The Zombieslayer

So I was reading in Newsweek that had the situation been reversed, if Exxon Mobil had an accident that dumped 319 million gallons of oil into the North Sea and it was washing all over England’s beaches, we’d never hear the end of it.

How true that is.  How also true about how the British people are strangely quiet and unapologetic.

BP in its cleanup is also using toxic chemicals banned by the EU.  Of course, that doesn’t matter to BP because it’s not affecting Britain.

I call things as I see them.  Often times, it offends people.

I tell people that you can’t fix an alcoholic.  That alone has lost me more than one friend.  I’m not kidding.

The whole train thing may have made me sound like a jerk.  So be it.  If you see a train track and you cross it without seeing if a train is coming, you don’t deserve to live.  Plain and simple.

Don’t over-invest in company stock.  I knew this before Enron.

People on steroids have much higher pain tolerances than people not on steroids.  I’m glad I learned this with headgear and a mouthpiece instead of on the street or else it would have been really ugly (on my end).

There are things that you simply won’t be good at no matter how much effort you make.  We’re all bad at something.  The sooner you realize that, the less time you waste.

You can’t be anything you want to be.  People who say this are not being realistic.  However, you do have natural talents.  Pick your favorite and get really good at it.  If you have two favorites, get good at both of them.

Money doesn’t necessarily buy you happiness.  But being broke will stress you out.

Capitalism isn’t fair.  However, it’s still better than the alternative.  Socialism punishes the thrifty, the focused, the creative, and the hard-working while rewarding the lazy and the people with chronic bad luck.

Some folks do have bad luck.  I feel bad for them.  Seriously, I do.  However, I don’t feel bad for people who do the same stupid shit over and over again.  Big difference.

America needs to treat her veterans better.  Heck, America needs to treat her own citizens better.  This country needs more freedom, not less.

This world already is overpopulated.  Just wait until we get into the resource wars.  The oil wars have already started.  The water wars will come in our lifetime.  And don’t tell me that we have plenty of resources and we just need to redistribute them better.  I already told you how much I hated communism.  What’s mine is mine.  It’s not yours.  And it especially doesn’t belong to someone on the other side of the world I’ll never even meet.  It’s mine.  Sound like a two-year old? Well, sometimes toddlers are wiser than adults.  Maybe when I’m done with it, I’ll let you play with it but for now it’s mine.

Speaking of oil, this is still going on.  Picture from NASA.

And speaking of stupid, if you’re this close to the field, ever think it may be a good idea to pay attention to the game? I hope this hurt. (It’s only 32 seconds long and if you got a sick sense of humor like I do, you might laugh).

…but I’ll say it anyways.  Cleaning up the gene pool.

Look.  If you get hit by a train, chances are, you’re an idiot and getting killed before you breed is the best thing that can happen to the human race.  In Spain, 12 people were killed crossing a train track on the way to a concert.  I don’t care if they’re following a crowd.  Even more reason to clean up the gene pool.  If you see everyone else doing it, it does NOT mean it’s safe.

Here’s the story.  In Spain, a high speed train hits 26 people, killing 12 of them and injuring the rest, some in critical condition.  There was a concert on the beach going on by a popular singer.

Cold? No.  You know why I don’t think that’s cold? It’s because my heart is not infinite.  I feel bad for people with bad luck, not people who make stupid decisions.  HUGE difference.

Crossing train tracks without looking is stupid.  ALWAYS assume trains are running.  You don’t fool around with trains.  Trains are bigger than you and they’re made of metal.  They go faster than you too.  If a train hits a human, the train wins.  Always.  No exceptions.  Train beats human flesh and bone.

So now what? Well, there are at least four separate investigations going on about the train.  Yes, the fucking train.  Not the fucking idiots who crossed a track while a train was going 85 mph (which for the record was under the speed limit for that area).  Chances are they’ll find fault in the train company and some poor schmo who was doing their job will be scapegoated and fired.

Then, the other complaint was not enough warning signs.  OK, that one set me off.  How many warning signs to you need? You see a train track.  Before you cross it, you look to see if there’s a train coming.  If someone fails those simple rules, their deaths are probably some of the best things that can happen for the future of the human race.

Now, if this event isn’t a nomination for a Darwin Award, what is?

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OK, now looking back at this, I like this rant as it’s so brutal.  Have I done stupid things? Sure, many times.  But this is equivalent to running across a freeway when everyone is speeding.  I don’t have sympathy.

When I went to college, we lived by the train tracks.  Every few years, some drunk moron would walk on the train tracks and get killed by the train.  Of course, the trains get blamed.  Not the drunk moron.  So they lower the train speed limits (which is bad for capitalism) and require trains to blow their horns.  Well, living by the trains, take a guess how I felt about that, especially 3 o’clock in the morning on a night before Finals.

Since this happened in Europe, the continent that gave us political correctness, I wouldn’t be surprised if this event ends up setting up yet another useless bureaucracy.  Spain is one of the PIIGS*, which in capitalistic terms is one of the countries in the EU that can’t manage their money.  The EU is currently waiting for the straw that broke the camel’s back and the whole thing crumbles down.

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PIIGS = Portugal, Italy, Ireland, Greece, and Spain.

Children who are raised in fatherless homes account for the following:

For the record, that 85% of all youths sitting in prison seems low.  I remember talking to a lot of former prisoners and they tell me one thing everyone has in common is nobody has a father.  I have seen other statistics where the figure is well over 90%, but too busy right now to dig for them.  So for now, we’ll go with the 85% figure.

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Thanks R for pretty much supplying this post

If you’re not pissed off about the spill in the Gulf, something is wrong with you.  You should be.  You should be pissed off about the people and animals who lost their lives, the environmental damage, and the long-term damage to economic livelihoods of the people that depend on that area.

The fines levied against British Petroleum aren’t enough.  Joe and Jane Taxpayer will have to cover the rest, and yes, that means if you live in the United States of America, that means YOU.

I joked about drilling our oil right off the coast of England so if we spill, we ruin THEIR beaches.  Well, I was only half-joking.  Maybe we should.  Let them pay the bill for the next spill, not us.

Two things from this which I think are very obvious:

1) We need to do something serious about our energy policy.  If this isn’t a wake up call, I don’t know what is,

2) Limit campaign contributions to $100.  Any person or corporation can donate to a campaign, but $100 tops.  That immediately limits corporate power and puts the power back in the hands of the PEOPLE, where it needs to be.

#2 fixes a heck of a lot more problems than we realize.  The people have been losing power to corporations for decades now and it’s time we got it back.

I’d love to run for Congress on that platform alone.  I’d never win, but someone needs to do it.