Maybe some questions really ARE stupid

 

Most of you on Twitter have seen this kind of stupid clickbait question:  “If you were to be given XYZillion dollars tomorrow, what would you do with it?”

 

Stupid, and clicky baity, but it has made me think.   Most of us (human beings) would likely give a bunch of that money away.   But I don’t have to be given XYZ dollars to wonder what happens to the ABC dollars I donate to about 30 “charities” every year.   What makes me think about this issue is the fact that I wonder how much of the money (that I just gave them) they spend on asking me for more money.   All of it, it looks like to me, for some of the charities.

 

 So, most likely, wealthy people hire law firms to disburse their charitable donations.  They (the wealthy people) remain anonymous so as to avoid the above problem.  I’m beginning to think that I should have a lawyer send in my little bitty amounts of money with the legal notation:

 

“This is what you’re getting from me.   If you ask for more, you will never see another penny.  Thank you for your attention to this legal declaration.” 

 

Signed: 

 

DEWEY, CHEATEM, and HOWE, attorneys at law.   (Apologies to Click and Clack, oh, how I miss those guys).

 

If I trusted the people that open letters, I’d just anonymously send cash… And thereby (as a lawyer would say) actually be able to send my money to the people that MIGHT be in the business of spending it on the issues that I want to promote, without the overhead of a law firm, or the risk of them spending all those funds on asking me for more money.  I wouldn’t be “wasting” part of my funds on lawyers…

 

But that world is long gone if it ever existed.  You, who know me, can quote my oft stated comment: “Human nature ain’t all it’s cracked up to be.”

Hey! WSVA NEWS RADIO

 

News?

I’ve been listening to WSVA “NEWS” radio for 47 years.  So you might not be surprised that I was disappointed when I called into the station with some “breaking news” of my own.  I told the guy (oh, how I wish, I could tell you his name!) that after I had already called both the Virginia Department of Forestry AND the Federal National Forest contact numbers about the smoke AND the smell of burning leaves that I was seeing and smelling, he told me that he was busy and that it was a “burn”.

He told me that they (the radio station? the FEDS?)  had told us about it “last week”… \and that he had to go on the air.  He was in a hurry.

I said “Please tell people that there’s a fire….”   as he hung up on me.

I tried to tell him that this was NOW, this wasn’t a “burn”.  

He needed to go on air and tell us all the “NEWS”.  He had no time for nows.

Cream Cheese

 Of course social media are a waste of time.  Yeah, it’s like shouting into the toilet as far as meaningful responses to one's comments are concerned, no matter how cogent or germane to the issue they may be.

 

But what if it’s all that you have?  What if you find yourself in a situation where no matter what you say or do; nothing ever comes of it?   I’m not talking about a classically hopeless situation like being in a Saudi Arabian prison for heresy and drug possession.  I’m talking about being in a beautiful, safe, location like a self sufficient home far from any danger; but locked in because of a yearlong pandemic.  A year, and no end in sight.  And after that long, you’re afraid of even mentioning anything about it to your partner.

 

Sure, you say, aren’t we all?  Well, yes.  After four years of hateful incompetence and outright narcissistic disregard for anybody’s well being on the federal level; we expect to be dealing with a response that’s a year behind the eight ball.  Then there’s the state level incompetence that is expected from a large bureaucracy that is reeling from a year of chaos (in response to the federal problem?).  Add to that the roiling cluster-fuck of local bureaucracies with over and under lapping responsibilities, and it’s obvious why it is way more than likely that vaccine shots will never catch up with virus mutation rates even in the absence of nutjob deniers and anti-vaxxers.  Throw in a little corruption, rich and powerful greed, (AKA human nature) while you’re at it. SNAFU!

What I didn't expect was the outright total resistance to vaccinations and masks exhibited by 50% of the Republican Party voters and near 100% of the elected officials.  I will never say: "I can't believe..." again.

So?  Who do you tell?  The overworked, underpaid, and under protected first responders have nothing to do with this problem.  They are vastly more abused victims of this thing than we are; I am sure as Hell not going to rag on them.  So, I bitch on Twitter, It doesn’t do anything but makes me feel a little better for a minute or two.  

