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"YESTERDAY" AND TODAY
I watched the movie "Yesterday" and was really moved and affected. We tend to take The Beatles for granted and hardly think about them in these days of rap and crap. In light of music TODAY it's really amazing to rediscover The Beatles.
Must see movie.
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WHAT'S YOUR NAME?
Your name is William...but I can call you Bill?
Your name is Richard...but I can call you Dick?
Lately I've been wondering, when did it start that William was Bill, or that Richard was Dick? Or how about Robert being Bob? It doesn't seem to make sense.
Sure, Timmy can be Tim, Michael can be Mike, and Steven or Stephen can be Steve. Easy to understand. But how do you get "Dick" from "Richard"? Rich? Richie? Sure. Dick?
Who came up with that?
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BRUSH YOUR TEETH WITH POISON.
It's in toothpaste. It's even in the water in most large U.S. cities. It's a deadly poison known as fluoride.
A waste product in the production of aluminum and fertilizer, fluoride was the main ingredient in rat poison before it was taken out by a government agency, in the 1930s, as too dangerous for humans. (It's currently back in.) This left aluminum and fertilizer producers with a problem...how to get rid of...and perhaps even monetize...this waste. The obvious answer...toothpaste! Since fluoride kills bacteria...along with everything else it touches...it undoubtedly would prevent tooth decay. (Ironically, the opposite has proven to be true...see this long, well-researched article: https://www.globalresearch.ca/fluoride-killing-us-softly/5360397 ). And no government agency really regulates what goes into toothpaste. So toothpaste it is!
A massive P.R. campaign led to the acceptance of fluoride as a tooth-decay preventative in toothpaste and even in the water we drink. But it's really no different than adding...let's say arsenic. However, it's common knowledge that arsenic is poison...and no industry would profit from its acceptance...so arsenic NO, fluoride YES!
Fortunately, there are now a few relatively minor toothpaste manufacturers making a non-fluoride variation available. But if you live in one of the 43 large cities that intentionally pollute their drinking water with the deadly chemical, you have but two options: buy your drinking water...or move.
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THE LAST NON-TEXTER?
I don't text. ''Alien texting first became a thing it was shown to me on a telephone keyboard where in order to get the letter "L" you had to press the 5 key three times. Then, undoubtedly, there would be another letter you needed after the "L", let's say it was an "O" since you were typing the word LOVE. Well, you then had to press the 6 key three times. Next comes "V"...that's three hits on the 8 key. Finally "E"...much easier...just two presses on the 3 key...and voila...you've typed the word LOVE.
Well, I just typed the word LOVE in a millisecond on my computer and with no possibility of errors. So what advantage was there to texting rather than just writing what you want to write on a computer and sending it via email?
I know that texting has come a long way since those early days...smart phones with normal keyboards...but as someone who uses a phone to TALK and a computer to WRITE, I just don't see why I need to text when I can send an email just as easily.
Of course, I'm SO in the minority that I'm seeing more and more TV commercials where the call to action is NOTHING BUT a text! No phone number to call. No website to visit.
Sorry. They won't get my business.
BATHS Vs. SHOWERS
I've been happily married for 30+ years even though my wife is a bath person and I'm a shower person. Sorry, but I just don't get baths, except perhaps for therapy... body aches and such. But cleanliness?
Sitting in a tubful of soapy, body-dirt-filled water just doesn't seem all that hygienic to me. As for water usage, while I've NEVER run out of hot water in my shower, if you run the hot water after my wife's bath, it's lukewarm at best.
Yes, an entire thankful of hot water is used by each of my wife's baths. And the winner is...
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The Dangers Of Vaping...I mean DRUGS...I mean PRESCRIPTION DRUGS!
Now that six people have died, apparently from vaping, it's all over the daily news. Meanwhile, every time you turn on the news...or anything else on TV...you're besieged by commercials for prescription drugs, many containing the warning that "serious, possibly fatal side effects" may occur.
O.K. So how many people in the U.S. are vaping? According to the latest statistic, more than 9 million. That's six people out of 9 million vapers who have died.
And what percentage of people taking any of these "ask your doctor if BLANK is right for you" drugs have died? We don't know, but can it be a lower percentage than the 1 out of 1,500,000 who have possibly died due to vaping? I doubt it, and for sure the drugs companies aren't going to tell us.
Now they're talking about making vaping illegal or else very restricted (incidentally, I'm not here to defend vaping...I've never vaped...never even smoked a cigarette or anything else...not even once). So why exactly is it legal to advertise prescription drugs to the general public? It used to be illegal until 1985 under President Ronald Reagan. As a result of this advertising onslaught, doctors are being pressured by untold numbers of patients to prescribe drugs that they probably don't really need. Risking serious side effects...even death.
