If you read this blog at all you know how much I detest political correctness. I come by that honestly due in part to a man who assisted me in setting up my first blog many years ago. His ideas and writings on political correctness are exactly the same as mine. He is what you might call my “blog father” and his name was Rob “Acidman” Smith. Unfortunately for us all he passed away on June 26th 2006. He’s been missed by me and many others and his blog remains online, maintained by his family. It will always hold a place of honor on my Favorites List. I visit him there on a regular basis to read his old postings because they’re still as pertinent to the discussion today as they were back then. If you’re interested, his blog is called gutrumbles.com, check it out. You are missed Rob.
Acidman
As you are well aware there are many bright people in this world who see the dangers of political correctness and the ongoing damage that it’s causing within the society. It’s become so ingrained in our society that it’s now the norm rather than the exception. My main question, can it be reversed? Seems to me correcting political correctness will be a long-term and difficult process. As anyone can see it’s taken a few decades to drag us down to this level and very well may take a few more decades to correct it.
It seems to me that the fault belongs primarily with academia. Public education systems in this country are being run by a liberally biased group of academics whose whole purpose is to brainwash each upcoming generation to embrace political correctness and to revile those who don’t. The amount of power wielded by the teachers unions across the country has made it virtually impossible to root out these individuals and to reclaim control over our education system.
There you have it folks, responsibility for correcting political correctness is once again in the hands of the parents. I think it’s time that PTA groups across this country become better organized so they’re able to rein in the administrators and not rubber-stamp every stupid and ignorant idea being shoved down their throats by school committees. Lazy parents concede control over school subject matter and then blame everyone but themselves for the results. Stand up, be heard, and take back control of your children’s schools. I’m all for turning the kids into productive citizens and not just people who worship social causes, the environment, and poo poo personal responsibility.
I’ve been giving serious thought to topics normally considered women’s issues. In actuality all women’s issues are really men’s issues too. If the women’s issues are addressed, approved, and implemented, we men are affected as well. I’m really not writing about women’s issues per se but more about the woman’s movement in particular.
Most people in this country think the women’s movement started in the U.S. in the sixties with bra-burning (my personal favorite), free love (another favorite), and the birth of feminism (not so much). The truth of the matter is that that the women’s movement started many decades ago in countries around the world and is still alive and well. Places like Afghanistan, needless to say, are lagging behind by a few centuries. During those centuries women were pushed into the background, dominated by men, and we’re required to be barefoot and pregnant as often as possible. Arranged marriages were common in many cultures making a woman’s choice of just about anything impossible. Women kept inching their way forward, one step at a time, three steps forward and then two steps back. They will never stop regardless of the price they have to pay.
In the United States women’s suffrage came to a head in Utah where men hoped by giving women the right to vote they could dispose of the Mormon tradition of polygamy. As soon as polygamy was voted out the male-dominated Congress of the United States turned around and disenfranchised those same women. It wasn’t until the end of the nineteenth century that Idaho, Colorado, Utah, and Wyoming again enfranchised women after diligent efforts by the suffragette movements at state level.
So here we are in the 21st century and probably within twenty years of seeing the first woman president of the United States. I hope I’m alive to see it. I’ve been impressed with a few women over the years who I would have voted for in an instant if given the chance. Margaret Thatcher for one (unfortunately wrong country), Jean Kirkpatrick, former UN Ambassador, and Condoleezza Rice as well. But never Hilary Clinton, OMG NEVER! We’ve now had our first black president and I’m certain no woman I know could do as bad a job as he and Biden have done and are doing.
I have a great deal of admiration for the women who came before. They paved the way for our modern women with their blood, sweat, and tears. At the same time I thumb my nose to Gloria Steinem and her ilk who turned the woman’s rights movement into radical feminism and used that organization for their own liberal political agenda. I began blogging seriously 11 years ago and during that time I’ve read and communicated with a host of women of all ages. I’ve been impressed with what I’ve read and also with the written conversations I’ve had with many of you. Women will continue to make even greater strides in the coming decades and all of you young ladies out there should remember your history and continue the good fight.
