The Burning Questions

     Facebook.com is quickly becoming one of the most popular ways on the internet to reach people.  Originally starting out as a website for college students, Facebook has taken the internet by storm in the past year or two.  Google the subject and you will see the millions and millions of keyword hits associated with Facebook.com.

Along with connecting with people from the past and present, Facebook has become one of the most profitable ways to advertise products and content on the internet.  It seems Twitter has reached its capacity for spammers and microbloggers alike and Facebook will be taking the role of the newest way to spam the internet with useless garbage such as affiliate marketing, news programs, and other worthless content.  There is certainly money to be made with the right approach to the use of facebook as a platform for marketing and advertisement.  With a good product and a lot of “friends”one could potentially make millions just from setting up at this one free website.  Even the television companies have gotten in on the game.  As I stated above you can even befriend your favorite news programs on the site now.  This is all about ratings and money, of course.

Why in the world would one go to such a site to check up on the news in the first place?  That is what your homepage is for, oh, and television, and radio, and so on.  Facebook was designed for people to interact with each other, not for logging in to see what is going on with world and local news shows, right?  Besides news shows, one can find the latest fad for internet marketing being spammed as “friendships.”

How long will it take for this site to become old hat?  I am guessing once it reaches the point where hackers and spammers find it so attractive that they overrun the site as they have begun to do with Twitter and MySpace.  I guess we will see in a year or two when the “new car smell” wears off and people are looking for something different.  Facebook is certainly going to stick around for a while, but soon it will be overcrowded and irritating like Black Friday at the mall and people will be looking for the exits.  I wonder which site will become the next big thing…

  Sometimes when I am sitting around listening to all that is going on around me, I have these random questions pop into my head based upon the collage of information that I take in.  In this case, I am not quite sure what triggered the question at hand, but I would like to know what you think!  Which is more important:  Your Family or Your Soul?

I know the answer should be obvious, but there are many different belief systems in this world and I for one want to know the priority of family versus soul/spirit of each.  Of course I can not perform this investigation properly without seeing what the viewers here have to say, so please comment.

  Our economy appears to be at the bottoms, or close to it.  The nation’s confidence in Barrack Obama is shaken.  Our industries have taken a huge hit as well as our nation’s image in the world’s eye.  Rattles and clangs have appeared in America’s ideologies. Not since the 1970’s has our great country seen such a shock as our current situation.  It seems as if the light at the end of the tunnel has been shot out and removed.

The real deal is that things are not as bad as they could be.  What will it take for American’s to realize that drastic changes have to be made around here.  For our childrens’ America to be the glorious nation that we have claimed to be for so long, we need to prove once again to the world that we are supreme in our essence, the key to the future of the world, and the strongest/smartest nation on earth.  I watch everyday as people whine and cry, “Don’t spend up all the money!,  Don’t take money from me!, Don’t let them do that, it will cost me too much.”  Don’t, don’t, don’t!  This nation was founded by people who gave up everything for the dream.  How many of them said, “Don’t do that!”?

I think we have this huge problem with change.  Such a huge problem that it has become more an issue than many of the problems we deal with nowadays.  Noone wants to give up anything for their “beloved” country.  They want to keep everything the way it is unless they are of the minority-the unemployed, those with no healthcare coverage, those impoverished by lack of education and lack of resources with which to fix said problems.  So keep on keeping all that you have.  While you have it.  When you no longer have a job, or a car, or a family doctor, or a roof over your head, and noone cares, maybe you will understand what it is to give up something for the greater good.  Until then good luck for your bad Karma;)

Keep buying cheap foreign-made things, keep hoarding anything we can, keep on bitchin’ about anything rather than taking action, keep making more rules to protect the feeble-minded, keep doing things the way we have always done them.  Keep doing things this way and we will no longer be able to say we are Americans who are Free.

