The Internet. It’s a 1000 lane highway of bullshit. Pre-internet, we could read the news and decide among ourselves what was likely accurate. We might even discuss it among folks of differing points of view and get a few different takes. Now no need for that. We’re allowed to live in our own private bubbles and nobody knows what’s real. And it happened VERY fast. Twenty years.

Some of us who predate this time retain some critical thinking skills, but I can’t imagine what it’s going to be like when we’re gone.

^^^^^^^
I believe that is spot on, Milliron. I have often heard that '666', "The Beast", was actually the computer, or some derivation of that. There have been some good, thought-provoking insights in this thread.

For me, it comes down to this country losing sight of its moral fiber and the removal of our BASIC religious tenets on which this country was founded. In my lifetime, that started with the ACLU and Madalyn Murray O'Hair. The actions of this individual (who I hope died a slow, painful, excruciating death), along with support from the ACLU, removed prayer from schools. Yeah, yeah...we can debate all day long about "freedom of religion", but the Constitution doesn't say ANYTHING about freedom FROM religion. I'm just using that as an example of how the schools began their indoctrination of the children of this nation. And now...here we are. Those now "adult" children are running the asylum.

Another factor as well is this notion of changing "norms" in this country, i.e., changing how things were "always done". EVERYTHING (by way of the internet of which Milliron spoke) is OVERT. There is NOTHING that can't be seen by young teens, kids, and even infants old enough to view a PC monitor. People started challenging what actually is normal as it pertains to sexuality and sexual deviance and it's the Libs/Leftists that have pushed that envelope for YEARS. Take the latest "trend" of Trannyism and "pronouns", as an example. This behavior was allowed to seep ever so slowly into our environment, that now people think it's "normal". IT. IS. NOT!!!! It is absolutely a mental disorder!!

I've told the story before, but I will recount it here...I was a young IT professional working for a company in downtown Houston; circa 1998. I was sitting in the break room, circa 2000, reading this thing called a newspaper...some of you may remember what those were. The headline article was that Vermont had just passed gay marriage in their state and they were the first state to do so. I just shook my head and mumbled something like, "That's a shame". A co-worker, Susan and one of our actuarial analysts (who I knew was a bark-crunching Liberal), asked, "What's a shame?" I conveyed my disapproval of the article's subject matter and she said something like, "So what's wrong with people exercising their rights?" I responded with, "This country was founded on Judeo/Christian values and principles. What is happening here is a direct contradiction of those values and a very dangerous and slippery slope to be walking. What's next, Susan? People start advocating that sex with children, say a 12-year old, is "normal"??" She had no response.

And here we are. Damn! I was 20+ years ahead of my time!

It sickens me DAILY to see that the moral fiber of this country has been destroyed at the behest of such a small MINORITY (and nothing to do with skin pigment) of this population. I am a Christian. I have accepted Jesus Christ as my Lord. Yes...I sin DAILY and I pray forgiveness for those sins. But this NATION has turned its back on God and, like Peter, denied him three times. Shoot...a GAZILLION and three times~~.

If I'm even lucky enough to get into Heaven, I'll be cleaning the sewers. By hand. But I will RELISH the day my Lord pours out his vengeance on this earth and smites the crap outta those that denied Him!! The weeping and gnashing of teeth will be GLORIOUS!!! People have asked me, "Why do you believe in this crap?" I tell them very politely, "If you're right and there is no God, I've lost NOTHING. I've lived a good life and don't regret one thing. But if I'm right, and God does indeed exist, then you are going to lose EVERYTHING and it's not going to be pleasant."

Happy Easter, everyone! May you all be BLESSED!!

/soapbox

ETA: I failed to point out my second signature tag line from Isaiah. That pretty much says it all right there about what is going on in this country. Good is being called evil, and evil is being called good. Can't get any plainer than that...

I despise media also, but I’m addicted to wanting to know what is going on, only then to wish again I never watched it. Ciuriosity killed the cat.

quote:

Originally posted by CoolRich59:
I had never heard of Vivek Ramaswamy before last Tuesday when I saw a short talk on woke capitalism he gave at Hillsdale College (link: https://youtu.be/a5gwJ382dIw). I was blown away by him.

The wife and I along with our youngest son attended the faculty round table on ESG that preceded that along with Vivek's speech at Hillsdale College. He was OK, speaks well but I think he's more sizzle than steak.

quote:

Originally posted by CoolRich59:

Thanks R0gue.

It's amazing how you've never heard of someone and then you run across them several times.

I had never heard of Vivek Ramaswamy before last Tuesday when I saw a short talk on woke capitalism he gave at Hillsdale College (link: https://youtu.be/a5gwJ382dIw). I was blown away by him.

I've seen him regularly on segments. He was in Trump's administration, I believe spokesman for the Pentagon. He wrote a book titled Woke Capitalism.

I do like that he's speaking out.

This link is via Instapundit:

Epidemic of mental illness in the young after 2010--why?

[QUOTE] “It is now widely accepted that an epidemic of mental illness began among American teens in the early 2010s. What caused it? Many commentators point to events in the USA around that time, such as a particularly horrific school shooting in 2012. But if the epidemic started in many nations at the same time, then such country-specific theories would not work. We’d need to find a global event or trend, and the 2008 Global Financial Crisis doesn’t match the timing at all, as Jean Twenge and I have shown.”

