Once upon a time in our language, we had these things called aphorisms. Adages. Sayings. Collectively, they were known as "common wisdom". We all knew these things, and yet had to remind one another of them periodically. For instance, a mother or father, bemoaning their child's bad grades and wanted to blame it on how "slotted" their attention has become because of TV, video games, Twitter, etc., might say "The slotted spoon doesn't hold much soup." Their friend, wanting to remind them to look at their OWN grades in high school might respond "Well, the apple doesn't fall far from the tree."
Some of these aphorisms became changed over time to mean something else. For instance, have you ever heard someone dismiss someone else by quoting Marie Antoinette's "Let them eat cake"? Well, that's not about haughtiness. That's about being out of touch. When a representative of the French peasants came to her and told her that her people had no bread, she was genuinely puzzled and said "They have no bread? Well, let them eat cake." They cut off her head for it. Or "the proof's in the pudding"? Yuck. Sounds like some bad pudding. Actually, "the proof of the pudding is in the tasting". One of my favorite aphoristic slaughters is "You can't have your cake and eat it, too." Of course you can. That's patently false. As a matter of fact, you'd have a hard time eating your cake if you DIDN'T have it. As a matter of fact, the saying is actually "You can't EAT your cake and HAVE it, too." Meaning you can either have it or eat it. Once you've eaten it, you can no longer have it.
I think that part of the death of aphorisms is the fact that we don't really want to think about what they represent in our modern culture. We desperately WANT to eat our cake and still have it.
One that has fallen seriously out of favor, for instance, is "You get what you pay for", meaning if you pay for low quality you can't complain about getting low quality. We want to believe that we can pay for cheap, Chinese junk (no pun intended) at WalMart and get quality products without compromising our own economy. It doesn't work.
Another one is "a stitch in time saves nine", meaning that if a rip starts in your clothes and you put a single stitch in now, the rip might not become worse and require nine stitches later. This has been replaced with "use it up, throw it away and buy a new one".
Yes, this relates to how we elect our representatives. Another aphorism, this one directly attributed to "Moms" Mabley is "If you always do what you always did, you will always get what you always got."
Peace.
Randal
Friday, November 25, 2011
Sunday, November 20, 2011
Mindless Reaction
I am a cigar smoker.
Have been for about half of my life at this point, but only been really serious about for the last... oh... twelve or thirteen years.
Recently, though, cigars have been lumped together with cigarettes. Why? Is it because they are comparable? No. It's because the fact that they're NOT comparable is just too hard to think about!
Comparing a person who smokes a cigar a day or so because he or she enjoys it to someone who smokes a pack of cigarettes a day is a little like comparing someone who has a glass of fine wine or so per day with the wino getting blotto on Night Train outside of your apartment building. I realize that i'm generalizing here, but most cigar smokers (and, i would venture, NO smokers of fine cigars) are addicts, just as most cigarette smokers are. I say that i'm generalizing, because i do know some addicted cigar smokers, just as a i knew a few (very precious few) cigarette smokers who can smoke say... two or three cigarettes a day and be done with it, just because they enjoy it.
And while we're on the subject, i bet that some of those anti-smoking nuts who lump cigars with cigarettes drink occasionally sometimes themselves. As a matter of fact, i've had conversations with some of them. I've got to warn you... if you're one of these people, avert your eyes! I've lost more than one friend by blinding them with the light of truth! Here goes...
It is difficult to get accurate statistics on deaths from either alcohol or tobacco. Why? Because of all of the other factors that may play in these deaths. For instance, in the eighties, when smoking was on a sharp decline, lung diseases in the United States almost TRIPLED. At this point, we have about ten times the amount of childhood asthma than we did ten years ago, and a hundred or more times that number since the seventies when everyone smoked everywhere all the time. You know how many of these are attributable to cigars? Zero. As a matter of fact, look at famous cigar smokers who have lived into their eighties, nineties or even a hundred plus. George Burns. Milton Berle. Sid Caesar, who'll be ninety next year. Burns, who died in 1996 at the age of 100 was performing right up to the end. Caesar still pops up on TV from time to time.
My father, a life-long cigarette smoker, died last year at the age of 72, after having spent the last several years of his life house-bound.
See the difference? Compare that to famous cigarette smokers, who all died young of lung disease. Rod Serling (50), Bogart (57), Edward R. Murrow (57). Yul Brenner actually made it to 65.
You know how many of these deaths are factually attributable to second hand smoke? NONE.
Now look at alcohol. The CDC estimates 25000 deaths per year from alcohol... but that's just alcohol users. How many non-drinkers are killed every year by crazy drunks? In fights, auto accidents and just random acts of alcohol-induced stupidity. And that doesn't take into account the number of people seriously injured or crippled by drunk drivers every year.
If you REALLY want to ban a serious health hazard to people who DON'T use the product, you should work on banning alcohol.
I lived in Seattle the year that they passed the idiotic law banning smoking in ALL buildings, including bars. Including CIGAR bars of all the stupidity. The government actually stood still for this. Aren't we sick of the nanny state taking away our freedoms? Oh, and a note to my republican brothers and sisters... when we talk about "small government", we're not talking about government staying out of corporations' affairs, we're talking about keeping them out of OUR affairs. There are even places where you can't smoke in your apartment. Places where you can't smoke in your own CAR, for dog's sake.
Look, i HATE cigarettes, okay? For nicotine addicts, they are the equivalent of needles for heroin addicts. But smoking is LEGAL. If you want to regulate it, do it in a sane way, not in a mindless, knee-jerk way. Ban it in McDonald's and Chuck E. Cheese, which are mostly for kids. In a place like the Pike Pub in Seattle, which has a HERMETICALLY-SEALED cigar room, keep it legal.
