Just Passing...

 

Saluting All Drunk Americans

 

Visitors

 

Who Rules?

 

All Enemies

 

The Agony of Sophia

In 2017, social robot Sophia was given citizenship of Saudi Arabia – the first robot to be given legal personhood anywhere in the world. Bestowed with this great gift, Sophia has embarked on a distinguished career in marketing.  SOURCE: WIRED, author:  Emily Reynolds...  the article continues with the notion that Sophia is destined to have a worthless life in Marketing because as robot, she has no sentient rights...  obviously, her creator is fighting for those rights and the rights of all future robots so that they will no longer be treated as a product or a commodity.

The creator of Sophia believes that we could have sentient robots as soon as 2030...  only 10 years away...  which is not long at all in the world of technology...  in 2000, we believed that this MIGHT HAPPEN in 2050 but we were not really sure...  and now, 20 years later, we are making life altering predictions to take place in 10 years, one half that time.

This happened only 3 years ago, and 1 year after Donald Trump was elected President and very few people in the world knew about it...  or, if the press knew they decided not to write about it...  and yet, it will soon be reality when we start mass producing robots and they gradually start to take our jobs...  actually your job, since I am retired...  sorry...  I think that I would rather lose my job to a male robot rather than a female one...  but, I am not sure as of yet, how to tell the difference.

More Sunday Cartoons

 

Morning Coffee Routine Forever and Ever Amen

Sundays...  are special days...  religious days for some...  relaxing days for others...  while some see Sundays as just the ending to a nice long or short week...  and, the last day before we have to being all over again...

Being retired and no longer in the so called "rat race," I see Sundays as a day of reflection whether it be spiritual or not because it seems like I am always involved in some sort of spiritual reflection every day of the week.

Just like when I was working, all my days started with coffee, but my coffee was either consumed in haste because I needed to go or consumed while driving to work in a car...  as where I worked all my life, I never needed to use public transportation.

But...  my days typically started differently than most...  because I would get dressed and drive to McDonalds at 5:00 am and drink several cups of coffee slowly as I wrote in my journals.  I was there about an hour or so maybe 90 minutes, then I would return home, shower and get dressed for work...

Being retired, I no longer need to get up that early and drive to McDonalds but I do drink several cups of coffee while continuing to write in my journals.

However, my coffee is no longer regular but decaf and instead of drinking it straight, I put in two spoons of sugar free Cappuccino Mix even though once it is mixed up, it never tastes like the "real thing."

 

Did Our Past Really Happen?

I watched a NETFLIX movie series yesterday about American Crime and one of the characters made the following statement:  "I just sitting alone in a room with all my failures."  This phrase touches a lot of people at every level of our socio-economic profiles because at some point-in-time, we have all been left with failures of which they either motivate or destroy the beholder of these truths.  But, there is a bigger picture...  there is always a bigger picture...

As Americans and members of mankind and the human race, all we have in the future is our memories of the our past...  and, we keep those memories housed in the memory bank of our mind...  somewhere inside that head of ours or we keep them in a container of photographs and video clips....  of which again, very few of us ever go back to take a looksee...  unless we are sharing with others or are lonely.

NO ONE EVER ASKS THE QUESTION:  Did those memories actually happen?  Sometimes, when we look back into our forgotten world of photographs, we see images of us, they look like us, but we don't remember doing this or that...  Has our subconscious blocked it out or is it possible that it never happened.

Once our past is GONE it is gone...  it never reappears to confirm what we just experienced, felt, or endured and yet we are more or less certain that it did, in fact, happen, just the way we remembered....  but, what about a year later, or five years later, or a decade, or half a century...  is our past really accurate, are our recollections of our past accurate either?

When I wake up in the morning in bed, after sleeping all night, I immediate conclude that this is exactly what I just did...  SLEEP...  but, I cannot prove it in a court of law because it is gone and the actual past of the person sleeping with me is gone as well...  never to be proven other than assuming it was sleep we just experienced after getting out of bed, but we do not know for sure...  since that past is GONE FOREVER...

I can look at the clock on the wall or on the computer and see that I have been sitting in this chair and typing on this computer for 20 minutes or more...  but, how can I prove that this is what I was really doing 10 minutes ago, since my past is GONE...  I am assuming...  I am extrapolating...  but within some level of comprehension, I can NEVER BE SURE of the PAST because the PAST is GONE.

