As I am driving down a country road with my windows down on a beautiful summer day, I am listening to the Cubs pregame show. The broadcasters are talking about the upcoming contest and even interview some players. Then it's game time. Cue the Federal Anthem. I reach over and turn the volume down and wait until I'm certain it is over before I return the volume setting to its previous level. I have seen and heard the Anthem played before a baseball game countless times. But I'm done listening to it. Why do they feel the need to play this government hymnal before sporting events anyway? Because they love their
Recently, my family made the trek to the north side of Chicago to visit Wrigley Field. My grandparents, parents, two siblings, my wife, my kids, and myself. Once we arrived downtown, we all boarded a subway train that would eventually take us above ground and to our destination. As we sat on the train, inches away from a homeless man who was using the transit system as a mobile bed, we were continually alerted via speaker of the approaching stops. Between these announcements we were encouraged by the speaker to report any suspicious activities of our fellow citizens. I could almost hear George Orwell narrating my thoughts...
I discovered today, as I was reading the newspaper, that they have implemented "Blue Alerts" in Indiana. Evidently, it works like an Amber Alert by notifying the public that a policeman has been killed or injured. I would be far more interested in an alert that warned me of police officers who had just killed or injured a member of the public. Of course, that happens far more often. But what I really can't stand is the hubris of the government police force. They really do consider it more important to protect their brothers in arms than the people they are paid to protect, viz., the citizenry. This is just another step in the continual propaganda push to teach us that some animals are more equal than others...
Edward Snowden has become an enemy of the state for revealing to the American public that the U.S. government is spying on us and everyone else on the planet. Ironically, they are now charging him with espionage. It was revealed that the NSA has the capability to monitor every digital transaction of the public and is storing that information in case it ever wants to. Their reasoning is that any one of us could turn out to be a terrorist, so we all must be treated like potential enemies of the empire. They also would like for us to stop worrying that this information can or will be used for political purposes. I mean, it's not like some giant government department just admitted to using its vast powers for that very reason...
Sometimes I feel like I am living in a dystopian novel...
No comments:
Post a Comment