By the way... do you know what illegal drug has never, as far as anyone can prove, killed anyone? Anywhere? Ever? Pot. I don't smoke pot, but legalize it for heaven's sake.
Peace.
Randal
Have been for about half of my life at this point, but only been really serious about for the last... oh... twelve or thirteen years.
Recently, though, cigars have been lumped together with cigarettes. Why? Is it because they are comparable? No. It's because the fact that they're NOT comparable is just too hard to think about!
Comparing a person who smokes a cigar a day or so because he or she enjoys it to someone who smokes a pack of cigarettes a day is a little like comparing someone who has a glass of fine wine or so per day with the wino getting blotto on Night Train outside of your apartment building. I realize that i'm generalizing here, but most cigar smokers (and, i would venture, NO smokers of fine cigars) are addicts, just as most cigarette smokers are. I say that i'm generalizing, because i do know some addicted cigar smokers, just as a i knew a few (very precious few) cigarette smokers who can smoke say... two or three cigarettes a day and be done with it, just because they enjoy it.
And while we're on the subject, i bet that some of those anti-smoking nuts who lump cigars with cigarettes drink occasionally sometimes themselves. As a matter of fact, i've had conversations with some of them. I've got to warn you... if you're one of these people, avert your eyes! I've lost more than one friend by blinding them with the light of truth! Here goes...
It is difficult to get accurate statistics on deaths from either alcohol or tobacco. Why? Because of all of the other factors that may play in these deaths. For instance, in the eighties, when smoking was on a sharp decline, lung diseases in the United States almost TRIPLED. At this point, we have about ten times the amount of childhood asthma than we did ten years ago, and a hundred or more times that number since the seventies when everyone smoked everywhere all the time. You know how many of these are attributable to cigars? Zero. As a matter of fact, look at famous cigar smokers who have lived into their eighties, nineties or even a hundred plus. George Burns. Milton Berle. Sid Caesar, who'll be ninety next year. Burns, who died in 1996 at the age of 100 was performing right up to the end. Caesar still pops up on TV from time to time.
My father, a life-long cigarette smoker, died last year at the age of 72, after having spent the last several years of his life house-bound.
See the difference? Compare that to famous cigarette smokers, who all died young of lung disease. Rod Serling (50), Bogart (57), Edward R. Murrow (57). Yul Brenner actually made it to 65.
You know how many of these deaths are factually attributable to second hand smoke? NONE.
Now look at alcohol. The CDC estimates 25000 deaths per year from alcohol... but that's just alcohol users. How many non-drinkers are killed every year by crazy drunks? In fights, auto accidents and just random acts of alcohol-induced stupidity. And that doesn't take into account the number of people seriously injured or crippled by drunk drivers every year.
If you REALLY want to ban a serious health hazard to people who DON'T use the product, you should work on banning alcohol.
I lived in Seattle the year that they passed the idiotic law banning smoking in ALL buildings, including bars. Including CIGAR bars of all the stupidity. The government actually stood still for this. Aren't we sick of the nanny state taking away our freedoms? Oh, and a note to my republican brothers and sisters... when we talk about "small government", we're not talking about government staying out of corporations' affairs, we're talking about keeping them out of OUR affairs. There are even places where you can't smoke in your apartment. Places where you can't smoke in your own CAR, for dog's sake.
Look, i HATE cigarettes, okay? For nicotine addicts, they are the equivalent of needles for heroin addicts. But smoking is LEGAL. If you want to regulate it, do it in a sane way, not in a mindless, knee-jerk way. Ban it in McDonald's and Chuck E. Cheese, which are mostly for kids. In a place like the Pike Pub in Seattle, which has a HERMETICALLY-SEALED cigar room, keep it legal.
By the way... do you know what illegal drug has never, as far as anyone can prove, killed anyone? Anywhere? Ever? Pot. I don't smoke pot, but legalize it for heaven's sake.
Peace.
Randal
Thursday, November 10, 2011
Movie Review: The Thing (2011)
First, a little history.
This story started life as a novella called "Who Goes There?" by John W. Campbell. If the name sounds familiar, it's because one of the most prestigious awards in science fiction bears his name. The story is about an alien found in the ice of Antarctica and thawed out. It then begins changing shape, imitating the life forms around it, and attacks the humans on the base.
It was first made into a film by Howard Hawks in 1951 as "The Thing From Another World". The filmmakers originally wanted to simply call it "The Thing", but another film beat them to the punch with that title. It was about an alien discovered in Antarctic ice, which is then thawed out and attacks the humans on the base. Of course, in this film, James Arness as the Thing was basically a six-foot tall walking carrot.
Thirty-one years later, in 1982, John Carpenter made the film again as "John Carpenter's The Thing". It was called this because Carpenter, in his infinite ego, insisted that his name go above all of his movie titles. This created a problem when he made the Stephen King novel Christine into a film, because King (in his infinite ego) had the same stipulation in his contract. This version basically followed the original story, and is probably the best of the three film versions.
Which brings us to the new version, "The Thing", which also basically follows the original story.
THE GOOD: The special effects are great, and the story has some good jumps in it. The cast all turn in serviceable, if not stellar performances. The filmmakers were smart enough to follow Carpenter's blueprint, all the way down to swiping a couple of his effect ideas.
