Thursday, September 28, 2017

Divide and Be Happy in America

I have a prescription for how to make both conservatives & liberals happy in America.
(well at least not fighting each other).

I suspect the impact of doing what I suggest would be:


SHORT TERM
LONG TERM
CONSERVATIVES
Will love it
???
LIBERALS
Mixed feelings
Will love it


I propose the Federal Gov’t. dictate only one thing:
Each State may pass whatever laws they want.

So Red States may:
  • Use the bible as a science text in elementary thru high school
  • Ban any medical research they want
  • Repeal every regulation (financial, environmental, etc.)
  • Reduce government expenditures on infrastructure, universities, etc.
  • Make abortion illegal (make contraception illegal if they want)
  • Remove healthcare funding
  • Ban illegal residents

I believe over the ensuing 10 years the impact would be the best medical, scientific, educational, financial, etc. professionals who currently live in Red States will move to Blue States. There is plenty of room and they would all be welcomed. Red State populations would shrink leaving only the older generation.

One group who would suffer initially are the poorer among us who currently live in Red States. However, they will gradually move to Blue States, and again there is plenty of room and they would all be welcomed too. They will help support the Blue States economies by doing the blue collar, service and agricultural jobs that need to get done.

The outcome in a generation will be two classes of people in America:
1.     Blue State residents will be the best educated, healthiest, wealthiest and happiest Americans.
2.     Red State residents will be less educated, have poorer healthcare, face a declining economy, and for once be correct when they think of themselves as a victim. They will be the victim of their own selfishness.

Note: A Red State may apply to become a Blue State by stop being assholes…
and eliminate every Red State law in the bullet list above.

-------------------------------------------------------

Dear Blue States…

We include California, Hawaii, Oregon, Washington, Colorado, Minnesota, Illinois, Virginia, Maryland, D.C., Delaware and all the Northeast.
  • Red States get Texas, Oklahoma and all the slave states.
  • Blue States get stem cell research and the best beaches.
  • Blue States get Intel, Apple and Microsoft. Red States get WorldCom.
  • Blue States get Harvard.
  • Red States get Ole' Miss.
  • Blue States get 85 percent of America's venture capital and entrepreneurs.
  • Red States get Alabama.
  • Blue States get two-thirds of the tax revenue.
  • Red States get to make the red states pay their fair share.
  • Since Blue States aggregate divorce rate is 22% lower than the Christian Coalition’s, Blue States get a bunch of happy families. 
  • Red States get a bunch of single moms.

Blue States will have firm control of 80% of the country’s fresh water, more than 90% of the pineapple and lettuce, 92% of the nation's fresh fruit, 95% of America's quality wines, 90% of the high-tech industry, all living redwoods, sequoias and condors, all the Ivy and Seven Sister schools plus Harvard, Yale, Stanford, Cal Tech and MIT.

The Red States will have to cope with 88% of all obese Americans and their projected health care costs, 92% of all US mosquitoes, nearly 100% of the tornadoes, 90% of the hurricanes, 99% of all Southern Baptists, virtually 100% of all televangelists, Rush Limbaugh, Bob Jones University, Clemson and the University of Georgia.

Blue States get Hollywood and Yosemite, thank you.

38% of those in the Red States believe Jonah was actually swallowed by a whale, 62% believe life is sacred unless we’re discussing the death penalty or gun laws, 44% say that evolution is only a theory, 53% think that Saddam was involved in 9/11, and 61% of the crazy bastards believe they are people with higher morals then we lefties.

Blue States are taking the good pot too. Red States can have that dirt weed they grow in Mexico… IF THEY CAN GET IT OVER THE WALL!


Sunday, September 17, 2017

Some Religion Beginnings

The information below came from the fantastic book "Sapiens, A Brief History of Humankind" by Yuval Noah Harari. I highly recommend reading it.

It covers the entire span of human history up to and including Google and gene editing. Note, humans began before homo sapiens. There were previous 'homo' species.

Religions were just one small part of the book, but it points out that Polytheistic religions were all "local" in that they did not try to spread their beliefs outside their own area...

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Judaism argued that the supreme power of the universe has interests and biases, yet his chief interest is in the tiny Jewish nation and in the obscure land of Israel. Judaism had little to offer other nations, and throughout most of its existence it has not been a missionary religion.

The big breakthrough came with Christianity. This faith began as a esoteric Jewish sect that sought to convince Jews that Jesus of Nazareth was their long-awaited messiah. However, one of the sect's first leaders, Paul of Tarsus, reasoned that if the supreme power of the universe has interests and biases, and if he had bothered to incarnate himself in the flesh and to die on the cross for the salvation of humankind, then this is something everyone should hear about, not just Jews.

The Christian success served as a model for another monotheist religion that appeared in the Arabian peninsula in the 7th century - Islam.

Catholicism and Protestantism both involved accepting Christ's divinity and his gospel of compassion and love. However they disagreed about the nature of this love. Protestants believe that the divine love is so great that God was incarnated in flesh and allowed himself to be tortured and crucified, thereby redeeming the original sin and opening the gates of heaven to all those who professed faith in him.

Catholics maintain that faith, while essential, is not enough. To enter heaven, believers had to participate in church rituals and do good deeds. Protestants refuse to accept this believing whoever thinks entry to heaven depends upon his or her own good deeds magnifies his own importance, and implies that Christ's suffering on the cross and God's love for humankind are not enough.

During the 16th and 17th centuries, Catholics and Protestants killed each other by the hundreds of thousands. On Aug. 23, 1572, French Catholics, who stressed the importance of good deeds, attacked communities of French Protestants who highlighted God's love for humankind. In this attack, St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre, between 5,000 - 10,000 Protestants were slaughtered by Catholics in less than 24 hours. When the pope in Rome heard the news from France, he was so overcome by joy that he organized festive prayers to celebrate the occasion and commissioned Giorgio Vasari to decorate one of the Vatican's rooms with a fresco of the massacre (the room is currently off-limits to visitors). More Christians were killed by fellow Christians in those 24 hours than by the polytheistic Roman Empire throughout its entire existence.