Daily Show February 8th, 2010

Good episode on the Daily Show, a few good issues are brought up, such as the lack of rebuilding/restoring the once World Trade Center, or Twin Towers, and on a small part of the vast amount of government hypocrisy/deceit that is currently going on. This entire episode shows some ridiculous instances happening in our society today.

One of the main reasons I believe the area known as Ground Zero has not been re-established is so that it can remain a constant reminder of this "threat" always around us, all the time. Especially in a city that is as populated as New York and this location is dead in the center of it all. Seriously though, why not rebuild it, why reveal in fear and sorrow. It was a horrific moment in the history of mankind, but it shouldn't be left, dangling in our faces. Regardless of who did it, who was involved, something powerful and to some even magnificent was destroyed. Maybe you cannot replace it, but we got enough technology to put something there that can still be of use, other than a demolition mark left in the ground.

There is a clip in the episode where John Oliver is at a G.O.P. convention being held in a resort in Hawaii. It just shows that regardless of what they say (For example, "let's stop spending pointlessly" and the infamous "Save tax-payer dollar's"}, they go and spend tax-payer dollars for above and beyond luxury to discuss issues, such as fiscal spending. It seems quite, hmm, how should I put this... Idiotic, hypocritical, and tantalizing. They basically mock us, feeding us, the tax-payers, voters, etc, consistent and constant bullsh*t and it gets bought, eaten right up. Every one says the same thing, only slightly different, or maybe with more attitude (e.g. John Stewart refers to Sarah Palin as being such a person, mentioning her "Sass"), but no one acts on it accordingly. It's all talk, maybe a little walks, a few steps, but that's it. They say what ever people want to hear, the way people wanna hear it.

At the very end of the episode, at the "Moment's end" there is a news program discussing how our government regulated education system wants to begin teaching children, at the age of 10, about sex education. Not only that, but that they want to teach these children about how one can self-pleased. Personally, I really don't think kids at the age of 10 need to be concerned with things like sex or how to please yourself. In fact I find it quite disgusting that teachers and officials are even discussing this as an educational option. It's sad that things like morals are not even taught in education, as they are mentioned all throughout history, but you have people willing to teach ten year old's about sex, which is short for sexual activities, which if used unwisely can lead to disease and possibly even death, or can result in premarital pregnancies and reproduction.

http://watch.thecomedynetwork.ca/the-daily-show-with-jon-stewart/full-episodes/the-daily-show-with-jon-stewart---february-9-2010/

BANE

Movement. Footsteps. Approaching, enclosing. Each second getting closer. Hundreds, maybe thousands, stepping in sync, pacing themselves. Everything is silent but the many feet treading nearer and nearer. Then...

Iron and metal churn and grind together, echoing vibrantly from beyond, almost as if it is speaking. The ground begins to move, slightly at first, only a rumble in the distance. The footsteps are tastefully close, but are slowly being devoured by the droning, encroaching mechanisms.

A shiver crawls up the spine as the feet begin to sense the very ground below vibrate and tremble. The sensation touches every inch of the body. The footsteps are right there. The creaking planks directly outside are the only notification of certainty, as the intruding thunderous roar increasingly drowns them out. All of it slowly becoming one consuming noise.

The pit of the stomach feels as if it continuously opens as now everything around begins to shake. The darkness, no longer safe. The only thing that can be heard are the mechanics tearing through the ground. Not even the deep, accelerated breathes are noticeable. The shattering of falling plates, cups, picture frames and even entire furniture pieces are merely a harmonic frequency floating by.

Then, it all ceases. Silence. For just a moment, the machines slow, then stop, lowly rumbling, in the distance. Several of them, one directly outside. A loud mechanic crack echoes, then metal of some kind slams together, ringing violently. Voices in the distance, foreign, another language. Intruders!

The fear immediately returns as quick footsteps can be heard scattering in all different directions. Then there is yelling and banging on neighboring doors. The mechanics begin to patronizingly roar again, the ground returning to a vibrating state. The body once again completely trembling in unison.

Footsteps approach, more than one set. They are coming fast, muttering to one another. They step toward the main door, creaking planks.

They knock.

Silence.

They knock again, louder, harder.

Screaming from outside, a few gun shots. Both equally tear through the thunderous roar, deeply touching all sense of the body.

Moisture, below the eye, growing in size, finally gravity takes hold and a tear evades the attempt to maintain composure, slowly sliding down the face. For a moment, this is all that is felt or heard. Then.

The door is violently kicked open, the voices raise, yelling in their foreign language, scattering through the building. Both their intruding steps and unknown words grow louder, coming closer. They are right outside. The door creaks open, their steps are right there, stopping. The voices stop. It silent.