Komic Korner Kartoons

 

Less Than Two Weeks Away and...

It is Saturday once again in the Valley of East TN, and yesterday I finished all my fall activities outside when I cut back (some might say severely) my Japanese Maple back to 1/4 to 1/3 its pre-cutting size but only after it had shed all its leaves.  It took me a couple of hours as I tried very carefully not to get poked by any cut branches as I am on Xarelto and bleed like a gutted hog.

The temps are in the 60's for the rest of this week even though the days start out below the 40's and for me it is difficult to venture outside when it is cold nowadays...  I like warmer weather but not with a high humidity.

As I was sitting on my front porch watching the cars go by which in my location is really not many (but it gives me something to do), I finally realized since I have not been watching much television these days and thereby inundated with commercials that we are less than two weeks away from Christmas.

And...  this got me to thinking a tad...  when Thanksgiving rolled around about a month ago, even though my health is poor but better than some that I had a whole hell of a lot for which to be thankful, the least of which was the fact that I was still above ground.

But...  Christmas is a different kind of holiday and instead of being thankful when become mindful of the birth of our Savior Jesus Christ...   however, Christian beliefs are no longer shared by MOST AMERICANS and yet we still hypocritically celebrate the holiday by giving gifts and going on vacations...   and, if we are not really Christians and not really celebrating our beliefs, then WHY THE HELL ARE WE EXCHANGING GIFTS?

So...  let me see if I can understand this...   we don't believe in Jesus and even though this is his birthday celebration, we are giving gifts anyway...

Muslims, Jews, Hindus, Buddhists must really think that we are STUPID...  STUPID...  STUPID...

AND...  the sad part about all of this is the fact that the NON CHRISTIANS exchanging gifts because of a religious birth do not think they are being hypocritical because they do not attend church services on Christmas Eve nor do they offer prayers before eating their meals....  and these damn non Christians will go heavily in debt buying gifts to exchange for a religious holiday about which they do not believe.

Know It All

 

Asking For Blessings...

It would appear that for most Americans at least, it is very easy to ASK GOD to BLESS US but is it fair to be so ONE SIDED?  I mean, God created the HEAVENS and the EARTH, all ANIMALS whether extinct or still alive...  and GOD CREATED MANKIND...  not just AMERICANS...  but all men (and women) in all walks of life and in all countries...  and, when GOD was finished creating he said ALL WAS GOOD...  

Now for me, when someone says, especially a CREATOR, that all is good with respect to HIS creations, then one must consider the:

• Chinese
• Russians
• Orientals
• Asians
• Arabs
• Jews
• Nazis
• Terrorists
• Communists
• Socialists
• Dictators
• Monarchs
• Americans
• Hindus
• Buddhists
• Muslims, etc., etc., etc.

BUT...  AND IT WOULD APPEAR... that Americans only want God to BLESS THEM...  and, various parts of them as well like:

• winning political races
• winning athletic events
• winning competitions
• marriages and births
• various wars
• when someone is sick

AND...  I DON'T MEAN TO BE DISRESPECTFUL BUT IS THIS REALLY APPROPRIATE???

 

Domestic Terrorism

Domestic terrorism or homegrown terrorism is a form of terrorism in which victims "within a country are targeted by a perpetrator with the same citizenship" as the victims.

According to the FBI:
Domestic right-wing terrorist groups often adhere to the principles of racial supremacy and embrace antigovernment, antiregulatory beliefs. Generally, extremist right-wing groups engage in activity that is protected by constitutional guarantees of free speech and assembly. Law enforcement becomes involved when the volatile talk of these groups transgresses into unlawful action.

The LA Times Newspaper on December 2, 2020 printed the following story...

IOWA CITY, Iowa —
A prominent law enforcement training group is promoting a lengthy research document riddled with falsehoods and conspiracies that urges local-level police to treat Black Lives Matter activists as terrorists plotting a violent revolution.

The document distributed by the International Law Enforcement Educators and Trainers Assn. contains misinformation and inflammatory rhetoric that could incite officers against protesters and people of color, critics said. It alleges Black Lives Matter and antifa, an umbrella term for antifascist leftist activists, are “revolutionary movements whose aims are to overthrow the U.S. government” and claims they are planning “extreme violence.”

