If You Think Climate Change Is Real, Act Like It

You don’t get to go from warning about or denying climate change to saying it’s too late to do anything about it without having done everything in your power to make things better. I won’t let you get away with it. If you expect to make that transition peacefully, prepare to be disappointed. Great battles are not abandoned because they seem hopeless, that is the time to dig in and show what you are made of. Anything less than that is cowardice.

God, my mother lived through WWII and experienced all the sacrifices necessary on the home front in order that the battle might be won. They did without silk stockings so that parachutes might be made. They rationed gasoline, chocolate, had paper drives and tin drives, evened rationed staple foods. And the sacrifices made by those in the United States were NOTHING compared to those made in the Soviet Union and other countries.

And my father sacrificed four years of his life in order to do what needed to be done by joining the Army, never knowing if he would see his hometown or family again.

The only thing different between now and then is they had a government to lead them, someone to tell them what to do and give them a flag to rally around. Well, your government is not going to lead you this time, your media is not going to instruct you on how we will achieve victory. They’re not on our side for this fight. It’s time for all of us—each of us—to find a way to fight the battle of our generation, a battle that is even more important than the fight against fascism. Indeed, it IS a fight against fascism, but the fight in front of us has far more long-term consequences than what my parents faced.

What can you sacrifice in the name of what is most important to you? I suspect that given proper understanding of the consequences, my mother and others like her at home found such sacrifices a light burden. I suspect even my father understood that the cause was just and heroism was a necessary and noble aspiration. You will find ways to make a difference, I have faith in you.

My parents were never threatened by the dangers we are faced with today. The worst atrocities of the Nazis were not comparable to the possibility of an environment spiraling out of control.

Chocolate and silk stockings are all very fine, but without the meagerest of nature’s blessings, they seem like tawdry toys and temptations. We only undervalue nature’s miracles because we have been conditioned to believe that they will always be there for us. It is only when we realize we may lose them that we appreciate how integral nature’s simplest blessings have been to our fondest recollections: the sounds of waves lapping on the shore or the singing of birds. The feel of a gentle spring breeze upon our skin or the suns warming touch. Nature underlies all that we are, but we have been too distracted by the artificial world we have created. But that world has been built upon the foundation that is nature, and that foundation has been crumbling under the burden it has been forced to uphold.

What can you do to lighten the burden that modern civilization has placed upon the natural world? What sacrifices are you able to make, what acts of heroism can you take in order to inspire others? These are the questions we need to ask. Such questions might initially seem frightening, unpleasant, terrible, but they are not. Because I promise you that once you let go of things you now believe are necessary, you will begin to reconnect with nature in ways that are wondrous. You will ask yourself how you ever got so wound up in artificial distractions that led you away from all that is important and holy. You will experience real joy, perhaps for the first time in a long time, perhaps for the first time in your life. And you will find something worth fighting for and living for. You will experience a sweetness to living that you had long written off as impossible. It will begin the moment you commit yourself to trying.

This must be done.

Do Video Games Cause Violence?

As much as I dislike guns personally, I have to admit there are valid reasons people give for wanting to have one: I hunt, I want to protect my family, I want it as a way of preventing a totalitarian government, I want to protect my livestock from wild animals.

There is no valid reason for owning a First Person Shooter video game.

I suspect with that last sentence I’ve triggered a few people (no pun intended). “How dare you suggest I have no reason to play a game in which I violently play-murder people in high definition as I watch the blood squirt out of my pretend victims?” “How dare you suggest that it is not good, clean fun to play-murder people either randomly or else under the orders of a fictional superior?” “What is wrong with you?”

At least, that has been the response I’ve observed every time I’ve seen someone on social media suggest that violent video games might have some part to play in the upswing in murderous rampages in the last few decades.

It does seem that the rise in mass shootings corresponds rather closely with the rise of sophisticated violence in video games. Not to say that there is a causal relation, but we shouldn’t immediately dismiss it as complete coincidence, either. In my lifetime, I have seen video games go from Space Invaders to incredibly realistic virtual reality. Never while playing Missile Command did I ever feel like I was shooting down missiles, but watching my son snipe people from a distance, I do question whether it is healthy that he do so.

