Tag: Musings

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Ever feel like you’re waiting…

…for the other shoe to drop?

I’ve been feeling like that for months.

It feels like being a kid waiting for your Father to get home to beat your ass for doing something you shouldn’t have done.

I suppose a more polite way of saying that would be a reference to the sword of Damocles. (If you don’t get that one look it up.) Perhaps a reference to Poe’s Pit & Pendulum would work better?

To be sure, this summer has been a pain in my ass personally. But it’s also been a mess nationally and internationally.

Hurricanes, Floods, Continuing and mutating pandemic, The show trials over the Jan 6th (mostly peaceful protests, hey they didn’t burn the capital down. Just sayin.), Afghanistan (Now we know why Biden has kids, he didn’t know how to withdraw… I couldn’t resist,) Poor economy, Rising Prices, etc. etc. etc.

Tuesday morning there was a report in Breitbart where an epidemiologist reviewed grants associated with St Fauci of the mask, and concluded that in fact some 600K did fund “Gain of function” research in Wuhan. The material was released under the FOIA.

Technically, this information is a smoking gun. Fauci broke the law. Federally, gain of function research is forbidden.

It’s possible, Fauci may have skirted the law, by approving grant money. Then Fauci lied to Congress about it, denying that any funding went to Wuhan for such research. He’d have been better off simply admitting that without his knowledge, the funds were misused and that the grant had been terminated.

Fauci has always been about gain of function research throughout his career.

On the one hand I can kinda see it from the standpoint of learning what may happen, and then doing the research to have countermeasures in place. On the other hand, I think I agree more with folks who say that gain of function is simply too dangerous. If COVID-19 is any indicator, I’d say that we have proof of the latter point.

I hate like hell that I believe Fauci will skate on all of this. I no longer have faith that our Justice system is remotely impartial. It’s been made very clear if you’re a darling of the administration (or a family member) there are no consequences. If, on the other hand you’ve demonstrated any opposition to the administration you’re going to be hunted down like a rabid dog.

Yet, with all this, it still feels like I’m in the corner of my bedroom waiting for Dad to come home. “This is going to hurt me more than it hurts you son…” I knew that was bullshit at 8 years old, it’s no less bullshit now.

In fact my Dad and I had a good healthy laugh over that particular comment as adults sipping scotch. I told him I called bullshit, and he just laughed.

“Yep Son, it was bullshit, but your ass was such a small moving target I’d end up with strap marks on my legs too. You’ve got to nonetheless, concede that you’re the man I’m proud of today in part because of me busting your butt.“

He was right. I admitted it to him right then and there. We poured another drink and talked about all kinds of things as Men, not father and son.

God, how I’d enjoy talking with him now! If only to hear his take on why I’m feeling like I’m waiting for doom.

Thinking about that conversation though, still puts a smile on my face. The hangover the next day was even worth it.

I just wish I could get past this feeling…

As we come up on the 20th anniversary of September 11, I find myself wondering if that’s the thing. Perhaps it’s just that it’s been 20 years.

I’m sure Biden will attempt to make some speech. Sadly, no matter how well written that speech will be, if he goes off the rails, or if some jackasses shoot up a crowd or set off a bomb to mark the date, I wonder if that could simply be the flashpoint of what’s bugging me.

There are just so many division points between so many groups in America today. Those points are in my mind metaphorical powder kegs. Half the country seems to be violently opposed to the other half of the country for one reason or another. Is what I’m feeling a subconscious recognition of how angry, stressed, and ready to blow, we as a people are?

Or is this feeling simply a sign of my frustration at the job search and my worry over paying my bills?

I’ll admit I think we should flatten Afghanistan with carpet bombing.

I’d love to see this administration and much of Congress on trial for corruption and wrongdoing. But I’m not ready to join a militia, white supremacist group, or do anything that is outside of the laws that we’re all supposed to abide by. I keep hearing my Mother, “Two wrongs don’t make a right.“

I keep hearing in the back of my mind, “Everybody Knows” by Leonard Cohen. Although I like the rendition by Sigrid better than the original.

