There is a growing Ebola epidemic/possible pandemic brewing out of West Africa, ISIS beheadings in Iraq or Syria (or Iraq AND Syria), a volcanic eruption in Iceland (maybe), Russian rebels in Ukraine, Russian military jets in US airspace daily, and China has invaded disputed area of India. Oh, and the Pope just announce that he might not be around in three years. But maybe it isn't all so bad because President Obama is still on vacation. Does anyone expect (or pray for) a full-on alien invasion from the Pleiades that will put us out of our misery?
Now, I happen to believe the world is like this all the time. We just have so much access to a constant stream of global news, it just seems like chaos. What do you think? Or if you don't buy my chaos theory, do you have more to add to the list?
I will be out for part of the day and will join in as soon as I can. Play nicely!
28 comments:
The Icelandic volcano is called Bardabunga. That means if it erupts reporters (and the rest of us) will actually be able to pronounce it this time.
The Kingston Trio
The Merry Minuet
They're rioting in Africa. They're starving in Spain. There's hurricanes in Florida and Texas needs rain.
The whole world is festering with unhappy souls. The French hate the Germans. The Germans hate the Poles.
Italians hate Yugoslavs. South Africans hate the Dutch and I don't like anybody very much!
But we can be tranquil and thankful and proud for man's been endowed with a mushroom shaped cloud.
And we know for certain that some lovely day someone will set the spark off and we will all be blown away.
They're rioting in Africa. There's strife in Iran. What nature doesn't do to us will be done by our fellow man.
I'm going to be working with homeless vets all day, so I won't get to follow things....all I can think of when there just seems to be too much bad news is what my Latin teacher taught us: Illigitimi non carborundum est.
Critch:
Gloom, despair and agony on me-e!
Deep dark depression, excessive misery-y!
If it weren't for bad luck I'd have no luck at all!
Gloom, despair and agony on me-e-e!"
- Hee Haw
Bev, The world is like this all the time, and when you compare the past to the present you will see that these things are tiny compared to both the breadth and depth of problems in the past. In the past, most of the people of the world lived in war zones or famine zones or depressed economic zones. Today, the people who live in places like that are the outliers. In the past, riots meant riots with whole cities turned into ash. Today it means a bunch of a-holes who say whine about being patted down by the cops. And don't forget that life expectancy is way up, health is improving, technology has made true poverty a thing of the past in most of the world, and whether we believe it or not, freedom is at an all time high.
KRS! That is exactly what I was thinking - Hee-Haw!
Andrew - And further to that - I wonder what those journalists who were whining/screaming/filing grievances about being strong armed by the police in Missouri are thinking know that one of their own was actually publicly beheaded by ISIS? I hope that it will put things into perspective or they are just a little...no. a lot embarrassed.
Critch - God bless for the work you are doing, btw! Btw, the literal translation for "Illegitimi non carborundum est" by Google Translate is "Rats is not illegitimate". I am guessing what it really means is either "The rat bastards have a point" OR "Don't let the rat bastards get you down". ;-)
Scott - Yes, they are blaming the quakes on fracking. However Oklahoma is on an actually major fault line that runs the Midwest. New York has quakes too and we don't frack. The OK quakes general correspond with some quake somewhere in the world. They have always had earthquakes, mostly undetectable on the surface.
Oh, and Scott - I find the whole ALS Ice Bucket challenge a brilliant way to raise awareness and funds. It shows the true power of the internet that they can spend no money and start a movement that goes all the way up to former Presidents. And it is just wonderfully silly fun! It's a heck a lot more affective that the State Department hashtagging on Twitter.
Bev, On the quakes... two points.
First, they aren't actually blaming it on fracking per se. They are blaming it on the injection of waste water after the fracking. So both sides are kind of claiming victory on this.
Secondly, the St. Louis region gets earthquakes without a fault line and what they discovered is that the reason is that the ground is shifting because it is adjusting to the decreased pressure of having icebergs from the last ice age withdraw. Apparently, the weight of those icebergs pushed the land down and now it is rising up again and that is causing earthquakes. Fascinating.