I know the standard response: science has determined that playing violent and bloody video games does not make those who play them more violent. I would say to those who make this claim that they are cherry-picking their evidence. “Studies have shown that playing violent video games can increase aggressive thoughts, behaviors, and feelings in both the short-term and long-term.” And while it has yet to be proven that violent video games are a cause for increased violence, insufficient data is currently available to support either side definitively.

But in the absence of solid scientific evidence, common sense can be applied. Is it not reasonable to assume that if a child is given a football to play with, that child might be more inclined to play football? If a child is given a racetrack, is he not more likely to become interested in NASCAR than a child who does not have one? In fact, in the history of humanity, children have been given toys that replicate the tasks they are to perform as adults, from toy lawn mowers, to toy workbenches, to toy ovens, to dolls, etc. If toys prepare children for what they are to do in their adult life, what are they learning from games in which they walk around shooting everybody they encounter?

Granted, video games are likely not the primary reason for the rise in mass shootings in the United States. After all, other nations have the same games as we do and have far less such events. But they could be one contributing factor. In fact, if one were to be honest, they are likely at least a small part of the problem and certainly not helping matters any. Any excuse for how playing video games where you go around killing people you do not know, either on a lark or because some disembodied voice is telling you to, is good for you is just that: an excuse. No, violent video games are not a safety valve to release our violent impulses. If you already have impulses to go around shooting people, video games aren’t going to help you. They won’t improve your social skills. They won’t enable you to cope with real life in a more meaningful way. And if they improve your hand/eye coordination, well, that’s probably only going to come in handy if you decide to gear up and head down to some place where large groups of people are gathered like ducks on a pond.

I know, it hurts, doesn’t it, to have your hobby criticized when you yourself are never going to snap and kill a bunch of people? You know very well that pretending to go on an extended killing spree is all the experience you will ever need. But maybe there are some people who can’t make the distinction between pretend violence and the real thing. Maybe, for some, that line is blurred, and long hours of pretend violence in graphic detail just makes it blurrier. Maybe, just maybe, your insistence on your freedoms might in part be responsible for someone being killed in the future. In real life, not in a game. 

You’re really not that much different than a lot of gun-owners in that regard. As a matter of fact, if one of you pointed in a mirror, there wouldn’t be much difference than the two of you pointing at each other. Except for the real sickos, of course, who like to play violent video games AND like real guns.

The point I’m driving at, is that the reasons for mass shootings are varied and complex. It is up to everyone to ask what they can do to make it better. Finger-pointing is really not all that different from pointing a fake gun. 

I get that you like to spend hours and weekends pretending to kill a bunch of people. And I’m sure you are fine and your hobby will never make you a menace to society. I’ve gambled in casinos and have never had a problem with it. On the other hand, I’ve known people’s whose lives were ruined by their gambling addictions. I’d rather shut down the gambling industry and miss out on my small pleasures than permit families to be ruined. It’s a small sacrifice.

So ask yourself what violent video games are contributing to society, then ask yourself if the reward you receive is worth the price society pays. And if you simply cannot imagine making a sacrifice for the greater good, cut some slack to those who do not wish to be parted with their guns. 

Remember, this is coming from someone who’s never fired a gun, except virtual ones. If you want gun owners to compromise on not merely their hobby but their deeply held beliefs, maybe you can show them that you are willing to sacrifice a little, too.

Why I'm So Hard On Democrats

Why do I constantly harp on the Democratic party for their failures and demand more of them when Trump is the greater threat? For the same reason a soldier makes damn sure his weapon is in working order before going into battle. It is folly, madness, to go into combat with a weapon that is always misfiring. As it stands, we’re almost as likely to be hurt by the Democrats as we are by Trump. Politicians are not friends nor allies, they are tools to be used. If we cannot rely upon them we owe them no loyalty. If they cannot help us, we must set them aside and choose other means of winning the battle.

Suppose you were set to march out to battle to oppose an enemy intent on destroying the world. Wouldn’t you want to know the weapon you are carrying is in proper working order? And if someone told you your weapon was unsafe and would explode in your face whenever you aimed it at your enemy, would you demonize that person if he was able to provide a convincing argument for why he knew it to be true? Would you accuse him of being a willing or unwilling tool of the enemy?

This is the situation as I now see it with liberals. I have seen time and again how they have gone into combat against Republicans, armed with a Democratic party that has never proven itself capable of beating back the opponent. So when I see you rushing out to get slaughtered, please do not think that I am less eager to engage in combat, only that I have learned the dangers of rushing into battle with blunderbusses against a division of tanks.