"Everybody Knows"

Everybody knows that the dice are loaded 
Everybody rolls with their fingers crossed 
Everybody knows that the war is over 
Everybody knows the good guys lost 
Everybody knows the fight was fixed 
The poor stay poor, the rich get rich 
That's how it goes 
Everybody knows 
Everybody knows that the boat is leaking 
Everybody knows that the captain lied 
Everybody got this broken feeling 
Like their father or their dog just died 

Everybody talking to their pockets 
Everybody wants a box of chocolates 
And a long stem rose 
Everybody knows 

Everybody knows that you love me baby 
Everybody knows that you really do 
Everybody knows that you've been faithful 
Ah give or take a night or two 
Everybody knows you've been discreet 
But there were so many people you just had to meet 
Without your clothes 
And everybody knows 

Everybody knows, everybody knows 
That's how it goes 
Everybody knows 

Everybody knows, everybody knows 
That's how it goes 
Everybody knows 

And everybody knows that it's now or never 
Everybody knows that it's me or you 
And everybody knows that you live forever 
Ah when you've done a line or two 
Everybody knows the deal is rotten 
Old Black Joe's still pickin' cotton 
For your ribbons and bows 
And everybody knows 

And everybody knows that the Plague is coming 
Everybody knows that it's moving fast 
Everybody knows that the naked man and woman 
Are just a shining artifact of the past 
Everybody knows the scene is dead 
But there's gonna be a meter on your bed 
That will disclose 
What everybody knows 

And everybody knows that you're in trouble 
Everybody knows what you've been through 
From the bloody cross on top of Calvary 
To the beach of Malibu 
Everybody knows it's coming apart 
Take one last look at this Sacred Heart 
Before it blows 
And everybody knows 

Everybody knows, everybody knows 
That's how it goes 
Everybody knows 

Oh everybody knows, everybody knows 
That's how it goes 
Everybody knows 

Everybody knows

Written By
Sharon Robinson & Leonard Cohen

The weird thing is that I haven’t heard that song in a while. Let’s face it, it’s dark and not something that anyone who’s the least bit depressed should listen to. It is however, a good song.

I guess I’ll go back to banging my head against the employment wall and just wait & see what happens next.

When the wheels come off this bus, it will be spectacular.

I am curious to see what happens in the Newsom recall. I have no doubt that he’ll retain office. I’m absolutely sure that we’ll never know if he retains office legally or by nefarious means.

I say that, because these days who do you trust?

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Like tears in the rain.

I don’t know if that phrase is from an older work, or if it originated in the script of Blade Runner.

Nonetheless, it’s a great visualization.

Afghanistan has fallen. Apparently President Biden was shocked, according to some reports. This, less than a month after he told America and the world that the Afghanistan Military could handle the country’s defense.

Uh huh.

There are tons of articles all over the net with various takes on this situation.

The most poignant was one I read on Apple News. It’s actually an article that appears in The Guardian here .

We’ve spent 20 years in Afghanistan. In that time we’ve lost troops, had others maimed, still others remain profoundly affected by what they saw and endured in that country. Those men and women did an outstanding job and their duty, of that there is no question.

I’m less certain that we should have remained in Afghanistan after we’d broken the Taliban. But that wasn’t really an option now was it?

The beliefs that allow the Taliban can’t be changed overnight, and apparently they can’t be changed in 20 years. I suspect that even 100 years wouldn’t change the underlying belief structure that creates monstrous ruling bodies like the Taliban.

You’d have to systematically destroy every mosque, kill every Imam, burn every copy of the Quran, wipe all memory of Islam from the internet, and destroy all of that religion’s adherents everywhere.

US soldiers take up their positions as they secure the airport in Kabul on August 16, 2021, after a stunningly swift end to Afghanistan’s 20-year war, as thousands of people mobbed the city’s airport trying to flee the group’s feared hardline brand of Islamist rule. (Photo by SHAKIB RAHMANI / AFP)

First of all we don’t have the stomach for that kind of bloodshed. Second of all, it would be wrong for us to try. Third of all, it would be doomed to fail right from the start.

