Dwain Northey (Gen X)

Ok this is my brain going on a random thought carnival this morning and the very reason that this blog is called Esoteric Meanderings.

So here goes… Everyone that watched the Avengers movies know what I am talking about and for those that don’t the villain Thanos at the end of Infinity Wars having secured all the magical infinity stone snapped his fingers and ½ of all living things in the universe disappeared. His goal was to return balance to a system that was and out of balance.

My thinking is, was removing ½ of all living things really going to bring balance, wouldn’t removing prejudice and creating economic equality level the imbalance rather than a 50% reduction in population. I suppose that would not make a good verse evil story if the villain wanted to end poverty by making the super-rich just rich and reducing or removing hunger and poverty. Man, that wouldn’t be a compelling story line.

As of late 2022, according to Snopes, 735 billionaires collectively possessed more wealth than the bottom half of U.S. households ($4.5 trillion and $4.1 trillion respectively). The top 1% held a total of $43.45 trillion. The World Population in 2023 is 8,045,311,447. Let’s do the math… that is 0.000000091357557% of the global population. The global wealth as of 2023 was $454.4 trillion, that math isn’t too difficult 735 families possess nearly 10% of the global wealth. Seems to me that there is a real imbalance in those figures.

Ending world hunger would require significant financial resources. According to estimates from the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), an annual investment of around $267 billion is needed to achieve Zero Hunger by 2030. Let’s but this number in relation to the amount Elon Musk spent to buy, and is now destroying Twitter, Musk the arrogant South African bought Twitter for $44 billion and that had no impact on his wealth. He willy nilly spent 15% of the funds that could help to end world hunger. It would cost the wealthiest families 0.0006145% of their combined wealth to end world hunger. That is a miniscule amount that they would even notice is missing, that seems like more of an imbalance than just too many living things.

I don’t know how to solve the inequity problem; I know it can’t be done by any one individual or even one government because the unfortunate truth is that those with the money will always have the power to hold on to it. The problem we have and have always had is that a very few always consolidate things, money, land, power, and with those things they manipulate influence in order to confound the masses into believing that they aren’t worthy partaking in the bounty those few hold.

I wish I could Thanos Snap and level the field, there will always be rich and poor but if the super wealthy were just less wealthy and the poor were less poor maybe just maybe the imbalance would only be a river instead of an ocean.

Thanks for suffering through my musing… feel free to interject what your Thanos Snap would be.  

Dwain Northey (Gen X)

So, let’s talk about another Generation X nightmare but now it has a new twist.

Remember the Mathew Brodrick 1983 movie WarGames, where a dumb kid got into a strategic computer system and asked it to play Thermonuclear War. The resolution was getting the program to play Tic-Tac-Toe repeatedly until it learned the futility of the game.

That was primitive AI in relation to the massive computing power of today’s massive systems. On December 8, 1987, Reagan and Gorbachev signed the INF Treaty in Washington, D.C. The final treaty eliminated an entire class of nuclear weapons, restricting the deployment of both intermediate and short-range land-based missiles worldwide. Well for all the bluster of that treaty the proliferation of nuclear weapons hasn’t stopped and now more than 2 major players have the capability of committing a nuclear strike which could set off a global nuclear war.

Ok that’s terrifying but what does that have to do with a 1983 movie? Well let me tell you. Every time we develop a new and better technology one of the fist things that the mind of man applies it to is warfare. Did you know that the Soviets had and probably still do what is called a Dead Hand Strike option? What that is, is a protocol that if their strike system detects an opposition strike that destroys the Kremlin that it will automatically launch all nuclear weapons at all designated targets, mutually assured destruction. Nice way to play, ‘If we die. We all Die’.

That isn’t the scariest part of this cicero… see when we started this game of life extinction chicken the response time from one government starting a strike against another was hours, with nuclear submarines and new technology the response time is minutes. Those minutes are not enough time for a cogent human response to react to or call off the strike, so we have turned that over to AI. There is an article in the Atlantic about AI not having the launch codes and it paints a ‘Skynet’ future that I don’t think we want. Below is a link to the article. https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2023/06/ai-warfare-nuclear-weapons-strike/673780/

I really wish that we could spend as much time and effort trying the make the world a better place than dreaming up better and more efficient ways to kill each other.

Sorry for another bummer post.

Dwain Northey (Gen X)

Holy crap this isn’t something anyone has talked about in forever. I remember back in the 70’s the hole in the ozone layer was a big deal, how Chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) are nontoxic, nonflammable chemicals containing atoms of carbon, chlorine, and fluorine. Were destroying the Ozone Layer these chemicals used in the manufacture of aerosol sprays, blowing agents for foams and packing materials, as solvents, and as refrigerants were fairly quickly regulated to stop the destruction of the ozone layer.

Ok for all you youngans’ or those who simply never paid attention let me tell you what the Ozone Layer is. The ozone layer sits in the stratosphere between 15 km and 30 km above the earth and shields us and other living things from the sun’s harmful ultraviolet radiation. Its depletion could have serious effects on human health and the environment. In scientific terms the air we breathe is Oxygen O², that is 2 oxygen molecules bonded together Ozone is O³ 3 Oxygen molecules, you can smell the ozone after a lightning storm because electrically charged Oxygen molecules bond together creating ozone. The function of this oxygen rich layer covers the entire planet and protects life on earth by absorbing harmful ultraviolet-B (UV-B) radiation from the sun.

