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Showing posts from March 23, 2014

Enemy Mine- The Sunday Collage

I can hardly believe it's been 30 years but it has been. Sometime in 1985, a movie was released called "Enemy Mine." It was a science fiction flick about two warring worlds- ours and an alien force. During an aerial or interstellar dogfight, two opposing fighter pilots get shot down and land on another planet. Eventually they make nice with each other when they discover that there are other, more deadly, adversaries trying to kill them. On this planet, they discovered there were far greater enemies than each other. They were taught to hate each other because their culture had indoctrinated them with this belief. Of course the belief was nonsense. That was the point of the story. The American people have been indoctrinated with the same foolishness. It is called "Democrat vs. Republican or liberals vs. conservatives." Why is that? Is it just human nature to identify with one tribe and hate the other? Yes, actually I think that is part of it. Opposing ideol...

We May Be Thieves, But We Are Honorable Thieves

If it wasn't so absurd, it wouldn't even be newsworthy. The latest Edward Snowden revelation is that the NSA hacked into a Chinese telecomm provider to look for "bag guys." That's the cover explanation from an agency which isn't exactly known for telling the truth.  http://www.aljazeera.com/news/asia-pacific/2014/03/beijing-condemns-us-over-spying-huawei-2014324103530957966.html The United States Government or more specifically, the NSA- doesn't even try to lie anymore. Snowden owns them and he can prove his statements. Denial is no longer their first reaction. Because they know Snowden has the goods on them- the NSA's explanation for hacking into foreign, private businesses is that they are simply looking for bad guys and....get this... They don't turn over the information they steal to American telecomm competitors. Like those Chinese spies do. So the inference is clear. We are honorable thieves.  

We Like the Lies Better- The Sunday Collage

Years ago while I was still the Police Chief, I made a terrible mistake. I told a citizen and fellow city staffer that realistically, it is nearly impossible for police officers driving cars at night to catch people in the act of vandalizing our city or her home. In fact, in my quarter century- I could only think of one kid we had ever caught in the act of vandalizing anything. (with the exception of the unintentional damage that skateboarders inflict) She was upset because her house got toilet papered. After meeting her, I understood why the vandals did it. I only wished they had called me so that I could have helped. At any rate... She got this screwed up look on her face and shortly thereafter, fled my office. Years later she told me that I should have lied to her. She disliked my answer and added that she disliked me. By the way, she is a flaming liberal and it was one of the first times I made the connection between the liberal thought process and bona fide mental illness. L...