Did this place always suck this bad, or have my expectations risen over the years. I’ve had like three steaks there over the last couple of years, and all of them were on par with Waffle House’s offerings when you order steak and eggs. It’s insane that people consider Red Lobster to be a nice restaraunt. It’s like one level above Longjohn Silvers.

[ Link: Womens Rights or Multiculturalism -- You Choose ]

I’ll say it again. Multiculturalism should be applied sparringly for the purpose of making the original stronger through the benefits of diversity. It should never be allowed to take hold of the receiving country in such a way that damages its identity.  Of course, that requires that you know what your identity is, which seems to be the problem these days.

Those with political agendas like to conveniently flip-flop in philosophy when it comes to how they view the poor and disadvantaged in this country. Half the time they want to say they need special treatment because they aren’t like the rest of us, and other times they get offended if you even suggest that they be given special consideration.

This is unfortunate because progress can’t be made until we define the problem, and I’d argue that our first priority is to collectively realize how utterly disadvantaged the uneducated class is compared to those who have high-school and especially college educations ¹.

A recent post by Scott Adams reminded me of something I’ve been wanting to write about for a long time now. He asked whether or not it would be ok to burn poor people for energy if it was based on a volunteer-only system, and if only one out of 20 people were chosen. So basically, if you volunteered you had a 1/20 chance of being chosen for death, which would help power a whole city or state, and the other 19 people would be given a myriad of benefits, such as a car, a home, etc.

He asked two things, 1) whether or not this would be ok morally, and more interestingly, 2) whether or not we were already doing something like this. The answer is that we are, and that thing we’re doing is what I’ve wanted to comment on for years.

It’s called the lottery.

What I See

I get the opportunity to travel often, and I often find myself in small towns throughout the south and other parts of the country. It constantly shocks me to see what happens on a minute to minute, hour to hour, and day to day basis — all day, every day — in these small towns.

I basically walk in, grab a water or diet drink and a bag of beef jerky, and go to wait in line. But sometimes I’ll just hang out for a bit to people-watch. What I see is unwaveringly consistent: a constant stream of the underclass, filing in with crumpled up cash (they tend not to have checking accounts, I’m guessing) and lottery tickets. Many of the towns I go through are in the south, so it’s usually a majority of black folks, followed by white people, then the Mexicans who have recently immigrated. No Asians or Indians, of course.

It’s constant. Every time. Every gas station. Every little town. Always. A constant stream of people who are dressed poorly, have poor dental hygiene, and a less than powerful command of the English language. They’re poor and uneducated, and they buy three things en masse: alcohol, tobacco, and lottery tickets. Over and over. All day, every day.

Society’s Role

When I see this two things happen to me: first I get angry at those who are buying the crap, and then I relax and realize that they’re just trapped in a cycle of failure that they don’t know how to pull out of. Then I ask the inevitable question: what is society doing to help these people?

The answer is nothing. Why are we doing nothing? Two reasons:

1. Liberals don’t do anything because they lack the balls to stand up and say, “These people are not capable of knowing what’s best for themselves; they need help making decisions for themselves, much like children.” They’re politically correct pussies, basically, and their will to be PC is causing harm to the world.
2. Conservatives, on the other hand, don’t do anything because they don’t give a fuck about these people. They’re happy to chant along with the liberals about “equality” just so long as at it keeps the poor, uneducated people funding their childrens’ education. But in fact they know damn well these people aren’t “deciding” anything. They’re programmed to do blue-collar work (or absorb government assistance), reproduce, watch T.V., buy DVDs, and spend any money they have on alcohol, tobacco, and lottery tickets. Conservatives like them this way because as long as there’s an under-class there can be higher ones.

So it continues. The lottery is nothing more than a cleverly disguised tax on the poor. I also call it the stupidity tax. If you’re stupid enough to think you can make money doing this long-term, you must pay your dues. These people load up on drugs (alcohol and tobacco) and dump hundreds of dollars per month into large slush funds that largely don’t benefit them, but instead go towards projects that benefit the upper classes.

It’s sickening.

I’ve resisted the temptation so many times to pull these people aside and try and wake them up. But given the social structure in most of these places it’s likely just futile. Who’s going to believe some random white guy in a BMW who says the lottery is a scam when they know for a fact that it’s real because their friend Shirley just won $500 dollars last week?

