Monday 18 May 2020

Modern American History

POTUS 2009 vs POTUS 2016


There once was a man named Barack
Distinguished and sharp as a tack
With a cool, calm modus he soon became POTUS
Respect and honour was back

Eight years he was the master
Saving his land from disaster
Under Obama they took out Osama
Barack was America's Pastor.

Elected a second four years
Elated electors shed tears
He gave them health care and a future to share
Admired by all of his peers.

A third term wasn't allowed
But he and Michelle can be proud
Some people say he was like JFK
Will always stand out in a crowd.

Next the right wing prevailed
And after Barack's ship had sailed
With a shady renown they elected a clown
A man many thought should be jailed.

This guy got his dollars from Dad
His record of cheating was bad
Make America great he yelled in debate
Turning to Twitter when mad.

A new President tries to blame
The previous one - it's a game
He should say "The Buck Stops Here Today"
Blaming Obama sounds lame.

The best of the bunch always seem
To gather a strong loyal team
You don't roll the dice but take sound advice
A one man show is extreme

This guy says he knows best
The doctors, the generals, the rest
An Einstein he's not - he knows diddly squat
World leaders mock him in jest.

Of leadership skills he has none
Riling up rednecks for fun
Governs by lies pulling wool o'er your eyes
But COVID has him on the run.

When COVID numbered fifteen
It would all go away he would preen
Spouting off every day - never knew what he'd say
He had to be heard not just seen.

Black, brown and white heed the call
Republicans, Dems one and all
Your man's not just wild he's a petulant child

Send him back where he came in the fall!


#thebrewsterblock











Saturday 9 May 2020

Sure Could Use A Little Good News Today

Hats Off to Anne Murray


I was trying to think of a heading today. I had in mind all the bad news we have had, in particular since 2016, and during the Corona crisis. "Sure Could Use A Little Good News Today" came to mind. I knew it came from a song and Googled it - up came Anne Murray. I listened to it. You would almost think she wrote it in the last few months.

Listen to it and you will hear an expression of what I had in mind expressed to music - a great job well done. But I will express my thoughts anyway and won't burden you with an attempt at singing them. She is also a lot more pleasant to the eye than I am.

It has been a long time since some really good news: people rescued from in a mine or cave facing almost certain death; natural disasters wherein after days someone is found alive; a sports victory; a city or country liberated (but usually destroyed); a big lottery winner; a child prodigy; life changing surgery. Perhaps it is time for another touching chart topping musical group or artist - not mechanized, repetitive noise with a 4-5 note range masquerading as music.

Usually we hear about Trump; war; more war; floods; tornadoes & cyclones; climate change; animals moving to extinction mainly by the hand of man; pollution of the air, water, and land once again by the hand of man.

What prompted this was the media coverage of yet another black man - Ahmaud Arbery -shot to death in the good old USA by multiple white guys with guns. The black man was jogging and perish the thought, had stopped to observe a construction site. How many of us have stopped to do that, jogging or otherwise? It is a sad state of affairs when this horrific news is all there is to provide a diversion from COVID-19.

As I said in my introduction, a little good news would go a long way. A breakthrough in COVID-19 would be like Armistice Day re-lived! If we could hug and scream without masks it would be wonderful.

For a day or two.Then the bad news would return - it always does. Is there a network that features only what is clearly good news? Maybe there should be.


#thebrewsterblock


Friday 17 April 2020

Social Media the Road Rage of the Internet

Chill Out People!

I was just following a chat session about something currently making the news - Biden
naming a VP. Some things never change.

In about the 3rd chat, a couple of nameless parties started going at it. Out came the accusations and the hate - name calling that the same individuals would probably lack the guts to utter in person. That has always been the case - from early emails, to early social media sites, to Facebook, Twitter etc.

It is like so-called road rage.  People are really brave and at their worst as long as they can stay in their cars and make a getaway! If they are so tough then they should have a real user ID and let people know where they are. After all the subjects that trigger these things - usually politicians - are out there in public and take it all in stride - well OK, maybe not POTUS.


That was the beauty of hard print like newspapers. You had to pass a smell test before an editor published you. Nameless comment brings out the worst in people.

Chill out people. Say what you have to say but leave the smell and bitterness behind.


#thebrewsterblock

Saturday 11 April 2020

Are we being punished by COVID-19?


“Beam me up Scotty - Stat! ET wants to come home."

