July 26th, 2009
I used to be a big believer in conspiracy theories. I believed that the new world order was run by the illuminati and that all the governments in the world were in on a plan for world domiation, enslaving humanity with the help of the UN. Yeah, it went something like that. It was ridiculous.
Recently I met a woman who opened my eyes to how ridiculous these ideas are. She’s in her mid forties, unemployed, and lives in the ghetto part of Lockport Illinois surrounded by drug dealers and gangs. Her husband works for a Sonic Drive-In where he cleans the parking lot each morning. They live there along with their two kids, three guys (aged between 18 and 20), and are soon going to be adding an additional roommate to the collection. They pay no mortgage because they claim the bank made a mistake on some paperwork and they “don’t want to be tied to anything illegal”. I wonder if they know they will get kicked out regardless. The woman, whose name I will not mention, claims to be an ordained minister of Messianic Judaism but only preaches in her home and never let’s anyone know where or how she was ordained. She says she never went to school and that Yaweh opened her eyes to understand and find hidden messages in the bible.
Enough background information. Let’s get to the cult. This woman gets members by being the cool older lady who smokes pot with the kids. She gets them high and then constantly preaches how the bible and the new world order conspiracy go together. I won’t bore you with the actual conspiracies. You can look then up online.
These ideas are very tempting. Everyone would love to believe that they are privy to secret information the rear of the world doesn’t know therefor making those believers think they are special. There is a while industry devotes to making money off of these pseudoscientific theories and religious beliefs. Some of those making money off this stuff know it’s false while others are true believers.
The only way to combat these beliefs is with simple logic. Take a step back and simplify these beliefs. Pointing out how people choose to make connections where there are none may help. Opposing opinions do not sway these believers. Only fact and logic can challenge these ridiculous theories. I could go into specific examples of how this can be done but I am feeling lazy today. If after confronting these people with logic they refuse to even consider your ideas then whomever you are talking to is beyond saving. These people have something missing in their lives and often are looking to blame something or someone outside of themeselces for their lot in life. Like I said before these ideas are tempting and appeal to something within us that make us want to believe. Most of the time those preaching the gospel of the absurd are very charismatic. This combined with the tempting ideas themselves can sucker us into believing in fantasies.
No one really knows the answers to the big questions. Don’t trust anyone who says they know. Question everything and use simple logic to make sure everything makes sense. Always research both sides of any theory or religious belief before accepting a position. Don’t be a sucker.
Tags: conspiracy, cult, messianic judaism, Religion, theory
Posted in Constroversial Stuff, Politics, Religion | Comments
March 2nd, 2009
I’ve been on a break from politics these past few weeks but today I decided to turn on my local liberal talk station (WCPT 820AM, 99.9,92.5, and 92.7FM in Chicago) to see what was going on in the world. Well, because liberal talk is underfunded and primarily owned privately (which is a good thing I guess) WCPT can’t afford to stay on air all night so all I got to listen to was crappy techno music. Then I switched over to the stupid conservative talk station (I won’t give call letters or station numbers for this station because conservative radio doesn’t need anymore promotion and should die) and heard the bump for Sean Hannity. I think it was a bump. Basically, Sean signed off to go to a commercial and there was a voiceover guy who said, and I paraphrase, “He eats steaks, doesn’t recycle, and drives a big SUV - this is the Sean Fucktard Hannity Show…”. This was upsetting. Sean is encouraging people to be wasteful.
Read the rest of this entry »
Tags: dangerous, global warming, hannity, hicks, hillbilly, redneck, republican, right wing, sean, south, southern
Posted in Random Stuff | Comments
February 23rd, 2009
This is for Technorati. Here’s your claim, assholes. Technorati Profile
Posted in Random Stuff | Comments
February 18th, 2009
Hello everyone and welcome to the fourth incarnation of ‘to the Left of Bill’, the site that started out politically, got into programming and music, widened its horizons and is now what you see today. If you’re confused let me clue you in.
This site is run by me, Bill. I’m a musician by talent, and a programmer by trade (or at least I will be after college). I have three interests: politics, music, and programming. This is the political blog. Look for new posts several times a week.
Enjoy!
Posted in Random Stuff | Comments
February 17th, 2009
Welcome to WordPress. This is your first post. Edit or delete it, then start blogging!
