war

Have a new year….

I wrote this post a few days ago and scheduled it. I’ll most likely be at a party with friends I’d rather not see and do things I would prefer not to do. Any literary motivation would be sufficiently killed if I had sat down and published this on the day it actually was scheduled to post. That being said, I’ve reflected quite a bit on 2016 and the year that seemed to drag slower and slower the farther into it we got. There’s way too much to review in a post, and if I did review everything that impacted me, I would be writing this well into 2017 and probably never actually publish because it would have become too burdensome to proof it.

There were three things that really had an impact to the year that history will most likely judge harshly in the coming decades. Rather, three things that had an impact with me personally. Consider this a top three-year in review for w1nt3l. We all have our own top three, I’m sure, we might even share some, but I am so happy that this year is almost gone and really really hope that it doesn’t carry residuals into 2017. Well, here we go.

Windows 10 for Mobile, titanic shaft to loyal fans

My archives are littered with Windows 10 for Mobile (formerly Windows Phone) going back several years. I was a huge fan of Windows Phone (WP) and had three mobile devices that ran various versions of the mobile operating system. What I failed to realize with my last device is that HTC was going down the same path as Nokia and Blackberry getting complacent that they had their act together and no one could possibly take the top spot. Well, they were wrong, and HTC is in a bad situation right now losing ground to Samsung and Apple. A little known device that ran Windows Phone 8.1 failed to get upgraded by HTC to Windows 10 for Mobile. Multiple excuses were given as to why, there was even some finger-pointing between HTC and Microsoft, but in the end, it came down to the fact that hardly anyone actually purchased one making the user base statistically miniscule compared to the Android version of the same hardware. Windows 10 for Mobile was now a fail whale in my book and I decided to never own another device again. I switched to a cheap-o Android phone that I get frustrated with every time I pick it up; daily reboots, slow, locks up, apps crash, etc. Pure Android is awesome, it starts to suck hard as soon as a manufacturer thinks it can improve it, hence, the previous sentence rings true. 2016 was the death of Windows Mobile in my opinion.

Wasn’t the year of the third-party

I wrote off the Democrats months ago. I was never a Republican. This was the year I went independent and supported a third-party candidate for President. Despite Jill Stein having a really good platform and some ingenious ideas to help fix things, she never captured a lot of support from anywhere in the country. Gary Johnson had a real chance of at least getting to 5% of the popular vote to have a third-party receive national recognition, but one gaffe after another blew all the steam out of his sails. In an election where there was negative news on both Trump and Clinton, unfavorability for both Trump and Clinton and poor performances in debates from Trump and Clinton I would have thought that Americans would have sought an alternative. That was not the case, as Clinton-haters voted from Trump and Trump-haters voted for Clinton. I’m also convinced that a lot of people just didn’t vote because they didn’t like either of them. 2016 was not the year of the third-party candidate unfortunately.

War and terrorism

No one likes any of this. Show me a war or terrorist attack that actually had any positive impact. I made a comment on a post a few weeks back that listed the number of people who died in conflicts from the Civil War to the Vietnam War; ended up being hundreds of millions. Did we really need to let things get that far? Perhaps. Some conflict is just unavoidable when no one on either side is using so much energy for their mouth that they be come deaf and blind. I’m sorry, call me an apologist if you wish, but *I* think there is always a better way that doesn’t involve weapons, death or destruction. In recent weeks, I’ve discovered the true meaning behind “the pen is mightier than the sword” or a more modern version, “the keyboard is mightier than the AR15.” I’d ask when we lost the ability to listen and reason, but I don’t believe we ever had either of those mastered. I’ve chosen to try to make a difference, one person at a time, one reader at a time, until the knowledge pay-it-forward effect is perpetual. 2016 was not the year we chose something other than war.

Have a New Year

I didn’t mean for this to be a downer, but that is what it became. Blame 2016 for being such a year of suck that we’re all better off to have it in the rear-view mirror. The problem is that 2017 looks like a road under construction that is going to continue tearing at the under carriage of the United States and the rest of the world. Buckle your seatbelts, we’re in for some chop.

