Ramblings of a hypocritical cubical farmer

Whatever medical science may profess, there is a difference between Life and survival. There is more to being alive than just having a heartbeat and brain activity. Being alive, really alive, is something much subtler and more magnificent. Their instruments measure blood pressure and temperature, but overlook joy, passion, love, all the things that make life really matter. To make our lives matter again, to really get the most out of them, we will have to redefine life itself. We have to dispense with their merely clinical definitions, in favor of ones which have more to do with what we actually feel.

As it stands, how much living do we have in our lives? How many mornings do you wake up feeling truly free, thrilled to be alive, breathlessly anticipating the experiences of a new day? How many nights do you fall asleep feeling fulfilled, going over the events of the past day with satisfaction? Most of us feel as though everything has already been decided without us, as if living is not a creative activity but rather something that happens to us. That's not being alive, that's just surviving: being undead. We have undertakers, but their services are not usually required; we have morgues, but we spend most of our time in office cubicles and video arcades, in shopping malls, in front of televisions. Of course suburban housewives and petty executives are terrified of risk and change; they can't imagine that there is anything more valuable than physical safety. Their hearts may be beating, but they no longer believe in their dreams, let alone chase after them.

But this is how the revolution begins: a few of us start chasing our dreams, breaking our old patterns, embracing what we love (and in the process discovering what we hate), daydreaming, questioning, acting outside the boundaries of routine and regularity. Others see us doing this, see people daring to be more creative and more adventurous, more generous and more ambitious than they had imagined possible, and join us one by one. Once enough people embrace this new way of living, a point of critical mass is finally reached, and society itself begins to change. From that moment, the world will start to undergo a transformation: from the frightening, alien place that it is, into a place ripe with possibility, where our lives are in our own hands and any dream can come true

Nuke em all.

Yes, I remember hearing that quote. I also remember hearing about 8:15 in the morning of August 6, 1945 in Hiroshima. This falls very much along the lines of what Heinlein was talking about. We placed 2 very strategic warheads right where they would make the Japanese government surrender. I don't think we need to turn the entire country of Iraq into a glass parking lot but maybe we should pull soldiers out of a certain town (perhaps Karbala) and wait for all the "holy warriors" to gather and make a "stategic attack" of a atomic type. I realize this will not happen anytime soon since our economy would have to take a huge nose dive before a President would even think of doing this. Ok, I can hear you out there screaming "We are a more civilized race now and we would never Nuke anyone." Well, I hate to break it to you but when the stock portfolio of all of the professional politicians starts to bomb they will think differently, I guarantee.

Heinlein

There are people at work with No War in Iraq signs. I have friends that want to know why we didn't just turn the Ragheads into glass. This is the best quote I've ever heard regarding war and its from 50 years ago. What do you think?

War and Sly & the Family Stone

"If you wanted to teach a baby a lesson, would you cut its head off?”

“Why . . . no, sir!”

“Of course not. You’d paddle it. There can be circumstances when it’s just as foolish to hit an enemy city with an H-bomb as it would be to spank a baby with an ax. War is not violence and killing, pure and simple; war is controlled violence, for a purpose. The purpose of war is to support your government’s decisions by force. The purpose is never to kill the enemy just to be killing him . . . but to make him do what you want him to do. Not killing . . . but controlled and purposeful violence. But it’s not your business or mine to decide the purpose or the control. It’s never a soldier’s business to decide when or where or how — or why — he fights; that belongs to the statesmen and the generals. The statesmen decide why and how much; the generals take it from there and tell us where and when and how. We supply the violence; other people — ‘older and wiser heads,’ as they say — supply the control. Which is as it should be. That’s the best answer I can give you. If it doesn’t satisfy you, I’ll get you a chit to go talk to the regimental commander. If he can’t convince you — then go home and be a civilian! Because in that case you will certainly never make a soldier."

Robert Heinlein
S.T.
1959