THE BAD: There are some inexplicable logic problems in the film. As an example, there is one moment where they're trying to determine who's human and who's not. Since the Thing can't replicate non-living tissue, they do this by checking everyone for fillings. So far, so good... except that some of the humans can't be excluded because they have porcelain fillings, which can't be distinguished from dentin. Except... they can. Porcelain looks much more like a natural tooth, except as the person ages and lives the tooth changes colors, whereas the filling doesn't. So after twenty or thirty years the filling still looks pretty much like dentin, but if you're looking for it you can see it. And trust me... these people would be looking HARD.
THE UGLY: The filmmakers never really decided how the Thing does its thing. Does it replicate or hijack human beings? One character says "It replicates the being and then lives inside them." Huh? That doesn't even make any sense. In the 1982 film, it is determined that every cell of the Thing is a separate living entity, and it can infiltrate a human being and basically turn into that being, replacing every cell in its body with its own. I wish that the 2011 filmmakers had had the same clarity of vision, it would have elevated this film from simply good and watchable to almost excellent.
Peace.
Randal
Thursday, November 3, 2011
Story Review: Mile 81 by Stephen King
Okay, this first thing that I want to say for this review is that it contains spoilers. Why? Because I like my friends and readers and DON’T WANT THEM TO SUFFER THROUGH THIS STORY!
A kid passes out at an abandoned rest stop on the freeway from drinking vodka. Meanwhile an apparently alien car rolls into the rest stop and starts EATING PEOPLE.
THE CAR.
IS EATING PEOPLE.
Sound stupid? Good. Because it is. And it’s not even like chomping them up using its hood as a mouth. That, at least, would be entertaining. It just kind of… absorbs them. As it does, it deforms and then pops back into shape with a sound (according to King) of a tennis ball popping back into shape. So apparently it’s a RUBBER alien man-eating car. Jeez.
“Look, Mr. King… I like you. Been a fan every since I first read Cujo in the early eighties to impress a girl. At your best, sir, you write like no one else in the business. Anyone who can read ‘Salem’s Lot and sleep well that night or Misery and not cringe at the hobbling scene or Bag of Bones and not be moved by the ghost’s plight are so cold emotionally that I don’t want to meet them in a dark alley. For my money, the downward slide in quality started with It, and continued merrily with The Tommyknockers. Since then you haven’t so much been “hit and miss” as you’ve been “miss miss miss hit miss miss”. The only one that was so self-worshipping and bad that I couldn’t finish it was Lisey's Story. The truly amazing thing is that, at about the same time, you published the last of the “Richard Bachman” novels, Blaze. In the prologue of Blaze, you actively apologized for the book and dismissed it as a “trunk” novel. If I’m not mistaken, you even wondered in the text why you even bothered publishing it, AND IT IS ONE OF THE BEST THINGS THAT YOU’VE WRITTEN IN YEARS. You’ve really started to repeat yourself badly, as well. What’s Under the Dome but The Stand meets The Tommyknockers? Please. As a fan, I’m begging you. Quit publishing every piece of crap that you write. Start accepting the input of others, and if anyone that you trust thinks that it’s junk, trunk it. You’re rich enough and you’re really tarnishing your reputation with some of this garbage.”
Speaking of repeating himself, some will be tempted to think that this is a reworking of From a Buick 8 (which was a reworking of the earlier and vastly superior Christine), but it’s really more like his short story The Raft where a group of teens are stranded on a raft in the middle of a lake by an apparently alien monster that absorbs them. He even has a female protagonist trapped by the monster getting a hold of her hair.
THE GOOD: I give King huge points for how far he’s come in his representation of gay characters. One of the characters (read as: car chow) in Mile 81 is a lesbian, and she’s one of my favorite King characters probably since the group in The Stand. She is light-years beyond the flaming stereotypes that he wrote in the opening pages of It.
THE BAD: The rest of the story. It ranges from bad to laughably bad. In particular, the car as antagonist. For those who don’t know, King was struck by a van and almost killed in 1999. When that happened, I remember thinking “Man, I hope that he writes about this one day.” Now, after On Writing, and Dreamcatcher, and Kingdom Hospital and now this, all that I can say is “MAN, I HOPE THAT HESTOPS WRITING ABOUT THAT CAR CCIDENT ONE DAY!”
THE UGLY: The main character, who is passed out through most of the story. King has relied heavily on kids in his books. He says that he has the heart of a small boy (in a jar on his desk), but the “small boy” whose heart King claims to have seems to be stuck somewhere between 1955 and 1970. This boy is not believable as a twenty-first century kid in any way. The kid’s older brother even belongs to a group of kids who call themselves the “rip-ass raiders”. Seriously. Do you have any idea how GAY that would sound to a modern kid? Heck, I’m a child of the seventies and that phrase sounds incredibly gay to me. I think that it’s time that he either stops writing about kids or gets to know them a little better.
The bottom line? Don’t read this story. It’s bad. As fans, we need to stop encouraging him so that he can get back to quality writing and quit publishing this junk.
Oh, and don't forget to click on an ad while you're here, will you please?
Peace.
Randal
A kid passes out at an abandoned rest stop on the freeway from drinking vodka. Meanwhile an apparently alien car rolls into the rest stop and starts EATING PEOPLE.
THE CAR.
IS EATING PEOPLE.
Sound stupid? Good. Because it is. And it’s not even like chomping them up using its hood as a mouth. That, at least, would be entertaining. It just kind of… absorbs them. As it does, it deforms and then pops back into shape with a sound (according to King) of a tennis ball popping back into shape. So apparently it’s a RUBBER alien man-eating car. Jeez.