The Democratic Party is a weapon forged by bankers and pharmaceutical companies with no thought to craftsmanship but only to profit. It is worthless in our battle against the corporations, in fact it is a tool created by them. Forget about whether or not it will explode in your own hands, it will not even permit you to aim it properly at the enemy. The scope is off so that you will never hit your intended target. In fact, if you look through the scope of the Democratic Party, you will never even see the target you wish to hit. You will see only what they wish you to see.

Go ahead, take your rusty old Biden into battle and see what happens. They say its an upgrade from their previous model, but both were made from the same blueprint. Both are weapons forged by the very enemies we need to be fighting: corporations that have usurped our democratic processes. Trump is the more obvious tool of the enemy, the more powerful weapon, but we are unlikely to win a battle and will damned sure lose the war if we rush into battle with whatever weapons are handed to us by those who grow rich by funding both sides.

What Baby Boomers Have Left For Millennials

Baby boomers are handing over $21 trillion in national debt to millennials, a debt that was virtually at zero when they started to come to power. They have also saddled them with student loan debts most boomers never had to worry about. They shipped industrial jobs overseas and ended the idea of job security forever in order to boost their 401Ks so that they might retire in luxury. They trashed the environment and had more kids than they should have when overpopulation was already a known problem. They are overwhelmingly responsible for the plastic pollution that exists, since their parents got their milk and soda from returnable glass bottles and took their groceries home in paper bags. 

They over-consumed absolutely everything, demanding larger and larger and more and more vehicles, TVs, wardrobes. Most of them divorced rather than committing to the family they created, so that two parents ended up having two houses instead of one. To compensate for abandoning their roles as parents, they sought to become “friends” with their children. Because acting like a friend meant they never had to grow up and act like adults.

Because they pursued their selfish interests rather than being full-time parents, they tried to make it up by buying their kids “all the things they never had”, mainly stuff they never needed and wasn’t good for them. Mountains of cheap plastic toys sold in fancy packaging and marketed by television campaigns that sought to indoctrinate kids into a consumer culture. Yeah, baby boomers brought marketing to a whole new and disgusting level.

Baby boomers accepted consumerism as a way of life because it was an acceptable alternative to doing the hard work required to actually leave the world a better place than the one they had been given. Unfortunately, the world they gave to their kids did not have enough left over to provide them with the easy and frivolous lifestyle boomers experienced. The party was over by the time millennials graduated from high school with little prospect for a secure position. They couldn’t afford a house but they had to pay for a storage shed for all the guilt gifts their parents had given them over the years.

But baby boomers have so much more yet to give to the generation they are passing the baton to. 

They are busily giving them their judgment and contempt, boomersplaining to them how soft they’ve had it and what losers they are for not starting their own businesses or for complaining about the economy. How someone can ever sit in judgment of a generation that they helped create is beyond me, but self-reflection does not appear high on the boomer strength list. They appear to believe that their failures were due to their not being tough enough on their children rather than not being tough enough on themselves. They never figured out that you can’t tell children not to be selfish and materialistic when you are exhibiting such traits yourself. Nobody sees hypocrisy more clearly than children.

I’m a Gen Xer, though in my younger days I tried to fudge the numbers and pretend I was a Baby Boomer. When I was young I was convinced that the postwar generation was going to change the world, bring about the revolution that needed to take place. And while Baby Boomers had good ideas (and hella good music), their ideas and ideals never came to fruition. They were a generation such as was described in The Gospel: “Other seeds fell on rocky ground, where they had not much soil, and immediately they sprang up, since they had no depth of soil, but when the sun rose they were scorched; and since they had no root they withered away.” Sadly, the Baby Boomer generation was not rooted in tradition but grew within the culture television provided for them. They were taught that material possessions would make you happy and that problems would resolve themselves within thirty minutes for less serious ones, and within an hour should they be dramatic problems.

My parents were part of the generation that witnessed The Great Depression. They always said that it was the greatest time to grow up, because though they had little, they didn’t know they were lacking because nobody else had any more than they did. They had what was important, and too often when you have more than what is important, you start mistaking the non-essential as being essential as well. You lose track of what is truly important, and you lose the miraculous present among the packaging. Those who were coming of age in the ‘60’s were aware of that, but they lost sight of it somewhere along the way. I guess television’s voice was louder than their parents' voices. Or perhaps, the television was telling them what they wanted to hear.