Phillip Atiba Goff, a Yale University professor who is an expert on racial bias in policing, called the document dangerous, noting that the association is an important source of training materials for many small and midsize departments across the country.

“It’s stunning. It’s distressing in many ways. It’s untethered to reality,” said Goff, chief executive of the Center for Policing Equity. “I worry that it leads to people dying unnecessarily.”

I find it sadly humorous that our society is bending over backwards so as not to offend BLACK PEOPLE...  just because the BLACK PEOPLE are making the claim that they are still a SLAVERY OPPRESSED people and by golly damn something has got to be done about it...

In  conjunction with this feeling is that fact that if a WHITE kills a BLACK is a HATE CRIME but if a BLACK kills a WHITE there is not hate involved at all...  it is a result of their upbringing and the white suppression that they have felt all their lives...

When I hear crap like this, all I think is BULLSHIT...  and the last thing i want to do is allow my tax dollars be spent on you...

If we don't stop bending over and catering to the blacks in this country, then we are going to have a race war in this country, the likes of which you have never seen before...  simply because of all the firearms that we have at our disposal and the damage that can be created in some of these larger cities.

A race war will not be fought in the country where all the crops are grown since most of that land is flat and it not easily protected...  but, inside a city, with large buildings and high rises, bridges and tunnels, and waterfront areas that can be easily defended...  this is where our race war will be...

AND, it will not be with the cops, but between A WHITE DOMESTIC TERRORIST GROUP AND A BLACK DEMESTIC TERRORIST GROUP...  with all sorts of innocent victims in between the two ENEMIES...

THE/Our New America

 THE WEALTHY AND THE POWERFUL CONTROL ALL

THE WEALTHY AND THE PWERFUL CONTROL THE MEDIA

THE WEALHTY AND THE PPOWERFUL CONTROL ALL COMMERCE

THE WEALTHY AND THE POWERFUL CONTROL TECHNOLOGY

THE WEALTHY AND THE POWERFUL CONTROL HEALTHCARE

AMERICANS LEAD THE WORLD IN THE CONSUMPTION OF ILLEGAL DRUGS

SYSTEMIC RACISM WILL NEVER BE ELIMINATED

AMERICANS DO NOT OBEY LAWS WHENEVER THEY WANT TO

AMERICANS ARE ONE OF THE MOST OBESE NATIONS IN THE WORLD

AMERICANS ARE HYPOCRITICAL WHEN IT COMES TO PRACTICING THEIR FAITH

AMERICANS ARE EGOTISTICAL, SELF-SERVING, AND ARROGANT TOWARDS OTHERS

AMERICANS THINK THAT THEY ARE BETTER THAN EVERYONE ELSE

AMERICANS DON'T CARE ABOUT AMERICAN POVERTY OR GLOBAL POVERTY EITHER

AMERICA: Not A Country Of Laws

America prides herself on being a country of laws but that is a BOLD FACE LIE and the farthest from the truth...

YES...  we have laws, but they do not apply equally to the wealthy, the middle class, or the poor and we know this to be true...  we just do not want to admit it.

White as well as Black Law Enforcement Officers know FOR A FACT that in Urban Areas, blacks perpetrate more blue collar crime than whites...

Black as well as White Law Enforcement Officers know FOR A FACT that in Urban Areas, whites perpetrate for white collar crime than blacks...

These are the facts...  just the facts...

Bill Cosby went to jail and was made an example and that is unfortunate...

OJ Simpson was declared innocent of murder and that was unfortunate as well...

Several WHITE COPS kill black potential criminals while in their custody and the whole BLACK COMMUNITY wants to RAM SLAVERY DOWN THE THROATS OF WHITEY because they are still opposing blacks...

If I am not mistaken, Barrack Obama was considered a BLACK MAN and he was PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES for 8 frigging years and did VERY LITTLE to help his own black race...   and, no cries of slavery were yelled from the streets at that time...  nor has the former President apologized to his own race of people for not doing more.

Where is the TRUTH,

Where are the LAWS...  by which we as Americans want to live by???

How many wealthy people are in jail in America and compare that to how many wealthy people who have committed similar crimes are incarcerated?

How many law enforcement personnel on their OFF TIME...  their PERSONAL TIME...  commit tiny but illegal offenses...  like smoking a little pot on the weekends in States where it is still illegal...  or, drive home DRUNK after they have been out at a bar with the GALS and GUYS?

