Tag: Media

Daily Life

No More News

Decade after decade without a natural predator to trim the deadwood has turned Americans into herd animals. All they want to do is chew their cud and watch television.

Clay Martin, Wrath of the Wendigo

It used to be a routine. Read the paper in the morning. Sundays were the best. A full three pounds of newsprint (I still remember delivering those big boys on my bike as a little kid). Hours of reading. Plenty of longer form content, opinion pieces, the comics, Parade magazine, sports. Evenings was a half hour of local news (mostly watched for the weather), followed by an hour of a “serious” evening news program so you’d know what happened in the world. If you were a real news junkie, you’d subscribe to at least a few other national newspapers as well as some monthly magazines. Throw in a few publications like Esquire, Rolling Stone, and Powder Magazine (Ski Magazine wasn’t cool enough) so you could be hip, and boom – you’re reasonably in touch with the world.

Then came CNN. 24 hours of news? Who in the world would watch that? I distinctly remember watching Bernard Shaw reporting from Iraq at the start of the first gulf war. Wow. We were seeing war in real-time. What the news industry could morph into was mind-blowing and exciting. Fast forward to today and 95% of all news media, video and print, is now basically a news version of the early Maury Povich or Morton Downey Jr. trash TV shows.

The point of “news” today is to generate clicks, likes, and engagement. Like Maury Povich’s “who’s the daddy” segments, the point is to get that gasp or cheer from the audience. It doesn’t matter if it’s true or not as long as you capture the eyeballs. Turn on any of the alphabet news channels and you’ll see one of two formats. The most popular is to give a twenty second intro, to a hopefully controversial topic, and then turn to a panel of media personalities that yell at each other. Your other option is a thirty second description of a story, then bring on an “expert” calling in via Zoom from their living room and give them twenty seconds to babble before cutting them off. Whoo hoo, journalism bitches!

It is becoming exceedingly rare for me to watch any sort of news channel. It’s pointless. Not only for the aforementioned trash TV format, but because I’ve already read or watched anything news related that day via Twitter. Twitter, as Elon has said, truly has become the public square for information. Anything that happens in the world shows up on Twitter long before the mainstream media outlets begin reporting on it. Want long form opinion? It seems everyone with a pulse now has a Substack or podcast. I can read opinions on any subject under the sun.

The beauty of Twitter? I get to curate what I see and have the freedom to decide what I think is truth, opinion, or tin-foil-hat conspiracy. If you are sad enough to only consume CNN… you get a slick used car salesman, Joy Behar version of the news.

So, here’s the million-dollar question. Is the media doing it because that’s what they think we want, or have we truly become that dumb? Have we reached the start of the Idiocracy era? I’m not naive enough to think the early versions of the news I grew up with didn’t have an agenda. Government absolutely attempted to influence the nightly narrative we were fed by Walter Cronkrite. But at least back then, they had to tread somewhat lightly… people still practiced journalism from time to time. Today, the government has an actual private pipeline to all the social media platforms (as revealed by the Twitter file dumps).

My gut feeling? We (the US) have become that dumb. We all want nothing more than to be Instagram influencers, buy cheap shit from Amazon, and binge the latest celebrity expose series on Netflix. If the government tells us we all need to subscribe to a national digital ID, well super! It will make everyday life so much easier. Just make sure I know what the latest thing is, so I can post my solidarity flag on Facebook.

Clearly, I’m feeling a bit cynical today. But for good reason. The crash is coming. Deglobalization is happening, and the Ukraine conflict will produce ripple effects in oil prices, energy scarcity, fertilizer supply, and food prices that are going to hurt. Very quickly, everything that comes from someplace else… is going to be harder to get and more expensive. Oh, Don Lemon isn’t talking about this on CNN? Hmm. The gap between the haves and have-nots in this country is going to accelerate rapidly. Throw in a non-stop media barrage of racial division and, well, you get unrest. People who can’t afford to buy eggs or fill up their cars will want to vent their anger towards someone. And when you split the country like we are now… whoever the other side is a perfect target.

