Man stares into the future with near sighted eyes. Our lifetime is but a nano-second, our entire existance and that of all we have ever known, less than a tick of the second hand on the ever expanding face of the watch we know as time. Those who dare to place focus beyond the reach of flesh can still only imagine that future in terms relative to the contemporary.


I have a problem with visionaries who work to effect change beyond their lifetime. The dynamics of chaos that we have assured ourselves we have a grip on are a fickle bitch. When ideologies reach into the unknown they change in ways unknown to the visionary. The most devestating campaigns of change were/are effected with the goal of cohesion of all to a particular ideology. The wide range of social ideologies and geographic location often require the use of force to implement change on a wide scale. The visionary is able to justify the force with the conviction of their perspective that the cause is noble.


The euphamism "The road to hell is paved with good intentions" is a good way to sum up how I feel on this issue. I am quite certain that none of the characters deemed despots thought to themselves "hey, I'm an evil bastard, lets go do some evil" They were convinced that their cause was righteous and were willing to do whatever necessary to see through their ideology. The identity of good and evil is related mostly to which side of the issue you are on. The American Revolution is the most common example in our society. I assure you that king George III did not think of his rebelious colony as anything but, and certainly would never have catergorized them as freedom fighters.


I bring up the American Revolution to illustrate my point further. The framers of the constitution envisioned a specific future for America, a future that reached well beyond anything they could have forseen. A future that many say differed greatly from the contemporary situation we live in today. They attempted to account for ideological shifts by making the Constitution a living document, amendable to contemporary circumstance, as evidenced by the 17 amendments in addition to the Bill of Rights. What they could not know, therefore not account for was a dis-engaged populace and the semantics driven political strife that has become the norm.

I wish I had an answer for this problem, I see the advantageous side of progress and I see a down side as well. This is directly related to my perspective and moral judgement on the intent of the actions and direction of progress. The rational and existential wage war on my thoughts and I find myself in a regressive loop ending in the thought that we should all just revert to slaves of our primal origins. So if there is anyone out there reading this, help me out here. Must we accept the good with the bad and strap in for the roller coaster that is humanity, or is there a way to focus each generation on the contemporary therefore building a solid foundation for the future, with out violation of my original and seemingly circular concern?

The meaninglessness of the meanings of words

The central core of communication dictates that all party's involved in communicating draw from the same meanings and definitions to communicate successfully. Word's and idea's become blurred by playing fast and loose with the definitions. From the infamous "what the meaning of IS, is" to the subtle shift in frame that occurs when people call the occupation of Iraq a "war", the manipulation of words to serve the purpose of controlling what the consumer of the information draws from that information is abundant and mostly below radar. It's no wonder the world in which we as individual's live can be so disconnected from reality, nobody understands what the fuck anyone else is talking about.

The careful measure of verbal mis-direction by those who want you to see things as black that are clearly white is a time honored tradition. Clergy, politicians, lawyers, advertisers, teachers, parents all want to control your perception of reality. That's how you end up with suicide bombers and anyone who isn't a millionaire voting republican. There are various groups who's sole purpose is to dissect the common language and find ways of manipulating their target audience to believe not what is true, but what that group wants them to believe is true and they're damn good at it.

Take the food industry as an example. The words; light, lite, free, low, lean etc. were abused in food packaging to the point where the FDA had to step in and regulate criteria for the use of those and many other words so the consumer would not be duped when they focused on the big brand label telling you how good for you an item is and not on the nutritional content. Fat Free items can contain up to .5 grams of fat per serving, regardless of the serving size. Soda usually comes in 12oz or higher containers yet the nutritional data is geared towared an individual serving which is 8oz. It seems as though companies who process and package foods for the consumption of the general public don't want you to know what's in, or has been done to the food being consumed.

The ability to twist words to suit a particular meaning, or more precisely the ability to accurately pattern the twisting of those words to achieve the desired effect is a powerful tool for those that are aware of it, and a weakness of dire social consequence for those who do not. 90% of communication is non-verbal, yet most rely on the verbal portion to process for reaction, leaving the meaning-less words to formulate, in effect, a meaning-less reaction leaving many with a life without meaning.

Most Prolific Quarterback EVER!!!

Congrats Bret, thanks for all the memories!!!