I personally love a strong tasting beer. To me, if I am going to shovel out $8 or more for an 8 pack of beer, I want something that has some taste to it. My brothers-in-law are just the opposite of me and both are fans of Bud Light which to me is tantamount to water dyed to look like beer. One thing nice about a strong beer is that if it's too strong, you can always water it down a little on your own whereas a weak beer you have no way to make it stronger.
The same goes for politics. You can always water down your brand but it's virtually impossible to make it stronger. That is what is essentially happening to the GOP this year with the addition of Trump in the race. He has brought with him a large assortment of "independents" to the GOP to vote for him. While the GOP has been trying to expand their tent in recent years, this expansion has weakened the brand considerably like adding water to your beer.
I have never understood people who choose to not to choose sides. To me they are nothing but a bunch of cowards who don't know their own mind or values. Whenever I hear a person proudly pronounce to the world "Oh. I'm an independent!", I would want to say to them, "You mean you don't care about your country at all??". At least with Libertarians, you've made a choice for a third party, but independents isn't a party at all. It has no values, no core, no platform and no candidates. Personally I thing the GOP should require ALL primaries to be closed-primaries. After all, do you really want a bunch of fence-sitting-cowards to be allowed to choose your parties candidate?
Oh I can hear the independents who might be reading this now saying, "Who's he to call me a coward! I just don't agree with everything the GOP stands for and so I choose to be an independent". Well, do some research on all the parties available to you: Democrat, Republican, Libertarian, Green, Socialist, Communist. At least ONE of them must appeal to you at least 60,70% or more. I don't even agree with everything the Libertarians stand for but I do agree with about 80%.
I think the reason the term independent appeals to so many is 2 reasons. One, they don't have to commit. Like the guy who would rather live with his girl-friend and get the sex for free, independents don't want to commit to anything. They feel that somehow they can avoid any confrontation by staying out of the fight altogether. The second reason is they can never lose (of course they never win either). No matter who gets into the White House in November their person didn't lose, because they didn't have a horse in the race to begin with. They therefore save their pride and their little egos (what little they have) from being crushed.
So now the GOP will have to live with watered-down-beer this election. They will have to probably march into November behind a spray-tanned con-man with no values and no plans other than to "Make America Great Again!". The media is already queuing up their endless in-depth investigations into Trumps fake university, fake investments, over-exaggerated wealth, past marriages, past sins against women and other minorities. They will pummel Trump like a pinata at a birthday party for a class of 8 year-old boys with ADD and hyped up on soda and candy.
The question for the GOP is this. Is it worth it? Maybe their only option is to broker a better candidate and hope all the "independents" that came in for Trump will stay home on November and not vote for Hillary. I can't say if that will happen or not. It's a big gamble
Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your MIND
Friday, March 4, 2016
Monday, February 29, 2016
Choosing the lesser of 2 evils .... or not
Back in 1987 I was working in Massachusetts and I was on a company softball league of other fellow engineers. Even though I grew playing sports, sadly that was not the case for many of my peers on the team. We decided on a team name called : None of the Above. To illustrate its meaning our shirts were printed with a check-off-list of items related to the question at the top that said
"Our team can: "
On Facebook a friend named Barbara posted, "We must select the lesser of 2 evils" to which I responded, "Would you vote for Hitler if the only other choice was Stalin?". Their answer was simply "No". Of course no one is calling Trump Hitler or Hillary Stalin but it goes to show you that not all choices are simply between the lesser of 2 evils and sometimes it's none-of-the-above.
As a Christian, some often make you feel like "not-voting" or "voting for a 3rd party" is some sort of mortal and unforgivable sin. Back in 1992, a fairly large group of disaffected voters cast their vote for an outsider by the name of Ross Perot who had caught the eye of many Republicans for his "no-nonsense-approach" to government spending. As this split the GOP vote, it allowed Bill Clinton to come into the White House with a dismal 42% of the vote. And the same might happen again, only instead of the vote being split between 2 people it could be split between Trump and that other outsider candidate called "none of the above". But if you recall, from the 1992 election what happened was of not much consequence. We are still here. The world still spins on its axis and God still reigns.