Or maybe not. Maybe we’ll defeat Putin (whatever that means). Everyone will have an electric vehicle. Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion rules will solve all those pesky social issues. We’ll tax the rich enough to solve our budget and inflation problems. We’ll finally get around to replacing the police with conflict therapists. AI will free us from the mundane of day-to-day jobs. Peace. Love. Harmony.

Maybe.

Or, become a Contrarian. Question everything. Become ungovernable. Oh, and prepare. You’ve been forewarned.

Confirmation bias

Scammed By A Headline
  • Brace yourselves – I’ve discovered some shocking information… the news is dishonest. I know, hard to believe right? While I’m certainly not the sharpest crayon in the box, I feel like I have a pretty good sense of what’s garbage and what’s not when it comes to the news. Unless it’s something you’re predisposed to believe is true because you’ve seen it day in and out. Confirmation bias. If it’s what you expect to hear, then it’s easy to blindly believe the words in front of you.
  • Here’s the backstory. I have been a longtime cycling fan. Starting in high school I dabbled in a few races and briefly thought I was a “real” cyclist. Reality set in pretty quickly and I evolved to a weekend rider and TV race fan. I watched the grand tours religiously year after year. There were days I’d be late to work because I got up early to watch the Tour de France in real time. I was, and continued to be, a big fan of Lance Armstrong through every tour and even after his fall from grace. A few years ago he started a podcast on YouTube with George Hincapie that gave the best race analysis you could find. Lots of “inside the tour” details and great tactical discussions. Every day of the tour I’d watch the recorded replay of the stage and then Lance’s podcast. As the big names all started retiring, I began slowing down on following cycling. Lance’s podcast revived my interest again. And then last year we had all the BLM protests. Sure enough, what pops up in the news headlines?
    • “Disgraced cyclist Lance Armstrong goes “woke,” cancels bike shop’s contract with Austin police”.
    • “Lance Armstrong’s Bike Shop Cancels Police Contract – Still Wants Cops To Protect Them From Threats”.
    • “Lance Armstrong’s Texas bike shop cuts ties with Austin police”.
  • God Damnit! Why can’t these celebrities just stay in their lane? I watch/follow them for their athletic ability or acting, not their politics. Why do they have to ruin things with their woke opinions? That was it, I was done with watching the tour and Lance’s podcast. I did not follow a minute of cycling last year or this year. I didn’t even realize the Tour de France had started this year until I saw the headline about the idiot spectator that caused that huge crash.
  • I was telling someone why I no longer followed the tour and was looking for one of the articles about Lance. Suddenly an article I hadn’t seen before appeared. Turns out Lance found out about the bike shops decision while he was on vacation and didn’t agree with it. He contacted the Austin police chief and brokered a thirty minute meeting with the chief and the bike shop to try and work something out.
    • Armstrong said ” the shop’s decision to cancel the contract is “not a situation that I support.” He also said he was “sick and tired of everybody screaming” at each other over the issue, which pitted the business against the police and some members of the public in a war of words”
  • Turns out Armstrong is a sworn sheriff’s deputy in Colorado. So… I got suckered into some sensationalist news headlines and made a snap judgement about something without making much of an effort to research further. What’s that old saying about assuming something? I lost a few Contrarian street cred points over this one. So what’s the lesson learned? The news lies. Media will always go for the sensationalist headline without bothering to do much, you know, actual journalism. Don’t let yourself be so easily swayed by “popular” opinion. Oh, and this year’s Tour de France is shaping up to be a really good one!

Song of the day: The Clash-Police And Thieves 1977

Government, Politics

You Don’t Need To Know

While there may be some exceptions, for the most part I don’t believe people in power are inherently evil. I honestly don’t think politicians and CEO’s have malicious intentions. I do think that people in power become so wrapped up in their own bubble and authority they lose sight of the big picture.

For example, take the mayor of my little city. At the beginning of the pandemic, public officials were panicking. For that I don’t blame them. The “experts” were publishing dire information and basically we were all going to die. Our mayor never actually made any tough decisions, only echoed whatever the state and CDC did. Three or so weeks after shutting down all private businesses, the grumblings from the citizenry started. The cities economy was cratering and job loses were huge. On several occasions, via an online forum, I asked the mayor what metrics the city would use to open back up? I received two answers. The first was “the city will follow the guidance of the health district, state, and CDC”. The second was “all our data is posted to the heath district’s web site” (it wasn’t).