“Look, Mr. King… I like you. Been a fan every since I first read Cujo in the early eighties to impress a girl. At your best, sir, you write like no one else in the business. Anyone who can read ‘Salem’s Lot and sleep well that night or Misery and not cringe at the hobbling scene or Bag of Bones and not be moved by the ghost’s plight are so cold emotionally that I don’t want to meet them in a dark alley. For my money, the downward slide in quality started with It, and continued merrily with The Tommyknockers. Since then you haven’t so much been “hit and miss” as you’ve been “miss miss miss hit miss miss”. The only one that was so self-worshipping and bad that I couldn’t finish it was Lisey's Story. The truly amazing thing is that, at about the same time, you published the last of the “Richard Bachman” novels, Blaze. In the prologue of Blaze, you actively apologized for the book and dismissed it as a “trunk” novel. If I’m not mistaken, you even wondered in the text why you even bothered publishing it, AND IT IS ONE OF THE BEST THINGS THAT YOU’VE WRITTEN IN YEARS. You’ve really started to repeat yourself badly, as well. What’s Under the Dome but The Stand meets The Tommyknockers? Please. As a fan, I’m begging you. Quit publishing every piece of crap that you write. Start accepting the input of others, and if anyone that you trust thinks that it’s junk, trunk it. You’re rich enough and you’re really tarnishing your reputation with some of this garbage.”
Speaking of repeating himself, some will be tempted to think that this is a reworking of From a Buick 8 (which was a reworking of the earlier and vastly superior Christine), but it’s really more like his short story The Raft where a group of teens are stranded on a raft in the middle of a lake by an apparently alien monster that absorbs them. He even has a female protagonist trapped by the monster getting a hold of her hair.
THE GOOD: I give King huge points for how far he’s come in his representation of gay characters. One of the characters (read as: car chow) in Mile 81 is a lesbian, and she’s one of my favorite King characters probably since the group in The Stand. She is light-years beyond the flaming stereotypes that he wrote in the opening pages of It.
THE BAD: The rest of the story. It ranges from bad to laughably bad. In particular, the car as antagonist. For those who don’t know, King was struck by a van and almost killed in 1999. When that happened, I remember thinking “Man, I hope that he writes about this one day.” Now, after On Writing, and Dreamcatcher, and Kingdom Hospital and now this, all that I can say is “MAN, I HOPE THAT HESTOPS WRITING ABOUT THAT CAR CCIDENT ONE DAY!”
THE UGLY: The main character, who is passed out through most of the story. King has relied heavily on kids in his books. He says that he has the heart of a small boy (in a jar on his desk), but the “small boy” whose heart King claims to have seems to be stuck somewhere between 1955 and 1970. This boy is not believable as a twenty-first century kid in any way. The kid’s older brother even belongs to a group of kids who call themselves the “rip-ass raiders”. Seriously. Do you have any idea how GAY that would sound to a modern kid? Heck, I’m a child of the seventies and that phrase sounds incredibly gay to me. I think that it’s time that he either stops writing about kids or gets to know them a little better.
The bottom line? Don’t read this story. It’s bad. As fans, we need to stop encouraging him so that he can get back to quality writing and quit publishing this junk.
Oh, and don't forget to click on an ad while you're here, will you please?
Peace.
Randal
Saturday, October 29, 2011
Are Corporations Not People?
In a follow-up to my last blog entry about the “Occupy Wall Street” movement, I would like to address a sign that I saw some of the protestors carrying. It said “Corporations Are Not People”. I’ve seen this sign over and over again.
First off, let me be clear that the term “corporations are people” does not imply in any way shape or form that anyone thinks that corporations are human beings. What this refers to are Supreme Court decisions in 1819 and 1886 stating that corporations possessed SOME of the rights of human beings, including the right to enter into contracts and the right to 14th amendment protections. A few years back, the Supreme Court took this (I think) flawed logic to an extreme by saying that since legally the earlier court had granted corporations personhood that this should be extended to the right of free speech, which, in the case of corporations, meant money.
Personally, I think that rather than granting corporations MORE “human” rights, the 21st century court should have struck down or severely restricted the earlier decisions for the flawed pieces of logic that they are.
Here’s the problem… a corporation cannot and should not be able to enter into a contract. In order to enter into a contract, you must be a legal adult. Corporations are not human, therefore the phrase “adult” can never apply to them. Instead, we should recognize that contracts are entered into by human beings on behalf of corporations. For instance, at my former job with Costco, every time we received a new contract, the signature at the bottom was that of Jim Sinegal, the CEO of the company and not “Mr. Costco”. Our contract was with Jim, who accepted the responsibility of enforcing the contract on our behalf with the company, and not with the company itself.
As far as the personhood that the 21st century court was arguing for that includes the right to free speech, why should that not apply?
Well, to begin with, let’s look at the differences between persons and corporations. What are the inalienable rights of human beings, as enumerated in the Declaration of Independence? Well, to begin with, it recognizes that we were created by a being greater than ourselves, who the document rightly and simply refers to as “our creator”. Corporations were not created by this omnipresent creator, but by flawed human beings. Then it goes on to say that this creator granted us the rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Corporations do not live. The liberty that they have is, like the liberty that WE have, curtailed by laws to protect us from society and society from us. That is the one thing that we have in common, for a corporation cannot pursue happiness. Happiness is an emotion and corporations are incapable of feeling emotion.
And what about the motives of human beings? I I think that most of our motives are pretty complex. In addition to the inalienable rights enumerated above and Maslow’s hierarchy of basic needs (food, water, shelter, air and affection) we want so many other things. We want a good life for our kids. We want to know that our spouse is safe, or that our ex-spouse is suffering tremendous pain. What’s the motive of a corporation? To make money. That’s it. That’s the entire reason for a corporation’s existence, is to make money. I think that that, alone, should deny a corporation personhood. Although our tolerance for persons whose sole goal seems to be to make money, we know in our hearts that that person has other goals, they are just not pursuing them as publicly.
