The Consequences of Being Stupid

One of my favorite America social issues are the two big questions we make sure to file away from time to time. They are:

1 - Why did we elect Bush?

And

2 - Why did we re-elect Bush?

1 - Al Gore was like our best friend’s dad. A nice guy you didn’t want to sit in the room too long with. Also, he worked for a guy who sexed interns. George Bush didn’t sex interns, and secretly, we all commended him for being human enough to drive drunk. Or whatever he did back then. Something bad.

2 - John Kerry was a nationally decorated, highly experienced bore. He was the least charismatic candidate in the primary, and won in the last minute because Dean (Howard Dean 2004-2012 RIP) made a totally inhuman noise, which probably endangered more lives than driving drunk. George Bush however, and here’s the hook, hated gays. We’ve forgotten now, but the big issue in 2004 was gay marriage and religion. The plurality of exit polling showed that votes voting bush were doing so for ‘cultural values.’ Our lovely culture of gay-hating bible-strokers.

The idea I mean to address here is that as a nation, we are expected to share the guilt of Bush’s presidency equally. I find this to be bullshit. In the last eight years, democracy has steadily managed to prove itself a totally ineffective system when your public sphere is the size of a metaphoric 8-ball. People are openly retarded, and somewhere from 199X to 2004+ people got so retarded they voted for the ‘leader of the free world’ based on which candidate HATED GAYS MORE. I will wear a badge that says ‘Eliteier than you’ if it will bore it into your heads that you, the ill informed, the people even now voting against Obama for being black or Muslim (who cares if he was), voting for McCain at all, or slandering Carter for doing the president’s job for him made a man into president who cost us trillions and left hundreds of thousands dead.

To sum. It’s not my fault the stupid outweighed the enlightened. Bush is not my fault and I’ll accept none of the responsibility. My only hope is that this time around, you won’t just be lulled by a message of change, you’ll be shock-therapied into reading a book or making your kids do their homework so we can avoid this in the future.

I need a drink.

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The Consequences of Being Stupid

Nominal Breakthroughs: Fighting corruption

This is the first post in the “Nominal Breakthroughs” series, which will talk about news that is farcically touted as groundbreaking.

The fight against political corruption is one of the most important tasks confronting many of today’s developing countries; for instance, many leaders have stolen billions of dollars (which is worth a lot more in Africa/Asia than it is worth here) from their starving population. For this reason, the UN has spent a lot of resources in the past five years to establish the Convention Against Corruption, which establishes a set worldwide anti-corruption regulations. These regulations will allow a country to prevent this theft, criminalize the thieves, and recover lost assets.

Let’s let go of the fact that it took them five years to say that “theft is illegal, thieves are criminals, and stolen money should be recovered.” It’s more interesting to focus on this: they are expecting the leaders of a corrupt government to persecute corrupt leaders. If you were stealing money, would you really want to bring attention to the fact that money is being stolen? I do see potential benefits from such legislation… but why did it take them so much time and energy to pass such a simple regulation with no real means of enforcement? I know that it will be completely ineffective in my home country of Pakistan, but they tried to mask this by publicizing the Zambian government’s recent recovery of a measly $60 million. I wonder how much money they spent trying to make this convention a reality… will they even recover what they spent?

Since I usually get angry comments when I challenge the status quo, I decided to do a Google search for scholarly articles about the subject (which are written by people who know what they’re talking about). Click here to see the response study by the Anti-Corruption Resource Centre.

Where is the incentive for corrupt governments to follow these new regulations?

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Nominal Breakthroughs: Fighting corruption

Digital Dogtags 2: Yes, bartender, I’m 21

You can count on the Japanese to top the British GPS-based radio show that I wrote about in the first installment of “Digital Dogtags” (click here to see it).

The Tokyo-based Fujitaka Company is seeking approval for a new system which will determine a person’s age from a digital photograph.  The system approximates your age (at the moment, it’s 90% accurate; they’re working on getting it up to 100%) by comparing your face to a database of 100,000 other faces.  At this point, their plan is to use the system as an age validation tool for cigarette vending machines.  But is it unrealistic to believe that their database will eventually grow to include everybody’s face?  Here’s how I see events progressing over time:

  1. Cameras on cigarette vending machines use face recognition software to determine your age.
  2. Face recognition software gets cheaper over time, and it is eventually implemented at bars, casinos, nightclubs, and other venues that have age requirements.
  3. A feature is added to the software that allows it to match a specific person’s face to a face in their database.
  4. The software is used as an identity verification tool by testing centers, authorized-personnel-only areas, and other exclusive locations.
  5. The software gets even cheaper and it becomes widespread as a keyless-entry tool (similar to fingerprint readers, but more convenient).
  6. People start to buy the face-recognition keyless-entry system for their houses, their cars, their offices, their safe deposit boxes, and any other place that needs a key.
  7. Face recognition is now everywhere.  Soon, governments start to assemble databases containing the faces of every legal resident of their country.
  8. The face recognition cameras on everybody’s houses/cars are linked to the government database, making it impossible for a criminal to go anywhere unnoticed.
  9. The system is used to identify you wherever you go (just like they do in the book/movie Minority Report).

