Author: Kevin Driscoll

Just a blog of random thoughts. Some will be about street photography; some about DMR radio; some about weight training; we can chat about cigars, motorcycles and tools. Since everyone has an opinion, maybe I'll throw in the dreaded political thoughts.

The Bowling Green Massacre

Alternative facts, lying and outright creating “false news” is becoming a theme of this administration. 

I’ll accept that there was some confusion on Ms Conway’s part as the two bad guys were nicknamed The Bowling Green Terrorists or something like that. But there was no massacre. 

Considering the White House Spokesman is demanding accountabilty and responsibility for reporting facts, there had better be some comment from Ms Conway correcting her error. 

Hmm, Just Like You and Me

I live in Arizona. I am one of the most viral anti-illegal immigration people you will ever meet. HOWEVER, here is my personal experience regarding encounters and observations of this populace:
1. I never see them sitting on a traffic corner begging for money. I see them standing in home improvement parking lots seeking out work.
2. I see them take their entire family to church on Sundays. Very family and religiously oriented.
3. They are profoundly respectful.
4. They can take a joke – i.e. when you try to speak Spanish and end up offering them “squid salad on the roof of my dog’s head”.
5. I never see one guy working while five others stand around leaning on their shovels. They work their ass off.
6. They, like MY ancestors before them, take lower skilled, perhaps even, menial jobs to support their families.
7. They absolutely help our economy. After all, who can you get to cut down a tree, break it up, and haul it away for $100 bucks. They just saved you $400 bucks and now you can buy groceries and gas for another week, maybe two.
8. Finally, they’re actually very nice people just trying to make it through another day. Hmmm, sort of like you and me.
Here is my solution to the illegal immigration / illegal “staying here” situation. Like everything else in our society money talks. Let them pay a fee to get EXPEDITED green cards or citizenship. I don’t know what that fee should be. People will argue they are too poor to pay a fee. Well, 1. let’s make the fee reasonable and 2. if they are willing to pay some piece of shit mule thousands of dollars, they can afford our fee and cross the border safely rather then 120 degrees in the desert. Finally, a path to citizenship makes them tax payers, contributors to our society, loyal to our country and based on my observations above: brings back a strong work ethic, strong family ties, nice neighbors.
Just a thought.

Are File Cabinets Obsolete?

I’m not sure why this question popped into my head this morning as I was walking the dog.  I usually get up between 5:00 and 5:15 and go right out into the morning for Bruno’s 1 mile walk.  It takes anywhere from 20 minutes to 30 minutes depending on how many fun things Bruno finds to smell.

In any event, yesterday morning, as I passed by the end of the bed, I hit my right knee on a bench that rests along the bed’s footer.  It reminded me of a file cabinet I used to have in my bedroom when I lived at my parent’s house.  It was one of those two drawer units you could buy at K-Mart (we didn’t have Office Max back then).  You remember, the one with the lock in the upper right hand corner that you pushed in with your thumb and the key that you would proudly put on your key chain because now you had a place to “secure” all your secret papers.

After a while, that thing would get really packed.  Years of tax returns and their supporting documents, insurance policies, union papers, auto loan books, years of monthly checking account statements and the cancelled checks, etc etc.  And, if you weren’t careful and loaded the bottom draw with as much garbage as in the top drawer, it would tip over when you opened the top drawer.

Now, I have a HUGE file cabinet.  It holds all the stuff above PLUS.  But, it’s not real.  It’s virtual.  In the cloud.  And it holds EVERYTHING: photos, videos, emails, owners manuals pulled off the web, employment packages, bank statements, cell phone records – essentially, anything you can scan / digitize and upload.

As I looked around the house today I realized we don’t have one file cabinet.  We do have two of those smaller, hand carried, file storage tubs.  You know, the ones you can carry out to the kitchen table and then push back up onto the shelf in the back of the closet.  But, those are really for documents that are used on a more or less “daily” (well, monthly) basis.

Here is when we return to my original thought.  Are file cabinets now obsolete and going the way of the compact disc player??