Baby Boomers were the first generation raised with a television in the house. They were the first to have an authority besides their elders, the church, or the state. It worked its magic too on my generation, and on those who came after. But the lie that worked on boomers is no longer as convincing to younger generations. One difference is that people have learned from what came before. Another difference is that young people grew up with the internet, which has dispersed authority, giving individual voices a chance to grow their own audience. But perhaps the greatest reason the most recent crop of adults is rejecting the narrative of the mainstream media is that the media has been forced to deviate too far from the truth. As the power of the media grew, so too did its arrogance and its corruption. And as the media is merely one facet of the power that is behind corporations and the government, corruption and arrogance was allowed to grow there as well. As corruption grew, the lies were forced to become greater in order to cover for it.

It is too late for the Baby Boomers, for them the lie has been too comfortable. It is too late for my generation, too, because the lie has been infused with hatred for others so that we blame others without power who should be our allies. It is not too late for millennials, for whom the lie has not been comfortable and to whom much of the hatred has been directed. The lie cannot explain their reality, so there is hope yet that they will see the media for what it is: a means of control of the masses used by those with a compulsion for dominance and an insatiable hunger for more.

The DNC Answers My Questions

I submitted a list of questions to the Democratic National Committee, and to my great surprise they were kind enough to respond. Below are the questions I asked along with the answers I received.

Q: What nation do Democrats view as being the biggest threat to U.S. Interests?

A: Russia

Q: What will be the main focus of the Democratic Party in the 2020 elections?

A: Russia

Q: What are the perceived weak spots of President Trump you are hoping to be able to exploit?

A: Russia

Q: What response do you have to critics who claim the Democratic Party works not for the people but for corporations?

A: Russia

Q: Should the Democrats manage to win both houses of Congress AND the presidency, what bold plan do they have in place for combatting climate change?

A: We would immediately work to have Trump’s tax returns released to the public. Also, we would call for new investigations into Trump’s hampering of the Mueller investigation into Russian interference. Lastly, we would change the name of Russian Dressing to Freedom Dressing.

Q: What is your ideal approach to providing health care?

A: It is our goal to make sure everyone has access to health care insurance whether they can afford it or not. If you want to keep the insurance you now have that will drop you like a hot potato the moment you get sick, you can. Also, Russia.

Q: There are some who are worried that you might cheat Bernie Sanders again. What do you have to say to these people?

A: Russia hacked the election.

Q: Are you at all worried that Saudi Arabia and Israel have an undue influence on our political process?

A: Yes, we are very concerned that Russia might interfere with our election.

Q: The last two Republican presidents won office not by winning the popular vote—they lost it—but because of the Electoral College. Having you considered doing away with the Electoral College since it is an outmoded tool for electing presidents?

A: We need to keep the Electoral College. It is an essential protection of our election process should a clearly incompetent candidate sweep to office on uninformed populist sentiment, as well as a way of safeguarding our democracy from foreign meddling.

Q: For two and a half years, Democrats have been insisting Trump is a traitor who is being controlled by a foreign power, and yet the Democrats have chosen not to impeach him. Why is that?

A: We are very concerned that Trump is being controlled by Russia. Our initial response was to seek impeachment in order to hopefully remove this traitor to our nation from office. But then we thought, “What if this is just what Putin wants?” So we’ve decided to take a different approach, something that neither Putin—nor anyone else—would see coming. We’ve decided to run an unlikeable and untrustworthy centrist against Trump. Didn’t see it coming, did you? We’re putting all our chips on this strategy.

Q: Do you have any last thoughts to leave to the American people?

A: Yes. In 2016, Russia bombed Pearl Harbor by placing a picture of Bernie Sanders in a speedo on social media. This election cycle, things could get even worse. If you can imagine it. Just remember that any report of a Democratic candidate possessing any flaw was likely penned by the hand of Vladimir Putin himself, and passed on to twisted, inhuman Bernie Trolls who live in their parents basement because they are loser misogynists who don’t like black people. We must be very, very, careful of propaganda. Russian Propaganda. It is a tool to sew discord and get you to hate your fellow Americans. The only way to avoid this is by pledging your unquestioning loyalty to the party and by closing your mind to any dissenting opinions. Only in this way can we hope to preserve our democracy.