I wish there were some way to wake people up in this world. It’s time to stop treating the disadvantaged as equals, and more like children who can become equals. They aren’t naturally inferior, just as children aren’t — they simply haven’t been shown the way. And to pretend that they have been, and choose to live this way, is reprehensible.

To let the underclass try and fend for itself is cowardly and shameful. Liberals allow it to happen due to a lack of testicle and spine. Conservatives do so, ironically enough, due to a lack of morality.:

– ¹ This isn’t to say that wisdom, intelligence, or success is always granted by more education — we know that not to be the case — but in general it’s true that those with more education tend to make better, long-term focused decisions in life.

This is a politician that gets it. Read this.

[ Link: Ron Paul on Security and Liberty ]

I know now why Georgia has such horribly uneducated grade school students. My friend teaches at a school in south Georgia and happened to walk by a classroom where a teacher was teaching some young, impressionable first graders about the universe.

Outside the classroom was a poster where a bunch of the children had written a collection of facts that they’d learned, and there were a few main points that the teacher put there herself.

Of those were two important facts that many aren’t aware of:

1. The sun is the center of the universe.
2. The sun is the hottest star in the universe.

The teacher wrote these things down. She thinks our sun is the center of the universe, and she’s teaching human children about science in the United States of America in the year 2007.

WTF.

[ More to follow: My friend is going to write an essay on other things he's seen, and he's going to name the school so we can voice our concern. I'm going to link to it here. ]

I’m up in the D.C. area on a job and will likely be more silent than usual. Stay tuned.

First, answer two questions:

1. What is our country? What defines it? What parts could not be removed without it becoming something different? If a country has not identified what it truly is, it will have no way of knowing if it has lost itself.
2. Do we have the cohesion and political strength to defend this identity? Are we too cowardly to acknowledge the fact that we love what we are, and that we don’t want it to change? If so, we are already doomed.

Once these two questions have been answered in the positive, a single, all-encompassing concept must be established and accepted by all as the foundation for all immigration policy. When a country begins to enjoy surging immigration numbers it should take this as a compliment to, and an affirmation of, its chosen system of management. The act of moving from one place to another is a clear declaration of:

“Overall, I prefer your country to where I came from. Please let me partake of it.”

As such, allowing incoming populations to modify the existing system puts at risk the very set of conditions that made the receiving country desirable in the first place. Any country that fails to define and defend this identity is doomed to become a collection of countries rather than a strong, unified entity benefiting from the myriad advantages of diversity.:

( Thanks to Jeff Milner for the link )

I hadn’t heard about Helio until last weekend. I was in Perimeter mall in Dunwoody, Georgia and stumbled upon a small kiosk for the company. Something about the presentation caused me to take notice, so I gave them the opportunity to start into their spiel.

I was impressed.

Here’s are the basics, in no particular order:

• Asian technology, here. Meaning that it’s anywhere from 1-3 years ahead of anything we have in the U.S.
• Stressing “mobile device” vs. “phone”. This means they get it.
• Rides the Verizon and Sprint networks.
• Full 3G experience. Highly superior video and audio quality.
• Sick phones.

So what does this all mean? It means that the Ocean (their new phone) is in many respects already beyond the iPhone in terms of mobile device evolution. Plus it already has 3G. Sick battery life. Etc.

Bottom line: if iPhone stumbles these people are going to be right behind them ready to pounce.

I’m a fairly happy Cingular customer, but I like T-Mobile marginally better and switched away from it only due to coverage issues in some small towns.

But I grow tired of both Cingular and T-Mobile not having 3G. Verizon and Sprint have had EV-DO forever now, and Verizon’s coverage is the absolute best. It’s no wonder Jobs went to Verizon first; it’s the best candidate without question. It really sucks that didn’t work out.

Oh well, I’m already a Cingular customer and I have a contract renewal instance waiting for the iPhone. This project has the potential to make or break Cingular/AT&T due to its massive gravity. Hopefully they won’t embarass themselves.

Of course, if iPhone does end up flopping, Helio is going to be all over their asses, and if it’s bad enough I’ll be switching myself.

[ Link: My Helio Post ]