And even if we do grant corporations personhood, then we also have to consider the idiotic idea of “deregulation”. Think of the number of laws that you have constraining you every day from laws against killing your ex-spouse and kicking your cat to speed limits and what you can see, read and hear. I’m a cigar smoker who finds myself constantly at odds with all of the insane laws around my hobby. Right now Congress is considering yet ANOTHER law that would prohibit internet or catalog sales of cigars. I guess that the logic is that since they can ban internet sales of cigarettes to keep kids from ordering them, they are within their rights to do the same thing to cigars. I hate to break it to our rather out-of-touch Congress, though… KIDS DON’T SMOKE CIGARS. If they use tobacco, they either smoke cigarettes or chew. So yes, let’s logically deny them access to the things that they abuse, but not pretend that they abuse something that they don’t so that you can get your nose further up our butts.
Anyway.
I digress.
My point is, shouldn’t corporations have at LEAST as many laws constraining them as we do, if we are going to consider them persons like us?
Peace.
Randal
First off, let me be clear that the term “corporations are people” does not imply in any way shape or form that anyone thinks that corporations are human beings. What this refers to are Supreme Court decisions in 1819 and 1886 stating that corporations possessed SOME of the rights of human beings, including the right to enter into contracts and the right to 14th amendment protections. A few years back, the Supreme Court took this (I think) flawed logic to an extreme by saying that since legally the earlier court had granted corporations personhood that this should be extended to the right of free speech, which, in the case of corporations, meant money.
Personally, I think that rather than granting corporations MORE “human” rights, the 21st century court should have struck down or severely restricted the earlier decisions for the flawed pieces of logic that they are.
Here’s the problem… a corporation cannot and should not be able to enter into a contract. In order to enter into a contract, you must be a legal adult. Corporations are not human, therefore the phrase “adult” can never apply to them. Instead, we should recognize that contracts are entered into by human beings on behalf of corporations. For instance, at my former job with Costco, every time we received a new contract, the signature at the bottom was that of Jim Sinegal, the CEO of the company and not “Mr. Costco”. Our contract was with Jim, who accepted the responsibility of enforcing the contract on our behalf with the company, and not with the company itself.
As far as the personhood that the 21st century court was arguing for that includes the right to free speech, why should that not apply?
Well, to begin with, let’s look at the differences between persons and corporations. What are the inalienable rights of human beings, as enumerated in the Declaration of Independence? Well, to begin with, it recognizes that we were created by a being greater than ourselves, who the document rightly and simply refers to as “our creator”. Corporations were not created by this omnipresent creator, but by flawed human beings. Then it goes on to say that this creator granted us the rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Corporations do not live. The liberty that they have is, like the liberty that WE have, curtailed by laws to protect us from society and society from us. That is the one thing that we have in common, for a corporation cannot pursue happiness. Happiness is an emotion and corporations are incapable of feeling emotion.
And what about the motives of human beings? I I think that most of our motives are pretty complex. In addition to the inalienable rights enumerated above and Maslow’s hierarchy of basic needs (food, water, shelter, air and affection) we want so many other things. We want a good life for our kids. We want to know that our spouse is safe, or that our ex-spouse is suffering tremendous pain. What’s the motive of a corporation? To make money. That’s it. That’s the entire reason for a corporation’s existence, is to make money. I think that that, alone, should deny a corporation personhood. Although our tolerance for persons whose sole goal seems to be to make money, we know in our hearts that that person has other goals, they are just not pursuing them as publicly.
And even if we do grant corporations personhood, then we also have to consider the idiotic idea of “deregulation”. Think of the number of laws that you have constraining you every day from laws against killing your ex-spouse and kicking your cat to speed limits and what you can see, read and hear. I’m a cigar smoker who finds myself constantly at odds with all of the insane laws around my hobby. Right now Congress is considering yet ANOTHER law that would prohibit internet or catalog sales of cigars. I guess that the logic is that since they can ban internet sales of cigarettes to keep kids from ordering them, they are within their rights to do the same thing to cigars. I hate to break it to our rather out-of-touch Congress, though… KIDS DON’T SMOKE CIGARS. If they use tobacco, they either smoke cigarettes or chew. So yes, let’s logically deny them access to the things that they abuse, but not pretend that they abuse something that they don’t so that you can get your nose further up our butts.
Anyway.
I digress.
My point is, shouldn’t corporations have at LEAST as many laws constraining them as we do, if we are going to consider them persons like us?
Peace.
Randal
Saturday, October 22, 2011
The 99% Needs to Put Up or Shut Up
I was just watching a news report on the Occupy Wall Street movement, and something struck me. The reporter was talking about what a bunch of freaks the protesters were, and how it was hard to sympathize with their movement when they behave so oddly. Then he interviewed a group of so-called “Normal” Americans who all agreed that something had to be done about the income inequity in the US. Not by them, of course, but by SOMEBODY. They all had kids to take care of and football games to watch, etc., etc.
The great Rabbi Hillel said, among other things, “If I am not for myself, who will be for me? And when I am only for myself, what am ‘I’? And if not now, when?” In other words, the oft-misquoted “If not us, who? If not now, when?” So WE have to do something about it. I think that these protests will wind up having the same net effect that the WTC riots in Seattle had… net zero. So it’s not up to the protesters. It’s up to us. And if we’re going to change this, it’s going to require a massive grass roots movement. So how do we do it?