If you could make any wish and know it would be granted, what would it be? Would you be like any number of Miss America or Miss Universe contestants and ask for world peace? Some people would ask for money and lots of it. There are a million things to think about before making such a tremendous decision. Would you wish to be king or queen of the world and rule your kingdom anyway you please and God help the disbelievers.
Most of our politicians would ask for a healthy and happy electorate with a chicken in every pot and a car in every garage. What they really want is continuous reelections without campaigning and the ability to act in any manner they please both sexually and otherwise without consequence. Again read between the lines. They really want total power over as many citizens and their tax dollars as they can get. They want to be able to give big money jobs to their friends and relatives without having some reporter in their face.
The Hollywood types would ask for a steady diet of big roles, big movies, and the undying gratitude of the masses. Of course, they would tell the world they really are asking for world peace, no poverty, and the rescue of the unfortunates in Africa. You must learn to read between the lines when dealing with actresses and actors too. Most of what you see and hear is smoke and mirrors but they think we’re all too stupid and believe everything they say.
The criminal element wishes for the ability to steal almost anything, find a place to sell the merchandise, and then get lots of money, money, money. They then move to a tropical island, lay on the beach, and throw the finger at the world. They don’t kid around, they wish for exactly what they want and aren’t afraid to stand up and shout it to the world, give it to me or I’ll just take it.
So where are you in all of this? What’s your big wish? Money and fame? I know, now you want me to tell you what I would wish for. Let me qualify my answer with a few facts first. I am the ultimate cynic and skeptic. I trust almost no one and I believe almost nothing I hear and only half of what I see. I expect the worst from people and when I’m wrong I celebrate. Unfortunately in dealing with people for as many years as I have, I’m not wrong very often. So here’s my answer.
Nobody’s going to give you a damn wish, so wake up! Too much Wishing and Hoping and Singing and Praying and Planning and Dreaming.
I think it’s time for a serious rant about this wonderful but addictive society we’re all members of. For years we’ve been slowly retrained to believe that every bad thing we do isn’t our fault. It’s the fault of our parents, our teachers, our bad friends, and last but not least, because of our genetic predisposition for addiction. What it’s finally come down to in this country is the fact that we are not permitted to like anything too much.
When I was growing up we had addictions but in my opinion they were the real deal, drugs and alcohol. It wasn’t until the liberals and courts opened Pandora’s Box and decided that those addictions were really just serious medical conditions. That’s when our real problems began. Those terrible addictions were first declared a sickness, then an excuse for a disability check, and now it’s become the rationale for every bit of bad behavior you can think of. If you like candy too much, you’re addicted to candy. If you like scratching your ass, you’re labeled an addictive ass scratcher. It’s the current trend to label any activity someone likes a little too much as an addiction.
It’s not our fault that we drink too much, take illicit drugs, steal, murder, rape, and assault our children. We can’t help it, it’s a medical issue. We should never be prosecuted or jailed for our bad behavior, just cut us a government disability check because we’re addicted. We’ve become a society that just can’t or won’t deal with personal responsibility.
Government and courts are as responsible as anyone for this. You can commit heinous crimes against society but before you can be convicted you’re required to meet with lawyers, therapists, counselors, priests, nuns, and every once in a while an actual member of law enforcement. You can meet with law enforcement but the Miranda ruling forbids you from talking to them without an attorney present.
The nanny state has made it impossible to deter crime by consistently attempting to remove all of the tools available to law enforcement. If the liberals have their way they would abolish the death penalty and take away all rights from the citizenry to own and carry weapons for their own protection. That will put us all at the mercy of the criminal element who will be armed and dangerous and preying on us at will.
I could easily list three hundred addictions currently available for people to help them escape responsibility. I won’t list them all because most right-thinking people already know how big the list is and what’s on it.
