. After all, Einstein convinced himself he was wrong even when he wasn't.
The general acceptance of our time is that the universe had a beginning - the theory of the big bang - and has been expanding ever since. Through the theories of relativity, we also get the explanation of space being bent by mass, which simulates gravity. Also, we have the idea that the speed of light is a constant, always observed the same no matter how fast you are traveling in relation to the object that produced the light.
Several of these concepts are mind boggling, and I admit that I do not understand how these conclusions are reached (only that the theories are explained as having reached these conclusions).
Just as it took tremendous amounts of work and thought to come up with these theories, I cannot sit here and tackle each one and propose my own theories in a single blog entry. Therefore I shall try to keep it to one or two concepts at a time, even though they all interrelate. After all, the concept is to try to come up with some formula or theory that encompasses everything - some explanation that does not require exceptions.
That is the beauty, but also seems to be one of the major flaws of how we are going about explaining the cosmos, and I'm really not going to be much different, so no help there. The problem is that we are trying to come up with the theory that has the least holes, and as we find each explanation, put forth by truly spectacular and hard working minds, we latch on to and accept it until a theory with fewer exceptions earns enough adherents.
The bottom line is that for practical purposes in the every-day life we don't really need to know these things, though for deeper satisfaction we always seem to turn to greater questions - be they physical or metaphysical (or, as so many claim, some mixture of them both).
I am going to give the punch line at the beginning of the joke, so to speak, because I must do this in a disjointed (and probably interrupted) fashion. I will continue posts on politics, begin posts on hockey, and will be posting regarding science as well.
My belief is that the universe is actually four-dimensional, and I do not consider time a dimension. I mean there are four spatial dimensions. Most of us are familiar with the three dimensional terms length, breadth, depth. We can picture three dimensional objects, even render them in two-dimensional drawings. The question of where the fourth dimension goes, or the direction of the fourth axis, is somewhat more difficult to imagine. It can be imagined through extrapolation, which will be one of my next posts (if not the very next.
The difficulty in establishing this theory of mine is a lack of understanding about four-dimensional physics. Perhaps my hope is that through some of these posts, some of the physics can be figured out. Unfortunately, our experience appears to be largely limited to three dimensions, often simulating two or even one, but rarely (outside of Science Fiction) approaching four.
I believe, however, that even with some very basic and acceptable assumptions about four-dimensional physics, extrapolated from the growth from one-dimensional to two-dimensional, and from two-dimensional to three-dimensional physics, will allow us to produce very logical and simple explanations for how our own universe works - and make some interesting predictions about what we may find "out there".
I must also (laughingly) admit that I may, through these very posts, convince myself I am completely wrong. After all, Einstein convinced himself he was wrong even when he wasn't.
Blog's Cosmic Shift
Grab something heavy, or strap yourself into a stable chair.
This post is not about politics.
Other than to say it is not about politics, and to explain why.
I have told many people (including, I believe, this blog) that politics is my spectator sport. What I had not told too many people, though most of my closer acquaintances already knew this, was that politics became my spectator sport because I lost my other two sports right about the time I got really interested in how politics, from local to global, worked.
Well, I'm not exactly burned out on politics, as my blog will prove, but through a totally unrelated cosmic accident I rediscovered one of my other sports: Ice Hockey.
While I cannot claim to be a native born Texan, I have been naturalized by the authority of several native born Texans (based largely on the fact that I owned a pickup truck longer than most of them, have been in this state for a long time, and can out BBQ - the real kind, not grilling - most of them). I have also been given naturalization papers from several members of the Texas State Judiciary for services rendered to the State (it was tongue-in-cheek, but all the more precious to me because of it - I did some computer work for the state and we all had a blast).
