America’s Gun Culture
Here’s an idea for would-be school shooters: Read this article on the two kids who die in a California high school shooting, then head to the gun expo advertised at the bottom of the page to arm yourself.
Tagged with: America's Gun Culture
Marketing At Its Worst
As a marketing consultant, I sometimes like to comment on extremely poor choices when it comes to promotion.
I might do something like this in a vegan campaign, but could this possibly entice anyone to eat more meat?
Why Trump Is Still “A Thing”
The cartoon here depicts something that is sickeningly real: Trump, acknowledged by GOP leaders to be a liar and criminal, continues to be the voice of the party.
Congressional Republicans need to deal with the fact Trump enjoys cult-like adoration from their voters, who will rebel against anyone who disavows their leader. Trump, true to form, plays this for all it’s worth, e.g., doing everything he can to ruin the careers of any dissenters. (more…)
Warning: Vulgar Slang Here–“Pissant”
At left is a brief excerpt from Kurt Vonnegut’s Cat’s Cradle. Vonnegut doesn’t have quite the appeal to me that he held in my teens, but I still admire his sardonic wit, his observations that people are both stupid and cruel, and thus the conclusion that our lives are essentially absurd.
Now, on to the subject of pissants, especially as they apply to environmental sustainability. I frequently find myself talking to people who use talking points they’ve picked up from Fox News to try to “make me feel like a boob,” to use the author’s words. (more…)
We’re Never Absolutely Certain, But We Really Don’t Need To Be
Descartes told us that the only thing of which we can be certain is that the statement “I exist” is true every time we pronounce it or conceive it in our minds.
In our real-world lives, however, no one needs absolute certainty. I’m fairly confident that I’m sitting at my desk typing this blog post, though I concede it’s possible that I’m asleep dreaming it, or that I’m in a lab somewhere with mental images being electronically implanted into me. However, I’m as certain as I need to be about my being here at 2GreenEnergy “headquarters,” typing away.
As suggested at left, those who believe that the Earth was created about 6000 years ago have a similar dilemma, only in reverse; they have chosen to believe something that seems, while not impossible, improbable in the extreme.
Tagged with: Absolutely Certain
Race in America and the Tragedy of George Floyd
By the time the Derek Chauvin / George Floyd case is over, the volume of news coverage on it will be astronomical. The case rivals the O.J. Simpson trial in terms of its national and international fascination, but sadly, it’s far more important, given this terrible point in U.S. history, where racial tension has, for an entire presidential administration, been deliberately amplified and exploited for political purposes. (more…)
Tagged with: Race in America
Boys’ Thoughts
Like all decent people, I’m a feminist. But I’m also a man of science, and the statement at left is simply incorrect biologically. Boys’ thoughts are often driven by girls’ bodies; it’s a scientific fact, and it has no moral connotation whatsoever.
Of course, if you want to say that girls’ bodies shouldn’t motivate boys’ sexual aggression, then you have a legitimate point.
But talk about sustainability! If boys weren’t aroused by girls (and vice versa) the last generation of human beings would have already been born, and we would no longer have a species here shortly after the end of the century.
The meme is an example of something deeply regrettable in present-day American society, IMO. We try to pretend that romantic affairs begin when a mutual attraction happens simultaneously, and that flirting constitutes sexual harassment. Don’t we remember when someone we had a crush on just wanted to be friends, but that friendship morphed over time into love? Is there somehow something bad or wrong about this?
The title song from the musical masterpiece Beauty and the Beast begins:
Tale as old as time
True as it can be
Barely even friends
Then somebody bends
Unexpectedly
True as it can be
Barely even friends
Then somebody bends
Unexpectedly
I hope you’ll take a moment and listen to the whole piece:
Tagged with: feminism
Devouring Today’s GOP On Air
Bashing today’s Republicans, the group from which the party of Lincoln devolved, has never been difficult for intelligent and articulate people, but it’s always great to see it done with such zeal and panache, and especially when it comes from a self-described “NRA conservative” political commentator, in this case, SE Cupp. (more…)
Common Sense Gun Laws Are Extremely Popular, But…..
We don’t need another reminder of how broken our democracy is, but if we did, the meme here would certainly get the job done.
It’s hard to imagine anything with a higher rating of public approval than universal background checks for prospective gun owners. But not only is it not a law, we cannot even get a discussion of the subject on the floors of Congress. (more…)
Humor Intermixed with Tragedy
It’s a tragedy that we have people who lack a 6th grade education in science influencing policy-making that will mean the difference between life and death for the human civilization.
That doesn’t mean that we can’t smile at comments like this one from Neil de Grasse Tyson.
