There are a plethora of conspiracy theories floating around regarding Neil Armstrong’s lunar landing and subsequent moon walk in order to disprove the United States’ claim to dominance during the Cold War. Some of the theories of these conspiracy creating hippies make some sense while other theories were derived from Dumb and Dumber. But regardless of the theory, the concept is about as wet as dry ice.
First of all, they say that if you speed up the moon walk video, it looks like an average person running. I happen to work with a guy that works in slow motion, and he looks more like a fart in a whirlwind than a moon walker.
They say that the dune formations from the moon video match with the dune formations somewhere in Nevada. If any of you have ever been around sand dunes, you’ll know that they move around more than a toddler.
They say that the United States made it up so that it could one up the socialists, who had dominated the capitalists up to that point. Good point, but our hockey team still beat theirs. Our amateurs are better than their pros.
They say that the video of the flag in space is flawed because the flag has the appearance that it is waving in a wind free environment. Gravity provides a downward force on the flag. The absence of gravity means the flag floats. Floating flag looks like wavy flag.
Aside from all the components of this conspiracy theory, the main reason I have a hard time believing that we never walked on the moon is the same reason Benjamin Franklin would give. Ben once said that three people can keep a secret, if two of them are dead.
How many people would have to be in on a secret like this and keep silent about it? First there are the actors. Then there are the stunt doubles, extras, cinematographer, his assistants, and the list goes on.
They ask why we haven’t been back to the moon. I’ve only been to Niagara Falls once, and I never went back. Same thing, right?
Actually, Apollo 13 was headed there, and Tom Hanks showed us what happened with that trip. NASA has been granted billions of dollars to send another craft in that direction, but it looks as though they may not need as much money because, of all things, competition. Commercial passenger flights to the moon could be happening as soon as 2012, which means NASA has competition, the same thing it had during the Cold War.
It’s funny to think that the source of motivation for the socialists during the Cold War was competition. Can’t we all just share the thrill of victory?
Next weeks' topic: Bankruptcy
Friday, July 24, 2009
Friday, July 17, 2009
I Control My Guns
One of my favorite lines from a movie comes when a potential juror is asked how he felt about gun control. His response, “The same way I feel about birth control, it don’t work.”
Gun control has been a hot topic for several years. Extremists on both sides are willing to push their ideology, hoping that the other extremists would listen, yet they never seem to listen to themselves.
As a gun owner, I think the whole issue is pure indulgence of passion, unnecessary if they understood what they were arguing about.
From the perspective of the gun zealot, they’re argument is that the gun is used as a means of protecting themselves. They think that carrying a concealed weapon is enough to deter the pocket pickers. These are the people that have lifetime National Rifle Association memberships along with NRA as well as “Guns don’t kill people, people kill people” bumper stickers on their 1973 Chevy pickup. These are the people who have gun safes larger than their single wides.
These are the people that complain that there is too much red tape involved with purchasing a firearm. These are the people that buy guns for their first grader, just in case.
I don’t know about you, but it seems to me that every time I get held at gunpoint, I never seem to have a gun that would intimidate the aggressor. Oh wait, I’ve never been held up at gunpoint. Same would be true for about 99% of the population. The point is, why carry a concealed weapon when the chances are that you will never use it?
And if were held at gunpoint, what did you do to piss someone off? Did you flaunt your money? Flash the wrong gang sign?
Second, if I were to carry a concealed weapon, and I were held up at gunpoint, I think the conversation would go a little like this:
“Don’t move or I’ll shoot.”
“Wait a second, that’s not fair, you snuck up on me.”
“Hand me your wallet!”
“Could you give me a second while I unbutton my shirt so that I can get to my gun?”
In browsing different forums, I noticed several people asking for advice on which model of .22 handgun is the best to carry. If I have to defend myself and all I have is a little Ruger, I’m giving up. I’d be better off with a rubber band gun.