I wrote "Beam Me Up" in Feb. 2018. The idea was that ET like characters were sent to earth to report back on a grand experiment by alien forces called - Earth. This might be offensive to those who believe in the religious doctrines about the creation of human kind,  normally referenced as "The creation of MAN" which in itself shows a gender bias, common in religion. 

Pay attention to the red text near the end regarding punishment. Is COVID-19 the punishment? I said it tongue in cheek - cheeks now covered by masks! I re-post it here:

Change your ways or we will be back!


I have often thought how absolutely nonsensical we earthlings would appear to an alien – any alien. If this were a scheduled follow up visit for them, they would surely be shaking their heads in dismay.

I could fill this space entirely with references to our southern neighbour's new administration and all that goes with it. However heads are already shaking around the globe over that. Enough said. To be fair, I could do that for a lot of countries and their governments.

Imagine some of the reports back to UFO H.Q. wherever that is. Consider the following a conversation … a report card from a team of ETs about Earth.

****************

We are reporting this in one of their many languages. Our hope that they would develop and use a unilanguage failed. Sadly this is one of many disappointments we have to report.

They have really messed up that religion thing we counted on for their guidance. We left them some latitude but My God – oops, sorry. They got the “Different Gods for Different People - Just Choose One” concept but have used it to torture and butcher each other for centuries. Centuries that’s a miniscule unit of earth time. My bad. Oops again - "My bad" is modern Earthling for acknowledging an error or mistake. It was not part of the language we left them.

It appears that we might have to utilize the Devil in Hell option soon - very soon. Sadly we don’t think many have earned enough merit points to be returning with us in the near future. Even many of their self-appointed religious leaders need to spend some time down under with The Horned One for their own good. What’s that? Yes we’ll get right on it.

Imagine this! None of them think that YOU could be a female. As expected, the men pretty well dominate this place and yes, the men have totally screwed it up - another earthly expression. They have an obsession with sex and sexual expressions.

As you will recall, we chose this planet because of its abundant resources for everyone. Soon they will run out. Their water and air will be totally poisoned and undrinkable by their own doing. Their land will be unfit to live on and the wildlife is already heading towards extinction. Go figure! Damn these colloquialisms! Just testing you. I don’t know where they got that one.

Remember when we used to argue among our sexes before we agreed there were eleven? We gave them only two which they are trying to expand to six or seven. They even kill each other over it. It’s a really big topic here. What’s that? No Way you say? Repeat please. OK, I get it – now you’re pulling my leg. "Way." I forgot you know their languages better than I do.

Here is a very strange habit. Again under the guise of religion, the males and females and now some of the expanded sexes undergo this formal union called marriage. They swear before one of their “Gods” and colleagues that they will forever be true to one another sexually and then they perform any sex act they desire with every other person they can. They just have not yet grasped truth, trust, commitment, and loyalty. Even their leaders are guilty. We think perhaps sexual pleasure was a mistake. We should undo it.

You know how we compete one-on-one or many-on-many in physical activities that require a fit body, strength, endurance, and skill? We do it for fun. Here it is a career, and often you don’t even have to go to school. The players are called "athletes" and they receive incentives which are often worth hundreds of times more than those who do educate themselves for years. Really! They have also totally abused the rudimentary chemistry we bestowed upon them and have developed performance enhancing substances to gain an unfair advantage while competing. They actually think such victories are valid.

They have made good progress on basic use of electronics and now communicate around their planet with it. Unfortunately rather than use it for spreading truth and good, here it is used to entertain and too often to spread lies, evil thoughts, and for personal control over less fortunate people and all they have worked to accomplish.

Now to the equal sharing of power, leadership and wealth between the sexes. Indeed they went through many of the phases we did but it appears that we learned and they did not. Remember when we last did a study on this here?

We found that there had been several examples of very competent leaders of countries here who were female. They were tough when they had to be and defended their charges against others - usually male counterparts - but only when necessary. Some of the names I recall were Thatcher; Meir; Bhutto; Gandhi; Gillard; Merkel and several Queens. In contrast many of the most horrific eras in their history were attributable to males.

I fear that a rude awakening is needed for this civilization. Fear of annihilation by fire and rain has been ineffective. They are just not getting it the way we thought they would. We have to come up with a way to save the good - there are many of these, but destroy the selfish and wicked - there are too many of those.