Posted in Uncategorized | Comments
February 3rd, 2009
Sorry for the lack of postings. I’m dry right now. I can’t write anything. I have no ideas. I mean, I have plenty of ideas but they don’t seem to be flowing out right. They come half way out and end up seeming terrible.
There’s a ton to write about but I’m not articulate right now. I’ve definitely hit a dry spell. I can’t write music or political opinion or anything.
But its not like people come here for new posts. The posts people read on a daily basis are all older posts. I can name them: the one about Obama being assassinated, my review of Xslimmer and a couple about Blago being a badass. Otherwise no one reads the new stuff. Oh well.
Give me some time and I’ll be back with great content again. And a new site design. Because I’m fickle like that. I’ll be searching for inspiration for a bit. Don’t think the site is shut down, its just on hiatus - a short one at that.
Posted in Uncategorized | Comments
February 2nd, 2009
Posted in Uncategorized | Comments
February 1st, 2009
Bipartisan is a word politicians use to get elected. Its supposed to convey a sense of leadership transcending party lines. These days its a gibberish word but Obama is giving it meaning again.
I know by saying what I’m about to I run the risk of sounding like one of those people who deify Obama. The kind that Republicans refer to when they make the same old tired joke about Obama walking on water. But those people are ignorant to what is going on at this time in history. This is more than politics now. I hate saying this but I must call a spade a spade: something spiritual is going on. Obama is operating on an entirely different level than the rest of Washington and much of the country for that matter. His views are liberal but he isn’t working for liberalism, he’s working for what is right.
The Right are deeply entrenched in the old politics and won’t let go any time soon. They’re filled with negativity. They work for money and power while Obama works for justice. This is one reason Republicans are fighting him at every turn.
Obama has been bringing them in on every piece of legislation and they refuse to be a part of it. Obama is giving them a chance to get in on the projects that will restore this country to prosperity and the Repubretards refuse because it wasn’t their idea or they aren’t making money off of it, or simply because they’re Republicans and the idea is from a Democrat.
These guys are acting like a bunch of preschoolers. Complete sore losers. Its ridiculous to see them cry and shit their pants over everything the liberals are doing. They come out in their press conferences and repeat the same old Bush administration lines trying to scare people into submission. They want to keep trying ideas we’ve tried multiple times under Bush. If I’m driving a car and I hit the brake I stop. I know that every time I hit the brake the car will slow to a stop. When the Republicans drive cars they never get very far. You know why? Because they always hit the brakes expecting it to switch functions one day and accelerate the car. Maybe that was a lame metaphor or analogy but I think it gets my point across. These people are the worst of the worst. They the most stubborn close minded people on this planet. All of them. The ones in congress and those who vote for the idiots in Congress. They won’t let anything get done.
The Repubs have a plan to be obstructionist then claim that Obama was ineffective at election time. I promise you that if the Republicans keep on fighting Obama on EVERYTHING as they are now, when the elections come around the American people will just vote even more Republicans out of office. We aren’t blind anymore (I was never blind but I speak for the rest of the people). The people see what the Republicans are doing and know exactly where to place the blame if nothing gets done.
The Republicans have driven America off enough cliffs in the past eight years. Its time to try something our way. The Democrats let the retards take over class long enough. I’m sick of hearing about Republicans not going along with Obama. I’m also sick of them holding up cabinet appointments for non-reasons. Let me let you in on a little secret: if a Republican holds up a cabinet appointment its because he or she is trying to run out the clock on the statute of limitations on whatever crime the congressman or his friends have committed.
Obama has been nice long enough. You petty assholes (the Republicans) better wake up and realize that the Dems don’t need your vote for anything. Your minority vote is now worth shit. So stop shitting on every opportunity to be on the right side of the issues before there are no more opportunities and you become like the dinosaurs. One of your problems is that you listen to Hannity and Rush - two people who don’t know shit. They don’t even believe what comes out of their own mouth!
Grow up and contribute something. Its a new era. We’re going to be positive whether you can handle it or not. We’re going to build instead of destroy. Get on board or get ass rammed by the ship.
I never though I could be more angry at the Republicans than I was during Bush but the new minority has really sunk to a new low.