Why is this important? Because I moved to South Texas, where there is very little in the way of NHL hockey. I have watched (and enjoyed) some of the local teams, but the players (if they're lucky) change rapidly and I couldn't get into the team as a whole, not to mention NHL hockey is the best of its kind. Just recently, and largely by complete random chance, my family and I tuned into a Dallas Stars game and got re-hooked on hockey. With only three games to go in the regular season, alas. We are doing well, but I doubt we will get very far through the playoffs. I want us to badly, but no doubt my positive energy is balanced out by other teams' fans who want their teams to advance just as badly.
Okay. Massive digression, but important, as you will see. Hockey is fantastic, but it takes a lot of time in the evenings (mostly) and due to the nature of the sport, you don't win every game (nor, with the exception of whoever wins the Stanley Cup, do you win all the playoff series). While this is good, and part of what makes the sport exciting, it means that while you are in the playoffs (which we now are) your team is likely to lose some very important games, leaving you feeling all grumpy and down.
So, rather than go to bed feeling disgusted with everything because some boob on the other team got a lucky bounce or break and scored a goal after a hard-fought overtime, proving that you've got the better skill but they've got the more frustrating luck, I decided to haul out some of my more interesting documentaries.
I downloaded some documentaries from the internet one year, burning them to DvDs as presents for friends and families (this was not the year I worked for the State of Texas - I could actually afford more expensive presents that year). I didn't get to watch them all, other than a quick scan through to check for quality and content, but they looked interesting.
While this post is now pretty much too long (it is all digression, to some degree, how bad is that?) I plan to post a little bit of my random, amateur thoughts about The Cosmos (I can't say that word without hearing James Wood's voice as Hades in the Disney version of Hercules). I have actually read several works about Einstein's theories of special and general relativity, and about various parts of quantum physics. I have a decent mathematic and physics background. However, everything I am going to say is amateur.
That disclaimer aside, I feel compelled to point out that several major breakthroughs in our understanding of the universe have come from people who were considered amateurs at the time they had their breakthroughs, and even "established minds" were considered completely off their rocker when claiming new theories about How Things Work.
I expect to find myself contradicting some of the greatest scientific minds of our time. I am not asking anyone to think that I am smarter than they, because I do not think I am smarter than they. But like the simpleton who solves the complex problem because it needed a fresh perspective, I do have some thoughts to share on these Cosmic Concepts.
Advice:
- Concepts covered can be confusing. Skip if they bore you, return to the comments section if you ask a question (I often reply to comments on this blog - I recommend returning to comments any time you leave one).
- I recommend lots of coffee while reading these posts.
- Not to be mixed with narcotics.
This post is not about politics.
Other than to say it is not about politics, and to explain why.
I have told many people (including, I believe, this blog) that politics is my spectator sport. What I had not told too many people, though most of my closer acquaintances already knew this, was that politics became my spectator sport because I lost my other two sports right about the time I got really interested in how politics, from local to global, worked.
Well, I'm not exactly burned out on politics, as my blog will prove, but through a totally unrelated cosmic accident I rediscovered one of my other sports: Ice Hockey.
While I cannot claim to be a native born Texan, I have been naturalized by the authority of several native born Texans (based largely on the fact that I owned a pickup truck longer than most of them, have been in this state for a long time, and can out BBQ - the real kind, not grilling - most of them). I have also been given naturalization papers from several members of the Texas State Judiciary for services rendered to the State (it was tongue-in-cheek, but all the more precious to me because of it - I did some computer work for the state and we all had a blast).
Why is this important? Because I moved to South Texas, where there is very little in the way of NHL hockey. I have watched (and enjoyed) some of the local teams, but the players (if they're lucky) change rapidly and I couldn't get into the team as a whole, not to mention NHL hockey is the best of its kind. Just recently, and largely by complete random chance, my family and I tuned into a Dallas Stars game and got re-hooked on hockey. With only three games to go in the regular season, alas. We are doing well, but I doubt we will get very far through the playoffs. I want us to badly, but no doubt my positive energy is balanced out by other teams' fans who want their teams to advance just as badly.
