1984 is a relatively long time ago.
2004, not so much.
In that space of time between a transposed year (1948) and now, we look back at the analysis of the right to privacy.
We ask you, “what privacies are you willingly giving up for the sake of convenience today that you will want back in the future when it’s too late?”
Formica, Polaroid, Kleenex, Virgin, Coke, Google — are these proper company names or common nouns/verbs?
The Ruralite Revolution is moving faster than we anticipated.
We put out a silent mental call for volunteers earlier this week, people willing to die for our cause.
Over the past few days, we have put those volunteers to use.
Over-the-road tractor-trailer (i.e., lorry) drivers whose hearts were worn out and unable to pass a blood clot.
Overworked traveling sales people who were constantly attached to their mobile phones either in conversation or texting, or both, evidently distracted while driving.
Over and over, we made a mental connection to them to crash, causing major smashups, strategically block roadways and prove our ability to shut down the national highway system whenever we choose.
Next, we will use these virtual roadblocks as checkpoints, verifying one’s residency.
If one is a Ruralite, one may pass.
If one is an Urbanski, one must register oneself, with the intended travel destination stamped on a temporary rural visa; in addition, the Urbanski will be read Ruralite Rule No. YTV8(a), “every subsequent visit to or travel through a rural area requires a Urbanski passport and an official escort provided and/or approved by the Ruralite Committee for the Protection of Ruralite Citizens Against the Corrupting Influence of Urbanskis.”
Checkpoint operators are given full authority to arrest and provide immediate judgement (acquit or convict, subsequently incarcerating or eliminating any violators immediately), fulfilling the Ruralite Promise No. 31, “every citizen will not be delayed in receiving justice at the scene of the crime.”
At this time, the Ruralites do not plan a fully coordinated shutdown of the national highway network.
However, if Urbanskis do not cooperate in recognising the sovereignty of the Ruralite nation and continue to violate Ruralite travel laws, the Ruralites will find more volunteers to not only shut down highways, but also train tracks, airports, sea/river ports and any other transportation methods that connect the Urbanski terrorities which depend on the generous food, fuel, military and transportation protection of the Ruralites.
Some on the Ruralite Committee for the Herding of Urbanskis wish to use the approaching winter to implement an Urbanski territory-wide rationing of food and fuel. For now, we’ve asked them to table that wish unless matters get desperate.
More as it develops…
We sat down at a Ruralites meeting last night.
A ba…rain storming session.
Many ideas…
Some wanted to take an inventory of who had large stashes, caches, of food, water, gold and cash/currency.
Some wanted to discuss their personal armories and armadas.
Some wanted to explain the advantages of computing systems hacking.
We multivoted the ideas.
We selected leaders.
We formed a new government in exile, a “more perfect union.”
We assigned the smartest and wisest amongst us to create an indecipherable language set for further coding of our meeting notes.
In the past, we used written symbols. Our latest research has given us direct mind-to-mind communication techniques that store our meeting notes and schedules in our members’ central nervous systems subconsciously, the best distributed network we can have, hidden in plain sight, able to get through every security system ever invented, so far.
We contacted other secret organizations that publicly declared their right to petition for secession to determine our coordinated set of activities should (or, more likely, when) national and state leaders, controlled by multinational firms and the mass media, deny our rightful, legal petitions.
We were impressed by the number of people willing to put their reputations and lives on the line for protecting the rural way of life against the corrupted mindsets of the Urbanskis.
We agreed the first battlegrounds will be the suburban wastelands where fence sitters live, forcing them to choose urban or rural, no more washy-washy lifestyles.
We know the recent methods used by our national government to discredit career soldiers will aid our recruiting efforts.
More as it develops…
In the U.S., a public radio network that is oddly called National Public Radio frequently broadcasts a show hosted by a singing comedian named Garrison (not Barracks) Keillor (not Keelhaul).
I’m not a big fan of the show because it’s just too squeaky clean for my comedic tastes.
The show, however, is what they call family-friendly.
Enter the British…
Thanks to the quirky less-than-zero family-friendly humour of Eric Idle, I found an old-fashioned radio show to my tastes:
“What About Dick?” [ https://whataboutdick.com/%5D
Which reminds me…
Our lab technician, after quietly hacking every home/business security company, can now, without need of your phone’s/car’s location data, know where you’ll be when, making our marketing efforts easier than determining who’s home using telemarketing data collection.
More as it develops…
Should I buy Mel Brooks’ latest collection,
“The Incredible Mel Brooks: An Irresistible Collection of Unhinged Comedy”? Hmm…
Now, for something familiarly different — Star Wars snowflakes!
Last night, I took a good, hard look at my changes in attitudes (but not changes in latitude) since my father died in May.
