With a tip of the hat and many thanks to Max Headroom and Edison Carter for a great lead-in line.
Tuesday, September 30, 2008
WHAT I WANT TO KNOW IS.....
What I want to know is, When all of these people talk about not leaving Iraq until we have achieved victory, just what the hell do they mean? Just what is victory. We got into the Iraq war without adequate front end knowledge of what we were getting into and why. Once in, we discovered that we didn't have an exit strategy, at least not one beyond a Saturday afternoon black and white cowboy movie strategy. And now we're 5 years into this thing and we're told that we can't get out until victory is ours. Victory? There is no victory in war. Don't you know your history? Where war is concerned, victory is only temporary. It's an illusion clouded by the fog of war.
Is victory determined by body count, by some sort of legal document, by some measure of reconstruction, or what? Is it an agreement by all sides concerned to cease hostilities? Well, that's impossible. How can one get the other side to agree to anything when one refuses to even speak with the other side. How does anyone think they can get the other side to agree to concessions that are in opposition to their cultural beliefs? Is victory determined by beating the other side into submission? Hey, that will work just swell. It will have about the same end as if someone tried to beat the United States into submission.
Why did Bin Laden attack us anyway. Don't say that it's because he hates our freedom. If you believe that, then you haven't been listening. Of course if you believe that, then you're probably one of the ostrichs that still believe that there were ties between Al Quaida and Saddam Hussein.
I have heard not one word explaining what victory means. Look, if you can't spell it out, if you can't explain what you mean, then would you please be quiet? Otherwise, tell me. Victory? What is victory? And what is the price? And is it worth it?
What I want to know is, "Who stole the white from out of the red, white and blue?
It’s Friday morning, April 28, 2006 and I just got through listening to Neil Young’s new album “Living With War.” It’s replaying on my computer as I write this. A little over half way through, I heard him singing about the blue and the red, and it suddenly occurred to me, “what happened to the white?” I don’t mean white as in Caucasian. I mean white as in “inclusive of all colors.” I mean white as in pure and uniting. I mean white as in completion of the trinity of red white and blue. I mean white as in spiritual perception. When one looks at the flag of the United States of America, it is noticeable that the red stripes are separated by white stripes and the blue field is full of white stars. The white stripes and stars represent the commonality that is shared by the uniqueness of all Americans, of all people, of all of life. I think that it is time for the whiteness of unification to rise up and quell the devisive climate created by those of the red and the blue who are unable to see beyond the myopic world of their own limited color.
What I want to know is, "Why should Dick Cheney's Vice Presidential meetings with former oil cohorts, who have long been known to have designs upon Afghanistan and Iraq for reasons that would promote their own petroleum power at the expense of others, be kept secret while the former United States President's sexual pecadillos were broadcast around the world in all of their smokin' detail?" Seems to me that there's a distortion in our concepts of privacy going on here. Earlier today I sent the following email to MSNBC.
"Just heard Pat Buchanan on MSNBC say that the President of the United States has the right to speak privately with whomever he chooses. Does he also agree that the President of the United States has the right to privately communicate sexually with whomever he chooses? If not, why not? If so, does he feel that the overwhelming voyeuristic emphasis placed upon the previous President's private sexual activities might have had a detrimental effect upon that President's ability to effectively execute the requirements of the Executive Office? And finally, is Pat concerned about the enormous amount of hypocracy rampant throughout the political and journalistic institutions of this country? Could it be that Carl Bernstein was recently righton perceptive in his claim that this country is suffering from an epidemic of a culture of idiocy?
"The tone of my questions obviously indicate my personal views upon these topics. Shame on you all. The United States of America is a great idea that is being sacrificed upon the alter of hypocracy. Shame on you all for reporting upon that sacrifice as though it has any legitimacy whatsoever. "
WHAT I WANT TO KNOW IS..... What I want to know is, "How many people are actually familiar with what they are talking about?"
This morning, I hear on the news that, according to a recent poll, an alleged 60% of Americans believe that the Bible is the absolute, infallible, revealed “word of God,” and, therefore, that every word is correct.
What I want to know is how many of these 156+ million people have actually read the Bible, all of the Bible. And if they have read it, and they believe that this is God’s message to them, then why are we having so few sacrifices. The air should be heavy with the smell of blood and burning flesh from all of the sacrifices “required” in atonement for sins in the book of Leviticus. Maybe we’ve decided to let McDonald’s do the animal bloodletting for us. “Have a Big Mac, my child, and be absolved from your sins.” It frightens me that my fellow citizens are so gullible.
For those interested in examining versions, comparisons, and inconsistencies in the Bible, InnVista is a good place to go.