There are people here with shelters large and luxurious enough to house a small city and they keep it all for their own small family. The water in their pools could keep a city from dying of thirst. They have become certifiably insane over the rudimentary form of transportation we outlined several visits ago - their cars. They hold competitions to race them. The wasted fuel consumed at these events alone could once again heat a city or plough enough fields to feed thousands. Instead it is totally wasted. These vehicles are getting even bigger.

Thankfully they are learning that use of these fuels is killing them. Progress is being made on electricity and power from their local star. It might be time to give them a small hint as to how we travelled here - for their own sake.

Upon our return we suggest a full conference of our most wise to discuss their fate. Should it be a nudge in the right direction or total destruction of the worst among them? If the latter, there will be much carnage. They even have a term for that. They call it collateral damage.

Nanu Nanu

Your daughter,


ET.


Sunday 29 March 2020

Beyond the Reach of the Human Mind

The World Within; Our World; The Great Beyond 

Let's take a moment since we now have lots of them, to put #COVID-19 into perspective. Those of you who tune out from anything that is purely academic can go back to your muffins and morning TV shows. I have no idea where this is going and no, there is no stimulant in my coffee! It is early; I just got up; and a virus is still out there ravaging humans. That is my starting point or launch pad. Amateur philosophy 101 perhaps.

There have always been attempts to categorize "things" or "existence" generally driven by our human limited powers of perception. In high school we heard the term "matter" in physics. Reaction? What is "matter"? Apparently this is anything that has "mass" and a volume that takes up space. Now ask "what is mass" and you will see a reference to "matter" at which point many tune out from physics. The definition references something that "accelerates" under the influence of "gravity". Gravity itself is something we experience here on Earth. On and on it goes. I enjoy it, especially when the moon landing verified theories of gravitational pull being less on the moon.

One can also divide things into animal, vegetable, or mineral; perhaps also animate and inanimate.

Here is another I am making up as I write! I am not a scientist:

1) The inner makeup of all that our eyes alone can not see in species and other items
2) Those things we can and do see every day including fellow humans
3) The cosmos or universe and everything in it. Some we can see and some not.

1) Some time ago at a book sale I purchased a publication called "The Human Body Close-up" by John Clancy, Firefly Books. The pictures alone are worth the purchase price. They are all taken with an electron microscope, thus being in category 1) above. What we can now see was not possible with human eyes or conventional microscopes. Here lies COVID-19.

2) In this category I mainly include ourselves and all animate and inanimate things we can sense using sight, hearing, smell, touch, and taste. We have made huge strides here with the help of technology, but we are still guessing when it comes to really understanding ourselves and our fellow beings. This is where psychology was born.

3) The universe is so vast we need telescopes and spacecraft to enhance our limited perception. There are lots of theories about what is out there including ET and his relatives and how it all came to be . We have not scratched the surface. None of us know for sure.

So let's return to 1). A single human cell and all its content uncover a whole new world. The components of a cell are amazing and the technical terms beyond my limited intelligence. You have to remember that for most the "cell" - trillions of them in our body - is defined as the smallest unit capable of performing the body's basic needs (from the above book, page 18).

Within it there are a lot more things than the "nucleus", and even more within that. The cell picture (page 19) looks more complex than a jet engine. Many items are defined and they each have a role to play in our bodies. Somehow they are programmed to fulfill it. How? They have no "brain" as we know it. They are just tiny molecules of protein and other substances but they can either sustain our life or, if they go rogue, can snuff it out. In this book as well are references to genes and chromosomes and the infamous DNA. It is  fascinating.

This virus and so many others are the types of "rogues" I mentioned. They are themselves "programmed" to destroy some of our intricate makeup, starting with our cells.

How do you develop a vaccine against such an enemy? We can't really "see" it, touch it, or get inside it. How can that microscopic little thing we picture as a sponge ball with red golf tee like structures attached, get into our cells - our own building blocks - and what drives it?

So there you go. A little inconvenience in your daily routines is not much to ask. The enemy is invisible. Scientists are facing an immense task. It took centuries to be able to identify and define a "virus". It might take as many to overpower them.

Cut some slack folks and try helping however you can. Ignoring stay at home advice falls into category 2) above - solving our own human problems. Stop being so selfish. Don't hoard and don't go out when you don't have to do so.

Just hope that when we get the huge surprise from category 3) - and we will - we can survive it as well. Will it be living; energy; collision with another heavenly body? The list goes on. Focus on 2) and leave 1) and 3) to the best brains on the planet.

Thanks if you got this far. Now ET want to go home!


#thebrewsterblock