George Carlin: ‘Life is Worth Losing’- Dumb Americans

George Carlin

Source: This piece was originally posted at The New Democrat

Warning! This piece might contain language that may offend people who are still living in the 1950s and forgot to move with the times in America as the rest of country moved forward without them.

Just to say one thing about George Carlin: Goddammit George Carlin fuckin cussed a lot! What the fuck was his fuckin problem? What kind of asshole fuckin cusses that much? God dammit he must have been fuckin pissed off. Not that I would ever tell him to watch his fuckin language, because someone like that who is generally that angry not just at people, but basically an entire country, probably wouldn’t like that humor and perhaps not have even understood it. But he might have grasped the hypocrisy from a statement like that.

As far as stupid people in America, not saying we have a monopoly on that compared with the rest of the world. Especially with countries that don’t allow women to even drive cars or show themselves in public, who murder people simply for being gay through government force. As well as terrorists who murder people simply for not being Muslim, as well as gay. But we might have more than our share of stupid people especially with a region of the country that values their religion over education and knowledge. That alone can create a lot of problems there when people who simply don’t respect knowledge and think Jesus or whoever they pray to is all they need. That alone would qualify as stupid thinking, or lack of thinking.

See, people who don’t have knowledge tend to be stupid. Knowledgable people tend to be intelligent. The actual definition of intelligent is someone who is having or showing intelligence, especially at a high level. The actually definition of stupid, is having or showing a great lack of intelligence or common sense. Someone who takes America to war over bogus ( to be overly generous ) evidence that never existed in the first place, is the classic definition of s stupid decision. Making a decision on no real evidence and information.

Buying stuff ( or in many cases junk ) that you simply don’t need and are buying it perhaps only because it’s a status symbol for you like buying that latest smartphone simply because it’s the latest smartphone, even though you bought the latest smartphone last week, would qualify as a stupid decision. Even if it did allow you to be one of the first five people to share that latest purchase on Facebook, Twitter, or perhaps my favorite Google+. Sure! That decision made you look like totally awesome ( or whatever ) for an entire five minutes. But now you have two smartphones that you’re not using and still paying for both of them.

When you have a country that is as vast and diverse from all sorts of vantage points and not just racially and ethnically, a country that is also as free and individualistic as we are ( at least outside of pop culture,where most people look like a clone of the latest hot celebrity ) and then you have an entire population that values their religious and cultural beliefs over knowledge, reason, and science, you’re going to have a lot of stupid people. Because you’re going to have a lot of people who are literally free to do whatever they want short of hurting innocent people, including deciding to not be educated and not believe evidence and facts. This is why America at times at least can look like a national morons convention where everyone is late, because everyone went to the wrong place for the convention.

George Carlin: ‘Life is Worth Losing’- Dumb Americans

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Politics and Prose: Bruce Bartlett- ‘The Truth Matters’

Source: Politics and Prose

Source: This piece was originally posted at The New Democrat

I don’t want to make this all about Donald Trump, but when I thinking about The Truth Matters I think of that Kellyanne Conway line from February last year I believe when she’s on NBC’s Meet The Press with Chuck Todd and Todd asks her something about the truth and facts and Kellyanne looking back at it I believe she was somewhat reluctant in saying this because of how bad it would sound and make her look with the mainstream media going after her for about a week on this, but she said, well there are alternative facts. With Todd essentially saying that no, there aren’t alternative fact. There’s the truth and then there are falsehoods.

Alternative facts and Martians have one thing in common and even that is only one thing it’s a very important thing, they don’t exist.

You have facts which is the truth and and how people know what’s going on with either themselves or people around them or in society in general.

There are falsehoods things that simply aren’t true. And then there’s garbage ( to be nice ) which is a nice way of saying lies.

The truth is what’s going on and what’s happening what we know to be true. America is a federal republic. That would be one truth.

Falsehoods are things that are simply wrong and people unintentionally say falsehoods all the time thinking what they said is correct not having the right information with them at the time that they said what they said or did what they did. Like the weather report saying that i’s going to rain tomorrow and maybe it’s an overcast day but the weather is dry the whole day because the storm moved onto another area.

And there’s garbage or lies when people are representing things as the truth that simply aren’t true. Like Donald Trump claiming he would work all the time and not spend as much time playing golf as President Obama. That was obviously a lie.

There’s no such thing as freedom without facts and real hard information that people have to have to make the right decisions. Without the truth you’re a blind person with eyes feeling your way around the world never knowing for sure what’s in front of you. But with the truth, as well as a sane, sound, intelligent, sober, experienced mind, you can be as free as a bird and do anything that you’re personally capable of doing. The truth and always knowing what’s going on and always knowing the truth about your self is the most important and effective tool and freedom that anyone can have. And when people especially public officials are caught telling either falsehoods or flat-out lying it’s the job of the media and the public especially to always hold those people accountable. To promote this most important tool that people have and discourage the archenemy of the truth which is falsehoods and nonsense.

Politics and Prose: Bruce Bartlett- ‘The Truth Matters’

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HBO: Video: George Carlin on Expressions and Sayings

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This post was originally posted at The New Democrat on Blogger

You know how cliché’s become cliché’s? Because someone comes up with a really simple and hip way of putting something in perspective in a way that even morons can understand. Like “well that is all she wrote”. Which could be used for several different situations, but generally used in sporting events when it is clear that the game is over as far as who is going to actually win the game. Someone comes up with a real, gee I don’t know (talk about cliché’s) nifty way of putting something in its place that everyone can understand.

America has become a cliché country. You see that everyday in our country, culture politics, sports someone comes up with a clever and new way of doing something or way of talking. Five minutes later it is no longer new because everyone else who wants to be cool, oh I’m sorry awesome ends up doing the same thing or talking the exact same way. The modern America sitcom is a cliché taken from whatever the latest hit sitcom is and now everyone is writing and acting like that.