In the mid-1970s, scientists warned that man-made chemicals in everyday products like aerosols, foams, refrigerators and air-conditioners were harming the ozone layer. At that time, they didn’t know the scale of the problem. But in 1985, a hole was confirmed in the ozone layer over Antarctica. In 1987, the area of the hole reached 22.4 million square kilometers and ozone concentrations dropped to 109 DU. By 2006, the worst year for ozone depletion, the numbers were 29.6 million square kilometers and just 84 DU. DU refers to the Dobson Unit, a way to describe how much ozone there would be in the column if it were all squeezed into a single layer. The average amount of ozone in the atmosphere is roughly 300 Dobson Units, equivalent to a layer 3 millimeters (0.12 inches) thick—the height of 2 pennies stacked together.

We haven’t talked too much about the ozone layer because many of us believe that it would repair itself if we stopped emitting CFCs into the atmosphere, you know if you ignore it long enough it will just get better. Well unfortunately, like cancer just ignoring it hasn’t made it better. The 2023 Antarctic ozone hole reached its maximum size at 10 million square miles (26 million square kilometers) on September 21, which ranks as the 12^th largest since 1979, according to annual satellite and balloon-based measurements made by NOAA and NASA.

This hole in the ozone layer over the Antarctic is hastening the melting of glaciers and adding to the increased level of the world oceans which in turn is changing the jet stream and changing global weather patterns.

This goes to show that the screw up of the past are still here and with the increase of global population and our stubborn reluctance to stop burning carbon we are pushing ourselves to an extinction event. Believe me the planet will be fine and will heal itself in a few millennia after we are gone. I, along with many others, had hoped that our hubris would doom our species.

Damn that was a bummer post… I just want everyone to understand that ignorance of something only makes it worse.  

Lyle Northey (Silent/Boomer)

  New look at how the Constitution was violated by Mr. Trump. There is a clause that forbids attempting to retain power after being voted out of office. That is one way that he should be removed from the ballot. He has promised to pardon all those that have been tried and convicted for their part of the Jan 6 rebellion to include those convicted of treason. Based on the clause of giving aid and comfort to the enemies of the United States that is another reason to remove him from the ballot. He has not done it, but intends to do it.

  All those currently in Congress that are still pushing the stolen election theory need to be removed from public office. Anyone that has been involved and jailed for actions during that activity should be barred from seeking office.

  Additionally we need to go back and start rewriting laws that provide voting rights. Money does not talk in a natural sense. Corporations are not persons and therefore should not be allowed to influence elections. Many very capable people never get the opportunity to contribute to the political process because they are not rich. As much as the rich don’t want to hear it, the nation does not belong to them alone.

  Many of the guidelines that are set forth in the Constitution have been changed for reasons known only to those that changed them, or no good reason at all. We need to re-establish the basics such as separation of church and state. 

  You can easily call politics a folly because in so many ways it is. The same may be said of religion whether the religious appreciate the remark or not. The truth is that you can not mix 2 frivolous entities together and end up with anything but an absolute chaotic mess. Don’t believe it, take a look at every nation that has religion sitting side saddle with their politics. Most are a mess because not everyone in the nation may be of the faith that runs the nation and they can not seem to govern and minister without conflict as will be the case here when the righteous right gets to run things the way they want to.

  We know what is best for everyone even if you do not agree. To prove the point we will give you the opportunity to denounce your current faith and accept ours and then we will put you to death anyway as we really don’t believe you have changed. Sound familiar? The Catholics used this once and would probably do it again if they thought they could get away with it, but many different faiths have the same attitude. 

  This is one of the reasons that our Constitution was not written as a secular document, the founders did not want it tied to a particular faith for fear of strangulation of the concept of freedom. Most of the founders were Masons and for better or worse their attitude was that they hoped you believed in a higher being than yourself but they did not really care what that being was called, God, Allah, or what you will. The push to put everything under the banner of Christianity purposely isolates us from those that hold other beliefs. 

  Our nation is supposed to be homogeneous, not purely one or the other. Welcome to all and favoritism to no one is where we need to be not boxed into a corner of our own stupor.

Dwain Northey (Gen X)

Congressional Oath of Office

I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me God.

Presidential Oath of Office

“I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.”

Dear ‘wannabe’ Leader DJT and his attorneys are arguing that the Presidents oath of office does not state to support the constitution so, the mere fact that he tried to overturn it doesn’t disqualify him from running for President again. My, not a lawyer, question is how can someone swear to preserve, protect, and defend something without supporting it? It is all semantics and word play kinda like saying I will play by the rules then cheating with the argument that you never said you wouldn’t cheat. Although this appears to me to be a flimsy claim as Colorado Judge has judged that DJT can be on the ballot in Colorado because the 14^th Amendment grammatically doesn’t apply to the President because his oath is not to support but preserve the constitution.

Wow I would except the weak argument from my kid much less the guy who wants to, once again, sit in the White House. I say sit in because he has no intention of running the government, he didn’t last time he was there and won’t if he happens to regain the position.

The other claim they are making is that the President is not an officer of the government. How does that work? Wouldn’t President be the chief officer of the government… the President is called the Commander in Chief. Doesn’t one have to be an officer of an organization in order to be its chief? Once again these seem like really elementary assumptions. The other minor fact that I would like to throw in DJT and his counsel face is that Donny asserted that he was an officer of the government when he made derogatory comment about E. Jean Carroll so that the DOJ would defend him.

Stop letting this clown and his attorneys use kindergarten arguments, the GOP House wouldn’t let Bill Clinton get away with arguing, “it depends on what you define is, is”, they still impeach him over a BJ. We have to shut this reality show down and get on with running the government and improving the lives of the citizens of this country instead of humoring a buffoon who wants to be the Dictator in Chief.

Thanks for putting up with my abuse of language today,