…says media superstar Paris Hilton. Gotta love the young generation’s role models. If we’re gonna give celebrities the status of being role models, can’t we find any DECENT ones? Trying to think of one off the top of my head…actually, there’s one that I always seem to mention and as far as I can tell (being someone who is not “connected” to all things entertainment), who is that…Mandy? I don’t see her getting in all these ridiculous amounts of trouble. She’s successful, does some talent with music and film and what not…but then again, she seems to be well-behaved. Can’t have THAT for a role model, now can we?

ADD Note: Whoa…she has a new CD? Oh yeah, she sang before, didn’t she?…

So lately, more and more people have been bringing up the clueless state of this country’s populace lately. About a year ago, I read an amusing (but not surprising) article in the newspaper about how businesses today are trying to deal with the new generation of workers…which is pretty much my age category and younger, those that can work. Turns out, this is the generation where everyone got a trophy, there were no winners and losers and everyone was special. Well, they’re not getting their praise and all that at work and they are going into mental breakdown. How sad is that… I remember in the article they even did things like have someone with a bucket of confetti stand by and throw confetti in the air and praise people just for showing up on time to work.

Bill had today brought in his analysis on the growing trend of road rage. Jeff had talked about it about two days ago as well. We have all heard my mounting frustration of being on the road (btw, I may have bad days but I have so far succeeded in NOT taking it out on drivers around me…those drivers around me, do NOT get an attitude with your crappy driving and if I annoy you that you confront me…you do not want to do that). Bill has a key portion of the blame going on the Internet.

When it comes to tech stuff, I don’t know…he is tech handicap himself! Though in this line of thinking I can see where he’s going. He finds that nowadays, a lot of people go on their computer and create their virtual happy world. Where they get to do whatever it is they want on command and things go well and blah blah blah. Then they go out to the real world…they can’t take it, because they are as small as everyone else, usually not mattering to everyone. Most importantly, they can’t get what they want all the time. This frustrates them and causes people to be ticking time bombs in some ways. Someone brought up the fact that when you bump into someone in person, you’ll do a quick “Excuse me” a maybe reconciliatory gesture and move on. In the virtual anonymity of your car, you cut someone off or vice versa and the only thing left to take it up a notch is to mount a machine gun to your roof.

I have repeatedly brought up how more and more people tune out the world. It makes them upset hearing this or seeing this and blah blah blah. Yeah, I love being a gloomy person, let me tell you. Everyone’s watching American Idol and Dancing with the Stars, but tune out anything related to what’s going on in the world. Me, I love watching people get their heads sawed off or people burning in an airplane crash…I love it, can’t you tell? That all still makes me a little lightheaded, but it happens and I’m not going to tune it out because it makes me a little uncomfortable. How weak have some people gotten? A few months ago, two news helicopters collided filming a car chase with police. One person I know can’t watch the video from one of the helicopters that crashed. Have you seen the video? You see the car they are tracking, then about half a second of static, then the world is spinning. That’s it…yet someone I know cannot stomach that. Then they make the excuse that it’s about the people dying in there. Quit with the excuses.

I, for one, am glad of the limiting of my computer use. I have brought my computer usage to where it has been since I was much younger. Mainly for work and research. There is some entertainment here and there, but hey…so what? A little here and there doesn’t hurt. But if you’re using up your daily life on pretty much entertainment (don’t loophole it, if you’re not honest with yourself then you’re just screwing yourself over), you must be very fulfilled in what you’ve done for the day. Actually, most of my “entertainment” comes from writing and posting these blogs. They have also saved me money from buying game consoles or a more powerful computer. I’m happy with the few games I play, if I want to shoot I’ll do it in real life at the range…it’s stress relief too!

There was even a discussion of how many people can really do the hard work. Not saying my job is so tough, but it is fairly involving and does require about as much gritting of teeth as when I was in the Navy…except with no air conditioning (but on the flip side, no repeated topside preservation!). A lot of people I know twiddle with a keyboard and/or paperwork, physical labor is minimal. Apparently, some industries (like construction) are getting a little hurt because of that.

Then, everyone thinks they’re special. Especially when they go online to their virtual happy land. They get to spew how great they are on their MySpace and Facebooks. In real life, they’ll only have maybe half a dozen decent friends but online they’ll have hundreds. Don’t tell me it’s the whole diverse and global reach either. If that’s the case, I can have my hundreds…though my definition of “friends” in the virtual world is roughly with very slight differences the same as that in the real world. People will put their entire life’s effort to something online…well, good for you. There’s plenty of people that can honestly applaud your efforts, or you can cleverly exploit and dupe them into thinking how great you are. I mean, those were some giant US military missiles hitting the NYC World Trade Center towers, right?

I’m just glad my worth in the real world is much more weighted than in my virtual world (which isn’t much of anything, so I guess that kind of nulls out the sentence, ha ha!). I don’t need to have my “legacy” posted on some virtual list where I have to keep going to the computer to constantly gloat to myself. My accomplishments are not some initials that will vanish on a memory reboot, a virus or any other hindrance on the world of ones and zeroes. If you die, will people be able to stand and show that you definitely came to this world and made a difference, or will people be trying to search for URLs in your bookmarks or other gaming systems?