What will it take to again make America the nation that all others aspire to become?  Remember the fact that your neighbor may not be as well off as you.  Just because your pockets are lined, doesn’t mean that the person living next to you even has money with which to eat.  Quit being so greedy.  Oh, and calling the President a socialist because he wants your neighbor to have the things that you have is not the way to go about affecting change.  I am not saying that the things he is doing are all right, but he has a mountain of trash to dig through in order to find any solutions at all.  I can not believe that we are so set in the old ways of processions that new, life altering, society changing, social bar bending ideas can be so quickly dismissed.  Personally, I feel the “cash for clunkers” deal is raw.  That money should ahve to be spent on American made products and only American made products.  Why give other countries the opportunity to profit from us while we are in a down economy?  However, there is a method to the madness and pure math is the root of the deal.  Fixing the math in the equation of the moment may help to clear out paths for solutions to other problems we face.  The only thing it will take to truly fix our current economic rut is to buy American, be American, love your fellow Americans! But, hey, what the hell do I know anyway?

In light of all of the crazy changes going on in the world today, the question “Will robots take over the world?” is a quite valid one.  In fact, at the rate mankind is going to destroy all that is wonderful about the world, robots should take over.  However, what’s real in the world of robots is this .

Do we REALLY want that to happen?  I say hell no!  It is bad enough that many of our children are taught by the television and video games.  What the heck are people thinking…having Robots teach kids! This can only lead to job loss and dehumanization.  If someone were to tell me that my son were going to be taught by a robot…Oooh…I’d have to let them in on a little secret-No robot is going to teach my kid how to do anything, except maybe how to destroy robots that are trying to take over human jobs and tell humans how to think!

Okay enough of all that.  Now I would like you to see this .  Is it really important that we all have a personal robot assistant in the future?  I don’t think I would ever enjoy the “Jetson’s” lifestyle even if I were able to afford it.

Next thing would be this.  You need to read the article below the huge-breasted robot chick with no hair!  Sega is about to release the first plastic girl that can pucker up for the creepy ol’ perverts!  I was sickened by the whole thing, although you may get a girl to have some sort of sex encounter with jealousy from only one of the two “women”?  Not my kind of thing, but to each their own, I guess.

So there are many ways that robots are preparing to take over humans’ positions in society.  That just means more rich people will get to keep their money and more poor people will have less due to the lack of medial positions open to humans.  Robots don’t sue for worker’s comp, they can’t bitch about company policy if they aren’t programmed to, and if they give you too much trouble, you can melt them down-if they don’t get you first!

Here’s a list of robot-type stuff just for fun..(Click on them)

N.A.I.R.

EATR

ASIMO

  Lately, there has been many references to countries defying the United Nations and its nuclear armament policies.  Iran, Syria, and North Korea are at the top of the list.  Reports that undeclared nuclear material surfaced in the Syria yesterday.  North Korea has reportedly tested nuclear devices recently, although there has been no findings of radiation to my knowledge.  Iran has, of course, been a nuclear thorn in the world’s side for a while now.  Is there cause for alarm?

Intelligence officials state that Iran has possibly a few years to go before being able to overcome technical issues having to do with the assembly of an atomic bomb.  It does not seem that the U.N. is very concerned with North Korea’s latest attempts at disturbing the world with their antics.  Many believe that they are really just trying to extort money from the world’s leading nations.  Syria has had two instances in the past couple of years (including the most recent) where minute amounts of nuclear material have been discovered, but no real evidence of anything more than traces of undeclared material.  Does this mean there is no real threat?

There are many countries with nuclear capabilities other than these three examples.  Fact is: we really don’t know how many.  After the Soviet Union fell, there were many sites with nuclear devices that were unknown, possibly even unmanned.  How are we to tell who has what any more?  It is possible that many countries have “nukes” that we have no idea about…Even the ones that we think we know about may have far more or less capabilities than we believe.  Is this cause for concern?  Absolutely.  Is there much we can do about it?  Not without having the entire U.N. at our disposal.  There is no way we as a nation will get much support for searching out nuclear issues any time soon.

So what do we do?  Sit on our heels and wait to see what happens?  At this time, I would say yes.  It is impossible for us to do much more than wait and see.  If we spent as much time and money on developing our own new technologies, though, as we do waiting to see what the other guys does next, we may not need to worry as much about the other guy.  This is one instance where I would have to say that Ronald Reagan was on the right track back in the 80’s.  SDI was a great idea and we could use that kind of thinking in today’s world once again.

  Jay Leno aired his last episode as host of The Tonight Show on Friday, May 29th.  He held the position for 17 years and is passing it on to Conan O’Brien, host of Late Night.  Leno took over when Carson retired causing scandal at NBC.