Plus: “At this point, there is only one theory we know of that can explain why the same thing happened to girls in so many countries at the same time: the rapid global movement from flip phones (where you can’t do social media) to smartphones and the phone-based childhood. The first smartphone with a front-facing camera (the iPhone 4) came out in 2010, just as teens were trading in their flip phones for smartphones in large numbers. (Few teens owned an iPhone in its first few years). Facebook bought Instagram in 2012, which gave the platform a huge boost in publicity and users. So 2012 was the first year that very large numbers of girls in the developed world were spending hours each day posting photos of themselves and scrolling through hundreds of carefully edited photos of other girls.”

What an interesting interview! ROgue thank you for posting this. Vivek Ramaswamy is someone who I have seen mentioned a few times but until now I was unfamiliar with his accomplishments and aspirations.

I really like how Vivek thinks. I’m 30 minutes in so far and enjoying the interview.

Vivek made an excellent observation on writing as a tool to help organize and better articulate viewpoints on complex subjects.

“One of the things about writing is it forces me to actually define what I think”
He then referenced a quote from his 11th grade teacher that annoyed him at the time.
“If you can’t write it down you probably don’t know what you actually think”

I also loved how his attempt at stand up comedy led him to keep a notebook at all times for joke ideas but because he didn’t have many funny jokes he wrote extensively on the Pharmaceutical industry and it’s many problems.

It’s going to take me a bit but I will be listing to the whole interview.

Vivek has some great ideas about running a different campaign. Ultra transparency and almost having a reality TV campaign for lack of a better term with a film crew to show the process and the vicious nature of American politics could hopefully bring about some change. There is also potential to build back some trust in governmental figures with genuine authenticity.

It’s a fascinating concept to ponder because it has the potential to disarm the Corporate hard left media cartel’s ability to smear and destroy all the candidates they dislike and any promising rising star. It really has potential to expose media outlets as dishonest corporate propagandists.

When Obama was elected and his remark then as to "fundamentally change America" was on TV, I knew right then we were in for a big trouble increase. I saw it coming since the 60s. And the roots are indeed before that.

^^^^
Preach it.

Just bought his book WOKE, INC. Inside Corporate America's Social Justice Scam.. It's dumbfounding how it all finally comes together.

Mao got this done without an internet.

https://twitter.com/Lily4Liber.../1635446792652222469

Thanks for the the link. I listened to the podcast, and I agree with a lot of what Vivek has to say. He has good perspective, and can speak from a position of authority based on his background.

I also just got done listening to the interview with Yeonmi Park on the Shawn Ryan Show. This young lady escaped from North Korea in 2007 when she was 13 years old, along with her mother. They were trafficked into sex slavery in China, and eventually escaped that as well and made it to South Korea and finally the US. Despite all the horrific stuff that she endured, she still considers herself lucky to have gotten out, as the alternative was death by starvation in communist North Korea.

At the beginning of the interview Ryan asked her to describe life in North Korea. A lot of the things she highlighted (punishing subsequent generations for having "privilege" because of their ancestors, a class society based on political position with no regard for merit, punishment for thoughts that deviate from the political establishment, indoctrination of school children, etc.) are exactly the same things happening in this country. We're simply at a different stage of development than Kim Jong-Un's Korea. All this race-baiting, cancel-culture, and reparations stuff is just thinly veiled totalitarian communism. It shares the same ideology...they're just calling it something different.

I've never lived in a communist country, but I moved to a country that was part of the former Soviet Bloc in 1993, so it was still in the very early stages of digging out of the mess that 40 years of communism had created. I personally knew people who had been repressed for their beliefs...interrogated by the police, limited in their educational and employment opportunities, forced to worship in secret out of fear of reprisal from the government. My language teacher and her husband fled the country in '68 during the Dubcek administration, directly before the Prague Spring. Her family faced interrogations and repercussions from the government as a result. When the government controls everything...the schools, the jobs, the housing, the healthcare...they can make your life really miserable even without shipping you off to a prison camp. All that "free" stuff isn't really free.

During that era, the United States was a vision of hope for people who wanted to be free. They risked everything to come here, because they knew that if they made it, they'd have a chance at making a life for themselves regardless of their race or background.

I have to think that we still represent that to some people, and that amongst the hoards of immigrants trying to get here there are a lot who are truly seeking opportunity and a chance to work hard and make themselves a better life. Reparations, "equity", Critical Race Theory, affirmative action...all that stuff spits in the face of those people who are trying to come here and work to be successful, just like it does to those of us who are already here. Wokeism isn't about helping minorities or the "underprivileged"...it's about undermining the very system that makes this country what it is.

Conservative candidates need to be calling this out for what it is, and coming up with real concrete solutions to combat it. I want to see an actual strategy that includes cleaning up the executive branch and legislation to curtail the handouts. IMO Trump did a VERY important thing by appointing the right justices to the USSC, and tried to make changes elsewhere, but he lost the PR battle by making emotional outbursts on twitter rather than sticking to a clear and cohesive strategy to inform the public of the issues and following through with solutions.

The next President needs to start with the stuff he can directly control in the executive branch...The Department of Education, IRS, ATF, the FBI, the Military, etc...and clean house. Set those in order, and see that it's done. At the same time, he needs to be working with congress to pass legislation to make the changes stick...all the while clearly presenting to the public what they're doing and why. The left is going to fight it at every turn, in congress, in the courts, and on the streets. They'll foment riots and unrest, and the President is going to have to have the balls to deal with that head-on and not waver on the goal. It's going to be a lot of work, and it's not going to be the type of work that will bolster an ego, or even a career, but it's important and needs to be done.