People get their necks all out of joint on this issue. They almost turn purple in the face when they say "Do you want Hillary to roll into office?", like as if the world is going to end. Of course I don't want Hillary in office, but I won't sacrifice my morals and faith to do that. I will still vote, but it will probably be a write-in for Ted Cruz instead. How have we gone from George Washington, who tried as hard as he could be be ethical, moral and straight with the American people to voting for a man who lies, cheats, calls people stupid, ugly, liars, dumb, and says he can't remember asking God for forgiveness for anything.
Jesus said, "All authority has been given to me in heaven and earth". The political system here is just a temporary system until God comes to make all things right. The Constitution did not come down from Mount Sinai with the 10 commandments. It's a man-made invention and an attempt to bring a just system to help us get along. I personally think its the best one we have going so far that allows the most personal freedom, but not everyone likes freedom (sad). God will still reign on his throne and will still accomplish his goals for our world somehow, even if Hillary becomes POTUS. The people of Israel were often frustrated in trying to understand God's will for them. They wanted to return back to the good old years of King David or King Solomon, but they were constantly under other peoples control. First it was Alexander the Great and then later it was the Roman Empire. They tried everything they could to fix the situation, but nothing seemed to change. Yet it was through the Greek and Roman Empires that God brought the Messiah. These empires made it possible and also easier to spread the gospel to millions of more people. God's will was accomplished.
Maybe our desire for a new "Reagan" is much like their need for a new "King David". It's a selfish desire and a short-sighted goal and not in keeping with God's will at this time.
And really, isn't God's will what it's really about in the end?
"Our team can: "
- Hit
- Catch
- Pitch
- Run
- None of the Above
On Facebook a friend named Barbara posted, "We must select the lesser of 2 evils" to which I responded, "Would you vote for Hitler if the only other choice was Stalin?". Their answer was simply "No". Of course no one is calling Trump Hitler or Hillary Stalin but it goes to show you that not all choices are simply between the lesser of 2 evils and sometimes it's none-of-the-above.
As a Christian, some often make you feel like "not-voting" or "voting for a 3rd party" is some sort of mortal and unforgivable sin. Back in 1992, a fairly large group of disaffected voters cast their vote for an outsider by the name of Ross Perot who had caught the eye of many Republicans for his "no-nonsense-approach" to government spending. As this split the GOP vote, it allowed Bill Clinton to come into the White House with a dismal 42% of the vote. And the same might happen again, only instead of the vote being split between 2 people it could be split between Trump and that other outsider candidate called "none of the above". But if you recall, from the 1992 election what happened was of not much consequence. We are still here. The world still spins on its axis and God still reigns.
People get their necks all out of joint on this issue. They almost turn purple in the face when they say "Do you want Hillary to roll into office?", like as if the world is going to end. Of course I don't want Hillary in office, but I won't sacrifice my morals and faith to do that. I will still vote, but it will probably be a write-in for Ted Cruz instead. How have we gone from George Washington, who tried as hard as he could be be ethical, moral and straight with the American people to voting for a man who lies, cheats, calls people stupid, ugly, liars, dumb, and says he can't remember asking God for forgiveness for anything.
Jesus said, "All authority has been given to me in heaven and earth". The political system here is just a temporary system until God comes to make all things right. The Constitution did not come down from Mount Sinai with the 10 commandments. It's a man-made invention and an attempt to bring a just system to help us get along. I personally think its the best one we have going so far that allows the most personal freedom, but not everyone likes freedom (sad). God will still reign on his throne and will still accomplish his goals for our world somehow, even if Hillary becomes POTUS. The people of Israel were often frustrated in trying to understand God's will for them. They wanted to return back to the good old years of King David or King Solomon, but they were constantly under other peoples control. First it was Alexander the Great and then later it was the Roman Empire. They tried everything they could to fix the situation, but nothing seemed to change. Yet it was through the Greek and Roman Empires that God brought the Messiah. These empires made it possible and also easier to spread the gospel to millions of more people. God's will was accomplished.
