Are politicians seriously not paying attention at all?

Are politicians just not paying attention at all? Look at Giuliani and his legal troubles and see how virtually every person he knows has turned their back on him to the point he is literally begging for donations via a defense fund. The intelligencer has a great article currently about his issues by the way that’s well worth the read. You could also look to the original who flipped, Michael Cohen, or the more recent revelation that Bill Barr More is apparently cooperating with the 1/6 Panel, but the list goes on and on and is getting longer daily. These people have basically become pariahs within what used to be their close circle including Trump. So, what I can’t for the life of me understand is why every republican, save Kinzinger and Cheney, from national to state and even local still are backing the Alt-right Line of BS and Q crap. They know it’s BS, they know there being obstructionist and not doing a damn thing for the country but continue to put party over all else no matter how insane it is.

I don’t care what the polls say, there all so biased these days it’s crazy. Most are done via websites and social media, not very unbiased but more on that another time. As well 75% of articles people are writing are much the same., writers just regurgitate whatever group is screaming the loudest. I’ll tell you how I get info many times. I’m that lone liberal sort of guy who works in construction, so I’m around some strong right leaning folks. While I won’t say any have admitted having hopped the fence, I can tell you many have admitted Trump was a joke and a liar and they got railroaded. They are just like anyone else, just want to provide for their family, be safe in their homes, and hope that eventually their kids will be better off than them. The stuff most argue over is personal issues and trivial on a how their lives are affected on a day-to-day basis. Their also just as fed up with the gridlock. When nothing gets done it doesn’t help anyone! Hell, they can’t even vote to agree that they will talk about something much less get to a point to vote on anything.

When will politicians start realizing that continuing on the take no prisoners mentality is nothing but a ticket down the drain to obscurity. If you think, as examples, Sinema, McCarthy, Manchin, Gohmert, or the Jim Jordans of current politics are going to be relevant a couple of years from now or even be elected to anything ever again, you need to take some serious “ME” time and think where your headed!

Short edit to add an article that came out today exemplifying what I am talking about. Ms. Sinema has a problem.     Democratic donors plot primary challenge against Kyrsten Sinema (cnbc.com)

The End Game .....

 

I recently asked on my twitter feed  “what was the end game of the failed republican Coup? What was the “End Game”?” The few responses I got were centered on Trump trying to set himself up as a dictator, get rid of elections and become partners with Russia more than our current allies. I did like one persons comment that it was sort of like a dog chasing a car and that they never thought ahead as to what to do if they “caught the car”. Have no doubt, they had a plan!

So, to pull all this together, here is my thoughts. I do not believe DJT, or for that matter the majority of the politicians’ supporting him, from Washington down to state and local level don’t have any clue about what the attempted Coup, and it was an attempted coup to overthrow our government was really about. First, understand this was much more than a riot or an “insurrection”. To be totally honest, 99% of the politicians including DJT were nothing more than patsy’s, figureheads, being completely manipulated by the true powers that are already controlling the bulk of everything you see, hear, and purchase every day.

Think about the following information. The top 100 US Companies by Revenue generates Approximately 6.8 trillion Dollars in market revenue. The total Disposable income in the USA  is 15.74 Trillion. The top 40% of wages go to the top 10% of wage earners so your average Joe and Jane basically control roughly 9.45 Trillion. Based on this, 75% of every dollar the average person spends goes to the top 100 companies in the country. Generally speaking, of course.

This shows we have 100 companies controlling the bulk of everything and each one has a CEO, and board who have a MAJOR vested interest on ensuring the country from National Politics down to state and local, remain firmly in the hands of Republicans. People who will always be much more willing to hand out Tax Cuts to the wealthy, think trickle-down economics, provide tax breaks for companies building factories and headquarters, as well as making sure regulations remain as lax as they can get away with it. They could care less “who” is in office as long as they are bought and paid for and controlled by them.

Who are these people? They are people like the obvious ones you have heard about, Koch Brothers, companies like Boeing, HP, Schwab, and others but there are also people you never hear about unless you’re a “digger”. Bear in mind articles such as I linked here, report on the obvious but sometimes you don’t truly see how much they also donate in Dark Money thru PAC’s that have little reporting requirements. A great example being Robert Mercer who gave 15 mil on the condition DJT hire Steve Bannon and Cambridge Analytica. He also gave 10 mil to Breitbart making it into the Alt-Right “News” outlets it is today. His wife is the primary financier for the Parler Social Media Platform. Of course, there is always the Rupert Murdoch/Roy Cohn connection. First it was Reagan and then Trump. You could track back dollars to pretty much every one of the companies listed and the heads of them as having done major donations to RNC candidates.

On top of these people, you have the “Associations”, the most well-known being the NRA. They spent upwards of 30 million on DJT’s campaign. Why? Because they are supporting their members? Hell No, the majority don’t even truly support what they are doing. So why, simple, the Firearms and ammo business is a 64-billion-dollar industry and those handful of companies such as Remington is their “real” members/Clients. There are tons of these, many are controlled by the same people running those companies. Think oil and Gas, Coal, Farming, they all give heavily to Republicans and most if done via Dark Money Pac Type donations.

