Idle Musings of the Active Mind

Seriously. Does anyone give a crap?

…besides me, that is. I ask because…

Social media sites (SMS), such as Facebook, Twitter…and others, have offered a trade. It goes like this…

SMS: Hey! Want to play with my cool new communication technology? It’ll let you stay updated on what your friends are doing!

Uninformed Public Joe (UPJ): Sure! Sounds great! What’s it cost?

SMS: Nothing! That’s the best part! All you have to do is register, agree to our Terms of Service and you’re in! It’s easy!

UPJ: It doesn’t cost me anything? Really?!  Wow!

SMS: You won’t spend a nickel. Want the link to register?

UPJ: You bet!

Later on, UPJ talks to Informed Public Jane (IPJ)…

UPJ: Hey! Come join me on SMS!

IPJ: Uh, no thanks.

UPJ: Why not? It’s free!

IPJ: Nothing is free. There’s a catch.

UPJ: Nope. Not this time. All I had to do was register.

IPJ: *smirks* Uh, huh…and did you have to agree to Terms of Service?

UPJ: Sure, but just click OK when it comes up.

IPJ: Did you read those Terms of Service?

UPJ: Nah, they’re all alike. You agree to play nice blah blah blah.

IPJ: So you didn’t read the part where it says you agree to give SMS access to all of the information on your SMS page?

UPJ: I don’t have anything there anyway, so it’s not big deal. Sheesh! Lighten up, will ya?

IPJ: So, you don’t have your full name? No pictures of yourself or your children? You don’t list your birthdate or that of your kids? You didn’t tell them what religion you follow? What political affiliations you have? What books you read? Nothing like that, huh?

UPJ: uh…I think I did, yeah. But so what, it’s just so they can help you connect with other people like myself.

IPJ: So, you don’t think they’ll sell any of that information, huh? I mean, they’re going to put up all that computer equipment, buy all that network bandwidth to let 300 million people connect and they won’t charge anyone anything. They’re just that loving and caring, eh?

UPJ: uh…

IPJ: Look, you clearly don’t understand. So let me spell it out. You TRADED your personal information for the services they provide. You GAVE them (for free) information that THEY can sell to others. And even if you don’t care if they make a profit from your information, just know that YOU no longer control YOUR information. It’s in THEIR control. They get to use it however they wish and all you can do is cancel your subscription. But they get to KEEP everything you gave them.

UPJ: uh…

IPJ: That includes all of the photos you uploaded, all of the comments you posted on your page and on all of your friends’ pages–your family photos of your children, your dog, your parakeet–everything. They get to access it and use in whatever way they see fit.

UPJ: Uh…well…

IPJ: Yeah, so no thanks. I’ll keep my personal information to myself.

…and I didn’t even bring up the information you give your bank when you take out a loan, your insurance company to get insurance, your physician to get treatment, your mechanic, your grocery store to get that cool discount card…and on…and on…and on…

I may not be a political science expert or a historian of any repute, but it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to look at what the Republican Party is doing and wonder if they have any clue at all.

I’m not talking about their principled stand against progressivism, that’s old news. In fact, it’s over 100 years old, as news goes. (Here’s a decent link to explain the progressive era.) I’m talking about these “neo-republicans” that are hell-bent on completely and entirely driving their party into the ground.

I’ve never really considered myself a full Democrat or a full Republican, though I do lean toward the original Republican party ideal; that government should concern itself with world affairs and let states manage their own domestic affairs. If several states want to band together to form a coalition on specific social issues, that would be their prerogative. But keep the Federal government out of matters of domestic commerce.

It may be naive of me to think this approach would work, I’ll admit to that possible failing on my part. As I watch Obama grow the Federal government to new and untold heights, however, I have to admit that he scares me a little. Okay, maybe more than just a little. But the current Republican stance isn’t helping either. All the Republican party is being successful in doing is standing in the way. They aren’t getting out in front of the American public with a detailed plan that will deliver us from the economic storm we are in. Obama may not have the best plan, but so far no one is putting a better one on the table.

Simply put, I’m not a fan of big government. Never have been and never will be. I don’t believe we have enough altruistic actors in the political arena to make a big-government strategy work for the masses. In fact, the current Republican strategy seems only to be strengthening the position of the progressive Democrats that seem to be holding the reins of power right now. Their strategy seems to be to take the popular Republican faces, give them some haphazardly written sound bite and toss them in front of a news camera.

I don’t know who is calling the shots over at Republican Central Station, but who ever it is they are doing a crappy job right now. They’ve lost practically all of their credibility capital and mutilated their dwindling supply of integrity capital to such a degree that it would not surprise me in the least to see the Republican party split and cave in on itself. When they put their spokesmen in front of the cameras, they should confirm first that these people don’t have huge piles of money hiding in their closets–closets being fed by big business supporters. It does nothing for them except further alienate the middle and lower income voters.

The farther down the food chain you push the power, the closer you get to putting the power in the hands of the people affected by that power. Again, this isn’t rocket science; it’s just simple reasoning.

If I don’t like what my local city mayor and my councilmen are doing, I don’t vote for them. They know this, so they support their voters by instituting policies and spending our local funds on projects I (and those who share my positions on various matters) want. If people don’t like something that a given city has instituted, they can move to the next town and get away from it.

Think about it. When people decide to change jobs and they are scanning the market for work, one of the things they look at is the community where they will be living. If they have a family and school-aged children, they make sure the schools in the area will meet their criteria for what they consider an acceptable level of quality in education. They look at taxes and cost of living. When the find the right combination of job and community, they move.

I realize this won’t work for everyone, at least not in the middle of our current economic crisis. Too many people don’t have the funds or a good enough job to make a change. And even in times of prosperity, not everyone have the financial position to have that kind of free mobility…at least not without making other changes first. And if they don’t want to make those changes–more education, acquiring new skills, etc–then that, to me, says they also don’t mind where they live. If they really did mind, they’d make changes.

Central to the current set of issues is the idea that we need to create competition–or intensify it in someway–between insurance companies and healthcare providers. Maybe we do, but who’s job is it to create this intensification of need? Is it government’s job or is it ours? I think it was Arkansas (might have this point wrong, but one of the states anyway) had the greater percentage (over 80%?) of its residents getting their insurance through one insurance carrier. I was amazed at this statistic. I don’t know what perfect storm of greed and corruption contributed to this, but the fact remains that if the people didn’t like it, they should have either left the state or used the power of their vote to remove these greedy bastards from office! Why do we need to encourage the Obama administration and his progressive supporters in their assertion that the only way to fix that kind of problem is by growing the involvement of the Federal government in the affairs of domestic commerce? Isn’t that our job–the job of the voters?

Instead of spending the millions of dollars these politicians are spending on ways to educate us to how bad the situation is and to try to convince us that bigger government is the answer, why not spend it on education about how local voters can initiate their own reform by NOT VOTING FOR THE SAME GREEDY BASTARDS WHO PUT THEM IN THIS SITUATION IN THE FIRST PLACE??