And then there is the ever controversial AR-15, a beautiful gun that could put a smile on any man’s face when he’s holding it, even Al Gore. Have you ever looked into the price of owning and practicing such a piece of art? Ammo for the thing is almost $2 a round. I don’t know about you, but I don’t think $2 is worth wasting on killing someone.
My conclusion is that the people who carry heat, and are avid advocates of such activities are the people that like to get into fights. They are the ones that antagonize other groups. If they weren’t, what are they afraid of? The boogeyman?
On the other hand, anti-gun activists sound just as ridiculous. Farmers can’t dig without a shovel, women can’t buy without money, and criminals can’t shoot without a gun.
Eliminate any legal procedure of acquiring a firearm will prevent any criminal from participating in illegal activities. Great thinking there. Posting speed limit signs have always dissuaded me from speeding just a couple miles over the speed limit.
I suppose Caesar had wished he had prohibited knives too. Then Brutus would have no way of assassinating the Roman ruler. He couldn’t use a candlestick, lead pipe, or rope in the ball room.
The solution is simple in my eyes. Enforcement of the death penalty will prevent anyone from illegal activity. It’s too easy today. Shoot someone, plea insanity. Ten years later, your a free man.
I say death penalty for murder. Death penalty for rape. Death penalty for drug trafficking. Death penalty for stealing, embezzling, looting, tax evasion, or any form of felony. If you want to prevent criminal activity, establish stiff punishments, and execute.
Friday, July 10, 2009
For the unemployed, underemployed, underpayed, .....
The unemployment numbers that came out last week created a buzz that even a bee would tire of. The entire focus was on the 9.5% of American workers that have no work. No one talks about the 14% that are underemployed, or the average workweek that has dropped to 33 hours from 36 just a year earlier. I guess the optimist would say that you would be getting overtime in Europe.
There’s a few pieces of advice I could give to those who are unemployed and underemployed. First of all, don’t suck at work. As a typical blue-collar worker, I know which of my fellow employees would be first to go. These future statistics have one thing in common, they don’t work. They just stand around, talk, drink, eat, and surf the internet.
Second, don’t be too lazy to find another job. You know that trailer park about 4 blocks from where you live? Every one of those illegal immigrants have a job. You know that because if they didn’t, they would migrate to Canada. What is it that they are doing? Oh yeah, they work. What got you collecting unemployment? That’s right, you were being paid to talk, text, and watch the Office while you should have been selling paper.
What is it that is preventing you from working on a farm? No internet? I understand that those strawberries get pretty heavy, but breaking a sweat won’t damage your skin to the extent that Mary Kay couldn’t fix it.
My third piece of advice is to get creative. How many of you have been unemployed for more than six months? A year? What do you do during your 24 hours of daily down time, sitting around, texting, drinking and eating, watching The Price is Right? There’s something better to do than watching your soaps. Creativity is what got Bill Gates rich. Creativity is what got Warren Buffet rich.
And speaking of Warren Buffet, the guy seems to have an endless supply of money making ideas. He auctioned on Ebay the opportunity to eat lunch with him. $1.8 million later, some Canadian with a job has a lunch date with the world’s richest man.
Perhaps you could auction off time with yourself. Lunch, dinner, bed, there has to be something. Your life can’t be that pitiful, can it? I guess that’s why you are unemployed.
Kyle MacDonald’s creativity basically got him a free house. He started out with a single red paper clip and through a series of trades, eventually landed himself in a house in Canada. The house looks crappy, but it’s better than the single wide that you are currently sporting.
One of the most creative ideas came from the man who created the NASDAQ. Bernie Madoff created $65 billion dollars out of nowhere. His ponzi scheme that stole billions of dollars from investors landed him in jail for 150 years. He’s serving one year for every $430 million he stole. How many of you would be willing to serve for one year for that much money. Then do it.
There’s another person I know that just gets free stuff ad resells it. He recently sold a couch that was given to him for $50. That couch was replaced by another couch that was given to him.