Okay. Massive digression, but important, as you will see. Hockey is fantastic, but it takes a lot of time in the evenings (mostly) and due to the nature of the sport, you don't win every game (nor, with the exception of whoever wins the Stanley Cup, do you win all the playoff series). While this is good, and part of what makes the sport exciting, it means that while you are in the playoffs (which we now are) your team is likely to lose some very important games, leaving you feeling all grumpy and down.
So, rather than go to bed feeling disgusted with everything because some boob on the other team got a lucky bounce or break and scored a goal after a hard-fought overtime, proving that you've got the better skill but they've got the more frustrating luck, I decided to haul out some of my more interesting documentaries.
I downloaded some documentaries from the internet one year, burning them to DvDs as presents for friends and families (this was not the year I worked for the State of Texas - I could actually afford more expensive presents that year). I didn't get to watch them all, other than a quick scan through to check for quality and content, but they looked interesting.
While this post is now pretty much too long (it is all digression, to some degree, how bad is that?) I plan to post a little bit of my random, amateur thoughts about The Cosmos (I can't say that word without hearing James Wood's voice as Hades in the Disney version of Hercules). I have actually read several works about Einstein's theories of special and general relativity, and about various parts of quantum physics. I have a decent mathematic and physics background. However, everything I am going to say is amateur.
That disclaimer aside, I feel compelled to point out that several major breakthroughs in our understanding of the universe have come from people who were considered amateurs at the time they had their breakthroughs, and even "established minds" were considered completely off their rocker when claiming new theories about How Things Work.
I expect to find myself contradicting some of the greatest scientific minds of our time. I am not asking anyone to think that I am smarter than they, because I do not think I am smarter than they. But like the simpleton who solves the complex problem because it needed a fresh perspective, I do have some thoughts to share on these Cosmic Concepts.
Advice:
- Concepts covered can be confusing. Skip if they bore you, return to the comments section if you ask a question (I often reply to comments on this blog - I recommend returning to comments any time you leave one).
- I recommend lots of coffee while reading these posts.
- Not to be mixed with narcotics.
Friday, April 13, 2007
How Gasoline Burns my Cookies
(and I don't even eat cookies)
The Liberal double-whammy is going to be a new phrase of mine. Here is an example (as brief as I can keep myself).
Today's gas prices. They're up another 11 cents even here in the Great State of Texas in just one week alone. Why? Because there is more and more demand in this country, and no more supply. Let's look at both sides of the equation, because liberals are screwing us both in supply and in demand.
The supply side is easy to see. First of all, liberals hate supply. Supply gets goods to the poor, the downtrodden, the very voters they depend upon. If people are supplied with what they need, they don't require government hand-outs.
How are they screwing us over gasoline supply? By the incredibly frustrating stance regarding our own oil. This country has tremendous oil reserves, and the ability to get that oil efficiently and with little to no damage to the environment. Despite this, we take as little advantage of our own natural resources as Mexico. For the same basic reason: corrupt government with a vested interest in keeping the poor in their poverty. Again and again liberals use "well meaning" cover stories such as protecting the environment (and they have to misrepresent both the environment and the damage in order for those stories to fly) to deny us our own oil. The net result? Poorer people can't afford gasoline. Poorer people like ME. My family falls into the Largest Tax Bracket (not paying any because we don't make enough money). Tell you what. Make me pay flat taxes, but let us drill for our own oil. I may even end up behind - but I will be blissfully paying my taxes as I sail through the gas station where it's once again below a dollar a gallon for 87 octane unleaded.
How are they screwing us over gasoline demand? Oh, you really shouldn't get me started on this one, but while they love to lambaste oil companies for record profits, they ignore the way those profits are made. Stay with me here:
Al Gore Style "Diet Coke" Illustration
I will try to make this as simple an illustration as possible. Let's say you make a fantastic drink. Let's say it has a snappy name that rhymes with Frapple. It's delicious, and it's expensive. Like, $2.50 a bottle (one serving). People everywhere are buying it. You crank up production, making more Frapple. People would rather drink it than Poke, Repsi, or even water. You have a fantastic quarter, selling one Frapple to every American, or 300 million Frapples. Congratulations, you just made $750million in gross receipts. Let's say you make $1 profit on each bottle (simplified for number purposes, make it as small as you want). You made a record-breaking 300 million dollars. Next year, the population has grown to 305 million people. You didn't change anything, except now you made $305 million dollars. Record breaking. Obscene? No. The result of greater demand.