Two complete non-answers. So either the mayor had no idea, or she didn’t want to be held to specific numbers in a rapidly shifting scenario. Either way, as a person in a position of authority she decided that as mere citizens we didn’t need to know what the governments plan or thought process was. She single handedly shut down private businesses and then wouldn’t be transparent about when they could open back up again. I think it’s easy for people in positions of power to get all wrapped up in the feeling of we’re doing what’s best for the public, so they don’t really need to know the details. Like parents telling a ten year old “because I said so, that’s why”.

The ultimate example is to watch any president’s press secretary give a briefing. Every single word is parsed and nuanced. Nothing is said that doesn’t advance the political messaging. The people rarely get to see or hear anything resembling reality. Are these people evil? No. But they are so caught up in their power and authority they’ve completely lost sight of the fact that they work for us. Or that’s the theory anyway.

The private sector is no different. I’ve been watching an interesting development with a YouTube channel I subscribe to. This channel has half a million subscribers and suddenly was removed from the partner program, which means it can no longer monetize the videos. No explanation, no warning, nothing. The channel creator has no idea why his channel was removed. The worst part is that once removed from the partner program you also lose all means of contact with YouTube. He has no way to actually contact them to try and find out what he’d done wrong. Now, Google is a private company and they can do whatever they want. But it is certainly the ultimate in power and authority when a company has the opinion they can treat their customers any way they want and feels no obligation to offer any explanation. I’m sure they justify it internally under the guise of “protecting” us vulnerable members of the public from something harmful. (see also, Twitter) Irony in full bloom from the company who’s slogan once was “Don’t be evil”.

I have little point to this other than to remind you that you probably shouldn’t accept anything the government, experts, or most authority figures tell you at face value. Timothy Leary in the ’60’s had it right with his slogan “Question Authority”. As this last year has proven time and time again… they are most likely wrong, lying, obscuring, or hiding the truth. But it’s ok – it’s for your own good.

Government, Politics

Weekend At Bernie’s

Clinton, Bush, Obama, Trump. I don’t care what you thought of them personally. I don’t care what you thought of their policies or political bent. What is undisputable is that all of these men were leaders. Type A CEO’s. When they came into a room it was clear who was in charge. You cannot with a straight face tell me that Grandpa Joe falls into that same category. Yesterday’s press conference was an embarrassment. The few answers he actually gave he read directly from prepared notes given to him. When he tried to speak extemporaneously he wandered off on tangents and lost track of what he was saying or what point he was trying to make. The hand picked press core (complete with a handy dandy cheat sheet. With pictures!) were complicit in this farce by lobbing a few softballs at him. A stark difference from a Trump press conference. I have two thoughts about this disaster.

The first is an observation about the reaction on social media and by the press. I have a fair number of links to fairly liberal folks on social media. The last year (and more) my feeds have been inundated with a non-stop barrage of Orange Man Bad postings. Daily I’d see postings from various friends lamenting the outrage of the day that Trump had committed and dear god will we ever return to a time when we had a “real” president? Well… that time, in theory, is now. And what do I see on my social medias? Nothing. Crickets. Radio silence. I expected to see never ending, nausea inducing, praise of how eloquent, smart, and serious a president Biden is. I was sure I’d see non-stop memes comparing how well Biden is doing vs Trump. There’s nothing. It’s refreshing, but I find it odd the folks so desperate for him to win are so quiet. CNN, as of this morning, did not have a single story about the press conference on the top of their site. I find that strange. Where are all the liberals singing the daily praise of Biden?

My second thought is one I’ve posited before. Given that Grandpa Joe is clearly not in charge, who is? Who’s really running the show at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave? It’s not Kamala, she came to the game late and was selected by whoever’s in charge. Is it Klain the chief of staff? That would make the most sense since he was a long time “senior advisor” during the campaign. Is it Susan Rice? Perhaps it’s a coalition of them plus the DNC brass and Obama in the background? Doesn’t it seem like something the public should know?