We have historical examples of failure to eliminate beliefs. Rome tried it with the Christians. Hitler wasn’t successful with Jews. Even the Ottoman Empire couldn’t eradicate the Jews in Spain, nor could the Inquisition. The kind of oppression required to attempt something like eliminating a religion would simply drive it underground.

You have to kill not only the practitioners of a religion, you have to kill all memory of it entirely. Which is something that the Taliban understands all too clearly. That is why no world heritage site, or non-islamic archeological dig is safe in Taliban territory. They understand how to destroy “false beliefs”. Their brutality in this is unmatched.

Which brings me to the point I want to make.

We as a nation must enact a non-interference policy. It is not our job to free anyone from their dogma, or give them a democracy by force. Our military is ours. It exists to defend us and our interests from invaders, or conquerors. That’s it. Our allies are by definition in our best interests and they too deserve our protections just as they offer their armies under treaty to our protection.

Taliban fighters sit on a vehicle along the street in Jalalabad province on August 15, 2021. (Photo by – / AFP)

That being said, when we’ve done the job, we should leave. To do anything else leads to decades of misery and unintended consequences.

Think of the misery the young woman in The Guardian article has to endure now. Had the Taliban remained in force for the past 20 years, she’d still have lived the misery to be sure. But now she knows there’s another way, she knows what she’s lost, she’ll feast on that bitterness for the rest of her life.

Were I in her position…

I’d develop a pretty healthy hatred of the US and all Americans for abandoning her to her fate after showing her how things could be different. I’d be teaching all my children to hate Americans, America is a lie, America cannot be trusted, America deserves to be destroyed.

That’s how the cycle of violence continues.

We MAKE our enemies, and frankly, we do it very well. How many more generations will spring from this one woman and all the others like her, enlightened and abandoned by our actions?

We shouldn’t have long term student visas for any country outside our allies. Short term upper division students perhaps, but not long term college educations.

Long term students simply become contaminated, then return to their countries with knowledge of a very different life. How can one of those folks ever be content returning to cooking over a fire pit or defecating in a hole in the ground, when they’ve lived the convenience and ease that Western civilization enjoys?

I know what I’m saying sounds cruel. But I think it far more cruel to “give” someone 21st century knowledge and then send them back to the 6th century.

President Biden’s legacy will be his Baghdad Bob moment a month ago. But the legacy of hatred and terrorist activities to come, belongs to our government from Bush through Biden, perhaps even further back than that.

I think it is time for us to exit the role of “good guys”, it’s time for us to stop trying to remake the world in our image. It’s time for Americans to be mythical beings in undeveloped parts of the world. Something whispered of, but never seen.

It is well past time for us to stop feeding our enemies, or pumping trillions of dollars, material, and American lives, into a hole that will never never be filled.

People make war on each other, and people die every day, disease and natural disasters happen all the time, these are facts of life. We need to get past our messiah complex and focus on our own problems.

There is no shame or guilt in recognizing that we can’t help everyone. The shame is in telling those people we will help, then breaking that promise.

Close our borders, allow visitors from allied countries only. That way we don’t contaminate and destroy primitive cultures.

We have historical examples of cultural contamination starting with the European conquest of North and South America. (Damage done. There’s no going back) We have examples of other indigenous people having their lives turned upside down in the South Pacific during World War II. (See Cargo Cults.) We even have contemporary examples of possible cultural contamination with all the hubbub surrounding UFOs and Alien contact.

Just the rumors of Aliens causes shockwaves and distractions in our “enlightened” culture. If they actually exist, it would make sense for them to be circumspect. Especially if they’re doing some kind of anthropology study.

We’re advanced compared to some of the folks on our planet, but we’re not superior.

We certainly don’t have enough positive outcomes to be dictating how any one else should be living.

It’s time for us to come to grips with our limitations and recognize that;

“Sometime you have to be cruel to be kind.”

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As I stated… I’m completely against COVID passports

It’s not that I’m an Anti-Vaxxer.