Like I said in the first installment of “Digital Dogtags”, I actually like the idea… I have nothing to hide and I’d love to use this system to catch criminals.  What do you think of it?  Is it a valuable tool or an infringement of privacy (or both)?

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Digital Dogtags 2: Yes, bartender, I’m 21

And the most influential Republican is…

Not Bush or McCain (not by a longshot), but Rush Limbaugh.

Recently, 235 right-leaning bloggers voted on the 25 most influential conservatives in US politics. The rankings are interesting:

#25) Mark Levin: 6 votes
#21) Hugh Hewitt: 7
#21) George Will: 7
#21) John Roberts: 7
#21) Ronald Reagan: 7
#20) Victor David Hanson: 8
#19) Antonin Scalia: 9
#18) John McCain: 10
#14) Glenn Beck: 11
#14) George W. Bush: 11
#14) Glenn Reynolds: 11
#14) Matt Drudge: 11
#13) Bill Kristol: 12
#10) Charles Krauthammer: 13
#10) Thomas Sowell: 13
#10) Laura Ingraham: 13
#9) Karl Rove: 14
#8) Jonah Goldberg: 15
#7) Bill O’Reilly: 17
#5) Newt Gingrich: 21
#5) Ann Coulter: 21
#3) Mark Steyn: 23
#3) Sean Hannity: 23
#2) Michelle Malkin: 24
#1) Rush Limbaugh: 49

A few interesting things stand out; I thought you might be interested too:

  • President Bush is #14 and Republican Presidential frontrunner John McCain is #18. So, the supposed “most powerful man in the world” is the 14th-most influential person in his own party.
  • Rush Limbaugh, who is widely considered to be a hardline right-winger whose opinions are often dismissed by policymakers, is considered by most right-leaning bloggers to be the most influential of their party.
  • There are no well-known politicians in the top 4.
  • Karl Rove, despite all of the controversy surrounding him, still comes in at #14.
  • Ronald Reagan had only 4 less votes than President Bush… did people forget that he’s dead?

I think that the most striking fact is that the President has less influence over these bloggers than 13 other conservatives. What does that say about the status of the Executive Branch today? Do we really place so much value on the opinions of a former President who hasn’t been mentally healthy since the Cold War (before the information age)? And is there any respect left for the Presidency today?

I think this might tell us something about where the US is headed in the future… what do you think?

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And the most influential Republican is…

Worst job in the world: Al-Qaeda leader

Many of my friends are young/uneducated enough so that they still work (miserably) at fast food restaurants or other low-paying unrewarding locations. But today, after reading that yet another top-ranking al Qaeda official has been arrested, I think I’ve decided what the world’s worst job is.

I’m sure that Abu Ayyub al-Masri was very proud of his prestigious position within the ranks of a right-wing religious group. But I wonder what went through his head when he found out that he was about to become the head of the organization. He knew that this meant an automatic place at the top of the FBI’s Most Wanted list, and he knew that his fate was unlikely to be much different from that of Abu Zubaydah (captured in 2002), Khalid Sheikh Muhammad (captured in 2003), Abu Faraj al-Libbi (captured in 2005), and Abu Musab al-Zarqawi (killed in 2006). I can’t imagine how depressing it must be to constantly have to look over your shoulder until, one day, you end up just being caught. We actually heard reports about his possible death about a year ago… how do you think it would feel to have people rejoicing at your death? Is he proud? Is he depressed?

He must have known what was coming to him, as did everybody around him. I wonder if, knowing what the future holds, anybody ever turns down positions like this one. Was al-Masri the top candidate or did he just get the job because some other guy didn’t want to deal with the stress? Now that he’s caught, does that mean that others will be “applying” for the job or will somebody be forced to become a de facto leader? And, most importantly, now that coalition forces have caught another top-ranking al-Qaeda leader, does this mean that the war might finally be ending?

Interestingly enough, today is also the 5th anniversary of Bush’s “Mission Accomplished” speech.

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Worst job in the world: Al-Qaeda leader

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The Consequences of Being Stupid

One of my favorite America social issues are the two big questions we make sure to file away from time to time. They are:

1 - Why did we elect Bush?

And

2 - Why did we re-elect Bush?

1 - Al Gore was like our best friend’s dad. A nice guy you didn’t want to sit in the room too long with. Also, he worked for a guy who sexed interns. George Bush didn’t sex interns, and secretly, we all commended him for being human enough to drive drunk. Or whatever he did back then. Something bad.

