Beginnings

Well, there's always got to be a beginning, so here's the start of my first blog. Funny to think that I didn't even know what a blog was a year ago and that my inspiration for this was the blog of my "Luddite" friend who cannot stand computers, e-mail or apparently anything else connected with, well, "connectivity"!

Why is this called "Blue's rants"? Well, my nickname (the only one I've ever had) for a short time in 10th grade was "Blue"; an upperclassman in my P.E. class during flag football couldn't remember my name and called me by the color of my gym shorts.

Anyway, what in the world do I want to rant about? I'm a pretty calm guy most of the time and try to stay out of conflict with most folks (unless I have to, and in my employment, that's just about every day), so I figure this is a good place to rant about stuff going on these days without having to fear getting my lights punched out by somebody with less self-control than I have (or who's bigger than me!).

So, what's the rant du jour? For once, I've got to agree with Rodney King; can't we all just get along? The level of rhetoric these days on TV, radio, newspapers, blogs and even over lunch is getting really heavy just about everything. It's getting real personal out there. I hate to bring up the Schaivo business, but you got to be careful who you talk to, since there's folks who'll call you a murderer or worse if you say you think Michael Schaivo is a devoted husband carrying out his wife's wishes. Depending on what you read or listen to, this guy is a monster/liar/wife abuser/litterbug whom many of the protesters outside the hospice would happily rip to pieces while singing "Jesus loves me, this I know".

Of course, it could be worse; you could be talking to a die-hard Republican. Used to have a friend in the office next to mine who would come in every morning and say to me, "In case I haven't told you, I HATE them blankety-blank Republicans". There used to be some really good ones out there in the old days--Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt--but since the uber-right wing has taken over the party, they've managed to bamboozle a lot of folks who would never have voted the Big Elephant in the old days because there was nothing the GOP would have done to benefit them; now it is simply wave the Bible and people come a-runnin'. Too bad that their Social Security benefit might be non-existent because of the "privatization" ideas or that they might never get a feeding tube in the first place because of the dumbing-down of Medicare, but heaven forbid that a gay gets into the military or PBS shows a breast during a show!

Am I a Democrat? Yup. Am I, as someone said in the newspaper a few days ago, "pro-abortion"? No, I think abortion is a terrible choice, better left to the absolute last choice of the desperate, but I'm not going to tell my daughters that their ability to choose should be taken away so that they'll have to look for some back-alley abortionist again like women had to decades ago. Do I like the idea of government give-aways? No, since I've got to pay taxes like everyone else (oops, well, maybe not like some of the big corporations that found ways to avoid paying taxes or some of the mega-rich who've got the money and tax lawyers to ship their money overseas with loopholes), but the neo-con way of slashing and hacking at the most needy in our society and then proclaiming that they just LOVE everyone makes me cringe. Do I want to see the US bankrupt? Nope, but the modern Republican way seems to be to spend us into the poorhouse, send all our jobs overseas and then interfere with State Court decisions and personal lives. Didn't think I'd ever live to see Democrats calling for less government interference with people and lower government spending, but it's happened. Barry Goldwater must be rolling over in his grave.

Anyway, like Rod Serling, I've put this out there in cyberspace for your consideration. Thing are getting more and more like "The Twilight Zone" everyday. Maybe tomorrow I'll have a bad dream about the earth's temperature rising...oops, that's already happening! That's another rant for another day.