Category Archives: Rant
My impulse was to here write, “It’s been an interesting week,” but in reality, it’s just been a week much like those that came before it. The social weather forecast: continuing craziness with scattered outbursts of outright insanity.
President Obama gave his final State of The Union (SOTU) speech on Tuesday, and so I find myself writing about how proud I was of my president for the second time in as many weeks (and, very possibly, the only two times since he was elected).
Watching that speech, I kept thinking, “Where has this guy been for the last seven years?”
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6 Comments | tags: cable news, democratic society, dialectic, Edward R. Murrow, election 2016, illusion, lies, Nikki Haley, President Obama, rhetoric, social change, social issues, social media, social mores, Walter Cronkite | posted in Politics, Rant
The thing about climbing up sand dunes is that you keep sliding downwards. If you slide downward one step for every step you take upwards, you stay in place and get nowhere. Worse, if you slide two steps down for every step up, you go backwards!
To climb a sand dune successfully, you have to take more steps upwards than you slide downwards. I’ve climbed sand dunes; it’s hard; it takes effort (or a dune buggy).
The thing about social progress is that, without real effort towards moving upwards, society tends to slide backwards. Or just stay in place.
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7 Comments | tags: gun control, gun debate, gun laws, gun ownership, guns, movie violence, Quentin Tarantino, The Dark Knight Returns, TV violence, violence, violence in movies, violent society | posted in Politics, Rant
Well, here we are in 2016, a Presidential election year, and — man, oh man — it’s going to be a weird one! High waters from several rivers seems to be converging to form a flood unlike any we’ve seen in modern politics. And while that’s kind of fascinating from a sociology perspective, as a citizen some of it seems kind of scary.
As I write this, actual rivers are flooding Midwestern cities in the USA, but the rivers I have in mind are reality shows, the interweb, and our social environment (where global unrest and terrorism is a primary topic). The flood here is a lack of sense, nuance, and thoughtfulness.
My question today: When did we so fully embrace lies and illusion?
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17 Comments | tags: Anyone But Trump, Bernie Sanders, cable news, democracy, Democratic Party, democratic society, dialectic, Donald Trump, election 2016, evil, GOP, Hillary Clinton, illusion, lies, Marco Rubio, politicians, Republican Party, rhetoric, social change, social issues, social media, Ted Cruz, Trump is a loser, Trump is a monster, truth | posted in Politics, Rant
I’ve been watching the cable news a lot lately, and it fills me with dismay. I’m seeing coming to fruition a crop that I’ve been warning about for over 40 years. I’ve referred to it as the Death of a Liberal Arts Education.
As this crop of useless weeds chokes the life out of the nutritious and necessary political and social fauna and flora, I find that we’ve arrived at an even greater loss: Utter Dialectic Failure!
That’s a topic for future posts. Right now I want to ask:
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16 Comments | tags: Anyone But Trump, Bernie Sanders, democracy, Democratic Party, democratic society, dialectic, Donald Trump, election 2016, GOP, Hillary Clinton, Marco Rubio, politicians, Republican Party, rhetoric, social change, social issues, social media, Ted Cruz, Trump is a loser, Trump is a monster, violent society | posted in Politics, Rant
It happened again. I offered someone a small tip that would have — in a very small way — raised the excellence of their life. The response was (and I quote), “lol [whatever].” I can’t say I was very surprised because it happens all the time.
In fact, laughing it off is the more benign reaction. I’ve learned that it can be dangerous to point out the correct use of “their” and “they’re” and “there.” (Grammar Rules: They’re there for their purpose.) Some folks get downright hostile with regard to their own precision and excellence.
This is one of many human behaviors I have a hard time understanding.
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21 Comments | tags: excellence, ignorance, stupidity, whatever, willful ignorance | posted in Life, Rant
Bear with me; I have another get it off my chest rant about how something on the TV machine made me angry. In this case it concerns a show that’s risen quite high on the list of shows I watch: NBC’s Grimm.
I enjoy the show a lot, but I’m really annoyed about one particular aspect. It’s a glaring flaw in an otherwise very appealing show. I understand why the flaw exists, but it concerns something that’s generally bugged me in storytelling for a long time. In the case of Grimm it especially grates; I wish the writers had taken another tack.
The issue concerns keeping secrets from loved ones.
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18 Comments | tags: Batman, Castle (TV series), Galaxy Quest, Ghost Rider, Grimm (TV series), mistaken identity, Nick Burkhardt, secret identity, secrets, Spiderman, Superman, The Man Who Knew Too Little, TNT, wesen, woge | posted in Rant, Sci-Fi Saturday, TV
Once I’ve decided that I like something, I tend to be pretty loyal. That’s even more the case when it comes to people. But hate is very close to love; both are very strong and persistent emotions — they just have opposite polarities. The true opposite of love (or hate) is indifference.
And it does happen that, sometimes a single event that gets on the wrong side of me instantly flips the polarity of my feeling. Sadly, it’s always been from positive to negative. I’ve never had the movie experience of hating and then loving.
Recently two things have flipped my switch, and a third one is tugging at it.
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34 Comments | tags: customer service, delivery pizza, NCIS, NCIS:Los Angeles, NCIS:New Orleans, Papa Johns, pizza, salsa, Target stores | posted in Life, Rant
It’s been over two years since I wrote the Worst NCIS Ever! rant post, and I still think that was weak plotting. That episode was the premiere of the 10th season, but clinkers like that one episode seem incredibly rare. They’re turning out powerful, engaging stories even after 12 years. Still my favorite show currently airing.
So why is that the spin-off show, NCIS: Los Angeles, is such an ugly sibling to me? It seems so different that it’s as if it’s not part of the franchise, but some other — far less worthy — show. The new spin-off, NCIS: New Orleans, is so far proving to be as attractive as the first sibling, which puts the ugly one in even greater contrast.
Last week’s episode was so bad I just have to rant about it.
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14 Comments | tags: G Callen, Hetty Lange, JAG, Kensi Blye, Marty Deeks, NCIS, NCIS:Los Angeles, NCIS:New Orleans, Owen Granger, Sam Hanna | posted in Rant, TV
It’s bad enough that it’s winter and cold and dark and I’m stuck inside and my back is bugging me and I’ve got a major case of the seasonal blues.
The icing on today’s cake is the email from the ISP that supports my personal webpage. A large professional organization. (In point of fact, I’d give their support a C- rating at best, but the price is hard to argue with, and you get what you pay for.)
Were dommed I tales yu. “Literally” Dommed!
61 Comments | tags: doomed, misspelling, seasonal blues, spelling, you're, your | posted in Rant
Those of you who are bloggers, I don’t know how much you look through your Spam Comments list. I delete spam without looking at it too much. But you must go to the list to click the button, so you can’t avoid seeing some of it. Sometimes there’s a new twist on the basic trick: “I’m a real comment! No, really, I am!! Please let me through!!!”
But most of it becomes familiar in a short time. You see the same comments vaguely praising your post without actually saying anything about it. Some of it makes you chuckle a little; some of it makes you despair. It’s a kind of constant background noise.
Then last September it seemed like there was a lot more spam than usual.
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20 Comments | tags: blog, blogging, die die die spammers, die horribly spammers, die painfully spammers, die spammers, vanish from the earth spammers | posted in Rant
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