I’ve had my own set of terribly dangerous addictions that I’m forced to deal with everyday. I love eating good food, drinking good wine, watching beautiful women, playing video games, and many others. I’m sure it won’t be long before I’ll also be able to collect a big fat disability check for these terrible addictions.
Maybe under the Biden Administration I can find the help that I obviously need. Maybe I should just turn myself in to the authorities before I’m forced by my medical conditions to commit a crime of some sort. Then I’ll be eligible for free therapy sessions (court-mandated) that will cost the taxpayers thousands of dollars. I’ll get a free court appointed attorney who’ll take me by the hand and lead me to the promised land of free money, free food, and freedom from prosecution due to my medical difficulties. Isn’t America wonderful? Land of the free, not hardly, and home of the brave, not hardly. The only bravery I see these days is from those citizens who’ve volunteered to serve their country by wearing the uniform of our military.
I’m forever slamming politicians and their ilk anything and everything I can. I feel it’s my obligation as a citizen to give them all the credit they deserve, both for good and bad. But it’s the weekend and I’m feeling less intense today and in that vein I offer some political humor from various sources. They made me smile so I stored them away for this occasion. Enjoy!
This first humorous story isn’t truly a political story but it has political implications if you read between the lines.
There’s an old sea story about a ship’s Captain who inspected his sailors, and afterward told the First Mate that his men “smelled really bad”. The Captain suggested it would help if the sailors would change underwear occasionally. The First Mate went straight to the sailors berth deck and announced the “Captain thinks you guys smell bad and wants you to change your underwear”. He continued, Phillips you change with Jones, McCarthy you change with Witkowski, and Brown you change with Schultz. The moral of this story is that someone may come along and promise change, but don’t count on things smelling any better. (Applies to all parties.)
George Bush, Queen Elizabeth, and Vladimir Putin all die and go to hell. While there, they spy a red telephone and askwhat the phone is for. The Devil tells them it’s for calling back to earth. Putin asks to call Russia and talks for 5 minutes. When he’s finished the Devil informs him that the cost is a million dollars, so Putin writes him a check. Next Queen Elizabeth calls England and talks for 30 minutes. When she’s finished the Devil informs her that the cost is six million dollars, so she writes him a check. George Bush gets his turn and talks for 4 hours. When he’s finished the Devil informs him that the cost is $5.00. When Putin hears this he goes ballistic and asks the Devil why Bush got to call the USA so cheaply. The Devil just smiled and replied, “Since Biden took over, the country has gone to hell, so it’s a local call”.
Some of you may think those two stories aren’t all that funny but get over yourself, they are. If you’re a conservative or a Republican I’m sure you enjoyed them and if your a Democrat or liberal you probably didn’t. I don’t really care. I enjoy ridiculing all politicians, regardless of their party affiliation. Just remember, this blog isn’t Fox News or MSNBC and I’m certainly not “Fair and Balanced”. I have a serious dislike for them all.
Being the cynical bastard that I am and having less love for our human race than most, makes this topic concern even me. Most of my life and career has been involved with close personal communications (interviews and interrogations) with hosts of diverse individuals. I’ve been able thanks to years of training and experience to read them exceeding well, hence my overall dislike of so many. Granted a majority of people come across in a good way but once pressures and stresses are introduced to the mix, all of the negative reactions become easily recognizable. My educated guess is that the best people are those with a much stronger control of their basic instincts. I can’t blame the negatives on emotion alone because we all deal with them equally.
The Pandemic has brought us all to the emotional edge in a number of ways through intense worry and fear. It’s interesting in the extreme to recognize both the good and the bad effects and who handles them the best. I won’t even try to explain the negative behaviors of people whose lives are completely consumed by politics and the media. They come to this discussion already biased and flawed. Then we have the medical professionals and first responders who as they always do show us the way things should be done. Compassion, caring, and fearlessness are their norm. A few bad apples have been observed through this horrible period but overall we as a people owe them praise and thanks. Fortunately the negative and selfish people with concerns only for their personal agendas are easily and quickly identified. I’m not here to name names but you already know who they are if your paying the least bit of attention.
