Life

Eh, I'm more worried about what the USA is considering regarding Syria. There are lots of reasons why I don't want a military strike in Syria but first and foremost has to do with the fact that anything that grants Bibi positive press is not good. I'm waiting for the corruption indictments (and I will celebrate when the AG announces them) and a war is going to rock that boat. That being said, Bibi isn't the most dangerous MK in this country (that award goes to Ayelet Shaked). So who knows? EDIT: As an aside, it is important to note that if any single document from the FBI's raid gets leaked to the media, Mueller can be criminally prosecuted for using the FBI to violate the 4th Amendment of a private citizen (Cohen). Mueller had BETTER have something relating to collusion with Russia or he could potentially go to jail himself.

I took a nice long break to do a lot of reading and evaluation so here's my two cents. 1) A lot of people (on all sides of the debate) seem to misunderstand the purpose of the 2nd amendment. The point of it is to say "right, the government has no right to disarm me and if the people want to create a militia, the government is going to need to crush it by force if they want to stop it". It doesn't give anyone the right to bear arms; it simply denies the government a legal way to disarm the citizenry, technology be damned. It's similar to the 1st amendment in that respect. It's not that I have the right to free speech; it's that the mandate on violence has no legal ability to silence me, no matter how heinous the words I say are. It may seem like a small word-game but it's much bigger than that. Now, just because I can bear arms doesn't mean I should do so. But it is important for people to at least understand the principle behind the 2A before piping up (and this is extended to those who are against guns altogether). 2) I spent 3 years sleeping with an M16A1 under my pillow. I've been shooting rifles since the age of 10. And I think I know why most city people (being that I grew up in a big city) don't understand why there is far more gun crime in areas that have far stricter gun laws. It's the culture. When you grow up around guns in a controlled manner (and I mean by culture, not by laws), you learn to respect the gun for what it is: a killing tool. You don't fuck about with it and you're far less likely to pull the trigger when aiming at another person (because rule number 1 is to never aim even an empty weapon at something that you're not going to shoot 100%). These are not ideas that friends of mine understand about guns... because they never grew up around weapons. And when you don't grow up around weapons, you don't learn to respect them. 3) There is no "right" or "wrong" solution here. The UK has to ban knives and restrict acid sales because those are the weapons of choice there. Israel has guns everywhere due to a mandatory draft and our violent crime rate is relatively low (if you're not in South Tel Aviv). No one answer is going to work everywhere. But I will say this: You cannot claim that the police are indiscriminately shooting blacks and that Trump is a Nazi... and then ask for them to be the only ones armed. Because if those statements were true, I'd want the black community armed to the fucking teeth as some sort of protection. Are there issues with the US police? Absolutely. But why would you claim to be victimized by the government... and then ask them to disarm you? It makes no sense. Just a few thoughts I have.

Right, I really need to vent. I wa pleased as punch with this government shutdown. I've said multiple times and I'll say it again: Government does too many things that we can simply leave to the free market. The fact that there are about 800k non-essential gov't employees in the USA makes me wonder how many there are here in Israel (and if the Ministry of Interior is anything to go on, it's far too many). But anyway, I was pleased that this gov't shutdown happened in the first place. Then reality set in. I'll even quote myself from a conversation on Facebook with a friend when I realized what was really going on.

Off today, have a gram of coke incoming with my weed already rolled and ready to go and excited for tonight's game. Shit boys, I'm going all out tonight.

I'm sorry, can you explain what not going to the playoffs at all in almost 2 decades is like? Because I can, you can't and both Hawk King and I will happily take a first round exit while you just act salty because your team self-destructed at home with a playoff shot on the line.

I fundamentally disagree with this statement, Raven. I would rather have the chance at fighting to not go in the first round than not have that chance at all. And this is what I mean when I say "spoiled". When you don't make it to that first game from the age of 8 until 26 with the last time being a painful loss at home in the wild card game, you just want to try that game again. And sure, we can lose it again. But we could win it too. And we'll never know that until we get to that game. I would rather be a perennial first round exit than not making the playoffs.

Incorrect. We win and we play NE.

You're just salty that you lost like that.

I don't care. You're spoiled by years upon years of watching the Patriots go to the playoffs. I'm not. This isn't going to happen again for another 20 years for me.