Independent of “who’s in charge” I do find in odd that there’s almost zero coverage of the overall White House staff and cabinet. During the Trump administration there was wall to wall coverage of virtually every member of the administration and how evil/incompetent/racist/etc… they were. Many in the administration were household names. Now, I’d wager that many of you had never heard the name Klain or even knew that Susan Rice was part of the administration. I bet, until the China meeting gone bad, you had no idea who the new Secretary of State was. Why is that? The only reporting seems to be around the edges, mostly centered on the diversity aspect of some rarely seen cabinet post.

No, I don’t think it’s some giant conspiracy. I simply think it’s a press corps that’s reluctant to give negative coverage to team Biden. They tread carefully around the edges and don’t press too hard so they can tell themselves they’re providing fair and equal coverage. Maybe that’s for the best. If the majority of the public loses confidence in their government, bad things tend to happen. The most worrisome part of this, in my opinion, is that world leaders respond to strength and confidence. They will take advantage and exploit any signs of weakness, as bullies and strong nations are prone to do. We will be tested. Who is going to make the decisions about how we respond? Two months in and this administration has been already been steamrolled and/or thrown shade by China, Russia, North Korea, and Mexico. We finally wheeled out our President in an attempt to show he’s mentally sharp and in command. What came across is that he’s a confused old man who clearly does not belong there. This does not bode well. The next four years do not fill me with confidence. But hey, at least we will have sorted out the proper pronouns and saved the climate!

Uncategorized

The Purge
  • The tech takeover is complete. They waited until democratic control of all three branches of government was official, then on Jan 8th 2021 began purging any speech that doesn’t match the party line. The President has been permanently banned from every social media platform. Any government official or associate that attempted to tweet out a message from the president had their account suspended or removed. Google removed Parler from their app store and Apple gave them 24 hours to put a moderation policy in place or they’ll be removed. YouTube began removing multiple conservative channels, deleting Steve Bannon’s podcast mid-stream. Sidney Powell and General Flynn had their accounts on most platforms deleted. Reddit removed a popular Trump discussion thread. Twitter is stripping followers from conservative accounts. People are reporting losing tens of thousands of followers a day. Facebook and Instagram continue to suspend or delete prominent conservative accounts. The message is clear – voice an opinion contrary to the views of the left and big tech and you risk being shut down. Most of the media are giddy over this. Ironically (there’s that word again) Biden yesterday compared Sen Cruz and Hawley to Nazi propaganda minster Goebbels for spreading Trump’s “big lie”. Tech and the media have now taken away the main communication platform we have in this country from anyone they don’t agree with. It’s hard to overstate how frightening this is. Twitter, Facebook, Google, Apple, and the major media outlets will now freely modulate and control with impunity what news and speech you’re allowed to hear. Continuing with the irony, the left used to be the champions of free speech, speaking out against McCarthyism and the evil authoritarian right. The left warned Trump was going to be a fascist authoritarian and the hashtag #notmypresident spread across social media. Trumps inauguration spawned multiple protests, with DC turning into a scene of chaos. Cars were torched, windows broken, and police used tear gas, pepper spray, and stun grenades. 217 people were arrested and six officers were injured by flying bricks and bottles. On his first day in office we had the million women march in DC to protest the Nazi, white supremacist, pussy grabber that had been elected to office. All of that was ok by the left. Such short and selective memories we have. I don’t see this going well. 75 million people voted against the left’s octogenarian puppet. A very large portion of them are very upset right now. I truly don’t think the establishment appreciates the level of anger they’ve spawned. Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe the tech pacification program will work. Give it a few months without being able to spread counter opinion and the people will turn back into passive sheep, happy to answer the latest Facebook quiz while waiting for their monthly stimulus check. But as I’ve said before, squeeze people hard enough, long enough, and bad things tend to happen.