The eyes open revealing two large men stare down two large automatic rifles. Neither man shows any emotion nor concern for the fact that they are aiming their weapons at a seven year old boy. The boy stares back at them, unsure of how to react, the trembling the only reaction. Then, another scream from outside, the boys eyes shut. He holds himself tightly, praying that this will all be over.

The rest of the house is empty, it has been so for many days. It was a large house, but now only half of it exists. It had been blown away by recent air bombings. This child, the only survivor in the home, his entire family being awake watching television while he was asleep.

Both of the soldiers slowly lower their weapons, realizing he is alone. One of them approaches him, reaching to lift him. The boys eyes open in shock, he swats the mans hand, screams and jumps to run. The soldier steps forward, lifting the boy as he tries to fight to get away.

The soldier carries him away, the other following. The boy fighting with all his strength and effort to get away, but he just can't do it. It's no use. He can only watch on as both of the soldiers laugh to one another, mocking him.

The soldiers take him out of the house, he can't help but stare at it. Already missing it, whats left of it. He isn't aware, the soldiers walk toward several armored vehicles and hundreds of other soldiers that enter or exit homes. Other civilians, families or individuals, are being led out of their homes. Most of them at gun point.

The boys eyes remain on his house, watching himself be taken further and further from it. A tear forms in his eyes. They close once again, attempting to photograph this moment in his memory. This may be his last.

More Regulation, More Problems

Interesting interview here on the Colbert Show regarding the agriculture industry and the food, well meat to be exact, that we are consuming and how it is effecting us. Personally, one food I will rarely consume (I wish I could say never, but from time to time I do eat little bits of it) is pork, and that is a decision I made several years ago. Farmers who grow and produce Hot Dogs say they won't even eat the stuff.

For thousands of years meat consumption has been taken into consideration. It talks about it in religious texts such as the Bible, the Tora, and the Qu'ran, and even Buddhism and Hinduism warn of us the effects (they believed too much of it would weigh and slow the body down, that it was unhealthy) over consumption of meat will have.

Today, meat is excessively produced and artificially manufacture. "...We now bred these animals so radically that, the thanksgiving turkey for example, is not even capable of reproducing." We are ruining these animals and ourselves, 76 Millions Americans will get food poison each year and it is a result of animal agriculture. Swine and avian flu's are being bred on these farms, antibiotics are being made less effective. To be honest, it unsettles my stomach knowing that a pig will consume and digest anything you feed it, including a human body (minus the teeth and hair), let alone to think about the unimaginable things going on in this industry beyond trying to figure out what Hot Dogs are made of.

Agriculture is regulated by our government and it is now, today, run by corporate interests, not for the interests of the people, who are the consumers. The way this currently works is, well; we pay taxes so that farmers can maintain growing their products so that we can pay for them after the farmers sell them to a supermarket or corporate grocer chain so that we can then eat this "food" and fill our body with, what? What happened to natural, what happened to real?

Now, most of what we eat is genetically modified, scienticifally altered, unnatural, artifical materials that are somehow called food. The important things that, for example, fruits, vegetables, and all the real things that naturally grow on this earth, naturally give us the vitamins and minerals we need, are replaced by corporate interests after our government makes regulations on the entire agriculture industry.

http://watch.thecomedynetwork.ca/the-colbert-report/full-episodes/the-colbert-report---february-8-2010/#clip265006

Granting Logic, Taking Simple and Giving Real

Recently I was watching an episode of the Daily Show, in which John Stewart and a guest, surgeon and author of the novel The Checklist Manifesto, Atu Gawande, discussed the recent experiences pertaining to this book. The Checklist Manifesto gives detail on how, for example, important it is for Doctor's to have a checklist in order to reassure they have done everything possible to ensure their job has been completely correctly and safely. It is interesting, that a surgeon of all things, would come up with this idea and then write a book about it. We are talking about a simple checklist that would include, for example for doctors: Wash your hand's.

At first hearing this, one might laugh at the idea of professionals in industries needing simple checklists to perform their jobs. I almost laughed, until I heard some of the statistics. World-wide there are hundreds of thousands of deaths, during or after a surgery, that are caused simply because a doctor or surgeon failed to wash their hands. Now, that is quite scary to think of. The industry which is in place to ensure we are save and healthy is actually causing deaths, all because of something as simple as people not washing their hands. To further the statistics, this idea was put into place in 20% of the hospitals in America and they have cut one-third of deaths caused by infections. After implementing it, 80% of Doctors said they liked it and actually saw it catch errors, and then another questions was asked and 93% said they would use it during surgery.