I had made a comment, along with others, that we kind of looked forward to some of the new cars coming out. Latest entry being the GT-R, amused to see how that will turn out. Then we have some people that obviously have no time as it seems they have multiple browser windows opened and spaced with anti-GT-R (or whatever car’s being mentioned) to quickly send our way. You know what’s funny? A lot of them say “Skyline” even though it’s said this is more or less a ground up vehicle. The other side will say, “Yeah…that’s what they say.” And if not, so what? What’s in a name? To me, it looks more like a 350Z…another car they tried the ground up bit, since it sure doesn’t look like the older Zs. Then you look at some of these people’s profiles…yep, the Internet makes everyone look important. So important, you’re gonna talk about things like to Skyline or not to Skyline…but hey, whatever makes you and your favorite car brand feel special.

Wil had posted this a few days ago. I’ve seen it for a while, but it does need refreshing sometimes…

About the time our original thirteen states adopted their new constitution in 1787,Alexander Tyler, a Scottish history professor at the University of Edinburgh, had this to say about the fall of the Athenian Republic some 2,000 years earlier:
‘A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government.’
‘A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury.’
‘From that moment on, the majority always vote for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, which is always followed by a dictatorship.’
‘The average age of the world’s greatest civilizations from the beginning of history, has been about 200 years’
‘During those 200 years, those nations always progressed through the following sequence:
1. From bondage to spiritual faith;
2. From spiritual faith to great courage;
3. From courage to liberty;
4. From liberty to abundance;
5. From abundance to complacency;
6. From complacency to apathy;
7. From apathy to dependence;
8. From dependence back into bondage’

Professor Joseph Olson of Hemline University School of Law, St. Paul, Minnesota, points out some interesting facts concerning the 2000 Presidential election:
Number of States won by: Gore: 19 Bush: 29
Square miles of land won by: Gore: 580,000 Bush: 2,427,000
Population of counties won by: Gore: 127 million Bush: 143 million
Murder rate per 100,000 residents in counties won by:Gore:13.2 Bush:2.1

Professor Olson adds: ‘In aggregate, the map of the territory Bush won was mostly the land owned by the taxpaying citizens of this great country. Gore’s territory mostly encompassed those citizens living in government-owned tenements and living off various forms of government welfare…’ Olson believes the United States is now somewhere between the ‘complacency and apathy’ phase of Professor Tyler’s definition of democracy, with some forty percent of the nation’s population already having reached the ‘governmental dependency’ phase.

I had talked about the people that drown the world away with their iPods (I’m not picking on you iPeople, though when it comes to these traits, a majority of you have them white headphones), little games and other systems. No matter where you go, it’s just a game and you talk about how awesome you are. All everyone knows about you is how good you are at manipulating buttons and switches.

When Paul commented about the VT shootings, I found the latter part of his comments to be fairly important…

For many years college police departments have ignored active shooter
training. Many do not have shotguns or rifles as they are “too offensive.” Scanning
the many photos and video, I still find that many do not carry bandages or litters.
You see multiple officers dragging out hostages (that have not been bandaged) in
every type of carry configuration. We must do better.
As for swiftness of response, it is critical. We have raised a generation of selfserving
kids who would rather go fetal and cower than take offensive action.
Further, most would rather run than come to the aid of their fellow student. Few if
any would take the fight to the cowardly murderer and stop his onslaught.
I applaud the actions of the 76 year old engineering professor Liviu Librescu and
consider him a true hero. A concentration camp survivor who understood the
meaning of life and who probably deserved to live more than most of his students.
Instead of running, he knew what was at stake and he chose to hold the door with his
aging body so that his young, strong and able bodied students could scramble to
safety. It is sad that the male students of his class left an old man to watch their six
while their only concern was to save their own skins. This does not say much for
some of the students at the school.
As for the “memorial” for the shooter, he was a cowardly piece of shit that decided
to vent or “twist off” on unarmed kids. He had many choices in life and decided this
was the best course of action. My only hope is that there is a Hell and he is burning
every second of every minute of every day…

If you’re getting offended by this, I guess that means I’m talking to you. You probably closed this already, because you can’t stomach this. You’ll go to your BFF Jill and show her this place where you can just laugh, assure yourselves I’m crazy and move on into your virtual world, talking to a “friend” who is really a 40 year old pedophile that will rape and kill you when you finally meet. I wish I was joking, except it’s happened a few times already.

Some of you even want to get a job that’s “tough”…civic duty like police, fire, emergency…or the military…or helping people in a hospital or what not. If you are offended by this, or if little things (you may think they’re big, but sit it out and see if you can realize if it’s genuine or if you’re making a fool of yourself…) get you riled up, I worry if you want to do those type of jobs above. You can’t handle sounds from a speaker, or even your little virtual world? Well, for one, we’ll eventually Matrix ourselves anyway…but till then, you might as well start spending more time in the real world, that’s where it really matters anyways.

Wil:

Veterans…PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE consider public office. All of you with your patriotism and drive, youre exactly what this nation needs when you return to the civilian world.

Jim:

This is precisely why our warrior class needs to reaffirm the ideals they are grounded in, all of them. In times of hardship, the temptation to serve a Caesar will be great, liberty by its nature always being the harder row to hoe.

*Awww…looks like the Paris Hilton story is retracted. Oh well, whatever keeps her clean and out of jail…I think I still would’ve welcomed a drunken elephant story, lol.