I fear that the pressure of death, serious financial ruin, job loss, and long periods of isolation have begun to take their toll on all of us. I’ve noticed in recent weeks the edginess of ordinary citizens doing ordinary things and showing a total loss of patience for each other in a mean and nasty way. All that tells me is that the Pandemic is having a much deeper and long-term harmful effect than I first thought. Returning to the new normal still requires a huge change for all of us from the old normal. We humans are not big fans of change, large or small. This intolerance for each other will hopefully wan as time goes on but who knows for sure. We’ve been told for more than a year now to stay the hell away from each other or else. Some of the incidents I’ve observed lately fill me with doubt that there is a short term solution. We must all wait and see and then do what we can to help remedy this confusing situation.
As always I will remain the pragmatic cynic.
That being said its now time for a little humor. Anyone who follows this blog knows of my deep appreciation for really erotic limericks. I’ve delved into my archives and found this little ditty. Enjoy!
There’s a feckless young fellow named Goody
Who insists that he wouldn’t, but would he?
If he finds himself nude,
With girls in the right mood,
The question is not would he, but could he?
Surprise…it wasn’t quite as erotic or lewd as you were expecting. Next time it’ll be a doozy.
Over the years I’ve wasted a great deal of my valuable time and efforts arguing about politics and political strategy. How stupid am I? Don’t answer that. It always feels good at first when your spewing your expert opinions to anyone who will listen. Fifty percent of them listen politely, smile, and later talk about what a bore you’ve become. The other fifty percent listen politely, wait until you’ve stopped talking, and then begin filling the air with their opinions and nonsense. They’ve listened to none of your ideas but waited patiently for you to shut up. You just gotta hate those A Type personalities.
I’ve always enjoyed finding and reading quotations from deceased politicians and a very few politically deceased politicians. Some are inciteful but many are not. The current hoard of elected officials never have quotes that are even a tiny bit interesting. Realizing that has forced me to find some lesser known politicians and journalists with quotes from the past that could actually impart some information that’s worth reading. You may not recognize some of the names but the quotes will speak for themselves.
“A politician must often talk and act before he has thought and read.” Thomas Babbington (1859)
“A politician thinks of the next election; a statesman thinks of the next generation.” James F. Clark (1888)
“Our great democracies still tend to think that a stupid man is more likely to be honest than a clever man, and our politicians take advantage of this prejudice by pretending to be even more stupid than nature made them.
Bertrand Russell (1951)
“The press conference is a politician’s way of being informative without saying anything. Should he accidently say something, he has at his side a press officer who immediately explains it away by “clarifying” it.”
Emery Kelen (1960)
“Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong remedies.” Groucho Marx (1977)
“I offer my opponents a bargain: if they will stop telling lies about us, I will stop telling the truth about them.
Adlai Stevenson (1952)
These kinds of quotations were once plentiful but no longer. With newspapers losing readership there’s much less chance of any pearls of wisdom making the headlines. It’s truly a damn shame. Here’s one last and extremely old quote which remains as true today as it did in 1947.
“Politicians . . . rise predominantly from . . . the “lower middle class””; most are self-made men . . .; most depend on their political jobs for a livelihood and most have little time, inclination, of opportunity for adult education; hence the dominating qualities of so many are greed, vulgarity, attention to special interest, avarice, and selfishness.
Nothing prompts me to write a post as much as the letter I just received from Joe “Don’t Wake Me” Biden. He was just sending out millions of copies of that letter to advise all of us stimulus check recipients of how hard he worked to make it happen. Since most of the stimulus work was begun under Trump I thought he was being just a bit disingenuous. I wasn’t particularly surprised because he IS the ultimate long term politician. Any politician worth his salt would immediately try to steal the thunder of another. It’s a standard political move and to guys like Biden it’s just reflex. He is a decades long expert.