Tonight was New Year's Eve. I'm working on the cold pass and the kitchen is slammed from about 8 until about 11:30. Hard day at work but I put out a really good service. Check the score just before midnight. Bills are looking good (10-0 at that point) and Bengals are winning. This works. Finish up and check the score again. 22-3 Buffalo at the start of the 4th. Excellent but I'm expecting Baltimore to win. Surprised that Cincy is still up but there's 15 minutes to go. Chat to my dad the entire way home as he describes what's going on. Pure tragedy. Everything bad that could happen is happening and I'm really not surprised. Get home and Bills game is over. Barely get a win. 2:30 left in Baltimore. Watch Cincy win as I slowly process the fact that the monkey is off of my back. We don't need to talk about the Tragedy in Tennessee anymore. We're in the playoffs. Does it matter how? No. Does this team deserve to be there? I sure as fuck don't think so. But we're playing Jacksonville in January. We haven't played January football since I was 8 years old. And next week, we are still playing while everyone else is golfing. I don't know what to think right now.

That's a meme but it accurate represents my feelings about collectivists. It seems to me that people who don't like what I say are frustrated that I'm simply not echoing the party line of "we must only condemn Nazis because clearly everyone else is pure-hearted and good". I reject that and condemn all genocidal ideologies. If that means that I have no decency, sure. If anything, it would seem that I have more than you because I'm not apologizing for an ideology that is inherently murderous.

Yeah, the far left anarcho-communists known as Antifa who have spent the last 18 months rioting and destroying property in Berkeley, Washington DC, Seattle... Ring a bell? Also, your comment above really irked me and I just figured out why. "As a Jew..." - Don't you ever say this sentence to me again. How dare you for assuming that I should think a certain way simply because I'm a Jew. That is entirely insulting because you've essentially accused me of being a thought-traitor to my "group".

It's emotionally draining when it's done over and over for years. Especially when the mere accusation is generally enough to turn someone into a social outcast in the best case scenario. I have a quick question. Is this acceptable? I find that to be also unacceptable. I'm not going to take sides when both ideologies are cancer and I certainly won't apologize for either of them.

For the most part, I agree with this. Might differ on the finer points but this is my general opinion on where I go from this point forward.

Attack of my character is unnecessary. I haven't mentioned fault or blame. I'm simply pointing out that this sequence of events was obvious to anyone outside of the ideologies involved. Let me sum it all up for you in a nice little analogy. Me: I hate sweet things. As a result, I hate both cake and pie. You: How dare you equate both cake and pie when cake is the only bad thing here! Me: You've missed the point. Never mind that you might be wrong. I'm not equating blame. I'm simply pointing out that this was obviously going to happen. If you spend years trying to shame people for being born white, don't be surprised when they decide to band together with white identitarians and get sucked into another awful ideology. Also, this is your mess, not mine. I am not going to fight on the side of radical leftists because I dislike them just as much as I dislike Nazis. Don't tell me to pick a side because I hate both sides.

Well, no, that's actually incorrect. Like, scientifically. How about a clinical psychologist who actually teaches personality? That's just for starters but everything Demore stated is actually backed up by empirical fact. And here's a list of sources to back up every single claim.

Well, it's been a while, hasn't it, folks? I get the feeling that I predicted this shit. Right, some of my thoughts. - It's certainly a chilling feeling to see the flag of the Third Reich being casually hoisted in America. - I still think National Socialist Party of America vs. Skokie holds up. I don't like it but we need to preserve the sanctity of freedom to congregation so that it can't lawfully be used against us one day. This is something that both I and my best friend agree on (and he's a closet socialist). - All collectivists (not just the far-right) need to take a free helicopter ride. - It bothers me that people are so "surprised and shocked" that this would happen. Really? You're shocked? What, you mean you had no clue that this would be a response to the constant years of accusations that "white people are racist" and "fuck white men"? Well, congratulations. You've successfully created your own boogeyman. And now he's real. Why else would they be chanting "anti-white" as one of their cute little slogans? - Trump is a buffoon. It's not like I never thought that before but dude, just play ball with the narrative for once. All you had to say was "one side was filled with Nazis, the other with Commies and they're both cancer". Would have still left the media hopping mad no matter what but they would have been forced to admit that "yeah, there certainly were a bunch of flags with the hammer and sickle on it". But no, you attempt to go into the semantics and give the media and the hard left exactly what they wanted to hear. - Welcome to the Weimar States of America.

You're confusing "OK, I might actually be able to support this dude" with a full-throated blowjob. You probably meant Reagan, by the way. Am I never allowed to change my opinion on someone? False. I wanted Fiorina, Cruz and Rand (basically in that order). Nice try, though.

One question. If we're all here by random chance, then how do you explain The Big Bang theory? Simple physics says that every action has an equal and opposite reaction. That would also mean that every reaction would need an action before it? I don't have an answer to that question, by the way. This isn't a "gotcha" moment.

You know how many people were "Never Trump"? I was "Never Hillary". That should answer your question.