This is why I often refer to the USA as having turned into an Oligarchy type government which historically leads straight into Fascism Ala Mussolini and the start of Hitler coming to power. First establish a limited number of people who control industry, food, and media then the same or even fewer take control of government but always in the background.

So back to the original question, what would have happened had they actually pulled off the coup? I don’t think most politicians even understand. There was a lot of backroom dealing going on. We will never know more than maybe 25% of it. People that rich and controlling do not allow themselves to be brought out into the light, there is a reason people call them Vampires! We would have wound up very quickly, and this is TOTALLY my opinion, having some major catastrophe, or several, and many people through catastrophes or “old age and bad health” would have “died” and been replaced with hand selected replacements, possibly for life. During one of those events, it would lead to abandoning normal law and be replaced with a full and formal Oligarchy/Fascist style government. What is truly sad is the loud minority would be 200% on board with it because they don’t know any better and just like now, think it is being done to “help and protect” them. That was the true end game, and most politicians, let alone citizens, don’t even have a clue. Some of those who think they would part of the new regime think they were to be part of the new regime, sorry Kevin, sorry Ted, sorry Lindsey, you were most likely slated to die in the first catastrophe.

What caused it, Fox, Trump or Facebook?

 

I came across a Twitter question recently asking, “which is worse and created the current political atmosphere?”  a. Fox News  b.  Trump  c. Facebook

You must immediately strike Trump as he is the “result” not the cause.

While FB operates on two levels, a connection to family, friends, and old High School cohorts but also the dark side which is a venue for the Republican right to post misleading and in a huge percentage of cases flat out false information regarding all sorts of information.

The acceptance by Mark Zuckerberg to allow it and do nothing about for so long, allowed the right to anchor their position to the point that it’s virtually impossible get the toothpaste back in the tube as they say. While Twitter, Snap, and Instagram as opposite examples took a position that they were going to try and monitor and delete posts that were spreading false information. Evan Spiegel the CEO of Snap went so far as to state, “We simply cannot promote accounts in America that are linked to people who incite racial violence, whether they do so on or off our platform”. Meanwhile, Mark Zuckerberg’s view as he put it himself was that he was not the arbiter of free speech. In meetings not only with staff, but also with Trump, going so far as to state that his decision was “supported by the social networks policies”.  While he has since done some tweaking of things, not much has changed, Facebook remains one step short of Parler, Reddit and 4-chan where politics are concerned. Remember, Facebook began in 2003 as a college platform and didn’t open itself to everyone until 2006. It only became a platform for the Republican right in 2016, ten years later, basically to leverage small dollars compared to television or radio to reach a wide audience of people who felt disenfranchised in one way or another and to play on those feelings. As a FB employee put it Facebook speaks to "an incredibly strong, primitive emotion" by touching on such topics as "nation, protection, the other, anger, fear."  If you have ever watched him in a hearing, he is the epitome of the title of this blog, he is no doubt the most obtuse person I have ever witnessed speak. Honestly, I don’t think cares about politics one way or another, what he cares about is money and his alliance will be with whoever allows him to make the most.

So, based on the question, that leaves us with only one choice left, Fox News. A little history. Fox News was created in 1996 by Ruppert Murdoch and Roger Ailes. While it wasn’t created until then it was conceived by Roger Ailes and other aides during the Nixon administration. As Ailes stated in a memo, "People are lazy," he explained in a memo. "With television you just sit — watch — listen. The thinking is done for you." As he stated, he and his supporters needed "our own news" from a network that would lead "a brutal, vicious attack on the opposition." In other words, a network outside of the fairness doctrine where he could spread any lie and falsehood he wanted that helped get “our” people elected to office. Because of the Watergate scandal, nothing happened at that time. When Clinton beat Bush in his run for a second term, the Republicans saw that they needed a way to feed their information to the voters in a way that would rile them up and get them out to vote.  After meeting with Murdoch, or his money you could say, the scam was on. Being a cable network, the fairness doctrine did not apply as Reagan had abolished it in 1987 although as a cable network, it would not have applied anyway, and they could basically do and say anything they wanted. Using “hot button issues”, Abortion, always #1, LGBT Rights, voter fraud, and of course now with BLM, ANTIFA and such. They throw out the lies, or at best, stretched truths, and then the Facebooks and other Social Media Sites as well as the Trumps and other Politicians, they all run with it.

At the end of the day, based on the choices, Fox wins this contest hands down. That said, it runs much deeper and there is much more to the story going back to many things done during Nixon and before from the real purpose of the Chamber of Commerce, The Gingrich Contract on America, and how the Republicans learned the lessons of unifying behind a cohesive message and more. But that’s for another day ….. Be safe, Pay attention and always, question it all.

Let’s make a resolution to not work so hard in 2016 and goof off more!