Nature Can Sometimes Be Cruel, Capitalism Always Is

Nature can be quite unforgiving. When life and death are on the line, nature will grant you no extra chances, show no pity, make no exceptions. Nature can be cold, uncaring, indifferent to your survival. At such moments, people have to put aside excuses, realize there is no point in asking for pity, and do whatever they have to in order to survive. Because nature simply does not respond to our wish for a kinder, gentler, world. Nature can often be a jerk.

It is for this reason that humans have created societies and civilizations, in order to provide some sort of cushion against unyielding, unforgiving, uncaring nature. Sure, being tough and sucking it up is one way of dealing with the harshness of nature, but there are a lot easier, less taxing ways of surviving. It may be manly to learn how to sleep in an igloo or eat squirrel, but it’s a lot more fun to be civilized and sleep on a nice warm bed in a climate-controlled house. The civilization we’ve created offers many perks such as this.

But nature is not always heartless. In fact, nature often gives humans—and all other species— wondrous blessings from her bounty. Primitive humans were as likely to come across a field of berries or a grove of apple trees as they were to come across a period of hunger. They were as likely to be blessed with more food than they could hope to eat as they were to go without. Indeed, any primitive human being would have had frequent instances when they were blessed by the generosity of nature: a time when the river ran thick with salmon, the fields rumbled with the hooves of bison, the boughs of trees hung low from the amount of fruit they bore.

For primitive man, all that nature gave, it gave for free. Though effort was sometimes required to harvest or prepare what was given, no price was placed upon what nature gave. Primitive houses might need to be built, but there was no charge for the lumber. Water might have to be carried from one place to another, but nobody had to go into debt to acquire essentials.

And when it came to the non-necessities, those things we do not need but which make life truly beautiful, nature gave without asking for anything in return. A person in nature did not have to pay to go to the beach, nor were beaches deprived them because they were not in possession of a piece of paper proving ownership of said stretch of waterfront property. Man could wander where he would without paying tolls, could sleep where he wished without paying rent, could eat what he wanted without having to pay for the privilege. Camping out beneath the stars and hanging around the campfire did not require a park permit or a lot site.

Nevertheless, man realized he could purchase an insurance policy of sorts against nature by creating societies and civilizations, and in so doing, reduce the risks of being eaten by a cougar or being undone by a failed crop. By working together, humanity could absorb the overall costs that would sometimes be too much for individuals and smaller groups. Groups in areas experiencing the excess nature often provides would be able to share from their excess with those experiencing a drought or other misfortune. When this is working well, humanity is able to thrive.

But somehow it is going all wrong. While society is still capable of providing wealth and comfort for many, it not only does not give freely, it no longer allows nature to do so. Visit any place where great populations of humans are assembled together, and you will soon find that nothing is available without cost. Whereas nature was often quite generous in providing food, humanity has replaced that abundance with qualifiers. Yes, you can have all you care to eat, if you can give something in return. Otherwise, perhaps you will be able to find something in the garbage of others that will give you strength to live another day. Yes, you can sleep somewhere, but only if you can pay for the privilege. Otherwise, police will rouse you from your sleep upon the cold pavement and send you on your way. Yes, you can live wherever you like, if you can pay rent to those who have claimed ownership of the land that once belonged to no one. Your choices of beverages are virtually endless. If you can pay. Otherwise, even life-giving water is becoming something which society can no longer provide to all.

You see, capitalists have taken all of nature’s blessings, of God’s blessings, and claimed them for their own. Your very existence depends upon your ability to increase their wealth. Whether you live or die does not matter to them, only whether you can increase their bottom lines or not.

You are now living in an artificial world created by capitalists. Your connection to others and to the planet is dead. They want you to think that capitalism is a natural extension of nature. They are very big on reminding people about the natural law of survival of the fittest and how merciless nature can be, but they are quite mum when it comes to reminding you of how nature is often quite free with its gifts. No other species but our own is required to pay for what they acquire. Even today, there exist cultures living close to nature for whom such a capitalist system would appear quite unnatural.