I’m concerned about the creation of two distinct classes of individuals. I’m concerned about the abuses that become possible. We’ve actually been down this road before.

Smallpox was technically eradicated worldwide by a vaccine push, according to The WHO in 1980 smallpox became a thing of the past. That is a good thing. It demonstrates that there are times when we can and should take action.

This got me thinking about HIV.

There was a time when people who had HIV were isolated and in some cases denied housing, medical care, jobs, or insurance.

At the time ethicists, rightly concluded that discriminatory practices on the basis of actual or supposed infection did not abrogate the rights of the individual. Granted, we learned over a period of years much more about HIV and its transmission routes.

During those early years however, testing positive for HIV was essentially the end of your life. Not only did you just find out your had an incurable mostly fatal disease, if that knowledge became public information you could find yourself looking at an ugly accelerated death living on the streets.

That was when I became aware of moves to create legislation designed to protect medical privacy and add more protections against discrimination.

At the time. we were teetering on the edge of allowing rules that actively discriminated based on a health condition.

Imagine what could have been. Camps of the HIV infected, men and women swept under the carpet, out of sight and out of mind waiting to die.

I remember religious TV personalities implying that HIV patients, due to their sin in the eyes of God deserved nothing better. IV drug users were only slightly more important in the opinions of religious pundits. (After all, at least they were having heterosexual sex…)

Fortunately cooler political heads prevailed, and researchers provided various methods to deal with HIV allowing patients to live with the disease.

There was even a brief flirtation with nationally mandated HIV tests for all citizens. This idea was shot down pretty fast because of privacy concerns.

In this age of COVID there are a lot of folks who have forgotten those early HIV years. Here we are again. Even if the government doesn’t step in and create a national Vaccinated Passport system, private institutions are embracing the idea.

Colleges requiring COVID vaccinations to enter campuses, restaurants in some cities requiring their employees to not only be vaccinated but to subscribe to a private database where they upload their status and receive a bracelet with a QA code linking to their records, other employers are requiring you be vaccinated before you return to in-person work.

This is only the beginning. Acceptance of these “Private” standards will eventually lead to the same outcome as a Government Passport. I strongly suspect that the Government will evaluate the various standards and then nationalize the one that works best. (Meaning the one that provides the most private information.)

My concern is that it won’t simply stop there.

Is it going to be okay for your employer to dictate what vaccines you take as a condition of employment? We already have to provide ID, our SSN, and Citizenship status to employers at the time of hire, what if next we must routinely provide our vaccination records too? How about our other health records?

15 – 20 years ago, I was in the hiring process with a company, their HR person noted that I have a motorcycle endorsement on my driver’s license.

She told me that the company couldn’t permanently hire me unless they saw a bill of sale showing I’d sold my motorcycle to another party and that I had 60 days to produce the bill of sale. “It’s an insurance thing,” she said. I asked her what about SCUBA Diving? “Oh no, you can’t do that either it’s too risky, and you can’t smoke while in our employment either. If we find that you’re doing any of these things it’s grounds for immediate termination.”

She was very confused when I said I no longer wanted to work for the company.

The pay was mediocre at best, and the insurance coverage was really crappy. I tore up the W-4 and associated employment paperwork and continued looking for a job.

Having my employer that deeply embedded in my life made me very uncomfortable. It was almost as if I was signing an indentured servant contract. Yeah, I wanted a job, but not badly enough to give up my personal freedom.

Nowadays my choice could be viewed as selfish, because I didn’t want to give up hobbies or activities that I took pleasure in.

Where is the proverbial line? Would it be reasonable for an employer to say you can’t engage in oral sex because you might develop TMJ, thereby raising the cost of their dental insurance?

How about a celibacy clause in your contract? After all, if you’re not married, you don’t need to be having sex and the insurance premiums could be lowered because there’s less risk of the single employees catching STDs?

Would it still be thought of as selfish to say, “No, I will not give up these activities?”

Having experienced several companies (to greater or lesser extent, a couple of which for whom I did work,) using health insurance as a pretext for dictating to employees what activities they may participate in, I perhaps am overly concerned about mandated vaccinations and vaccination passports.