Song of the day: Pharrell Williams – Happy (Official Music Video)

Government, Politics

Are You Ok With Censorship?
  • Scott Adams is the creator of the Dilbert comic. He also has a YouTube (Google) channel with about 90k subscribers and does a daily show. Yesterday they shut him down, demonetized and pulled down his video. His crime? He mentioned the lawsuits about alleged voter fraud in the election. Here is YouTube’s reason: “Content that advances false claims that widespread fraud, errors, or glitches changed the outcome of the U.S. 2020 presidential election is not allowed on YouTube.” I don’t care what you think of the claims. I don’t care if you’re the most lefty, leftist, left leaning person around. This should make you mad and frightened. The freedom to speak your mind is a basic tenet of this country. It doesn’t matter if you think it’s conspiracy theory being spouted by a tinfoil hat wearing prepper living in a bunker somewhere in Wyoming. They have the right to say it. Today, the outlets we have where we can speak our mind are Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and the mainstream media. ALL of them are actively censoring content they don’t approve of. Other content creators are talking about this story but are having to be very careful to not mention certain “trigger” words so YouTube won’t take down their videos as well. This is not ok. As the old saying goes, you may be ok with this today because it fits your political narrative but tomorrow – they may come after something important to you. Do we really want thought police? I don’t know what the answer is. I do know this shouldn’t be a left/right thing. I’d hope that as a thinking person you’d believe in the whole “I do not agree with what you have to say, but will defend to the death your right to say it”. The influence of big tech on how and what we think is going down a dangerous path.
  • New York just shut down indoor dining with no end date. Kiss the restaurant industry by-by. LA and New York are in a race to see who can crater their economies faster. At least LA is protecting essential business… like Hollywood. Somehow the Hollywood lobby was able to score an exemption and be declared an essential business. I wonder how that happened? The little taco shop around the corner? Not so essential. I guess it’s a worry, if we’re locked down and there’s nothing new to watch on Netflix what are we to do?
  • We have a local produce place that bakes amazing pies. Family is in town for the holidays (A.K.A. superspreader event). I’ve eaten a lot of pie. There’s no point to this other than I’m still wearing the fat pants and haven’t been able to get out and ski. This scenario is not moving in the right direction. Fortunately the storm window looks to be open the next few weeks and the pie is almost gone. There’s hope.
  • This is horrifying. A couple is kicked off a flight and left stranded with no luggage or car seat because they couldn’t get their two year old to wear a mask. Is this really what we want?
  • Struggling to find something good today. We’ll go with a dog who stole a GoPro and filmed his chase.

Song of the day: Bobby McFerrin – Don’t Worry Be Happy

Daily Life, Government, Health, Politics

Basic Dude Stuff
  • I’m sure I’ll be accused of perpetuating “toxic masculinity“, but oh well. Pat Mac is clearly on the far end of the masculinity spectrum, but his general message should be shown to the youth of today. He started posting some silly clips to his Instagram titled “Basic dude stuff”. Quick little clips of general stuff most guys of older generations knew. Tying knots, gardening, taking care of your tools, chivalry, cooking, driving skills, exercise, shooting, etc… Things that I took for granted, but seem to be lost on the current generation of youth. I look at my younger nephews and just shake my head. I love ’em to death, but worry for them and their generation. Even though they’re of driving age they have no interest in getting a drivers license. No interest in being active in the outdoors. It’s all about gaming. They’ve never had a job. By the time I was their age I’d had paper routes, mowed lawns, and been getting on a Greyhound bus each summer and traveling across the state to work as a lifeguard for months – alone. No parental supervision, no cell phone, and had to walk across town to the laundromat each week to do laundry. Thirteen years old. I couldn’t wait to turn sixteen, be able to drive and explore. I honestly don’t know how my nephews will survive and what kind of men they’ll grow up to be? Maybe the online gamer, manbun, intellectual is what women want today? And speaking of women… I think “basic dude stuff” should apply equally. Actually I think the young women of today are becoming more badass than the boys. It’s a brave new world.
  • A laundry list of voting infractions in Georgia was presented yesterday. Most shocking was video footage showing suitcases of ballots being revealed from under desks in Georgia vote counting facilities after poll workers were reportedly told to leave the room. Yawn. Nobody cares. Almost zero media coverage. How is this even possible? It’s frightening to think about what sheep we’ve become.
  • Speaking of sheep, the Governor of CA, apparently worried that the LA mayor was upstaging him in the unchecked power department, shut down the entire state. I still don’t understand how one man or woman has the power to unilaterally destroy businesses and livelihoods like this?
  • If you still think the mandatory mouth diapers everyone wears are the magic anti-covid solution, you should read Alex Berenson’s investigation into mask research. He’s busy doing what journalists used to do in a bygone era.
  • Was Covid here much earlier than we have been lead to believe? Eh, who knows. Maybe we’ll find out in 2026 when the Durham report comes out.
  • Sorry if I’m sounding a little cynical today. I was pulling my dogs tail in the shower, tripped over him and broke my foot. Hmm, ok. No, you’re an eighty year old man who tripped getting out of the shower. We’re one broken hip or getting the ‘rona away from President Harris.
  • If you’ve ever worked in a tech company, the Work Chronicles comic will make sense to you. This is why I no longer work in tech.

