Monday Musings...
If you EVER doubted for one moment that you were somehow transported off of the Earth YOU once knew and, after a time, have decided that you have found yourself on some sort of "alternative Earth"?
Well, doubt no longer, believers.
You ARE, like it or not.
If these past seven days aren't like something out of BIZARRO WORLD, I really don't know what is.
Seems people been getting busy going off the deep end.
Last week, it was the four police officers killed by a lone shooter in Oakland, CA.
Then it became another THREE officers killed in Pittsburgh, PA, and if that wasn't enough, we also had an immigrant in Binghamton, NY stroll into the American Civic Association building there, after using his car to block the rear exit, and proceed to kill over a DOZEN people. wounding quite a few more, before he shot himself dead...and all over the fact that he couldn't deal with being teased about his broken English.
Lastly we had a man out in Graham, WA, who apparently killed his five kids before he went to a casino to kill himself.
Fort Wayne was right in the mix as well, notching it's NINTH homicide of the year, when a man was found dead with a gunshot wound in a garage at St. Joe and Derome Rds.
And...ciggies are costing over $50 a carton...!
I mean WTF is going the hell ON here, anyway?
Did someone just flip on a "dumbass switch" somewhere and turn all these borderline nutcases into homicidal maniacs?
Is there something in the damn water?
Perhaps a bad batch of pistachios?
This is sheer lunacy...
Now, I suppose we can blame the economy, but I think we'd be wrong in assessing the majority of the blame there. Granted, it IS a contributing factor, but c'mon now...all this shit going down all over the place is nuts, plain and simple.
It's almost like the world decided that civilized behavior wasn't worth the hassle, and chose to devolve into anarchy.
But, of course, we'll no doubt hear the gun critics climbing out from under their rocks (again) sobbing the woes over more GUN control.
Sorry, but those weapons used in the fatal shooting didn't possess some otherworldly power over men, turning them into raging killers when they were picked up.
The guns had no collective cabal or pondered ruminations against mankind.
This was done BY mankind...against mankind.
It would be the same if a person took a car and decided to run over as many people as they could. The car has no control over the actions of the nutjob holding the damn wheel.
Hey, maybe we can blame all this crap on GLOBAL WARMING...?
I mean we DO (currently) have several ACTIVE volcanoes around the world filling the air with particular matter and noxious fumes, not to mention all the lava flowing from them. It's got to be making SOME sort of impact on the ecosystem, don'cha think?
What say you, Mr. Gore?
(silence......followed by more silence, and perhaps a few cricket noises)
Didn't think so.
If I were a fatalist, I'd say we're definitely into the "End Times", and having studied the Book of Revelation in the BIBLE, we've got a LOT of the "signs" showing...and not the blinking, neon-laced "EAT AT JOE'S" kind of signs, either.
Something IS brewing, and it's certainly NOT one of Sam Adams "21 varieties of beer".
Now if these people all of a sudden "snapped", we should be looking into what snapped them in the first place. I mean if ANYONE had reason to go postal, it would be yours truly, considering the way the human refuse manages to float past our house every damn day.
If ANYONE had a reason for some serious "urban renewal", then yes, it would be ME.
But...maybe I've got a little something these other people didn't have in any measure.
And maybe that something is called...SELF-CONTROL.
Lord knows these morons living around me have tested it on more than a few occasions. And they remain among the living because of my self-control.
Sure, deep down inside, we are ALL (still) savages. None of us has become THAT "enlightened" (even after being a regular reader here...), or civilized that we have risen above ALL the fatal foibles that infest our humanity.
We STILL have that mindless primitive inside us all, waiting to be unleashed.
Mostly all of us have that beast rather firmly in check, and "keep our genie bottled" as it were.
The rest...not so much.
Actually, we'd be a lot LESS human would we not have that aspect of our psyche. But I'm not going to get into the philosophical and clinical realm of the nature of mankind's actions. Another day, perhaps.
What I will state is that we're heading into that "Something Wicked This Way Comes" kind of scenario.
Used to be a saying that went:
"What's good for America is good for the world"...
I dunno about YOU, but we might want to entertain a motion to rethink THAT, We're not setting the pace, but following suit.
Maybe it's time to change that around, retake the lead....by EXAMPLE once again.
In closing, I want to extend my sincerest condolences to the families of the both the slain Pittsburgh Police department officers as well as all those killed in Binghamton. May all of you, in some way, find the solace you seek, the strength to continue with that empty chair at your tables, and the courage to pursue justice to it's inevitable end.
Life is always about CHOICES, and this weekend has seen it's share of bad ones (made by these shooters).
Funny thing about choices...they always come with something "extra"...
That's called CONSEQUENCES.
And like the choices we make in life, they also come in GOOD and BAD varieties.
Perhaps it's time to seek the good, instead of embracing the bad.
It's just a thought...
Stay safe out there, America.