First off, let me say that I’m not anti-wealth. I’d like to be wealthy myself one day. Frankly, I don’t care how much money and stuff people like Phil Knight and the rest of the 1% have. What I care is how they GOT it. When the chairman of Chrysler says that his company can’t afford to pay Americans a living wage to make him rich, and then he himself nets millions of dollars per year while the Americans that he’s NOT employing are on food stamps, that’s a problem. And I’m not talking about forcibly redistributing his or anyone else’s wealth, either. I’m talking about forcing him and the rest of them to start reinvesting that wealth into America and Americans to strengthen our country and our economy before it’s too late.
So… how can we do this? I mean me… you… individuals. What the heck can we do?
For starters, pay attention to your candidates when you vote. FORGET YOUR DAMNED PARTY, IN OTHER WORDS. (Sorry about the swear word. I can’t promise that it won’t happen again, but I am trying to keep this blog friendly for everyone. Just get a little irate where political parties are concerned.) Both major parties in the US have become so corporatized and corrupt that it’s hard for me to tell them apart. And just like I was sick of Bush’s so-called conservatism after a few years, I am sick of Obama’s so-called liberalism as well. Neither of these men apparently know what those words mean. So pay attention to your candidates, not just their party. If you’re a republican who supports American jobs, and your representative was one of those who voted against the jobs bill, don’t vote for them. If you’re a democrat who feels like Obama didn’t just DROP the ball on health care, but actively handed it to the other team, don’t vote for him again. Spend some time. Do some research. “Throw your vote away” on a so-called “third party” candidate. Think of this… in the 2000 presidential election, Al Gore won the popular vote and George Bush won the electoral vote. In real terms, they each got about half of the votes cast. That means that since only about 60% of Americans voted, they each got about 30% of Americans to vote for them. So what would have happened if the other 40% had “thrown their vote away” on Ralph Nader? It would have been President Nader in 2000 instead of “President” Bush in 2001. You can bet that the 1% and their lackies are paying attention and voting. The 99% should, too.
Another way that we can do this is to vote with our dollars. If you know that a company is taking huge amounts of money OUT of America without putting any back IN (I’m looking at you, Apple and Nike) then don’t buy their shit. When my wife and I went out to buy new sneakers for me, she got a little frustrated at me because I wanted to find a pair that was made in the USA. She didn’t like any of the ones that I found and I REALLY didn’t want to buy a pair made with Chinese slave labor. We finally found a pair of New Balances that we both liked that was made in the USA, that cost less than most of the sneaks made in China. And they’re comfortable, for a bonus.
Yes, it’s hard. Yes, it takes time. But your choices, 99%, are to either take the time to take care, or shut up about it. There is no viable third choice.
Oh, and while you're here, please take a moment to click on one of the ads. You don't have to buy anything, just click. I'm trying to make a living off of my writing, and that's one way that I can do it. Thanks.
Peace.
Randal
The great Rabbi Hillel said, among other things, “If I am not for myself, who will be for me? And when I am only for myself, what am ‘I’? And if not now, when?” In other words, the oft-misquoted “If not us, who? If not now, when?” So WE have to do something about it. I think that these protests will wind up having the same net effect that the WTC riots in Seattle had… net zero. So it’s not up to the protesters. It’s up to us. And if we’re going to change this, it’s going to require a massive grass roots movement. So how do we do it?
First off, let me say that I’m not anti-wealth. I’d like to be wealthy myself one day. Frankly, I don’t care how much money and stuff people like Phil Knight and the rest of the 1% have. What I care is how they GOT it. When the chairman of Chrysler says that his company can’t afford to pay Americans a living wage to make him rich, and then he himself nets millions of dollars per year while the Americans that he’s NOT employing are on food stamps, that’s a problem. And I’m not talking about forcibly redistributing his or anyone else’s wealth, either. I’m talking about forcing him and the rest of them to start reinvesting that wealth into America and Americans to strengthen our country and our economy before it’s too late.
So… how can we do this? I mean me… you… individuals. What the heck can we do?
For starters, pay attention to your candidates when you vote. FORGET YOUR DAMNED PARTY, IN OTHER WORDS. (Sorry about the swear word. I can’t promise that it won’t happen again, but I am trying to keep this blog friendly for everyone. Just get a little irate where political parties are concerned.) Both major parties in the US have become so corporatized and corrupt that it’s hard for me to tell them apart. And just like I was sick of Bush’s so-called conservatism after a few years, I am sick of Obama’s so-called liberalism as well. Neither of these men apparently know what those words mean. So pay attention to your candidates, not just their party. If you’re a republican who supports American jobs, and your representative was one of those who voted against the jobs bill, don’t vote for them. If you’re a democrat who feels like Obama didn’t just DROP the ball on health care, but actively handed it to the other team, don’t vote for him again. Spend some time. Do some research. “Throw your vote away” on a so-called “third party” candidate. Think of this… in the 2000 presidential election, Al Gore won the popular vote and George Bush won the electoral vote. In real terms, they each got about half of the votes cast. That means that since only about 60% of Americans voted, they each got about 30% of Americans to vote for them. So what would have happened if the other 40% had “thrown their vote away” on Ralph Nader? It would have been President Nader in 2000 instead of “President” Bush in 2001. You can bet that the 1% and their lackies are paying attention and voting. The 99% should, too.
Another way that we can do this is to vote with our dollars. If you know that a company is taking huge amounts of money OUT of America without putting any back IN (I’m looking at you, Apple and Nike) then don’t buy their shit. When my wife and I went out to buy new sneakers for me, she got a little frustrated at me because I wanted to find a pair that was made in the USA. She didn’t like any of the ones that I found and I REALLY didn’t want to buy a pair made with Chinese slave labor. We finally found a pair of New Balances that we both liked that was made in the USA, that cost less than most of the sneaks made in China. And they’re comfortable, for a bonus.