That principle reminds me of the stock market. Buy something cheap, sell it for more expensive, make a few dollars.
My final piece of advice is to quit blaming everyone else. Potential employers don’t want to hear about how you were screwed by the guy that occupied the cubicle next to yours. They aren’t going to want to hear about how you were just a victim of the poor economy. They don’t want to hear that you sat on your recliner for the past 15 months while collecting unemployment.
For those who have jobs, keep in mind that the only thing that is keeping you from becoming another statistic is that there may be someone else that sucks at working more than you, and if there isn’t, keep in mind that you are simply hurting the economy by not contributing to the GDP.
There’s a few pieces of advice I could give to those who are unemployed and underemployed. First of all, don’t suck at work. As a typical blue-collar worker, I know which of my fellow employees would be first to go. These future statistics have one thing in common, they don’t work. They just stand around, talk, drink, eat, and surf the internet.
Second, don’t be too lazy to find another job. You know that trailer park about 4 blocks from where you live? Every one of those illegal immigrants have a job. You know that because if they didn’t, they would migrate to Canada. What is it that they are doing? Oh yeah, they work. What got you collecting unemployment? That’s right, you were being paid to talk, text, and watch the Office while you should have been selling paper.
What is it that is preventing you from working on a farm? No internet? I understand that those strawberries get pretty heavy, but breaking a sweat won’t damage your skin to the extent that Mary Kay couldn’t fix it.
My third piece of advice is to get creative. How many of you have been unemployed for more than six months? A year? What do you do during your 24 hours of daily down time, sitting around, texting, drinking and eating, watching The Price is Right? There’s something better to do than watching your soaps. Creativity is what got Bill Gates rich. Creativity is what got Warren Buffet rich.
And speaking of Warren Buffet, the guy seems to have an endless supply of money making ideas. He auctioned on Ebay the opportunity to eat lunch with him. $1.8 million later, some Canadian with a job has a lunch date with the world’s richest man.
Perhaps you could auction off time with yourself. Lunch, dinner, bed, there has to be something. Your life can’t be that pitiful, can it? I guess that’s why you are unemployed.
Kyle MacDonald’s creativity basically got him a free house. He started out with a single red paper clip and through a series of trades, eventually landed himself in a house in Canada. The house looks crappy, but it’s better than the single wide that you are currently sporting.
One of the most creative ideas came from the man who created the NASDAQ. Bernie Madoff created $65 billion dollars out of nowhere. His ponzi scheme that stole billions of dollars from investors landed him in jail for 150 years. He’s serving one year for every $430 million he stole. How many of you would be willing to serve for one year for that much money. Then do it.
There’s another person I know that just gets free stuff ad resells it. He recently sold a couch that was given to him for $50. That couch was replaced by another couch that was given to him.
That principle reminds me of the stock market. Buy something cheap, sell it for more expensive, make a few dollars.
My final piece of advice is to quit blaming everyone else. Potential employers don’t want to hear about how you were screwed by the guy that occupied the cubicle next to yours. They aren’t going to want to hear about how you were just a victim of the poor economy. They don’t want to hear that you sat on your recliner for the past 15 months while collecting unemployment.
For those who have jobs, keep in mind that the only thing that is keeping you from becoming another statistic is that there may be someone else that sucks at working more than you, and if there isn’t, keep in mind that you are simply hurting the economy by not contributing to the GDP.
Sunday, July 5, 2009
Independence Music
This great weekend has been filled with the aroma of barbeques and fireworks. The sound waves have been filled with the overplaying of pathetic renditions of patriotic music, which led me to do a little research on this music.
First of all, our national anthem has really caught my attention. Our original national anthem was “My Country, ‘tis of Thee”. The lyrics represented the new nation, but the national anthem of the independent country was dependent on the melody of the national anthem of the oppressor.