We are a HYPOCRITICAL NATION and we are finally being called out by the rest of the world who thanks to us have taken our money and gone to school and used that education against us on the economic battlefields...  while America is still claiming that we are a NATION OF LAWS...

Freedom of Choice

Philosophy of Choice  --  is a corollary of the proposition of free will or the ability voluntarily to decide to perform one of several possible acts or to avoid action entirely.   An ethical choice involves ascribing qualities such as right or wrong, good or bad, better or worse to alternatives.

In order to have a Corollary, one must form a proposition or concept from a proposition or concept that has already been proven...  therefore, ONE'S CHOICE(S) comes from ONE'S FREE WILL...  and FREE WILL means one's ability to act with one's own discretion...  therefore, making choices without influences either external or internal...  however, exercising one's free will is always contingent upon all factors that may influence the outcome of that decision.

Psychology of Choice  --  explores subconsciously why people make the choices they do as they decide making decision based upon two or more options; what motivates us to make these decisions, and what these choices are meant to satisfy within us. 

Our subconscious refers to that part of the mind which is not fully aware but which influences one's actions and feelings...  and, it may be difficult to accept having parts of our mind not being fully aware of anything...  it would seem that our mind is either aware or not aware...  BUT, that logic is INCORRECT.

When one reflects upon these definitions, one should come to the conclusion that we NEVER exercise our FREE WILL and/or CHOICES without some sort of external or internal influences which could be seen as an INTERACTION OF FORCES...

Even Jesus's choices were influenced by His Father, God...  Jesus never exercised his free will without first considering the influences and the potential outcomes of his free will, or what was motivating his free will and/or choices.

Whether we like it or not, we can never escape these influences or motivators of our behavior and our FREE WILL is NEVER exercised without influences even though we think it is just us who is making these choices.  We never makes choice on our own.  We never exercise our free will on our own, regardless of what anyone else tells you.

Therefore...

do we really have 

FREEDOM OF CHOICE?

THE FBI: A Government Police Force That Destroys People's Lives

Richard Jewell is a 2019 American biographical drama film directed and produced by Clint Eastwood and written by Billy Ray. It is based on the 1997 Vanity Fair article "American Nightmare: The Ballad of Richard Jewell" by Marie Brenner and the 2019 book The Suspect: An Olympic Bombing, the FBI, the Media, and Richard Jewell, the Man Caught in the Middle by Kent Alexander and Kevin Salwen.  The film depicts the July 27 Centennial Olympic Park bombing and its aftermath, as security guard Richard Jewell finds a bomb during the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta, Georgia, and alerts authorities to evacuate, only to later be wrongly accused of having placed the device himself. The film stars Paul Walter Hauser as Jewell, alongside Sam Rockwell, Kathy Bates, Jon Hamm, and Olivia Wilde.

The film had its world premiere on November 20, 2019, at the AFI Fest, and was theatrically released in the United States on December 13, 2019, by Warner Bros. Pictures. It received positive reviews from critics, with praise for the performances (particularly Bates, Rockwell and Hauser) and Eastwood's direction. It was chosen by the National Board of Review as one of the ten best films of the year. However, the film was criticized for its portrayal of a real-life reporter, Kathy Scruggs. The film grossed $43 million against its $45 million budget.  For her performance, Bates won the National Board of Review Award for Best Supporting Actress, and earned nominations at the Academy Awards and Golden Globes.  SOURCE:  Wikipedia

I watched this movie on Netflix over a period of 2-3 nights, maybe more and for some reason was not aware that it was a true story until the very end....  but, If I had known if it was TRUE prior to me starting to watch, there is a good possibility I would not have watched it at all...  it was watched out of boredom and once I started I did not think the acting was very good and almost stopped several times...  but, I became curious, especially knowing that the FBI was making such fools out of themselves and thought the writer might be trying to make law enforcement in the USA look bad....  along with the media who got fixated on a topic and therefore knew it had to be true.

The FBI is really full of stupid people and after watching the news broadcasts from FOX about Comey and his cohorts at the fbi, this movie solidly convinced me never to trust the fbi again no matter what our federal government tells you.

