A couple of three things you need to know (today and every day)
In the Light
If you look on the Internet at news sites you will notice a trend that absolutely drives me crazy (er).
Five things you need to know today.
Five things to take away from ... Whatever.
Seven things to learn from ... Again, whatever.
What am I? Stupid?
Apparently the gumball who came up with this little gimmick wants to tell me what I should learn from any given news/sports story. Apparently, I can’t decide for myself.
And I surely can not decide, on my own, what five things I need to know today.
Thank you, thank you very much ...
What if I don’t want to know about the rising cost of cabbage in Mongolia because of a cabbage-eating moth in Kazastanopia and how it affects the Asian market?
What if I don’t care if a Kardashian is in a legal battle with a former assistant over leaked pictures of a birthday party?
What if I couldn’t care less what the President of the United States thinks about football players taking a knee during the Star Spangled Banner?
The presumption is that it doesn’t matter what I want to know about. I should want to know what someone thinks I should want to know.
Is this a short cut thing for people who are too busy to think for themselves? A short cut for people who are so sheep-like they can’t think for themselves?
What I really want to know is why our federal leadership allows pharmaceutical companies to lead them like dogs on a leash.
Who’s in charge of that?
Who’s in charge of pharmaceutical companies making huge profits from drugs that are crippling this country?
I also want to know where the leadership is when it comes to race relations. I’m tired of this stuff.
When I’m in a room with a person of color should I think they hate me? Do they think I hate them? That I hate their culture?
Shouldn’t somebody — anybody — be talking about this, finding a common ground, a solution, a way to communicate that isn’t self-serving?
We’re just people, right? Trying to find our way without doing harm to others.
I want to know why people are rude and arrogant. Did they grow up feeling entitled? Did their parents fail in their responsibility to raise good people?
I want to understand why climate change is so hard for so many to consider as “real.”
I want to know where the scruples and the compassion for those being governed has gone from those doing the governing.
(Our government is like a bad episode of Gilligan’s Island — the one where the Howells have all the coconuts and won’t share with anyone else — not even a fatally ill Mary Ann.)
I want to know all of these things and more.
When is Pearl Jam releasing new music?
When will the White Sox be a contender again?
When will those annoying Cubs fans get over themselves because they are absolutely killing me.
When will someone make a healthy (and tasty) cheeseburger?
These are things I want to know.