During the War of 1812, Francis Scott Key, a POW, witnessed an attack on Baltimore that inspired his poem “Defense of Fort McHenry”, which would later become the lyrics for “The Star-Spangled Banner”. “The Star-Spangled Banner” would later become the official national anthem of the United States in 1916, almost 150 years after its so-called independence from England.
The irony of all this is mind numbing. The lyrics had nothing to do with the war for independence, so it makes sense why this song would be associated with Independence Day. The lyrics came from a war that the United States ultimately conceded. That brings out the pride in American patriotism. The tune for this song came from, of all countries, Britain, but the best part of it was that it was a British drinking song.
What better way is there to represent the United States? Singing the lyrics of a lost war to a pub song. That’s called drinking your sorrows away.
The Independence Day tune that raised the first red flag for me came while I was watching a commercial on Discovery Channel. The advertisement for the Greatest Catch featured a crab from several camera angles to the tune of “The Battle Hymn of the Republic”.
My initial thought was that the song was a Civil War song, more specifically, the anthem of the abolitionists. Separated by almost a century, the Revolutionary War and the Civil War represented two completely different purposes. The Revolutionary War was to separate the United States, the Civil War was to keep it together. I suppose you could argue that they were both civil wars. The suppressed just happened to win the first one.
If they were both civil wars, then it would make sense to play civil war music on Civil War of 1776 with Favorable Results Day. When is the last time you heard “Dixie” played on Civil War Day though? I guess that effectively eliminates the Civil War Day theory.
If I were to pick a song that would make the most sense for July 4th, it would be “America the Beautiful”. It has nothing to do with 1776. It has nothing to do with war. It doesn’t even have anything to do with independence. It was however, first published as a poem on July 4th, 1895. Entitled Pikes Peak, the poem was set to music in 1910.
The lyrics support the title perfectly. The song talks about The beauty that is found in the United States. That was more than 100 years ago though. George Carlin described America like this:
Oh beautiful, for smoggy skies, insecticided grain
For strip-mined mountain's majesty above the asphalt plain.
America, America, man sheds his waste on thee
And hides the pines with billboard signs, from sea to oily sea!
Next year, on July 4th, listen to the music. Don’t be surprised when you hear “O, Canada”.
First of all, our national anthem has really caught my attention. Our original national anthem was “My Country, ‘tis of Thee”. The lyrics represented the new nation, but the national anthem of the independent country was dependent on the melody of the national anthem of the oppressor.
During the War of 1812, Francis Scott Key, a POW, witnessed an attack on Baltimore that inspired his poem “Defense of Fort McHenry”, which would later become the lyrics for “The Star-Spangled Banner”. “The Star-Spangled Banner” would later become the official national anthem of the United States in 1916, almost 150 years after its so-called independence from England.
The irony of all this is mind numbing. The lyrics had nothing to do with the war for independence, so it makes sense why this song would be associated with Independence Day. The lyrics came from a war that the United States ultimately conceded. That brings out the pride in American patriotism. The tune for this song came from, of all countries, Britain, but the best part of it was that it was a British drinking song.
What better way is there to represent the United States? Singing the lyrics of a lost war to a pub song. That’s called drinking your sorrows away.
The Independence Day tune that raised the first red flag for me came while I was watching a commercial on Discovery Channel. The advertisement for the Greatest Catch featured a crab from several camera angles to the tune of “The Battle Hymn of the Republic”.
My initial thought was that the song was a Civil War song, more specifically, the anthem of the abolitionists. Separated by almost a century, the Revolutionary War and the Civil War represented two completely different purposes. The Revolutionary War was to separate the United States, the Civil War was to keep it together. I suppose you could argue that they were both civil wars. The suppressed just happened to win the first one.
If they were both civil wars, then it would make sense to play civil war music on Civil War of 1776 with Favorable Results Day. When is the last time you heard “Dixie” played on Civil War Day though? I guess that effectively eliminates the Civil War Day theory.