This led me to begin thinking of other industries that maybe have a similar issue, or might be in need of a similar ideal. One place that we can actually find one of these examples is the aviation field. Aviators/Pilots use checklists to ensure everything is correctly in place and working smoothly before they decide to take off at around 500 miles per hour thousands of feet above the earth. Seems like a reasonable thing to do. Recently, Toyota released hundreds of thousands of cars world-wide that have been found with Brake problems. Brakes are one of the methods used in a car for defense and safety. We're talking about one of the worlds leading car manufacturer's releasing millions (billions of dollars [in sales] worth) of their products, and they are an endangerment to our lives. Somewhere along the line, some people messed up their job by allowing something as visible as sticky Brake's and misplaced floor pads (which entraps the gas pedal) to be completed and then sold to someone to use. I am pretty sure there is a job for this sort of thing, I believe it is called Quality Assurance/Inspector.

So why not include this in other fields, ensure every job is being done safely and properly. Well, my only answer to that is that in this current era, we all think we know more than we do. Everything is taken for granted; our professions, our education, and our actions. One of the reasons checklists are needed is because, regardless of the training and expertise one might have, what we have today are some extremely complex and advanced instruments that we must use, and practices that we must perform. Another reason such a list could exist is that, well, regardless of what we know and do, we are human, we make mistakes. Why not have something simply remind us of our tasks, take a minute or two to ensure what we are doing is correct. Thomas Edison tried over a hundred times to make the first light bulb ever work, when asked about his failures, he simply responded, "I found a hundred ways not to make a light bulb work, and one way that it does work." In the past, we had a lot less than what we do today, technology has advanced, therefore our tasks have advanced. So, why not ensure we are always aware what we are doing, why not put care and effort into our actions so that we do the best that we can do. Because we fail to do so, people are put into danger and even die. A life is a life and if it is at risk, then something is not right. Logically and simply put, we need to take better care of ourselves and what we do so that we can not only protect ourselves and those we love, but everyone around us.

This is an interview for the daily show

http://watch.thecomedynetwork.ca/the-colbert-report/full-episodes/#clip262231

This is a link to view how millions of US Toyota vehicles are currently endangering American's lives.

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5gUwo_KWSGcrkE9LmIQ8NsxYKMIAwD9DP1MT84

Here's Colbert talking about this situation - http://watch.thecomedynetwork.ca/the-colbert-report/full-episodes/the-colbert-report---february-8-2010/

Some books can be judged by the cover?

Watch this video, I find it intriguing that this man, without knowing who the man in the photo is, refers to him as being a "Crook." After all, it is what he is.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_imdzRsfLvQ&NR=1

Hardest Thing In Life

Life, as we know it, is not that easy. In some ways, it can be simple, but in most cases it is complicated. The hardest thing in life is to be a good person. It can be a simple task to accomplish, but it requires many things: Determination, motivation, ambition, honesty, honor, respect, dignity, patience, to name a few. Being a bad person, an ignorant a**hole, is probably the easiest thing in the world for any single person to do. Many people are struggling, regardless of what type of person they are attempting to be. In fact, many people attempt to be someone that they are not, and really, that is easy because you just don't have to be yourself. Some people take it to the extreme and actually impersonate others, but many people just don't show others who they truly are. After all, ignorance is bliss.

It is easy for someone to be a "bad" person because, for example, when you are selfish, all you think about is you, and that is an easy thing to think about. It is easier to give in to insecurities and fears than it is to face them and prove to yourself (because that is all that matters [and I don't consider that being selfish, because all your doing is proving to yourself your not weak]) that your determined to get beyond those simple negatives and push for the positives. When your a "bad" person you conform, because conforming is a part of not being you; your too lazy to make your own decisions so you choose to do what "everyone else" is doing.

On the other hand, when you try to be a good person, you actually have to think things through, care about how you affect others, care about how you feel about yourself. Effort has to be made into how you view yourself, because really, that is what it all comes down to. It's as simple as this: You are what you think you are. Most people choose not to control their minds, and that is the most important part, what you think about. Everything that you are, you do, and you feel, is that way, because of how you perceive everything around you, including you, to be. Negatively or Positively, it is thought of in your mind. There are many negative influences surrounding people, so that is definitely an aspect that stutters the progression of being a good person. More importantly though, it is everyone's individual decision, all the time, to be who and what they are. What we think we are is what we will become. If we think we are nothing, we will become nothing.

I try to be a good person, but it is hard. And when I talk about being a good person, I take into consideration morals, and on many different levels. Immoral aspects are major distractions and cause infliction when trying to be a good person. Other negative people become negative influences towards us. My grandmother once told me, "Surround yourself with good people with ambition and who want to succeed. Don't pick friends who are losers. You will become what you surround yourself with." Who we choose to associate with definitely plays into how we want to be in our lives. But it all stems from the mind, and the mind is a hard thing to control. It wanders, it escapes, it shuts right down and sometimes it seems like we don't even know how to use it. The truth is, we have full control of it, all the time, we just have to realize it, understand it, and act on it. It's simple, it's logical, but its definitely hard to do. Doesn't mean it's not possible, it is available.