Maybe our desire for a new "Reagan" is much like their need for a new "King David". It's a selfish desire and a short-sighted goal and not in keeping with God's will at this time.
And really, isn't God's will what it's really about in the end?
Tuesday, February 16, 2016
Do you ignore bad information on purpose?
Several years ago I remember reading an article that said humans are programmed to ignore information that is severely traumatizing. This is referred to as "intentional blindness". An example of this was a case when an airplane mid-flight had an engine catch fire and was forced to return to the airport. While no one was hurt, many people on the side of the plane where the engine was reported looking out the planes window and seeing nothing wrong despite flames clearly seen coming out the back of the engine. Some theorize its the brains own coping mechanism to handle stressful situations.
We all do it to some level. Parents do it when their son or daughter is not doing well at school and they pull away from the family and become reclusive. We tell ourselves "it's just a phase" or "normal teenage rebellion", when in reality they are skipping school, getting caught with drugs and becoming an addict. Eventually something happens that forces the parent out of their intentional blindness to wake them up and get them back to what is really going on. Hopefully before it's too late.
I have also seen this intentional blindness in the news lately. Recently Wall Street has been crumbling under the fall of global oil prices. Normally the fall of oil would be a cause of celebration on Wall Street as it would mean lower gas prices and therefore more money for Americans to spend as well as lower energy costs for corporations which would lead to larger profits. But today we live in an upside down world. The fall in oil prices is from a fall in demand for oil which means we are seeing the advent of a global recession. The reason is simple. Oil is so needed for a growing economy (energy, chemicals, plastics etc.) that if the demand is down it means that the economy is slowing and therefore Wall Street falls. So what is Wall Streets answer? Have these countries cut their production and bring oil prices back up (law of supply and demand says prices rise either when demand increases or supply falls). Is the recession over? No. It's just covered up the problem. Demand is still down and the recession continues. But for Wall Street they pretend its all fine now and the stock market "rallies" on the news. This also shows that Wall Street is no longer connected to Main-Street. Where as in the past lower gas prices was a good thing and higher gas prices was a bad thing, now it just doesn't matter at all what happens to us as a nation. Wall Streets rules have no bearing on how things go in the real world at all. It's all just a game to them. But their game is short sighted. Had they let oil prices continue to fall, we would be better off. Families would have more disposable income. Small businesses would have more profits to hire more people. Profits would go up. Un-employment would go down. Wall Street would eventually see REAL profits come back (not just ones on paper) and would have real good news to celebrate.
This intentional blindness is not limited to the stock brokers on Wall Street either. Recently I was talking to another co-worker about how the technology world is headed for a cliff when it can no longer continue doubling the number of transistors on a chip every 2 years. I wrote in a former piece about how the transistors are so small now that the width of the transistor is so small that the number of silicon atoms it takes to make one is in the low double digits now (about 40). In order to cut the size by half would mean we would have to go down to 20,10,5,2,1 (5 more doubles) and most feel you can't go past 10 atoms with any amount of reliability. Faced with this FACT, my co-worker simply shrugged and said, "Oh I am sure they will figure out a way" and moved on. He is not alone. Most people in my field don't want to face this immutable fact either and are making no plans for their future. I have been in the business for 30 years and I have lived through 15 "doublings" but most kids coming out of college now with computer engineering degrees will only see 1-2 more doublings. Then what? Cross that bridge when it comes?
The same happened when I first started work in 1986. My first job was at a company called Data General in Westboro Massachusetts. It was an off-shoot of Digital Corporation and made deep-freezer sized computers called "mini-computers" (mini because they were smaller than large IBM main-frames). To those at Data General mini-computers were all the rage and new small micro-computers were scoffed at. How could these little computers take on the large takes these mini-computers could do? To them, mini-computers were always going to be around and most of the workers there continued their work like all was well. But we all know now mini-computers became out-dated dinosaurs of the technology world. They just could not compete. Those at the top of the company became victims of their own intentional blindness.