Clearly, these commercials and print ads to consumers ARE effective in boosting the usage of various prescription drugs... why else would drug companies be paying billions to advertise them to the public?
A public that would probably be safer vaping.
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AMBULANCE CHASING...AND BEYOND.
It seems like every other commercial I'm seeing these days is for some attorney or other promising to hold some driver, drug company, or manufacturer responsible for your accident, condition, disease, or whatever.
Well I thought I'd seen it all...until today. It's a commercial by one the area's most prominent ambulance chasers and featuring a partner of that distinguished organization delivering what looks to be an anti-bullying public service announcement...talking about how common bullying is in today's schools and how damaging it can be for the bullied children today and throughout their lives. Wow...what a nice change from the usual sleazy ambulance chaser pitch. Until...
"If your child has been bullied at school contact us, and we'll hold the school responsible."
HOLD THE SCHOOL RESPONSIBLE!?!??!!! As schools struggle with overcrowded classrooms, teacher shortages, and stretched-to-the-limit budgets, this ultimate sleaze bag is out to sue every school where bullying takes place, undoubtedly for all they've got...AND THAT'S EVERY SCHOOL!
IN THIS AREA...
AND EVERYWHERE!
As for this distinguished attorney--There oughtta be a law!
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MONEY-THE FINAL FRONTIER!
How much money does a person need? It seems to me there must be a limit, even considering one's taste for luxury goods. But I keep seeing people who can clearly afford anything and everything they could possibly want...basically prostituting themselves for more, more, even more money.
Now I understand highly paid actors who are still at it after 20, 30 years. They must love their craft...love the attention...factors beyond mere $$$.
But what's the story with people like Jennifer Aniston or Samuel L. Jackson? They're not making enough money in movies that they have to do endorsements for a skin moisturizer or a credit card?
And the ultimate bummer for Star Trek fans...William Shatner, after literally 60 years of TV roles (he started as a character on Howdy Doody in 1954!) doing commercials for CPAP breathing machines...to add to his repertoire of commercials for Priceline, ambulance chasers (law firms) and several more through the years. Not rich enough yet, Bill?
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SEEING THROUGH THE TIMES.
Watching a movie from the '40s. '50s, '60s (especially), 70s, '80s it's now easy for anyone to see the hairstyles and fashions as anything from affected to pretentious to outright stupid. But once you're my age (mid-70s) you don't have to wait...you see TODAY'S women with their ultra-white teeth and unshaven men as...downright stupid looking.
No need to wait!
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UM IS NOT AN ANSWER. YOU KNOW?
It's Judge Judy's famous retort to people who "um" a lot when they speak: "Um is not an answer!"
But the good Judge, and everyone else, seems to overlook the more common speech-crutch: "You know?"
Nearly every interview I watch on TV or hear on the radio these days is peppered by "you knows" by either the interviewee, the interviewer, or both. You know?
The black variation: "you know what I'm savin'?"
The English As A Second Language variation:
(People who speak English as a second language don't "you know" at all!)
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AFRICAN AMERICAN? REALLY?
A few years ago, referring to race was black and white. Black people were called "black" and white people were called "white." But now the term "African American," referring to black people, has taken hold...with no "white" equivalent.
The last time I heard a white person referred to as a "European American" was...let me think...NEVER!
The term "African American" politically correct?
Okay. Pretentious? Condescending? Disingenuous? Conciliatory?
DEFINITELY!
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BREAKUP WITH MAKEUP?
Watching women's World Cup soccer this week I was struck by how damn PRETTY virtually all of the women are. Clearly, these champion soccer players weren't chosen for their looks...so what's the deal? Then I saw the answer: One player...exactly one...was wearing lipstick...very red lipstick...and did she ever look out of place! Stupid actually.
Everybody else...not a stitch of makeup. And why should they...running around, sweating, and physically stressing for more than an hour is just not compatible with makeup.
So it got me to wondering...why exactly do women wear makeup? Men don't. In fact, women wearing makeup is probably the opposite of what nature intended.
Consider birds. The male of each species is always more colorful and "attractive" than the relatively dowdy female. Male birds hope to attract females...not the other way around! Females have what it takes to attract males...it's "built-in" so to speak...and they apparently don't need any extra color or markings.
I'm sure there will come a time when makeup on women will be a thing of the past...once women get REALLY serious about gender equality...and/or realize that people actually look BETTER as nature intended...without makeup!