If I were to pick a song that would make the most sense for July 4th, it would be “America the Beautiful”. It has nothing to do with 1776. It has nothing to do with war. It doesn’t even have anything to do with independence. It was however, first published as a poem on July 4th, 1895. Entitled Pikes Peak, the poem was set to music in 1910.
The lyrics support the title perfectly. The song talks about The beauty that is found in the United States. That was more than 100 years ago though. George Carlin described America like this:
Oh beautiful, for smoggy skies, insecticided grain
For strip-mined mountain's majesty above the asphalt plain.
America, America, man sheds his waste on thee
And hides the pines with billboard signs, from sea to oily sea!
Next year, on July 4th, listen to the music. Don’t be surprised when you hear “O, Canada”.
Friday, July 3, 2009
Michael Jackson, financial genius?
Well, now that everyone has had a week to ruminate over Michael Jackson’s death, I felt that he would be a fairly appropriate topic. Instead of writing about my memories from the Super Bowl XXVII halftime show, “Billie Jean”, and the first week of this past season of American Idol, his financial situation is the topic that intrigues me.
At the time of his death, Michael Jackson was approximately $400 million in debt. That’s not a typo. His financial people said that he was spending $20-$30 million more annually than he was making. That’s called a stimulus package. Since he died at the age of 50, Michael Jackson spent about $8 million more than he made each year of his life.
The United States is about $12 trillion in debt, and it seems that we just continue to increase spending every year. I guess the theory is that the more you spend, the better you become at it. Practice makes perfect, right?
One of his first major purchases took place in 1988 when he bought the property to build his ranch. His obsession with Peter Pan eventually inspired him to transform that property into Neverland Ranch, where he often housed children and slept in bed with them because it wasn’t inappropriate behavior. Records show he spent about $17 million for the property, and then who knows how much to build everything, from ferris wheels to bumper cars.
One of Michael Jackson’s more brilliant financial moves was when he purchased the rights for the Beatles music.
He blew a ton of money on surgeries and procedures to change his appearance. Those closest to Michael say that he despised his father, so in an attempt to avoid the appearance of his father, he changed his appearance. And how many procedures did he undergo? Michael Jackson hasn’t spoken on the subject in the past couple weeks, but I’m sure the amount of money he poured into the processes were unprecedented.
While those closest to him place his father as the reason for the changes, I have an alternate theory.
Coincidence, or obsession?
Then there is the money he spent on prescription drugs to feed his habit. Not only was he spending tons of money on prescription drugs, he hired a doctor in order to have those prescriptions prescribed.
With $400 million of debt, the plan to pay it off is by selling the rights to the Beatles music, selling off his real estate, and selling off his business ventures.
Perhaps that is the example that the United States government is following. With all the debt the it has accumulated, the U.S. may opt to sell off its assets. When Napoleon was the leader of France, he sold America the Louisiana territory to finance his debt. We could sell it back to France for a couple trillion.
Then we could sell Florida back to Spain for, well with the beaches and Disney World, a couple trillion. We could sell California to Mexico since the mexicans pretty much own it already. A couple trillion would be a fair deal.
Since Michael Jackson had converted to Islam, we could sell him, his records, and his family to Iran. Oh wait, he’s dead. Dig him up!
Then we could sell our nukes to North Korea.
So with so many people concerned about the national debt, is this idea a great idea? Or is it the greatest idea?
This is the “American Dream”.
One of the more not dumb financial moves that Michael Jackson had made was the life insurance policy he left for his children that may not even be his. His three children were left about 100 unreleased tracks that were to be released sometime after his death. Sounds like a source for the financial fountain the Jackson’s are looking for.
Disclaimer: If Michael Jackson comes back in seven years like Tupac, let it be known that the Sarconomist boldly made this prediction, July 3, 2009.
Next weeks’ topic: Bernie Madoff?
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