Where do you allow yourself to be intentionally blinded to the facts? At home? At work? Our political system? Our financial system? Knowing this, what changes would you make? Like those on the airplane who shut their windows and pretended all was fine with the engines, maybe they would have started preparing for a crash landing or alerting others to what the problem was.
We all do it to some level. Parents do it when their son or daughter is not doing well at school and they pull away from the family and become reclusive. We tell ourselves "it's just a phase" or "normal teenage rebellion", when in reality they are skipping school, getting caught with drugs and becoming an addict. Eventually something happens that forces the parent out of their intentional blindness to wake them up and get them back to what is really going on. Hopefully before it's too late.
I have also seen this intentional blindness in the news lately. Recently Wall Street has been crumbling under the fall of global oil prices. Normally the fall of oil would be a cause of celebration on Wall Street as it would mean lower gas prices and therefore more money for Americans to spend as well as lower energy costs for corporations which would lead to larger profits. But today we live in an upside down world. The fall in oil prices is from a fall in demand for oil which means we are seeing the advent of a global recession. The reason is simple. Oil is so needed for a growing economy (energy, chemicals, plastics etc.) that if the demand is down it means that the economy is slowing and therefore Wall Street falls. So what is Wall Streets answer? Have these countries cut their production and bring oil prices back up (law of supply and demand says prices rise either when demand increases or supply falls). Is the recession over? No. It's just covered up the problem. Demand is still down and the recession continues. But for Wall Street they pretend its all fine now and the stock market "rallies" on the news. This also shows that Wall Street is no longer connected to Main-Street. Where as in the past lower gas prices was a good thing and higher gas prices was a bad thing, now it just doesn't matter at all what happens to us as a nation. Wall Streets rules have no bearing on how things go in the real world at all. It's all just a game to them. But their game is short sighted. Had they let oil prices continue to fall, we would be better off. Families would have more disposable income. Small businesses would have more profits to hire more people. Profits would go up. Un-employment would go down. Wall Street would eventually see REAL profits come back (not just ones on paper) and would have real good news to celebrate.
This intentional blindness is not limited to the stock brokers on Wall Street either. Recently I was talking to another co-worker about how the technology world is headed for a cliff when it can no longer continue doubling the number of transistors on a chip every 2 years. I wrote in a former piece about how the transistors are so small now that the width of the transistor is so small that the number of silicon atoms it takes to make one is in the low double digits now (about 40). In order to cut the size by half would mean we would have to go down to 20,10,5,2,1 (5 more doubles) and most feel you can't go past 10 atoms with any amount of reliability. Faced with this FACT, my co-worker simply shrugged and said, "Oh I am sure they will figure out a way" and moved on. He is not alone. Most people in my field don't want to face this immutable fact either and are making no plans for their future. I have been in the business for 30 years and I have lived through 15 "doublings" but most kids coming out of college now with computer engineering degrees will only see 1-2 more doublings. Then what? Cross that bridge when it comes?
The same happened when I first started work in 1986. My first job was at a company called Data General in Westboro Massachusetts. It was an off-shoot of Digital Corporation and made deep-freezer sized computers called "mini-computers" (mini because they were smaller than large IBM main-frames). To those at Data General mini-computers were all the rage and new small micro-computers were scoffed at. How could these little computers take on the large takes these mini-computers could do? To them, mini-computers were always going to be around and most of the workers there continued their work like all was well. But we all know now mini-computers became out-dated dinosaurs of the technology world. They just could not compete. Those at the top of the company became victims of their own intentional blindness.
Where do you allow yourself to be intentionally blinded to the facts? At home? At work? Our political system? Our financial system? Knowing this, what changes would you make? Like those on the airplane who shut their windows and pretended all was fine with the engines, maybe they would have started preparing for a crash landing or alerting others to what the problem was.
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