Happy new year to all! Were back from all the breaks and vacations and it’s time to kick off a great and exciting New Year. I won’t go in to making resolutions or any of that. We all have them, and most of us probably if were honest, break them by the first quarter, if not weeks, anyway.  As I took my annual break that I do every year between Christmas and New Year’s though, I did take some time to think about things for the upcoming year and thought back to events from the past year.

Business was great, we celebrated our second year of business, and we successfully completed and turned over our first major project, Springhill Suites in Lewisville Texas, and we began some great new projects that we will finish this year. Of course, we had some hurdles, we struggled through some things, naturally, but we had our moments of great successes also which is about all you can ask for.  I am really excited about next year now that we have gotten our feet firmly planted, processes working smoother and were looking forward to continued growth and tightening up of things as always to continue in our goal of always being better, faster, stronger.

So, the big thing I am going to do this year as the title says is not work so much and so hard! Seriously, the one thing we all talk about not having enough of is ….  time. What we all regret I think, especially as we get older and begin looking back, is not spending enough time with those we care most about, our kids, spouses, parents, extended family, and friends. Our companies, our careers, and day to day duties are important, we all know that, but is it truly more important than those we care about? We always say no it isn’t, but what do we do about it?

Recently I have had my 84-year-old Dad staying with us and hopefully will for a while longer. While he has some medical issues tracking back to his years and years in the Military, he does fairly well most of the time. It has been a little bit of a change in the normal routine but nothing too major. I know he hates feeling like he is burdening us, but you know what? I am loving every second of it. Yeah, I’ve heard the stories countless times, big deal, I still relish hearing them again and again. The big thing though is it’s made me more cognizant about leaving work on time and focusing more on family and that’s a good thing.  There are always things to do at work and always will be at the end of the day, but you know what I found out? It was all there the next day and no major catastrophes happened because I didn’t stay and do something, the world did not end, and nothing came crashing down. It’s even made me realize how much I love and care for my MUCH better half who has jumped in with both feet to help. All in all, I realized, my dad being with us makes me a better person.

So, this year, my advice to everyone, make more of an effort OUTSIDE of work. Get out and do something with those you care about. It’s like so many other things, we may have to learn to do it sometimes, and yes, that does mean making and EFFORT!  I don’t mean go out to dinner or movie type stuff either.  Get out and have an EXPEREINCE with them! Whether it’s taking Mom to her favorite Museum one afternoon, Dad to a ball game, do something with your brother or sister, build something with the kids …. REALLY INTERACT. These are what true memories are made of.

So, in 2016 my friends, what I wish for you all is that you goof off more at work and enjoy incredible exciting adventures and make memories that last you and those you care about a lifetime!

Let's get it cranked up!

    If your one of those people that pick up on small details you will notice I created this last year, just one more of those things that fell to the bottom of the list and never got done. So, let's get started with a few basic things. 

    My thought on creating this blog was two-fold. First, I had not been big about doing anything on Social-Media other than Linked-In for my work with writings on business, and Facebook for my personal thoughts and rants. Most of the FB people I was connected to came from when we were getting ready to do a High School reunion. I quickly, like many I'm sure, realized a lot were not people I had much in common with, didn't in High School and still don't. Otherwise, it was mainly family and close friends. It got a bit overwhelming during the elections and even after clearing out most of the people I was connected to, finally I just gave it up for about 6 months. When I returned, I made a commitment to myself that I would just keep it light and not get into big rants and fights, instead, I took all that to twitter! I love twitter but get frustrated with the limit of 280 characters at times. 

    So here we are, the big reason for the blog is so when I have something I want to expound on I have a place to do more in depth writing. What will be here? It won't all be ranting and raving and screaming about whatever our idiot politicians, on both sides of the aisle by the way, or people in general have done or said to get me rolling but will also have some inspirational and motivating things along the way, such as my first "real" post below about the new year. 

    This was a post I did on LI back in 2016 and frankly, I find it even more applicable today as we need to focus on family and those close to us more than ever what with Covid and almost 3,000 people dying from it daily. Sadly, we lost my dad, mentioned in the article, to Covid this past October at 92 years old. 

Why the name?

obtuse

 adjective

ob·​tuse | \ äb-ˈtüs  , əb-, -ˈtyüs 

 

1.)  formal: stupid or unintelligent : not able to think clearly or to understand what is obvious or simple

2.)   Someone who is obtuse has difficulty understanding things, or makes no effort to understand them

When I mentioned to some friends about doing this, because for a talker like me 280 characters on twitter is just not enough at times, I tossed this name out and several were … “HUH” ? 

Obtuse is a favorite word of mine as I find it describes so many people out there, frankly, on both sides of the aisle. Too often, many people just flat out don’t want to admit when they are wrong as opposed to opening their minds and accepting the facts that are laid out in front of them or are easily and readily available. No, they would rather spout and repeat things knowing they are bullshit. Honestly, I am not sure why, trying to save face? Sorry, you’re not, you’re just making yourself look stupid. 

So, end of the day, I found it fitting!