2 - John Kerry was a nationally decorated, highly experienced bore. He was the least charismatic candidate in the primary, and won in the last minute because Dean (Howard Dean 2004-2012 RIP) made a totally inhuman noise, which probably endangered more lives than driving drunk. George Bush however, and here’s the hook, hated gays. We’ve forgotten now, but the big issue in 2004 was gay marriage and religion. The plurality of exit polling showed that votes voting bush were doing so for ‘cultural values.’ Our lovely culture of gay-hating bible-strokers.

The idea I mean to address here is that as a nation, we are expected to share the guilt of Bush’s presidency equally. I find this to be bullshit. In the last eight years, democracy has steadily managed to prove itself a totally ineffective system when your public sphere is the size of a metaphoric 8-ball. People are openly retarded, and somewhere from 199X to 2004+ people got so retarded they voted for the ‘leader of the free world’ based on which candidate HATED GAYS MORE. I will wear a badge that says ‘Eliteier than you’ if it will bore it into your heads that you, the ill informed, the people even now voting against Obama for being black or Muslim (who cares if he was), voting for McCain at all, or slandering Carter for doing the president’s job for him made a man into president who cost us trillions and left hundreds of thousands dead.

To sum. It’s not my fault the stupid outweighed the enlightened. Bush is not my fault and I’ll accept none of the responsibility. My only hope is that this time around, you won’t just be lulled by a message of change, you’ll be shock-therapied into reading a book or making your kids do their homework so we can avoid this in the future.

I need a drink.

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Free Nepal… or Tibet… or whatever

Stephen Hadley, President Bush’s main security adviser (and the man in charge of planning his trip to China for the Olympics), apparently doesn’t know the difference between Nepal and Tibet.  I recently wrote an article about this on Rational Outrage, an excellent webzine that you should bookmark; click here to see it.

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And the most influential Republican is…

Not Bush or McCain (not by a longshot), but Rush Limbaugh.

Recently, 235 right-leaning bloggers voted on the 25 most influential conservatives in US politics. The rankings are interesting:

#25) Mark Levin: 6 votes
#21) Hugh Hewitt: 7
#21) George Will: 7
#21) John Roberts: 7
#21) Ronald Reagan: 7
#20) Victor David Hanson: 8
#19) Antonin Scalia: 9
#18) John McCain: 10
#14) Glenn Beck: 11
#14) George W. Bush: 11
#14) Glenn Reynolds: 11
#14) Matt Drudge: 11
#13) Bill Kristol: 12
#10) Charles Krauthammer: 13
#10) Thomas Sowell: 13
#10) Laura Ingraham: 13
#9) Karl Rove: 14
#8) Jonah Goldberg: 15
#7) Bill O’Reilly: 17
#5) Newt Gingrich: 21
#5) Ann Coulter: 21
#3) Mark Steyn: 23
#3) Sean Hannity: 23
#2) Michelle Malkin: 24
#1) Rush Limbaugh: 49

A few interesting things stand out; I thought you might be interested too:

  • President Bush is #14 and Republican Presidential frontrunner John McCain is #18. So, the supposed “most powerful man in the world” is the 14th-most influential person in his own party.
  • Rush Limbaugh, who is widely considered to be a hardline right-winger whose opinions are often dismissed by policymakers, is considered by most right-leaning bloggers to be the most influential of their party.
  • There are no well-known politicians in the top 4.
  • Karl Rove, despite all of the controversy surrounding him, still comes in at #14.
  • Ronald Reagan had only 4 less votes than President Bush… did people forget that he’s dead?

I think that the most striking fact is that the President has less influence over these bloggers than 13 other conservatives. What does that say about the status of the Executive Branch today? Do we really place so much value on the opinions of a former President who hasn’t been mentally healthy since the Cold War (before the information age)? And is there any respect left for the Presidency today?

I think this might tell us something about where the US is headed in the future… what do you think?

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Digital Dogtags 2: Yes, bartender, I’m 21

You can count on the Japanese to top the British GPS-based radio show that I wrote about in the first installment of “Digital Dogtags” (click here to see it).