It’s very much like employers monitoring employees social media accounts. Once the employer has the ability, they will inevitably use the ability to press their advantage.

Would it be right for an employee to be denied a well deserved promotion because of a social media post from a decade before, when they didn’t work for the company? It’s clearly not right on the part of the employer. Yet I suspect that scenario is happening or will happen in the very near future.

Can you imagine being questioned about why you didn’t get a COVID vaccine sooner than you did? What happens if your reluctance to get vaccinated is conflated with an assumption that you’re an insurrectionist? Unpatriotic? A Trump supporter? How about just not enough of a team player?

What impact might any one of those assumptions have on your life or employability in this culture of compliance & conformity?

It’s because I’m wondering about these things and realize that there is zero protection against them that I’m against a vaccine passport. By the way, have you noticed that now it’s just called a Vaccine Passport? Most of us think it’s still just about COVID but already the naming convention is less specific and more inclusive of Vaccinations in general.

To my way of thinking, this loss of specificity is the next step. I have a vaccination record on paper. It won’t be long until the Vaccination Passport will be marketed as a convenient and secure method to maintain all your vaccination records. People will flock to the idea for convenience and put all those records voluntarily into databases sponsored by the Government or not. At that point we’ll lose another bit of privacy.

Does my school, the mall, or my employer really need to know that I’ve been vaccinated against Hepatitis?

When I was younger and traveling for work a lot, I was often sent on trips because I was single. The other guys had families and needed to be home for various reasons. They too were paid a lot more than I was but I always drew the short straw. At one point, I was traveling so much that I simply asked my employer to keep me on the road all the time and told them I’d give up my apartment, (which I wasn’t using anyway.) This inadvertently caused my employer to evaluate how much traveling I was actually doing. When they got the report they were very disturbed. (About 48 to 50 weeks a year.)

When my supervisor was questioned, he said plainly I was young and single so I didn’t have family obligations.

He wasn’t wrong. What he failed to realize was that with that kind of travel schedule, I was never going to have a family because it was impossible to actually date.

I’ve wondered how a vaccine passport might be used in a similar fashion to determine who gets sent to third world countries.

Imagine your boss looking for someone to send to India. They’d pull up their employees vaccination records and filter for everyone who’d had, say COVID, and Hepatitis vaccines. From that list your boss could decide to send you. You probably wouldn’t get any more pay, you might not even get any better chance at promotion. You’d be their India person though.

That might not bother you the first or even the tenth time you got sent to India. Being chosen based not on your skill but on vaccinations might not be the best career path. When you did get tired of it, and asked for a different assignment, you might find that you didn’t ever have a choice. Much as I did when I asked to just stay on the road.

I’m not saying that Vaccination Passports will be abused, I think it is likely they will, because they’re ripe for abuse.

The other concern is that Vaccination Passports inevitably create a two caste society. I’m not alone in this line of reasoning. There are a lot of folks (a lot smarter than me,) writing opinion pieces expressing their concerns over this issue.

Florida’s Governor DeSantis spelled it out pretty concisely when he signed Florida’s law outlawing vaccination passports. However he can only outlaw them for State business or State contractors. What private companies in Florida do is their own business.

Other Governors are requesting similar legislation for their states for the same reason. Generally the reasoning seems to be, The imposition of a two caste system defined by vaccination status is asking for trouble. These Governors want no part of the legal challenges that are sure to happen.

In my entire life, I’ve never been asked for any of my vaccination records, not even smallpox.

When traveling to other countries. As a responsible person, I’ve always checked with the State Department to find out if there was anything special I should be protected against. I’ve also checked with my doctor before traveling outside our borders. Otherwise with the exception of my Passport, and visas being required on the issue of diseases it’s been caveat emptor.

I find it ironic that inside our own country we may be required to produce “papers” to attend sporting or musical events, or perhaps just engage in our normal daily lives.

This concerns me greatly. I just don’t like the NAZI-esq feel of it.