David Letterman had his sights set on the top spot in late night after following Carson for years and was insulted by NBC’s decision to cast Leno, Carson’s understudy, for the role as host.  Letterman left his show at NBC (Late Night) to host Late Show for CBS.  Conan O’Brien took his spot on Late Show and is soon to take over the role that caused Letterman to leave NBC.

Conan O’Brien is a very different comedian than Leno or Carson.  He has a much more flamboyant style than either of the two previous hosts and is, of course, much taller. lol.  The previous hosts, Steve Allen, Jack Paar, Johnny Carson, and Jay Leno have all had different styles, but O’Brien is by far different than any of the others.

Will he succeed as host on The Tonight Show?  Let’s explore this question.  He does have his own following on the Late Show.  He has written for “The Simpsons” and was one of the more popular writers there in the early 90’s.  He is, however, taking over a show that has been the industry standard for over 50 years and will be placed in a position that could ultimately land him in exile for his strange comedic presence.  Many of the viewers of the show are of older traditions and may not stand for his off-the-wall approach to humor.  He is also not the professional, in my opinion, that his predecessors were.  This could land him in hot water with the older crowd.  Screwing up The Tonight Show would be a disaster for his career as well as the longevity of the show which has run since 1954.

So, will The Tonight Show ever be the same?  I doubt it.  Will it continue on?  For sure.  Will Conan O’Brien be the quality showman that the previous hosts have been?  No way.  Will Dave Letterman be happy to see Conan cause the ratings to slide?  Probably so.  All I can say is good luck, Conan.  I think you are going to need it.

Is it inherent that news be bad?  Turn on the “boob tube” and someone somewhere is telling everybody about all the death and destruction in the world.  Change the channel, and they’re talking about how someone was sexually assaulted or their child was molested.  Another channel, another tragedy.  What the…?

Are we addicted to the bad news?  Would we really rather see about Britney’s next poor decision?  Is there anyone out there that turns off the television when it seems to be nothing but bad?  I know I do.  I have a hard time understanding what the deal is.  The news broadcasts obviously get better ratings for bad news or they wouldn’t produce such lousy information.  Why do they get better ratings?  Because most people would rather watch the crap that these broadcasts smear all over the backs of their retinas than learn of something beautiful or inspirational.  One answer I received for these questions was “That kind of stuff should be on the learning channel or PBS.  The news is for telling us what is wrong with the world.”  WHAT?  Is this really the way most people think?  I have no idea…but I have to do something about this way of thinking.

I’ll make up my own good news!  The following are fictitous representations of what I believe would be good news for today…Today in North Korea, an explosion blew up the nuclear weapons production facility…no one was hurt except for those that believe they were doing a good deed for society by producing such devices…Next, a wildfire saved a family…their campfire got out of hand and spread rapidly across the wooded area in which they had setup camp…they were all thinking how much of a pain in the ass this last ditch effort of a camping trip was until they had to work together to save themselves and the forest…they now realize how important life and family can be and will take care of each other from here on out…One more…in the news today:  People threw out their televisions.  Digital converters will no longer be needed as all people threw out those infernal televisions and went outside to see the world.  There was a massive amount of happiness and reflection as the general public realized that television news was sucking the life out of them and rejected it.  Good job, World!

Recently, there has been an onslaught of articles recommending that we take away the right to possess, talk on, or text on cell phones at given times. I am tired of people trying to revoke my rights as a United States citizen. I know cell phones weren’t listed in the Constitution, but: Police officers have been using communications devices while driving for quite a few years now, as well as utility workers and others. They are hardly ever found at fault for a device-related crash. They are commended for driving at high speeds while doing their job, part of which is properly communicating their position over the air! So tell me that a police officer that can drive over 100 mph is a better human than I, therefore giving him the right to talk while driving without judgment and without distraction. Tell me that education of use of the equipment as well as stricter rules for passing the driver’s course and test, along with using proper equipment aren’t a better way rather than take more of our civil liberties away from us. You can’t have trans fat, you can’t have a smoke, you can’t have a phone in your car…Next thing they will be telling us that we can’t do what we want within our own homes….OH, THEY ALREADY DO THAT! Give the rights reductions a break people or we won’t have any left!