Yes, it’s hard. Yes, it takes time. But your choices, 99%, are to either take the time to take care, or shut up about it. There is no viable third choice.
Oh, and while you're here, please take a moment to click on one of the ads. You don't have to buy anything, just click. I'm trying to make a living off of my writing, and that's one way that I can do it. Thanks.
Peace.
Randal
Friday, October 14, 2011
Isn't It Amazing...
...how at the age of 46 (WII Fitness age 26, thank you very much) i can still be struck kind of stupid by a physically attractive woman. I consider myself an intelligent, fairly articulate guy... i think that most people that know me would agree... but... there's this woman...
She's a supervisor where i work. In heels, she's almost as tall as me (6' 2") and slim with long blonde hair. Whenever i get around her, all that it's in my head to say is "Heh heh heh... you're purrrrty..."
Personally, i find it kind of repulsive that women have that kind of control over me.
Am i the only guy that this happens to? Admittedly, it happens a lot less now than it did in my thirties... a lot less then than it did in my twenties... and so forth, back to about age 15 or 16 when i discovered my dad's Playboy stash and REALLY got interested in females. (What can i say, kids? It was a different world. We didn't grow up as fast.)
By the same token, i wish that more women would take Spider-man to heart. "With great power comes great responsibility." Most of the women that i've encountered over the years who realize that they have this power over us seem bound and determined to use it for evil.
There was a TV show on for years on either the comedy channel or Spike, i can't remember which, called "The Man Show" that was pretty good as long as Jimmy Kimmell and Adam Corolla hosted it. When Joe Rogan and whoever the heck that other guy was took over, it just slid into a pit. This show celebrated all things men, with tongue firmly in cheek. They spent the show quaffing beer and ended with a huge toast and a stein-drainer. They had beautiful girls on there called (kids, cover your eyes) the Juggies, for obvious reasons, and, over the end credits, always showed slow-motion video of girls jumping on trampolines. It was a MAN show, darn it.
Anyway.
I digress.
They did one segment on this show that, frankly, made me a little embarrassed to be a man, while, at the same time, demonstrating perfectly this power that i spoke of earlier.
One of the prettiest of the "Juggies", whose name i am embarrassed to admit that i can't remember, was hanging out in a bikini shop that was wired with hidden cameras. Guys would come in and she would try to talk them into buying her ridiculously expensive bikinis. Sometimes she just had to ask, a couple of guys she had to take into the changing room with her while she tried them on. (Don't worry, ladies... WE didn't get to see any of the girl, even if the guy in the changing room with her did). Most of the guys broke out the plastic and "bought" them for her. I don't think that their card was ever charged. Good thing, too. Let's see them explain THAT to the wife.
Anyway, one of these poor saps, the one that made me embarrassed to be a man, made it to the changing room with her, and, after getting the full show, rather sweatily admitted that he couldn't buy them for her because he didn't have any money. So then she started trying to talk him into STEALING them for her. AND HE DID IT!
I guess that what i'm trying to say, ladies, is that if you know that you have this effect on men, please don't use your powers for evil. Don't get us to buy (or steal) things for you with it. Don't promise sex and then withhold it as a punishment for some transgression. Don't bend, fold or manipulate us. Be gentle with us. We do good things for you and only ask that you treat us well in response.
Peace.
Randal
She's a supervisor where i work. In heels, she's almost as tall as me (6' 2") and slim with long blonde hair. Whenever i get around her, all that it's in my head to say is "Heh heh heh... you're purrrrty..."
Personally, i find it kind of repulsive that women have that kind of control over me.
Am i the only guy that this happens to? Admittedly, it happens a lot less now than it did in my thirties... a lot less then than it did in my twenties... and so forth, back to about age 15 or 16 when i discovered my dad's Playboy stash and REALLY got interested in females. (What can i say, kids? It was a different world. We didn't grow up as fast.)
By the same token, i wish that more women would take Spider-man to heart. "With great power comes great responsibility." Most of the women that i've encountered over the years who realize that they have this power over us seem bound and determined to use it for evil.
There was a TV show on for years on either the comedy channel or Spike, i can't remember which, called "The Man Show" that was pretty good as long as Jimmy Kimmell and Adam Corolla hosted it. When Joe Rogan and whoever the heck that other guy was took over, it just slid into a pit. This show celebrated all things men, with tongue firmly in cheek. They spent the show quaffing beer and ended with a huge toast and a stein-drainer. They had beautiful girls on there called (kids, cover your eyes) the Juggies, for obvious reasons, and, over the end credits, always showed slow-motion video of girls jumping on trampolines. It was a MAN show, darn it.
Anyway.
I digress.
They did one segment on this show that, frankly, made me a little embarrassed to be a man, while, at the same time, demonstrating perfectly this power that i spoke of earlier.
One of the prettiest of the "Juggies", whose name i am embarrassed to admit that i can't remember, was hanging out in a bikini shop that was wired with hidden cameras. Guys would come in and she would try to talk them into buying her ridiculously expensive bikinis. Sometimes she just had to ask, a couple of guys she had to take into the changing room with her while she tried them on. (Don't worry, ladies... WE didn't get to see any of the girl, even if the guy in the changing room with her did). Most of the guys broke out the plastic and "bought" them for her. I don't think that their card was ever charged. Good thing, too. Let's see them explain THAT to the wife.
Anyway, one of these poor saps, the one that made me embarrassed to be a man, made it to the changing room with her, and, after getting the full show, rather sweatily admitted that he couldn't buy them for her because he didn't have any money. So then she started trying to talk him into STEALING them for her. AND HE DID IT!