Tags: acting, babies, barack, bipartisan, bipartisanship, children, democrats, history, immature, like, obama, president, republicans
Posted in Enraged rantings on anything, News, Politics | Comments
January 30th, 2009
Sorry for the lack of posts. I’ve been sicker than I’ve ever been. Its been years since I’ve gotten sick and this time it was double.
I was confined to the couch since Sunday night with a 103 degree fever thats just now starting to go down. I ended up having an upper respiratory virus and strep throat at the same time. I’m still a bit sick and I see my doctor again tomorrow.
I have a lot to say about the fucking crazy republicans acting like little kids and sore losers etc. etc. Hopefully I’ll be fully functional tomorrow and I’ll get to write about it.
Other than that I have a lot of homework and other errands to catch up on as well so just bear with me. I’ll be back on schedule very soon.
Tags: republicans, sick, strep, throat
Posted in Uncategorized | Comments
January 22nd, 2009
I’m a Mac fanatic. You already know that, though. I’m definitely a power user but not all of the time. What I love is when an application comes along that equally serves a niche and is more than suitable for use by casual users. Today I’m going to talk about
two Mac apps that I’ve recently discovered that truly work together to make a great team: Punakea and Stuf (with one F).
If you own a Mac then you’re using the Finder. But doesn’t it start to become a pain when you start to accumulate documents like resumes, homework, graphics, PDFs, and countless others? No? Well is it not a pain to have to constantly reorganize your Finder in folders and subfolders in order to tame the unruly mess that inevitable becomes your digital life?
It does. This is where Punakea comes in. Apple designed the gr
eatest OS on the planet but it isn’t perfect. Once you have your cavern of nested folders its hard to find what you want to open quickly. The Finder’s search is great and so is Spotlight but what Apple left out was the ability to easily tag documents.
Punakea browser window
Punakea is a tiny little app that sits in your dock and menu bar waiting for files to be added. It
also features a window that slides out when you move your mouse to the edge of the screen for easy adding of files. Either drop your files into the open Punakea window or drag it to the side of the screen to add files to your library. A window pops up, you add your tags, press OK and you’re back to work. You can either let Punakea manage the location of all your files or you can simply use it to just add tags and leave the files where they are.
Personally I think its useless to have tags if you’re just going to use whatever folder organization scheme you already have. One great feature of Punakea is its Drop Box. Once enabled you can specify a folder that acts as a holding center for files. The files you put in the Drop Box are automatically tagged with the tags you specify in Punakea’s preferences. I use the tag “untagged” and when I’m ready to tag them I search Punakea for “untagged”. Once you tag your Drop Box files they are automatically moved by Punakea (unless you disable automatic file management). You can either search for your files by their tags from within Punakea or Spotlight/the Finder’s search. Punakea is free and I believe it still will be after it is out of beta. Every now and then a bug pops up but this app works great 99% of the time and I am very confident that the 1.0 release will blow you away. Check it out at the Nudge:Nudge website.
Another app that I use in conjunction with Punakea is Stuf. Stuf is made by the Escapers. Right now they have a really awesome web editor, Flux, that I’m testing out. I may just use instead of Coda or Espresso. I’ll review Flux next week. Stuf is a clipboard manager. Whenever I’m usi
ng the computer I end up copying and pasting a lot of stuff. Its always different kinds of stuff too. And inevitably I end up having to use it over and over. Sometimes I end up copying something else and lose the first thing I wanted to copy and past. At that point I need to go back online or in whatever program to find it and do it all over again. Stuf saves you from that. Stuf allows you to copy as much to the clipboard as your computer can handle. It even lets you organize that stuff into categories. Never again will you copy and past something into an email and then have to find it all over again to do the same in a chat room or while instant messaging. Stuf is a godsend for programmers like me who end up using code, graphics, text, links, etc. over and over again. Your web editor may have a clipboard that does this but I promise you that it pales in comparison to Stuf. Once you try it you’ll want to buy it and never give it up. Stuf costs 12 British Pounds pretty much equal to around $20. You can demo it by visiting the Escapers website. I highly recommend it.
Stuf - Screenshot
Tags: Apple, apps, clipboard, escapers, files, finder, flux, free, mac, manager, nudge nudge, os, os x, osx, programming, punakea, search, spotlight, tag, tags, the, x
Posted in Apple, Computers and Technology, mac, programming | Comments