"Diet Petrol"
When was the last time you used less gasoline? Honestly looking at it, how often have you driven less, used less electricity, heated your home less, etc? Not to mention: if you used fires to heat your home, aren't you belching more carbon into the air than a power plant would to provide you with heat? That digression aside, let's say there are 280 million people in the United States (as there were about two decades ago). Let's say the average person bought 10 gallons of gasoline a week. That's 2.8 billion gallons of gasoline a week. Let's assume there are 52 weeks even in a liberal's year. That's 145.6 billion gallons of gas a year. Let's divide that up into quarters, as "big oil" must report quarterly to the government. We're at about 36.4 billion gallons of gasoline per quarter. Over a decade ago. With fewer people. And no truckers. Just 10 gallons a week in your hybrid. Let's say (just for argument's sake) "big oil" makes about 20 cents per gallon (which is, I believe, a reasonably accurate estimate from what I remember reading from oil-antagonistic sites.) Set aside the fact that the government typically makes over a dollar per gallon, which is therefore five times what "big oil" makes on their own product (remember, the government doesn't do anything to earn that money, just taxes it) and let's say that was $7.2 billion for that quarter. What happens if Americans use the same amount of gas, "big oil" makes the same amount of profit per gallon, yes the F****N' government taxes the same amount per gallon, but we add Americans. Now there are 300 million of us instead of 280 million. The numbers run like this: 3 billion gallons a week, 156 billion gallons a year, 39 billion gallons a quarter, and $7.8 billion in profits. It sounds huge, and it certainly is a record, but it is because more people are buying the product, not because the amount per gallon has increased. I haven't even touched inflation, which points out we are paying half what we paid in 1979 (who was President then? was he a liberal?) if you adjust for inflation, so yes the numbers look huge, but due to inflation they should always go up!
See this chart for research:
Historical Oil Prices
How does this relate to liberals? Besides, of course, the pointed barbs I have used in the past couple paragraphs? They themselves estimate more than 20 million illegal immigrants are here in this country. Aside from the fact that they're using our schools, our social security, our medical systems, they are driving cars (whether they carpool or are driven by someone else) and using our resources. Yes, they may very well add to our economy, but they are also adding to the cost of goods because, just like us, they consume. They are people, not statistics, and they eat, drink, sleep, drive, etc. That increases demand.
I am not suggesting that you can simply remove 20 million people from our economy (though I do believe something must be done, even if it is not easy or politically correct) but if you did, demand would go down.
Liberals are 180 degrees out of phase with reality. They do damage at both ends of the problem, they are never the solution, and they would do more damage if they could.
The Liberal double-whammy is going to be a new phrase of mine. Here is an example (as brief as I can keep myself).
Today's gas prices. They're up another 11 cents even here in the Great State of Texas in just one week alone. Why? Because there is more and more demand in this country, and no more supply. Let's look at both sides of the equation, because liberals are screwing us both in supply and in demand.
The supply side is easy to see. First of all, liberals hate supply. Supply gets goods to the poor, the downtrodden, the very voters they depend upon. If people are supplied with what they need, they don't require government hand-outs.
How are they screwing us over gasoline supply? By the incredibly frustrating stance regarding our own oil. This country has tremendous oil reserves, and the ability to get that oil efficiently and with little to no damage to the environment. Despite this, we take as little advantage of our own natural resources as Mexico. For the same basic reason: corrupt government with a vested interest in keeping the poor in their poverty. Again and again liberals use "well meaning" cover stories such as protecting the environment (and they have to misrepresent both the environment and the damage in order for those stories to fly) to deny us our own oil. The net result? Poorer people can't afford gasoline. Poorer people like ME. My family falls into the Largest Tax Bracket (not paying any because we don't make enough money). Tell you what. Make me pay flat taxes, but let us drill for our own oil. I may even end up behind - but I will be blissfully paying my taxes as I sail through the gas station where it's once again below a dollar a gallon for 87 octane unleaded.