I guess that what i'm trying to say, ladies, is that if you know that you have this effect on men, please don't use your powers for evil. Don't get us to buy (or steal) things for you with it. Don't promise sex and then withhold it as a punishment for some transgression. Don't bend, fold or manipulate us. Be gentle with us. We do good things for you and only ask that you treat us well in response.
Peace.
Randal
Sunday, October 9, 2011
Welcome to the New Blog!
Hello, my friends!
My name is Randal Schaffer and this is my new blog. Here i'll be writing about whatever it is that i want to write about, hopefully you'll find it interesting and amusing. May be random thoughts on language, like this one, or movie or book reviews, or political stuff or whatever's on my mind.
For me, i am a married Christian man who holds bits and pieces of just about all political philosophies. I am a believer in small government like the republicans, a believer in personal freedoms like the libertarians, and a believer in the rights and safety of the people like the liberals. I find myself typically voting democrat (i voted for Obama) but find myself as isolated from the modern democrats like i do all of the other parties.
Also, as soon as i figure out how to post the darned code to get ads working on this thing, do me a favor and click on one of the ads when you read a post. You don't have to BUY anything if you don't want, just click on an ad. I'm trying to make money from my writing, and that's one way to do it.
Okay, on to my first post.
There are two words in the English language that i truly do not understand. One is "modest", the other is "arrogant".
At my old job riding a cash register, i was doing my usual multi-tasking thing to try to move the line as fast as possible when one of my customers said "How do you do all of that at once?" I replied "I'm really good at my job." She looked a little taken aback and said "You're not very modest, are you?"
So what, exactly, is modesty? Is it pretending that you don't know that you're good at something, hoping that someone else will notice it and recognize you for it? That seems somewhat dishonest to me. It's not like i greeted this lady with "I'm really good at my job, aren't i?" She asked me a question and i did my best to answer it honestly. Maybe that's part of the problem... many people simply can't deal with honesty. I know what i'm good at and what i'm not and am honest about these things. For instance, i'm really pretty good at getting people to smile and laugh, sometimes even without meaning to. On the other hand, i seem completely incapable at learning how to knit, no matter how hard i try. And i HAVE tried. I'd love to learn to knit.
The other side of this coin is "arrogance". I can't tell you how often i've heard "You're very arrogant." What's the difference between arrogance and confidence? I had a job interview once where i didn't get the job, but the manager of the company asked me in to tell me in person. He said "You were in the top three, and i've got to tell you that i almost gave you the job simply because you walked in here and acted as if it were already yours for the taking." That was, i'm sure, part of the reason that i got the job that i have now. There was no doubt in my mind that i could do this job, and i was right. I've been at the job for less than a month and i keep hearing from the more experienced reps that i seem like i've been doing the job for years. Is it simply a matter of "it's confidence in you but arrogance in others"? I hope not, but i fear that may be it.
Feel free to post a comment on this or any other blog posting. I love lively discussion, and also love to just stir stuff up sometimes.
Peace.
Randal
My name is Randal Schaffer and this is my new blog. Here i'll be writing about whatever it is that i want to write about, hopefully you'll find it interesting and amusing. May be random thoughts on language, like this one, or movie or book reviews, or political stuff or whatever's on my mind.
For me, i am a married Christian man who holds bits and pieces of just about all political philosophies. I am a believer in small government like the republicans, a believer in personal freedoms like the libertarians, and a believer in the rights and safety of the people like the liberals. I find myself typically voting democrat (i voted for Obama) but find myself as isolated from the modern democrats like i do all of the other parties.
Also, as soon as i figure out how to post the darned code to get ads working on this thing, do me a favor and click on one of the ads when you read a post. You don't have to BUY anything if you don't want, just click on an ad. I'm trying to make money from my writing, and that's one way to do it.
Okay, on to my first post.
There are two words in the English language that i truly do not understand. One is "modest", the other is "arrogant".
At my old job riding a cash register, i was doing my usual multi-tasking thing to try to move the line as fast as possible when one of my customers said "How do you do all of that at once?" I replied "I'm really good at my job." She looked a little taken aback and said "You're not very modest, are you?"
So what, exactly, is modesty? Is it pretending that you don't know that you're good at something, hoping that someone else will notice it and recognize you for it? That seems somewhat dishonest to me. It's not like i greeted this lady with "I'm really good at my job, aren't i?" She asked me a question and i did my best to answer it honestly. Maybe that's part of the problem... many people simply can't deal with honesty. I know what i'm good at and what i'm not and am honest about these things. For instance, i'm really pretty good at getting people to smile and laugh, sometimes even without meaning to. On the other hand, i seem completely incapable at learning how to knit, no matter how hard i try. And i HAVE tried. I'd love to learn to knit.
The other side of this coin is "arrogance". I can't tell you how often i've heard "You're very arrogant." What's the difference between arrogance and confidence? I had a job interview once where i didn't get the job, but the manager of the company asked me in to tell me in person. He said "You were in the top three, and i've got to tell you that i almost gave you the job simply because you walked in here and acted as if it were already yours for the taking." That was, i'm sure, part of the reason that i got the job that i have now. There was no doubt in my mind that i could do this job, and i was right. I've been at the job for less than a month and i keep hearing from the more experienced reps that i seem like i've been doing the job for years. Is it simply a matter of "it's confidence in you but arrogance in others"? I hope not, but i fear that may be it.
Feel free to post a comment on this or any other blog posting. I love lively discussion, and also love to just stir stuff up sometimes.
Peace.
Randal
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