We are a country of Faddist’s. The American religion is Faddism. We do what we believe we need to do to fit in, in life and be like everyone else. So we are cool or awesome too. You want to know why Americans are stereotyped as dumb? I’ll tell you anyway, because we don’t think for ourselves. We let the latest hipster or hipsters do that for us. Whatever the profession and whatever the lifestyle is. Cloning is not supposed to be biologically possible yet, but you wouldn’t know it with so many people looking and talking and acting like everyone else. Faddism is in and individualism is out.

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Jesse Taplin: ‘George Carlin On Roosters, Self- Help and Motivation’

Source:Jesse Taplin– comedian George Carlin on what pisses him off.

“George carlin clips from (2001) George Carlin – Complaints and Grievances”

From Jesse Taplin

As far as self-help: I’m always in favor of people who try to improve themselves (except when I have to compete with them) just as long as they’re doing it to improve themselves and not just to say: “Hey, I’m reading this book right now.” Just to say that they’re reading it and can claim that they’re in step with whatever the current hot, pop culture offer is. But I think the best self-help is always someone’s very own mirror and they bother to look at it. If you want to improve yourself, look at yourself first and do it honestly. And every honest and intelligent person, especially anyone who is honest and intelligent about themself, will figure out what works for them and what doesn’t. If you want outside help, hopefully you have honest, intelligent people in your life who give a damn about them and listen to them.

Brian Billick who use to coach the Baltimore Ravens had a theory of coaching about what to do when a player screws up and he said: “You can put it gently and say you know what that’s not what I was looking for on that play and hopefully you’ll do better in the future. Or you can tell them: “God dammit, you fucked up buddy”. Just put it on the line and let them know exactly how they messed up: “And this is not what I’m looking for and you’re going to have to be better in the future”. But then tell them how they screwed up and show them what you want done instead. And if they continue to screw up, find a replacement for them.

When you reward failure, you just get more of it. But if you teach and reward success, you get more of that as well. It’s the tough love approach to life that I prefer. Lay it out on the line so you know where you are and then you can adjust.

Self-esteem is only worth as much as its worth, if you have reason to have high self-esteem, then you should have that. But if you’re not doing very well, then you need to know that or have someone show you where you are lacking. So you can figure out what the problem is and improve yourself. And not get overconfident and think you are better than you are. Because that’s how we let ourselves down.

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Discerning History: Video: History of the Filibuster: The Right for Senators to Make Assholes Out of Themselves

This post was originally posted at The New Democrat on Blogger

You want to know why there’s so much hot air in Washington? For one its in an area that gets about five months of summer. Sometimes more, hot humid endless summers at times, where people pray for rain. Which only makes the area hotter and more humid but these summer showers all five- minutes of them do give us some temporary relief. Another reason for hot air is we are the seat of power for not only the United States but North America and the rest of the world.

We are an area of six-million people where people from all over the world come to express their five- minutes worth. And get to tell Congress exactly what they are thinking in order to get their help. And when they talk to senators, senators get to speak until they decide to shut up. Or there are sixty votes to tell Sen. Hot Air and their allies, to “shut the hell up! Or there’s a Blizzard in South Florida, you know whatever comes first, it used to be worst.

Up until 1975 it took 67 votes to kill a filibuster, which meant that 34 Senators could defeat 66. If you’re a sports fan that probably makes as much sense as the team with twenty-one points beating the team with forty-two in a football game. I don’t have a problem with the current sixty vote rule. I do believe in things like minority rights. So there’s some type of check and balance in Congress both in the House and Senate. And that the Minority Leader the Leader of the Minority Caucus and Ranking Members the Leaders of the minority memberships of Committees, should be more than just their caucus’s Chief Spokesperson’s but that they shouldn’t be able to rule the Senate like they are in charge.

Two problems with the Senate and there are problems with the House as well, but since this blog is about the filibuster, which only happens in the Senate (Thank God!) I’m just going to focus on the Senate. Can you imagine a filibuster in the House, with 435 Representatives being able to talk until they run out of breath, or 261 votes are gathered to get them to, shut the hell up! “You’re not the only one with nonsense to say!” You think there’s already too much hot air in Congress now, have a filibuster rule both in the Senate and House.

There would be so much hot air in the House, people could do their sun tanning on the House floor. No more weekend getaways to Florida or Southern California paid for by lobbyists because they could do that on the House floor. But the two main problems with the Senate have to do with two rules, one of them needs to be replaced. The other needs to be thrown away like the piece of trash that it is. The trash is the Motion to Proceed Rule, get this it currently takes 60 votes just to move to a bill in order to debate a bill.

Which makes the Leader of the Senate as weak as what the Vice President use to be, before the President gave them a real job. The Leader should just be able to call up any bill that they put on the Senate agenda. Thats passed out of committee or that the Leader and Minority Leader call up together under Emergency Rule. And this way the Senate would look more like a PTA meeting, or the United Nations. Because things would actually get accomplished in the Senate.

The Senate Rule that should be replaced is the is the Cloture Rule better known as the filibuster. I would replace that with a Motion to Table, that could only be made by the Leader or Minority Leader. After a Senate Debate has concluded, no more blocking amendments, just have those need 60 votes to pass anyway. So controversial amendments would have to pass an extra level to pass, as well as forcing them to be relevant to the legislation.

Reforms like this an establishing a real Rules Committee in the Senate and make that bipartisan. And then we would actually see something strange in the Senate, senators working and producing. Instead of just showing up and getting a great tan from all of their own Hot Air.

Right to Hot Air

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