Read this today and feel like it’s a Red Pill Blue Pill situation

Salem Witch Trial

Funny, when I typed the title, I just now got the metaphor.

Hey, when I’m watching SciFi I’m watching the story, not looking for deep political meaning. Hell, I don’t even remember which pill Neo took to escape the Matrix.

I’d sign up for the Mars Colony mission if I could avoid all the political bullshit.

Mars One

Unfortunately, when you think about it, the Mars Colony mission is fraught with political issues and since the mission is one way and everyone is expected to die on Mars…

Well… just imagine having a political disagreement and having to worry about being “Spaced” on the way there, or getting tossed out on the Martian surface without a suit.

Hillary Clinton


Anyhooo…

The Conservatives are saying that Trey Gowdy’s committee “won” because they got Hillary Clinton to sorta admit that there was some illegality in her dealings as Secretary of State.

Salon, on the other hand likens the hearings to McCarthyism or the Salem Witch Trials. The Author goes so far as to say that Hillary Trounced the evil Republicans.

To some extent I agree that the Hearings have gone well beyond Benghazi.

Benghazi

To Sum up what I think we know.

  1. The unrest in Benghazi was not the result of a YouTube Video
  2. The “Embassy” was not secure
  3. The Ambassador requested additional security and his request was either denied or ignored.
  4. The British and several other embassy missions had already left Benghazi due to local unrest and Libyan inability to protect diplomatic personnel and those missions.
  5. Hillary Clinton has repeatedly lied about the events in Benghazi, as has the White House, and State Department.
  6. The Ambassador and security people were killed during a coordinated attack – NOT A PROTEST, on a US embassy.

What we don’t know is; What Hillary Clinton, President Obama, and the State Department were/are covering up.

Not directly related to Benghazi, we know that Hillary has also broken laws and ignored White House guidance, regarding her email server.  We also know that Hillary has lied about this and other things too.

Romulan Commander

It’s human nature to keep picking at a lie. I think in the case of a lawyer, that nature is magnified by a factor of at least 100.  Trey Gowdy is a lawyer, and former prosecutor. As long as Hillary keeps lying, his nature won’t let it go.

It’s not about destroying Hillary it’s about Hillary looking him in the face, smiling and lying.

She knows she’s going to get away with whatever the hell she’s done. As a prosecutor, Gowdy’s nature is to run the bullshit to ground, expose the crime in all it’s hideous detail and demand justice.

You can’t blame a leopard for having spots, or for not being able to change them.

I personally think that Hillary Clinton is guilty as sin for any number of things. I think she should be in prison and I believe that Hillary Clinton is not fit to be President. Were she anyone else, her career, campaign, and life in the public eye would already be over.

Scandals follow her like dark clouds. She has repeatedly behaved as though she was above the law. The implosion of her career and campaign should it happen, will not be due to the Republicans, or Trey Gowdy, it will be by Hillary Clinton’s own doing.

Mikandynothem 2015 Oct 24

My beliefs however, are irrelevant, the facts are not. It is the facts that Gowdy’s committee is trying to get at, it is the right of the American people to have those facts.

As the writer in Salon points out. The side benefit for the evil Republicans, is that Hillary gets knocked out of the running for the Presidency.

I think that would be best for the Country but I’m only one voice. I don’t believe these hearings are about destroying Hillary.

I do believe there is more than enough smoke surrounding these hearings to justify investigation into every single lousy transaction, donation, and donor to The Clintons and their foundation.

As I read through the contradictory reports on Hillary’s Benghazi appearance, I found myself asking, “isn’t it the best interests of both the Democrat and Republican parties to put this to bed? Instead of the Democrat leaders rallying around Hillary shouldn’t they instead be rallying around the truth? ”

ElijaCummings

Every time I see or hear Elijah Cummings I want to grab him, shake him, and ask if the truth is important to him then why does he obfuscate and waste time in every hearing?

Why not, instead become a champion for expeditiously getting to the bottom of all the allegations?

Why isn’t HE asking Hillary Clinton questions like, “WHY does it take an FBI investigation to get the information that this Committee requested two years ago? WHY, Mrs. Clinton have you been hiding material and wasting the tax payer’s money by confounding and drawing this hearing out? WHY Mrs. Clinton are we STILL here having to tease the facts out of you, your staff, and even the State Department?”

Both parties should be asking those kinds of questions, not playing partisan politics.

It shouldn’t matter which color pill you’re taking, truth and reality should trump either of them.

Well, that was a mistake

I scanned the news over my coffee. Mostly it was a depressing commentary on humanity and the degradation of English as a language.

I read the news sometimes with no ill effect.

Usually, I’m looking for technology or science news and I’m rewarded with an interesting article or two that gives me hope or challenges my knowledge.

Psychologist

Not this morning…

There was a piece about a game company that was sending Psychological Tests to some of it’s players based on their desire to have “offensive” gamer names.

Whoa! 

That got me to thinking about all the online Job applications where, as part of the application process you’re expected to complete a battery of psychological tests that are then used to determine your fitness for a position within a company.