 

The only thing that comes even close to this total failure of logic and desire for improvement, that is killing us all; is the inexplicable decision by Philadelphia Cream Cheese (classic box package) to continue to package their product in a 19^th century manner.  I really hate that.

How much optimism is too much? Do you look both ways?

 

I just listened to @SciFri.  I’m really getting tired of hearing from people who can start with the current clusterfuck and calmly talk about it. Yes!  I know that that is exactly what they/we have to do.  But, it is profoundly depressing for me to hear the “optimists” who are featured who don’t start out with: 

“THE most ignorant, psychopathic idiot savant ever to attain power in the history of the USA... DID this to us”.   Then I'll be ready to listen to reason. 

 

I'm not happy about the slow and disorganized roll out of the life saving vaccines.   And even though, an ardent critic of the crazy and false "zero sum game" that supposes that everything good that happens to someone else is something bad that happens to me; I still can't dispel the idea that:  

"Everything that I can get for me" doesn't end up being something not so good for them.  So, I'll not jump into any vaccine lines. 

So.  I am happy for every single person who gets a vaccine (even the line jumpers).  I will try to not think about which one of those shots that I didn't get might end up in me dying.  I am a firm believer in the idea that when I'm dead; I will not know it.

I am also an ardent pessimist.   I have always expected to die from this pandemic.   If I don't; I'll consider it a triumph of something...

If I do, I won't know that I was right all along. 

Off all the things wrong with t****, I believe that his total adherence to the "zero sum" was his worst attribute.  From that, all inability of empathy flows.  Oh, and ignorance and stupidity.... but where does one stop?

What he didn't do Wednesday January 6, 2021

Is way worse than what he did to start it.

I wrote directly to my congressman, Ben Cline 6th District, Virginia.  Cline is an avid trump supporter who has, to my knowledge, never criticized anything trump has ever said or done.  He is among those who "protested" the vote counts of other states both before and after the invasion and sacking of the Capitol building.

I urge you to Read the timeline of events of last Wednesday [ As allies pleaded for help, Trump kept watching TV ] in the Washington Post, written from interviews with 15 white house staffers on January 12, 2021.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-mob-failure/2021/01/11/36a46e2e-542e-11eb-a817-e5e7f8a406d6_story.html 

I saw a live stream of some of this from Jr. Donald Trump's friend who was there at the time.  Trump watched the invasion of the Capitol like a toddler glued to the TV watching a cartoon, as his mob... did what they did.  Many Trump aides tried to get his attention, but it was hours before he would react.  When he did, it was by tweeting the wrong words.  Others danced and music played. It was hours before anyone could break into his reverie and convince him to issue a statement on the attack on the Capitol.  When he finally did, too late, it was too little.  Read the transcript of his last words that day.  He mostly said the wrong things.  He was still lying about the validity of the election and still supporting the mob: "we love you, you're special". 

 

I know that Ben Cline will never see this.   YOU his staff will.  If you can support Cline and Trump after knowing what is true of that day, you join them as traitors to America, plain and simple.  Trump is insane; he must not be president one day longer.

 

Your only redemption from this assessment is to resign and get another job... working for a patriotic American.

Hey! Ben Cline House "representative" for the 6th District, Virginia

 Dear Ben:

From your continued support Donald Trump I can only conclude that you have never read any of his comments on Twitter.  If you had ever read them, you would be clamoring for application of the 25th amendment.   He is now tweeting about a non-existent brother of Mr. Raffensperger.  And that is only one of thousands of demonstrably insane things he has said. 

 

By the way, your signature on that request to invalidate the votes in four other states is a violation of your sacred oath to the constitution that you swore to with your hand on a Bible.  

Many people believe that Jesus will remember that when you die.

What is an "intentional explosion" ?

It is the last few days of 2020 and we have the media coin new words:

            "intentional explosion"

A phrase that I've never heard before today.

Gee, is this planet just a little weird? Are we living in a Vonnegut novel? How long in the news cycle before you never hear about any of this again?