Bev, It really should put things into perspective, but I doubt it will. Leftists never get the obvious comparisons which show that their own issues are trivial.
Andrew - So what you are saying is that global warming...er...climate change is causing earthquakes and riots in St. Louis?
Seriously, when liberals ridicule fundamental Christians for their belief that the Earth is only 5000 years, it makes me laugh. They fail to see the fundamental environmentalists (Al Gore-ites) with their own stupidity for refusing to believe that the Earth is a living thing that moves and shifts and was once covered in ice for billions of years and the ice melted because well...the Earth warmed up. Oh, I forgot, that's settled already.
Bev - whenever one of our teenage girls starts going maximus dramaticus on a trivial issue, my wife and I start singing, "Gloom, despair ..." Which drives them bonkers - and shuts them up.
Btw, "Rats is not legitimate" is awesome. Almost deserves a bumper sticker.
"Illegitimi non carborundum est" and it's popular meaning I think originated with British Intelligence during WWII. Goldwater used it, too. Carborundum is not latin and it's the name for the compound, silicon carbide. So, the most accurate translation possible would be, "the unlawful is not silicon carbide."
I only mention this because, for some reason, I find this version and your "Rats is not legitimate" far more entertaining than the original!
Don't let the bastards get you down...
Fairly productive day. I had a lot of help from some our clients who are in treatment and living at VA housing..There but for the grace of God go I.
I was a Hell raiser and hard drinker in my misspent youth, I just got lucky I guess.
I agree with Andrew. Bad stuff always happens and always will, but most people in the world are better off in every sense of the word than similar situated people were a generation ago.
I just got back from lunch at a homeless shelter. I was there to get acquainted with them and their services and they invited me to sit down with them. Lunch was a rice a roni mixture with beef, kool-aide and small salad. It was interesting watching these people, some had been off the road only a day or two, they were starving, you could see it. These are not people homeless due to economics, it's mental health and substance abuse..and there lies the problem. No matter what we as a society do, other than forcibly locking people up for their own good, we will have this problem. When you see the pictures of the immigrants heading to California in the 30s you can see that desperation in their eyes...but it's not alcohol, drugs or mental health causing their problems..that was economics and mother nature working hand in glove against them.
"...Earth is a living thing..."
Oh no! Bev has become a Gaia worshiper. We need an intervention stat.
My father is in the oil/gas business and I keep trying to get him to get his buddies together and give cities like Boulder what they want: no fracked gas. Since 98% of the natural gas in this country comes from fracking their price of natural gas would go up to about $10/BTU from the current $0.04/BTU. He keeps telling me it's illegal or something.
Koshcat, that would shut their liberal pie holes.....
This sounds like a job for Maxwell Smart. Even he'd do a better job of managing the country than Obama but, then again, so would a fifth-grader.
You want the definition of chaos?,,,,my middle son just told me that I was playing my punk rock album too loud....Strange world we live in...
Get off my lawn, old man!! LOL!
OMG! Critch that's just one more sign of the impending apocalypse! "...the child is the father of the man". It's in Revelations, I know it is! Okay maybe not, but it should have been. Also, punk rock, really?
Bad News: Another Icelandic volcano is erupting.
Good News: We can actually pronounce its name! Bardabunga!
Well, we can attempt to say it without turning our tongues into figure-8 knots.
Kit, Bardabunga sounds like a strip club from the Sopranos.
I thought it sounded like a word from Tolkien. Which might be because he borrowed a lot from Icelandic, Danish, Norwegian, and Old Norse —all languages he spoke.
Let's add "earthquake" to the list. A 6.0 Magnitude Earthquake hits Northern California. 87 injured, 3 in critical condition (including one child). No reported fatalities.
So volcanic activity in Iceland and earthquake in northern CA. Does anyone see a geological connection?
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