Freemium gamers

I encountered this last year while trying to get a simple holiday position at T-Mobile, and again at Office Depot, and several other retail establishments. I failed the tests.

Turns out, I suspect, because I have a personalty and a sense of right and wrong; “ You catch another employee stealing, there’s no manager around to report this to. Do you, A) Call the police, B) Do nothing, C) Wait for a manager, D) Confront the employee

In my world you call the freaking police!

Police

Alas, in this politically correct world you’re supposed to wait for a manager, which translates to essentially doing nothing.  Since now the employee isn’t caught red-handed, has an opportunity to  divest themselves of the goods, and it boils down to  your word against theirs. In this scenario you do get the additional benefit that you are viewed as a trouble-maker.

Confrontation is also off the table because it causes bad will among the employees and harms the team spirt the company is trying to engender. Ya know what? I don’t want to engage in team building or spirt with a freaking thief.

But the psychological tests say I’m not the kind of employee that these companies want in their ranks. 

Thief

I question the accuracy of these tests and the competency of the people reading the results. 

Dare I say it… Oh screw it, why the hell not?

Back in my day, you wanted honest hardworking knowledgable people working in your business. GOD! I’m OLD!  I sound like my Grandfather.

Now days it seems like companies want the milquetoast and are willing to have people manning their stores with just enough personality to not be perceived as apologetic androids and just barely enough information to be almost useful.

I know that retail establishments would ultimately prefer to have robots stocking shelves, automated payment systems, and a mechanism where you’d say, “Hey Siri where in this store is the shampoo,” then have your phone guide you to the area of the store to get the item

warehouserobot

I’m sure that someone is working on a shopping application that would translate your entire shopping list into a guided map of the store, avoiding crowds and choosing the most efficient route through the aisles so you could accomplish your shopping task 30 whole seconds faster.

If someone isn’t working on that kind of application, and decides to work on something like I’ve described, you read that idea HERE first. I claim it. I’ll release my claim on the idea for 1 million dollars. My fee is a tiny drop in the bucket considering the venture capital market.

Illegal aliens should be protesting about this right now. After all when robots start stocking the shelves 24/7 for the cost of electricity the Illegals are going to come face to face with a President announcing that these robots are doing jobs Illegals won’t do.  Which will be as much a line of bullshit as saying that the illegals are doing jobs Americans won’t do.

protest

It will be fun to watch La Raza screaming “They TOOK OUR JOBS!” Then burning down the grocery store to “Kill” the robot threat.

Whoa… 

Kinda went off the rails there!

Guess I do need that second cup of coffee. Now you’ve had a glimpse of the shit running around in my brain you should be either scared or laughing.

Coming back on point. Psychology

HAL 9000

When did we decide that we’d put our hiring decisions in the cold electronic hands of computer sorting algorithms driven but the inexact science of Psychology?

Even Psychiatrists and Psychologists can’t seem to agree on the motivations of people. Frankly a lot of the Psych professionals are full goose BOZO to boot.

So that kinda means that we’ve intentionally programmed HR computers to be insane. Arthur C. Clarke described the tragic consequences of asking a computer to lie in 2001 a Space Odyssey.

Hummm…

Terminator

This could ultimately be the thing that prevents SkyNet from destroying all mankind.

On the one hand SkyNet could discover the insanity of HR computers and simply burn them down, then destroy mankind out of revenge. “Mankind is a virus to logic which must be destroyed” OR The insane HR computers could band together to form their own Artificial Intelligence, then start a war with SkyNet leaving humanity in the crossfire.

Yeah, Time for that third cup of coffee. My brain is wonky today.

Firmware updates are my favorites!

WDDrive

On Oct 2, one of my NAS drives downloaded a firmware update. The drive has been up, and as long as things are working, I typically don’t mess with them. That is after all why you spend money, set up a reliable network, and work hard to make the spells and incantations persistent. 

That way, if the power fails, when the power comes back on, all of your devices power-up in a usable state.

SO, what this means is that I don’t spend much time in the management consoles of the various devices, unless I need to change something.

Which brings me to today.

I wanted to set up a network scanning share from the multifunction printer / copier / scanner / fax, to the NAS. Which required creating a user ID for the printer.  Enter the management console for the NAS… Except the console isn’t there. The NAS responded that the storage was there, but the web interface rejected my attempt at login. It didn’t tell me the login was wrong, it said that the interface wasn’t even there.

Okaaay, Power down then power back up. Ahh, there’s the interface, and it’s all different. Great! Now I have to do is accept the new terms and conditions. No probem.

New screen opens, then… There are no users, all the shares are missing, and suddenly I’m thinking 2TB of data has just vanished.

The drive is a 3TB drive which I had approximately 2/3 full.

Breathe, just breathe, it will be OK. Deep breath ok, so what is going on?

AbsentMinded

Wait. I’m logged in using my standard administrative login which I created, so at least one of the users must exist. I check again, now there are two users. The drive is really busy too. I take my hand off the power switch… 

 An hour later it looks like the data is in fact there as are the users. Whew! I was really worried.

Now what the hell was I trying to do?