— Anything, not everything, but lots in-between | March 19, 2023

Trump arrest; Haircut with a 2-letter, 1-word dismissal; Feminism is over; James O’Keefe is in the house; AI Luddites; Member Section (AI stuff)

Trump arrest

Let’s get this one out-of-the-way right off.

Supposed to happen in a coupla daze. Of course, it’s bullshit. But, you know what else was bullshit? Going after Bill Clinton for having the temerity to get blown in the Oval Office by a consenting adult.

Did Republicans conduct that witch hunt—culminating in Clinton’s impeachment and disbarment—because he blew a load on a blue dress?

Yes, of course they did. And they trump-ed up religious and patriotic moral outrage to do it.

Is that what they charged him with doing? Having SEXUAL RELATIONS WITH THAT WOMAN? No, of course not. Why? Because while it might be uncouth…it might be worthy of moral scorn on any number of levels both sacred and civil, it wasn’t illegal. It was merely morally reprehensible to some, mostly God-fearing, conservative, hypocrites Republicans.

So, what am I to conclude, essentially, beyond saying that I neither give a fuck over Clinton lying about a personal and private consensual sexual matter, nor Trump doing the same? Nor do I give a fuck about whatever legal technicalities and contrivances are brought to bear in order to veil that which the witch hunt is really all about—which is entirely political.

So, beginning with Clinton, at least—perhaps before… I’d have to think about it—political opponents on one side began weaponizing federal investigative and enforcement agencies against the other. Back in the good ‘ole days, they created and maintained secret files on everybody, so it was a MAD situation (mutually assured destruction), just like everyone in a saloon having a six-shooter on their hip tended to maintain a polite clientele. The same went for the Cold War between the USA and USSR, when we could both destroy the other with nukes a hundred times over.

I can say that what goes around can come back around. I can say to be careful what you wish for.

On a practical political level, pure gamesmanship, it’s probably a mistake for the Democrats to do this rather than quash it, which surely the party apparatus could have done and spin it as a win anyway. It’s probably a Hail Mary, indicating that their internals show that Trump is very strong and is likely to get stronger, wild card DeSantis’ possible candidacy notwithstanding. The dynamic in play there is that if you have two very popular candidates squaring off, and if Trump comes out ahead, Ron is an obvious VP pick and that virtually makes anything the Democrats put up a laughingstock.

Booty Judge? LOL.

OTOH, Trump’s call for protests in advance of the arrest makes him look weak and scared. The better move would have been to go independently and alone, no entourage, up to the whatever office in NYC, arms outstretched for the cuffs.

That would have been badass. But as I’ve said before, Covidiocy turned him into a politician, concerned and preoccupied with the outcome of elections. His strength was in acting as though he didn’t give a fuck because he’s above all that stupid shit.

… A few Sunday Scribbles ago I imagined being God for an hour and exterminating all mosquitos globally; a worthy, mostly unselfish fantasy and after all, in case you didn’t know, mosquitoes are the chief killer of humans, after natural causes. 750K per year. The only other pest that even comes close…are other humans (475K).

But perhaps an even worthier use of that God hour would be to ordain that henceforth and forevermore, any person who lies, manipulates, or otherwise reveals non-criminal private information of a sexual nature about any other person shall have their own complete sexual history—actions, thoughts, and fantasies from the first girly-mag onward—put on public display in 4K HD for all the world to see.

That’d stop the hypocritical nonsense real quick: the fucking chief purveyors of which are the hypocritical Bible thumpers, conservatives, Republicans, MAGA, et al. What an enormous waste of time they’re all responsible for. Fuck off. And you all deserve heartily what’s happening to Trump. You fucking asked for it, Stupid Party.

… And one last thing. Fiscally; as in, competent federal budget handling, debt reduction, etc., including reductions in global policing by the US Military? Bill Clinton, hands down. The best budget hawk in decades and far better than all recent Republicans, who’ve been bigger spendthrifts than the Democrats…but it’s OK, see…it’s done in the name of God, Country & MAGA, keeping the whole world in turmoil ‘Cause Jesus is Cummin’ Again and The World Needs a Savin’, Praise God!!!

Really. I know those base Evangelical motivations like the back of my hand; I lived them, on the inside. I’ll use that quote yet again. You see, as much as it applies to the Left and their SECULAR “THE SCIENCE” RELIGION, it applies equally to the Conservative Religious Right.

Both wish to impose their “morality” upon you, and they’ll gleefully see you suffer heartily if you don’t repent and conform.

A pox on both their houses.

Haircut

The girl is always bugging me to get a haircut. Anything over about 1/4″ is “long hair.” When I show her photos of my truly long-haired days, she says, “I would not even talk!”

Heretofore, I’ve always gone to one of the ubiquitous barber shops and the cut, plus a straight razor shave, is about 120 THB ($3.50). What I dislike about it is they take so much damned time and do an exceedingly excellent job. I’ve sat in the chair upwards of an hour for the cut and shave combined. I’m fidgety, and I hate that dang hot and uncomfortable caped-crusader thingy choking my neck.

Also, I’m fed up with those cheap-ass beard trimmers China defrauds the rest of the world on. You get what you pay for, I know, but it’s all that’s available here without launching an exploratory expedition. All cheap (like 200-300 baht…under 10 bucks), all utter crap. I’ve broken/tossed about three of them.

So I was in the Super Cheap chain (like a mini-Costco) down in Phuket, and they had no-shit professional-grade hair clippers for like around 15 bucks. Got a cordless one, and it’s solid hardware. Weird using it for a shadow-shave, but it works and it’s reliable. Lasts forever on a charge.