What I want to know is, "What is it that frightens the "recording industry" so much about peer-to-peer swap engines like Napster?" Could it be that the greedy middlemen, like ASCAP and BMI and RIAA see their own demise on the horizon? Is anyone really fooled when they scream for the "artists' rights?" Isn't it obvious that they've only concerned about their own rights, the right to make massive amounts of money off of the creativity of others? If cocaine has been such a big problem in the "recording industry" for decades, where do you suppose the money to buy all that coke comes from? I mean here we have people pleading for more money so they can shove more coke up their nose. Doesn't that make the recording consumer an enabler to the recording industry addicts?
As for ourselves and the effects of Napster, we're closely aligned with people like Prince and Courtney Love. "Intellectual Property," is, unfortunately, a term which has created more benefit and cash flow for agents, and executives, and accountants, and lawyers, and industry middlemen, and tax collectors, and drug dealers than it ever has for the "intellectuals" who are the source of that "property."
For some people, the Internet is scary as hell, for it means that the money that they have for so long been pirating from the artists and the consumers is no longer going to be an easy source of income for them. We believe wholeheartedly that the artist is worthy of their hire and furthermore that they should be amply rewarded for their creative contributions in accord with the popularity and level of acceptance of those contributions. Over the years there have been countless cases revealed wherein the “artist” has been ripped off by the “business person.” Unfortunately, these cases are not the exception. And now those who have been ripping off the artists are crying because they feel that they are being ripped off. Hey, here’s a tissue. Blow it out and suck it up.
What I want to know is, when are we going to invent, develop, and implement new systems and procedures for paying the artist without bleeding the public? We can do it, whether the RIAA or anyone else likes it or not.
What I want to know is, "Why do so many people who profess to be Christians have so much difficulty forgiving others?" I always thought that love and forgiveness were chief foundation stones to Jesus' teachings. His ministry was one of inclusiveness wherein he did not judge others, but rather accepted them and forgave their sins, on the spot, no questions asked.
The only people that Jesus seemed to have no toleration for were the Pharisees. They were, of course, a Jewish sect that believed in insisting that everyone adhere to the "letter of the law" (that is their interpretation of the letter of the law). One of the synonyms for Pharisee in Roget's Thesaurus is "hypocrite," a term Jesus used often when talking with those unrealistic, judgmental fanatics. Oops, got a little judgmental there myself. Hypocrites.
Jesus way of dealing with sin was to instruct the sinner not to commit the sin again and to be on his or her way. That’s it, pure and simple. And powerful.
What I want to know is, "If a person gets behind in a debt that they owe, and the holder of the debt decides to sell the debt to a third party, why doesn't the holder of the debt offer the sale of the debt to the debtor at the ridiculous price for which it is prepared to sell it to a third party?" Think about it. The debtor sells the debt at 10 cents or 30 cents on the dollar, and then the new "owner" of the debt tries to collect at 50 cents or 60 cents on the dollar. Kind of makes one think that the debt owner and the third party buyer of the debt have absolutely no regard for the debtor. Offer to sell the debt to the debtor at 10 cents on the dollar.
If you've ever gotten sufficiently enough behind in payments on a debt that the debt holder's representatives begin to call you, they almost always say, "we're calling because we want to try to help you to resolve this situation." That's a blatant lie. They are never trying to "help" the debtor. Their only reason for "appearing to help the debtor" is to benefit themselves financially. Simple observation reveals that their actions are nothing more than heartless, unfeeling greed. In the movie, "Wall Street," Michael Douglas's character says, "Greed is good." Hey, it was only a movie, folks. Just because he said it doesn't mean it's true. Michael says he still has people come up to him sincerely saying, “Greed is good.”
Lately there have been demonstrations by groups of people who want the "powers that be" in world trade partnerships to cancel third-world, national debt. Now, I have a question for you. If it could be proven possible to cancel all debt without severely impacting the world's economy, would you, as an individual, be willing to agree that all debt should therefore be cancelled? If not, why not?
For the record, there is a way that it can be done. That's right, it's possible to cancel all world debt, all the way down to the individual level without adversely affecting the world economy. If you say, "impossible," all you are doing is revealing your ignorance of the possibilities, and, if you are a debt holder, you are demonstrating your fear of losing out upon the object of your greed.
If you're curious how we can make such a claim, then you'll come back and visit with us regularly at “Millennium Paradigm” http://millenniumparadigm.blogspot.com for we are now in the process of revealing just how our claim can be achieved. In fact, we believe that it not only "can" be achieved, but that it "will" be achieved, and a lot sooner than most people expect.
What we want to know is why has it taken so long? The emperor has no clothes other than greed and the greed is transparent.
Neither a borrower nor a lender be. Good advice. It could actually happen in your lifetime.
“War is over if you want it.” – John Lennon
“Reality is nothing more than a whole lot of agreement.” – Dr. Fred Alan Wolf