If you haven't seen the movie, you should...  and know that clint eastwood directed it and no doubt took some liberties in how he portrayed the fbi and the atlanta journal but what director does not take liberties to get points across to the viewer.

after watching this movie, i am now inclined to support defund police departments because there is no doubts in my mind that they abuse their power and privilege and that our country is headed for a showdown...  and, it will not be pretty.

Unless You Are Wealthy

Did you inherit a Trust Fund worth millions?

Are you a movie star?

Are you a professional athlete?

Are you a singer or musicians?

Are you a writer?

Are you an artist?

Are you an investment banker?

Do you own your own company?

Are you a CEO?

Are you a Politician?

Are you in the top 10% of incomes?

THEN YOU, MY FRIENDS, ARE LIKE THE 90% REMAINING, AND ARE NOT WEALTHY NOR WILL WE EVER BE IN A POSITION TO BE ANYTHING OTHER THAN WHAT WE ARE TODAY...

Maybe 1-2% of you will always live in poverty no matter what the government does to help because any increases you get will be obliterated by cost of living increases, so you will never be any better off than you are now.

50% of you will earn more than you will ever need to live, spending that extra money on large house, cars, clothes, second homes, and vacations and well off you will be but you will never be WEALTHY and to tell the truth, NONE OF YOU GIVE A DAMN...

20% of you will have the money but you will struggle financially because of all the debt you carry and the fact that mentally you can not stop you spending habits...  you are addicted to the spending of money and either do not see it or do not want to see it.

The remaining 18% will live modestly from a modest income but your lack of education, determination, and discipline keeps you in the socio-economic level in which you find yourself now...  and, really do not want to see beyond because that is something that you have never been trained to do.

INTERESTINGLY,

the wealthy know all of this too well...  expecting you to be the sheep that you are and not rock the boat.  But, if you think that rocking the boat means getting your federal government to collect more in taxes so that they can give more to you, then you are sadly mistaken...

Collecting more taxes as the federal government wants to do will not be accomplished as easy as all that because the WEALTHY will shelter their monies in tax exempt offshore bank accounts...  and the easiest way to explain this is that the WEALTHY ARE NOT STUPID WITH STUPID TAX LAWYERS AND ACCOUNTANTS.

AND,

what is even more interesting than this, is the fact that all the other emerging nations because of our buying habits are getting wealthier and wealthier and now have the buying power in their countries that you have here in the USA...

So...  what does this mean?

It means that THEIR DEMAND for goods and services will pull those scarce resources away from you...  all you have to do is a little internet research and make sure your sources of information are reliable because many sites on the internet lie to people, especially Americans since they are so gullible.

THIS NEXT DECADE ENDING IN 2030 WILL RESULT IN A GLOBAL, ECONOMIC, AND FINANCIAL TURNING POINT...  AND, THE LOSERS WILL BE MIDDLE CLASS AMERICANS...

Stairway to Enlightenment

ENLIGHTENMENT is...

the state of having knowledge or understanding

the act of giving someone knowledge or understanding

a movement of the 18th century that stressed the belief that science and logic give people more knowledge and understanding than tradition and religion

ENLIGHTENMENT... 

was centered around the idea that reason is the primary source of authority and legitimacy, and advocated such ideals as liberty, progress, tolerance, fraternity, constitutional government, and separation of church and state.

ENLIGHTENMENT...

happens when one reaches the state of having attained spiritual knowledge about the true nature of our body and soul and all of divinity. Everyone struggles to experience, enjoy and embody what awakens your heart and soul.

ENLIGHTENMENT...
is difficult only because we are not willing to let go of the way we currently express consciousness. Yet to those who have attained enlightenment, it is the most natural way of being. Some enlightened beings express genuine wonder why would anybody choose to live any other way.

ENLIGHTENMENT...
happens when people accept themselves just the way they are. 

happens by being aware of any self critical thoughts and then deciding that they are not true. 

There is a 

THREEFOLD PATH to ENLIGHTENMENT:

First --  there is ethics which is the avoidance of non-virtuous deeds

Second --  there is concentrations which involves controlling one's mind

Third --  there is wisdom which pertains to insight into the nature of reality

These three revolve around:

CORRECT...

1. action
2. speech
3. livelihood
4. effort
5. mindfulness
6. concentration
7. view
8. intention

SOUNDS SIMPLE...  DOESN'T IT?