So you're a nihilist. Nothing that you do matters as opposed to everything that you do matters. Guess which idea is more terrifying. I don't see God as God as written in the Torah or Bible or Quran (or what have you). In fact, I really think we have the God idea all wrong even though God exists as a meta-truth. Imagine God as a low resolution picture of what the highest ideal is. Why is God in low resolution? Because that's the best way that we could characterize those higher ideals that we couldn't really put a finger on. I mean, let's take a very simple premise. In Genesis, God creates the Garden of Eden. A walled garden in effect. We could say that the garden is representative of nature while the walls are representative of culture (which forms walls against nature). And of course, both of these have positive and negative elements to them. But even though God is apparently all-powerful and all-knowing, there's a snake in the garden. Why a snake? And how can God create a perfect paradise that clearly isn't perfect due to the snake existing? One of the general arguments is that "God wanted to test human beings" but that assumes that God is really a bit of a sociopath and literally sees all humans as playthings. Sure, that's a valid theory to go down but since we know that these stories have the mark of man on them, let's assume that God isn't a sociopath. So God creates the Garden of Eden and there's a snake inside of it. I've already alluded to the idea that the walls represent culture which in turn has two aspects to it: Order (positive element) and Tyranny (negative element). And the same is with the garden itself: Nature (positive element) and Chaos (negative element). So what does the snake represent? Well, the snake tricks Adam and Eve into eating from the tree of knowledge. The snake is, in effect, malevolent because it is telling Adam and Eve to do something that is both dangerous and contrary to what this higher power wants them to do. We see this idea all the time in popular culture in the typical hero/adversary archetype: Harry Potter vs. Voldemort (who can both talk to snakes, by the way) really springs to mind. In fact, the best example of this would be in the second book where Harry goes underneath Hogwarts to fight the basilisk in order to save Ginny Weasley. Change the names and you have The Hobbit (Bilbo vs. Smaug) or St. George and The Dragon or Sleeping Beauty. The fundamental story is always the same. And dragons are essentially snakes with wings and legs. One thing that's really interesting about Harry Potter and Bilbo Baggins is that they're not perfectly pure characters. Harry's a bit of a rulebreaker while Bilbo is a thief. There is some level of malevolence inside of them but they know how to embrace it rather than be swallowed whole by it. Anyway, once Adam and Eve eat the apple, they realize that they're naked. Why? Well maybe the influence from the malevolence opened their eyes? We know that's the answer because it literally says "and their eyes were opened". But why are their eyes now open? What if they suddenly realized that malevolence exists and they're not safe if they can't pay attention to it? Remember, they didn't know what the punishment for eating the apple was and it could have killed them. Similar to the basilisk vs. Harry. It bites Harry and Harry almost dies. That is until he is revived by Fawkes (the phoenix). It seems to me that the revitalization is very similar to the idea of "opening your eyes". It's that revelation that not everything is as it seems and that the dragon (or snake) can kill you if you don't pay attention. So where does God fit in here? Well, if God is a low resolution depiction of a higher ideal, maybe that ideal is the ability to pay attention without having to almost die to the snake? That if we could just pay attention, we would be on top of the dominance hierarchy and not let malevolence get to the point where it can kill us. And since we are the humans in the story and not the ideal, maybe that malevolence doesn't take the physical form of a snake but exists as a snake in our own hearts. That's my two cents. And by the way, the Jesus story fits very well into this idea along with other stories like the Egyptian myth of sovereignty (which is basically the Lion King) and the old Mesopotamian story of creation. Each story constantly alludes to eyes and sight (Horus, Marduk, Jesus).

They're all terrible but that's not the point.

Honestly, I would treat it the exact same way as I treat this one. If it can't be proven and has been denied by the Sanders camp, it shouldn't be in print.

I didn't give them that title, what do you want from me? I'm just using the title that they have been given. What do you want from me? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Atheism#The_.22Four_Horsemen.22

No, they tried to pass off something entirely ridiculous as implied fact with absolutely no verification for the simple reason to smear Trump. There is a reason why NOBODY touched this dossier aside from Buzzfeed. NOBODY. Because it is almost assuredly not true because none of it can be proved in any way, shape or form. Imagine this. There is an article in your local newspaper which accuses you of the exact same thing but says "hey this isn't verifiable but we just want to let everyone know that you could have done this". You'd be pissed the fuck off and call it fake news. Or if this shit was made up about a politician who you like (say maybe Bernie Sanders as an example), you'd be calling that slander. But for Trump, it's fine to move the goalposts. That is what I call "fake news". Meanwhile, I'm actually really impressed by Trump. This would be why. In 50 years (when we're all dead), people are going to look at Trump like Conservatives today view Reagan. He is going to be a fucking folk hero.