Odd Position

People in Washington are protest marching with a partial anthem that includes, “I disagree with the outcome of the election”.  What???  What is the disagreement?  One side won, the other side lost.  Just because you don’t like the outcome, and just because you say you aren’t going to sit there quietly, doesn’t mean the election results aren’t what they are.  Am I missing something?

Accountability

One side says it’s “size” is bigger than the previous. The other side thinks this nonsense is newsworthy. One side says it is going to hold the other accountable. The other side sits there and cowers without retort.  And, we, really the only ones who should count, still await real leadership from one side and real informative news from the other. And by the way, there is only one group that is going to be holding the other two “accountable” and that’s us. 

Sore Losers and Sore Winners

I’m hoping yesterday was the last. The last of all the pro-Hillary / anti-Trump and of all the pro-Trump / anti-Hillary posts, videos, pictures, captions, cartoons.

I’m not suggesting a big fireside cum-by-ya, just a little peace and quite from the posts that started almost two years ago.

I think most of us are on social media to be, well, social. That is, we thought it would be cool to catch up on the lives or keep up on the lives of our family and friends. Then, we started to see advertisements based on what our browsing history is and “news” from various organizations. Frankly, if I want the news, I’ll go to one of my various news apps. There’s nothing we can do about the advertisements. But, there’s a lot we can do to eliminate the stress, head banging, hair pulling, our side won, you suck even though you won, posts.

It’s getting worse because most of us feel the need to “help our friends and family understand their position is wrong” while alienating those very same friends and family. I bet I lost a lot of followers on Facebook and Twitter with my rants and raves over the past election season. I don’t think one single person was “changed” by my “wisdom”. I bet if I would go back in my timeline and feeds I would shock myself with the number of times I forwarded something from CNN, the NY Times, or the WS Journal and added my own knowledgable commentary.

So, I’m vowing not to make any more political comments.  Well, at least not personal attacks.  If I read about a policy or law, or bill, etc., that I don’t like, I reserve the right to comment on that.

After all, you all have so much to learn from me.  HAAAA!!!!!

THE MEDIA – Credibility, Accountability, Truthfulness

There has become a rather large misnomer about “the media”. The members of this industry are alleged to be liars, cheats, ultra-left wing radical liberals, etc. etc., spreading all types of false stories, false news, unsupported allegations, etc. about the target of their story piece.

Certainly, there can be an argument that “the media” has slanted views and its reporting is biased towards supporting whatever view it holds. It would be cliché to suggest all you must do is watch CNN and Fox News and you get a clear idea of what bias is in “the media”. How easy is it to see Sean Hannity is totally a Trump person while Rachel Maddox is so far in the other corner? (By the way, I remember when CNN and Fox were actually news channels. Now they appear to be tabloid shows. I miss those 24 worldwide news broadcasts’ when one could almost be like the CIA and know what was going on around the world at any time.)

We seem to have lost our understanding of exactly what “the media” is supposed to do. And, perhaps we also misunderstand the difference between “the media” and journalists. We also seem to have forgotten there is a big difference between a reporter and someone who simply reads the news at dinner time from a teleprompter. I would dare say, a journalist is someone like Anderson Cooper, a guy who gets out in the field and does his reporting and moderates panels for in studio discussion, while a media person is someone like Megan Kelly (both of whom I thoroughly enjoy watching and of whom, I think, bring a great amount of respectability to their field) who, more or less, host panels and picks apart particular topics arising during the day.

I am hoping the large news organizations acknowledge that we have, for the most part, lost faith in their ability to bring us the facts. “Fair and balanced” means you are presenting a “side” of the story. I don’t want a “side”. I want the facts unaltered by the media’s interpretation of what those facts mean.

Accountability needs to be restored. Hear the argument, check the facts, report accordingly and hold those who spread “false news” and non-fact checked articles or broadcasts accountable for their actions. Self-police yourself, news folks. Or, we might just not watch / listen to you any longer.

I think we are all hoping that these large news organizations look inwards and seek to determine what it is they need to do to regain our respect and regain their credibility. Perhaps a lot of “just the facts, mam” reporting is what we all really yearn for.