If you’ve followed this blog at all then you should be aware that I have little or no use for any political party or politician. Actually I really love it when they spend so much of their precious time calling each other names and creating an endless supply of stupid do-nothing committees. The more gridlock we have the better. Gridlock means they aren’t passing more legislation to take money out of my pocket.
Keeping in mind what I’ve just written, I’m proposing a new and exciting political strategy that I’ll be sending to Donald Trump. Since he is so hated by the political left and the endless number of Republicans that want to be Democrats, he just might be receptive. In preparation for the next presidential campaign I’m proposing that Trump resign from the GOP and sign himself up as a viable Democratic voter. He could then spend the next four years driving the Democratic party crazy and creating as much havoc as possible. They hate him so much they would lose their minds and most of their emphasis on the election hoping to get Trump the hell out their party. While that’s going on the GOP could run Mickey Mouse for president and probably win.
In my humble opinion Trump has little or no chance to be reelected but he is a such a epic hell-raiser he could do more damage to the democrats than he was able to do as a Republican president. The effects could last for decades and I want to be around to watch the fun. The worst case scenario would be that he wins the presidency as a Democratic candidate and OMG do I want to be around for that.
The human race in my opinion is seriously flawed. There’s all sorts of speculation from the scientific community these days concerning the coming “Singularity”. They say that’s the point in time when the machines will be more intelligent than mankind and will assume control of things. I actually read one recent statement that machine intelligence could be the next logical evolutionary step for the human race. I honestly have no answer to that kind of thinking but who knows. There are times when I think machines would probably do a much better job than we’ve done so far. Everything humans get involved with starts with strong emotions which and slowly devolves into ethnic and religious biases and conflicts. Nothing gets accomplished and the arguing and fighting eventually result in some sort of armed conflict and endless killing.
I’m sick to death hearing about religions spewing their self-serving propaganda to any fool who’ll listen. I don’t hate or even dislike people who are true believers in their religion of choice but I also need to make clear that I have no love whatsoever for any current organized religions or sects. That being said I intend to pass along a few tidbits of information supplied to me by a trusted friend. He’s a diligent researcher and most of what he’s offering is factual. A few of you religious fanatics out there will insist on refuting everything I’ve written but I honestly could care less. As we all know opinions are like assholes. Everyone has one and this one is mine.
I’ve made a point over the years to read everything I could find on as many religions as possible. I had the pleasure of reading translations of the Torah, the Koran, Old and New Testaments of the Bible, The Egyptian Book of the Dead, and many associated writings of the Greeks and Coptics. What it all has amounted to for me is a forty year migraine headache. The only thing worse that reading religious propaganda is trying to rationally discuss religion with allegedly intelligent religious people. These are the people who are similar to the People’s Temple Kool-Aid drinkers that followed the Reverend Jim Jones to their death in Guyana in 1978. They hear only what they want to hear and immediately attack anyone who disagrees in the slightest. They loudly disagree only to interrupt any discussion they might bring into question their own belief system.
Here is the information as I received it.
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The following paragraphs are just rough estimates of all of the fine works accredited to RELIGION. Read them and weep for mankind.
German Peasants’ War – A series of peasant revolts during the height of the Protestant Reformation, spurred on by a mix of economic and religious causes. 100k deaths for Christianity.
Moro Insurgency – Islamic rebels in the Philippines have a long, bloody history of resistance against colonial and Philippine governments alike. 120k deaths for Islam.
Northern Crusades – Crusades to root out the Baltic pagans. Couldn’t find any good casualty estimates, but 150k deaths for Christianity seems reasonable.
Algerian Civil War – More Islamist rebels. 200k deaths for Islam.
Lord’s Resistance Army – Christian militants in Central Africa. Remember Kony 2012? 200k deaths for Christianity.
Albigensian Crusade – France leads a crusade to root Cathar heretics out of the Languedoc. Estimates vary wildly from 7k to 1mil, but let’s just say 200k deaths for Christianity.