The Tokyo-based Fujitaka Company is seeking approval for a new system which will determine a person’s age from a digital photograph.  The system approximates your age (at the moment, it’s 90% accurate; they’re working on getting it up to 100%) by comparing your face to a database of 100,000 other faces.  At this point, their plan is to use the system as an age validation tool for cigarette vending machines.  But is it unrealistic to believe that their database will eventually grow to include everybody’s face?  Here’s how I see events progressing over time:

  1. Cameras on cigarette vending machines use face recognition software to determine your age.
  2. Face recognition software gets cheaper over time, and it is eventually implemented at bars, casinos, nightclubs, and other venues that have age requirements.
  3. A feature is added to the software that allows it to match a specific person’s face to a face in their database.
  4. The software is used as an identity verification tool by testing centers, authorized-personnel-only areas, and other exclusive locations.
  5. The software gets even cheaper and it becomes widespread as a keyless-entry tool (similar to fingerprint readers, but more convenient).
  6. People start to buy the face-recognition keyless-entry system for their houses, their cars, their offices, their safe deposit boxes, and any other place that needs a key.
  7. Face recognition is now everywhere.  Soon, governments start to assemble databases containing the faces of every legal resident of their country.
  8. The face recognition cameras on everybody’s houses/cars are linked to the government database, making it impossible for a criminal to go anywhere unnoticed.
  9. The system is used to identify you wherever you go (just like they do in the book/movie Minority Report).

Like I said in the first installment of “Digital Dogtags”, I actually like the idea… I have nothing to hide and I’d love to use this system to catch criminals.  What do you think of it?  Is it a valuable tool or an infringement of privacy (or both)?

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Don’t parade your lack of education as culture

This is the first post by Kola, our newest writer. Please join me in welcoming him to Globally Rational; hopefully, we will be seeing more great content in the future.

Hello class.

When it comes to the issue of international minimums on human rights, I usually take positions that mobs of good people would stone me for. I don’t believe in interfering with the natural economic/political/social progression of things, even if we may consider ourselves more ‘humanely evolved’ than our neighbors. It’s brutal, but sometimes we have to just sit on our hands and let the world mend itself.

However.

While I do not like the idea of policing every state on worldwide policies, I do believe there are barest minimums. Among these few is fair treatment of both genders. Social evolution will show that in our transcendence from hunters and gatherers, where a man’s muscle structure might lead him to believe he holds a more significant role in the tribe, women have suffered through thousands of years of half-rights and only recently ended up with what they have been entitled to all along: the same as everyone else. The final step of this evolution, the complete removal of gender labeling in constitutions and courts is one of the few social goals that can be regarded as completely correct. Truly, as the education of a country advances, so to will suppressed women be recognized by their men for what they are: equal.

The major problem in this I see developing is that in countries with economic and educational disparities, women still have quite the fight ahead of them. And the shield being put up by these states is CULTURE. (Cute, Utterly Loony Tricks Undermining Real Evolution)

Culture is an important and scary element of every state. It is the heart of Jihad vs McWorld, and the true conflict for most of the people being manipulated into suicidal frenzies. The western markets would crush every culture that let them in, just to see a 5% increase in profits, and it is a real danger to the developing world. But it has made the word itself altogether too powerful, too easily misrepresented for the sake of corrupt governments and ignorant populations. It is swung around by the people of under-evolved societies as a catch-all answer for why they execute gays, imprison rape victims, and persecute people who change religions.

“This is not America,” “This is not our culture,” are not rational excuses for flat ignorance.

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The Consequences of Being Stupid

One of my favorite America social issues are the two big questions we make sure to file away from time to time. They are:

1 - Why did we elect Bush?

And

2 - Why did we re-elect Bush?

1 - Al Gore was like our best friend’s dad. A nice guy you didn’t want to sit in the room too long with. Also, he worked for a guy who sexed interns. George Bush didn’t sex interns, and secretly, we all commended him for being human enough to drive drunk. Or whatever he did back then. Something bad.

2 - John Kerry was a nationally decorated, highly experienced bore. He was the least charismatic candidate in the primary, and won in the last minute because Dean (Howard Dean 2004-2012 RIP) made a totally inhuman noise, which probably endangered more lives than driving drunk. George Bush however, and here’s the hook, hated gays. We’ve forgotten now, but the big issue in 2004 was gay marriage and religion. The plurality of exit polling showed that votes voting bush were doing so for ‘cultural values.’ Our lovely culture of gay-hating bible-strokers.

The idea I mean to address here is that as a nation, we are expected to share the guilt of Bush’s presidency equally. I find this to be bullshit. In the last eight years, democracy has steadily managed to prove itself a totally ineffective system when your public sphere is the size of a metaphoric 8-ball. People are openly retarded, and somewhere from 199X to 2004+ people got so retarded they voted for the ‘leader of the free world’ based on which candidate HATED GAYS MORE. I will wear a badge that says ‘Eliteier than you’ if it will bore it into your heads that you, the ill informed, the people even now voting against Obama for being black or Muslim (who cares if he was), voting for McCain at all, or slandering Carter for doing the president’s job for him made a man into president who cost us trillions and left hundreds of thousands dead.

To sum. It’s not my fault the stupid outweighed the enlightened. Bush is not my fault and I’ll accept none of the responsibility. My only hope is that this time around, you won’t just be lulled by a message of change, you’ll be shock-therapied into reading a book or making your kids do their homework so we can avoid this in the future.

I need a drink.

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