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You get hungry so you eat something. But billions of people around the world can't do that. People...human beings...are starving...living with their constant hunger...or actually dying from it.
Meanwhile, here in the U.S., two of the richest people in the world are spending billions of $$$ to fly into space and look at the Earth for a few minutes. They see the Earth BUT they don't see the starving humans on it that might be helped or saved if not for a greedy obsession to get rich, rich, and richer and then spend their trillions strictly on themselves.
Possibly you need that off-the-charts degree of obsessive greed to get quite that rich. It's probably why so many of us never get past "just making do."
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AWESOME ADVERTISING.
It's a lot easier to be a professional, employed advertising copywriter today than it was in the '60s when I was starting out. Simply know the word "awesome."
You know the word "awesome"? You're hired!
Curious to see how many people on eBay were describing their offering as "awesome" I did a search today.
2.379.848 results for "awesome" in the title.
50 million+ for "awesome" in either the title or description.
And I'll bet you didn't realize there were 50 millions listings on eBay TOTAL!
Truly awesome!
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MEASLES ANYONE?
It's crazy to restrict kids from school who haven't been inoculated against measles. I say, LET 'EM IN! The kids who have had their measles shots aren't in danger of getting measles. Only those kids whose parents wouldn't allow them to be vaccinated will be getting the measles AS WELL THEY SHOULD. Let their parents deal with their sick...potentially very sick kids...expensive doctors' visits...potential hospital stays. It's what these parents (but unfortunately not these kids) deserve.
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HANDICAP PARKING SPOTS...
...are a genuine convenience for people who genuinely have difficulty getting in and out of their car and getting around with their cane or walker. But it occurred to me today that I see more people park in those spots WITHOUT a handicap notification than I see people WITH a notification who are genuinely handicapped.
Most typically, a car will pull into a handicap spot, the driver (ALWAYS a male) hangs the handicap notification on his mirror, and gets out of his car CLEARLY with no hint of a handicap. I used to assume that they were simply using their handicapped relative's car...but why hang the handicap notification at all? Getting one of those notifications (I have no clue how I would go about it) is just their way of scamming society and not having to walk 20 extra steps each time they park somewhere.
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WHO'S A RACIST?
Governor Ralph Northam of Virginia is in hot water due to a "racist" photo that appeared on his page in a 1984 college yearbook. The photo showed a man in black face having a drink with a ku klux klan member. The message seemed to be "can't we all just get along?" That's racist? Meanwhile, throughout his political career, Governor Northam has been an unflinching champion of equal rights FOR ALL.
Compare that to Trump Management Corporation, sued by the U.S. Justice department in the '70s for refusing to rent to blacks. And to Donald Trump in the '80s who didn't want blacks working for his companies or in his casinos. According to one employee: "When Donald came to the casino, the bosses would order all the black people off the floor so he wouldn't see them." And to Donald Trump in the '90s who found out that a black man worked for the accounting firm he was using and was quoted as saying "Black guys counting my money! I hate it. The only kind of people I want counting my money are short guys that wear yarmulkes every' day. I think that the guy is lazy. And it's probably not his fault, because laziness is a trait in blacks. It really is, I believe that. It's not anything they can control."
And to this day (fill in the blanks)...
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GIVE AND LET LIVE
I'm seeing lots of commercials for a lot of different charities. One "popular" one, the Wounded Warrior Project...soldiers who lost limbs in war zones need our help...asks S19 a month from viewers. But...where's the U.S. Government? As a write this we have a President shutting down the Government in order to get 5Billion$$ for a useless wall. 5Billion$$ would go a long way to help Wounded Warriors and it wouldn't be at all controversial. No shutting down the Government rather than that!
As for the many, many other charities asking $12 a month...S18 a month...$22 a month...I can't help but wonder why multi-billionaires like Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos and Richard Branson are busy competing with one another as to who will be the first to send a rocket to Mars rather than contributing $1 Million a month (something they could each easily afford) to help, for example, handicapped children. Actually, it would take just one of the world's 2200+ billionaires to eliminate the need for all of the begging-for-money charities I'm seeing on TV these days.
COMMENT
I've made a little study of these so-called charities. I've found that many if not most of them exist only to exist. They aren't formed in order to raise money for their stated cause (although some small portion of the money may eventually reach veterans, children, people with diseases...). They are formed as businesses to do business in the fundraising industry. The employees get paid, the management gets paid well, and the executives do very well. For every $10 contribution they get, maybe $6 goes to pay the salaries of the workers and another $2 goes toward operating costs. As long as they don't make a corporate profit they can legally call themselves "non-profit organizations." Even if the CEO is getting paid a seven-figure salary. LUKE W.