While Dad was alive and fully cognizant, able to carry on a conversation, I acted as a “devil’s advocate” defender of our U.S. President, Obama, against the following accusations of Dad:
1. Narcissist — Obama’s only personal accomplishment, his wealth, is based on his autobiographies, which, as biographies go, are usually full of fabrications and myth/legend making material
2. Inexperienced — never finished a term in office, “fast-tracked”
3. Socialist — the Affordable Care Act was just the start of socialist, entitlement approach to governing
3. Pot smoker — the Commander-in-chief should lead by example and not have violated any laws voluntarily, especially as it relates to “recreational” drug use
4. Aligned with the Clintons, known associates of the Russians and most likely Communist sympathizers
5. No military experience — prone to misunderstanding the need for a standing army, air force, navy, etc., to protect interests both foreign and domestic
6. No foreign policy experience — prone to major lapses in relationships with other governments and inability to respond to disasters/flare ups on a timely basis
7. No business experience — lack of business ownership meant the President would be more inclined to redistribute business owners’ wealth as if the earnings were socialist/communist-owned
8. Part of the Chicago political machine, as corrupt as most big city politicians can [probably] be
9. May or may not have been born in the U.S., which is sufficient doubt to question all the President’s qualifications
10. Born of a non-U.S. citizen, especially a Muslim — will align his politics with non-U.S. interests first
We are all allowed to have personal beliefs that clash with popular opinion.
Obama’s first term in office was not a total disaster but we did see some of Dad’s worries above come to fruition, with many in the Secret Service and military display a total lack of regard for respect of their duties to country, family and self, reflecting an attitude that must start at the top, as all organizations do.
Are sex scandals a Democratic specialty?
Yes, Obama is an inexperienced narcissist but he also has a keen set of thoughts and had been involved in assembling a team in his first term that contributed to an economic recovery (only history will show us how much).
Obama carries a lot of international goodwill because of his mixed family heritage, which the U.S. has promoted as a form of foreign policy — part African, part Malaysian, part Hawaiian, part Muslim, Part Christian, part American — but has also contributed to division in domestic policies.
I understand narcissism. I write a blog, after all, with my name, not yours, on it. However, I have chosen not to put myself front and center in the public arena.
I tried to convince my wife last night that Obama is a black Reagan in his mix of government policies. My wife tried to convince me that Obama is no Great Communicator.
I voted for neither one so my perspective is biased against both the Gipper and whatever nickname we’ll end up giving Obama (the gray-haired skinny one?) but my argument is the same.
Bottom line: labels don’t change the fact that our government is intruding more and more into our private lives, including our thoughts and family relations, arguments as perennial as grass growing cycles.
In other words, enough about current politics — on to the future!
Best observation of the recent U.S. presidential election:
“Pundits argue whether Obama’s reelection is a mandate for change. To single women and gays, he’s simply a man date.”
Worse source verification of the recent “Hillary says let’s avoid talking about Benghazi, get revenge on socialites and philandering men in the military” scandal:
In this month’s copy of a children’s magazine, Highlights, we ask you to identify which image of a person in the first photo is most like an image of a person in the second photo:
HINT: there is no version of the girl with long black hair in the first photo.
Credits:
Rumour has it, based on the blood pouring from my scrotum, that the flooding of Venice released an ancient terror. I am almost too tired to continue writing.
My wife and I included the city of canals on our tour of Italy.
We were there when the latest floods hit.
Being avid swimmers, we decided to join other tourists who dived into the waters of a local plaza and jumped out of a gondola into the floodwaters.
Several days later, we all feel a little sick.
I sit here, soaking up blood that I can’t stop.
Most of us have wounds that won’t heal.
One tourist reported that the doctor he brought with him reported seeing unusually large multicellular organisms in his bloodstream that seem to like eating through skin and blood vessels.
We are weak.
I don’t know if I can write another blog entry.
The priest in our hotel offered us last rites, saying, apologetically, that we looked like hell.
With the countrywide strikes in progress, I don’t think we’ll be able to get out of here alive.
…if you can call what’s been happening to us, the last few days, living!
“Love is what happens to a man and woman who don’t know each other.” — W. Somerset Maugham
“This is a free country, madam. We have a right to share your privacy in a public place.” — Peter Ustinov, Romanoff and Juliet, 1956
“No matter. The dead bird does not leave the nest.” — Winston Churchill (on being told that his fly [pants zipper] was undone)
“Are we having fun yet?” — Carol Burnett, The Four Seasons, 1981
Rainy days and Mondays…the weekend over, MI6 looking like a bunch of dallying dunces in a Bond film, a football team losing another close one…these are the men that try time’s souls.
I face another crossroads, more choices, less certainty, many goals to accomplish should I so choose.
In this big, big universe, a group of minorities banded together to form a rainbow coalition majority on a small portion of a medium planet.
Sixty-two million out of three hundred-plus million out of seven-plus billion.
My sister and her children celebrate victory — hello to liberal Christianity, legalised marijuana, gay marriage and abortion rights.
My mother, my sister in-law and her children see defeat — goodbye to conservative Christianity, the sanctity of heterosexual marriage and the right to life for all unborn children.
My wife and I wonder where this places us in the scheme of Internet of things.
At 11:12 on 11/12/12, this blog fades to silence — there is no longer any joy for the advance of technological achievements in the face of diverging social movements.
treetrunkdings 