Great Turkish War – A “Holy League” of Christian states rolls back the Ottoman Empire’s conquests in Eastern Europe. 300k deaths for Christianity.
Afghan Civil Wars – A variety of Islamists, including Al Qaeda, vie for control over Afghanistan. 400k deaths for Islam.
Rashidun Conquests – The Islamic Caliphate conquered its way from being a desert backwater to the world’s most powerful state in an incredibly short period of time. I can’t find anything resembling an estimate for the casualties involved, so I’m going to completely BS this one: 500k deaths for Islam. Trust me, it won’t affect the winner.
Ottoman Conquests – Mehmed II leads the Ottomans on a merry path of conquest over Eastern Europe. 800k deaths for Islam.
The Crusades – All of Christendom spends a few centuries banging it’s head against a Holy Land-shaped wall. 1mil deaths for Christianity.
So far, Christianity’s crusading habit is definitely a big source of casualties, but those pesky Muslim militants have pushed Islam into the lead. The score is neck and neck at 1,950,000 deaths for Christianity and 2,120,000 deaths for Islam.
But three wars that most people have never heard of completely blow this competition out of the water.
French Wars of Religion – The French Protestants and Catholics spend 36 years massacring each other silly. 3mil deaths for Christianity.
Thirty Years’ War – Protestant and Catholic princes duke it out for control of the Holy Roman Empire (modern Germany). War is waged between mercenary companies that loot the countryside to support themselves. One third of Germany dies. 10mil deaths for Christianity.
So that’s 15 million deaths for Christianity and a mere 2 million for Islam.
But in the year of our lord 1850, a new challenger blows them both out of the water.
Taiping Rebellion – Hong Xiuquan was born into a poor family in southern China. In 1837, he fails the imperial civil service examinations– his only hope of getting ahead in life– and has a nervous breakdown. Long story short, he reads some pamphlets from Portuguese missionaries, gets some freaky visions, decide’s he’s Jesus’s younger brother, rounds up some followers (known as the God Worshippers), and launches a rebellion against the Qing Dynasty that results in the deaths of over 20 million people.
It’s entirely possible that Christianity has made up the 5 million death gap with smaller wars and general low-intensity persecution over time, but without any good statistics on that, I’m going to say the most bloody religion of all time is the God Worshippers, a religion that existed for less than 30 years.
EDIT: Meir Lipnick points out a glaring oversight– Timur used Islam to justify his conquests, adding 17 million to Islam’s score. I’m sure there are plenty other wars I’ve missed.
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This deadly human virus arrived on this world in an unknown fashion and as any good virus will do . . . it slowly began to methodically destroy it’s host.
It’s been a number of months since I last visited my blog and I’m not entirely sure why. I suppose it’a mixture of laziness, apathy, and the holiday season that’s approaching. I’ve been wanting to write but I don’t want it to be more of the same crap you’re hearing and seeing in other media. The “Trump is the devil.” nonsense is wearing really thin except for a few braindead liberals and diehard Democrats.
There’s a time and place for everything but the last thing we need is the steady media drumbeat of negativety during the holidays. I’d much rather enjoy the season with my family than listening to an incredibly biased media laying hours and hours of propaganda and fake news on me. Life is just too goddamn short.
We’ve had out first two snow falls for 2017 and the snowblower came through as expected. I’m going to try very hard not to do the normal fall-on-my-ass routine that seems to occur every year. I’ll be staying in the house as much as possible, I’ll keep nice and warm, and have a drink or two to calm my nerves. Before I know it Spring will be here once again.
So Merry Christmas to family and friends and anyone bored enough to read this blog.
I’ve also been giving some serious thought to my New Year’s resolutions for 2018. I’ll do a quick review of 2017 just after Christmas and then post 2018’s early in January.
Stay healthy . . . Stay warm . . . Kiss the kids and grandkids . . . Hug your pets.
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