So, kinda tongue-in-cheek, I asked myself how tough can it be to cut your own hair. Turns out it’s not so bad (doing it in the mirror presents an initial challenge), and took only 5 minutes. Saved three-fifty!

I thought she’d be happy once I showed her that finished look, above!

Ooooh, ouch; the dreaded 2-letter, 1-word dismissal.

Feminism is over

I’ve been saving this one in an open tab for a while, intending to do a post or some kind of treatment of it because it’s so damn good.

It’s Tucker Carlson. Chances are you may have seen it. Funny, funny shit, man…filled with one-liners. It’s one of those things where you have to preface it with, Not the Bee; meaning, The Babylon Bee…the satire site that completely overshadowed The Onion, a former funny place that almost nobody has heard of in years.

Leftists just aren’t funny, and wouldn’t even know how to turn a laugh over a fart in church; by which I mean, they’d righteously celebrate it as though it was of metaphysical importance. Conservative Christians? Yep, bust a gut, because they get it.

A juxtaposition:

Now that’s one sad spectacle. It’s enough to bring depression down upon a 20-year-old Chinese Cultural Revolutionary in 1966, who’d just received a letter of recognition and commendation from the CCP Politburo for the successful formation of his very first Red Guard unit!

The Onion wouldn’t know how to make commie-ism funny if they could resurrect John Candy. They’d take it personally if they could.

So, all of that to get you primed to laugh-your-ass-off to Carlson utterly destroying and mocking feminism. No spoilers. Just watch. Pure gold.

James O’Keefe is in the house

I was going to add “Way to tell Project Veritas to Go Fuck Themselves,” but tweets are limited to 280-characters.

AI Luddites

Is there anything more certain than that with each and every new human advancement in anything at all, Luddites will rise up—probably even from the dead—to whine about being put out of a job?

It’s metaphysical, and that’s the 2nd time I’ve used that obscure adjective. But actually, that’s a bit excessive this time. What it is, really, is psycho-epistemological, which is a fancy way of saying learned and automatic. Knee-jerk, if you will, but always cocked and at the ready to spring forth as soon as your apple cart gets upset…which by the way, were superseded by gasoline-powered trucks eons ago, putting countless apple-cart craftsmen on the street, out of a job, screwed for life!

This stems from a bit of a tweet discussion about OpenAI with its ChatGPT. There’s also DALL-E and others where, essentially, you give it a description, and it creates a work of art that you can then edit by asking it to change certain things. Some of the creations are truly cool.

Let’s have a look:

Yes it can, of course, take a digital copy of any original work and improve modify it.

The point is, ever since the very first digital text, audio, image, and video, there have been the hordes of butthurt artists and producers claiming they’re being stolen from. Before digital, theft wasn’t really worth it, usually. Even when you could copy and record analog, what did people usually do? They took their vinyl and made cassette mix tapes…doing it at any scale is quite time-consuming using home equipment. Sure, there were pirating operations in places (such as in Asia, as always) but no real dent in markets was taking place.

Beyond the legal issues of copyrights—which are complex and different in each country—there’s a deeper problem and that’s that all people don’t necessarily see it as theft…in spite of legal definitions, court pleadings, arguments at trial, and judgments rendered.

Why? Because a digital copy doesn’t deprive the creator of his creation. The only damage that can be argued is that you might otherwise have paid him for a copy, but you didn’t.

If you steal an original work of art, say a painting or sculpture, you’ve truly committed a theft that’s distinguishable from making a digital copy. You’ve deprived the owner of their physical property and all value pertaining to it. And if it’s good enough, that one-of-a-kind status can add a whole pile of value (legitimately so, when it’s actual art, and not a pile of shit).

My point is that in the age of digital—and not only being able to copy, but distribute unlimited copies…to every person on earth, really—whining, litigious copyright-holders have been fighting a losing battle. It’s inevitable, a force of nature. Shut down one distribution site, three mirror-sites pop up in its place almost instantly.

Whack-A-Mole. Or three. Or ten…

The butthurt, whiners, bemoaners, and purveyors of doom have this utilitarian quasi-moral argument: by allowing copies to proliferate unchecked, it reduces [financial] incentive for artists to produce original work, thus depriving society of something of immeasurable importance.

(That would have been a good argument back when the preponderance of art had some form of gate-keeping, such that most of it was downright amazing.)

But last time I looked, there’s too much original programming on Nexflix to even put a dent in watching it all.

Add to that everything being produced by Amazon, Apple, Disney, and you name it. More original content than ever, all at the same time it’s easier than ever to pirate. Take BitTorrent, for instance. It used to be that one would have to download it, then burn it to a DVD, and only then, watch it. Now, many sites can even stream it, so you don’t have to download it all.

In the end, there will always be Lazy Luddites trying to float the notion that human advancement destroys jobs and opportunity rather than create lots of both (hint: there are more jobs and more opportunities this minute than in any previous point in human history).

Whenever I hear any complaining, my mind automatically goes to one place: laziness, rooted in dishonesty. People don’t like to have their apple carts upset.

And in terms of jobs, people tend to concretize them rather than conceptualize them.

“I’m an X.”

Rather than, “I’ve developed these sets of skills and talents, currently being applied to job X.”

See the difference? Basic, closed-ended vs. open-ended.

Here’s a favorite scene from an educational film, back when they used to do that sort of thing. Larry The Liquidator isn’t your best friend. He’s your only friend.

At about 01.10 he talks about the wire company losing market because of new tech, fiber optics. Then he related it to back in the day, there were probably lots of companies making buggy whips and that the last one standing surely made the best buggy whips of all time…

Shit, you don’t even have to think hard about how to re-apply those skills and talents and plus, it’s a horizontal market with endless new product potential.

Members Section — Big AI post; Yesterday’s post on knowing WTF