Real news makes me nauseated

counterpunch Inside the Invisible Government; War, Propaganda, Clinton & Trump

So, I read this over lunch today. I stopped eating, having gotten sick to my stomach. What I can’t figure out is whether the American people are so trusting that they believe everything they see on mainstream media (MSM) or they just don’t want to discover the truth through a collective TL;DR mentality. I read Counterpunch.org on a daily basis now. I choose now to not fall into line with the rest of MSM and what they’re feeding the American public because I think its important we know what is actually happening. If all the details aren’t known, the opinion you form on what *is* known is fundamentally flawed and incomplete.

MSM is so good at delivering news to us, usually in the background, that broadcasts almost have a lulling type of cadence to them. Speech is measured, tone is even and dull, anyone listening is lured into a false sense of security and understanding. Where is all the reporting of even half of what’s in the above article on Iraq, Iran, Honduras, Syria, Yemen? Why aren’t people angry over the fact they’re getting played for idiots? Well, not being one of them, I can’t give an honest answer; I’m reading real news, I’m angry, I’m talking to anyone who’ll lend me half their attention to shake the fog that has descended over the American public. Knowledge is the power the MSM, government, politicians, and rich white privileged people don’t want “commoners” to have. The propaganda spin machine is full throttle and speeding along faster than ever in the last 100 years.

counterpunch Roaming Charges: Comfortably Dumb

Here is the opposite side of MSM and it’s minions. When things are happening that are hard to hide from, you just ignore them. No comments, no reports, no opinions. Just play “dumb” to the few scant reports that actually get through the paid-off, sort of self-imposed, media blackout of the events. HRC has a long and verifiable history of dodging claims of impropriety, greed, war mongering, and the such. When you know the media is owned and controlled by people that are in collusion with you to feed the propaganda machine, it’s frightening easy to make up whatever story that suits your needs.

I think I’m going to create the CounterPunch diet. Read real news, everyday, and you’ll lose weight because you won’t WANT to eat anything.

Standing letter to alien visitors

I am a human being of the planet Earth. Please do not visit us. The human species of Earth is violent by nature, intolerant of differences, and will perceive a visit as a hostile action regardless of your intentions. We fight amongst each other and have for our entire existence. See references in our world texts regarding hate, war, and racism for example. We are not an enlightened species and most are motivated by fear triggered by the slightest change in their environment. For cripes sake, if you are an Arachnoid species, seriously, stop reading this and just keep going! No one down here likes spiders.

We are unable to get along with each other for any sustained length of time and multiple times have engaged in what can be described as world wars throughout our history. Our hate and intolerance of differences is what drives us to fight with each other. In regards to our wars and armed conflicts, the only option we are able to agree on is answering violence with more violence. There are exceptions though, as history shows Switzerland has not engaged in armed conflict for what seems to be their entire history as a country. If you had to visit, I would suggest dropping in on them as my opinion is that they are the best of the mediocre examples we have to offer.

As you can probably tell, our environment is less than appealing even to our own species. Our water is dirty, the air is polluted, we dump trash everywhere we can manage. A precious few live in extreme excess while the majority of others struggle to have enough food for their entire lives. We have stripped Mother Nature of her dignity and weakened her ability to sustain our species for the long-term. We are a society of chemicals and technological advancements that probably makes us look interesting but scratching the microscopic surface you will see us for what we truly are. There are individuals distributed throughout the world that are trying to help and may in fact be very enlightened, however how much can one individual do to fix our problems when the rest of the world is bent on destroying it for short-term gains?

Rather than deciding we have a chance to learn from your more advanced species, do consider that in our current state, we will never learn from you any more than we have learned from our own actions toward one another. Rather than deciding we can benefit from your technology to help fix our problems, do consider that while there will be brief gains, we will continue to take more until we end up eventually turning on you. We are still inherently greedy and self-centered with a superiority complex that blinds us to a level of thinking that would be required to accept rather than reject your presence.

The only outcome of a visit at this point is a fundamental shift of our focus onto you, however that shift will most likely not be a positive one. See “Independence Day”, “The Day the Earth Stood Still”, and “Knowing” for examples of how we handle visitors from other planets. All good examples of a few “good” people with a whole heaping lot of “bad” people. Once you realize we’re more similar to our primate ancestors than to enlightened humans, you’ll hopefully leave swiftly so that we can continue our focus on destroying each other. I offer you this letter as a friendly warning to just keep going, we’re not worth your time right now. At the rate things are going, we’ll end up destroying ourselves before you decide to return for a progress update.

Sincerely, Concerned Human

P.S. – Please feel free to probe our politicians, they’re not human by any definition.