Song of the day: 311 “All mixed up (live)”

Cool, Daily Life, Government, Health, Motivation, Politics

Is That A Key Fob In Your Pocket, Or Are You Just Glad To See Me?

Cool things, random thoughts, advice, and independent thinking from someone who’s been around the sun a few times.

  • I have a small rant. Ok, I rant about a lot of things, but this time I mean it. What is it with the giant car key fobs that weigh like two pounds? I drive an older truck and it has a normal key and a tiny little fob to do the lock/unlock thing. I can also, gasp, just use the key if I don’t want to carry the fob. My wife has a newer vehicle with the fancy keyless, pushbutton start thing. Her key fob is ginormous. Do these manufacturers not realize that normal people sometimes do things where you don’t have a huge purse or backpack to store this brick? Like going for a run, a bike ride, or in my case yesterday, cross country skiing. I clipped the massive key fob to the waist belt thing I wear (DONT call it a fanny pack) and skated off down the trail. The damn key fob was so big it kept falling out of the little pocket in the waist belt and dangling on my hip like a giant set of janitor’s keys (hint, foreshadowing). The trail conditions were a bit challenging yesterday and sure enough, my skate skis went out from under me on some boiler plate ice while going ludicrous speed and I landed directly on my hip on that damn key fob. Now, I’m not a tiny fellow so that’s a lot of weight coming down on a hard plastic brick. It was already swelling by the time I got home. This morning I have a hematoma the size of baseball on my hip. It’s time to rise up and rebel people! Just say no to gigantic key fobs!
  • A few days ago I wrote about investigating the Ct and amplification value of the Covid PCR tests. Sure enough, yesterday we got a call from a friend who was in the exact situation I wrote about. Son is coming home from school for Thanksgiving, had a Covid PCR test done before leaving and it came back positive. He’s completely asymptomatic, feels great. If that test used a high amplification (greater than 30) he could have contracted the virus weeks and weeks ago and is no longer contagious. He also could have gotten it a few days ago and is highly contagious. What are the parents to do? (they opted to quarantine him in his room).
  • Is today the big day? Yesterday Sydney Powell said today she’d be filing the first blockbuster, bombshell lawsuit in Georgia. Trump’s legal team also said they’ll get legislative hearings starting today in Georgia and two other states. Georgia came back and said it’s not a hearing, just an informal presentation. The two other states said this was news to them. What a shit show. One of Trump’s biggest failings has always been the lack of someone who can ensure a clear, consistent message that doesn’t contradict what everyone else is saying. Unclear why that wasn’t obvious with the level of media hostility they’ve faced. When you know the media will pounce and ridicule the slightest mistake or inconsistency, it becomes even more important to get the message right.
  • Yesterday, thirty-two people read the words I wrote. Now, in the blogging world that’s a laughable number. But since my usual number is zero, and I often ask myself why bother, that’s huge. Thank you!
  • A compilation of “If 2020 were a…” memes. Because really, 80% of my internet time is only for the memes.
  • If you didn’t like the film “The adventures of Buckaroo Banzai across the 8th dimension“, you’re dead to me.

Song of the day: Stick Figure “Weight of sound (live)”