The society we created in order to protect ourselves against the savageries of nature has now become feral as well. It has devolved from a way of allowing people to work together for the benefit of all into a jungle in which the strong prey upon the weak.

The lesson the capitalists would have you learn is that it is up to the parents to protect their children from the dangers the capitalist system thrusts upon them. It is the parents’ responsibility to shield their children from the vulgarity and immorality that passes for culture in a capitalist society. It is the parents’ responsibility to keep their children away from the unhealthy foods created by corporations, foods that are causing record obesity and diabetes in children. Short of kidnapping your children, the capitalist advertisers do everything in their power to insure your children spend their (your) money on things that are neither good for them nor for society. But the blame is all yours should they succeed.

But this is not the way our primitive ancestors would have dealt with this threat. They would have taught their children to stay away from danger, yes, but when there was a dangerous beast lurking nearby, they understood something had to be done about it. They set traps, or they hunted it down and killed it. Primitive man did not hesitate to neutralize a problem that threatened their children. Not so in a capitalist society. Children of a primitive culture were never threatened by the dangers of obesity, diabetes, corporate branding, and a host of other ills foisted upon them by corporate marketing. But the answer is always to blame the parent, never the corporations.

There are very few threats we face from nature, nowadays. Humanity has created technology that has allowed us to grow more food than we know what to do with, to provide shelter and clothing to all. The main threats to our children now are the ones created by us, by people looking to enrich themselves at the expense of others. Predatory capitalism is the most prevalent manifestation of man’s inhumanity to his fellow man. We must learn from our ancestors how to protect ourselves, our children, and our very species from the threat of such predation. We must create civil structures strong enough to defend against predators, and we must do whatever it takes to remove such threats from prowling around wherever our children, our elderly, and ourselves are potential prey.

Where's My Cut Of The Children's Detention Profits?

I have to admit, I have a problem with the way the Trump administration is handling the children of immigrants. Private corporations are charging $775 dollars a day to house just one child. It seems to me this is another outrageous example of crony capitalism. Allow the free market to work it’s magic, and the price to taxpayers will go way down. Let everybody place their bid and cut the small businessman in on the action, rather than letting President Trump’s buddies make all the money.

As for myself, I’ve been crunching numbers and I’m pretty sure I could do the job for $500 per child per day. It’s not like I have a big basement or anything, but I think I could shove a dozen or more of the little tykes down there, which would be a real boon to my personal income. And what helps me will be sure to trickle down into the local economy. It's not me I'm thinking of, you understand, it's my local shopkeeper, barber, masseuse. 

My wife usually comes home for lunch, so she could check on the little immies during the day to make sure they’re okay. And seeing how she works for a dentist, I’m sure she could snag a few toothbrushes and toothpaste from the office, so we’d be one up on the people doing the job now. And my wife only works a few blocks from home, so it’s not like we wouldn’t be able to respond to any emergency or attempted escape.

I’m sure there’d be some initial outlay, after all we’d need to pick up some steel fencing and some kind of surveillance system so we’d know what was going on while we were away. In order to make sure we'd recoup our investment, we'd  have to make some kind of agreement with the government to make sure we had a steady supply of immigrant children. That shouldn’t be a problem because the government already signs agreements with for-profit prisons to ensure that they’ll be booked solid. Investors have to protect against risk, after all.

I do have to say Donald Trump has let me down on this issue. I really thought he’d be looking out for the small businessman. This could be a golden moment for small-scale entrepreneurs to shine. 

Innovation takes place at the micro level, small business is the driver of the economy. This could be the cottage industry that could breath new life into the middle class. A friend of mine has shared with me images of her proposed child immigration holding pens she sent along with her bid to the White House: 

Hell, she was even planning on giving them real blankets, not that aluminum crap. Alas, they were rejected in favor of this:

Now tell me, which do you think is more humane? I think my friend’s plan looks downright homey in comparison. I've stayed in many an airbnb that was far less accommodating

I'm beginning to think the interests of the dis-empowered are not being fairly represented on this issue. The poor, beleaguered, hardworking small businessmen are once again being given short shrift. It's sad to say, but it appears Trump has forgotten where he came from, that success has caused him to forget what it was like to struggle to evict a single elderly woman from her home in order to build a casino. You've gone Washington on us, Donald.

Or perhaps, perhaps  Donald Trump is not the brilliant tactician I thought he was.