How are they screwing us over gasoline demand? Oh, you really shouldn't get me started on this one, but while they love to lambaste oil companies for record profits, they ignore the way those profits are made. Stay with me here:
Al Gore Style "Diet Coke" Illustration
I will try to make this as simple an illustration as possible. Let's say you make a fantastic drink. Let's say it has a snappy name that rhymes with Frapple. It's delicious, and it's expensive. Like, $2.50 a bottle (one serving). People everywhere are buying it. You crank up production, making more Frapple. People would rather drink it than Poke, Repsi, or even water. You have a fantastic quarter, selling one Frapple to every American, or 300 million Frapples. Congratulations, you just made $750million in gross receipts. Let's say you make $1 profit on each bottle (simplified for number purposes, make it as small as you want). You made a record-breaking 300 million dollars. Next year, the population has grown to 305 million people. You didn't change anything, except now you made $305 million dollars. Record breaking. Obscene? No. The result of greater demand.
"Diet Petrol"
When was the last time you used less gasoline? Honestly looking at it, how often have you driven less, used less electricity, heated your home less, etc? Not to mention: if you used fires to heat your home, aren't you belching more carbon into the air than a power plant would to provide you with heat? That digression aside, let's say there are 280 million people in the United States (as there were about two decades ago). Let's say the average person bought 10 gallons of gasoline a week. That's 2.8 billion gallons of gasoline a week. Let's assume there are 52 weeks even in a liberal's year. That's 145.6 billion gallons of gas a year. Let's divide that up into quarters, as "big oil" must report quarterly to the government. We're at about 36.4 billion gallons of gasoline per quarter. Over a decade ago. With fewer people. And no truckers. Just 10 gallons a week in your hybrid. Let's say (just for argument's sake) "big oil" makes about 20 cents per gallon (which is, I believe, a reasonably accurate estimate from what I remember reading from oil-antagonistic sites.) Set aside the fact that the government typically makes over a dollar per gallon, which is therefore five times what "big oil" makes on their own product (remember, the government doesn't do anything to earn that money, just taxes it) and let's say that was $7.2 billion for that quarter. What happens if Americans use the same amount of gas, "big oil" makes the same amount of profit per gallon, yes the F****N' government taxes the same amount per gallon, but we add Americans. Now there are 300 million of us instead of 280 million. The numbers run like this: 3 billion gallons a week, 156 billion gallons a year, 39 billion gallons a quarter, and $7.8 billion in profits. It sounds huge, and it certainly is a record, but it is because more people are buying the product, not because the amount per gallon has increased. I haven't even touched inflation, which points out we are paying half what we paid in 1979 (who was President then? was he a liberal?) if you adjust for inflation, so yes the numbers look huge, but due to inflation they should always go up!
See this chart for research:
Historical Oil Prices
How does this relate to liberals? Besides, of course, the pointed barbs I have used in the past couple paragraphs? They themselves estimate more than 20 million illegal immigrants are here in this country. Aside from the fact that they're using our schools, our social security, our medical systems, they are driving cars (whether they carpool or are driven by someone else) and using our resources. Yes, they may very well add to our economy, but they are also adding to the cost of goods because, just like us, they consume. They are people, not statistics, and they eat, drink, sleep, drive, etc. That increases demand.
I am not suggesting that you can simply remove 20 million people from our economy (though I do believe something must be done, even if it is not easy or politically correct) but if you did, demand would go down.
Liberals are 180 degrees out of phase with reality. They do damage at both ends of the problem, they are never the solution, and they would do more damage if they could.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)